Psych Fic (b-day fic for htbthomas): Vacation
Title: Vacation
Fandom(s): Psych (and Monk, just for the fun of it)
Author: Em aka Old Romantic
Rating: PG
Genre: Comedy/Mystery
Ships: Slightly Shawn/Juliet and Monk/Natalie, but not really
Timeline/Spoilers: Season 3-ish, before the last two eps.
Disclaimer: I’m not nearly as good with the 80’s movie and pop culture references to ever claim any part of the creative team of Psych. So, yeah, not possibly any money being made off of this.
Summary: Shawn and Gus visit a museum in San Francisco, and get involved in a case. B-day fic for htbthomas. X-posted at oldromantic.
A/N: Five days late and a LOT of dollars short… :P Hope this is considered “geekery” enough for ya’, Barb. And I hope it was worth waiting for! Happy belated birthday!! :D
Thanks to auntof3 for the beta! (I'll get her hooked on Psych yet. ;) )
Enjoy!! ♥
- - - - - - -
“Really, Gus?” Shawn was complaining as he sat across the café table from his best friend. “We go on our first vacation in months, drive all the way up here to San Francisco, and you want to spend our time visiting a museum? That’s your surprise?”
“You told me to figure out where we should go for our vacation.”
“Yeah, but, I’m sure there are a dozen things to do here, other than boring museum hopping.”
“It won’t be boring.”
“We could tour Alcatraz. We could see where Clint Eastwood escaped with that guy from Tremors. Or was it Tremors 2?” His eyes wandered to the ceiling as he pondered the answer to his own question.
Gus frowned. “I told you that the surprise would be what you found when we got to the museum, Shawn. And I’m not spoiling it.” He set his lips in a firm line and turned away. Then he added, “It’s not my fault you decided to try to solve some random non-crime and ruin our day.”
Shawn argued. “Dude, it was, like, fate. It’s not my fault that car crashed right in front of us first thing this morning.”
“Excuses, Shawn. What are we waiting here for, anyway?”
“I don’t know. Some detective’s assistant called and said they would meet us here to find out what we know about the case.” Just then, a blonde came through the front door, practically dragging her reluctant boss in by the arm. Shawn nodded their direction. “That must be them now.” He gave the detective a studied, once-over look, noting how he was avoiding touching the door handle, and really anything, and yet, he still wiped his palms on his pants. As they walked closer, the man purposely reached out and touched each lamp shade that hung over the tables they passed. “Whoa,” Shawn noticed. “That guy has some serious OCD issues.”
Gus snorted in agreement just as the woman reached their table and asked, “Are you Shawn Spencer?”
Shawn replied, “Why, yes, and this is my partner, Cannibal ‘Gus’ Lecter. No relation.”
“Oh-kay,” she answered, slightly taken aback by his joke. Then she held out her hand. I’m Natalie Teeger, and this is my boss, Adrian Monk.”
They all shook hands in turn and then Shawn watched as Monk wiped his hands on a disinfectant wipe Natalie had handed him. They all sat back down in the booth, with the boys across from the couple, and Monk taking the outermost edge. Shawn watched with interest as Monk took a handkerchief out and wiped down his silverware, even though he was pretty sure none of them were actually going to eat anything there. Then he went about setting them straight as Natalie began to tell them what answers they were looking for; mainly, if they’d seen what happened to the driver before he’d crashed and died.
“He was passed out,” Shawn answered easily and Gus stared at him, wondering how he’d known that. They were just starting to turn a right corner when the car had come from out of nowhere from the right and crashed into a building on the left of the street. Sometimes Shawn’s powers of observation even amazed Gus, who knew the truth that he wasn’t truly psychic.
As expected, Monk was skeptical. “But, wait. How could you have seen him? The crash must’ve happened in a split-second.”
“Yes,” Shawn replied smugly, “but I have an advantage. You see, I’m a psychic.”
Monk sat back and mumbled, “Oh, brother.”
Shawn put his two fingers to his temple as if seeing into the past and said, “I’m sensing that there was some kind of foul play involved - it wasn’t a heart attack as the police first suspected.”
“That’s right,” Natalie squeaked excitedly. “He’d been injected with something. You’re good at this.”
“Please… Don’t encourage him,” Monk complained.
“Gus and I solve cases for a living. We’d be glad to give you guys a hand on this case while we’re in town.”
“I don’t think so,” Monk said, even as Natalie agreed that it would be a great idea. He held up his hand and continued to protest, “It wouldn’t matter anyway, because we’re going to have to out of town for further investigation. This guy was from Santa Barbara-”
“Perfect,” Shawn replied, pulling out his cell phone. “That just happens to be where we’re from. We have great contacts in the SBPD.” He’d dialed Juliet as he finished his sentence and then held the phone to his ear. “Jules! Gus and I are in San Francisco, and we’ve witnessed a murder.”
“Geez, Shawn, can’t you guys go anywhere?”
“Well, I did know of a telephone booth once that could travel through time-”
“Shawn, the point, please?”
He got back to business. “Turns out this guy is from Santa Barbara. Wondering if you could look him up for me.”
“What’s his name?”
“His name?” he relayed to Monk and Natalie.
“Bill Knox,” Natalie replied, and Shawn passed on the info.
He heard clicking on the other end of the phone, and then Juliet said, “Well, let’s see… Bill Knox was a scientist and a professor at UCSB. Oh,” her tone changed, “he went missing a month ago.”
“Well, we found him.”
“I’ll tell the Chief and Lassiter. He’ll probably want to come up there to be a part of the investigation so that we can close the case on our end.”
“Okay. Thanks, Jules.” They made arrangements to meet the next day and he hung up.
