Chapter Text
“Suspect spotted hanging around this national park multiples times across the past three weeks. We think this is his drug drop-off,” Juliet informed him as he gazed over a few photos from CCTV that clearly show the guy Carlton had been chasing for months now. He was facing all sorts of charges, murder, theft and robbery, disorderly conduct, drug possession and dealing. Not only that but putting him away could be the start of the end for California’s biggest gang. The wonders it would do for both his career and his ego... He doubted Shawn Spencer would ever try and square up to him after he busted this guy. “We just need a team to stake out for a few days in a car in the parking lot, take photos and we’ll have him,” she said with her usual bright grin, her pink lip gloss glinting in the yellow fluorescent lights.
“Perfect,” Carlton said, with his usual amount of glee; none. “You and I park by his usual drop-off, take a few shots, I’ll finally be rid off this guy.”
Juliet chuckled awkwardly. “Yeah, about that…”
Heavy dread began to pool in Carlton’s chest. The kind that he felt whenever his wife- ex-wife said they needed to talk. Or when he arrived at a scene only to realise the killer had never left. Or whenever he heard that stupid 'psychic' call his name across the bullpen. “What?”
“I, um…”. She had that look on her face, one that told him whatever it was, it was partially her fault at least.
“O’Hara…”
Juliet finally burst, “After your fight with Spencer yesterday, Chief wanted you two to do the stakeout together so you could make up-“.
“Oh my god,” Carlton said with something that was a mix of a growl and a sigh. He rolled his eyes and walked away from his desk to the coffee machine. It wasn't his fault that Shawn had drank two energy drinks before barging into a homicide scene and took it out on Carlton. It was one thing for him to shout and shake the evidence in their bags because of the noise it made, but to try and climb on top of him like a piggy back? Yeah, you're going straight into a wall.
“It wasn’t my idea!” Juliet followed quickly after, arguing her case to no avail as Carlton added his last sugar to his coffee. “I told her it would be a disaster, but she wouldn’t listen-“
Carlton rounded the corner toward the Chief’s office. “Thank you, O’Hara. I’ll handle this myself now.” He dismissed her with a turn of his head and forcefully pushed open his boss’s door.
“If you think for a second that I’m going to spend more than one hour with Spencer-“ He started, anger boiling and threatening to bubble over, But She immediately shut him down.
“Carlton,” Chief Vick scolded, closing her eyes in impatience and letting her fingers rest on her computer keyboard. “I’ve told you many times before about knocking. Sit.”
Carlton sat down hastily like an obedient child because he was always a rule follower, no doubt about that, and patiently waited for her to continue.
“This is not up for negotiation. Your rivalry with Spencer is driving me, O’Hara- in fact, everyone in the precinct crazy. If you don’t pull yourself together I’ll have to take further action.” The tone in her voice was intentional to remind him that she had told him this before. They all remembered the snow globe incident (the second one we did not speak of).
Carlton laid back a bit in the chair ready to make his case, like a lawyer who knew the case would be a cakewalk. “Spencer is a man child, and if you want me at my best performance to finally close my case, I cannot be paired with him.”
“I’m sorry, Detective Lassiter, but that’s not going to happen,” Chief Vick went back to typing in her desktop like the conversation was done. It wasn’t, not if Carlton wasn’t happy. He opened his mouth to speak a few times but all that would come out were half letters and syllables.
“Mr. Spencer is an excellent detective, and we could use his skills for this case.” Vick stopped typing and looked back at him. “And your aware of this, but I promise you-“ Carlton sipped his coffee as he hoped for some encouraging words from her. “-that he won’t receive any credit or pay for his work with you.”
Carlton spat a bit of his coffee into his cup. “Is that what you think this is?” He dabbed it away from his lips with the back of his hand. “Chief, I am not jealous of Spencer, I despise him,” he put his coffee on a round side table and gripped the armrests of the chair, his blunt fingernails pricking against the black leather. “Spending a night alone with him will only end in a hospital trip.”
“I see,” she said and went back to working like nothing happened, like Carlton had never walked in, only pausing her typing to scribble something down. She was giving him the silent treatment, like a child.
