Title: Charmed Angels
Author: Joshua
Disclaimer: Aaron Spelling was the owner/creator/Executive Producer of "Charmed". Charlie's Angels is owned and operated by several people, especially after the movies, which part of this is indeed based upon. "Charlie" is as much a fictional character as Andy, Prue, Piper, and Phoebe, and while you can imagine the voice being the same as from the TV show and movies, feel free to do so, but unfortunately I couldn't get the guy to actually do any of the script for me, so we're all stuck just using our imaginations. And I don't have to give the disclaimer for anything in this fic being similar to anyone in real life.
Summary: This is a 'Chaotic Circumstances' universe fic. On his way back to San Francisco, Inspector Trudeau comes across a costume shop in the small town of Sunnydale, and knowing that Halloween is coming up, gets himself a costume and some props. One of which is a strange speaker-box that he gives to his friends the Halliwell sisters.
Story:
Chaos is weird sometimes.
Nobody knows exactly why it is the Forces of Chaos decided that Ethan Rayne should change his costume ritual at the last minute, nor why it was that everybody chose the costumes that they did, or even why it was that two days before Halloween, before Ethan Rayne cast his spell that changed the lives of an entire town and more, that there was a massive Interstate accident that resulted in several of the major highways in Southern California being closed. Nor why a police detective from San Francisco and his partner, who'd been attending a conference in Los Angeles, would leave late enough to hear about the accident and at the moment that they were heading towards their rental car, they overhear somebody talking about the only way around the accident was to go through the suburban community of Sunnydale.
Looking from afar, or even with the up close and personal view that everyone had during those events, one would just see a bunch of seemingly random, chaotic events of either bad or good luck, depending on your point of view. In hindsight however, people might begin to wonder at the events to follow and wonder just how much of it /was/ coincidence.
After all, the presence of a chaos spell atop a Nexus and a Hellmouth at the same time would certainly provide some interesting mix of magics and could potentially explain why it was things happened the way they did, but most will never know. Not for a while anyway.
After all, chaos is weird sometimes.
"C'mon Andy, what are you doing now?" Special Investigator Darryl Morris asked his partner, who happened to be driving, as the white man pulled into a parking lot next to a local seasonal costume shop. The fact that it was local to a town a few hundred miles away from where both Investigators Trudeau and Morris lived and worked, didn't really seem to bother the driver as he turned the car off and stepped out.
"Andy? Andy! Trudeau, come on already!" Darryl exclaimed getting out of the car on his own and following his partner towards the store.
Before they actually got there though, Darryl took a few extra steps and grabbed his friend and practically slammed him against the brick wall of the building. "Andy, saying things like 'Trust me' and 'Its for Halloween' are only gonna fly so far. We've got to be back in San Francisco by nightfall, and that's still at least a few hours away, not to mention the reports we've got to fill out once we get back to the station! Now what is up with you man?"
Andy rolled his eyes and let out a sigh. "The sisters are throwing a Halloween party," he finally admitted after several hours of constant needling on this Road Trip from Hell.
Suddenly Darryl backed up, a crooked little smile on his face, things making a lot more sense. He said, "You mean Prue's throwing a party?"
"Well, more like Quake's throwing the party and Prue invited me. It's a costume party," Andy then gestured at the costume shop they were standing outside of.
"And we're here because . . ." Darryl queried.
"I need a costume/and/ I promised to help the girls get theirs. Look, it won't take long at all. I'll just do a little browsing and then get the cheapest things that'll fit. Won't take even ten minutes, if that!" Andy swore.
Darryl hemmed and hawed for a few seconds but finally said, "Fine but I've already got my costume. My kids picked it out actually. And I requested special time off just so I could go with them Trick-or-Treating, so make this fast. I don't want the Chief revoking that just because you had to wait until the last possible second."
"Five minutes, tops," Andy swore, "I promise."
"Oy," Morris rubbed his forehead and went back to the car.
"You're not coming . . . ?" Andy forestalled.
"Told you, I've already got my costume, now go. Four minutes, fifty-one seconds and counting. Then I'm driving off with or without you!" The two laughed, but nevertheless, Andy hurried into the store.
Darryl got another three steps before he realized something, Andy had the keys to the car. "Damnit Trudeau!"
/Inside Ethan's/
"Hello," Andy was greeted immediately upon entering the surprisingly crowded shop, only it wasn't crowded with people, but costumes and costume props of so many kinds and types, the San Franciscan detective couldn't begin to wrap his head around it, "I'll be with you in just a minute!" a voice from the back called out.
"Uh, that's OK," he started to shout back, but a couple of colorful costumes on a nearby rack distracted his attention for a moment. Then he turned his head and found another wall of colorful costumes and weird-looking masks. He was beginning to feel a might overwhelmed, especially since he had absolutely no idea what 'costume' he was wanting to get in the first place.
It was only then that he noticed a box set on a display-case-counter. It was just a cardboard box, but it also had an incredible number of toys, props, and costume fixtures in it. He walked over to it, reading the marker writing on the side of the box saying "Bargain Bin", and began to look through it. A lot of it was junk, old broken toys or such , but he did see a couple small items that sparked an interest in him.
One especially was an old revolver that was modeled perfectly after the standard issue for police inspectors thirty years ago. There was even a fake badge for a private investigator, or Private Eye, some guy by the name of Bosley. Not recognizing the name, he just put it off to the side and began to look more thoroughly through the box, setting most of the stuff off to the side when he dismissed it.
"Can I help you?" came an English accent almost right behind him.
Andy nearly jumped out of his skin as he turned around, grabbing as much of the stuff he'd been taking out of the box and blindly shoving it back into it, including the revolver and fake P.I. ID. "Geez Louise, you scared me!" he admitted.
"I apologize," the older, black-haired man said, not looking apologetic in the least. "Were you looking for something in particular?"
"Oh, uh, I . . ." Andy's mind went blank for a couple of minutes before he managed to remind himself what he was doing here in the first place. "Actually, I came here to get a costume for a Halloween party, but no, I don't have much idea of what I want to go as. Came in here to get some ideas to be perfectly honest."
"Well, that's entirely understandable," the man was now looking at Trudeau like one would a piece of art, or a particularly unusual insect that was just shoved under their nose. "I find often the most creative people, tend to make their own homemade costumes, merely needing a minor little trinket to complete it. And you, Inspector Trudeau, strike me as a very creative man."
"Uh, thanks?" Andy was caught a bit off-guard as the man lead him back around to the counter and the box he'd just been rummaging through.
"I'm afraid I'm a very busy man, however, so I can't afford the time or resources to help you find the perfect thing for your own costume, so I propose you a deal," he smoothly spoke.
"Why kind of deal?" Andy asked, suspicious.
"This," he pushed the box closer to the San Franciscan, "For five American dollars."
"A box?"
"And everything in it. More than enough for someone as intelligent and creative as yourself to make an absolutely brilliant home-made costume for the upcoming party. I'm sure you'll find exactly what you need in here to help you . . . impress a certain someone, if you know what I mean?"
