With thanks to Sheila Paulson for allowing the use of her original character, Dr. Greg Labraccio.
Originally published May 2002, in "Our Favorite Things #18", by Elan Press.

It was in the shower that Egon Spengler discovered the growth in his lower abdomen.

It was morning at Ghostbuster Central, a light, bright day in early May that fairly shimmered with the promise of mid-spring. New York’s typical industrial perfume of automobile exhaust and too much humanity had been overlaid by one sweeter and subtler, redolent of budding blooms and fresh grass, that blew in through the opened, screened windows of the upstairs bunkroom.

It had rained the night before. Egon had heard the soft, persistent pattering of fat droplets outside the window as he worked late in the lab. Perhaps, he mused as he rinsed conditioner out of his hair, that natural air-freshening phenomenon would merit further scientific investigation in his spare time. His mind drifted off into an automatic analysis of molecular perfusion, of ozone and hydration and whether his esoteric collection of measuring implements would be adequate for the task, or if he would either need to modify it, or perhaps borrow additional pieces….

The smell of coffee brewing and bacon frying, wafting from the floor below, jerked him back to the present moment, and he finished squeezing the excess water out of his hair. Since he had been up so late the night before, Egon had indulged himself by sleeping a bit later than his usual custom. One-half of the Ghostbusting team - namely Ray Stantz and Winston Zeddemore - was already up and active.

Peter Venkman was, of course, inexcusably still asleep.

Or, perhaps not so inexcusably, Egon had to concede as he fumbled for his own soap amid a collection of sudsy dime store deodorant bars. The past ten days had been exceptionally busy, with them initially going out on up to a dozen tiring busts per day. The emergency calls had finally slowed down after they had located and closed a small dimensional cross-rip, which had no doubt been the portal through which the entities had gained access to this plane. They had seen a startling variety of the more unusual manifestations, the vast majority of them Class Five, and even in their exhaustion at the end of the grueling day, he and Ray had been energized enough to set to cataloging them all and adding them to their database. Indeed, references to the more unique of their spectral quarries had dominated their conversations almost to the exclusion of all else for the better part of the past week.

He shook his head, wondering why Peter, and, to a lesser extent Winston, could never quite share his and Ray’s unbridled enthusiasm over their varied catch. He supposed regretfully that not everyone could be as scientifically minded – or, as Peter uncharitably called it, single-minded – as he and Ray Stantz were.

Egon lathered up the nicely-scented and no doubt very expensive soap that Janine had inexplicably gifted him with a couple weeks before, after hitting a cosmetics sale at Macy’s. No matter. Not only was it quite pleasant, but it reminded him of Janine herself. It also made a lot of nice bubbles. He passed slippery hands over his body, scrubbing efficiently at neck and arms and shoulders, then moved them across his chest and finally down over his belly.

Hmm. He frowned. The skin under his soapy fingers did not feel quite right. No, not the skin, something beneath the skin. He slid his hand over his abdomen again, more slowly, and caught his breath as he felt what seemed to be a soft, rounded mass, halfway between his navel and his groin.

He looked down his torso, squinting against both the lack of his glasses and the streaming water blurring his vision. He could note no visible protrusion deforming the lines of his abdomen. Carefully, he pressed at it – no pain, his scientific method catalogued – then palpated the edges with his fingertips, assessing it. A few inches in width, regular in shape, slightly ovoid, actually….

None of that mattered. Whatever it was, it did not belong there.

Egon Spengler was not a man normally given to strong surges of emotion, but he suddenly felt sick to his stomach. He instantly forgot about the proposed spring rain paradigms and the new specters in containment, even the expensive perfumed soap, those diversions shunted aside by his discovery. Quickly he finished his morning ablutions, then shut off the shower and stepped, dripping, onto the bath mat. He barely patted himself dry with his towel before he slung it around his hips and ventured out of the bathroom and into the bunkroom, his heart hammering.

Peter was still in a most inelegant sprawl across his four-poster bed, deep in a contented sleep, snoring lightly. Egon stared at him for a moment, then roughly cleared his throat as if to catch the dreamer’s attention. When no response was forthcoming, Egon sighed – he should know by now that Peter never responded to subtlety – and instead put out a hand to shake him firmly by the shoulder. “Peter, wake up.”

For someone asleep, Peter’s response was remarkably firm and coherent. “No. No busts today. I’m sleeping until noon.”

“Peter,” he persisted, “I have to show you something.”

“Later.” Peter shifted, shoving his face into the pillow.

Egon swallowed. “Peter. It’s important. There’s… a problem.”

That got to him. That, and the fact that Egon’s voice, despite how he tried to control it, was undeniably shaky. Peter rolled over, blinking, and asked, “What’s up, Spengs?”

In his customary, pragmatic way, Egon went right to the point. “I believe I have a tumor.”

“Huh? What?” Peter rubbed at his eyes. “I don’t get it.”

“Here.” Egon reached over and grasped Peter’s wrist, pulling Venkman’s hand in the direction of the concealing towel.

“Hey, hey!” Peter involuntarily jerked his hand back, scowling. “First you have to promise to respect me in the morning if I touch you there.”

“It’s not that low,” Egon replied, his mouth a tense line. He shifted the towel a bit more, baring most of his belly, then guided Peter’s hand to where he’d felt the anomaly. “Here. Press. Do you feel it? Along the central abdominal line, approximately one-point-five centimeters below the umbilicus - ”

Peter’s eyes widened for a moment in startlement as he followed Egon’s direction and poked; then he hooded his gaze, becoming unreadable, and took his hand back. “Well, I sure as hell don’t like that.” He frowned for a moment as if considering, then flopped flat on his back on the mattress and slid his hand back under his sheets, pressing at his own abdomen. Finally he pronounced, “Nope. Definitely not something that belongs there. Or at least I don’t have one of whatever that is.” He threw off the covers and got to his feet, all signs of morning torpor vanished, and grinned. “Count on you to insist on being unique, Egon. Having an oversized brain isn’t enough for you, Dr. Spengler?”

“Apparently not.” Egon felt curiously comforted by Peter’s instant attention to the crisis at hand, and drew a deep breath of relief. “Perhaps I have inadvertently discovered an ancillary cerebellum.”

“Ha, like those dinosaurs with extra brains in their tails, huh?” Peter strode quickly across the room, his bare feet slapping against the cool floor tiles. “That would sure explain where you store all that info that would clog the thought processes of normal man. Whatever it is, though, I think we need to get you in to see Greg a.s.a.p. You didn’t have any other plans this morning, did you?” He flipped open a small phone book on the telephone stand, skimming with his fingertip for a number.

“No, I can’t say that I do,” he admitted, low-voiced, as Peter began to dial.

Dr. Greg Labraccio walked quickly down the hallway of the medical building toward his fourth-floor office. Two figures were already waiting outside the door. The shorter of the two was pacing aimlessly, as with nervous energy. The other, taller, thinner, and blond, was leaning casually – too casually, Greg noted – against the wall, crossed arms blockading his chest. Greg was glad he’d already been set to head out for the day when they’d reached him at home. Normal office hours did not begin until 10:00 a.m., but due to his long relationship, both professional and personal, with all four Ghostbusters, he had immediately decided to skip his morning workout and instead meet them at his office.

What Peter Venkman had told him on the phone about the mass in Egon Spengler’s abdomen did not sound good. Egon was statistically very young to be suffering from any malignancies, and the alleged “growth” had apparently come on very quickly, but Greg, as a practitioner in Internal Medicine, knew that statistics counted for nothing when a negative diagnosis was forthcoming. He sure as hell hoped that he wasn’t going to be forced with breaking that kind of news to someone who was more than just another patient.

“Greg!” The pacer stopped, tossing an easy wave as he called out to him. “’Bout time you got here.” Peter stuck out his hand and gave the doctor a brisk shake. “I was about to pick the lock so I could steal myself some of those three-year-old magazines from your waiting room.”

“Don’t mind Peter, Greg,” Egon chided. His own handshake of welcome was much more subdued. “You should merely do as I do and ignore him.” Greg noticed that Egon’s color was a little off, but for the moment chalked it up to anxiety. “We appreciate you fitting me in this morning.”

“Not a problem, Egon.” Greg found his office keys, saving Peter the effort of a break-in, and quickly opened up. He moved through the darkened reception area and into the hallway to the examining rooms, flicking on the overhead fluorescents as he went, the other two trailing him. “If I didn’t see you now, I’m pretty darn sure I couldn’t have squeezed you in the rest of the day. It’s going to be a busy one.”

He led them both into the first exam room, not bothering to ask Peter if he wanted to wait outside while the physical went on. Those two, Spengler and Venkman, were tight; in fact, all four of the Ghostbusters were, with the same kind of kinship you found between cops, or firemen, or soldiers. Greg had long since given up trying to control any of the other three when there was a problem with a fourth, allowing extended visiting hours when one ended up in the hospital and all other manner of concessions to make the quartet easier to deal with. It always paid off in the long run, at least, by minimizing the aggravation factor, especially when dealing with the hyper-protective Peter Venkman.

Greg dug a disposable gown out of a drawer and tossed it to Egon, who caught it awkwardly, then stared blankly at the folded paper. “Please strip down to your shorts, Dr. Spengler,” he directed in his best bedside-manner voice, “and put this on, opening to the front. I’ll be back in a minute.”

Labraccio’s crack office staff usually had coffee ready for him by the time he came in, and he severely regretted its unavailability right then. He settled for a flash-brewed cup of Lipton, sipping at it while he searched through his copious patient files for Egon’s records. To his amazement, he found it immediately, right where it should be, and made a mental note to give his office manager a wage increase.

Egon had already changed into the flimsy, undersized gown by the time Greg came back in, and was seated on the edge of the examining table, gangly legs dangling down. One foot was lightly, nervously tapping against the built-in stepstool at its base. He was also shivering a little, long arms wrapped around his torso, hands buried in his armpits.

Greg nodded in sympathy, not knowing if the shaking was from the chill, or from nerves, or a combination of both. Still, he gave Egon a gracious out. “Yeah, it’s a little cold in here. Sorry. I don’t think the thermostat kicks in until about 9, 9:30.” He began to dig through other drawers, pulling out the tools of his medical trade.

Peter was lolling in one of the room’s chairs, feigning relaxation as he idly leafed through a copy of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue. “Hey,” he said brightly, “this one’s only two years old! But,” he pouted, fanning the ragged pages and holding it up to display the gaps in the text, “all the good pictures are torn out.” He frowned deeply, then tossed the magazine aside, stood up, and began to follow Labraccio through the small room.

“Dr. Venkman, what’s your degree in?” Greg asked casually as Peter craned over his shoulder to watch what he was doing.

“Degrees.” Then one brow went up quizzically as he responded to the actual question. “Psych and Parapsych. How come?”

“Not medicine?” Greg found a phlebotomy kit and set it on the Formica counter. Egon winced at the sight of it and tucked his hands more deeply under his arms.

“Nope.”

“Then sit back down and get out of my way.” His words were amiable enough that no offense was taken, but Peter got the point and, with an aggrieved yet self-effacing grin, backed off. Egon, tense as he was, even managed a mild laugh.

“So let’s check your vitals, Egon.” Greg opened Spengler’s medical file to make careful notations of the current results and compare them with his physical of only a couple months before. Egon obediently opened up to the thermometer Greg stuck under his tongue, but flinched at the application of one very cold stethoscope to his chest. “Oops, sorry ‘bout that,” Greg said easily, giving Egon an automatic pat to the shoulder. “If it’s any consolation, I jump like that whenever I’m on the receiving end of it. Now, how about your blood pressure….”

“You know, above his waist is not where the problem is,” Peter said under his breath.

“Who’s the M.D. here again?” Greg commented as he pumped up the blood pressure cuff. “Wanna remind me?” Peter settled back down, pretending to read the mutilated magazine for another few seconds until, with a sigh, he tossed it back on top of the stack and just sat there, assessing the situation with avid eyes.

Greg scribbled the current results in Egon’s patient file, nodding to himself, then turned to Egon – and Peter – to deliver his report. “Well, your temperature is elevated, but just a little, so it may not be significant. Heartbeat and respirations are a little accelerated, and your blood pressure’s up a bit too, but I’m going to chalk all that up to your state of mind. Now, lie back and relax and let’s take a look at what brought you in today.”

Greg shifted aside the paper gown and slid the waistband of the modest boxer shorts down out of the way, then placed his fingertips on Egon’s abdomen and gently began to palpate. Egon just stared at the ceiling, and, while Greg watched, he swallowed once, hard.

Labraccio felt the growth immediately, as obvious as Peter had described it, but after a thorough physical examination, to his considered relief he found it lacking the characteristics that would have defined it as likely to be a malignancy. Not that he could quite tell what it was instead, however. There was something about it that was reminiscent of some other condition, but just what escaped him for the moment.

Finally he concluded the physical examination, knowing that he wasn’t going to get anything else by a mere tactile exam. Snapping off his latex gloves, he came around to the head of the examining table and gave Spengler a boost back to a sitting position. “Well, Egon, you’ve definitely got something there that doesn’t belong.”

“Good thing you got that medical degree, huh, or you mighta missed it.” Peter was up and hovering again, his face completely unapologetic.

“No, even someone with a psych degree could have figured it out,” he returned glibly. His quip did nothing to reduce the tension in the two pairs of eyes, green and blue, that soberly regarded him, so he cleared his throat and gave them the best analysis he could manage. “Actually, I suspect a cyst, or maybe a subcutaneous abscess, an infection of some sort – “

“But he’d have more of a fever though, if it was an infection, wouldn’t he?” Peter was pacing now, buzzing around the examining room in agitation.

“Normally, yes, but that isn’t necessarily a given. It could be some aberrant bacterial infection that doesn’t follow the normal medical models.”

Egon nodded at that pronouncement, the starkness in his eyes easing slightly. “Do you wish to biopsy it?”

Greg shook his head. “Not yet. We save the invasive procedures for last. It makes the insurance companies happier if we do the cheap stuff first. And considering the workout your medical plan gets already….”

“Tell me about it.” Peter sighed theatrically, and Greg privately thought that virtuous exaggeration was a good sign. “I write the checks.”

Greg pulled his prescription pad from a pocket and began to scribble on it. “So I’m going to set you up for an abdominal ultrasound, for starters. We’ll get you squeezed in today. I’ll also run blood and urine panels to see if they show anything. And I want to start you on a broad-spectrum antibiotic, just in case it’s an infection. See if we can knock it down. Now let me draw some blood and I can let you and your pal go back to saving the world.”

Egon’s voice was very soft. “So essentially, you would say that I am going to be… okay?” He grimaced and looked away as the needle slid into the bend of his arm. Peter, catching his eye, gave him a supportive grin and nod, along with a thumbs’-up.

“Egon, I’m going on instinct here.” Greg carefully drew three small tubes of blood, then withdrew the hypo and deftly placed an colorful band-aid – obviously from his collection saved for the kids he saw in his practice – on the tiny puncture. “Don’t quote me on it, but it doesn’t feel like anything life-threatening – ”

“You mean you don’t think it’s cancer,” Peter stated bluntly, those bright green eyes a challenge.

Greg hedged, “I can’t state with 100% certainty until I get all the test results back… but no, the signs don’t fit that of a classic malignancy. And whatever it is, there doesn’t seem to be any infiltration – it’s pretty self-contained. Just as soon as we figure out exactly what it is, I don’t think it’s going to be all that hard to take care of. Now, go ahead and get dressed, and then….” He handed Egon a sample cup, and the physicist made a face. “If you could just stop at the men’s room on your way out and make your donation, that’s it for today.”

Egon exhaled sharply as he stood, reaching for his shirt. “Thank you, Greg. You’ve eased my mind. I can’t even begin to tell you what I thought when….”

“You don’t have to tell me,” Greg sympathized. “I think I know exactly what was going through your mind. But we’ll get it figured out, and, while I can’t say it’s anything I’ve ever seen or felt before – “ He cut himself off as he suddenly realized exactly where and how he’d felt a mass most closely resembling that in Egon Spengler’s belly before.

Peter caught him out in his hesitation. “What? You thought of something. I can tell. Give.”

Greg shook his head, frowning. It was ridiculous, but… “This is really strange, but I’ll tell you, Egon, if someone blindfolded me and had me palpate your abdomen, I’d swear I was examining someone who had just reached the end of the first trimester of pregnancy.”

The ride back to Ghostbuster Central took place in uncommon silence. From the wheel of Ecto-1, Peter spared a glance away from the road to watch Egon out of the corner of his eye. The physicist was withdrawn, but not into focused thought; Peter knew that deep, intense look almost as well as he knew the expressions that traveled over his own face. No, Egon’s mind was drifting as he brooded, for once working not on intellect but on pure emotion

Peter reached over and amiably cuffed the silent man on the shoulder. Egon jumped and turned to him, the blue eyes behind his glasses not only wide and startled, but fraught with inner fear. Shit, Peter thought, don’t go there, Egon. “So, three months pregnant, huh?” He forced a laugh. “Spengs, I thought I told you and Janine to practice safe sex. Use a love glove. Shower with a raincoat on. Or… just say no.”

“Peter, this isn’t funny.”

“I know, Egon.” His eyes sparked with something deep and stark and usually quite well hidden. “I know. But Greg said he didn’t think it’s cancer, and I don’t think it’s cancer.”

“And of course you are the last word.”

“’Course I am,” he agreed heartily. “Look, it’s probably just some weird bacteria you picked up. We’ve had worse happen to us, you know.”

“Yes, we’ve had worse. It’s somewhat different when it is just… ” He left the last unspoken.

Peter blew out an exasperated breath. “It’s not ‘just you’, Egon. It’s all of us. And c’mon, whatever it is, we’re all in it with you – and for you – together, okay?”

“Of course.” The words came out in an unconvincing mumble.

Peter snorted. “Come on, at least say it like you mean it. You’re hurting my feelings.”

Egon turned to him, the look in his eyes a little less stark and lost and troubled. “Yes, Peter,” he said mildly, a small smile touching his lips, then cleared his throat and spoke the words again in a firm, loud voice. “Of course.”

“That’s better.” Peter grinned at him in return. “Trust me on this, Spengs. You’re gonna be fine. Promise.”

The downstairs was deserted when they pulled Ecto into its parking space in the Ghostbuster Central garage. Peter frowned. “Melnitz should be here by now. Is she slacking off again?”

“No, I saw her car parked outside.” Egon opened the door and swung himself cautiously to his feet, one hand resting carefully on his stomach. “She’s mostly likely waiting upstairs with Winston and Ray.”

“And I’m paying her for that?” Peter said under his breath as they headed for the stairs to the second floor.

Indeed, the three were all upstairs, grouped around the kitchen table and talking, low-voiced, over the remains of a breakfast no one appeared to have had much appetite for. Peter and Egon had given their teammates only the most cursory explanation before rushing out to meet Dr. Labraccio, leaving Winston and Ray to stew about what could possibly be wrong with one of their members.

“Hi honey, we’re home!” Peter caroled as he took the steps two at a time and bounded into the second floor. Egon followed him much more sedately, one hand on the banister, the other still unconsciously pressed against the swelling in his abdomen.

At Venkman’s announcement, Janine, almost predictably, jolted to her feet and went to Egon’s side, throwing her arms around him. “My God, Egon,” she breathed into his ear, “they told me you had to rush to the doctor this morning because you found a tumor or something in your stomach!”

“My lower abdomen, actually,” he corrected stiffly, not yielding into the comfort of the arms wrapped around him.

Ray put down his coffee cup as he stood, pacing over to join the other two. Peter passed him going the other direction, headed for their coffeepot. “What does Greg think it is?” Ray’s ever-earnest brown eyes seemed even more so, full of a worry that was echoed in Winston’s gaze as well.

“He doesn’t know,” Egon began, but Peter instantly cut him off.

“Except that he’s pretty sure it’s not anything serious. Probably just a funky little infection.” Peter grabbed his coffee mug from where it had sat on the counter since the day before, sloshed hot water into it to nominally rinse it out, then poured himself a fresh full cup “Don’t leave that part off in hopes of getting more sympathy from them.”

“Yeah, Egon, that’s more Pete’s thing,” Winston teased gently. “Don’t stoop to his level.”

“Are you accusing me of being manipulative? ‘Cause I know where you sleep, Zed, and there’s a short-sheeting with your name on it just waiting to happen.” Peter took a swallow of his coffee and made a nasty face. “Hey, how long has this been sitting here? The sludge at the bottom of the pot, yuck. Wanna make us a fresh pot, Melnitz?”

“Not in this lifetime, Dr. V.” She didn’t even spare Venkman a look, her bright, worried eyes only for Egon. She slid out of their lackluster hug, shifting to his side, but to her surprise one of his arms did slip around her waist and keep her at touching distance, as if he didn’t quite want to surrender her presence.

