Jeanie suddenly felt the temperature drop a good 10-20 degrees. She looked around nervously. Something or
things very old and very powerful were coming - or had come or had been here all along. She swallowed hard and
looked at the fairy boy and fairy girl. She wondered.
Suddenly a voice spoke in her ear, "Say hot stuff, so you like turning humans into fairies?"
Jeanie turned her head, and found herself face to face with a handsome young fairy. Correction, young
looking, but his eyes were ancient. He had seen Stone Henge erected, and at that time he had been old.
Jeanie knew the reference to her being "hot stuff" was word play. Genies were basically composed of fire, as
humans were of earth and water. It also was a reference to her current beauty, and maybe a threat against that
beauty. It may have been a reference to her daring to change humans into fairies, as if she considered
herself such hot stuff that she could do so with impunity.
She was nervous. Fairies meant fates, but were commonly called the "Fair Folk" as a polite euphemism. These
creatures existed outside of time as most creatures understood it. They were very ancient, and very powerful.
They were also notoriously far more dangerous and mischievous than djinn or genies. They looked like wimps but
they controlled all the elements including time, which is why they had arrived before Jeanie had transformed
anyone, but that she had been unaware of them until now.
Jeanie forced a confident smile, and said, "Why thank you for the complement, but really I didn't mean to
transform anyone into fairies, I simply granted their wish to become supernatural, and merely gave power to
their natural tendencies. Those two simply had the predisposition to be fairies."
"Indeed, my fair genie, that they did. But predisposition is not the same as predestined. The Fair Folk are
very careful about who and when is elevated to our kind. Only one in a million may be chosen. These ones
must be evaluated, and then we will decide if they will remain fairies, and -" he smiled wickedly and his eyes
gleamed. He left unsaid the words: then we'll decide what to do with you.
It was at this moment, Jeanie realized the fairy man was upside down with his feet firmly planted on the
ceiling . She let her surprise show. He laughed it was like the tinkling of bells.
"Ah, my pretty, all things are relative. What you call up, I may call down, and vice versa. Still if you
prefer?" he said, and somersaulted to the floor next to her landing with his ankles crossed and his gold
tinged silver wings gently fluttering.
"I'm Jeanie," Jeanie said.
"I know," he said with a smile. Then he fluttered over to Jason. A dozen female fairies were already
fluttering around the girl who had become a fairy.
He extended his hand to Jason, "Hello, Jason, usually we acquaint humans with fairies slowly if they are going
to become fairies, but this silly genie thrust the power on you without the usual orientation. She had no
idea that her creation could turn her to ash in the blink of an eye. All these creatures are mere child's play
for fairies. Have you ever seen Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream?"
"Uh, yes sir," Jason said nervously, "It was kind of weird." Then he felt bad for saying that.
The fairy man gazed off into the distance for a second. It was as if he were elsewhere, and then he snorted
and looked back at Jason. He said, "You're quite right, definitely a weird take on the bard. Probably, the
director was a child of the sixties and had had too many drugs."
"You saw it?" Jason asked in disbelief.
"Of course, and I may just go back and improve it or possibly punish the troupe that put it on," he said
testily, "Truly an insult to fairies."
"I guess?" Jason said uncertainly.
"Well, you are a fairy now, because it was in your nature or supernature to be one of our kind. The question
is whether you can be trusted with the power to remain one of us."
At this point, Jason noticed that only the fairies were talking and moving, and that the area was now filled
hundreds of glittery winged beings. Too many to fit in the area, but somehow space bent to accommodate their
numbers. Jason was confused by his feeling that it was right for the physical world to bend to accommodate
the fair folk regardless of the laws of physics. The transformed humans and genie stood as immovable statues
frozen in time. The world had become very still except for the melodious sounds of the fairies chatting and
fluttering.
"Laws of physics, indeed," laughed the male fairy.
"You can read my mind?" Jason asked.
"You should be able to read mine too," the old fairy said with a sigh, "This is what comes of genies meddling
in affairs beyond their feeble comprehension.
The mythical creatures that had been children and the genie were frozen in time and space as the convocation
of the Fair Folk gathered to make the decision.
Faraway in desert mountains, the Chief Djinn Hadji gathered his genies for a war council. He had felt Jeanie
apparently vanish from the face of the Earth, and he knew the feel of fairy magic in her disappearance.