Disclaimer – Look at all the other chapters 'cos I cant be bothered to write the damn thing again and cop and pasting takes too much effort.

Rated T for language.

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WickedGame – Thanks. I'm going to try and make J-lea different as the story goes along. She has a different background than what Sarah does, so I'm hoping that will change the way she acts.

Chapter 3 – Nothings is as easy as it seems

J-lea walked down the path for about ten minutes with no problems.

'This is going to be easy' thought J-lea.

Twenty or so minutes later, her hand hit something directly in front of her as she brought it up to run it through her hair. J-lea cautiously held her hand out and sure enough, there was a wall. An invisible wall at that.

"Argg!" J-lea growled before shouting, "'Dis is bullshit!"

J-lea sat down and lent against the invisible wall. She put her head in her hands and sighed before dropping her hands. What she saw gave her an idea. J-lea looked up at the top of the sidewall. It was only a metre taller than her at most!

J-lea grinned and got up for the floor before jogging back down the way she came until she stopped and turned around again. J-lea looked at a large tree branch on the floor then at the right wall, the invisible wall and then the left wall. J-lea grinned again, showing her square teeth and slightly longer canines, giving the impression she wasn't human.

J-lea was suddenly thankful that she had been bullied as a child. She had had plenty of practice at climbing.

J-lea ran towards the invisible wall, jumped off the tree branch, pushed herself off of the right wall, onto the invisible wall, and span to grab the left wall.

"Oh yea! Booya!" cried J-lea as she pulled herself up.

Looking down at the floor of the labyrinth, J-lea grinned.

"Jareth really should tidy up his labyrinth. Who knows how all the junk can help people," she said, still grinning. She looked at the rest of the labyrinth. She could see everything from here.

As she stood up, J-lea considered her options. She could either jump down and risk getting lost, or she could stay up here and see where she was going.

She was definitely staying up here. Good thing she had good balance. J-lea started walking along the top of the walls.

IN THE CASTLE

Jareth was on his way back from seeing little Kiara. Such a whining child. He couldn't blame Elektra for wishing her away and quite frankly, he didn't know why J-lea was trying to get her back.

'Ah, yes, dear J-lea. I do wonder how she is getting on in my labyrinth' thought Jareth.

He conjured a crystal in his fingertips and peered into it. After the mist had cleared he saw J-lea. He smiled as he saw her but then frowned, as he didn't see the walls of the labyrinth. He 'zoomed out' and realised that she was standing on the labyrinth walls.

Jareth let out a short laugh of surprise and amusement.

'Well that's new'

IN THE LABYRINTH

J-lea was starting to make steady progress in her venture towards the castle.

That was, until she met Wiseman.

J-lea saw an opening in front of her so she took a few steps back and ran at the opening before leaping over the gap and onto the next wall. She stood up and tried to get her balance when she heard a high squawk. J-lea jerked in the direction of the sound and, as she did so, lost her balance. As J-lea fell, she turned around and grabbed the top of the wall. J-lea winced slightly as she scraped her arm on the wall. J-lea swung her other arm up and grasped the ledge and tried to pull herself up. J-lea managed to be able to grasp the other side but she had exhausted herself and couldn't pull herself back up.

J-lea sighed.

"'Dis is bullshit" she grumbled before she pushed herself off the wall and landed with the grace of a feline. While she was still crouched, J-lea took a look at her inner forearm. It was grazed from mid forearm to her hand, which also had a few cuts on it. It was bleeding and J-lea could see that a few drops had fell onto the stone floor.

Abruptly, a stone in the floor came up, held by a tiny goblin that started grumbling.

"Watch where you're dripping, will ya" it said in the high-pitched voice J-lea had ever heard.

'Good job there is no glass around here. It would have shattered after one word of that' J-lea thought before she replied.

"Well, I can't exactly help it seeing as I'm bleeding can I?" J-lea said back to it. The goblin looked at J-lea's arm and just grumbled before flipping the stone over and disappearing.

J-lea shook her head in annoyance. She sighed as she got up and turned around. Wiseman was sat in his chair with his damn hat on his head.

"That hat is fucking ridiculous," J-lea said to herself in disbelief.

'I mean honestly, who is stupid enough to walk around with half a bird on his head. Half a bird that talks no less' J-lea shook her head again and walked over to the Wiseman. She might as well see what he had to say since he was there.

"Hello, Wiseman" J-lea greeted as she approached, "Some advice on how to get through this labyrinth, if you please"

Wiseman looked at her and was about to talk when the hat interrupted him. After much squabbling, Wiseman finally gave his advice.

"The way forward, is often the way… forward" he said. J-lea simply gaped.

'OH MY GOD!' J-lea mentally thought, 'Great input there'

"Please make a contribution", squawked the hat as the old bat held out a box. J-lea turned her disbelieving gaze on the hat before shaking her head.

