In a blinding flash, events ran through Jon's head. He saw Zoe, his misguided but well-intentioned sister, changed into a dog. He saw his best friend Karyn, and Sarah, the Head Cheerleader, dressed in harem attire, kneeling at his feet. He saw his mother and father reduced to nothing more then servents. But most of all, he saw pain. Death, pain, sadness, all caused by his wishes, all destroying the lives of those he loved and cared about.
He was about to throw the stone away from himself forever, in rage, until it occurred to him.
"I wish to know what would happen to the world, if I were to get rid of you."
He saw Sarah McMillan recover the stone and make dozens of people into her slaves. He saw corporations recover it, or the government, or even just Larry Nadish. And finally he saw his mother, years in the future, dead of a terminal disease... and him crying, realizing that if he had only kept the stone to wish her back to health at that moment, she would still be alive.
His arm slackened and fell onto his bed. If he hadn't been sitting he might have even dropped the stone at that moment. But he knew then that he would never get rid of it. His grandfather had willed it to him. He hadn't used it to cause unending misery, and he trusted Jon not to, either. Jon had no choice to keep it; getting rid of it was as much of a danger as not doing so. No wishes were made that night, but the next day....
