Okay, so after a long wait it's finally here. It sucks but I love it!! MWAHAHHAHA
Reneey: You're a nut.
Lyn: I'm hungry.
Reneey: Wanna get some nuts?
Lyn: Sure?
Reneey: -points at Sarah- THERE'S ONE!!
Sarah: -twitches- And people wonder WHY I never leave my house.
----
CHAPTER BEGINS!!!
"So...where'd he say the door was again?"
Reneey sighed, patting Juhux's shoulder in a comforting manner. "This is just sad Uncle; you can't even tell what a door looks like anymore? You must be going senile."
With a growl Juhux glared down at the long haired ravenette who only grinned mischievously at her in response. "I'm only one year older then you dammit and I can to tell what a door looks like but," she gestured at the blank expanse of dirty vine covered wall before them, "there isn't one here!!! Lyn back me up here, you don't see a door either right?!"
"NO!!' Reneey cried indignantly, latching possessively onto Lyn's arm. "She's my girlfriend damnit and she agrees with me, so you're senile!!" She glared at her blue eyed guardian in a less then intimidating way, looking a lot like an angry puppy.
"I AM NOT!!!" Screamed said guardian glaring in return. "THERE IS NO DOOR HERE!!!"
"YES THERE IS AND YES YOU ARE!!!"
"NO THERE ISN'T AND I AM NOT!!!"
"YES!!!"
"NO!!!'
"YES!!!"
"NO!!!!"
Growling the duo turned to their taller companion and at the same time screamed, "LYN!!!!!"
Lyn tilted her head back and sighed heavily. "Why are you guys getting me involved in this?" The girl with kick ass moves asked tiredly. She loved Juhux, and her girlfriend, but the three of them had been stuck here for all of four minutes and she already had a headache. She really wished Sarah was there to distract and or shut them up; she was pretty good at that, especially with Juhux.
Sadly though Sarah was exactly the reason why they were here, stuck in this strange and oddly beautiful stretch of almost bare and endlessly stretching landscape. Juhux, in a fit of rage had wished her beloved creator away to the Goblin King, not actually expecting for the tights wearing man to show up and take the easily distracted girl away. He had given them thirteen hours to make it through his Labyrinth, defeat him, and recover Sarah. If they didn't, Sarah would be stuck in the Labyrinth forever. Of course they couldn't have that. Sarah was there friend, their very annoying, oddly chipper, slightly misanthropic friend.
Juhux of course was extremely worried about her slightly naive creator, heck they all were, but Juhux thief was on edge and sweating bullets and looked more nervous than Lyn had ever seen her. So it was no surprise how easily she was getting into arguments with Reneey, who seemed to jump at the chance for a verbal disagreement. One of the many quirks Lyn loved about her. She was a little curious as to why Reneey was so calm though.
Was it because she knew something the two of them didn't?
"LYN!!!!" Two very annoyed voices cried, shocking her out of her thoughts.
"What?" The brunette asked exasperated.
"Who do you think is right Lynni?!" Reneey immediately demanded. "Me of course right?!"
Lyn frowned averting her eyes from her angry girlfriend. "You know what? I think your both wrong, and I'm right."
"But Lyn!" They both wined at the same time, only to be smacked over the head by the ticked off brunette.
"Shut up and think you two!" She snapped. "With your devious minds you should be able to scrape something together."
They pouted but she ignored them, shaking Reneey off her arm and turning to the deceptive wall with a glare. "And you better hurry, we don't have much time to save Sarah, and who knows what that nut ball's gonna do to her."
----
"So," Jareth asked waving a small plastic spoon in Sarah's direction, "this stuff here is chicken salad, and you feed it to your cats?"
Sarah was hanging from a large swinging cage in the center of the room, filled with plush pillows and blankets. A platter of odd but fancy foods piled high on a tray in front of her. Despite the situation she looked rather calm. And she was, Jareth wasn't a half bad guy, and they seemed to be getting along rather well. Somehow though, they had seemed to have gotten onto the topic of lunch foods. Sarah had been explaining that at school for lunch she'd usually bring either tuna (much to his disgust) or preferably chicken salad.
