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'This came with the flowers.' The Doctor handed her a sheet of paper folded in half. 'I think you have a secret admirer,' he said.

Roz unfolded the note; the paper had a smooth, luxurious texture and was written in a smooth elegant hand. She realized with a shock that she could understand the words of the title – 'Poem for a Barbarian Lady'. It was written in Ancient American and signed feLi-!xi-kat-xi. There was a scrawled note at the bottom inviting her to a picnic that afternoon.

'It's feLixi,' she told the Doctor. 'He has designs on my body.'

'May I?' asked the Doctor. Roz passed him the poem. 'I wouldn't say designs,' said the Doctor after he'd finished reading. 'More like a full set of blueprints, a scale model and an artist's impression of the finished development. Interesting that it's in English.'

'I thought so too,' said Roz. 'Do you think I've got a flat nose?'

'Streamlined,' said the Doctor. 'Where do you think he got the translation matrix?'

'He used to work for XR(N)IG,' said Roz. 'I imagine he has access to a lot of classified data.'

'They don't have classified data here,' said the Doctor, 'just things they don't tell other people.

A contact with XR(N)IG could be very useful just at the moment.'

Without being asked, House put a mug of coffee down in front of Roz. 'That was the general idea,' she said. 'His infatuation with me will make it easy to pump him for information.'

'How are you at infatuation?'

'Rusty,' said Roz. 'But it's amazing how fast it all comes back to you.'

The Doctor dropped a pastry into a bowl of caramel and watched it dissolve for a bit. 'I had an interesting conversation with the ships yesterday,' he said. 'There's a couple of things I'd like you to check out. That is if you're not too busy being feLixi's poetic muse.'

'A lead?'

'More like a hot tip,' said the Doctor. 'Did S-Lioness tell you about the habitat that was destroyed during the war?'

'Omicron 378,' said Roz. 'You think there's a connection?'

'Just a hunch,' he said. 'Not even that really, more like a shrug. A ship destroyed a habitat and killed over two hundred thousand people for no good reason. That's enough to ruin their reputation. Because it happened during a war I think XR(N)IG changed the ship's name and classification and then buried the whole sorry story.'

'Surely God would know which ship it was?'

'Not necessarily,' said the Doctor. 'The war was fought over a huge volume of space and ASBIG

were operating shipyards away from the sphere, primarily because God objected to the war.

XR(N)IG and ASBIG could have conspired to change the ship's identity without God knowing. And if vi!Cari found out?'

'That's a hell of a motive,' said Roz. 'Better than that, a former warship would have the expertise to carry out the attack. It won't be easy to find though; for all we know it's happily settled down as a toaster somewhere.'

'You can use the time telescope.' The Doctor plonked the furry terminal on the table. 'It might help you assimilate some of the data. I finished installing it last night and I made a few modifications that should stop God sticking its oar in.'

'I thought Bernice was –'

'I warned you that Bernice might be a bit distracted,' said the Doctor.

'Bernice is doing a job for you, isn't she?' asked Roz. 'Something to do with aM!xitsa and that purebred woman. One of your devious little schemes.'

'Something like that,' said the Doctor. 'Don't you want me to tell you what it's all about? I can do that now because God's figured it out already.'

'No,' said Roz. 'You'll tell me when you want to.'

The Doctor looked at her for a long time. She met his gaze and held it.

'You're not like any other person I've ever travelled with,' he said.

'You tend to travel with nice people, Doctor,' said Roz. 'I'm not a nice person.'

'You believe in justice and you're loyal to your friends . . .'

'Christ, Doctor, what's this?' asked Roz. 'A pep talk?'

'I just want you to know that I appreciate you,' said the Doctor.

'If you don't shut up, Doctor,' said Roz, 'I'm going