Chapter One
"Ohhh! And the crowd goes wild!" Shawn spun victoriously in his swivel chair, having just scored a perfect goal of his wadded paper into the trash can.
"No way. You must have cheated somehow." Gus glared at Shawn as he crumpled up another paper. Shawn jumped from his chair, bewildered. "Dude, how could I have cheated?"
"I dunno, but you can't have made that shot, so you must have cheated," Gus retorted moodily. Shawn sighed with exasperation; couldn't Gus lose with dignity just once? He watched him take aim with his newly-formed paper ball, one eye squeezed shut, moving his arm back and forth as though pretending to throw in slow motion. Up it went . . . and down it tumbled several inches in front of the trash can.
"Good throw, buddy." Shawn grinned good-naturedly. Gus cleared his throat. "Yes, well, of course. Even the best miss sometimes." Shawn plopped back into his swivel chair and refreshed his email. Again. And again. He checked Facebook for notifications (Gus had liked his status) and refreshed his email one more time.
Bored! He hated being bored. Shawn longed for the Santa Barbara Police Department to give them a truly challenging case. He was convinced that Lassiter was keeping all the good cases for himself. Well, at least in that case, Shawn thought, that means we'll get them as soon as Chief Vick gets sick of waiting for him to solve them. He didn't really mind Lassiter that badly – he just liked to push his buttons a bit – but God, that man could be so dense.
Refresh. Refresh. Refresh.
Shawn jumped a little as the phone rang. He and Gus had a small scuffle over answering it. Gus won. Shawn slouched back into his chair. Gus picked up the receiver and answered smugly, "Psych, Psychic Consulting Detective Agency. . . Yup. . . Right now? Well alright then. See you soon. Bye."
"Well?" Shawn leaned forward impatiently while Gus swelled with his important news.
"That was Juliet. Says we need to head over to the station- sounds like something big." Shawn leapt to his feet – finally! "What are we waiting for?" He reached out to grab the car keys on the desk but Gus snatched them away first. "Nuh-uh, Shawn. You are not driving my company car."
"Aw, c'mon, man. I'm not that bad of a driver!"
"Tell that to the headlight you busted last week."
"Oh good, you're here," Juliet greeted them cheerfully while carrying a stack of reports, "The Chief's waiting for you in her office." Shawn gave a little wave as they crossed paths. "Thanks Jules!"
"I'm tellin' you, it was an alien!" An old man was accosting Carlton Lassiter in Chief Vick's office. He had a thick head of white-gray hair and clean-shaven, turtle-like face, and he was very upset. "Oh really? An alien?" Carlton sneered, "Was he little and green?" He shook his head fervently, "No, no, he was . . . he was tall, and sort of silver, and he reached out with this long finger and- and . . ." he faltered, "and then. . ." Carlton was at a loss to respond, but at the first sight of Shawn he smiled wickedly. "Ah, here he is at last! This guy's right up your alley, Spencer." He patted his shoulder mockingly as he strode to his desk.
Chief Vick groaned and rubbed her temples. She was in no mood for Carlton's childish games today, and this man was certainly not helping.
"Hi! We're here! What's our case?" Shawn rubbed his hands together in anticipation. Chief Vick smiled wryly and gestured to the man in front of them. "Shawn Spencer, Alan Carmichael. Alan, this is our private psychic consultant, Shawn Spencer, and his partner Burton Guster." Shawn approached to shake Alan's hand, but Alan ignored him completely by turning exasperatedly to the Chief. "Look, I know how my story sounds, but I'd appreciate a little more than the bottom scrapings of the barrel."
Chief Vick's eyes flashed dangerously. "Shawn Spencer is a very accomplished detective who has solved many cases for the SBPD. You should be happy I'm assigning anyone at all." Alan muttered something frustrated under his breath and let out a heavy sigh. "Fine. Thank you."
"I have some work to do, so fill them in in the hallway, if you don't mind." Chief Vick's expression made it clear that this was not a request.
"So, Alan, tell us what's up," Shawn threw himself into Lassiter's chair and leaned his chin on his hand. Alan shifted uncomfortably. "Just know," he warned, "that I know how crazy this sounds. But I swear to God it's what I saw." Shawn shrugged and replied, "I deal with crazy stuff all the time. Lay it on me."
"I run a retail store," Alan began, "Nothing too big, had a full staff of about a hundred folks."
"Had?" Shawn raised an eyebrow.
"Yeah, well, there's the trouble." Alan scratched the back of his head worriedly. "People are going missing, one by one. Didn't notice too much at first. People get sick and forget to call in or something, I dunno. But now twelve people are missing. Twelve! I called their families and emergency contacts, nothing. All just vanished. Except the last one. Now," Alan wiped the beginnings of a nervous sweat from his brow, "you gotta understand, this is really what I saw."
"Alan, dude, relax. Just tell me what you saw," Shawn said soothingly.
". . . there just isn't any other word for it. Alien. It just had to be." Shawn leaned forward, bemused but curious. "Everyone had left at closing time except me and a kid named David. I'd asked him to organize some stuff in one of the stockrooms 'cause he'd needed some extra hours. I peeked in to see how he was doing and I saw this . . . thing. . ." Alan gulped, about to continue, but Shawn shushed him, closed his eyes and placed two fingers at his temple. "I see . . . a tall figure . . . silver. He's reaching out for a young man . . . he has . . . a long finger."
"Yes, exactly!" Alan marveled. Gus fought very hard not to roll his eyes. "And David suddenly just turned around, and I rushed to the front of the store so they wouldn't catch me looking, and he found me and said, 'I've just realized I need to leave. Sorry, I'll finish up later.' And now he's been missing for four days!"
Shawn nodded thoughtfully. "Allow me just a moment to consult with my colleague here." He jumped up pulled Gus to the side, turning their backs to Alan.
"Shawn, we cannot take this case," Gus whispered furiously.
"Gus, the guy has got no one else to help him. Twelve missing people is kind of a big deal."
"He thinks it was an alien! How do we know he's not just jerking us around?"
"No Gus, he's telling the truth," Shawn said firmly. Gus gaped. He turned to see Alan watching them, looking less hopeful by the second. "Excuse us just a second." Gus practically dragged Shawn around the corner out of Alan's earshot and asked, "You honestly think there's an alien behind this?"
"No, but I honestly think that Alan honestly thinks that there's an alien behind this."
"So he's crazy then!"
"Twelve people are missing-"
"And how do we know that his story even has anything to do with that?" Gus demanded. Shawn smacked his forehead in frustration. "Look, clearly the missing people all have this store in common, and that's a good starting place. Alan is just telling us what he thinks he saw. That doesn't mean he's telling us what actually happened." Gus looked confused, trying to work out this new information.
"So . . ." he began hesitatingly, "what you're saying is . . . what he said he saw didn't happen." Shawn nodded encouragingly. "But . . ." his eyes widened, "he still saw it!"
"Exactly!" Shawn said excitedly, "He just didn't understand what he saw. So if we can figure out what really happened based on his story, we can find those missing people. We have the clues! It was a tall man. Something about him was silver, and he was pointing with a long object. We can make something out of that!" Shawn strode confidently back to Alan and shook his hand vigorously. "Mr. Carmichael, consider your case taken!" Alan looked amazed. "What, just like that?"
"Just like that. We're going to need to look around your store, maybe question some staff. Definitely stop off to get some smoothies, because really, who can possibly work under smoothie-less conditions?" Alan began to look worried again.