Sleep, dammit!
Death took a deep breath. Anger was a powerful ally, but one that Death didn't need. He was patient, or at least, he was supposed to be. But the Other wasn't falling asleep like he'd planned; it was starting to get infuriating.
Emotions, however, were not a part of his personification. Death was a job, not a person. He only represented, as a human, what death was. The sheer terror that humans had for death… the reactions they had when facing it…. Anna Coones was only the beginning.
Death wished he wasn't still in Santa Barbara but there wasn't much he could do about it. The longer he stayed in one place the more likely it was that he'd be caught.
Of course, Death wasn't worried about being caught. But he did happen to like his new body—it got him places. He was trustworthy, with a face like his. Ha! It was almost disgusting, definitely amusing, and positively fascinating.
Yes, humans were fascinating creatures.
He wondered if the Other even knew he was there. It was doubtful. Every Other he'd hijacked never even had an inkling until he hopped to another. And he'd never been caught. How could he? He was Death, after all. You couldn't catch Death, unless, of course, you were talking about the plague.
At that exact moment, the Other fell asleep.
Silently Death exulted and slowly sat up, stretching his fingers out. Hands checked out; legs, check as well. Everything was in working order—not that he ever imagined they wouldn't be, but you never knew.
Alright, first order of business—Death traveled to the mall to pick up his tool. Humming quietly to himself, he fit in just like the rest of the humans. A man walked by and Death contemplated touching him, just one touch, and seeing if he'd just drop onto the white tiled floor, his heart stopped. Of course he would; Death could kill anyone with simply a touch. He could twist their heart and lungs with just the brush of skin to skin contact. And he could walk away while the man went into cardiac arrest right then and there, no proof except for the simple touch of a bystander.
The power was astonishing, but the fantasy only lasted briefly, and then the man was gone. Death let him go. His game was specific and careful. He'd spent years dreaming it up, writing it down, planning it out step by step by step. And when a wrench was thrown into the plan, he'd spent hours as he had in the captivity of the Other thinking of ways to fix it and get the plan back on track again.
In fact, through the hours the Other had taken over, he'd devised a simple solution to getting rid of the loathsome psychic, one that even altered the plan enough to make it pleasurable for Death. It was risky—of course it was. But Death was all about taking risks; twisting fates into weird and unnatural patterns. It was why he'd taken Anna Coones the way that he did.
Death stopped and turned on his heel, staring into the window. Through his handsome reflection he could see the tool he wanted set on a stand merely three feet away. What would happen if he simply reached through and took it? One word uttered, and he could curse anyone who got in his way with a life full of death and despair. He could do whatever he wanted to, and the only thing standing in the way was himself.
Instead he sighed. Appearances were everything. He needed to keep up appearances, if only for the Other's sake. Strolling around the side of the door, he grabbed the tool off the shelf and approached the counter.
The clerk, a pretty young thing with jet black, blue streaked hair and black lipstick, smiled at him, looking bored. "Can I help you, sir?"
Death nodded. "I'd like to buy this camera, please?"
~.~.~.~.
Oh, no.
Juliet had to keep herself from panicking more. Every breath was a struggle; this literally hurt on her. Emotionally she felt like she was about to explode. Physically it was taking everything she had not to.
Of course, she hadn't known that what they had was a serial killer. For all she knew it was a one-time thing—maybe the bad guy felt so guilty about what he'd done, he decided never ever to do it again. Maybe he'd even make their lives easier and turn himself in.
But she doubted it.
The way Anna Coones had been murdered… hung upside down, drained of blood, blue eyes open and staring, and then, of course, the slowest death possible, with the most heightened pain. Whoever did this had plenty of time to reconsider. He didn't.
And that meant there was probably more to come.
Juliet tried to control her breathing as she drove the cruiser back to SBPD. Luckily there was no one in the car with her—she'd asked for a ride alone to gather her thoughts, although that was putting it lightly. Panic was starting to build in her chest, and she couldn't stop it.
