A New Kind of Science / Holtzbert

Not This Again

The wind blew passed the four women as they ran down the hall, heading for the elevators. There were two small trails of ectoplasm left on the carpet as the substance dripped from both Erin and Holtzy. As they ran by a few apartments, they heard the residents inside yelling about the commotion. As they made it to the end of the hallway, they took a left and Abby heard Riley's voice right behind her right ear. "We can finally get our revenge, Bee. You know you want to. Don't you miss me?" 

Continuing to run, she tried to ignore him, but spoke anyway. "Of course I miss you." She looked around at her colleagues, just now noticing that she was the only one who could hear him.

"Then come with me."

She wanted to ask where when they finally made it to the elevators, but a part of her felt he was no longer there. 

"What was that?" Patty asked her when the doors opened and they stepped in.

"What? Nothing." Yates looked up to her.

"I thought I heard you say somethin.'"

Abigail did not respond and the silver doors closed, taking them down to the first floor. They busted a few ghosts in the lobby before Erin yelled to the group. "We've gotta figure out a way to stop the rest of these ghosts!"

"They'll listen to Riley." Abby said before shooting the ghost of a colonial woman. "And I know where we can find him." She ran over to stand directly beside Erin.

"We can't just leave all these ghosts here." Gilbert pointed out.

"It'll work. Trust me." She shot at one more. "We don't have to go too far."

Erin shot one more as she tried to make a decision. Patty and Holtzy made their way over to them as well. "So, are we goin' or not?" Tolan wondered with the anticipation of more and more spirit appearances.

After sending one more apparition flying, Erin looked to Abby as she answered Patricia. "Let's go!" Putting full trust into her high school friend, she headed for the exit, as did the other three, while looking around at the citizens running out of the building.

They ran a couple blocks down the road, attacking a few more ghosts on the way. They made one last turn down an alley and Dr. Yates immediately slowed her pace upon approaching the eerie street. Erin, Patty, and Holtz continued to run further into the darkness as Abby lingered back a bit, looking around at the location of a painful memory. It wasn't too long before she was walking and soon her walk halted and she stood completely still, watching the other ghostbusters slow their own paces in front of her. 

A greenish, blue light began to grow down the alley way and soon, they were all still, staring and waiting for the rest of Riley's transparent, floating body to materialize. "I knew you'd come, Abby." He said, looking right passed the first three gals and into Abigail's eyes. 

"We're not here to help you, Lee. We're here to stop you." 

With no hesitation, the entity flew as quickly as possible passed Erin and Holtz, bringing himself face to face with the shortest of the women. Gilbert groaned in frustration at his passing through them adding onto the amount of slime that covered her and the blonde. Patty usually would've laughed at them, but she was very freaked out by the deceased man at the moment. "He didn't like that." She accidentally said aloud.

"What's the matter?" An unknown voice boomed in their ears. "Trouble in paradise?" 

"What's that?" Abby spoke as did Patty and Erin.

"Who's-?" Gilbert began.

"Whoa." Tolan exclaimed.

"Nice." Jillian grinned and nodded, looking around with the others. 

"I thought you said she'd help." The louder voice said.

"She will. Just give me a moment to convince them." Riley replied.

"Fine. But don't waste my time." The impatient, unseen being answered.

"We won't." He turned his attention back to his former fiancee, who continued to look up, wondering where that voice had stemmed from. "Bee, look at me." Yates obeyed, nervously swallowing. "We have a plan."

"Who's 'we?'" Abby demanded.

"That doesn't matter right now. Just do what we ask of you and you will be rewarded. All of you." He turned his head around to look at the other three and Patty and Erin stepped back. Meanwhile, Jill found it fascinating. 

"Rewarded with what?" Abby asked, causing him to look back to her.

"Anything you want! Untold riches, a house. TWO houses. Heck! You can have fifteen houses if you want." He smiled down at her.

"I don't want fifteen houses." She took a step back. "I just want peace in this world and you and your little friend are ruining that." 

"Riley!" The booming voice was heard again. "This is a waste! We can go on without her."

"But Zuul, please? Give me a chance to-"

"ENOUGH!" The ground shook and the girls all took cover until the quake ended. "We don't need them. They'll have to go with the others." Riley looked back down into Abby's eyes with sorrow in a moment of silence. "Riley!" Zuul's voice yelled once more.

"I'm sorry, Abby." Riley whispered before letting out an ear splitting screech like a banshee. The wail caused all four ghostbusters to plug their ears as they watched Riley's spirit vanish into thin air.

After he had left, it took a while before all women could unplug their ears. They looked around at each other, confused as to what just happened. "Zuul." Holtzmann spoke, flicking some slime off of her right hand. "Hey, wasn't that what you heard on the EVP a while ago, Patty?"

"Yoooo!" Tolan looked to Abby, then to Erin, then back to Jill. "It was." Her wide eyes found their way back to Abigail. "Didn't you say you'd do some research on that?"

"I did do SOME. I never looked too far into it though because we got side tracked with other things, but I...I remember it saying something about-" Suddenly, something happened to her. She froze. Her eyes shot open and her mouth clamped shut. Her posture changed and nothing happened for several seconds.

"Ab...Abby?" Erin took one step toward her best friend, but when her head snapped to look at the brunette, Holtzmann recognized it immediately and she touched her slimy hand to Erin's slimy shoulder, urging her to say away from Yates at the moment.

"Oh, not this again." Patty mumbled, taking a few steps away as well.

"I have to find Vinz Clortho." Abigail spoke in a tone they all recognized as Zuul's. 

"Who the hell is Vinz Clortho?" Tolan asked in annoyed tone. Instead of an answer, she received a telekinetically thrown garbage can at her and the other two, but they all ducked on time and looked up to see Abby hovering in the air for a moment before flying away.