The rough ground of the alley beneath her was the first thing she noticed when she began to regain awareness of her surroundings. But she couldn't move. Her body felt as heavy as if it had been hollowed out and filled in with concrete.
All of a sudden, cool fingers closed around her wrist, and her mind quickly sparked with panic, but then she felt the familiar da-da-da-dum, da-da-da-dum of his double-heartbeat thrumming against her skin, and immediately relaxed. She was safe. It was him. The Doctor.
She struggled to open her eyes, to move. She had to tell him; he had to know. She was sorry, so, so sorry. She'd forgotten everything he'd told her; she'd killed ruthlessly, without mercy, hadn't even given them a choice! She could have helped them!
How many lives had she ended? More than she could count, surely, but how many in the last few months, when she should have known better? When he'd told her that everything deserved a second chance, or however many were needed?
Twenty? No, fifty, at the very least. Oh, gods, what had she done?
"Doctor…'m so sorr…" she whispered, her voice hardly more than a breath. But he heard her.
But still, her eyes wouldn't open. He couldn't see her eyes, couldn't see the horror and the pain and the guilt in them. He wouldn't understand.
"It's okay!" he said quickly, his words slightly frantic, tinged with a fear she'd only heard once in his voice. His assurance did nothing to quell her horror. He didn't understand. But she was so weak, couldn't even move, didn't have the strength to speak again, to tell him what she had done.
He continued, oblivious to her inner turmoil, trying to calm her, "Whatever it is you've done, I forgive you! Just, just don't die on me, okay? Because I'm sure you're a wonderful person, and I'd really like to get to know you better!"
His words almost had her heart breaking. He didn't know her.
"It's me!" she whispered, forcing her mouth to move, "It's me, Naani, it's me, Jess—" But her words suddenly cut off as a sound filled her ears, drowning out the world around her. The same sound that she had heard as she jumped off Glory's tower to save the world. The same sound she had heard as she fell to her death, hundreds of feet below. As her scream was lost in the chaos of the electricity tearing her apart. The same sound she'd heard on the beach, right before she woke up in her coffin.
She could remember now. She remembered heaven.
She remembered meeting the Doctor when she helped him save her planet from an asteroid impact that would have wiped out all life and restarted the evolutionary cycle. And no one noticed a thing. The Doctor and Jessana. They were the only ones who knew how close Xeyvokiir had come to destruction. She remembered accepting his offer to see the stars, and all the adventures that came after. She remembered meeting John, stricken by amnesia, when the TARDIS had landed them on Earth in the year 2008.
And she remembered meeting River Song for the first, and only, time. It was the first time she'd seen the Doctor cry.
And for just a second, she heard his voice clearly though the haze, shouting, calling to her, his voice full of horror and pain and the fear of being alone; "NO!"
Because he didn't know. Didn't understand. All he saw was a girl dying in his arms, a girl that he couldn't save. No one could. Because she didn't belong here. It truly wasn't her world anymore. She knew that now, more than she ever had before. She knew it in her heart, and her soul, and the sound of his voice, and the double heartbeat against her hand.
But then the world turned to fire, and she knew no more.