Author's Note: Hey guys, it's been a while since I've updated this one, but I have another few chapters to go before the conclusion. Thank you so much for the comments so far, and for reading the story in general. I should have the story updated in full as soon as I can.
Chapter 10: Eyes Open
The sight of Warek suddenly using magic and directing it at Aladdin made Genie put two and two together, further signaled by a lightbulb flashing red that appeared over his head.
"Al! Look out!"
'Warek's' angling of the magic ball was distracted by Genie's voice, but it was enough to make the magic hit the branch Aladdin stood on, causing Aladdin to plummet down through the branches toward the ground.
"Genie!"
That pretty much told Genie he needed to play catch up. Literally.
Genie transformed into a large contraption that was part trampoline, part group of pillows. Nonetheless it did its job catching Aladdin, bouncing him a few times as he landed to safety. Aladdin let out a slow breath as he looked up at Genie.
Genie was about to ask Warek what was going on when he realized the merchant had disappeared. Then he turned to Aladdin, raising a curious brow. "Okay, two...no, three things. One - that was a really quick getaway. Two - since when did Warek learn magic? And three - since when did you get on his bad side? You didn't do something to his camel did you? That's bound to get anyone's turban in a bunch."
"It's not that I got on Warek's bad side, because that wasn't Warek, Genie! It was an impostor." Aladdin went on to explain how Warek had attacked him shortly after they'd traveled together in the Oasis.
Genie's expression turned into a firm frown. "Sounds like you had a rough time coming here, kiddo. And this is all Jafar's doing?"
Aladdin shook his head. "No, I think you were right all along. That wasn't Jafar. It was just some imp in disguise. What I'm trying to figure out is why he'd attack us? What did he want?" Aladdin described the imp he'd seen in the water's reflection as best as he could remember.
"I feel like in all my millenia years of knowing, I should know who this imp is, 'cause he sounds familiar. Though I really don't like imps." Genie cradled his chin between his thumb and index finger. "Shapeshifting...Aha!"
"You know who he is, Genie?"
"Yeah. If I'm right, it's definitely Jatika. And if I recall correctly, he's an annoyingly tricky imp. He shapeshifts into different forms at will - if he has enough power to do it. Would explain the different guises he's taken on - Jafar, Warek even. But I feel like I'm forgetting something else important about him." Genie scratched his head with one hand and accidentally pulled the tuff of hair from his head. He grinned at Aladdin before putting it back into place. "Thinking too hard makes my hair molt."
"Maybe you can remember later. What happened? How did you end up here? Is Agrabah okay? Where's Jasmine, Carpet, and...?"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold your broncos there." Genie transformed into a cowboy, complete with boots, hat and spurs. "One question at a time. You're not the only one who had a tricky time coming here." Genie recounted coming to the Oasis with Jasmine and Carpet, and noted that as far as he knew, Agrabah was fine, for now.
Aladdin looked alarmed. "You're saying Jasmine and Carpet are facing off against those two scorpions...?"
"Giant scorpions," Genie added, wincing.
Aladdin didn't miss a beat. "...by themselves? We have to find them!"
"Tell me about it. Question is - it's quiet around this place and the last time I checked, I was put under a sleep spell by those things. So were you."
"Yeah, I know - at least we were able to come out of it," Aladdin said. "You said they were by the entrance to the Oasis, at the lake?"
"Yep, and we might wanna find our way back there. Better if we try not to run into Jatika again, either. That imp's no stranger to danger - causing it, I mean."
Aladdin nodded, running his fingers through his hair as he kept in step with Genie through the forest of the Oasis. "I just hope Jasmine and Carpet are having better luck than us."
"Keep going, Carpet, you're doing great." Jasmine urged Carpet forward even as Jafar pursued them with a series of magic blasts from his staff. She hadn't been hit by any of them, but a few close calls had singed the edge of her long hair and also struck a few of Carpet's knobs. Other than that, they hadn't been any worse for wear, and it did seem like their plan was working. Jafar was slowing down, his magic was being expended and they were maintaining a fair distance from him even with the close calls from the sorcerer's magic. But Carpet was also showing signs of slowing down, and Jasmine wasn't sure how long he could keep the distance between them.
Genie still hadn't shown any signs of waking. If anything, he'd gotten worse. He wasn't snoring anymore on the grounds near the lake and he'd taken on a pensive expression, like he was having a nightmare.
Jasmine realized Jafar must've been telling the truth about the nightmares he claimed to keep both Genie and Aladdin under. She wasn't sure where Aladdin was, but it couldn't be good if Genie was under the same spell, and if Jafar was using them as a source of power as he claimed. She didn't want to leave the clearing of the lake completely because if she took her eye off Genie, something horrible might happen to him, and she didn't want Jafar to take advantage of it.
But she knew Aladdin was somewhere out there also, and she wondered how much Jafar's taunts had been true.
Another blast of red magic streamed past them. Jasmine gasped, because it looked like fire it was so close to striking her.
Then the magic connected - once, twice, three times. The first blast caused Carpet to swerve, making Jasmine grip his edges to keep from falling. But the second and third blasts burned holes through Carpet's fabric.
