Logan Echolls

It's not that Logan minds the cold weather all that much.

Sure, there was a time when maybe he would have, back before the Navy, when Neptune's sunny southern California weather meant that surfing was in the cards more mornings than not. But though he doesn't mind it, he can't say he's not entirely used to it.

Down near the boardwalk with Marlowe, even now, he still feels like he should be grabbing his board and paddling out. But since he's not exactly looking to freeze to death— he doubts a wetsuit's going to do much good with how cold Darrow gets in the winter— Logan figures he'll take a pass.

Besides, after the incident at the Firetrap and a short hospital stay, if he doesn't manage to get himself killed trying to find a wave to ride, he has a feeling that Veronica will probably murder him for it anyway.

He's sitting on a set of stairs near the boardwalk, keeping an eye on Veronica's dog, who is probably more interested in trying to dig in the cold sand than anything else. Maybe, at some point, this part of Darrow is going to start feeling normal.

At some point, Logan realized that Veronica was low on groceries.

The fridge isn't exactly empty or anything, but last time he stayed over, there wasn't any coffee creamer, and he figures he should probably grab some before he heads over today.

He's starting to think that he's at her apartment more than he's at his own, and it's not just because The Bramford Building is kind of a shithole. Still, he eats there often enough-- when he and Veronica don't just get take-out-- that grabbing groceries when he has a chance isn't a problem.

But coffee creamer turns into a couple of other things, and the next thing Logan knows, he's got a pack of what looks like red velvet Oreos in his hand. Or whatever passes for an Oreo in Darrow.

"Huh. What will they think of next?" Logan says, mostly to himself. At least until he realizes there's someone else a few steps away.

The arrival of fall is never more apparent these days than when Logan's on Darrow's boardwalk. Six months in the city has shown him that that the weather there is never really going to be close to what he grew up with in Southern California, but the way the crowd seems to thin out more every day seems to be the same just about everywhere.

He's down in this part of town on his day off hoping to find that Veronica's in the office, but he finds the door locked. It's not unusual, she's probably out on a case, and he probably should have called ahead in the first place.

Logan's doing a decent job these days of not worrying too much. They've been down that path before, almost a decade ago, and he's sure neither of them want to go down it again.

Still, headed away from Mars Investigations and back to his car, Logan can't help but pull out his phone, browsing to their text history and wondering if maybe he should fire one off to her, just in case.

Though, he should probably be paying more attention to where he's going.

"What's a hundred and eighty days to us?"

For just a second after Logan shuts the door behind him, leaving Veronica there on his bed, he considers turning around. He could stay, go AWOL, never leave. He's not going to pretend that the idea doesn't have a certain level of appeal. After all, the siren call of Neptune brought Veronica back after nine years; what chance does the U.S.S. Harry Truman have against it? The pull is strong with this town.

Or maybe that's just Veronica. It's always been that way between them.

Even after all that time, she was the first person he thought to call when he found himself in hot water.

But ducking duty? That's not Logan anymore. The rhythms he and Veronica have fallen back into since she got back, familiar or not, he's looking at from a different perspective now. Nine years out, and the world doesn't look quite the same from the other side of a beaten murder rap. Not that he didn't enjoy yet another fun adventure with the Neptune Sheriff's Department and a member of the illustrious Lamb family, but it's not like the last time he was unjustly accused. Even after their relationship had basically fallen apart, lost in the busy shuffle that had been Bonnie: the drugs, the music, the hangers-on, he'd still cared about her enough to try his damnedest to make sure she didn't wind up dead.

Apparently, he should have been looking out for the other guy.

But this wasn't Felix and PCHers on a bridge when he was still a kid, reeling from what happened with his mother. This was his old life bleeding into his new one, Neptune and all of its shit pulling them all back in again and again.

He's glad to have it all behind him, though, to know that both he and Bonnie will fade from the spotlight and the tabloids just as soon as a Kardashian does something interesting enough to warrant a cover. Nobody wants to read about the movie star's son who decided to straighten up and literally fly right. That's not going to sell those Entertainment Weeklys.

So six months. One hundred and eighty days. It's just about enough time for everything to blow over. Even if being away from Neptune means being away from her. Logan takes one last look at his phone, at the picture he took of her just a few minutes ago and slips it into his pocket, because if he doesn't get moving, all those jokes about dealing with an AWOL rap are going to become just another tick on his rap sheet.

But just then, something shifts. It's all of a sudden that the front yard of the house changes and he's staring at a street. A shop. Whiplash? Not sure what the hell's going on, how he got there, or if he's gone into some weird drug trip without realizing, Logan hefts his pack more comfortably on his shoulder, and walks in.

"Well this ought to be interesting," he says to himself.