Rockslide’s red light flared up again as I closed the door to my room. It seemed the new glass made him extremely happy. If I played my cards right, I might only have Haliniel to deal with. If I threw down a straight flush, I might have another ally. I plopped onto the bed. The motel was better than sleeping in the car, but it wasn’t exactly restful.

I woke up a few hours later, feeling much better. I grabbed my phone, but there were no missed calls or messages. It seemed Emily was still not over our fight. Oh well, I didn’t have time to worry about it. I left my room, intending to go to my office, but a sulfuric smell grabbed my attention. I went to the living room to investigate, and nearly shat myself.

Rockslide was piling large molten rocks in the middle of the fucking room. Smoke filled the air as the carpet burned. I could see the concrete of the floor underneath scorching as well. I didn’t know how long concrete could stand up to that kind of heat, but I was betting not too damn long.

“Get that shit out of here!” I yelled.

Rockslide looked up from his work. His eyes were wide, and his mouth gaped. He trembled a little as I ran into the room.

“Didst thou not wish me to make thy abode my home?” he said.

“Oh, goddammit!” I said. “Yeah, I said make yourself at home. I didn’t mean literally make yourself a home. You’re going to burn down the building.”

Rockslide was silent for a few seconds before quickly devouring the molten rock. “Didst thou create thy abode in the mortal realm?” he said, bits of molten rock falling from his mouth as he spoke.

“It’s rude to talk with your mouth full,” I said. “And yeah, where else would it be?”

Rockslide gulped hard. His throat bulged comically as the rock slid down it. “I do not know how it is with the Alqanun, but it should be possible for thee to create thy own dimension.”

Jesus fucking Christ. It’s in all the books and movies for fuck’s sake. Genie’s live in lamps. Of course, it didn’t have to be a lamp, I knew that now. I looked over the living room and thought about turning it into a pocket dimension. The threads vibrated, then split into two. A mirror image of my apartment overlayed the real thing, and a thin tendril wagged to and fro in the center. It seemed to be hunting for something. I needed a container to hold the dimension, but I didn’t want it to be anything cliché or macabre.

“Fuck it,” I said.

I anchored the thread to my front door, and the room shimmered. Instantly, the smoking floor cooled, and the carpet looked new again. Rockslide looked around the room. His features relaxed, and he sat down.

“This is even better than thy old realm,” he said. “Tis so peaceful.”

Damn, it did feel better. It felt like all was right, and no one could hurt me here. I wondered if this was how Superman felt in his Fortress of Solitude. I walked to the front door and left the apartment. From the outside, nothing looked different. I opened the door and closed it immediately. The smell of burnt fabric and sulfur filled the entryway.

“Did I just lock myself out of my own dimension?” I said. “Where the fuck am I going to find a dimensional locksmith.”

I opened the door again, and again the smell and smoke wafted out. Well, shit. Ever since those memories invaded me, I had better control over my powers, but I still didn’t really know what I was doing. I was sure it was only a matter of time before I truly understood what I was capable of, but now I couldn’t even get back into my apartment.

I thought about my little slice of reality and focused on the door. I could just make out a faint second doorknob. I reached out and turned it. The universe around me dimmed, and I stepped into my new home.

“Now that’s pretty fucking cool,” I said.

Rockslide stood amid a new pile of molten rock. He looked baffled. “Even to me, tis warm.”

“Not the rocks, dumbass,” I said. “Just enjoy your lava. I’m going to my office.”

Rockslide nodded as though I’d proclaimed a great truth. He sat down and started coating the rock with the shards of colored glass. They melted and flowed along the surface. After a few moments, the stones cooled, and brilliant flashes of light reflected from their surfaces. It was breathtaking. I left him to his fun.

My office was nothing like my apartment. Action figures lined shelves built near the ceiling and wrapped around the entire room. Below those, on one wall, a bookshelf held every textbook on coding I’d ever read and several other books on computer architecture. Boxes stacked against another wall contained pretty much every computer component known to man. A lot of them weren’t even in use nowadays. There was something about throwing away electronics that was anathema to me.

My desk sat in front of the small window. The view was of another apartment building, and very little light came through, so I blocked it with my sixty-inch monitor. The damn thing was too massive to actually use, so I had a smaller screen sitting in front of it. I powered up my computer and grabbed a Diet Coke from the small refrigerator to my side.

Now that I had time to sort through my thoughts, I didn’t know how to start. Everything was a jumble in my mind. I opened a blank spreadsheet and started labeling columns. I managed to get down, power structure, Muqadas Nasi, Alqanun, and enemies before my mind blanked. Whenever I thought about something, the knowledge was there, but as soon as my mind shifted to something else, the previous information was gone.

The reality was, I hadn’t earned any of the information. It was given to me, and it would take time before it was part of me. It was like learning a foreign language. Sure, you could use Google Translate to find the words, but that doesn’t mean you speak the language. But, if you take the time to go through the process of assimilating it, you start to gain access to it without thought.

It reminded me of what my father used to say; “Something earned is always better than something given.”

I had resented those words when forced to earn my weekly allowance, but now I knew the truth of them. I focused on the Zaeim Aljiniy. My implanted memories offered nothing in the way of insight into them. I knew what Jinn told me, and what I’d guessed based on my interaction with Rockslide. They definitely seemed to rule all Djinn, but their laws were not part of the Muqadas Nasi.

The Muqadas Nasi, however, was in a lot of those memories. It boiled down to a set of rules for how non-mortal beings interacted. Well, not really rules. Rules could be skirted, but the tenants of the Muqadas Nasi could not purposefully be broken. I deleted the Zaeim Aljiniy column from my spreadsheet and started listing everything I knew about the Muqadas Nasi when my phone rang.

“Hello,” I said.

“David!” Em screamed. She sounded panicked. “Oh my god! Where are you?”