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Published:
2021-11-28
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2022-01-01
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The Spengler Way

Summary:

They keep in touch after all is said and done. Even though they don't really know each other and the person connecting them hasn't connected with any of them in a long time, if at all. Then again, the part where they all fought an ancient god and won should probably count too.

In which the OG Ghostbusters all see Spengler through his family.

Notes:

Ghostbusters Afterlife is my thing now. Like I literally watched the first two movies today in order to make it my thing. Expect a lot more fanfiction for this franchise from me.

Chapter 1: Ray

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Ray

It was a lot easier back when Ray was simply allowed to hate his best and dearest friend in the world. 

Egon screwed him over. That much didn't change, at least. He still stole all their stuff and booked it. Still went a decade without trying to contact him again. Still sounded insane.

'Sounded' being the key word.

But that was the thing, Egon may have screwed him over, but Ray did the one thing the Ghostbusters swore they'd always do. Ray didn't believe him. None of them did. 

And yeah, that's not stealing from and then leaving your pals. But it still sucked. 

So there he was, an old man, only realizing that he wanted- no, needed- to make up with Egon after it was too late. But he got more than most people would in his situation. He got to see him again. He got to say sorry. 

Maybe it was too much to ask for more time.

They watched as he held his daughter and faded away.

"Oh my god!" Venkman gasped upon entrance to the house. A stack of books stood, one placed on top the other on top of the other on top of the other. And even with all the chaos that just occurred in Spengler's front yard, it still stood relatively unbothered.

They shared a surprised look, before they both cracked up laughing.

Winston looked at the two in confusion. "What? What is it?" 

"No human being would stack books like this!"

Callie Spengler offered them guest rooms in the completely demolished house, while one of the older newcomers, Gary, offered Podcast and the girl whose name he was pretty sure was Lucky rides home. It had been a long day, after all. He tried to go to sleep that night, wondering what the hell they were gonna do the next day.

Telling stories was good enough.

"Okay, so then some asshole cop.... insults Grampa in front of Phoebe." Ray pushed away thoughts of how odd it was to hear him being referred to as 'Grampa' to focus on the story. By the tone of Trevor's voice, Ray could tell that this was something shocking, or at least telling of something extremely unfavorable. "So naturally, she grabs the ghostbusting thingy and points it at the police. You know, to prove that he wasn't nuts."

They all laugh. Venkman pretended to wipe a tear from his eyes. "Almost reminds me of Spengler trying to jump What's-His-Face-Environmentalist when he tried blaming us for him freeing all our ghosts."

"What!?" Phoebe shouted, affronted. 

Ray chuckled, warmth spreading in his chest. "Yeah.... Definitely Egon's granddaughter."

He saw him in her. In her looks, the hair and those glasses, in her techno-babble that Winston and Peter still didn't seem to understand after all this time, in her standing side by side with her grandfather as they took on Gozer, and now in her apparent temper.

"You guys can laugh." Trevor rolled his eyes, snapping him out of his thoughts. "The warden wasn't your girlfriend's dad!"

"I'm sorry. Your what?" Lucky interrupted, walking into the dining room followed by Callie, who evidently let her in. "Mr. Sixteen-In-February?"

"Nothing! I mean- My friend! Who's a girl!" Trevor tried to save himself. They laughed some more. 

Ray had to wonder if it was wrong to be laughing after what happened last night. And only a few days after finding out about Egon's- about his- his death. He tried not to think about his reaction after Phoebe's phone call, how he called his friends, and- 

But after spending so much time resenting the hell out of that bastard, it was really nice to feel good when it came to thinking and talking about him.

Egon did dedicate his life to saving the world, so he probably deserved it.

Ray tried to imagine him with this family he had, even if he was never actually with his family. Egon would have been two peas in a pod with Phoebe, that's not even a question. Trevor might've gone through a 'too cool to hang out with his grandparents' phase that Oscar's kids went through with Peter, but it would've been alright. And Callie- Well, one thing's for sure, Callie Spengler would not be listening to all these stories about her father with a mixture of regret and insecurity in her eyes.

