Clarice thought they had to be in the middle of bumblefuck nowhere. She had only seen a high volume of all-wooden buildings in small towns that she occasionally passed through when avoiding the major highways. Most of them were populated by country yokels, the kind of people who had little imagination for big city life and even less desire to be a part of it.

Hannibal Lecter had stopped at the edge of town and encouraged her to call two taxis- one for him and one for her. He wouldn't risk mixing with the population, he didn't want to be recognized. Clarice understood and also didn't want to be associated with the criminal the whole world had accused her of having a Bonnie-and-Clyde relationship with.

Clarice shuffled down the wide street, dodging horse poop and reading the ole-timey street signs lit only by hurricane lanterns. The longer she hiked through town the more she was impressed, it was a tourist trap that could have given Disney World a run for it's money.

"McCoy's Apothecary and Barber." Clarice read, laughing. In the script below she read, WE DO DENTISTRY TOO!

A few quaint homes were scattered between the buildings, some with horse-hitches and water troughs. She saw in the middle of town a bunch of horses tied up outside a building, it was one of the few that had paint and was higher than three stories. The sound of voices and piano music faintly reached her ears.

"Excellent." Clarice said, catching eye of the large "SALOON" sign. She was relieved whoever ran things in town hadn't packed up and gone home for the night.

Two men in full cowboy garb were talking outside and smoking cigarettes. She smiled at them as she walked past them. One of the men tilted his hat in greeting while the other shamelessly stared at her; he shifted in place as she walked past them to get a better look. It made her feel terribly self-conscious.

She pushed past the swinging bar-door, one of the panels had more spring than the other. The voices that floated through the air were suddenly cut off, like someone had pressed a mute button. A few tinny keys on the piano sang before joining the silence.

"Hi..." Clarice said, aware every eye was pointed in her directly. It was definitely a good thing Hannibal hadn't come with her. She wondered briefly if she had interrupted some sort of elaborate rehearsal. "I'm sorry, my car broke down...and...I need to use your phone."

A group of men in the back, who were a little too drunk, obnoxiously roared with laughter.

"What the hell...?" She heard a man to her right mumble to his friend. They were playing cards and in the middle dealing a hand. An old man with a leathery face still had a thumb on top of the deck, ready to flick another card to someone. Her sudden appearance had stopped the game completely.

She felt awkward and searched the room for a sympathetic face. It seemed to her that everyone was waiting for something to happen.

"I didn't mean to interrupt." She said.

"You didn't interrupt anything." One of the card-players said to her. He stood up from the table and nodded at her in greeting. The first thing Clarice noticed was his thick blonde mustache which was waxed to curl on the ends.

"Smitty, play the tune-box!" someone shouted from the stairs. The piano music began to play and the volume of conversation started up, but much more guarded.

"I'm lost." Clarice said, meaning the phrase in many different ways.

"You're welcome to stay here until you've found yourself." the man replied good-naturedly as he led her to the bar. She sat on a stool and he joined her.

"Forgive me for saying this, but ma'am, you're a little too pretty to be wearing pants, if you know what I mean." He said looking her up and down. He smelled like stale sweat and cigars, and Clarice noticed with some displeasure the dirty blonde hair that poked under the brim of his hat was plastered to his face by a thick layer of grease. "What's a girl like you doin' in her brother's clothes?"

"My brother's clothes?" Clarice repeated looking down at her outfit. She had gone out of the house in jeans and a gray blouse, very casual but hardly boy-clothes.

"Ah, you're a rancher, right? I don't blame you for being the practical type. Yeah, those frilly frocks aren't easy to ride in. Not that I'd know." He said winking at her. "Can I get you a drink?"

"I don't know who sounds crazier right now, me or you." Clarice mumbled.

"...I got myself an inkling." He said. He lifted his hand and caught the bartender's attention. Without a word the man behind the bar poured him a straight whiskey shot.

"Listen...you folks are impressive." Clarice said to him. "I can appreciate your dedication to your craft, but I need...like...real life help." She explained.

He looked around the saloon and leaned in towards her.

"Are you in trouble sweetheart?" He asked her flirtatiously, lifting up an eyebrow.

"I swear, I will put, like, a hundred dollars in your tip jar if you just lead me to a phone." Clarice begged him.