"For real?" Andy couldn't help asking, a gleam in his eyes now.
"$5"
No longer hesitating, or even suspicious anymore, Andy pulled out his wallet and handed over the requested cash amount, and without even waiting for a receipt, not that any was coming, he grabbed the box and walked back out to his car. It wasn't until he was shoving it into the trunk that he realized that he hadn't introduced himself to the man, who, by deductive reasoning had to be "Ethan".
"How the hell did he know my name?" Andy asked himself. Shrugging, he shut the trunk and turned his focus back to getting back to San Francisco as soon as possible.
/San Francisco/
/"quake"/
"No, no, NO!" Piper Halliwell screamed at the waiters as they moved one of the tables. "It goes to the RIGHT, the /right/! What are you guys, two? THAT way!" she exasperatedly waved the direction she wanted the table to go in.
The middle child of three sisters sighed, brushing her bangs back as she held her forehead in a vain attempt to stop the oncoming migraine. Unfortunately, she didn't have long to rest as the moment she turned from the waiters moving the tables around, she saw another problem with the decorations and about half a dozen potential problems with the food prep.
"No! Uh-uh! I already explained that to you, now get away from there! Get it back the way it was!" she slapped an offending helper with her clipboard before stalking over to the cooks. "What the hell is this?" she whined, gesturing at the mess before them. Highly intimidated, they could only shrug, helpless before another problem distracted their boss from them.
"Hey sis," Phoebe Halliwell, the youngest and reportedly 'wildest' of the sisters, snuck up behind her older sister to surprise her, "Having fun terrorizing your employees?"
After stifling the scream of fear and surprise, Piper worked to suppress the scream of rage and frustration at seeing her unemployed sister standing in her restaurant. Unfortunately, whenever Piper is startled, she tends to trigger her magic power, the power to 'freeze' time and people around her. "Phoebe," she finally managed through clenched teeth as she waved her hands again, this time consciously using her powers to un-freeze the room, "what are you doing here?"
Before the youngest Halliwell could answer though, Piper spun on the spot and started screaming at the cooks again, "Don't even think about it!" she snapped at one that was about to pick up a 'ruined' pastry. "I don't care what you guys do to get it done, but I want the COMPLETE list of refreshments and party favors DONE, WITH enough leftovers to fill a starving man by the time I get back here. And I'll be back very soon." Suddenly her clipboard shot out to rap Phoebe across the arm that had been stretching on its own towards the table of goodies, causing the youngest to recoil it and look in shock at her sister. "Understand me?"
"Yes Ma'am!" all the cooks snapped, looks of real fear in their eyes, and the moment Piper turned from them, they exploded in a flurry of motion, literally cooking as much as they could as fast as they could.
"If this is a demon thing . . ." Piper hurriedly whispered to her sister as she dragged her out of the way of all the preparations.
"What? Can't a sister come visit her sister at her other sister's place of work?" Phoebe innocently asked.
Piper glared for a few seconds, effectively destroying the 'innocent' look, before replying, "Not when both you and Prue know what I've got going on here and how much of a . . ." she trailed off as she caught sight of something that made her groan in frustration, "of a MESS I've got to deal with /here/! So the only thing that would make one of you actually try to come down here is if it's a demon thing and I gotta say their timing sucks big time!"
"It's not a demon thing," Phoebe finally answered.
Piper pursed her lips in annoyance before settling another glare on her sister.
"There's a . . . minor problem at home, with the costume thing, and Andy, and Prue, and the candy," Phoebe finally finished.
Piper didn't even hesitate, grabbing one of her Assistant Managers just as they were passing by, and rather forcefully bringing them to an absolute halt. "YOU!" she screamed in the young woman's face, "You're in charge until I get back, and if everything is not PERFECT and ready /when/ I get back . . ." she trailed off, getting directly into the girl's personal space, "We are going to have words."
Fearfully, the young manager hastily nodded and then scampered off as Phoebe lead her sister out of the restaurant.
"You're being a little hard on them, aren't you?" the youngest tentatively asked as they got into the car.
Piper just glared and Phoebe wisely shut up and started the car.
Fifteen minutes later, they were pulling into the three-story brownstone manor that had been their family's ancestral home for nearly the past one hundred years. Walking inside they quickly called out and found their third sister, Prudence 'Prue' Halliwell, and Police Detective Andy Trudeau in the Sun Room, standing around a box of junk that might have been exaggerating a bit by calling it 'junk'. Stuff a hobo would throw away would be more accurate.
"What the hell is this? I'm on a time table here people! I don't have /time/ to come all the way home to look at a box of . . . of . . ." Piper stuttered, highly emotional.
"Crap?" Phoebe suggested.
"Junk!" Piper finished with a glare.
"This is our costumes," Prue interrupted with finality, pointing at the box.
That brought the Halliwell sisters to a screeching, silent halt. One by one, starting with Prue, they all looked, though more like sub-atomized if looks could kill, at Andy.
"Hey, this stuff has a lot of potential!" he helplessly tried to defend himself.
"Yesterday you called and told us to not bother getting our costumes," Prue began.
"Saying you had some great costumes that all of us could use, for free," Piper continued.
"And you show up with this box of crap that a homeless person would throw away!" Phoebe finished with a shout.
"Have you actually looked at any of this stuff?" he asked, desperate, pulling out a white speaker box he'd noticed early on.
"I'm out of here," Piper snorted and turned on her heels.
Phoebe, recognizing that her older sister would be in an even worse mood when she finally got back to work, decided to have mercy on the employees of /quake/, and quickly brought Piper back around, saying, "Hold on, hold on, just hold on for one second. Now, obviously it's seriously late for us to go and find any kind of costumes that aren't the bottom of the barrel. Andy's probably right, and we can hopefully find something in here that could maybe go along with something we already have. It's gonna look pretty silly if we're the only ones not in costume at the party later, right? Especially with Piper as the hostess. Right?"
The elder Halliwells grumbled for several seconds before Prue finally consented and started digging through the box, looking for anything. Finally, she announced, "Well, I see a lot of toy guns, and some other toys that look like their straight from a cartoon, oh, and here's a wallet with a fake Private Investigator ID in it."
"Oh, that's still in there?" Andy gushed, quickly grabbing the item.
"Well, we could always do the Bond-girl thing," Phoebe suggested. At the looks she received she added, "Y'know, spy-girls, Russian double agents or whatever. Toss me a gun. One of the toy guns," she exasperatedly amended at the further looks she got.
Prue pulled out three of plastic pistols and passed them around, keeping a tiny 9mm pistol for herself.
"So . . . what?" Piper said after several minutes of looking at her revolver-type water pistol, "We dress up like Bond girls and carry these things around and talk in Russian accents?"
"Well, more than that, we have to actually /look/ the part, and we've got only a few hours before the party. Don't worry Piper, they can handle it," Phoebe assuaged her sister.
Sighing with relief, Andy was surprised when the sisters turned to glare at him again. "Thanks Andy," Prue finally said, letting up on her glare enough to let out a small smile.
