The eccentric Doctor and the vigilant Wyatt had seen all there was to see in the mall, lost to the tides of progress. So, as they passed by empty stores and walked into the light of the mall's center, leaving was the only thing on their minds.

"Should we be walking around in the open like this, Doctor?"

At least, it was on Wyatt's mind. The young man kept his eyes peeled for any nearby souls who may have begun to observe them now that the lights throughout the mall had been turned back on.

"I doubt anything you've imagined needs light to see us."

The Doctor, however, aimlessly examined the mall's center as they passed through.

"That's not terrifying at all…"

Wyatt sighed as he watched the Doctor remove his sonic screwdriver again, scanning the lights above them.

"Again. Nothing. Wherever the circuit breaker is, it's not doing its job. The mall's clear and has power, but nothing and no one is running in. It just doesn't add up, does it?"

The Doctor tossed about alternatives in his head as they walked down the escalator back to the first floor.

"If you want, you can solve all that some other time."

The two continued through the first floor of the Valley View Center, with Wyatt still looking around for anything they may have missed. The Doctor scanned other items powered by the unknown source, hoping for insight. Both found something new that the mall had to offer once they reached the staircase from which they had entered. This discovery, however, was the last thing either of them wanted.

"It's blocked!"

Wyatt yelled as they ducked under the opened gate in front of the store and walked through, only to find the staircase behind it filled with rubble.

"Must've caved in after we came through."

The Doctor offered a solution while Wyatt tried moving rocks out of the way to no avail.

"I didn't hear any cave-in."

Wyatt responded in disbelief before stepping back from the staircase.

"We're trapped here."

"Oh, we're not trapped. Malls have plenty of exits. I'm sure there's another staircase around here somewhere. We just need to try another exit."

"And if there isn't one?"

"We'll never know if we don't try."

The Doctor rested a hand on Wyatt's shoulder, calming him down in the wake of an encroaching panic. Soon after, they stepped back into the dreary mall air with only the faint sound of muzak to greet them.

"Alright, let's try the obvious exit first."

The Doctor offered, pointing to a glowing red exit sign hanging overhead.

"Follow the red signs."

"Right. Obviously."

The two started down the trail of neon signs that led them through the shadows of the abandoned shopping center's many walkways. It didn't take long for them to arrive at a red fire exit embedded between two kiosks. The very sight of it sparked Wyatt into a jog, and his face lit up at the prospect of getting out of the concrete prison.

"Let's see what's behind door number…"

Wyatt started to say as he latched onto the door handle and pulled it open. Unfortunately, his joy rapidly faded when he saw nothing but a wall of concrete behind it.

"Crap…"

"I don't suppose there's a big concrete block behind every fire exit."

The Doctor added as Wyatt slowly closed the door in defeat.

"Probably."

"Well, it couldn't be that easy for us to get out."

"The stairs we came in from were pretty hidden."

"Did you only find one entrance for this place?"

"Yeah. Guess we'll have to search for another one."

"Why don't we go back to the middle of the mall and collect our bearings? Maybe we can find another map."

"Sure…"

Disheartened but not defeated, Wyatt followed the Doctor back to the mall's center, trying more fire exits along the way only to find concrete behind each one. As they treaded through the ruins of the Valley View Center, something caught the Doctor's eye, making him pause their search for another exit.

"Look at this. More signs from the janitor."

The Doctor pointed to several signs behind a glass window in front of the storefront.

"Let's see. 'Parade of the Giants'."

He read off of a graphic displaying the silhouettes of giant puppets.

"That looks like a groundbreaking there."

He pointed to another sign, this one being of an excavator digging up dirt.

"There's the handsome lad we saw earlier."

The Doctor continued, gesturing to a picture of the paper-mache statue they'd encountered before.

"Handsome isn't the word I'd use."

Wyatt added that before the Doctor moved to the last few pictures,

"And this must be the man he's modeled after."

The Doctor moved to a portrait of an older man with a massive beard. Beside him was a picture of another man, but this person bore little resemblance to the giant.

"Julien Reverchon."

The Doctor began to read the captain beneath the posture.

"French botanist. A resident of Dallas. Born the third of August, 1837. Died, the thirtieth of December, 1905."

The Doctor looked down to find a collection of leaves at his feet before the glass, prompting him to move his foot around in the small pile.

"Never heard of him."

Wyatt commented as he studied the portrait of the famous florist.

"He must've been popular if they made a big statue of him. Popular enough to stay here while everything else gets cleaned out. C'mon. Let's keep going."

They continued past the blocked exhibit and back into the mall's center again.

"Is it just me, or are we going in circles? I seem to get that feeling a lot."

The Doctor asked as they stopped in the middle of the complex.

"Malls do get kinda smart here in America."

Wyatt replied, silently hoping they weren't stuck in some infinite mall with no exit.

