I threatened to do this a long time ago, and here it is: a crossover between The Silence of the Lambs and Once Upon a Time in Mexico. If you haven't seen the latter, I should warn you, this contains MAJOR spoilers. (Also contains violence, bloodshed, bad language, and sex. What did you expect from a hybrid like this?)

RC, former colleague of Agent Sands and CEO of Millennium Consulting, first appeared in "Darkness Bound", which chronicles the events immediately following OUaTiM and details the raid on a drug-processing facility. Later, RC reappeared as Kate Martin's boss in "If You Give a Grizzly Bear a Bear" and "Twilight Reflections".

Why Kate Martin? Because I'm one of those people who likes to speculate what happened next, and it seemed to me that for a pivotal charecter, hers was the least developed personality in the whole film. I started thinking about how she might've changed as a result of her experiences, and things got interesting.

Dates and technology: Consider this slightly AU from the original, set a few years in the future, so you can suspend disbelief about any gadgets that might not exist in the here and now. Nothing too wild, but I don't think fiber optics is quite ready to give us Personal Self-Contained Sonar, for instance.

My plan was to post a chapter a day during the month of February. It worked pretty well.

And if any of you think I own anything but the electrons I'm composing it with, you can send your donations to my account.

Enjoy.

Prologue...Going South

I'm up a lot earlier than usual for a Saturday morning; there was a tasty estate sale out in the wilds of Terhune County and after plundering that at the crack of dawn, I'm performing a navigation experiment in the Chrysler. A navigation experiment: you know, where you've got a map and onboard GPS, so you can make a left turn instead of a right, just to see where it takes you. I have a good idea whereabouts I am, to within a couple of miles-not too far from the airfield where RC's friend Lee keeps his Cessna. I'm either on County Road 12, or Hen Run Road. There's a crossroads up ahead, and I'm dropping the velocity of the 300 as my phone rings.

"Talk to me!" I sing out, hitting the speaker button.

"Trouble in Mexico," says my boss tersely. "How soon can you make it out to Lee's?"

I peer up at the sign, grin and hang a right, peeling out. "What's up?"

"I had a call for help from Lucifer. I've got a meet with the guy from Berne at two. I can't just drop that, but I don't think it can wait eight hours until I'm free."

The 300 is doing 65 down the rutted dirt road and shimmying like an exotic dancer. "Did he say what was going on?"

"Something about being followed. We were cut off."

"That doesn't sound good," I say, dropping into neutral and putting the car into a slide that spins me off the road and onto the trail to the airfield. Popping it back into fifth, I vroom into the parking lot and skid to a stop.

"So, how soon can you be-?"

"I'm there." I cut the engine and pop the trunk. "Keep me posted if you hear anything." It's a good thing I keep a bag packed in the trunk at all times. Hopefully, my estate sale booty will be okay until I get back. I'd hate to try to find another set of longhorns...these are going to be the perfect Christmas present for somebody special.

"Let's get this show on the road!" I holler as I enter the office. Lee grabs a stack of maps and charts off the desk and glares at me as he locks the building behind us.

Lee and I do not get along too well. He's in his mid-fifties, favors loud tropical print shirts-and I once threatened to shoot him four hours into a nine-hour flight if he attempted to put in another Jimmy Buffett CD. A quick trip to Margaritaville, fine. The complete works, consecutively? Uh, no. This might not have worked, except that I have a pilot's license (Expired, but I know how to fly, okay?) and he knows I could and would be capable of popping a cap in him and landing the plane afterward. We compromised with some Skynard-yes, I'm aware of the irony, thanks-and he's been wary of me ever since.

This time I've got my iPod along, so I can quietly contemplate my rescue mission, if that's what this is, without having to deal with flyboy's agitation.

The guy with the code name Lucifer worked with RC at the CIA a long time ago. I don't know all the details-they had a major falling out, and then Lucifer got in touch a few months ago, needing help to put the whammy on some drug lords. I came into it after the fact, running courier with some hard- and software.