The knocking finally woke River, despite all her attempts to cover her ears with a pillow. Her muscles ached, her head especially. She pressed her eyes shut, trying to remember where she'd gotten such a bad hangover. Or was it a hangover? She couldn't tell.

"Professor Song?" Anita's voice trickled through the door to River's flat. "Professor, are you in there?"

"Come in, Anita," River called and rolled back on her pillow. She'd slept in her clothes, it turned out, like a kid. She pulled at her hair a bit and managed to get it into a bun as Anita peeked through the door and walked into the room. She closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead.

"I'm glad you're here," Anita laughed. "When you didn't show up this morning, Dave and I were worried. He said 'give her the day off, she probably had a late night', but you know, I just wanted make sure you got back after the party."

River peeled one eye open. "Did you call me 'professor'?"

"Um… yes," Anita smiled, but her eyes were full of confusion. She gave River a look that asked are you alright? "Remember last night? You got your diploma and we all went out to celebrate?"

"No," River protested immediately. She didn't even stop to consider. "It was 1883…" She trailed off, and then her eyebrows furrowed. The thought crossed her mind that 1883 sounded crazy. Must've been a dream she'd been having…. "I mean, yes. We went to that restaurant." She tilted her head. Her mouth opened slightly. Her head was pounding. Absolutely aching. Why couldn't she remember….? It had been her, and Anita, and Dave, and others, and she'd kept hoping the Doctor would show up, even though he didn't drink and she'd had one too many glasses of wine…. God, she usually held her alcohol better than this.

Wait. The Doctor? She almost remembered, but she couldn't reach the memory, the knowledge was too far away, aching, reaching, bleeding, but she couldn't…. What had happened? She wasn't supposed to be here…

Anita murmured under her breath, baffled by River's response. She shifted on the sides of her feet and uncomfortably answered, "If you're not feeling well, I can cancel our meeting with Strackman Lux. The whole Felman Lux Corporation is coming down to hear the plans." She looked worriedly at River.

Bur River wasn't paying attention. She knew she was missing something, something important, something vital. Keep talking, it's what the Doctor always does. Keep talking and make the time to think it out. "When is that?"

"It's tonight. We're having the formal proposal…" Anita's voice droned. River closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead with the tops of her fingers. She wasn't supposed to remember, for some reason, and she knew she shouldn't. She didn't want to remember, didn't want to think, didn't want to imagine the truth, and her head hurt like the sharp ring of a pick on stone.

But why? What was so important? It felt so close, like it was at the tip of her tongue. Her mouth opened involuntarily. A sudden chorus of voices hammered at the door. Anita jumped, exchanging a look with River.

Strackman Lux's voice outpaced the others and started to shout, "Dammit, Professor Song, you're going to tell me what-the-hell is going on here!"

River got out of bed. For half an instant, the world rocked back and forth and the floor seemed to plunge far away. Anita grabbed her before she fell over and the vertigo passed just as quickly as it had come. Beyond the door, she could hear Dave yelling, "Mr. Lux, will you just step back a minute?" The rest of the cacophony was a swirl of nondescript voices, rising and falling on the crest of a tumultuous pitch.

"Anita?" River looked at the student, who shrugged in response. The door to River's flat shuddered with the blow from a body and it creaked open, then slammed shut. Dave pressed himself against the wood, half-panting.

"Something really weird is happening with 1963, Doc—Professor. Something's happening. But I don't know—"

Anita gave a groan and sunk down onto the bed. Dave stopped and looked at her, and River turned away from the door.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

"Do you feel like this has happened before?" Anita rubbed her forehead. "I think I'm having déjà vu."

