Those Cruel Eyes Edition 1

Chapter 12

"I'm sorry, Sarah," Hoggle murmured softly to Sarah, who was steadily pacing in a circle.
"No, it's all my fault." Sarah punched the wall angrily, yelling, "Stupid, stupid, stupid!" She then sank down the wall and crumpled disconsolately, cradling her now-bleeding hand.
Hoggle gave her a moment, and then patted her shoulder. "It's not your fault. You were frustrated, the fight was planned. Jareth and Emmeline were hoping that you'd wish them away. You just played into their hands, and you are paying the price. With Emmeline at Jareth's side, he can easily manipulate Emmeline's naïve mind. C'mon, we still have enough time to stop them before they get to the first challenge."
Sarah wiped her face with her sleeve and got up. "You're right, Hoggle." She gave him a watery smile. "What would I do without you?" she hugged him, straightened up, and muttered, "Let's go get that... snake... for messing with my daughter." Hoggle nodded and seemed to melt into thin air, reminding Sarah, a bit uncannily, of Jareth disappearing when he told her how much time she had.
'You have thirteen hours in which to solve the Labyrinth or your baby brother becomes one of us... forever...'

Soon, Jareth and Emmeline were fighting through overgrown hedge paths. They hit more dead ends than they thought possible. As they fought through the thicket, branches and thorns whipped at their faces and exposed skin, making shallow slices that itched and stung as if there was a swarm of wasps stinging them with each slash.
Refusing even a small whimper, Emmeline beat through the treacherous branches without a single complaint or noise of pain passing her lips. She knew that this journey was not about her, but about Jareth. She needed to help him. She'd felt a... connection with him as soon as she saw him. Not a lover's connection, but a familiar, father-daughter connection.
After fifteen minutes or so of running through endless amounts of brambles, Jareth and Emmeline sat down to catch their breath.
"How... much time... do we... have left?" Emmeline gasped, clutching a stitch at her side.
"Twelve hours," Jareth panted back, "I think."
"What happens... if we don't... make it... in time?"
"We will be banished... even if your finger is one millionth of a centimeter away from the thing you have come to retrieve, or in my case, the walls of the castle. Anything you came to the Labyrinth to receive, retrieve, or redeem vanishes forever and you will not ever see it again. For example, when your mother wished away your uncle, she had thirteen hours to get her brother and go home. If she didn't get to him on time, Toby would've been mine forever and Sarah would never have seen him again."
"That's so... mean." Emmeline said lamely.
"I didn't make the rules. They've been that way since anyone can remember." Jareth stood up and offered a helping hand to Emmeline, which she took gratefully. Instead of running, the pair walked, making the thorns less unforgiving. Bored, Emmeline began to quietly sing a song her mother sang to her when Emmeline was a little girl.
"But I'll be there for you... as the world falls down...." Emmeline sang softly.
Jareth stopped dead in his tracks. "Where did you hear that?" his face was completely bloodless and his voice was raspy.
Emmeline was startled by his abrupt mood change. "It was something my mother used to sing to me when I was little. Do you know it?"
Jareth began walking again, the shock wearing off. "Yes," He said sharply.
Emmeline got the hint and switched tactics, humming Thriller while she walked to pass the time.
While Emmeline was elapsed in her modern music, Jareth's head was whirling. Sarah remembered all of this and passed it onto Emmeline? It's so strange. I thought Sarah hated me, but it looks like I was wrong. Jareth glanced at Emmeline. She looks nothing like Sarah, but looks almost exactly like me...