A skinny man with bright red hair and the loudest yellow-checkered suit Clarice had ever seen stepped between her and the greasy man she was talking to.

"Wheepin' Jesus," He said, his Irish accent ringing. "I thought you were scum for goin' after my sister, but tryin' to bed a poor lass touched in the head, you're a real piece of work Andy."

'Andy' huffed and drank his shot in one go. She saw him knock his shot glass against the bar, signaling the bartender to fill it up.

"Eh...she wasn't convinced." he said. "Maybe she's got more sense than she let's on."

"Okay." Clarice said taking a big calming breath. She was really hitting her limit for tolerating craziness. "Who is in charge here?"

"You mean sheriff?" Andy said, his helpful, eager tone completely gone.

"Yeah- whatever- the sheriff." Clarice replied.

"In the jailhouse I reckon." Andy said lighting up a smelly, half-burnt cigar. "Sleeping off a night of debauchery, most likely."

"Stop being an arse." The Irishman barked.

"Hey- come on-" Andy cursed as his friend pulled back a flap of his jacket to reveal a sheriffs star.

Clarice covered her face with her hands, feeling defeated.

"You're in charge?" She asked between her fingers.

"God damn Mick!" Andy cursed at the Irishman. "I don't want to deal with this loony tonight."

"You were already trying to deal with her and she asked for ya, boyo." He turned to her, offering a dirt-stained hand. "I'm Patrick McCoy."

"Patrick McCoy? You really don't shy away from stereotypes, do you?" She said, refusing to take part in his handshake. "Let me guess," she said dropping her hands on the bar and looking at the greasy man, "Andrew Cassidy?"

Andy turned to Patrick and raised both his palms up in the air.

"And what exactly am I supposed to do with her?" He asked.

"She's clearly out of her mind..." Patrick said softly. "She could be a danger to herself."

Andy leaned on the bar, looking past Patrick and into her eyes.

"Are you gonna start any trouble?" He asked her, his cigar ash falling onto the bar.

"…I just might if I don't get some straight answers." Clarice replied.

"See?" Andy said to Patrick removing his cigar from his mouth. He lifted up his shot glass. "Harmless." He said drinking his second shot.

Patrick pursed his lips together and left the bar with his own glass of liquor.

"I'm done with this." Clarice said standing up from her stool. Andy rested his head on his hand, watching her. "Do you have a phone in this toon-town or not?"

"Wretcher!" A man's voice roared from outside. Clarice saw a big man in a loose, stained confederate coat burst through the swinging bar-door. "I thought I'd find your drunk ass in here!" He snarled.

"Shit!" Andy hissed spinning on his stool and leaving his shot glass on the bar. "Can't a man enjoy a quiet drink on his birthday?" He mumbled.

"Take it outside, Andy." The bartender said nervously.

"No worries friend, I'm here for one man." The boisterous man said pointing a finger at Andy.

"Callaghan...Your cousin was a horse thief, and too shitty a card player to win his last five hands...I think he cheated most the people here three times over. So as far as I'm concerned, he got his just deserts eatin' my bullet." Andrew spoke loudly.

"That may be true, but he was still family." Callaghan snarled. "Blood is blood, Wretcher."

Clarice had spent a lot of time in gun training, and was certainly considered a crack-shot herself. Never in her life, even in training, had she seen a man draw a gun so fast. Andy drew from the hip and blasted three shots like a semi-automatic.

It was then Clarice second guessed herself. She knew what real gunshot sounded like and the familiar stench of gunpowder filled her nose.

She hadn't allowed herself to believe what all her senses confirmed. These people weren't play-acting. Those were real bullets being fired; the smoke rising into the air confirmed it.

People scrambled and tables were turning, Clarice saw a man jump over the bar and duck behind it. The confederate hadn't come alone and she saw other men jump in and fire what she recognized was shotguns.

Things were getting too dangerous, and there were too many people in the line of fire. Clarice saw a group of men run to the back of the room and slip through a back door. She would have to cross a large part of the bar to get there, but she wasn't going to sit in the middle of a fire-fight with no weapon.

She kneeled down and crawled between the tables, the sound of bullets whizzing by bring back unpleasant memories.

This is serious, they are shooting to kill.

She had to step over a man who passed-out and pissed himself to exit the back door. A few other people had followed her lead and were running away in different directions, presumably towards their homes.

