"I didn't do this, OK?" Ric attests, as Sally, Matilda and Brad look on at him aghast. Well, you might say that mate, but the fact that they found you standing over a beaten body covered in more blood than the floor of the local abattoir suggests otherwise. However, Rocco isn't one of our not-so-dearly departed just yet. When the police arrive, they discover that he still has a pulse - and as Rocco is whisked to the local hospital, Ric is dragged down to the cop shop for a serious grilling. Although Peter dearly wants to believe that Ric is innocent, he drives a couple of points home. Given the threats he made against Rocco before, along with Fitzgerald's statement that he was enraged when she saw him before the attack, the evidence is piling up against him and it ain't looking swell. If he's going to prove that he wasn't behind it then he'd better pin his hopes on Rocco waking up and corroborating his story. Still, at least his friends and family believe him, don't they? Well, apparently not. A shocked and disappointed Ric soon realises that Matilda thinks he's guilty - and it looks as though he's going to have a harder time convincing her otherwise than he will with the cops...Rachel can't wait to become a stepmother. OK, OK, that's a lie. Not even the prospect of turning wicked will cheer her at the thought of her husband having a baby with his former squeeze. She's putting a brave face on things, mind you, but her colleague Julie is quick to see through it. Rachel confides that she's not as comfortable with the situation as Kit and Kim believe she is. "I'm trying to be enthusiastic about it", she sighs, as a silent "but" rings in our ears. Julie insists that Rachel needs to come clean now or face an even tougher time when the baby arrives. After mulling it over, Rachel decides that she agrees. She's about to open up to Kim about her true feelings, but decides against it when he jumps in first and tells her how much Kit appreciates having Rachel around for support. Rachel tries to force a smile but ends up looking like a guard dog bearing its teeth at a burglar. Will she have the balls to spill the beans?Down at the cop shop, Alf is being particularly gruff. "He's helping us with our enquiries", explains a portly policeman, when Alf asks what's happening to Ric. "He'd better not be getting the rough end of the pineapple", Alf fumes in response, leaving us wincing thanks to an unpleasant and lingering mental image. Soon afterwards, news comes that Rocco's condition is far worse than first thought and that's highly unlikely he will ever recover. All present are aware of how grave this information is; without Rocco's back-up, Ric can look forward to 25 years of eating porridge and trying not to drop the Palmolive. Meanwhile, Johnny fiercely denies any involvement - and Peter has to agree that it's very unlikely he could have arranged Rocco's thrashing from behind bars. Although Ric is eventually allowed to go home, the investigation is far from over. Besides, he's still struggling with the revelation that Matilda doesn't believe him. He confides his woes in Sally as she clasps him to her ample bosom. So much rests on Rocco waking up. But as he lies in his hospital bed, hooked up to machines that are doing the living for him, it doesn't look like there's much hope for either of them.

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