"Now take that crap and get out of here. We've got a lot to do and not a whole hell of a lot of time to do it in. Now scat!" Phoebe waved him out in good humor.
"All right, all right, I'm going, I'm going!" he laughed as he grabbed the box and quickly left to get back to his own home in order to put his own costume together.
Unfortunately as Andy left, and the sister's went upstairs to start working on their hair and make-up, none of them noticed the white speaker box that had been left behind on the sun room coffee table. It wouldn't be until much later, after the sun had set and the girls were all dressed and Andy was on his way to pick them up to take them to the party that they even noticed it.
Of course if any of them had noticed it and taken a much closer look at it, specifically at the underside of the box where there was a label, they might have noticed what was on the label; Property of the Townsend Detective Agency.
Such information might also have lead Andy to take a closer look at the 'fake' Private Eye wallet that he'd placed in his pocket next to his very real gun, he might have noticed that this 'Detective Bosley' worked for something called the 'Townsend Detective Agency'. Such things might have worked as a proper warning and allowed them all to avoid what was to come that evening.
But then there wouldn't be much of a story, now would there?
/Halliwell Manor/
/Nightfall/
"You guys almost ready?" Phoebe shouted up the stairs, standing in the foyer dressed to the nines. She was in a strapless, form-fitting blood red dress that was low cut to just over her bust line and ended just above her knees with a slit on the left side. Incidentally on that same side, she'd managed to find a black garter, which she had placed her "gun" in, just like the Bond girls from the movies did.
"Coming!" Prue yelled down.
Looking up expectantly as her sisters descended, Phoebe was amazed and impressed by just how good her family managed to pull off the 'femme fatale' look. Must be good genes she decided as she looked over the incredibly hot dresses her sisters were wearing.
Pure was in a black satin dress that tied at the back of the neck and had a plunging low cut that emphasized her breasts, further enhanced by the sparkling necklace. It hugged the rest of her body in all the right places showing off the curves the eldest Halliwell had had since she was 16 years old. The dress fell to just above her ankles, but there was a high cut slit on the left side of the dress that actually came almost to the top of her thigh, showing off an almost perfect leg that even Phoebe found alluring. Unlike Phoebe however, there was no visible garter nor anything that she could see that held Prue's own "gun".
Piper was elegance itself wrapped up in a sexiness that Phoebe and Prue always knew their sister had but very rarely ever let shown. Her dress was a silky dark blue that, as with her sisters, hugged all the right places with an almost insidious nature to hint and tease at the womanly curves beneath it. Unlike her sisters, it pooled down to her feet and the slit, which only went to mid-calf, was in the back rather than the sides. The neckline, however went nearly to her navel, as the dress seemed to billow above the waist, the folds covering her breasts and leaving the majority of her back, from neck almost to the tail-bone, completely bare.
After a moment or two to soak it all in, Phoebe finally noticed the handbags both her sisters were carrying and the answer to where they were keeping their 'guns' was finally answered. She smile in the simple joy of playing 'dress-up' with her sisters again, even if it was Halloween and they were all grown up now.
"Not bad, not bad at all," Phoebe complimented her fellow witches.
"Could say the same about yourself Phoebe," Prue complimented, looking her sister up and down.
"Thank you, thank you," the youngest Halliwell spun around like a model on a runway, soaking in the praise. Until Prue looked at her feet and suddenly exclaimed, "Are those my shoes?!"
"It's one night Prue," Phoebe huffily retorted, falling back into the role of little and big sisters.
"Let it go Prue," Piper mediated. "Besides, who do you think she borrowed that dress from anyway?"
Seeing that she couldn't very well complain when Piper had clearly already given Phoebe something of hers, she let it go and turned back to enjoying the evening. "OK, fine, but don't you dare ruin those shoes little missy!" she warned her sister.
Phoebe smiled radiantly at the eldest and promised to do so, spinning around, enjoying the feeling of being supremely beautiful for a night. Not that she wasn't always hot, she knew, but she rarely got to show off like dressing up could do. It was nice to be beautiful. Just every once in a while.
During her spin, she noticed something out of the corner of her eye and went to investigate it, just as there was a honk from a car horn outside.
"Oh, that must be Andy," Prue excitedly gushed.
"They better not have ruined everything," Piper was angrily muttering under her breath, but Prue slapped her on the shoulder and snapped at the middle child, "Stop worrying about it!" Then they went to the door, but before they got there they realized the Phoebe had disappeared on them.
"Phoebe?" Prue called out. "That's Andy! Time to go!"
"I'm in here," they heard her from the sun room.
When they saw that she wasn't rushing to join them, they both decided to go and get her themselves. Then they noticed her standing in the middle of the room, staring down at a white speaker box that was just sitting on the coffee table. Confused, they joined her at the table and looked down at the box for a couple seconds before Prue lost patience and asked point blank, "Phoebe? What are you doing?"
"Wondering where this thing came from. You think Andy left it here by mistake?" she asked.
"Probably, we can ask him about it, since he's here. C'mon, we've got to get to the party already," Prue hastily reminded her.
"Right, right," Phoebe shook herself out of the funk staring at the box had put her in. She couldn't quite explain why she'd been staring at it so intently. She just got this funny feeling from it, almost like, like . . . like a premonition waiting to happen.
Frowning in confusion at that thought, Phoebe let her curiosity get the better of her and reached down and touched the top of the speaker box, and then gasped aloud as the premonition took hold of her.
/Prue, Piper and Phoebe all standing around the box as they were, seeming to be listening to it.
The sisters in the middle of a big fight, only they were all in leather and each were fighting with martial arts that Phoebe couldn't even begin to do yet. They were fighting ordinary humans, but there was a few demons there too and they seemed to be using their powers in conjunction with their amazing martial arts.
Andy standing next to the sisters as they watched several businessmen being carted away in police cars.
Piper climbing up the side of a building on a wire. Prue dressed up undercover as she took photographs of someone who was obviously a criminal. Phoebe seducing some guy into giving her something while she pick-pocketed what she was really after.
All three of them running away from an explosion, just narrowly escaping.
And finally a shadowy image of three women, not the sisters, standing next to each other, an emotion connecting them so they seemed just as close, if not closer than all the sisters, all in the shadow of one man./
"Whoa," Phoebe whispered after the powerful vision finally let her go.
"Phoebe!" Prue shouted, "What is it?"
"Not more demons?" Piper almost wailed.
"No, not demons," Phoebe breathlessly answered, staring avidly at the speaker box now.
Confused by this, Piper and Prue stared at it themselves. And at that precise moment, their grandfather clock began to chime the hour. 6 o'clock.
A wave of magic and chaos swept over the house, the energy actually amplified to a degree by the Nexus beneath the house and the interlacing combination of the sisters' magic. Small bolts of electricity passed over the speaker box as the nexus-enhanced wave of chaos magic extended far past Southern California, reaching out to a remote location where only one man lived.
"Good Evening Angels," the speaker box, now suddenly plugged in, spoke.
"Hi Charlie!" the Charmed Ones all happily gushed.
