Stay Tuned
by Delkon
Disclaimer: None of the Labyrinth characters are mine, yadda yadda, Have no money, please don't sue...
Chapter One
Sarah looked around her dorm room and tried to think of anything she could be forgetting before she closed up her suitcase. She didn't see anything that she needed to include with her clothes and the few cds that she wanted to have with her in her old room at home. She zipped up her suitcase, took one last look around the room, then left. She made her way down to the parking lot behind her dormitory, put her suitcase in the back of her beat-up offensively yellow car, and then started driving to her parent's house in upper New York.
Sarah was excited about this trip because of two things; one, she was going to be able to see her little brother Toby for longer than a few days, and two, she was going to have the house all to herself and Toby for an entire week during Christmas break. She had been looking forward to the break ever since her stepmother, Karen, had told her that the week after Christmas, she and Sarah's father were going to have to go to California on business. That was just fine with Sarah, because, although she had finally buried the hatchet with Karen, she really loved the fact that she was going to be able to spend some time alone with Toby and find out all the things he had been up to since she had left to go to college.
Toby was now 6 years old, and, according to Sarah's dad, quite the little bundle of energy. Every time Sarah called home, she could hear Toby in the background asking if that was Sarah on the line or not, and yelling and hollering when told that it was. She smiled as she recalled how excited Toby had sounded upon hearing that she was going to be his babysitter for a week and not the, as he called her, smelly old lady from up the street. Sarah remembered the smelly lady herself from the few times that she had needed to be babysitted when she was a child. She was actually surprised that the old lady was still alive, much less still capable of sitting for Sarah's parents. Sarah saw the exit for her town coming up so she turned on her turn signal and made her way off the busy road and into the more subdued surburban traffic that heralded the arrival of Sarah into her hometown.
Sarah was surprised at all the new construction going on in her hometown. She could see big grocery stores being built, a new wing being added to the hospital, even a new mall was in development close to her neighborhood. It seemed that while she had been away, her hometown had changed on her. Well, she thought to herself as her parent's house came into view, I'm relieved to see that some things haven't changed. She took in the two story Victorian townhouse and the more modern garage set to one side, and felt herself become more relaxed as she saw that nothing on the home front had changed very much. As she was pulling into the driveway, she saw a familiar shape on the front porch lift it's head. Merlin was lying on the porch between the front door and the steps. The now elderly sheepdog got up slowly and made his way to Sarah and butted his head against her leg as she was getting her suitcase out of the trunk of her car. Sarah paused and leaned down and gave Merlin's head a friendly pat as she walked towards the front door of the house. She barely made it to the top of the stairs before the front door was thrown open and a small, blonde-haired boy ran into her, causing her to drop her suitcase.
"Sarah! You're here! Yay! Yay! Yay!" Toby said as he grabbed Sarah and gave her as hard a hug as he possibly could.
"Oof! Toby! You're getting strong little dude! Let me go so I can greet you properly!" Sarah said while trying to free herself.
Toby immediately let go and Sarah dropped down on one knee, and this time, when Toby reached for her, Sarah grabbed him and picked him up in the air and twirled him around, hearing him giggle as she did this.
"Sarah! We're glad you're home!" Sarah's father said as he appeared in the open doorway.
"Glad to be home, Dad. Is Karen home yet?" Sarah said as she stopped spinning Toby around and placed him back down on the floor of the porch.
"No, she won't be home till after supper, she made us all meatloaf, though, and I wanted to wait until you got here before I heated it up. How were your finals? Anything I should know about?" Sarah's father asked as he motioned for both Sarah and Toby to come inside the house.
"Nope! Everything's fine! I think I did really well on all my tests and I don't think you'll be disappointed in my grades!" Sarah said as she started up the stairs to her bedroom with Toby one step behind her.
Sarah put her suitcase on her bed and then picked Toby up and carried him over her shoulder as she made her way downstairs to the den. She deposited Toby on the sofa and then sat next to him as her father came into the room and sat in the recliner that was next to where she and Toby were sittting. Sarah started playing with Toby, trying to tickle him as he sat scrunched over trying to avoid her nimble fingers, laughing uncontrollably.
Sarah and her father talked about how she thought she did on the exams and what all she had done in college. How she got along with her roommate. How her acting classes were going. How her finances were holding out. The usual things. All the while Toby was still laughing as Sarah continued to try to tickle him.
