The moans began at midnight. Jessica Carter lay trembling in her bed, knowing they would only get louder and more ominous, but so far they had never hurt her. Pulling the covers tightly around her, she gazed fearfully into the corners of her bedroom, on guard should anything approach her. Mummy said it was her imagination, or the wind wailing around the house, or the traffic noises in the street, but Jessica knew moans when she heard them, and she knew it was a ghost.

Occasionally there were lights, too, multicolored lights that blinked and flickered in the library downstairs. They didn't blink when grown-ups were there. She didn't think that was fair. Grandfather scoffed, but Jessie wondered if Grandfather didn't know what was happening, but didn't want to tell her. Mummy didn't know. Mummy had no imagination. The child had heard grandfather say so. "God knows, Katy, I don't understand where the child gets it. You haven't one speck of imagination yourself."

But Jessie had lots of imagination, too much, Mummy said. And Grandfather did, too. In fact, she had so much she'd begun to think the noises were there because she was meant to stop them. Timmie, her little brother, was only four. She was sure he heard the moaning, too. He was too little to understand. It would scare him a lot worse than it did Jessie.

Timmie had been sick for days now, and the doctor didn't know what was wrong with him. He just lay in his bed and sometimes even calling to him couldn't wake him up. He wasn't in the hospital; he was breathing okay and his heart was okay; she'd listened because no one would tell her. She'd crouched outside the door of Grandfather's study and listened to her mother frantically outlining her fears. "What if he turns out like Uncle Morris? You told me about it when I was little, how he started acting stranger and stranger and nobody could do anything about it, and then he -- went crazy." She was weeping. Mummy might not have much imagination, but she could imagine the worst for Timmie.

Grandfather had grown very stern. "That was so many years ago, Katy. Doctors are much wiser now. It's evident to me that poor Morris had a mental illness, but at the time there was no proper diagnosis. It was 1933 when he was struck down. The heart of the Depression. Yes, there were psychiatrists, but there was a stigma attached. My mother would have none of it. So Morrie grew worse and worse, muttering strange words in a language of his own invention, finally screaming, endlessly screaming, until they had to sedate him and take him away. I've seen no signs of Morrie's condition in your boy. Timmie has a virus, Katy. He'll be fine in a few days."

But as Jessie lay in her bed listening to the distant moans, she knew Timmie would not be fine. Whatever had happened to his great uncle Morris was happening to him and the moans were behind it. Maybe it was a ghost, and maybe it was trying to possess Timmie. Jessie was terrified, but she loved her brother more than she was afraid.

Determined to save him, she pushed aside the covers, picked up the flashlight she'd placed beside her bed, dressed by its light -- it wouldn't do to meet a ghost in her pajamas, after all -- and tiptoed out of her bedroom.

The moans were louder in the passage. She couldn't believe no one could hear them except for her -- and maybe Timmie. To verify it, she went to his room, stood listening at the keyhole. From inside came fainter moans. Opening the door, she turned the flashlight upon her little brother's face. He was flushed and restless, twisting and turning beneath his covers. "No," he sobbed quietly. "Don't. Go away. I'm afraid."

Jessie's heart ached. She could see nothing around Timmie. Maybe the ghost was invisible. But behind her, in the passage, she could hear the moaning. It might be affecting her little brother, but it was doing it from a distance.

"It's okay, Timmie, I'll stop it," she promised fervently. Turning her back on the younger child was hard, but she knew what she had to do. Clutching the crucifix she'd made Mary, the maid, give her, she pulled it free of her shirt and let it hang on its chain against her chest. In her pocket were cloves of garlic, a shaker of salt, and a vial of holy water she'd sneaked into St. Anthony's to steal from the font by the door. She even had a stake, to drive into a vampire's heart.

Shaking with nerves, she crept down the stairs, pausing to listen. The moans were louder down here, and they seemed to be coming from the library. She hated the library; it had made her nervous ever since Daddy had gone away and Mummy had moved them to Grandfather's house to stay. Ever since she'd seen the lights there that no one else but Timmie could see.

But she knew her duty, and she opened the library door, shining the flashlight around the room, peering into the corners to make sure a horrible creature wasn't lurking, waiting to pounce on her.

The light fell on the sarcophagus and she shuddered. It had frightened her from the first time she'd seen it. She hadn't known what a sarcophagus was then, but it had resembled a coffin. Mummy had said it was a coffin, but a very ancient one. Jessie's great-grandfather had brought it from Egypt, where he had 'tried to capitalize on the work of an even more famous Carter', Grandfather had explained. Jessie didn't know what that meant, but she knew about Egypt things. Her class had been to the Metropolitan Museum of Art just last week, and she'd seen a real Egyptian sarcophagus there, and hieroglyphics and all sorts of things. This sarcophagus was a weird black, such a deep color that it felt like her eyes were being sucked into it every time she saw it. Grandfather said it wasn't Egyptian, that it might have been found there but it came from another culture. Maybe an important dignitary visiting in Egypt had died and his entourage had buried him according to their customs or perhaps it had been brought to Egypt as spoils of war. Jessie didn't know. But she'd been afraid there was a mummy inside it and she'd had nightmares at first about a mummy walking the halls, bandages trailing. She had just started to outgrow that -- she was nine years old, after all -- when the moans had begun.

Half expecting a mummy as she entered the room, Jessie was shocked when she saw something even worse. The top of the sarcophagus was suddenly transparent, and inside it lay a body. It wasn't wrapped up like a mummy, and she didn't think it was quite dead. It was moving, and the moans were coming from its mouth. The curious device that sat atop the sarcophagus and that Grandfather claimed was rather like a soccer ball on a pedestal was glowing, its panels blinking in a regular pattern in blue, green, yellow, red, and purple -- that was where the lights had come from, the lights she'd seen before. Beneath it, in its transparent case, the creature, the man, the ghost, moaned and struggled to break free of its containment.

Jessie screamed. Once she started screaming, she couldn't stop. She was still screaming when Grandfather and Mummy burst into the room followed by Jenkins, the butler, Mary, and even the cook. By then the soccer ball was just stone again and the transparency was gone. But Jessie had to be led from the room, scarcely aware of her mother ranting that she wouldn't stay another minute in such a horrible house.

"Something scared her, Father," she insisted hotly. "Do something about it. I won't have my children driven mad like Uncle Morris. You stop it from happening it or I will never speak to you again."

Jessie clung tightly to her mother. "He was dead, he was dead and he was moaning. I saw him."

"I'll call first thing in the morning," Grandfather said, his lined face shaken. "Don't worry, Katy. I'll make it right."

"It's too early, Ray," Peter groaned, tugging at the blankets to keep Ray from yanking them away with morning ruthlessness. If it wasn't Ray who dragged him out of bed in the morning, it was Egon. They just didn't like to see him sleep, that must be it.

"It's an emergency, Peter," Ray insisted earnestly. "We just had a call from Charles Rupert Carter."

"The millionaire?" Peter brightened and let go of the covers. He tried to keep track of the wealthy of New York, hoping to be prepared if one of them suddenly needed the Ghostbusters. Ray staggered back when Peter let go, then caught his balance. As Venkman jumped out of bed, he had already begun to compute the size of the bill.

"Yes, and it's most peculiar, Peter," Egon said, entering the room from the hallway. "I've been doing research on the Carters just now. While there has been no evidence of previous manifestations in the Carter house, during the thirties the young brother of Charles Carter suffered an unexplained mental breakdown. Last night, Carter's granddaughter apparently walked in her sleep and was frightened by what she claimed to be a dead man trying to scream."

Peter shivered involuntarily. He didn't like the idea of ghosts frightening children, not in his town, and the idea of a screaming corpse wasn't very pretty. "Then I'd better get ready."

"A dead man trying to scream?" Ray echoed as Peter gathered clean underwear and socks from his drawer. "He said she saw a body in the sarcophagus."

"Sarcophagus?" Winston Zeddemore had been fastening his boot laces. "That's bad, right?"

"Not necessarily," Egon replied. "Most sarcophagi are quite harmless, as are most cemeteries."

"Yeah, but this one isn't," Peter said, pausing in the doorway. "We can't have ghosts running around scaring little kids. Come to think of it, scaring anybody. I'll make it quick, guys." He hurried into the bathroom.

"I don't like it, Raymond," Egon said thoughtfully. "There was not much information surrounding the Carter incident in the thirties."

"I think I remember it," Ray said. "It was written up in a book I read once. There were those who insisted the incident had a paranormal trigger. No one knew for sure."

"What about the victim?" Winston asked. "The one from the thirties, I mean? Is he still alive?"

"I don't know," Ray replied. "He could be, I suppose, if Mr. Carter still is and the victim was his younger brother. We need to find out what could be happening." He started to pull on his jumpsuit over his jeans and shirt. "Mr. Carter said his grandson had been ill, and the doctors had been able to find no physical cause of it. He said when they led the little girl out of the room where the sarcophagus was, she had a crucifix -- the Carters aren't Catholics -- a vial of holy water, a stake, cloves of garlic, and a salt shaker in her pocket. As if she'd tried to prepare for what she might find. Everything but a gun with a silver bullet. She went after it on purpose." His eyes were wide. "Poor kid. She was awfully brave. It must have been nasty to scare her like that."

"So she suspected a paranormal occurrence?" Winston prodded.

"She must have," Egon replied. "We shall take multiple readings, also of the two children, since the previous incident also involved a child."

"The children's mother took them to a hotel," Ray replied. "We can question them later, after we've seen the sarcophagus." He took a few steps into the hall and yelled, "Hurry up, Peter."

"I'm hurrying," came Peter's voice faintly over the sound of running water. He was as good as his word. Soon emerging, washed and shaved, pulling a tee shirt over his still damp hair, he grinned. "Okay, guys, let's go earn or major bucks."

The Carter house was a brownstone in the East Seventies, extremely well maintained in a block with other houses in an equally preserved state that spoke of great wealth. What's more, it was twice as big as the ordinary brownstone. A brass railing with elaborately carved vine leaves divided it from the sidewalk, a gate in front of the steps. Peter whistled at the sight of it. "Not too tacky."

