//------------------------------//
// The Dream (Part 4: Djinn) 
// Story: Undisclosed Desire 
// by Dark Enigma 
//------------------------------//

	"And this is where we keep the ancient artifacts my sister and I collected over the years." Luna opens an immense door decorated with different, interweaving patterns, which doesn't become any less complicated the more Trixie looks at them. In fact, she longer she looks at them, the longer the patterns make her head spin. She forcefully pushes the afterimage of the door out of her mind as Luna leads her and Tricky into the room.

In the room, rows and rows of stone pedestals with many trinkets and the like are on display, each under glass casings edged with silver rods with some strange runes on them. A statue of a great dragon cast in marble stands in the middle of the room, surrounded by smaller statues of lesser creatures. 

The windows are simple, not at all embellished like the stained glass windows in the throne room, but that was probably done on purpose in order to let in the full splendor of the garden just outside. The night drenches the castle garden in cool blue light, giving each flower and orchid a unearthly appearance, and, occasionally, turning them completely pale as the clouds swim in the gentle breeze, allowing the moon to show its face before getting covered again.

"Here," Luna continues, motioning at the room with a sway of her hoof, "you two will clean the glass casings, vacuum the rugs, wash the windows, and dust the statues. Try to be careful with the casings. They will react to any magical energy used near them, so they will be have to be cleaned by hoof."

"All of them?" asks Tricky.

Luna responds by raising her brow at her.

"Pay no attention to her," Trixie says. "She is just lazy."

"Yes, well, make sure you finish before you go to sleep. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some matters to attend to. I'll come in to check on you two around midnight. You know where the supply closet is. Get to work." Luna looks over them one final time before heading out the room.

The clacking of Luna's hooves fade into the dead of night, non-existent.

"Okay," Trixie breaks the silence, "go to the closet and fetch the supplies, I'll stay here to start on the--"

"Trixie, look." Tricky points at a glass case underneath the moonlight dripping in from a nearby window.

"What?" Trixie says rather uninterested in anything her sister have to show her, but she humors Tricky anyway.

"It's the amulet."

"The what?"

"The thing you lost to that unicorn mare, you idiot."

"Tricky! You really want to get the Princesses angrier at you than they already are? Just stop this nonsense."

But Tricky ignores her and steps closer to the amulet, staring at it with hungry eyes. "All I have to.." She inches her hooves closer to lift the case, her tongue sticking out from the side of her mouth (a usual mannerism when trying to do something that requires a delicate touch.)

"Tricky!" Trixie hooks her two forelegs under her sister's and pulls her away. "I had enough of your... your... AH, I don't even know what to call it anymore."

"Let me go!" Tricky struggles to get free, squirming around and trying to hit Trixie with the back of her head, but Trixie avoids every blow. Though, she does get a mouth full of her sister's mane.

Tricky kicks off the pedestal, which is surprisingly very stable and doesn't fall over--something Tricky actually hoped for. The sudden force and weight of her sister catches Trixie off guard, so she tumbles backwards falling over into another pedestal. The edge jabs her just above the middle of her back and sends an aching pain shooting through her as if the edge of the pedestal actually cut her in half, but she still refuses to let go.

Moreover, she stops spitting out Tricky's mane and yanks on it with her mouth. She can't feel what Tricky is feeling, but her screams alone sends shivers down Trixie's spine.

In the middle of their fight, a young, scrawny-looking colt walks in carrying a peach-yellow urn with a white star on its face. He looks over the struggling mares on the floor while he carefully steps to an empty pedestal near where the Alicorn Amulet is. He knows he's not a fighter and doesn't wish to be dragged into their fight.

Tricky's horn begins to glow ready to cast a spell, and, just as the spell is cast, the silver lining within the glass turns dark black and begin to absorb the very light around them, making everything match its new color. At the sight of this, the colt drops the urn and runs away as if his very life will be consumed by the growing darkness, which, in reality, his panic is justified.

Trixie sees the oozing void consuming reality itself and lets go of Tricky, then steps back from the blackness dripping onto the floor and flowing towards her; no, not her but her sister. Her horn is pitch black and she is unconscious. All the darkness is centralizing itself around her.

Trixie goes to pull her sister away from the void--not using magic to do it out of fear of succumbing to the same fate--but stops herself. Her sister has caused her so much trouble and so much pain. Would it really be worth it? Saving her and all?

Trixie groans. "I'm gonna hate myself in the morning for this."

She grabs on to Tricky's tail and pulls her away, but the darkness continues its pursuit for its target. A ripple courses though it and it leaps faster than Trixie can catch and latches itself onto Tricky's horn. The sudden touch awakens her, and Tricky begins to scream. "What's happening?!"

Trixie spits out her sister's tail. "Oh nothing new. Just you being an idiot."

"Get this thing off of me! It's draining my magic!"

