Mr. Monk and the Red Herring

Chapter Three

"This is called a plasma sphere," the tour guide said, his voice echoing. His hand rested on the small glass ball he was describing. Electricity flickered inside it to his fingers. "And inside the sphere, there are millions of ions reacting to the electrical charge to create what?"

None of the group answered, they were too busy pushing past each other to touch a fingertip to the plasma sphere. From above, Monk mumbled something about a electromagnetic field, but was cut off with a shh! from Sharona.

They were watching the group from a mezzanine above. The detective tried his best to keep his eyes fixed on the tour guide, yet he couldn't keep his gaze from wandering to the uneven corner of the banner on the wall below them. Sharona elbowed him as he reached down to fix it, hissing, "Focus!" under her breath.

"I thought your meter man had black hair," she pointed out, suspicious.

"He must have been wearing a wig, I don't know," Natalie reasoned. "But that's the guy, I know it. I work in a bar. I'm good with faces."

"Maybe we should say something," Sharona suggested. "See how he reacts."

"No," Monk said quietly. "If he is the guy, we don't want him to know."

"What are we gonna do?"

"Follow him," Monk answered. "Keep an eye out for anything else suspicious."

"Okay, let's go."

They turned away from the railing, hastening to catch up with the tour guide as he led his group to the next room.

When they reached the lower floor, the tour group was filtering into a large, cave-like room detailing the miracle of birth.

"Welcome to the miracle of birth," an announcer was saying over a speaker. "Sexual reproduction is the fertilization of the female egg..."

The tour guide raised his voice over the loudspeaker. "We're gonna step carefully through this opening into the womb, and then we're gonna take a left up the fallopian tubes. Here we go-" He turned sideways to fit into the womb, then stood back as the rest of the group followed. "Do it carefully, that's it. Turn sideways if you have to. Now you're in the womb. Go left up the fallopian tubes! There we go."

Monk, Sharona, and Natalie hurried to blend in with the group as they ducked through the gap. Still echoing in the background was the speaker, playing the same few phrases repeatedly: "Welcome to the miracle of birth. Sexual reproduction..."

"Oh, no." Monk had realized what exhibit they'd ended up in. "No-no-no-no-no."

He stopped dead at the entrance to the womb. Sharona rolled her eyes and groaned.

"Detective Monk, hurry up! He's getting away!" Natalie yelled.

A pause as she watched Monk, dumbfounded.

"...What are you doing?"

It was unclear. Monk had one foot through the opening and one still standing in the entrance. He swayed back and forth, trying to force himself to jump through, but it was as if an invisible forcefield held him back.

"Ugh!" His skin had made contact with the wall, and he drew the cuffs of his jacket sleeves over his hands to protect them.

"Adrian, come on," Sharona called.

"Ahh—!" He threw both arms across his face so as to block out his surroundings, which gave him enough momentum to fling himself through the opening. Apparently out of sight meant out of mind for Monk, as long as there weren't any of the other senses that were affecting him.