"No!" Jasmine screamed as she fell with Carpet to the sands of the Oasis. Luckily the fall wasn't as far as it could've been, but the impact with the ground still stunned Jasmine. Carpet landed not far from her, drifting to the ground like a leaf.
She looked up into the face of a smiling Jafar when she recovered.
"It seems that your luck has finally run out, Princess. Too bad my power hasn't."
Warek, Iago, Abu, and Rajah were in the heart of the Moonstone Oasis forest. Warek tied Dyna to a tree to allow the camel to rest after the trek there. Something had caught Abu's eye through the trees, and he'd scurried off ahead of the group. Warek was quicker on his feet to pursue than Iago, but not as fast as Rajah, who bounded ahead after Abu.
"Wait...let us catch up!" Warek called ahead.
"What he said!" Iago called from behind the merchant. As Warek ran through the trees, he saw what had caught Abu's eyes. Something shining a distance away in the trees. His feet pounded the ground, kicking up some of the dust. He wove down the path, following Rajah as close as he could manage. But when the path cleared before them, and they saw the source of the glow, they all stopped abruptly.
Iago was a little slower on the stopping distance, barreling straight into Warek's back, and falling to the sands. Warek didn't so much as flinch at that, not with what they saw.
"Hey! What gives, everyone's stopped all of a sudden..." Iago looked in the direction they saw Aladdin lying on the ground nearby, struggling in a deep slumber. Directly above his body was a similar orb to what they saw in the city, drawing energy from around Aladdin's body.
"That's a ticking time bomb if I ever saw one," Iago said, his voice low.
"Aladdin!" Abu went forward, but Warek picked him up by the tail before he could go much further.
"No my monkey friend, if we don't move carefully, it could harm us as well as Aladdin. We don't know what it's doing."
"I would think that it's pretty obvious what it's doing!" Iago shouted. "Hello! Wake up and smell the fact that orb thing is killing him!"
Warek's spine prickled with fear, realizing he'd been in a similar situation when the demon had first attacked him. "He's in a much deeper slumber than any I'd ever been in. It's the same magic - the demon's power. If we can wake the Prince, we might be able to stop that, whatever its source."
"Please tell me disturbing that thing won't make us fall asleep just like it did the rest of Agrabah," Iago said.
Warek wasn't sure what to say to Iago's words, instead turning to Rajah, whose growl was low in its throat. "Can you give us warning if anything approaches, Rajah?"
Rajah seemed to understand, nodding reluctantly before retreating a distance around the area where they'd arrived. Warek, Abu, and Iago moved toward Aladdin carefully. Warek's steps were cautious, up until the point he was close enough to Aladdin. Iago and Abu followed him. Much of this made the merchant afraid, taking him back to the time where he was helpless against the series of nightmares the demon had given him before Aladdin and his friends had saved him. He wondered if Aladdin was going through a similar ordeal in his slumber now. The pained expression on the Agrabah Prince's face would suggest something amiss.
"Aladdin. Aladdin. Wake up," Abu said, nudging Aladdin on one shoulder.
"Come on Al, snap out of it already! Get a grip!" Iago followed.
Warek made his motion to wake the prince as well, hoping his voice would carry through the fog that had plagued him once as well.
"Aladdin! You have to wake up!"
The sudden voice caught Aladdin off-guard, causing him to stumble against a nearby tree.
Genie helped steady him. "Hey, you okay, kid?"
Aladdin shook his head. "That was weird. For a moment I thought I heard someone speaking to me."
"From where?" Genie asked.
"I don't know, it sounded...masked. Like it was coming from inside my head."
"Uh..." Genie paused. "Yeah, like that doesn't sound weird or anything."
"Genie! I'm serious."
"I'm just saying!" Genie held up his hands in protest. "I know I hear voices in my head sometimes, but that's...wait..." Genie's magic shifted him into having three heads with the two extra heads talking at each other. One of the heads had a halo and the other had horns. They were fighting rather heatedly. Genie's usual head looked down at Aladdin and frowned. "Is this anything like you're hearing?"
Aladdin's brow crept up, and he forced back a smile. "No, never mind. But I think we might want to keep it down. Jatika might still be somewhere out here. I don't think we need to draw extra attention to ourselves."
Genie snapped his fingers, making the extra heads disappear. "Good point."
Aladdin's eye caught something moving in the distance above them. A shadow. It made his body tense for a moment, ready to hide, but Genie seemed to recognize the shadow almost immediately.
"Hey, whatd'ya know. I knew we'd find someone we knew eventually." Genie nudged Aladdin's shoulder before whistling and calling the figure by name. "Hey, Rug Man!"
Sure enough, Aladdin saw Carpet's familiar form flying around, but at the lift of Carpet's underbelly, his eyes widened in horror. Carpet seemed to be heading straight for them, the underside lined with a sharp set of jagged teeth.
"Genie, that's not Carpet! Get down!"
Genie complied but nearly too late as the monster swooped past them, just barely missing chomping both of them as Genie and Aladdin dropped to the ground. Aladdin recovered quickly enough to see that the "monster Carpet" circled in midair, about to swoop down to take another attack against them. Aladdin found his hand on a stray branch - thick enough to use as something to attack with.