"We're not here about money, Peter," Egon reminded him. "We're here to bust a ghost." He activated his P.K.E. meter and frowned over it, although it did not seem to be noticeably reacting.

"I know, but let's remember who we're hired by." He swung open the gate -- it moved with well oiled smoothness -- and bounded up the stairs, proton pack on his back. The door swung open even before he could ring the bell, and Peter found himself facing a liveried butler.

"Mr. Carter is waiting for you, gentlemen," the man said and ushered them in. The four Ghostbusters exchanged glances as they found themselves in a large entry hall, the floor set with an elegant mosaic tile in a classical Greek pattern. Overhead, a chandelier sparkled, dust-free. The staff must work very hard to maintain chez Carter.

"This way, please." The butler crossed the hall and led them into a small parlor with Regency sofas in pale yellow brocade. An elderly man with a grave and worried face rose to meet them and held out his hand in greeting.

Peter pumped it enthusiastically. "Mr. Carter. I'm Peter Venkman and these are the rest of the Ghostbusters." He named them in order. "I understand you have a ghost."

"I don't know if we do or not, but I do know that Jessica is a brave child. She believed there was a spirit in the house and prepared to meet it."

"Like a Ghostbuster," Ray said approvingly. "You said so on the phone. It takes a lot of guts to get up in the night if you think something spooky's waiting for you. How old is Jessica?"

"She's nine. Her brother Timothy is four. They've been living here for six months, since their father...left my daughter. I thought the children were adjusting well at first, but then Timmie started showing signs of distress, and now this with Jessie. I would feel more comfortable believing all that's wrong is reaction to their father's desertion, but I can't quite accept that. I know children often create fantasy realities for themselves and Jessie is very creative. But Katy's a good mother to them and she's been very supportive. I can't imagine both of them going through different forms of breakdown at the same time."

"Yet that happened here once before," Egon reminded him with delicacy. "Could there, perhaps, be a family history of mental illness?"

"If there is, I don't know it," Carter said stiffly. "True, my brother Morris suffered a breakdown, but he was the only one in our family's history. We've been here a long time, we trace our line to the Mayflower. I'm a descendant of Governor Bradford and have the records to prove it. The Carters have always known our family history, and there is no evidence of mental illness in the family tree. I have six sisters, gentlemen. They grew up in this house, just as I did. Every one of them is perfectly sane and so are their numerous progeny."

Peter wasn't sure how much of that was denial; Carter was family-proud. He wouldn't welcome a 'blot' on the family name. One incident could be a freak happening. More would be a pattern, one he wouldn't welcome.

"Hmm," said Egon. "Something has definitely been here; the readings indicate residuals, but they are powerful residuals as if the entity is not currently active but as if it has been active many times in the past. Oddly enough, I also detect what might well be a charge of static electricity. Very odd."

"Static electricity?" Winston echoed. "Like when you shuffle your feet on carpet and get a spark if you touch something?"

"Wow," breathed Ray. "That's interesting. "When there's been a lot of power and it doesn't have anywhere to go, it builds up a charge, a lot like static electricity. It's as if whatever is here doesn't have a way to bleed off power -- but is producing lots of it."

"And that's bad, right?" Winston asked.

Egon nodded. "Very bad."

"I have something else to show you," Carter said slowly. He picked up an item from the table and offered it to Ray, who was closest. "This was found when we went to awaken Timmie. He had it clutched very tightly in his hand, but I have never seen it before. He didn't want to part with it, but as soon as he let go, he relaxed and began to breathe deeply. He went to sleep, and Katy simply took him away sleeping. But she left this with me."

It was a ring, ornate and elaborate, big enough to encircle a man's thumb. Peter could see ancient writing on it.

"Wow," cried Ray, holding it out for Egon to take a reading. "Look at this, Egon. I bet it's a mystical talisman. This writing might be Sumerian. I don't know as much Sumerian as you do, but I do know this one word. 'Gr'. It means 'ring'."

"Self-explanatory, isn't it, Tex?" asked Peter, leaning closer to peer at the piece of jewelry.

"Actually, Peter, 'gr' also means 'to die'," Egon cut in. "Many Sumerian words have a string of different meanings."

"To die!" exploded Carter. "Where did my grandson get such a thing? I have seen all the relics in this house; I know them. My interest in the past is not so great as my father's, but I am familiar with the artifacts he brought home. This was not one of them."

"Here's another word," Ray exclaimed, peering at the small circlet. "No, two. 'Dirig' and 'gibil'. I'm not very good with cuneiform writing. Egon?"

Egon frowned, taking the ring from Ray and squinting at it. He pulled from his pocket a jeweler's loupe -- the things in Egon's pockets never failed to astonish Peter -- and pondered. "There's smaller writing. A very rough translation, guessing at interpretation, I would say this reads, "The ring of death. The one will be erased to bring renewal." Of course further study will be required because meanings vary. The same word may have many different meanings."

"Just keep it away from Timmie," Carter said. "It's a wicked thing. I want it out of here."

"It does give off a reading," Egon mused, passing it to Ray. "But it's quiescent. Was it glowing or hot to the touch when you took it from Timmie?"

"No. It was warm from being held, that's all. Do you believe this ring could be the cause of Timmie's illness?"

Egon pondered the question. "It's too soon to say. We need to examine the sarcophagus."

"Then come this way, gentlemen. I'll show it to you."

The sarcophagus was in the Carter library, a huge room with books in built-in cases rising to the ceiling on all four walls, on either side of windows and surrounding a vast fireplace. In addition to the sarcophagus, there was a massive desk with a modern computer on its gleaming top, several comfortable chairs and a portable television set on a stand. But after registering the rest of the room, the Ghostbusters focused on the sarcophagus and looked no further.

It was massive, rounded at the corners, and created of a deep black stone so dark that if one gazed at it a long time, it created the impression that nothing was there, simply a hole in solid matter. Egon shook off the fanciful image and raised his P.K.E. meter to study it.

"What's that weird thing on top?" Peter asked, pointing. "It looks like part of a soccer ball."

"It's more like a small geodesic dome," Egon replied. "It's very ancient."

"I thought Buckminster Fuller invented the geodesic dome," muttered Winston to Ray.

"Maybe he re-invented it," Ray replied, moving over to the small protrusion that set at chest level, or where chest level would be on the sarcophagus if it contained a body. "Wow! I've never seen a relic like that, have you, Egon?" He touched it carefully. "Is this what Jessie said was glowing?" he asked. Carter had told them the details of Jessie's midnight vision as they walked to the library.

"Yes. She said the different panels were glowing as if it were not solid stone but part of a control panel. She used those very words. She's a modern child. She would think of a modern image."

"How could they glow separately?" Peter asked skeptically. "It's just a carved piece of stone."

"I don't know," Ray corrected. "I can feel the ridges at the edge of each panel."

"But it's stone, Ray. How could it glow? Stone's not transparent." Peter frowned and batted at Ray's hand. "Do you think you ought to be touching that? You don't know where it's been."

"It isn't doing anything, and Egon's readings are only residuals," Ray argued, resuming his tactile investigation. "We have to find out what happened here, Peter. We don't know if Timmie is safe from this at a distance. We have to make sure we stop whatever it is." His fingers probed the dimensions of the domed object. "Wow, this is really weird. I've never seen anything like this. Is it attached to the sarcophagus?"

As Carter said, "Yes, they're fastened together. It can't be moved," Ray lifted it up easily. Astonished, Carter gaped at him. "No one has ever been able to do that before," he insisted. "Perhaps Jessie was right. If this is a...a control device, perhaps she activated it."

"I believe it might be wise, then, to separate it from the sarcophagus," Egon said. "Not near the computer, Ray. It might produce energy capable of damaging it."

Ray deposited it effortlessly on one of the chairs. "It's not very heavy, guys."

With the device gone, Egon turned to his meter and pondered the readings. There had been no appreciable change in the meter's readout. Residual energy was very high, but it was definitely residual. Nothing was active and present. The static energy charge was constant, too. Egon imagined he could almost feel it in the way the small hairs lifted at the back of his neck. From Peter's squirming, Egon suspected he could feel it(comma here?) too. Winston cast uneasy glances into the four corners of the room, but Ray, excitement unabated, continued to take readings of the device, picking it up to study the underside of it.

Egon reached out and brushed his fingers against the surface of the sarcophagus although he felt a near-compulsion not to touch it. He felt a ridge where the device had stood; it felt like broken stone, as if the two items had been bonded and then separated violently. There was no discoloration to mark the division, only the rougher texture beneath his fingertips. As with the rest of the house, no dust had gathered here, although Egon had the sudden whimsical notion that the sarcophagus would repel dust as it had tried to repel his hand.

"Getting anything, Spengs?" Peter prompted, edging closer. "I don't like that thing. It looks nasty. I bet there's something nasty in it, too."

"Most likely simple human remains," Egon replied. "Mr. Carter, has this find been studied by archaeologists?"

Carter frowned. "No. My father was an amateur Egyptologist. They were fairly thick on the ground in those days. I always suspected he brought it home illegally, and although he did studies on his own, he never did anything official. Perhaps because his interest in Egyptology was so overwhelming, I had no interest at all."

"But this isn't Egyptian, is it?" Winston objected. "I've seen the stuff in the Egyptian section of the Metropolitan Museum and this isn't like any of it."

"No. Father always said it was probably the sarcophagus of a visiting dignitary; other cultures sent emissaries to Egypt, he claimed. Either that or it had been brought home from a war, captured from an enemy. I don't pretend to know anything about the subject, but he found it in the Valley of the Kings in an 18th Dynasty tomb. I don't know what period of time that would be."

"We can get the exact dates," Ray replied. "But that makes it really old -- well, the 18th Dynasty was fairly recent as dynasties go. Ramses II was an 18th Dynasty Pharaoh. You know, the one Moses ran into? And Akhnaten, too. Only if the ring has anything to do with the sarcophagus, it would make it a lot older than the 18th Dynasty. It should be carbon dated. In fact, it really ought to be examined by experts -- if we can get rid of the ghost."

