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Falling --COMPLETED	By : jinx1764 Category: G through L > Labyrinth Views: 10231 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I don't own Labyrinth, don't make any money, this is a work of fanfiction.

Chapter List
- 8
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- 10
"I'm the what?" she asked, shimming away from his outstretched hand holding the glowing red stone. Jareth's face was an odd combination of calm revulsion, and she didn't really know what do with that unusual expression. No one had ever looked at her like that before, like he wanted to hug her and strangle her simultaneously.
"How exactly are you supposed to repair this Nexus?" Sam asked, wheeling his squeaking chair closer to the two adversaries.
"I am unsure, but the stone is no longer blinking therefore the Nexus is here." Jareth grinned and Sarah didn't see any joy in it. "And the coincidence seems beyond fiction." He moved the rock closer to her, jabbing into her personal space.
Scrambling back, Sarah shrank herself into the couch's corner. "Don't get that thing anywhere near me!"
"I suspect ... touch the rock, Sarah, and all our woes will be at an end."
"I don't think so!" She shifted farther away. "I'm not touching your stupid rock!"
"Don't be childish. It won't harm you." Jareth waved it around as he shimmed over the cushions toward her.
"You don't know that."
"Nonsense. I'm touching it and it's not hurting me."
"Are you the Nexus?"
Jareth's brows furrowed and his movement paused. "No, of course not..."
"Then how do you know what'll happen to me?"
"I know because ... because ... oh enough, just touch the rock!" He lunged causing Sarah to leap and roll over the shabby arm of the couch. Her booted feet hit the concrete floor with a blunt smack and she crouched defensively. Jareth landed face first into the moldering cushions, arms outreaching for the empty Sarah-shaped space.
"What happens if Fixer touches your rock?" Sam asked, curiosity and concern warring equally in his voice. His chair creaked louder when he pushed it out of Jareth's way.
Jareth sat up with a scowl, rock clenched firmly in his hand. "The magic inherent in this rock should bind with her and heal the Bridge from my world to yours." He met Sam's wide-eyed look. "The damaged Bridge is the cause of your world's alterations, The Shove as you call it."
"Shit, Sam! Don't sound soo damn eager to help him."
"I'm not," he narrowed his eyes at her, "but I'd sure like to hear more 'bout this world healing."
"You can't trust him," she said, crossing her arms.
"Why don't you let me judge for myself?"
She snorted. "Soon you'll be believing everything he tells you. He's fae. They lie."
"That is a lie," Jareth replied in a haughty tone. "We may confuse and twist the truth," he cocked his head slightly and shrugged, "but we never lie outright."
"Hmm ... too bad there's no way to prove that," Sam said.
Jareth heard his sincerity and relaxed; at least this man was giving him a chance. He eyed the bright red rock in his palm. Now if he could only convince Sam to assist him in pinning Sarah so he might bring her and the rock in contact.
"If what I say is true," Jareth said. "Then if this rock touches her I will be proven honest."
"Or you'll harm my best resource."
"Gee, thanks, Sam. Now I'm a resource."
"Just tellin' it like it is. Don't you want this world back to normal?"
"Of course!" she said.
"And with your uncanny talents, I'd say what Goblin King's claimin' just might be true."
"Excuse me?"
"Given the situation, I'd rather you call me Jareth..." he said, but neither Sam nor Sarah paid him any attention.
"Fixer, maybe there's a reason why you can bring old tech back to life with some fiddling. You ever consider that?" Sam's chair creaked again as he leaned back, laying his threaded fingers on his chest. It wasn't often he trapped Fixer in a logic argument.
"Oh no." She waggled her finger at Sam. "Don't you put this on me just because I happen to be good at mechanical stuff."
"It's more than just the mechs; we both know that."
"Pardon, but what are you both speaking of?" Jareth asked as he stood.