It was also easier when Callie Spengler was just someone he could feel sorry for from afar. Another casualty of Egon. An innocent kid with no say in who her parents were, and got stuck with a dad who left everyone that loved him. Another reason to dismiss his friend, but it wasn't his place to intervene. She had her mother, and her mother took her away from New York.

But now, here she was in the flesh and blood, all grown up. She didn't look much like Spengler, she took after her mother. But then the family took them down to Egon's lab, with the three old man taking the stairs, unfortunately. And where Phoebe excitedly talked about his research with him, and Trevor discussed the Ecto-1 with Winston, it was what Callie had to show them that got to him. 

Pictures upon pictures of Egon's daughter. It wasn't just the thought that he cared about his daughter, that much Ray got from him hugging her before passing on. It was caring in his own way. Little things that screamed Egon. Post it notes and scribblings of dates, the way he could make out a timeline of her life from it, all reminiscent of any other research project. This was him. This was his doing. It was Egon who loved her, and finally, Ray let himself remember that he loved them all. In his own, Spengler way.

Notes:

So who else was just a little screwed up by this movie? Just me?

Chapter 2: Winston

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Winston

He took the Ecto-1 back to New York, got the old firehouse up and running, and got back to work. 

Winston had missed this.

Alright, fine, the three of them were too old for this job, but Spengler's grandchildren were too young, and all those ghosts let out during the almost apocalypse were still loose and they did not stay in Oklahoma. Apparently ghosts were too good for farmlands.

So they put up a Help Wanted sign.

They weren't expecting one of the new kids to come calling. 

"I'm eighteen years old." Lucky Domingo told them over the phone. "My dad is a cop, if that helps my case any. I have work experience at Spinner's Diner. I probably don't have enough money saved to pay for my own apartment but I have looked at several ads for a roommate around your general area. And I assume I do have more experience in this field than most other potential candidates for the position."

Winston shared a look with both Ray and Peter. Peter only shrugged. "She's not wrong about the experience thing."

Lucky had talent, that was for sure. She caught on quickly, like himself back in the day. And it was much more marketable to put a young person in their new ad to make it seem like it wasn't just three old men coming to solve their customers' ghost problems, sentimental value of the originals aside.

The Spengler Family come to visit one weekend, with them apparently saving for the plane ride after Winston covered their many debts. 

"Oh, you made it look so cool!" Trevor admired as he ghosted a hand over the new and approved Ecto-1. It was his first time seeing the car in person after they'd left Oklahoma.

He looked over it with a glint in his eyes, like he was wanting to go on a joyride that Winston was absolutely not going to let him go on. Egon might come back to haunt his ass if he let his grandson kill himself.

"I was shocked that you got it up and running at all. Good work."

"In hindsight, I think Grampa might've helped. Just a little, though." Trevor confessed. His lips pressed together like he was at a crossroads between wanting to take credit and wanting to brag about his grandfather.

Winston grinned a little. "Of course, he did." 

A blind man could see Egon in Phoebe. If she had been born before his death, and they hadn't seen his ghost next to her, they'd probably be looking at this as evidence of reincarnation. 

Phoebe spoke to Ray, rambling about some of the science behind their equipment, and Winston could almost convince himself that there was time travel involved on top of everything else, because the ages were all wrong. Ray and Egon were never like this as old men, they never got the chance to be. So he could almost imagine himself as a young man, looking at a preteen Egon and an elderly Ray conversing in their science jargon and trying to figure out how to work the time machine. 

Trevor, on the other hand, probably took after other members of his family. Not in the looks department, both his grandkids looked eerily like their old friend.... Or maybe it was just the hair. But Egon was never a ladies man, or even a wannabe like his grandson. 

"Man, the second I graduate, I'll be all over this place." Trevor said. He smiled at Lucky from across the room. "And I'll really be eighteen by then!"

