New York In The Time Of Monsters - Port Authority

[gone_byebye]

The door opens onto the corner of Thirty-ninth and Eighth streets on a bright and sunny afternoon. It's a cluster of what most Americans would consider alarmingly large buildings- strictly average for New York, you understand. Forty and fifty floors, tops. You get much taller ones further south, in the Financial District. You get more people here, though- lots of them, in and out of the buildings- and a lot more cars, most of which are being driven by desperate people all striving like hell to beat each other to the entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel.

None of the electric signs are working. None of the street lights are functioning. The buildings' shadows are only penetrated by headlights, taillights, and reflections of sun- which is probably exactly as the creatures roaring to each other somewhere nearby like it. It's hard to tell where they are, what with the throngs of people and cars-

Well. No.

The ones who're screaming and running like hell are probably a really good directional clue.

"I got a radio for you from the Bar," says Ray. "Call me or the other Ghostbusters on it if you need anything, okay? I'm going back to the Bar to see who else can lend a hand."

Comments

[slayer_fray]

Something bright shines in Mel's eyes as she takes off from her good leg and leaps high in the air, curling around her scythe as she points it downwards and bombs towards the cat point first.

She likes it when things are simple.

Six

This time she can take the time to stand, brush dust off her, and pick up the skull.

Steph'll love it.

[gone_byebye]

The last remaining cat is doing its best to limp away enough to lick at its wound. It won't help, of course. They might go to dust like lurks, but that's only at the moment of death. While they live, they bleed, and they're ordinary animals of their kind. no healing powers whatsoever.

They do, however, have really bad tempers if they're approached while hurt. There could be claws involved.

[slayer_fray]

Mel's not really one for attacking injured creatures.

She mulls this over in her mind before putting her scythe away, pulling out her gun and shooting the cat fully in the chest. That'll knock it out long enough for her to slive its head clean off.

Seven

Shame about the dust thing. She was thinking about saving a coat or two.

[gone_byebye]

It's a by-product of the spell involved in resurrecting the animals. As a matter of fact...

"...that I could give them bodies. Real, living, breathing bodies," squawks the radio Ray gave Mel. "for as long as their spirits inhabited them. I could see how they lived. I could know what they were really like. It was everything a paleontologist like myself could dream of...And then I thought, my high school is having its fifteenth reunion this month. And you know? I never liked anyone I went to school with. At all."

There's a burst of static.

"-Rico! Come, Patsy! We have an appointment to keep at Chelsea Piers!"

[slayer_fray]

Chelsea Piers. Chelsea Piers.

See, the problem is, that all the names of places have changed in two hundred years.

Mel has an inkling of where it might be, though, and straightens. A gentle jog down to finish the clean up before going home. She could use a shower now.

[gone_byebye]

Probably a wise idea. She's been exerting herself, and she's bloody in places, and blood makes for a great scent trail.

Just ask the sabertooth that dropped out of the chase early on to pull down the rotating skewers of unattended gyro and shawarma meat at Ibby's Falafel Palace, on the ground floor. Cooked meat's all right, but fresh is best, and the prey doesn't seem to be paying attention. The cat drops the skewer and pads into the bus terminal proper.

[slayer_fray]

Mel is back on the first floor, now, idly swinging her trophy skull as she proceeds towards the exit.

Part of her's idly curious at the state of this antique. The rest of it is dreaming on what Mike's going to make for dinner. She doesn't turn a head to the cat.

[gone_byebye]

The cat would be dancing for joy if it were a human. This is going to be EASY. This is going to be as easy as the MEAT ON STICKS. Only better, because it's fresh.

How close can it get to Mel from behind before it has to leap, it wonders?

[slayer_fray]

Apparently quite close. Although Mel's stopped looking around idly. Now she's just strolling along casually, heading to the main exit of the bus terminal.

And the crowds gathering out there.

[gone_byebye]

Oh, yes. This is New York. There are always crowds.

And because a crowd has the collective IQ of its lowest member divided by the number of people present, the one person who shouts, "Lady, behind you!" does so as the sabertooth is already leaping.

[slayer_fray]

Mel takes a moment to eye the helpful spectator, before spinning around (oh, ow, bad leg. BAD LEG) and throwing herself forward, under the cat's claws, to hit it square in the chest and interrupt its pounce.

She doesn't draw her weapon until he's on the downward part of the arc.

[gone_byebye]

The sabertooth doesn't quite make the o__O face, but he really comes close. Being hit by a Slayer? NOT fun.

He'd really like to do some basic gagging and gasping and 'I got the wind knocked out of me' stuff when he hits the ground, but there's that whole sense of something being about to strike him from behind, so he spins around to face...

[slayer_fray]

...slashy death!

Mel's sort of, kind of doing this for the audience now. She holds the scythe under the blade, and slice up from low, slicing cleanly across the tiger's throat.

Smirking all the while, now.

[gone_byebye]

Paff.

The dust rains down on all sides, and the bones clatter to the floor.

And the people- cops, pedestrians, and medical types alike- applaud like mad.

(Later there will be a widespread conviction that this was the work of an overzealous movie publicist, and people will swear up and down that there was a film based on the Jurassic Park premise in the works using ancient mammals, and the studio was forced to can it after lawsuits caused by the events of today. This incident is going to figure large in their arguments, believe us. It's too pretty not to.)

[slayer_fray]

Mel lifts her head, proudly, and slides her scythe home, hitching her trophy skull up onto her hip.

As she starts forward, she's forcing herself not to limp, and to let the crowd be - well, her people, sort of.

"You people don't having some fleeing in terror to be doing?"

[gone_byebye]

"We tried that," one of them says. "The streets're too backed up to get through anywhere."

One of the cops, though, is listening carefully to his radio; he glances up and calls out, "Hey! They've just cleared that monster bear thing out of the 42nd Street Ferry!"

... and this is what it looks like when several thousand New Yorkers all start trying to migrate into a single street at the same moment. (Except for the ones who're calling out questions about the movie and asking for Mel's autograph.)

[slayer_fray]

Mel steps back, especially from the autograph hunters. She's not willing to start coming up with excuses - that's Ray's job.

But the crowd's too strong, and she doesn't know where she's heading, and..

...oh well, to hell with it. Mel drops her hand to her Security badge and taps it hard, stepping back into the terminal so no one sees her vanish into thin air.

There's no place like home.