"You drew her a bath?"

"She's been here three days, Doctor."

No arguing with Pond, when she gets like this. I can stand here as long as I want and try to convince myself that she did what she's gone and done because she was uncomfortable with the Little Ghost's odour. I am trying that. It's just not going over at all.

No offence meant to the Little Ghost, or no more than usual, but there was a reason the only Tardis pet there ever was was robotic, and a reason that even at that there hasn't been one since. Except that parrot. We discussed that. I don't wish to discuss it again. Point is, Amy's getting attached and I can't say I'm happy about it. Still, she's left it so there's not much I can do about it at this point. She knows that. The way she stands there, arms folded, smiling up at me, she knows she's done that.

"A warning, Pond. Should I catch you braiding her hair, I promise you-"

"You know, I never realized, Doctor, just how much of what you say comes phrased as a threat."

It is only very slowly that I turn towards this interrupting voice, this Mr Pond entering from offstage left. Slowly, so that I might contain my initial reaction to said interruption. That gets even more difficult when I notice that this Mr Pond who is, in his own veiled, passive-aggressive way, passing comment on me, is eating a sandwich which has all but inevitably come from my kitchen. Either that or it's been in his pocket since the party at Howard Hawks' house, to which I took him, and the point therefore stands.

"Neither had I noticed, Rory, how little of what you say is ever just coming out and saying it."

"That made no sense," he says, with his mouth full, then wanders on off again.

I am beginning to feel really rather unfairly ganged-up-upon. But since Rory is clearly interested in doing no more than pass remark, I turn back to Pond. "The point is, the Little Ghost is still a prisoner, and still rightly so. And neither of you knows the whole story and I'd just like to point out that she is much happier with the situation than you two appear to be."

"She doesn't know any better."

Those words, the tone of them, the suddenness, it all brings Pond and I both to the console railing. Below, stopped with the sandwich halfway to his mouth, Rory is thinking the same thing we are.

What would he know? And why and how and what did he just say?

"Rory?" and Pond sits down on the edge of the platform, swinging her feet, reaches through to run a hand through his hair.

"What aren't you telling us?" I ask, with no such approach. That would be odd.

And he, lucid and honest, simply says, "I don't know."

"But it's there," I tell him, and he's nodding. "At the back of your mind, or rather it's not there, conspicuous by absence, like a big black hole, like a migraine any time you should attempt to reach into it, but sometimes when you stop thinking altogether it reaches out for you."

"Yes. How do you know that? What is this?"
Unfortunately, it is at that moment that the telephone rings. I need to answer it before we can land, so I go to that first. Equally unfortunately, the Ponds follow me. Still asking questions, still niggling, still oh-great-and-wise-Doctor-do-as-we-tell-you and other such ridiculous contradictions they don't even appear to notice. I have the phone pressed to one ear and my hand pressed to the other, and still it's very difficult to have a conversation.

"Hello? Hello? You'll have to speak up, I've got the humans in!"

"Doctor? This is Visitor Liaisons at Stormcage calling?"

"Good. Got my landing code, then?"

"I'm sorry, Doctor, but all visiting hours have been cancelled entirely for today." Pond is trying to drag at my ear-blocking arm and I stop to shake her off.

"Unacceptable. Put me through to Bracewell."

"I'm afraid it's out of the question right now. He suggests you try again next week."

"I'm still landing. He knows that. That happens."

"Please, Doctor, it's imperative we maintain total lockdown-"

"Oh," I say, and it is an interested 'oh', a very interested 'oh' indeed, all full of piqued curiosity and just the sense of a sniff of a possible intrigue, which would be nice, haven't walked into a nice bit of old-fashioned good clean intrigue in a while, except last night, and the night before that, and I talked myself into that one with Scone, but anyway, like I said, it's an 'Oh'. "In which case, I'll be right there."

[Back Soon, folks]