Title: Kingdom Author: J.J. E-mail: CZmushroom@aol.com Genre: Sequel, multi-part. Summary: Sarah returns to the labyrinth, once more in search of her brother, but this time, things are a little different. Toby hated Monday mornings. Monday mornings meant that the weekend was completely and unarguably over. Monday morning's meant Aunt Kaye was dishing out cold cereal for breakfast. Monday mornings meant that Sarah's cel-phone was going to start ringing again. And again. BRRR-EEEEPP! Toby hated Monday mornings. Dimly, he heard Sarah babbling on the phone about figures and shipments and deadlines. Disgusted, Toby glared at the wall clock hanging across from his bed. It was 5:30 AM. Couldn't those corporate buzzards at least wait until his sister had eaten breakfast? Even Aunt Kaye was probably still in bed. He got out of his nest of blankets and into his clothes as quickly as he could. A phone call at this hour usually meant that Sarah would be dashing out the door in two minutes and coming home very, very late. "No, the shipment cannot wait another week." Sarah was pacing across the kitchen floor, phone in one hand, coffee in the other. Toby soundlessly made his way across the kitchen floor, looking enviously at Merlin Junior, the ever patient Old English sheepdog of the house, who was still snoozing on the rug, oblivious to the din. Sarah turned again, nodded at her brother, and continued her tirade. Toby pulled a chair up to the kitchen counter and plugged in the toaster. Two slices plus peanut butter would be more than enough to deter Aunt Kaye and her mushy, cold cereal. He jammed them in and began his customary summer morning ritual of staring doggedly into the side of the toaster to see if he could figure out what the blurry shapes in the chromium surface might be reflections of. Maybe someday he'd find Waldo. "Well if he can't do the job, then fire him!" Sarah's coffee mug crashed down against the counter top. Lukewarm coffee splashed over the rim, turning MJ's fluffy, white tail a nice shade of tan. Toby snickered from behind the toaster. "Oh, no," Sarah looked down at her dog, unwittingly letting out a very unprofessional giggle. "Oh, no, oh- that's it. Mark, talk to me at the office. We'll squeeze in a meeting, OK? Fine. Sure." Sarah shut off the cel-phone with a sigh. "Oh, Merlin," she murmured, snatching up a dishcloth to dab at his discolored fur. "I'm sorry." MJ, like his predecessor, Merlin I, never exactly talked, but had his own little ways of communication. In this case, he grabbed the end of the dishcloth as soon as Sarah was finished and played a ten- second game of tug-o-war with her, just to show he was fine. "Goodmo-o-o-o-rning!" rang a matronly voice from the master bedroom. Aunt Kaye, decked out in her famous Daisy-patch bathrobe, swept into the kitchen with spectacles in one hand and Toby's slippers in the other. "Honestly, dear," she fussed, depositing the slippers next to the toaster, "I don't see why you have slippers at all if you never wear them." Toby braced himself for the oncoming tirade concerning lack of proper footwear on frosty August mornings when influenza was running rampant through the country and would pose a particularly venomous threat to the entire family's "delicate constitution". It never came. "I'll be home late tonight, Kaye," Sarah hurriedly scooped up her briefcase and gulped down the last of her coffee as she made her way towards the door. The elder woman's face puckered disapprovingly. "Another late night in the office? Really, I'm beginning to wonder if you get enough sleep at nights, dear. It's not even six o'clock and you're rushing out the door like a demon already. What kind of employer makes his workers stay up all night to the point where they blunder around like zombie-things in the morning?" Kaye, poured out a glass of milk for Toby and watched her niece pause by the alcove mirror. "At least you've had breakfast?" Sarah sighed inwardly. She knew her aunt meant well, but at this point in life, if she and Toby wanted financial security, she was going to have to be the one who got it. "If I want the promotion coming around next month, I'm going to have to beat out my competitors, Kaye. Once I get through this week, I'll be able to take it easy for a while, maybe even take a little vacation." Carefully, Sarah caught up her long, dark, hair and twisted it up into a coil before jamming in a multitude of hairpins to keep it out of her way. She scrutinized herself carefully in the mirror's depths. "I had a huge dinner last night with the chairman of Primetech anyway." Kaye had heard the excuse before, but decided to let the subject drop. For a young person, Sarah was quite good at taking care of herself. All the bills were always paid, the house and car were in tolerable condition, and the money in Toby's college fund had doubled since the last year. She always dressed nicely without spending too much and was never late for anything. Still, Kaye wished that Sarah weren't quite so good at her work. She was always hunting down every opportunity she could find to move up to a higher position, which meant late nights, missed meals, and the incessant ringing of that blasted cel-phone. "Have a nice day, dear." she sighed, turning back towards the kitchen. Sarah nodded absently as she shoveled a pair of folders into her briefcase. "Sarah?" Toby was watching her worriedly