It was dark.

Then again, it was always dark, so that wasn’t anything new.

So, what was?

She blinked once, realizing her eyes were closed.

She found herself sitting at a desk with her head pillowed on her folded arms as if she had fallen asleep there. Lifting her head and blinking slowly, a near jaw-cracking yawn escaped her as she looked around.

The room she was in looked like a cramped office. Remembering her brief stint as a secretary, she quickly discovered that there were enough filing cabinets to cover every square inch of wall space and to create irregular looking aisles that criss-crossed in front of the desk.

Piles upon piles of folders flowed from the tops of the cabinets, once neat and organized stacks spilling their contents into dusty piles of white and manila on the floor. The desk was just as cluttered, with drawers open and the desktop impossible to find under all the papers. Some of the filing cabinet doors were also open, some with keys still in the locks with key chains hanging from them ranging from a simple, flexible Ghostbusters no-ghost sign to what looked like a tiny baseball cap with the Toronto Blue Jays symbol above the plastic brim. Apparently, the last secretary here either quit or is still buried under all the papers…

UH-OH. Her voice sounded strange, but then she realized that the words had come directly from her thoughts.

It normally took a little while for her to remember that she was dead. Had been for years, ever since her house burned down. Her kid brother, Sean, also didn’t survive the blaze. That was the first time that she had met the fire-demon. She had no idea where it came from, still didn’t, for that matter. All of a sudden, it just flashed into being in her living room and set the place on fire.

If there’s a lesson she learned from dying, it was never to buy a house with shag carpets.

She figured that since she hadn’t been able to protect Sean and save him while she still had the chance, she had figured it was some kind of cosmic justice that she had returned as a ghost. Maybe it was to avenge Sean’s premature death, maybe it was that her soul was in balance or whatever that Piers Anthony book said and she had to do one last deed that determined whether she went to Heaven or Hell.

Now, she was sure this was Hell. Pretty soon, the dead woman was positive that Lucifer himself would come in wearing a slate grey Armani suit with a blood red tie and wore his hair in a stylish fashion. Who said the Prince of Darkness couldn’t be a snappy dresser? Still, he’d probably come in and tell her to file all these papers as punishment for her laziness before she quit being a secretary. Yep, he’d be along any minute now…

Two minutes later, she began to swing her legs back and forth.

Five minutes after that, she started checking her nails, a habit she had picked up from her secretary days.

Three minutes after that, she was looking around, now thoroughly confused.

OKAY, SO MAYBE THIS ISN’T HELL… She said uncertainly. The dead woman looked around warily. THEN WHERE AM I? AND WHY AM I HERE?

Since no answer was forthcoming, she idly picked up a random piece of paper. It had quick, spidery handwriting on it that strongly resembled chicken scratch, carefully staying within the margins. Every I was dotted, and every T was crossed with an almost anal efficiency. Despite the attention given to writing the words, it was impossible to decipher.

OH, WELL. She shrugged. MAYBE THERE’S SOMETHING ELSE HERE…

A minute or two of picking up papers and glancing at them yielded little, but as she absently stacked them into a vaguely neat pile, she was surprised to find that the piles she would make would disintegrate immediately into a mess on the floor. She was tempted to test out whether the room was actually designed to be a mess, but decided against it. No sense making a bigger mess than was already here.

She was about to get up when she saw something out of the corner of her eye.. Turning, she picked up what looked like an old photo and looked at it.

There were four men, standing side by side. The one to the leftmost was a redhead who grinned cheerfully as he had one arm slung around the tallest one’s slender waist, wearing a bucket hat and khaki fishing gear. The tallest, a blonde-haired man with incredibly rich blue eyes was standing second to the left, his full lips curved into a smile as he snuck a glance at the handsome brown-haired man that was the second from the rightmost. That one had bright green eyes and a winning grin, who seemed capable of charming anyone despite his drenched attire. The fourth, who was the rightmost in the picture, was a black man with a strong build and a broad smile. They all appeared to be a little wet, and telling from their casual dress, this must’ve been taken on some sort of vacation.

The look in the tallest one’s eyes intrigued her. It was a secret look, one only for the green-eyed man alone. It was resigned, but full of something more. Maybe the two had a fight, and the dark-haired one hadn’t been speaking to him? She shook her head. Why would Mr. Ladies’ Man have his arm draped on the guy’s shoulder, then? Maybe the blonde has a secret that he can’t tell him. The wistful shine certainly fit that theory. Then again, maybe not… There was something she was missing, but she wasn’t sure what.

The loud creak of a door made her start in surprise, looking with no small amount of surprise to the source of the sound. Now, in the middle of the wall, there was a plain door the same color as the rest of the walls. There wasn’t a doorknob or any other distinguishing feature, so that could’ve been why she missed it earlier. Still, it was a way out, and she wasn’t about to pass that up.

Getting up from the desk, the picture quickly forgotten, she carefully maneuvered around the mess of papers as best as she could manage, and stopped just in front of the door. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and stepped through.

***

Everything hurt. His eyes, his lungs, even his hair hurt, as unlikely as that sounded.