Sarah death-glared Sam, but he ignored her. "She's the only one I've ever known after the Shove who can get anything mechanical or tech to work, plus..." He hesitated at Sarah's cough, then mumbled. "She's good with the Empties."
"Don't..." The word cracked as she said it in warning, her body tensing.
Sam flinched, his mouth hanging open on his next phrase before he shut it with a snap. "Sorry, Fixer," he said, sitting up straight.
She held up one hand in mute acceptance while Jareth watched, uncertain what he witnessed. What did Sarah want kept from him? What exactly were Empties? In his fog, he remembered hearing Len and Chet speak of them but he knew nothing more. Finally, his curiosity drove him to ask:
"What are Empties?"
Sarah gasped and jerked bodily. Sam frowned and fidgeted, making his chair squeal randomly. Neither hurried to answer the question, but Sam eventually did while Sarah turned from him and faced a wall.
"After the Shove, many people couldn't handle the change. Gradually something ... happened to them, something permanent."
"Go on."
Sam shrugged. "There's really not much to tell. All sorts of people just stopped being ... normal. Barely ate unless they were starvin', barely slept 'cept when they dropped from exhaustion, just started wandering around like they were searching and not finding."
"As if they were empty..." Jareth said under his breath, brows furrowing and hand tightening around the rock.
"Yeah, exactly."
Jareth snapped back to the present. "And nothing helped them?"
"Nope; nothing I've heard 'bout. Doctors were stumped, but then everybody had lots to worry 'bout with the whole world falling apart." He nodded toward Sarah still deliberating ignoring them. "She's the only one I've ever seen be able to talk to an Empty and get a coherent answer."
"Really?"
"And wasn't much of a response, just a word or two once in awhile."
Sarah spun around, eyes bright, hands fisted at her sides. "Don't you dare say another word, Sam."
He threw his hands up. "I ain't gonna spill."
"People here are well, so not everyone was effected?" Jareth asked Sam, but Sarah answered.
"No." Her voice was clipped at first but grew softer, her expression distant. "Not everyone and not all at once."
"Fixer..." Sam coaxed, trying to console her. "Maybe he really is here to help."
Her eyes misted, filling with unshed tears. She wrapped her arms around her chest and rocked slightly. "You don't know ... you don't understand..."
"Sarah," Jareth stepped closer to her, "I can repair this," she looked up, lower lip trembling, "if you'll cooperate," he extended the rock once again, its glow unwavering.
"How can I ever trust you?" she whispered. "You've caused so much harm."
He moved another step, then another, heard the ubiquitous squeal of Sam's chair behind him. Slowly Jareth was hemming her into a corner, which she didn't seem to notice. Outstretching both arms wide and low, he tried to make himself appear as non-threatening as possible. "It wasn't me. I swear to you."
Her short, harsh laugh reverberated in the small room; it hurt his sensitive ears but he resisted cringing. "Still blaming me, are you?"
"Sarah..."
"Don't call me that!" She stumbled back a few steps, her back hitting the wall. "Sarah died a long time ago, Goblin King. You killed her!" Her arm struck out at his chest in accusation, hands and fingers shaking.
Jareth leapt forward and grabbed her wrist with his free hand, while swinging his other hand with the rock into her open palm. The few seconds between the resounding slap of his attack and his releasing her before he crashed into the same wall, gave Jareth time enough to register her shock. It quickly melted into fear then disgust as she flung the rock so forcefully it whizzed near Sam's face (who ducked with a startled curse) and shattered against the opposite wall.
"NO!"
Jareth never really knew who yelled, him or Sarah, only that one of them did just before the rock, the last source of magic in the Aboveground, was completely obliterated. Its ever-present glow winked out like a candle snuffed at bedtime, and its shards, now black, lie scattered like so many discarded, broken toys on the concrete floor.
