A.N.: Sorry for being late, guys; a moderate family emergency meant this slipped from my mind. Back on schedule!

When Mulder had left the bedroom, Sarah smiled at the woman seven years her senior, any nervousness or trepidation disappearing from her features. Without saying anything, the young lady dug a white shirt out of her dresser, a pair of jeans and white, cotton socks. "Do you want me to leave while you change?"

"No," Scully blinked, unbuttoning her suit jacket. "It doesn't make a difference to me."

The girl nodded, sticking her head in her closet to dig for the promised boots while Scully quietly and carefully changed. Her voice was muffled from the mess of the closet. "What did you say your first name was again?"

"It's Dana," she responded, pulling the shirt over her head and fastening the jeans as the young lady casually chucked one hiking boot behind her. "Sarah, yes?"

"That's me! So, how much do you know about the Labyrinth?"

"Nothing, really. We were hoping you might be able to tell us."

"You know about the Goblin King, but you don't know his name or anything about the Labyrinth..."

"Let's just say it was an odd acquaintance."

Dana could hear her snort. "It would kind of have to be, wouldn't it?" The girl turned and sat cross-legged on the floor, the second shoe resting in the hollow of her lap. Her eyes sparkled with a kind of knowing, and Scully carefully laced the first boot. "It's not really a labyrinth, because those are all just one line with no breaks, right?" Scully nodded her agreement with this. "But you can't just call it a maze, it's more than that. The Labyrinth is alive – it moves and changes around the Runner."

Scully held up her hand. "Runner?"

"Oh, right." Sarah tossed her the boot. "The person who made the wish, the one trying to get the child back."

"Of course. Go on."

"Like I said, it changes: you can turn a corner and think you're at a dead end, and then the wall behind you will move. It's as alive as the things in it, really. I don't know if Jareth does it, or it's all on its own, but it's a nightmare to get through. A kind of hell, actually." She called it a hell, but Scully noticed that her eyes were sparkling, that she seemed to relish talking about it. How much did she share of her adventure in the Goblin King's maze? Was she like Mulder, seemingly uncaring if she was believed or not? Or was she more cautious than that, keeping her own secrets close to her breast? And most of all, the lie of it...the lie of it was in her eyes, in the way they gleamed. No rational being could love something that was a hell, and yet as Sarah spoke, those green eyes of hers betrayed either a kind of childhood joy in the magical – or else something deeper. So either the lie was in her eyes or on her lips, and Dana wondered which it was. Perhaps a bit of both.

Sarah stood and clapped her hands together. "I'm going to pack some string, some snacks, water...um, what do you have, Agent Scully?"

Scully patted the pockets of her suit; besides her standard issue sidearm, she had a small pocket flashlight, her pen and pad, as well as a pair of handcuffs and her briefcase. "Unless you want plane tickets back to D.C., this might be it."

The girl gave a wry smile. "We'll make it work anyway. I know I've got a hip pack someplace..." Thus saying, she opened the door. "Okay, you guys, we're ready!"

…

Mulder gathered that Hoggle didn't like him very much, but he didn't take it personally. The dwarf had stomped his way into the kitchen (he seemed to know exactly where he was going, how long had Miss Williams been shuttling inter-dimensional beings into her apartment?), fished a step stool from between the refrigerator and the counter, set it up against the fridge, and yanked a pint of butter pecan ice cream out of the freezer. And he did not offer to share with the special agent, either, smacking his lips against his spoon, gruff voice grumbling in his throat all the while. Fox smiled to himself and left the fairytale whatever to his snacking, taking a turn about the apartment the way his partner just had while they'd awaited their tea.

Mulder didn't focus on family portraits and books the way Scully did, his interest immediately drawn by the dark space between titles on the shelf. The man flicked his tongue against his lip eagerly, not hesitating to dip his hand into the dark shadow on the bookshelf, pausing when he touched something cool. A smooth feeling, like resin; Fox's fingers found purchase on some jutting edge of the mystery object and pulled it out – too quickly, though. Without it there to balance the books, the entire row leaned to the right with a loud slump.

Mulder sat back on his haunches, turning the object in his hands over, gently blowing dust from the surface. A statue? A doll? On a heavy, lead-filled base, a mythic man stood with one arm arched over his head, his dark cape billowing forever in a breeze no one else would ever feel. From the straight line of his lapels, to the shine of his boots, to the tightness of his breeches, there was no doubt in the federal agent's mind: this was a statue of the-

"Take yer paws off that!" Before Fox could react, Hoggle had come racing over on his stubby legs and smacked the doll straight out of his hands. The thing hit the carpet with a dull thud, and Mulder winced, wondering if that wouldn't bend or break it. "Snoopin' around like its yer own personal property..."

