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Ray would've preferred to make this drive with Ecto, but the guys needed her too much back in New York. He's therefore rented a car on the State Department's budget for the sake of getting to Port St. Helena, Oregon, without having to deal with some of the nimrods at the airlines and Amtrak. Said nimrods have an issue with the contents of the passenger seat.

"Okay, Jhalak," Ray says to said contents. "Welcome to Boise, Idaho. We're gonna stop here for the night, if you don't mind. I know it's been tough being stuck in the car and all." Mind you, he's made a point of buying several reference books at any bookstore in each of the towns where they've stopped, along with a big honking quantity of fresh fruit. But still.

Comments

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"... that's as good a reason as any," Ray says, and strides up to the door. "Excuse me! Sir? Mr. Bouncer?"

Mr. Bouncer is not a bouncer, exactly, so much as a bored large man settled on a stool just past the entrance. He glances up from the sudoku puzzle he's been working on. "Can I help you?" he says, in a tone that implies most people who come here just hand me the cover charge and go in.

"I certainly hope so. My name's Ray Stantz. Mr. Stoppard wanted me to- um-"

Ray falters; the man is squinting at Jhalak.

"... okay, wanted us to come by and attempt an investigation of the local potentially paranormal phenomena?"

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"Potentially paranormal phenomena," chirps Jhalak, waving an extraneous limb.

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The man rubs at his eyes with one fist and squints again. "What the-"

Ray doesn't get his hands up fast enough to block Jhalak's ears before the man uses some very vulgar words indeed. Not that Ray knows where Jhalak's ears are. But he tries.

"-is that?"

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Since Jhalak has five sets of auditory equipment, Ray's attempt here was doomed from the start.

"Jhalak," it says cheerfully. "What the !@#$ is that?" "Jhalak!"

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"Thank you so much," Ray says wearily. "Look, can I just talk to Mr. Stoppard?"

The man doesn't take his eyes off Jhalak as he reaches for the radio at his belt. After a brief conversation, he says, "Go on in, he's in the back."

"Thank you," Ray says, and steps in. Thankfully the place isn't too busy at the moment; there's a couple of patrons who haven't got anywhere better to be in the late afternoon, but they've got better things to look at than one human and one Jotok. At least, Ray hopes they do. Because otherwise? They have really weird priorities for the patrons of a topless bar.

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"Thank you," Jhalak echoes.

Lucky thing it just ate, really, or its tendency to rattle off lists of fruit names could get singularly inconvenient.

However, at the moment it's happy to occupy itself with Ray's hair.

And-- thankfully-- not repeat the bouncer's question out loud any longer.

For now.

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Ray will deal with that when it comes up. Right now he's trying to navigate without actually looking at anybody, or rather without looking at anybody any lower than the chin. The patrons don't really care- there's always somebody like that in a place like this, usually there for the first time- but some of the dancers seem to find it terribly amusing. Jhalak's gonna get an introduction to giggling and then some by the time Ray makes it to the Management Only door in the back.

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Giggling is an amusing sound. Way more fun than curses. Jhalak manages several impressively musical imitations, each arm competing with the rest to see how melodically it can improve on the score.

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When you are as bored as a stripper who's been on duty for as long as some of these women have this month, you stop caring that the thing on the new guy's shoulder looks weird and start being mightily entertained by the fact that it's making some really neat noises. About half the dancers are looking Ray's way by the time Stoppard opens the door. "There you are, Dr. Stantz!" the manager says. "Didn't think you were gonna come around after all."

"This is purely a diagnostic survey, Mr. Stoppard," says Ray with as much dignity as he can manage. Unfortunately, we are talking about Ray. It says something about a person from 2008 New York City when the only way he can honestly be said to have any sort of dignity involves putting on a Jedi outfit. "I'm not here for-"

"Yeah, yeah, I know, not for the girls, not for the booze-"

"And not for cleaning anything out either. I don't have a proton pack with me," Ray cuts him off. "Can we get this over with? Please?"

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"Purely a diagnostic survey, Mr. Stoppard." "Not for cleaning anything out either." "Can we get this over with?"

Plus a last trailing giggle from short(arm), quickly shushed by the rest of them.

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Stoppard nods. "Yeah, sure," he says. "Right this way."

So of course the first place he takes Ray? Is back out into the main room. "Hey, Sue!" he calls to one of the less busy dancers, a red-headed woman with hair that falls about halfway down her back. The top of her head comes up to Ray's collarbone. In practical terms this means Ray has to look downward to look at her. We hope Romana appreciates his efforts at keeping eye contact, or at the very least, his utter embarrassment. "Sue, we got us a Ghostbuster here! Come and tell him about the Starlight Room!"

"...ohgod."

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Wait for it...



"What the !@#$ is that?"





Well, that was near-miraculously poor timing.

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Sue breaks out laughing at that- or, rather, at Ray's response; he turns a bright red and attempts to pull his head into his torso. This hasn't worked since the Bar turned him into Megatron for Halloween, and it doesn't work now. "Cute," she says, "real cute. What is it, a Furby?"

Ray mumbles an explanation in which 'alien' and 'language acquisition' and 'hasn't learned about George Carlin yet' figure among the few understandable words. Sue gives Jhalak a thoughtful look, then nods. "Whatever you say, mister," she says. "It's kinda cute."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome. Starlight room, huh?"