In the distance, on what could be the only "hill" for miles, was a church with a graveyard. If she ran straight for five minutes she could reach it.

She was yanked roughly away from the exit and nearly fell face-first on the ground but was caught by a pair of strong arms.

"I heard gunfire." She heard Hannibal say. He was dragging her towards the church.

Her risk to exit the back couldn't have been timed better as she saw Andy exit with another pursuer close by. Without looking Andy pointed his gun behind him and shot his aggressor in the head. The villain dropped like a stone, his face slapping the ground.

That's real.

After a tense bout of running, they finally reached the church. The lock to the church door was broken, and Clarice suspected Hannibal had been the one to break it considering how well-kept the building seemed. He slipped inside, holding the door for her.

It was a moderately large building with smooth wooden pews. Long, thin windows let the moon-light in, and Clarice could see a red carpet that had been rolled over the wooden floorboards leading up to front of the raised platform. A large wooden cross hung behind the pulpit and there were no decorations anywhere except a single painting of Jesus praying.

Hannibal picked up a Bible that was resting on a table near the entrance and marched toward the cross. Clarice watched him stop just before the pulpit. He turned to her.

"Come here Clarice, my sweet lamb." He sang to her with a perverse smile.

The Bible was still in his hand, and she could see his eyes focused upon her, unblinking. She swallowed down her terror, determined not to allow him to have any power over her, and walked down the isle with a steady pace.

His eyes followed her all the way down the isle where he stood expectantly at the end.

"Why are we here?" Clarice asked, her eyes burning as she refused to blink. It was much more difficult than she thought.

"A very good question." He replied smoothly. "I don't believe we'll ever know, unless the divine wishes to inform us..." His eyes flickered toward the single painting of Jesus Christ, the only decoration besides the cross in the church.

Clarice was half-convinced the man praying in the painting would start speaking, as if Hannibal could command the impossible. She held her breath for a moment searching the praying Jesus for any signs of life. After a pause she looked back to Hannibal, who was studying her with wide, crazy eyes and smiling at her showing a row of his small white teeth.

"I'm afraid we haven't been on speaking terms for quite some time." He said to her.

She let out the breath she was holding. He had purposely worked her up, and of course she fell for it.

"So," He said tersely, cutting through the heavy, dramatic atmosphere he had created. "What have you concluded from your short visit into town, Clarice?"

"It's full of lunatics living in some wild west fantasy." She replied.

"All of them?" He questioned her.

She didn't respond, and he pulled back slightly.

"If neither we nor they are lunatics, what is another conclusion?" He asked.

"...That somehow we have been transported in the wild west." Clarice replied skeptically. "But I'm sure these people must be part of a cult or something."

"I'm sure we have somehow arrived at a different place in time." He replied. "It's unlikely we simultaneously hallucinated our reemergence in another location and unwittingly discovered a cult living a universal delusional fantasy devoted to the post-civil war era."

"And how is it as unlikely as time travel?" Clarice asked him. "Cults exist."

"So do mistakes." Hannibal replied. "Everything, from clothes, to the colloquialisms to diseases is authentic and without error. Every wooden construct I've observed has hand-forged nails." Hannibal replied. "That is just one example of the authenticity of this place."

She watched him carefully for an attempt to work her up like had with the speaking Jesus.

"So maybe they had an expert in all things 1800's, and put a lot of work into it." Clarice said. "Maybe they raided a museum."

"And the railroad?" Hannibal asked.

"What?"

"The railroad." He replied. "Where does it go? If I were a cult leader, I wouldn't make it so easy for my followers to move around. I also wouldn't waste millions of dollars on a railroad to nowhere."

"I don't know. Maybe no one rides it- maybe there's no train." Clarice replied desperately. "It is not a stretch of the imagination to believe these people are brainwashed!"

"They don't show signs of psychological coaching." He replied.

"They could be the offspring of a super-cult."

"How do you account for our being transported here?" He asked.

"I don't have any theories." She admitted. He folded his hands in front of him, the Bible still in his hand. "…Do you have a theory?" She asked him.

"Yes." He replied. She got the impression he had been waiting for her to ask for a while.

He showed her the Bible and opened it in half. Clarice saw he settled in the Psalms.