With a smile, Natalie questioned, “Is her name ‘Julie’? That’s my daughter’s name.”
“Actually, ‘Juliet’. She’s my-”
Gus interrupted, “She’s not your girlfriend, Shawn, so don’t even go there.”
“I wasn’t!” he said defensively. “I was going to say that she’s my partner.”
“I’m your partner, Shawn.”
“Can she be my mentor?” He got a raised eyebrow from his friend for that one. “My goddess? My inspiration? The future mother of my children?”
Gus snorted. “Just don’t say that around her. You just might get yourself shot.”
“All the more reason to just…adore her.”
“Can we please get back to the case?!” Monk practically exploded.
Shawn had noticed him writhing in his seat, but hadn’t expected the outburst. “Okay, sorry. Jules and Lassie -”
“That’s Juliet’s partner, Detective Lassiter,” Gus interjected, to politely keep Monk and Natalie in the loop.
“Yes,” Shawn tossed an annoyed look his friend’s way. “Anyway, they’ll be here tomorrow with what they know. For now, I suggest we all just go and…take a chill pill.”
“I don’t take medication,” Monk declared, missing the point.
An eyebrow went up on Shawn’s face, and he replied, “Yeah, well, maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea.”
Natalie interceded, “Mr. Monk is fine. He’s…just a little upset today.”
He suddenly yelled out, “Only because you bumped me and made me drop a forkful of peas.”
“And, you don’t like a mess?” Gus guessed.
Shawn also tried, “You have a fear of things that roll?”
Monk got up from the table, pacing, and almost refusing to answer for a moment. When he finally did, it was almost as if it was because he couldn’t contain himself any longer. “I had a hundred,” Monk explained. “Once seven of them were on the floor, I no longer had an even number, did I?”
Saying goodbye to the boys until the next day, Natalie scooted off of the bench and tried again to mend things with her boss. “I’m sorry, Mr. Monk. I told you I was sorry already.”
“‘Sorry’ doesn’t cut it - I want my seven peas back.”
“I’ll make it up to you,” she offered, slipping her arm around his as they walked toward the exit. “We’ll have peas again for dinner, and I’ll make sure you get seven extra. That way, it’ll all even out.”
After they were out of earshot, Shawn mumbled, “Dude, and my dad thought I had issues.”
“That’s insane. How does she put up with that?”
“Oh, that’s easy - she’s in love with him.”
“What?”
“Come on, Gus. Even you could pick up on that,” Shawn whined. He waved his hand toward the door. “No one in their right mind would tolerate being treated the way he treats her if there wasn’t some kind of deeper connection there. And didn’t you see the way she held onto his arm?”
“Well, thank you, Oprah. I didn’t know you were so in touch with your feminine side.”
Gus pulled out a couple of dollars to pay for the sodas they’d consumed, and scooted out of the booth, followed by Shawn, who was saying, “Well, we psychics have to be sensitive to all the metaphysical sides of the human mind. Besides, it really helps out with the ladies, which, as we both know, is our ultimate goal here.”
“You know that’s right,” Gus agreed with a fist-bump, and the two left to continue their day.
They were just approaching the museum that Gus had planned for them to visit that morning, when Shawn said, “This has got to be the best vacation ever.” He stopped walking and stared across the street. “I’m bored and dying for a fresh case, and a suspicious car accident happens right in front of us. Now, I just started to get hungry, and we end up visiting a museum right across the street from an In-and-Out. That can’t be coincidence.”
The traffic clear, he started to cross the street even as Gus tried to stop him. “Shawn, what about the museum?”
“It’ll still be there after we eat. I just want a hamburger. Or maybe two,” he rubbed his stomach. “Eh, we’ll see.” He jogged the rest of the way across the road and Gus reluctantly followed.
As soon as Gus caught up, he reminded his friend what time the museum would close and that they needed to remember to get back there in time. But Shawn’s only response was to stop suddenly and gasp. “What?” Gus asked as the other man turned back to face him.
“The chick at the drive-through window is totally hot. You should ask her out.”
“She lives 300 miles away from us, Shawn. And she works in a fast-food restaurant for a living,“ he added with a sort of distaste.
But when Shawn stepped aside and made him get a look at the girl in question, Gus’s jaw dropped. “Whoa,” he muttered. “I see what you mean.”
They chose to buy their food and then stand by the walk-up windows to eat it, just so that they could appropriately flirt with Drive-Through Girl. But Gus did notice that after a few minutes, Shawn was distracted by something in the parking lot of the abandoned building next door. He didn’t say a word, even as he started to walk that direction, tossing the last little bite of his second hamburger into the trash on the way across the driveway.
Gus called after him, but he didn’t answer, so he politely said goodbye to Drive-Through Girl, and followed after him, catching up to him kneeling and hiding behind some bushes and peering through them. He knelt down too, just in case there was a reason beyond temporary insanity. “Shawn, what are you doing?”
“Gus, tell me you saw that blue car yesterday.”
“What car?” he asked, and then shared Shawn’s little space through the bushes to see what he was talking about. Two men were meeting between two parked cars where an exchange of envelopes took place - a large one for a smaller one - and then the two shook hands and got back in their cars. “I don’t remember seeing either one of them,” Gus replied as the cars started. “Why?”
As if seeing it still so fresh in his mind, Shawn closed his eyes and explained, “It was parked on the left side of the street facing us when the car crashed. About a minute later, it pulled out of its space and turned left to go the way Bill Knox’s car had come.”
“And you think this car has something to do with it?”
“Oh, oh!” Shawn exclaimed as the car pulled out of the parking lot and turned to drive past them. “Good, the license plate.” He memorized it instantaneously and then stood up when the coast was clear. “We’re going to find out.”
“And what about our vacation, Shawn? The museum?”
