6.

Reno picked up a piece of sushi with his chopsticks and held it up in front of his face for a long moment before putting it into his mouth. Astro, sitting across from him in the shopping mall's food court looked upward while dangling the pointy edge of a large slice of pepperoni pizza over his mouth. He took a large bite and chewed it.

"What's eating you?", he asked Reno while still chewing.

"Didn't anyone ever tell you it's not polite to talk with food in your mouth?", Reno asked.

"I'm sure Uran did several times," Astro replied swallowing a mouthful. "So again, what's bothering you?".

"I've been reading Egan Spengler's blog archives," Reno replied. "It seems that what happened in NYC a few years ago is repeating itself here, right now, possibly with greater intensity."

"Well the ghostbusters seem to have a handle on it," Astro replied.

"I hope so," Reno answered. "But I've been monitoring the police blotter, as well as the internet chatter, and I've been taking my own readings."

"Readings?" Astro asked.

"Egan's design documents for his PKE meter, and other instruments are on line," the boy explained, "and with help from the Ministry's fabrication shops, I was able to duplicate, even improve upon his devices."

"Well Sarge has been keeping me in the loop," Astro added, "and his reports have been rather positive."

"I know you like him, Astro," Reno countered, "but Sarge isn't very tech savy. His AI was based on the police bot models."

"Maybe, but he has a good sense of observation. No detail gets by him."

"Yeah, but he's only seeing things from street level," Reno pointed out.

At that instant, the red warning lights in the mall started to flash, as klaxons began to wail.

"WTF", Reno asked, "That's the earthquake disaster evacuation warning system, but we didn't feel any seismic shocks."

Suddenly, Astro's heads up display popped into active view, and he saw a message from Sarge appear. Astro held up a finger to Reno to indicate his attention was momentarily elsewhere.

"I've got to get over there," he cried out, quickly jumping to his feet and running towards the mall exit.

Reno ran after him, "Over where?", he yelled.

Astro looked over his shoulder, "Sarge just told me that he saw Godzilla rampaging through downtown not far from Yuko's apartment. That's where he took the ghostbusters."

"Wait a minute!" Reno yelled. "We got to get back to the hangar first!"

"Why?", Astro yelled back.

"Just get us there ASAP," Reno demanded, "I'll explain!"

Astro grabbed Reno around his waist and rocketed upwards. He smashed through the sky light roof of the mall while Reno buried his face in his buddy's chest to protect his eyes from the breaking glass. Thirty seconds later, they were inside the hangar to find Inspector Tawashi cursing at the chair that he was handcuffed to. Relieved to see Astro, he shouted, "Get these damn things off me! Your stupid brother stole my keys and locked me to this chair."

"Cobalt wouldn't do that," Astro barked, cutting the cuffs off with his index finger laser.

"He wasn't in his right mind," the inspector barked back, rubbing his wrist to get the circulation going again, "kept muttering that he was the keymaster and was looking for the gatekeeper."

"That means I was right, " Reno quickly said. "Same thing happened in NYC before, the gate has opened and Gozer has entered our dimension. If Cobalt was taken over, then I'd bet Yuko was too. If the two of them found each other, then it's likely that the destructor has also come though from the other dimension as well, I bet in the form of Godzilla."

"I've got to get there and stop it!," Astro said.

Before he could move, Reno grabbed him by the arm. "You're not going to be able to do anything," Reno yelled. "We're dealing with the supernatural here. You're not strong enough to fight it!" The boy grabbed a proton pack from the equipment rack and tossed it to Astro, and then quickly donned the jumpsuit with his name on it. "We've got to use their equipment to close the portal, that's the only way!"

Astro nodded. He quickly put his own ghostbusters overalls on, and then buckled a proton pack on. "OK, let's get over there!" Astro nodded. With one arm around Reno's waist, he once again took to the sky.

Godzilla continued his march of destruction towards the center of the city. Periodically, he spat fire on the ground, as he crushed cars, and building fronts with his feet. He used his tail to smash buildings, leaving a trail of rumble behind him.

"I've got to stop him!" Astro told Reno, as they flew towards the Yuko's apartment building. He hovered in mid air and aimed his arm at the prehistoric monster, the maw of his surge cannon glowing as it charged up to full power.

"I don't think that's going to stop him," Reno warned.

The huge reptile now had the Takadanobaba Station of the Yamanote line in his sites, he bent over and grabbed the lead car of a train in his mouth and pulled it from the tracks.

"That's going too far!" Astro yelled. He fired a burst at the monster's mid section, but he only succeeded in making Godzilla mad. Astro turned around just as a tongue of flame from the reptiles mouth roared past him.

"That was too close!" Reno cried, "I think he singed my hair!"

"Sorry!", Astro replied, as he rocketed away. "I shouldn't have put you in danger."

The two boys landed on the roof of the former hotel to face Gozer. Astro quickly scanned the area. Frozen like statues, Egan, Ray, and Peter stood motionless near the parapet of the building. "Looks like Gozer got the drop on them before they could do anything," he told Reno, pointing towards the central structure where the demonic being stood in front of a glowing altar.

"Are you gods?" the Demon asked.

"YES WE ARE!", Reno yelled, placing his hand over Astro's mouth, and whispering, "When a demon asks you if you are a god you say YES!" Then he yelled at Gozer, "This is our city, not yours!"

Reno clicked the safety off on his proton rifle, and Astro followed suit. "When I give the word, we fire," he told Astro. "We must combine our beams and aim for the altar."