"This is 1866." He said showing the book to her. He flipped one of the paper-thin pages. "Think of each turning page as a year..." he explained. "I am the force that is making time go forward. It is always going forward, we are always leaving the past behind us."

He stopped flipping pages and picked up the side of the Bible that was "the past".

"Do you see how the pages have stacked on this side?" He asked her.

"Yes."

"I believe time is a tangible thing. Some claim it's an illusion, but it's not, we can measure it precisely, and events can be 'stacked'." He said to her.

"I follow you doctor." Clarice replied.

"We are experiencing time at a normal pace…" He said. "We are not living in a slower second or a faster minute. We haven't interrupted time or manipulated it. I believe somehow something has pierced a hole in the stack, and we have fallen through it."

"A hole in time?" Clarice asked incredulously. "In my shed?"

"Location may or may not have anything to do with it." he replied stoically.

"Okay…say I believe this theory. How do we climb out of this hole?" Clarice asked him.

He flipped the pages and looked up at her.

"What about going back to the shed?" Clarice said. "Can we jump out of this time-pit?"

"How do you jump forward 200 years?"

"I imagine it's the same way you fall back 200 years but in reverse."

He smiled, genuinely amused at her answer.

"I'm trying to keep an open mind, Doctor, but it's difficult." She said. "I still think there's a rational explanation."

"I am open to any theories you come up with." He replied.

She sighed, exhausted, and sat on a pew.

"Are you tired?" He asked her.

"Yes." She replied. "I was supposed to get drunk and eat smores, and stay up all night gossiping with my best friend. Tonight was supposed to be fun."

He put the Bible down on the pulpit and sat next to her.

"We can still have fun, Clarice." He said suggestively.

"We're in a church…" She groaned. "If it was God who threw us back in time, the last thing I want to do is piss Him off by defiling His house of worship."

"You believe in God, but claim time travel is impossible?" Hannibal asked her.

"Ugh, please leave me alone." Clarice said laying down on the pew.

"It's too late for that, I'm afraid." He said.

Wariness finally caught up with her, and she felt herself slipping into sleep.

"…You're going to feel so foolish if we find a phone." She said softly with a grin.

He was untying the laces on her boots and lifted her pant leg a little before removing them. He placed them neatly under the pew, and began to take off her socks.

"What are you doing?" She asked him.

"Helping you relax." He replied folding her socks and sticking them in her shoes.

He used both his hands to apply pressure on her left foot. He was stroking between the arch and the balls of her feet. It had been years since anyone had given her a foot massage, she had forgotten how much she missed physical contact.

"That feels amazing." Clarice moaned. "Please don't stop."

"…You make this very rewarding for me when you say things like that." He said seductively.

He spent a good five minutes on her left foot before switching to her right. Clarice was close to falling asleep on the hard wooden pew. After he was done massaging her feet she heard him get up and walk over to her. He lightly brushed a few strands of her hair with his hand and kissed her forehead tenderly before walking away.

Wow. He really can be sweet sometimes.

"I'm sure he's thought the same thing about his victims." said an ugly voice from the back her mind that sounded suspiciously like Jack Crawford. It completely ruined the moment.

She heard him laying down the pew next to her, and he breathed deeply before letting out a powerful sigh.

It was still dark when she woke up, which wasn't unusual for her because her body was still accustomed to getting up around 5 AM. What she wasn't used to was the aches and pains she got for sleeping on a narrow, hard pew. It took her a moment to massage the crick out of her neck.

The massage reminded her of last nights affair when Hannibal had rubbed her feet. She sat up and searched the pew next to her expecting to find him asleep. It was empty. She looked toward the pulpit but he wasn't there either.

Her shoes and socks were still under the pew and she was relieved Hannibal didn't hide them. After she put them on she searched all the pews just in case he had relocated in the middle of the night. She discovered she was alone.

What time does he get up?

She checked the windows before going outside, she didn't see him lingering anywhere. The graveyard was empty as well.

She had no choice, she was going to have to wander into town.

She had taken precautions not the take the main streets in town, but it was hardly necessary. She didn't run into anyone until she walked out of an alleyway connecting to the main street.

Patrick McCoy was leaning against a beam in front of the apothecary and barber shop. Clarice made the connection that he was the stores owner, his sign confirming it.