over the toaster. She paused. Her insides rumbled uncomfortably. "Yes?" She knew the look on his face, knew he wanted her to stay home today, eat breakfast with them, anything for a couple of minutes without work or worry or- "Have a nice day, Sarah." Sarah closed the briefcase carefully, and gave Toby a tired smile. "You too, Toby" Letting out a few cheery goodbyes, she left the house and climbed into the car, but her stomach was lurching from the lack of solid food and a major attack of guilt. When with family, she always talked of success as though it were just around the corner, but in the five years since her parents' deaths, that corner seemed to be getting farther and farther away. Sarah started the car. Toby chomped toast as he watched the distorted reflections swirl in the chrome world of the toaster. The blobs on the left were the trees in the front yard, and the bulgy blue shape was Sarah backing down the driveway. He let himself drift in thought as Aunt Kaye turned on the dishwasher. Suddenly, a white shape streaked over the shiny surface after Sarah's car. Mystified, Toby turned towards the window just in time to catch a glimpse of the soundless white barn owl soaring elegantly towards the highway. "What are you staring at, Toby?" Kaye peered out of the window. "Are the raccoons trying to get into the garbage cans again?" "Nothing, Aunt Kaye," he muttered, turning back to his toast. "Just an old owl." "Fax preliminary sales reports to Manchester, Vancouver, and Toronto within the hour, no excuses." "V.P. of Primetech wants to do lunch. He's got a window from noon to 12:37." "Addams on 31 needs preliminaries for the Teller ad campaign. I don't care if they don't like the new version. It's too late to change it unless they want to spend a few thousand more on deadline extensions." "Miss Williams? Miss Williams!" Sarah snapped from her reverie with a jerk. Roger Clifton, one the more friendly pencil-pushers on her floor, was standing in front of her desk with a sheaf of papers in one hand and a box of donuts in the other. He looked a bit concerned. "You okay, Sarah? That cel-phone's been glued to the side of your head for the past three hours, and I don't know how long an ear can last without sunlight or oxygen." Sarah smiled in spite of herself. "I'm fine, Rog. Really." He set the reports down on her desk and and plunked the pink bakery box down on top of them. "You can't fool me, Miss Williams. I can scent a corporate vulture who hasn't had her breakfast from twenty miles away. You, Miss Williams, are in dire need of a bear claw." Without waiting for her to say yes, he whipped out a napkin, fished out a sticky, apple-filled pastry from the box, and plonked it down in front of her. Sarah eyed the sugary monstrosity a bit warily. "Thanks Roger," she said, carefully moving the bear claw off to one side. She picked up the reports and began to leaf through them. "You know, these reports weren't due for a week. You really didn't need to get them to me so early." "I know." Roger picked up the donut box again. "I figured since they were done, and I had donuts, and it really wasn't much of a walk, . . . would you like to have dinner sometime?" Sarah blinked. "What?" "You know, with me. I don't think I could afford Spago's or anyplace like that, but my brother, Simon, works at this nice little Italian place right next to- " "I'm sorry," she cut him off. Little voices in her head were urging her to accept, but she fought them off. "I'd love to- really, but I . . . I. . ." She drew a deep breath. "You're funny, and you're sweet, and you're one of the nicest guys I know . . " "But. . .?" "I just don't think I'll have the time. I mean, I've got all this work piled up and my schedule's insane- " Sarah fumbled with the papers in her hands. "It's okay, Miss Williams," Roger took the papers from her and set them down neatly. "I'm really pretty good at rejection." "Roger, please don't take this the wrong way. My life's a mess right now, and a social life is the last thing on my agenda." "Right. Feeding the dependents comes first. Perfectly understandable. You don't have to make excuses, Miss Williams. I've got my baby sister's tuition to worry over myself." "Maybe next month, when things settle down, we can get together. . ." "Of course." He patted the box in his hands. "I think I'd better get this back to the break room before it's missed. Thank you for the enlightening conference, Miss Williams." A last smile, and he disappeared amidst the cubicles. Sarah buried her head in her hands. Her stomach was beginning to twinge again. She caught sight of the bear claw, still sitting on top of a mountain of folders, messages, and memos. Gingerly, she picked it up and took a bite. Not bad. Feeling a bit better, she ate the rest of the bear claw, and started going through Roger's reports. "Toby?" Aunt Kaye called from the kitchen. "Toby?" "Coming!" Toby abandoned the model plane he'd been assembling on the coffee table and hurried into the kitchen. "Yes?" Kaye turned off the gurgling dishwasher. "I"m taking the bus to town to do some shopping this afternoon. Is there anything you need, dear, like toothpaste or socks?" "Toothpaste and model glue," he answered promptly. "Model glue," she repeated, amused. "I think we still have a tube or two in the upstairs hall closet. Why don't you go check up there first?" Coffee break, ten o'-clock.