Peter finished dumping too much creamer into his coffee, then paced over to their tableau, his eyes sparking with wicked humor. “Know what else Greg said? – that it felt sorta like Spengs was three months pregnant. Why don’t you ask him if you can check it out? I mean, he let me.” Peter arched a teasing eyebrow at the rest of the team.

Count on Ray’s innate curiosity to be sparked by the unusual occurrence. “Hey, can I, Egon?”

“Me too,” Winston chimed in. “Not that I’ve always wondered what a pregnant man might feel like, but I might never get the chance again.” Janine looked desperately as if she wanted to add her voice to their chorus, but didn’t dare.

Egon blew out an exasperated breath at their requests. He knew what Peter was trying to do, to lighten the mood, to minimize everyone’s worry, but still…. Yet, it did not hurt to play along; in fact, their attention, and their obvious concern, was most gratifying, oddly comforting and welcome. “Very well,” he agreed stiffly. “You may all have your way with me. But no touching bare skin, please.”

Ray was first to approach, and his fingers were very gentle as he placed them on the front of Egon’s trousers. His eyes widened as, through the fabric, he felt for and found the aberrant swelling. “Wow, isn’t that weird. Does it hurt?”

“No, not at all. I’m not even aware of it, unless it’s palpated. Then, it just feels a bit peculiar.”

Ray withdrew, and Winston was next. “It’s kindy… spongy.” Zeddemore’s brow furrowed. “My sister-in-law’s belly was like a rock. ‘Course she gained something like sixty pounds and had twins, so I guess that makes a difference.”

Janine, emboldened, dropped one hand, but only gave Egon a teeny pat, just below his belt line, her palm tapping against his fly. “Now, Egon, we don’t want you to lose your figure.”

Peter got another literal jab in, poking his index finger into Egon’s stomach as if Spengler were the Pillsbury doughboy and was being tested to see if he was still poppin’ fresh. “Damn, I think it’s bigger,” Venkman blurted out, lips thinning as his face lost a little more color. Quickly he tried to hide his faux pas in levity, knowing it was too late. “This sucker’s gonna be full-term by the end of the week. Got any names picked out, Egon? I wonder if it’ll have your eyes.”

The humor had already bled out of Egon’s face. “Peter.” He fell into one of the kitchen chairs, bowing his head, and dropped his face into his palms.

Janine gave Venkman a look that should have dropped the psychologist in his tracks. Peter fixed her with a hard stare of his own for a few seconds, then spun away, a hasty swallow of coffee in his mouth keeping him from saying anything further that he would regret.

Winston dropped a hand onto the back of Egon’s neck and gave him a reassuring squeeze. “Egon, don’t let it get to you. It’s gonna be okay.” Ray slid into the chair beside Egon, an arm automatically circling and squeezing his friend’s shoulders, offering his support and comfort without words.

Peter paced away, eyes dark and shuttered, and poured his unpalatable coffee down the drain. “Shit,” he muttered, staring out the window. Then, softer, “Sorry, Spengs. I won’t kid anymore.”

Egon lifted his head and nodded, then took off his glasses and very carefully polished them on a discarded napkin from the tabletop. He rubbed his eyes once, hard, before putting them back on, then stood, sighing with resignation. “I think I shall remove myself to the lab. There’s a great deal of maintenance work to be done after our latest rush. We’ve had to put it off all week.”

“Want some company?” Ray’s eyes were eager and bright with sympathy. “I don’t have anything planned.”

“Yes, Ray, I think I would. Thank you.” Together they turned for the spiral stairs to the third floor, Egon’s hand dropping almost protectively to his lower belly as he moved.

“I’ll make you a plate of something to eat, Egon,” Janine called up the staircase after him, “and bring it upstairs for you, okay?” His answer of vague assent drifted down to her after a moment’s pause; she ignored his ambivalence and went straight to the refrigerator, purposefully digging through it for food suitable for him.

Winston stood, bussing the detritus from the table over to the kitchen counter, quickly dumping the trash in the garbage and the plates in the sink. Once he had run warm water over everything and left it to soak, he announced, “I think I’ll go work on Ecto. She’s been running a little rough.” And down the stairs to the garage level he vanished.

“That’s right, all of you go have fun but me,” Peter complained as everyone headed off to their respective corners of the firehouse. “And after I got up so damn early to take care of things. Know what? - I’m taking a nap.”

When no one called him on it as he started for the stairs, he sighed, then turned in the opposite direction and headed for his office instead to get some long-overdue work done. After all, it was no fun being martyred if no one would play along, so he might as well do something productive.

And he had a feeling sleep wasn’t going to work for him anyway, at least until Egon’s problem was finally resolved.

Dr. Labraccio’s office manager called a little after 11, to advise that Egon had been scheduled for an abdominal ultrasound at the Radiology department at St. Vincent’s Hospital at two p.m.. Unfortunately, a little before 11, a rush call came in, involving the appearance of yet another Class Five spectral manifestation, in a location the Ghostbusters had already visited earlier in the week.

“Not only do we have to go out on our first day off in ages,” Peter groused as he zipped up his jumpsuit, “but it’s a freebie ‘cause we promised them they were clean two days ago.”

“Well, not if it’s a completely new manifestation….” Ray mused out loud. “We can compare the readings we took last time with the baselines we get on this bust, and if they’re substantially different, maybe we can prove it’s an unrelated appearance.”

“And how likely is that?” Peter fired back. “Not very. It’s probably another hunk of junk from that friggin’ cross-rip. I’ve never seen such a miserable, motley assortment of spuds and slimeballs, and I tell you, I never hope to again. I’d be glad to bust their ectoplasmic asses to Kingdom Come, if I could.”

“Temper, Dr. Venkman,” Egon said mildly. A few hours’ concentrated work in the lab had restored some of his equanimity. One would almost think he had forgotten about the growth in his lower abdomen, save for the hand that drifted toward it every so often, as if he were being forced to verify its continuing presence, or perhaps was hoping against hope that it had somehow miraculously vanished in the interim. “You should know by now that complaining does nothing to correct the situation.”

“And you should know by now that at least it makes me feel better,” Peter replied under his breath. He hefted two packs into the back of Ecto, then bent to catch up and load the third. It never felt right, to pack up gear for only three of them.

Winston hastily finished the spark plug job he’d been in the middle of when the call came, then slammed down Ecto’s hood. Quickly he wiped away the grease from his hands as well as the grimy spots from the hood, then tossed the dirty rag on top of their overflowing laundry basket. Another thing they’d meant to take time to do this afternoon, until the call came in. They were just about out of jumpsuits and someone was going to have to find the time to toss that stack of grubby fabric into the washer downstairs. Being forced to wear smelly, three-days’-ripe, overworn jumpsuits would really give Pete something to bitch about, Winston thought without much humor. “We’d better get a move-on,” he announced as he slid into the driver’s seat. “It takes some time to get all the way to the Upper East Side, and if they think we let something get away from us the last time, they’re gonna charge back all the damage.”

Peter made a sound of utter disgust as he climbed into Ecto’s shotgun seat. Ray paused before climbing into the back seat, alone, and turned to Egon with sympathy in his face. “I don’t think we’ll be back in time to take you to your appointment. Are you going to be okay?”

Spengler nodded. “Of course I will. I’m competent to take the subway to St. Vincent’s and find my way to Radiology – "

“You won’t have to,” Janine burst in. “I’ll take you.”

Peter mimed the successful shooting of a basketball right through a hoop, then broadly winked at the physicist.

Egon ignored him and instead gave her a look of gratification. “That’s very kind of you, Janine, but it’s not really necessary.”

“Maybe I want to.” She patted his arm. “I had to have an abdominal ultrasound a couple years ago when my gynecologist thought I had an ovarian cyst – “

“Hey!” Peter interrupted, grimacing. “Firehouse rules – no talk about female problems! Floor it, Zed, before she gives us a play-by-play.” Winston, grinning, shifted Ecto into reverse and started to back out of the garage.

“You sissy,” Janine fired back at Peter, smirking at him as he gave her a mock-gallant wave. She and Egon watched as they wheeled away; then she slipped her arm through the bend at Egon’s elbow and drew him away from the open doorway. There was a plaintive, regretful look on his face as the team vanished around the corner, without him.

Janine gave him a compassionate squeeze as she directed him toward a chair. She knew how each of the guys hated to have to sit out a bust, even those that promised to be routine; plus Spengler had a hell of a lot of other things on his mind right now as well. “C’mon, Egon, we don’t have to leave until about 1:30, so sit down and relax for a while.” She gave his shoulder an empathetic pat, and he looked at her with mixed gratitude and trepidation on his face. “Those ultrasounds are no fun. I really think you’ll appreciate my company.”

“Mrs. Spengler, if you’d please disrobe from the waist down, then take a seat until the ultrasound technician gets here. You can cover yourself with this.”

Janine stared at the hospital volunteer who had escorted her and Egon from the Radiology Department’s waiting area to their ultrasound room, and was now trying to press a folded blue-and-white striped cotton sheet into her hands. “Excuse me?”

The older woman looked at her oddly, completely ignoring Egon, who stood patiently, perhaps a little shell-shocked, at Janine’s side. “Mrs. Spengler, you’ll have to partially disrobe for the test. So if you’d –“

“I’m not the patient – he is.” She jerked a thumb in Egon’s direction. “And I’m not Mrs. Spengler either.”

“Oh.” The volunteer flushed a deep crimson and looked down, quickly thumbing through the sheaf of papers on the clipboard she carried. “I’m sorry, I didn’t really read the order in detail. I just assumed the two of you were here for a pregnancy…. Never mind.” She cleared her throat and started over. “Mr. Spengler, if you’d please –“

“I believe I heard you the first time.” He accepted the sheet from her and stood there, clutching it carefully in front of himself as if he’d already stripped.

“The technician will be here in a few minutes. I’ll leave you to disrobe in privacy.” She drew the sliding screen of the cubicle, blocking them off from the rest of the activity in the department.

“Oh my, this does not bode well,” Egon murmured, fidgeting with the folds of cloth in his hands as if in a daze. But when he turned away and his eyes fell on the array of fascinating hardware and software that comprised the ultrasound machine, his expression took on an entirely different mien. “This is certainly interesting,” he said under his breath, stepping closer to it and adjusting his glasses.

“At least they didn’t try to take you to Mammography, Egon.” Janine giggled, a little unnerved by the confusion herself, but mostly by being called “Mrs. Spengler” in something other than her dreams. “You think the ultrasound is bad, just try getting your tits squished sometimes.” Janine watched his distraction with amusement as he began examining the various parts of the complex medical equipment. Finally, she cleared her throat to get his attention. “C’mon, Egon, you need to get changed.”

“Um….” He pulled himself out of his willing scientific trance, looking at her over the top of his red frames. His cheeks were suddenly a little pink. “Would you, perhaps, mind excusing yourself for a moment while I do?”

She snorted. “Oh, come on, Egon, it’s not like I’ve never seen you naked before. Even just from the waist down. Remember?” She waggled a finger at him. “Two weeks ago, when no one else was around, you and me and the back seat of Ecto….”

“Um, yes.” The flush climbed all the way to his platinum hairline, but a reminiscent smile tugged at his lips – the first expression of lightness, actually, that Janine had seen yet that day. “That was indeed a memorable occasion.”

“So get out of those pants before I unzip you with my teeth again.” She hugged him in a way that she hoped would show him she was only kidding; with Egon, Mr. Limited Sexual Experience himself, she never knew when he’d take her teasing too seriously. “It’s not fair to ogle you here, so I’ll just read my book while you change, okay?” She sat down and made an obvious point of burying her nose in the mystery novel she’d brought.

Egon stared at her for a long second, wondering if he really should bother to try to preserve his modesty in front of the woman with whom he regularly had pleasurable dalliances involving the divestiture of much – if not all – clothing. He considered as well which side he might best present to her when he did undress, that would not cause him undue embarrassment. Finally, he turned in such a way as to give her a three-quarter rear view with an emphasis on his flank, should she actually look up from the pages, then kicked off his shoes and briskly shucked trousers and shorts together. At least, he thought with relief as he gathered the covering around his waist, there was sufficient fabric in the cotton sheet to make a decent wrap. Holding it in place, the folds bunched into one firm grip at his hip, he went back to his inspection of the ultrasound machine.

“I do believe some of this technology could hold useful applications to our line of work, Janine.” His voice held a trace of excitement. “For tracking purposes in Containment, for imaging of visually-imperceptible entities in the field… Janine, would you mind taking some notes for me?”

“With what? My lipstick on the jacket of Winston’s book? I don’t think he’d appreciate that. You’ve got a photographic memory, Egon – take a mental snapshot.” She deliberately left out the fact that she did have a little notepad with its own pen tucked in the bottom of her purse – the better to jot down her shopping list or “to-do” notes while riding the subway home, or stuck in traffic in her little Volkswagen – but she reasoned that the requisite deep mental focus to ingrain his ideas would take his mind off his current physical problem. Sure enough, he turned right back to the machine, and she could tell just by the shift in his body language that his mind had returned to the possibilities of the use of ultrasound in their ‘busting.

The sliding screen suddenly shifted aside. “Hey, Egon, Janine,” Greg Labraccio announced as he entered, one arm around the shoulders of a slight woman in hospital whites. “Meet Gwen. She’s the best ultrasound technician in the place.” His companion was small, blonde and almost fragile-looking but she had a chipper voice and a strong handshake as she greeted Spengler.

Egon instantly turned his focus from the machine to the new arrivals, his mind suddenly zinging with contradictory and upsetting thoughts. Was his condition actually serious enough to merit his physician’s presence during the ultrasound? “I thought you were booked up today, Greg,” he said in a deceptively steady voice, trying to keep his concerns hidden.

Greg shrugged as he replied in an easy voice, “Hey, I had a couple of cancellations. No harm to come here and watch.”

“Plus we’re having coffee afterwards, aren’t we, Greg?” the technician put in, and Egon immediately relaxed at the revelation of Labraccio’s hidden agenda. For the moment, however, Gwen was all business. “Please sit on the edge of the table, Dr. Spengler, then lie back and try to relax. We’ll be ready in a minute.”

Egon’s intrinsic reluctance to surrender to the test was made even more so when he regarded some of the attachments to the table. With not a little trepidation, he arranged himself as directed, carefully keeping the folds of fabric in place and then crossing his hands over his groin for good measure. Finally he broached, “I won’t have to use those… stirrups, will I?”

She was so busy preparing the transponder that she didn’t even look up to answer him. “Not unless we need to do an internal reading, no.”

He groaned and let his head drop heavily to the thin pillow, then pounded it there a few times in sheer exasperation. Janine, so softly that he could barely hear it, giggled and then murmured, “Welcome to my world, Egon.”

The surprise of the cold lubricant squirted onto his belly made him yelp and jump as it hit his skin. “Sorry,” Gwen said absently as she pulled the sheet aside to place the head of the transponder in a far too intimate place. Egon squirmed and felt himself flushing again as she began to move the device from side to side, then up and down, over and over again.

“Must the sheet be… that low?” he asked as he lifted his head to watch the procedure.

“Yes, sorry,” she repeated absently, “and please try not to move, Dr. Spengler….”

“So what if the world finds out that you really are a natural blond?” Janine said under her breath, her eyes bright as she peeked at the proceedings over the top of her book.

Egon managed to relax after a minute or so when he realized that everyone was not so much looking at him, as at the results the reflected sound waves were displaying on the machine. He tilted his head to look over his right shoulder, watching the monitor on which the images of his insides were displayed. As fascinating as the process and its results were, the test was sliding beyond his realm of scientific expertise, and he felt more than a little frustrated at his inability to interpret what he saw.

Greg seemed to notice Egon’s discomfiture, and began to explain, tracing the anatomy on the screen with an agile fingertip. “This right here…” He indicated an amorphous, undefined shape at the center of the image. “That’s what we’re here to see. Nasty little sucker. It’s not giving us much to go on. Self-contained…. Actually, more like encapsulated as far as I can tell. Hmm…” He tilted his head, then murmured something to Gwen, who immediately began working at a different angle. “It’s not actually in the abdominal cavity,” he finally pronounced. “It’s underneath the muscle layer, between it and the peritoneum.”

“Is that good?” Janine asked, her book forgotten.

“Well, the fact that there’s something that shouldn’t be there at all isn’t good in the first place. But if Egon had to have some sort of internal anomaly, yeah, that’s a better place for it.”

Egon dared to broach, “Peter said he thought it felt a bit… larger.”

“Ah, Dr. Venkman strikes again, huh? And what is he doing poking you in the gut?”

“They all did,” he admitted sheepishly.

“Don’t you have anything else to do around that firehouse of yours?” Greg sighed. “But let me take another look.” Quickly Labraccio palpated the mass, then pronounced, “No, I don’t think so. Maybe a little firmer, or more solid, but still in the same ballpark as what I took a look at this morning.”

“Can you tell what it is?” Good heavens, Egon chided himself, he was actually crossing his hidden fingers as a talisman against bad news.

“Nope, not a clue.” Greg sounded far too cheerful with that pronouncement. “But there’s not one thing there that’s indicative of cancer. And,” he added with a wink, “you’re definitely not pregnant either.”

Even serious Gwen laughed at that. “Done,” she finally announced, clinically mopping the gel off Egon’s abdomen and taking an extra moment to slide the sheet back into place. She and Greg conferred for another minute, low-voiced, then with a nod and a few scribbled notes on her files, she headed back out into the hallway.

Greg was writing some of his own notes on a small pad he’d pulled from the pocket of his doctor’s whites. “I’m going to send your test results and this ultrasound to a couple of my colleagues and see what they have to say. By tomorrow, maybe the day after, we’ll have some results. Did you pick up that antibiotic yet?” By the dubious arch of his brow it was obvious what answer he expected.

“We will on the way home,” Janine answered for him, as she handed Egon his neatly-folded clothing. Greg shot Egon a look of silent amusement at Janine’s possessive fussing, and Spengler wondered if it was possible to be any more embarrassed by the entire situation than he already was.

Greg wisely didn’t pursue whatever relationship he seemed to have intuited, just as neither Egon nor Janine had acknowledged his upcoming coffee break with Gwen. “Well, if this gets worse, give me a call, but until then, just sit tight.” He snuck a glance at his watch and seemed startled at the time. “Whoops, gotta go – coffee time, then it’s back to the office. If I’m lucky I can see my 3 o’clock patient before it’s 4.” Another affable wink, and a sincere handshake. “Egon, go home, get some rest. Let this nice lady and all those crazy pals of yours take care of you. And… don’t worry.”

There was no one at the firehouse when they got home, but there was a weary message on the machine in Ray’s voice, explaining that the mayor had called them on Ecto’s mobile phone while they were out, yammering at them to get their butts to the site of a manifestation at Times Square that was playing hell with the half-price TKTS line. Egon and Janine could hear Peter’s mocking shout in the background, imitating the mayor’s distinctive voice, “Bad for tourism!”; then Winston’s futile attempt to shut up Peter’s impression; then Ray raising his voice to speak over what was rapidly deteriorating into a competition to see who could do the better imitation of their fine city’s leader. “I don’t know when we’ll be back – Peter, shut up! – but we’ll call in, or you can call us – Winston, c’mon, that’s not funny! – just don’t expect us anytime soon, okay? Bye!”

“Well, they sound like they’re having a good time.” Janine frowned at the answering machine as she reset it.

Egon shrugged, knowing how Peter far too frequently hid moods and concerns behind outrageous conduct, and how he’d do his best to drag the others into that evasive behavior as well. Egon could only hope that in his absence the bust was going well. “At least the city pays quite well, and without too much question,” he offered.

Janine’s voice was softer than he would have thought, as if she too knew what was going on in not only Egon’s, but the team’s, collective heads. “I’ll give ‘em a holler and make sure they’re not goofing off too much without you.” The mobile phone rang and rang, a good dozen times before she finally hung up with an apologetic shrug. “They’re probably out chasing it down right now.” She briefly glanced at the clock on the wall, then offered, “ It’s almost quitting time for me, but… if you want me to stay a little while, maybe keep you company, I wouldn’t mind. Maybe make us some dinner?”

“That would be nice,” he admitted, and together, they went upstairs. They found the fixings for a decent meal in the refrigerator; while Egon chopped vegetables and tore some lettuce for a salad, Janine cooked up meatballs to add to a bottled pasta sauce, and boiled up enough penne to feed an army… or three other hungry Ghostbusters, whenever they managed to return home.

