(Concrete Blonde - Everybody Knows)

Growing up in Neptune often felt like clinging to a cliff face in the midst of a raging storm, and inexplicably though it was counter to survival, the urge to jump forwards into the powerful waves smashing below headlong into that thunderous horizon was often, seductive.

There was something in that abyss whispered to people.

L'appel de Vide.

The French termed it 'the call of the void' and dancing the edges of that thin precipice was something Logan had felt his most of his life. Like something the rage brewing inside was so loud he often wanted to jump out of his own skin, just to get away from it.

"I mean, if you don't wear the fake glasses, hang out in a crowd of people dressed identically in red and white hoops, everyone's gonna know where's Wally." Veronica joked down the phone to her best friend.

"Like that would help me," Wallace grumbled.

"Everything okay?" Logan asked as he emerged from the shower, wrapped in a towel and drying his hair.

"My new Mom found a girl in Wallace's dorm room this morning." She teased in a mock scandalised tone, barely covering the mouthpiece of the phone.

Shooting on campus=Parental Check-in. After the Lucky incident, and the weeks of nightmares Wallace had suffered afterwards, Veronica didn't blame Alicia for being concerned.

"Didn't she notice the sock on the door?" Logan quipped, kissing Veronica on the cheek as he passed.

"Apparently not, I'm guessing she didn't recognise it because its been so long since took home his laundry." Veronica theorised.

"That's it Mars, you have just lost your recipe taster." Wallace complained.

An empty threat if she ever heard one but it made her smile. It was nice to have a moment of normalcy before she ventured onwards into the fray. Professor Landry was officially back at work today after being cleared of Dean Odell's murder.

The only bodies she wanted to discuss today was the warm one walking around in nothing but a Neptune Grand white towel.

Veronica feigned being outraged. "Mars? I thought we agreed to go Lock, Stock and Double Barrel?"

"I told you, if I have to be part of the Neptune Defenders crime-fighting dynasty we gotta talk some kinda suit, and code names." Wallace countered, this back and forth had erupted recently since their parents rekindled their romance during winter break.

"Ah, our first sibling rivalry." Veronica grinned, running her gaze over Logan as he absently set about getting dressed. "It's so-Blended."

"You're really skipping breakfast?" Wallace asked. His mother had interrupted a sans clothes study session with Amira this morning, and had insisted that he join her for breakfast along with his younger brother. His girlfriend had shyly made her excuses and skipped out while his mother took Darrel to have a look around the campus.

"I'm still all the way across town, and I have to meet with my criminology professor this morning. Take Piz?" Veronica suggested.

"He's busy helping Butter's Pump up the Volume this morning." Wallace revealed. Piz had struck up a recent friendship with Vincent Clemmons, the host of Ahoy Matey's, Neptune's pirate radio station.

"You're roommate's filling up the airways with Neptune's Happy Harry Hard-on?" Veronica asked in surprise, he had been a very shy student at Neptune High School who lost his best friend, Marcos Oliveres in a bus crash at the start of Senior year. He'd been a typical loner, voted unkindly as most likely to start a school shooting but in the privacy of his bedroom, he rocked out as a podcast DJ.

Logan shot her a lopsided grin as he picked up on the reference. The ultimate why bother? generation. His love of 90s movies was rubbing off on her.

"Is it bigger than a babies arm?" Logan whispered in her ear.

"I guess what happens in high school, doesn't stay in high school." Wallace deadpanned.

"Legend in his own mind. Just as long as he doesn't go demanding Mac attend the MORP when Principal Moreno cancels Prom!" Veronica quipped, referencing Radio Rebel that Piz had chosen for movie night a few months ago.

Now that was a real performance... Damn... Veronica blushed when she realised Logan had just caught her checking out his body. I can't stay away from this man...

"Hey, I'm just glad Piz has developed other interests than-well that he's branched out from behind his radio booth." Wallace commented, glad his roommate had finally given up on his Are You Listening? 1932 American dream of tracking down clues with Veronica. "Now maybe we can talk about the Juno situation?"

Logan's phone lit up on the nightstand and he picked it up.

Mr Mars: I'll see Both at Breakfast.

"Uh- Sugarpuss?" Logan said turning the screen towards her.

So much for her morning of toe-curling sheet grabbing quality time with Logan...

"Save me some waffles." Veronica sighed down the phone.

The energy at Hearst was radioactive, everyone felt ill at ease. Most of those venturing from dorms to their classes didn't know the murdered co-ed from visiting from another school was a brazen calling card of the Neptune's Underworld but the aftermath of a shooting on campus, had enough students and faculty hypervigilant.

That could explain the Meer cat impressions from their fellow diners, intrigued by the presence of Balboa County's current acting Sheriff.

Staring co-eds were definitely preferable to lynch mobs… Logan thought as he glanced at the menu.

"Uh, you've got some pudding on your shoes." Alicia told Darrel who was practically climbing all over his older brother.

"As strong as an Ox and almost as smart." Wallace deadpanned handing him a napkin to wipe it off.

"It's totally rad, dad." Veronica smiled. "All the guys your age are doing it.."

"I'd like a little time to reminisce." Keith Mars retorted.

"You want time to think it over. I understand." Veronica grinned. "Saying good bye to fried breakfast foods and embracing pear-granola muffins and Greek yoghurt.. really does take the bacon!"

"And yet somehow you find the courage to go on living. You've got guts." Logan quipped as she took the menu from her boyfriend.

"It's that darn cult again. They have her totally brainwashed." Keith replied, sighing when Veronica moved the creamer out of his reach.

"By that darn cult, you mean the Doctor?" Veronica retorted, putting an extra sugar in her own coffee.

The Halls of Justice had ordered a strict medical evaluation of her fathers health if he was going to continue on as acting Sheriff while the Neptune City Council Committee held a consultation with residents and business owners to see if it was an acceptable long term prospect, or if they wanted to put the position up for a public election.

Mars vs Neptune.. even with a badge its still a rigged game.

"It seems to be some sort of carbon-based daughter." Keith sighed to Alicia, pretending to examine Veronica on the opposite side of the table. "Honestly, you raise them up… send them off to College, and it's like they come back as Pod people... girls in their dorm rooms..." He teased with mock despair as Alicia who patted his shoulder in sympathy.