The Yin fiasco… she thought she'd never get over it. Stuck in that clock tower was the most terrifying position she'd ever been in, and she never wanted to relive that moment again. Yin was only four months ago. Less than a year. Less than a year she'd almost died… she'd almost decided never to come back to the SBPD. If Shawn hadn't convinced her…
Juliet shuddered and tried to keep the tears at bay. The terror of the night coursed through her, reliving that long drop… Lassiter, grabbing her and hugging her and…
She clenched her teeth tightly. This case was different. This killer wasn't going after her, or Shawn. He probably didn't even know she existed. She was safe.
She was safe.
If only she could believe that.
~.~.~.~.
"I don't like this, Shawn," Gus said, chewing his jerk chicken thoughtfully.
"Since when do you like any murder case?" Shawn retorted, scrunching up the plastic wrapper. "The last one you fainted at the body. I'm surprised you didn't have a seizure at this one."
"I did not faint, Shawn," Gus shot back. "I passed out. There's a difference. Scientific study shows that if a certain part of the brain is overstimulated with something that the person strongly dislikes—"
"Are we seriously having this conversation right now?" Shawn rolled his eyes.
Gus glared at him. "That's not what I meant, Shawn. I mean, the way that girl was killed…" He shuddered and screwed his eyes shut, like he was attempting to banish it from his mind.
Shawn eyed him warily. "You okay, dude? Bathroom is that way." He pointed off to the side, earning another glare from his friend.
"I'm not going to throw up, Shawn."
"Okay, well, if you want I've got a pillow in the Blueberry—"
"Or pass out! And don't call it a—wait, why do you have a pillow in my car?"
Shawn shrugged. "High speed chases are pretty tiring, you know."
"We don't have high speed chases, Shawn. And that's my company car! You can't have pillows in my company car. What if I had a client I needed to escort somewhere? They'd see a pillow and assume I sleep on the job. And besides, Shawn, you have never once fallen asleep in my car."
"Well…"
"Shawn!"
His best friend grinned. "Chill, man, I'm just messing with you. Seriously, though—what's about this case that makes it so special?"
Gus sighed. "Shawn, I don't expect you to understand because you're a generally happy person." An insulted look flittered upon Shawn's face, but Gus held up a placating hand. "Let me finish: this guy… what he did was evil. I'm not taking this lightly, Shawn. He thinks he's Death himself. He thinks he has the power to control who lives and who dies."
Shawn was quiet for a minute. "He did with Anna Coones," he said, his expression stormy.
Gus looked after his friend as he went to throw the wrapper away. Shawn only got like this when he was dealing with the Yin Yang killings. It was rare to see anyone else get him into a fire like this. Gus didn't have to be psychic or even hyper-observant to notice that the only thing Shawn found at the murder scene of Anna Coones was what Death had planted there.
When Shawn wasn't himself he terrified Gus. He'd only seen his friend purely angry a few times in their thirty years of friendship—it wasn't a pretty sight. Now, the expression on his face was both pure fury and sheer frustration. An odd combination when it came to his happy-go-lucky best friend.
Shawn came back with Maya Rodriguez. Gus did a double take as he stood from the table, eyeing the Probationary Agent up and down. He's seen her at the crime scene but had been a little distracted by the body of Anna Coones, and now that they were in a normal place and he wasn't focused on losing his breakfast, he could see she was actually very pretty. Smooth caramel skin, curves, bright brown, inquisitive eyes and cascading, sleek black ringlets of hair falling onto her shoulders made her look younger and more innocent than she had been when she was at the crime scene.
"Gus, you remember Maya, don't you?" Shawn said, and the smirk was firmly back in place. Gus glared at him.
"Yes, Shawn, I do happen to remember the FBI agent who we saw less than three hours ago at the worst crime scene I have ever seen, thank you."
"He's a little crabby," Shawn explained to Rodriguez. "When we have jerk chicken, a pineapple smoothie immediately follows and when he has to wait he spins into an Oscar frenzy."