The phone rang halfway through their dinner, and Janine jumped to pick it up. Winston’s voice was tired as he explained how the one manifestation had divided into five separate entities upon feeling the first blast of their proton streams. “We spent all afternoon following those goopers all over the city,” he sighed. “Pete chased the last one all the way down to Herald Square on foot, and we hadda pick him up. Thought he was about to drop. But he perked up when he realized he could bill the city for five ghosts instead of just the one.” Janine, laughing, relayed the good news to Egon, who nodded in approval.

Winston went on. “Anyway, we’re starving and a local place offered to feed us dinner on the house for all our hard work. Pete’s busy grandstanding and signing autographs, and one of the waitresses has taken a shine to Ray and she’s giving him a neck rub. But tell Egon we’ll be back as soon as I can drag those two out of here, okay?” A shout of “Zed! Your mee krob is here!” interrupted him, and he rapidly finished the call.

When Janine got back to the table, Egon was pushing the tubes of pasta around on his plate. The greens in the salad bowl looked similarly untouched. “Egon,” she reminded, placing her small hand on his forearm, “Dr. Labraccio told you not to worry.”

“Yes, Janine, but it is… difficult, not to.” He concentrated deeply on bisecting a meatball with his fork; then once he had halved it, he further proceeded to cut the pieces again, and again, until it had been reduced its most basic components, little flecks of ground beef floating in the sea of red sauce.

“I know.” She curled her fingers into his, squeezing. “You wouldn’t be human if you weren’t concerned about it. But it’s gonna be fine.” She sighed, looking at his almost-full plate, and shook her head. “You’re done, aren’t you?”

“I’m afraid so.” He gave her a small, apologetic smile. “I’ll help you clean up, and then, I think I shall go rest for a while.”

They tidied the kitchen in record time. Janine wondered if she should offer to stay just a little longer, at least until the others got back, but knew that if Egon really wanted her continuing company, he would have asked her to remain. “I’m gonna head home now,” she finally announced, catching up her purse and sweater. “Tell Dr. V. not to expect me in until 9, since I stayed so late with you.” She winked over her shoulder as she trotted down the stairs. Normally, she knew, Egon would have escorted her down to the lower level, all the way out to her car, with a gentlemanly gesture even opening the door for her. But his mind was far elsewhere, and he merely watched her departure from the second-floor landing.

“Take your antibiotics!” she hollered as reminder as she darted out the door, locking it behind her.

“I will!” he hollered back, wondering if she’d heard his reply, and turned away.

It was rare that peace and order reigned on the third floor of Ghostbuster Central. Egon sat on the edge of his bed, wishing that he could take advantage of the unusual calm. But for once he did not feel like working in the lab, or updating their computer files, or even reading… just going to bed. He did feel a little feverish, as well as overly weary, so retiring for the night did seem to be the most logical option. He obediently swallowed the antibiotics, as well as two aspirin, then changed into his nightshirt and slid under the covers.

Both hands drifted irresistibly toward his belly. Almost obsessively he prodded at the growth… the tumor… the swelling… whatever euphemism Greg had placed upon it. He slid fingers along the edges, measuring it, cataloguing it as if it were an interesting sample that had been placed before him for his inspection.

Except that this sample was within him.

Damn, what is this? he asked himself, finally ceding reluctantly to his ignorance. Above all else, his ordered, logical mind hated having to deal with unknowns. And he hated not being in control of a situation. But he would just have to wait, to see what professional medical pronouncement finally made sense of his uncommon affliction.

Finally, closing his eyes, he rolled onto his side and forced his mind to relax. And long before the other three, dirty, drenched in slime, and bone-tired, at last straggled in on tiptoe, he had fallen into a troubled, uneasy sleep.

As abysmally, unnaturally early as Peter Venkman awoke the next morning, one other resident of the firehouse had already beaten him to it.

Egon was seated at the kitchen table, in the half-darkness of the early morning, staring into a mug of what was probably cocoa. Without looking up, and without preamble, he announced softly, “It’s grown.”

Peter’s stomach twisted at the pronouncement. Still, he switched on the light, moving with practiced calm around the homey familiarity of their kitchen. “Better to light a single candle than sit and curse in the darkness, Spengs.”

“It’s ‘curse the darkness’, not ‘curse in the darkness’, he corrected, still staring at the floating glob of congealed marshmallows atop his chocolate. His glasses were off, neatly folded on the table, and Peter doubted if Egon could distinguish any details in the tableau he was so fixedly regarding.

That looks like the lousiest batch of cocoa he’s ever made, Peter thought with sympathy. Still, as he slid the mug away from Egon, he put a pout on his face and asked, “Didn’t you make any for me?”

“I didn’t expect you to be up.”

“I’m full of surprises. Just like you. Literally.” He reached over and proprietarily flicked his finger at Spengler’s abdomen. “Let’s see.” Sighing, Egon shifted the hem of his old tee-shirt upward, out of the way, and hooked a finger in the elastic waistband of his sweatpants, pulling them down.

Egon’s belly was distended now, weirdly, abnormally rounded. Damn, it did look like he was pregnant. At least four months. Peter had once had a girlfriend who was cheerfully having a kid without benefit of a permanent male attachment and he’d had a few good looks at her nice, round tummy during the couple of months they’d been dating.

Egon continued in a monotone. “I’ve already left a message at Greg’s service.”

“Good. He’ll want to know.” Peter stuck his finger into the mug of cocoa, testing; yup, it was stone cold, and he wondered just how long Spengs had been just sitting there, in the dark.

As if he’d read Peter’s mind, Egon went on. “When I awakened around 4:30 I noticed that the size of the… growth had increased dramatically while I slept. I knew it would be futile to attempt to go back to sleep in my current state of mind, so I dressed and came downstairs.”

“You should’ve woke me up.” Peter sloshed the cold cocoa down the drain of the kitchen sink, and went to the refrigerator.

Egon shook his head. “I knew you were all very tired from the bust, plus you came in very late. I didn’t wish to disturb anyone.”

Peter lifted one shoulder in an easy shrug. “Eh, it would’ve been okay.” He poured two glasses of orange juice and carried them to the table, plunking one down in front of Egon. “Drink up.” He took his own advice, draining his glass, then sat himself down next to Spengler. “You don’t need refined sugar and caffeine right now. You taking those antibiotics?”

“Yes, and they are upsetting my stomach.” Egon’s lip curled with distaste.

“So much for coercing Zed into making us waffles for breakfast today. You probably wouldn’t want to eat them, huh?”

“Probably not,” Egon admitted.

“How’s the fever?” Peter briefly rested the back of his hand against Spengler’s forehead. “You feel okay.”

“I’m taking aspirin as Greg directed. If there is indeed any fever, the pills are keeping it in abeyance.”

“That’s good,” he said absently, shifting in his chair. Damn, it was so unlike Egon to act like this. Peter cast his eyes down, at Spengler’s still bared belly, then frowned. Maybe it was just the light… he leaned forward to get a better look. No, there was something there. “You know, Egon, I really don’t want to make a habit of looking at you this, um, ‘intimately’, but what’s that mark right at your bellybutton?”

Egon started. “Hmm? Where?” He squinted down at himself, puzzled and frowning.

“Glasses, Spengs,” Peter reminded, almost amused; Egon abruptly snatched up the red-framed spectacles and shoved them into place.

“I still don’t…”

“It’s a weird angle – it’s almost in it. See?” Peter briefly placed a fingertip on the small red sore at the lip of Egon’s navel.

“Ah, yes. It’s an insect bite.” Egon tilted his head, considering. “It happened Monday, I think. Yes – four days ago. The day we had those multiple busts in the warehouses along the docks. It remember it itching a bit for a couple of hours, but then, I suppose I forgot about it.” There was dawning realization in his face that he seemed almost afraid to acknowledge.

“Okay.” Peter felt the anxiety suddenly crank out of him. “Now we’re getting somewhere. Egon, that’s probably what caused the whatever-you’ve-got. It’s an infection from the venom, or an allergic reaction, or something like that.”

“Dr. Venkman, you may be right.” Light sparked in his eyes as Egon let out a heavy sigh of relief.

The main business line rang, both downstairs and in the third-floor bunkroom. “Don’t answer, don’t answer, “ Peter chanted under his breath. “Let the machine get it…” But when it stopped in the middle of the third ring, Peter groaned. “Hell, one of those Boy Scout upstairs took the call. Dammit. I’m really gonna have to talk to those guys. 6:30 is not normal business hours.”

A couple of minutes later Ray, sleepy-eyed, peered down at them through the stairwell. “Hey, we got an emergency call.”

“Tell them we’re only taking emergencies between ten and noon daily. By appointment.” Peter sighed, shaking his head, resigned. “Let me guess, another gift from the Netherworld.”

“Nope, it sounds like a bunch of Class Twos, but they’re really making a mess out of an all night diner. Throwing things, chasing the cooks around the kitchen, knocking over the pie display…”

“Great. A spectral food fight to start the day.” He stood, stretching and yawning widely. “Guess we’re on. No, you don’t, Spengs.” He placed a firm hand on Egon’s shoulder, holding the physicist in place when he tried to rise. “No busts for you today, pal. You’re staying in. Put those feet up. Wait for Greg to call you back. We managed without you yesterday, we can do it today.” He smirked as he headed for the stairs. “Enjoy your time off while you can, ‘cause we’re putting you back on double-duty just as soon as Greg or whatever bug-bite specialist he calls clears you for action again.”

“Oh, I have no doubt of it,” Egon replied, feeling of good cheer for the first time in nearly 24 hours. Lucky, he thought. It’s only a reaction from a bug bite. Yes indeed. He was certainly lucky.

They were suited up, downstairs, and ready to go – more or less – a little after seven. Ray, his short red hair disobediently sticking up at odd angles, shuffled over to where Egon, now sipping at a glass of Alka-Seltzer against the antibiotic-induced queasiness, stood watching them prepare for the day’s first bust. “Hey, Egon, can you help me recalibrate the P.K.E. meters?” he asked through a capacious yawn. “We were way too tired to even think about it last night.”

“I’m surprised we remembered to plug in the packs for recharge.” Winston disconnected his and hefted it into the equipment racks in the back of their transport. Those packs never did get any lighter, but they sure did get heavier, especially the earlier – as well as the later – in the day they were summoned.

“Certainly, Ray.” Egon put down the glass, then took the proffered meter and began running it through a basic diagnostic, while Ray did the same with his own. “If I can’t assist you on the bust, the very least I can do is help you prepare for it.”

Ray was frowning at the readings displayed on the screen of his meter as he ran through his own testing protocol. “This is really weird. The baseline must be off or something…. I’m picking up some unusual emanations here.”

“As am I,” Egon admitted, peering more closely at the equipment. “This is very strange. I’ve filtered out Slimer, yet I am still reading the presence of a Class Five entity. Do you think there could be some residual contamination from one of the busts yesterday?”

“I don’t know. We didn’t think so, but….” Ray switched his meter from diagnostic mode to normal spirit detection. The small antennae quivered and trembled as a trilling issued from the apparatus. “Something’s up. Something’s here. I don’t like this.”

“Let me see.” Egon similarly switched modes, from test to detect. His P.K.E. meter reacted instantly, almost violently, squawking as the antennae popped up as close to parallel as the internal mechanics would allow. “I don’t under – “ The blue eyes behind the glasses suddenly widened in shock. “Oh my God.” Egon paled. “These readings are coming from….” The meter fell from his suddenly numb hand, hitting the garage floor with a clatter.

“What?” Peter said sharply, reacting to the hubbub. When he looked up, he didn’t much like what he saw. He quickly stowed the traps he was carrying and made tracks to where Egon and Ray stood. Winston, his face wearing a similar expression of concern, followed him a pace behind.

Ray hustled closer, his own meter extended, and, hands shaking, pointed it at Egon.

At Egon’s belly.

The meter’s screen confirmed it.

“Class Five,” Stantz breathed. “Egon, it’s coming from you.”

“What?” Peter repeated, looking from one scientist to the other in confused denial. “Are you saying… something’s… some thing… is in him?”

“I believe he is,” Egon replied quite calmly. Then suddenly he reeled aside, over towards Janine’s desk, and dropped to his knees, heaving into the wastebasket beside it.

Peter was there in an instant, steadying Spengler as the physicist vomited in miserable waves of nausea. “Hey, it’s okay, it’s okay,” he murmured, rubbing and patting Egon’s back between the shoulder blades until the violent paroxysm was finally over and Spengler sank back against the cold concrete floor, shaking.

“Oh my God,” Winston muttered, looking shocked and horrified. Beside him, Ray was pasty-faced and wide-eyed. “What’s wrong with him?”

Peter smiled up at them wanly, lifting his shoulders in a helpless shrug. “Morning sickness?”

“If two’s company and three’s a crowd,” Peter leaned over and stage-whispered into Winston’s ear, “then what do you call this?”

Winston cast his glance around the ultrasound cubicle at St. Vincent’s hospital, and at how the team plus Janine were taking up every smidgen of available space in the small enclosure that was not already dedicated to either medical or their own Ghostbusting equipment, thought for a moment, and answered, “A crush?”

Ray, beside him, tilted his head and came up with, “A cram?”

Janine, garbed exactly as she’d been when Egon’s tense call had caught her just about to leave her apartment – black exercise tights, a zip front jacket that didn’t hid her sports bra, mussed hair and no makeup – shrugged and put in her two cents’ worth. “A quorum?”

Egon, stretched for the second time in less than twenty-four hours on the examining table, sighed deeply. The hands calmly crossed over the protrusion of his belly rose and fell slowly with the motion of his breathing. “If you mean other than a rhetorical question, Peter…. I would call it a quagmire.” He closed his eyes again as Janine patted his shoulder.

Egon was so calm as to seem almost catatonic. Once he had gotten over his bout of illness back at the firehall – which he had insisted was due solely to the nauseating side effects of the medication he was taking, and not the shock of discovering his body was serving as host for a rapidly-growing, paranormal entity – he had quickly pulled himself together and begun a series of speculations. He was all for going upstairs to the lab to run a series of tests on himself and correlate the data with what was stored in their computer system, but to a man – even Ray – the rest had outvoted him and insisted he be medically checked out first.

Greg Labraccio, frazzled and as yet unshaven, re-entered the cubicle, followed by a small blonde woman who still looked sleepy and a bit unkempt, as if she’d been pulled prematurely from a warm bed. Peter did not miss the look of recognition that passed between Janine and the tech, nor did he disregard Janine’s assessment of the new arrival, or their secretary’s grin and nod that followed. The blonde, grinning back, blushed and bowed her head in embarrassment, but not without a quick sideways glance at Labraccio. Peter suddenly realized that not only must Blondie be Greg’s current girlfriend, but that his frantic early phone call to the doctor’s home number had interrupted a nice little assignation between the two. He’d have to give Labraccio hell over it… later. Definitely later.

Greg was oblivious, or at least pretending to be, as he snapped on latex gloves and prepared for a physical examination. “Gwennie, get the equipment ready while I take a look at Egon, okay?” Gwen nodded as she cast a nervous glance around, her eyes finally coming to rest on the patient’s abdomen. She looked none too reassured about what her normally routine job was going to entail today.

There was little banter as Greg began his assessment. “I’m going to use a little more pressure than I did yesterday, so let me know if this hurts, Egon.” Frowning in concentration, he poked and prodded at the distention, palpating along the growth’s length with his fingertips.

Peter edged up right behind, leaning over Greg’s shoulder and pointing at the red spot along the indentation of Egon’s navel. “There’s the mark I told you about.”

“We surmise that is its entry point,” Egon added helpfully. “You may wish to examine me further for its… pathway through my abdominal cavity.” He drew another series of deep breaths, in and out, in and out, his concentration fixed for that moment on the steadying rhythm. Janine briefly touched his forehead, her fingers brushing against the disarranged blond curl that this morning drooped almost to his eyebrows.

“I’m picking up some definition to the growth today,” Greg commented under his breath after a minute or so, not sure if he was speaking to himself or to the assemblage. “Like… limbs, or something similar.” His expression went sheepish. “Swear to God, I’m trying to remember back to my obstetrical rotation. It’s been a while since I’ve tried to discern… parts, I guess you’d call it, just by touch.”

“Let alone whatever these parts might be,” Winston replied softly. He, like Ray beside him, was on tiptoe, trying to get a good look at what the doctor was doing.

“Whoa!” Greg suddenly jumped back and jerked his hands away. “Oh, crap.” Egon looked similarly startled, his complexion pale, blue eyes snapping wide open.

“What is it?” Peter shifted forward, the other two Ghostbusters crowding more closely behind him. He fought the urge to pull and aim his particle thrower just in case it was needed.

Greg and Egon answered in unison, “It moved.”

The taut skin over Egon’s lower abdomen was rippling slightly, in even, undulating waves. “Looks sorta like you swallowed a football in mid-pass, Spengs,” Peter said uneasily, “and it’s got a helluva good spin on it.”

Janine made a face. “If that feels half as creepy as it looks, Egon, I’m never getting pregnant.” She pressed her hand over her eyes, then slightly spread two fingers and peeked through the gap.

“It’s… highly unpleasant,” he managed, “but not unbearably so.”

Gwen the technician, her skin gone from a soft peachy glow to stark white, swallowed audibly, and almost tiptoed back to the table, transponder in hand. “Dr. Spengler, we’re going to take our readings now.” Gingerly she lubricated the stretched expanse of skin, then just as tentatively she placed the head of the recording instrument against the swollen abdomen. All eyes went from the live show to the monitor attached to the ultrasound machine, waiting to see what it revealed.

There wasn’t much. Greg frowned as he regarded the vague, oblong shape that was the entity as it stirred in a slow roll. “I don’t get it – it looks almost identical to yesterday’s. It’s larger, and there’s a thicker encapsulating layer, but none of the internal structures I can feel is showing.” He pressed beside the transponder’s location, and not only did the roll almost stop as his pressure worked to arrest the motion, but the indentation where his fingers probed at it showed clearly on the screen.

“What you’re feeling probably isn’t discernable to the ultrasound machine.” Ray cleared his throat nervously as he stepped forward. “Do you mind if I check it out?”

Both Egon and Labraccio answered, “No.” Greg went on, “At this point, this is as much your field as it is mine - probably more. I recommend you glove up,” he reminded as Ray held out his hands towards Egon’s abdomen.

“No, it’s okay.” Ray sounded utterly unconcerned. “It’s just Egon.”

“And friend,” Peter muttered, looking deeply unhappy.

Ray pressed at the lump, trying to imitate the deft analysis of their physician, visibly and obviously concentrating on what was under his fingers. Then his eyes suddenly widened. “Did you feel that, Egon?” he asked excitedly. “It pressed back.”

Egon nodded. “Indeed. I wonder… Is it sentient, or was it a simple reflex?”

Gwen choked out a little moan and turned her head away, closing her eyes for a moment. Greg momentarily set his hand at the back of her neck, murmuring reassurances.

“I don’t know.” Ray shook his head. “I really wish we could see some definition – that would give us a better idea of what we’re dealing with. Hey… let me try something. I’m not sure this will work but… would someone hand me the ectoscopes please?”

Winston passed them over as directed. Stantz quickly slid them into place, then turned his gaze toward the ultrasound monitor. The breath he sucked in let everyone else know he’d been able to spot something with their assistance. “Oh man,” he muttered. “Wow. This is really something.” He rapidly shook his head. “Anyone got some paper? And a pencil? I want to sketch it to take back to the lab with us.” Silently Janine pulled a little pad and writing implement out of her purse and handed it to him. He immediately set to scribbling on it, head bobbing up, then down, as he took his view from the monitor to the paper, over and over.

“Ray, may I?” Egon asked him quietly after a minute’s silence.

Stantz faltered in his sketching. “Um, yeah, if you want to, Egon. But are you sure – “

“I believe I have the right to see what is inhabiting me at this moment.” He had never sounded so composed, so phlegmatic and resigned. Concern bright in his brown eyes – a concern that was echoed in the expressions of everyone in the confined room - Ray pulled the ectoscopes off and handed them over, helping Spengler slip them into place.

Egon tipped his head to look, as he had the day before, over his right shoulder at the monitor. His muscles tensed as he took in what the display revealed to him, then he said, “Ah…” very softly. With careful deliberation he removed the ‘scopes, then offered them to Janine, who shook her head, turning them down.

Winston took them instead, holding them in place over his eyes. He started slightly at the view of it, then gave a low whistle. “Whew, that’s one nasty little son of a bitch in there – um, no offense, Egon.”

“No offense as to its parentage taken, Winston,” Egon said dryly. His eyes were closed again and he was back to his steadying pattern of long, slow, deep breaths.

Peter passed on the experience when Winston extended the ectoscopes to him. “What Ray’s drawing is giving me a good enough idea.” He took another peek at the sketch, at the rough ovoid with what looked like skinny limbs tucked around its perimeter – no doubt the entity’s idea of a fetal position – and shuddered theatrically. “I really don’t need to see it live and in color. Greg? How about you?”