Carlton’s eye twitched as he sat in silence for a few moments. “I’ll quit the force,” he threatened, emptily.
But Vick only nodded and responded, “mhm.” Having a baby, you learn to tune things out on command. Or maybe it was being the chief of a police department, one couldn't really tell. Point was: end of story. Shawn was to join Carlton on a little stakeout and Carlton should take a page from his boss' book if he wanted to make it out of this stakeout alive.
After sitting there for a few more moments, trying to figure out what to do, he finally stood up and stormed out of Chief Vick’s office. He thought of slamming the door behind him, but he didn't want to be fired so he just let it fall closed normally. Then, as he turned to retreat to his desk, he bumped into the man causing all his problems.
“Spencer,” he groaned, baring his gritted teeth to hopefully convey he wasn’t in the mood. He tried to brush past him, but Shawn started to talk.
“Lassie! Just who I wanted to see, you know, a little birdie told me we were going on a stakeout together!” He jeered, pointing out his index and middle finger and walking them up his chest in time with his words for three paces. “Are you excited?! I’ll pack the gummy worms, you pack the fluffy pillows. We both bring the gossip.”
“Get out of my sight,” he growled, placing his hand on his face and pushing him aside. He strode over to his desk in the hope it would make Shawn lose interest and he could work in peace. It didn’t.
“Aw, don’t be so grumpy! It’ll be fun,” he smiled. He obviously wasn’t trying to cheer Carlton up, and was just trying to be annoying. The only annoying thing to Carlton was Shawn’s bright green polo and burgundy corduroy trousers. He looked like Shaggy from Scooby-Doo. "Painting our nails, talking about boys, having pillow fights..."
Carlton rolled his neck and looked up at Shawn who was looming over his desk. “Don’t you have some Saturday morning cartoons to watch?” He made sure to add a particularly grumpy snarl to his retort.
“You must be getting old, Lassie-bear! Look at the time-“ Shawn flicked his wrist and glanced at his watch for a split second. “Isn’t the morning anymore.”
“It’s twelve o’ four.”
Shawn ignored him. “Do you prefer sour or fruity gummy worms?” He threw his leg up onto Carlton’s desk and rested an arm on his knee to then rest his face on. "You're right - I should just get both."
“I don’t care, Spencer, I have work to do,” Carlton ended as he stood up and walked away from his desk and Shawn, knowing as long as he was there he wouldn't be able to get anything productive done. This was going to be a long day and night.
“Lassiter,” Chief Vick called from her office. Or would it? Carlton did an instant U-turn, almost dropping the stack of paper and files he was carrying. “Yes?”
“You left your coffee,” she told him, still not looking up from her computer.
“Right.”
***
“Don’t be so glum, Lassie. You really need to learn to smile more,” Shawn said through a mouthful of sandwich, spewing crumbs all over the passenger side of the car; some nasty concoction he created to stink up the place and annoy him. Is that all he really does? Annoy Carlton? “Appreciate the little things, for example.”
“No little things to appreciate,” he grumbled, not moving has gaze from the binoculars. “And don’t get greasy fingerprints on the camera.”
Any hope that Lassiter had of finally catching this guy started to diminish as the day drew to an end. The grey and abandoned department store seemed to absorb all the colour and light around it. But the pastel oranges and yellows from the sky, and the dark night blue escaped this punishment and began to bleed into view like ink. It would be short lived, though, as the light pollution would wash away its bold colour in a matter of time. They’d stayed there for the entire day and no one had showed other than rowdy teenagers coming from school and passer-bys walking dogs. No shady guys in dark hoodies and motorcycle jackets suspiciously rubbing their noses and loitering.
“All I’m saying is that you should loosen up a bit, get a massage. Oh! Gus knows a great place for massages, helps him get rid of his ‘little Shawn’,” Shawn told him shortly before taking an obnoxiously loud slurp from his soda. Carlton was beginning to very much regret stopping for fast food on the way.
