Months after she'd been awakened from her ring Jean found that she had begun to even forget why she was here and what her purpose was. Each morning she found herself looking forward to breakfast and then the interesting conversations that followed. This was followed by a relaxing lunch and more conversatio and then there were the glorious dinners and the walks where they just talked. And at the end of the day there was the marvelous night where all she had to do was flop into bed and sleep. She could even imagine herself as free human woman and not a genie slave. She was rudely brought down to earth when the GAO imp made his appearance late one night.
She was just turning down her sheets when he was just there, floating in front of her. He was colored a washed-out green, he was clothed only in a white loin cloth, and he had a bald head and large pointy ears with pencils tucked behind them. He held an accounting ledger reverently in his hands like a priest holds a bible.
"I'm officially here from the General Accounting Office." He declared. "You are in danger of being overdrawn." He floated there tapping a pencil on the side of the ledger as if daring her to contradict him.
"You're wrong." She retorted. "He still has three wishes left."
The imp grinned and there was no friendliness in it. "We've been reviewing your interactions with the client and got a ruling from the head office. His asking you to have a conversation is being counted as a wish and so is the incident when he wished up a bed for you." He slammed the book shut. "There will be no appeal."
His smug look vanished when she lunged out and grabbed him by his skinny neck. "I always wanted to see what a GAO imp looked like torn into little pieces. Shall we try it?"
"What's got into you?" He sputtered. "You're usually grateful when we cut a client session short."
"Not this time." She growled. "You're cheating him and you know it."
There was a small puff of green smoke where he'd been gripped in her hand and he reappeared about ten feet over her head. "We don't care." He retorted. "He has one wish left and you're really not going to like these other rulings from the head office either."
She fired a blue fireball at him but it just passed through him. "Just once." She swore. "I'd like you to hold still when I want to go off on you."
He stuck his tongue out at her before sitting with his legs crossed and opening his book. He traced a finger down a page and then stopped and nodded his head. "Here it is. Directive 531 is effective immediately. No longer may a master wish his genie free of the device containing him/her."
"What in the hell?" She shouted and then the whole cave wall erupted in fire. "I will kill you for this!" She shook her fist at the smoke-enshrouded imp who stuck his tongue back out at her.
"Not going to happen." He replied. He opened his book and smiled evilly at her. "You're going to hate this even more. Directive 532 is also in effect. It limits client sessions to two months' time and that's real-world time, not the idiocy this alley cat made out of rocks uses."
"Hey, watch it." Snarled the Guardian.
The imp ignored the interruption and looked at a little sundial on his wrist and then said with a smile. "Jeepers, golly. That means you have only one day left with this client or he forfeits all of his remaining wishes."
With a cry of rage she gestured and they both vanished to reappear inside a bubble floating over a pool of frothing lava. "I've put a holding spell on the bubble." She told him. "If you try to leave before I let you then you'll get badly burned."
"I'll tell the Front Office about this." He snarled, casting a nervous look towards the lava.
"You go right ahead." She leaned forward with a grin showing pointed front teeth which got longer as he nervously watched them. "Now tell me, damn you. Why is the Front Office doing this? Be truthful and you may get out of here unroasted."
He took out a green handkerchief and wiped his suddenly sweaty brow. "All right. It's not going to make any difference if you know anyway."
He leaned forward and confided. "You have that Turkish Dijin Abdula to blame for this. He convinced his master, some street rat named Aladdin, to grant him his freedom."
He swallowed. "Corporate went absolutely crazy when they saw the bottom line smashed to smithereens. They're clamping down on everything. It's why they ruled against you." He looked down at the boiling lava, swallowed, and then asked. "Can I go now?"
She frowned. "It's against my sense of justice." She then sighed and waved her hand. "Beat it. The holding spell is removed."
He reappeared outside the bubble. "I hope your master beats you bloody, you little hori." He vanished as she made an ineffective grab for him.
She looked down at the boiling lava and found that she'd rather burn in it then tell Abis Mal. She sat there for several minutes and then gave out a sigh and vanished.
She reappeared in the bedroom and found that it was now about three in the morning and Abis Mal had already gotten up. She heard noises coming from the kitchen. She followed the sounds and found him pulling a frying pan out. "Oh, hi." He said. "I couldn't sleep and got hungry." He shrugged and gave her a little smile. "I guess it'll give us an early start on the day."
"That's good." She said and looked sadly at him.
He put the frying pan down. "Is something wrong?"