“I guess I should get a look at it myself,” Labraccio nodded, the look on his face betraying just how less than excited he was by the prospect as he found himself in possession of the ectoscopes. He positioned the device as he’d seen the others place it, dared a quick look at the ultrasound monitor, and automatically drew back at the sight. “Wow. Unbelievable.” He dropped his hands back to his patient, and began a series of tentative palpations, correlating what he felt with what he was now able to view.

Peter smiled without mirth. “You see something new every day, don’t you, Greg?”

Labraccio’s eyes darted from Egon’s belly to the monitor and back again as he rechecked the tactile definitions of the creature within Spengler’s abdomen. “I have to admit that I can say I’ve never seen anything even remotely similar to this.” He looked about through the goggles until he finally located Ray and asked, “Just how is this working?”

“I don’t know,” Stantz had to admit with a wry shake of his head. “The ‘scopes really shouldn’t be picking up something that the ultrasound doesn’t seem to be able to read, but then again, the properties of ectoplasm are unpredictable.”

Egon opened his eyes and lifted his head a bit. “Ray, it certainly merits further investigation. Perhaps we can set up a similar testing scenario when we get back to the lab.”

“Yeah, we could take some readings and –”

“Attention K-Mart shoppers,” Peter interrupted. “Sorry to disturb the test committee, but we’ve got more important things to work out right now. Namely, just how in hell are we supposed to get this thing out of him?”

“Surgical excision is what comes to mind,” Greg answered. He’d slipped the ectoscopes off, and was letting them swing lightly from his index finger. “And the sooner the better, before it gets any bigger.”

“I would like to avoid surgery if at all possible.” Egon’s level voice held an unmistakable thread of strain in its bass depths.

“Who wouldn’t, Spengs? But unless you want to recreate one of our least-favorite scenes from ‘Alien’…”

Ray spoke into the momentary silence. “I think we have to do some further research before we decide on our next step. For all we know, whatever this entity is has its own protocol for vacating its… host, when it is time.”

“I’m still going to look into a surgical removal,” Greg insisted. “You guys can play around with your meters and your proton packs and all that, but if it comes down to cutting this sucker out, we’ve got to be prepared for that.”

“And what if it begins to struggle during any surgical intervention?”

“We won’t give it enough time to do any harm. I’ve seen emergency C-sections done in two minutes flat.”

“A C-section?” Peter spoke up. “As in ‘caesarean’? Egon’s gonna have a C-section?”

Greg looked chagrined to the point of apologetic. “Approaching it from a strictly anatomical point of view, considering where it’s situated, that’s the closest match in surgical protocols. Sorry, Egon.”

Janine giggled nervously. “Payback’s a bitch, isn’t it?”

Greg continued. “And I’d want all of you and your… equipment in the surgical suite, to take care of that thing once we get it out. That’s your specialty.”

“We can do that,” Ray nodded. “Although busting something in an operating room would be a first for us, I think.

“We’re just full of firsts on this one, guys,” Winston pointed out.

“There’s a lot of details I’m going to have to work out, not the least of which is finding a surgeon who’s going to agree to do this. Gwen, you’re better at reading ultrasounds. Would you mind putting these on and seeing if it’s as encapsulated as it looks and feels to me, so I can pass that info along?”

“Um….” Her skin was transparently white, but she nodded gamely and let Greg slide the goggles over her eyes. She gave a long, hard look, then as if in a trance began to edge the transponder along the sliding, rolling lump, examining its details. “It’s… I think it’s all inside.” Her voice started to falter in her report. “Um…ah… no detectable abdominal wall penetration… Um…” she swallowed hard, swaying on the stool where she sat at the end of the examining table. Suddenly she whipped the scopes off, letting them drop with a clank to the floor. “Could you excuse me for a moment?” She stood, but in mid-turn toward the sliding door she halted as her eyes rolled back until only the whites were visible, and her legs gave way. Greg caught her as she slid limply toward the floor.

“Well, there goes another one,” Peter observed, giving Egon a sharp but humorless glance. “But at least she didn’t puke.

“Good afternoon, this is Ms. Melnitz with the Ghostbusters, and I’m afraid we’re going to have to reschedule your appointment.” Janine’s voice had a decided sing-song quality to it, after a morning spent making similar calls. “Due to an emergency with one of our personnel, we’re currently unable to…. Excuse me? Sir? Sir, there is no excuse to swear like that!” Janine mouthed a vulgarity of her own before slamming the receiver down and disconnecting the recalcitrant customer.

“Temper, temper, Melnitz.” From his desk, Peter blew out an exaggerated sigh. “Now Janine, what does that sign I gave you for your last birthday read?”

“’They can’t fire me - slaves have to be sold’,” she retorted instantly. “No, wait a minute. That was the one my sister gave me after she spent an afternoon here watching you all work me to death.”

“Not that one. ‘The customer is always right’. Remember that concept?”

“Then you call and reschedule all our appointments, Dr. V., and I’ll take care of sorting out two weeks’ worth of billings and invoices.”

“Ah, Janine, and deny you the pleasure of our customer contact? How could I do that?” He turned his attention back to the untidy stack of paperwork on his already hopelessly disorganized desk. “Or at least do that and continue to pay you.”

The main business line rang again. And again. Finally Janine, with a hard look at the top of her boss’s bowed head, surrendered and picked up the phone. “Ghostbusters, whaddaya – No sir, I did nothang up on you, it must have been an unforeseen interruption in the phone lines. Now about rescheduling….”

Peter restacked the bills – this time according to Classification of Entity Busted, as opposed to Date Bust Occurred – and tried to focus on any suspicious noises that might be coming from the lab upstairs, where Ray and Egon had retired to work. Hard to hear anything, he thought crankily, with Melnitz yapping away just a few feet from him. Maybe he should go on upstairs and keep his eye on them…. Nope, he’d promised he’d stay out of the way and work on the bills while they tried to come up with either an occult or scientific solution to the matter of Egon’s current double occupancy.

Peter jumped what felt like a foot when the second business phone line rang through directly to his desk. Janine kept on schmoozing the customer into accepting an appointment well into the next week – what a time for her to take the Customer Service axiom seriously – so he finally gave up and answered his own line. “Dr. Venkman’s your man. What’s up?”

“Peter, it’s Greg. Got some bad news for you.”

Peter felt a shiver curl deep in his stomach, but the words that left his mouth were cool. “You know, doc, I’m really interested to hear what you could say that would top a Class Five in Egon’s belly. Shoot.”

He could even hear Greg’s deep breath over the phone connection before replying. “St. Vincent’s has advised me that it won’t allow any surgical procedure on Egon to take place on its premises.”

”Huh? How come?” Peter automatically fumbled for the company checkbook and started thumbing through the register, praying that he hadn’t missed an insurance premium.

Greg hesitated a moment, then admitted, “Gwen let it slip that it what I wanted to arrange surgery for wasn’t just a growth.”

“What? She ‘let it slip’?” Peter’s temper started to bubble. “Hasn’t your squeeze ever heard of ‘patient confidentiality’? We could sue her for that –“

“Peter, she didn’t do it on purpose,” Greg instantly soothed. “She had to fill out an incident report after she passed out in the ultrasound room. Her supervisor was really riding her ass about what happened and somehow, what she’d seen came out.”

Peter’s temper slid instantly from “bubble” to “boil”. “And so now Egon’s supposed to let this thing keep growing in him because she - ”

“Peter, shut up and listen a minute.” Greg’s uncommon edge halted Peter mid-rant. “Gwen’s supervisor knew something was up anyway. I mean, the Ghostbusters come rushing into Radiology with half their equipment, take over the ultrasound cubicle, and a half-hour later the tech passes out cold? C’mon. All she did was confirm a rumor. The word was already all over the hospital that Egon’s got something in him that would put that… what the heck’s the name of that demigod you guys busted a couple of years ago on the top of your girlfriend’s apartment building?”

“Gozer,” Peter answered flatly. Absently he started to twiddle the coils connecting the telephone handset to its base around the mechanical pencil he’d been making billing notes with.

“Yeah, Gozer, that’s right – anyway, something that would put that Gozer thing to shame. It isn’t, is it? Greg’s voice suddenly sounded a little anxious.

“Who knows?” As he wearily rubbed a hand over his face, he was distantly aware that Janine had stopped talking – at last – and was doing her best to eavesdrop on his end of the conversation. “The resident mad scientists are still working on figuring out just what’s gotten into Egon.”

“Give me a heads-up as soon as they get a handle on what it is, will you, so I can get working on the medical end of it.”

“Oh, you bet,” Peter sighed again. “Provided there’s anything you can do about it.”

“Listen, Peter, the hospital’s lack of cooperation is just a minor setback. If Egon needs surgery, I’ll work it out. If I end up having to do it myself, in your lab, with a can of ether and a butter knife, I’ll do it.”

Peter paused a long moment before asking, “You’re kidding, right?”

Greg laughed. “About the ether and the butter knife, yeah. In your lab…” The doctor hesitated, weighing his words carefully. “I sure hope not, but if it’s a choice between Egon’s life and an uncooperative medical system, well…. Let’s just say I hope it doesn’t have to come to that.”

The door suddenly swung open and Winston strode in, arms weighted with two canvas bookbags filled with heavy tomes. He briefly nodded at Peter to acknowledge his return, and then started up the stairs at a fraction of his usual two-steps-at-time pace. Peter lifted his head from the telephone handset to make eye contact with him, and moved his hand in a quick “wait a minute” gesture. Winston almost stumbled and lost his balance as he came back down the few risers, to dump - almost certainly deliberately - the books onto Peter’s desk with a resounding thump.

“Greg, gotta go,” Peter finished up hastily. “Zed’s back from the library – Ray and Egon sent him there for some books they thought might give ‘em a clue about what’s going on.” With a promise to keep Dr. Labraccio posted on all further developments, Peter hung up and turned his attention instead to the waiting Ghostbuster.

Peter grinned despite the stress and tension he was feeling. “Wow, Zed, did they send you for reference books or weight training?”

“No shit, Pete.” Winston returned the weary grin. “If I’d known Ray had asked his librarian friend to reserve half the occult references available in Manhattan, I’d’ve taken Ecto. Had to get a cab back here ‘cause there was no way I was lugging 70 pounds of books back on the subway.”

Peter pulled one of the substantial volumes from the bag, turned it about and idly thumbed through it. The dust that spewed forth as the old pages crackled past his gaze sent him into an immediate sneezing fit. “Damn!” he said breathlessly. “There better be a cure for hay fever in here, along with something for whatever’s ailing Egon.” He sneezed once more, hopelessly, inevitably, and snatched up a tissue from the box on the edge of his desk, wiping at his nose. “Just what we need, more musty books in here. Just when you think those two have every possible reference they could ever need, they come up with more. I’ve never seen this one –”

His words were interrupted by a horrific cry of pain that everyone downstairs instantly recognized as Egon’s voice. In an instant Peter was out of his chair and racing up the stairs, Winston on his heels, and Janine on Winston’s, automatically heading for the sound. The trio barreled into the lab – where else? Peter thought with resignation – to find Egon on his feet but doubled over, hands braced on his bent knees, and breathing heavily. Ray, wide-eyed and anxious, was fumbling over Spengler, rapidly ripping away wires and electrodes, dropping them into an untidy tangle on the tile floor.

“What the hell?” Peter began, then figured it was better to help now and ask questions later. He followed the trail of wires to the left, reaching into Egon’s shirt and ripping several of them loose all at once. Egon let out a yelp as the adhesives tore free, taking clumps of blondish chest hair with them. “Sorry,” Peter said sheepishly, patting Spengler down to make sure there were no more offending pieces of equipment attached to him. Venkman pulled back in dismay as his hands brushed over Spengler’s belly; the entity within was rolling and, well, kicking, in a way that could only be described as angry.

Janine snagged a lab stool and dragged it over to where Egon balanced unsteadily; Winston caught Egon by the shoulders and eased him back to sit on it. The physicist was wheezing, trying to catch his breath, while the lump in his belly continued to roil and jiggle in a way that was starkly visible even through the fabric of his sweatpants.

Peter squeezed his shoulder. “Spengs, you okay?” Egon, white-faced, nodded a mute acknowledgment. Peter realized he still had the tissue in his hand and began to dab at the beads of sweat at Egon’s hairline.

“You don’t look okay.” Janine edged in at his other side, putting her arms around him. She made a face of disgust at the active swelling and snaked a tentative hand down toward it. Her fingertips pressed gently but firmly into its side, it finally slowed, then stopped, its agitated rolling. Egon drew a deep breath of relief

Winston, ever the pragmatist, asked, “So what happened?” He found a bottle of spring water in the lab refrigerator, half-hidden behind the various samples stacked tidily within, and poured Egon a cold cup, which the physicist drank gratefully.

Ray looked even more rattled by what had happened than Egon did. “We were running some tests, trying to determine the exact composition of the Chinglesche. When we ran the testing current through it, it… didn’t like it, and let Egon know it wanted us to stop.”

“But it didn’t harm me.” Egon’s voice was, as always, steady “I’m sorry I frightened everyone by crying out. I was merely startled by the violence of its agitation.”

“Like fun,” Peter said tensely. “It sounded like you were being ripped up – wait a minute.” The significance of what Ray had said finally penetrated. “Ray, what did you say that thing was? - Ching-whatsis?”

“Chinglesche,” Ray repeatedly somberly, while Egon nodded. “At least that’s the family we’ve narrowed it down to, although we don’t know exactly which member. There are dozens of types – subspecies, I guess you’d call them.”

“And a Chinglesche is…?” Winston prompted, when no more information was forthcoming within a few seconds.

Egon took a sip of water and cleared his throat before he began to speak. His eyes were very carefully averted as he explained. “A Chinglesche is one of a family of parasitic entities which reside exclusively in the Netherworld.”

“We’re sure this one came through that cross-rip,” Ray interposed.

“Figures,” Winston muttered, shaking his head.

“Parasitic?” Janine looked from Egon, to Ray, then back to Egon, eyes dropping to the momentarily-quiescent protuberance distorting his belly. “Oh my God…” Now it was her turn to make a sick sound as she squeezed her eyes closed against the sight.

“And do you know exactly which one of those little bastards we’ve busted in the past week did the deed?” Peter’s arms were crossed across his chest, an emotional barricade against the barrage of bad news.

“Well, we’ve fed the base PKE readings we got off Egon this morning into the database program, and matched it up to the likeliest candidate.” Ray’s fingers moved over the computer keyboard, calling up the record. “Last Monday, Class Five ectoplasmic entity of – as of then – undetermined species, trapped at 11:22 a.m., warehouse in Hell’s Kitchen area. Placed in Containment 1:36 a.m. Tuesday.” Ray looked up, his expression serious. “Ring any bells, guys? We had to think back, ‘cause we were out all day and did something like a dozen captures and containments, but…”

Winston asked in sudden alarm, “That's not the one that Peter named ‘Spike’, is it?”

“Please don't tell me it's that green and purple thing with the six eyes.” Venkman was practically begging. “Spun like a buzz saw with all those waving arms and legs that it shot out at us”. At Ray and Egon’s dismayed, confirming nods, Peter shook his head and moaned, “Oh, motherf-”

“We needn’t be too distressed,” Egon interrupted, too calmingly. “Now that we have an identification, Raymond and I can continue our search for a solution to my… problem. The gestation period of an embryonic Chinglesche that has been implanted in a host ranges anywhere from ten to twelve days, so we have some time.”

“Except that – ” Ray began, instantly silencing when Egon shot him a quick look.

Peter reacted instantly. “Except what?” The two fidgeted, staring silently at him.

“Okay, give.” Winston put his two cents’ worth in. “No secrets here.”

“Very well.” Egon’s tone was utterly resigned. “While the total gestation period is from ten to twelve days in length, approximately halfway through its generative cycle, the parasite… overwhelms and destroys its host.”

Janine, sucking in a sharp breath, couldn’t hold back either the small sob or the tears that immediately followed. “Oh, Egon,” she moaned, pressing her face against his neck. Absently, he reached up and patted her hair with fingers that trembled just the slightest, betraying his outward expression of calm.

Ray went on awkwardly. “It’s encapsulated now, like Greg said, outside of Egon’s body cavity. But pretty soon, it’ll move into his abdomen, then expand into his chest cavity.”

“And I’ll become as a ‘yolk’ of an egg, whereby it will draw its nutrition for the rest of its development.”

“In other words,” Peter said darkly, beginning to pace, “it’s going to eat you up from the inside out.”

Egon hesitated a moment, then briskly nodded. “In other words, yes. But,” he immediately brightened, “Ray and I have come up with several theories, some of which I plan on implementing immediately, that will buy us a bit more time.”

“It’s been five days already,” Winston pointed out. “Egon, I don’t mean to freak you out, but that clock’s ticking pretty damn fast.”

“Oh, no, a day is defined as one 24-hour period, not a calendar day. Thus it’s been barely four.”

“Still, by tomorrow you could start becoming Chinglesche chow.” Winston scowled, looking offended at the very concept.

Ray swallowed. “Egon thinks – and I agree – that if he doesn’t really give it anything to feed on, this stage in its growth will slow down.”

“And what does that mean?” Peter was practically twitching as he paced, moving in a tight, five-foot circle, back and forth, arms still crossed over his chest.

“That if I deny myself nutrition, by fasting from now until we’ve found the best way to remove it, it will find its own growth energy at a deficit. It seems at worst to be draining my energy at this stage – I’m more tired than I should be,” he admitted, “considering the relatively low levels of activity in which I’ve been participating for the past two days. The presence of the Chinglesche is the only variable which would account for that. Plus, the fever I’m suffering seems to confirm that my body is fighting the presence of its influence.”

“But you can’t not eat.” Janine sniffed and reached up to swipe at her tear-damp cheeks. “Not forever.”

“It will only be for a day or two, and, if truth be told, I don’t much feel like eating right now. By then, either Ray and I will have discovered how to remove it, or,” Egon shrugged helplessly, “we will have to opt for traditional surgery after all.”

“Well, then, we’re all just full of good news right now,” Peter interjected hotly. “Greg called, and those ignorant peasants at St. Vincent’s would be more likely to ram a stake through Egon’s heart than to let him into one of their operating rooms.” He kept his eyes fixed on the lab walls as if the solution might be pinned up there along with the rest of the scattered notes and diagrams their two scientists occasionally displayed there while working.

“Ah,” Egon said very quietly, and for a moment, there was a trapped expression in the somber blue eyes.

Janine hugged him more tightly, and whispered in his ear, “We’ll figure something out, Egon. We promise.”

“What I want to know is, how the hell did it get in you?” Winston shook his head. “I don’t remember it touching you – any of us – so how did it… God, for lack of a better word, impregnate you?

“When a Chinglesche is threatened, to guarantee the survival of the species it throws reproductive spores,” Ray explained. “It probably interpreted our proton streams as something threatening its existence, so it tossed out its spores while it was struggling to escape capture.”

Peter stopped, mid-pace, and stared at the occultist. “It throws spores?” His voice rose. “Are you listening to what you just said, Ray? If Egon got hit, then all of us might have gotten hit.” Peter suppressed the sudden overwhelming urge to rip off his clothing, stand naked before a full-length mirror, and unceremoniously grope himself all over just to make sure that nothing was poking out of him where it shouldn’t be. “We could all be walking around with a little extra something in us.”

“Oh no.” Ray paled. “You’re right. I didn’t even think of that.”

Egon blinked rapidly, looking stunned at the concept. “It’s not likely,” he tried to reassure. “Considering the advancement of my current condition, if any of the rest of you had been accidentally impregnated, you would certainly be showing signs by now.”

“God, we all got slimed within an inch of our lives on that bust.” Winston shuddered. “It was flinging that green and purple goo everywhere. Do you think that slime was the carrier for the spores?”

“Maybe,” Ray said hesitantly, in the exact moment that Egon said, “Probably.”

“The laundry,” Peter blurted. “Has anyone done any laundry this week?” The team exchanged glances, everyone slowly shaking their heads.

“We’ve been too busy – ” Ray started, but Peter interrupted him.

“Great. Our jumpsuits are probably still full of those little reproductive parasites. We’ve had Chinglesche spores within spitting distance of us every time we’ve walked past our lockers. Not to mention every time we’ve shoved our hands – our bare hands – in the basket to stuff in another set of dirty ‘suits. Shit, shit, shit.” He flung himself at the firepole, heading for the ground floor and the overflowing laundry basket in the quickest manner he knew how. A few seconds later, they could hear the solid thump of his two-footed landing, followed by rapid footsteps as he crossed the garage floor.

