Veronica sneaks into her bedroom and fills a bag with some clothes. She's trying to sneak back out when Keith comes out of his bedroom and wonders what she's been doing. He mentions he called Logan and Logan didn't know where Veronica was either. Veronica brings up the fact Keith didn't come home the night before either, and says she's staying in Wallace's room so Keith can be "happy". Keith says what he does with his life is his choice, and Veronica says, "This is mine", before leaving.
In Wallace and Piz's room, Veronica, just out of the shower and wearing a T-shirt and shorts, starts to search in a closet, which has a mirror, and she soon realizes Piz is there. She asks what he's doing there; dumbfounded, he points out it's *his* room. When she clarifies she thought he and Wallace were studying in a hotel room together, like in The Paper Chase, he says Wallace was letting the tension get to him and he needed to get out. Piz then asks Veronica what she's doing there, and she says Wallace offered her the room while he and Piz were at the hotel. Piz asks why she's there, and Veronica doesn't answer, but makes to leave until Piz says she can stay.
In the hallway of the dorm, Moe is walking towards his room when he sees Meryl (Amanda Walsh) sitting on the floor with a backpack. He asks her what's going on, and she says she's waiting for her boyfriend, who hasn't shown up.
Back in Wallace and Piz's room, Veronica is working on her laptop while Piz pretends to be reading a book while staring at Veronica. Moe knocks on the door, and asks Piz if he's seen his neighbor Sully, introducing Meryl as Sully's girlfriend. Meryl says Sully was supposed to pick her up from the airport, and it's not like him to flake out on her. Moe and Piz both look at Veronica, and she gives a resigned sigh before saying she'll see what she can find out.
Moe opens up Sully's room and they all go in. Veronica notes all the pictures of women, but Meryl says they belong to Glen, Sully's roommate. She asks Veronica if she does "this" a lot, finding people, and Veronica distractedly says she does. Moe discovers Sully's toothbrush and razor are still there, and Veronica finds a school "Who's Who" book with a circle around the name Scarlet Reyes. Veronica asks Meryl if she knows who that is, and why Sully would be circling the names and faces of "hotties". Meryl doesn't know Scarlet, and claims Sully's "circles" aren't like that. Veronica looks unconvinced, but when Meryl says she's just going to sit in the room and wait for Sully, Veronica says she'll check back with her after she's done with class. Before she leaves, however, Veronica has a thought, and digging through a wastebasket, she finds a credit card receipt, and says she'll check it out.
In Veronica's criminology class, Dr. Landry gives them the topic for their end-of-term research paper; planning the perfect murder. He says it's due a week before finals, and must be 20 pages long, but they can choose whoever they want as the victim, and to the class' amusement, he admits he's been a popular target in years past. Veronica muses at how Dr. Landry is just one of the men in her life who's been disappointing her, and she's not surprised when he asks to speak with her after class. She is, however, surprised at why; he's recommending her for a summer internship at the FBI, and says she can write a 1500-word essay on why she'd benefit from the program in lieu of the term paper. He also says he has a friend at Quantico who runs the intern program and on Landry's recommendation, Veronica would make the short list. Veronica thanks him, but muses that Landry's bribing her to not say anything about him and Mindy.
Logan is sitting in the quad area when Veronica walks up to him. She tells him she'll see Mercer when Lamb allows it, which is the next morning, but Logan doesn't want to talk about that; he just wants to make things right with her. She wonders how things can be right when he tells her Mercer is innocent of rape but won't say how he knows. Logan says he thought Veronica's desire to catch the real rapist would outweigh any hurt feelings she has towards him, but Veronica scoffs it's not the case. Logan, struggling to keep his temper in check, pleads with her to have faith, but Veronica can't understand what would be so bad that Mercer would rather be in jail than spill the secret. Changing tactics, Logan mentions Keith calling him looking for her, and asks where she was. Defiantly, Veronica says she's keeping her whereabouts a secret as well.
Veronica drops by Sully and Glen's room, but Meryl hasn't heard anything yet. Meryl wants to go to the police, but Veronica says they don't investigate missing person cases until they've been missing 48 hours, and mentions Lamb's a tool. However, while the credit card search came up empty, she gets the idea of listening to his cell phone messages. Almost all of them are from Meryl, wondering where Sully is, except for the last one, which is of Scarlet Reyes, wondering if he's still on for tomorrow night at the food court, and if she told his girlfriend. Meryl wonders what that's about, and Veronica can't believe how naive she's being.