"You're from Britain, right? You sound like it."

"Well, I'm certainly not from America."

Just as the Doctor answered, thunder rocked the mall, causing the lights to flicker and specks of rubble to fall from above.

"Do you hear that?"

The Doctor asked, looking to the ceiling before brushing a bit of dust off of his coat.

"How could I not hear that?"

Wyatt responded by immediately checking his surroundings.

"Not the boom."

The Doctor replied.

"The music. It's stopped."

"DOCTOR!"

Wyatt cried as he pointed to a massive shape lurking beneath the second floor in the corner of the mall. The Doctor stepped forward to meet the thing that should've been there. It had no muscles or limbs that could move, yet here it was.

The giant paper-mache statue had come all this way to meet them again. Somehow.

"It moved, Doctor. How did it move?"

Wyatt stammered, staying back while the Doctor moved closer.

"Maybe the janitor pushed it here."

The Doctor jested, carefully moving closer. With every inch he crept, the statue didn't move.

"This isn't funny, Doctor!"

"Of course, it isn't. We're trapped a mile underground in a mysteriously-clean mall with a giant paper-mache thingy that can seemingly teleport."

The Doctor raved on as he continued closer, looking for any signs of life or oddities on the giant's body. Apart from the whole moving bit, it was seemingly ordinary, but there were no signs of any influence whatsoever.

"It isn't funny, but it is…"

When the Doctor passed by an escalator to get closer to the giant, Wyatt looked around to see if anyone or anything nearby would have pushed it to where it was now. But after that moment passed, the Doctor walked out from behind the escalator…

Creak…

The giant was nowhere to be found.

"Interesting."

"Where did it go?!"

"No clue."

The Doctor briskly walked to where the giant once stood, peering around the corner to find nothing but the same empty mall.

"But something tells me we shouldn't stick around and find out."

The Doctor moved to another nearby map, his eyes wandering to the western side of the Valley View Center.

"There."

He pointed to a larger store on the west side.

"This should be the loading area for the mall. If we can find an employee entrance, that might be obscure enough for us to slip out."

Wyatt took off briskly towards the western side of the mall with the Doctor in tow. They watched for the giant as they darted up an escalator and past stores and restrooms. They knew it could move now. They knew it had met them when they were trying to find an exit, and it might pop up again soon.

Eventually, the duo came to another of the mall's hubs, much smaller than the one by the main entrance. In the center of this area was a children's playground, littered with plastic structures for kids to jump from and run across.

"This one's blocked too!"

Wyatt shouted as they approached a large storefront blocked off by cement behind its steel gate. After inspecting the gate, he returned to the playground, peering over the edge only to find nothing of use.

"Do we have to go through a store to reach that employee entrance, Doctor…Doctor?"

Wyatt looked over at the Doctor, who had become affixed to a store different from where the exit was held. He peered through the gate separating him from the other side, his eyes glancing up to the store's name, which he spoke aloud.

"'Midtown Artist Studios'."

The Doctor read as he gazed through the slits in the gate. On the other side, he could barely make out the flora in the darkness of the mall. Not just shrubs and grass but trees growing in a space that seemed far too large to be contained in a small store.

"More of Julien's plants…"

It resembled looking into his TARDIS, though the entrance was much more extensive. Still, he couldn't help but wonder why this mall portion was so much more removed from its cleaner counterpart, so much so that nature had reclaimed it entirely. Even the animals.

"Are those birds?"

The Doctor was puzzled as he rested an ear on the gate, trying to catch another bit of what he thought was chirping. Instead, he found a different sound in his other ear: the sound of rolling wheels.

Creak…

"Doctor, I think it's coming."

Wyatt heard it, too, backing away from the railing and walking towards the Doctor. The sound came from around the corner, beyond the artist's studio, closer than either cared for. Cautiously, they crept over, the Doctor leading as they rounded the corner at a snail's pace only to find another empty mall corridor.

"How does it move so fast?"

Wyatt muttered.

"Don't know. We're being stalked."

The Doctor replied.

"Not a fan of being stalked. And I'm certainly not a fan of eavesdroppers."

The Doctor seemed to catch on quicker than Wyatt, but they could both whip back around in time to find the giant rolling toward them just a few meters away. However, it slowly slid to a half the moment they saw it.

"Now I get it! You're a phony!"

The Doctor cried, walking up to the giant with reckless abandon.

"What?!"

Wyatt could only stammer as he backed away, watching in horror as the Doctor approached.

"What are you doing!"

"It's fine, Wyatt. It's not fine, but it will be as long as you keep looking at the giant. It can't move as long as you look at it."

"It…can't?"

"Nope. See?"

Even as he spoke, the Doctor kept his gaze on it, not getting too close but close enough to confirm his theory. He goaded the statue into moving, only to get no response.

