"I'll look for something else to stop it," Tiff said, eager to fix the situation he had caused.
"No," Katie said. "We've looked through everything in here already. Let's try another room."
She grunted as she got to her feet, unaccustomed to heavier breasts and two eight-month-old fetuses inside of her. As they slowly strolled out of the room, Tiff caught a glistening thing out of the corner of her eye. She trotted over to a large wooden door. The silver handle was finely polished, without a smudge or a single fleck of dust.
"Katie, over here!" He waited impatiently as his friend trudged over to the door. His tail thumped on the floor rapidly.
"This is strange," Katie said regarding the knob. She grabbed it gently, slowly turning it. She found it was unlocked and the door opened silently. "And I was definitely expecting a loud creak there."
The dim light revealed a staircase going down into darkness. Tiff noticed a string dangling just inside the doorway. "That thing! Up there!"
Katie reached up and pulled it, turning on a dim bulb. They still couldn't see to the bottom, but at least they could see the steps clearly. Tiff dashed down the steps in his dog-taur body, excited at the mystery the basement had to offer.
"Tiff!" Katie called as he disappeared into the shadows. "Don't do anything reckless!" Sighing, she grabbed a slim wooden railing and carefully hoisted herself down each step. About ten steps into the descent, she was hit with another pain. Katie plopped down onto a step and leaned back as her belly went through another expansion. Inside, she could feel the babies squirm and multiply. It now appeared as though a set of quadruplets was growing inside her. Her vast belly stuck out like a beach ball, and she could no longer see her feet beyond its tight flesh. She could feel her thighs expanding a bit as well, preparing themselves for the enormous load of the four children. "How much worse is this going to get?" she asked thin air, frustrated and bewildered.
The pain subsided and Amy tried once more to get to her feet. It was more difficult now, but she continued to descend the staircase, occasionally calling into the darkness for Tiff but hearing no reply.