Oops! I Caught a Genie!

Chapter 10

Fritz lept up.

"Come on!" He said, dragging me toward the door.

"But it's a school night!"

"This is a big lead!"

"Can I at least leave a note for my mother to say that I haven't been kidnapped?"

He slowed and made a pouting face. He handed me a pen and a sticky note.

I scribbled down a message explaining that I was going to study with a friend and wouldn't be back until later.

Fritz pushed me into my car and got in the passenger side. I pulled my keys from my purse that I had had the sense to snatch on the way out.

"Can't you just poof us there?" I grumbled, sticking the key in the ignition.

"Nope. You'd die."

"Huh?!"

"I can't carry passengers. For lack of better term, its unicycling."

"Explain..."

"You're trying to make this difficult... So, it takes practice and skill to ride a unicycle right? Its like carrying someone on your shoulders while you do it. Only the very skilled can do it without losing their balance."

"And what happens if you lose your balance?..." I asked, dreading the answer.

"Well, the person driving would be thrown to the nearest location. The passenger has a good chance of going 'poof' permanently."

I shuddered and backed out of the driveway, perfectly content to drive now.

I had Fritz use the GPS on my phone to find the storage unit. He directed me to it, there were long concrete buildings with silver garage type doors along the sides. We walked to number 261 A. Following the numbers on the scrap of paper. Apparently it had been paid for for the next twenty years.

It was, predictably, locked. Fritz produced a key with a poof and we let ourselves in. Immediately, a wave of mist rolled out. I sneezed while Fritz doubled over and started wheezing.

"What is it?" I asked.

"H-holly." He choked, now holding the front of his shirt over his nose and mouth. "I'll wait outside." He walked out of the unit and leaned against the wall.

I looked through the unit, I found a few tourture looking devices as well as more papers. I looked in horror at a chair situated in the middle of the room. It looked like a dentist's chair, with iron restraints.

"Does this room seem familiar to you?" I asked carefully. The mist had cleared and Fritz stuck his face around the corner. His eyes widened and he mumbled something that I didn't understand. He retracted his head and stayed outside of the unit.

I stacked the boxes and looked around for anything useful.

There was a small knife that appeared to be polished iron, I don't know what drew me to it, but I decided to take it.  

I struggled to push the boxes out of the unit and to the car.

"Use your legs, not your back." Fritz said helpfully.

"Thanks." I grunted.

"I'd help, but the holly interferes with my powers."

So I put the boxes into the trunk of my small car. There were two more than would fit, so I put them in the backseat. Fritz got into the car and we drove back.

When we got home, it was seven.

Fritz, away from the holly fumes, was able to get the boxes discretely to my room and tucked them under my bed. We spent the next hour looking through even though we both were sick of it.

Finally I gave up and dove under my covers, welcoming sleep.

-

When I woke, Fritz was still looking through notes. I had to toss a sock at the back of his head to snap him out of his trance. There were so many notes, it would probably take us ages to get through all of them. It must have been my father's life work...

I walked him out the door and to school.

The day passed slowly. In math, we sat through the hour lecture. Fritz made faces at me and I had a really hard time keeping a straight face. He didn't get caught.

Lunch passed normally. As did the rest of the day.

-

I gave Liana a house key to come by later for a study session, we hadn't finished during lunch and Liana was welcome any time.

I pulled out the boxes and read to pass the time. I was finding out a lot about the Djinn, their bodies functioned differently and they had incredibly long life spans. Fritz told me that no, they did not change into ghosts on the full moon and that most of them loathed granting humans wishes.

When Liana came over, she found us sitting at the kitchen table with our books out. Fritz had decided to 'educate me' as he put it. He was explaining things about Djinn until Liana walked in, he abruptly switched to calculus.

After a thirty minute study session we decided that we were going to be fine on any upcoming quizzes or tests and migrated to the couch to watch television.

We watched a couple episodes of some random cop procedural and Liana went home.

"When can we go somewhere to look for the solution to the bond?" Fritz asked after she had left.

"Well... Tomorrow after school. It will be Friday, we get Saturdays and Sundays off."

"I know how human schools work, I was here for a while before I was attacked."

"Ok then. Friday after school. Where would we go?"

"Hmm.. I was thinking Europe but then we would have a problem getting there..."

"Why Europe?"

"Culture, class and the fact that there are many Djinn there that might know something."

I was a little nervous at the prospect of meeting more Djinn, but I was getting ahead of myself, we hadn't even found out how we were going to get there. Not to mention the fact that we would be illegally crossing country borders. When I brought this issue to Fritz's attention, he shrugged.

"Human laws." He said.

"I'm human." I pointed out.

"You're with me."

"And there's still the glaring issue of how we are going to get there. Also what do I tell me mother? 'Bye i'm going to tour Europe with a djinn I found in a watch two weeks ago'?"

He thought for a bit, I could have sworn I saw a light bulb turn on and he grinned.

"You could say that you've gone on a road trip to relieve stress from school, It's not far from the truth and no one can poke holes in your story."

"Ok..." Still not liking the idea of leaving without permission. "How would we get there?"

"Let me think, shush."

A familiar purple smoke rushed into the room.

"Fritz-o! Human! What's up?"

"I've got it!" Fritz gasped. "Mangoo can take you!"

"WHAT?!" Mangoo and I exclaimed in unison.

Seriously ticked my test-reader/editor off while writing this one, Apperently she hates the song Genie in a bottle... (Thanks for putting up with it Manateegirl!)