When he looked up again, he saw that the monster Carpet headed straight for Genie, but when Genie tried to use his powers, the monsters mouth opened and started to swallow streams of Genie's magic.
Genie looked as alarmed as Aladdin felt as it opened its mouth, ready to skewer Genie.
Genie yelped, paralyzed by fear, but Aladdin knew what to do. He stepped in front of Genie, swung the branch like a bat, and hit right at the monster Carpet's teeth before they opened too wide.
The effect caused the monster Carpet to screech like a cat in pain, and its teeth to fall out, before disappearing into a dark puff of smoke. Aladdin blinked his eyes twice, coming down from acting in the heat of the moment. He dropped the branch and caught his breath.
"What kind of monster was that?" Aladdin asked, but when he turned around, he saw Genie gasping, with the shape of a heart beating from his chest.
"That was way too close," Genie rasped, sinking to the ground by his knees. "That was definitely a magic eating creature. I haven't seen one of those things in a long time, but for it to take Carpet's form..." His voice trailed off.
"Yeah, I saw that too. You'd think that with everything that's happened that we're being scared on purpose...wait." Aladdin realized the connection. "Genie, that's it! I think I know what Jatika's been after all this time."
But before Aladdin could say anything else, he saw his semi-phenomenal cosmic powered friend drop forward to the ground, as if hit with an unexpected exhaustion.
"Genie! Genie, what's wrong? Hey!" Aladdin rushed beside his friend, shaking his shoulders, and Genie seemed to rouse just as quickly as he'd fallen forward.
"Whoa, okay...That's never happened before," Genie said as his eyes adjusted.
"Did that demon do something to you? Or did you use too much magic?" Aladdin asked as he helped Genie back to his feet.
"No to both of those. It's weird. One moment I was fine. Scared out of my wits, but fine, and the next moment, I felt like something hit me over the noggin. I'm fine now though - weird recovery. I heard you saying something like you knew what Jatika was after."
Aladdin nodded. "I think he's trying to scare us on purpose. I'm just not sure why."
Genie slapped his palm against his forehead. "That's what I've been trying to remember!"
"What is it?"
Genie groaned. "It would make sense that Jatika's trying to scare us because he feeds on fear. Or at least his power does. Each time he's scares someone, he's able to absorb it. He probably just took a chunk out of me if he was behind that thing that attacked us. I've never figured out how he did it, but it makes sense now that you mention it."
A steady, loud series of claps came from beyond a cluster of trees. The voice was familiar to both Aladdin and Genie, but not in tone. "Bravo, my pretties. It took you long enough to figure out."
The figure stepped out from the shadows, and made Aladdin's anger rise into his throat.
"Jatika."
Genie winced. "As Jasmine."
Jatika laughed, his voice mirroring Jasmine's almost perfectly. "I'm surprised that you both don't like my disguise. It's familiar to you, no?"
"I'd rather see what you really look like," Aladdin snapped. "Or are you that much of a coward?"
Jatika snorted. "Oh, what is with all these charges calling me a coward? First I hear it from your Princess, and now I hear it from you? I guess the sugar dates don't fall too far from where they grow. I'm only having my bit of fun. Guess I couldn't hide my identity that well after all."
"Where's the real Jasmine? And Carpet too?" Aladdin demanded.
"Oh, I believe a certain sorcerer managed to blast them out of the sky. Exacting revenge for my scorpions' demise."
Aladdin seemed startled, but Genie did a mini cheer until he realized the second part of Jatika's statement.
At that, Jatika shifted his form from Jasmine into Jafar, with a cackling laugh. His imitation of the sorcerer's voice only had a slight lisp, one that was familiar to Aladdin when the imp had attacked him and Rajah. "It's such a pleasant sense to fill your hearts with fear. Whets my appetite for more."
"I don't think you're directly scaring us right now," Genie said, frowning. "A smidge on the side of creepy, a lot more on the annoying. But not scary."
"Oh fear is fear on any level, Genie," Jatika said, shrugging casually in what was something very un-Jafar like. "No matter how miniscule. Extracting the fear that you have very shortly after an attack like you just experienced is very easy, but can have a substantial effect on your being. Not really significant that much to semi-phenomenal being. But to a human such as you, street rat," Jatika turned to Aladdin, his eyes flashing. "It can make all the difference between life and death."
Aladdin had heard enough. Before Genie or Jatika could say anything else, he rushed forward and knocked the imp's form to the ground, holding the length of the snake staff against Jatika-Jafar's throat.
Jatika looked startled at Aladdin's angry expression, no doubt expecting Aladdin to be more afraid than with the show of force the prince had shown. But Aladdin was determined, and he glared down at the imp with as much disgust as the imp glared back.
"You're wrong. About all of it, Jatika. I'm not afraid of you, or what you can do because I know whatever you're planning I'm going to take everything that I have to stop you. For my friends or whoever I care about. So you have a lot of explaining to do - and maybe you can start with this - what did you do to Jasmine?"