milliways_bar | (no subject)

All of Times Square was crammed full of people doing yoga today. That wasn't the problem. Ray's New York, after all, is not New-York-Of-The-Slime, where a river of psychomagnetheric substances flows under the city's surface, gathering all the emotional vibes above and discharging it at random. Nor is it New-York-Of-The-Doors, where it seems like hardly a week can go by without discovering some door or hole or passageway in an otherwise perfectly normal city construction project leads to an unspeakable dimension or the end of the world. (Although there was that incident with the Second Avenue subway line's construction, but that was last year.) No, the problem today was that, while all of those people were tranquilly performing mass synchronized yoga in the middle of one of the busiest cities in the world, several blocks over there was an Incident. It involved a class six eruption, three NYPD mounted officers posing for tourists near Rockefeller Center, and the fact that the vast majority of horses haven't got anything even remotely resembling enough willpower to fend off spiritual possession.

The Post is gonna have a field day with the image of those cops hanging on for dear life as their suddenly-ten-feet-tall-and-black-and-snorting-fire mounts rampage through the crowds of screaming yoga practitioners. At least Ecto picked up on the officers' radios during a run to Queequeg's for coffee and the whole mess was brought to a screeching halt before the Three Unwilling Horsemen Of The Not Quite Apocalypse could wreak too much more havoc, but good Lord, this was not a good day at all.

Ray's out back with his lightsaber and his training drone and his concerted effort to forget what happens when ectoplasm, horse manure, and fire all come together at once. It's not going well, so please, if you want to talk to him stay out of saber range until the drone's routine is done. He kind of needs to work some of this off.

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Invincible stepped outside to get a breath of fresh air and enjoy the weather (just because you can fly above the cloud cover doesn't mean you can escape the air quality of Greater Los Angeles; you've got to come back down through that Stage 2 Smog Alert sooner or later), when he spots Ray. Obviously, his attention is first drawn by the lightsaber. Then there's the drone, zipping about in its pseudo-random pattern, looking for an opening. Then, finally, Invincible focuses on the man. He watches Ray go through his drills, an impressed expression on his face. It isn't until Ray turns and faces him long enough for Invincible to focus on his face, rather than his movements, that he realizes that someone told him about this guy.

Mr. Freeman was right, he thinks. He does look like Dan Ackroyd. While he's still impressed with the saber work, the expression on his face now more displays how he is both amused and weirded out by the strangeness of the multiverse.

The drone routine lasts about ten minutes. Ray's gotten pretty good at countering the thing over the years, despite having all the Force capability of a particularly over-processed piece of cheese. He'll probably get another one eventually and launch them both at once, but for now this one will do.

When it switches off and falls to the ground, he turns off the saber and waves cheerfully to the new arrival. "Hey there," he says. "I'm sorry, was I using the practice field too long?"

"Oh, no. I was just stepping out for some air and that sword of yours caught my attention. It looks familiar. Also, am I correct in assuming you would be Ray Stantz, or is there more than one person that the phrase 'he sort of looks like Dan Ackroyd' would describe?"

It's a good thing that Mother is not in the Bar as often as he used to be. That would have been a weird conversation.

"No, you've got the right person," Ray says. "Although I have a doppelganger or two hereabouts. I take it from the sound of things you've either seen the movie or spoken to someone who has and didn't want to come out and say it?"

Yes, he's aware of the movie. Whether Mark is or not is another story, of course.

"Movie?" Invincible asks, and then he catches sight of the patch on Ray's jumpsuit. "Oooh... Ray Stantz!" He grins. "That didn't even occur to me. Wow. That's kind of freaky."

Mark will not ask the Question. He's not that kind of geek and besides, he wasn't even born when the movie came out. The possibility of Ray's divinity never enters his mind.

"Actually, Gordon Freeman just said you'd be the guy to talk to about dimensional portals. I'm trying to track down some extradimensional aliens that kidnapped my dad."

"There's several different universes I've found so far in which the Ghostbusters exist as individuals, quite a few more in which it's just a movie, and at least one in which it was a movie based on true events. I was in that one through an accident of the front door when the film premiered at Radio City Music Hall, which was an extremely odd experience," Ray says. "I've had time to get used to it."

As he switches the saber off and hangs it on his belt he cocks his head, listening curiously. "I don't suppose you happen to know the name of the species?" he says. "We've worked with dimensional overlaps, cross-rips, portals both controlled and uncontrolled, warps, and distortions for quite some time now, so there's a lot of possibilities to narrow down."

"No name," he says, "but they were about my height, green-skinned, bald with ridged foreheads, and antennae. They came through a portal in Saudi Arabia, but materialized a second smaller portal in Central California later on. That's when they grabbed Dad."

Invincible thinks on it some more. "They had some difference in time between their world and ours. Like fast. The further they got from the portal - and it wasn't that far, maybe 500 feet or so - the faster they aged. The guys that tried to mob us when we landed aged in a matter of minutes."

"Hm. I can look those up in my wife's databanks- she might have some information on the species," Ray says. "Of course, there's probably a significant number of species in the TARDIS records that answer to that description, but it'd be a start. I don't suppose there's any chance the area around where the second portal opened is still accessible? Or has the government closed it off? I'd have an easier time figuring things out if I could get some scans of the vicinity. Probably won't pick up much in the way of PKE, but you never know what other instruments might be able to sound out."

"Hmm, we might be able to get to it. It did happen in a public place," Invincible says. "A shopping mall. The tricky part is that there was a bomb threat at that mall that Dad and I - well, mainly Dad - took care of just before he got nabbed. That was... God, that was just yesterday." He looks astonished. "It feels like it's been a week."

"It's probably cordoned off, but I had to talk to the police yesterday, after it happened, and I've been active since the first of the year, so they shouldn't have any problems with me being there."

"If they'll let you I'd be vastly more comfortable investigating the site myself. Romana might be able to get through any door possible without batting an eye, but she's had a lot more experience at it than me," Ray says. "If they won't, I can.... probably fit out a robot for remote scanning. Assuming they'll let you near the area with Francis on hand."

"Well, it certainly can't hurt to try," he replies. "Though the jumpsuit might raise a few eyebrows." He motions to the iconic Ghostbusters logo, smiling.

[OOC: I have to go to a doctor's appointment, but I should be back on around 6-7pm CST.]

"That's all right. I work in my civvies when there isn't an incipient slime hazard," Ray says. "Tell you what- it would probably work best if you made sure the site was accessible to unauthorized visitors like myself, then opened a nearby door. I'll change my clothes first and bring my detection gear with me. Sound reasonable?"

"Absolutely," agrees Invincible. "The Door opened from my back yard this time around. I think Mom might flip if I brought somebody through from Milliways into her kitchen without warning. Plus, you know, that whole secret identity thing...."

Mark sucks at secret identities, but he tries.

"I'll be back as soon as I can get to the site. It's a shopping mall, as I said, so there should be a restroom or photo booth or something that will work. Shouldn't be too long." He turns towards the Back Door, then turns back. "Thanks, Dr. Stanz. I appreciate the help."

[OOC: I'll take this to a new entrance post, since we're back two or three pages at this point.]