"Sorry," the man offered with a half-apologetic smile, gathering up the doll and righting the books so as to slide it back into its dark, dusty home. "Is that a statue of the Goblin King?"

"So what if it is?"

"It just seems a bit strange to have a statue of someone you say you don't like."

"Don't see what business it is of yours," the dwarf grumbled, waving his spoon close to the man's face; Mulder put up one palm in an offering of peace.

"Just a bit curious, that's all."

"Well, don't be! Sarah don't need no more trouble than she's already got."

"Is Sarah in trouble, Hoggle?" Mulder stood up to his full height, but if he thought he might intimidate the little man, he was sorely mistaken. Hoggle glared up at the stranger with sharp, cold eyes and crossed his arms before he responded.

"She will be, goin' back t'the Underground. Why'd you have to go stickin' your big nose in it anyway?"

"Who's got a big nose?"

Hoggle made some unclear noise, something like a, "rar," and stormed back to his ice cream, shoving spoonfuls into his gaping mouth. "That Jareth won't give her no rest, he won't, not once he smells her back in the Labyrinth. And what's worse, that place will-" He stopped, suddenly wide eyed, and sucked at his spoon a little more thoughtfully.

Just like his namesake, Fox's ears pricked. "What?"

Around a mouthful of butter pecan, Hoggle muttered, "I didn't say nothin'."

"What will that place do?"

The bedroom door opened, Sarah's dark head just visible from the jamb. "Okay, you guys, we're ready!" She gave a winning smile as Hoggle grumbled and put away the ice cream, her green gaze fixed on the other man in her apartment. "I'm afraid I don't have anything to outfit you with, Agent Mulder."

"I'll be comfortable enough."

"I'm going to grab some things out of the kitchen, then we can go. Just a second."

Mulder glanced from the dark space on the bookshelf to Sarah in the kitchen, the young woman shoving protein bars into pockets and filling up a polyurethane bottle with water. With the slightest of smiles on his full lips, he stuffed his hands into his pockets and began a slow swagger into the kitchen. "Miss Williams...do you mind if I ask you a question?"

She glanced up at him through the curtain of her hair, smiled. Hoggle was glaring at the special agent. "You can call me Sarah, Agent Mulder. And sure, shoot."

"That statuette on your bookcase-"

The damp bottle slipped from Sarah's fingers. "Shit!" Water began gurgling all over the sink and she quickly righted the bottle to refill it. "I-I'm sorry, what was that?"

"That statue you have – of the Goblin King."

"You think it looks like him?" Young Miss Williams turned off the tap, screwing on the bottle's thick lid before drying it with a dishtowel. "I never thought the resemblance was all that canny."

Mulder's smile widened at the corner into a larger smirk. "It's close enough."

"Well – what about it?"

"I'm just curious as to where you got it."

"My mother gave it to me, if you must know," Sarah huffed slightly, turning and going to a hall closet, digging around for her hip pack. "She was always giving me knickknacks."

"Was? I'm sorry for your loss."

"Oh, my mom's still around," the actress corrected, standing and hooking the small, black pack around her hips. "She just gives me gift cards now. Sometimes jewelry, perfume."

"How very thoughtful."

Sarah shrugged. "I don't know how well acquainted you are with the theater, Agent Mulder, but my mother's an actress – Linda Williams." The special agent blinked, so the girl sighed and continued on. "Well, in this town, she's a big deal, and she's been in some big Hollywood films as well. She's a star, I'm an ingenue. She doesn't always have time for me."

"Must be rough."

"I made peace with that a long time ago." Sarah hooked the bottle through an elastic strap; it bounced against her thigh, the water cool through the plastic. "I was really into fantasy as a kid; she encouraged that, gave me trinkets, odds and ends. That statue's one of the things she gave me. That's why I still have it."

"But gathering dust in the darkest part of a shelf...?"

"I don't know how you decorate, but I needed something to prop up my books. And as sentimental as I am, that's hardly a Bernini. The bookshelf is a fine spot for it." Sarah patted herself all over, as though she was merely checking she had her keys. "Are you ready to go?"

Mulder nodded. "I am."

"Hoggle, we're going!"

"I'm comin', I'm comin'," the old dwarfish thing groused, toddling back to the woman's bedroom. Scully was just pulling her hair back in a short, red ponytail. Mulder smiled at her, a little mysteriously, she thought.