Furthermore, the blonde girl had been thoroughly surprised to learn that the Goblin King had never even tried chicken salad. Thus leading to the current situation of the almighty Goblin King, ruler of the labyrinth, hear his name and tremble, eating bumble bee brand chicken salad from a can with a tiny plastic spoon.
"Um, no," responded the blonde, "It's chicken salad. Apparently my friends seem to think I should be feeding it my cats." She said as the Goblin King downed another spoonful.
"I should say so, its delicious." he said stuffing another tiny spoonful into his mouth.
Sarah sighed. "No, you don't get it; they seem to think its cat food, because they think it looks and smells like cat food. More importantly it comes in a can, like cat food." She pouted slightly at that. "But you agree with me right? It's good isn't it?"
Jareth nodded, and another spoonful was popped into his mouth. "It has a rather zesty flavor to it." he replied after swallowing. "I may have to have my cooks create this for me on a regular basis."
The blonde girl grinned at him. "I'm glad somebody other than me likes it."
Just then a hoard of goblins rushed into the room looking slightly charred and screaming. "Kingy, Kingy!!" They cried crowding around Jareth's thrown. "They've broken into the Labyrinth!!"
Jareth rolled his bi-colored eyes slouching a little further in his chair. "Finally, how long does it take to find a bloody door; I even pointed it out to them."
The goblins looked a little sheepish. "Um, actually Kingy, they didn't use the door."
There was a short silence. "What?" The Goblin Lord asked in a deceptively calm voice. The goblins trembled and Sarah winced, hugging a pillow close to her chest.
"Well, Kingy," the same brave goblin said, his voice quavering slightly, "They couldn't find the door so, they just sorta, blew up the wall."
The silence that rang through the room was almost deafening, and Sarah could practically FEEL the animosity coming off the Goblin King in waves. The goblins who were unlucky enough to deliver the message fidgeted nervously, shuffling from foot to foot as they waited for their king's reaction.
And react he did.
"WHAT?!" He shouted standing from his thrown to tower over his subjects in a pillar of fury and blazing magic. "HOW DARE THOSE LITTLE GIRLS DESTROY MY LABYRINTH!!!"
Growling he kicked one of the Goblins sending it hurtling out the window. The other goblins quickly backed away, not wanting to be next to face Jareth's wrath. Another goblin however stepped tentatively forward. It was a female if the slightly softer and more curved features were anything to go by and she quivered in her cloth shoes as she looked up at her angry king.
"Y-your Majesty," she stuttered out her wrinkled face going pale as she was pierced by Jareth's harsh eyes, "R-remember what Miss Sarah-"
"What does Sarah have to do with this?!" He demanded cutting the frightened female off, though his eyes seemed to soften ever so slightly as he said her name.
The goblin woman gulped. "W-well you see your Highness, Miss Sarah, she's been wanting you to go easier on the runners, and to watch your temper. The Miss made us promise to send for her if your, t-temper got the best of you." She paused looking nervously around the room and her next words came out rushed and barely distinguishable. "HerwordsnotmineKingy!" With that she darted out of the room leaving Jareth to glare angrily at his surroundings.
"Bog damnit." He growled, running a glowed hand through his hair. "That girl," he trailed off staring up at the ceiling with a clouded look on his face. He sighed, plopping back down onto his throne, "that insufferable girl."
Sarah blinked at the sudden quiet fondness in his voice then grinned. 'How cute,' the troublesome blonde writer thought, 'Jareths in love~.'
Suddenly as if he had heard her thoughts, he turned to look at her, his bi colored eyes full of contemplative curiosity. Sarah could only think one thing, 'shit.'
