Work Text:
When Gus walked into the Psych Office, he wasn't expecting a kid in a flowery dress rushing around the lobby area with a lot of papers in their hands.
"What...?"
The kid looked up with surprise and almost dropped the papers. "Hi! You're.... Burton Guster, right? Please tell me I'm right, I can't add another wrong person to the ever growing list of people I've wrongly called Burton Guster," the kid whined.
"Yes, I'm Burton Guster, call me Gus though," Gus said, tone skeptical.
"Ah! Cool, why would your parents name you Burton? You look a bit more like a Steve, though that might be because my friend looks exactly like you and is named Steve," the kid rambled. "Sorry, I'm rambling again. I do that when I don't hear other things like the deities I worship or music."
"Deities?"
"Yeah! I worship, uhm. Persephone, Hades, Loki, Iris, Bast, and a few of my ghostly ancestors!" The kid chirped.
"Okay, because you know my name I think I should know your name, kid," Gus stopped the kid, they couldn't look more than twenty-one.
"Stormy!" Stormy chirped, they then tensed up and whistled.
"You good, Stormy? Who names their kid Stormy?" Gus asked.
"Oh, uh... Yeah, I'm good! I just get tics, that's my most popular one," Stormy explained. "And my partners helped me choose it..."
"How old are you, you look young," Gus asked.
"Oh! I'm eighteen!" Stormy replied.
"Eighteen, damn you're young," Gus commented.
–
"Dude, Shawn. What's with the eighteen year old at the front desk?" Gus questioned later that day.
"Oh, you told me to take the more lame cases too and there was too much work so I hired a receptionist!" Shawn explained.
"And do they know about you faking this psychic stuff?" Gus asks, giving him a look.
"They know, they agreed to give me pointers to help fake it," Shawn says.
Gus sighs, this will be a long week.
–
"Hi! Thank you for calling the Psych Private Detective Agency where we help with problems today, tomorrow, or last week!" Stormy smiled as they said the cheesy ass slogan.
"Mhm. You want to know if your husband is cheating? May I ask what brought this on?"
A beat of silence.
"Ah... See, I'm hearing whispers right now saying that your husband's energy is being blocked by something and they'll get a clear reading in....." Stormy looked to Shawn.
Three weeks Shawn mouthed.
"Three weeks, ma'am," Stormy finished. "Do you have any non-marital problems you'd like us to confer on?"
Stormy nodded as if the client could see them. "Hm... Missing package...."
Shawn made a cut throat motion.
"Ah, sorry. The spirits don't like cardboard boxes. There's this superstition that cats don't like spirits and cats love boxes. Everything's more connected and true than you think," Stormy apologized.
They looked apologetic as the client spoke on the phone.
"Yes, yes. I'm sorry, but I don't know why cats don't like spirits," Stormy pitied. "Alright, you have a good rest of your day, ma'am."
–
"Hey, Storms!" Shawn yells from his "office."
"Yeah?" Stormy pokes their head out of the break room.
"What's on the schedule?"
"Oh! Uhm.... There's a 10:30 for a CEO asking if he should sell his company or not, a 11:00 for a girl asking if she should take her dream job or one with better pay, and a 1:10 asking if he should buy this one weird looking cactus or not. That last one is weird..." Stormy reads off.
"Thank you, Storms," Shawn smiled.
"Mhm! Now, I'm going on break so handle your own calls for an hour or two. I got a date!" Stormy walked off.
"Have fun!"
–
The door rang as Stormy sat in a pentagram holding Gus' hands doing a seance.
Shawn quickly shushed them, opting to explain afterwards.
"I sense.... love in your future, Gus Gus," Stormy smiled at the nickname while Gus scowled. "The spirits tell me that you'll meet the one in a week or so."
They finish the seance up, and Stormy looks towards Shawn to see a client.
"Oh! Hi! Sorry, I was just testing out skills that Shawn's been teaching me," Stormy easily lied. "But what can I do for ya?"
"Uhm... I have a 10:30 appointment?" The client answered.
"It's 10:30 already? Well, since Shawn doesn't have anything to do right now, you can go right ahead," Stormy smiled at the client, their small stature engulfed by the tall man.