Maya looked confused, so Gus decided to cut her some slack. "He means I get grouchy, from Sesame Street. And I don't, Shawn, I just need something that stimulates my taste buds to wash down that weird new sauce this place has."
"Whatever you say, buddy." Shawn leaned into Rodriguez and whispered something conspiringly into her ear, to which she raised a brow in Gus' direction and smirked.
Gus sighed and shook his head. "Word of advice," he offered to the agent. "Don't believe anything Shawn says about me or the Telly Tubbies."
"The red one's a girl!" Shawn answered immediately.
"You guys seem to have a thing for children's shows," Rodriguez said, looking between the two.
Shawn shrugged. "They stick when you've babysat for eight years after you grow out of them."
"You don't have any younger siblings, Shawn," Gus said, confused.
"I know, man. I was talking about you."
Gus glared at him again and slugged him in the arm, drawing a laugh from Maya. "And very entertaining," she added. "It's better than soap opera."
"I don't know," Shawn said thoughtfully, "General Hospital's starting to get good again."
"Shawn, you never watched General Hospital."
A guilty look flittered onto Shawn's face for a millisecond, but long enough for Gus to see. He groaned. "Oh, no. Tell me there wasn't a marathon on in the last three months."
"Four," Shawn defended himself. "It was four months ago, and yes, Gus, I did. Re-runs, man… Jerry went loco and kidnapped Sam and—"
Gus shook his head and turned to Maya. "So," he said in as sane of a voice he could manage, "Maya. What brings you here, of all places?"
She flashed him a grin. "Oh, I was following you guys."
"You can follow me whenever you want to," Gus said, switching into his 'sexy voice'.
Shawn looked at him, his face twisted. "Oh, man, don't even go there."
"What, Shawn? She isn't married—" At this he gave her a searching look. "You aren't married, are you?" She shook her head and he continued, grinning, "I can hit on whoever I want to."
"For the record," Shawn told Maya, "he flirted with his Garmin this morning. You know, the navigational tool to 'get to crime scenes'? Navi for short? Apparently her name is Sasha and they're on their fourth honeymoon—"
Gus' shoe promptly slammed into his shin, harder than it had at the crime scene, and Shawn gritted his teeth, reaching down to rub it. "Seriously, dude?" he complained. "You're going to shatter my fibula."
"It's tibia, Shawn."
"I've heard it both ways."
Rodriguez's head followed the conversation like a tennis match, an expression of amused befuddlement on her face. "Uh, guys," she cut in awkwardly. They looked at her with inquisitive looks. "Don't you want to know why I was following you?"
Shawn immediately put a hand to his head and guessed, "Wait a second, I'm getting something… it's about my ability!"
Maya gave him a silly grin. "So, what's this about pineapple smoothies?"
~.~.~.~.
Absolute, sheer fury.
Ben was furious. He couldn't stop shaking. How dare he? How dare he? Stupid! Stupid, stupid psychic!
He stalked across the street to his car. The sun shone brightly like some stereotypical chick flick, rays of warmth beaming down on his cheeks and arms. He wanted to punch it. Everything was just so wrong here! It wasn't fair! Why couldn't everything just happen the way he wanted to, just for once?
A camera was gripped tightly in his hand. On it were pictures, pictures of the psychic, Shawn Spencer, the asshole who ruined his life. All of his plans, gone in an instant—who the hell was this guy? He didn't know where the camera had come from. It just appeared in his car this morning like… like somebody had planted it there.
Ben snorted. Was it this Death guy? The serial killer was all over the news this morning. Killing a teenager—Ben could've done so much better. And what the hell was a Horseman as a calling card? Pathetic, the whole goddamn lot of them.
He didn't know what to do with the pictures. What kind of message was this, anyways? "I'm onto you," or some kind of stupid crap like that. What was he supposed to do with pictures of a psychic he hated?
Well… An inner voice prompted Ben to do something drastic, something not even Death would've seen coming. If this is meant to be some sort of warning… he'd warn him right back. And he knew exactly how to do it, too.
Shawn Spencer is mine. Nobody could do it like Ben.
~.~.~.~.