-----
Juhux sighed, trudging after her giggling friends. She couldn't believe that Reneey had really gone and blown up the wall. Well she could because it was Reneey and Reneey's middle name was, 'oh look at the pretty explosion' but I mean seriously, did she have to go and blow up an evil magical Goblin Kings Labyrinth wall? They were so screwed.
"Where did she even get explosives anyway?" the thief murmured to herself. Of course Lyn heard her and she grinned falling back and wrapping an arm around Juhux's shoulders.
"Very simple my fellow featherless friend," The martial arts master said with a sparkle of amusement in her eyes, "she got them from her purse!"
Juhux blinked at her uncomprehendingly. "Her purse?"
"Damn straight!" Reneey chirped smugly, wrapping both her arms around one of Juhux's from her other side. "I mean seriously Uncle, where else would I get them from? It's not like I can just pull explosives out of my a-"
Lyn smacked the overly rambunctious raven over the back of her pretty little head, startling a loud squeak from her lips. Reneey pouted, glaring in an adorably menacing way at the taller girl. "What the hell was that for Lynni?! You nearly bashed my brains out!!"
Lyn frowned at her, before sighing and stroking the back of her head in apology, causing the younger girl to purr contentedly. "That you idget, was for cursing."
"But I always curse." Reneey defended weakly, her eyes lolling shut from Lyn's ministrations; Lyn always did know how to calm her down.
The brunette sighed plopping her chin down on the top of Juhux's head. "Yeah I know, but you can't curse right now."
"Why not?"
"You can't because Sarah's writing this in the middle of her first period class on a school computer. " Juhux stated matter-of-factly as she wiggled out from her companions lazy embraces. Said companions nearly fell over from the sudden loss of support and Reneey had to grab onto Lyn's arm and hair to keep herself upright.
"ACK!" Lyn squeaked in surprised pain. "That freaking hurts Rea!!"
"Don't look at me!" The obsidian eyed girl growled in annoyance, struggling to untangle her hand from Lyn's hair without causing further damage. "Juhux is the one who moved damnit!"
"Language!!"
Reneey just glared at her, as if to say: 'I never, ever watch my language.' Which was probably the general gist of the glare anyway if her, Sane Person's Guide to Understanding Reneey's Glares was anything to go buy. She was about to retort with an angry: 'don't give me that glare' fist to the head maneuver (trademark Lyn) when Juhux gave an aggravated groan and began to nimbly untangle Reneey's hand from her hair.
"Look can we just get on topic?" She pleaded to her loveable, kickass, and extremely ADD friends.
They looked at her and blinked, then looked at each other and blinked. The two repeated the process for several seconds before Lyn looked at Juhux with a slightly sheepish expression and tentatively asked. "So, um, what were we talking about again?"
Juhux smacked herself in the forehead with the palm of her hand. "We were talking about where Rea get's her explosives from."
They blinked. "Oh that's easy." Reneey said cheerfully, once more wrapping her arms around her self-proclaimed Uncle's. "I got them from my purse!"
"GAH!" Juhux screamed, throwing her left arm into the air. "I know where you got them from damnit," Juhux said sounding exasperated, "what I'm wondering is why you even have them in the first place?!"
Reneey blinked; then grinned. "Daddy gave them to me."
Juhux's eye twitched. "Of course he did." She groaned dropping her head back into the palm of her hand. "Can't sensei give a practical gift for once?"
"What are you talking about?" Reneey queried looking aghast. "Explosives are totally practical, I never leave home without them!"
Lyn patted Reneey's head over Juhux's shoulder. "It's okay puppy, she'll understand eventually."
Reneey purred once more, nuzzling into Lyn's hand and loving the attention. Juhux just twitched.
----
"So, you wanna know what their weaknesses are?" Sarah asked taking a sip of the Chai Tea the Goblin King had been so kind as to provide for her.
Jareth had let her out of her hanging prison on the condition that she stop trying to write all of his staff into oblivion and stay in the castle until her friends came to rescue her. However he had a request, the King of the Goblin City wished to know her friends weaknesses so he could take revenge on them for destroying the outer most wall of his labyrinth.