Tricky tries to pull away, but the ooze is stuck on her like bubble gum. It slowly crawls up her horn and begins to literally eat her alive. "Trixie!" she yells; her legs are flailing frantically.

Trixie can feel the panic emanating from her sister, so she grabs on to her sister, wrapping her forelegs around Tricky's stomach and pulls. But the ooze doesn't like it one bit, so it opens its "mouth" and swallows more of Tricky along with a part of Trixie's mane and horn. 

"No," she says, "I will not be stuck in that thing with you." Slowly, Trixie steps back bringing along her sister and the ooze. Though, one misstep on the urn the colt dropped and she falls. The urn rolls under Trixie's hoof and into the ooze, sticking to it like a rock to cement.

The only visible feature of Trixie's frustrated face is her eyes glaring at the object of her misfortune. No, not her sister, though it's kind of hard to keep her out of sight considering she is sitting directly on Trixie. She can feel the hopeless cold of the pitch void swallowing her as it takes up her legs, then her body. Slowly, it makes its way up Trixie, leaving only her eyes to glimpse at what she believes will be the final rays of light she will ever see.

Strange enough, even though the ooze covers her muzzle, she can still breath just fine, and her sister can still scream just fine, which Trixie can feel resonate throughout her own body since she is so close to Tricky at the moment. This is possibly the only time she has been, or ever will be, this close to her sister.

The last bits of moonlight fade away, but something else flashes brighter. It dispels some of the ooze and fills Trixie with warmth. It gets brighter and brighter until Trixie can feel her head fall loose of the void. She looks around to find the source of the glow hurting the void and discovers it's coming from the urn.

Soon, the glow gets too bright to directly look at, but Trixie can still feel its warmth. Yellow smoke seeps out of the urn and swirls, contorts, sprouting legs with baggy blue pants, a torso wearing a white shirt and gold vest, bare arms and hands, and a head covered in curly hair topped with a yellow fez with a white star on it and a gold tassel. It, or he, yawns; the glow dims down. "Whoa, whoa, 3,000 years stuck in that thing and I awake to this. Celestia gots some 'splaining to do."

With a snap of his fingers, the ooze instantaneously vanishes, leaving two mares in a rather awkward position laying on the floor. "Sorry, ladies, or mares... huh... But I didn't want my urn to get eaten. Now, tell me: are ponies still the dominate race on this planet?"

"Uh," Tricky drones on but gets cut off as Trixie tosses her across the room with her magic, causing Tricky to crash into a pedestal with a loud BANG; the sound of vibrating metal reverberates in the air afterwards.

"Yeah," Trixie answers his question, "ponies still dominate this planet. Why?"

"No reason," he says while dusting off his vest, "just catching up. A lot can change in a millennium, and I've been in there for three." He points at his urn. "Hey, did you know I am the reason you all are ponies? Some girl a long time ago wished for her entire race to be turned into ponies. Her name was Bonnie something... I guess no one fixed that during the time I was gone, go figure."

"What are you talking about?" Trixie asks.

"Nothing you need to worry your pretty pony head about." He knocks on Trixie's head as if it is hollow, which Trixie doesn't like, so she tries to swat his hand away.

Her hoof rasps his knuckle which makes her wonder: "What are you?" she asks.

"Hmm? Me? I'm Erin, Erin the Djinn. A pleasure to meet you, miss... uh... what was your name again?"

"I never told my name."

"Ha! Good one, you're name is Trixie Lulamoon." Erin says while slowly browsing the selection of artifacts in the room as if it is a market place for the public. He stops in front of a golden bracelet with runes written on them similar to the runes on the glass casings.

"How did you know that?" asks Trixie trying to catch up to him.

Meanwhile, Erin reaches through the glass and takes out the bracelet. He looks it over, rubbing his fingers over the runes. "To put it simply, I can read your mind. Hey--" Erin places the bracelet back "--shouldn't you check on her? I think you knocked her out."

"She'll be fine. What do you mean you can read minds?"

"Aw, I thought I put it simply. Maybe this will help you understand." Erin's finger glows and he touches Trixie on her forehead. Images, voices, emotions, all of it flood into Trixie's mind. She can see the guard upstairs thinking about what to give his daughter for her birthday, she can feel Tricky's mind spinning and spinning and spinning, she can hear the worries of the colt who came in here earlier and his intention of finding Princess Luna. The only hole in her new sense is Erin; from him, she gets nothing.

Trixie staggers at the rolling waves of thoughts and ideas. Just as she is about to fall, Erin grabs her by the chin. "Hey, hey, look at me." He snaps in the air. "Clear your mind, count to three and clear your mind."

Through her haze, she does as she is told, though whether she is counting out loud or in her mind is debatable. But at the sound of three, her mind quiets. She can feel, though, at the slightest impulse, that they can return at any moment. A soft murmur still rings in her ears, but it's nothing more than a mental itch on the back of her mind.

"Now," Erin says, "this may be new to you, but you'll learn to control it eventually." He lets go of her chin, and without his support, Trixie falls flat on her stomach.