"Jessie said she could see right into it," Carter remembered. "She said there was a dead man in it and he was screaming. She could have been having a nightmare and walking in her sleep...."

"But you don't think so," Peter said. He exchanged a quick, doubtful glance with Egon.

"No, I don't think so. I remember when my brother became ill. One of the things he said was, 'he's trying to scream'. He said it over and over. Then he ranted about being trapped for eternity. We didn't understand any of it and the doctors dismissed it as madness. But I was only twelve at the time and I remember it vividly. It stuck in my mind. I had a few nightmares about it."

"Is your brother still alive?" Peter asked. He sounded sympathetic.

"No, he died in 1950, still quite young. He was born in 1927, on the day Lindburgh landed in Paris. He became ill in 1933 when he was only six."

"So we might assume there's a link, that in fact your brother's illness was induced by the same thing that has frightened your grandchildren. That perhaps it affects children rather than adults." Egon moved around the huge sarcophagus, taking readings with one device after another. "This is odd. Most of the readings come from the artifact Ray removed and not from the sarcophagus itself. There are residuals here, of course, but the artifact itself appears to be the source of them."

"Well, is it really a control device?" asked Winston?

"As of yet, that is unclear. I'd like to take it back to the firehall for further study." Egon turned to Carter. "Would that be acceptable, sir?"

"If it's hurting my grandchildren, I want it out of the house," he said. "I'd like to be rid of the entire sarcophagus, but it's too big to move easily, and I can hardly donate it to the Metropolitan Museum if it's dangerous to children. Will it be safe to leave it here while the children are gone?"

"If there were no manifestations before the children came here, it ought to be," Ray said. "Unless having them here aroused an entity. Maybe you could all go to a hotel while we study it. I think we'd better take the artifact with us. We can rig a force field around it if it proves dangerous. Although it didn't hurt you or your sisters, or your daughter."

"Or we can zap it," Peter said, hefting his thrower. He would probably have enjoyed blasting away. But then Peter was a sucker for kids. He would definitely resent ghosts threatening the Carter children.

"We can't zap it yet, Peter," Egon told him. "We know too little, and no spirit has, as yet, manifested. While it is quiescent, trapping it is impossible."

"Don't tell it that, Egon. It'll just lurk until we're gone." Peter went over to the sarcophagus, stretched out his hand toward it, then pulled it away again. "I can feel that static electricity in the air. It's almost like it's pushing my hand away."

Winston edged up beside him and reached for it, too, his fingers stopping inches away. "He's right. I know I could touch it if I wanted to, but it's like it doesn't want me to."

"I could feel that, too," Egon admitted.

A fascinated gleam in his eyes, Ray slid between the two of them and pushed his hand up against the artifact. That was Ray, too excited for caution. As his palm slapped against the sarcophagus, the meter's readings jumped violently enough to make it beep its way up the scale to an earsplitting sound in an instant. Peter grabbed Ray's wrist and yanked him back. "Don't. It might do something nasty."

"It doesn't feel nasty," Ray argued, although he let Peter pull his hand away. "It feels...kinda nice. Smooth."

"Feels like it could make all my hair stand on end," Peter corrected. "And I don't need a bad hair day."

"Raymond," Egon put in thoughtfully. "Take the artifact out into the entry hall, then return here."

Ray grabbed it up obediently as if he understood Egon's intention. He was back quickly. "What's up, Egon?"

"There are no readings now from the sarcophagus. Even if a body is present in here, the ectoplasmic energy resides in the device, not the sarcophagus. We'll have to take it to headquarters for further tests."

"Take the thing that makes people go nuts back to where we live?" Peter demanded without a shred of enthusiasm.

"It doesn't appear to hurt adults, Peter," Egon reminded him. "And it didn't hurt Mr. Carter when he was a child, or his daughter either. We'll establish safeguards around it and we can monitor it. If it becomes dangerously active, we can use the particle throwers upon it."

Peter grinned. He must have liked the thought of blasting it. "Okay, but once we get it home, no touching it, Ray," he instructed sternly, shaking his finger at Stantz. "You're too much like a great big kid, and I don't want you to take chances. I think you should wear gloves if you carry it."

"There's a pair in the car, I'll get them," volunteered Winston. He hurried off.

"Perhaps I should carry the device," Egon volunteered. "You've touched it twice already, Ray. I don't have any proof that there could be an energy backlash that would build up with extended contact, but I am willing to take no chances."

"Well, okay, but it hasn't hurt me," Ray said, disappointment visible in his face. "It's not even heavy."

"Are you certain removing the artifact will make the sarcophagus safe?" Carter asked.

"We can't guarantee anything like that," Peter said. "Egon's readings gave off more reaction from the device than from the sarcophagus, but you could always check into a hotel for a few days just to be safe. We might need to run further tests on the sarcophagus, though."

"I'll have Jenkins give you a key to the front door," Carter decided. "That way, if we do leave, you'll have ready access. This disturbs me. I don't want Timmie or Jessie to go the way of my brother."

Egon carried the artifact out to Ecto. He was surprised to find it rather heavy when Ray had claimed it was light, but Ray had a tendency to exaggerate, and it was not so heavy that it put any strain on him to tote it to their car. Once he deposited it in the rear of the vehicle, they said their goodbyes to Mr. Carter and returned to the firehall.

Janine had arrived for the day's work and was waiting at her desk when they returned from the bust. "Early call?" she asked.

"Yeah, a really weird one, too, Janine." Ray, hands encased in gloves, hauled out the artifact and carried it over to deposit it on her desk.

"What's that weird thing?" she demanded suspiciously, eyes narrowing as she regarded it. "I saw a movie once that had a nuclear bomb with panel things a lot like that. I don't want it on my desk."

"Nuclear bomb?" Peter's voice rose to a screech. "Egon, we didn't bring any bombs in here, did we? This thing's not gonna blow up?"

"If it is, get it off my desk, the secretary instructed.

Egon took readings. "It's presently quiescent. Winston, will you carry it upstairs?"

"Sure, Egon. Come on, Ray, let me have it."

Ray stripped off the gloves reluctantly and passed them to Winston. "Well, okay," he said with mild annoyance, "but it's not a big deal. It hasn't hurt me or anything."

"Taking the proper safety precautions is a prudent measure, Ray," Egon reminded him.

"Yeah, Ray, that thing could be dangerous," Peter reminded him.

The telephone rang and Janine scooped it up automatically, her eyes lingering on the artifact. "Ghostbuster Central. Ghosts blasted, demons zapped, spooks -- " Her voice broke off. "Okay, just a minute." She passed the phone to Egon. "It's a Mr. Carter. He says you were just at his house." Peter lifted an eyebrow at Ray, wondering what could have gone wrong so quickly.

"Yes, Mr. Carter?" Egon said into the receiver. Then he frowned, reaching out to activate the phone speaker as if the man's words had astonished him. "Go ahead. We're all listening."

"It crumpled to dust," Carter cried in a shaken voice. "As soon as you drove away. The sarcophagus just collapsed in on itself like soggy cardboard. The lid crumbled and there was a body inside. It was well preserved -- almost as if it were alive -- but as soon as it was exposed to the air, it decomposed in moments and turned to dust."

"Oh, gosh," breathed Ray, eyes widening. "I wish we'd been there."

"Yeah, seeing bodies decompose is one of my favorite things," Peter said wryly, eyeing Ray with wary surprise. There were times when he couldn't understand Stantz's fascination with the weird and bizarre. "Down, Ray."

"I think the artifact may have really been a 'control device', in other words a means of maintaining the body's preservation," Egon mused. "Separated from the sarcophagus, it couldn't maintain it. I don't recall such instances in my reading before."

"Was the body human, Mr. Carter?" Winston asked suddenly. When the others stared at him in surprise, he added, "Well, the sarcophagus wasn't Egyptian, after all. Who's to say it wasn't one of those 'ancient astronauts' that were so trendy awhile back." Clearly skeptical of such a thing, he must have wanted to clear that remote possibility out of the way.

"The writing on the ring was Sumerian," Egon reminded him as if that proved the ring's owner, assuming the body in the sarcophagus had actually been the ring's owner, was from Planet Earth.

"Human?" Carter's voice rang with shock. "It never occurred to me to think anything else. It looked human to me. It was apparently male, at least I assumed it was. It was wearing a weird skirt thing with a long panel down the front, like they did in ancient times and its hair was black, long, and arranged in stylized waves. But definitely human."

He sounded very shaken. Peter edged closer to the phone. "Mr. Carter, Dr. Venkman here. The body didn't do anything other than dissolve, did it? Like move, or yell or anything."

Carter made a disgusted sound. "I...I don't know. For a moment, I thought it was lifting one hand to reach for me. It was pointing at me as if it could see me, as if it knew I was watching." Peter could almost feel his shudder over the phone. "I left the house immediately after that and I'm calling from my club. It had long, thin fingers, and one of them was reaching toward me as if to grab me. I'm not a fanciful man but it was as if it wanted something from me."

"Wow," gasped Ray, eyes like saucers. "That's incredible."

"You may say it's incredible but it was damned unpleasant," Carter snorted. "However the sarcophagus is destroyed now. I thought you should know."

"We'll have to go back and take additional readings," Egon decided after they hung up. "The collapse of the sarcophagus may have activated the spirit that was quiescent. Winston, you and I will return to the Carter house while Ray and Peter begin a study of the artifact. Peter, you carry it up the stairs. Take turns if you have to touch it. Ray, I mean this. It, or something connected with it, has the ability to influence the living. I don't want it to influence one of us. We will take every possible precaution."

"I hear you, Egon," Ray said as Winston passed the gloves to Peter.

"And you listen to him," Peter chided as he slid them on. "Because he's talking common sense and that's a term I don't think you understand." He hefted the artifact and made a great show of bowing down beneath its weight. "I knew I'd get to take it upstairs. It's always little Petey Venkman that has to do the hard work around here." Ignoring his partners' derision, he tightened his grip on the artifact -- it really was heavier than it appeared -- and started up the stairs.

"Wow, this is really great," Ray cried enthusiastically as he set up the magnetometer to take readings of the artifact. Peter deposited it on the lab table with considerable relief. Just carrying it had given him a creepy feeling, and the static electricity sensation hadn't gone away, making him certain his hair was standing on end. He'd been grateful for the gloves. The thought of touching it directly made his skin crawl.