“Look, I don’t know what to tell you, man,” he stopped to point toward the building across the street. “But we’ve been here for twenty minutes, and in that time, I haven’t seen one person go in or come out over there. That’s not a good sign.”
“Oh, yeah? Well, maybe the museum is already full of patrons busy enjoying the artwork,” Gus rejoined.
“Or maybe they’ve all died of boredom. Either way,” he quickly added, “it’ll still be there when we’re done with this case.”
“Alright,” Gus finally agreed. “But you’re buying the souvenirs for this trip.”
Shawn rolled his eyes and moaned. “What could you possibly want from a museum? One of those ridiculous paperweights that are supposed to be art but looks like a bunch of office trash glued together? I’ll make you one when we get home, and it’ll be kickin’.”
Gus didn’t have a retort for that, so Shawn slipped on his sunglasses and began to strut back toward the car. “Come on, we have to look good for Drive-Through Girl.” Gus smirked and also put on his glasses as they cut across the driveway and waved goodbye to the employee who waved back. Shawn said, “I say that it’s time that we visit the SFPD and show them our mad skillllllzzz.”
“With a ‘z’,” Gus added as they both nodded and walked back to the parking lot where they’d left Gus’s car.
At the station, they asked to speak to the Captain, once they knew who was in charge, and, as soon as they got into the main part of the office, Shawn took a look around their surroundings for some little details he could use “psychically”, just in case. Then it was time to get the attention. He collapsed to the floor and those in the closest desks reacted the same way Gus did, in shock, rushing to his aid. “Shawn, Shawn! Are you okay?” Gus asked, playing the part.
Shawn held his head as Gus helped him up from the floor, complaining, “It’s just too much. There are so many unsolved mysteries in this room; the victims are all coming through to me at once. Ahh!” he yelled, thrashing his body around.
Gus spoke loudly, “Can you focus on just one?”
Still writhing, Shawn yelled out, “Ahh, it’s too hard! No, it’s a fort! No, wait - it’s opportunity!”
“You mean, ‘knocks’?” Gus pretended to try to help. By this time, Lt. Disher and Capt. Stottlemeyer were standing and watching the whole scene unfold. Shawn dropped his head, with his body slumped against the cop that was holding him up, as if he’d finally been freed from the burden of the message. “Quick,” Gus yelled across the room. “Is anyone working on a case with someone with the name of ‘Knox’?”
“I am,” Disher spoke up and then corrected, “I mean, we are.”
“Randy,” Stottlemeyer shook his head at the younger man in silent reprimand.
Throwing his body foot by foot, Shawn made his way across the room, knocking the occasional lamp or stack of papers off a desk amid protests. Finally his hand latched onto a manila envelope and he gripped it tight, even though the officer whose desk it had been perched on tried to take it back. “Something to do with an envelope - an exchange! Oh!” He fell over again, dropping the envelope. “It’s dirty.”
“Well, you’re lying on the floor, Shawn,” Gus reminded him.
“No!” he said, sitting and getting up to his knees. “The money, the exchange, this Knox guy… There was something underhanded going on.”
Stottlemeyer crossed his arms on his chest. “You must be the psychic that Monk was telling us about.”
“Yes,” Shawn caught his breath, standing to his feet. “I’m sorry for the disturbance, but sometimes the spirits really knock me around to give me their information.”
“I see that,” the captain mumbled unemotionally. “Is it over yet?”
“Yes, it’s clearing now.” Seemingly healed from his psychic attacks after a deep breath or two, Shawn was able to stand to his feet and shake the Captain’s hand. “I’m Shawn Spencer, lead psychic of the SBPD. This is my partner, Gus ‘Scattergories’ Guster.”
He shook Gus’s hand as well and then pointed to Randy. “This is Lieutenant Disher. I’m Captain Stottlemeyer. Now if you don’t mind telling me what the hell you’re doing here…”
“Obviously, I’ve had a psychic lead on this case that I thought deserved immediate attention. I - psychically, of course,” he said, touching his fingers to his head again, “I saw a man driving a car that was at the accident scene earlier today, in another part of town, making some kind of exchange: money for… Well, I don’t know what it was, but whatever it was, it was in an envelope just like that one.”
Disher frowned and clarified, “So, you’re saying…”
The way his voice trailed off clearly meant that he was waiting for Shawn to finish the sentence. “I’m saying that he wasn’t buying a tank. Whatever it was had to fit in that envelope.”
Stottlemeyer tried, “Okay, so…how does that help us exactly?”
Shawn sucked air in his teeth, flailing about with his eyes closed and leaning against the wall for support. “Two-four-X-Y-nine-seven. A blue cat - no, a storm. A bird!”
“A Thunderbird?” Gus offered.
But Shawn corrected, “A blue Thunderbird.”
Disher was writing all of this down in his notepad - scribbling it off when Shawn would change his description - and realized, “Oh. I’ll bet the numbers and letters are a tag number. I’ll look that up.”
Unimpressed, even as Randy sat down at his desk and started typing away at his keyboard, Stottlemeyer asked, “Anything else?”
“Well, Mr. Knox was a scientist from Santa Barbara, so it’s possible that he was a partied - partied? Apartied?” he and Gus looked at each other and shook their heads, unsure of the correct wording. “He might’ve been a part of some kind of drug ring, or lab experiment, or -”
“Or a guinea pig for an experimental drug,” Gus added.
“Or he could’ve been blackmailed or kidnapped for information. He’s been missing for a month.”
Stottlemeyer leaned against the door jamb to his office. By now, most of the other officers and detectives were back to their own work, not paying any attention to Shawn and Gus. “The thing is, boys, it could be anything, so your information, while it helps a little, doesn’t do much to move along our investigation.”
