~ It was a few weeks after he had discovered his captivity that he realized he had become more alert. Perhaps it was his discovery that piqued his interest, stimulated his mind. There was something nibbling on the edge of his mind, a slight, paranoid suspicion that he was in the center of something big. His inner mind told him that he would have cared before his coma. That he would have slipped out somehow and discovered the secrets that the rest of the place held- for, surely, there had to be more to this place he was being held in than the four walls he now sat in. But he didn't care. He couldn't remember what he had cared about before this, and thus didn't care. He was like an amnesia patient who had loved classical music but now turned to hardcore rap. If only he could escape the room, he could rediscover his life before the surrounding four walls. He could remember what had been important. It was this place, surely, that was keeping him from remembering. And he had to get out, if only to remember. He had begun to remember things, little things, like his favourite thing to snack on, or bits of a movie he had seen. But he remembered them in quick flashes that were over nearly as soon as they began. Lilly came in, syringe in hand. There was something different about her today. The everpresent smile was there, plastered on her face as it always was, but today it looked fake. Unreal. Her emerald eyes bore through his soul, and he began to shiver. ~A woman- a redhead -looking up at him. Her voice whispering, soothing. He couldn't make out the words, but he knew they were only good things, only for him. Her green eyes, full of passion and sorrow. A pang through his body. Guilt. He put the sorrow there. It was his fault, just like everything else...~ He shook his head slightly to clear the resurfacing memory from it, then glanced over at Lilly to see if she had noticed his slightly psychotic episode. She hadn't. She was too busy injecting him with more drugs. There was no light banter like usual, just the false smile and her emerald eyes. When he really thought about it, for the past few days she had been like this. Ever since her conversation with the mysterious smoking man. He had just been too busy worrying over his returning memory to notice. She noticed him staring at her and her smile grew wider. "I'm a married woman, mind you." A joke, to lighten his mood. It didn't work. "What's the matter, Lilly? You've been acting so strange lately." She stared at him for a few seconds. "I've just been reconsidering my view on life. Thinking about whether or not I made the right career choice. Whether or not I'm doing the right thing." "You're a nurse. You're helping me, Lilly. Helping people. That's always the right thing." The smile disappeared from her face as she glanced down at her feet. "Yeah," she said softly. "Thanks." She turned and left the room, leaving him to wonder what she meant. *** Mulder paused for a moment, taking the time to collect his still-scattered memories. He thought of Lilly and what might have happened to her now. He had thought of her frequently after he had escaped his cage, his prison, but never allowed himself to think of what might have happened to her now that he was gone. Dana brought him back to San Diego. "So you began regaining your memories. But how? I thought you said they were injecting you with experimental drugs designed to make you forget." "They were. But they underestimated Lilly's morals. She thought they had gone too far with me by destroying my memories. So while they thought she was being a good nurse, she was secretly injecting my IV lines with more saline solution. And so I began regaining my memories. She warned me not to let on to the father if I remembered anything new, so I played dumb in the beginning. But after I had regained more than half my memories, it began to get harder and harder not to slip up. He had this intense stare that seemed to penetrate my entire being, and it seemed to me that he would know if I was lying. Of course he didn't, but it didn't make anything easier. "I kept telling myself that if I slipped up and made some remark that would let on to them that I remembered something, anything at all, they would not only return me to my previous vegatative state but also hurt Lilly in some way or another. So one day I told her how hard it was getting, and from that day, we began to plot my escape. "It took a lot of effort not to divulge any of my memories to the father. There was this longing to share these newly recovered memories with someone, but Lilly wouldn't hear of it. She didn't want to get any closer to me than she already had, and she argued that if I told her, she might accidentally let it slip to the others. So I retold myself over and over again, in my head, so I wouldn't forget again. I didn't want to forget them again. Most of the memories I had recovered were only good ones and even the bad ones were bearable. "They weren't ever of anything important, though they did seem like they were when I recovered them. By that point, I had only recovered memories of my life up til I was in my late twenties, when I had first joined the FBI. I hadn't remembered my work- our work- yet. I didn't even begin to remember that- or you, for that matter- until after I had escaped." *** He heard the door unlock and instantly scrambled out of the bed, using his newly toned muscles. Every day for the past couple of weeks, he had been doing the few excercises he could do within the confines of the room, getting ready for his escape. Now that the night was upon him, it was all he could do to stop himself from running up the walls. A familiar figure entered the room as he heard the door whisper shut. "Are you ready, Fox?" Lilly asked. Inwardly, he cringed at the name, though he didn't remember why. He knew that was his name, yet there was something within him that longed to hear a female voice call him Mulder just one more time. "Yes," he replied, brushing aside any thoughts of his name. Right now, that wasn't the important issue. His escape was. Lilly moved towards him. "The guard that watches your wing takes a ten minute break every night at exactly 1:26 for a piss or a sandwich or whatever. He never varies his routine, so you must do exactly what I say. You can't do anything differently, or you'll be caught. Now I've brought you some doctor's clothes, so if someone does see you, from a distance it'll look like you're just a doctor leaving for the night." She handed him the scrubs and he scrambled to put them on. "Now, when you exit this room, go right all the way to the end of the corridor. There will be a stairway to the left and an elevator on the right. Take the stairway. We're on the fifth floor now, but don't go all the way to the ground floor directly. At the second floor there's another guard that doesn't take a break, and he watches the hallway from the stairway. You'll have to get off at the third floor to avoid him. Make no sound to attract his attention. Exit the stairway and walk to the other end of the wing. There are no guards on the third floor at this time of night. At the end of the corridor is another stairwell. Take these all the way to the bottom. To get onto the ground floor, you'll have to use a key code to open up the door. The code is 6-5-1-9-8-4. From there, you exit the door. It'll lead to a parking lot, where there will be a silver '98 Intrigue waiting for you. The keys are under the floor mat on the driver's side." Lilly glanced around in the darkness. "There's a woman you can contact from your former life. Her name is Dana Scully. But no matter what, you mustn't contact her too soon. Vanish for a few months, keep a low profile, then do what you can to find her. Make sure you attract no one else's attention while doing so, or they might find you again. Take you again. Experiment once more with your mind. And both of us don't want that to happen. Because if they find you, they'll find out about me." He stopped her. "Why are you doing this? Why are you helping me?" Her green eyes flashed in the darkness. "Because I believe what they're doing is wrong. Because I believe in what you worked on before they took you. And because it's the right thing for me to do, both for you and for me... and for Dana Scully." She handed him the bag they had pre-packed. "Now go! And keep in mind, no matter what you remember, do not contact her until it's safe to do so." He nodded and kissed her on the cheek. "Thank you," he whispered into her ear. He turned and fled the way she had shown him, leaving the lilly to wilt alone in the darkness. ***