"This shit is fucking ridiculous," she mumbled as she felt around her pockets. She found her mobile phone, mp3 player and finally, in the last pocket that she looked in, some spare change.

J-lea dropped a few pounds into the box and walked away muttering about how 'this shit is ridiculous'.

J-lea walked through the maze trying to find the two doors when she came to a dead end. She retraced her footsteps to come out of the opening she had just went in when she realised that her arm was dripping blood on the floor.

J-lea looked at her arm. All of the grazes had swelled slightly and were all leaking blood so it trailed down her arm and dripped. Her hand was also painful to move as it had a gash across her palm that was bleeding profusely. J-lea clenched her fist and winced slightly but ignored the pain.

Suddenly, a movement caught her eye. There were two doors, a red and a blue one, each with two heads.

J-lea remembered from the film but asked the left door the question anyway.

"Would the other door tell me that this door leads to the castle?"

The head conferred with his other head.

"Yes" it replied.

"Great, thanks" J-lea responded. J-lea turned to the door on the right.

"Now, you, open up"

It did and J-lea could see an underground tunnel but as she walked she braced herself for the fall that was about to come.

Sure enough, as soon as she walked two steps into the tunnel, the floor disappeared from under her.

J-lea fell for a minute until hands caught her.

'Sarah was a wimp, this doesn't hurt at all' J-lea thought.

"Hello there" said some hands, "Which way would you like to go?"

"Up, if you please" J-lea replied.

"Okay" other hands answered before they let her go.

"Wait! Wait!" J-lea shouted as she went down then caught another arm with her injured one.

"I said up" she growled, arm stinging like hell.

"Well, why didn't you say so?" a voice said. J-lea sighed but bit her tongue from retorting when they started to pull her up.

Several minutes and, what felt like, several dislocated joints later, J-lea was back in the tunnel from where she had fell.

"Thanks for that" J-lea shouted sarcastically as she rolled her shoulder, which clicked painfully.

Grumbling, J-lea walked down the tunnel to hear false alarms sounding.

"This is not the way"

"Turn back while you still can"

"Take heed and go no-"

"Oh, for fucks sake, SHUT UP!" J-lea shouted, frustrations getting the better of her.

"Thank you" J-lea said when they all shut up.

"Aw, please, I haven't said it in years" pleaded one as she reached the end to come out onto another tunnel.

"Go fuck yourself," said J-lea absent mindedly as she saw a crystal rolling down the tunnel and into the one she was about to step into.

J-lea followed it and saw a goblin sat on the floor. J-lea grinned.

"Hi, Jareth" she greeted as she lent against a wall. Jareth stood up and took off his costume.

"Hello there, J-lea" he returned.

"Lovely costume you have there, you know" said J-lea while keeping a straight face. Jareth turned to look at it thrown hazardously on the floor.

"It serves it purpose" Jareth replied grinning. J-lea couldn't help it, she just laughed.

"I'm sure it does"

Jareth walked up to J-lea as she said that as rested his elbow on the wall just in front of her.

"So," he said softly, "How are you enjoying my labyrinth?"

"It's… interesting. And quite random" J-lea replied. Jareth was about to reply when they heard grumbling below.

"Stop dripping on the floor!" it grumbled before flipping the stone over and disappearing.

"Dripping?" asked Jareth as he frowned. J-lea sighed.

"Yea," J-lea crossed her arms over her chest showing the blood, "I had a slight escapade with the Wiseman and the f- blasted hat of his"

Jareth grinned at her change of words.

"No need to change your words around me, J-lea," he said as he took her arm. J-lea raised an eyebrow at him.

"Yes, well apparently I have to watch my tone. I might as well watch my language while I'm at it, right" she replied, sarcasm evident in her tone. Jareth just laughed.

"I'm sure," he said. He waved his hand over her arm and all the blood disappeared. He glanced up into her eyes before he placed soft kissed along her arm, making the skin tingle behind. As she did so, though, the grazes and cuts healed. J-lea sighed. His touch was burning; she couldn't get enough of it. However, as he went to place her arm back, he turned it over and saw the scars on her outer forearm. His face darkened and he was about to say something when J-lea cut him off.

"Don't Jareth. Leave it alone" she warned him.

"J-lea, he-"

"I know what Eric did, Jareth. So just leave it," J-lea replied feeling a burning hate when she mentioned Eric, her stepfather.

"So be it," said Jareth stepping away, his eyes cold, and transporting back to his castle.

J-lea sighed and turned to rest her head on the wall.

Great, now she was arguing with Jareth, which was something she didn't want for two reasons. 1) He had he baby sister captive and 2) Well, she really didn't want to think about that right now.

'This place is hell' J-lea thought before she walked into the dark tunnel.

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