“Well, do you know yet what Knox was injected with?”
“No,” he replied. “We should have the autopsy report by tomorrow morning.”
Gus looked at his watch and complained, “Damn, and now the museum’s closed.”
Shawn sighed, knowing there was nothing they could really do until morning. “Well, maybe you could help us out with something else, then.”
“What’s that?” Stottlemeyer asked.
With his serious face on, Shawn questioned, “Is there any nightlife in this town?”
- - - - - - -
“There are two things I’ve learned about this city,” Shawn said to Juliet the minute he saw her outside of the police station where they decided to meet.
“What’s that? There are a lot of hills?” she snarked back.
“Okay, three things.” He held up a finger. “First, the streetcar is not named ‘Desire’, and secondly, riding it downhill is almost as thrilling as a rollercoaster - without the lovely perks of Gus’s vomit, of course.”
“I only vomited on one rollercoaster and that was when I was ten years old, Shawn.”
Juliet rolled her eyes and held up her hands. “Okay, can we possibly talk about the case, here?”
“Yes,” added Lassiter, “before we age beyond recognition.”
“Lassie, is that you?” Shawn teased, blinking at the other man. “I almost didn’t recognize you.”
Lassiter just made a childish face at him and turned to go inside the station. Monk and Natalie were already in Stottlemeyer’s office when the Santa Barbara foursome was escorted in.
The captain was just finishing up a phone conversation, and he set the phone on its cradle, greeting Shawn and Gus with a handshake. “Good to see you again,” Shawn said cordially, and then gestured to his police-trained partners. “These are our care bears, Lassie-Face and Jewel-Tones.”
Sighing at yet another nickname, Juliet held out her hand and introduced herself and Lassiter with their real names. “We have a little bit more information about Professor Knox.”
Stottlemeyer revealed, “If it has to do with the fact that he stole an experimental drug from the lab he worked at, we know that already.”
“Y-you do?” Lassiter stuttered. “How?”
“Thanks to Spencer’s tip on the license plate number, we managed to pick up this Raymond Lane. When the officers searched his car and found several other syringes full of drugs, the guy cracked. He told the cops everything. Apparently, he and Knox were selling the drug to the highest bidder when Knox got cold feet. They got into a fight, Knox was injected with a nearby syringe, and he fled until he crashed. Case closed.”
“So that’s it?” Shawn said, disappointed. “No more clues to follow, no more need for psychic help?”
Monk interjected, “Not that we ever needed any in the first place.”
“Mr. Monk,” Natalie quietly chided.
“Oh yes,” Shawn replied sarcastically. “And just who was the one that gave you the information on the license plate so that this Richard Blaine could be caught-”
“Raymond Lane,” everyone in the room corrected.
“Whatever,” he went on. “I still get credit for solving this case,” he said and then began to dance. Gus joined him, but after a few seconds, when they noticed that the rest of the room was staring, they both stopped and stood still once more.
The captain cleared his throat. “The credit, you may have,” Stottlemeyer proclaimed as he sat on the edge of his desk. “I’m just sorry I can’t pay you for it.”
“What?” Shawn looked appalled. “We don’t get paid?”
Gus prodded, “Shawn, I think we could just consider this a courtesy this time.”
Crossing his arms, Lassiter scoffed. “Well, I can’t believe we drove all the way up here for this.”
The captain nodded at him. “Sorry about that, but we got this information five minutes ago.”
“Yeah,” Randy finally spoke up. “The captain just got the phone call.”
Stottlemeyer went one, “We’ll make sure you guys get all the necessary paperwork you need to close your case.”
They said their goodbyes, Shawn and Monk kind of eyeing one another territorially, before the Santa Barbara investigators walked out together. Once outside the police station, before they were to part ways, Shawn realized, “Oh, Jules, while you’re here, you can come with us to this museum Gus is dying for me to see. Should be fun, right?” he feigned interest.
She saw right through what he was doing and smirked in amusement. “Sorry, Shawn, but I have a lot of work to catch up on back at the station. We really need to be heading back. We’ll see you next week,” she smiled and then followed Lassiter back to his car.
Once they were gone, Shawn turned to find an angry expression on Gus’s face. “What?”
“What do you mean, ‘what?’” Gus repeated. “You just tried to get out of going to the museum again.”
“No, I didn’t - I was trying to get more people to come and enjoy it with us.”
“That’s not what I saw, Shawn.”
“Well, clearly, you need glasses because and hearing aids because I just thought for sure that this museum would be just so much to take in that I would need a distraction, like Jules and Lassie.”
“Mm hmm,” he mumbled disbelievingly, inwardly declaring not to talk to him again until they were at the museum.
“Guster,” Shawn sang as they drove, but Gus was totally ignoring him. “Okay, don’t make me pull out the big guns and start calling you by your middle name.”
Gus turned his eyes from the road long enough to glare at his friend. Fortunately, Shawn didn’t have to use his forbidden name, since they’d arrived back at the parking lot adjacent to the museum. Gus parked and got out, still silent, rushing his way toward the front entrance ahead of his lifelong friend, when Shawn stopped him with the words, “Okay, Gus, I’m sorry.” Shawn slowly approached him and then shrugged. “I guess I just don’t see what the big deal is about art, anyway.”
“I told you that the surprise would be inside. Did you ever think it might be the kind of art you’d actually like?”
“What kind of art would I like? Drawings? I only read comics and watch cartoons…” The look on Guster’s face was enough to make him realize, “A cartoon art museum? Really? Gus, why didn’t you say so in the first place?” he scolded, and then started to run toward the door with Gus running right with him. “Oh, dude, this is going to be so cool!”
Suddenly, it was the best vacation two friends could ever take.
