Author's Note: I do not own Veronica Mars. Enough said.

CHAPTER 11: "Something Wicked This Way Comes"

CAST (in order of appearance):
Veronica Mars: Kristen Bell
Logan Echolls: Jason Dohring
Dick Casablancas: Ryan Hansen
Cindy "Mac" MacKenzie: Tina Majorino
Eli "Weevil" Navarro: Francis Capra
Parker Lee: Julie Gonzalo
Sheriff Keith Mars: Enrico Colantoni
FBI Agent Kris Morrison: Sarah Chalke
Mikhail Sorokin: Boris Lee Krutonog
Nikita Magadan: Pavel Lychnikoff

I cannot sleep. This absolutely AMAZES me, since I didn't sleep at all last night.

On top of that, let's think about the last twenty-four hours. After my sleepless night of investigation, I engaged in a little "good morning nookie" with Logan – as Dick so eloquently referred to it – which was interrupted by Mac. Then, a call to my dad got interrupted by Mikhail Sorokin.

We got the hell out of the cabin, only to be pinned down in a Wal-Mart by Russian mobsters. Weevil just HAPPENED to show up, just at the right moment. We took off out of Show Low in the mobsters cars, which we ditched in Gallup, New Mexico, in exchange for cars of questionable registration that an "associate" of Weevil's provided for us.

After that, we drove north, and didn't stop driving till we reached Parker Lee's parents' cabin in Pagosa Springs, Colorado. My dad is pretty sure we're safe here, but I don't know. I don't think I'm going to feel safe again until Mikhail Sorokin is either behind bars or dead.

I sit up in bed and swing my legs over the edge. Logan groans in his sleep and shifts his body a little, but doesn't wake up. I'm thankful for that – he's had a rough day. I mean, yes, so have I, but disturbingly enough, I've grown accustomed to being assaulted, having guns pointed at me, nearly dying.

I'm pretty sure I need to see a therapist.

I leave the bedroom of the rather spacious "cabin" and head down to the kitchen, hoping to find myself nothing more than a glass of water. As I descend the stairs, however, I hear a hushed voice speaking in Spanish.

It's unmistakably Weevil, talking to somebody on the phone. I feel guilty for eavesdropping on my friend, but the P.I. inside of me takes over.

"Mátelos," Weevil says. "Mátelos todos. Queme la casa a la tierra. No deje cualquier cosa vivo."

Now, I don't speak Spanish fluently. However, I do know that "mátelos todos" means "kill them all." And yeah, hearing that disturbs me just a little bit.

I wait until I hear Weevil's phone click shut, and then I descend the rest of the stairs. He's sitting on the living room couch, in the dark, his back to me.

"Who are we killing, Weevil?" I ask, with no preamble.

He jumps off the couch and stumbles backward, falling over on his ass. It would be funny if the topic of discussion weren't so serious.

"Were you listenin' in on me, V?" he shoots back, an angry note to his voice.

"No, Weevil, I couldn't sleep," I reply. "I came downstairs to get a glass of water, and I heard you talking to somebody about 'killing them all'. That is still what 'mátelos todos' means, right?"

Weevil doesn't say anything for a moment, and then finally speaks. "Sorokin's goons," he says sullenly. "Enough's enough. You know, they're wreaking havoc in my hometown, they're tryin' to kill one of my best friends – they're goin' down."

I shake my head in disbelief. "Wait a second, Weevil. Let me get this straight. You've got the PCHers – who you haven't even been involved with for over a year – taking on the RUSSIAN MAFIA?"

He shrugs. "Weevil, they're gonna get slaughtered!"

Weevil shakes his head. "They got stuff you wouldn't believe, V."

"Yeah, so does the Russian Mob," I snap. "You got LUCKY this afternoon, Weevil. Those four wack jobs weren't expecting a Latino with an agenda to come up behind them with a Mac-10!"

Weevil chuckles. "MP-5, Mars," he snarks. "You should know your guns better."

I throw my hands up in despair. "Weevil! Stay serious for three seconds here! You have to call – who were you talking to? Arturo?"

He doesn't say anything. "Weevil, you've got to call Arturo back. Tell him to call off the attack!"

"No."

"WEEVIL!"

A column of police cars blasted northbound on the Pacific Coast Highway at high speed. After the attack on Veronica and her friends in Arizona, Sheriff Keith Mars had informed FBI Agent Kris Morrison that Mikhail Sorokin was going to be taken down, and if the FBI thought that was a bad idea, then they were going to have to stop Keith and his friends.

Keith's friends consisted of the entire Balboa County Sheriff's Department, along with large chunks of the Orange County Sheriff's Department and the California Highway Patrol.

The FBI blinked first.

The car at the head of the column was that of Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona. Since Sorokin's estate was in Laguna Beach, he was in Orange County Sheriff's jurisdiction, but there was no way the Balboa County Sheriff's Department was being left out of the operation.