"Sorry girls, I just stepped out for a minute," Andrew Bosley apologized as he stepped into the manor, joining the sisters in the sun room.
"That's OK Bosley," Prue smiled at their fellow detective.
"Well, since were all here," Charles Townsend, via the speaker box, spoke to his employees, "I'm afraid I have another case for you Angels."
"But Charlie, it's Halloween!" Piper whined.
"I'm sorry Piper, and normally I would have let some of the other Angels handle it, but it's incredibly urgent and it's happening right in your area," Charlie apologized.
"That's OK Charlie," Prue glared at her sister, silently saying 'What the Hell are you doing?!' "What's the case?"
"It may sound like a cake walk Angels, but I'm afraid there's more to it than at first glance, otherwise I wouldn't have brought it to /your/ attention," Charlie explained, causing the sisters to exchange a knowing glance. Only Charlie knew they were witches, and not just any witches, but the most powerful triad in centuries, the Charmed Ones. Not even Bosley knew.
"A businessman by the name of Koga Shuko is throwing a Halloween party tonight at the plaza. Among the guest list are some of the lesser-known but still notorious mafia and black market leaders of the entire world. Including representatives of a rather infamous law firm known by the name Wolfram&Hart. The unusual thing about this however, is one person that should not be on this guest list."
"Who is it?" Phoebe asked.
"Up and coming Assistant District Attorney for the city of San Francisco, Cole Turner, a straight arrow by all accounts. It may be that he's already been corrupted and no one has caught him at it yet, or . . ."
"Or they're going to try to buy him tonight," Prue finished the thought.
"Precisely," Charlie agreed. "Angels, I can't stress enough how dangerous this could become, but we need to know if Turner is dirty or not. If he is, there are steps I can take to have him removed from office or watched so that he can take us to the big sharks. For right now though, the mission is strictly reconnaissance. Stick to Cole Turner like glue and watch his every move. And be careful. Bosley has all of the details you'll need, but there's the possibility that anything could happen, including . . . demon involvement. In fact with Wolfram&Hart representatives there, I'd daresay you can count on it."
"We'll go prepared Charlie," Piper promised.
"Good. Because the party starts in less than an hour. Have fun Angels," Charlie signed off.
"I'll start making potions," Piper hurried off to the kitchen.
"I'll look over the plans with Bosley," Prue started to say, but Phoebe was right behind her, slapped her on the back of the head and glared at her older sister.
"/I'll/ look over the plans with Bosley/you/ get all of the equipment we'll need," she glared, causing the eldest Halliwell to blush at being caught. They all knew she had a crush on Bosley. Though for some reason the name 'Andy' kept reverberating through their heads.
"Fine, fine, I'll get the gear," Prue said as she walked off.
"Show me what we've got Boz," Phoebe turned to their detective friend.
/Shuko Public Convention building/
/Downtown San Francisco/
/7:08 P.M./
"Everyone ready?" Prue asked under her breath as she and Phoebe stepped up to the guarded entrance to the building. There were a few press still around, but the majority had either already gone inside or left as the big wigs were all already inside.
Prue and Phoebe, still in their dresses from earlier, had put themselves on either arm of Andrew Bosley, or Special Investigator Andy Trudeau for the evening, and were bringing the scene back to life as once-bored photographers now came back to the life capturing the images of two drop-dead gorgeous brunettes on the arm of an equally handsome and important looking man.
"As I'll ever be," came Piper's voice from the specially-issued molar mikes.
Where Prue and Phoebe were going in the front door and making a fair amount of 'distracting noise', Piper was going in through the side, specifically with the already in-place caterer, and working herself in with the staff. A mole basically, capable of following the target even if he left the party.
"Name," the head guard at the door stopped them, like they were going into a club or something.
"Trudeau," Bosley smoothly replied with a cocky grin on his face, "Special Investigator Trudeau. We're here for the party."
"Invite only," the guard replied with a stony, almost cold glare.
"Oh," Phoebe suddenly giggled, leaning /way/ forward, almost presenting her cleavage forth to the security, "You mean these?"
The guard stared and gulped for a second until Phoebe pulled out three embroidered cards from her dress/bra and handed the specially crafted and made-less-than-an-hour-ago invitations to the man. He accepted them, still openly staring, then barely glanced at the cards, before turning back to Phoebe, (or rather her boobs), and then over to Prue who was presenting herself on display just as much. "Everything looks in order," the security agent dumbly handed Andy back the invitations, unable to tear his eyes off of Prue and Phoebe's "charms" for a second, and waved them on through.
None of the other guards at the door even bothered questioning them again, glad to have some eye-candy that wouldn't get them and their families killed for looking too long or not long enough, and if the boss was letting them through, then they must be good enough to go on.
"Too. Easy," Phoebe grinned at her eldest sister.
"Yeah, well, now comes the slightly more difficult part," Prue pointed out as they made it into the party.
"Only slightly?" Bosley trailed off as they came face-to-face, so to speak, with the world's most dangerous, deadliest, and most powerful criminals, a few lawyers from Hell, and then with Wolfram&Hart, the lawyers that worked /for/ Hell.
"Yeah," this time it was Prue who was grinning broadly, "only slightly."
It took them only a few minutes to spot their target and immediately after they separated, Bosley going to hobnob and distract the Host of the festivities, while the sisters came in at three different directions on Cole Turner. He was actually speaking with the representative from Wolfram&Hart, a Holland Manners, but it only took Phoebe walking by, almost right under his nose, to end that little obstacle.
"Excuse me Holland," Cole said, handing the man his drink, his head and eyes turning to follow Phoebe, "I'll have to get back to you on that," and then he walked off, trying to follow the witch through the crowd, not that he knew she was a witch at that moment.
Phoebe knew the moment she'd caught her fish, and moving lithely and quickly with an almost supernatural grace, danced around the other party goers while Cole seemed to be hitting, bumping into, or shoving aside everyone inbetween him and Phoebe. Finally, he lost sight of her for but a moment, but the moment was all she needed to angle back out of his line of vision, while keeping him steady in hers. She nodded to her sister and Prue moved in.
Cole was confused and frustrated as the gorgeous woman he'd seen disappeared and he was stuck in a crowd of the lowest filth humanity had to offer, which actually made him feel right at home, and seeing no trace of the stunning creature, gave up and went back to the bar to get himself as drunk as his demonic side could allow. Which, given even demons occasionally got drunk, was actually pretty damn drunk.
After he'd downed his first drink, he was momentarily stunned for a second time as /another/ breath-taking brunette appeared almost right in front of him, although he didn't feel quite the same pull for her that he'd felt for the first one.
"Hi there," Prue greeted him with a seductive smile as she reached around him to get her own drink.
Surprised at the forward moves of the gorgeous brunette in the body-molding silk dress, Cole could only stare in fascination as she bent over just right so that each and every one of her supremely feminine curves were displayed just for him at close range. Gulping, Cole downed the drink in his hand faster than he'd gotten it and simply counted his proverbial blessings for being in his current position.