~End
Request a birthday ficlet here!
Fandom(s): Psych (and Monk, just for the fun of it)
Author: Em aka Old Romantic
Rating: PG
Genre: Comedy/Mystery
Ships: Slightly Shawn/Juliet and Monk/Natalie, but not really
Timeline/Spoilers: Season 3-ish, before the last two eps.
Disclaimer: I’m not nearly as good with the 80’s movie and pop culture references to ever claim any part of the creative team of Psych. So, yeah, not possibly any money being made off of this.
Summary: Shawn and Gus visit a museum in San Francisco, and get involved in a case. B-day fic for htbthomas. X-posted at oldromantic.
A/N: Five days late and a LOT of dollars short… :P Hope this is considered “geekery” enough for ya’, Barb. And I hope it was worth waiting for! Happy belated birthday!! :D
Thanks to auntof3 for the beta! (I'll get her hooked on Psych yet. ;) )
Enjoy!! ♥
- - - - - - -
“Really, Gus?” Shawn was complaining as he sat across the café table from his best friend. “We go on our first vacation in months, drive all the way up here to San Francisco, and you want to spend our time visiting a museum? That’s your surprise?”
“You told me to figure out where we should go for our vacation.”
“Yeah, but, I’m sure there are a dozen things to do here, other than boring museum hopping.”
“It won’t be boring.”
“We could tour Alcatraz. We could see where Clint Eastwood escaped with that guy from Tremors. Or was it Tremors 2?” His eyes wandered to the ceiling as he pondered the answer to his own question.
Gus frowned. “I told you that the surprise would be what you found when we got to the museum, Shawn. And I’m not spoiling it.” He set his lips in a firm line and turned away. Then he added, “It’s not my fault you decided to try to solve some random non-crime and ruin our day.”
Shawn argued. “Dude, it was, like, fate. It’s not my fault that car crashed right in front of us first thing this morning.”
“Excuses, Shawn. What are we waiting here for, anyway?”
“I don’t know. Some detective’s assistant called and said they would meet us here to find out what we know about the case.” Just then, a blonde came through the front door, practically dragging her reluctant boss in by the arm. Shawn nodded their direction. “That must be them now.” He gave the detective a studied, once-over look, noting how he was avoiding touching the door handle, and really anything, and yet, he still wiped his palms on his pants. As they walked closer, the man purposely reached out and touched each lamp shade that hung over the tables they passed. “Whoa,” Shawn noticed. “That guy has some serious OCD issues.”
Gus snorted in agreement just as the woman reached their table and asked, “Are you Shawn Spencer?”
Shawn replied, “Why, yes, and this is my partner, Cannibal ‘Gus’ Lecter. No relation.”
“Oh-kay,” she answered, slightly taken aback by his joke. Then she held out her hand. I’m Natalie Teeger, and this is my boss, Adrian Monk.”
They all shook hands in turn and then Shawn watched as Monk wiped his hands on a disinfectant wipe Natalie had handed him. They all sat back down in the booth, with the boys across from the couple, and Monk taking the outermost edge. Shawn watched with interest as Monk took a handkerchief out and wiped down his silverware, even though he was pretty sure none of them were actually going to eat anything there. Then he went about setting them straight as Natalie began to tell them what answers they were looking for; mainly, if they’d seen what happened to the driver before he’d crashed and died.
“He was passed out,” Shawn answered easily and Gus stared at him, wondering how he’d known that. They were just starting to turn a right corner when the car had come from out of nowhere from the right and crashed into a building on the left of the street. Sometimes Shawn’s powers of observation even amazed Gus, who knew the truth that he wasn’t truly psychic.
As expected, Monk was skeptical. “But, wait. How could you have seen him? The crash must’ve happened in a split-second.”
“Yes,” Shawn replied smugly, “but I have an advantage. You see, I’m a psychic.”
Monk sat back and mumbled, “Oh, brother.”
Shawn put his two fingers to his temple as if seeing into the past and said, “I’m sensing that there was some kind of foul play involved - it wasn’t a heart attack as the police first suspected.”
“That’s right,” Natalie squeaked excitedly. “He’d been injected with something. You’re good at this.”
“Please… Don’t encourage him,” Monk complained.
“Gus and I solve cases for a living. We’d be glad to give you guys a hand on this case while we’re in town.”
“I don’t think so,” Monk said, even as Natalie agreed that it would be a great idea. He held up his hand and continued to protest, “It wouldn’t matter anyway, because we’re going to have to out of town for further investigation. This guy was from Santa Barbara-”
“Perfect,” Shawn replied, pulling out his cell phone. “That just happens to be where we’re from. We have great contacts in the SBPD.” He’d dialed Juliet as he finished his sentence and then held the phone to his ear. “Jules! Gus and I are in San Francisco, and we’ve witnessed a murder.”
“Geez, Shawn, can’t you guys go anywhere?”
“Well, I did know of a telephone booth once that could travel through time-”
“Shawn, the point, please?”
He got back to business. “Turns out this guy is from Santa Barbara. Wondering if you could look him up for me.”
“What’s his name?”
“His name?” he relayed to Monk and Natalie.
“Bill Knox,” Natalie replied, and Shawn passed on the info.
He heard clicking on the other end of the phone, and then Juliet said, “Well, let’s see… Bill Knox was a scientist and a professor at UCSB. Oh,” her tone changed, “he went missing a month ago.”
“Well, we found him.”
“I’ll tell the Chief and Lassiter. He’ll probably want to come up there to be a part of the investigation so that we can close the case on our end.”
“Okay. Thanks, Jules.” They made arrangements to meet the next day and he hung up.
With a smile, Natalie questioned, “Is her name ‘Julie’? That’s my daughter’s name.”