"Test it all you want, Tex, but don't lay so much as your pinkie on it," he instructed sternly, eyes narrowed as he watched the device. He didn't like having it here in the firehouse, and he especially didn't like his friends messing with it, not when it had already driven one person insane and caused nasty nightmares, not to mention scaring a little girl. "I know you. You rush in where angels fear to tread. I don't want to have to send you to the nut house. You wouldn't like it there, I guarantee it."

"It's just another device, Peter," Ray reminded him, activating his detection equipment and staring at the readout screens.

"Yeah, a device that turned old Morrie schizo and had a go at Carter's grandkids. And Morrie didn't stop being weirded out when he grew up either. He might have been only twenty-three when he died, but he didn't recover when he was an adult, so you can't say it only affects little kids." He studied Ray closely for any evidence of unnatural behavior, but Ray was his normal self.

"'Weirded out'?" Ray asked with a wicked grin. "Is this one of the terms you learned in Psych 101, Peter?"

"No, that didn't show up until grad school," Peter teased. "You know what I mean. That thing's dangerous. I don't want any of us touching it. I'd feel a lot better if we could just zap it."

"No, there's too much to learn from it," Ray insisted, an edge to his voice. "Destroying it before we can understand it is just stupid. We have to find out how it works and what it does."

"And why you could pick it up off the sarcophagus when nobody else could. Does this remind you of anything, Ray?"

"Yeah, King Arthur," Ray said in surprise. "The sword in the stone."

Peter frowned. That had been the image in his mind, too, although Arthur's ability to pull Excalibur from the stone hadn't exactly signaled his death -- well, at least not right away. "I don't like that," he said. "Who's to say old Morrie couldn't pick it up, too. You might be its next target. And nobody messes with my Ray and gets away with it."

Ray smiled. "I'm okay. I don't feel like I'm about to go nuts or anything. I think I could lift it because it had been activated, not because it was waiting for me, personally, to come along."

That sounded reasonable, but it still made Peter nervous. He peered at Ray, who seemed completely tranquil and relaxed, not tensed and uneasy. He was displaying no symptoms like the little boy or girl had, and he hadn't complained that the body in the sarcophagus was screaming. Maybe removing the artifact had already defeated the ghost. Peter would like to think so but he was too suspicious for that. He didn't trust the thing on the table -- not for a second.

"Besides," Ray said quickly in what sounded like an attempt at reassurance, "the children weren't able to pick up the control device."

"That we know of." Peter frowned. It had evidently skipped a generation too, between Morrie and little Timmie. Could it only react to a male? Carter had one daughter but no sons. "What are you going to do with it, Tex?"

"Take additional readings," Ray said. "I wish I could get it to activate because then we'd get a lot better idea what we're up against."

"You want it to activate?" Peter asked in disbelief. "I don't like the idea of that. I think it means big trouble."

"Yeah. Because if it just sits here, how can we do anything about it. We're Ghostbusters, Peter." He looked up and grinned. "We can handle it. We need to know what its for and I can't get any more information like this."

Peter drew his thrower. "How about like this, Ray?" he asked, taking aim at it.

Instantly Ray jumped between Peter and the artifact, spreading his arms to shield it. "No, Peter, don't. I haven't finished taking readings yet."

Peter heaved a sigh and holstered his proton rifle reluctantly. "Ray, come on. It's dangerous."

"It's not hurting us. I still only get residuals," Ray said in disappointment. "I thought maybe since the sarcophagus bought it, that would mean all the power had transferred here and we'd be able to tell."

"Maybe it's just resting," Peter objected. "You know, waiting for us to drop our guard."

"No, I don't think so."

"So what do you think it is, anyway?" Peter walked in a slow circle around the table, eyeing the artifact with great distrust. It made him very uneasy and he didn't know why. He'd be a lot happier if it were blasted to its component atoms or dumped in the East River.

"Maybe it was a repository for the body's soul," Ray said thoughtfully. "Even if the writing is Sumerian and the tomb was found in Egypt, it could be from another culture entirely, one whose priests could channel the soul into an object."

"Yeah, like that was real common in ancient days," Peter scoffed uneasily. For all he knew such things really had happened and nobody knew about them. Religion had been dominant in a lot of primitive cultures.

"It's just the terminology, Peter. Ancient Egyptians practiced mummification; they thought they were preserving the physical body for the afterlife."

"Yeah, and the body would have been real useful after they scraped out the brain," Peter muttered. He'd read about the mummification process once and it had grossed him out.

"Well, I think they thought what would do it was the 'ba', the soul or life-force," Ray said. "They weren't really big on anatomy or modern medicine, after all. Maybe whoever was in the sarcophagus thought he was storing his ba in the artifact and that it would rejoin the body later. After all, Jessie said the body was preserved, but not mummified. And it was ancient; there's no way a body could appear 'normal' after all those centuries unless a paranormal force was involved. Maybe an energy inside the sarcophagus preserved the body like a primitive stasis field, and the soul was stored separately, and they were supposed to be reunited one day. And maybe the sarcophagus crumpled to dust with age when the artifact containing the 'soul' wasn't there anymore."

Peter frowned. That made a weird kind of sense even if it took a giant leap to come up with such a theory. Was Ray just speculating or did he already have a link to whatever was trapped? Only instead of 'soul', he thought 'ghost'. That was what he was trained for. "Or the 'ghost', Ray," he said, eyes lingering on Ray's face for traces of abnormal behavior.

Ray nodded excitedly. "I know. I bet that's it. Maybe this is even a miniature containment unit. They trapped the ghost when it first manifested and kept it with the body and the process preserved the body. Wow, this is really great."

"I hate to break it to you, Ray, but keeping a ghost with the body doesn't generally preserve it. At least not in my experience, and I know a lot about ghosts. "

"Not in our society," Ray replied. "But we don't know what process they might have used. Maybe the body was even from outer space."

"That's pushing it, Tex," Peter said. "Last I heard there wasn't a lot of visiting back and forth between ancient Egypt and UFOs, unless you want to get into that Ancient Astronaut thing. Besides, Carter said it looked human when Winston asked, and Jessie didn't say anything about it being an alien body."

"No, I guess not. Anyway, most of that ancient astronaut stuff is just silly," Ray said. "Just because the people didn't have modern technology, it didn't mean they were stupid. We know how they built the pyramids, and it wasn't outer space folks coming to do it. It just all took longer to do things." He grinned. "But that doesn't mean there never was any alien contact. Just that it probably wasn't really common -- if it happened at all."

"Yeah, and all aliens wrote in Sumerian," Peter objected.

"It was probably the result of an obscure sect," Ray said, waving one of Egon's esoteric gizmos at the artifact. "Or maybe even a being as powerful as Gozer."

"Let's not do gods, Ray," Peter said reluctantly. "I hate it when we have to do gods." Gozer had been powerful enough to pull off something like this, but the thought of it made Peter very uneasy.

"No, these readings aren't that high," Ray said almost wistfully. He loved it when they ran into ultra-powerful entities and thrived on the challenge. Peter wasn't quite as enthusiastic as that. "No, this is really class four type stuff, only not quite," Ray concluded.

"Not quite -- how?" Peter didn't think he really wanted to know.

"Well, I can't figure that out yet. I want to talk to Egon about it." He set down the device and did a visual on the artifact, hands jammed into his pockets. "It's like, maybe whoever was in the sarcophagus wasn't dead in the same way we die," he said thoughtfully. "Dead, but maybe not quite...unconscious."

Involuntarily, Peter shivered. "You mean trapped in there aware?" he asked with a vague gesture northward in the direction of the Carter house. He couldn't think of any more appalling way to go than to be sealed away all alone, away from anyone who had ever mattered while centuries and millennia went by. For a moment, he was sorry for the spirit.

"Well, it'd be like that if the ghost was sealed in with the body, wouldn't it? That was why Jessie saw it screaming, I think."

"Yeah, saw it through a block of solid bassalt or whatever that stuff was," Peter objected hastily, unwilling to embrace the possibility because he found it so horrifying. If Ray was right, if there had been trapped awareness after death, no wonder if could frighten a child. No wonder it drove Morris Carter nuts, if the ghost could touch his mind. In that instant, Peter wanted nothing so much as to blast the device and put an end to any such possibilities in the future. "Let me neutronize it, Ray. This thing makes me nervous."

"You're not nervous, Peter," Ray soothed quickly. "It's just that static electricity in the air that makes you think you are."

"No, Ray, I am nervous," Peter corrected. "I don't want this thing doing its number on one of us."

"It can't," Ray promised. "The body's gone, remember?"

Ray stood there, hands in pockets, leaning against the table beside the object, totally comfortable with it, but just as stubbornly prepared to defend it from Peter's thrower. He was too fascinated to give up on it. "It's not going to hurt us, Peter. I just know it. I think it's so great to be able to study it. You'll let us study it, won't you?"

Peter had never been able to resist the wheedling look in Ray's big brown eyes. He heaved a disgusted snort. "Only until I think it's endangering any of us, Ray. And then I'm gonna zap it so hard its molecules take off for the Andromeda Galaxy."

Ray frowned, irritation coming and going so quickly in his eyes that Peter wasn't sure he'd seen it or imagined it. Then Stantz nodded. Pulling one of his hands out of his pocket, he gave Peter a comradely pat on the arm. "I know, Peter. We can't let it hurt anybody. But I really don't think it will. It's gonna be just fine. And we'll be able to learn so much from it. You'll see."

Peter hoped uneasily that he was right.

Egon and Winston returned from the Carter mansion in time for lunch, tramping up the stairs to find Peter and Ray in the kitchen throwing together leftover beef stew and a salad. After an hour with the artifact upstairs, Peter had been grateful to come down. No matter how harmless Ray insisted it was, the static electricity feeling that lingered in the air promised they weren't yet done with the artifact.

Or maybe that it wasn't done with them.

