Prologue

"Don't say I'm out of touch with this rampant chaos, your reality. I know well what lies beyond my sleeping refuge, the nightmare I built my own world to escape." – Evanesence

"Goodbye, Sarah," Ludo said.

Sarah looked behind her quickly, but Ludo wasn't there.

"And remember fair maiden, should you need us…," Sir Didymus appeared and disappeared as he spoke to her. Sarah felt the tears welling in her eyes.

"Yes," Hoggle appeared on her bed, "Should you need us for any reason at all…"

"I need you Hoggle," Sarah stated evenly, feeling the tears burning.

"You, you do?"

"I don't know why, but every now and again in my life for no reason at all, I need you," she paused, pushing the tears back, "all of you."

Hoggle's facial expression changed. "Oh, you do?" He broke into a big grin. "Well, why didn't you say so?"

As Sarah turned around in her chair, all of her friends appeared in her bedroom joined by several goblins from the city, some Fireys, and the Wiseman. She embraced Ludo and laughed when Sir Didymus suggested playing Scrabble. She began dancing around, pleased with herself for beating the Goblin King, pleased with herself for getting Toby back home safely, and pleased to have friends to share her experience with. It had truly been the most incredible journey. Turning around to dance with Hoggle and then jump off her bed, she heard her father's voice.

"Sarah?" She froze. "What on earth are you doing?" Glancing around the room, Sarah saw that they were all gone. All of her friends – every single one – was gone. There were no signs that any of them had been there. She jumped off the bed, ignoring her father and racing over to her mirror. There was only her reflection, nothing else. "Sarah?"

"Where did they go?" she asked, almost frantic. What had happened? They had only been here for a moment. She was just beginning to have fun. Had the Goblin King punished them? Were they in danger?

"Where did who go?" Robert Williams asked.

"My friends," Sarah cried. "My friends from the Underground. They were just here!"

Mr. Williams had no idea what an Underground was, but he didn't like the idea of people being in his fifteen year old daughter's room at this time of night. He scanned the room, but there was no sign of anyone being in the room, besides his daughter. The look on her face made him doubt that, but a quick check of the closet and under the bed proved no results. They were alone in the bedroom.

"Sarah, I think you're exhausted. Karen and I will stay in tomorrow night so you can rest," he said, softly. "You won't have to watch Toby."

Sarah shook her head, barely listening to her father, as she paced the room. "Dad, they were here. Didn't you see them when you walked in?"

"If this is some kind of game, Sarah," Robert Williams was getting tired of the charade now.

"It's not a game!" Sarah screamed. "Why aren't you listening to me? They were right here." She pointed at her bed. Mr. Williams made a face, not liking the fact that his daughter was screaming, or that she was insisting there was someone on her bed other than herself.

"Sarah, please keep your voice down. You'll wake Toby," Karen scolded, coming into the bedroom.

"Toby!" Sarah cried, pushing past her parents to the bedroom across the hall. When she arrived at the side of the crib, her baby brother was still fast asleep, clutching Lancelot in his arms. Relieved that he was alright, Sarah began crawling around on her hands and knees checking under the crib and her parent's bed to see if any of the goblins were hiding in the shadows.

"What are you doing?" Karen hissed, as she and her husband entered through the doorway. "Get up off the floor!"

"Was anyone in here when you got home?" Sarah asked, hopeful.

Mr. Williams walked over to his daughter, arms crossed over his chest. "Sarah, what exactly is going on here?"

Sarah looked at him, studying his face. Then she did the same to Karen. "Alright," she sighed. "I'll tell you." She went through her entire night from start to finish, from the moment she wished Toby away, until she defeated the Goblin King and brought her baby brother back home. "And my friends were here with me to celebrate since I beat the Labyrinth. Now that they are gone, I want to make sure they are ok. I don't want Jareth to punish them."

"Who is Jareth," Karen asked.

"The Goblin King."

Mr. Williams looked over his daughter's head at his wife. She shook her head, not believing what her step-daughter was saying. "Sarah," Robert began, "you know none of that is real."

"Of course it is!" Sarah cried. "Dad, it just happened to me."

"I think you must have fallen asleep," Karen suggested, gently. "It sounds an awful like one of those story books you love so much, or one of your mother's fantastical plays." She reached for Sarah, trying to put her hand on her arm.

"No," Sarah pulled away. "No, it was real!"

"Sarah," Mr. Williams started again.

"No!" Sarah screamed, racing to her bedroom and slamming the door.

The next day, Sarah Williams was admitted to St. Catherine's psychiatric ward after a doctor gave her a full evaluation. She regaled the admitting physician with the same tale, not one detail out of place from the version she had spun her parents. The doctor had determined that she had a delusional disorder brought on by the adjustment of her mother's recent death and her father's recent marriage to Karen, who was already pregnant at the time of her wedding.

"Not only is competing to remain in your life, now that her mother is gone, but now she is competing against a baby for attention at a critical moment in her adolescent development," the doctor told Mr. Williams. "It is not uncommon for someone her age who is going through so many drastic changes to escape into a fantasy world. Her illusion even makes sense, considering the situation. She is running a maze. That could symbolize every thing she had been fighting against these past several months and this character-,"

"The Goblin King," Mr. Williams added.

"Right," the doctor nodded, turning through the pages on his chart, "he is the embodiment of the cancer that took her mother away."

Mr. Williams shook his head, staring at his daughter through the barred glass window in her door. She was sitting on the edge of her bed, in her hospital gown, motionless. "Will she be ok?"

"She is young. With therapy and treatment, she will be able to learn how to channel her stress and anxiety so she no longer feels the need to create this illusions to cope with reality," the doctor patted Mr. William's shoulder supportively. "Give her some time. This girl has been through a lot."

In the room, Sarah was alone, whispering to herself over and over, "I need you. I need all of you." Outside, a barn owl sat perched near her window, watching silently. As her desperation increased, tears rolled down her cheeks, staining her new hospital smock. She continued to say the words over and over until her cadence became a desperate chant.

But no one came.

Author's Note: I saw Isabeauluv's trailers on YouTube for this and I had to write a fanfiction story based off her awesome work. All credit for the plot idea can be given to her. I'm writing this based on how I see the story transpiring from the details in her two videos. I hope you enjoy it! Please check out her videos. They are edited together with such talent that they could be real movie trailers.