“Actually, ‘Juliet’. She’s my-”
Gus interrupted, “She’s not your girlfriend, Shawn, so don’t even go there.”
“I wasn’t!” he said defensively. “I was going to say that she’s my partner.”
“I’m your partner, Shawn.”
“Can she be my mentor?” He got a raised eyebrow from his friend for that one. “My goddess? My inspiration? The future mother of my children?”
Gus snorted. “Just don’t say that around her. You just might get yourself shot.”
“All the more reason to just…adore her.”
“Can we please get back to the case?!” Monk practically exploded.
Shawn had noticed him writhing in his seat, but hadn’t expected the outburst. “Okay, sorry. Jules and Lassie -”
“That’s Juliet’s partner, Detective Lassiter,” Gus interjected, to politely keep Monk and Natalie in the loop.
“Yes,” Shawn tossed an annoyed look his friend’s way. “Anyway, they’ll be here tomorrow with what they know. For now, I suggest we all just go and…take a chill pill.”
“I don’t take medication,” Monk declared, missing the point.
An eyebrow went up on Shawn’s face, and he replied, “Yeah, well, maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea.”
Natalie interceded, “Mr. Monk is fine. He’s…just a little upset today.”
He suddenly yelled out, “Only because you bumped me and made me drop a forkful of peas.”
“And, you don’t like a mess?” Gus guessed.
Shawn also tried, “You have a fear of things that roll?”
Monk got up from the table, pacing, and almost refusing to answer for a moment. When he finally did, it was almost as if it was because he couldn’t contain himself any longer. “I had a hundred,” Monk explained. “Once seven of them were on the floor, I no longer had an even number, did I?”
Saying goodbye to the boys until the next day, Natalie scooted off of the bench and tried again to mend things with her boss. “I’m sorry, Mr. Monk. I told you I was sorry already.”
“‘Sorry’ doesn’t cut it - I want my seven peas back.”
“I’ll make it up to you,” she offered, slipping her arm around his as they walked toward the exit. “We’ll have peas again for dinner, and I’ll make sure you get seven extra. That way, it’ll all even out.”
After they were out of earshot, Shawn mumbled, “Dude, and my dad thought I had issues.”
“That’s insane. How does she put up with that?”
“Oh, that’s easy - she’s in love with him.”
“What?”
“Come on, Gus. Even you could pick up on that,” Shawn whined. He waved his hand toward the door. “No one in their right mind would tolerate being treated the way he treats her if there wasn’t some kind of deeper connection there. And didn’t you see the way she held onto his arm?”
“Well, thank you, Oprah. I didn’t know you were so in touch with your feminine side.”
Gus pulled out a couple of dollars to pay for the sodas they’d consumed, and scooted out of the booth, followed by Shawn, who was saying, “Well, we psychics have to be sensitive to all the metaphysical sides of the human mind. Besides, it really helps out with the ladies, which, as we both know, is our ultimate goal here.”
“You know that’s right,” Gus agreed with a fist-bump, and the two left to continue their day.
They were just approaching the museum that Gus had planned for them to visit that morning, when Shawn said, “This has got to be the best vacation ever.” He stopped walking and stared across the street. “I’m bored and dying for a fresh case, and a suspicious car accident happens right in front of us. Now, I just started to get hungry, and we end up visiting a museum right across the street from an In-and-Out. That can’t be coincidence.”
The traffic clear, he started to cross the street even as Gus tried to stop him. “Shawn, what about the museum?”
“It’ll still be there after we eat. I just want a hamburger. Or maybe two,” he rubbed his stomach. “Eh, we’ll see.” He jogged the rest of the way across the road and Gus reluctantly followed.
As soon as Gus caught up, he reminded his friend what time the museum would close and that they needed to remember to get back there in time. But Shawn’s only response was to stop suddenly and gasp. “What?” Gus asked as the other man turned back to face him.
“The chick at the drive-through window is totally hot. You should ask her out.”
“She lives 300 miles away from us, Shawn. And she works in a fast-food restaurant for a living,“ he added with a sort of distaste.
But when Shawn stepped aside and made him get a look at the girl in question, Gus’s jaw dropped. “Whoa,” he muttered. “I see what you mean.”
They chose to buy their food and then stand by the walk-up windows to eat it, just so that they could appropriately flirt with Drive-Through Girl. But Gus did notice that after a few minutes, Shawn was distracted by something in the parking lot of the abandoned building next door. He didn’t say a word, even as he started to walk that direction, tossing the last little bite of his second hamburger into the trash on the way across the driveway.
Gus called after him, but he didn’t answer, so he politely said goodbye to Drive-Through Girl, and followed after him, catching up to him kneeling and hiding behind some bushes and peering through them. He knelt down too, just in case there was a reason beyond temporary insanity. “Shawn, what are you doing?”
“Gus, tell me you saw that blue car yesterday.”
“What car?” he asked, and then shared Shawn’s little space through the bushes to see what he was talking about. Two men were meeting between two parked cars where an exchange of envelopes took place - a large one for a smaller one - and then the two shook hands and got back in their cars. “I don’t remember seeing either one of them,” Gus replied as the cars started. “Why?”
As if seeing it still so fresh in his mind, Shawn closed his eyes and explained, “It was parked on the left side of the street facing us when the car crashed. About a minute later, it pulled out of its space and turned left to go the way Bill Knox’s car had come.”
“And you think this car has something to do with it?”
“Oh, oh!” Shawn exclaimed as the car pulled out of the parking lot and turned to drive past them. “Good, the license plate.” He memorized it instantaneously and then stood up when the coast was clear. “We’re going to find out.”
“And what about our vacation, Shawn? The museum?”