Rich blue eyes slowly opened, and he could feel cold stone beneath him. He was lying on the ground. Carefully, he got maneuvered his sore arms underneath of himself and pushed himself off the stone and got to his feet after a bit of difficulty, as his legs were unstable enough to want to give out from underneath of him.

Egon Spengler wheeled around, taking in the pitch black, accentuated by the almost continual lancing of bright bolts of lightning, almost as if they were shattering the very sky. Bits and pieces of earth rose from all around the barren landscape, groaning in protest before the concrete-like floor gave them up as lost, only to revolve around the scenery in varying distances above him. The groans were different pitches, some echoing, some quiet. The stench of sulfur was very faint in the air, but it was enough to linger in his clothes and his blonde hair, though not enough to be harmful. He was hard-pressed to say where he was, but one thing was definitely sure. This was…

"Fascinating."

HI THERE.

Egon spun around, deep blue eyes scanning the barren scenery quickly. "Who’s there?"

DOES IT MATTER?

"Yes!"

A vision blurred into existence right in front of the startled physicist, almost toe to toe with the man. It was a woman with long dark hair that glowed, and liquid brown eyes that resembled a deer’s stared straight back at him. Wearing only a modest, plain white dress, the young woman waited patiently as Egon looked at her.

"Who are you?"

I DON’T THINK THAT’S REALLY IMPORTANT RIGHT NOW. DO YOU?

Egon shook his head, stepping aside as part of the ground groaned in protest beneath. His rapt gaze followed the chunk of rock, maybe a little bit smaller than a dictionary, float slowly upwards. Before he could forget his question, he turned back to the woman. "Where are we?"

She gave him a long look. NOT SURE, TO BE HONEST. I’M PRETTY SURE WE’RE NOT IN KANSAS, THOUGH.

Egon raised an eyebrow at her. "What are you doing here?"

DAMNED IF I KNOW. She shrugged, looking not particularly worried. DO YOU REMEMBER WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU LAST?

Egon frowned. "Barely. There was a demon, and it grabbed my gas mask…"

YEAH… THE DEMON RIPPED IT OFF. She nodded, beginning to remember herself. I TOOK OVER WHEN YOU WENT UNCONSCIOUS TO TRY TO LESSEN THE DAMAGE, BUT IT LOOKS LIKE THAT DIDN’T DO A LOT OF GOOD. The young woman frowned.

"Am I…?"

She shook her head. NOT QUITE, BUT I’M AFRAID THAT IF I LEAVE, YOU’RE TOAST.

"Is there anyway to me to recover?" Egon asked slowly.

I DON’T KNOW. She said uncertainly. I’M NOT SURE WHAT THE SMOKE DID, BUT I HAVE A FEELING WE’RE NOT GONNA LIKE IT.

Egon’s legs tried to give out again, but as stars suddenly flew in front of his face and he felt his eyes cross, the dead woman doubled over sharply, grabbing her stomach with a cry and sinking to her knees in pain.

"Are you all right?"

The woman nodded after a moment. YEAH… IT JUST SURPRISED ME. WHAT ABOUT YOU?

"Me?" Egon asked, surprised by the question.

YOU WERE FLICKERING LIKE SOME CHEAP SPECIAL EFFECT JUST BEFORE I GOT STRETCHED OUT LIKE A BUNGEE CORD.

Egon frowned, his right hand coming up to cover his mouth absently as he thought. "Hmmm… Fascinating."

WHAT?

"It appears that we may have become interconnected to one another somehow on a psychic level. What affects one of us will undoubtedly affect the other."

IS THIS IS BECAUSE OF THE SMOKE? She asked skeptically. WHY WOULD THE DEMON WANT US STUCK LIKE THIS?

"Perhaps it wasn’t the demon’s intention."

WHADDAYA MEAN?

"Did you feel something, anything when I went unconscious?"

She nodded. YEAH, LIKE SOMETHING WAS COMING LOOSE. I GRABBED FOR WHATEVER IT WAS, AND THEN IT FELT LIKE I WAS… MELTING INTO SOMETHING ELSE.

"Considering that you were inhabiting my body at the time, let us suppose that it was something in *my* body giving way."

OKAY…WHAT COULD THAT HAVE BEEN?

"When I flickered, you experienced a great deal of physical pain… as much as you can feel in your current ectoplasmic state, correct?

YEAH. I FELT SOMETHNG STRETCHING ME LIKE I WAS A BUNGEE CORD. I DON’T WANNA GO THROUGH THAT AGAIN IF I CAN HELP IT.

"I felt something akin to losing consciousness, which is what I can only imagine happens to ghosts when they pass on."

SO, YOU’RE SAYING THAT I’M ACTING LIKE CRAZY GLUE TO KEEP YOU IN YOUR BODY?

"Essentially, yes."

GREAT. She sat on the cracked stone ground, and looked around. SOME PLACE YA GOT HERE.

"Hmmm?" Egon looked at her with a puzzled look.

I GUESS THIS— The young woman waved a hand at the barren landscape. –IS YOURS, ISN’T IT? AREN’T WE IN YOUR HEAD?