“He may be right,” Egon admitted. He shifted himself up off the lab stool, leaning back to counterbalance the unusual weight dragging at the front of his body. His gait was becoming affected, he noted, as his attempt to walk normally toward the staircase turned into an awkward waddle.

Janine, still holding on to his arm, made a sound of humorless laughter, shaking her head. “You’re starting to remind me of Monica when she was pregnant with my nephew.”

Egon ignored her comment and went on. “Any one of us could have been infected as recently as yesterday, providing, of course, the spores retain viability and motility for any amount of time after leaving their parent.”

“Let’s hope they don’t.” Ray’s face was pinched with concern and devoid of all humor as he rapidly began to collect an assortment of tools and gizmos to take downstairs.

Winston looked from Egon and Janine making a slower-than-usual trek across the lab, to Ray fidgeting over the workbench, and shook his head. Too damn pokey, that was for sure. “I’ll meet you all down there,” he announced, and followed Peter’s example of exodus-via-firepole to the garage level.

Peter had already dumped the laundry basket, and five days’ worth of slimed and filthy jumpsuits were tumbled across the garage floor. Despite his haste, he had found and put on an uncontaminated pair of work gloves and was gingerly plucking at the pile of fabric, separating everything out. He barely glanced up as Winston, an inquiring gaze on his face, came to his side.

“We did a load of laundry on Sunday, when we took a half-day off,” Peter explained as he stared at the mess of dirty clothing, “so Monday’s suits would be on the bottom.” He nudged one particular pile of fabric with the toe of his shoe. “This is them. Get some gloves, maybe even put on a face mask, and go through your stuff.”

“Got it,” Winston nodded, digging through his locker in hopes of finding at least one pair of unused gloves.

Janine, Egon and Ray joined them a minute later. “I’ve got flashlights, magnifying glasses, a couple of meters, and I need to bring a trap up from downstairs,” Ray announced breathlessly, but for once not from enthusiasm. He dumped the pile of equipment on the floor, near where Peter and Winston had already started to work, announced, “I’ll be right back,” and pelted for the basement.

Egon laboriously lowered himself to the floor and reached for his teal suit. Peter, crouched beside a pile of filthy brown jumpsuits, swatted him away, just avoiding grazing the extended hand with his now-contaminated glove.

“Stay away from this shit, Spengs,” Peter muttered as he took one of the flashlights as well as a magnifying glass from the ready pile. “With your luck, you’ll act like a magnet to the other spores on our clothes and they’ll jump on you like they were iron fillings.”

“There’s no evidence that Chinglesche spores might behave that way –”

“Just like there was no evidence that Chinglesche spores existed in the first place. Up. Out. Away. Go.” He tilted his gaze toward Egon, favoring him with a wan smile. “Get this – Peter Venkman telling you not to work, Spengs. Another thing we don’t see every day.”

“Very well.” With as much difficulty as he had expressed getting down onto the floor, he now levered himself back to his feet. “May I at least supervise? Since I do have a vested interest in your findings.”

“Why the hell not? Pull up a chair and have some fun.” Peter scowled at the wrinkled folds of fabric arrayed before him, reluctantly stretching out his gloved fingers to smooth the material flat. Dried slime cracked and flaked away under his touch, and he made a face. “Gross.”

“I’ll help,” Janine said very quietly, going to the locker where her own occasionally-utilized equipment was kept and pulling out all the protective gear she figured was necessary. She separated out all of Egon’s jumpsuits from the collection on the floor, then settled herself down beside the pile. Gratitude in his face, Egon rolled her chair over from behind her desk and sat down in it beside her, watching over her shoulder as she straightened out the cloth.

“What are we looking for?” Winston asked pragmatically, carefully unfolding the cuffs of his gloves to cover the hems of his shirtsleeves before he dared to touch any of the light blue fabric of his jumpsuits.

“Damned if I know.” Peter dismissively lifted his shoulders. “Spores. Whatever spores look like.”

“Kinda like seeds.” Ray, returning with an empty trap and a pair of black rubber gloves, pulled up a piece of the floor and, intensity in his eyes, got to work. “Egon and I thought that was the most logical form for them to take.”

“How big?” Winston muttered, a pair of safety goggles covering his eyes and one gloved hand in front of his nose and mouth as he bent closely over his work.

“Judging by its entry mark on my abdomen,” Egon answered as he unconsciously patted his distended belly, “approximately the size of a grain of sand.”

“Are we talking beach-in-Tahiti white powder, or nasty gritty kitty-litter?” Peter peered closely through a magnifying glass as he swept his gaze up and down the length of one dark brown, very dirty sleeve. “Big difference, you know.”

“Normal sand,” Ray nodded. “Coney Island beach sand.”

“Figures,” Peter returned. “It couldn’t possibly try to remind me of something nice – oh God.” Gulping, he suddenly pulled back from his jumpsuit as if he’d been prodded away. “Damn! I think I found some.” He gestured soundlessly at a small cluster that looked weirdly like a splat of iridescent caviar at the shoulder of his suit, very near the dark green collar. Ray scrambled over and took a close look. “Yeah, I think so. Egon?”

“Undoubtedly.” He selected a pair of forceps from the tools Ray had brought downstairs and, bending with care, plucked one of the tiny spores from the cluster and held it up in front of his glasses, closely regarding it.

“God, Egon,” Janine breathed, her eyes widening with horror, “don’t get that close to it.”

“Oh.” He blinked and drew back slightly. “Yes. Indeed.” Ray joined him in the examination, sliding a powerful magnifier in front of the sample for a more-detailed view.

“Wow,” Ray murmured, “we need to get this under a microscope. I’ll bet it’s really something when we can see all the details. Let’s take some samples and run ‘em upstairs.” He dropped to his knees next to Peter’s suit and carefully scraped the rest of the cluster into a glass specimen jar, then tightly capped it.

Winston suddenly sucked in a sharp breath. “Ray, you can come over here next.” His voice sounded nothing like his usual timbre. “There’s some on my suit too.” He pointed toward the bottom of the zipper placket of his jumpsuit - which in horrid coincidence would be, when worn, directly atop his groin - where another clump rested in a glob of dried slime.

“Gosh, that’s an awful place to find some,” Ray said softly, finding another specimen jar and scraping those examples in as well.

“You’re telling me.” It looked like it was taking every bit of Winston’s self-control to keep from groping himself at that moment to make sure everything was all right.

Peter stood up, his gloved hands held far out from his body. “That’s it. We’re burning our suits. In fact, we’re burning everything in the laundry hamper.”

Egon arched a pale brow. “That may not be necessary, Peter. I suspect we can vacuum all the spores off with trap suction. They are, after all, ectoplasmic, and should respond normally to its pull.”

“No.” Peter’s lips were a stubborn, compressed line in his white face. “It’s not worth taking the chance.” He shuddered suddenly, closing his eyes. “Those… things… were right next to my face. They could have bored into my neck… or crawled right into my mouth. And Zed… I don’t even want to know what you’re thinking.” Winston gave everyone a faint, sheepish grin that did more to reveal his train of thought than words ever could.

Ray acquiesced very quietly. “I think Peter’s right. Destroying the laundry and everything that’s on it is really the only way to be absolutely certain that no one else gets contaminated.”

Winston stood. “I’m going to go fire up the incinerator. Will those things… burn?”

“Know what?” Peter strode to his desk and pulled a book of matches from the top left-hand drawer. “I’ll happily test this little fucker right now.” Carefully he lit one match and held the fire to the tiny spore trapped in between the delicate tips of Egon’s forceps. The seedling sizzled to ash in just a few seconds. “Bingo. Get the home fires burning for us, Zed. Ray and I’ll shove this stuff in a couple of trash bags and bring it out in a couple minutes. Janine, get on the phone and buy us some new ‘suits, willya?”

“You know, Dr. V.,” she pointed out, “it takes a week or two to fill our orders. And just about every jumpsuit was in that laundry hamper – “

“I don’t care if we end up busting in nightshirts and Speedos for the next month,” he said hotly, shoving four brown jumpsuits into a Hefty bag and tightly cinching the top. “It’s worth it.” He briskly started to wipe his gloved hands on the seat of his jeans, then stopped himself, but a moment too late. “Aw, shit.” He unzipped and peeled out of his jeans, right there in the garage, and shoved them into a second trash bag. The gloves followed. “And I liked these pants too.”

“Nice shorts,” Janine said under her breath. “Pink cupids are a good look on you.”

Peter pretended not to hear her and went on. “I’m going to call Greg again. He’s checking each and every one of us out, right now, for any suspicious lumps, sores, moles, bumps, what have you. Just in case.” He lifted a wicked brow. “That means you too, Janine.”

“Me? Why me?”

“Hey,” he said casually, “if you can guarantee me – can prove to me, beyond all shadow of a doubt - that you and Spengs didn’t put your hands on each other, any time on Monday, when he might have had that suit, and those spores, on his person… you can skip the check-up.”

She scowled at him in silence. “Didn’t think so,” Peter said smugly.

“Regrettably, he has a point, Janine.” Egon’s tipped a sympathetic face up to her, peering into her eyes over the top of his sliding red frames. “It’s a most reasonable precaution. I would hate for you…” He gestured at his swollen belly. “For you to have to endure this.”

“So you’re on with the rest of us, Melnitz.” Peter gave her a sunny smile. “Remember, having you checked out is just because we care. Or,” he added as he jogged up the stairs in search of another pair of pants, the red hearts next to the cupids on his shorts a bright splash of color as he moved, “maybe it’s just payback.”

It was well after his office hours – nearly 7 p.m. – before Greg Labraccio was able to come to Ghostbuster Central to perform the requested full-body examinations. One by one, the residents of the firehouse – and their secretary – left their waiting area on the second floor to trek up the spiral stairs for the privacy of the bunkroom which had been co-opted as the site for their physicals.

Peter, first by dint of drawing the short straw in their impromptu lottery, descended the stairs in a foul mood after nearly twenty minutes. “Body cavities!” he announced irritably to everyone in general. “Do you believe it? He’s checking body cavities.” Pausing on the spiral staircase, he half-turned and shouted up the well, “You’ve got a thing for latex, don’t you, Greg? Don’t you deny it – I think you like those gloves a little too much.”

“Next!” was Greg’s only response to Peter’s tantrum. Winston obediently stood and pushed his way past the belligerent Dr. Venkman.

Peter ambled the rest of the way down the stairs and across the rec room, plunking himself down on the couch next to Egon, who was comfortably reclining, hands crossed over his enlarged belly and feet propped on the coffee table. “Egon, he stuck his hand in my mouth like I was some sorta prize stallion,” Peter continued complaining vociferously. “Looked in my ears, up my nose…. And when he said ‘bend over’….”

“I imagine that mucus membranes would present a very attractive environment for a Chinglesche spore, Peter,” Egon said calmly. “I’m certain that Dr. Labraccio’s physical exam is appropriate for the criteria and conditions we’ve presented him with.”

“Easy for you to say,” Peter sulked, crossing his arms over his chest again and propping his feet next to Egon’s on the coffee table. “Just because we already know the belly button was your point of entry….”

Greg was done with everyone – including a second, just-in-case-something-was-missed check on Egon - a little before 8:30. “Well, good news,” he announced, as he came downstairs, giving Spengler a hand around the tight spiral. “No sores. No lumps or bumps, other than, of course,” he gave Egon a sympathetic, significant glance, “the one we already know about.”

Peter released a breath of relief, his tense, irritable expression lightening a bit.

“I really think everyone is clean, although I could order that full-body CAT scan for everyone if it would make you feel better, Peter.”

“Nah.” He looked sheepish and embarrassed. “What you say goes. As long as you checked everyone’s belly buttons.”

“Even Ray’s outtie,” Greg confirmed.

“Hey!” Stantz flushed, embarrassed and defensive. “My girlfriend thinks it’s cute.”

“Who wouldn’t, Ray?” Janine soothed, resting her hand on his forearm for a moment.

“Me, for one,” Winston put in.

“And moi,” Peter added.

“Boys!” Greg cleared his throat to bring the team banter back under control. “You need to keep a watch on yourselves, though. In fact, check out each other for anything that looks suspicious.”

Peter grinned faintly. “Hey, Spengs, you want dibs on checking Janine?”

“Peter!” Both Egon and Janine chorused in chagrined unison.

“Now, as far as Egon goes….” Greg went on, and the mood instantly sobered. Peter brought his feet down with a thump and leaned forward expectantly. “Egon and I already discussed most of this upstairs, and he filled me in on everything that went on today, as far as the testing and his physical reactions. Quite frankly, I’m a little concerned. Egon, your blood pressure is up, you’re still running a fever, and I don’t like the exhaustion you’re experiencing. I think we need to get that… thing out of you as soon as possible.”

“No shit, Sherlock,” Peter muttered. Greg frowned at him and Peter had the good grace to look abashed.

“I’ve got a bunch of calls in to specialists who can help us. I’m not a surgeon; I don’t have surgical privileges at any Manhattan hospital. St. Vincent’s has technically banned us, but that doesn’t mean the right surgeon couldn’t pull some strings and get permission to perform the extraction there. And if not, there are dozens of other hospitals in the five boroughs and I’m sure that at least one of them will give us the go-ahead.”

“We don’t have a lot of time, Greg.” Peter’s voice held an uncommon note that was almost pleading.

“I know.” Greg’s demeanor was sympathetic. “Egon, I’m ordering you to bed. I don’t want anything to aggravate that…” He hesitated.

“Chinglesche,” Ray supplied helpfully.

“Right. Anything to aggravate it and make it react like you said it did earlier today.”

”I was not aware at the time that it damaged an abdominal muscle,” Egon admitted. “I thought the… pain, was merely a side effect of the rapid expansion of my epidermal layer.”

“And Ray, that means no more physical tests on Egon either.”

"Gosh, I wouldn’t even consider it,” he answered earnestly, reaching over to pat Egon on the knee. Spengler smiled back at him.

Greg went on. “I’m not crazy about Egon fasting, but I understand the logic behind it. Drink plenty of fluids though – we can’t afford to have you dehydrated.” He reached into the informal duffel bag he had carried his supplies in. “Now, I’m going to give you some sample packets of muscle relaxants and some mild anti-anxiety medication.”

“I’m not anxious.”

“Uh-huh.” Janine squeezed his hand. “And Dr. V. doesn’t wear tacky underwear.” She favored Dr. Venkman with a radiant sneer.

“I’m trying to get my office to either reschedule my appointments or have my p.a. or my partner take care of them, so I can devote my day to your situation. I’ll come by tomorrow and check on you again, Egon.” He zipped his duffel, then stood there fidgeting with it, as if there was something else he was disinclined to mention.

Egon met his eyes knowingly. “The entity has grown since this morning, hasn’t it? I noticed you taking some measurements.”

“Yeah. It has,” he admitted with obvious reluctance. “I’m sorry, Egon. We’ll get you taken care of as soon as humanly possible. I promise.”

Peter quickly climbed to his feet. “I’ll walk you out, Greg,” he said easily, taking Labraccio’s arm and drawing their physician across the rec room toward the stairway. “So that thing you were saying about ether and butter knives…” the others heard him mutter as the two moved out of sight.

“I brought you some cranberry juice, Egon.” Janine placed the iced glass with its striped straw on the table between his and Peter’s beds in the bunkroom.

Egon, warmly tucked under his bedcovers and dozing the morning away, fumbled his glasses back into place and stared up at her, still slightly fuzzily due to the mild tranquilizing effects of the pills Greg had left for him the evening before. “Ah. Thank you, Janine. I was a bit thirsty. Although I’m resistant to drinking too many liquids – the juvenile Chinglesche appears to be resting on my bladder, with exactly the kind of consequences you would expect.”

“That’s the price you pay for being knocked up, Egon.” She perched herself on the side of his bed, and he slid over slightly to give her more room. He was on his back, cushioned in a veritable nest of pillows charitably provided from the beds of the bunkroom’s other three usual occupants. The rounded lump distorting the line of the blanket covering his usually-lean form was noticeably larger than it had been the day before. Neither of them commented on the obvious.

He shifted upward, reaching for the juice and taking a small sip “It’s very quiet. Where is everybody?”

Janine took another swig of her own iced tea before she replied. “Well, Ray’s down in the basement, doing… Ray stuff. You know.” She shrugged. “Peter had some sort of business meeting in midtown that he couldn’t get out of, and Winston had to go take care of something for his mom. We had to let everything but busting slip while we were so busy.”

“And now due to my unfortunate condition, we are still unable to fulfill our appointments.” He sighed. “We’re going to be very busy yet again once we’ve resolved my…problem.”

“Hey, it’s kinda nice with it being this quiet, with all our calls rescheduled till we know what’s going on. And it’s kinda nice having you around.” She coughed. “Despite the circumstances, I mean.”

Another long pause. Egon took another sip of cranberry juice, Janine her tea. Finally he asked, “I assume there is no word from Greg?”

“I wish. The only phone calls have been from the guys, checking in. I swear, that phone rings every fifteen minutes, but it’s always one of them. You know…” She put her glass down on the floor and reached instead for a little bag. “Since no one’s around anyway, this would be a good time….” She flipped the blankets down to Egon’s hips. “Shirt up, pants down, Dr. Spengler.”

He looked at her, utterly aghast, as she shifted his shirt up and out of the way, then reached for the stretch waistband of the sweatpants he’d been forced to borrow from Ray, since his own were pulling far too tightly across his swollen abdomen for comfort. “Janine, this is hardly the time or place!”

“Oh, shut up, Egon.” She showed him the small jar of emollient lotion she’d pulled out from the bag. “It’s cocoa butter.”

“What’s it for?” He regarded the pink jar with deep suspicion in his blurry eyes.

“Pregnant women rub it on their stomachs to help with the stretch marks. You’ve…” She paused, groping for an appropriate euphemism, then finally gave up and went on. “You’ve puffed up so much, so quick, I bet you really need it.”

“Very well,” he said in the tone of the long-suffering. “If you think it’s necessary…”

With that tacit permission, Janine slid the sweatpants down and out of the way. “Oh, Egon,” she murmured, as she slung the elastic far below the bulge of his middle. Thin, irregular ripples of red ran along the distended, distorted flesh, and a large purple splotch where the muscle had been pulled – from inside, at that – the day before discolored an entire quadrant of what was normally pink, healthy skin. She swallowed as she tenderly placed her fingertips on the shifting protrusion. “Does it hurt?”

“It is much more impressive in its appearance than it is painful, fortunately.” He frowned. “Oddly, it does itch somewhat, I suppose from the rapid expansion of my dermal layers to accommodate its growth. And of course it’s very unpleasant when the Chinglesche decides to changes its position.”

She gave him an absent pat on the peak of his swollen belly. “Bet you’ll start giving up your seat on the subway to the next pregnant woman who gets on during rush hour.”

“Janine, I always have,” he answered in all sincerity.

“I know, Egon.” She smiled fondly at him. “You’re a good guy.” She scooped a palmful of balm from the jar and smoothed it over his abdomen in gentle strokes. The emollient smelled sweet and pleasant, reminiscent somewhat of chocolate kisses and honey and the hint of aloe. She could feel his body start to relax, even as the creature within him stirred into motion as it was touched. The ripples of its random motion pressed against her massaging palms. “Ick.” She made a face of distaste. “Should I stop?”

“Not unless it becomes very agitated. Ray and I agree that while discretion against aggravating it is important, we do not want to cosset it too thoroughly between now and when we are able to arrange for the extraction. Otherwise, a period of sudden activity might make it suspicious.”

“’Suspicious’? You mean that thing might know what we’re doing?”

“Perhaps,” he hedged. “There is some question about at which point it becomes fully sentient. Best to avoid any alarms. ”

“Great,” she muttered, her hands stirring again over his skin, more lightly this time.

“You know, that does feel quite pleasant,” Egon commented. “How did you know to do this?”

She laughed. “It’s a girl thing, Egon. You’re getting to look at life from the other side. My sister Monica had to spend her last three months in bed when she was pregnant with Victor - I didn’t know you then. And because she couldn’t be up and around, she got really big. And bored, too.” She closed her eyes as her hands continued to soothe over his belly, moving purely by touch. “So I went over almost every evening after work and kept her company until her husband got home. We’d talk, or watch a couple of soaps she’d taped during the day, or we’d play music for the baby…. And I’d rub cocoa butter on her stomach to fight the stretch marks.”

“Did it work?”

“Enough. She’ll never be a Sports Illustrated Swimsuit model, but she never woulda been one in the first place.” Janine’s voice went suddenly wistful. “You know, I always hoped the next time there was a bed and a big belly and a jar of cocoa butter… I’d be the one getting the rub-down.”

“Ah.” His response was measured and quiet. “Perhaps…not this time, Janine, but there will be a time.”

“Uh-huh.” She concentrated intently on the motion of her hands over his straining skin.

