There used to be a great antique-looking clock in the living room of the cabin, whose soothing tick-tock punctuated young Sara's daily activities – reading by the fireplace, inventing games, using every object in the room as playmates – and which actually signaled each passing hour with a majestic dong, a sound Sara had only heard before in historical movies.

Now the clock had been broken for close to eight years, still it remained on the wall, hanging proudly, an odd piece of decoration.

Sara couldn't help but casting darting glances at it, though it no longer told the time, and though knowing the time wouldn't be a great improvement to her situation.

The tape around her wrists had started sawing through the skin. She couldn't tell whether she was to blame – she hadn't dared fighting against the bonds because there was always an inmate watching, but she supposed she might have struggled in her sleep.

The man who was currently watching her – Fernando Sucre, if memory served – was walking into minute circles round and round the room. Though he was brawny like Lincoln, heftier than Michael, she found him perhaps the least intimidating of all three. John Abruzzi was far worse, to be put in another box altogether than his fellow convicts. But there was something about Sucre, less cryptical, more honest than the others. He was sweating and forever running his hand over his shaved scalp. Afraid, as they all were, but incapable to mask it.

It didn't make Sara any less wary, of course. It's the ones that are the most scared that are the most unpredictable.

It'd be ridiculous for either of them to make conversation yet Sara found the tense silence between them just as unbearable. In the end, it was because of the transparency in Sucre's face that Sara realized something she'd been missing before.

Fernando Sucre threw regular glances at the window, not with paranoid apprehension but genuine fear. There's something out there, she thought, something in the woods that scares them more than the police.

Sara could remember the group had been talking about another inmate but not what they'd said about him. At the time, she'd been a little busy crawling from her bedroom floor to the bathroom window. What name had they said? It hadn't sounded like any that belonged to the Fox River eight. Tee-something. Raking her memory for the last news report, she searched for the faces and names of the four other escapees. The only one that came back was Benjamin Franklin – because come on, how could she not have remembered that?

Sara emerged from her thoughts. Sucre had started cursing in Spanish.

"Is there –" She heard herself say. The words travelled painfully up. Her throat was dry, tasted of blood and bile. "Is there someone else, out in those woods?"

Sucre stopped walking into circles, meeting her gaze with eyes that looked taken aback and yes, actually a little afraid. "No." He said, but then didn't seem to see the point in lying. "There better not be. No, I mean – there's no chance he actually made it."

The pieces came together slowly. Sara didn't see what else to do but put them together. "You didn't just come here to hide from the cops. You fought with one of the people who escaped with you, right?"

"I, huh –"

"Which one was it?"

"Doesn't matter."

The answer didn't come from Sucre and it startled them both. Lincoln Burrows was standing by the door, which had remained open all morning. He was holding a glass of water. It had names of famous cities printed on it in yellow and blue, Paris, London, Roma, Chicago. When she was a kid, Sara drank orange juice from that glass every breakfast.

The knot in her stomach tightened slightly. Any minute now, she felt like she might burst into tears, and it would be terrifying and miserable and probably a little embarrassing.

She didn't want to cry in front of these people. So long as she retained her dignity, she was still a woman, a full-blown subject like them, which was harder to kill than people you saw as victims. She hoped.

Lincoln stepped closer to her, added with a slight exhale. "He's dead, anyway." The he brought the glass to her lips and the water glided down her throat, freezing but welcome.

"S'it your turn already?" Sucre said after a moment, looking anxiously at Lincoln.

"Nope."

He pulled the glass away from her lips somewhat softly. A bead of water ran down her upper lip, the sensation a shameful and powerless tickle. Then Lincoln Burrows wiped it with his thumb and Sara decided that felt worse.

"But you can go, Sucre. Stretch your legs, go take a piss or something. Mike's upstairs trying to come up with a plan with Abruzzi. He sent me here so we could make our prisoner more comfortable. No reason we can't all behave like reasonable people."

Sucre left the room without needing to be asked twice.

Lincoln was still crouching close to her. Sara's insides felt twisted tight into a small ball of uneasiness. True, Lincoln hadn't given her the impression that he was entirely true to the image of the monster the media had concocted; he'd been quiet, had given her no insistent stares. But that didn't matter. He was a man who had broken into her home. He was a man who'd helped sit her on a chair and tie her up. He was a man standing close enough to her to breathe the same air as her. He had all the power and she had none and from one minute to the next, he and all of the others could become monsters.

"Mike said to hear you out," Lincoln told her. "If there's anything you want that doesn't put us in danger. We don't mean to scare you, okay? Or hurt you. This is just an uncomfortable moment and we're all going to wait it out."

Right, this moment was equally uncomfortable for all of those involved. Sara wished she could say something snappy and wry but kept silent in the end. Though her situation was far worse than uncomfortable, she felt in the pit of her stomach that worse, much worse could yet happen.

"We're going to get you something for breakfast," Lincoln said.

"I'm not hungry."

The glass of water had been bad enough. The idea of being fork-fed by any of these men made her stomach heave.

"Well, if you get hungry or thirsty, you just say so, ok? Whoever's keeping watch. We'll just holler for someone upstairs. Is there anything you would like?"

Sara gave this actual thought. Putting on some clothes would be nice. The knot was tied firmly around her robe but the fabric was loose and so thin anyway she still felt overly exposed. But even in her most optimistic thoughts, she couldn't see how she might be allowed to dress without one of them watching. If they refused to untie her, they might even do the dressing themselves and it was undoubtedly something she'd rather not go through. No matter what happened from now, even if she ended up getting killed, she felt there was still a number of nasty things she could avoid, if she was lucky enough.

"No," she answered.

Lincoln Burrows appraised her for a while – as if she were the dangerous one. As if not even someone tied to a chair could be trusted. From up close, his face looked frightening, didn't look like a face at all. Deep furrows on his forehead, eyeballs peering attentively at her.

Then he said the most unexpected thing. "I'm sorry." His words like a stone dropping down Sara's stomach. "You shouldn't be caught in the middle of this. It's my fault. I know you can't believe this right now, but when we're gone, when you look back on this – I hope you can see we aren't bad people. Not Michael and I. Years from now if we manage to clear our names, we'll answer for what we did to you. I swear. Maybe that's even worse, Miss Tancredi," he sighed, "but it's the truth. We're the good guys."

Sara was too startled to think of a reply and had no time to come up with one. A second later, Lincoln's eyes were riveted on the window, straightening up, his whole body alert, as if he'd seen a ghost. Outside, in the woods, there'd been the slight creeping sound of something getting close.

AN: I think this is starting into my favorite story to write. I can't wait to hear your reactions! I'll try to come up with a new chapter soon enough. Thanks again for all the great feedback!