Chapter 19: Simple Motives

Aladdin wasn't expecting the door to slam behind him and disappear. He thought he saw a shadow pass in the room, but it disappeared before his attention followed it. Maybe it was one of Mirage's tricks, but it filled him with unease. His eyes scanned over the barren stone wall. It was an empty room, the floor littered with debris and overturned tables. Torches were the only source of light in the room, and only one door marked the way forward - probably leading right to Mirage's lair.

"If I wanted to turn back now, little too late for that," Aladdin said. "Might as well face forward. Hope the others can find Carpet soon. Hope they know what I'm doing even if I couldn't say it." He knew that Jasmine knew something was off. Even her words spoken before he'd gone through the door were part of the act. He hoped that was enough to fool Mirage, that the others would be able to find Carpet. He hoped what he had done - despite the lie - was enough to give them time.

Some things never change.

"Mirage?" He called as he opened the door, which led to a narrow stairwell that led upward. It was dark beyond the room he stood in.

"Up the stairs, Aladdin. I'm waiting." Mirage's words were very close to a purr. Way too inviting to not be suspicious.

Aladdin cautiously made his way up the stairs. Part of it was because he needed to be careful of how narrow the stairs were going up in the darkness. The other part of his rationale for going slow was making sure he didn't fall into any last minute traps that Mirage decided to pull. His caution wasn't without merit. As soon as he'd gone halfway up the stairs, a Scavenger appeared through the wall, lunging for him.

He only had enough time to brace himself for the impact of the monster slamming into him. It had been trying to make Aladdin lose his balance, fall down the stairs, but since Aladdin had been prepared for the attack, he had the advantage. The prince braced himself against the opposite wall from which the creature came, used his leg to sweep the creature off balance. It fell, head first, down the stairs behind him. It disappeared into sand before it even reached the bottom.

A weak creature, but not nearly weak enough. Aladdin winced as his old wounds ached. Siva had done a great job healing Aladdin where he could, but it still wasn't enough to take the ache away completely. He closed his eyes, allowed himself to breathe.

Aladdin knew what he had to do, but whether things would work out was a whole other issue. As he reached the top of the stairs and entered the room, a slow, rhythmic clapping greeted him.

"Bravo! Bravo!" Mirage said as she stood a distance away from Aladdin in the well lit room - a larger tower room than he was expecting. "After all this time, you've finally made it to the end, Aladdin, former street rat and soon to be former Prince of Agrabah. You have so many titles to lose."

This must be the top of the tower - there's nowhere to go from here. "Hello to you too, Mirage," Aladdin said casually, even daring a smile as he folded his arms across his chest. "Looks like I survived the tower of deathtraps. What's my prize? Better make it something worth double with no magic power."

"I do have to admit there's a certain level of impressive that you've managed to make it this far without your Genie," Mirage mused.

"You did a great job keeping him out of the picture. And just about every single person I care about for that matter. " Aladdin had to fight to keep the edge out of his voice. He was aiming for as light a tone as she gave. "Kind of hard to call it a game when you're pulling the strings every moment you can to make certain things happen."

"What can I say?," Mirage said, her eyes flashing as her smile widened. She took a few steps closer to Aladdin. "For me, it's the thrill. I especially like the element of making someone walk very, very close to their wits end. I would almost call it a game of fear. A dance, even."

The yawn that Aladdin gave then was real. Not so much on the note of anything Mirage had said, but Aladdin had been up since before dawn when he left Agrabah. He wondered what time it was there now. After midnight? Another day entirely? It was hard to grasp the concept of time in Karais since it was the same murky sky, something that revealed itself in the outside window that was a fair distance from where they stood. Aladdin saw the smile slip from Mirage's face. He leaned into his efforts to irritate her. "To be honest, there's nothing about this dance that's interesting. It's the same old thing."

"What do you mean?" Her tone was still light, but noticeably on edge. Aladdin decided to keep talking as he took in the room's surroundings.

"You operate on being the greatest sorceress of the cosmos, creating disorder and destruction. Your words, not mine. But why would the greatest sorceress wield one of the most powerful magic staffs in order to steal magic from an entire magic city, to turn another entire kingdom against one lowly former street rat? Who doesn't even have one single drop of magical power! That doesn't happen unless you somehow feel threatened."

"What did you say?" Mirage had lost all of her humor. Aladdin knew he had to keep talking as well as keep his distance away from her. If she decided to use the staff, he'd need the energy and focus to dodge it. He knew she wouldn't use its full capability. Not unless she wanted to hurt herself. Plus, as much as it seemed like she wanted to kill him, she wasn't going to do it so easily. Not yet at least.

Aladdin held his hands open, his tone sly. "Come on, it helps if you actually admit the truth for once! Every single time we've had encounters you've always talked about 'breaking' my spirit, or 'destroying' me, but have you actually come anywhere close to doing it that didn't involve using magic to manipulate me or my friends? The first time after we stopped you from destroying a whole village, you tried to banish us to your lair and turned yourself into Jasmine to kill me - the first time. That was in Morbia where you had the advantage. Your fear games didn't beat us."

Mirage remembered that all right. Aladdin heard the hiss in her voice recalling the very first time they met. Keep talking, he thought to himself as the pieces of his plan fell into place. He didn't have a lot of time to keep her distracted while he tried to get his bearings in the room.