What was it that had confused Anita? 1883…? And the déjà vu that wasn't… A memory shook River. She stared at Anita and Dave. "But what about the readings? Yesterday they were all eights and nines in 1883, and…" Once she started, the words just kept coming, and the memories with them. "And it was 1912, and the Titanic, but there was nothing there…"

Dave took a step backwards, eyebrows jumping up, forehead wrinkling. "Professor, I don't understand…"

River shook her head, excited. Things were coming back to her in bits and pieces. She searched through her bureau drawers, yanked up her sheets and sieved through the billows and folds of her blankets. She dropped to her knees and her fingers strained to reach the farthest spaces under her bed. "No, I remember… I wasn't even supposed be there. It was an accident, but I couldn't just leave him. And…and…Krakatoa! And he was dying. And the TARDIS was—" Her breath caught as she recalled the damage to the TARDIS, its crying, writhing like a tortured beast. She stretched a little longer and her fingertips bent across the cover of her soft-bound diary. She hooked her nails into one of the grooves in the square-patterned cover and drew it toward her. On her knees, she flipped through the pages. "He left me a note. Or… or someone did, I don't know. A time, a place…"

Her fingers deftly picked the page and traced the words along the grain of the paper. She pictured the Doctor's face, tired and pained. "It didn't work," she murmured at last. "It wasn't ready. Oh, god. The paradox." She looked up at Anita, paling. A breeze flapped the curtains at River's open window like sails. She wondered where Jack was, if he could remember too, come looking for her. River got to her feet, dropping the diary. She had woken up in bed, placed back into a timeline, even though she could remember. And if it had done the same for Jack…

River exhaled, a long, drawn out breath. 1963. If the paradox machine had sent her back home, could that mean…? Maybe it had saved him after all. "The Doctor's alive." Hearing the words aloud made her smile, her tensed muscles relaxed. Dave looked at her sideways. He took Anita's hand and sat down next to her on the bed.

"Anita, I promise you'll be fine," she paused, ignoring a swell in the shouting match outside. "It'll pass, you'll be fine. Just some temporal disturbance." She glanced over her shoulder. "Take care of her, Dave."

"Lux is going to kill you," Dave said.

River's shoulders lifted indifferently. "As if it matters at this point." She pushed out the door.

A flood of people greeted her. River strode through the crowd powerfully, and quickly enough that no one realized at first that she'd gone by. Lux spun on heel, face red enough to give off steam. His nostrils flared at the bright drop of his nose that was quickly taking on the appearance of a cherry tomato.

"River Song," he growled menacingly.

"Yes, Mr. Lux?" She spared him a short glance, filled with disinterest.

"Would you care," he began, "to explain yourself this time?" He spat out the words slowly, tongue barely leashed enough to keep civil. "Or are you going to swan off again?" He marched next her, but the rest of the crowd was catching up. River frowned.

"All this noise!" she shouted. "Who are all these people?"

Lux's shoulders shot up. "Give me one good reason why I should keep you on this expedition because so help me, I will—"

"If you have a problem, would you let me know before you form an angry mob? Threats without explanations, Mr. Lux. How does that accomplish anything?" Another figure emerged from behind her.

"Well, that didn't work, did it, Mels Pond? How are things?" Jack's trench coat swirled by her side. She looked over at him and shook her head. "You going to find him?" She nodded; he flashed an ironic half-smile. He'd certainly gotten there fast enough, come to find her just like she predicted. "Anything I can do?"

Maybe it was her memory—still foggy—but she couldn't figure out why all these people were here, shouting, driving her mad. Did they have a reason or were they all with Lux? "Shut them up, Captain?"

He gave her a mock salute and whipped out pistol. Several rounds blasted into the ceiling. "Alright, that's enough!" A collective flinch shook through the crowd. The hallway tumbled to dead silence as a few specks of plaster drifted to the ground. Even Lux shut his mouth into a thin line, suddenly pallid. River curled her tongue at the roof her mouth.

"And your vortex manipulator, if you don't mind." Jack started to dig around in his pocket. "The good one, please," she interrupted, nodding to his wrist. He rolled his eyes, annoyed, but yanked his hand from his pocket and started to undo the strap at his wrist.

She took it from him and wrapped it around her arm. "Good luck," he said, eyebrows lifting.

Lux's eyes widened. "River Song…"

River shrugged. "We'll have to chat when I get back, sorry." She smiled, and Lux cast a glance at Jack, with gun still out. She programed the vortex manipulator. Jack nodded, and she pressed the button. Time and space rushed all around her.