She was already in the soft interview room, waiting. Sitting up, on the edge of her chair, with her shoulders hunched over. Her hands, emerging from loose black sleeves, were tucked under her stockinged thighs, and her fluffy jacket rested across her lap. She seemed forlorn, perhaps. A little bit lost.

Ramani put her pen between her teeth and juggled her coffee cup, notepad and shoulder bag to open the door.

"Hello," she said over the pen as she entered. She put down her coffee cup and took the pen from her mouth.

"So, Jo, is it?" she asked, with her warmest smile.

"That's right."

"My name's Ramani."

"Hello, Ramani," said Jo sweetly.

Ramani sat down in the chair opposite Jo with her notepad resting on her skirted knee.

"Now, Jo," she said. "Sergeant Smith wanted me to have a word with you because he was concerned that you might need some help, that you might be in some sort of…trouble?"

"Well, yes. That's rather an understatement I'm afraid."

"Okay," smiled Ramani. "Do you mind if I take some notes as we talk?"

Jo shook her head.

"Can I get you anything? A cup of tea, glass of water?"

"No, I'm fine, really. If we could just get on."

"Right. Sure." Ramani crossed her legs beneath her skirt and put on her serious listening face.

"Well the first problem is that you've got the wrong man under arrest. The Doctor's the one who's trying to stop the Master! And he suggested that you - that is, the police - might be able to help us find him. Only when he asked those two constables for help, they arrested him instead and brought us both here. But you must understand, it wasn't the Doctor who caused the warehouse fire - it was the Master!"

"Okay, Jo. Can you slow down a bit. The doctor is trying to stop…the master?"

"That's right. The Doctor believes he's the one responsible for - well, for everything, really. Everything bad, that is. But in particular for putting this temporal thingamajig on Sun Hill. And if we don't find him in time, the whole world will be trapped in it, and we'll never be able to stop him."

Ramani nodded, not quite able to keep the frown from her face. "Right," she said. "So you are helping the doctor to find the master? Is that why you were at the warehouse?"

"In a way. We weren't planning to at first - we were on our way to visit some - some old friends of his. But the TARDIS - which is our vehicle if you like - got sort of snagged on this temporal force field and that's how we ended up here."

Ramani nodded and made a note.

/snagged on temporal force field./

"Okay. I'd like to go back a step, if that's…all right… The doctor - he's your boyfriend?"

"Why, no!" exclaimed Jo, and she couldn't help letting a lively laugh escape with the words. It transformed her anxious righteousness to wild sunshiny mirth in an instant, and Ramani couldn't help smiling along with her. "He's a friend," Jo went on, warmly. "Well officially I'm his assistant, but I'm not very good at science. So I suppose we're just travelling companions."

"And do you do a lot of travelling together?"

"Well, yes - if we're not being ordered about by UNIT, that is. But the Doctor recently got his TARDIS fixed, so he can leave whenever he likes, and these days he's chuffing off somewhere every ten minutes. And I'd be an idiot not to go with him. You see, the places he travels to are so very - exotic."

Jo clasped her hands around her knees, keeping her booted miniskirted legs politely together.

She was quite delightful to watch, like a little doe-eyed pixie. A child of the universe, thought Ramani.

"But I'm sure he'll be feeling altogether grounded in his cell," Jo admonished seriously.

"Well two of our best detectives are looking into his case."

Jo sighed. "Look, I appreciate you trying to help, Ramani, really I do. But the best thing anyone can do is to let the Doctor go. He didn't do it, you know. And he ought to be out there looking for the Master."

"Well if he didn't do it, the detectives on his case will find that out."

This came out more harshly than Ramani had expected it to, so she leant forward to squeeze Jo's forearm. "Okay?"

Jo had to be satisfied with that. "Yes," she said, forcing a grateful smile. "Yes, of course."

Ramani sat back and sucked lightly at her bottom lip. The girl was lovely, of that there was no doubt. And compassionate, probably well meaning.

But.

"Jo. I understand how anxious you must be feeling about what's happened today. But I have a few more questions I need to ask you."

"All right."

Lightly, as if enquiring about the quarter past bus, Ramani asked, "Are you - or the Doctor - taking any medication at the moment?"