“I… don’t want to think about what that is,” Carlton ended as he stared lasers into the concrete parking lot, its cracked white lines spotted with small green sprouts. As the sun slipped over the trees, the parking lot began to glow mustard yellow from nearby streetlights, one of which was looming right over their car. “Shit. We’re going to have to move. Buckle up.”
Shawn didn’t and Carlton went on to move the car a few spots backwards into the shade of trees the surrounded the lot. “Why do you even have those binoculars? We’re in the parking lot, we can see them from anywhere,” Shawn asked. He kicked his feet up on the dash again despite Carlton telling him not to multiple times already.
“Because you wanted to hold the camera.” He threw them into the backseat onto their makeshift beds made from sleeping bags and rough blankets.
“So what is it, Lassie,” Shawn asked again, disregarding Carlton’s previous statement. “Sour or fruity gummy worms?”
Carlton snatched the camera from Shawn’s lap as he put it down to pick up the bags of candy. “Shut up. This might be our guy.” He raised the camera to his eye and focused. Four dark silhouettes on the other side of the lot had appeared with black vans and were close together, conversing. He adjusted the resolution and could clearly see, passing bags - click! - more bags - click! - a briefcase, probably filled with money - click!
“Got them. We’ll head back tomorrow,” Carlton lowered the camera from his face, but not looking away from the criminals.
“Lassie! You didn’t answer my question,” Shawn whined like the small child he was.
“I don’t care, Spencer. I don’t eat candy, I'm not eight,” Carlton answered. “I mean, from time to time, sure, but not right now though. I just take whatever I’m feeling like.”
Carlton sat back in the driver’s seat and rubbed his eyes. Exhausted was the only way to put it. He thought maybe he should take Shawn’s advice. Take the next week off as a vacation. No massages, fuck no. The idea of a stranger rubbing his skin and touching him when he had nothing but a towel on made him shiver. He could go fishing as a victory, get back into the sport. Sort out somethings that need sorting out, visit a family member or two. make use of the last of the warm weather before November rolled around. That sounded nice.
“To me, sour and fruity both rock! Sometimes, Lassie, you gotta take them at the same time to get the real flavour, you know?” He turned to face him, but did a double take and stared out the windshield. “Lassie.”
His voice was a flat tone. Something wasn’t right.
Carlton was about to ask when he looked out the windshield and saw it. The crooks, staring dead at them, horrifying and uncanny. And there were more. Way more. A few vehicles light up and shone their head lights towards them as they began to move. Cars they thought were dead and abandoned, now alive and very much not abandoned. One of the crooks took a picture of them before he dashed into a black van and they speed off.
“Fuck!” Carlton yelled.
Shawn speedily took his feet off the dash and turned to him. “Hey, don’t worry! I’m sure we’ll catch this guy at some point.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about, Spencer!” He didn’t mean to shout that loud, but the situation called for it. “Those guys are part of one of the biggest gangs in California, and they have our picture!”
Shawn’s lips formed into a thin line with a small oval in the centre. “They must’ve been camping out here longer than I thought and saw us move backwards,” Carlton said with a sigh. “I’m surprised ‘the spirits’ didn’t warn you.”
“No, they were to busy waiting for you to answer my question.”
***
“What?!” Carlton practically shrieked, but he had been taught from a young age about indoor voices and their importance, among other things, so it sounded more like he were making an announcement rather than an objection.
“It’s the only way, Detective. I know it’s inconvenient, but Mr. Spencer is legally a citizen and it’s easiest to put you two together,” Chief Vick told him.
Shawn stood a foot to his right, grinning slyly at him. He was lavishing in every second of this, which only made everything feel worse.
“Co-couldn’t you just take an officer off the force, like O’Hara?” Carlton proposed as he desperately looked for alternatives. He can't spend even more time with Shawn, alone in the middle of nowhere.
“No, I need all of the force on right now. Crime rates are estimated to spike this month, especially after what has just happened.”
Carlton tipped his head back and groaned quietly. He sucked his teeth as he thought. “Could we-“
Vick shouted at him. “You two are staying together until your lives are no longer at stake. Go home and pack your bags!”