Soon it was time to eat and Toby, Sarah, and their father all sat in the living room and ate the meatloaf that Karen had fixed for them all. Not one word was said about how the meatloaf tasted, just the ketchup bottle being passed around was evidence enough of what they all thought of it. As supper concluded, Sarah announced that she was tired and was going to go up to her room and go to sleep.
"Aw, come on Sarah! I don't even go to bed this early!" Toby complained.
"Remember Toby? Tomorrow's Saturday! Nothing but cartoons in the morning and the park playground in the afternoon, but right now I need some sleep, okay?"
"Okay..." Toby reluctantly agreed.
Sarah looked at her old room. It looked so different when all her stuff had been taken out of it. She had packed most of her stuff away when she went through it deciding what she needed to take with her to college, and what needed to stay here. The only things she had left out where she could see them were her teddy bear collection, and her poster of M. C. Escher's Relativity that was still hanging on the wall next to her bed. Gone were the other items, the videos, the games, the countles number of fairy tale books, the unique little items that she had collected from one place or another, all gone and packed up in storage in the attic. She sighed and walked over and sat down on the bed. She glanced around at the walls of her room, shrugged her shoulders, got up, unzipped her suitcase and starting unpacking.
Saturday and Sunday had come and went. Sarah had enjoyed watching cartoons and playing with Toby in the park. She had almost forgotten what it was like to see the world through the eyes of a child. She also had enjoyed having a nice discussion with her stepmother Sunday afternoon, and she was glad that she had started to see that Karen wasn't just some evil stereotypical stepmother, but rather a human being who loved her father almost as much as she did. Sarah was happy to be home.
Monday morning had seen her father and stepmother off to their jobs as this was the last week of work for both of them. They had both been able to get the week that Christmas fell on off, so they were busy now so that they didn't have to come in at all the week of Christmas, and definitely wouldn't need to be called in all the way from California. Sarah had seen them off and then she and Toby, who was out of school for Christmas the same time she was, made themselves pancakes for breakfast with only minor mishaps involved, chief among them being when Toby had accidentally poured flour all over the floor and Sarah had had to clean it up. They both then watched t.v., played checkers, watched videos, and generally had a good time well into the early afternoon. Around 3:45, Toby turned to look at Sarah.
"What time is it?" he asked.
"About 3:45, little dude. Why?" Sarah asked.
"Uh-oh! Gotta get ready!" Toby exclaimed as he jumped up from where he had been siting on the floor putting together a jigsaw puzzle and taking off for his bedroom.
"Gotta get ready for what?" Sarah asked.
She got up and went to Toby's room. The door was closed and Sarah could hear Toby rummaging around inside. She was about to knock and enter when Toby opened the door and marched out. He looked like he was wearing some kind of Halloween costume from what Sarah could see of him as he quickly ran down the stairs to the den. She looked at what he was wearing over the shirt he had been wearing all day, and it appeared to be some sort of flimsy plastic vest that looked a little like a big face on his back An uneasy feeling of deja-vu swept over Sarah as she followed Toby downstairs to the den. She watched as he sat down in front of the television set and put a brown plastic bag down on the carpet in front of him. He turned the t.v. on with one hand, picked the bag up with the other and dumped it out on the floor in front of him. Sarah looked at what had come out of the bag. Something about the contents was unsettling to her. A large clear ball was sitting on the carpet with a piece of paper draped over part of it. Next to that was what looked like a deck of trading cards. The final item turned out to be a round flat disc with a red, see-through piece of plastic flim in the middle of it. All this was spread out in front of Toby as he sat back to watch the television screen. As the v.c.r. below the television set turned to four o'clock, an image appeared on the screen. Sarah could only make out that it was a crystal ball with the number three on it before it changed to an identical crystal ball with the number two on it. Then the crystal ball showed the number one and then the screen went black.
"I wish the goblins would come and take me away right now!" She heard Toby yell out loud. Sarah was too stunned to do anything. Her mouth was wide open. Her eyes were as big as saucers. She barely could think straight. She couldn't move. She tried to walk over to Toby, to protect him, or to keep him from going anywhere, but she was rooted to the spot where she was standing. She then heard a voice she hadn't heard in a long time coming, it seemed, from the television.
"Okay, all you little goblins!" She heard what sounded like Hoggle say in a somehow cheery voice, "Live, from the castle at the center of the Labyrinth, beyond the goblin city, it's the Underground Hour with your royal host, Jareth the Goblin King!"