"This is amazingly good," Maya said, her brown eyes large as she sipped the smoothie through the straw. "We don't have pineapples in Virginia, let alone pineapple smoothies."
Santa Barbara Central Park was the only major park in the city. It had park benches, a swing set, a large field, a "Big Toy", as Shawn called it, and picnic benches. The three were currently at the benches as the sun glared through the breaks in the trees, dancing across the field in the slight breeze.
"It's a tradition here in Santa Barbara," Shawn answered, sounding almost modest. "You've never experienced California until you've tried a pineapple smoothie."
"That's not true," Gus informed her, rolling his eyes at Shawn.
"We have a file on you," she said, nodding in respect to the both of them. "It's got pretty much everything you've ever done in it."
"Well, that's a little creepy," Shawn commented, looking at Gus. "Does it have, like, all the bathroom breaks I've ever done in my lifetime? All the times Gus has watched National Treasure?"
"I've only seen it three times, Shawn."
"And you saw the sequel eight times."
"What's in this file?" Gus asked, ignoring Shawn because he didn't want to admit that he really had seen the sequel eight times.
Maya shrugged. "Every case you've ever done, your childhood history, stuff like that. It's impressive, actually, but that's not why I'm here."
"Why are you here, then?" Gus wanted to know.
She leaned forward across the table they sat at. "How does it work?" she asked intensively. "I mean, my mother was psychic. She had visions of the future—there was this one time when I was crossing a street and a drunk driver almost hit me, but she saved me right before it did. So… is your gift like my mom's? Or is it, like, different?"
Shawn cleared his throat uncomfortably. "Well, you see Maya, it's like the spirits take over my body. I have no control of what they do or how they do it. It's why Lassie-face lists my method as "unconventional"." Gus proved the air-quotes to go with the words, smirking.
"That's fascinating," Maya said, her eyes bright. Shawn nearly gagged; she was really into this stuff. "So, the vision you had at the crime scene, is that how it works, live?"
He shrugged. "There are different ways. Like I said, the spirits are about as spontaneous as Gus' toy train when he was eight."
"That train was not spontaneous, Shawn. You were the one steering it."
"Yes, and it spontaneously flipped out on me!" Shawn complained. "I nearly lost a finger. How would you have felt then, huh? Having a finger-less best friend!"
Gus rolled his eyes. "You'll have to excuse him," he said to Maya. "He's a child sometimes."
"All the time," Shawn corrected. He turned back to Maya, who had sipped up the rest of her smoothie. "So, Maya Rodriguez, tell us about yourself."
Her cheeks turned a rosy red. "Well," she said shyly, "I'm from this tiny little town in Virginia, so California's a change for me. I'm a Probationary Agent and partners with Jake—I mean, Agent Turnbow. Actually, I just joined the FBI a few months ago."
"What is it you consult on?" Shawn asked curiously.
"We profile serial killer behavior," she said, shrugging. "I have a Doctor's degree in psychology."
"That's impressive," Gus said, brows raised.
"Not really," Maya said, blushing even deeper. 'I mean, it's nothing."
"That's definitely not nothing," Shawn agreed. "So, what about your partner? Jake… Jake Turnbow." His fingers flew to his temple. "Oh… I'm getting… was he military?"
Maya looked at him, amazed. "Yeah, he was," she said. "He was in Afghanistan right before he transferred here. I mean, he was FBI for a long time before he went off to join the Army. No one knows why, but nobody's stopped to ask him about it since."
"So why'd he come back?" Shawn wanted to know. "Was he injured?"
Her expression turned sad. "He was shot in the arm," she said quietly. "It nearly shattered the bone." A thoughtful look flittered onto her face for a second. "How'd you know?"
Gus thought he knew. Shawn waved his hand towards his head in a his trademark "Psychic, duh," gesture, but Gus had seen the way Turnbow carried himself. Like a soldier, with the strictest of rules laid down in his life, and the way he was favoring his right arm at the crime scene as he bent down to look at Anna Coones.
