Chapter Three: Genie of the Lamp
The blond, black-clad teen had moved from the room with the white marble pool to another, much larger one. It was a rather dark, gloomy place, although he found it quite suitable for someone like him. The walls were made of grey stone and aligned with former stained-glass windows that had now been shattered to pieces, leaving behind only a few sharp shards. A long, torn red carpet led up to the only item in the room which looked new: an ornate, high-backed throne made of black ebony wood with red seat cushions. The teen paced back and forth in front of the throne, waiting impatiently for his two best henchmen to return.
Suddenly, through one of the broken windows came three large showers of red sparks. The three showers floated up to the teen, who upon seeing them had stopped directly in front of the throne, and transformed back into Styx, Nox, and the blue-haired girl.
Styx and Nox knelt before their other master and said in unison, "Master, we have been victorious."
The teen laughed and embraced the blue-haired girl in his arms. "Ah saw zeh whole thing from zeh reflecting pool! Mon cher Susiros, you deed simplee mahvelously!"
Susiros laughed. "Thank you, Resheph-I've always prided myself for my gift for making idiotic heroes such as those four believe every single word that 'poor, sweet little Susie Rose' says."
The two of them cracked up. "Now zen, c'mon-bring out zat lamp!" Resheph said.
Susiros grinned. "Right-I can't wait to see the look on that goody two-shoe's face!" She reached into her cloak and started frisking around within it. She continued looking for a minute, a panicked look slowly growing on her face.
"What ees wrong?" Resheph asked her.
Susiros finally looked up at him and screamed out exactly what Resheph didn't want to hear: "It's gone!"
Yugi, please, wake up!
Yugi slowly stirred and opened his eyes to the sound of the Pharaoh's voice in his head. He saw that he was lying on his back deep down inside of the former cave. Now, all that was there was a deep pit, which was covered at the top by a huge, immovable stone.
Yugi slowly sat up and looked around to see his three friends sitting on the floor of the cave as well. Joey was rubbing his head and groaning, Tristan was murmuring "Oh, man,", and Téa was rubbing her eyes.
Joey looked up to the top of the pit and yelled, "Aw, man…we got trapped down here?!"
"Susie Rose!" Tristan cried, jumping up onto his feet. "What if Styx and Nox tried to attack her? We've gotta get outta here and save her!"
Both he and Joey immediately soared up to the top of the rock and started pounding on it with green and orange sparkling fists.
"Guys!" Yugi yelled up to them. "Don't worry-I'm sure Susie is fine!"
"How would you know dat?" Joey called down.
"Because…" Yugi paused, looking down at the ground, "she's their master."
Both Joey and Tristan crashed down to the ground in shock. Téa stared at him in horror and cried, "What?!"
"She used us to get the lamp, guys," Yugi said. "She wanted it so that she could make her world into 'one ruled by fear and darkness'. Then she tried to have Styx and Nox get us killed in here."
"Dat…dat…dat witch!" Joey yelled.
"Man, how could you not see through that charade of hers?" Tristan asked him.
"ME?! You fought wit me ta see who would carry her over here!"
"GUYS, THIS IS NOT THE TIME TO ARGUE!" Téa screamed with her banshee-shriek voice. The earth shook a little with her resonating scream. Joey and Tristan winced and plugged their ears while Yugi was knocked off of his feet.
"OW!" he suddenly cried.
Joey and Tristan looked over to him, and Téa rushed to his side. "Oh, I'm sorry, Yugi! Are you okay?" she asked.
"Yeah, I'm fine," Yugi said, "I just sat on something that poked me…"
He got up and dusted off the spot where he'd sat-and stared.
Lying there on the ground was the lamp.
"The lamp!" he cried, picking it up from the ground.
Joey and Tristan dashed over to him. "De lamp?" Joey cried.
"I thought that Susie Rose took it!" Tristan added.
"I thought she did too, but…oh, wait, now I remember!" Yugi cried. "While she was telling me about how she was going to use the lamp to turn her world into one of darkness, I created a force field around it and pulled it out of her cloak! It must have fallen down here with us!"
"Nice goin', man!" Joey said, slapping Yugi on the back.
"Oh man, what I would give to see the look on her face when she finds out!" Tristan said.
"Now den, let's see dis genie inside…" Joey said. He lifted the tiny lid off of the lamp and peered into the small hole.
His face suddenly gained a look of horror.
"What's wrong, Joey? What do you see in there?" Téa asked.
Joey angrily looked back up and yelled, "Nothin'!"
"WHAT?!" the other three cried. Yugi turned the lamp upside down and shook it, but nothing came falling out.
"Don't tell me we just risked our lives for some useless piece of junk!" Tristan yelled.
Joey slammed the lid back on and yelled, "Man, what a waste!"
"Hold on, guys…maybe there's something we need to do make the genie appear…" Yugi said, looking over the lamp. "Oh, wait!" he suddenly said. "I think there's something written on here, but…" He peered at the lamp a bit more closely. "There's too much dirt to tell." He started rubbing the lamp with his shirt sleeve.
The lamp started to glow with a golden, mysterious light. Suddenly, golden sparks shot out of the lamp's nozzle and started swirling around the entire pit. The four stared at the golden sparks and watched as they slowly floated down in front of them, arranged themselves into a human-like form, and transformed into a teenage boy.
