musicalluna

Shawn would never know how he made it back to Santa Barbara alive.

Whatever insomnia the Red Bulls had caused the night before seemed to have vanished as soon as he started driving and it was brutal, trying to stay awake as he raced home. He drank a left over Red Bull from the night before but it nearly made him sick, head pounding worse, if that were even possible. He drove recklessly—Gus would have murdered him—and arrived back in half the time it had taken him to get to Los Banos.

He had to try twice for the front doors of the station when they doubled in front of him.

Karen was standing at Lassiter’s desk, listening intently as he explained a theory when, out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of something bright orange headed in their direction. She turned to see Shawn striding grimly toward them, carrying a black duffel bag between tightly clenched hands.

He looked, quite frankly, like hell. His hair was in a state of disarray she hadn’t thought he could honestly reach, his cheeks were scruffy, and even his clothes hung awkwardly on his body, somehow more deranged looking than usual. But it was still easy to push aside the concern as her anger flared.

Beside her, Lassiter growled and stepped forward, catching one of Shawn’s wrists in his hand as he reached them and yanking hard, which turned out to be unnecessary, because Shawn’s hand came free with almost no trouble at all. Disconcerting as that was, Lassiter ignored it and the large bruise he could now see had recently blossomed along the side of Shawn’s face, snapping handcuffs onto his wrist. "You have the right to remain silent—"

"I know my rights, thanks, and I’d rather not." He tossed the duffel bag on to Lassiter’s desk with the uncuffed hand, then raised his fingers to his temple. "I’m getting a strong indication that you should open the bag." Juliet tried very hard to be angry with him, but between Shawn’s serious demeanor and his appearance, she struggled as anger and worry battled inside her.

Lassiter grabbed the hand and pulled it behind his back, handcuffing it too. "What makes you think we’re going to listen to you, Sp—"

"All right, Shawn, what’s going on?"

Gus came jogging up and Shawn turned his head to look at him, tired smile growing. "Everyone was about to suddenly forgive—"

"Shawn!" he cut him off, finally getting a good look at his face. He reached forward, grabbing his chin and wrenching his head around further so he could inspect the violently purple and red colored swelling on his face. "What happened?"

Lassiter frowned, hands still on the cuffs around Shawn’s wrists. "You don’t know?" he demanded before the psychic could answer. "Where the hell have you been?"

Gus’ expression soured, but he studiously ignored the detective, jerking Shawn’s head again so his best friend was forced to look at him. "What happened?"

Shawn forced his eyes back to Karen. "Would you just look in the bag?"

Gus abruptly let go, stepping back as his arms crossed. Shawn’s world spun for just a second as the hand he’d been leaning on was taken away. "I don’t know where the heck you’ve been, but your stupid distractions won’t work. I can’t believe you would…"

Shawn stood, watching his best friend rant himself hoarse, as the world started tipping itself to the left. He had no idea he was leaning to follow it, though Gus had trailed off, his expression turning to confusion.

"Spencer?" Lassiter asked suspiciously from behind him as the fake psychic slowly listed left. What was he up to? If he thought this would make him let go of the cuffs on his wrists he had another think coming. Karen’s eyes were nearly as hard as her Head Detective’s as she tried to figure out what the unpredictable man was doing. Gus exchanged a weirded-out look with Juliet.

The world suddenly jerked 90 degrees and Shawn realized, abruptly, that he had been standing on the wall the entire time instead of the floor. His body rushed to fix the mistake, but with a visual snap the scene had righted itself and Shawn realized he was sagging heavily, knees bent nearly to the ground, arms wrenched awkwardly up and behind him as a startled Lassiter gripped his arms. "Spencer!" he snapped, but it wasn’t as angry as it was disquieted. A second later Gus had grabbed his other arm, looking equally taken aback.

"Thanks," he mumbled dizzily, body still hanging heavily in their arms. "That was pretty weird."