Jareth's last bit of hope withered when he saw Sarah standing next to him, unchanged except for her red and blotchy face. Her chest rose and fell faster than he could count. He knew the feeling - unmitigated hate seasoned with raw anger, felt it twisting in his chest. Only he didn't quite have the energy for it at the moment, as much as he wanted to strangle and beat her senseless for destroying their salvation.
Likely, she was still the Nexus.
And he was so very tired.
"You sick fuck," she said through clenched teeth. "You don't give a rat's ass what happens to me. You could've killed me!"
He didn't argue. Instead, he used the wall for support as he sank to his buttocks, resting his limp arms over his bent knees. He couldn't stop staring at the shards ten or so feet away. Who knew it would be so delicate? He should've taken more care.
"What the hell is wrong with you?" she yelled at him.
He thought she might have kicked or punched him a few times but he couldn't be sure. Sarah's voice was so far away now and getting farther, as were all his senses. Did any of it really matter anymore?
"I can't believe you tried to use magic on me!"
A familiar acidic nausea welled up in his gut; the kind he only experienced during periods of extreme stress. He'd failed. So quickly, some Goblin King he made.
"I hate you!"
"Why aren't you dead like everyone else?"
"Why can't you just die?"
"Why, why, why, why..."
.

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"You still alive in there?"
A man's voice filtered past Jareth's subconscious, along with a rough shaking of his upper body.
"Hello? Goblin King?" More shaking. "Fixer's gone; I made sure she'll be away for awhile." Like a machine coming back online, Jareth's mind lit up to this information. After a few more seconds of encouragement, he cracked his eyes open to Sam's grim but supportive face.
"Finally, thought you might've taken the easy way out."
"Pardon?" Jareth croaked then coughed.
"Sounds like you could use a drink." Sam slapped his thighs, stood and walked to a battered metal cabinet. "Alcohol is gold 'round here, but I think this is definitely an occasion." After pouring two neat scotches, Sam walked back and offered him a simple glass tumbler with a chip on one edge. Without standing, Jareth reached up and accepted the finger of amber. He always did enjoy human alcohols, and he certainly needed the stiffening now.
The chair protested again when Sam resumed his seat, appearing a casual king. Jareth absentmindedly wondered how much life the chair had left, anything to keep him mind off the elephant.
A few companionable sips then Sam finally asked, "She's important here. Why'd you hav'ta go and piss her off like that?"
Sighing, Jareth dropped his head back to the wall. It felt rough through the mat of his tangled hair. He suddenly felt very unkempt, dirty and itchy. "It was not my intention to upset her."
"Just to use her."
"You don't understand."
"I'm gettin' that a lot lately." Sam leaned forward, elbows to knees, drink dangling between his legs. "Why don't you enlighten me? She sure as hell won't tell me shit. Rarely does."
Jareth sneered. "I'm sure your opinion will be unbiased."
"You'd be surprised how open-minded I can be," he dipped his head, "in the right circumstances."
"I suppose..." Jareth sipped and considered. Why not? What else have I to lose? "I suppose I should start at the beginning of our sordid tale; when I met Sarah she was merely a child of fifteen and not the hardened woman Fixer, as you know you..." Sam became intent and very still as Jareth related the story of how he and Sarah destroyed their worlds. "She selfishly wished away her brother and, as King of the Goblins, I came to claim him..."
Jareth sipped again, enjoying the burn over his lips, tongue and down his throat. It pulled him back to his pathetic reality. The one he deserved, ending where his current story led. The one he was slowly dying in without his magic, wasting away a little each day, unless he chose the coward's path of suicide, or this new Aboveground finally destroyed itself.
A Goblin King never gives up, you ponce. A long dead voice nettled at him from beyond the Veil.
Jareth snorted to himself. Tell that to some other Goblin King, Da, one who gives damn, one with power to do something, and leave me to drink and talk without your nagging. His father's voice didn't return, and Jareth wasn't sure if he was relieved or disappointed as he continued his tale for Sam.
- 8
- 9
- 10
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Falling --COMPLETED