"Yes, please." (He's still trying to turtle; it winds up with him addressing Sue's toes, but what can you do.)

"Well, okay. That's that door over there, see-" She points; her bracelets, several of which have bells and charms on, jingle. "We got a couch in there. For lap dancing, not anything else." There's a distinctly defensive tone to it, but she goes on. "It's a good room and all, but ever since I started working here, there's always this one corner that's cold as a witch's ass."

Okay, Ray's not looking at her toes any more; he's looking at Jhalak with an expression of resignation.

"And like once a month," Sue continues, "it gets really weird."

"Weird how, ma'am?" Ray says as he manages to make eye contact once again. Must. Not. Look. Down.

"Well, if you walk into the cold spot most of the time? Nothing happens. It's just cold for no reason. Even with the heater on. But like once a month? If you walk into the cold spot, or the guy walks into the cold spot? You can feel fingers. On the back of your neck. Like somebody's trying to grab you or something." She shakes her head. "Some of the other girls say they see somebody in the corner, too. Me, I never did. But you hear it a lot."

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"Cute! Real cute!" "Language acquisition." "Cold as a witch's ass." "Just cold for no reason." "Cold, cold."

It giggles again, musically.

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"We're gonna have such a talk when we get back to the hotel," Ray says to Jhalak. Then, to Sue: "When, um. When was the last, um. Time of the month, ma'am?"

Either Sue doesn't notice the possible unfortunate euphemism there, or doesn't care. She shrugs elaborately and says, "About three weeks ago. It doesn't last more than a couple of days."

"Okay," Ray says, and fishes out a notepad to start writing the information down. "Thank you very much, ma'am, you've been awfully helpful."

"No problem," says Sue, and smiles at Jhalak. "You two kids have fun, okay?"

Ray exhales in relief as she heads off to get herself in line for her next dance number. Alas, he doesn't get his shoulders more than a centimeter away from his ears before Stoppard brings the next dancer over- and then the next, and the next.

Jhalak's going to get a very colloquial vocabulary today.

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"You two kids have fun!"

Jhalak giggles.

And repeats all the wrong things, like any good kid should.

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Of course.

Ray makes a mental note to teach Jhalak Sumerian or something, just to keep it occupied.

Eventually the dancers are done, and the bartender, and the bouncer himself. At that point Ray looks at Mr. Stoppard. "Would you mind if I did a PKE meter sweep now?" he says. "It's the only investigative equipment I have on me, but it's pretty reliable for detecting recent or incipient paranormal activity."

"Be my guest, Dr. Stantz."

"Great. Jhalak, you ready?"

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"Jhalak, ready."

In lieu of a nod, it opens two hands very wide and shivers its digits slightly.

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"Great," says Ray, and starts pretty much walking the entire floor of Night Moves starting from the main entrance. There's more patrons by now; they're going to be a little disgruntled, given that he a) barely looks up from the light and sound display on the meter and b) is doing a running commentary on what he's seeing as he goes, but... well, this is Ray; he tends not to notice, you know?

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Jhalak makes enthusiastic repetition of everything Ray says, peering variously at the display, at Ray himself, and at anyone who glances in their direction. "Great," it says cheerfully whenever his ramblings take on a positive cast; "Holy cats," if a note of surprise enters his voice.

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Considering some of the things the two of them have heard so far, that's probably just about the best Ray can hope for in terms of exclamations, isn't it. He's good with that. Especially since he's distracted very early on by the prevalence of brief but noticeable PKE surges in seemingly random locations around the bar. They tend to be on the small side; they'd be completely unnoticeable in a high-PKE city like New York or New Orleans. Here, though, they stand out like fireworks.

And the strongest of the bunch are all clustered around the Starlight Room.

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Jhalak focuses one dark eye on the display and two on Ray's face, blinking questioningly.

If only it had the vocabulary to ask how the PKE meter worked. All those blinking lights! Clearly informative, if not to Jhalak! What do they mean? How does he know what they're trying to say? What about the noises the device makes? (Experimentally, short(arm) imitates one, giving it a very Jotoki musical lilt.)

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"What we're seeing is a sensor reading of paranormal energies throughout the bar," Ray explains. "I can tell you about it in more detail when we're done here. It has to do with detecting the ionization of paranormal and supernatural beings across the planar barrier between the etheric plane and this one. The valences generated by the process of spirit entities manifesting in this reality tend to get ignored by day-to-day senses, but the meter's capable of picking them up. That noise you're making is the meter's way of indicating that there's a sufficient concentration of spirit energy on the other side of that door to suggest a possible full manifestation sometime in the next several minutes- assuming there isn't one in progress already. Care to check it out?"

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"Sensor reading of paranormal energies throughout the bar." "Tell Jhalak about it in more detail when we're done here." "Ionization--" "--barrier--" "--etheric plane--" "--valences generated by the process--" "--sufficient concentration of spirit energy." "Care to check it out?" "Full manifestation." "Check it out." "Holy cats!" "Approve." "That's right." "Check it out."

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Ray opens the door on a discreet room with padded walls, good stereo speakers, and, as mentioned, a couch. It's an old couch, and not the least bit paranormally active. The spot in one corner of the room, though, that lights up the PKE meter? The one with the drop of about ten degrees Fahrenheit as they approach? It's another story. Ray frowns at the corner and starts running his free hand over the walls.

"Jhalak, does the air here taste funny to you?"