Chapter 8 - Magic Crystal Ride

Chapter Eight: Magic Crystal Ride



Chantal stopped suddenly, causing Jareth to nearly run into her.

"Why did you stop?" he asked, almost angry.

"Shhhh!" she said hushing him. "I heard something."

With those words, rustling noises could be heard coming from a bush just ahead of them. The branches began to move and something emerged. Chantal's eyes grew wide.

"Steph!" She exclaimed. Chantal ran up to her friend to give her a hug. As she approached, Serek began to hiss very loudly. Chantal stopped dead in her tracks. Serek continued to hiss.

"What is the matter with you?" Chantal asked him.

"Chirp!" was all he said in reply. He then tightened the grip of his trail around her neck a bit and glared at Stephanie. Chantal shook her head but didn't say anything more.

"I'm so glad you got out of that oubliette," Chantal said turning back to Stephanie. Jareth approached and stood beside Chantal.

Stephanie smiled.

"Shall we continue on our way?" Jareth asked. Stephanie smiled again and Chantal nodded.

As they started walking Chantal turned to her friend.

"I can't believe you fell into an oubliette again," Chantal said as she patted Serek's head. Serek still glared at the eighteen year old girl.

Stephanie looked over at Chantal and laughed.

Chantal raised and eyebrow. 'Odd,' she thought. "Are you sure you are okay?"

She got another laugh for a reply.

Jareth, who was walking behind the two girls groaned. Stephanie giggled loudly.

Jareth reached out and grabbed Stephanie's arm. "What is wrong with you?" he snapped.

Stephanie only laughed even harder.

Chantal exchanged a look with Jareth. "Something isn't right here," she told him.

"Indeed," Jareth replied.

Chantal regarded Stephanie closely, then she noticed something. The many rings that Stephanie often wore, were on the wrong hands. And her watch was on the wrong wrist. It was like she was looking at a mirror reflection.

"Who are you?" Chantal asked angrily. "And where is Stephanie?"

Suddenly Stephanie started to shift and then a few seconds later, standing in her place was a mirror reflection of Jareth. The reflection smiled, flashing its canine teeth.

"A doppelganger!" Chantal exclaimed. The double then shifted again and there stood a mirror reflection of Chantal.

"Stop this!" Jareth snapped.

The doppelganger just laughed and pulled away from Jareth. Once free, it ran away, back through the bush. Jareth and Chantal stood there in shock, unsure whether to give chase or not.

O O O O O O O O O


Dust and sand swirled around Stephanie as she brushed off her dark blue jeans. She frowned.

"Why always these pants?? Maybe I shouldn't even bother dusting them off, lest they'll just attract more Labyrinth sand and such," Stephanie mumbled to herself. She took a moment to stretch.

"Now," she said looking up and searching around her surroundings. "Where's the castle??" A moment passed before she spotted the castle still pretty much far into the distance.

Stephanie tightened her shoelaces and started going in the direction of the dark shadow of Jareth's castle. She walked around for several minutes, humming a song, once in a while would sing a few lyrics. She was about to break into another song when the sound of footsteps was faintly heard, followed by laughter.

Stephanie spun around.

Behind her stood Chantal, a huge grin on her face. She had her arms crossed over her chest. She was all alone, no sign of Jareth or the little purple and orange dragon.

"Chan!!" Stephanie rushed over to her friend. She stopped. "Where's Jareth??" she asked. "And Bob??"

Chantal only laughed.

"You didn't just leave him did you??" She said, thinking perhaps she had left the Goblin King in an amusing mess to figure out on his own.

Chantal smiled and dropped her arms down to rest at her sides.

"Look, I'm sorry I've left you with him, it wasn't my intention, but we can't just leave him wherever he is." Stephanie shook her head with a sad smile. She was about to say something else, her head in a mid shake when she spotted something unusual.

Stephanie blinked and looked harder. Something wasn't quite right, something was wrong with her friend's shirt. "Huh?? mud?? scitelhtA?? It's backwards. You're not Chantal."

