Eidetic

By Maelynn Meep

It was a crime scene.

Gus didn't have to remind himself of that simple fact. Every time he was even in the vicinity of one, his stomach had its own 'psychic' episode. It was like his own personal spider-sense… except it pointed toward a yellow crime scene tape and dead bodies.

Shawn had that same sense. Only he had the special 'lets-race-towards it' edition.

"Lassie!" Shawn exclaimed, gracefully pulling the yellow tape up with one hand, firm grasp on a pineapple smoothie in the other, over his head to reach where Lassiter and Juliet were standing.

Gus could already see the shape that the two detectives were standing around. He paused, hanging back and taking in the surroundings, something he was sure that Shawn had done in under five seconds. They were in a very plain and standard suburban neighborhood, in back of a light blue house at the end of the cul-de-sac. Despite the disturbingly peaceful front of the house, they found themselves that day in the backyard, where the body lay.

Attempting to kick his mental strength into gear, Gus moved closer to the body.

"Wow, that's one giant pair of scissors!"

Shawn's very Shawnish outburst made Gus falter but, determined not to get teased by Shawn - or Lassiter for that matter - he forced himself forward.

In all honesty he'd seen worse. Sad, he thought, but true. The man looked to be in his mid-forties, though he seemed fit for the age, and he would have looked like he was sleeping…. Save for the sight of the hedge clippers sticking out of his chest.

Bringing Gus back to full-awareness was Lassiter's usual groan of annoyance. "Spencer, what in the name of sweet justice are doing here?"

Shawn seemed to consider this, tilting his head with a humored expression. "You've been asking me that for a while Lassie and every time the same two question pops to my mind. 'How do you know what justice tastes like?' and 'Is it really sweet?'"

The head detective rolled his eyes.

Juliet was business as usual. Reading off her notepad, she explained, "Name's Bob Tuckerman. Was found this morning when a neighbor's dog managed to get into the yard."

"So they went looking and found a dead guy?" Gus asked. Jules nodded.

"That's a bummer wake-up call." Shawn said, ignoring Lassiter's near-laser eyes focusing on his back and kneeling down to get a better look at the body. He could already see a trail of clues forming, the angle of the penetration (obviously a fairly tall guy), the wear-and-tear of the handle and lack of rust (pro lawn care provider or a lawn enthusiast), the red tiny dot marks on his arms (some one was on drugs and it wasn't him), etc. He stood back up and sipped his smoothie before he asked, "So do we know who owns the hacksaw?"

Gus froze. 'Oh no…'

"It's a pair of hedge clippers, Spencer." Said Lassiter irritably, rolling his eyes at the consultant.

"Right. Hedge clippers." Said Shawn slowly and seriously, just a bit too much of each to be normal. Lassiter went back to ignoring him, kneeling closer to the ground to get a better look, but Gus noticed Shawn's eyes widen slightly.

"O'Hara, when's are the CSI guys getting here?" Lassiter said briskly to his partner.

"They're on their way now."

Shawn blinked a few times, shaking his head and seemingly back to his previous mood. "So is that a 'no' on who owns the hacksaw?"

The head detective's head turned swiftly back towards him, eyes flashing in annoyance. "First of all, yes, it's a no. Second of all, it's a pair of hedge clippers. Third of all, I don't like the way you're disrespecting my crime scene by continuing your clowning around."

Shawn's eyes went back to their previous wide state, tone quiet. "Right. Hedge clippers."

Gus took one look at Shawn before immediately stepping in. "Lassiter, he's not 'clowning around' he just doesn't know what those things are called."

Lassiter stepped towards him, gaze suspicious. "Hedge clippers?"

"Yeah."

The detective turned back towards Shawn. "Spencer!" He called. Shawn seemed to jump, like he was coming out of some daze. Instantly he was back to normal.

"Yeah, Lassie?"

Lassiter pointed at the hedge clippers. "What are those?"

"It's a hacksaw, Lassie." Shawn said, with usual aloofness, almost laughing. "Didn't we discuss this?"

"It's a pair of hedge clippers, Spencer." Lassiter said, emphasizing the weapon's name. He turned back to Gus, brow raised, expression curious and skeptical. He waited a few moments for Gus to say something. When Gus didn't provide, his look faded to exasperation. "Alright, what's wrong with him Guster?"