Sarah sat before her vanity, as though mentally prepping herself. Eyes closed, she sighed, "Mirror, mirror, on the wall..." Scully exchanged a glance with her partner; why did she get the feeling this was a bad idea? "Well, come on." She slid her hand against the smooth surface of the glass.

It passed through.

…

Scully wanted to be very scientific about this: jotting down notes was impractical, but she wanted to at least record sensations, landscape, sights, smells, sounds. She wanted to transcribe what it felt like to pass through a mirror, a physical object (unless it wasn't, unless it was actually a clever optical illusi- oh, never mind) – but the sad truth was...she couldn't. There was no feeling at all. If pressed to describe it, all she would have been able to say was that it was very much like passing from one room into another, perhaps even less so. There was no sense of walking through a door, of light or shadow. One moment they were in the bedroom of Sarah Williams, twenty three, of Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan; and in the next moment, they were someplace else.

Agent Scully didn't even have time to be stumbling or confused. As soon as she blinked and caught sight of the new world around her, she also felt her partner's fingers wrapping around either of her elbows from his position behind her. "Trans-dimensional travel, Scully!" Mulder was hissing excitedly into her right ear. "Think of the implications – the possibilities! How much space does the Underground take up? At what points are we connected with it? Does it have other neighbors? Is it like a worm hole, a tunnel? Can we pass through it, and what would we find if we did-"

"I can tell you one thing," Dana sighed, blowing a loose lock of hair from her face when it fell from her small ponytail. "I wouldn't want to vacation here."

The reasons for that seemed perfectly obvious: the quartet stood on a small, dry hill, a dead and leafless tree their only company. Scully mused; the lone and level sands stretch far away... Unlike Romantic verse, however, the dry, swirling sands here were red and gold, threaded through with bursts of glitter, as if precious stones had been ground to make the gritty sands that surrounded them. That might have made it seem beautiful, but it wasn't. Far off in the distance, Scully could see jagged mountains, but there was a kind of orange haze that kept her from knowing if they were snow capped or not. Everything just looked so dead – and nothing more so than what awaited them at the bottom of the hill, the thing that stretched into the horizon like a sea of stone.

The twisting spires and corridors of the Labyrinth. Agent Scully felt her breath catch in her throat at the sight of it. This was the perverse hell the Goblin King was putting children through? She imagined Anwer Ahmed, not twelve years old, trying to find his way through all that, beset by the goblins she had more felt than seen before, in New York. Or would he be tortured by creatures like Hoggle, whatever he was? The special agent might have opened her mouth to ask Hoggle if he knew of the boy, if he knew of victims like Courtney Breckinridge or Benedict Pierce; but the dry, gritty air made her lungs seize for a moment and she coughed fiercely. Mulder lay his broad palm at her back, rubbing her through the borrowed, white shirt. Blinking back tears made thick with sand, Dana could just catch sight of the center of the mad maze. A small, squat, brown village rose from the middle, but perched high above that was a castle. So far away they were, she could have pinched it between her thumb and forefinger, but she could still just make out rounded crenellations, banners whipping in the winds. The Castle Beyond the Goblin City...

Sarah was breathing deeply, as though this atmosphere was almost homey to her. The breeze teased at her hair, sweeping it into her closed green eyes, but the girl just brushed it back without concern, ignoring the way it clung to her fingers with dry static. The dwarfish Hoggle was looking about nervously, thick fingers tapping together. "Well, if we're gonna go, we oughta go already."

"Everything's fine, Hoggle, see?" the young woman assured, her smile brilliantly white in the tinted light of the hill. "No sign at all of-"

"Hello, Sarah."

Scully stumbled to the side slightly, caught by Mulder before she could lose her balance; the Goblin King had appeared right beside her. She hadn't been crazy, he was real – either that, or she was crazy now. And he was exactly the same as he had been all those months ago! The same wild shock of platinum hair, the same strangely dilated blue eyes. Same tight pants, too, it seemed. This time they were black. They matched his black boots, the black leather breastplate he wore that was curled with strange markings, like goblin fangs and goblin horns, the special agent thought. The cape that whipped around him in the wind was also black, but was lined with sparkling blue, and he stood out like a beacon on the orange crest of that hill.

Mulder and Scully might as well not have been there, for all the notice the Goblin King was paying them. No, instead, he leered over the young woman accompanying them, though her back was to him and her arms were crossed firmly over her soft, rounded chest. The fey creature's teeth were showing, and Dana wouldn't have been surprised if his sharp canines had dripped saliva onto Miss Williams' shoulders. "My, but it has been some time, hasn't it?"