"No," Jo said simply. "We're quite well, thank you."

Ramani took a moment to consider this chipper response, wondering if the apparent naivety was genuine.

"Okay. And what's your home address?"

"Well the TARDIS is where we live at the moment."

"And the tardis is your car, caravan…?"

"It's not mine, it's the Doctor's. And it's not a car, it's more of a…a…"

Ramani raised her eyebrow expectantly. "More of a…?"

"A wooden box?" ventured Jo.

"So you're living in a wooden box," said Ramani as flippantly as possible, having heard much worse many times before.

"Only temporarily," said Jo uncertainly. "While we're travelling."

"And do you have a permanent home?"

Jo paused. "Well originally I'm from Hampstead."

"Oh, nice," offered Ramani encouragingly, feeling that she was finally getting somewhere. "Do you have family there? Friends?"

"Um," said Jo. "I'm not sure. I used to but they might have…moved on."

"When was the last time you lived there?"

"It's a bit difficult to say," said Jo. "It might have been 1973."

Ramani was rather surprised by this answer. "You must be older than you look," she said as she wrote it down. "How old are you by the way?"

Jo didn't answer right away. "I'm not sure you'll believe it," she said finally.

"Well I would have guessed you'd be twenty one, twenty two. But if you lived in Hampstead in 1973, then you must be at least thirty…something…"

Jo bit her lip. "I'm twenty four."

Ramani frowned. Her hand wandered to her head to worry at her hairline.

"You know maths was never my strong point but twenty four years ago was…1981?"

Jo nodded in a resigned 'here we go again' sort of way. "I'm afraid you're probably right about that."

"Is that the year you were born? Or 1980?"

Jo said nothing.

It was heartbreaking. Ramani could go along with psychotic delusions up to a point. But beyond that point - which she seemed to have reached - it stopped being fun, and duty forbade her from indulging them any further.

She smiled, sympathetically. "Your story doesn't make sense, Jo. Do you see that?"

"Yes," Jo smiled back, warily. "I can see it doesn't make sense to you, Ramani."

"Right," said Ramani with a thoughtful knuckle at her mouth. "Um, is there anyone you'd like us to contact? Do you have a phone number of a parent, or, or—"

"No," said Jo, smiling gratefully. "Thank you. But that sergeant did say he'd contact UNIT for us. I'm sure once he does that a lot of this confusion can be cleared up."

"Mm, that's right." Ramani consulted a page in her notepad. "Sergeant Smith did make contact with UNIT just before he asked me to meet you here. But the person he spoke to wasn't aware of your names being among their personnel files, as scientific advisors or otherwise. They've no record of you."

Jo sighed. "Oh. I see."

"So, I'm not sure—"

"Did he tell them we were former UNIT personnel, not current? They might have to look up old records, perhaps thirty years old…" Jo's voice petered out in defeat. "I'm not going to convince you, am I?"

Ramani took a long, thoughtful breath, her eyes roving over Jo's face as if searching for something there. "Look, Jo, can I be honest with you?"

"Please."

"I'm concerned that this man - the Doctor - has told you some very convincing stories about UNIT and somebody he calls 'the master', and has you under his influence as a result. And I'm worried that he might lead you into all sorts of trouble - has led you into trouble already, today, with this warehouse fire. And I'm worried that one day you won't be able to get yourself out of it."

"Oh," sighed Jo. "I thought you might say something like that."

Her big brown eyes had lost their lustre. No longer a child of the universe, she looked much more worldly and weathered all of a sudden. Ramani blinked at her, and wanted very much to fix what she'd killed.

"The Doctor means a lot to you, doesn't he?"

"Oh, yes. Yes, he does. Oh, I know you think he's a criminal, or - I don't know - some sort of a loony. But he's not, really, he's not. His manner, it's just…unusual, that's all."

"It's not just his manner, though, is it now? I mean - it's all these stories of yours that just don't add up."

Ramani hated every word that came out of her mouth. She picked up her coffee mug, the pale polish on her fingernails gleaming white against the blue china. Then straight away she put it down again.

"I'll get you a cup of tea," she said, and fussed for a moment with her pen and paper before leaving the room.

While Jo, on the opposite chair, looked terribly, terribly forlorn.