But Gus wasn't paying attention to Lassiter. Shawn's wide-eyed look had now expanded to rival that of Bambi's. He looked frozen, thinking obscenely hard. He blinked a few times, and Gus hoped that he would bounce back to normal. Instead, Shawn winced, bringing his hands to his forehead, slowly, like he was about to have the migraine of a lifetime. He let out a breath heavily, before slowly starting towards Gus.

"Excuse me, Lassiter." Gus said, leaving Lassiter alone to think what he will and walking to Shawn, grabbing him by the elbow gently and heading towards the car.

Lassiter watched this exchange with interest, suspicion and…. No. No, not concern. That was not a word used in the same sentence with Shawn Spencer or Carlton Lassiter. He observed as Guster kindly herded Spencer towards the parking lot. Shawn seemed to be having some sort of difficulty, looking paler than usual, barely, but still somewhat noticeable. As they passed, Shawn mumbled, "See ya later, Lassie." But Lassiter could tell that was just Spencer's version of covering this odd incident with a little slice from the normality pie.

He turned to watch them get into the car. 'What is going on?'

"Are you alright?" Gus asked for the fifth time as they were riding back to the Psych office.

His passenger rubbed his hands over his face, and made a small groan. "Yeah, nothing I'm not used to. Just a head ache."

After all these years dealing with Shawn, Gus wasn't fooled. "Honestly?" He prompted.

Shawn knew that he couldn't get away from the issue. "My brain's having its own little civil war with me in the middle." He leaned back into the chair. "Feels like my head's gonna explode" He complained. "It's trying to recall all these useless facts."

"Focus."

"On what Gus?" Shawn almost shouted. "I would love to focus! But I need something to focus on!"

Gus sighed, gearing into a tough question. "Do you need me to call your dad?"

Shawn shook his head before leaning it against the window. "No… I can…" He fumbled with words mid-sentence, rubbing his eyes. But Gus got the picture. No Henry.

It was times like this were Gus wished that he could just call Henry. Henry had trained Shawn to focus and was almost always the one that could manage to get Shawn out of these types of afflictions. When it happened, Henry would always use it as a training tool to get Shawn to learn how to deal with the chaos and focus on the one singular thing that was needed. Unfortunately at this point, Shawn would kill Gus by hitting him with his own mini-bat if he called.

That just left clueless Guster to the rescue. "How about the identity of the killer?" He tried.

The fake-psychic seemed to accept this and closed his eyes, hand reaching to his head instinctively. "Tall, probably a professional lawn caretaker, left-handed-"

Gus knew to draw on details. "Why left handed?" He asked, tone intentionally neutral despite his worrying. This hadn't happened in years.

"The way the hacksaw was shoved in," He explained, Gus not bothering to fix the mistake. "was at an angle that indicated him being left handed."

"Anything else?"

Shawn paused for a moment, studying the scene over in his head. "Besides the fact that the dead guy was high…" He trailed off, thinking. "No not really." He let out a breath, like he had earlier and opened his eyes. "Thanks buddy."

"No problem."

They rode in silence for a few miles, before Shawn spoke up again. "I've made a decision." He announced.

"What?"

"Well, first of all, I would like to make sure that we don't look completely like idiots of that nature ever again."

"That would be nice."

"We would probably get more trust."

"Also nice."

"And possibly Lassiter would stop trying to arrest me."

"Okay, now that? That's just impossible."

"Dude," Shawn started, sounding as serious as he did when Henry started dating again, when he started rebuilding that dog house or even when his mother showed up unexpectedly. "Dude, you're not going to like this."

Gus could hear the klaxon alarms going off in his head. But curiosity won over. "What?"

"We need to tell Lassiter the truth."

A/N: So welcome to Maelynn deciding to update and revise this (a bit, most of the original is still there) after TWO YEARS. *Sheepish grin* The end has been posted as well. This is also on AO3 as well. Note that this isn't normally how I write because, as I've said, the fic is two years old.

Beta: None. No "do you have spell check" because, unless I'm carving into a rock right now, I do. Helpful comments on mistakes are always welcome.

Disclaimer: If I owned Psych I'd be a very happy camper. But unfortunately camping and I disagree with each other since the Great Storm Incident of '08. So all I own is my formidable imagination.