Sarah didn't flinch, didn't blink, didn't flutter a muscle. "Eight years, Jareth."

"And the sweet little princess has grown into a lovely young woman, hasn't she? Fit to be a queen?" This man, this Jareth turned his hand, as though examining his nails through his (also black) leather gloves. "Tell me, Sarah, dear, do you still play dress-up in the park?" That did get the young woman's ire, she wheeled to face him, and he simply grinned at her. Sarah's mouth closed, she would not rise to that bait. She scowled at her age old antagonist. "Oh, but you turned dressing up into a career, now, didn't you? So mature, so worldly, Miss Sarah Williams."

"I didn't come here to prove myself to a baby snatcher."

The King snorted, most un-regally. "Please, that's precisely why you came here."

Sarah ignored him. "I hear you've been hunting outside of your league, Jareth."

"Sarah, darling," he drawled, blue eyes half hooded, as though he were both vaguely insulted and amused. "You will find that nothing is outside my league. To what do I owe the indescribable pleasure of your company?"

"About that." Mulder at last stepped forward, still smiling, having the grandest of times while his partner tried to process everything logically and sensibly – to very little avail. "Goblin King – we're here to investigate the disappearance of Senator Daniel Beau-"

The first noise Scully heard was the sharp intake of her own breath; there had been no more warning than that, she hadn't even seen the fairytale man's arm move. But it must have, for before anyone could even blink, his gloved hand had shot out and seized her partner by the thick point of his throat. Mulder choked on a lack of air. "Agent Mulder." The King's purr was like gravel. "When last we met, it was in your realm and you could act as you chose. That is very much not the case here." The fey man seemed genuinely angry, he turned flaming blue eyes on Mulder as he clawed at his gloves. "You did not come here as my guests, you did not make the sacred exchange – no, you snuck in through the backdoor, like a thief in the night!"

"Jareth, stop it!" Sarah boldly grabbed for his gloved hands, her fingers attempting to slide between the leather and the federal agent's neck. "You're such a freaking psycho, stop it, you'll hurt him!"

At the girl's touch, the fey king released the man, examining his hand in the place where she had touched him, almost as though he were burned by her. His lips were slightly pursed, slightly parted, his eyes just a hint foggy as he gave his thumb and palm careful scrutiny; but then he looked up, and he smiled at her again. "Sarah," Jareth cooed, tucking both his hands behind his back, one grabbed at the wrist. "Tell me, have you missed me, precious thing?"

"You try to choke a man, and then you ask me if I missed you?"

"You make the question seem illogical."

There was the briefest of pauses, but then the actress tilted her soft, round nose into the air, arms crossed all over again. "No, I haven't."

Jareth equally paused, his eyebrows twitched up just a moment. With no more notice than that, he gave a gay sigh of, "Ah well! Dainty, dazzling Dana!" and he turned toward Agent Scully, who had been checking her partner's neck as he slowly recovered. She stumbled slightly from the sudden notice, and the Goblin King seized her left hand in his, bending over it. "I know you will be more charitable to me, my most delicious, delectable, darling woman." Scully thought he meant only to kiss her hand, but instead he absolutely licked it with the full of his tongue.

"Ugh!" The federal agent swiftly yanked her hand back, rubbing it on Sarah's borrowed jeans. "That's disgusting, what is wrong with you?"

The King sighed, the back of his glove pressed against his forehead. "Love, sweet Scully! Was ever a man more cruelly abused than in his rejection from the woman he holds most dear? What say you, Little Fox?"

Mulder's voice was little more than a wheeze. "Yeah, sure..."

"Your Majesty." Agent Scully was standing at her full five feet three inches of height, hands clenched fists at her sides. Her blue eyes burned, she seemed positively livid. For a man claiming such devotion, the Goblin King barely even glanced at her. "I'm sorry your feelings are so very sensitive over the bet you lost-"

Jareth's hackles raised, his teeth were bared. "Lost? You mean the wager where you so scurrilously cheated, swindled, and-"

"-but we are agents of the United States government and we are investigating a very serious disappearance in the Aboveground – if we could have your cooperation, please, sir."

Jareth paused. He snorted. "Well, do you see that, dearest Sarah? How far a little kindness and respect will take you?" The King sighed, he twisted his wrist and a crystal danced over his lithe fingers. "Very well, decorous Dana. What do you wish to know?"