"Right," Astro nodded.

Godzilla had advanced towards the center of the city, his huge head towered over the edge of the building, Reno could feel his hot breath at his neck. "NOW!" he said, aiming the proton weapon, and bracing himself for the recoil.

They pulled their triggers together. Two spiraling beams of white hot plasma raced towards Gozer. Astro carefully controlled his rifle, combining its output with Reno's. The streams crossed and hit the central structure full on, causing a massive explosion. The blast knocked Reno and Astro over, and flying debris buried them under a pile of rubble. Godzilla was leaning over the edge of the roof line of the building when the blast occurred. He exploded, sending a torrent of green ectoplasm raining down from the sky.

Astro recovered first, digging himself out from under a thick coating of thick goo. He looked around and saw the outline of a body buried under a pile of a crusty smoking tar like substance, and recognized it as Reno's outline. Astro quickly dug his buddy out, "Are you OK, Reno? Can you breathe?", he asked.

Reno rubbed his eyes. "I'm OK," he said. "But I feel like the floor of a taxicab."

Three voices moaned from behind them. Egan, Peter, and Ray, broke themselves free from a thick layer of a hardened concrete like coating of slime and managed to get to their feet. "Good work, Kid," Ray said, slapping Reno on the back. "How did you know ..."

"To cross the streams?", Reno replied. "It was all in your blogs."

"You mean you read them?" he asked. "I didn't think anybody did."

Astro slowly walked around the piles of rubble, carefully picking through the wreckage. He finally came upon two statue like figures, each encased in a layer of a hardened plaster like material.

"Over here!", he yelled. "Help me!"

Reno and the ghostbusters quickly made their way toward where the boy robot was standing. Astro was already cracking the shell of one of the figures. Yuko opened her eyes. Her initial panic subsided when she saw Astro's face.

"Yuko kun, Daijōbu desu ka?", Astro asked.

"Daijōbu desu," Yuko voiced. "But I think I could use a stiff drink."

A few feet away the other figure slowly broke out of its cocoon, like a baby chick cracking through an egg. "Where am I?" Cobalt cried out as he got up and brushed himself off.

"Do either of you guys remember anything?" Reno asked.

"Iie," Yuko sighed looking down at her torn clothing.

"I don't remember anything that happened after I was chased out of your apartment by that bear thing," Cobalt said, looking at Yuko. "I do remember that your apartment got trashed, though."

"I'm going to sue that Drake Lampe," Yuko said angrily. "I bet he knew this building was haunted."

Egan finished his fourth measurement run on the laser containment chamber. "The energy readings have been going down on each run," he announced. "It would seem that with the portal now sealed, the paranormal energy in the area is rapidly dissipating."

"Meaning?" Inspector Tawashi asked

"Meaning, your fair city won't be needing our services any longer," Ray said.

"What about the ghosts that you have locked up in there," Dr. O'Shay asked pointing to the large red steel box in the corner of the hangar.

"You can power it down in about a week's time," Egan explained. "Then just dump it in the ocean a few miles off shore. You won't be bothered by the spirits locked up inside. Their energy will gradually fade as the containment field breaks down. In other words, they will finally find peace."

Ray and Peter, packed up the last of the equipment into the shipping containers that they had came in. "We'll have to ship the proton packs back home by bonded courier, the same way they were shipped here," Ray said. "At least we won't have to pay double for expedited delivery, we won't be needing them immediately once we get back to NYC."

Yuko entered the hangar and called out to the professor, "I thought I'd find you here Hakase," she said.

"Just cleaning up some loose ends," O'Shay smiled. "How are things on the home front?"

"Well I'm not moving back into my apartment anytime soon," she sighed, "and the entire contents of my wardrobe closet are ruined due to smoke and water damage."

"Once the repairs are made on the building it should be safe to reoccupy it," Egan spoke up. "I've marked up the blueprints for the city engineers showing what structural changes needed to be made to render the portal inactive forever. Fortunately, the building was well designed, it was able to withstand the carnage without losing any structural integrity. Of course all of the units on the upper four floors will need to be repainted, recarpeted, and fumigated."

"That may be, but I think I'll pass on it," Yuko said. "If I ever here anyone say "zuul again, I'll probably jump out of my skin."

"By the way," Dr. O'Shay replied. "Before you guys leave, the Emperor wants to see you. I think he wants to give you some kind of honorary medal for service to this country."

"Well we were hoping to catch an early flight," Venkman said, "But we wouldn't want to screw up relations between our two countries, so I guess we can stay another day and accept his highnesses honorarium."

Uran looked at her two brothers and pulled her lower eyelid down with her pinky. "I TOLD you I saw a ghost," she pouted.

"OK, you were right this time," Astro voiced. "I guess Kobaruto and I really did see Tobio's ghost, he was real and not a figment of our A.I.'s."

"Gee I wonder what happened to him?" Uran sighed, "Did the Ghostbusters bag him in their trap?"

"Yeah they did clean out Tenma's old house," Astro said, "But I wouldn't worry about it. According to Egan, ghosts are troubled souls that got stuck in our plane of existence. He believes that by gradually releasing the energy from that containment gizmo, all of the tortured souls that they trapped will finally find peace."

"You mean they will go to heaven?" Uran asked.

"That's what priest would say," Dr. O'Shay smiled.

"What about Gozer?", Cobalt asked.

"Hopefully, that evil has been boxed up for good," O'Shay said. "But if something like that ever surfaces here again, at least we know who to call."

- The End -