"Amanda?"

"Yes, Joseph?"

"I just want you to know that I'm not planning to say 'I told you so'"

"That's very gentlemanly of you."

"Thank you. So, I'd like to ask a favour."

"Of course. Within reason."

"Get your foot out of my eye."

"That's your eye?"

"What did you think it was?"

"Well I don't know - I can hardly feel anything."

"Me either, but you know what?"

"What?"

"I can still feel your foot in my eye."

"I'm trying to move, just hush a moment."

"Ow! You're meant to move away."

"I don't have any leverage. Where did they put us?"

"How should I know?"

"Can you see a door?"

"It's just as dark down here for me as you. And, also, you have your foot in my eye."

"Just be grateful I'm not wearing the stilettos anymore. There, is that better?"

"Yeah. Yeah, that's better. Amanda?"

"Yes, Joseph?"

"I told you so."

The voices lost their clarity, bickering blended with the clamour of traffic outside and then faded completely as she awoke. The textured darkness of the vision gave way to the blurred, too-bright shapes and shadows of the apartment. Greta turned, feeling the bed dip slightly to support her as she stared up at the ceiling and waited for reality to reassert itself.

New voices and the smell of rain and dirt but no images in her mind to accompany them, just the white tiles above. One tile had a little crack. She felt a momentary kinship, and then decided madness was identifying with the décor.

The voices became clearer as she let them take her attention, became distinct enough that, for a moment, she was tempted to turn her head to reassure herself that Richie, Adam and Duncan weren't standing next to the bed. She remembered when reassurance had meant just the opposite.

"Are we going to bring Greta in on this?" Adam, tone so neutral it was barely a question at all. She could practically see the distance between the man and the words, the man and the intent. The man and the consequences. Asking the question so he wouldn't have to be the one to answer it.

"She'll be able to help us." Duncan now, an affirmative in a reason without suggesting it was his preference. Distance again but better hidden, even from himself. He probably didn't realise how far removed he was becoming, how much he was going through the motions.

Grief, she realised after a moment. He wasn't tired, or jaded, but he mourned and in mourning fell back on habit. And habit for any Immortal, she was learning, meant hiding intent even from friends. Maybe it would pass.

"No. It's not fair; she's not like us …" Richie, a flood of warmth over the barren ground the other two men left - vibrant, passionate. Unthinking surety in place of experience.

She felt Methos, impossibly, cut himself away even further. Completely silent and tuning out as the other two kept talking.

"Neither's Joe." A reasonable tone from MacLeod that still didn't quite hide the depth of his worry from her and, she suspected, from anyone listening to him. He would rather Joe be safe than herself and she didn't begrudge him that. Well, she didn't while her mind was half taken with his. Later, she decided, she'd be upset. Possibly even curt. She'd glare at the very least.

"Joe knows the risks." Obstinate sweetness, already Richie was forgetting what he was fighting for and just concentrating on standing his ground. She couldn't begrudge him either. Everyone fought the way they knew best.

"So does she."

"No way."

"It's up to her."

"No, it's not going to happen. We'll walk before I'll put her in danger again."

"Richie …"

"No, Mac."

In the silence was everything unsaid: the frustration, anger, guilt, fear, even jealousy. No, she didn't begrudge them a thing. Methos was a balm now, not the barren land she'd likened him to at first. No stinging emotion, just a cool wash of impersonal logic. That she begrudged. Just a little.

"We have to go back to my apartment anyway, they may have called in. She'll know what's happened …"

"Not if we don't tell her."

"Richie, she's a seer, remember? We're probably only marginally more interesting than dubbed American soap-operas, but I imagine she's been tuned in. Anyway, it's her choice."

Her choice. Her … choice.

She blinked and forced the rest of their conversion away, it was enough to know they were on their way back. Just a turn of her head and she felt herself falling, a sudden vertigo that made her draw a sharp breath as much from surprise as the fear she would miss. Miss what, she didn't want to ask.

Then it was over and she was rolling off the bed and to her feet. The sandwich Adam had left was actively trying to outstare her; she approached with caution and corralled it towards the garbage.

The clock ticked, she counted with it and reached a hundred and five before she noticed and stopped. This was not how she'd imagined a romantic holiday in Paris was meant to go.

She heard the knock before it came and was standing at the open door when three drenched Immortals came up the hall. Richie's gaze fell everywhere but on her, she smiled slightly and pulled him to the side as the other two went on.

He wouldn't meet her eyes even now and she gently reached up to his cheek, exerting just enough pressure with her palm to force him to look at her. "Richie, it's okay."

"You heard?" His shoulders dropped and he shot a glance at the door as if wondering whether it was too late to just take her and leave everyone else to it. In fact she'd bet that was his thought exactly, no freaky mind meld required.

With as much determination she could muster she answered him, never breaking the eye contact. It was just the two of them here and now. "Yeah, I heard most of it. I want to help."

"I don't want you to." His voice was quiet and pleading, looking at her through his eyelashes, a boyish charm he'd be able to pull off for eternity. As long as his eternity happened to be.

She hadn't fallen for that since their second date. "I know."

"Greta …"

"I know. Richie, it'll be okay."

"You seen that?"

There was just the hint of a smile and she responded with one of her own, teasing attitude in its curve. "Yeah, I seen it."

"You lying to me?"

"Yeah."

His laugh was quiet, but unforced and she relaxed, letting him pull her into a hug. She sprang back almost immediately.

"Euw, take a shower."

"It's just rain."

"On that jacket? Shower. Now."