*~*~*~*~*
by Delkon
Disclaimer: None of the Labyrinth characters are mine, yadda yadda, Have no money, please don't sue...
Chapter One
Sarah looked around her dorm room and tried to think of anything she could be forgetting before she closed up her suitcase. She didn't see anything that she needed to include with her clothes and the few cds that she wanted to have with her in her old room at home. She zipped up her suitcase, took one last look around the room, then left. She made her way down to the parking lot behind her dormitory, put her suitcase in the back of her beat-up offensively yellow car, and then started driving to her parent's house in upper New York.
Sarah was excited about this trip because of two things; one, she was going to be able to see her little brother Toby for longer than a few days, and two, she was going to have the house all to herself and Toby for an entire week during Christmas break. She had been looking forward to the break ever since her stepmother, Karen, had told her that the week after Christmas, she and Sarah's father were going to have to go to California on business. That was just fine with Sarah, because, although she had finally buried the hatchet with Karen, she really loved the fact that she was going to be able to spend some time alone with Toby and find out all the things he had been up to since she had left to go to college.
Toby was now 6 years old, and, according to Sarah's dad, quite the little bundle of energy. Every time Sarah called home, she could hear Toby in the background asking if that was Sarah on the line or not, and yelling and hollering when told that it was. She smiled as she recalled how excited Toby had sounded upon hearing that she was going to be his babysitter for a week and not the, as he called her, smelly old lady from up the street. Sarah remembered the smelly lady herself from the few times that she had needed to be babysitted when she was a child. She was actually surprised that the old lady was still alive, much less still capable of sitting for Sarah's parents. Sarah saw the exit for her town coming up so she turned on her turn signal and made her way off the busy road and into the more subdued surburban traffic that heralded the arrival of Sarah into her hometown.
Sarah was surprised at all the new construction going on in her hometown. She could see big grocery stores being built, a new wing being added to the hospital, even a new mall was in development close to her neighborhood. It seemed that while she had been away, her hometown had changed on her. Well, she thought to herself as her parent's house came into view, I'm relieved to see that some things haven't changed. She took in the two story Victorian townhouse and the more modern garage set to one side, and felt herself become more relaxed as she saw that nothing on the home front had changed very much. As she was pulling into the driveway, she saw a familiar shape on the front porch lift it's head. Merlin was lying on the porch between the front door and the steps. The now elderly sheepdog got up slowly and made his way to Sarah and butted his head against her leg as she was getting her suitcase out of the trunk of her car. Sarah paused and leaned down and gave Merlin's head a friendly pat as she walked towards the front door of the house. She barely made it to the top of the stairs before the front door was thrown open and a small, blonde-haired boy ran into her, causing her to drop her suitcase.
"Sarah! You're here! Yay! Yay! Yay!" Toby said as he grabbed Sarah and gave her as hard a hug as he possibly could.
"Oof! Toby! You're getting strong little dude! Let me go so I can greet you properly!" Sarah said while trying to free herself.
Toby immediately let go and Sarah dropped down on one knee, and this time, when Toby reached for her, Sarah grabbed him and picked him up in the air and twirled him around, hearing him giggle as she did this.
"Sarah! We're glad you're home!" Sarah's father said as he appeared in the open doorway.
"Glad to be home, Dad. Is Karen home yet?" Sarah said as she stopped spinning Toby around and placed him back down on the floor of the porch.
"No, she won't be home till after supper, she made us all meatloaf, though, and I wanted to wait until you got here before I heated it up. How were your finals? Anything I should know about?" Sarah's father asked as he motioned for both Sarah and Toby to come inside the house.
"Nope! Everything's fine! I think I did really well on all my tests and I don't think you'll be disappointed in my grades!" Sarah said as she started up the stairs to her bedroom with Toby one step behind her.
Sarah put her suitcase on her bed and then picked Toby up and carried him over her shoulder as she made her way downstairs to the den. She deposited Toby on the sofa and then sat next to him as her father came into the room and sat in the recliner that was next to where she and Toby were sittting. Sarah started playing with Toby, trying to tickle him as he sat scrunched over trying to avoid her nimble fingers, laughing uncontrollably.
Sarah and her father talked about how she thought she did on the exams and what all she had done in college. How she got along with her roommate. How her acting classes were going. How her finances were holding out. The usual things. All the while Toby was still laughing as Sarah continued to try to tickle him.