–
Stormy sat at the front desk on their phone when the bell chimed. They looked up to see a girl with long blonde hair and a man with dark hair extremely short.
"Hello! Welcome to Psych Private Detective agency where we help with problems today, tomorrow, or last week! What can I help ya with?" Stormy asked sweetly.
"Uhm, I'm Detective Lassiter and this is Detective O'Hara... We're here to see Shawn?" the man, Lassiter, answered, sounding unsure.
"Okay! Do you have an appointment unless he's a suspect in anything" Stormy asked, smile going tight.
"No, no! Nothing like that, he helps us out with cases and he wasn't answering his phone," the girl, O'Hara, Stormy's mind supplied, rushed to explain.
"Hmm, okay. Follow me," Stormy abruptly stood and walked to where Shawn was. If you were in front of Stormy (which both Shawn and Gus were ), you'd see their smile completely disappear before coming back when they faced the two detectives.
"Coffee?" Stormy asked, Lassiter nodded and O'Hara just asked for tea.
Stormy nodded and disappeared, though they weren't out of hearing range so they could still hear the conversation.
"Oh, hey Lassie and Jules!" Shawn smiled. "What brings you here?"
"You weren't answering your phone and the chief wanted to speak with you?" Lassie explained, annoyed.
"Oh, I have a murder to solve?" Shawn asked.
"Yeah, also what's with the young girl?" Lassiter asked.
At that, Stormy walked back in briskly. They handed Lassiter his coffee and Jules her tea, "Okay, first of all. The name's Stormy. And second, I use they/them pronouns," Stormy pointed to the pin on their white and light pink checkered shirt that clearly said Stormy They/Them .
"Sorry, what's with the young kid?" Lassiter corrected.
"Oh, they're my receptionist," Shawn explained simply. "The workload got too much for me so I put out an ad on Craigslist and they responded."
Stormy nodded along, they had only been working here for a week but they already loved it.
Suddenly, a whistle was heard. The two who just met Stormy looked towards them who rubbed the back of their neck. "Sorry, I get tics. Most of the time it's a whistle," Stormy explained.
Jules nodded and continued talking to Shawn, "Well, we need you at the station in about five minutes."
"Great! Yo, Storms!" Shawn yells out to the front desk where Stormy was on call with a client.
"What!" Stormy covers the microphone part of the phone to ask. "Yes.. we can squeeze you in, in 2 weeks from now miss."
Stormy hangs up and walks back to the four of them, "Yes, Shawn?"
"What's on the schedule for the next... two days?"
"Oh! We have uhm...." Stormy briefly searched for their clipboard. "We have a 10:30 and 1:00 tomorrow and one 3:00 the day after."
Gus had a thought to touch Stormy's fluffy brown hair and followed through with it. Stormy melted into the touch as Shawn spoke, "Yeah, we can keep those."
Shawn looked at Gus, eyes raised. Gus shrugged but continued scratching Stormy's hair.
"Well, that's all. We'll be off..." Lassie looked at Stormy weirdly as he walked out while Jules smiled politely.
"Okay, now why the hell did you practically melt at Gus's touch?" Shawn turned to Stormy.
"Uhm, I act like a cat a lot and I like head pats," Stormy briefly explained.
Gus nodded and the two men left for the precinct. Stormy walked after them and flipped the sign from Open to Closed .
–
Stormy put their fluffy hair into a half ponytail and went on their phone. They didn't have work that day so they were going to go on a date with their partners, Calypso and Latvia.
They waited for Calypso to pick them up, Stormy didn't have a car and so Calypso or Latvia was their ride to work everywhere.
Calypso pulled up and Stormy hopped in, kissing their partner briefly and they headed off to pick Latvia up.
Calypso was in a white blouse with a black corset, and a dark green skirt fell down to their ankles. Their knee high laced boots were a nice brown and a dark green bow around their neck matched the skirt. Their short, dark red hair was put in two small pigtails held with white ribbons tied into bows.