So now the two of them were sitting at an elegant coffee table in the center of his throne room, sipping tea and eating muffins and chicken salad.
At the Goblin Kings nod Sarah frowned setting down her dragon printed tea cup and crossing her hands in front of her chin."Now tell me why exactly I should tell you my friends weaknesses, in what way would that do me any good?"
"I'll let you keep the tea cup." He said and Sarah had to bite her lip to avoid screaming 'DONE DEAL!' it was no secret to anyone mortal or magical alike that Sarah adored dragons, and Jareths offer was indeed tempting. She blinked as she noticed the way her fingers had begun to lovingly stroke the cup. Sarah bit her lip and forced herself to stop, what kind of person gave away their friend's secrets for a tea cup?
"I'm sorry Goblin King but that's not a good enough reason for me." She said tightly.
Jareth nodded and leaned back in his chair. "Alright then, i'll let you keep the cup, and your human form and freedom should your companions fail to rescue you."
"N-no, I won't need to take you up on that, I believe in my friends, they'll make it in time."
The Goblin King frowned. "I wouldn't be so sure about that." He said looking at her with a lazy expression, Sarah just pursed her lips and for a moment there was silence. "Then how about this," he drawled, "I'll let you keep the cup, your freedom and humanity and," here he paused, his lips forming a downright evil smirk, "you can meet my Sarah."
"DONE!!" She shouted jumping up from her seat. "I ADORE Sarah, she's my idol!" The blonde squealed, hopping from foot to foot with barely contained excitement. "Who do you wanna know about first?!"
Jareth smirked. "I knew you'd come around. How about that little blonde magician of yours? She seems like she could present a bit of a challenge."
"Oh Juhux is easy," The blonde boasted absently as she skipped around the table, (Jareth didn't even bother trying to follow her movements) "I know everything about her. Of course, I made her so that's not really a surprise."
Jareth's eyebrows rose just slightly in surprise before he resumed his customary I'm-so-intimidating-I- don't-even-need-to-bother-trying-to-look-intimidating-so-I'm-just-going-to-sit-here-and-look-bored expression. "You did?" He asked raising an eyebrow. "How intriguing, and exactly how did you manage such an accomplishment?"
Sarah froze mid-skip, her anxious face turning to him so quickly it was a wonder she didn't get whiplash. "Er, well it's sort of a secret but," she looked at him with wary, searching blue eyes, "if you promise not to tell anybody then it might be alright."
'How trusting she is.' He thought suppressing an amused chuckled as she nervously reached for her cup (without looking) only to yelp as she stuck her hand in the tea instead. 'What an excellent minion she'd make.' The king smiled at her encouragingly, passing her a gratefully received towel. "I swear on my Precious that I won't tell a soul."
Sarah blinked at him, not even noticing that she had stopped wrapping her offended hand. "You swear on a ring?"
"Pardon?"
"Um, never mind," Sarah muttered waving the comment away with the towel, "you must be talking about Sarah. I was just thinking about Lord of the Rings and," she shook her head and set the towel down on the table, "Whatever, anyway, I used this thing here to create Ju-chan." The blonde said pulling an odd and seemingly normal pen out of her pocket. On further inspection however the pen seemed to have something written on its entirety in a strange language he had never seen before, and on the side there was a small switch. The King frowned intrigued by the contraption and he held out a hand for it, intent to inspect it further, but Sarah drew back shaking her head with an apologetic look on her face.
"Sorry your highness but I can't let you touch it, your magic might infect it and I can't have that, it's a family heirloom after all."
The king's eyes narrowed. "Very well, I suppose I'll have to respect that. Tell me though, what is the switch for?"
Sarah blinked. "The switch, that just turns it on see?" She said pressing it with a small click. Just like that the pen seemed to glow faintly, exuding a powerful magical aura. "Wanna see how it works?"
