A/N: We're back! I'm so excited to be posting again; it's been a long month.

And we're starting off with a disclaimer I never thought I'd use: There've been several actors/musicians/others who have cameoed on Psych over the years, playing fictional versions of themselves. If a celebrity ever shows up 'on screen', know that it's based on their fictional-self, not real-self.

Thank you EvenAtMyDarkest for giving me the inspiration for this chapter.

A thick haze covered the pier. The sounds of leather hitting flesh sounded out in the distance, soft sobs echoed nearby, and voices called out soundlessly with bid numbers and specifications. Shawn followed the pull on his leash, leaving bloody footprints behind on the endless wood planks.

Voices whispered in his ear, the words dripping through his memories like wet tar.

"Masters sit; slaves kneel."

"People are better than slaves. You can't win."

Bars dug into his side as darkness swallowed him.

"A slave shouldn't be seen nor heard."

"What should we punish you for this time?"

Water burned down his throat as a hand held him still.

"A slave doesn't fidget. It does as it's told."

"Disappointing. I'd thought you'd learned your lesson by now."

Metal slotted into his mouth as laughter surrounded him.

"A slave belongs to its master. Completely."

He gasped through his nose, water dripping down his face as the closet door opened. It revealed a tall wooden beam with empty shackles that waved in the sea breeze. A whip cracked loudly through the surrounding haze, smelling like blood. The leash pulled, and he dug his heels into the wooden pier, fighting the pull of his collar. He wasn't supposed to be here; it wasn't right. Where was his master?

"I want you to be you, no matter who that is."

He fought harder. His master had promised not to sell him.

"How long have we been friends?"

His feet found purchase on a broken plank. His friend wouldn't have sold him.

The leash snapped, making Shawn stumble for balance. Echoing yells and dog barks rushed behind him and he sprinted forward, not wasting the opportunity given to him. He could barely make out a figure ahead, someone standing at the end of the pier with a fishing pole. The man was safe. Shawn just had to get to him.

Teeth nipped at his ankles, a strap came down on his back, and the air grew thick around him, slowing him to a crawl. He fought the restraints, forcing one foot in front of the other. He had to get to the fishing man.

Hands grabbed his collar, voices yelled at him to be good, and he threw himself forward, choking against the metal. He just needed one more inch… He fell through the fog, the sensations fading away to be replaced with the smell of the sea and the soft ratchet of a fishing reel.

Shawn caught his breath, panting through his ungagged mouth as he looked up at the source of safety. A weathered face looked down at him, the man's eyebrows raised expectantly like he was waiting for the answer to a question. He was older, but still unmistakable.

"Dad?"

His dad smirked and answered, "Hey, kiddo."

He even sounded the same. Except… he was wearing a bright Hawaiian t-shirt for some reason. Shawn pushed himself to standing as he realized, "I'm dreaming."

"Yep." His dream-dad rubbed a hand over his shining head. "You know, it's only been six years. Do you really think I would have gone bald that quick?"

"Let's be honest, we both knew you were fighting a losing battle on that one," Shawn answered immediately. He should probably be feeling something, but all of his emotions seemed to be locked behind the cloud separating them from the rest of the pier. "So, what, you're my subconscious or something?"

His dad reeled in his line, sighing in disappointment at the empty hook. "I'm apparently who you thought you needed to see. What, would you prefer I was Tony Cox?"

Could he do that?

The thought barely finished crossing his mind before an angry voice complained behind him. "Man, what am I doin' in this dump?"

Shawn spun around to see Tony Cox standing on the pier in all of his glory. The actor glared back, clearly not amused with his comically large fishing hat and giant rain boots. "Seriously, why am I here? It ain't my turn and you got issues that I ain't touchin'. Call me in ten years when you got your shit figured out."

He turned and stalked away through a convenient door in the water, leaving just as abruptly as he'd appeared. Shawn stared at the spot before glancing back; he wasn't the only one who'd seen that, right? His dad shrugged, now sitting comfortably in a chair as he cast his line out again. "You heard the man; you've got issues."