Soon it was time to eat and Toby, Sarah, and their father all sat in the living room and ate the meatloaf that Karen had fixed for them all. Not one word was said about how the meatloaf tasted, just the ketchup bottle being passed around was evidence enough of what they all thought of it. As supper concluded, Sarah announced that she was tired and was going to go up to her room and go to sleep.
"Aw, come on Sarah! I don't even go to bed this early!" Toby complained.
"Remember Toby? Tomorrow's Saturday! Nothing but cartoons in the morning and the park playground in the afternoon, but right now I need some sleep, okay?"
"Okay..." Toby reluctantly agreed.
Sarah looked at her old room. It looked so different when all her stuff had been taken out of it. She had packed most of her stuff away when she went through it deciding what she needed to take with her to college, and what needed to stay here. The only things she had left out where she could see them were her teddy bear collection, and her poster of M. C. Escher's Relativity that was still hanging on the wall next to her bed. Gone were the other items, the videos, the games, the countles number of fairy tale books, the unique little items that she had collected from one place or another, all gone and packed up in storage in the attic. She sighed and walked over and sat down on the bed. She glanced around at the walls of her room, shrugged her shoulders, got up, unzipped her suitcase and starting unpacking.
Saturday and Sunday had come and went. Sarah had enjoyed watching cartoons and playing with Toby in the park. She had almost forgotten what it was like to see the world through the eyes of a child. She also had enjoyed having a nice discussion with her stepmother Sunday afternoon, and she was glad that she had started to see that Karen wasn't just some evil stereotypical stepmother, but rather a human being who loved her father almost as much as she did. Sarah was happy to be home.
Monday morning had seen her father and stepmother off to their jobs as this was the last week of work for both of them. They had both been able to get the week that Christmas fell on off, so they were busy now so that they didn't have to come in at all the week of Christmas, and definitely wouldn't need to be called in all the way from California. Sarah had seen them off and then she and Toby, who was out of school for Christmas the same time she was, made themselves pancakes for breakfast with only minor mishaps involved, chief among them being when Toby had accidentally poured flour all over the floor and Sarah had had to clean it up. They both then watched t.v., played checkers, watched videos, and generally had a good time well into the early afternoon. Around 3:45, Toby turned to look at Sarah.
"What time is it?" he asked.
"About 3:45, little dude. Why?" Sarah asked.
"Uh-oh! Gotta get ready!" Toby exclaimed as he jumped up from where he had been siting on the floor putting together a jigsaw puzzle and taking off for his bedroom.
"Gotta get ready for what?" Sarah asked.
She got up and went to Toby's room. The door was closed and Sarah could hear Toby rummaging around inside. She was about to knock and enter when Toby opened the door and marched out. He looked like he was wearing some kind of Halloween costume from what Sarah could see of him as he quickly ran down the stairs to the den. She looked at what he was wearing over the shirt he had been wearing all day, and it appeared to be some sort of flimsy plastic vest that looked a little like a big face on his back An uneasy feeling of deja-vu swept over Sarah as she followed Toby downstairs to the den. She watched as he sat down in front of the television set and put a brown plastic bag down on the carpet in front of him. He turned the t.v. on with one hand, picked the bag up with the other and dumped it out on the floor in front of him. Sarah looked at what had come out of the bag. Something about the contents was unsettling to her. A large clear ball was sitting on the carpet with a piece of paper draped over part of it. Next to that was what looked like a deck of trading cards. The final item turned out to be a round flat disc with a red, see-through piece of plastic flim in the middle of it. All this was spread out in front of Toby as he sat back to watch the television screen. As the v.c.r. below the television set turned to four o'clock, an image appeared on the screen. Sarah could only make out that it was a crystal ball with the number three on it before it changed to an identical crystal ball with the number two on it. Then the crystal ball showed the number one and then the screen went black.
"I wish the goblins would come and take me away right now!" She heard Toby yell out loud. Sarah was too stunned to do anything. Her mouth was wide open. Her eyes were as big as saucers. She barely could think straight. She couldn't move. She tried to walk over to Toby, to protect him, or to keep him from going anywhere, but she was rooted to the spot where she was standing. She then heard a voice she hadn't heard in a long time coming, it seemed, from the television.
"Okay, all you little goblins!" She heard what sounded like Hoggle say in a somehow cheery voice, "Live, from the castle at the center of the Labyrinth, beyond the goblin city, it's the Underground Hour with your royal host, Jareth the Goblin King!"
*~*~*~*~*