Prue gave her parting shot, namely the look that her sister's had nicknamed the 'Mankiller' for all the attention and boyfriends it had gotten her in High School, a smoky-eyed, cocky smirk that promised just as much as it suggested and more. Walking away she saw out of the corner of her eye Cole getting another drink and immediately chasing after her.
"Houston, we have lift off," she whispered to her sisters and Bosley, maneuvering herself through the crowd with expert ease.
"Piper, bag and tag if you please," Phoebe requested as she hooked back up with Bosley.
With a grin, now in her "borrowed" waitress uniform, which thankfully was a pant-suit with blouse instead of any fetish kind of gear, Piper moved in to intercept Cole as he chased Prue through the crowd. Just on the edge of the room, near to where the restrooms were, the two intercepted, which is to say crashed into one another. Thankfully Cole wasn't yet drunk enough to go sprawling over everything, but between chasing beautiful women and as many drinks as he did have, he wasn't fully aware of Piper slipping the bugs, yes multiple listening devices and even a video camera, on him.
"Oh gawd, I am so, so, so sorry!" Piper fluttered and kept patting the man, keeping up the act of the extremely nervous waitress on her first night at a big party.
"It's OK, I'm OK," Cole kept trying to look over her head for either Phoebe or Prue, not that he knew their names, but seeing the ladies restroom nearby he finally gave up with a sigh and ultimately brushed the waitress, that hadn't actually spilled a drop of the drinks in her hand, off of him and went back to the party.
Piper watched him leave and gave a cold calculating look at his back. She moved her tray to the other hand and almost magically, Phoebe and Prue appeared directly behind her. With a glance and a casual toss, a passing waiter took the tray from her and the sisters went back into the ladies restroom, and from there upwards into a ventilation shaft.
With deft precision and the ease of long practice, they sisters all changed into the more comfortable 'fight gear', skintight black outfits that allowed free range of movement and hid several "toys" as well as being kevlar-level bulletproof. Once they made their way through the building's ventilation system into a currently empty office a floor up from the party, they pulled out the surveillance gear and started to watch Cole Turner's every move, making special notes whenever he came across someone of particular import.
"Well, everything seems innocent so far," Piper observed, making notes on all the infamous criminals they caught on the video screen. "Except for, y'know, Shuko hosting a party with all of /these/ people, if you can call them people, as the guests."
"We've known Shuko was dirty for a while, just never been able to prove much of it," Phoebe pointed out. "And as much as I hate to admit it, we still can't prove anything. Throwing a party with a bunch of /suspected/ arms dealers, drug lords, terrorists and worse is not a criminal offense. Though wearing that suit should be!" she snapped at the sight of a rather garishly dressed foreigner.
"He's still talking to that Holland Manners guy from Wolfram&Hart," Prue reported. "Most of it is legal jargon I can't make heads or tails of, but we've got the recordings so we can go back through it later I suppose."
"But I bet you can still quote them word for word," Phoebe remarked with a teasing grin. A grin that her sister freely returned, but still paying most of her attention to the equipment.
"Hey Bos, gotten yourself kicked out yet?" Piper asked over the radio.
"Still working on it actually," Bosley reported back, his voice hushed. "You girls got a bead on Shuko?"
"Don't try to 'arrest' him! We need you out of the party with a good excuse, not kicked in jail yourself, or worse!" Prue snapped back at him.
"Don't worry," the detective said back in 'that' tone. The sisters all rolled their eyes and sighed. Phoebe finally told him, "He's thirteen feet from the punch bowl. And if you're going to try the 'drunken fool' routine you'd better pick up a few drinks inbetween."
"Please, I'm not /that/ desperate!" Bosley protested, but was oddly silent after that.
"Whose going?" Prue asked immediately after.
Together the three held out their right fist, bounced them in the air three times and on the third made a sign with their fist, Prue and Piper holding their hands and fingers flat, Phoebe making a V with her pointer and middle fingers.
"Ha!" Phoebe triumphed and moving faster than her sisters could begin to protest, crawled back into the ventilation network, though her destination wasn't the 1st floor ladies restroom, but somewhere where she could go to watch over Bosley.
"Think she cheated?" Prue asked half a minute later, the majority of her attention still on the surveillance equipment.
"What?" Piper responded, even more distracted as she was trying to crack the security system, should they need it.
"Phoebe!" Prue exclaimed. "Do you think she cheated?"
"How?"
"Hello? She's a psychic!"
"Her premonitions don't work that way!" Piper replied, beginning to get annoyed.
"Yeah, but . . . !"
"Prue! Drop it!"
Prue sulked for a moment or two, but kept her attention on the surveillance equipment and keeping track of Cole Turner.
Bosley's plan, as it happened, did just happen to be the "drunken fool" routine, and even as he downed glass after glass of champagne and wine and alcohol on his way towards Shuko, he kept wracking his brain for any /other/ plan that could possibly work at the moment. Unfortunately he was coming up short, until he saw something out of the corner of his eye on the wall that struck him with inspiration.
"Bosley, I know that look, what are you thinking?" Phoebe's voice came through the molar mike.
"I'm thinking a little . . . friendly competition between me and Mr. Shuko," the detective answered with a sly undertone. "Check out the south wall," he added.
Phoebe was silent for a few seconds, but when her voice came back it was with the same slyness his held, "Ohohoho/nice/! You want Prue to record it for posterities sake?"
"Thank you but no," Bosley retorted, "And if this gets into the scrapbook, I'm seriously considering giving you three a spanking."
"Good luck!" Phoebe replied with a laugh.
"Thanks, I'm gonna need it," he said just before he got to Shuko.
The man was a few inches shorter than Bosley himself, and had strange white hair, with dark bangs and a black goatee. Even stranger was that he was wearing shades inside, and at night, although the lights were rather bright inside the room. He wore a solid-black suit, and had a couple of intimidating body guards on either side of him. Even more strangely, they were dressed like kendo-samurai, all in black as well.
"Oh, well hello there," the salt'n'peppered businessman greeted Bosley as the detective walked up.
Immediately dispensing with the 'drunken fool' plan, Bosley straightened himself out and smiled politely at the man and gave a small, courteous bow before holding out his hand and introducing himself under his guise for the evening, "Mr. Shuko. An honor to meet you. Andrew Trudeau, SFPD."
"Ah, yes," Koga Shuko drawled, not taking his eyes off of the detective for an instant. "My Security people told me you'd arrived. I'm so glad you could make it. No problems I hope?"
"Nothing I couldn't handle," Bosley smoothly replied.
"Smooth Boz," Phoebe 'silently' remarked. He just smiled slyly in return.
"This is an amazing party I must admit," Bosley said to Shuko, turning to take in the entire room, taking a champagne glass from a passing waitress as he did so. He downed it in one gulp.
Shuko smirked, like he knew a secret and answered, "Thank you, thank you very much. Trudeau? Special Investigator Trudeau? Don't you work with SFPD's SIU?"
Bosley smiled easily and shook his head and answered, "No, I'm afraid you have me confused with someone else. I do happen to know Captain Bridges though, but I'm down at the 23rd street department, he's down by the Bay."