The next morning, Veronica visits Mercer at the sheriff's department. He asks what she's doing there, and she says Logan asked her to prove his innocence. He won't reveal what he and Logan were doing that night (though he admits Logan is a "stand-up guy"), but does talk about the cologne Parker reacted to and the GHB and clippers Lamb found. He says the cologne was a sample from GQ magazine, the clippers (and the cologne) are things a lot of guys he knows has, and he claims the GHB isn't his. Mercer also claims Chip Diller and Dean O'Dell (who uses a student aide to bet on boxing) owe him a lot of money, and the dean in particular wants him closed down, so they could be setting him up. Veronica says she'll look into it, and Mercer thanks her.
Veronica drops by Sully's room, and Meryl wonders if maybe Sully, who's working on lasers in physics, has maybe accidentally discovered new technology like a laser cannon that could kill people from space. Veronica sighs at Meryl's naivete, and brings up Occam's Razor; her point is the simplest explanation is that Sully simply wanted to break up with her and is taking the coward's way out. Just then, the door opens, and Glen (Charlie Weber), Sully's roommate appears. He says he was gone because Sully asked him to leave for the weekend. He also claims Sully said he was going surfing (Meryl doesn't believe it), and mentions a huge fight Sully had with Meryl over the phone. Veronica's eyes narrow and she looks at Meryl.
Harmony comes by Mars Investigations, and Keith greets her. Harmony says what happened happened, although Keith isn't sure it was right. Harmony reminds Keith she's in a loveless (and sexless) marriage, and says she's going to leave her husband. She also invites him to Palm Springs for the weekend. They smile at each other, and Harmony walks out of the office a few seconds later, passing Vinnie, who's sitting on the couch in the waiting area. He recognizes her, and she freezes momentarily before leaving. Vinnie then drops in on Keith, who naturally wants to know why he's there. Vinnie says he's working for the Fitzpatricks, and they still want to know where Kendall is and where the money she stole is. He offers to split the retainer if Keith gives him the information. Keith says he doesn't know where Kendall is, so Vinnie tosses him an envelope of pictures he took of Keith and Harmony together, and offers the "Vinnie special" to keep the photos under wraps. Vinnie, who's been smiling the whole time, gets serious and says, chillingly, "Sound like a deal, Keith?" Keith doesn't respond.
That night, Veronica and Meryl stake out the food court. Veronica can't believe Meryl didn't mention the fight she had with Sully; Meryl says it wasn't a big deal, just the usual long-distance relationship jitters, and she's not suspicious. They see Scarlett (Sandra McCoy) walk in. Veronica thinks they should wait to see if Sully comes in, but Meryl can't wait, and marches over to where Scarlett is sitting, with Veronica reluctantly following. Meryl introduces herself to Scarlett, who says she's meeting Sully to study and she hasn't seen him since physics lab the other day. Veronica snarks on Scarlett's outfit, and Scarlett says she's going to a club afterwards. Veronica accuses Scarlett of stealing Sully from Meryl or wanting to, and tells Meryl she can be a patsy or choose not to be one. As she's saying this, Veronica sees Dr. Landry, and excuses herself. She goes up to Landry and tells him thanks but no thanks, as she's going to write the term paper instead. Landry doesn't understand why, so she slowly tells him she doesn't want to feel like she's been bought off, especially since she had no intention of telling anyone about him and Mindy. Landry, however, asks that Veronica take the internship and he insists he doesn't care what Veronica saw at the Neptune Grand; all that matters to him is Veronica should get a chance to live up to her potential. Veronica admits her mind is blown, and is further confused when she sees Meryl hugging Scarlett.
That night, Piz walks into his room to find Veronica working on her laptop at Wallace's desk and Meryl asleep in Piz's bed. Veronica explains Meryl is worked up about not finding Sully, and needed a double dose of cold medicine to get to sleep and stop crying. Veronica suggests he sleep on the floor; Piz grumbles that Keith Richards wouldn't sleep on the floor, but says he will when he gets back from doing Club Flush, which he's covering for Mercer. Veronica becomes interested and says she'll go with Piz...
...and at the Hearst radio station, Veronica looks at the computer there and sees the schedule, which shows Mercer was in fact doing a show the night Parker was raped (Piz didn't know Parker was raped). Veronica also discovers the show happened the night Stacy was raped; she wonders if Mercer pre-recorded his show, but Piz points out it's a call-in request show.