The column of cars turned off of the PCH onto Park Avenue, headed eastbound, into the hills. "We're approaching the Sorokin estate," Keith heard Sheriff Carona's voice say over the radio after about ten minutes.

"All cars dark," Carona spoke again. The world suddenly went dark as the lights and sirens went off. The column began to slow as it neared Sorokin's house –

And then the world lit up again. A massive explosion on the north side of the street lit the night sky, a fireball erupting toward the heavens. Keith's eyes widened as a multi-million dollar house was reduced to practically nothing in the blink of an eye.

"That was the Sorokin estate!" Carona exclaimed. His car sped up, and went back to Code-3. Keith followed suit, as did every other car in the column.

Mikhail Sorokin lay on the beach in Spain, letting the sun's rays warm his body. He smiled to himself – yes, the failed elimination of that Mars bitch and her crew of annoyances pissed him off, but it was only a temporary setback.

"Señor Sorokin?"

Or was it? "Yes?" Sorokin asked irritably, sitting up and opening his eyes.

"You have a phone call, sir," the resort attendant said, handing Sorokin his cell phone.

Sorokin sighed and reached out to take his cell phone. "What the hell is this?"

"Sir, I apologize," came the voice of his second in command, Nikita Magadan, who had, until two days prior, been his fourth in command. However, with the deaths of Pavel Narmonov and Vladimir Ochoa, Magadan had seen his star rise rapidly. "We have a serious problem, sir."

Sorokin narrowed his eyes. "What problem exactly would that be?"

"Uh, somebody blew up your house, sir."

Sorokin's eyes bulged, and he leapt to his feet. "YEBANAT!" he roared. "YEBAT VASHU MAT! SIC SUKAM SIM!"

He could practically hear Magadan cringe at the other end. "Yes, sir," he replied. "The problem is, we have no idea who did it. Worse yet, the Orange County Sheriff's Department was literally right down the street when it happened."

Sorokin closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "Was anybody at the house when it happened?" he grated.

"No, sir," Magadan replied. "Your wife is still in Hong Kong, and your son is still in protective custody at the jail in Neptune. None of your employees were there."

Sorokin sighed. He supposed he should be grateful that nobody had been killed, but instead, he was just enraged. "Alright," he said. "Here's what's going to happen. I want you to find that promudobliadskaja pizdoprojebina Veronica Mars. I want you – or somebody who's willing – to fuck the shit out of her. I want her to be tortured. Make her bleed. Make her scream. Make her BEG for mercy. But don't kill her."

He heard Magadan sigh at the other end. "Christ," Sorokin growled. "What?"

"We have no idea where she is," Magadan said. "After that govniuk Navarro showed up in Arizona and killed your men, their trail went completely cold. Your cars were found abandoned in Gallup, New Mexico, and we have no idea where they went after that."

Sorokin's fist clenched around the phone. "Nikita," he hissed, "I want you to listen to me VERY carefully. Perestan dedushkin huy sasat AND FIND THEM!"

With a wordless howl of rage, Sorokin pulled his arm back, and sidearm pitched the cell phone into the ocean. It arced up, and splashed down a good way out.

He shook his head and returned to his lounger. "Goddammit."

I just sit on the couch, facing Weevil. He hasn't said anything for nearly fifteen minutes.

When his phone rings, I nearly jump out of my skin, but he stays calm. Picking it up off the coffee table, he answers. "Bueno."

The look on his face doesn't change as he listens. "La casa esta destruido totalmente, ¿sí?" He is quiet for another moment. "¡¿Nadie estaba en la casa?" he explodes, without warning.

Weevil's head drops, and he hangs up the phone. "Mierda," he mutters.

I just shake my head. "You know, I'm not gonna say I told you so –"

"Then DON'T," he cuts me off, a fierce edge to his voice. "Here I'm tryin' to get this Russian piece of shit off your back, and you're givin' me shit."

"Weevil, blowing up Mikhail Sorokin's house isn't going to help me AT ALL," I shoot back. I feel like my blood is beginning to boil.

"You know what would've helped your cause?" Weevil growls. "If you hadn't gotten involved with this bullshit in the first place."

"Oh, so I was supposed to let him blow up Staples Center."

"No, you should've reined in Echolls a week and a half ago!" Weevil shouts. "If you hadn't let him go after that faggot at Hearst, you wouldn't even be involved with this fucking mess!"

"She was supposed to rein ME in?"

I turn to see that the noise has apparently attracted attention. Logan is standing at the base of the stairs, glaring at Weevil. "Do tell, Weevs. How was Veronica supposed to rein me in?"

"By taking hold of your dick and guiding you in another direction. As I understand it, that's your steering wheel," Weevil spits at Logan.