With that Chantal shifted and in her place, stood Jareth. He reached into a pocket and pulled forth a crystal. Extending his hand, the crystal floated over to Stephanie. Before she could turn to run away, the crystal touched her and she found herself trapped within it.

"Hey!!" Stephanie protested. "Let me out of here!!" She yelled at the Jareth look alike, her voice echoing inside the tiny confinement.

Suddenly a slight breeze made the crystal move.

Stephanie sighed. "This is not good."

The wind became more stronger and blew the crystal that was light as a bubble away from the Jareth look alike. The doppelganger laughed as Stephanie was swept away.

O O O O O O O O O


"I wonder if we should have gone after her," Jareth said, still staring in the direction the doppelganger had gone.

Chantal shrugged. "I'm not sure. Maybe it knows where Stephanie is."

"That is a possibility," Jareth told her. before he could say anything else, she disappeared through the bush that the doppelganger had gone through.

"Hold on!" Jareth called after Chantal, then followed her through the bush.

"Hurry up slow poke," Chantal called after Jareth as she walked away. There was no trail here but that didn't stop Chantal from making her way quickly through the bush. She had done lots before, while taking her dog for a walk in the bush espicially in the winter time.

Jareth grumbled behind her as he tried to untangle himself from a branch.

"Cursed tree!"

"Jareth?" Chantal asked from up ahead.

"Hmm?"

"I have a request to make of you!"

"What is it?" Jareth asked trying to untangle himself from some branches.

"If we make it to the castle, promise me that you will create a shorter way to the castle."

Jareth stopped tugging on his clothing and thought about it for a moment. "That I think I can do."

"Then it's a deal!" Chantal said with a smile as she continued on.

A few minutes later Chantal stopped. "Hey Jareth, there is another trail over here. Come on and stop getting tangled in the trees," Chantal called after him and she stepped on the trail she had found.

Jareth grumbled again. He finally got loose from the tree and followed Chantal. He stepped onto the new trail and brushed leaves off of his clothes. Chantal smiled at him and fought back the urge to say 'About time'.

Once Jareth came onto the trail, Chantal began looking around to try and figure out their approximate location. She spotted the castle, north of their position, still quite far away, yet closer than about five minutes ago.

Suddenly something reflecting the sunlight caught her attention in the distance. A glittering object was flying towards them.

"Umm...Jareth?" Chantal said, still staring at the object.

"What?" he asked looking up. He had been trying to untangle a small branch from his long blond hair.

Chantal pointed towards the object. "Any idea what that might be?"

Jareth shaded his eyes with his right hand and squinted. "I'm not positive, but it looks like a crystal to me."

"Whatever it is, it's moving fast," Chantal commented, watching it closely.

A few moments later the object, a small clear crystal, came into view.

'Something doesn't seem right about it,' Chantal thought to herself. She stared at it to try and figure out what. Then she saw it. A small figure inside banging their fists on the crystal walls.

"Stephanie is inside the crystal!" Chantal exclaimed. The crystal flew right up to them.

"Pasta Vazoo!! Get me out of here!!" came a small cry from within.

Jareth laughed, reached out for the crystal before it flew away with the next breeze. But once he had touched the crystal, something happened. Jareth found himself inside the crystal, looking out and Stephanie was now standing in his place, beside Chantal.

"I warned you not to touch anything," Chantal said with a smirk. "Serves you right."

Stephanie looked over at Chantal for an explanation. Before she could ask what had happened, Jareth's curses interrupted her.

"Aren't you going to get me out of here?"

"I'm not sure how," Chantal told him truthfully.

Stephanie shrugged. "Don't look at me. That double put me in there."

Chantal turned to her friend. "You ran into that thing too?"

Stephanie nodded in reply. And Chantal rolled her eyes.

"Excuse me! How about getting me out now?" Jareth said impatiently.

"We are trying to figure that out," Chantal told him. "Hold your horses!"

Chantal turned back to Stephanie.

"Well it seems that whenever something comes in contact with the crystal, they swap places," Stephanie reflected. "That explains how Jareth got in there and me out here."

