Mercer Hayes

A slippery guy, this one. When Mercer first showed up, we assumed he was some sort of late-teen version of Eddie Mars, what with running a casino and being somewhat of a bad influence on our main character's love. When he was suspected of the serial rapes at Hearst and it turned out he kept GHB in his cashbox, we guessed he might be a college-situated Pin, only without an affliction and an overly violent sidekick, and his claim to have the dean and the president of Pi Sigma Sigma indebted to him certainly seemed to confirm that he possessed that sort of influence.

After Veronica, urged by a conflicted but loyal Logan, who could provide Mercer with a solid — and sordid — alibi for one of the rapes, dug up proof that he had been broadcasting his call-in radio show during two of the other assaults, we were pretty convinced that he wasn't another Waldo Lydecker and that for once there was actually a bad boy besides Logan in Neptune who wasn't wholly depraved.

But alas, it wasn't to be: Mercer not only turned out to be the rapist, he was also revealed to be yet another "guard" from Dr. Kinny's prison experiment who had gone psycho and subjugated his "prisoner," RA Moe Slater, to do his bidding. Moe complied all too willingly for a bit of hair — ew — and tough love — ...no comment — going even as far as drugging and attacking Veronica in the parking lot while Mercer was still imprisoned. Feel like screaming yet?

Don't worry, there's more, for Mercer's tendency to evilly monologue while choosing the background music for his rapes and his obsessively vain attitude made us finally decide that the most fitting comparison might be Patrick Bateman — although we are pretty sure everyone's favorite yuppie killer wouldn't have been thwarted by a combination of a unicorn, a brave girl, and an incompetent minion who didn't think it might be worthwhile to turn off his cell phone. How inconvenient when things don't go according to plan, just because other people are being inconsiderate!

Whether Mercer will have ample opportunity to try out a whole new side of Moe's beloved prison experience remains to be determined, since the last time we saw him, he was stuck in a cell with Moe — and an extremely enraged Logan Echolls, who seems to be all too willing to unleash some Aaron-style "justice" on his "friend." That should be quite a first-class horrorshow, Mercer, o my little brother. Wanna bet?

And here we thought we were finished with the sleek but sleazy one, but no, there is even more to Mercer's tawdry tale: apparently his sociopathic urges were so overwhelming that he not only returned to Neptune from a trip to Mexico to rape Lilith house member and "Take Back the Night" activist Nancy, but he even raced back to Tijuana to awaken poor Logan with a crisply burning motel — and all of that in the course of one night! We might see this as a sign that Mercer really is a psychotic version of Impulse The Flash — after all it wouldn't be the first time that a young man connected to that character turned out to be all-out evil — but that might be wrapping things up a little too neatly, don't you think?