Disclaimer: I do not own Magi or any of these wonderful characters.
Better than Gold
Jafar pinched the bridge of his nose to try to ward off the impending headache that was forming. The last few days had been busier than usual. Between the change of alliance with Balbadd and the resulting paperwork, and everything that Sinbad had dumped on him he had been falling behind on his other paperwork. That in itself was bad enough, but now Pisti was relaying some crazy story about Sinbad having been naked in front of Morgiana and the tumble of events that had followed. It wasn't that Jafar could not believe that such a thing had happened, it was rather likely in fact. The thing that bothered him the most was that no one had scolded Sinbad for it, but rather everything had turned around and somehow Alibaba had gotten dragged into it. Worse still, Pisti had knocked over a jar of rather expensive ink while throwing her arms around to exaggerate the tale, and three hours of carefully tabulated accounting was now utterly ruined. As usual, Jafar would have to fix Pisti's mess, replace what was destroyed, catch up on his paperwork, finish the paperwork that was due for the day, scold Sinbad for having such poor manners around guests, and make sure that said guests were alright. He was just grateful that Sinbad actually had a free schedule today, so Jafar did not need to make sure that he made it to his engagements on time.
"Pisti! Calm down! If you spill another bottle of my ink you will be replacing it and fixing what you ruined!" He snapped irritably.
The petite blonde pursed her lips as she lowered her arms and glared at him. "Are you even listening to this? This is the most hilarious thing to happen around here in six months!"
"Unfortunately I heard everything you just said. I'm just not sure why Alibaba is involved in any of it."
Pisti groaned irritably as she stood up from behind her desk, walked to the one in front of Jafar, and slammed her hands down with a loud thump on the desktop in front of him. "Because, Morgiana asked Masrur why some people let other people see them naked in their rooms when they really don't know each other very well, and the she said Alibaba was waiting for her in his room one night and he had no pant's on for rukh's sake! Alibaba! Dopey idiot Alibaba! I never would have pegged him for a closet perv, but you can't always go by first appearances I guess." With that her irked expression changed to a more gleeful look. "Masrur was furious when she told him! I wish I had been able to see Yam and Masrur when they confronted him about it."
Jafar rubbed the side of his face. His head just continued pounding as Pisti kept on lamenting the missed confrontation. He finally interrupted Pisti with a wave of his hand. "Are you sure they didn't hurt him? All they did was talk?"
Pisti shrugged. "He seemed embarrassed when they got to the courtyard, but otherwise he looked ok. Masrur is not some brute that would just kick his butt you know."
Jafar just shook his head. "It's not Masrur that I'm worried about," he muttered darkly. An image of Yamuraiha electrocuting a cowering Alibaba while she was screaming about him being a dirty little pervert was worrying him.
A wicked grin spread across Pisti's face as she considered what Jafar had just said. "And to think this all happened because our esteemed king Sinbad is shameless as a newborn baby when it comes to his morning habits," she cackled.
"What about me being shameless?!" Jafar groaned when he turned to see Sinbad walking into the small office with Sharrkan close behind. Sharrkan had started laughing when he figured out what Pisti had been referring to before they walked into the room. Evidently, Pisti had filled him in on the rest of this story as well.
"Absolutely nothing that you need to-" but he was cut off when Pisti smacked him in the face with a small stack of the papers that had escaped the rogue bottle of ink earlier.
"Morgiana saw you naked in your room two mornings ago and then she told Masrur that Alibaba had waited for her in his room one night with no clothes on and Masrur got mad and told Yam and then Masrur kicked Alibaba's butt in training and then Yam and Masrur confronted Alibaba afterwards and it was the best thing that's happened around here in six whole months!" Pisti blurted without pausing for air as Sharrkan continued to guffaw behind Sinbad.
"Wait, Alibaba is interested in Morgiana?" Sinbad asked in surprise.
Jafar's mouth fell open. "That's what you got out of all that? Alibaba likes Morgiana?"
"Well, that was the most important part. Did she sleep with him?" Sinbad waved his hand dismissively at Jafar as he strode towards Pisti and sat down in an unoccupied chair.
"I don't think so! Why would she do that?" Pisti grumbled.
"Ha! Alibaba is still too much of an amateur I suppose. Waiting for her in his room with no clothes on is definitely not the way to get a girl to do nice things with you," Sinbad muttered thoughtfully as he rubbed his chin.
Pisti rolled her eyes as she perched on the side of the desk next to Jafar's. "Obviously."
"What can I say? The kid has no game. He even got stuck with Ekaterina in the pleasure house," Sharrkan managed to gasp after his laughter died down a bit.
Sinbad froze as the name brought back a haunting memory from when he had first gone to Artemyra. A shudder brought him out of it quickly though. "Poor kid. He really needs to learn how to flirt right doesn't he?"
"No he does not! Sin, I really don't think you need to cause any more trouble than you already have!" Jafar insisted as he stood up and moved around the desk to stand in front of Sinbad with his arms crossed.
"Yeah!" Pisti agreed verbally, but behind Jafar's back she was nodding and grinning while giving Sinbad a thumb's up. This was going to be good!
Sharrkan glanced from Sinbad to Jafar before shrugging. "What could a little advice hurt? It's not like he has to take it."
