The Doctor leaves the Tardis in the vortex for a while, going back to his pointless fiddling and attempts to reason with the ship. River goes back to the library and the Tardis' medicine cabinets whenever she can disengage from Clara and avoid the Doctor.
And then, just a few short days later, the Doctor spins into the kitchen one morning announcing he's "fixed it!". They join him in the console room, the Tardis lands (loudly), and the Doctor throws the door open to the view of a starry night sky and an endless expanse of dessert stretching out into the distance.
"Doctor," Clara says, slowly, "where are we?"
He stands in the open doorway, frozen. "Egypt," he answers, shortly.
"Are you sure?" Clara asks him, peering around his unmoving form.
"Yep."
River bites back a sigh, glaring at the time rotor, "We're on top of a pyramid, aren't we?" she asks.
"Yep."
They don't dare go outside, in case the Tardis decides to lock them out again. They can't leave either, because the Tardis has decided not to fly again.
The day drags on, unchanging. River tries not to think about where they've landed, playing ancient board games with Clara and exploring a terrarium type room that shows up just a couple doors down from Clara's bedroom.
The Doctor disappears under the console room floor, and no attempts to pull him into their board games or explorations proves fruitful. He is too bright and talkative when they're with him, avoiding eye contact and falling far too quiet as soon as they turn away. Hours later, Clara asleep again, River finds herself seated in the Tardis' doorway, left open to the desert breeze. Her back is warm against the open door, the breeze from the dessert cool and sharp against her face. It smells the same, which suddenly strikes her as very strange. Shouldn't it be different now than it had been then, in a time and a place where time was broken and everything happened all at once in the middle of one moment as the universe collapsed in on itself? It feels so calm now, so still. She remembered last time, with the stars burning out around them, and it didn't seem like anything should be the same.
Behind her she hears the Doctor emerge from the depths of the Tardis. His feet drag, and he isn't chattering to himself the way he usually does.
Mentally begging the Tardis not to lock her out all by herself at the top of a pyramid in the middle of the desert, River slips quietly out of the doorway and around the corner, settling behind the open door with her back to the wall. She listens, hoping he'll leave again so she can slip back inside before the Tardis decides to be contrary. Instead she hears his footsteps drawing closer, and the door bumps softly back against it's hinges as she hears him settle into the place she'd just vacated.
Of course, because it's never easy with him.
For once, and of course when it's least convenient, he seems entirely satisfied to sit still for quite a long time. As the minutes pass, she relaxes, resting her head against the wall and turning her focus back to the unfamiliar stillness of the familiar place. It's not supposed to happen with the bio-dampeners, but she thinks she can smell the Doctor now too, familiar like the desert.
"I'll make it a good one."
He's quiet, which is strange and out of place, but also somehow fitting against the unfamiliar stillness of the desert. The only word he says is a very soft, "why?", and his voice is so sad she almost rounds the corner to hold his hands and kiss his silly face until he figures it out.
She doesn't though, because-
"You are an echo, River."
He goes back inside after a little while, and she follows after his footsteps have faded. A short time later the Tardis flies again. Clara wakes up, disappointed they hadn't been able to see more of the pyramid, and River watches the Doctor's jaw clench and a line slip between his eyes as she says it.
The Tardis decides to take them to the Thames next. Not to the same year, but it's winter, and the river is frozen. The Doctor steps out onto the ice and immediately slips and falls. Clara laughs, and the Doctor complains, but a few minutes later she's watching them from the doorway. The serious ice skaters slip carefully around them as they stumble across the ice in their shoes, clutching onto each other and laughing like children.
"Come on Mo!" Clara calls to her, waving so wildly that she unbalances, her feet slipping out from under her. She grabs the Doctor on their way down and they land in a tangled, giggling heap.
River decides to stop watching after that. She tells herself it's a good thing; that even here he can be happy, unburdened by the memories she just can't get away from. He isn't sad and alone, and that is good, it's what she'd wanted for him. It's doesn't feel like a good thing though, and she finds her way under the new console room platform. It's a little sad and dark without the glass floor letting in the console lights from above, but the repair swing is still there. She sits in it with her eyes closed, rocking back and forth to the familiar cadence of the Tardis idling until she hears Clara and the Doctor come back inside.
"What do you think?" she hears Clara ask, "Should we find some ice skates and make a proper go of it?"
"You can if you'd like, I'm out of space on my bum for further bruising."
"It is a scrawny little thing isn't it?"
"Oi!"
River climbs back up onto the platform just in time to see the Doctor jumping away from Clara's mocking perusal of his backside.
"Well it is, don't you think so Mo?" Clara asks as she catches sight of her.
River fixes a grin on her face as she tries very, very hard not to look at his backside with the appreciation she feels for it, "Oh yes," she lies through her teeth, "very scrawny and unattractive. Is that why you wear such a long coat these days?" She realizes her mistake a split second after the words leave her mouth. It's such an obvious slip that even Clara notices.
"What?" Clara asks, "He's always worn that coat…."
The Doctor walks over to her, he stands too close and peers carefully into her eyes.
"Not always, actually."
"I saw a picture," River tells him, glaring back into his gaze and tilting her chin defiantly.
"Where?" he asks her, softly. He isn't quite accusing, but she can see the suspicion in the lines around his eyes.
"I don't remember. Clara and I were poking around somewhere and there was a picture. You were with a red-head and some bloke."
"Do you remember this, Clara?" he asks, not looking away from River.
"Not exactly, I mean we did find a bunch of pictures in a few of the bedrooms though. And I remember the red-head, with the legs. Why are you being so weird? Leave Mo alone, we were just kidding."
He ignores Clara, "Where were you coming from, a minute ago?"
"Down below here, there's a little room."
"How do you know about that?"
"I found it, obviously, what's wrong with you?" she snaps at him, and behind him Clara snorts and says,
"It's not like it's a big secret, you know, there's a staircase right there."
She holds his gaze for a few more seconds. It isn't hard, and she realizes suddenly that maybe it should be, for someone without many years of experience facing down the Doctor's stare. She breaks away, shoves past him angrily and leaves the room, stopping just out of sight.
"Why do you have to be like that?" She hears Clara asks him, "Every time I think you two are starting to be civil, you go and set her off again. She's my friend, not some alien invader sneaking around on your precious ship!"
"She's….odd." says the Doctor, and River winces. She'd been aiming for thoroughly uninteresting. 'Odd' is much too interesting. Especially for the Doctor.
"No offense, but you're pretty much the definition of 'odd'," Clara tells him, and the conversation degenerates from there. River slips away quietly, back to her room where she pulls her bag out from under the bed and checks her inventory list. She has a lot, in fact she's fairly certain she has everything she needs, and some very useful extras, like the Gallifreyan children's books and a very useful tome about teaching developing young Time Lords to train their psychic abilities.
She drops the perception filter around her abdomen, noticing the apparent growth there. "Almost time to go, little one," she tells him, softly. Around them the Tardis lights dim sadly.