"Right, right, of course," Shuko laughed easily, though he seemed to be no longer amused by Bosley's presence.
"I noticed your wall," the detective pointed.
Shuko smirked condescendingly, until he glanced and his eyes filled with something . . . competitive.
"Do you fence Inspector?" Shuko 'innocently' questioned.
"I can take a stab at it," he replied, stumbling slightly as he downed another champagne glass.
The look on Shuko's face was pure predator as he took Bosley by the shoulders and lead him away.
"He's taking the bait," Phoebe reported over the radio.
"And Turner's still talking with that lawyer from Wolfram&Hart," Prue reported back.
"What 'about' now?" Piper asked.
Prue frowned in concentration for a moment, and then her eyes went wide as she listened more carefully, instead of just allowing the words to flow through her mind.
"Your kidding! Holland, some times you guys really crack me up!" Cole laughed, taking a sip of his drink.
"Hopefully not literally," the Wolfram&Hart lawyer laughed along with his fellow lawyer. "But seriously Cole, what has the Source got planned for you? Assistant /District Attorney/? The one /prosecuting/ and /punishing/ the wicked? Please, that's not in you Turner, otherwise the Firm never would have offered you the job in the first place!"
"It's not for me to decide or place judgment on the /Source's/ decisions. And don't look at me like that Holland. I'm not stupid, or as naïve as all your new recruit hick lawyers trying to make it in the Big City. I've done my share of digging, and once I have confirmation, I plan on going and asking the Source directly, but until then, I'm keeping all my ducks in a row, if you know what I mean," Cole finished off his drink.
"What the hell!?" Prue exclaimed.
"What? What is it?" Piper demanded, getting up and going over to Prue and the monitoring equipment.
Quickly, her eyes flashing back and forth, rolling around in her head as she went over every word of the conversation she'd been listening to and memorizing. She quickly discovered the pattern that had lead to the conversation she'd just paid closest attention to and turned wide-eyed and scared to her sister.
"He's a god-damned fucking DEMON!!" she screeched.
"What? Who?" Piper was lost.
"The target! Him! Turner! Cole Turner is a /demon/! And he's the fucking District Attorney!"
"Phoebe!" Piper screeched into the molar mikes, "Get Boz out of there! Now! Turner's already been compromised! Get out of there! We're done!"
"On it!" came the urgent reply as Phoebe quickly slipped back down through the ventilation shaft to where she could get to Bosley as quickly as possible and get them both out alive.
Meanwhile, Prue and Piper were packing up everything as fast as humanly possible, and in a couple moments faster as they used magic to assist where they could and then raced out of the office for the primary extraction point. A little more messy than they'd planned to, but then again hardly any mission ever goes according to plan.
"And then he said, 'See you in Hell!' and I said back, 'Be sure to save me a seat to Friday night's opera'!" Holland began laughing, Cole joining him, apparently finding it funny.
Thankfully at that moment, Holland's cell phone rang and he cut off short and answered, "Holland."
He listened for several moments, all humor leaving his face and the beginnings of a scowl of anger.
"Holland?" Cole asked, not really concerned but curious. "Everything all right?"
The Wolfram&Hart lawyer slammed his phone shut and gave Cole a cold glare. "No. Someone was just spying on us, and the security system I have in place backfired. Someone with /very/ powerful wards and protection spells, not to say the least of incredibly advanced resources, was just listening in on our conversation for the past half hour." Holland then roughly reached out to Cole's lapel and tore off the bug Piper had placed there earlier, holding it up for the half-demon to see.
"Shit!" Cole cursed, taking the bug from the lawyer.
"Who knows what kind of information they've already gotten!" Holland was furious.
"Oh relax," Cole snapped, "The bug was on me, it was me they're after. I'm the assistant district attorney, remember? And this is the party of the year in the den of snakes, somebody obviously got curious about me and wanted to find out just how dirty I was. Shit, this means I'm going to have to get a new identity!"
"Now wait, it may not be that bad," Holland tried to console the demon.
"Oh don't patronize me Holland!" he nearly yelled.
"Well, either way," the lawyer said as he brought his phone back up, "we're going to take care of it right now. Hello? Security? I need a tactical unit at the plaza right now."
Meanwhile, over in a private room set aside off of the main show room, set up like a small karate dojo, or gym, Bosley and Shuko were facing off in personal combat, with a few spectators around from the party to take bets.
Both were dressed up in full fencing practice padding and held the capped fencing swords. Facing each other, they bowed, once, and held their weapons in ready position. Then at a signal from Shuko, they both charged, yelling and crossed swords. This happened several times, each man displaying impressive strength, resilience, and skill.
Finally, it all went down to experience in the end, and Shuko was just far too skilled for Bosley who barely knew what he was doing in the first place.
When it was over, despite the fact that he was a "cop", Shuko was laughing and clapping him on the back and congratulating him for actually giving the reclusive, and dirty, millionaire a decent workout. Bosley just grinned and took the compliments and jives without complaint or comment, instead just grateful when Shuko finally let him go without throwing him into the back alley for his samurai bodyguards' practice.
He was a little disturbed however when the Angels didn't answer his attempts to hail them, and got downright worried when he saw the target, Turner, standing next to the Wolfram&Hart lawyer as they argued over something while the latter spoke into a cell phone. Worry turned into outright fear when he noticed Phoebe signaling him to get the hell out of Dodge and rendezvous at the escape route. He quickly made his way to the back of the building, making extra sure to avoid Shuko and some of the more notorious names at the party, silently thanking Charlie for that all-expense-paid-for training expedition to Japan in ninja and samurai arts.
Once he was out back, he almost breathed a sigh of relief, until the tire-squeals started and the black vans tore down the alley, surrounding the building on all fronts, save the public one that is. "Shit," he cursed and started running for the secondary rendezvous, "Angels, Wolfram&Hart just made us!" he screamed into the molar mike as he ran for the high ground, bursting back into the building and racing up the stairs.
Roughly about the time that he was hitting the third floor, 10 seconds after he'd made his announcement, he heard back over the mike, "Uh, yeah Boz, we know. Thanks," Piper sarcastically remarked.
/A couple minutes before/
"Pheebs, where are you?" Prue whisper-screamed into the air as she and Piper scrambled through the ventilation shafts of the Shuko building.
"Right here," came the whispered reply as Phoebe suddenly appeared from an adjacent shaft, scrambling alongside her sisters now.
"What took you?" Piper sarcastically remarked.
"I had to change again," Phoebe whined, gesturing at her all-black form-fitting outfit, suited to combat and infiltration, as was the clothing her sisters were wearing.
"No time," Prue stopped the playful teasing, "Bosley's headed to the extraction point, we need to get to the secondary."
The crawled on in silence for several more seconds, before Phoebe stopped them. "What is it?" her sisters asked together.
"Do you smell that?" she asked, wrinkling her nose.
As one, the turned to look behind them to see an ugly green-colored gas coming up through the vents.
"Move!" Piper, the last back, quietly urged.