"All right, so get me out!" Jareth grumbled.

"We don't know how without getting anybody else stuck within the crystal themselves," Chantal told him calmly.

"Just use that scrawny little dragon of yours," the Goblin King said, getting very impatient. His kingdom was at stake and he was stuck in a crystal.

"Scrawny?" Chantal asked angrily, her eyes flashing. "Tell me Jareth, tell me why I should use my 'scrawny' dragon to help your ungrateful sorry @$$?"

Stephanie frowned at Jareth.

The Goblin King remained quiet. He could see that Chantal was pissed off. He wasn't sure if it was because of his comment, his attitude or both.

"Maybe we should leave you in there until we get to the castle. That way you won't get us into so much trouble," Chantal snapped at him. Serek raised his head towards the crystal and hissed at the Goblin King.

Jareth sunk back into a sitting position, leaning against the wall of the crystal, arms crossed and a frown on his face.

Stephanie held back a laugh, for Jareth's frown almost looked like a pout. He knew he had lost this round to Chantal and nothing he would say or do would make the situation any better.

Chantal bent down and picked up a rock. Standing back up straight she chucked it at the crystal. Jareth winced and covered his head with his arms.

The rock just bounced off the crystal's surface.

"Damn," Chantal cursed. "I guess we need a living, breathing thing to get him out."

A laugh was heard from behind them. Jareth sat up on his hunches and stuck his face to the glass to see. Both girls spun around.

Behind them was the doppelganger.

"The double!!" Stephanie cried out. The double still looked like Jareth from when it had trapped Stephanie within the crystal.

Chantal's eyes grew wide. She got an idea, she turned to Stephanie and looked at the crystal then back at the doppelganger. Stephanie nodded, understanding the plan.

Both girls charged the double. Serek launched from Chantal's shoulder and dived for Jareth's double's face. He grabbed hold and didn't let go. Stephanie and Chantal tried pulling the doppelganger towards the crystal, but it fought back. Serek then hissed and bit the double on the nose, giving the girls a chance to get behind the double and push him towards the crystal. Serek launched from the double just as it touched the crystal, then flew over to Stephanie, chirping proudly.

Jareth found himself sitting on the ground below the crystal. Chantal extended her hand to help Jareth up. He looked up at her, a little confused and startled, he took her hand anyway and she helped him to his feet. Chantal smiled and Jareth eyed her, confused.

"What? Don't look at me like that," Chantal told him.

"You're not still mad?" He asked.

"Jareth! I'm not one for staying mad at my friends No matter how much of an @$$ they are," Chantal told him, crossing her arms over her chest.

Stephanie laughed. "And you sure seem to have been a pain," She said as she petted Serek who was sitting on her shoulder.

"You better believe it Steph. This is the second time he's gotten himself into a mess. He owes me now," Chantal told her friend with a smirk.

"Hey! You got stuck in that cube too," Jareth snapped.

"Indeed I did. But the way I see it, if I hadn't reached out to stop you, I probably wouldn't have ended up in that trap. Plus, who got us out?" She asked glaring at him.

Jareth groaned. "You did," he mumbled.

Stephanie giggled. "It looks like you two had lots of fun without me," She said with a smile.

"Too much," Chantal said sarcastically. She then gave Stephanie a hug. "Don't fall down into anymore oubliettes."

"I'll try not to!!" Stephanie laughed, hugging her friend back.

Jareth groaned at the sight. "Can we get moving yet?"

"All right Jareth, just hold on a second," Stephanie told him. She turned to the crystal. It wasn't there. "Whoa!! The crystal is gone."

"Ack! Well not much we can do about it. Hopefully the doppelganger had enough playing with us and will leave us alone," Chantal said.

"Let us hope so." Jareth said eyeing the castle. "Can we go now?"

"All right Mr. Impatient!!" Stephanie said with a grin. "Just like a child!!"

Chantal laughed.

Stephanie grabbed Chantal and led the way towards the castle. "Now tell me everything that happened."

The two girls exchanged stories as they walked. Jareth groaned occasionally behind them.

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