Shawn eyed up the new chair, noting that it was the same one from the fishing trips he'd been dragged to when he was a kid. It was the only chair there. Before he could say anything, his dad spoke up again. "It's your dream, remember? Why do you think you don't have a chair?"

Shawn clenched his jaw and planted his feet on the ground. Hell no. He was not kneeling next to his dad.

His dad sighed and placed his rod in a holder. "See, there's your first problem. You didn't even consider the possibility that you could make a chair. You control this whole area, you even distracted yourself with a small actor cameo, but a simple people-thing is too far to imagine."

And, shit, he was right. Shawn made a face as he forced his eyes up from the wooden planks under his feet. Though, if he made a chair now, it would be his dad's idea. Shouldn't it be his idea?

"I'm your subconscious, remember? It's just you here."

Shawn still pondered whether to do what his dad wanted for another few seconds before looking over to see another chair. It was Gus' chair. Maybe standing wasn't the worst idea… But his dad was staring at him, and he couldn't show weakness.

Shawn tentatively sat on the edge of the seat, the spring creaking in a comfortingly familiar way.

"Not bad," his dad said with a nod. "So, why am I here?"

"Isn't that your job to tell me?" What was the point of a dream walk if he had to be the one to come up with all of the answers?

"I'm just here because your subconscious made me." His dad leaned down and grabbed a beer bottle out of nowhere. "The question you have to ask is why."

Shawn stared at the bottle as his dad took a drink. His dad didn't drink. Why on earth would his mind make that up?

"I'm dead. I'm about as off-duty as I can get." His dad held another bottle out, but Shawn didn't take it. Him and alcohol didn't like each other. His dad rolled his eyes. "Relax; beer doesn't taste like wine."

Shawn studied the bottle for another second before taking it. Since he was dreaming… He concentrated before taking a sip, smiling in satisfaction as the memory of a fruit smoothy slid down his throat.

His dad snorted in amusement. "Smart-ass."

Shawn's smirk fell as he looked into the distance, taking in the orange sunset that was breaking up in the ocean waves. He was distracting himself again. He knew why his dad was here. "This is the part where you tell me I screwed up, right?"

"Why would I do that?"

"You know…" Shawn waved at the collar on his neck.

His dad raised an eyebrow at the gesture. "It's your dream. You're the one deciding to wear that."

"I am not," Shawn snapped back in indignation. The collar stayed in place.

No wonder his dad was disappointed in him.

His dad set his bottle down. "Remember when you sprained your wrist and I had to take you to the hospital?"

The collar weighed heavily on Shawn's neck; how had he managed to ignore it just a few minutes ago? "Of course I remember."

"What did I lecture you on?"

Shawn sighed and closed his eyes. At least the dream was authentic. It wouldn't be his dad without a memory test. His wrist lanced with pain as he cradled it to his chest and a calm voice spoke above him. "You said that pain was a tool, and I couldn't let it control me."

He kept his eyes closed to avoid seeing his dad's face. He'd let pain control him plenty of times since then.

"And what did I not lecture you on?"

Shawn's eyes popped open in surprise. What sort of question was that? "Nothing. You always lectured me on everything."

"Come on, kid, you can do better than that." The expected disappointment on his dad's face was easy to read. "Any other time you got hurt from doing something dumb, I taught you how to not do it again. Why not that time?"

Shawn had been lectured on that, hadn't he? Grass crinkled under his bare feet, tires squealed nearby, a car barreled right towards him. Each second stretched as he noticed every detail. Light gleamed off of the roof, a shocked face stared through the windshield, the back half of the car swerved wildly. He threw himself sideways as something breezed by his heels, and his hand caught the ground as pain erupted in his wrist.

A door slammed open, an angry voice yelled curses, tires squealed away, the voice turned gentle, his dad crouched next to him.

Shawn blinked, studying the cuff that rested on his fully-healed wrist. "I wasn't doing anything stupid."

"It wasn't your fault," his dad rephrased. "There wasn't anything you could have done differently. Do you know why I taught you all of those lessons?"