A pair of nimble fingers suddenly grasped him under the armpits, small, feminine hands (and they could only belong to Juliet because he was staring directly at a concerned Karen Vick), and they curled under his arms. All three immediately pulled him back and he was dragged, feet sliding along the hardwood floor, whereupon he was dumped, unceremoniously, into a chair. A second later Gus was kneeling in front of him, pushing his eyelids back with his thumbs.

"What in the world happened to you?" he muttered as he inspected first one eye, then the other. Shawn shook his head, half-heartedly trying to dodge out of the irritating poking at his eyes but unable to push him back, arms still cuffed behind him and now pressed against the chair back. The position was uncomfortable enough as it was.

"Dude, stop," he said. "I’m fine." Gus raised an incredulous eyebrow at him but backed off, glancing almost imperceptibly at Karen, who was eyeing the psychic with irritation and concern.

"If that was supposed to be an escape attempt, Spencer," Lassiter broke in, "you’re losing your touch." He sounded irrated, but nowhere near as angry as before.

"What happened to you?" Juliet asked and it was impossible to fight off the concern. Her anger, much to her annoyance, had dissolved somewhere in the last minute.

Shawn shook his head again, the dizzy spell passing. He ignored her, instead locking gazes with Karen. "Open the bag, Chief."

Karen inspected him warily. She didn’t really want to humor the psychic—he had been causing a lot of trouble lately—but she had also never seen him so serious…or so disheveled. "Mr. Spencer, I don’t think I have to tell you, but if this is some kind of joke—"

"Open the bag, Chief," he repeated, the dark smudges under his blood-shot eyes a glaring contrast to the psychic’s usual care-free appearance. What on earth had he been doing the last few days? She sighed and reached for the bag, resisting the urge to roll her eyes. She pulled it to her, already pulling back the zipper. All of them, except for Shawn, leaned forward, peering curiously inside.

"Oh my gosh…" Juliet whispered. Gus echoed her sentiment, turning to gawk at Shawn.

"What the—how the hell did—" Lassiter began spluttering.

Karen’s head turned sharply to look at him, voice quiet but tightly controlled. "Mr. Spencer, where did you get these?"

Shawn shrugged. "Led to them psychically. I had a vision about the killer’s name and whereabouts too, if you’d like them."

"Now, Mr. Spencer," Karen said, tapping a sheet of paper on Lassiter’s desk, suddenly impatient.

Shawn leaned forward, jangling the cuffs at his back. "I’d love to, but what with the arrest and all—"

"Take them off," Karen ordered and Lassiter, looking extremely disgruntled, did as he was told.

Shawn smirked, but it was a shadow of his usual good humor and he slumped against the back of the chair, rubbing his eyes tiredly.

"Write the information down, Mr. Spencer," Karen said firmly and set a notepad and a pen in his lap. She watched keenly as he obeyed with some difficulty, rubbing his eyes and blinking heartily. It seemed to take a great deal of effort for him to do anything, his hands trembling violently as he held the pen unsteadily, trying to force his hand to write.

She took the sheet of paper from him when he was finished, still eyeing him warily over it. She glanced at it briefly, eyebrows raising as she saw the almost unintelligable scrawl. Her eyes met his as she looked up. "I don’t know what exactly happened to you, Mr. Spencer, and I’m not entirely sure I want to know, but if all of this information checks out—"

"It will."

Karen pursed her lips but nodded. As she turned away to hand the information off to Juliet, Gus scowled at Shawn and said, "I told you that drinking all that caffeine was a bad idea. Jeez, Shawn. Don’t you ever listen?"

"I had to stay awake," Shawn said petulantly. "What else was I supposed to do?" It did nothing to help his case that when he looked at Gus, it took a couple of seconds for his eyes to focus.

"Oh, I don’t know—go to sleep?"

"And not let the spirits lead me to this evidence? Right, Gus." Gus glowered at him and Lassiter smacked Shawn over the head, making him wince. "Hey! What was that for?"

