THE WYVERN
PART ONE

Filed by Mike Devicente, GBWC Reservist
GBI Case File No. GBWC-2009-27/320

The warehouse walls vibrated with the familiar sound of the Ecto-cruiser pulling into the driveway. The car doors slammed. Jeremy walked into the main part of the room with three full ghost traps and a confident smirk on his face. Mick's face looked somewhat grimmer; he wandered just behind Jeremy shouldering both their proton packs. "Hey! Quit running for the gold medal and help me out here!"

"Sorry," Jeremy said in a sing-song voice "I caught 'em, I can 'em. I think you made up that rule."

Mick, sighed, paused, and hung the packs on the first two racks he could find. Then he charged through the containment room after Jeremy. They both passed right through Rachel, who was standing in the hallway, waiting to welcome them back. She simply turned around and sighed. A fight was coming. She didn't have to be clairvoyant to see that.

As soon as Mick caught up to Jeremy he was already opening up the containment unit. He opened the chamber, inserted the trap, cleared the containment grid, flipped the switch, waited for the green light to come on, pulled the trap, and tossed it on the table with a thunk that rattled Mick's teeth.

"You really need to be more careful with the equipment." Mick said, still trying to maintain an advisory tone of voice.

"You mean the equipment that I've been working with for six years? Yeah, I'll do that." Jeremy held up the second trap with a 'cheers' gesture. Inserted. Cleared. Flipped. Green light. Pull. Toss.

Mick took a lunge forward and grabbed the trap in his gloved hand. He leaned against the table with his other shoulder. "I'm just saying there have been way too many times in my career that I couldn't afford to have any of this not work."

"I'm sure there were a lot times in your career when your equipment didn't work anyway. What about that time you dropped your pack in the bay and had to fend off that succubus by ripping off that car's side mirror?" Jeremy scoffed. He kept kidding around, while Mick persisted in being annoyed.

Third trap.

Mick was stymied for a second. "I'm only telling you because Fritz would tell you the same if he were here right now."

"Yeah, and I'm hoping that while Fritz is gone I'll get a little vacation too."

Inserted.

"Well, as fun as it's gonna be, I don't want him to go back to find the warehouse melted to the ground." Mick gritted his teeth. "Just promise me you're not gonna let this place go to hell while he's out."

"I'M not gonna let this place go to hell?"

Cleared.

"What can I say? I can trust myself not to cause any trouble while Fritz is out, but I can't speak for the both of us..."

"That's about the smartest thing you've said so far."

Flipped.

Jeremy twisted around and glared at Mick, his hand still on the trap handle. "Listen up, maybe I let Jeff, or Andy, or Kyle talk to me like this but from you it's an insult. I'm not gonna take this kinda abuse from a guy I've seen swinging from a chandelier." Jeremy yanked out the trap and tossed it on the table in front of Mick. Then he stomped off. "I'm a professional too...What could I possibly screw up in three days?" He muttered to himself.

Mick gave a groan and turned. He followed Jeremy up to the lounge, and then they went their separate ways, Jeremy to the bunks. The green light never came on. Neither of them noticed.

It was night, so Rachel was awake. The washing machine and dishwasher were both loaded, and Rachel had a good 6 hours until anyone was going to be awake or showing up at the front door. All she could do now was waft around and worry about Mick and Jeremy. After that fight in the containment room, the two hadn't spoke to each other all afternoon, and even did that...thing where two people sit down and look away from each other.

"Men are so immature." Rachel grumbled to herself and sunk her head. Then she raised it up again quickly. There was....a disturbance. More specifically, there was another ghost present in the warehouse. That...couldn't be good, could it?

She glanced over her shoulder at the proton packs hanging on the wall behind her. She should probably take one with her in a situation like this, but she didn't, because, well...Perhaps she could simply make contact with it...maybe it was friendly. She began to move towards what she felt and felt herself feeling worse and worse the closer she became. She saw it. Well, perhaps she only saw a shadow. A shadow that unfurled a pair of bat wings towards her before pouncing.

The next morning, Jeremy awoke and dragged himself out of bed. When he looked around, he was surprised to see how clean the whole place was. The walls were sparkling, which was highly possible in a silo. He clicked his tongue in admiration but with his body still fatigued, he continued to drag himself to the bathroom.

Jeremy entered the bathroom door, pulled off his pajama shirt and threw it on the floor. Then he moved to the shower so he could turn on the faucet

Thankfully, he looked down.

On the floor of the shower, Rachel was half-phased through the floor and energetically scrubbing at the tile with a coarse look at her face. Jeremy looked down at her dumbfounded. He could tell immediately that something was wrong, but, once again, fatigued.

