==== ==== EPISODE 5 ==== ====

{ The big finale! }

==== ==== Harry Sullivan ==== ====

Never had Harry grasped the concept of relative time better than in the moment Sarah's arm slipped from his hands. He could have sworn that what really must have happened in a mere second had stretched to half a minute from his point of view as he stared in shock at Sarah's frightened face while she was being pulled into the mirror's so-called pocket universe. Even after she had vanished and the mirror's reflection returned to normal for once, Harry stood in front of it, paralysed, simply struck by the feeling of utter helplessness.
On the verge of his conscience, he noticed the Brigadier bellowing through the warehouse. Orders, most likely, as was to be expected in this situation, but Harry didn't feel addressed by any of them. In fact, it was surprising he had heard him in this moment at all, because the one thought that fully occupied his mind was his own failure.

Had he known he would be unable to pull Sarah back out, Harry might have preferred to follow his friends to the other side, but now, as luck would have it, the reflections were no longer interested in the medical officer. In the faint hope of opening the gateway somehow, Harry pressed his hands on the silver surface of the mirror he had just lost Sarah and the Doctor to, yet the looking glass refused to reveal its secret to him. It had simply returned to its inactive state. Like any other old mirror, it served only to show Harry his own face, distorted by the feelings of despair and anger that had begun to take over his mind. Defeating who or whatever was behind the tetrahedron-shaped menace had suddenly become a more personal matter than ever!
But before he could continue this train of thought, a sudden, loud commotion caught his attention. As Harry swirled around, he saw his fellow UNIT members streaming into the warehouse and heading straight for the corridor of the mirror maze that he was standing in.

"NO! DON'T! Stay out!", Harry yelled at them with hands raised, but without the authority of a Doctor or a Brigadier, his words, sadly, meant very little to them. And so, by the time the first soldier had set a foot into the range of the most outer mirror, it was already too late. The dozen reflections of Harry were immediately joined by the soldier's – and the mirrors' artificial intelligence was triggered again.

In the wink of an eye, the soldier was grabbed by his own image and pulled in, while at precisely the same time, two frames further into Harry's direction, a perfect copy of the man stepped out of another mirror. It happened all so fast and so fluently that all the UNIT members could only stare in shock at the disturbing event before their eyes. What struck Harry the most was that, this time, the three-dimensional reflection was not just a pair of arms to grab someone with, but a complete body. Had it not been for a certain artificial, almost malicious vibe that Harry got from the walking image, he could have mistaken it for an actual human being.

Once the initial shock had passed, the medical officer hurried down the corridor to help the UNIT infantry. Yet by the time he had made that decision, the mirrors had already registered several of the soldiers, and so he barely made it past three of the support frames before he was forced to stop in front of a second reflection that was climbing out of its two-dimensional prison. Again, it was the image of one of UNIT's foot soldiers.
Harry turned around hectically, hoping to find another way out, but even the way further into the centre of the star-burst pattern was starting to become populated by artificial life forms. Very quickly, Harry had to realize how hopeless his situation was. He was absolutely, positively, surrounded...

While he was still uncertain where to turn to, a fight broke out between the soldiers and their copies back at the corridor's entrance. Since the Brigadier's men had not brought their rifles, they tried to subdue the artificial people with the power of their fists alone, but given the reflections' unnatural strength, they were a poor match. The fact that another small party of UNIT soldiers tried to enter the trap from another corridor did not improve their situation, either. Instead, it merely caused more of the mirror's to wake from their standby mode.

