Disclaimer: I still do not own the labyrinth. This gets a bit repetitive. . .
A/N: Again, thanks for the reviews! (I even enabled my anonymous reviews, so thanks!)
Chapter 5: Destruction
Tabitha was awake before she realized it. Her eyes opened and she stared straight up, seeing nothing at all. Slowly her eyes cleared and her mind accepted the view they offered; the smooth white plane of the ceiling. She blinked. Slowly, almost painfully so, she sat up. Her body was unusually heavy and stiff, and it didn't want to bend into a sitting position at first. Wincing, she eased herself up and pushed her feet against the fallen desk chair for leverage. The chair didn't move; it was firmly entrenched in debris.
She slumped a little, breathing hard from the effort. The world swam before her eyes and she lifted her heavy hands to cover them, straining to remember what had made her this way. The events of the night before, the entire day before, were shrouded in fog. A faint tremor of panic fluttered in her throat, and she shivered.
The sudden sound of the phone shattered the quiet in the room, and sent a tremor of shock down Tabitha's spine. Pain burst suddenly through her chest, her heart racing as if she had just finished a marathon. Gasping, she clutched at her chest and hunched forward against her knees, praying desperately for the wrenching, bubbling pain to stop. It seemed like forever before the knot of pain inside of her began to ease, but when she became aware of herself again she could still hear the phone ringing. It continued to ring several times, stopping only when her answering machine finally picked up. Through a haze of pain, Tabitha could hear Karen's voice grinding into the recording.
"Tabitha, where are you!" She was practically yelling. "You aren't answering the phone, your supervisor says you were a no-show at work today, and none of your friends have seen you in a week! Answer this phone!" Tabitha lifted her head slowly, looking toward the place where her phone should have been. She could hear the concern underlying her sister's angry tirade. "I can't deal with this, Tabitha! Granddad's in the hospital and you need to get over here! I'm not calling you again!" There was a firm click, then the room was quiet once more.
Tabitha was still for a moment as everything she saw and heard sunk in. She was a no-show at work - something about the way Karen said that made her think that her work shift was already over. But that would mean it was already after two o'clock in the afternoon. She moved on to the next bit of information, letting it roll around in her head until it latched on to something. Granddad was in the hospital. Fear rose up inside her and her heart began to speed up again. Small, warning pains darted through her chest. The more those thoughts crowded her mind, the worse she felt, until blackness crept into the edges of her vision. She began to tremble. Curling into a ball, she huddled on the floor.
She wasn't sure how much time passed before she felt strong enough to try standing. Hours, probably. She spent that time slipping in and out of sleep, her exhausted body refusing to do what she wanted it to do, until the bright sunlight that filtered in around the blinds began to deepen into gold. Evening had arrived, which meant to Tabitha that it must have been about six o'clock. Over time her heartbeat had grown stronger and more stable, and the fog that clouded her mind was beginning to lift.
Sleeping memories of the night before began to stir in the depths of her mind, but she found it difficult to concentrate on them. It was as if all thoughts were just draining out of her head like water.
At length she sat up, much easier this time, and decided to try the intimidating act of standing. The layer of books and loose paper on the floor did not make that easy, especially since there was nothing to hold onto. With one foot she dug a clear space on the floor to stand on, then rolled onto her knees there. Slowly but surely she climbed to her feet and managed to stand. This is how a toddler must feel when she's just learning to walk, she mused. Now that she was much higher off the ground, she took a look around.
The shock nearly sent her to the floor again, but she managed to keep her balance by wheeling her arms. She had known that the room was a mess, the pile of papers and books she had been lying on had warned her of that, but what met her eyes was so devastating she could not at first comprehend. It was as if her belongings had been reduced to a thick carpet of lint, dust, and splinters. She had the distinct mental image of a giant hand plucking up her house and shaking it like a snowglobe until everything inside crumbled.
Somewhere in that heap lay her cordless phone. Her desk looked like it had been ripped into chunks, under which lay the shattered remains of her computer. The rest of the room fared no better. She picked her way carefully out of the office, bracing herself for what she felt sure she would find.
As she explored the remains of her things, a welcome feeling of numbness settled over her. She remembered now seeing the black figure in the doorway, remembered it lunging at her. The condition of her house after all of that could hardly be a coincidence. But why? The question left her dumbfounded. Why on earth would anyone do this? What could they possibly gain?
She strained her brain, hunting for a logical reason, but only earned a dull ache behind her eyes and a painful flutter in her heart. Apparently this. . . injury? . . . was going to force her not to think too much. What on earth was wrong with her, anyway? She was far too young to have a heart attack.
Abruptly her thoughts turned towards her grandfather. She had almost forgotten that horrible message in the haze of the day. The last thing she needed to be worrying about was the condition of the house! She made her way back up the stairs to her room and dug a duffle bag out of the debris. As she hunted around for wearable clothes she allowed her mind to travel to her granddad.
'The last thing he needed was another heart attack.' She thought worriedly. None of Karen's message had not disclosed the reason her grandfather was in the hospital, but she knew it was a heart attack the way she knew that the sun would rise in the East in the morning. The fact that this sudden hospitalization happened around the same time as her odd attack made her think that this was not a coincidence. With that thought in her head she moved a little faster, jamming clothes and things into the bag and zipping it shut. In a moment she was outside, climbing into her car.
She would have to call her supervisor from her grandfather's house, she figured. If she was careful she could come up with an excuse close enough to the truth to appease him, while omitting the more. . . supernatural elements that would likely only get her checked into a mental institute. There was also the house to consider. If she felt better soon she could take care of it herself, otherwise a cleaning service would need to be called.
'Try explaining that to a group of maids.' She thought drily as she turned on the car. 'Go ahead, try.' Nothing plausible came to mind, the situation was extreme even for a burglary. 'My other personality did it,' She tried. ' Her name is Cindy, and she likes kitchen utensils.' Sadly enough, they would probably believe that. They may even make an attempt at cleaning the place before running away.
She eased the car out onto the street and flipped the air conditioning on full blast. It would be at least an hour's drive, and the evening was uncomfortably warm. As she drove she began to calmly go over the previous night's events. Who had that been? After seeing that crystal on the balcony she had been sure the next person she'd see would be the Goblin king, perhaps just a goblin, but that had certainly not been either. Everything about that phantom had been anti-Jareth in nature. Jareth would never cover his head so completely. It would ruin his hair. Besides, he loved to intimidate his subordinates by making eye-contact with them.
She sighed inwardly, admitting to herself that there was more too it than that. Jareth wouldn't try to terrify a person to death. He was arrogant, demanding, stubborn, and childish, but that kind of behavior was really beyond him. So what had that been? No matter how many times she asked herself that, she still didn't have an answer. All she knew was that it came from the Underground.