“Look, I don’t know what to tell you, man,” he stopped to point toward the building across the street. “But we’ve been here for twenty minutes, and in that time, I haven’t seen one person go in or come out over there. That’s not a good sign.”
“Oh, yeah? Well, maybe the museum is already full of patrons busy enjoying the artwork,” Gus rejoined.
“Or maybe they’ve all died of boredom. Either way,” he quickly added, “it’ll still be there when we’re done with this case.”
“Alright,” Gus finally agreed. “But you’re buying the souvenirs for this trip.”
Shawn rolled his eyes and moaned. “What could you possibly want from a museum? One of those ridiculous paperweights that are supposed to be art but looks like a bunch of office trash glued together? I’ll make you one when we get home, and it’ll be kickin’.”
Gus didn’t have a retort for that, so Shawn slipped on his sunglasses and began to strut back toward the car. “Come on, we have to look good for Drive-Through Girl.” Gus smirked and also put on his glasses as they cut across the driveway and waved goodbye to the employee who waved back. Shawn said, “I say that it’s time that we visit the SFPD and show them our mad skillllllzzz.”
“With a ‘z’,” Gus added as they both nodded and walked back to the parking lot where they’d left Gus’s car.
At the station, they asked to speak to the Captain, once they knew who was in charge, and, as soon as they got into the main part of the office, Shawn took a look around their surroundings for some little details he could use “psychically”, just in case. Then it was time to get the attention. He collapsed to the floor and those in the closest desks reacted the same way Gus did, in shock, rushing to his aid. “Shawn, Shawn! Are you okay?” Gus asked, playing the part.
Shawn held his head as Gus helped him up from the floor, complaining, “It’s just too much. There are so many unsolved mysteries in this room; the victims are all coming through to me at once. Ahh!” he yelled, thrashing his body around.
Gus spoke loudly, “Can you focus on just one?”
Still writhing, Shawn yelled out, “Ahh, it’s too hard! No, it’s a fort! No, wait - it’s opportunity!”
“You mean, ‘knocks’?” Gus pretended to try to help. By this time, Lt. Disher and Capt. Stottlemeyer were standing and watching the whole scene unfold. Shawn dropped his head, with his body slumped against the cop that was holding him up, as if he’d finally been freed from the burden of the message. “Quick,” Gus yelled across the room. “Is anyone working on a case with someone with the name of ‘Knox’?”
“I am,” Disher spoke up and then corrected, “I mean, we are.”
“Randy,” Stottlemeyer shook his head at the younger man in silent reprimand.
Throwing his body foot by foot, Shawn made his way across the room, knocking the occasional lamp or stack of papers off a desk amid protests. Finally his hand latched onto a manila envelope and he gripped it tight, even though the officer whose desk it had been perched on tried to take it back. “Something to do with an envelope - an exchange! Oh!” He fell over again, dropping the envelope. “It’s dirty.”
“Well, you’re lying on the floor, Shawn,” Gus reminded him.
“No!” he said, sitting and getting up to his knees. “The money, the exchange, this Knox guy… There was something underhanded going on.”
Stottlemeyer crossed his arms on his chest. “You must be the psychic that Monk was telling us about.”
“Yes,” Shawn caught his breath, standing to his feet. “I’m sorry for the disturbance, but sometimes the spirits really knock me around to give me their information.”
“I see that,” the captain mumbled unemotionally. “Is it over yet?”
“Yes, it’s clearing now.” Seemingly healed from his psychic attacks after a deep breath or two, Shawn was able to stand to his feet and shake the Captain’s hand. “I’m Shawn Spencer, lead psychic of the SBPD. This is my partner, Gus ‘Scattergories’ Guster.”
He shook Gus’s hand as well and then pointed to Randy. “This is Lieutenant Disher. I’m Captain Stottlemeyer. Now if you don’t mind telling me what the hell you’re doing here…”
“Obviously, I’ve had a psychic lead on this case that I thought deserved immediate attention. I - psychically, of course,” he said, touching his fingers to his head again, “I saw a man driving a car that was at the accident scene earlier today, in another part of town, making some kind of exchange: money for… Well, I don’t know what it was, but whatever it was, it was in an envelope just like that one.”
Disher frowned and clarified, “So, you’re saying…”
The way his voice trailed off clearly meant that he was waiting for Shawn to finish the sentence. “I’m saying that he wasn’t buying a tank. Whatever it was had to fit in that envelope.”
Stottlemeyer tried, “Okay, so…how does that help us exactly?”
Shawn sucked air in his teeth, flailing about with his eyes closed and leaning against the wall for support. “Two-four-X-Y-nine-seven. A blue cat - no, a storm. A bird!”
“A Thunderbird?” Gus offered.
But Shawn corrected, “A blue Thunderbird.”
Disher was writing all of this down in his notepad - scribbling it off when Shawn would change his description - and realized, “Oh. I’ll bet the numbers and letters are a tag number. I’ll look that up.”
Unimpressed, even as Randy sat down at his desk and started typing away at his keyboard, Stottlemeyer asked, “Anything else?”
“Well, Mr. Knox was a scientist from Santa Barbara, so it’s possible that he was a partied - partied? Apartied?” he and Gus looked at each other and shook their heads, unsure of the correct wording. “He might’ve been a part of some kind of drug ring, or lab experiment, or -”
“Or a guinea pig for an experimental drug,” Gus added.
“Or he could’ve been blackmailed or kidnapped for information. He’s been missing for a month.”
Stottlemeyer leaned against the door jamb to his office. By now, most of the other officers and detectives were back to their own work, not paying any attention to Shawn and Gus. “The thing is, boys, it could be anything, so your information, while it helps a little, doesn’t do much to move along our investigation.”
