Rooftops and Recovery ||Shassie||

His Fall

((TW: Suicide.
Enjoy!))

Shawn glanced back at the dead man on the roof behind him. He was sweating. A lot. Seeing Mark shoot himself right after those horrible demands. His fingers trembled, holding the phone, seeing the taxi Lassiter was in pull up.

"Hello?" Carlton's voice was full of concern. He wasn't an idiot. He'd figured out Mark had lured Shawn to the tall hospital building.

"Lassie!" Shawn put on the illusion of confidence but his voice cracked and he stuttered.

"Spencer, where are you?"

"Lassie can you do me a favor?"

"What?" Detective Lassiter heard the wind but couldn't pinpoint where Shawn was.

"Turn around and walk back the way you came. For me?" Lassiter disregarded that statement immediately and started walking to the hospital.

"No, I’m coming in."

"Just do as I ask. Please." Shawn used a voice he never would. He wasn't trying to be funny. Shawn wasn't serious yet his voice sounded... Scared.

Carlton backtracked, looking around him. "Where?"

"Stop there."

"What is this Spencer?" Lassiter's worries we're getting conveyed in the form of anger and annoyance

"Okay, look up. I’m on the rooftop." Lassiter's heart started beating faster, his face filling with horror seeing Shawn on the roof, his feet teetering on the edge of the parapet.

"Surprise!" Shawn said, adding a sad laugh at the end

"I ... I can’t come down, so we’ll ... we’ll just have to do it like this." He said slowly, trying to memorize the features of Lassiter from the 6 stories up.

"What’s going on Spencer?" Lassiter stuttered. He's had a gun pulled on him but seeing Shawn on that roof immediately had him feeling weak, and desperately hoping he'd wake up.

"An apology. You were right." Shawn said, his voice carrying through static on Lassiter's phone line. He wished he'd spent money on a better phone. He didn't consider it luxury now.

"Right about what?" Lassiter's voice was more insistent, more pressing, hoping to stop this stupidity and for Shawn to get off that roof.

"Everything they're said about me. I lied about everything." He took a deep breath, hating every second of this phone call. Shawn caught another glance of Mark's body, that terrifying smile still painted on his blood-ridden face.

"Why are you saying this? You've been saying you're pyschic for years, why now?"

"I’m a fake." Shawn admitted. It felt good to finally tell Lassie that. But not like this. Not with Lassiter's voice breaking on the other line and not with the lies he was about to tell.

"Spencer.." Lassiter's voice sounded more like a plead. A plead for him to come down. A plead for this all to be a terrible nightmare.

Tears pooled in Shawn's eyes and he tried to keep it out of his voice, failing miserably. "You were right all along. I want you to tell Jules; I want you to tell Gus, and The Chief, and My dad... in fact, tell anyone who will listen to you that I pretended to be pyschic for my own purposes." This hurt so much more. This hurt more than the pavement was going to.

"Okay, shut up, Spencer, shut up. The first time we met ... the first time we met, you solved two cases in front of me." Lassiter put his hand on his head, trying to come up with anything that could convince Shawn to back off.

"Nobody could do that." Shawn said with a small chuckle

"You could." Lassiter responded, his voice shrinking.

Shawn laughed at how much faith Lassiter had in him. It made guilt pool in his stomach.

This was what Shawn was dreading.
"I planned it. I hired everyone to gawk around me, to commit those crimes." Shawn sniffles quietly "It’s a trick. Just a magic trick."

Carlton closed his eyes and shook his head repeatedly.

"No. All right, stop it. Now." Lassiter said, pure fear radiating from his voice.
Fed up with this performance, the detective started walking towards the entrance of the hospital again.

"No! Lassie, stay exactly where you are. Don’t move." Shawn said urgently, his voice unwavering, holding his had out as if he could read Carlton from this far up.

"Okay! Just tell me what you're doing Spencer" that pleading had found it's way back into his voice.
Shawn paused, Lassiter only hearing the 'psychic's' heavy breathing.

"Keep your eyes fixed on me. Please, will you do this for me?" Shawn sounded frantic and desperate. He was terrified of what would happen otherwise.

"Do what?" The anger bled through once again. His tone shared with the times he'd taken Shawn aside to berate him, now painting a much a darker picture.

"This phone call – it’s, er ... it’s my note. It’s what people do, don’t they – leave a note?" Shawn asked, with a sad smile he was sure Lassiter couldn't see.

"Leave a note when Spencer?" Lassiter refused to acknowledge the obvious answer, letting his mind fill it in with anything. Anything but that.

"Goodbye, Lassie." Shawn said, discarding the phone, it falling down several stories, where Shawn would soon follow.

"No no no, Spencer!" Lassiter yelled, but it was too late, the dial tone already rung, and now Carlton's phone hit the pavement as well.

With a couple second delay, Shawn eyed the concrete below him before leaning forward, losing his balance and quickly plummeting down.

"Shawn!" Lassiter's voice echoed in his own ears as he sprinted to the pavement in front of the hospital, tripping and hitting his head, only for him to immediately get back up, met with the picture of Shawn. And blood, oh god so much blood.

"Shawn..." He said quietly, though he couldn't hear his own voice. The images around him was blurred and the sound was filtered, people crowded the remains as Lassiter tried to shove through.

"Please, let me through, please, he's my friend. I'm a detective, he's my friend" he said desperately, being able to push through only to feel the cold skin of his friend and the lack of a pulse before the people around him dragged him off, and the ambulance arrived.

Lassiter was on his knees just watching, as his whole world fell apart.