These are all excellent questions! Bear me with me as this is going to take three comments or something to post. :D
Why did you chose to start the story right after the (slightly reworked) events at the Russian Embassy?
I was looking for notes about this because I couldn't remember anything about why I did it except that I wanted to have a resolution to the Fowler situation that made sense to me, as opposed to the nonsensical craziness of canon. I found a part of chat that I'd saved where you and I had discussed this, and my reasoning was that I wanted Neal to be off-kilter already at the beginning of the story. Not only did he confront Fowler using violence, something he usually abhors, but he also got a resolution to what happened to Kate, which left him with a 'what now' sort of feeling. (Though, at the time, the idea was to have either Peter or Diana shoot Fowler in front of Neal – I'm not sure why I changed that, but I'm glad I did. I think it would have been too much.)
I love the extra level of tension created by including Rice in the story. How/why did you decide to include her?
Writing Rice is a ton of fun. She is a very specific type of antagonist that worked really well here because we already knew her dynamic with Peter and with Neal. Also, she was the only agent from Missing Persons that we knew, so it was natural to use her instead of creating someone new.
Also, I really wanted to write that interrogation scene between Rice and Neal. On the one hand, she's not really a fan of Neal's, but on the other, she has been working this case for a long time as a favor to Hughes, so she would have some sympathy for Neal and the situation.
no subject
Why did you chose to start the story right after the (slightly reworked) events at the Russian Embassy?
I was looking for notes about this because I couldn't remember anything about why I did it except that I wanted to have a resolution to the Fowler situation that made sense to me, as opposed to the nonsensical craziness of canon. I found a part of chat that I'd saved where you and I had discussed this, and my reasoning was that I wanted Neal to be off-kilter already at the beginning of the story. Not only did he confront Fowler using violence, something he usually abhors, but he also got a resolution to what happened to Kate, which left him with a 'what now' sort of feeling. (Though, at the time, the idea was to have either Peter or Diana shoot Fowler in front of Neal – I'm not sure why I changed that, but I'm glad I did. I think it would have been too much.)
I love the extra level of tension created by including Rice in the story. How/why did you decide to include her?
Writing Rice is a ton of fun. She is a very specific type of antagonist that worked really well here because we already knew her dynamic with Peter and with Neal. Also, she was the only agent from Missing Persons that we knew, so it was natural to use her instead of creating someone new.
Also, I really wanted to write that interrogation scene between Rice and Neal. On the one hand, she's not really a fan of Neal's, but on the other, she has been working this case for a long time as a favor to Hughes, so she would have some sympathy for Neal and the situation.