"I've dealt with similar things before. I had my suspicions, but the stunt back at the escalator proved me right. This thing is fast, but it can't move as long as we stare. An art piece that chases you if you aren't looking at it. I've heard of experimental art, but this is something else."

"So we just keep staring at it? We still have to find an exit."

"And we will. Just as long as we're careful from here on…"

Creak…

"In."

The Doctor's face dropped as he watched the giant nudged ever-so-closer to him. It wasn't pushed or propelled by any visible force. It simply moved a bit closer.

"That's not right…"

Creak…

The giant moved again, this time close enough to force the Doctor to walk backward.

"You said it couldn't move!"

Wyatt exclaimed as the Doctor backed away from him. Meanwhile, the giant started gradually accelerating towards them, rattling on its cart as it approached.

"Remember what I just told you?"

The Doctor asked Wyatt as they started to back away while still observing the giant.

"Yeah?"

"Forget it and run!"

By the time the Doctor and Wyatt forgot the prevailing theory of observation and began running, the giant had picked up considerable speed. Even in full sprint, the two couldn't stop the giant from gaining a little ground as it barreled down the hallway towards them.

"We've trying to leave!"

Wyatt yelled behind him. The giant didn't stop.

"Up there! Hurry!"

Wyatt called out as they approached the mall's center and its many escalators. The two bolted up the escalator and emerged on the second floor. By the time they reached the top, they turned to see the giant rolling up to the base of the escalator, only to stop at its foot.

"Not built for stairs, are we?"

The Doctor called out as the giant paused momentarily before turning away from the escalator and rolling away.

"Sorry. You'll have to find an elevator. A really big elevator."

"Doctor, while we were running, I saw another store. It wasn't blocked by a gate, but it was boarded up. The giant won't follow us there if we can get in. There might even be an exit."

"Brilliant! You can run and think on your feet! I could get used to having you around."

The Doctor praised Wyatt before checking up on the giant, which seemed aimlessly rolling over to another portion of the mall.

"It's only a matter of time before that thing gets to whatever secret entrance it's going for. We'll wait a bit and then go for it."

"How long is 'a bit'."

"Oh, I'd say right…about…NOW!"

Wyatt was perceptive enough to realize the Doctor was waiting for the giant to round another corner, so the moment he cried out, he was more than ready to take off down the escalator and lead the way to the potential exit he'd seen. The Doctor followed behind Wyatt, checking to see if the giant had caught on, and turned back around only to see nothing there. Despite nothing to see, they could still hear it lurking in the Valley View Center.

Creak…

The sound of moving wheels.

After another minute of tense running, something they'd both become accustomed to, Wyatt stopped in front of a store blocked only by a wood frame.

"C'MON!"

Wyatt howled as he bashed his shoulder against the wood, causing it to give just a bit, but not enough to slip through.

"Not to rush you or anything, but it's coming."

The Doctor replied, watching the giant emerge from behind the corner and start towards them.

"I've almost got it!"

Wyatt smashed his shoulder against the wood again, causing it to budge slightly further from its original spot.

"Wyatt!"

The Doctor watched nervously as the giant reached full speed, strafing toward another building to divert its attention from them. Still, the giant seemed steadfast on its original path. The sheer adrenaline of seeing the giant so close to him enabled Wyatt in his last push, sending him falling into the empty store and onto the wooden frame after his last, successful push.

"Let's go!"

The Doctor ran between Wyatt, picking him up from the ground and helping him along as they ran through the back alleys and catacombs of the mall. Wyatt looked behind him as they disappeared into the depths.

No giant following them inside.

Creak…

But it still creaked somewhere.

The duo weaved through a maze of shadowy corridors illuminated only by decrepit bulbs suspended overhead. It was a far cry from the mall's clean exterior but no less disturbing. They eventually reemerged in another storefront, finding themselves on another side of the mall.

"Over there. Look."

The Doctor crept towards the shop's entrance, still blocked by a gate. However, on the other side, he could see a set of glass doors leading to a seemingly normal hallway going to a portion of the mall they hadn't seen before.

"Do you think we can make it?"

"This gate might be a little noisy, but we'll have to try. Plus, it can't follow us in there. Help me with this."

After weighing their options, the Doctor and Wyatt knelt, curling their fingers around the bottom of the gate and lifting it about their heads. Try as they did; they couldn't stop the metal from making a few scrapes that echoed throughout the mall. Once they had it up, they wasted no time darting across the hall and slipping into the room, relieved that no giant was waiting for them on the other side.

"So…"

Wyatt exhaled as they stepped into a dark room marked by only a few marble pillars.

"What now?"

"Now, we see where this leads."

The Doctor replied, causing Wyatt to point his camera down the hall. The flashlight illuminated a long stretch of hallway that they began yet another quiet trek through. The sound of creaking wheels was nowhere to be heard, but they knew they had to be fast. It was only a matter of time before it caught up to them.