Labyrinth and Leroux

Chapter 7: Confrontation

Sarah sat at Erik's desk trying to read the notes of Don Juan Triumphant. She had never had any music lessons so she was making very little progress. Christine could have probably helped her, but she was still locked in her bedroom sulking. Sarah looked up when a strange noise began to echo through the walls of the house. It sounded like the wheels of a giant clock turning. Sarah stood up and pressed her ear against the wall. Some sort of mechanical device was definitely at work. She stood back and looked around. What was happening? She heard a loud thump as something smacked hard against the side of the house. The mechanical noise slowed to a stop. It sounded as if something large had just been dropped into the walls.

Erik came bounding into the room laughing.

"I have a present for you Sarah. Come. Come and see." He grabbed her hand like an eager little boy pulling his mother towards a newly built sandcastle. He slid back a curtain to show a small window. Erik hit a switch and light poured into the six-sided room. Sarah recognized it as the mirrored torture chamber. Lying on the floor was a man, wet and dirty. Sarah looked at Erik.

"I don't understand. Who is that? Is that Raoul?"

"Raoul? Bah! The Vicomte has nothing to do with you. No look closer." Erik banged on the wall.

"Get up. Show yourself magician."

Jareth pushed himself up off the floor and adjusted the tatters of his shirt. He started to survey the room. As he turned towards the window, Sarah saw his face and gasped. Erik smiled at her underneath his mask.

"You are pleased? Yes I have captured the fiend. I will be happy to torture him for you. It has already started you see. He will slowly go insane from the heat and the light until he hangs himself with the lasso. It will be a fine entertainment."

Jareth could hear the Opera Ghost explain his plan to Sarah. Sarah started to speak.

"But he's the Goblin King. He'll just use his magic and pop right out of there."

Jareth put his hand on his hips still looking for a way out. He called out to her.

"I'm afraid not Sarah. You've seen to that haven't you? My magic won't work on him anymore."

"Jareth what are you talking about?" She yelled back.

"Do the words "You have no power over me" ring any bells? You handed all the power right over to him. I can't do anything to him or his creations. You let him castrate my magic in this place you little vixen. When I get out of here I am going to drop you head first into the Bog of Eternal Stench."

"What? Hey you're the one that started all of this! You and your nasty little tricks. Your stupid magic. If you can't use your magic on Erik, well, it serves you right. And frankly if you are going to threaten me like that I might as well let him torture you. If you really can't use your magic anymore than there is no way you can get me home. I'm going to be stuck here with or without you."

"What is happening?" the quiet voice of Christine came from behind as she finally emerged from her room.

"I've brought Sarah a present. The magician Jareth. I am torturing him for her."

"What?" Christine ran forward alarmed. She peered through the window.

"Oh monsieur I beg you. Use your magic and escape this place. Please please go!"

"Who is that?" Jareth called out.

"Christine Daae monsieur" she replied.

"There is a boy upstairs looking for you."

"Oh no! Raoul is still here? I begged him to leave. He too will be in danger."

"No your boy hero ran off screaming like a little girl when I opened the secret passageway in your dressing room. He's long gone. He won't be back."

"Oh Raoul. Poor poor Raoul." Christine sank down into a chair. So much was going on.

"Look as much as I enjoy the heat of this room drying my clothes could we cut to the chase? Sarah 'm sorry I tried to trick you back into the Labyrinth" Jareth began half-heartedly. "Why don't you let me out of here, I'll take you back to your time and we'll just call it a night. No more games." He didn't really mean it. He still had every intent to take her back to the Labyrinth once they were out of this opera house.

"No!" Erik interjected before Sarah could say anything. "Torturing you is my present to her."

"Oh Sarah. Please let him out. I cannot bear to see such a beautiful man be tortured." Christine pleaded. Sarah turned to Christine annoyed.

"Beautiful? Good lord. Well if you're so in love with him you let him out."

"I do not know how."

"Well then mind your own business."

"Christine?" Jareth cooed deeply from within the torture chamber. He had found himself a willing little helper. "Christine how would you like to come to my Labyrinth? No more Opera Ghost. No more Raoul. I could make you my Queen."

"NO!" Erik screamed. "She's MINE!"

"Well I thought it a fitting plan. You took my girl; I'll just take yours. A clean swap. How about that?"

"NO! Neither is yours. You will die!" Erik increased the light and heat in the torture chamber.

"Why do you need them both? Do you want some sort of harem? Steal that boy Raoul's girl. Steal my Sarah. Too ugly under that mask to get a girl on your own, hmm?"

Erik shook with fury.

"Jareth shut up" Sarah warned him.

"Yes I'm sure you are quite the impotent little monster aren't you? Wouldn't know what to do with either of them when you get them to your bedroom would you? Just like to play make believe that you are a man. You really are nothing more than a ghost."

Erik mad with rage tore the mask from off his face. Sarah jumped back at the first sight of his disfigured features. Erik pulled at a lever and opened the torture chamber. He grabbed Jareth and hit him hard. The two men pulled and beat each other, rolling into the room with Sarah and Christine. Sarah stepped in between them and the both backed away not wanting to hurt her. She stood arms outstretched telling them nonverbally to keep their distance.

