Just a random (unpolished, unbeta-ed, un-anything'd) snippet, which may or may not eventually make it into the F/K/V, which is currently moving at a glacial pace.
"Look, all I'm sayin' is that when Welsh finds out, he's gonna go--" Ray broke off as they entered the station, mainly because no way could Kowalski hear him over the racket.
It didn't matter; he'd lost his train of thought, staring around the bullpen at dozens of loud, angry--
"Munchkins!" Kowalski said, grinning. The noise, previously directed at several harassed-looking uniforms scattered here and there, abruptly coalesced and homed in on a new target.
Fraser looked over their heads--not hard at all, Ray had to admit--as they closed in. "Ray, I believe they prefer the term--"
"We represent the Society for the Vertically Challenged!" A well-dressed...well, what was the politically correct term? Ray didn't know. A well-dressed extremely small person with a beard was shouting up at Kowalski. "We protest the use of such terms as munchkin, midget, dwarf, short stuff--"
"Uh huh." Kowalski was unimpressed. He detoured around the man and sprawled into his chair. "What about loudmouth, can I call you that?"
"I thought the condition was referred to as dwarfism?" Fraser asked politely.
The man glared at him. "If I hear another chorus of 'Hi Ho'..."
"I s'pose you're not allowed to beat people up," Kowalski mused. "Seeing as how you could only hit below the belt."
"Shut UP," Ray hissed at him.
Kowalski shrugged. "Guy wants to get himself arrested protesting, I'm gonna treat him like any other perp. You want I should make nice with him just 'cause he's short?"
"Vertically challenged," the man insisted, a bit quieter this time. "And that's what we're protesting. We demand the same rights as everyone else!"
That was evidently a signal; the whole group burst into chants of "Height doesn't make right!"
"What particular rights do you feel have been violated at the moment?"
Ray rolled his eyes. "Fraser, we are not on duty, you do not have to--"
The man stood straighter. "The amusement park is discriminating against us," he declared. "Their restrictions are particularly egregious in singling out certain groups for non-participation."
Ray couldn't stop it, felt himself being inexorably drawn in. "You talkin' about 'You must be as tall as this line to ride?' Yeah, 'cause it's dangerous."
"We're not children," the man insisted. "We are informed and consenting adults. We have the right to make our own decisions!"
He turned back to Fraser, evidently feeling that here was a possible ally. "You should talk to our spokesperson. She can give you our list of grievances in detail..."
He dragged Fraser off, and Ray looked at Kowalski helplessly.
"Munchkins," Kowalski said, shaking his head.
Ray didn't bother correcting him. He figured Kowalski was only trying to wind him up, anyway. "Some yellow brick road this is."
Kowalski nodded in the direction Fraser'd gone. "There's your Tin Man, right there."
Ray thought about that. "Benny? Sure, I guess so. He's very..." He stalled out. "Perfect" wasn't the word, definitely, but--
"Shiny," Kowalski said quietly.
Ray sat back, regarding him. "Yeah. Shiny."
Kowalski was quiet for too long, and Ray deliberately looked him up and down, smirking.
"What?" Kowalski was instantly suspicious.
"Just thinking...brains of straw, you know? The hair, the clothes..." Ray shrugged.
"Hah." Kowalski two-finger-pointed at him. "Guess where that leaves you, Mister Cowardly Lion."
But he was grinning now, and Ray grinned back at him. "I can live with that if you can, Scarecrow."
And Fraser was back suddenly, having apparently--Ray looked around--unloaded the small man onto Huey, who was glaring daggers at Fraser's back. "You know, the point I found most interesting about that story was the fact that the characters didn't actually lack the traits that they feared they did." He looked earnestly at both of them. "The scarecrow wasn't brainless at all, he was in reality very smart. And the lion was very brave indeed. He fought for his friends whenever they needed help."
Ray hoped like hell that Fraser hadn't heard the Tin Man remarks. But that was true, too, wasn't it? Fraser thought his heart had been cut out of him, but Ray knew differently. He cleared his throat. "Yeah, well. They were buddies. They helped each other out, right?"
Fraser was smiling at him. "Yes, Ray. They had similar goals and desires. They were all friends of Dorothy, and that was what kept them together."
Kowalski went into a coughing fit. Ray leaned over and pounded him on the back a bit less than solicitously, using the motion as a cover to murmur, "SHUTUPSHUTUPSHUTUP!" very quietly.
Fraser was looking at them both entirely too innocently. "Is everything all right?"
"Oh, yeah, fine," Ray said quickly, before Kowalski could open his mouth. "Just wondering where Toto is."
Fraser glanced around. "Oh, dear. I suspect he's in the breakroom. I'll go and get him."
He headed off purposefully, and Kowalski burst out, "Dorothy, Vecchio, what the hell--"
Ray didn't want to think about it, not right here in the middle of the station. "Forget Dorothy. What I want to know is, who's the Great and--"
"VECCHIO!" Welsh's bass rumble carried out the closed door of his office and all the way to the back of the bullpen where they sat. "Any detective now or at any previous point in time known as Vecchio, my office, immediately!"
They looked at each other. "He found out," Ray said unnecessarily.
"Pay lots of attention to the man behind the venetian blinds," Kowalski muttered, and scrambled.