"We stopped at the hotel and spoke with the Carter children," Egon informed them as they reached the top of the steps. "And took readings of them. Jessica's were completely negative, and the boy, Timmie, had faint, fading residuals. I suspect they will not linger much past this evening. He was up and full of energy, completely recovered from the experience. He scarcely seems to remember it."

"That's great," cried Ray, rushing out to meet them. "I'm really glad, Egon. I hated to think of that kid in trouble."

"Did he know what had happened?" Peter called from the kitchen, stirring industriously at the stew.

"No, he thought he'd had some bad dreams," offered Winston. "We didn't push him too hard; he's only four and we were afraid he'd have more dreams if we reminded him."

"Jessica said she knew the artifact had caused it, that and the body," Egon added. "She had seen lights blinking on the artifact more than once and heard sounds, but she reported she couldn't feel any sense of possession or even of contact. She believed her brother could, which is why she went downstairs. She meant to stop it."

"Brave girl," Peter said.

"She shouldn't have done it, though," argued Ray. When Peter turned to him, he added, "It might have been dangerous."

"Evidently it was," Egon replied. "However, she believes that going downstairs did save her brother from the entity in the sarcophagus and she may well be right."

"What did you find when you checked the sarcophagus?" Ray asked eagerly as Egon led the way into the kitchen.

"Actually very little," Egon replied in disappointment. "The only readings we detected were a by-product of the actual dissolution. The body was completely turned to dust; we were able to take samples of it." He patted his pocket where he probably held them in petri dishes. Peter shivered. He didn't like the thought of carrying around desiccated body parts. Not even very, very old ones.

"Could you get readings off it?" Ray asked.

"No, only fading residuals. It was as if there was nothing left but dust. However, I want to analyze the remains under the microscope and see if I can make any non-ectoplasmic determinations about it. We might want to call in an expert on the Eighteenth Dynasty or the Sumerian period just to see what we have here. Perhaps the remnants could be carbon dated to establish the time frame."

"Carter was back, picking up a few things while we were there," Winston put in, reaching over Peter's shoulder to snitch a carrot from the salad bowl. "He'd sent his servants off to stay in a hotel and was going to stay at his club until he heard the all-clear from us."

"Actually I should theorize the house is completely safe now," Egon replied. "If there is any actual danger, it would be here, with the artifact."

"I told Ray that," Peter said quickly. "Only he says it's safe. I'm gonna watch that thing like a hawk. I don't trust it. Ray, tell the guys what theories you've dreamed up." He ladled the stew into four bowls, passing one to Winston and one to Egon. Ray grabbed his own bowl while Peter carried the salad out to set it on the dining table.

Ray explained what he'd come up with as they ate, interrupted periodically by fascinated questions from Egon. Winston frowned, in uneasy accord with Peter. He didn't take kindly to the idea of little green men, and Egon was skeptical there, himself.

"Really, Raymond, you have no basis to assume it's from outer space, not when the writings on Carter's ring were Sumerian."

"I told him that," Peter crowed triumphantly, pausing to take a big swallow of milk. "I said it was probably an ancient cult."

"Which it most likely is," Egon replied. "I want to run additional tests on it and make certain there isn't anything similar to this in the literature."

"Ancient cults don't sound that great to me," muttered Winston. He glanced at Ray, who had paused, fork halfway to his mouth, eyes bright as he thought about the artifact upstairs. "Reminds me of the trouble we've had with cults, and just think of all those Gozer worshippers in the twenties. I think we ought to make sure nobody touches that thing. We don't know for sure that whatever happened can only affect children."

"Quite right, Winston," Egon concurred. "We must take every precaution." He scooped up the last spoonful of his stew.

"Tell Ray," Peter said, nudging the occultist with his elbow. Ray jerked slightly and gave them an abashed grin, lowering the fork he'd been holding absently.

"Gosh, I was just thinking about all the possibilities," he admitted. "I don't really think it was from outer space. Jessie didn't say that. She said she saw a body but if it hadn't been human, she would have said so."

Peter nodded. Ray was thinking. There had been a couple of times upstairs when Ray had faded out like that, only to bounce back with new theories. He'd touched the artifact and that worried Peter. But his eager excitement now was purely Ray. He wasn't acting like Morrie or little Timmie. Peter meant to blast the artifact the minute he saw any evidence of such behavior from any of the team.

"There's no basis to assume the body is anything but human," Egon replied. "I'm eager to go over your findings, Ray."

"I made notes of everything," Ray admitted, pushing away his plate. "Wait until you see it all, Egon."

As the team finished up their meal, Ray hid a smile. This was better than he thought. He hoped none of them had seen him pocket the ring when they first went to see the sarcophagus, but no one had even mentioned it again except in passing. Now he had it, and he knew it was going to tell him everything he wanted to know. He wouldn't share it with anyone; it was his secret. He'd been poking his hand into his pocket all along, caressing the smooth metal, feeling out the indentations where the letters had been etched in, gloating to himself. He knew the truth would be revealed at any minute. He was sure of it. Then he'd understand about the body and why it couldn't stay dead any longer. He could feel it, feel the essence of it, and he knew the answers were right in front of him. And they were meant for him, and him alone.

But only if he told no one. He gnawed on his bottom lip so he wouldn't smile and give it away. Life! It was going to be his. He would be free again. Soon now. Soon. He'd bide his time, wait and see. If the others meant to stop him, then they'd have to pay. No one could stop him now. He wouldn't permit it. They were so far beneath him it didn't matter what happened to them. Only freedom and life mattered. If they would not serve him, bow down to him, worship him, he would crush them like bugs. He would enjoy squashing the life from them, draining them, erasing them. Ray wouldn't fight him, either. He couldn't. He wasn't strong enough to fight the centuries of hatred. He wouldn't even remember, only feel the need for secrecy, until it was too late for him, for his friends. Then he would kill them!

Ray hesitated, feeling a fleeting sensation of shock. What had he just been thinking? The memory lingered, faded. Then he ran his fingers lovingly over the ring again. It was his, all his. This life. This freedom. This body. He hesitated again, but then he shrugged and relaxed. Nothing was wrong. Nothing at all. Everything was going perfectly, as if he'd planned it this way. Soon he'd know all the answers, and it would be perfect. Soon -- he would have life!

He frowned, wondering if he should tell anyone, but the compulsion to keep the secret was too strong. Soon, he would activate the control device, and then he would be free. Free! Free! He'd wait until dark, wait until Janine went home and the building was locked up. Then no one could come in unexpectedly and interfere. He'd be safe then, safe and free.

Alive again. And these other men, these three, Ray's friends? What did they matter against the chance for life? He'd allow them to live if they would worship him, do his bidding. But if they tried to interfere...they would die!

Ray squirmed uncomfortably. That wasn't right. Was it? His finger traced the contour of the ring again. Yes, that was right. But now was not the time. Not yet. Wait. Don't do anything. Wait.

The fierce, driving compulsion sank to the back of his mind and he was Ray again. He pulled his hand out of his pocket. Wow! This was great research. He couldn't wait to find out what the artifact would do? Encountering Peter's gaze, he shot him a blazing smile. "Let's get going," he said. "I just know we're going to figure it out."

"Down, Tex," Peter said fondly. "We'll get it. I don't know about you guys, but I'm sure up for dessert."

By late afternoon, Peter found himself growing bored with the artifact. Egon had repeated several of Ray's tests besides running endless new ones. He had Winston working on the computer, cross-referencing what he found, and had given Peter several weighty tomes to plow through, all of them excruciatingly boring. If he never heard another thing about Sumerian demi-gods, or evil ghosts and devils, or priest cults again, he'd be happy. Why did people have to write such books in the driest manner possible? What was wrong with using a more exciting style? He felt like sending the books off to the National Register and letting their star reporter, Edgar Benedek paraphrase them into the style of sensational journalism. At least then they wouldn't be so flat and monotonous.

Janine had come up to take her departure for the evening and had frowned at them. "You guys look like you're about to zone out," she had remarked. "And that doesn't look like your usual reading matter, Dr. V. No pictures."

"Tell me," Peter agreed in heartfelt tones.

"It feels weird up here," Janine said, glancing over her shoulder. "You guys notice?"

Egon nodded. "We've been aware of it all afternoon, Janine. It hasn't hurt us so far."

"It better not." She gave all corners of the room a quick scan, then nodded in approval when she saw nothing out of place. The lure of tickets for a Broadway show with her sister tugged at her, and she finally departed, watching Egon over her shoulder. The team had returned to work.

Even Ray's enthusiasm had eventually wound down. Check him out now, sitting there, his chin in his hand, his eyelids drooping as if he were about to fall asleep. Egon might thrive on this kind of environment, but he was even starting to bore Ray. And that said a lot for the subject matter.

As if he sensed Peter's eyes on him, Ray jerked, straightened up, and stretched. "My eyes are getting tired from all these readings," he said. Jamming his hands in his pockets, he stood up and walked around the room in an attempt to rouse himself from the near stupor. He arched his shoulders and rolled his head around on his neck.

"Maybe it's all this static electricity," Winston muttered, leaning back in the chair and stretching energetically, then rubbing the back of his neck. "Feels like there's gonna be a storm in here. I keep waiting for something nasty to happen."

"There is an atmosphere of waiting for the other shoe to drop, isn't there?" Egon glanced up from a small notebook he held. "I've made reference to that in my notes. Has anything similar shown up in the literature, Peter?"

"Not that I've found," Peter denied. After an afternoon of 'waiting for the other shoe to drop' he'd given up it ever happening. He thought longingly of an evening out with the lovely Charisse, away from the uneasy atmosphere and dull reading.

"Well, you've been asleep half the afternoon," said Ray. He teased Peter like this all the time, but now there was no element of teasing in his voice. There was not even a reproach. It was a statement of fact, not a very approving one, but just a flat statement. His eyes glittered with an unnatural brightness, then it smoothed away and he winked.

Peter frowned. He wasn't used to that tone from Ray, who managed to maintain a slight level of amusement even when seriously criticizing Peter. "Wasn't sleeping," he defended himself although it was true he'd nearly dozed over part of the material. He shot a sideways glance at Egon to see if he'd noticed that weird glitter in Ray's eyes, but Egon was concentrating on his calculator and hadn't glanced up. Winston had turned back to the computer. With a sigh, Peter knuckled his eyes. Maybe he was just tired.

