A primal roar tore at her eardrums.

She saw Oswin stumbling forward a couple steps, and heard the slamming of a door.

Past the heavy breathing of the new arrivals, and through the wooden door, a woman's voice pleaded with the thing, begging for mercy with all of her heart.

Clara heard a quiet moan, and felt Laurie convulse against her side.

The woman outside screamed once, out of shock, and then again, louder this time, out of pain. The screams continued, and Clara cringed, wanting nothing more than to sit in a corner with her hands covering her ears.

"Lizzie!" Laurie shrieked, "Lizzie! Lizzie! Lizzie!"

A cold sweat broke out on the back of Clara's neck. There was no way the thing had not heard that.

Clara grabbed him by the collar, digging her fingers into the stiff fabric, and pressing his face into her dress in order to muffle his grief.

She felt the Doctor's arms come around her, sandwiching the boy between them. A rebellious tear escaped from the corner of her eye. She pressed her nose into his brown tweed, breathing in his scent and withholding a sob.

She heard a familiar sniffling and concluded that Oswin had been unable to hold in her emotions.

The Doctor ran soothing circles over her back. Up. Right. Down. Left. Up. Right. Down. Left.

It made her feel funny. To think that she'd once been pregnant. That she'd once been married. To think that she'd even been in a serious relationship at all!

To think that in her past lives, she'd loved someone enough to let herself fall pregnant... well, it was pretty unbelievable. At least to her it was.

The Doctor kissed her temple, his lips leaving a slightly moist imprint on the soft skin there. She shuddered when Laurie tightened his grip on her and let out his most heartbreaking howl yet.

When the woman's screams finally died down, Clara's breathing seized.

The thing, whatever it was, roared.

Untangling himself from her, the Doctor sprang to the door, Matthew close behind. They pressed their backs into it, digging their heels into the wooden floor and grunting as the creature tried to force its way in. Clara would have helped had Laurie not been using her as a human support.

After a few seconds the thing whined and stalked away, clearly unwilling to continue fighting for its meal.

Everyone relaxed, but the men didn't leave from their places at the door.

The high pitched whine of the Doctor's sonic set her teeth on edge.

Above their heads lights came to life with a pop.

"What was that thing?" Clara asked.

Oswin shook her head, "We couldn't see... Too dark..."

Matthew broke in, "We've run into demons from the darkest corners of my nightmares in this building."

He shuddered, "And they eat people.."

Oswin's face went slightly green and she clutched at her stomach.

Clara closed her eyes as her echo vomited onto the floor.

She opened them to see Matthew supporting his wife.

"How did you get in," she asked, fighting the urge to throw up herself.

Matthew answered, "Oswin found some blueprints of the building at the library. There's a tunnel connecting this building's basement to the one at the corner of the street. It hadn't been used for ages, and I nearly broke my shoulder trying to open the hatch."

The Doctor smiled humorlessly, "Good old New York. Full of secrets. Full of history."

A movement at her side reminded her of Laurie's presence.

"Lizzie," he groaned into her dress.

Clara grimaced, and pushed him away just enough for her to bend down to his level.

"Who's Lizzie?" she asked gently.

"Who's that?" Matthew asked pointing at Laurie.

Clara shushed him.

Suspicious, Oswin straightened up.

Laurie wiped at his nose with his sleeve, pulling away a trail of glistening snot.

"She raised me after mother died. She was all I had... And now she's dead!"

He cried into her chest, and it reminded her of eight year old Artie hours after his mother passed away.

His eyes had been so big as cried into her university shirt.

With a hiccup he'd asked if she was going to leave them too.

She couldn't bring herself to say yes even though the plane tickets for San Francisco were booked. And she hadn't been able to say yes at any point in the last three years even though she'd desperately wanted to.

"Laurie," she began, mumbling so that only he could hear, "I know it's hard to lose someone you love, but you can't break to pieces right now. Do you think you can focus long enough to help us? You must know this place better than anyone... Please."

His harsh breathing told her that he was trying to put himself together.

"My father. He changes animals, and he changes people using the serums his scientists invent in the labs on the ninth and tenth floors."

He took a deep breath, "The sixth, seventh, and eighth floors are where the creatures are kept behind locked electric doors. Father thought they were safer since the only way the doors could open were by the controls in his office. We'd had power outages before, and it had been fine because of the back-up, but I figure that's gone as well."

"Where are we now," The Doctor asked, "What floor?"

Laurie's face scrunched up, and he curled in on himself, his thin shoulders shaking from the weight of his grief.

"No, no," the Doctor began, looking uncomfortable, "Don't..."

Clara glared at him, and mouthed for him to be comforting.

"Hey," he said, kneeling down in front of the crying boy, "Hey. Hey. You said you wanted to get out of here didn't you?"

"The fifth," Laurie said, wiping at his eyes furiously, "There are stairs at the end of this corridor that go all the way to the basement. We can use those if there really is a tunnel."

"There is," Oswin said, "Trust us."

Laurie looked between her and Clara with dull astonishment, "You two look exactly the same."

Clara sighed, "Yeah."

"Are you sisters?"

"No. It's a bit too complicated to explain and now isn't really the time," she said.

Oswin raised her eyebrows, "But there will be a time won't there?"

Clara held her gaze, "Yes. There will definitely be a time. I promise."

Opening the door quickly as to prevent the creaking of door hinges, Matthew peeked his head out.

"Right then," the Doctor said, looking at the both of them warily, "Let's get out of here."


Though they couldn't see the corpses, the smells of the few on the stairs provided plenty of unpleasant images, and more than once Clara wondered how Oswin was faring.

They went down the steps with great care, not knowing what could await them at the bottom of every flight.

She nearly fell twice.

Once when she missed a step, and the second time when the Doctor, in an attempt to be chivalrous, tried to put his hand on her waist in order to keep her steady and accidentally went a little too low.

After walking down a flight of stairs, a bitter smell reached her nostrils, making her cough.

It seemed to be coming from the floors above them, but she couldn't be absolutely sure.

The world felt hotter, thicker.

At the third floor stop, the air quality wasn't getting any better. They were all coughing, the Doctor was breathing into the sleeve of his coat.

Wait.

She could see him breathing into the sleeve of his coat.

The world was quickly growing visible.

She turned on the step, feeling her heart pound as she looked up. There were no flames yet, but the smell and the light made the fact obvious.

"Fire," she gasped.

She'd once read that fire traveled faster than some cars going at over ninety miles an hour.

They were on foot.


A/N: As I have it planned, this story will be wrapping up in a couple of chapters, and after that I'm not sure what I'll do. Maybe a couple one-shots, but nothing major unless I'm struck with inspiration. Thank you for reading, and I'll be responding to all reviews written for this chapter via PM

Also I apologize for any errors you may find, I haven't had the chance to edit this to the best of my abilities :)