Later, Veronica goes to Logan's hotel suite. She says she has proof Mercer didn't rape the other girls, and it doesn't involve what he did with Logan in Mexico, but she still wants to know what happened. Logan wants to know why Veronica can't just trust him, but she tearfully tells him she's not built that way. Logan admits they were in Tijuana, partying, and when they got back to their hotel rooms, Mercer had girls in his room and he was making flaming DPs - rum and amaretto set on fire in a shot glass and then dropped in a beer - when he accidentally set his room on fire. Logan says he was asleep at the time, but he was in the adjoining room next to Mercer's, so he heard the fire spread. Veronica scoffs that Logan could have told this all to Lamb, but Logan admits he and Mercer fled the scene rather than help anybody with the fire, and he felt ashamed. Veronica, still gutted, tells him tightly to have Lamb check Mercer's schedule at the radio station, and leaves.
The next morning, Meryl wakes up Veronica and tells her she got a message from Sully on her cell phone, and it was from his cell phone. Veronica says they can track him if the phone is still on, but she needs to stop by Keith's office first. Piz wakes up from sleeping on the floor and groggily asks for breakfast.
At Mars Investigations, Keith finds Veronica looking for the cell phone tracker. He says he knows she's disappointed, but wants a chance to explain. As she finds what she's looking for, Veronica points out he sounds like all of the people he's taken on as clients, and wonders if it would have been okay if Jake Kane and Lianne had said they had something special. She says she's seen too much to be surprised anymore. Keith responds she shouldn't be that jaded; Veronica responds she didn't used to be, and she used to have "a shining example that gave me faith." She storms off, and Keith, close to tears, watches.
In Veronica's car, she tells Meryl she ran Sully's credit card, and there's a bunch of charges that all occurred in the neighborhood they're in. They track Sully's phone signal to the River Stix, which Veronica notes with a wry chuckle. As Veronica parks the car, Meryl wants to go in, but Veronica points out the last time she was there, Logan had to pull a gun on the owner to get her out of there. She says they should call Lamb; Meryl remembers Veronica called him a moron, but Veronica admits at least Lamb is armed. While Veronica is on the phone, Meryl gets out of the car and runs towards the bar. Veronica has no choice but to follow.
Inside the bar, Meryl asks Danny Boyd if he's seen Sully. Danny says he hasn't. Veronica comes in and tells Meryl they need to go. Danny recognizes Veronica and asks what makes her think Sully was there. Veronica is scared, but manages to snark, "You're sitting on it, Potsie", pointing out the goods that he bought on Sully's credit card. Danny denies it, but Veronica dials Sully's cell phone number, and a phone in the bar rings. Just then, Liam sneaks up behind her, picks her up, and starts swinging her around, saying he's going to get revenge on her for Keith not telling him where Kendall and her money are. Meryl tries to hit Liam with a beer bottle, but Danny easily disarms her. Just then, Vinnie stumbles over and takes a picture of Liam and Veronica with his cell phone. He crows about e-mailing the picture to Keith. He gets ready to take another one when Liam knocks the phone away. However, Liam does put Veronica down, Meryl grabs her, and they run out of the bar.
Outside, Veronica is still shivering from her encounter with Liam when Vinnie runs up to her and Meryl. He jokes about her leaving without thanking him, but motions they should walk further away before they talk. Once they get to Veronica's car, Vinnie admires Veronica's car before asking Veronica what she was thinking by going inside. Veronica admits she didn't intend to, and asks Vinnie if he really sent Keith a picture. Vinnie admits his cell phone wasn't capable of taking pictures, much less sending them; he also tells Meryl Sully came into the bar the night before looking wasted, Danny took his wallet and made Sully buy all the stuff charged to his card before kicking him out. Before leaving, Vinnie guesses Sully is now in the drunk tank...