"That was for being a total moron. You could have told the ‘spirits’ to hold their damn horses," Lassiter snapped. "Look at you. You’re a disaster, Spencer. Your hands are practically trying to shake their way off your body. Or did you not notice that because you haven’t slept in God knows how long? How long has it been since you slept?" he demanded angrily.

"I—" he suddenly broke off, looking confused. "I—" He bit his lip, staring at his lap, then suddenly looked up, awe spreading across his face. "I can’t actually remember," he said, sounding absolutely fascinated by the thought.

Juliet looked surprised, voice faltering on the phone as Gus rushed past her, and even Karen had to forcibly turn herself back to what she was doing. Lassiter simply looked taken aback as Gus dropped to his knees, peering at his friend again, an anxious look on his face. "You’re not kidding, are you?" he asked, voice urgent.

Shawn’s head whirled. "What? It’s not a big deal."

"Not a big deal?" Gus demanded. "Shawn—" he forced himself to stop talking, standing abruptly as Lassiter started speaking again, that peevishness back in his voice.

"What about food? Have you even eaten anything?"

Shawn grinned sheepishly, "Since when?" Lassiter glowered and then a split second later, realization dawned on his face.

"You never got your food yesterday. When exactly was the last time you ate, Spencer?" he demanded.

"That’s a good question, Lassie." It only irritated Lassiter more that he could tell he was being honest.

Karen heaved an enormous sigh as she turned away from the desk, giving up on pretending she wasn’t paying attention. "Oh, for heaven’s sake, Mr. Spencer. O’Hara," she said, the younger woman having gotten off the phone just a moment before. "Will you get the man something to eat?"

"Coffee, too?"

Shawn lifted his hand, opening his mouth to reply when Gus broke in, saying decisively, "No. Absolutely not. No caffeine." Shawn pouted, but it was more for effect than anything. He was pretty sure any more caffeine would kill him.

"All right, Mr. Spencer. I want you to tell me everything you know, starting with how you got this bag," she said, gesturing.

"I told you," Shawn said, "I was led to it. Psychically."

Karen sighed. "Can you please be more specific?"

Shawn’s head swayed. "Not really. I was kind of in a trance. I don’t really remember what happened last night."

"Oh, for the love of—you were driving around in a stupor last night?" Lassiter exclaimed.

"In a trance, Lassie. A trance."

"Induced by caffeine," Gus muttered and Shawn shot him a dirty look over his shoulder.

"I’m getting something about…Los Banos?" he continued.

"You drove to Los Banos?!" Lassiter bellowed. Karen shot him a look and he reigned in his temper, waving his hands disbelievingly at the ceiling.

"Okay… And this name?"

"It’s an alias."

"Another alias? And how does this help us, Mr. Spencer?" she asked dubiously.

"He’s using it right now." He put his fingers to his temples, then flapped them around unenthusiastically without getting to his feet. He was too tired for the usual flamboyant psychic charade. "I’m getting something about scrambled letters? And the dead officer’s names? …I don’t… Ohhhh… He takes on the name of his last victims, but he mixes up the letters to form a new name…that’s where the connection is."

"I’ll be damned…" Lassiter muttered, pulling out the two lists to look at them side by side.

"And the location?"

"I see him…in a hotel. Room…45…no, 543. Yes, that’s it. That’s where you’ll find him," Shawn said certainly. "The Los Banos Days Inn." His brow furrowed and he poked the bruise on the side of his face. "Ow!" Then his eyes flew open and he said, "I may have been in a fight with him. That would explain some things."

"You WHAT?" Gus and Lassiter roared simultaneously over Shawn, and he flinched. Karen was staring open-mouthed at him when Juliet returned, looking uncertainly at the two men breathing fire over a pointedly unconcerned psychic, busy inspecting his nails.

"I found some donuts," she said apologetically, "And Buzz had a smoothie that he said he couldn’t finish."

