milliways_bar | (no subject)

Egon appears behind Ray. "Good evening." He's holding a plate with something on it that is thick and brownish and lumpy, a glass of something clear, and wearing a Mad Scientists Union T-shirt and a consternated expression.

Ray glances over at the plate, frowning. "Either you ordered the salisbury steak or you tried to cook something over a Bunsen burner and it caramelized wrong. Want a seat?"

Egon sits.

"I asked the Bar for something to eat. I didn't specify. It appears to be..." He pokes it with a fork. "Beef stew with egg noodles. I think, perhaps, the Bar is trying to send me a hint."

It's got no sugar in it. It's scary to Egon.

"Yeah, she does that sometimes," Ray says. "I keep getting these slabs of vegetarian stuff if I don't watch it."

Obviously he watched it tonight, since his plate has the remains of a half-pound hamburger on it, but still.

"Just be glad she's confining it to your diet. I went through a four-week period where every meal I ordered came with a side of 'here, learn the Sumerian language'."

"I've studied Sumerian," Egon reminds Ray mildly, "a remarkably useless language for modern times." He eats some, and then looks somewhat mollified. "It's quite good, actually," he admits, then glumly takes a drink of the liquid.

"How are you today, other than mostly carnivorous?"

"I'm aware of that," Ray says. "In this particular case, it was apparently a lead-up to a jaunt into an alternate universe where we never lost our grant and Ivo Shandor was still alive. It turned out more useful than you'd think, albeit under that particular admittedly limited set of circumstances."

"Other than that? I'm excellent. Romana came back last night."

He's beaming so hard he's completely forgotten that this particular Egon doesn't know about him and Romana.

"That's very nice, Ray." He eats some more, then says it.

"Who's Romana?"

"Romanadvoratrelundar of Gallifrey, a dimensional traveler, Time Lord, and my girlfriend."

He's had time to get used to the concept, but it still sounds fantastic when he says it.

"Of Gallifrey. Of course. You're a Jedi, you're dating a Time Lord - or is it Lady, the etymology could go either way. Peter and Dana are back together and reproducing." He pauses. "And Winston is, I suppose, secretly a member of the Illuminati?"

He sounds a bit fragile. Too many shocks, not enough caffiene and sugar today.

Ray almost, almost says actually, in another universe he's the head of the Men in Black, but... well. Peter broke into a zillion pieces when he first turned up at Milliways. Ray isn't about to do that to another of his friends.

So he switches it for a somewhat easier revelation.

"No, but there's this one world where Janine's a fourth dan black belt instructor for Tiger Shulman's Karate out on Long Island. Kind of an unnerving place, though. Lots of space aliens, very little paranormal."

"And we are, I suppose, either still in academia, bums, or doing something with the aliens." Egon eats a bit more, taking a drink of the water (!). "Do you know which, or would I be best off not knowing?"

Ray thinks for a bit.

"I can tell you that you're working for the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal. You're their public spokesperson and chief researcher," he says at last. "I don't think you want to know about the rest of us, though."

"I find that highly amusing, considering my current occupation." *munch* An eyebrow is raised at the next part. "If you suppose so, I trust you on that." He shrugs slightly. "I keep feeling like I should be doing something. I finished the proofs and mathematics on that article I intend to write. Perhaps I should actually, well, write it."

"Actually, you could probably handle Peter's situation," Ray says after some thought. "Something went wrong at Columbia and you never encountered him. He took his psychology degree and went to work for Caesar's Palace in Atlantic City instead."

He picks up his own drink, which is Ovaltine rather than the green stuff. "Writing it isn't a half bad idea. Sometimes getting these things together goes a long way. I've done up more than a few patent applications while I've been here, myself. Oh- at some point I'll have to show you the map I've been drawing up over time of all the worlds the various patrons come from- the statistical distribution's pretty bizarre, but the level of philotic connection between the variant worlds is just amazing to see."

"Peter working for a casino. My surprise is limitless." The last in the flat tone that, for Egon, is deep, deep sarcasm.

