Tayanna walked casually farther into the park. She felt exposed in the lawn, and the city streets offered little more cover. In situations like this Tayanna missed her native Mexico. Her wooded and mountainous home was rife with places to conceal herself. As usual, her xolos adapted more quickly. She knew the man following her would never see el Sombre until the end of this situation was a forgone conclusion.

Fiel stopped suddenly, intently sniffing the ground, her eyes glancing behind Tay. "Yes, I know" Tay murmured, and knelt, pretending to examine a small plant, just sprouting through the damp spring earth, just catching a glimpse of her tail, who ducked suddenly behind a grouping of tree trunks, too suddenly for her to make out the identity of her follower. Her hand slid into her pocket, her index finger feeling for the trigger of her small pistol. She rose slowly and turned. El Sombre trotted casually in a wide circle back toward their follower while Fiel stuck closely to Tayanna's side.

Tay walked into the pink sky over Grant Park. She followed the dogs across Michigan Avenue,and into the park. Her Xolos' breath showed like animated cobwebs in front of their faces as they trotted together, investigating, over the damp lawn. They did not seem to mind the cold air. Tay tightened her scarf. She turned south towards Balbo and the sculptures in the park. She sometimes could not believe that she lived in the center of a huge city, amid millions of people, thousands of miles away from where she lived, used to live.

Tayanna rolled up the delivery gate of the Monadnock building and braced against the pre-dawn Chicago cold. Would she ever get used to this weather? she wondered as she shivered and scurried down the alley, Fiel and el Sombre at her heels. She reviewed yesterday's encryption lessons in her mind as she walked through the deserted downtown streets toward the park. "e4 c5 Nf3 d6 Bb5+ Bd7 Bxd7+ Qxd7 c4 Nc6 Nc3 Nf6 0-0 g6 d4 cxd..." cipher wasn't her strong suit, but her marksman skills were improving fast and she loved the hand-to-hand classes. She remembered yesterday's near defeat of Atticus with pride. "Soon I will beat him and I will be champion!" The train clattered noisily overhead as she neared the park.

Chapter one of Apon Descending begins with the murder of Gordy Moot. Detective Simon Ash, along with another Detective, Morgan Ferris, who’s trying to horn in, begin their investigation. A mysterious series of arsons and murders follows, including the murder of Ash, when a bomb planted in his car explodes. Just moments before his murder, we had learned that Ferris and Ash are married. Meanwhile, a stranger surrounded in mystery wanders into the town of Apon named Jackson Moot, the nephew of Gordy, the first victim. Moot and Ferris begin investigating the series of crimes together and, along with Faye Valentine, who was working undercover in Apon as a forensics investigator, uncover the cause for all the mayhem buried deep below the town. Mystery solved, Ferris decides to join MASK and heads for Mexico.

In chapter two, MASK operatives Jackson Moot, Faye Valentine, Rook, and newly minted member Morgan Ferris are hired to cross the border to fight the Mexican drug cartels. Ferris quickly identifies a potential switch agent - 14 year old orphan and la Familia lieutenant Tayanna. Always accompanied by her two Xolo hounds Fiel and el Sombre, with whom she has an uncanny ability to communicate telepathically, it remains unclear until the end of the mission exactly whose side she’s on. After an early bloodbath, Moot is pulled from the mission leaving the mysterious Knight, along with veteran operators Valentine, Rook, Ferris, and Tayanna to finish the job.