"Uuueeeum....Is this a bad time?"

"You know, it wouldn't hurt you to do these things every once in a while..." Rachel snarled.

"Aw gee, first Mick and now you. When the hell was I ever put in charge of scrubbing the bathroom?"

"I don't care if it's you, or Fritz, or...anyone. Why am I the only one responsible for all the mess around here!?" As Rachel spoke, her voice deepened and took on a supernatural drone. "DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT SLOBS YOU ALL ARE!?" Rachel slowly rose out of the shower, and while levitating, made her skin flake off, exposing the skeleton underneath.

Jeremy, who felt effected by Rachel's attempt to induce horror, stumbled out of the bathroom, and made a scramble towards the wall-mounted proton pack. He picked it up, holstered it over his shoulder, and shakily pointed the thrower towards Rachel, threatening. "Don't make me do this...Not for the second time this month."

Rachel continued to advance on him. Jeremy would never again admit it but he whimpered as he pulled the trigger.

Nothing happened.

"Damn, no charge." Jeremy began to back against the wall, cringing. Then from at his side a mighty blast of proton shot fourth, catching Rachel in a containment stream. The wielder of the blast was Mick, who had remembered to charge his pack instead of just replacing it.

Rachel shrieked. From out of the containment beam there melted a puddle of ectoplasm, which re-formed into a second ghost. It was spherical, with a pair of bat wings, a Mohawk and a gigantic eye. Its skin was grey and scaly and it stood on a pair of two-toed feet. As soon as it extracted itself, it gave a warbling scream and sailed out a nearby window.

"Let go of the stream!" Jeremy shouted. Mick shut off his beam. Rachel was so drained from the experience she was rendered practically invisible. Only her lips were vaguely seen as she said. "Guys, I don't feel so good..."

"You've never looked lighter." Jeremy said grimly.

Mick turned to Jeremy with a smug grin of his own on his face. "Now, that was one of the ghosts we caught yesterday wasn't it?"

Jeremy pulled his hand away from his face and heaved a sigh. "What do you want me to say? No, actually I know. You're right, okay? I did mistreat the equipment. That ghost wasn't disposed of properly and because of me it got out and it got IN to Rachael. I....am the biggest idiot ever. I am so dumb, and sometimes....sometimes I accidentally brush my teeth with zit cream."

Mick shut off his pack and replaced it. Then he gave Jeremy a strong clap on the back and said. "You see, that's all you had to say."

"So let me get this straight," Fritz said, pausing to help Chelsea load a suitcase onto the frame of their rental sedan, his cell phone in one hand. "The ghost ENTERED Rachel?"

"That's right," was Mick's reply, spoken through his own cell. "She was acting...like hyper-Rachel for a moment, then my proton beam simply kicked it out of her. I've never seen anything like it: a ghost possessing another ghost?"

"It's not possession. It's soul-sucking."

"Say that again, Fritz? I thought maybe we got a crossed signal."

"I said it's soul-sucking. The entity was obviously forcing Rachel to go through her daily motions on a higher than average level, so that it could absorb the excess energy. It probably intended to burn her out then take the remainder of her ectoplasm."

"Great," Mick gave a sigh. "If that's the case this thing's gonna be twice as hard to catch now that it's taken in so much PKE."

"Listen...do you guys need me to come back there?"

"Well..." Mick was interrupted when Jeremy snatched the phone out of his hand and said. "No, no we're fine here. Enjoy your vacation, Fritz." He beeped the phone off.

"Why did you do that?" Mick asked, graciously accepting his cell back and putting it in his pocket.

"If we let him get involved, he'll never leave us in charge again." Jeremy said with a shrug.

"Jeremy, this thing merely re-dead-ened, Rachel. Sorry for being presumptuous again, but maybe this one's gonna take a little more work..."

"Nonsense. We just keep answering calls, and if one of them seems...stranger than usual, we've got our eyeball-thing."

Mick shook his head. "I don't know...This looks like a lot more than a simple zap n' trap. Soul suckers are always bad news. I bet it could even become so powerful it could graduate from sucking ghosts and start sucking people."

"I'm not worried. If all else fails, we got the Jeffinator."

Mick turned around and began to walk towards the lounge. "Okay, then. In the meantime you need to get suited up for the PR event we have at the used car lot."

"You're a sucker for procedure you know." Jeremy said with a wry grin.

Without breaking his pace, Mick quipped. "You're just a sucker."

To Be Continued

Based on Ghostbusters Created by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis

Ghostbusters West Coast Division Created by Andy Harnish and Vincent Belmont