"Because you're a detailed-obsessed maniac who wanted me to be a detective by eighteen." A shiny badge rested in Shawn's hand, and he ran his thumb over the mocking engraving of his name. His full name.

"You've got the answer, kid. You just have to look closer." His dad shook his head and laid out the facts. "We spent hours counting hats and reciting license plate numbers, honing your skills. We never saw a doctor when you dealt with your headaches. I told you about the Black Market whenever I learned something new about it. I taught you how to survive…"

The badge fell in the ocean as Shawn stared at his dad. So many lessons and tests... "You knew. That this would happen."

Steps dug into Shawn's back as he hugged his knees to his chest. Voices argued in the other room.

"You can't know nothing will happen, Maddie. I put my life on the line anytime I put on my badge. You risk your life whenever you talk to a nutso-"

"Henry!"

"We could both die in a car crash tomorrow. We have to think about these things! It's not like we have family around…"

The ocean surf whispered in the silence, bringing a breeze that ran through Shawn's hair. He quietly corrected himself. "You didn't know."

"I knew it was a possibility," his dad said, his eyes boring into Shawn. "But even knowing that, I couldn't stop it. So, why don't you blame me?"

It wasn't like he hadn't tried. "It wasn't your fault; you were just doing your job."

"Then who's fault was it?"

"Mine." Shawn's stomach twisted as he said the truth out loud for the first time.

"Did you set the fire?"

Shawn recoiled from the question. "Wha- No!"

"Did you make the ceiling collapse before I could get out?" A blackened skull showed through his dad's unblemished skin.

"No," Shawn answered, more subdued.

"Did you tell your mother to stay away? To let the foster agency take you?"

Shawn glared; he wasn't answering that. His collar stayed silent.

His dad looked at him knowingly. "It wasn't your fault."

"You don't know everything…" Shawn took another drink of the beer, the imagined bitter taste not quite as sharp as he wanted.

His dad gave him a dark smirk. "Of course I know everything. You were mouthy, you fought, and you lashed out at that family." Shawn winced and braced himself for the lecture. "And if you really think you could have done anything different right after losing everything, then maybe that thing's fried more of your brain cells than I thought."

Shawn's jaw dropped and he automatically argued, "I didn't even try."

"They expected you to be perfect when your whole life was replaced overnight. You really think that's on you?" His dad shook his head and took a long swig of his beer. "It was a rigged system, and you know it."

This whole dream walk thing was supposed to be helpful, not blatantly fake. "You're just telling me what I want to hear."

"The collar says otherwise," his dad pointed out mildly. "Besides, even if I was, so what? Maybe it's self-meditation, or healing, or some other mubo-jumbo bullshit."

Shawn couldn't help but huff a laugh; it sounded so much like his dad.

His dad checked his fishing line, eyeing up the bobber. "Here's how I see it. One, you remembered your lessons. The real ones that I taught you. Two, you survived. Way more than most would've. Three, you're still you. No matter what other gunk is in your head, you're still there too. Why wouldn't I be proud of that?"

Shawn's gut clenched; that didn't sound like his dad. He never said he was 'proud'.

"Yeah, well, maybe I should have." His dad walked over to him, gently pulling Shawn's head forward to give it a kiss. "You've done good. And I'm proud of you."

Shawn's jaw dropped and he just stared. So much for the dream being predictable… Before he could make his words work, a large ripple sped through the ocean, bringing with it a loud beeping noise. The sound of the alarm clock.

Shawn took a step back as the cloud moved, encroaching on his safe area. "I don't want to go."

"I don't think you have a choice." His dad patted his shoulder in consolation. "Go get 'em, tiger."

His dad was right; he never had a choice. Shawn sighed in resignation and stepped towards the next set of beeping ripples. "Hey, Dad?"

"Yeah, son." His dad started to reel in his line.

"You should know something. My ocean doesn't have fish."

His dad nodded sadly as the empty hook came into view. "I know."

"Good luck with that. And thanks."

"I'll be here if you need me."

Shawn walked off into the sunset and woke up to a sunrise.