Jareth took a good long look at Erik's face. He smiled.

"Well well, you are a sight. Very terrifying. Very grotesque. I'm impressed."

"Do not mock me." Erik spat at him.

"I'm not. You are the most frightening thing I've seen in a long time. Think how you could scare the children who dare wish themselves into my Labyrinth. You would make quite and addition to my menagerie."

"Jareth stop it" Sarah snapped at him, "He's a man, not one of your creatures. Leave him alone."

"Erik please" Christine started "Please. You promised. You said you would make them both leave. You said he would bargain for her. Just let him have her."

"Oh you'd like that wouldn't you? You who leave me for that fool Raoul. I shall die alone. No! Sarah stays. SHE shall be my living wife."

"What?" Sarah turned her attention to Erik.

"Yes you shall be my living wife. I knew when I first saw you that it was fated. You wore the costume from my Don Juan, a costume not even yet created. It was magic incarnate. You spoke to me unafraid, down right jovial. You do not fear me. You shall love me. Yes you will stay and live with me. We shall have a house aboveground and you will be happy."

"What about Christine?" Sarah replied eyeing the room for the nearest exit.

"Christine rejects me. You said so. She leaves me for Raoul. But you will not. Your only choice is me or Jareth. I know you will not choose him."

"Uh…" Sarah stalled.

"Erik no! This is madness!" Christine rushed to his side.

"Quiet you. Go to your room" Erik grabbed her by the waist and forced her into her bedroom locking the door behind.

"Tut tut. Such a fickle heart. Reject your one true love for mine? Very tacky if you ask me" Jareth chided him.

"No one asked you." Erik leered.

"I've had quite enough of this. Sarah come on, time to go home." Jareth said. Sarah looked at both men and moved towards Jareth.

"NO!" Erik screamed at her.

"I'm sorry Erik. I have to go with him, I don't belong here. This isn't how your story ends."

"My story? My story. The one where I loose Christine and die alone a miserable monstrous wretch? No! We change my story now. You stay."

"I can't."

"You have to choose!"

"I already have."

"No you haven't. You must choose the Grasshopper or the Scorpion." He gestured towards the mantelpiece where two figurines of imitated Japanese bronze stood.

"Turn the Scorpion and it shall mean you choose me. You choose a life here. Turn the grasshopper—ah beware the grasshopper, he jumps very high my dear. Oh yes very high indeed."

"What are you blathering on about?" Jareth said. Sarah knew. She knew from the book. The grasshopper would blow up the opera house and everyone in it.

"It's a trigger. It blows us up." She replied. Erik laughed.

"Time to choose Sarah— left or right?" he gestured towards the figurines.

"Blow him up Sarah. Just end this. You and I will be fine. This is all just misfired magic anyway. His story and all these people in it will just disappear back into the book they came from. It's all an illusion. I've just lost control of it."

Sarah looked at Jareth. Maybe he was right. Maybe it was all just an illusion. Erik wasn't real. This was all just a figment of her imagination. Sarah moved towards Erik. He looked excited and nervous. She stood in front of the bronze figurines. After a moment's hesitation, she turned the Scorpion. She chose Erik.

"Sarah no! Why Sarah? Why?" Jareth looked at her dumbfounded.

"Because that is the way that it is done. That's how Erik's story goes. Christine chooses Erik. She doesn't choose Raoul. She turns the Scorpion. She chooses Erik."

"What?" Erik stepped backwards.

"She chooses you."

Erik stumbled absorbing this revelation. The gurgle of the gunpowder barrels sinking into the lake echoed around them. Christine would choose Erik and then Erik would let her go. She would show him compassion and he would return the favor. Yes that is how his story ended. That was the way it had to end. Erik silently moved towards his desk. He opened a drawer and pulled something out.

"I have a gift for you Sarah." Both Sarah and Jareth shifted to try and see what it was.

"What is it?" Sarah inquired.

"It's just a crystal." Erik replied. Jareth recognized it. It was the same crystal he had thrown at Sarah into the Maze of Mirrors. Erik showed the crystal to Sarah.

"Stop!" Jareth outstretched his hand.

"It's just a crystal' Erik continued ignoring Jareth. Erik knew well enough that that trickster was still going to try and kidnap Sarah and drag her back to the Labyrinth. But not tonight. Not if he had anything to say about it.

"But if you turn it this way…" Erik turned the crystal. The light from the candelabras reflected through it and bounced off the walls of the mirrored torture chamber illuminating both Jareth and Sarah. They both disappeared.

Erik turned the crystal in his hands letting it dance back and forth. The light faded in the crystal. It popped into a harmless soap bubble. The magic was over.

Erik walked towards Christine's door and opened it. She stirred from her bed.

"I had the most peculiar dream" She started sleepy-eyed.

"It was just a dream. Come. We must get you back to Mamma Valerius."

"Yes all a dream"