Damn, the next generation of Spenglers joining the official Ghostbusters for good. Or at least until ghosts sightings dried up again. Hell, if that wasn't before Phoebe grew up, there was really no doubt about what her plans were. What would that be like? 

Winston loved his kids, and he was extremely glad that they weren't that interested in the Ghostbusters business, and that his own grandchildren had other plans for their lives. Likewise, Oscar's kids lived relatively unaffected by Peter's Ghostbusting. 

But not the Spengler Family. They couldn't ignore the call. They didn't want to. Then again, neither could Egon, even when it cost him so much and he definitely couldn't have wanted that. Where Winston went on to his own life, there he was trying to save the world until his last day. Maybe people like the Spenglers were just meant for this business. 

Notes:

Hope you enjoyed! <3 I wanted more comparisons other than just the obvious Phoebe is New Egon. I kind of wanted to look at how it's Egon's descendants taking on the Ghostbusting when he was the one who dedicated himself to saving the world.

Chapter 3: Peter

Notes:

Happy New Year! Hope you're doing well. Glad I could finish this fic. :)

Chapter Text

"Alright, kids! Who wants to do something illegal?"

"Woo!"

"Great, tell me when you come up with something. I'm an old man, you can't expect me to be doing this and that at the drop of the hat."

The grandkids all laugh. 'The grandkids' being Peter's, Winston's, and now, Egon's. 

Peter loved being the cool parent, who had no choice but to occasionally be forced to reprimand his son because he didn't need him in jail. But it was also pretty great being the fun grandpa and goofy uncle giving out advice that a responsible parent couldn't get away with. 

Plus, he just got more nieces and a nephew. (He didn't think he was 'there' with Lucky or Podcast yet.)

Dana took to the kids easily, shaking her head at him when he explained that, 'Well, actually, Spengy wasn't wrong or crazy and had a good enough reason for stealing everything and taking off? 'Good enough' being saving the world?', and making him sleep on the couch for three days, which was so unfair given that he was an old man and that he stepped up to fight the good fight at the end of the day. Or life.

They gladly opened their home to the Spenglers for Thanksgiving.

Their grandchildren got along well. Or, okay, little Maia raised an eyebrow at the little girl version of Egon, especially since they never really told her about him, even the good parts. It was all tainted by the end. But in their defense they never badmouthed him, he was just the person they didn't talk about.

But the Maia thing, that was okay, too, because Peter probably gave Egon the side eye a few hundred times before warming up to the guy.

So it was a small but pretty happy surprise when he was sent upstairs to get the kids ready for dinner and found the two girls sitting on Maia's bed, a chess board between them. Both children looked bored, but Maia looked awfully smug while Phoebe seemed to be impressed, looking like how her grandfather did whenever he thought he knew something Peter didn't.

He could not believe Egon was the first of them to go. 

"Now, now kids. Settle down. Don't want all that dust to spoil your appetite."

Maia ran up to him. He accepted a hug from him with an 'oof' and chuckled.

"You have fun with Phoebe?" Peter asked his granddaughter. 

Maia looked back at the other girl over her shoulder and shrugged. "She's alright."

"And the game?" He asked. Her eyes shifted to the side and drew closer to him.

"I'm cheating." Maia whispered to him.

"How do you cheat at chess?" Peter whispered back.

"I have my ways." 

She ran off to get clean up before eating, but Phoebe took her time, stepping up next to him and looking up at him through those glasses. 

"I let her win."

Peter nodded.

She frowned, looking back at the chess set. "You know, we were kind of playing chess together. He threw one of the pieces rather aggressively though."

"Aggressive?" 

Spengler could be aggressive. He was aggressive towards the end there, always insisting that.... He was aggressive when he needed to be, trying to throttle dicks and assholes whenever he was insulted. It could be a bitch to hold him back. 

But at that point? Dead and just finally getting to meet his grandchildren? 

Peter thought about Oscar and his own grandchildren. He was too selfish a man to give that up.

Yeah, doing what Egon did would be a real bitch. 

"Fair enough, I'd be pretty pissed too in his shoes."