Drowning in an introspection he couldn’t even spell, Jon gasped at answers. Then, as it all went black, he came to a conclusion:
I gotta undo all this.
He knew he fucked up. All it took was a bit of a horny haze and he wished for things the morality of which was more than questionable. Willing people into existence for them only to disappear soon after? Was that not essentially like creating life only to murder it not soon after?
He started pacing around the hallway low-key panicking, thinking of his options.
Jon knew that he wished the effects of the stone had a 48h expiry period. He also remembered he wished he was able to simply cancel any of them at any time, by saying 'stop' while thinking about it.
But a lot of the damage was done already. The people conjured into existence now existed, and undoing that in any way would be akin to murder. So that's the thing that needed fixing - make the termination of the wish not equal to ceasing of Josephine's family existence.
Luckingly Jon was a reasonably intelligent person, so it didn't take long for the solution to come to him. What if he wished up a specific interpretation of his wish? What if he wished that no conjuration and disappearing of people happened? What if he insured that the 'end' of his wish only resulted in the return of his consciousness to his original self, while the characters of the reality he occupied now continued their lifes in some paraller universe? Yeah, that would do.
And while he was at it, he though he might give Simon some justice. It wasn't fair leaving him in a relationship where his wife, no matter how loving, held an all-powerful artifact of pretty much limitless power. Actually, to think about it, Josephine was kinda the baddie here too, with this degree of potential control over her surroundings without telling her life partner or sharing it with him.
"I wish that Josephine told Simon about her wishing ring later today, and let him have a go with it" And then, thinking about all the years Josephine has been using the ring without telling her husband, Jon added. "I wish Simon allowed himself to go a bit wild with the ring."
That was good. Of course Jon would not get to see the justice happen, as by that time he'd have halted the wish which got him here in the first place.
"I wish that after the effects of the wish placing me in Josephine's life end, any people involved in the scenario would continue living in an universe paraller to my own."
That should do it. Hopefully. The only thing left to do was to terminate this mistake of a wish, which shouldn't be difficult, thanks to the safety precautions Jon took ealier. And after that's done hopefully he'd be able to try better at coming up with a sexy scenario which doesn't envolve existentially questionable consequences.
He closed his eyes, focused on the wish which turned him into Josephine and firmly, decisively said "STOP"
A second passed and then another one. He didn't feel any different. The... the sensation of having the bloaty flesh of his chest protrude and be cradled by a a constraint around his ribcage was still there. Same with feeling his feet being propped up, angled with heeled shoes. And his legs exposed by the pencil skirt.
He was still Josephine.
"How?" he whispered softly looking at the magic ring on his right hand in disbelief. "No, but actually, how? I wish I knew why this didn't work."
The ring grew a bit warm. There was no knowledge magically appearing in his head but he felt something in his left hand. In there, there was a crumpled piece of paper.
With his heart racing he uncrumpled the paper exposing the slightly antiquated cursive writing:
"One can not alter the way the magic object works. Time limits or termination conditions on wishes are allowed. But a wish for a time limit or terminating condition to be automatically applied equates to an attempt in temporarily altering the way the magic object works."
As he read, Jon felt a cold, sinking feeling in his stomach. The kind you might experience when realising that you've left your very full wallet on a train. Except with much more at stake.
"Therefore" the note continued. "wishes regarding magical effects lasting only 48 hours and blanket termination condition are void and have not been fulfilled."
Jon stared at the piece of paper in his hand blankly for several seconds.
"Oh..."