"That map would be interesting to see. It might give some interesting insight to the theory we have about thin places in dimensional walls."

"And I've been pondering that comment you made about the pre-historic lightsabre precursors. I may be on the verge of being able to make it work. If I had my proton pack here, I could probably work it out in a few days, but..."

"Not a problem. Three dimensional modeling is a godsend when it comes to trying to render that sort of distribution- I'd never have been able to do it on paper without going completely insane or inventing a new geometry or both."

Then he smiles, which maybe is not such a nice thing to see given that he's trying to finish off his burger. "Got my pack upstairs," he says indistinctly. "Modified in a couple of places. Been working on it for a while-" He swallows. "Okay, that's better. Sorry. I constructed several packs for the, um, the... did I even tell you about my friend Andrew Wells and his world?"

"No," Egon admits, "but I'll probably hear stories from you about your escapades for a while until I'm caught up." He eats some more stew, and has an odd look. He leans over and talks to one of the waitstaff, who scurries off.

"Might as well tell me the story, Ray."

Ray nods. "Okay," he says. "I first met Andrew a day or two after I arrived here. He's from a world very similar to mine and yours, but their supernatural element generally goes in for a more physical manifestation, rather than a primarily ectoplasmic one. Basically, they don't get ghosts so much as they do vampires, as well as fully manifested demonic entities of varying degrees of hostility. They've got a history of interaction with the supernatural stretching back at least fifty thousand years to the creation of the first Slayer- a girl whose tribal shamans bound a weakened, unconscious demon into her to give her the strength and speed necessary to successfully battle the vampires. That line's continued for millennia, metaphysically rather than genetically."

"Anyway, Andrew's friends recently managed to successfully spike the plans of a very overpowered bunch of evildoers called Wolfram and Hart. Yes, evil lawyers, go ahead and make the remarks..." Ray shakes his head. "Needless to say, the Big Bads were not happy about this. And when they ain't happy, ain't nobody happy. They raised themselves a demon army with the intention of sending it after Angel, Spike, Wesley, and the others. Andrew had warning that this was coming, so he came here to raise a counter-army. And since he'd helped me save one of the worlds i got trapped in for a while, I volunteered to go help him."

Egon takes this in. Oddly, he seems unsurprised. "I've had a private theory - I haven't shared this with anyone else - that there's some kind of line that allows metaphysical contact. Evo Shandor may have had it, so have some of the other individuals. The flute player..." Egon trails off at that one.

"I assume there was success in this mission?" Egon refuses to let his emotions show most of the time, but people who know him well - and Ray, despite not being HIS Ray, might be able to read it - will see signs of concern on his face.

Ray remembers the flute player; he nods. There isn't much else to say about Jeremy.

"Yeah, there was, actually," he says, brightening a bit. "We saved the people we went there to save, and they managed to close the portals the demons were coming in through before too many of the things could show up. I've got a couple of scars from the whole adventure, though. On the other hand, my world's Egon is getting demon parts for Hanukkah. I managed to salvage a Hefty bag's worth before getting back here and passing out all over my bed."

"Raymond... as my grandmother would have said, sometimes you are completely meshugge. On the other hand, the opportunity to study such things is extremely rare and I'm sure he'll be remarkably pleased by it."

"Was the local Peter involved? It seems like something he'd be involved with - if only because you went. He is many things that exasperate me, but his loyalty is unstinting."

Ray grins. "I kinda felt the same way. There's a couple of teeth, a horn or two, a small jar of ichor, and a few bone fragments. Best I could do- well, that and this-"

He bends over and rolls up his right pantleg a little way. Enough to reveal the mark of two rows of teeth- of fangs- having been sunk into his leg deep enough to leave scars from very nearly the entire dental arcade. The outer row of teeth was neat and pointed. The inner? Snaggly and pointed every which way.

"Some of the teeth are from the same kind of demon that did that. Nasty critters. There were six of them versus one of me at the time and I'll tell you, I have never been so glad in my life to have that lightsabre at hand."