"Yes'm"

While Richie detoured to the bathroom, she followed after Adam and MacLeod. They were talking quietly in the kitchen and she paused before going any further, not wanting to interrupt or eavesdrop. Then the emotional imprints that came from them anyway reminded her there really wasn't much she could do about the latter. She felt the frustration underpinned by worry that both men refused to allow to become true fear. She wondered if they knew how to be scared anymore.

Both voices silenced and then she heard MacLeod. "Greta?"

"Hi." She looked around the frame of the door, hesitating just a moment and then allowing the rest of herself to follow. "Richie told me…"

Adam, sipping from a mug of the coffee she'd prepared for their arrival, smiled thinly and finished her sentence. "… very little you didn't know?"

MacLeod shot him a warning look and she ignored both in favour of delivering her message.

"Well, yeah. But here's something you didn't know. Joe and Amanda are still alive."

She paused to let that sink in, saw the relief in their expressions. Then she continued, feeling herself beginning to frown with the effort of recall. This would explain those crater-like wrinkles the old prophets in movies always had; she made an effort to smooth her face again. Mad was one thing, mad and pug was another.

"They're tied up somewhere dark, damp, but they haven't been hurt. I think it might be kinda tight. Amanda's pretty much lying on Joe. There's foot - eye issues, and Joe's on the wet patch."

There was a pause as both men attempted to process this and she smiled slightly. They may or may not have known how to be scared but definitely, judging by their bemusement and then sudden wincing, didn't know when to avoid a visualisation.

MacLeod recovered first and refocused with a nod. "Okay, thank you, that helps but somewhere dark, cramped and damp covers a lot of places. Is there any way at all to narrow it down?"

Her lips pursed of their own accord and she let them as the lesser evil of wrinklage. "There's steps, maybe it's a cellar or something, but really small. It was really cold."

Even as she spoke she knew how it sounded, all Adam did was give voice to what all three were thinking. "A really cold, small cellar in the Latin Quarter. Well then, it should only take thirty or forty years to find them."

Now she was forgotten as Mac turned to look at the resident cynic, shaking his head, grasping at the straws they'd been offered. "Not necessarily a cellar. If it's such a confined space, it could it be some kind of priest hole."

And he was shot down again by the same slightly biting tone Adam had been using since they'd returned. Maybe it wasn't Adam, then. Adam, she was sure, was kinder than this. He had to have been. Methos, she knew with the same certainty, really wasn't. "Oh well, that's much better then… no, wait, how does this help? We're in Paris. Paris. Do you know what Paris is built on, MacLeod? It's built on Paris. You could spend a lifetime looking below the city, you could spent several lifetimes, and not come anywhere near them. Worse, you could come within five feet of them and never know it. They could even be under this building."

They all looked down instinctively and, on looking up, MacLeod's expression was thoughtful enough she wondered whether he'd be asking for the digging equipment.

Then he just nodded shortly and looked back to her. It was still just a little disconcerting to have every part of his attention on her, even after experiencing how single minded he could be during his search for Tessa.

"If you went near the place do you think you could … see them?"

Now Adam, Methos, was watching her intently as well. He seemed as interested in her answer as MacLeod but there wasn't hope in him. It was almost as if he wanted a 'no' from her but, unsure of his reasons and even her interpretation, she went with honesty. "Maybe. I can try."

Methos was a closed - translated into Swahili, wrapped and buried - book again, but MacLeod smiled and then became hesitant as he appeared to have a sudden attack of conscience. "You don't have to, Greta; none of this is anything to do with you."

Remembering his priorities between herself and Joe, she discovered the annoyance she'd hoped for wasn't nearly as much as she'd expected, but it was the principle of it now. Perversely, she decided pettiness was her price and waited until he began to look worried before answering. "It's in my head, it's not leaving. I think that makes it something to do with me. You need my help; Richie will be okay with it."

"You … heard us?"

"I heard you three, Amanda, Joe and something about which route to take getting the Premier out of the city. Unless that was the radio …"

Methos laughed with a wicked delight she felt herself begin to grin in response to, just as she had before he left to bail out MacLeod. "You're turning into a national threat. Of course, as this isn't my nation, I have no real problem with that."

Sternly she made herself remain impassive; she'd seen what happened when people engaged with him. Three hour long bickering sessions that you could never, ever win and he never, ever let you forget it.

"What is your nation?" So MacLeod still had delusions of victory.

"Egypt." Methos turned wide-eyed to the rapidly blinking man beside him.

"Egypt." Flat disbelief from the Highlander was her cue to leave, they were squared off now.

"What?" As single word salvos went, she had to admit it was reasonably well used – all innocent curiosity and veiled suggestion.

Definitely time to go. She quietly backed out of the kitchen and returned to sitting by the phone, still able to hear their conversation but no longer at risk of being conscripted to either side. The shower made a hissing backdrop that was almost soothing; at least Richie was taking her order seriously.

"Egypt. I know for a fact the Watchers have been trying to ... everyone kept wondering and … Egypt. Just like that."

"Well, not really. I mean, it wasn't Egypt then. It's just easier to say. It's not my fault no one actually decided to ask me."

"You can't be Egyptian."

"All right, if you say so."

"You don't look …"

With a slight smile she hunched down further into the chair, then sneezed and reached for the box of tissues on the side of the table. She couldn't really grumble, a cold was better than pneumonia and that could have been on the cards after the bridge diving incident.

Yeah, on the whole, she was doing okay.

She closed her eyes and the frozen image of the man she had stabbed, probably killed, under the bridge presented itself for her attention. She opened her eyes again.

Oh yeah, she was fine.