"What did you do to me?" Trixie asks.

"Shh-shh-shh." He shushes her. "You'll wake your sister."

"I'm already awake," Tricky announces her regained consciousness.

"Oh, then why don't you get up?" Erin floats over to Tricky.

She growls as Erin gets closer. "I'm stuck."

As Erin looks over Tricky's horn embedded in the pedestal, Trixie tries her luck at standing but fails. "Yep, that's stuck alright," Erin says. "Unless an all powerful djinn is right next to you." He snaps his fingers and Tricky is pulled loose from the pedestal by invisible hands.

She rubs her horn and asks, "What's a djinn?"

"I guess the new word everybody is using now-a-days is genie, but I'm one of the first genie to ever have existed, so I'm sticking with djinn as my title. It has a nice ring to it--Erin the Djinn--don't you think?"

"No." Tricky adopts her sister's blunt attitude when addressing things that don't matter to her.

"Well, no one asked you! Oh, wait I did. Hey--" Erin pulls in Trixie and Tricky with his magic, and wraps his arms around their necks "--here's a fun question: any of you lovely mares want three wishes?"

Tricky's eyes light up while Trixie is still struggling to understand what he said over her mind-numbing stupor. "I would," Tricky blurts out.

"Great!" Erin lets them go and Trixie falls to the floor again. "What's your first wish?"

"Hmm..." Tricky taps her hooves together, fiendishly. "I wish I was the ruler of Equestria."

Erin snaps his fingers, but nothing changed." There, as of now, some idiot stormed the castle, dethroned the Princess and ruled for a mere thirty seconds before the princess's younger sister returned from her quest and, using their combined alicorn power, dethroned you, I mean the idiot, and sent the idiot and her sister to work as maids in the castle they tried to take. Now, your second wish, please."

"What?!" Tricky explodes. "That's not fair!"

"Ah-ah-ah." Erin wags his finger at the boiling mare. "You said was. And so you were, for thirty seconds. But don't worry, it'll be in the history books for future generations to mock you. Doesn't that sound fun?"

"NO!"

"Hmmpf, I'll be laughing. Now, your second wish if you may."

Tricky growls in frustration, but eventually succumbs to his cool demeanor. She knows, now, what game Erin plays, and she thinks she can get the better of him, or at least get him to comply long enough to get what she wants. "Okay, I'm going to make this as specific as possible."

"Hey, hey, now were talkin'"

But Tricky ignores him. "I wish to become, this second, an alicorn far stronger than Celestia and Luna combined."

"Wait, the Celestia and Luna? Are they still in charge around here?"

"Yeah, how could you not know? You just made a wish where I dethroned them for thirty seconds." Tricky chews over the last part of her sentence with distaste.

"I know, I just like to spice things up a bit. Immortality is boring. Anyway, I hate their guts--" Erin ruffles Tricky's mane "--telling me that my wishes will throw the world off balance. But what they don't know is I do what I want, so one powerful alicorn coming right up."

Tricky's smile grows as wide as a crescent moon as Erin snaps his fingers and brings forth the new alicorn of the land: Tricky Lulamoon. Her new body glows in surreal light, and she feels her power grow and grow and grow. It doesn't seem to stop growing. And she laughs maniacally all the while.

"Well, it looks like I'm done here."

Tricky's laughter stops abruptly. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that was my millionth wish done and over with." Erin snaps his fingers and makes two full suitcases appear. "So, um, good luck with the alicorn thing. Send the Princesses my regards, and stay away from that urn. Like now."

Tricky turns to see the urn as its color drains away, leaving a white, flawless surface. Suddenly, it flies midair and "looks" around the room. It "sees Tricky and flies at her at a devilish speed. "No," she says, grabbing the urn in midflight with her alicorn magic. "Her." She directs the urn at Trixie, who is staring at everything in a haze.

Tricky lets go of the urn, and it flies at Trixie, hitting her dead-straight on her forehead. White smoke bursts from the mouth of the urn and envelopes Trixie, turning blue as she still tries to figure out what is going on. She vanishes with the blue smoke into the urn. The urn falls and shakes on the ground as if it is struggling to keep Trixie inside. It eventually stops and turns blue, branding itself with Trixie's cutie mark.

Erin walks to it and places it in the pedestal that was suppose to be for him. "The urn always needs a host," he says to no one, or no pony, in particular. He turns to Tricky. "What are you still doing here? Go tell the Princesses that Erin says hello. Now, if you'll excuse me. I have a world to rebuild." In a puff of smoke, he disappears.

Tricky smiles, already plotting exactly how to destroy the regime of the sun and moon. Trixie, on the other hoof, is lost within the dark emptiness of the urn. She feels nothing, but the sweet sense of only her own mind. Now that she can think clearly, one name stands out in her thoughts and her mouth. "TRICKY!!!" she yells, but no pony can hear her.