He rolls the pantleg back down. "As a matter of fact, he was. He came along, partly because I was there and partly because he wanted something to do that was actually in our line of work.. he's been Bound for a while, Egon." Ray sobers. "He thought maybe this would be helpful for him, but I think it's only made him worse, and I don't know how to help him. Can you talk to him for me? Try and get a fresh perspective on things? The poor guy's gonna fly to pieces if we don't figure out what's going on and help him get his head back in order."

Egon whistles at the bites. "How many months ago was that?"

Then he listens, carefully.

"Perhaps he'll speak to me. Or, more likely, my lack of tact and blunt manner will get him to vent at me, and then we can work on a plan to restore him to his normal incorrigible self." There's a small smile there. "Should we include Dana in this discussion?"

"Actually? A week and a half ago. One of the local wizards healed it most of the way for me, since I passed out from blood loss briefly towards the end of the fight. I've spent the past week or so recovering here- my world's Egon told me not to come back to New York until my hematocrit went over forty."

"I sincerely hope so, Egon. I keep trying to get him to talk , or at least offer him the opportunity to talk, and I get nothing. Dana can't get anywhere with him either; he's got this whole 'I'm afraid of what I'm going to do to the people around me' schtick going. If I hear him call himself a freak one more time I'm gonna- well- I don't know what I'm gonna do, but he's not gonna like it." Ray shakes his head ruefully. "Whatever you can do, buddy. Whatever you can do. And no... not yet, I don't think. She's worried enough as it is. We don't want her fretting in anticipation or anything, I don't think."

"Freak? That's very unlike Peter. Unless..." He pauses, and looks at Ray over his glasses.

"This is something else you're not telling me. Is he the one who can wave his hand about it not being the droids you're looking for?" This changes things; not that Egon has any reason to fear any version of Peter Venkman, but it means that a slightly different tack might be more useful.

He's thinking. He's got That Thinking Look on his face.

"I didn't mention it to you because Peter swore up and down that you'd been the one to tell him that he was having psychic catalyzation going on-"

Ray blinks a few times.

"Oh, hell, I think there's two of your continuum if you don't remember that. Anyway, Peter went through a period of mild to moderate psychic activity, most of it emotion-linked, but back around Halloween a lot of that got burnt out or something. I wasn't here when that happened- I was trapped in the alternate universe where you work for CSICOP. Peter got hit with some kind of curse and it nearly killed him- it stopped his heart at one point, but one of the local doctors got him back. He's still registering on my PKE meter but not nearly as much as he used to. It's the whole 'oh God I can see the ghosts even when they're not fully manifested and I can do weird things with the power of my brain, oh no, I am a freak' deal that gets under my skin. Obviously, the man isn't enough of a geek to appreciate the hand he's been dealt."

"Well, then," Egon says. "It looks as if I have no choice in the matter but to do something I do better than anyone on the planet:"

"Annoy Peter Venkman."

(( aaaaand slowtime ))

Ray beams, visibly relieved. "Thank you, Egon. You have no idea how glad I am to hear you say that..."

He picks up his drink, takes a sip. "Anyway. My whole point with telling you about Andrew's world- other than explaining the scars in advance of you actually seeing them, there's another set on my left shoulder, by the way- was to tell you that as part of the preparation for the battle I put together several more proton packs for the other people who were willing and able to use them. So there's a spare or two upstairs. I've added fingerprint power-up security so that none of them can be switched on by the wrong people; right now Peter and I are the only ones who can turn them on, but there's room in the bioident memory for several more authorizees. They've had a few other upgrades, too, the most notable of which is the Anakin latch- yes, as in Anakin Skywalker, he was here for a while and he helped me work on the packs when I first got here- anyway, the Anakin latch functions as a kind of safety and reroutes the particle stream between the original accelerator and the quantum-spin match function of the positron collider so that when the protons make their appearance they pass briefly through warpspace. The upshot of this is that crossing the streams with the Anakin latch engaged is not immediately fatal to everything and everyone we've ever known. It can be disengaged at need, of course."

"Also, the throwers now go up to eleven."