Without wasting useless energy on panic, the trio simply, and quickly, began advancing their progress much faster, making efficient, almost professional movements in their crawling dash. When they got to the end of the horizontal line, without hesitation, as the gas was slowly gaining on them, Prue, in the lead, leaped up the metal passage, holding herself steady by spreading her arms and legs on either side of the duct, caterpilling to make her progress, Phoebe and Piper mimicking when they came to the new turn.
With scant feet between them and the edge of the no doubt toxic gas, the Charmed Angels finally made it to their secondary escape point, the air conditioning unit on the roof. The ducts had widened enough for all three of them to be together, but with only seconds to spare, they weren't wasting time on hugs good bye. While Phoebe and Piper came abreast, bracing themselves, they linked their arms together, while Prue climbed right above them.
Nodding to each other, trust and sisterly-love shining in their eyes, Prue dropped down, her sisters catching her on their arms before they immediately reversed the momentum and launched their sister up and out of the ventilation shaft. Almost as an afterthought, literally at the last second before the gas could have begun to caress the feet of her sisters, Prue used her magical gift of telekinesis to 'pull' her sisters up after her, launching all three of them up and out of the building into the night air.
Unfortunately, Phoebe and Piper's own powers do not include super strength, and Prue's own gift is limited in its own ways, so rather than fly to safety all on their own, they were still going to land on the roof of the Shuko building, although in demonstration of phenomenal gymnastic talent, the three, aptly named, Angels spun around in the air, twisting their bodies to control the motion of their fall, as well as granting them a full overhead view of the entire roof, so that when they finally landed, they did so standing next to each other and in fighting stances that allowed their bodies to comfortably absorb the impact of their landing. All of which was a very good thing as they were surrounded by a virtual army of dark SWAT-armor clad men with guns, and just happened to have a patch on their shoulders that displayed W&H.
Five seconds after they landed, and the Wolfram&Hart Security Force recognized that the trio of beautiful brunettes were the 'intruders' they were sent there to identify and terminate, the Angels heard through their communicators, Bosley shouting for them that they'd been made by Wolfram&Hart.
"Uh, yeah Boz, we know. Thanks," Piper sarcastically remarked.
"Hiya boys," Phoebe coyly winked at the armed thugs all around them, "Can we do something for you?"
"Come in quietly for questioning," a guy that looked to be the one in charge, sarcastically remarked.
"Yeah, sorry, no," Prue remarked.
The guy just shrugged and made a gesture that brought all the guns up and pointing at the three brunettes in the center. None of the armed goons said a word nor made a move that their commander didn't order. Quite impressive, but not exactly an easy situation for our heroes to get out of.
"Do we really have to do this?" Piper asked, "I mean, you don't even know who we are, we could be anyone."
"That's why we want to take you in for questioning," the commander lazily replied.
"Ah," Piper winced at the logic.
The sisters shared a look, a plan of action and commitment to that action debated and agreed upon in the space of a single second, before Prue shouted, "Now!" and the Charmed Angels exploded into action.
Piper froze the entire group, and was surprised to discover that there were several high-class demons in the mix. With a gesture, she kept the humans frozen and the demons free to move, while Prue targeted those unfrozen with her telekinetic powers. Phoebe concentrated on casting a spell that would either disable W&H's guns, or make her and her sisters immune to bullets.
Many of the demons on the roof, a few vampires, but mostly Fyarl, Hunter, and Qu'lok demons, all big, strong, stupid, your perfect minion-type demon, went flying at the explosion of Prue's power. Those that could be hurt and killed through such methods, broke necks or spines on impact, while few of them got back up, they were all heavily injured, but most importantly, they were disarmed, their weapons having gone flying in opposite directions with them.
Piper, leaving the humans frozen for the moment, turned to help Phoebe with reciting the bullet-proof spell they had come up with on the fly, providing more power to the shield that now surrounded them, which would stop bullets mid-air before hitting them, and would disable any guns that might be fired from within the shield. Of course fists, and other physical objects and attacks could break through, but they weren't too worried about that aspect of the fight. Especially not Phoebe.
"Witches!" one of the demons suddenly screamed.
"All the demons die," Prue announced with cold certainty.
Phoebe removed a couple of athame, blessed knives, to use against the demons, while Prue proceeded to use her telekinetic power to completely pummel and knock all the demons around like rag dolls. Piper, when it was convenient for one of her sisters, Prue to smash, Phoebe to slash, froze one or a group of demons at a time. With brutal, cold, and surprisingly quick efficiency, the Charmed Ones completely obliterated all of the demons, until only the human contingent of Wolfram&Hart Security Forces was left.
Once the demons were taken care of, the girls turned to face their human enemies, briefly considering just walking away and leaving them like that, but Phoebe soon pointed out the flaw that that would reveal to Wolfram&Hart that they're witches. And potentially much worse, it could lead them to clues that would reveal their true identities of Prue, Piper, and Phoebe Halliwell as the Charmed Ones, guaranteeing them no peace for the future.
"So what should we do with them?" Piper finally put to her sister.
"What do we always do with them?" Phoebe asked with a slightly manic grin.
"Humiliate them?" Prue answered with her own growing grin.
"Beat them into submission?" Piper answered.
"Totally and utterly defeat them," Phoebe nodded in agreement with her sisters at her own answer.
"Besides, we've got Bosley on the way to help 'save' us. We can't just leave them standing here frozen. Only Charlie knows about us, and I'd like to keep it that way," Prue put the final nail in the coffin of their agreement to finish the fight with Wolfram&Hart.
Ironically, it was just as Bosley was breaking through the door to the roof from the stairs that the girls got back 'into position' that Piper's freeze finally wore off. Thankfully, between Bosley breaking in and the girls charging forward, there was too much confusion for the commander to figure out that half his forces, his demon half, had disappeared.
The fight went three ways after that, four if you want to count Bosley fighting along the edges taking on stragglers and the cowards that ran away from the vicious vixens fighting and defeating them all. Prue went head on, straight for the Commander while Piper went to the left and Phoebe to the right. There was plenty of action to go around for all.
"Now, where were we?" Prue mocked her opponent before throwing a left hook across his face.
The man scowled at her, apparently not amused, and made to shoot her point-blank, only to realize all of his guns, and clips of ammunition, were missing. Deepening his scowl, he matched her fighting stance, bouncing lightly on the soles of his feet, allowing him to move, to dodge or attack, quickly in any direction.
The two quickly fell into a pattern of attacking and defending with hard-hitting punches and high-flying kicks, all delivered with brutal force and expert skill. Prue would duck under a haymaker, the Security Commander would jump up over her sweeping kick in the same move. He would land a devastating uppercut to her head, she would send him flying back with cracked ribs from a bone-jarring flying dragon kick to the chest. She made sure, however, to not use so much as a glimmer of magic against him.
Piper, likewise, limited herself to purely physical means of defending herself, unwilling to even make a gesture that could freeze her bad guys or give away their status as witches. Where Prue was a balance of fists and feet, with more karate and basic self-defense influences thrown in, Piper was all about the weak points and striking only when necessary and when there was an opening. She almost flowed around her enemies' attacks like water, or better, like a snake, dodging, waiting, and striking. As it was, her opponents did not last very long against her, falling to the ground, groaning in pain from both injuries and pressure-point pains that she had inflicted upon them.