"Be right back," Ray said, and vanished in the direction of the bathroom. Winston heaved a sigh and pushed his chair away from the computer keyboard, flexing his fingers.

"We're not getting anything new," he said. "This 'artifact' thing isn't glowing for us. I can't imagine it glowing, you know. Maybe the little girl imagined it. I mean, she was wandering around in the middle of the night; she might have been sleepwalking."

"I don't think so," Egon disagreed. "She had clearly prepared for her midnight excursion. She had provided very thoroughly for dangers she expected to encounter. She appears a brave and practical child."

"Yeah, but she's nine years old, Egon," Peter objected. "No matter how much you might approve of her scientific method, she's a little kid. Just because you were a miniature Einstein at her age doesn't mean she is. She could have imagined the whole thing."

Egon actually seemed pleased at the Einstein comparison. "Perhaps," he said. "And perhaps there is no chance of the artifact activating when it is separated from the sarcophagus. On the other hand, without it, the sarcophagus didn't last. This is the control source, not vice versa. And I am still detecting strong residual energy from it."

"You mean there's a ghost right here?" Peter said. He was glad he was wearing his pack. "Is that why it feels like it's about to thunder?"

"If so, the spirit is quiescent," Egon replied. "And I fear the energy we can all feel may be affecting our equipment."

Peter stared at him. "If it's affecting our equipment, it might be active and not quiescent, did you ever think of that?" he complained.

"Actually, yes, Peter, I did," Egon replied. "I've been considering that all afternoon, which is why I have cross-referenced my findings on the various devices in hopes that one might pick up information another missed. So far, the device has not harmed us. That does not, of course, mean it will continue in that fashion."

Ray returned. "Anything new?" he asked, rocking on his toes, his hands jammed deep in his pockets. His eyes fell upon the artifact as if he couldn't stop staring at it.

"Not yet," Egon replied. "Try the artifact, Raymond, but don't touch it. Put your gloves on."

Ray pulled his hands out of his pockets and slid them into the heavy gloves he'd been using all afternoon to manipulate the ancient device. Peter frowned. For a second a faint reaction had nudged at the edge of his mind, but he didn't know what it was. He hoped it wasn't anything important.

Letting the unformed thought slide away in hopes it would come to him if he didn't try too hard, he watched Ray as he lifted the artifact, tracing gloved fingers over every part of its surface. He looked happy, excited, as if he couldn't imagine anything more fun than what he was doing. Peter grinned. That was Ray, always alive to the joy of their job, spewing excitement around him in all directions. Peter got a kick out of that, especially because he was apt to take the cynical approach to anything going. Everybody needed a Ray Stantz in their lives.

Then Ray stared at him, and for an instant there was that same weird glint in his eyes that Peter had seen before, one that wasn't friendly, one that was almost threatening. It was gone immediately, a trick of the light, perhaps, because Ray cried suddenly, "Hey, guys, I've got it," as he manipulated a ridge on the base's surface.

The artifact burst into glowing light in his hands, each of the panels glimmering with a different color, shining out to color the room in a kaleidoscope effect, the glow shining from deep within the artifact.

"Put it down, Raymond," Egon shouted urgently as his P.K.E. meter burst into shrill beeping that rose to such a high note it hurt Peter's ears.

"It's not hurting me," Ray called. Peter thought his voice sounded oddly hollow. All that static charge must be hurting him and maybe he was just too caught up in the experience to notice. Or maybe it was affecting him in ways none of them understood. Peter didn't have to take the thought any further. With a warning cry, he dove for Ray, knocked the glowing artifact from his hands and bore him to the ground in a tackle reminiscent of his college football days, rolling him away from the brilliant burst of light that erupted from it. Ray screeched and beat at Peter with his fists for a second, making him duck away out of range in astonishment rather than actual pain. Peter raised his arms to protect his ribcage. Then Ray caught himself and jerked away from Peter, his eyes wide with shock and disbelief.

"Gosh, sorry, Peter. I don't know why I did that." Peter listened for the usual remorse he had come to expect when Ray had done something he was ashamed of or blamed himself for. Ray had been awfully prone to guilt when Peter and Egon had first met him, although he'd grown beyond excessive blame these days. Still, hitting Peter might trigger a return of the old feelings, and Peter wasn't sure what he'd say in the face of a sudden guilt attack. Still shocked, his feelings hurt that Ray had tried to hit him without real provocation, he halfway wanted the guilt, although he meant to ease it at the first sign of its arrival. He didn't hear it, although the words were right. Ray was still more absorbed with the artifact than in what he had just done to Peter. "Is it broken? Why'd you do that, Peter? It wasn't hurting me at all. I was fine." He scuttled sideways after the device, its panels ablink in a myriad of colors. The minute his hands landed on it, the colors began to fade and the feeling of static electricity eased from the air.

"Don't touch it, Ray!" Egon and Peter cautioned in perfect unison, prepared to lunge at him again and yank him away from it if anything threatening happened.

"It didn't hurt me," Ray said accusingly, casting a reproachful glance at Peter. "I'm okay. But now it's broken. We'll never learn anything from it now. Thanks a lot, Peter."

He straightened up, still clutching the artifact against his chest, stroking it caressingly as the light faded into a dull glow that surrounded his ungloved hands for a second. Hunching his shoulders as if to protect himself for another attack, he guarded the artifact with a loving protectiveness, as if it were of greater importance to him than any of his friends were. Peter squashed down a surge of disappointment that Ray would react in such a way, half afraid the gizmo was influencing him. Then the light drained away entirely, and the device collapsed in on itself the way the sarcophagus must have collapsed. The very texture altered, and it sagged like cardboard that had been left out in the rain, unable to maintain its original shape. The dome section caved in, then the entire artifact turned into dust and trickled away between Ray's fingers.

Peter propped himself up on his hands and knees then sat back on his heels, gaping at the ruined device in astonishment. "Egon?" he asked. "What's happening here?"

The physicist glanced up from the screen of his P.K.E. meter. "Just for a second there was an incredible power surge, Peter. You heard the meter go off. I recorded it for further study. But there are no readings now, just as there were none on the sarcophagus. Only fading residuals." He pointed the meter at Ray, who sadly deposited the dusty remains of the artifact on the lab table, brushing off his hands. Peter frowned. The gloves were gone. Ray had donned them to pick up the artifact; he'd been wearing them when he hit Peter. He must have yanked them off immediately afterward. He hadn't been wearing them when the light had gone funny.

"Is he okay, Egon?" Peter asked, eyeing Ray warily and worriedly. "He just touched it with his bare hands and he's been acting weird. Not to mention whacking me for no good reason. You don't think it's been influencing him, do you?" He was torn. He didn't want Ray influenced, no way -- but if Ray was influenced, it would explain why he'd taken it upon himself to attack Peter.

"Influencing him?" Winston echoed. "Yeah, I've gotta say trying to use old Pete as a punching bag isn't very normal."

"A punching bag?" Ray echoed blankly. "What do you mean, a punching bag?" He stared at Peter in shock. "I didn't...did I?"

"I know, gentlemen, and I have concerns about the possibilities of influence, or even possession, but his readings are entirely normal. His biorhythms are completely within acceptable tolerances and there is no evidence of demonic possession or any strange overlay upon his normal readings." He passed a series of meters and test devices over Ray, who stared up at him in astonishment and allowed it without hesitation. He kept sneaking glances at Peter as if he couldn't believe what he'd done. Maybe the artifact had influenced him, at least to feel an abnormal obsession with it. Now that it was gone, that control, if control it had been, had vanished. There was no evidence of an unnatural glint in his eyes now as he stood allowing Egon to test him.

Peter remembered the feel of Ray's clenched fists impacting on his arm and ribcage. The blows hadn't been hard enough to do any real damage other than perhaps a bruise or two, but they were really out of character for Ray. Maybe it was just the device, making Ray ultra protective of it. But he had to make certain that was all it was -- and that the control was ended. "Are you sure, Egon?" he demanded.

"Of course I'm certain, Peter." Egon adjusted the dials. "Ray, your biorhythms are quite normal. But I suspect the artifact has fascinated you so completely that you identified with it. Peter was trying to save you from a perceived danger, not to attack you -- or it."

"I guess so." Ray cast a shamefaced gaze at Venkman. "I'm really sorry, Peter. I guess I just got over-excited. I didn't mean to hit you. I hardly even remember doing it."

"You were focused on it too deeply," Peter said, slipping into psychology mode because a part of him had been hurt by Ray's actions, not physically; he'd had worse from a class two on a bad day. But he had been slightly wounded that Ray would care so much about the artifact that he'd take it out on one of his friends. "You've gotta watch that. I'm glad it's collapsed. You might have wound up like Morrie if the thing was still intact. Who knows how he started on his weirding-out. At least with it gone, we don't have to worry about that."

"If that gizmo did it, then I'm glad it bit the big one," Winston murmured. He grabbed Ray's right wrist and examined his palm. "You look okay, homeboy. Sure you're not hurt? You don't feel weird, do you? Anything like that?"

"I feel great, Winston. Only disappointed." For a second his eyes lingered on Peter, who halfway expected to find resentment there, as if Ray had blamed him for the destruction of their find. But instead Ray's eyes seemed quietly satisfied. He shot a blazing smile at Peter, one tempered with an edge of guilt.

"Mad at me?" he asked.

"No, I'm not mad at you," Peter said, bounding up and giving Ray a poke in the ribs. "But next time, I want you to stop and think before you pull anything that dangerous."

Ray gave him a return poke, right over one the spots his fists had impacted. Peter squelched a wince before it could show. He was almost positive Ray had lashed out because Peter had tackled him unexpectedly, that his reaction had been purely instinctive. At least Peter hoped it was. Seeing the slight wince, Ray hung his head.

"No way, Ray. It's okay. Just don't do it again." Peter shook his finger at him. "We're not gonna do guilt here. I'm fine. And Egon says you're fine, too. I'm glad the thing came apart."