Shawn tilted his head back, smiling up at her. "You’re a doll, Jules," he said as he accepted the food (and there was no doubt she had just inadvertently saved him from the lecture of the century).

She rolled her eyes. "Just eat, would you? You look awful…"

"All right, we need to get this information to the Feds," Karen said, getting to her feet. "Lassiter, I want you to call them and let them know what we’ve found out. O’Hara, I want you to find as much as you can on this—" she looked at the notepad Shawn had written on, "‘—Humphrey Bell’. I want to know everything, so when we take this stuff to the Feds, they’ll accept it, understood? I’m going to…"

Gus peered over O’Hara’s shoulder as she wrote down the name and she glanced up at him. He backed off a little muttering, "Sorry. Just curious. Would you…mind if I tagged along?"

O’Hara cracked a tiny smile. "No, I think that would be okay. It’s not going to be that exciting, though."

Gus grinned, "Trust me, all of this is exciting." She smiled again. "Shawn, are you—"

The psychic was nodding off, head bobbing sporadically. "Shawn," said Gus, then sharper, "Shawn."

Shawn jerked, barely managing to save the food and the smoothie cup in his hand. "Uh," he interjected, swallowing the large bite of donut he had just taken and raising the drink, ignoring the look his best friend was giving him. "You should all know that Humphrey Bell is supposedly dead too. That might be kinda important."

The three officers stopped, turning to stare at him. "Excuse me?" Karen said, disbelief coloring her words.

"Um, yeah." Shawn wiggled his fingers near his temple. "That just came to me. He’s not dead, but yeah, he’s been legally declared dead. Something about a car crash. It was really shifty though."

Karen sighed and said, "I’ll check it out." And then she paused, looking Shawn over conscientiously, noting his violently trembling hands and the dark circles around his eyes. He was slumped in the chair, like it was an extensive effort just to sit up, and it seemed like he was having trouble staying awake long enough to even eat the food he so obviously needed. It seemed to be helping at least a little, he had perked up as he practically shoved it down his throat. Apparently the last few days had been rough on him.

Rolling her eyes, she stepped forward and put a knuckle under his chin, tilting it upwards. He blinked at her slowly, torpidly, still chewing and she said, "Mr. Spencer, I think we have everything we need from you. As soon as you finish that donut—" She nodded to the last bit clutched loosely in his hand, "—I want you to go back to the Overtime Room, and get some sleep. We’ll come and get you if we need you."

Shawn started to protest, and Karen snapped her fingers, shutting him up. "Did I make that sound like it was an option? Because it’s not. And don’t forget, I do give you your paychecks, so I can order you around."

Shawn couldn’t think of a snappy retort to that, so he stuffed the last bit of donut in his mouth and nodded. Karen gestured for him to get to his feet and he obeyed, turning and starting to shuffle down the hall. She watched him, making a face when he looked back, raising a finger. "One question, Chief. …You’ll tell the Feds I helped, right?"

She crossed her arms, trying to smother a smile and pointed sternly. He grinned and held up his hands in surrender, turning and shambling off down the hall. Karen let a small smile crack her features as she moved back towards Lassiter’s desk.

Shawn smiled to himself as he walked, running a hand (which was shaking a little less, thanks to the food) through his hair. He had done it. Everything was going back to normal. He had solved the case, and now he was finally going to get the nap he so richly deserved. He hadn’t anticipated the sympathy he had gotten because of what a wreck he’d made himself, but he had a feeling that it had helped immensely in getting him back on their good sides. He grinned to himself and glanced back to see them all bustling around, wrapping up the case, and it was all thanks to him.

Oh, yeah. He still had it.

He turned back around and there, as calmly as though he were all alone, stood Humphrey Bell, Shawn’s backpack dangling traitorously in one hand.

"Hello, Shawn," he said and threw the psychic’s driver’s license at his chest.

"Had to ruin everything, didn’t you?"