OOM: Where the...

*pop*

He'd gotten as far as a particularly convoluted bit involving sixteen-digit precision when he realized the lighting wasn't quite right- not for Milliways, not for the Firehouse, not even for the alley he normally used as his entry and exit point. He looked up.

There was a hallway. It wasn't anywhere in the Firehall.

There were lights in the ceiling- dim, musty things that suggested basement by their age and condition.

There was institutional carpeting on the floor.

And there was someone behind him- a kid of maybe nineteen or twenty, if Ray were any judge- smiling. "Hey, Professor," the young man said cheerfully. "Listen, I can't make it to your office during your posted hours-"

Professor?

What?

"-Thursday okay instead? After class?"

Ray blinked, several times. "Uh. . . refresh my memory," he said, struggling to keep the unevenness of sudden dread out of his words. "What day is that?"

"The twenty-sixth."

"Um, uh..." He made something of a show of patting his pockets down. "I don't have my calendar on me, but..."

The young man smiled. "That's okay. Just lemme know in class tomorrow and I'll be good."

"Sure," said Ray weakly, smiling anyway. "Sure. Thursday, uh... Thursday's probably good. I'll tell you then."

"Great! See you tomorrow, Professor!" And he was gone.

There was a doorknob under his hand, Ray realized. As was so often their lot in life, this doorknob was attached to a door.

A door with his name on it, and Egon's, and Peter's. And the words DEPARTMENT OF PARAPSYCHOLOGY, or something very close to that.

This wasn't happening. This wasn't happening, it couldn't be, he'd been joking about it but-

It's hard to read when you're busy banging your head against the wall.