Speaking of which… "So what's your take on the case?" Gus asked Maya.
Maya shrugged. "Like I said, I'm just a Probie, but if I had to take a guess, I'm thinking this guy isn''t even close to being done. He's pretty damn sure he can control who lives and who dies, which is a dangerous combination in a serial killer. He's confident, but not arrogant, and he wants to prove a point. He's not finished, and that's bad news for us unless we can tell how he picks his victims."
Gus stared at her. "You can tell all that from a crime scene?"
She did that adorable blushing thing again. "Sorry," she said.
"What in the world are you sorry for?" Gus was delighted. "That was amazing! That was better than what Shawn does!"
"I resent that," Shawn said, sulking.
Maya shook her head emphatically. "No, it was nothing."
Gus smiled at her. "It was better than nothing."
~.~.~.~.
He couldn't move.
Gripping fear and frustration flowed through him as he peered up through his eyes, wide open and staring, and he couldn't move. His arms lay at his sides; they were strapped down at the wrists and elbows, and the same with his legs, knees and ankles, but the restraints were unnecessary. He could feel the drug pumping through him like a snake writhing its way through his veins. It made him feel sick to his stomach; like everything was spirally out of control and he was stuck in one postion, his limbs too heavy to lift or move.
He couldn't even move.
Pain was everywhere, as was the panic. Cold and hot alternated through him, making him shiver uncontrollably and sweat at random intervals. He tried to twitch one of his fingers, but to no avail. He tried to move his head, even turn it to the side to press his burning cheek against the cool, metal table he was lying on, but it felt as heavy as a boulder, like it was the world and his muscles were Atlas.
A man loomed over him. He had dark skin, caramel, littered with scars and dirt and zits. His eyes were bloodshot; his teeth were rotten through and dark yellow, with black spots that he realized, with horror, weren't dots at all—they were holes. A beard, dark brown, black even, and thick as a bush, engulfed his mouth, giving him a ruggish appearance. He was dressed in desert clothing; this was of no surprise.
The man who stood above him held a needle. It was full, unlike the last one, which had only been half-way filled with clear liquid. He felt another wave of panic sweep though him as the man lowered the needle with a hole-y grin, towards his arm, which he couldn't move.
He couldn't move. He couldn't talk, blink, breathe… the needle struck his arm with a painful pinch, and then the agony came.
~.~.~.~.
"And this is the Psych office," Gus said, sweeping his arm through the door to allow Maya's full peripheral vision to take in his pride and joy. She looked on in barely suppressed awe, while Shawn sulked in from behind her.
"Wow, this place is amazing," she gushed, staring at the bright green words on the window. They were backward, but this didn't seem to faze her a bit.
"Gus," Shawn said slowly.
"Not now, Shawn," Gus said out of the corner of his mouth. "Over here is our mini-kitchen…"
"You have a mini-kitchen?"
"Gus," Shawn said again. He was staring at one of the paintings on the wall.
Gus ignored him. "This is our desk, and… well, we used to have a secretary… never mind."
"What do you need a secretary for?" Maya wanted to know.
"Well—"
"Gus!" Shawn said, frustrated.
Gus turned to him, annoyed, mouth open and ready to retort, but something in Shawn's expression made him stop. He looked serious, and that scared Gus. Shawn was never serious.
"Something's wrong," he said, and he stared at the picture again. "That painting's upside down. So are all the other ones."
Gus followed his eyesight. Maya looked on, nervous, as slowly they both realized that Shawn was right—every picture and painting hung on the wall were all upside down."
"Okay, weird," Shawn muttered. He followed the paintings to the lounging room. "Really…"
He trailed off. Gus watched him through the window, worried, when he didn't say another thing. "Shawn?" he called, and now his voice sounded nervous.
"Gus, call the police." Shawn's voice was grim. "I am officially creeped out."
"Why?" Gus went through the door to see what was wrong. "What's the matter?"
Shawn pointed silently to the wall. Gus followed his finger, and his jaw dropped open.
On the wall were pictures. Pictures of Shawn.