“I am certain.” Something about his voice made her open her eyes, to look into his. “In fact, I feel that someday… I very well may be the one returning this favor for you.”

“You will?” Her hand paused atop his abdomen. He reached up to slip his fingers between hers and hold her hand in place for a long moment. “Oh, Egon,” she began.

The telephone rang.

Janine made a sound of dismay as their hands slipped apart, and then swore under her breath as she realized she hadn’t brought anything to wipe off the cocoa butter. Before she could find anything, Ray’s voice called up from the second level, “I’ll get it.”

“He must have finished whatever he was doing downstairs,” Egon added needlessly, a little flushed as he settled his clothing back into place.

Janine mopped her hands on a tissue, leaving little flecks of white fiber on her skin, then flipped the covers back over him. “Nice of him to let us know,” she muttered.

“Hey!” Ray’s happy shout resounded up the stairwell. “Egon! Janine!” Grinning, Stantz followed his shout up the stairs. “That was Greg. He wants us to meet him in at his office in a half hour. Then he’s going to take us uptown to see a friend of his. He says she’s the perfect doctor to do this surgery.

“Oh, thank God,” Janine said, bowing her head almost prayerfully.

“Excellent.” Egon breathed a sigh of relief as well. “And may I ask what qualifies her as the ‘perfect doctor’?”

Ray’s grin broadened. “She’s an obstetrician.”

Dr. Evelyn Maner, Fellow of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, sat in her elegant, wood-paneled office just off Park Avenue, staring at the motley assortment of people arranged before her, and tried not to shake her head… or laugh.

“Greg, if I hadn’t known you since medical school, and if I didn’t know of these guys and believe in what they do….” And, she added mentally, if my granddaddy Maner on the Islands didn’t know Winston’s Great-Uncle Zeddemore, “I’d think all of you were full of it.”

Green eyes under a mop of brown hair - Dr. Venkman, she recalled - tilted in her direction with amusement. “Oh, all of us are full of it,” he nodded cheerfully. “Especially Egon. With a Class Five parasitic manifestation he picked up engaging in Unprotected Busting, that bad boy. Still think you can successfully take him through Labor and Delivery, doc?”

Dr. Maner turned her gaze to the tall, obviously-normally-slender, bespectacled blond who fidgeted in discomfort in the chair before her desk. “I don’t see why not. I’ve looked at the test results, I’ve examined Dr. Spengler, and with the exception of the nature of what’s encapsulated within his body - in its own approximation of a uterus, I would like to point out - I would term this the equivalent of a normal C-section. Medically, that is. The paranormal part is up to you gentlemen.”

The stocky man with the liquid eyes – Dr. Stantz – still looked a little worried. “But you haven’t seen it. Maybe you want to arrange another ultrasound – I can show you what it looks like through the ectoscopes.” He held up a bizarre pair of goggles for her inspection.

She shook her head. “I’ve felt it,” she reassured. “And I’ve talked with Dr. Labraccio about what he’s seen. And that’s enough. I can tell what’s in there and how best to get it out.”

“She’s good, guys,” Greg spoke up. “Evelyn’s had plenty of experience with abnormal conditions in pregnancy. She’s delivered a lot of multiples, and if I recall correctly, a couple of sets of conjoined twins?”

“Right,” she nodded. “One woman flew up from Mexico City to have me handle that delivery. Her girls are doing great, by the way,” she added as an aside to Greg, then went on “I’ve successfully managed pregnancies that no one else thought were possible to bring to a successful conclusion.” She steepled her hands, a smile just short of smug on her face. “Now is there anything else I can tell you?”

Not that she was bragging… but yeah, she was good. And when Greg had called to give her the skinny, while she couldn’t say she’d jumped at the chance, she’d certainly been intrigued by the possibility. She assessed how the presentation of her qualifications had hit home in reassuring the team and their compatriots. Dr. Venkman’s cynical yet concerned gaze had tempered into trust. Dr. Stantz still looked almost ready to burst, both with earnestness and the need to be of help, but he had settled down enough that he was at least no longer bouncing on the edge of the chair he’d perched in. Dr. Spengler just looked relieved, as did the slight redhead beside him, her hand resting ever so lightly on his forearm.

And the last person, Winston Zeddemore. It was a nice rarity to have chocolate eyes turned to her that didn’t belong to someone in a relationship so committed that “he and she” were coming to her to arrange for the delivery of their baby. She’d certainly have to check him out under better circumstances.

She brought her mind back and went on. “I have obstetrical privileges at Lenox Hill Hospital. I’ll set everything up for surgery first thing tomorrow morning. Now… ” Greg had told her they were a team of equals, but something told her that Green-Eyes Venkman took care of things in a crisis, so automatically she turned toward him and caught that gaze before she went on. “I’m counting on you to back me up in the OR. I’ll take your word for it that you know how to deal with it after the extraction.”

“And we’re counting on you,” Venkman said suavely, “to get that thing out of Egon, no matter how it might kick up and fuss along the way, without letting him get hurt.”

Spengler spoke up very softly. “Yes, I would indeed hate to be… eviscerated, should it put up a struggle at an untoward time.”

“I can do it. I promise.” She rose, extending her hand toward each in turn to indicate that the session was over. “I’ll see you at six tomorrow morning, gentlemen. And Ms. Melnitz,” she added, after a moment of groping for the name of the secretary.

“Six in the morning?” Peter raised his voice in a token protest as he pumped her hand in return, laconic grin lighting his eyes. “You gotta be kidding me.”

The group rose almost as one, Dr. Spengler levering himself out of the chair with difficulty. Evelyn, feeling immensely sorry for the dignified man, swollen as he was in a parody of a pregnant belly nearing the end of its second trimester, had to hide a smile behind her hand. And, in a bizarre gender switch, the redhead was helping the poor man to his feet. Now that’s something you don’t see every day, Evelyn thought with amusement.

Snatches of conversation followed them out into the corridor. “We’re going to need a meter for monitoring, plus at least one trap, and while I’m hoping we won’t need the packs, I still want us armed, just in case.”

“Don’t ever ‘hope’ we don’t need the packs. It’s a curse when we do. Bad luck. A hex. A - ”

“Don’t be so cynical, Peter.”

“He is not being cynical, Raymond, he is merely being cautious….”

On impulse, just before the last team member moved through the door, she called out, “Dr. Zeddemore, hang on a moment.”

He paused and turned back toward her. Oh my. “Just ‘mister’, Dr. Maner,” he answered easily. “I’m not as educated as these guys. And actually,” he paused, “I’d like it better if you’d call me Winston.”

“I can do that.” Smiling, she reached out to spontaneously touch his arm. “And it’s Evelyn. I just wanted to say, after all this is over, we’ll have to get together and talk about home. My family’s from the Islands, like yours.”

He looked her over. “Well, don’t that beat all. I didn’t know you were one of ‘those’ Maners. Wait a minute….” He assessed her again. “I know you.”

She started. “You do?”

“Think back. 1967. Summertime in Kingston. You danced a mean boogaloo when you were thirteen, Evvie.”

“Oh my God.” She put her hand to her mouth in astonishment, as the vision of the lanky teen she’d boogied with at a family party for half the night – and then at the end of received the third kiss of her young life – resolved into the tall and well-built fellow in khaki pants and a muscle tee before her. “You know, you’re right. I almost don’t believe it.”

Dr. Stantz had stopped to listen, and the round face brightened at what he heard. “Wow, it’s serendipity! You’re the best person who could be doing Egon’s surgery, and you and Winston already know each other. This is great.”

“See, Egon, I told you you’d be in good hands,” Greg put in, gently shooing the team – save Winston – out, for he knew first-hand just how easy it was to throw a physician’s schedule off. “We just didn’t know how good.”

“You know,” Winston began, “it might be a good idea to get together sooner rather than later. I can fill you in on our equipment, on what you can expect for our part of the procedure.”

“She said she didn’t need to see it,” Ray put in. Peter elbowed him hard in the ribs, and Ray protested, “Hey, what did you do that for?”

Winston ignored them and went on. “So, you free for coffee this evening?”

“Zed, that’s my line,” Peter groused good-humoredly, drawing oblivious Ray outside, as Dr. Maner told Winston yes.

Peter couldn’t sleep.

Big surprise.

He lay on his back in his bed, staring at the high ceiling of the dim bunkroom. Moonlight plucked out silvered details in the darkened room, its splash of pale light illuming the colorful afghan draped across the foot of Ray’s bed, the novel on Winston’s nightstand, the red-framed glasses resting neatly folded on the table between Egon’s and Peter’s beds … and the pile of discarded clothing dumped on the floor at the foot of his own four-poster.

Okay. He’d do his laundry once all this was over. Nothing like procrastination to really heighten the anticipation for a task.

In the midnight silence of the bedroom, he could pick out the rhythm of everyone’s breathing: Winston’s light with a touch of a snore on the inhale, Ray’s as arrhythmic and disturbed as his obviously-uneasy sleep, and Egon’s slow and almost hypnotically deep. Spengs had zonked out right after he’d taken the sleeping pill Dr. Maner had prescribed, to ensure him a good night’s rest prior to surgery. It had taken both Winston and Ray a lot longer to drop off to dreamland.

Peter had given up a long while ago and just went with the lonely midnight flow.

He glanced over at the bed beside him. Egon was curled on his side and doped into oblivion, the expression on his long face curiously tranquil despite the unrest Peter knew he must have been feeling. Perhaps the positive feedback he’d received earlier in the evening had done something to soothe his mind. Winston had returned from his coffee date with the lovely Dr. Evelyn fully confident of just how well everything would go the next morning. Theirs had been a night of swapping war stories, bust to birth, and Winston had come back eager to share the tales he’d heard with the rest of the team, to reassure them of the doctor’s confidence. While Peter secretly felt he could have gone the rest of his life without hearing of toe-curling, dramatic last minute saves of mothers certainly doomed to die, or babies who owed their lives to the competency of their chosen surgeon, it seemed to relax Egon, who listened to them with serious, contemplative concentration.

Across from him, Ray’s breathing harshened, and the random, stirring motions became more pronounced. Nightmare, Peter knew immediately, and tossed the covers back to jump to his feet. Before he reached Stantz’s bed, though, the younger man had jolted himself awake with a cry already half-stifled, as if to keep anyone else in the bunkroom from being awakened.

“Ray?” Peter said in a half-whisper as he caught Ray’s upper arm, steadying him. “You okay?”

Ray let out a slow hiss of breath, his eyes still pressed tightly shut. Gradually, as his breathing evened out, he relaxed and let his eyes slide open, taking a slow, cautious look around the bunkroom as if to reassure himself that he had reentered reality and was no longer in the dream-tableau of his nightmare. Peter could feel the residual quivers traveling through the fingers clasped around Ray’s biceps and gave him a reassuring squeeze in return

Normally, under these circumstances they’d hit the kitchen and have something to drink – cocoa when Egon was involved, tea or juice or even half a can of flat, leftover Coke – to unwind, but Janine was spending the night at the firehall, was sacked out on their couch under a pile of borrowed blankets, and the last thing Peter wanted to do was disturb her. On the other hand, they couldn’t stay here, in the bunkroom. In his own bed, already disturbed, Winston tossed once, half-lifting his head, and mumbled “Mmmm?”, not awake enough for anything else.

“Lab,” Peter hissed tersely at Ray. The mussed red head nodded, and Ray climbed to his feet, sliding into fuzzy slippers and clutching his robe around him to shuffle after Peter as he led the way.

Lights. Lights were nice to chase away the shadows, as much the tangible ones that filled the room as well as what darkened the mind. He flicked the light switch and lit the chaos within. Ray, squinting, rubbed his face hard, then sighed.

“You okay, Tex?” Peter asked again.

“I’m fine,” he answered quietly. In the harsh glare of the overhead lighting, Ray’s face looked chalky, pinched with concern. He lowered his head, mumbling, “It was just a bad dream.”

“Let me guess,” Peter put in calmly. “Live and in color, the Chinglesche gets pissed off in the middle of surgery and rips its way out of Egon like a bat out of hell.”

Ray lifted his gaze, the brown eyes shadowed. “How’d you know?”

Peter grinned. “I’m Dr. Venkman. I put the ‘psychic’ in psychologist.”

“But there’s no ‘ic’ in –“

“Don’t be so literal, Ray. Joke. Ha-ha. Funny. Remember what that is?” He lifted his shoulders in a dismissive shrug. “No, because I see it myself without even being asleep. It just goes 3-D when I close my eyes.” He padded barefoot to the lab refrigerator, fishing out a carton. “What’s the half-life on this milk anyway?”

“It should be good. I brought it up, oh, sometime last week, I guess.” Still, Peter shook it suspiciously, sniffed it, and checked the expiration date – twice – before he dared to take a swig. “He’s afraid of it too,” Ray went on, as Peter chugged and swallowed.

“Huh? He is? He’s sure not letting on.” Of course he was, and of course he wouldn’t. Peter very unhelpfully mentally castigated himself for not going the extra mile on Egon-tending as he usually did, chalking it up to denial of the situation.

Ray settled himself on a lab stool. “Well, you know how he keeps things inside.”

“Yeah. I do.” Peter noted that the rest of the lab stools were stacked with papers and tools and bits of equipment in the middle of either the repair or the enhancement process. However, a large portion of the lab bench itself was bare. He swung himself up on its scarred surface, sitting cross-legged in the middle. “You haven’t spilled any acid on here lately, have you?”

Ray almost seemed to be hiding a grin. “No, but that’s where we were running our tests on the spores the other day.” With a strangled yelp, Peter virtually levitated himself into a safe position standing on the floor. “Not that they’re viable anymore,” Ray added as the punch line to the joke.

“I take back what I said about humor,” Peter said darkly, deciding that leaning against a bare section of wall was probably his best and safest option. “And how do you know? Are you sure?”

“As sure as I can be, considering that we didn’t have any information on them and didn’t know what we were up against.

Peter responded practically, “We can’t know everything. And you yourself said we were getting a selection of critters not usually seen in this dimension, due to that cross-rip. Oh well.” He sighed and gestured expansively. “There goes the neighborhood.”

“We’re lucky that they were probably inert within a couple of hours of being expelled. So we aren’t going to have to decontaminate the entire firehall. In fact, we probably didn’t even have to burn our jumpsuits.”

Peter shuddered, and not because the floor was chilly against his bare feet. “No thanks, I’ll gladly pass on the opportunity to recycle. So what did you do?”

“Well, we came up with some testing models and a couple of protocols. We checked them under microscopes, but didn’t detect any overt evidence of motility. So, then we tried implanting some of them in ectoplasm to see if they would grow in that medium.” Ray started to color with chagrin. “We sorta tricked Slimer into acting as the host for that part of the test. They didn’t implant under those conditions, so we extracted them and gave him a pizza for his trouble. I don’t think he even knew why.”

“Ah, so at least the spud earned his keep this week. One out of fifty-two,” Peter appended cynically.

Ray continued. “Then we figured that it needed something warm-blooded to implant and grow in. Egon was already sorta... involved with one, so I….”

Peter paled. “You didn’t. Ray, tell me that you didn’t….”

“Peter,” he said with calm, scientific logic that would have done Egon proud, “we needed a warm-blooded specimen and we needed one right away, and I was the best choice. And if I’d thought I was really going to be in danger… well, I wouldn’t have done it.”

Peter dropped his face into his hands and groaned, “Why didn't you just go to Perky Pets and pick up a rat or two?”

“Gee, Peter,” Ray answered, in all sincerity, “that would have been cruel. I don’t want to hurt any innocent animals. And, as it turned out, nothing happened. I taped a couple of spores –” Peter interrupted him with a sick groan – “to my skin for about eight hours. When nothing happened, we concluded that the viability period had passed, and they no longer posed a threat.”

“You two need a refresher course in the scientific method. Isn’t there something like ‘Thou shalt not experiment on thyself, especially with nasty parasitic entities from the Netherworld’, in your Scientists’ Code?”

“I think we missed it,” Ray admitted.

“Well, go back and read it again, and make sure you sign on the dotted line. And show me when you do it, too, Dr. Stantz.” He stretched, feeling – finally – a little sleepy. About time too, as it was coming up on one in the morning. “So we all ready for tomorrow?” He stifled a yawn. “Winston and I loaded the packs and the traps before we went to bed.”

“I calibrated the meters, plus I made some adjustments to one that should help us anticipate any overt reactions on the Chinglesche’s part. It’s going to track its kinetic energy against its current baseline, which should give us and Dr. Maner’s surgical team a heads-up if it looks like it’s coalescing its power into any violent, sudden moves.”

Peter nodded approvingly, ignoring the sick twist in his belly at the thought of that… thing… making a violent move while so intimately acquainted with Egon’s insides. “Nice job, Tex. That could save the day.”

“Thanks.” He looked a little embarrassed again, in that “Aw, shucks, ma’am, just doin’ my job” manner of endless old movies, and quickly changed the subject. “Wasn’t it nice of Janine to volunteer to make up the fourth tomorrow? Just in case we need her to help out.”

“Ah, she just wants to see what makes Egon tick.” Peter began to move toward the lab door; Ray, picking up the cue, followed. “Literally.” He thought another second, then added much more charitably, “She’s been great on this. Maybe I will have to give her a raise after all.” He clapped Ray on the shoulder, voice dropping to a whisper as they reentered the bunkroom and headed for their respective beds. “Get some more sleep, Tex. See you in the morning.” Ray, sliding wearily between his tangled sheets, was out again in a matter of minutes.

And Peter continued to watch the moonlight slide across the room until, at last, the glow moved on and left him alone.

A kiss on his cheek awakened Egon into the darkness just before 5 in the morning. Janine, sleepy-eyed behind her eccentric glasses, whispered in his ear, “Time to get up, Egon.”

In the bed beside his, Peter stirred. “Hey, Melnitz,” he murmured hoarsely, “do I get a wake-up kiss too?” Even with his eyes closed – or perhaps more so because his eyes were still closed – the expression on his face managed to be almost obnoxiously salacious.

As she slid an arm under Egon’s shoulders to help him shift to a sitting position - good heavens, it was certainly getting awkward to move due to the distention of his belly – she retorted, “Dream on, Dr. V.”

“How’d you guess?” Peter made a point of groaning theatrically as he got to his feet. The dark semi-circles under his eyes made his pale skin seem almost translucently white, and Egon felt a sudden burst of empathy towards his friend. “Anyone else have a lousy night?” Venkman scratched, then yawned capaciously.

Egon shivered as he threw off the covers, even though the bunkroom was toasty-warm. Ray and Winston were now stirring into action, rising with their own weary groans and mumbled protests at the early hour.

“Damn our insurance.” Peter rubbed his face briskly, the morning stubble on his cheeks and chin making a scratchy noise as his palms moved over them. “I long for the good old days of letting you check in the night before instead of this god-awful day-of business. We coulda slept in another couple hours, Spengs.”

“Yes, it is all my fault,” he agreed tractably, since, when you got right down to it, it surely was. A curious fatalism drove him, leaving him almost numb and lacking much in the way of perspective and humor. “I will try to arrange my next parasitic infestation with more respect to your sleeping needs.”

Peter blinked at him, face falling. “Nah, I didn’t mean it. You know I’m kidding, right?”

Egon realized how defeated he must have sounded, so he carefully composed his seemingly astringent reply. “Dr. Venkman, if you start justifying your obnoxiousness toward me at this late date, I shall surely enter surgery in an improper state of mind, certain by your kindness that I am doomed.”

“Ha.” A grin appeared on Peter’s face, but the accompanying laugh sounded totally phony. “Well, gotta go get beautiful. I bet they’ve got a whole ‘nother caliber of nurses at that fancy uptown hospital.” He trudged off to the bathroom, twitching his shoulders as if to work the kinks out of them.

“How about you, Egon? You want a shower?” Janine still had an arm around his shoulder, and he leaned gratefully into her warmth.

“No, I bathed sufficiently last night.” For all that he would be exerting himself for today, certainly.

“And Pete’s hoggin’ all the hot water anyway,” Winston said in a voice still rough from sleep.

“You know that’s the only thing that’ll wake him up,” Ray put in.

“That and coffee,” Janine stood there patiently while Egon held onto her shoulder to lever himself to his feet. He wondered if he truly looked as huge as he felt. “There’s a pot ready downstairs.”

“You made us coffee? Ray’s smile was like early sunshine as he bounced out of bed. “Wow, thanks!”

“Don’t get too darn used to it, buddy.” She winked at him then turned back to Egon. “So whaddaya waiting for? Let’s get you dressed and outta here – give these guys some privacy, y’know.”