"Me too," Ray said around a great big yawn. "Gosh, I'm tired all of a sudden. Do you think maybe it was influencing me and now that it's stopped, all that is catching up with me?"

"Entirely possible," Egon replied. "Do you feel any overshadowing or possession?"

Ray shook his head positively. "No, Egon, I feel great, just kind of sleepy."

"Hey, then, go take a nap," Winston replied. "I think we're pretty much done with this. Fizzled out, didn't it? How's it go? Not with a bang but a whimper?"

"Sounds good to me," Peter said, but he cast an uneasy glance over his shoulder. He wasn't quite ready to believe it had been so easy to stop the thing. Whatever the thing had been....

"Anyway, Egon, keep monitoring him, why don't you?" Peter asked. "He's been wool-gathering all afternoon. Maybe now that the thing is gone he'll be back to normal -- whatever normal is." He still wasn't certain Ray had come away untouched. If Egon took periodic readings to make sure....

Ray poked him again, this time in an unbruised area. Peter couldn't help grinning. As long as Ray was himself, they'd come out of it okay. If only he could remember what he'd noticed before. There was something...he wasn't sure what it had been. Something that had been there and then wasn't? Maybe if he stopped trying so hard, it would come to him.

"Raymond, the ring?" Egon said suddenly. "You had the ring, didn't you? I wonder if we should test that."

"Ring?" Peter asked. That was it! He'd seen the ring on Ray's thumb, hadn't he? When Ray pulled the gloves off and picked up the artifact from the floor.... He tried to remember. He could see the glowing light surrounding Ray's hands, then abating. No, there'd been no ring when the light died. He was positive of that, and Ray wasn't wearing it now. But he'd seen it. He was certain of that.

"Ring?" Ray slid his hand into his pocket and came out empty. "That's funny, Egon. I did have it. I stuck it in my pocket so we could test it when we came home, but then I just -- forgot about it. It isn't there now. Do you think it could have dissolved like the artifact did?" He yawned gapingly, then pulled his pocket inside out to check for dust and remains of the ring. There were none there, other than normal pocket lint. A few coins spilled out onto the floor. Winston scampered after them and picked them up.

Egon waved his P.K.E. meter over Ray's pocket. "Residuals are stronger there, Ray, but only because you had the ring. What a disappointment. We could have studied it!"

"At least it's not doing nasty things to any of us," Winston replied. "You sure you're okay, Ray? You've been acting slightly off all day."

Ray's eyes widened. "Gosh, maybe it was the ring," he blurted. "Only it didn't make me do anything weird, really. At least I can't remember it." He gazed earnestly at his friends.

"Other than pounding on me a little," Peter said. That still rankled slightly. But if the ring had influenced Ray.... "Egon, could the ring have made Ray decide I'd make a good punching bag?"

"Without further study, it's difficult to say. However it is an excellent hypothesis."

Peter frowned. "'The ring of death,'" he quoted. "'This one will be erased to bring renewal.' I don't like the sound of that. We forgot all about that."

"It was a very hasty translation," Egon said quickly. "There may have been other meanings."

"'...erased to bring renewal...'" Peter said slowly. "I sure don't like the sound of that. Renewal of what? The body in the sarcophagus?"

"If that's it, I don't think it will be renewed at any time in the foreseeable future," Egon responded, gesturing over at the petri dishes that held the body ash. "It's highly possible that the little girl's actions saved her brother's life."

"Or his sanity," Peter muttered. "Old Morrie did die young, but he didn't renew the body." He frowned then. "Maybe he did. Maybe it took energy from him to maintain a state of preservation. I don't like this."

"It's over now, though," Winston said reassuringly. "Right? Separating that device from the sarcophagus broke the cycle. Even the ring is kaput. Right, Egon?"

"It is possible," Egon replied. "But I would not care to say for certain until we've done further tests. Ray, I suspect the ring did influence you. That's why you feel drained, just as the child, Timmie did. Check your other pockets. We must be sure the ring is gone."

So Ray turned out all his pockets and even, at Egon's stubborn urgings, stripped down to his shorts while Egon passed the P.K.E. meter over him and over his clothing. Finally, satisfied, he suggested Ray dress in different clothes just to be safe. The ring was clearly gone. If there had been a cycle of 'erasing' and 'renewal', it was broken. Peter hoped so anyway.

"Why don't you catch a nap, Tex," he suggested. "I bet you could use it." His brow crinkled. That had happened to Timmie, hadn't it? Increasing lethargy? But the sarcophagus and artifact had been intact then. Its destruction had broken the cycle. Ray had to be safe. Maybe they were all overreacting. But he didn't intend to let it go. They'd check on Ray until they were sure.

"I think I will," Ray volunteered. Gathering up his clothes, he started for the bedroom, then paused in the lab doorway. "Peter. I...I think it was the ring that made me hit you. Or the artifact. I don't even really remember doing it except vaguely. I hope you know I wouldn't do anything like that normally."

Peter went over and clapped his bare shoulder. "You bet I do, Ray. It's okay. Whatever it is, it's over now, but we'll let our favorite mad scientist tiptoe in and test you every now and then, okay?"

Ray's smile blazed out. "Thanks, Peter." Then he turned and trudged tiredly into the bedroom.

"I suspect it drew energy from him all day," Egon mused, checking the readings of the room in general once he was gone. "And perhaps had a mild influence over him. I several times caught an expression in his eyes that didn't feel like Ray."

"I did too," Peter said. "Egon -- are you really sure it's gone?"

"I've done every possible test we've ever developed for evidence of possession," Egon replied soberly. "Ray was never actually possessed. I suspect he was more influenced than anything, and it was never a total influence. If it had been, we'd have been given further evidence of it. I suspect the entity was driven to protect the artifact, which is why it made Ray attack you when you tackled him, Peter. It was never Ray's intention to hurt you. You do know that? I know it bothered you."

Peter nodded. "Yeah, Spengs, I do know that. I'm okay with it, as long as Ray is all right."

"Now that the artifact and sarcophagus are both gone and the ring has vanished, Ray should be quite safe but I will go in and test him in an hour just to make certain, and will take periodic readings through the evening. I think a brief nap will refresh him. However, I am not prepared to take any chances with Ray's life or his sanity. I intend to continue the tests until I am certain there is no lingering danger."

"Nobody better hurt Ray," Winston muttered in agreement.

Peter hesitated, then he headed for the bedroom, pausing in the doorway. Ray had simply flopped down in his shorts without even bothering to open the bed. He was already fast asleep.

"You'd better be okay, Ray," Peter said under his breath. Then he grabbed up the quilt that hung folded over the footboard of Ray's bed and spread it over him. Ray didn't wake.

He turned to find Egon in the doorway behind him and shared a grin with him. "He's gonna be just fine," Peter said positively. "It's all over now, Egon, right?"

"We'll make certain it is, Peter," Egon replied, gesturing out of the bedroom. "That appears a completely natural sleep to me, and the readings are still normal."

"Great." Peter wasn't sure he'd entirely trust the readings quite yet, and he saw a flash in Egon's eyes that suggested the physicist felt the same. But then Ray didn't have to face the danger alone. The guys would stick with him. They were a team.

Peter checked in on Ray several times over the next few hours. He was sleeping so deeply, Peter was loath to disturb him, but he did try once, just to make sure Ray could be aroused. Ray awoke instantly and gazed up at Peter with sleepy eyes. "I feel better, Peter," he said. "But I think I'll just sack out for the rest of the evening." When he spotted concern in Peter's eyes, he added earnestly, "Really. I can tell a big difference already. I'm fine."

Peter let it go. He retreated to the doorway and listened until Ray's breathing deepened, then he popped in across the hall where Winston was updating computer files. He gave Zeddemore a thumbs' up sign. "Where's Egon?"

"Working in the basement lab," Winston said, gesturing downward. "He has equipment down there he wanted to use on the ashes."

"Okay. I'll head on down and check on him in a half hour or so," Peter said and went down to the second floor, where he flopped down on the couch and switched on the television set.

Egon had decided to run further tests on the ashes from the sarcophagus, and had gone downstairs to the cross-referencer he'd designed to compare physical artifacts with P.K.E. readings. There had been times it had been important to match a ghost with a specific human being. Not all ghosts appeared human after death, but Egon had discovered that there were tie-in readings that could be obtained from the artifacts of someone newly dead. It was a rather grisly occupation but it had helped them on more than one occasion to learn just who a specific ghost was. The person's history made it possible to deal with the ghost on a personal level, and twice, to help it disperse peacefully. Knowing there were ghosts with extremely faint readings, Egon wanted to make sure this particular ghost was not present at headquarters. If he had a specific setting to work from he could boost the gain on the meter and test Ray thoroughly. Although he'd detected no unnatural readings from Ray, he was not comfortable with letting it go without doing everything he could think of to make certain there were no unexpected aftereffects, especially since it was obvious that Ray had been affected by the artifact or the ring.

He had been working industriously for an hour when he felt the hairs on the back of his neck prickle. It took him a second to recognize the static electricity sensation they had experienced when the artifact had been present. Egon's stomach sank. It wasn't over. It had never been over.

He stiffened. Suddenly the sensation that he was no longer alone permeated the entire room. He spun around and froze.

Ray Stantz stood before him.

Except it was not Ray Stantz. It was a figure formed in Ray's image, wearing unfamiliar garb, a white skirtlike garment, gathered up in the front in a myriad of pleats, his feet encased in sandals just as Carter had described the body in the sarcophagus. His features matched Ray's but they matched in a slightly coarsened manner, as if the spirit had used Ray as a mold, and had only captured the superficials -- like the shapeshifter Odo's attempt to appear human on Deep Space Nine, only slightly more so. The eyes were far darker than Ray's, deep and hollow, and filled with a sense of malignant triumph. It gazed past Egon at the equipment with understanding, not of the process but of the intent, and it moved toward Egon in a sudden rush, physically solid, and slammed a fist down on the cross-referencer. Sparks flew as it shorted out.

"What are you doing?" Egon shouted. "What have you done with Ray?" He glanced around surreptitiously to see if a trap and thrower was in the room with him.