"Now that you mention it, I guess we are." Egon said with a bit of awe in his voice. "Though I would have pictured it as a bit more… organized."

The woman shrugged. MAYBE. Her thoughts returned to that picture she had left on the cluttered desk, with the secret look that this guy was giving the green-eyed man she had possessed at first and the friendship and camaraderie between the four that was evident in it. Maybe if they had met a few years back when she had been alive, they could’ve gotten to know each other.

She turned from her thoughts to see the scientist pacing across the numerous cracks in the scenery, one long-fingered hand covering his mouth as he frowned in thought. The deep blue eyes were exceedingly worried. It didn’t take a rocket scientist, or whatever this guy was, to see that.

YOU WORRIED ABOUT YOUR FAMILY?

Egon was a bit surprised to have his thoughts interrupted. When the question sank in, he sighed and nodded sadly. "Yes. They will be most concerned if I cannot return to the living world."

The young woman shook her head sadly. I DUNNO IF I’LL BE ABLE TO TAKE MUCH MORE OF THOSE FLICKERS OF YOURS, BUDDY.

"And, as much as I am loathe to admit it, I cannot think of a way to improve our condition."

THIS IS BAD… I MAY NOT HAVE ANYBODY TO TRY TO RETURN TO THE LAND OF THE LIVING FOR, BUT THIS ISN’T FAIR TO YOU. She frowned. THERE’S GOTTA BE SOME WAY THAT YOU CAN TALK TO THEM, AT LEAST TO TELL THEM GOOD-BYE BEFORE WE DISAPPEAR… She coughed uncomfortably and looked away a little. SORRY.

"What do you have to apologize for?" Egon asked her gently. "The other Ghostbusters and I have always known that there was danger inherent in this line of work. There is always the possibility that anyone of us could be incapacitated or killed in some way."

THAT’S GOTTA BE TOUGH WHEN YOU GUYS LOSE SOMEONE.

"Actually, I will be the first casualty."

The young woman’s eyes widened and she swallowed audibly. OH, MAN. . .

"My sentiments exactly." Egon gave her a rueful smile before adding with some pride, "At least Peter and I were able to save that little girl’s life before this occurred."

She shook her head slowly. BUT, THOSE GUYS ARE WAITING FOR YOU TO RECOVER.

"Like you said previously, there must be some way to communicate with them, if only to say my last farewells."

The woman frowned as she tried to think of something. He didn’t deserve being stuck in this limbo, nobody did. Still, they needed a solution and soon. Frankly, the dead woman wasn’t sure if she could hold out much longer if those flickers the guy had came more often.

"May I ask you a question?"

The question made her look up to see Egon looking down to meet her gaze with a curious glint in his eyes. WHAT?

"Who is Sean?"

WHY DO YOU WANNA KNOW ABOUT HIM? She frowned.

"Perhaps it will help to piece out why you are still here."

I THOUGHT WE ALREADY ESTABLISHED THAT. I’M STILL YOUR CRAZY GLUE, RIGHT?

"That you are." Egon agreed, bending down to sit next to the young woman. "However, there must be a reason for your remaining in the human world. The name intrigued me when you first mentioned him, and I deduced that Sean was linked to the reason that you were in the house."

She gave him a sad smile. NOT REALLY MUCH TO TELL. I WAS A SOCIAL WORKER. She shrugged. I MOSTLY DEALT WITH RELOCATING KIDS INTO FOSTER HOMES AND LOCATING PROSPECTIVE FAMILIES.

Egon looked at her questioningly. "And was Sean one of these children?"

She shook her head. SEAN WAS MY KID BROTHER. SINCE MOM DIED IN A CAR ACCIDENT, AND HIS DAD RAN OUT ON HIM BEFORE HE WAS BORN, SEAN DIDN’T HAVE ANYWHERE ELSE TO GO EXCEPT TO LIVE WITH ME. THINGS WERE PRETTY GOOD FOR A WHILE, BUT WHEN SEAN SHOWED ME THIS BOOK HE BOUGHT AS A PRESENT FOR ME AT SOME OCCULT SHOP, THAT’S WHEN THE TROUBLE WITH THE DEMON STARTED.

Egon leaned forward, his interest showing in his raised eyebrows. "Do you remember the title of the book?"

She shook her head with a sigh. NOPE. AS SOON AS SEAN STARTED READING SOME OF IT TO ME, THE DEMON SHOWED UP AND WENT NUTS, AND SET FIRE TO THE HOUSE. There was a pregnant silence before she quietly added, WE BOTH DIED.

"And you feel responsible for Sean’s death?"

She shot Egon a dark frown. ISN’T IT PRETTY OBVIOUS? I LOVED SEAN, AND I DIDN’T SAVE HIM. She shook her head when Egon looked like he was going to speak. SORRY, BUDDY, BUT I THINK THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN REALLY FORGIVE ME IS SEAN. NO OFFENSE.

"None taken." Egon sighed. /Peter would be much better equipped to deal with this situation than I./ "It appears that we need a solution, and soon."

The woman nodded. YEAH...