"No, no Sharrkan. Jafar is right I suppose. I'm afraid I didn't realize how much damage that I had done already. Maybe we should just stick with our original plans and head to the pleasure house or the tavern, yeah?" Sinbad smiled warmly as he stood up to leave.
"And another thing, if you give Alibaba your horrible dating advice and he makes Morgiana upset then… huh?" Jafar blinked uncertainly as Sinbad and Sharrkan were starting to head towards the door. "You're not going to go talk to Alibaba?"
"Nah. He seems to have been put through enough. We need to just let him relax for a while and let him enjoy his next couple of days off. He deserves it after Yam and Masrur scared him like that," Sinbad replied while nodding sagely. "Sharrkan and I are headed to the pleasure house… or the tavern. Want to come Pisti?"
Pisti puckered her lips in distaste. "Why would I want to go boozing or sex cruising with you two? I'm gonna go take care of my birds. I haven't seen them all day!" With that she jumped off the desk and scooted past Sinbad and Sharrkan and out the door. "See ya Jafar!"
Jafar watched all three of them go as he muttered a farewell. He was tempted to follow Sharrkan and Sinbad as well just to make sure they stayed out of trouble, but he really did need to finish these mountains of paperwork…. It was just that Sinbad never gave up that easily when it came to things like this. He turned to survey the wreckage that had been his once orderly stacks of papers and scrolls with a sigh. Would it really hurt if he just let them go while he stayed here with his nice, simple papers full of uncomplicated numbers? Surely, numbers wouldn't make his head throb with irritation like the others did. Jafar started shaking his head and muttering some foul words as he walked behind his desk and sat down again. They could all rot for all he cared now. He was already looking at working through the next two nights and days just to get caught up. Babysitting Sinbad and his miniature was just not feasible right now. Jafar just prayed to any listening deity that Sinbad would behave himself for once and let him finish his paperwork in peace.
Sharrkan had followed Sinbad quietly just long enough for them to make it out of the tower and out of Jafar's hearing range. "Are you really just going to let this slide? I thought you loved giving out dating advice!"
Sinbad smirked as he continued down the path. "Of course not! How can I deny the poor boy my advice on how to get a girl? That stuff is better than gold!" he crowed confidently.
Sharrkan grinned at his king as they headed towards the courtyard where Alibaba was most likely moping. Turning to look over his shoulder he muttered, "I can't believe Jafar just let us leave like that. I thought for sure he was going to make us stay in there with him all day so he could watch us to make sure we didn't do anything he didn't want us doing."
"Sharrkan! Have a little faith in your king! I know what I'm doing! I've been planning these next two days off for weeks! I even had the foresight to stash away some extra paperwork for Jafar to keep him busy enough that he doesn't want to watch me every minute. I don't want him nagging at me about all the things I could be doing ahead of time so I don't have to worry about it later!" Sinbad sped up his pace as they came close enough to the courtyard to spot Alibaba as he sat cleaning his dagger underneath a shade tree. "Alibaba! Just the man I was looking for! How are you this fine morning?"
Alibaba jumped as Sinbad and Sharrkan came out of nowhere and stopped next to him. "F-fine sir!" he stuttered as he scrambled to his feet. Sharrkan shook his head in amusement. Alibaba had been understandably jumpy for the past day or so.
"So, I heard that you have had quite an interesting time of it the last few days!"
Alibaba's face paled. "Please, sir. I really didn't mean anything about that incident with Morgiana. It was just bad timing!"
Sinbad waved his hand as Sharrkan snorted. "No, no! I'm not here to lecture or threaten you! I'm here to help you! What you need is an experienced guide to help you get the girl you want!"
With wide eyes Alibaba started shaking his head as Sinbad's words got through to him. But it was far too late. Even though the courtyard was a very large open space, there was nowhere that he could go to get away from Sinbad as he graced him with far too much information.
"…and that's how you get girls to do nice things with you. Simple right?" Sinbad finished some time later. Sharrkan was nodding in appreciation.
"I guess…" Alibaba murmured reluctantly. "But I really wasn't trying to get Morgiana to go to bed with me! I was checking for wounds after a battle! That's it! I can't help it that Morgiana took it the wrong way!"
"Now Alibaba. I know you are very young and inexperienced in these things. Just take my advice ok? No need to be embarrassed about making that mistake. Although you were just a little too eager…" Sinbad smiled at him. "Just don't upset her again. Masrur has enjoyed having another Fanalis around and I'm afraid he's getting a little protective of Morgiana. But that doesn't mean he'll hurt you so long as you keep Morgiana happy, yeah?"
Alibaba just buried his face in hands. Why did these things always, always have to happen to him?
Author's note: Ha! Every time I think I can't get anymore inspiration for this story another plot bunny digs its way up! Thanks to ididn'tdoityoucan'tproveit for the prompt. Lol! That was a fun one to write! I may as well just leave this story as in progress for a while. If anyone has anymore story prompts for me, let me know! I will try to write most any character in this series, and I can write angst, hurt/comfort, humor, and fluff. Things I suck at writing are lemons, fight/action scenes, and romance fics, but I'm willing to try most everything else! Otherwise, feel free to favorite, follow, and review! Also, welcome to LadyAshetzi, my newest follower of this story! I hope you and my other story followers enjoyed!