Scully huffed slightly, her fingers twitched with her desire to produce her pen and notepad, but that would do her little good here. "Do you know the whereabouts of Senator Daniel Beaumont."

Jareth smirked. "I do."

The female agent sighed, managed to stop herself from rolling her eyes. "And could you share that information with us?"

The smirk widened into a smug grin, and the crystal rolled up his arm, only to slide back down again and hop graciously to the tips of his fingers. "Well, since you asked so sweetly..." The crystal disappeared with a short pop! "He's here, in the Underground."

"How did the Senator come to be here?"

"Oh, a very old deal of ours, I daresay he'd entirely forgotten."

"Goblin King, the unlawful detainment of any individual against their will is-"

"Oh, stop it." The King's amused mood was gone, his thin lips lifted over sharp teeth, and he seemed every inch the predator Scully remembered him as. "Must we go through all this rigmarole again? You know I do not care for your petty, mortal laws, so spare me your righteousness!"

"Jareth." Sarah stepped half an inch closer, and the Goblin King's eyes were drawn to her, as though she burned like a beacon. Sarah's own green gaze was firm and unwavering. "We'll do this the old fashioned way; let us run the Labyrinth for the senator."

His Majesty snorted again. "No."

The girl hesitated. "...No? That's it?"

"Why should I indulge you thus?" he asked, stepping behind the young woman with smooth, near-soundless motions, twirling idly as though he were engaging her in dance. Agent Scully thought that, perhaps, he was, of a kind. "You fraternize with my most traitorous subjects-" he spared a withering glance for Hoggle, who quickly ducked behind tall Agent Mulder. "You sneak into my most sacred dominion; you had nothing to do with our agreement, and moreover, you've beaten the Labyrinth before, which gives our dear Agents Mulder and Scully a distinctly unfair advantage." His tongue clucked against the back of his teeth three times. "Oh no, no, no, my sweet Sarah. You have not convinced me at all."

Miss Williams was glaring at him. "What are we supposed to do, wager our souls against you? Don't be an ass, Jareth."

"I see your manners haven't improved much in eight years..."

"Straight talk, Your Majesty: what do we have to do to win back the senator?"

The Goblin King paused, his thin fingers against the sharp point of his chin. He spared quick glances for Mulder and Scully, but all his attention was on Sarah Williams. The girl was as steel, though, she did not shrink away from that gaze. After a time, he grinned at her. "What indeed..." the fey man purred, taking a careful step toward his favorite adversary. "I suppose you have won me over, precious Sarah. For how can I deny you anything, when it means you'll spend more time here, in my kingdom? I suppose I could be generous..." The gloved fingers of his left hand threaded through her dark hair at the temple. Sarah's lips parted in surprise; she half moved to pull away from him, but likewise, half did not, as though rooted to the spot. Before she could react to the King's caress, his forefinger and thumb pinched around a single thread of her hair – and pulled.

"Ouch!" The Williams girl covered the sore spot against her head, mouth open with shock. "Why, you son of a-"

"This," the Goblin King was continuing, mien very regal; a key appeared between the fingers that were not holding the strand of Sarah's dark hair. "Is the key to the prison I keep my old friend the senator in." He threaded Sarah's hair through a hole in the key, tying the free ends behind his neck. The whole thing lengthened and strengthened according to his will, forming a necklace that hung next to the pendant at his sternum. "And since this is a piece of Miss Sarah Williams, only she can retrieve it." He leaned forward on the balls of his feet. "By getting quite close to me..." His lips were inches away from Sarah's, and she was too surprised to back up. "Feel free to make that happen at any time at all, precious thing."

Miss Williams woke up, shaking her head and blinking her green eyes. "Keep dreaming, Goblin King."

"Oh, you have no idea about my dreams, sweet Sarah," he purred once more, standing straight. "As for the rest of you," he addressed the agents and their dwarven guide with considerably less warmth. "If you're so intent on finding me, I shall be relaxing in my Castle. I warned you about the Labyrinth, but you just had to keep pushing it." His lips briefly curled in a sneer. "Well, no matter." He resettled the cloak at his shoulders, looking very otherworldly, very powerful – very frightening. "May the best man win, as the saying goes, eh, Little Fox? Adieu, sweet babes in the wood – and Sarah..." With no more warning than that, he disappeared from the ether around them, and Scully blinked, trying to make sense of the situation.

After a moment, Mulder sighed, running a rough hand through his limp hair. "I've got to be at least ten years older than you," he addressed Sarah, who blinked at him in surprise. "Exactly why am I 'the babe?'"