Logan's eyes flare and he begins to move toward Weevil. "ALRIGHT!" I shout, stepping between them. "That will be quite enough!"

I turn toward Logan. "Go back to bed."

"Veronica –"

"GO BACK TO BED, DEAR," I growl at him. "I will join you momentarily."

Logan growls wordlessly, but he turns and stomps back up the stairs. "And YOU!" I hiss at Weevil, rounding on him. "I appreciate what you're trying to DO, but would you for GOD's sake go to bed and stop trying to have people killed?"

His shoulders slump. "Whatever you say, V."

Six hours later, we're all sitting around the breakfast table. Logan and Weevil keep shooting looks of death at one another. Dick, Mac, and Parker are all blissfully ignorant of what occurred last night.

I finally fell asleep after the confrontation with Weevil and Logan – I think I got maybe four hours. It was filled with nightmares, so I really don't feel very rested. I've got prescription Xanax left over from when Mercer Hayes tried to rape me – I might be taking one of those later, along with a nice, long, dreamless nap.

As I sit there, sullenly contemplating my Cheerios, I think about how I got into this mess. Weevil was partially right – if I had kept Logan from going after Gory Sorokin in the Hearst Union, I probably wouldn't know anything about this. I would be blissfully ignorant myself.

But that wouldn't mean that Mikhail Sorokin wasn't going to blow up Staples Center. It's just that nobody would know about it.

I sigh and shake my head. I can feel tears building, but I'm doing my damnedest to hold them in. I'm just so sick of all this shit, you know? It's like somebody threw my life in the blender during my sophomore year of high school and set it on puree.

I spent the last two and a half years of high school as an outcast. I spent a year and a half trying to figure out who killed Lilly. I spent a year trying to cope with being raped. I spent a year trying to figure out who set off a bomb on a school bus. I spent a year catching a rapist and a murderer.

And now I'm on the run from a psychotic mobster who wants to kill 20,000 people to prove a point to Antonio Villaraigosa and Arnold Schwarzenegger. How, oh HOW did I wind up in this shit?

I'm so tired of it. I want, just for a little while, to have a normal life. I don't want my dad to be Sheriff Mars. I don't want Logan to be County Supervisor Echolls. I want them to just be Dad and Logan –

My little pity party is interrupted when Logan's chair falls over backward. He rockets to his feet and launches himself across the table toward Weevil. "LOGAN!" I scream, thinking that Weevil is about to get pummeled –

But just as quickly as Logan launches himself, his body jerks sideways and backward. He falls to the floor, Dick's arms wrapped around his body.

Weevil watches this all unfold, wide-eyed. I think he's slightly in shock at the unprovoked attack that Logan just launched, but as I watch, the corners of Weevil's mouth tick slightly upward.

I shoot him a dirty glare, as if to say, Stop enjoying this so much.

Meanwhile, Logan is standing up, and dusting himself off. "What the fuck, dude?" he asks Dick angrily.

"What the fuck yourself!" Dick shoots back. "Are you out of your damn mind?"

"Weevil and I have got issues, DICK," Logan growls.

"I could give a shit that you and Weevil have issues. Have you fucking forgotten that we're all on the run from some psychotic Russian? Have you forgotten that he has repeatedly tried to kill Veronica?" Dick's face has turned red with rage, and he's shaking now. "You need to FUCKING prioritize your SHIT, Logan!"

Okay. You can color me shocked. Dick Casablancas is the last person I expected to give Logan a dressing down like that. Apparently, Logan didn't expect it, either, because he's staring at Dick, his jaw hanging open.

The room is silent for a moment. Finally, Logan breaks the silence. "I'm going for a walk," he announces abruptly. He turns, kisses me briefly, and stomps toward the door.

"Yeah, me too," Dick snaps.

"Don't fucking follow me."

"Don't worry, asshole."

"Dickhead."

Logan blows through the door, while Dick stomps upstairs. "Dick!" Mac snaps, following him.

"Fuck a bunch of this shit," Weevil grumbles, heading out the door behind Logan. A moment later, I hear a motorcycle engine start up, and Weevil roars off.

I'm left sitting at the table with Parker. She's looking at me in shock. "Holy shit," she finally breathes.

I shake my head. I don't even know what to say.

SPANISH PHRASES
mátelos – kill them
mátelos todos – kill them all
queme la casa a la tierra – burn the house to the ground
no deje cualquier cosa vivo – don't leave anything alive
la casa esta destruido totalmente – the house is completely destroyed
nadie estaba en la casa – nobody was home

RUSSIAN PHRASES
yebanat – motherfucker
yebat vashu mat – damn it
sic sukam sim – son of a bitch
promudobliadskaja pizdoprojebina – fucking bitch
govniuk – shithead
perestan dedushkin huy sasat – stop sucking grandpa's dick