"Hey!" He called to her. He jogged to greet her. "We thought you ran off, glad to see you're okay." He said running a quick eye over her.

"More or less." Clarice replied guarded.

"Um..I don't want you getting the impression that shooting up the place is a regular event." He said self-consciously. "This is a nice town, I promise."

"Last night I saw your sheriff shoot a man dead." She replied.

"The bastard had it coming." Patrick shrugged.

"Ever heard of due process?" Clarice asked.

He didn't seem to have an answer for her. Clarice sighed.

"Have you seen anyone pass through this way? I got separated from my...friend." Clarice said.

"You mean your husband?" Patrick asked.

"What?" Clarice asked frowning. "My husband?"

"He's in the pub, patchin' up the wounded." Patrick told her, nodding his head toward the saloon.

Suddenly it made sense. Patrick's insistence that the town was a great place to live and his interest for her welfare wasn't entirely based on gentlemanly concern. He was trying to get her to stay and most likely trying to recruit Hannibal into their cult as well. Clarice couldn't let that happen.

She wondered if the man in the eccentric suit before her could turn violent if she tried to break his delusion. She had been surprised by people before.

"Thanks." Clarice said politely. She didn't want to talk to him anymore or give him the opportunity to suck her into a conversation. Instead, she left him quickly and turned around to see if he was following her. He smiled and waved goodbye.

People were starting to spill into the street, especially as she made her way to the saloon. She felt exposed as the locals eye-balled her, none of them called out a greeting to her like Patrick had done. She wasn't sure if she was thankful or not for their off-putting demeanor.

As Clarice entered the saloon she found ten people laying on the ground, all of them in various stages of injury. Hannibal was bent over a man who Clarice assumed had caught a bullet in the leg and was wrapping a bandage around it tightly. An old bandage was disregarded at his feet, blood and puss tainting it.

"Hello, husband." Clarice said to him, trying to throw as much distain in the word as she could.

Hannibal's clever face turned to her, and she could see a smile forming.

"Ah...my lovely wife." He replied pleasantly.

It was Sheriff Andy that Hannibal was tending to, and Clarice heard him groan. Hannibal had just finished changing the bandage on his leg.

Andy sat up, he was shirtless and the bandage on his shoulder needed changing.

"You're married?" Andy asked her, disappointment heavy in his voice. "Could have told me that before I almost bought you a drink."

"I'm sorry sheriff, I just found out myself." Clarice replied shooting Hannibal a meaningful look that he didn't seem to notice.

"Forgive my wife, she's prone to female hysteria." Hannibal said to Andy.

'Female hysteria' Clarice mouthed at Hannibal furiously.

"Yeah...looks like she's got it bad." Andy said sympathetically.

"I haven't been able to give her the proper attention she deserves, and you can see how it's affected her." Hannibal said sadly.

You son of a bitch.

"That's terrible, Doctor." Andy said.

"Yes, it seems we've had nothing but bad luck since we arrived." Hannibal sighed. "We lost everything in a bandit raid, and it's strained my wife's nerves considerably."

"I'm sure we can find a place for you here." Andy said. "It's the least we can do."

"Thank you sheriff for your kindness, we're very grateful." Hannibal replied.

"No." Clarice said fiercely. "We really have to be moving on."

"Don't be ridiculous, Clarice. We don't have any money or supplies." Hannibal said. He was patronizing her. "How could we possibly move on?"

They both watched her, pity etched on their faces.

"Bite me." Clarice fumed at Hannibal. As she left she made sure to shove the swinging-bar door with all her might, causing it to noisily squeak behind her.

Once again she was fighting Hannibal Lecter for control.

Authors Note:

I know, I know, the story-line is eccentric. Still, I am very excited to be writing it and I hope you all are just as thrilled to read it.

My road rash is healing (finally), thank you for asking Katrina! It's a relief to see it scar over, because I wasn't sure if the deepest burn in my arm would.

I know I'm pumping out these chapters pretty fast. That may or may not be the case next week because I will be going on vacation in New Orleans with my best buddy. She's a writer as well, so it's entirely possible we'll be spending long hours in a car scribbling dialog and bouncing ideas off each other. I could be posting a new chapter every night or not at all. You know how it is on vacation.

Anyway, please review and let me know what you think of the story so far. I am really interested- and appreciate- your feedback.