Ghostbusters: Resurrection

1. Act I: The Haunting of Ray's Occult Books

If Spengler hadn't made off with all the PKE meters, Ray would be taking readings right now. It's been almost three years and he has yet to broach the topic of getting any of the Ghostbusters equipment back from Callie. It's half his, and he sure could use it right about now.

He tries to script the phone call in his mind: "Callie, this is Dr. Raymond Stantz, remember me from the time you were possessed and almost died? Well, I think your Dad's haunting me and I need half the stuff he stole back. Phoebe and Trevor can keep the rest. Oh, and he was my husband, and you're my stepdaughter, and when I found out about you, I broke his heart and maybe his mind. I am so sorry. Now about those PKE meters..."

He will never be ready for that. Other people would lie, he knows, come up with something appropriate and half true that would charm Callie, get his foot in the door to the lab without any personal drama, but just trying to script the right lie makes Ray feel a bit meltdowny.
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There's a pattern to the book stacks because of course there is.

They're from all over the store. They weren't simply floated over from one shelf and stacked alphabetically. That means they were deliberately chosen for a reason. It's up to Ray to figure out the reason.

They're not color coordinated. So, it's not that the entity was attracted to the color blue, or something. Therefore the message lies in something other than the books' appearance.

They're not all the same size. Each stack is a different height, contains a different number of books. It could be Morris code, with thick books representing dashes and thin books representing dots. Ray checks, and it doesn't compute.

Ray eats a yogurt and stares at the books.

He tries to read his most recent copy of The Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, but instead stares at the books.

He helps a customer and stares at the books.

He brews tea and stares at the books.

He calls Venkman and stares at the books.

When she comes in for her afternoon shift, Ray packs online orders with his shop assistant Sabrina, and they both stare at the books.
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Late that night, he's almost asleep, when Ray sits up, clicks on the bedside lamp and futzes with his c-pap machine.

"Damn cigarettes" he thinks every time. Remembers when he was young and immortal and could breathe and sleep at the same time.

He gets the thing off his face and goes for his notebook. Looks at the list of titles. There it is. Circles the first letter of each book title, which come together to spell out a word. It's an Acrostic poem. Each stack makes a string of sentences. Sometimes the pattern is the simplest thing.

The first one says: "RAY I AM SO SORRY TOO I FORGIVE YOU REMEMBER I WILL ALWAYS LOVE YOU."

Ray feels wobbly and it has nothing to do with being 71. He's swooning like he hasn't swooned since 1984. Egon still loves him. That is certainly good news as he has never stopped loving Egon. Ray has to sit on his bedroom floor to ground himself while decoding the second one.

It says: "TRAPS WILL FAIL AND GOZER WILL BREAK FREE SOON PREPARE TO FIGHT"

The third one says: "PROTECT CALLIE PHOEBE TREVOR PETER WINSTON JANINE YOU"