He changed out of his nightshirt, pulling on another pair of oversize sweatpants – with its drawstring now removed, no less – an extra-large tee-shirt that stretched across his belly taut as a drumhead, and threw one of his button down shirts over the ensemble to act as imperfect camouflage. “I can’t see my feet,” he announced mournfully, as he tried to look down to direct them into slip-on shoes. He toed his way around the side of the bed, feeling for and finally finding them, then shuffled them into place. Less than sartorially confident, he announced to Janine, “I’m ready. Let us go down to the kitchen and wait.”

Janine was careful to keep a steadying arm on his as she escorted him downstairs. The uncommon weight and girth in front of his normally lean and angular frame badly affected his balance, plus the 36 hours of fasting to deprive the parasite of energy had left him light-headed with hunger and none too steady on his feet. She steered him to the kitchen table, into a chair, and then tailed her way on a direct trajectory to the coffee pot.

Hmm, Egon noted, his ankles were swelling too. Hypertension, he catalogued. He snagged another chair and carefully propped his legs up across it. Oh dear. Next thing would be varicose veins, wouldn’t it?

Janine poured herself a generous cup of coffee. “Want some? Or some water?” she offered.

He sighed. “No, I mustn’t have anything in my stomach the morning of surgery.”

“Ooh, yeah, that’s right. Like when I took my cat in to get fixed – oops, I didn’t mean it to sound like that.” She heavily sugared her mug, then pulled out the chair next to his and plunked herself down. “Mind?”

“Of course not.” Briefly, he cupped his hand around the one of hers that was wrapped around the warm mug, and squeezed. She smiled back.

From upstairs, Peter’s discordant warbling still drifted down, the shower spray muting his words. The tune sounded a bit mournful this morning, and Egon frowned. Then the door-banging started, counterpointed by Winston’s demand. “Get outta there, Pete, you’ve been in long enough.”

Ray, a change of clothing in-hand, jogged down the stairs on his way to the small guest bathroom, his oversize bath sheet slung around his body like a sarong and determination on his face. He closed the door behind him, and a split second later the toilet flushed, diverting the water from the upstairs bathroom. Another second later and Peter let out a yowl as the firehall’s peculiar plumbing system turned the shower spray ice-cold and half-strength. The swearing that followed was nowhere near the neighborhood of “mournful” as Peter let everyone within earshot in on how just displeased he was by the occurrence. But the door upstairs yielded, and Peter’s griping about now being wet and cold trailed away as he slunk back into the bunkroom.

Diversion over, Egon and Janine turned their attention back to each other. “Egon, you called your mom and let her know about this, didn’t you?” Janine’s eyes were bright with concern.

He dropped his gaze from hers and started picking apart a leftover napkin. “Not as yet,” he admitted. “I didn’t wish to worry her.”

“Egon. That’s what moms do. It’s their job. She’d want to know.”

“Please. Don’t tell her. No, not until we are sure… all is well.”

“Egon – “

Anger suddenly gathered in him, its wave breaking over his control. “No.” Her eyes went wide at the choler in his tone and she drew back slightly “Come now, Janine, how am I to explain this to her? ‘Mom, a parasitic entity that very well may kill me has embedded itself in my abdomen where it is undergoing its growth process. I am essentially pregnant. Aren’t you proud?’ I doubt very much if this is what she expects when she prods me about starting a family and producing her a grandchild!”

“Egon, calm down,” she tried, her brow furrowing with concern. “You don’t want to get upset right before your surgery.”

He ignored her, pushing to his feet, and started pacing in the same way that Peter was wont to do when worked up. “This is ridiculous, Janine,” he spat. “Look at me! I am on my way to have a gynecologist deliver a paranormal fetus that has taken up residence in its self-grown uterus within my body! It’s as if I have tumbled into an absurdist play by Ionesco or Beckett.”

“’Waiting for Venkman’?” Peter padded downstairs on near-silent sneakers, eyebrow quirking as he entered to the tirade. “It’s hormones, Spengs.” He clapped the physicist on the shoulder as he passed on his way to the coffee pot. “They’re causing your mood swings. And know what else?” He half-turned and winked as he poured most of the strong brew into a mug almost the size of a soup bowl. “I hear the postpartum depression is even worse.”

“Peter,” Egon warned, starting to pivot, but he suddenly wavered, wobbling, as dizziness washed over him and a cold sweat began to prickle at his hairline. “Oh…” he managed breathlessly, blinking rapidly against dark spots that swam before his vision. “This does not feel… promising.”

Peter’s flippancy immediately vanished. “Spengs, what’s wrong?” His voice was sharp and a couple of anxious tones higher.

“Egon?” Janine’s voice was similarly apprehensive as she pushed her chair back from the kitchen table, rising. “Are you okay?”

“I’m not sure. There seems to be some sort of… pressure, within.” He pressed folded hands to the protrusion at his middle. “I think… it’s begun moving inward.” He tilted, sinking to one knee as he tried to stifle a moan.

Peter started forward to help, but stopped dead as the mug in his hand slopped hot coffee over his fingers and he stared around, frantically looking for somewhere to dump it out the way. Janine, at least, went instantly into action, shooting forward and grabbing Egon by the upper arm to steady him before he pitched completely to the floor.

Peter finally discarded the cup into the sink and bounded to Egon’s other side, steadying him between them. “Hey, hey,” he said quietly, trying to tease, although his eyes were stark. “Didn’t we tell you not to get worked up, Egon?”

“Breathe in, and out, and in, and out….” Janine was murmuring at Egon’s other side, trying to calm him.

Peter turned slightly away and hollered up the stairs, “Hey! Guys! Now! We got a problem.” Together, he and Janine gently shifted Egon upwards, back into the kitchen chair, where they fussed over him with anxious futility as he calmed his breathing.

Ray was still buttoning up his shirt as he rushed out of the guest bathroom, his hair and neck damp from his wash-up, his face shiny, scrubbed and shaved. “Egon, what happened?”

“Take a guess,” Peter answered for him. “That thing’s making its move.”

Winston pounded down the stairs to join them, his brow furrowed with concern. “Want me to call an ambulance?”

Egon finally found his voice again. “No… just get me there, now.” The hand he had pressed to his belly was shaking.

“You bet, and with all the bells and whistles going, too.” Winston rushed to the ground floor, Ecto’s keys jingling in his hands as he moved.

“Can you stand, Egon?” Ray was prompting, a gentle hand on his friend’s shoulder. “Or do you need us to carry you?”

“I’ll try.” He took a deep breath and with Peter at one side, Ray at the other, he managed to rise shakily to his feet.

Janine dropped back to catch up Egon’s overnight bag then marched forward, the expression on her face stoic as she commanded, “C’mon, guys, let’s get this show on the road.”

Egon lay on his back on the gurney, doped up and half-insensible, staring at the blur that was the ceiling so far above him. Shortly after he had arrived at the hospital, the creature in his abdomen had finally ceased to stir, but he didn’t find that comforting; there seemed to be an expectant thrumming within him, almost as if it were gathering itself for an imminent attack.

An orderly brushed back to his side, the anxious look on her face imperfectly masked in a professional demeanor. “All ready for surgery, Dr. Spengler?” she tried as she unlocked the wheels and began to push him briskly down the hallway.

Oh, please. He could not keep the asperity from his reply. “As I have already been poked with needles, prodded by a dozen hands, then for God’s sake prepped for this procedure – as well as had my glasses taken from me by force – what might be your expert opinion?”

“I guess that would be a ‘yes’ then,” she replied in a distracted murmur, her eyes fixed on the route ahead toward the operating room.

Dr. Maner had rushed in to intercept him at the emergency room and have him whisked up to Obstetrics, in hopes of avoiding the infliction of undue attention on Egon due to his unusual condition. Not that that had necessarily worked, for as she’d examined him in a curtained alcove, a gaggle of surgical and obstetrical residents and interns – and, for all he knew, every other curious staff member of the hospital, up to and including Admissions and Clerical – had managed to gather around to observe.

“The entity is still outside Dr. Spengler’s abdominal cavity, as we had hoped,” she had announced, “but the encapsulation layer has thinned and the bulk of the creature has shifted toward his midline. There’s been some mild bleeding as well as slight compression of Dr. Spengler’s internal organs, so I would say we are performing this procedure not a moment too soon.”

And now Zero Hour was at hand, and he was being wheeled down the hallway. Ahead, muffled, he heard faint laughter that could have been Peter’s, had it not been so tight. On that pell-mell drive uptown to Lenox Hill, their loud conversations – almost like the tension breaking banter before what they knew would be a difficult bust – had had an edge to it. Whistling in the dark, Egon knew, that all would be well. And their eyes…. The eyes must indeed be the windows into a person’s soul, for he could meet their gazes and know instantly their every thought, every concern, countered by their determination to protect their friend, to see him through this, to be at his side despite the dangers, as they all placed themselves on each other’s behalf so many times in the course of their daily work.

They would not let him down.

He sighed and swallowed and listened to the squeak of the wheels as he was moved down the hallway.

The gurney turned and pushed its way through a set of balanced, swinging doors. Ah, he deduced as he now found himself staring up at a high ceiling with an array of overhead equipment and bright lighting instead of the bland hospital hallways, the surgical suite. He shivered, suddenly very cold under the sterile sheets that draped him.

“Hey, the man of the hour!” Peter, garbed in green scrubs from head to toe and his proton pack draped loosely with something clear - presumably to prevent the equipment from contaminating the austere surgical environment - eased himself away from the wall where the team had gathered to wait for the surgery to start. Peter’s green eyes crinkled over the top of the mask that covered his nose and mouth. “Can’t touch you, Spengs, but pretend I’m giving you a high-five for luck, okay?”

Winston was leaning over him now, with his chocolate skin, eyes dark as coffee beans and his expression warm with compassion. “How ya doing, pal?”

Almost nonsensically he answered, “They took my glasses.”

“We’ll make sure they’re in your room when you get back there,” Ray answered him seriously, brown eyes sober and sincere as only Stantz’s could be.

A flash of pink poking out from beneath yet another set of surgical scrubs grabbed Egon’s attention, and he rolled his head to the side for a better look. Janine. Yes, Janine would be the only one whose busting suit had not been destroyed the other night in the Great Uniform Purge. “You with me, Egon?” she was asking him. “Good luck.”

Her lovely eyes; aqua as the ocean, a deep sea of feelings. He could sense her smile, read it in their sweet upward tilt, the fluttering of her lashes. He was speechless, when there was so much he could – should – say. So instead he merely smiled up at her, and despite the surgical mask and the gloves covering her small hands, there was no mistaking the kiss she blew to him.

Another person stepped forward, and it took Egon’s blurry vision a moment to resolve the image. “Ah, Greg. I didn’t expect you to be here.”

“Think I’d miss this?” Greg’s blue eyes sparkled. “This is one for the record books.”

“We ready, people?” Dr. Maner was there, her cappuccino complexion an attractive contrast between the elegant taupe of her surgical mask and cap, her bright black eyes good-humored yet alert.

Peter had to have the last word. “Hey, Doctor M., make sure you use that bikini cut on Egon, okay?”

“Yes, ‘Doctor V.’,” she responded dryly. “Greg’s told me to respect your professional expertise. I promise I’ll do my best.” A titter rolled through the operating room at the exchange, and Egon wondered that he did not feel further mortified. But no, he was not.

They were fearless, all of them, Peter and Winston and Ray and Janine, and they were watching him. They’d keep him safe.

Two members of the surgical team slid him carefully onto the operating table, then there was an injection, and the world slipped away.

“He’s under,” the anesthesiologist announced.

Dr. Maner stepped before the partially-draped mound of bared belly, yellow from the antiseptic wash, and began to address her team. “We’re going to attempt a low transverse cut to minimize surgical trauma to our patient. But be on your toes, people. I don’t have to remind you that we are not going to experience our typical outcome in the course of this procedure. Plus we may have to move fast and change our plans. Everyone got it? Good.” Requesting her scalpel, she began.

Peter cleared his throat and, low-voiced, addressed their own team. “One of us really needs to observe.”

“I’ll do it,” Ray spoke up instantly. The PKE meter in his hand beeped in soft counterpoint to the subdued sounds of various surgical monitors.

“Ray,” Peter countered, “you get queasy if you have to mop up after a bloody nose – “

“That’s not true,” he countered, his expression contradicting his words.

Peter shook his head. “Just keep your eyes on that meter, Tex, and let us know if ‘Son of Spike’ in there starts getting any clues about what’s going on outside. I’ll monitor.” Peter gulped audibly and took a half-step forward.

“Talk about queasy at the sight of blood, Pete. You’re king of it.” Winston’s hand on Venkman’s shoulder gently eased him to a stop. “And Egon’s? Not a chance. You’ll be out cold on that floor before you know it. I’ll do it.”

“Well, I really didn’t want to share the fun, but if you insist….” Peter looked ineffably relieved.

I’ll monitor too,” Greg spoke up. “I can give a play-by-play if you like.”

“Why don’t we just go on a need-to-know basis, Greg?” Peter countered.

The distended belly quivered in a rolling motion just under its taut surface. “It’s moving,” one of the nurses reported in an awe-struck voice.

“She’s through the dermis…about to incise the subcutaneous fat layer…”

“Egon doesn’t have any fat,” Janine defended automatically, craning for a glimpse of what was going on behind the blockade of backs before her. “He watches what he eats.”

“Encapsulation exposed. At least I think that’s it.”

“Yeah,” Winston confirmed, “that’s it. There’s a family resemblance.”

Someone’s hushed voice pierced the tension. “Oh my God… it’s purple… and green…”

Ray suddenly spoke up in concert with an increased beeping from the meter in his hand. “I don’t like this. I’m picking up a concentration of kinetic energy. I think it’s aware that something is going on that it might not like.”

Peter raised his eyes to the obstetrician, and stated quietly, “Doctor M., might be nice if you can step on it.”

“Doin’ the best I can, Doctor V.,” she answered with equanimity, her hands working quickly just out of his sight. “Forceps,” she requested, and a nurse efficiently slapped them into her waiting hand. “Let’s see if I can get this whole thing out in one piece, capsule and all.” After a moment, almost to herself, she murmured, “No, no, can’t do it… one of its limbs is partially embedded in the left rectus abdominus muscle, like it’s hanging on…” She put the forceps down, took a deep breath, and carefully slid her gloved finger inside the incision, probing. Winston, usually utterly unflappable, groaned at the sight and, closing his eyes, turned away. “Let me see if I can work it loose,” she continued evenly.

A slimy tentacle suddenly shot upwards through the incision, waving delicately before her. “Mother of God,” she breathed, drawing back slightly, but still intent on her task. “Okay, it’s free now.” Armed once again with the forceps, she closed the tips of the surgical tool around one end of the partially-exposed entity and, with a steady pull, gently began to manipulate the quivering, translucent blob from Egon’s body.

“It’s out,” Greg finally announced, but the increasingly frenetic beeping of Ray’s specially-configured PKE meter abrogated the feeling of relief anyone might have been experiencing.

At Dr. Maner’s terse direction, a nurse held out a steel basin to her, and she carefully slid the squirming Chinglesche into it “Congratulations, Dr. Spengler,” she said under her breath, “you’ve just given birth to an eight-pound bouncing baby… thing.” She held latexed hands dripping with multicolored residue away from her body. “What is this stuff?”

“Ectoplasm,” Peter answered tersely, taking the basin away from the nurse and depositing it on a second surgical table halfway across the room. The rest of the Ghostbusting team – including Greg – followed him, to flank themselves watchfully around where the Chinglesche now rested. “The primary building block for the Netherworld’s finest.”

“Nasty. I need fresh gloves – I can’t finish up like this.” One of the team scrambled to help her quickly replace them, then she turned back to Egon, all business again. “We’ve got some bleeding going on – cautery, please.”

Across the room, the creature was shifting fitfully in its stainless steel bowl. Winston caught Peter’s eye. “Do we want to try to trap it now before it gets any more active?”

Peter deferred to science. “Ray? What’s the word?”

His eyes were fixed on the quivering meter. “We don’t dare, not until everyone’s out of here. These readings show that it’s got enough energy to make things pretty busy for us if it panics when it feels the trap.” The anxiously whispered words were counterpoint to the brisk surgical instructions from Maner and her team.

“Can it ‘panic’?” The slice of forehead visible above Janine’s surgical mask was pale and furrowed with concern.

“Oh, yeah,” Ray confirmed sadly. “These readings are comparable to its… parent’s. All it’s lacking is its size. For all intents and purposes, we have to consider it as dangerous as an adult.”

“And that bastard sure gave us a run for our money.” Peter wrenched his gaze away. “Doc, how long to finish up?”

Over her shoulder, Dr. Maner called, “I’m doing a saline lavage of the vacated cavity, to make sure he’s clean. Then we just have to close him up.”

“Make it snappy.” Peter shifted uneasily, then reached over his shoulder and preemptively pulled his thrower. Ray, Winston and Janine followed suit. Greg backed up slightly.

The encapsulation began to break down, little pieces shivering in tiny avalanches down the flank of the newborn Chinglesche. Another long, tentacular limb worked its way out of the remains of the ectoplasmic shell and began to slither upward, waving its small hooked appendages in the air.

Winston, holding his breath, pulled a trap off his belt.

Another limb broke free and waved like a pennant in the air. The Chinglesche began to uncurl from its fetal position, oozing up the side of the steel bowl. The bulbous eyes at its center blinked in reaction to the bright lights of the operating theatre. Someone on the surgical team gasped, “Oh, my God.”

“People! Attention on the patient, please!” Dr. Maner’s voice was stern. “Anyone who’s going to freak can leave this room right now.”

“Doctor M., we need to get him – everyone – out of here right now.”

“I just need two minutes more,” she muttered, her hands moving briskly to close the incision. “We’re almost done.”

“Okay, Spiky Jr.,” Peter discouraged it, low-voiced, “hang loose, just give us a two-count here and in no time at all we’ll have a nice warm dark little place to put you back in…”

The last of the encapsulating structure destabilized into a drippy goo at the bottom of the bowl, and the Chinglesche began to rise, unfolding at least a dozen more limbs as it levitated. “Ray….” Peter questioned anxiously. “This thing gonna explode on us?”

“No, it’s…aware, and active, but there’s no excess stress levels on the meter. Just watch it….” Ray’s voice was strained and concerned as he kept one eye on the readings, the other on the hovering entity. Shimmering ectoplasm dripped from its limbs, some falling with a soft patter back into the bowl, the rest splashing onto the table and the tiled floor of the operating room, as it gently began to swing back and forth in mid-air.

“Done,” Maner announced. “Let’s get Dr. Spengler out of here and into Recovery. Now.” The surgical team moved at double-speed to disconnect the various equipment and monitors that had tended to Egon, then shifted him back onto a gurney and whisked him – along with themselves – out through the swinging double doors. The doctor hesitated for a moment longer, addressing the Ghostbusting team. “It’s up to you now, boys and… girl. And try not to wreck my room.”

“No promises there,” Peter said absently as she turned on her heels and departed. The Chinglesche was still hovering in front of him, aimlessly flexing and contracting its multicolored limbs, and Peter incongruously thought of a butterfly newly hatched from its cocoon, drying its wings. “Okay, everyone powered up? Zed, let’s try to take it quietly… open your trap.”

Winston, trap in hand, aimed the small containment unit directly at the Chinglesche and deftly triggered the manual release. As the fan of white light erupted from the sprung doors and began to envelop the entity, Ray’s meter began to shriek an alarm. Ray himself started to shout, “Look out!” but with a keening cry, the infant Chinglesche elongated against the trap’s suction and rose toward the ceiling.

“It’s making a break!” Peter snapped. “Hit it!” Three particle beams split the air with their light, pinning the juvenile entity in their pull, and for a second it stalled in their grip. Winston dropped the trap to the floor and kicked it directly under the struggling Class Five. For a moment it hesitated, hovering, fighting, tearing itself toward freedom even as the trap pulled it back toward darkness.

It suddenly began to spin like a whirligig, instinctively fighting against them as its parent had, flailing wildly against the streams and bending their light as it moved. Janine went off-balance as her particle stream was tugged sharply downward by one of the thrashing limbs, and she dropped to her knees with a hard thump. “Son of a bitch!” she hollered. Greg, looking askance at the chaos of particle blasts and dripping ectoplasm, carefully edged his way to her side to help.

“It’s not nice to talk about your boyfriend’s kid that way, Melnitz!” Slime was spraying everywhere, coating the operating room with a thin glaze of iridescent purple-green. Peter ducked and just missed being nailed by a bowling ball-sized blob of slime. “Keep away from that shit! We don’t need any more spores in any of us.”

Ray, trying to fire into the creature’s eyes, rapidly shook his head. “It’d have to be born pregnant – like a tribble –– to be throwing spores now, and I don’t think that’s too likely.”