...and sure enough, when Meryl and Veronica go to the sheriff's department later, Lamb tells Meryl Sully is there. He assumed, since he was drunk and didn't have any ID that he was just another partying kid until Lamb saw the lump on the back of his head the next morning, which he apparently got from surfing. Lamb says he'll let Meryl see Sully in a minute. Before they go in, Veronica apologizes for getting the wrong idea about what happened with Sully, but Meryl tells her not to worry, and she wouldn't have found Sully without her. Meryl rushes up to the cell and Sully (Michael Grant Terry), who's still dazed but is overjoyed to see her, greets her. Lamb comes in and says Meryl can join Sully when Sachs takes him to the hospital. Meryl says goodbye to Veronica and leaves with them. Veronica starts to walk out when she sees Mercer being led back to his cell. He thanks Veronica for getting Logan to talk to the sheriff, but says Lamb wants to keep him as long as he can because he doesn't like Mercer's attitude. Mercer tells her Logan is picking him up the next morning and invites her to join them at breakfast, but Veronica turns him down.
Meanwhile, Harmony drops by Mars Investigations, ready for the weekend in Palm Springs, but Keith tells her he can't, and both of them start to cry.
Sometime later, Keith is still in the office when Logan calls, looking for Veronica. Keith admits she's hiding from him as well, and suggests he try Wallace's room.
In fact, Veronica is in the food court, and is about to eat when she notices a hair in her food. Leaving her drink on the table, she brings the food up to the counter and complains, so she gets a replacement meal. A little later, she's back at the table, taking sips of her drink, and checking her cell phone, which contains numerous messages from Logan, as well as one from Keith, who says he ended things with Harmony and wants her to come home. She smiles and starts to eat, but notices the room is getting blurry.
Logan stops by Piz and Wallace's room. Piz answers, and says Veronica hasn't been there since early that morning, and Wallace has been studying all week. Logan looks into the room, and asks Piz to tell Veronica he was looking for her.
Veronica staggers towards her car in the parking garage. She's in enough possession of her faculties to know she's been drugged, and can sense someone in the garage watching her, but she's still disoriented, and stumbles and falls, her keys dropping to the ground. Before losing consciousness, she manages to set off her car alarm; Logan, who's near the garage, hears the alarm and starts to rush down. A person wearing white gloves grabs her keys and turns the alarm off. By this time, Logan has reached the garage, and starts walking slowly towards where he heard the sound coming from. He sees Veronica on the ground and rushes over to her. He picks her up and cradles her as she weakly asks for him to take her home. As he continues to cradle her, Logan is horrified to discover some of her hair is on the ground, and she has a bald spot on the back of her head.
Later that night, Veronica wakes up on a couch in the Mars apartment to discover Keith giving her medicine while Logan looks on, concerned. Veronica makes a face but swallows the medicine. Sometime later, Veronica wakes up again, only it's morning. She sees Logan is asleep, holding her feet, and Keith is asleep on an armchair.
This episode contains examples of:
- Even Evil Has Standards: Again, Vinnie's more sleazy than evil, but while he's not above blackmailing Keith, he rescues Veronica from getting attacked by Liam, and as a bonus, even tells her and Meryl what happened to Sully and where he is.
- Foreshadowing: Veronica's proposed internship, Mercer's Club Flush alibi and Veronica getting drugged and having some of her hair cut off all become important later.
- Idiot Ball: Upon realizing she's been drugged, Veronica opts not to go back to the crowded cafeteria, but to continue to her car, apparently still fully intent on driving back home.
- Ironic Echo: Logan tells Veronica, "It's better for everyone if the secret stays that way" to justify his not telling her Mercer's alibi. Veronica uses the exact same phrase when she refuses to tell Logan where she's staying.
- Literary Allusion Title: The episode title is a play on Of Mice and Men.
- Oh, Crap!: Veronica's reaction when Meryl goes into the River Stix alone.
- Playing Drunk: Vinnie does this in order to fake taking a picture of Liam attacking Veronica.
- Shout-Out: Piz says, "All work and no play makes Wallace psychotic".
- Vinnie invokes Let's Make a Deal as he's about to blackmail Keith.
- When Piz discovers Meryl sleeping in his bed, Veronica says, in her best Austin Powers voice, "Yeah, buddy!"
- Veronica jokingly asks if Piz and/or Meryl want an "orange whip".
- When Veronica sees Sully's cell phone signal is coming from the River Stix, she says with a sigh, "Of all the gin joints in all the cities in all the world.".
- Slipping a Mickey: Someone slips GHB into Veronica's drink, though we don't find out who (yet).
- Warts and All: Veronica learns to feel this way about Keith and Logan, as well as Landry.
- Waxing Lyrical: Piz points to his guitar, which is on his bed, and says, "That's where it gently weeps".
- Wide-Eyed Idealist: Meryl, though Veronica at first thinks she's more Stupid Good.