Sarah asked receiving a nod in return she grinned and pressed the tip of the pen to the air in front of her face she drew a circle, then a few more on the inside. She then shaded the circle with careful, practiced strokes; a look of absolute concentration on her face. After a moment, Sarah lifted the pen away from her picture to jot some strange and long winded notes underneath it and when she was done she pressed the button once more and the sphere fell from the air and onto the ground. It bounced a few times before rolling to a stop at the Goblin Kings feet. With an awed look he picked it up and examined it, it was a ball, a red one with green spots.
So solid and realistic that it might have existed all along, yet he had just seen this mortal girl create it before his very eyes. It was similar to his own magic only on a much smaller scale, and it seemed to involve a lot more effort and artistic ability. Understandable, for it would take a great deal of ingenuity to allow a normal human being to have this sort of power. However, he was beginning to see that none of the four girls he had trapped in his kingdom were normal human beings. Two magic wielding twins, one with the ability to create anything with a few pen strokes. Her twin and creation, a thief's apprentice who wielded the power of shadows.
Just as fascinating were their friends, an ancient thief's daughter completely uninhibited by the laws of the world, and the daughter of an ancient king with a great deal of strength and ingenuity. Both of them had knowledge and power that seemed beyond them. He wondered if they knew how to use it. Frowning he bounced the ball in his hand, his eyes on the child in front of him. "Interesting," he said and she grinned at the praise, "Now about those weaknesses, I believe you were starting with young Juhux?"
"Oh yeah!" Sarah said quickly pocketing her pen. "Well Juhux doesn't have that many, none of them do, but she worries about me a lot for some reason. Um, she also doesn't like Mariku much, and she would do anything to protect what's important to her."
"Mariku?" Jareth asked raising an eyebrow. "Just what may I ask is a Mariku?"
Sarah frowned. "Not what, who, and um, do you have one of those shiny floating crystal balls lying around?" Jareth threw the ball Sarah had created across the room and then closed his hand into a tight fist, when he opened it a crystal had appeared in his hand. Sarah blinked, starring at the crystal with an awed and fascinated expression. "That is so cool."
Jareth smirked. "Thank you, now what exactly do I need it for?"
"Oh right," Sarah said startling herself out of her staring. "Er, you can see people in that can't you?" The king nodded. "Okay well the guys name is Mariku Ishtar, and he's Juhux's greatest enemy and stalker." Sarah shuddered just thinking about him. "He's a real creeper."
Jareth raised a delicately manicured eyebrow at her. "A creeper?"
Sarah blushed shuffling her feet. "Yeah, it's someone who's really creepy or a stalker, or both," she frowned crossing her arms over chest and grumbling out an annoyed, "which he is."
Frowning Jareth looked down to the crystal in his palm, and began to rotate it from the front of his hand to the back. He then balanced it on the tip of his index finger before tossing it into the air and catching it so that it rested once more in his palm. "I see." He drawled as light and color started swirling around in the crystal and when it stopped showed a slightly foggy image of a tan spiky haired blonde teen with narrow violet eyes. "What of your other two friends?"
At this Sarah began to laugh a little. "Yeah about that, well, you're not going to believe this but they're a little different."
"How so?"
Sarah rubbed the back of her head still giggling. "Um, well you see, what they're afraid of comes from they're dreams."
----
"Look, I'm just telling you it's not physically possible!" Juhux defended loudly, her dark blue eyes burning with determination. "There just isn't a way!"
"I'm telling you there is!" Reneey defended just as hotly. "I mean have you ever seen it happen?!"
"No! Which is why I'm telling you that it-"
Reneey shushed her putting her hand over the blonde's mouth. "If you've never seen it, how do you know it's not possible?"
The young thief twitched. She grabbed Reneey's hand and tugged it away from her mouth. "I know because I have common sense. I bet you haven't seen it either anyway."
"Of course I have!" Reneey said proudly.
Juhux actually looked surprised. "You have?"
