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May 25, 2004
Corner of Varick & North Moore Streets
Manhattan

New York City is a funny place. Things happen there all the time, and nobody notices. Well, the tourists do, but they don't count, and the people from New Jersey do, but they're from Jersey, and the New Yorkers themselves do, but to admit that you actually noticed would be to admit that you were caught by surprise. In New York City this is often the equivalent of hanging out a sign saying 'COME AND GET IT, BIG TASTY BAIT', and so the natives do their best to avoid visibly acknowledging the unusual. Sometimes, especially in the vicinity of a certain firehouse on the edge of TriBeCa, this is all but impossible.

This is not one of those times. Nobody really cares if there's a full-sized refrigerator delivery carton leaning up against the outer wall of the firehouse. Garbage happens.

So nobody's looking when the side of the box stirs a bit, gets pushed open, and disgorges a pair of people. The woman merely steps away from the box as if to get her bearings, but the man takes one look up at the building, then dashes straight to the edge of the street, where he crouches in front of a newspaper machine. "Yes!" he exults, pumping a fist in the air. "I think we found it, Romana!"

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"Well, I appreciate it anyway..." He looks over at the machine. "You know, that might just be a good idea. I think I'll do that." It's the Daily News, a whopping fifty cents. Nice tabloid-sized paper, easily folded and stashed under the arm or inna pocket. He is inordinately happy about it.

He then looks Romana over thoughtfully. "Definitely," he says. "You look great. I haven't had a spontaneous attack of spinach in the teeth or anything, have I?" He only waits a moment for the assessment before taking a deep breath. "Okay, then, here goes..."

He walks up to the Firehouse's double doors and pushes the small, human-sized sub-door in the left one open. "Ladies first!"

[http://users.livejournal.com/_romana_/]

"Silly." But she thinks it's rather cute that he does take a copy of the newspaper.

Romana beams. "Brilliant. And you look just fine. Jelly baby?" It's only polite to share, after all.

"Very well." She adjusts her hat once more and then walks on in.

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"Thanks, don't mind if I do." He makes a mental note to take her to the candy store in Chinatown where he occasionally buys random things by the half-pound just to find out whether he likes them or not. It's not that far.

Ray follows Romana in. The firehouse is very definitely in use- Ecto-1, the converted hearse that's borne the Ghostbusters through many a trial, is parked in the middle of the open space. As Ray's eyes adjust to the change in light, he grins. "Janine!" he calls, waving to the red-headed secretary at her desk.

Janine looks up, and her eyes get very wide. "Stay *right there*," she says, coming to her feet- and slamming a hand down on the button next to her phone. Immediately, the alarm bells start going off.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_romana_/]

Romana hands him the bag. She has plenty more on the TARDIS anyway.

Once she walks into the Firehouse, she looks around and grins at the hearse. Fitting, really. And she's pleased to see there's poles.

"Hello, Janine!," she says brightly, waving to the woman and curious to see what's going to happen next.

Alarms? Interesting. She looks over her shoulder at Ray. "They don't think you're a ghost, do they?"

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Ray pops one into his mouth before sticking the bag into his jacket pocket.

Oh, yes, poles. That was a big selling point for the place. For this, Ray uses the embarrassing icon. Ray smiles fondly at them himself.

Then the alarms go off. "No," he says over the din, "but I think I know what the problem is. I've been to two other continua so far, right?"

Squeeeeeeek. Thud. That's the sound of Winston Zeddmore sliding down the pole.

Ray's still explaining, though. "In the last one I went to, they said there'd been a different Ray in the Firehouse-" Squeeeeeeek. Thud. Peter Venkman. "before I arrived! They must've had both of the alternate-universe-" Squeeeeeek. Thud. Egon Spengler. "-versions of me in this reality before! I don't blame them one bit!"

He turns and waves, grinning, at the three wide-eyed men standing in front of the two of them. "Hi guys!" he says brightly. "It's me! Ray! I'm pretty sure this is my universe, considering that this lovely lady here was my pilot, and she's a hell of a lot better at it than-"

"I know you," says the shorter of the two white men slowly. "I've... I'm sorry, I don't remember your- JANINE WILL YOU PLEASE CUT THAT ALARM? Thank you... Sorry about that. My name's Pete Venkman and I'm almost positive I've seen you before. Should I remember your name?"

The taller man is looking back and forth from Ray to the scientific device in his hand and to Ray again, so it falls to Winston to look at Ray thoughtfully. "What day is it?" he asks.

"Bad question," Ray all but chirps. "I bought the paper."

"Okay, so... when were you last here?"

"If here's the exact 'where' that I think it is, I was last here on October 4, 2003. Right when Peck the dickless wonder shut off the power grid."

"It's him," said Winston and Egon at the same time. They smiled, Winston a bit wryly, Egon very slightly.

"Welcome back, Ray," said Winston. "Now, would you mind introducing us to your lady friend- and telling us where you've been?"

[http://users.livejournal.com/_romana_/]

Romana just sort of beams at Ray's flattering remarks and is royally amused by the alarm and his friends.

She tips her hat to them. "Hello, gents. I'm Romanadvoratrelundar. But you can call me Romana."

She decides not to intially tell them she's Time Lord. She doesn't want to ruin Ray's credibility just yet.

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Winston nods. "Winston Zeddemore," he says. "Winston's fine."

The other two introduce themselves in short order. Ray's too busy grinning and running his fingers over Ecto's fins to notice the goings-on- he's finally home! It's been nearly a year for him- six months animated, three months in the 1985 reality, and the time spent in Milliways...

He's home. Even if only for a little while. Soon he and Romana will be going out again, of course, but... for here and for now, at least, things are back to the way they were before it all began.

Which is, of course, an excellent point from which to start anew.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_romana_/]

Romana listens to everyone talk, pleased that Ray's found his friends. Well, that she's found them or either way. Pleased. And the firehouse is charming.

"Now that that's settled, can you show me around?" She asks well, all of the others but mostly Ray after everyone's introduced themselves.

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Ray jerks his attention back from the car and smiles. "Right this way," he says to Romana. To the others, he notes, "I'll explain everything as soon as we're done, I promise. I've had a weird couple of months, so you'd better get out the sensors and the tape recorder, because you're not gonna be able to write it all down. Oh- and here..."

He reaches into one of his pockets and pulls out the PDA of Doooom. "Egon, I know you're going to be the hardest to convince, but this should go a really long way towards verifying my story. Feel free to correct the math on any equations you find, but I think I got all the important bits."

As Egon starts scanning through the device's contents, Ray turns back to Romana. "We've been in this firehouse about... oh, close to two years now. It was a pretty standard piece of city architecture when we started, but we've made a few modifications along the way. Left the poles in, though- how about we start the tour in the basement and work up to the third floor? They're really easy to use, if you wanna try them."

Peter rolls his eyes. "He does that to everyone who comes in here," he says in a stage whisper.