"Doctor, you're telling me you ran away from home when you were already an old man?" asked Amy, staring at the picture of the white- haired gentleman she's tricked him, again, into pulling up.

"A young man, Pond. An extraordinarily young man." He stared at the picture, happily remembering many of the moments in the life of his first face.

"You don't look so young. Although, that companion of yours… Doctor- you do have a thing for the ladies, don't you?!" she teased, staring at the very youthful- looking woman beside him.

"Oi! I'll have you know Vicki was a very nice young girl. Once, we had such a time with Nero! And don't let anyone tell you that fire was my fault."

"Was it your fault?" she asked wryly, looking up at him in suspicion.

"Well, I may have accidently given him the id- NO. No, it most certainly was not my fault." He flailed unconvincingly.

"Right," her voice oozed scepticism, "and you're telling me you didn't happen to notice even then that most of your companions were young… beautiful… female?" She looked sideways up at him at this last point, eyebrow raised as she pinned him with her gaze.

"Eww," his voice had taken on a particularly disgusted tone that just perfectly matched his face. "Don't be gross, Pond. Vickie was an orphan. We were great friends. She had just lost her father, I had just lost… Well, it would have been like... like being attracted to… to you!"

"No need to spare my feelings," she said grumpily, arms crossed over her chest.

"Do you need me to remind you of my relationship to your daughter?" He asked distractedly, focused on steering them to rendezvous with their respective spouses.

"I'm not saying I want you to have those feelings for me, just saying you don't have to sound so repulsed by the thought."

He paused in his flying for a moment, contemplating her remark, and then shuddered hard as though to shake loose a horrendous image. Amy punched him brutally on the shoulder.

"Ouch!" he bellowed.

"My feelings exactly, Raggedy Man."

"Didn't we already have this discussion? Because I feel like we did. In fact, I'm sure of it."

"I'm just saying, it would be nice to know you've at least recognized at one point in all the time we've travelled together that I am in fact, female."

"Of course I noticed that. Noticed that right off. It was the hair." He pointed to her long ginger locks, "And, you know, the bossy attitude." She gave him a cross look at that. "Not to mention the fact that you once gave birth to my wife," he tried, keeping the console between them, hoping to remain smack free from then on.

"It just sounds wrong when you say it like that," she observed, deciding whether a pout was appropriate or not at the moment.

She scrutinized him, making him duck down to ostensibly work on flying once again. Then, she decided to let that particular subject go, since the photo had piqued her curiosity on something else.

"So, when you ran away from home, you had a family, yeah?"

He really was concentrating on his ship now, no trace of amusement in his voice.

"There were people there who meant a great deal to me, of course."

"So, did you have a mum and dad?"

"Everyone has a mum and dad."

"Yeah, but-"

"What would make you think I didn't have a mum and dad? Where do you think I got all my cool style, and dashing good looks?"

He straightened his bowtie at this, looking proudly at his old photo.

She snorted, covering her mouth before looking up and patting him on the shoulder in mock sympathy.

"Well... that first face looooong ago did have a sort of distinguished quality about it, I suppose."

"Hey!" he proclaimed, offended once he realized she had specified the not- current version of himself.

"You look really old here," she reiterated, focusing once more on the man he used to be. "How old were you, in Time Lord?"

"Oh, old enough," he said, calculating his age briefly before going about his business once more.

"Old enough for what?" she asked, turning to see a wistful look in his eyes.

"Everything. I'd gone through the Academy already. Became an official Time Lord... Took my TARDIS flying classes. Some of them," he amended.

"And did you pass?" she asked with a knowing smile on her face.

"I'm sure I would have." He waved his hand dismissively.

"So, even by Time Lord years, you were an adult, yeah?"

"Of course!" he said, clapping his hands together before spreading his arms and smiling in his "and look at me now" manner.

"So, did you have a girlfriend? Or a wife?" she wondered, staring again at the man in the picture, trying to reconcile life of the old looking young man with the young looking old man next to her. She looked up when he didn't answer.

"Doctor?" her voice filled with concern now that the light seemed to have left his eyes.

"Hmm?" he grunted, suddenly very focused once more on his ship.

"Did you... did you have a wife back then?"

He was silent a few moments more, until she gave up hope he would answer her question. Then, surprisingly, she heard him, hardly a whisper.

"Yeah," he sounded as though the word barely made it out of his mouth. "Yeah, I had a wife."

She came up next to him, putting a hand on his shoulder and squeezing comfortingly. "Did you leave her behind?" she asked quietly. "When you ran away? Or did she come with you?"

He kept his head down, flipping levers and pushing buttons slowly, as though it took all his effort to do so.

"No," Amy could hear the utter sadness in his voice, "no, I didn't leave my wife behind. When I left, she'd already... Gallifrey wasn't my home anymore. My family was grown, my wife was gone, and I wanted to see the universe."

Amy gasped softly, squeezing him once more in sympathy. "So did you have children?" she asked, her eyes softening as she tried to imagine what her best friend must have lost.

The Doctor looked down again, breathing in deeply one time before giving his head a small shake and pulling down a lever.

"It was a long time ago." His tone was matter- of- fact now, and Amy sensed the conversation was over.