Stormy was in a pastel pink sweater under an overall skirt. They had a white messenger bag and white leg warmers over their pastel blue sneakers. Their messenger bag was covered in pins ranging from the lesbian pride flag to kuromi from the Hello Kitty universe to multiple anime characters they liked.
They arrived at Latvia's house and picked them up too.
Latvia was in a white blouse with a brown corset, black pants went down to their ankle and black heels accompanied them. Their brown hair is up in a small bun held with a black ribbon.
"So, Stormy, love. How do you like your new job?" Calypso asked when they reached the restaurant.
"Oh my gods, okay so..." Stormy starts to talk about their job, not noticing the guy watching them carefully planning something.
–
Stormy walked into the office in a white blouse and orange and white plaid skirt. They were wearing their white leg warmers and pastel blue sneakers again. Their makeup was simple, light blue eyeshadow and mascara.
They sat at the front desk, waiting for Shawn to get back from getting breakfast. They had headphones in, listening to music and playing on their phone or writing fanfiction on their phone. Even with their music on full blast, they were still alert. It was something that never really went away with their fear of being kidnapped or killed (they watched enough crime shows to be paranoid but still cheerful). That fear, plus being afab, was enough to keep them vigilant.
That was why they were gripping their pocket knife until their knuckles were white and watching the unknown man try to sneak up on them. He was apparently stupid as he got closer to try and kill them with a knife of his own. They didn't know what they did to piss this dude off so much, but they didn't want to think about it too much as they stabbed the guy's arm and restrained him.
They called the police while they disarmed him and sat on him to prevent him from getting away.
–
Shawn walked up to Stormy in the precinct wondering why they were there, they didn't like going to the precinct. Moreover, meeting them at the crime scenes.
"Storms, what are you doing here?" Shawn asks when he's close to them.
"Oh... Some guy tried to kill me," Stormy shrugged but they could tell that under their air of nonchalance was a scared kid.
"Really? Why? You don't have any enemies," Shawn asked, Stormy just shrugged.
"The guy might've had a mental break and took it out on me," Stormy guessed.
Shawn nodded, that made sense, but something still didn't sit right with him.
–
Stormy stared blankly at the corpse, it wasn't that they were desensitized to it, but they were just feeling out of it ever since that attempt at their life a few days ago.
Shawn nudges them. "You okay?" he whispered.
Stormy shrugged, eyes almost devoid of color. That was unusual for the typically cheerful receptionist. Shawn looked worried, but then refocused on finding clues.
–
Stormy finally broke down a few weeks later, they were heaving and sobbing and hitting their arms while Shawn and Gus tried their best to calm them down.
Stormy tried to speak, "C-c-c-call L-L-Latvia, p-p-p-password i-i-i-i-is 2-2-26-6-69-9-90-0-0-0."
"Okay, uhm," Gus searched for their phone.
He found it, unlocked it, and opened their contacts to Latvia my Beloved <3 .
After a few rings, a voice spoke, "Love? Why are you calling me?"
"Sorry, I'm not Stormy. I'm Burton Guster at the Psych Private Detective Agency and Stormy is here having a panic attack. Could you come here and help calm them down?"
"Oh gods, yeah, I'll, uhm, I'll be right there!" Gus could hear Latvia rushing around their house.
Latvia reached the Agency in ten minutes, they probably broke a few speeding laws. They rushed in and immediately sat next to Stormy. "Hey, love. Can you name five things you can see?"
Stormy shook their head and flopped over onto Latvia's lap. "Alright, breathe with me-no, that isn't how you breathe."
After a few minutes, Stormy calmed down enough to steady their breathing. Their tear-stained eyes drooped and they fell asleep.
"Thank you for calling me, you did good with that," Latvia whispered, not wanting to wake Stormy.
"It was actually Stormy who told us to call you, though it was a struggle for them to talk," Gus admitted.
Latvia hummed and started petting Stormy's hair, "Good thing they did then, they're probably shaken up from the attempt on their life a few weeks ago."
Shawn nodded in understanding.
"Anyways, they'll probably be fine in a few hours, but I'm not leaving until then," Latvia decided.
–
Stormy did in fact a few hours later and was practically forced to take the rest of the day off.