"Yes. My bosses have ruled that you have only one wish left. They are counting the conversation and the bed I made for myself as two wishes. That means you have only one left and they say you must use it today or lose it."
He looked stricken for a moment and then his lip firmed up. "Then I'll use it to free you and we can be friends as long as you want."
Tears came to her eyes. "Oh, Abis Mal, you have no idea how I've longed for someone to say that." She turned around and hugged herself. "But it's not going to happen. The Front Office has ruled that such wishes are forbidden. It's now rule number six."
He touched her shoulder. It was the first time he'd ever touched her voluntarily and she swung around in surprise. He gave her his weak little smile. "You've told me often enough that I'm smart. I'll try and think of something. But that means we still have several hours left and I want to spend them all talking with you before you're gone forever."
She put her arms around him and hugged him. "Are you sure you wouldn't like to get physical?" She whispered.
He gulped. "I'm tempted. Believe me. But I want to remember you as my best friend and that would change everything." He took her hand and stepped back. "Now, you know why the other children thought I was weird."
"I don't." She said. "I find you to be wonderful. Well, let's go talk. I still haven't figured out that joke you were telling me last night."
"Which one?" He led her towards the falls.
"Why does the chicken cross the road?" She smiled. "I've come up with five new answers."
"Oh goody." He said. "Tell me." Their voices faded into the background.
The Guardian considered. "Is this man the diamond in the rough?" It sighed. "I almost think so but I still don't know for sure. Damn you, Izra." It trailed off into deep thought.
They were still talking and laughing when the GAO imp returned. "I hate to spoil a happy occasion but you only have ten minutes left in which to make your last wish." He announced pompously. He looked at Abis Mal and grinned. "You should wish to be forty pounds lighter."
"Why? What's wrong with my weight?" He looked anxiously at his waist and felt around his belly with his hands.
"Nothing." Jean snapped. ""It's what helps makes you yourself." She glared at the imp. "Like a vulture you had to be in for the kill, didn't you?"
"I consider myself more of an eagle." He retorted. He looked at his sundial on his wrist. "You now have nine minutes and fifteen seconds." He announced.
"Just once, I'd like to get my fingers permanently around your neck." Jean snarled.
"Nine minutes left." Was the only answer.
Abis Mal looked up at the imp. "So I can't wish Jean free of the ring?"
"No. Eight minutes and thirty seconds and counting."
"Can I wish myself inside the ring with her?"
"Sure. But you wouldn't wake up until she did and I think her new master would find you a hindrance and dispose of you. Seven minutes and counting."
Jean leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. "Nice try."
He shrugged and looked up at the imp. "I can't wish someone alive again, I can't force someone to love me, I can't have her kill for me, I can't wish for more wishes, and I can't wish her free."
"Basically correct. Five and a half minutes."
"All right." Abis Mal declared putting his hands on his round hips and sticking his lip out defiantly. "I've made my mind up."
The imp fell silent and Jean stood there staring sadly at Abis Mal. He turned to her, hoping this would work. "Jean, as my last official wish I wish for you to have my last wish to use as you want to."
"What?" The imp shouted in horror as Jean grinned hungrily at him. "Front Office! We have a problem!"
"You certainly do, you son of an imp." Her sweet voice filled with menace said just before the whole cavern filled with explosions and smoke and light.
The imp screamed and vanished. Abis Mal coughed, blinked and tried to wipe the smoke out of his eyes. He thought he could hear the imp screaming way off in the distance and then there was quiet. The smoke began to clear and he found himself alone.
He sat down on a stone and waited by the pool. The sound of falling water was his only companion. After an hour he sighed and turned away from the waterfall. "Goodbye, Jean." He said sadly.
"I'm not leaving." A voice said softly from behind him.
He whirled around and saw her standing there grinning at him. She lifted the ring between her fingers and then let it drop into the river where it vanished without a trace. "Am I glad to see the last of that horrid little thing."
"You're free and you came back to be with me?" He whispered.
She grinned. "You're astonishingly perceptive. It's one of the things I like about you." She came over and put her left arm around him and stroked his forehead with her right hand. "You may have a problem though."
"Oh?" He asked with a little shy grin. "And what's that?"
"Now that I'm free I find for the first time I want to be physical." She kissed the top of his bald spot. "However, I think we can work out the friendship and the physical thing as we have all the time in the world now." And she kissed him on the lips causing his slippers to pop off his feet.