It smiled. The expression was singularly horrible, setting ill with Ray's usually-pleasant features, a twisted, gloating smile full of ancient malice. "I have taken life force. Gradually I will take it all, leaving him a drained husk. And then I will live again, completely."

"You can't do that," Egon said involuntarily.

"I have done. I have already taken language from him. I have the knowledge he has. I know of your tools and weapons. I know how to stop you."

"We will stop you," Egon insisted. Any other alternative was unthinkable, especially since the entity's transformation would no doubt kill Ray Stantz.

"And if you do? You will kill him. Each burst of energy from your particle throwers will strike him as it does me. Fire at me, you will kill him. Only he could fight me and he will not. It has gone too far. I have taken too much."

"You don't know Ray," Egon said although he felt a horrified sickness deep inside at the thought that the creature had been draining Ray all day without detectable evidence, and that it may have already gone too far. Ray's sleep suddenly seemed far from natural. "He'll fight you. And we are not so helpless as you assume."

"You think you can defeat me? I have the weight of millennia behind me. I have existed from the dawn of your history."

"You were dead," Egon said coldly, trying to think of a solution that wouldn't destroy Ray along with the entity.

"Dead, but not as you know it. Perhaps it was a form of stasis. Aware, always aware as the centuries and millennia trickled by, but unable to move, to breathe, to be free. Now I am free. I have tried before, but it never worked. Not until Ray broke my bonds. Until now I have only replenished my existence. But he freed me. What need had I of my containment after that? What need of my original body? I drew the dust of it from your small dishes, reanimated it with the energy I took from Ray. Now I am free and none can stop me. More and more, I will become him and he will become nothing. When I am finished, you will have his dust to study."

It lifted a hand, and Egon saw the ring on its thumb, slightly glowing. It was erasing Ray to renew its existence, just as the writing on the ring had said. And it could not be allowed to continue. Fury tore through Egon, along with a grim determination to stop the creature. What frightened him most was the deep, unacceptable knowledge that to do so he might also have to destroy Ray Stantz.

Egon flung himself at the outstretched hand, his entire attention focused on the ring. He had to get it away from the entity. Only then could he break the link that existed between it and Ray with even the slightest guarantee that he would not kill Ray as well.

When he noticed the other hand, slamming down toward his unprotected skull, it was too late to duck. Pain exploded through his head, and he collapsed face down upon the floor beside his still-sparking device. As the darkness claimed him, he knew with overwhelming despair that he had failed and that Ray would die of it.

Upstairs in his bed, Ray jerked and twitched, struggling frantically to break free of the stasis that held him. A part of his mind lingered, aware and conscious, able to see what his avatar had done to Egon. Horrified, he fought to awaken, knowing only he could save Egon. But he was too late. Egon was already down. Maybe dead. Ray writhed and twisted, frantic to break free of the compulsion that bound him. "Egon," he moaned under his breath. "Oh, god, Egon...." But he could not rouse.

Winston barely glanced up when Ray wandered into the lab. He'd been busy inputting the data from Egon's notes about the afternoon experiments. He liked to do that kind of work. He was the only one of the team without a formal degree in parapsychology, although he'd taken enough night classes to make a start at a masters' degree in the field. He always felt that inputting the data gave him an edge he wouldn't have otherwise, so he'd taken it on. Egon had been satisfied that Winston was thorough and meticulous and had been glad to have him do it. He went over it himself later, not to correct Winston's work but to see if the arrangement of information would stir answers in his mind. It was an arrangement that had proven beneficial to all, especially since Winston printed out copies for the whole team at the end of each day and Egon insisted they all read it. Peter usually did it quickly to get it over with, but it did them all good.

"Got enough sleep?" Winston had time to ask before he registered what he saw before him. The ring, intact on the thumb of the hand that held the thrower leveled at him. The weird skirt thing the creature that resembled Ray was wearing. With a shudder, he could feel the return of static electricity in the air. Winston's skin crawled with it. Worst of all, the being wore a proton pack on his back and held the thrower in his hands as if he knew how to use it.

"You're not Ray!" he blurted, overturning the chair as he leaped to his feet.

"You are perceptive."

"What are you?"

"I am an ancient hunger. I am a new life. I am your god, your ruler. You will worship me, you and the others. To the world, I will be Ray, and you will be my slaves, to wait on me, to serve me."

"Did you ever pick the wrong guy to talk to about slaves!" Winston spat. "No way. That's never going to happen. You're not Ray. You're not even using his body. That's a cut-rate copy. And we won't be your slaves."

"Then you will die," he said indifferently, the mouth so like Ray's twisting in cruelty. "I care not. There will be slaves elsewhere, if not you." He gestured with the thrower to make his point.

"What have you done to Ray?" Winston demanded, looking around for a weapon to fend of this monstrous creature that had assumed Ray's form.

He pointed the proton rifle toward the bedroom. "He sleeps. He dies." Then the tip of the weapon swung in Winston's direction again.

Winston's stomach twisted, appalled by the danger to Ray, by the monumental indifference the creature felt at the thought of Ray's death. He had to stall, figure out a way to alert Peter and Egon. "But what are you? Are you an alien?"

"From beyond this earth? No. But from it for a far greater time than you can imagine. I was cursed by an enemy. I would die but never die. The device you call the 'artifact' was what bound me, and the ring was what fed me. It passed down with each new owner of the sarcophagus, mystically. Someone found it, wore it, and replenished my existence. I felt those centuries pass, helpless, trapped, even unable to scream."

And the years had driven him insane, Winston realized, his heart sinking. All that existed for him was hatred and the desire to be avenged. The creature was so obsessed with the idea of life that nothing anyone could say would convince him that it was doing evil. He wouldn't care.

"Yeah, and the one who cursed you is dead, gone to dust so long ago you can never find him," Winston scoffed. "No way you're gonna get revenge. No way you'll ever hope to fit into this world."

"I have already begun. From the one you call Ray, I have taken the language, the understanding of this century. Before his life is finally snuffed out, I will possess the entire knowledge I need to survive. This body is built from my ashes and his essence. He will never awaken. Soon I will be free. If you will not serve me, you, too, will die."

"Like fun I will," Winston scoffed. He had seen a ghost trap under the table, the trigger not too far from his foot. He shifted sideways toward it, spreading out his hands in a show of compliance. The entity wasn't free yet. Ray was still alive. That meant there was hope. "I don't want to die," he said, determined to deceive the creature. "I just don't like this slave thing. My people were slaves once, and I won't be a slave. But maybe you could phrase it differently." He tried to appear compliant, a man who had weighed his options and selected expediency.

"In my service, then," the creature said indifferently, which made Winston understand there wouldn't be any options. But he couldn't let the entity know he had realized that. He took another step.

"Come on, let's deal. There are a lot of things about this century you can't understand, even after seeing them in Ray's mind. You're gonna need a coach. I can be that. A trainer?" He was pretty sure the entity wouldn't believe him, but he obviously possessed no ethics. Why should he expect them in others? Winston's foot moved carefully, fumbled for the pedal to activate the trap.

"No! You deceive me!" The being's thumb stabbed down against the trigger of the thrower and a burst of glowing energy shot out to envelope Winston, who jerked, caught in the stream, his body twitching. For an instant, consciousness lingered, enough to know he'd been hit at a low level of power. It wouldn't kill him -- unless the creature took from Ray's mind the knowledge of how to alter the streams.

But even that faded.

He was unconscious before he hit the floor.

No! Don't. You can't do that. Ray writhed and twisted against his bed, the quilt tangled around his legs. He fought to break free, terrified as he saw Winston fall. The only thing he could do was to think very hard of something else, anything but the throwers and the level of power. At that level, Winston could be deeply stunned. He could even be shocked enough to stop his heart from beating. But Ray couldn't think of that. All he could do was wipe his mind and concentrate on nothing but hate, blasting out at the entity that was stealing his essence, that was killing his friends. Egon, sprawled in the basement, blood on his head. Winston, down on the lab floor, twitching slightly.

Peter?

Peter was dozing on the couch in front of the TV when he thought he heard a weird sound downstairs. He pushed himself up and started down to see what Egon was up to. He wasn't happy with the day's experience. Maybe splitting the team up on three different floors had been a bad idea.

"Spengs?" he called as he started down the basement steps. "What are you up to down here?"

No answer. That might only mean Egon was completely caught up in his experiments. But it could also be a bad sign. The hair rose on the back of Peter's neck and it took him a second to realize it wasn't only fear for Egon that did it. It was that static electricity, back with a vengeance.

"Egon!" Peter screeched and burst into the lab, jerking to a halt in horror at the sight of Egon down on the floor, his hair and face bloodied. His glasses had fallen to one side, his body lax and boneless. For that first instant he looked dead, causing Peter to flinch as if he'd been struck a fatal blow himself. But Egon was already stirring, even as the static electricity faded. It had just happened, Peter had missed helping him only by moments.

He flung himself down on his knees at Egon's side, his fingers pressing against the side of Spengler's neck, desperate for the feel of a pulse. "God, don't do this to me, Egon," he groaned. "You're gonna be okay. You're gonna be just fine." His stomach twisted with painful knots even as he checked his surroundings for a weapon. He didn't know what had hurt Egon, but even a possessed Ray wouldn't have been able to pass Peter to get down here.

The pulse beat beneath his fingers, strong, normal. Peter parted his hair, seeking the injury, finding it, a cut right at the scalp line, still bleeding, the beginning of a swelling around it. Egon moaned under the touch and flinched away from it. As Peter stared in disbelief, his eyes opened and he squinted up at Peter.

"Egon? God, Egon, you scared the hell out of me. What happened?"

"I don't know," Egon replied, dazed. "I can't...."

"Easy, take it easy, it's okay," Peter encouraged him. "Can you see me okay? Any blurred vision?"

"No," Egon admitted. "My head hurts."

"You bet it does," Peter said as Egon struggled to sit up. The psychologist worked an arm around his back and pulled him against his shoulder, where Egon sagged in the support of Peter's arm. "Easy, easy. What did this to you, Egon?"

"I..." Egon frowned. "It's fuzzy, Peter. But..." He took several deep breaths to regain control as his memory