Scrambling to make sense out of all this, Miranda could only assume this was some kind of absurd, poorly executed prank. "So what's this place, Casino Royale?" she quipped.

"Sorry?" the reading glasses 'Doctor' queried innocently.

"Nineteen-sixties James Bond spoof?" Miranda explained. Glancing around, she couldn't believe all four of them seemed to have no idea what she was talking about. "Wrong crowd, I guess," Miranda muttered, feeling even more awkward. Recovering, she began again. "So, sorry if I've totally missed something here, but what do you mean, you're all called the Doctor?"

"Er, no, we are the Doctor," the original stranger said, sounding slightly embarrassed. "Each one of us is the Doctor. The same person." He turned to her Doctor. "You never told her about it, then?"

"Why would I? It's not really something that comes up in conversation, believe it or not," the Doctor retorted in umbrage.

"Tell me about what?" Miranda asked.

"But more importantly, what are all of you doing here? What am I doing here with all of you? This is completely wrong," the Doctor continued heedlessly. "And what's happened to all of you?" he added suddenly.

"What do you mean?" the clown one demanded.

"Tell me about what?" Miranda repeated a little more forcefully. With such a mousy voice, she was used to being ignored.

"You all look terrible!" the Doctor said plainly. The others all seem to take offence at that (and rightly so, in Miranda's opinion).

"You're one to talk!" the clown one spat. "Exactly what sort of life form is that you're wearing, anyway?"

"You're having a go at my outfit, Patches?" the Doctor sneered in disbelief.

Frustrated, Miranda shut her eyes. "TELL ME ABOUT WHAT?" she repeated quite loudly. When she opened her eyes, she saw all four men giving her their undivided attention. It was a little embarrassing, but it did the trick.

"What's the trouble?" the reading glasses man asked openly.

"How can you all be the same person?" Miranda tried very hard not to snap, quickly tiring of this run-around.

"Oh that! Quite simple. I regenerated. Again," the clown one remarked succinctly with another disapproving once-over of the Doctor.

"It's a Timelord trick," the first stranger added. "Every time my body dies, I regenerate into a new one. By the way, which regeneration are you?" the stranger eyed the Doctor curiously.

"Eighth. Not bad, eh?" the Doctor took a moment to pose on display, once more all smiles. Miranda shook her head sadly.

The stranger looked a bit worried. "All that to look forward to…" he murmured mysteriously.

"Yes, well now that we're all acquainted with one another," the reading glasses man spoke up, "I suggest we discuss our more pressing concerns before Goran–"

SNAP! CRZZZ!

Miranda yelped and jumped back as a bright light exploded where the Doctor was standing. It was gone in a flash, and she noticed, once she blinked the big white spots away, so was the Doctor.

"–activates the transmat," the reading glasses man finished lamely.

Miranda stared stunned at the empty air that had been the Doctor. First the TARDIS, now he was gone too. "What happened?"

"That was fast," the stranger remarked, completely unconcerned.

"One less for tea, then," the clown one observed simply. "Speaking of, Miranda, how do you take yours? Sugar, cream?"

This was too surreal. Miranda could only blink stupidly at him. Tea? Tea! The Doctor goes POOF right in front of them and he's asking her about tea?

"Oh, bother, I'll bring the tray, you can suit yourself, how does that sound?" His puffy face crinkled in a jolly grin. "If you'll excuse me, chaps." He started humming a little tune as he walked out of the room.

The reading glasses man picked up his book and settled back down into his chair, popping out his wire frames, seemingly without a care in the world. "Pull up a chair. There's nothing to worry about," he advised.

"Well now! Seeing as your friend won't be back for a while, what say I give you the grand tour?" the stranger exclaimed with an eager smile on his face, as naturally as if a man hadn't just disappeared in a flash of light from the middle of the room.

"What? What do you mean? What just happened?" Miranda demanded shrilly.

"Happened?" the stranger looked puzzled.

"To the Doctor!"

"Oh, that! Just Goran's transmat beam, nothing to worry about," the stranger reiterated.

"Excuse me, but how do you know?"

"Because that's what he does. We've all been through it. More than once. Not my favourite hobby, I'll admit, but at least the accommodations are–"

"Who's Goran?"

"Oh, merely the zookeeper," the man with the reading glasses remarked, not looking up from his book.

"Did his teleport take the TARDIS, too?"

"I suspect so," the stranger said.

"Why? What for? Why are you helping this guy?"

"Helping? What on Earth gives you that idea?" The stranger asked.

"D'you know I've reread this same passage over three times now?" the man with the reading glasses commented with thinly veiled annoyance.

"Why? Is it something interesting?" the stranger quipped. To Miranda he said, "There's a perfectly sensible explanation for all of this. I recommend we sit down, have a cup of tea, and–"

Enough was enough. Miranda was out the door and halfway to the front gate before she could realize that she didn't know where she was going. Anywhere but back in that psycho ward, for sure. Maybe flag down a car on that road.

"Miranda, wait!"

She whirled around, still backing towards the gate. "No!" she snarled at the longhaired stranger following her. Unfortunately, her voice lacked the depth to do much better than a screech. "I don't know what's going on here, and you guys aren't making any sense at all! Just…don't bother me!"

The stranger stopped on a dime, an injured look on his careworn, aristocratic features. "I'm sorry, it's just that we've been here quite a while and sometimes forget–"

"I don't care, just like the rest of you! We're trapped here, now the Doctor's missing, and all you want to do is drink your stupid tea! You're…strange!"

"The Doctor will be returned, you're overreacting."

"You're damn right I am!" She yanked the gate open angrily, aware that at least part of this outburst had been simmering inside her for a considerable time.

"Where will you go?" he asked.

She paused. "I don't know. Hitchhike to someplace where everybody's not insane!"

"There aren't any."

She shot him a venomous glare before staring out through the gate again. "Think you're funny?"

"That's not I meant! I meant there's nowhere else to go," he amended himself quickly. "We were all brought here against our wishes, like you, and whoever's done it has made certain there's no way out. Sorry to have to tell you, but we're trapped."

"There's a road."

"That ends here, both ways. I don't suppose you had time to notice, but there's an identical gate round the back. The road starts here, goes a few miles and dead ends back here."

"That's stupid."

"But the truth, I'm afraid," the reading glasses man chimed in. "There's a spatial limitation field in place. Walk long enough in any direction and you'll come round to where you started."

Miranda turned. The reading glasses man, hands in his pockets, stood in the place where the Doctor had encountered the tripwire. A breeze flapped his red-hemmed coattails and tousled his pale, shaggy tresses, revealing a badly receding hairline. In the watery light, neither one of them came off very well. Rather haggard and worn out, in fact. Their tired acceptance of the situation was a far more distressing symptom, however. Downright creepy. "Then I guess I'll be seeing you later," she spat, marching through the gate and throwing it closed behind her.

As she walked away from the house, she heard one say contritely to the other, "You'd think we'd be better at this by now."