“Well, do you know yet what Knox was injected with?”
“No,” he replied. “We should have the autopsy report by tomorrow morning.”
Gus looked at his watch and complained, “Damn, and now the museum’s closed.”
Shawn sighed, knowing there was nothing they could really do until morning. “Well, maybe you could help us out with something else, then.”
“What’s that?” Stottlemeyer asked.
With his serious face on, Shawn questioned, “Is there any nightlife in this town?”
- - - - - - -
“There are two things I’ve learned about this city,” Shawn said to Juliet the minute he saw her outside of the police station where they decided to meet.
“What’s that? There are a lot of hills?” she snarked back.
“Okay, three things.” He held up a finger. “First, the streetcar is not named ‘Desire’, and secondly, riding it downhill is almost as thrilling as a rollercoaster - without the lovely perks of Gus’s vomit, of course.”
“I only vomited on one rollercoaster and that was when I was ten years old, Shawn.”
Juliet rolled her eyes and held up her hands. “Okay, can we possibly talk about the case, here?”
“Yes,” added Lassiter, “before we age beyond recognition.”
“Lassie, is that you?” Shawn teased, blinking at the other man. “I almost didn’t recognize you.”
Lassiter just made a childish face at him and turned to go inside the station. Monk and Natalie were already in Stottlemeyer’s office when the Santa Barbara foursome was escorted in.
The captain was just finishing up a phone conversation, and he set the phone on its cradle, greeting Shawn and Gus with a handshake. “Good to see you again,” Shawn said cordially, and then gestured to his police-trained partners. “These are our care bears, Lassie-Face and Jewel-Tones.”
Sighing at yet another nickname, Juliet held out her hand and introduced herself and Lassiter with their real names. “We have a little bit more information about Professor Knox.”
Stottlemeyer revealed, “If it has to do with the fact that he stole an experimental drug from the lab he worked at, we know that already.”
“Y-you do?” Lassiter stuttered. “How?”
“Thanks to Spencer’s tip on the license plate number, we managed to pick up this Raymond Lane. When the officers searched his car and found several other syringes full of drugs, the guy cracked. He told the cops everything. Apparently, he and Knox were selling the drug to the highest bidder when Knox got cold feet. They got into a fight, Knox was injected with a nearby syringe, and he fled until he crashed. Case closed.”
“So that’s it?” Shawn said, disappointed. “No more clues to follow, no more need for psychic help?”
Monk interjected, “Not that we ever needed any in the first place.”
“Mr. Monk,” Natalie quietly chided.
“Oh yes,” Shawn replied sarcastically. “And just who was the one that gave you the information on the license plate so that this Richard Blaine could be caught-”
“Raymond Lane,” everyone in the room corrected.
“Whatever,” he went on. “I still get credit for solving this case,” he said and then began to dance. Gus joined him, but after a few seconds, when they noticed that the rest of the room was staring, they both stopped and stood still once more.
The captain cleared his throat. “The credit, you may have,” Stottlemeyer proclaimed as he sat on the edge of his desk. “I’m just sorry I can’t pay you for it.”
“What?” Shawn looked appalled. “We don’t get paid?”
Gus prodded, “Shawn, I think we could just consider this a courtesy this time.”
Crossing his arms, Lassiter scoffed. “Well, I can’t believe we drove all the way up here for this.”
The captain nodded at him. “Sorry about that, but we got this information five minutes ago.”
“Yeah,” Randy finally spoke up. “The captain just got the phone call.”
Stottlemeyer went one, “We’ll make sure you guys get all the necessary paperwork you need to close your case.”
They said their goodbyes, Shawn and Monk kind of eyeing one another territorially, before the Santa Barbara investigators walked out together. Once outside the police station, before they were to part ways, Shawn realized, “Oh, Jules, while you’re here, you can come with us to this museum Gus is dying for me to see. Should be fun, right?” he feigned interest.
She saw right through what he was doing and smirked in amusement. “Sorry, Shawn, but I have a lot of work to catch up on back at the station. We really need to be heading back. We’ll see you next week,” she smiled and then followed Lassiter back to his car.
Once they were gone, Shawn turned to find an angry expression on Gus’s face. “What?”
“What do you mean, ‘what?’” Gus repeated. “You just tried to get out of going to the museum again.”
“No, I didn’t - I was trying to get more people to come and enjoy it with us.”
“That’s not what I saw, Shawn.”
“Well, clearly, you need glasses because and hearing aids because I just thought for sure that this museum would be just so much to take in that I would need a distraction, like Jules and Lassie.”
“Mm hmm,” he mumbled disbelievingly, inwardly declaring not to talk to him again until they were at the museum.
“Guster,” Shawn sang as they drove, but Gus was totally ignoring him. “Okay, don’t make me pull out the big guns and start calling you by your middle name.”
Gus turned his eyes from the road long enough to glare at his friend. Fortunately, Shawn didn’t have to use his forbidden name, since they’d arrived back at the parking lot adjacent to the museum. Gus parked and got out, still silent, rushing his way toward the front entrance ahead of his lifelong friend, when Shawn stopped him with the words, “Okay, Gus, I’m sorry.” Shawn slowly approached him and then shrugged. “I guess I just don’t see what the big deal is about art, anyway.”
“I told you that the surprise would be inside. Did you ever think it might be the kind of art you’d actually like?”
“What kind of art would I like? Drawings? I only read comics and watch cartoons…” The look on Guster’s face was enough to make him realize, “A cartoon art museum? Really? Gus, why didn’t you say so in the first place?” he scolded, and then started to run toward the door with Gus running right with him. “Oh, dude, this is going to be so cool!”
Suddenly, it was the best vacation two friends could ever take.
~End
Request a birthday ficlet here!