In between two of many glimpses about himself, Harry caught sight of a pair of hands reaching for his throat just in time. As the reflection advanced towards him, the medical officer managed to duck and step back. In response to the assault on his life, he bravely threw a punch at his attacker, but even though he managed to hit the man's jaw, the effect of his punch was a lot less helpful than he had hoped and a lot more painful for him than he had imagined. It was like trying to break through a brick wall! Just as he had feared in that moment, the reflection barely acknowledged any pain and while Harry recovered from the shock that had gone through his fist into his body, it grabbed his arm to pull him past instead. Albeit stumbling, Harry somehow avoided to land on his knees, yet as he turned back to face his attacker, his hope was steadily melting away along with his courage. If physical combat was not an option, what else should he try to do? Ask them to take him prisoner? But they did not look the type. For his friends Harry would have given his life, but these… things, they were ready to take his life and give nothing in return. The sound of people wrestling with each other reminded him that the rest of UNIT present was in the same dratted situation as him. He didn't have too much time to think about their struggle, though, because the reflection was slowly closing in on him again. Instinctively, Harry retreated backwards, although he kept glancing behind himself, afraid to bump into yet another enemy along his way. It was during one of these glances behind himself that Harry witnessed a third image crawling out of its frame.
This time, however, something slightly, but significantly different was happening. Instead of stepping out of the pocket universe fluently, Harry noticed a pair of thin arms wrapping around the false soldier's waist and trying to hold him back.

"Harry!" A female voice escaped the pocket universe behind the soldier. "Harry Sullivan! You must help them! Hurry, over here! While it's still open!" It wasn't Sarah's voice, that was for sure, but this one was not unfamiliar, either.

Since there was not much of another option left to him, Harry hurried over to the frame in question. This particular mirror was especially big, probably taken from a palace dining hall or an equally grand place. Three people could have examined themselves easily in it. But as the medical officer stepped in front of the mirror's far end, where he was out of his enemies' reach for a few seconds, there was no reflection of himself displayed.
Instead, there was only the image of the soldier stuck halfway in, halfway out of the mirror, the blur of colours which seemed to make up the pocket universe beyond and a short, brown-haired girl in her twenties, who was the only reason the artificial man had not yet climbed out to strangle Harry.

"Clara Oswald...?!", a surprised medical officer blurted out. He had only seen her about a day ago, and was quite shocked to find her on the wrong side of the mirrors now. But there was no mistake: The girl fighting to keep the mirror's gateway open was definitely her. She was even still wearing her university uniform.

Clara gasped for air, trying to get out a few words before she tightened her grip. "You must help the Smiths, Harry!", she shouted over to him.

There wasn't enough time to even begin to wonder what had happened to her or where that extra confidence in her voice came from. Why she was not asking him to pull her out, but specifically asking him to save his friends... If he would not be convinced of something else, he could have sworn that Clara knew something very important he did not. But as it were, Harry did not have the time to question her and instead, decided to trust her in the wink of an eye. The other reflection by whom he had been attacked by earlier was not giving him the chance to think his decision over, anyway. Once glance over his shoulder, and Harry saw that it had almost closed the distance which he had gained by running away to this specific mirror earlier.
The UNIT officer held out his hands to touch the mirror's surface, expecting to feel a wall of glass underneath his fingertips, but this time, there was nothing in his way. Since he realized much too late that he should have taken hold of the mirror's frame before climbing in, he lost his balance and tumbled forwards into the other world.

…

The first thing Harry noted about the pocket universe was that it had a cement floor. Pretty much like the one in the warehouse, except maybe a little smoother. Although he assumed his landing had been far below of any artistic ranking, he was grateful that he had not fallen from a great height and could not complain about injuries, either.

A short cry of Clara then caused Harry to scramble back to his feet twice as fast. As he turned his head around, he saw the soldier shoving her to the floor and towering over the brave student like the menace that he was. She hastily tried to back away, but not only did the reflection close in on her immediately, it also raised a fist, ready to bring it crashing down onto the poor girl's head any time.