“And how ‘likely’ was it that first time?” Winston had pulled his thrower and added his stream to the battle.

“Janine, you okay?” Greg asked, doing his best to resist the impulse to run and hide behind the sticky surgical equipment.

“I’m fine – I just can’t balance with this damn pack – “

“Look out!” Ray shouted again. The Chinglesche wrenched free of their streams and shot across the room, aiming for Janine and Greg.

“Duck!” Peter added, whipping his beam around and trying to catch the creature in mid-flight.

Greg managed to get himself out of the way, but Janine was still wobblingly upright when the Chinglesche flung itself hard against her chest, knocking her flat. With an “Oof!” she landed on the floor on her back, awkwardly sprawled over the pack, limbs flying akimbo. The creature pounced, grabbing and pinning her with its skinny, tensile appendages. Two of the hooked limbs dug into her knees and forced her legs apart, while a third weaved and bobbed like a striking cobra, aiming for her center. She screamed and struggled, trying to throw it off, as the multiple arms flailed in a phalanx around her.

“No, you don’t!” Ray flew through the air at the creature and, tackling it, pulled it off her with his lunge. He hit the floor hard, head rebounding off the tile, and he went limp, dazed. The Chinglesche seized him, the limbs that had clawed at Janine’s body now pinioning his head. Another tentacle pried his mouth open and tried to shove its way inside.

Winston pumped up the power on his particle stream and blasted it off Ray just in time. “What the hell’s it doing?” With a shriek it rose toward the ceiling, spinning faster and harder, those bulging eyes at its middle staring balefully at its attackers.

“How would I know?” Peter circled around, spraying it with protons to the max. “Trying to reimplant itself, maybe? But whatever you do, don’t let it get close to - ” It suddenly surged toward him and Peter minded his own words and briskly sidestepped. His heel hit the edge of a pool of ectoplasm and the sidestep turned into a spill as he slammed hard into the wall, the thrower flying out of his grip. Instinctively he dove to the floor and the Chinglesche just missed him, itself rebounding off the wall.

“Ow! Ow ow ow!” Peter cradled his left wrist against his chest, swearing as he tried to flex his fingers. “I think I broke something, dammit!” His swearing went on, increasing in intensity and volume as he tried to recapture his particle thrower one-handed.

Winston caught the Chinglesche again with his beam before it had another chance at anyone else, and flung it back against the wall, managing to pin it there by tightly focusing his beam at full power directly at its center. Its shrilling as it spun wildly in place sounded unnervingly similar to the wails of an hysterical infant.

Ray groaned and stirred feebly. Greg left Janine, where he’d just managed to haul her to her hands and knees, and went over to him.

“You hit your head, Ray – don’t try to get up.”

“The Chinglesche,” he muttered, blinking dizzily. “Gotta…” There was blood at the corner of his mouth where one of the hooks had torn his lip.

“I can’t hold it alone!” Winston snapped. “Anybody feel like giving me a hand here?”

“Greg, grab Ray’s thrower!” Peter managed to get a decent grip on his own weapon, shoving the hilt under his arm to brace it, and added his firepower to Zeddemore’s blasts. “All you have to do is aim and hit the button!”

In the interest of self-preservation, Greg immediately obeyed. “Got it, Dr. Venkman!” He grabbed the hose connecting the thrower to the pack and hauled the business end of the equipment toward him.

“Oh, watch out for the recoil!” Peter added, just as Greg was about to press the activation button.

The doctor’s eyes widened. “Thanks for remembering to tell me!” he shouted back, bracing himself for the kick.

“Anytime!” Peter’s grin was as cocky as Greg had ever seen it. “Hey, Labraccio, who’s the expert now?” Greg mouthed something not-very-nice back at Peter, but he was grinning too.

“I think we got it!” Winston crowed, as Greg’s stream hit the flailing entity and locked it in place. “Time to go nighty-night, Junior!”

Janine, still on hands and knees, managed to reach up for her trap and detach it from her gear. “Trap OUT!” she screamed, flinging it forward, and pounded the activation button with her fist.

Light flared again, but this time there was nowhere for the Chinglesche to go. “Pull it down, guide it…” Peter was chanting. Somewhere along the way he’d lost both his surgical mask and cap, and the sweat and ectoplasm liberally coating his face dripped off the point of his chin. He dragged a grimy sleeve over his eyes to clear his vision as he began to sing in a deliberately discordant falsetto. “’Lullaby and good-night’, close those eyes’ – all six of ‘em! – ‘and sleep tight….’”

With a sorrowful wail, the creature elongated toward the trap, no longer fighting, its wiry tentacles waving like seaweed in a current. For all its frenetic earlier struggles, it surrendered easily, collapsing into the blaze of light that enveloped it.

Greg, staring wide-eyed at the mayhem and disorder surrounding them in the aftermath, broke their silence. “Wow. Is it always like this?”

Peter shipped his thrower and shook his head. “Nope, usually it’s worse. Comparatively, this one was a piece of cake.” Absently, he massaged his swelling wrist, frowning at it. “At least we’re in the right place for our casualties.”

Ray slowly sat up, and Greg turned his attention back to the dazed Stantz, advising, “Take it easy, there, Ray. Looks like you were out for a minute.”

“No, I’m fine,” he protested, rubbing a rising knot on his forehead as his breathing steadied. Then memory struck him and he stared around, searching. “Janine! It didn’t… get into you, did it?

She’d pulled off her pack and was now sitting cross-legged in a comparatively clean section of tile. “No.” She fingered the holes torn in the knees of the surgical scrubs as well as the pink jumpsuit underneath, then slid her hand up one thigh to examine a rip in the cloth of the scrub pants right at the crotch. “But it sure tried. If it had gotten any closer I think it could have done a Pap smear – ”

Peter shrieked in dismay and clapped his hands over his ears. “Too much information!”

Winston shook his head. “Okay, kiddies, let’s wrap this show up.” Full trap stowed safely on his belt, he extended a helping hand to Janine to lever her up from the floor. “Gonna need a helluva clean-up in here. This hospital has a Haz-Mat team, right, Greg?”

Greg was similarly aiding Ray to his feet. “It should.” Labraccio tilted his head, listening to the alarms shrieking in the hallways. “They – and Security – are probably on their way already. What a mess.” He wondered what kind of spin Lenox Hill’s Public Relations department would put on this incident, or if it would outright attempt to suppress all news of the inglorious operating room bust.

“I’m betting Doctor M.’s not gonna be too happy with us,” Peter assessed ruefully.

“Not too damn likely,” Greg conceded, wondering if Evelyn was going to blame him for this outcome.

Peter, eyes full of mischief, already had a handy solution. “Butter her up, Zed. Use that Caribbean charm on her.”

“Hey,” Winston said easily, looking not unpleased with the order. “I’ll do my best.”

“I’m going to take you three down to the E.R. and have you looked at.” Greg’s gesture encompassed Peter, Ray and Janine, all of whom definitely bore the war wounds of the bust.

Winston nodded. “I’ll finish coordinating the wrap-up and meet you there in a bit.”

“And we all should go through some kind of decontamination,” Ray added, taking a tentative step to make sure his balance was steady.

“Hey, I thought you said more spores weren’t likely, Tex,” Peter said mournfully as their foursome moved towards the operating room’s doors. Outside, through the small window to the corridor, they could see a crowd of hospital personnel milling about anxiously, waiting for some sort of all-clear signal.

“Well, they’re not, but don’t you think it’s better to be safe than sorry?” Ray’s eyes sparkled with innocent concern.

“Yeah,” Peter sighed. “But, please, just don’t make me sacrifice another pair of good jeans.”

Flat.

His stomach was flat again.

Well, relatively so, at least.

Muzzy from an injection of post-surgical Demerol, Egon lay curled on his side, his hand resting lightly on the bulky bandage low on his belly, and smiled. Every so often, he stroked his palm up and down the length of his abdomen, up and down, relishing the return of the normal, masculine, planes of his body. Were new mothers, he wondered, while in their genuine postpartum daze, similarly and irresistibly drawn to re-examine their physiques and reacquaint themselves with their usual contours?

Of course not, he woozily chided himself. They had their newborns to concern themselves with, small, sweet-smelling, mewling innocents to cradle and caress and hold to their breasts in maternal rapture. What he had to show for his efforts was a Class Five ectoplasmic entity in a trap.

Thank God. Better there than in his body.

He slid his hand over his belly yet again and sighed with relief.

He vaguely remembered hearing a ruckus while he was in the recovery room, the shrilling of hospital alarms, rushing footsteps and babbling voices as people raced past. In a dim, unfocussed way, he’d been concerned about his teammates, but had been too groggy to verbalize it. Then it had quieted again, and he had lain there, confused, concerned and alone, until a nurse had finally crept to his bedside with a whispered message. “Dr. Spengler, Dr. Venkman wants you to know that, um, ‘they got the gooper’. And they are fine, and will be up to see you shortly.” Only then had he allowed himself to rest thoroughly, falling into a sleep so deep that he had even missed the transition from the recovery room to his own private accommodations.

Thankfully, they had had the good graces not to place him on the maternity floor. It would have been in accord with Dr. Venkman’s peculiar sense of humor to arrange to torment him with that additional indignity.

The door to his room opened cautiously. “Hey, Spengs,” a familiar voice stage-whispered. “Up for company?”

“Ah, Peter,” he breathed gratefully, lifting his head and squinting up to see his team – his friends – tiptoe in. His lack of glasses left them quite out of focus – and there were a few other figures behind them whom he could not discern in the slightest – but even so, he could see they were intact.

Peter virtually swaggered over to the bed, full of that post-bust cockiness that as much annoyed as endeared him to everyone. “How you doin’, buddy?” He firmly caught Egon’s hand in his own, squeezing it heartily.

Egon returned the press of fingers with a somewhat feeble squeeze of his own. “I’m fine,” he managed. “Sore, but…” He saw a plastic brace on Peter’s left wrist, and frowned in concentration. “Oh, dear, you’ve been hurt.”

“Hey, not even a flesh wound,” he shrugged dismissively. “I slipped in slime and sprained my wrist.” He beamed. “That kid of yours is a Spengler to the core – it didn’t give me an inch.”

“It’s not my ‘kid’,” he corrected irritably, starting to sense which direction their teasing of him would take over the next few months.

And not, he mentally conceded, as if it wasn’t a thoroughly and painfully obvious target for him to be wearing anyway.

“That’s right,” Peter said brightly in his best doctor mode. “Current studies recommend against both the use of slang and baby talk in communicating with your infant – “

“Oh, be still,” he murmured, not unfondly. Peter, snickering, backed away and gave the next person a turn at him. Ray bent over to give him a cautious hug. There seemed to be a bump and a bruise on Stantz’s forehead, and definitely a suture at the corner of his mouth.

Winston strolled up next, broad grin on his face. “Check it out, Egon!” He proudly held up a blinking trap by its cord, and Egon had a strange mental flash of the stereotype of an obstetrician dangling a newborn upside-down by its little ankles prior to giving it the traditional swat on the bottom.

He left his semi-hallucinatory vision unspoken and instead stupidly asked, “It’s in there?”

“Of course it is, Spengs,” Peter answered brightly. “Where do you think it would be, the nursery?”

“Well, no,” he answered, still a little dazed. Or did he think that? Things were still not making as much sense as he would normally expect them to.

“Hey, Egon, why don’t you hold it?” Winston went on, his grin widening.

Egon instantly distrusted the suggestion. “No,” he said peevishly, trying to turn away from his compatriots.

"Aw, come on, be a sport,” Peter urged. The green of his eyes glittered bright as polished jade. “It’s your kid, fruit of your loins – how can you not?”

“Egon, it’s gonna feel rejected!” Ray pulled his cherubic face into a disappointed frown. “Its own daddy doesn’t love it?”

“Will you guys leave him alone?” Janine snapped as their teasing filled the room. To his surprise, they immediately quieted, like kids caught out in a jest that was just about to go too far. She limped to his bedside, proprietarily taking one of the waiting chairs, and gave him a sweet yet thorough kiss to his lips. “He’s been through enough already without you jokers adding to it.”

Her lips against his was certainly the most pleasant sensation he had experienced this entire, odd day. “Thank you, Janine,” her murmured, relishing how she continued to rest her cheek gently against his shoulder. Then he recalled something important and raised his head. “Can you please call my mom now?”

“She already has, dear.”

Into his limited field of vision moved the familiar and beloved figure of his mother. “Mom,” he breathed, as tears nearly came to his eyes. Janine shifted aside to allow Mrs. Spengler to gather him in her maternal arms and hold him close.

“Egon, why didn’t you tell me what you were going through?” He was glad to hear only concern, no hurt or remonstration, in her voice, over how he had chosen to keep this a secret from her.

“This is silly, but… I didn’t think you’d understand,” he murmured.

Of course I would, Spookums.” Her laugh was soft. “I was 32 hours in labor with you, dear. I would have welcomed a C-section.”

Peter snickered with delight. “That’s tellin’ him, ‘Mom’.” He patted her affectionately on the back, then with the same familial fondness, rested his hand on Egon’s shoulder. “Hey, pal, we gotta head back to the firehall. But Janine and your mom will stay here to take care of you. Right, Katie?

“Of course, Peter.” She winked at him, and Egon was appalled to see the same trace of humor glinting in his mom’s eyes as showed in the eyes of his friends. My mother, Egon realized despairingly, has been acquainted with them for far too long. “After all, where else should a boy be after an experience like this, than with his mother?”

And actually, he thought with breathless relief, he did not disagree with her one bit.

“Easy there, buster, don’t push yourself.” Janine pulled open the passenger door of her Volkswagen for him after parking on the street just outside of Ghostbuster Central. “After all, you gave birth only two days ago.”

“Janine, will you please stop saying that? I prefer to consider it merely an operation.”

She grinned wickedly at him. “Whatever you say, Egon.” Under her breath she added, “Walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, looks like a duck….”

He ignored her and carefully shifted in the low seat of the little car, trying not to strain his abdominal muscles as he swung his long legs through the door.

“Need a hand there, big boy?” she teased.

“No…. yes,” he capitulated with a gasp as a nasty pain rippled through his insides. For the love of God, he thought again, how indeed do women endure all of this, as a matter of course? Janine slid her hands under his armpits and gave him much-needed leverage as he carefully maneuvered himself out of the car and to his feet. He waited on the sidewalk while she retrieved his overnight bag from the minuscule trunk of her VW, then gratefully leaned on her as they slowly made their way toward the firehall doors.

He didn’t quite have his strength back yet, both from how the Chinglesche had drained him while it had been planted in his body, and the surgery that followed. Dr. Maner – who, while she had not been thrilled by the destruction of the surgical suite, had been fascinated by the paranormal processes she had witnessed first-hand (and now seemed to be relying on Winston’s busting expertise to fill her in on the details, Egon had noticed) – had reassured him that the recuperative process following his surgery should not be too lengthy or difficult. Plus, since he had not undergone an actual pregnancy - only an incredible simulation, Peter had flippantly tossed out in his best K-TEL announcer voice – it was likely to be greatly shortened from the statistical norms.

All Egon wanted to do was go upstairs and rest for awhile, perhaps recline on the couch in the TV room and spend a genteel afternoon in Janine’s company watching science shows on the cable channels, but a shout as he and Janine passed through the ground floor waylaid their plans. “Hey!” Peter’s holler echoed up the basement stairwell. “Melnitz! We need you to come downstairs. Right now. And bring Egon with you.”

“Uh-oh, I bet they’ve cooked up something for your homecoming.” Janine rolled her eyes.

“Whatever gave you that idea?” Egon commented dryly. Their ribbing while he had been hospitalized had been so interminable that it was inevitable they had carried it over to home. “Although one would think they would have tired of this topic by now.”

“Not them. They’re regular perpetual motion machines.” She sighed, lifting an inquisitive eyebrow. “Well, Egon?”

He shrugged. “I suppose so, even though I doubt I’ll ever get back up those stairs.”

“I’ll make ‘em carry you,” she defended, loyally, her arm still on his.

“They” were waiting for him, Peter and Ray and Winston, grins on their faces, as he had expected; but he had not expected “them” to include Dr. Greg Labraccio, Dr. Evelyn Maner, or, heaven forfend, his own mother, as well. Someone had gone to a great deal of trouble to set one corner of the basement as if for a party. A gaily-bedecked card table held a small sheet cake, decorated with buttercream swags and roses in Chinglesche-matching purple and green. Crepe paper streamers and even a few balloons flanked a computer-printed banner shouting “Welcome Home Egon!” in elaborate black swirls that had probably taken most of the printer ribbon to produce. And beside it all, on a table of its own, sat a blinking trap. It did not take his genius to deduce that it contained the captured juvenile Chinglesche.

Peter cleared his throat. “We’re not sure who’s the guest of honor at this bash, but in any case, we decided we’d save the containment privileges for the ‘host with the most’.”

“Very funny, Dr. Venkman.” He turned to glower at his mother who stood in all innocence with the rest of his friends. “Mom, I’m sorry, but seeing your involved in this, I’m forced to conclude that prolonged exposure to the likes of Dr. Venkman, Dr. Stantz, and Mr. Zeddemore have clouded your rational thinking.” But it was hard to maintain his scowl in the face of his mother’s obvious affection, however, and in a moment he had capitulated under her fondly humorous gaze.

Ray picked up the full trap and presented it to him like an award. “So what do you say, Egon? Wanna send it to its new home?

He nodded. “I admit that the prospect of ejecting my parasite into the environment of the containment unit has a certain ironic appeal to it.”

“So let’s get it over with and get to the cake.” Peter greedily rubbed his palms together and smacked his lips.

Janine, sticking right to his side, helped him up the steps to the unit. As he slid the trap into the ejection port, Dr. Maner of all people suddenly spoke up. “Push,” she said in the kind of commanding tone one would use in a delivery room.

The others immediately took up the chant. “Push, push, push…”

His hands were still shaky enough that he had a little trouble fitting the trap into place. Finally, with a hard shove, he sent it home, pulled the cycling lever that ejected their captured entities into Containment, waited for the clear light, and triumphantly pulled it back out, empty.

They cheered.

“Hey, let’s see if its mother finds it.” Ray pressed his face to the viewing portal and located the juvenile Chinglesche, hovering hesitantly near the ejection site, as other contained spooks and spirits floated over to check out the new arrival. Similarly, on the outside of the containment unit, the gathered guests clustered to try to get a view of their own of the action going on inside.

“Listen, isn’t this perfect?” Smiling, Ray started to sing in a faux reggae beat.

“No I would not give you false hope
On this strange and mournful day
But the mother and child reunion
Is only a motion away…”

Peter gave him a sharply-amused look. “Ray, you are aware Paul Simon named that song for a dish in a Chinese restaurant, right, not a touching maternal moment?”

“It is?” Stantz’s sunny face clouded momentarily as he stopped singing. “Well, damn – I mean, darn it!” He looked as disappointed as contrite. “Sorry, Mrs. Spengler.”

“That’s all right, Ray.” She smiled at his inadvertent verbal slip. “It’s a nice song and you have a nice voice. Keep going.”

“Well…” He almost blushed at the maternal compliment before he went on. “Oh, little darlin’ of mine….”

“Hey, there it is!” Winston pointed to the far corner where the larger creature they had trapped only a week ago was slowly revolving into view, approaching its young with caution and curiosity. The other entities examining the new arrival quickly scattered as the senior being neared.

“Look, they see each other!” Janine cried out as the adult Chinglesche suddenly surged toward the juvenile. With a squeal they could hear even outside containment, the baby raced toward its parent, tensile limbs waving excitedly in recognition.

“Ah, isn’t this sweet?” Peter lisped in a baby-talk falsetto, then rolled his eyes.

They watched as the mother Chinglesche embraced the child in its long, hooked limbs, pulling it close to the center of its body, looking eyes-to-eyes with it… and then as a huge, unexpected orifice split at the center of its body, it unceremoniously gobbled its spawn up.

“What the hell…?” Winston was the only one who even vaguely managed to verbalize their group astonishment.

“Survival of the fittest,” Egon began slowly, explaining. “I surmise that any given environment can only contain one Chinglesche at any time, and since the parent thought it was a threat …”

And then he started to laugh, from deep inside himself, so deep that the staples low across his belly pulled and the healing muscles protested the abuse. Theatre of the Absurd indeed – this had crossed even that surrealistic line. “I think I need to sit down now,” he finally gasped, wiping at tears of mirth that ran from his eyes. His friends and family, laughing as well with the same visceral relief he felt, clustered around him, Janine and his mother each taking an arm to guide him from the platform and to a chair that awaited him like a throne of honor.

“Well, what do you know, Tex?” Peter, grinning widely, ruffled Ray’s hair in passing. “That was the right song after all! Now like I said… who’s for cake?”