Reneey just grinned, pulling her hand from her over protective protectors loosened grip. "Yeap, I saw it on a medical science show!"
There was short silence. "Why were you watching a medical science show?"
The tie-dye haired girl shrugged. "It was late, I couldn't sleep, there was nothing on. End of story."
With that she turned and continued to walk. Juhux pouted before following after her, a snickering Lyn at her side.
"I still don't think it's possible to fit an entire banana up your nose." She grumbled.
Lyn patted her grumbling friend on the back consolingly, a wide grin plastered on her face in place of the snickering. "Come on you whiner, loosen up a little. You win some you lose some and all that crud." Still grinning she shrugged, and shoved Juhux hard in the direction Reneey was going. "Whatever, we've gotta go save Sarah remember? You don't have time to pout."
"I wasn't pouting!" Juhux yelled. "And you nearly pushed me into the Labyrinth wall!"
"My, so this was what all the noise was about."
Lyn blinked. "Juhux did Bakura teach you how to throw your voice?"
Juhux looked at her funny. "No, I'm a thief not some sort of puppeteer."
"Okay first of all its ventriloquist," the martial arts master corrected irritated, "secondly throwing your voice would be a very useful skill for a thief."
"Oh dear am I interrupting something?" The voice said again.
Both girls paused and Lyn gave Juhux a look as if to say 'please say you heard that too'. Juhux returned the look and Lyn visibly relaxed; then slowly moved into a fighting stance, motioning for Juhux to protect Reneey if need be. "Okay little voice from nowhere," the brunette said as Juhux moved into position, "just who, and where are you?"
The voice chuckled in a warm soft voice. "I'm right in front of you."
Lyn's eyes widened. It was directly in front of her and she couldn't see it? "Are you invisible?"
The voiced laughed again. "No, no, no, my dear, I'm just a might small is all. Look down."
She did, and all she saw was a little blue backed worm looking up at her from a tiny rock sticking out of the Labyrinth wall. The worm smiled at her and waved with one of its small hands. "Ello."
Lyn was silent, staring at the worm in stunned fascination. "Um Lyn, "Juhux asked warily, "did that worm just say hello?"
The worm smiled again. "No I said ello, but that's close enough. Most runners don't get it right anyway."
They were both quiet, simply staring at the smiling talking worm, willing it to go away. The worm however just continued to sit there, smiling benignly up at them. Finally the silence broke.
"RENEEY!!" The two girls screamed rushing ahead towards their black haired friend and wrapping their arms around her.
"What the fuck?!" Reneey squeaked indignantly from the tangle of arms that had made their way around her waist and shoulders. Then she was being dragged back the way she had just come. "What are you doing?!"
"Rea, you have to come quickly!" Lyn urged. "We found a talking worm!"
"…A talking worm?" Reneey asked skeptically receiving a frantic yes from her girlfriend. "Lynni did you take your meds today?"
"Reneey!" Juhux whined pitifully. "It's true, it's small, and blue, and it says ello!"
"So it's like a fuzzy blue ello worm?" The olive skinned teen asked amusedly.
She had been joking but Juhux and Lyn both said yes and continued to drag her towards the thusly named 'Fuzzy Blue Ello Worm'. Reneey pouted, as much as she loved that attention and the sorta hugging, she wasn't all that happy about being dragged off to see the weird talking worm. Just as she was about to chew her friends out for manhandling her, the manhandling stopped and she was facing a worn ivy covered expanse of wall.
"Well?" Lyn said.
Reneey frowned looking at the taller girl like she had just sprouted an extra arm. "Well what?"
Lyn gestured wildly before pointing at the wall. "Well, look at the talking worm!"
"What talking worm?!"
"Ello there, would you girls quiet down a bit? My wife's cooking a soufflé."
Reneey blinked, took in Lyn's triumphant expression; Juhux's twitching face, and then slowly turned around to face the Labyrinth wall. There, sitting on one of the many rocks that jutted from the wall, was a fuzzy blue