"Oh no you DON'T!", Harry called out and was back in action faster than he had expected himself to be. The medical officer sprung to his feet and launched himself at the soldier's image. The feeling of him colliding with the false man's figure was like throwing oneself against a stone pillar, but at least he was able to take the pillar down with him. Still in the advantageous moment of surprise, Harry tried to position himself on top of his enemy and strike a punch at his head to knock him unconscious. One might argue that this was not the best course of action since he had already failed in doing so before, but Harry's brain was not the best when it came to making fast decisions…

As was to be expected, his counterattack failed remarkably. His fist was stopped by the other man's hand, whose fingers now wrapped around Harry's knuckles and pressed them together. It took only moments for the medical officer to realize the reflection was trying to reduce his hand to a mass of broken bones and tendons. Knowing the exact make-up of the inside of his fist only made matters worse, and he had not even called on the picture in his mind consciously. At the first cracking sound of bones being pushed out of their right place and the first wave of pain rushing down his arm, Harry got back to his feet and tried to pull away from the man.

"Argh…! If you would… kindly stop this, maybe we could talk it over…?", Harry begged as he attempted to undo the fingers around his fist with his other hand – unsuccessfully.

"LET HIM GO!", shrieked a woman's , Clara was back in the fray with them. Instead of making an escape as Harry had hoped she would have, she had returned to help him! Still... he wished she had not. After all, what could she do against this brick wall of a man?
But to his immense surprise, she fearlessly wrapped her arms around the reflection's eyes and throat and attempted to drag him away from the medical officer. It got his attention all too well as Harry's fist was suddenly freed, but instead the soldier was thrashing about now, standing up and trying to reach the girl in his back to throw her over his shoulder.

At the same time, Harry backed a few steps away. His hand was pounding with pain, but as far as his medical knowledge allowed him to tell in the brief few seconds he had to massage the sore spot, nothing appeared to be broken. It was just in that moment, he firmly decided, that he had to be an even greater fool if he attempted to hit a reflection in its face again.

"Clara, get away! RUN!", Harry shouted at her. She was safe while she was in the soldier's blind spot, but it was only a matter of moments until the moving image had freed itself again.

His warning call came too late. The reflection threw itself around and, in one violent, fluent motion, caught Clara's throat with a hand. He had not expected those big brown eyes of hers to grow even bigger, but the shock that overwhelmed her had caused them to. The young woman's hands immediately reached up to her throat, but she had even less strength to undo the soldier's grip than Harry had had moments before. Fearing what would follow next, the reluctant hero rushed forward again, but this time around the soldier had expected his course of action and struck behind himself. He knocked the medical soldier back down to the floor like a man would swat a fly. Harry felt very much like one, too, as he landed square on his back. His head hitting the cement floor again gave his sense of balance a good whack and the world spun for a moment or two.
He blinked and lost sight of the fight for a few seconds as he hurried to somehow get back on his feet – and that was the moment when he heard it.

The noise was unmistakably the one noise a human neck should not make.

Harry raised his face in horror. He couldn't see the whole picture – he wouldn't have wanted to, anyway – but there was Clara's body collapsing to the floor before the reflection's feet, lifeless and limp.

Whereas time had felt very slow as he had lost Sarah from his hands, now time felt surprisingly fast as Harry's mind worked through the horrible scenario which had unfolded before him. The first emotion which hit him was the shock. He wanted to deny that Clara had just fallen victim to this monster, but it had happened so plainly before his eyes that no denial was possible. Then, anger welled up inside of him, the thought of quick vengeance crossed his mind, but as Harry gazed at his enemy, the furious frown was washed from his face. The only thing he could do was to find himself dead on the floor next to Clara if he settled for the violent option. Besides, even if he could miraculously overthrow the reflection, the victory would be of use to no one. So last but not least, the initial horror, fear and sadness returned to fill the emptiness in Harry's mind.
He backed further away as the soldier turned around and came for him.

"I'm so sorry, Clara. So sorry. There was nothing I could do.", the medical officer muttered to himself, having failed his oath to preserve life again, though the reflection could not care less about his grief. Harry tried to glance at Clara's unmoving figure behind him, secretly begging to see her twitch so he knew there was a chance he could double back and help. But the soldier advancing towards him meant that he could not keep his eyes on her for long enough. He had to get away. The hope was too faint, he eventually decided, and with a gulp, turned around and started to run.

Harry ran and ran. Without looking back once, he ran as far as his legs carried him.