"You put Agrabah under a sleep spell and manipulated those under it into trying to kill me. I still beat your magic. Heck, you even turned me into a puppet that was slowly losing my humanity each time I performed. And if the monsters we entertained weren't happy during the puppet show I was in, they were going to destroy Getzistan, Agrabah and several other kingdoms. But you lost then too! That's not even the tip of describing all the times that me, my family, and my friends have stopped you. Which leads to now. What's really changing? If we're going on previous history, all that's left is failure - for you."

"Do you have any idea how much power I have in my possession right now?" Mirage's eyes flashed green, this time with fury. "You are flirting with death mere steps away, Aladdin! This staff alone wields the bulk of power from Karais."

"That you stole to play a game with my life and my kingdom's. Not to mention this one's," Aladdin pointed out. At this point there was no humor in his tone, he was totally serious as his hands balled into fists at this sides. "No matter how much power you possess, you'll never change or break me the way you want. I haven't feared you once in this realm, Mirage. I've feared for the safety of my friends, and the creatures who I didn't know how much damage they could do. But never you. And I'm not planning on dying so easily here."

"All nice words, I'll admit. But you're a little too outmatched. I think you know that more than you're willing to admit. Embrace your death, Aladdin." Mirage's smile returned, far crueler than before, and Aladdin knew she was about to act. Just like he expected she would. He was ready.

Aladdin hoped more than anything that the plan that he'd quickly formed would work.

Jasmine, Iago, and Siva had gone through the first door, but had found no trinkets to speak of, only a few carefully placed traps. One of them almost dropped Siva through to the previous floor they'd been on, complete with a set of spikes. Jasmine had grabbed Siva's arm in time, helped pull the merchant to safety.

Iago winced. "Hey, if you die, we're not gonna have a healer to help us if things go rotten so you've gotta avoid traps like that next time!"

Siva groaned as he caught his breath after getting to safety. "You say that in a way that makes it certain that I knew that trap was there. My magic is in healing, not unveiling hidden traps."

"I wish we could slow our pace. Maybe we wouldn't run into so many of these if we were more cautious," Jasmine said. "But Aladdin and Abu only have so much time. We have to find Carpet."

"Point well taken, your highness," Siva agreed. "Do you think Aladdin knew these traps were here?"

Jasmine shook her head. "No, but if Mirage was somehow trying to convince him to go alone, she probably told him we'd be fine. As usual, she lied." They made it back into the main room with all of the doors. "Looks like the only door for us to try now is the one Aladdin didn't go through."

"Process of elimination," Iago grumbled as Jasmine turned the key in the lock. The room they entered was small, with no visible exit or windows.

"Welp, nothin' here. Might as well turn back." Iago started to fly back to the door they came in, but it disappeared, leaving nothing behind but a solid wall.

Jasmine looked over her shoulder, frowning at him as he squawked in disbelief. "Did you really think it'd be that easy?"

"Nothing in this tower is at it seems," Siva observed, resting his chin on one of his hands as he thought a long moment. "This locked room and the former included. If we are to move forward, we must find the solution to the layered puzzle within these rooms."

Iago wasn't impressed. "Ya think Al and the monkey had to solve so many puzzles to get to Mirage? 'Cause if not, I'd like to file a complaint with the manager. On the grounds of unfairness."

Jasmine shook her head. "No, because she's waiting for Aladdin, at the very least. There's no reason why she would put a barrier between Aladdin and herself. A trap maybe, but not a puzzle. There has to be something here that can tell us how to move forward. And if I'm right, the fact that this is a puzzle must mean Carpet is behind the game. He's a 'treasure' to find."

"I believe you're correct as well, your highness," Siva said. "Aladdin had the right idea in being observant of the doors. Perhaps the key to the puzzle is observing something which may be in front of us, but takes a careful eye. Or a clue that may be related to what we're seeking." The three looked around the room for any missing or offset stones.

Jasmine found it first, pointing upward as she spoke. "Of course the switch to leave would be in a place we couldn't reach. Up there. There's only one of us who can reach there. Iago?"

Iago frowned. "Of course you'd leave it up to the only one of us who could fly up there."

Siva folded his arms across his chest, giving the bird a small, sly grin. "I did heal your wing in a pinch earlier. Or would you rather not be given credit where credit's due for what you can do?"

Iago's irritation instantly faded as quickly as it rose. "On second thought, I can use this to gloat to the Rug when we get him out. Leave it to the pro."

Jasmine shook her head as she shared a knowing look with the merchant. Leave it to Iago to act when there's something in for him later on, the princess thought. Even if it's related to ego.

Iago had no sooner pressed the slightly-ajar stone in the wall that a short staircase opened for them. Jasmine didn't hesitate to walk forward, even as both Siva and Iago tried to stop her from rushing ahead, for fear of any other dangers.

But as soon as Jasmine saw Carpet in the room that resided beyond the stairs, she knew they had another problem. At least Carpet seemed happy to see her. "Carpet, are you okay? Looks like you're trapped."

Both Siva and Iago caught up, with Iago breaking the silence when he discovered the same thing as Jasmine. Carpet was held captive in what looked like a glass casing, with symbols of a puzzle lock. "Wait, we gotta go through ANOTHER puzzle to get him out?"

Carpet waived his knobs, frantic in urgency.

"I would suggest we spend less time complaining, and more time trying to help your friend out of there," Siva said, scolding the bird.

"Right." Jasmine turned her attention to Carpet, putting a hand atop the casing as if she were trying to reach to pet Carpet. Carpet used one of his knobs to reach up, touch where her hand hovered on the casing. "Don't worry, Carpet. We'll find a way to get you out of there. And once we do, then we have a meeting with Mirage to worry about. I just hope Aladdin and Abu can hold on long enough for us to get there."