The plush squid sat on Gordon's pillow watching him pace around his bedroom. This wasn't entirely unusual as Gordon didn't tend to stay still for long periods of time, it was fairly normal for him to walk in circles around his room ranting to thin air about his brothers, or a rescue, or the latest conservation project he'd been involved with. What was unusual was that Gordon was not happy, in fact he seemed distressed if his wild gestures were anything to go by. Most of this was lost on the plush squid, mainly because it was a plush squid.

"Man, I am such an idiot."

Gordon often talked to himself when he was alone. He put it down to always having fish as a kid and the fish liked conversation. His brothers put it down to him being insane. Hypocrites. They all talked to themselves, some more than others. This was positively normal behaviour compared to them.

"A major idiot. I probably ruined everything, and things will be weird now. Why don't I think? Why did I have to open my big mouth?"

The plush squid said nothing. Maybe it was too disappointed in him to grace him with any kind of response. If the shoe had been on the other foot disappointed silence would have been Gordon's reaction. Though the likelihood of a plush squid ruining everything with the girl it had had a crush on for centuries was low, i.e. non-existent.

"The bit on the statue was okay. I think I handled that well. I was pretty smooth actually. If we'd died I wouldn't have been too disappointed. But I definitely ruined it."

Gordon flung himself onto his bed displacing a number of soft toys.

"After all we went through perhaps some things are best left buried."

"You're probably right, I mean you and me it just wouldn't ... you're talking about the Laughing King, aren't you?"

He winced and tried to imagine for a moment that he'd said something sensible instead. He couldn't think of anything.

"This is the end! I'm becoming a hermit. I'm going to live as a sea cucumber and die of a broken heart and embarrassment."

Someone knocked at the door and he jumped out of his skin.

"Gordon? Are you okay?"

That was all he needed. "I'm fine Grandma."

"If you want to talk you know where I am. Do you want some cookies?"

"No thanks," Oooh, too quick to reply. "I'm not hungry."

He held his breath as her footsteps faded down the hall, then he turned and glared at the squid.

"You should have said something."

The squid toppled over.

Gordon rummaged in his snack box for something to munch on and continued his monologue in a whisper. "You know I've fancied Penelope for years, and it's not like I just think she's sexy and I want to sleep with her because she's so much more than that. We've all had crushes on Penelope at some point."

The squid would probably have pointed out that this wasn't true, but it didn't have to because Gordon realised.

"Okay, not John but they're besties and that probably makes up for it."

He lapsed into silence to stew over the fact that John definitely ranked higher on Penelope's list of friends than he did. Stupid John.

"She's beautiful and I know I throw that word around a bit, but she really is beautiful. She's elegant and graceful and charming. She's classy, like not just because she's posh but she's really, really classy. And she has a great sense of humour and she's so badass. I mean she explored that pyramid in heels. Who does that?"

He rolled over and sighed.

"Y'know…maybe I should just pretend it never happened. Nah, that's stupid. I like her, Inky, really like her and I don't want her to think I'm an idiot."

Inky's silence said that it was too late for that at least ten years ago, but since Lady Penelope had known him that long she wouldn't actually mind, she probably found it endearing.

"Yeah, you're right. D'you think I might have a chance? Anything's possible, right?"

Anything was possible, especially where love was concerned. Gordon picked the soft toys off the floor and threw them, with varying degrees of accuracy, back onto the bed.

"People do stupid things all the time, it's not a reason to give up hope. And even if we don't date, we can still be friends. I can make my way up to best friend. What do you think Inky?"

If Inky could think it would probably think that Gordon had a better chance than most at scoring a date with Penelope and that Penelope was really rather fond of Gordon, but Inky didn't think. Mainly because Inky was a plush squid.