The four teens stared at the guy in shock. He looked almost exactly like the Pharaoh, except he had more orange-tanned skin. He wore a black sleeveless shirt, blue slacks with blue boots attached to the bottom, a black belt with silver studs, and a short blue cape. A blue buckle that was also studded was wrapped around his neck, and on each of his wrists were blue bracelets with gold trim studded with silver diamonds and two other gold hoop bracelets.
The teen stretched and yawned, then leaned back, placed his hands behind his head and crossed his legs, all while floating on the air. He looked down at Yugi, who was still clutching the lamp, and said, "Sooooo…I'm guessing that since you're the one holding the lamp, you're also the one who rubbed it."
"Uh…yes, yes I am," Yugi stuttered out.
The teen grinned, floated down in front of Yugi, and said, "Nice ta meetcha, master."
"Master?" Yugi asked.
The teen laughed. "Well, of course! You know the story, don't cha? Rub the genie's lamp, and you become his master for a total of three wishes granted! Oh, and we've caught on to that whole 'I'll just wish for more wishes' thing, so I'm sorry, bro, but three's the limit. One, two, three, uno, dos, tres, ichi, ni, san. That clear to ya, master?"
"Um, yes, but you don't have to call me master!" Yugi laughed. "You can just call me by my name."
The genie looked shocked for one second. "Oh, uh…I can?" he said, sounding baffled by what Yugi had just said.
"Yes," Yugi said, holding out his hand. "I'm Yugi Muto. And these are my friends Joey, Tristan, and Téa."
The genie looked down at the out-stretched hand, then smiled and shook it. "Spencer, genie of the lamp, at your service, man."
"Soooo…as a genie, dat means you get ta grant Yug any tree wishes dat he wants, right?" Joey said eagerly.
Spencer looked away from the teens. He sheepishly said, "Welllll….almost. There are the big 'cannot be granted under any circumstances whatsoever' wishes." He started ticking them off on his fingers. "Can't wish for anybody or anybodies to die or be killed, can't wish for absolutely anyone to fall in love with anybody else, and you can't wish somebody back from the dead-and why anybody would want to do that is a mystery to me, 'cause I've seen some of the people who came back before that last rule went into effect, and trust me, once someone has been dead for years, they are not a pretty sight. But other than that," he bowed to Yugi, "your wish is my command."
"Wow," Yugi breathed.
"Sí, it's incredible, isn't it?" Spencer looked around the pit and a frown crossed his face. "Wait…where the heck are we?" He looked up at the stone-blocked opening and cried, "We're still down in the cave?!" He soared up to the top and touched the rock, then looked back down and said, "How in the world did you guys get stuck down here?"
"It wasn't our fault," Joey said, folding his arms. "It was because of dat lying liddle witch and her two dang flunkies!"
Spencer sighed. "Let me guess-she had blue hair, red eyes, pale skin, and she was the most incredibly beautiful and innocent girl you had ever met in your entire life, and you knew that you just had to help her out with whatever she needed, no matter what."
The four stared up at him. "How did you know that?" Yugi asked.
Spencer floated back down to the ground. "Her name's Susiros. Well, actually, her real name is Susie Rose, but she blended it all into one name because 'Susie Rose' didn't sound evil enough for her. I think it's now, oh, a bit more than five thousand years since she's been trying to get a hold of my lamp. Thus far her efforts have been fruitless, thank the gods." He shook his head and looked back up at the blocked entrance. "Well, I'm sorry you have to waste a wish to get out of this place because of her." Spencer raised his arms up, made them glow with golden light, and prepared to fire at the rock.
"Wait a minute, Spencer!" Yugi said. "I don't think that'll be necessary."
Spencer stared at him, arms still up in the air. "Uhhh…why?"
Yugi looked at his three friends and said, "I think that if we combine our powers together, we should have enough strength needed to blast open the entrance."
"What about when the rock shatters? Won't the pieces come crashing down on us?" Téa asked.
Yugi winked. "Don't worry-I'll take care of that."
Spencer was extremely confused. He thought to himself, Okaaay…these humans are nuts.
The other four gathered in a circle directly beneath the rock. "Hands together, everyone," Yugi said.
Yugi, Joey, Tristan, and Téa stuck their hands out in the circle. Slowly, they started to glow with their respective shades of magic.
Spencer stared at their shining hands in shock. What the-
"NOW!" Yugi cried.
A swirling ray of blue, green, orange, and pink magic shot up in the air and smashed directly into the rock. With a loud BANG! the rock shattered into thousands of tiny pieces that started tumbling down into the pit. However, Yugi held up his hand and shot a force field out around them, which the rock pieces harmlessly bounced off of and onto the ground.
"See ya guys at de top!" Joey said, soaring up towards the now open top of the pit. Yugi, Téa, and Tristan followed him up; however, Yugi stopped and looked down to see that Spencer was still standing at the bottom of the pit, his eyes wide and jaw dropped.
"Hey, Spencer!" Yugi laughed. "C'mon!"
Spencer shook his head and snapped himself out of the shock. "Right-coming, mas-erm, Yugi," and he soared up after the four of them.