Phoebe, however, was all about the kicks and flying feet, flipping this way and that rather than simply dodge one way or the other to avoid enemy attacks. Phoebe's style reflected greatly upon Crane-style Kung Fu, the newly discovered movie-martial-art Wire Fu, (just amazingly enough without the wires or the lack of injury), kickboxing, Muay Thai, and military style self-defense training. And while her opponents didn't get back up, same as Piper's, quite a few more of them went flying all over the rooftop, or off to the sidelines for Bosley to finish up with a sharp, hard punch to KO them for the rest of the night.
Prue's battle, between directly fighting the leader, and occasionally knocking down and out a passing soldier, was a bit more intense and complicated, as she was the more balanced fighter of her sisters, her skill set more keyed to power than speed or overall skill. Therefore she was having the most trouble, and of course that put her directly in the center of the worst of the fighting.
She would block a high blow from him, and then turn in a roundhouse to fell somebody trying to blindside her, before continuing on around to block another attack from the commander. Then it would practically repeat every other second as the security forces started to swarm around the eldest Halliwell, distracting her further from her fight with their leader, and allowing him more chances to attack.
He struck her across the face with a backhand, knocking her back a step. She retaliated with a kick to two nearby minions, sending them careening out of control into their commander. They recovered quickly, and made to charge her, all three at the same time. Before they could however, Prue leaped up in a leap that only Phoebe had been displaying so far, and roundhouse kicked all three back to the ground in a moaning heap.
Phoebe had two soldiers by the arms, bent back at uncomfortable angles, and was using them as a shield against further opponents, and striking with lightning-fast kicks across her rear. Finally, fed up with totting them around, she flipped them to the rooftop and made sure they stayed there with a quick split-kick, flipping herself up and doing the splits mid-air before landing her feet on their chests, the rest of her not even touching the ground. After that, the rest of her opponents became rather scarce, willing to help out their commander than face a woman that could do a move like that.
Piper didn't bother with impressive feats or display of skill, instead just making sure her enemies stayed where she put them, down. They would take a swing at her, she would block with her forearms, twist to the side, or duck under their reach before getting behind them, or close to their side and then she would attack with a flurry of fists and fingers, attacking their pressure points and weak spots, making them cry out in agony as they dropped from their feet.
Bosley just clubbed them over the head or cold-cocked'em with a solid punch whenever he could.
When it was all said and done, the Angels, and Bosley, were standing over a rooftop of Wolfram&Hart Security, all over the "security" knocked cold, or worse in the demon cases, and the commander being put down with a sleeper hold from Prue.
"So, uh, do we still want to get away . . . this way?" Phoebe asked once the tough stuff was taken care of.
"What do you mean?" Prue asked, annoyed. "You want to go to the /third/ route?"
"Ugh, no!" Phoebe made a face at her sister and continued, "Like I'd ever willingly go through the sewers as opposed to hang-gliding at night in downtown San Francisco. No, I meant that are we sure we should still be trying to get away."
"Are you kidding me?" Piper nearly screamed at her sister.
"Well, we have managed, technically speaking, to not blow our cover," Bosley pointed out. "Yet."
"Think about it," Phoebe protested. "There's a great party going on downstairs."
"Filled with murderers, crime lords, thieves, lawyers, and the scum of the Earth!" Prue argued back.
"Exactly," the youngest sister smiled knowingly.
"Uh oh, I know that look," Bosley whimpered.
"Oh c'mon!" she whined when the looks of dread formed on her sisters' faces.
"All right," Prue finally gave way after a full two seconds of Phoebe-puppy-dog-face, "what are you thinking?"
Phoebe squealed with delight and quickly filled them in on what she wanted to do. After she was done, both her sisters and Bosley shared her evil-grin and were looking forward to the execution of such a plan.
"Is there a problem here gentlemen?" Koga Shuko asked as he walked up to the grim-faced pair of Cole Turner and Holland Manners. "It's Halloween, of all my guests this evening, I'd figured you two would be in the best of spirits, given the holiday."
"Actually, we tend to stay in on Halloween," Cole vaguely remarked, while Holland scowled into his cell phone.
"Is there a problem?" Shuko politely asked.
"Somewhat," Holland rudely answered.
"Somebody put a bug on me. I'm sure you can imagine why, but Holland wanted to take care of it personally. Now it seems that the Security force he sent in has broken off contact. Nothing to worry about, I'm sure," Cole informed their host, his usual calm, which was unusual in itself given what he'd just said and the circumstances that he'd described.
"Turner, shut up," Holland snapped and started dialing a new number.
Several moments later though, the entire party came to a crashing end as the lobby was filled with the reflected flashing blue and red lights of a number of cop cars just outside the building. Somebody, apparently, had called the police.
There was a lot of confusion, and a bit or two of panic, rifling through the crowd, so Shuko, being an honorable host, quickly took charge and calmed everybody down while stepping forward personally to speak with the police officers.
Of course it all went to hell in a hand basket when the police announced that there had been a call that there had been a murder at the party, and unfortunately, none of the arriving police officers were on Shuko's, or anyone's at the party really, payroll, so when a dead human body was found hanging in the freezer in the kitchens, Shuko knew that this entire mess was a set up of some kind.
Of course it had to get worse, and it did, when none other than Special Investigative Unit Lead Investigator Detective Nash Bridges showed up less than half an hour after the first police cars showed up, along with a fully awake, and clean Judge on speed dial, more than willing and able to write a shitload of warrants for all kinds of things when it became necessary.
Across the street, in a shadowy cove where no one could see them, especially against the glare of all the police lights flashing everywhere, the Angels and Bosley watched with approval and smug looks as Shuko and his pit of vipers were all put under a very thorough microscope just because a dead body had been found inside the building. And though it might eventually be discovered that the body died of natural causes and used to be a street bum named Hobo, in the meantime, every single one of Shuko's "guests" would be subpoenaed and forced to remain in the city while the police did a /thorough/ investigation of the scene and the party.
After a few minutes of Shuko, and several of his guests, being "escorted" to "answer some questions", the heroes of the evening gave themselves a few pats on the back and then headed back to the manor, confident in their good deed for the evening, as well as that Charlie would take care of Cole Turner in the long run.
Once they were back safely at their ancestral home, the sisters relaxed and changed back into their costumes for the evening, planning to party what remained of the night away. After that, they had Bosley ring up Charlie and reported the evenings events. Once they were done, Charlie congratulated them on a job well done.
"Congratulations Angels, on a job well done," the speakerbox recited.
"Thanks Charlie!" the Charmed Ones chorused, pleased with the praise.
"Not only did you find out some vital information about Cole Turner, but you managed to tie the hands of several very dangerous people, though I'm hesitant to call them people in the first place. As well as dirty Mr. Shuko's reputation a bit. At the very least, his guests will be far more hesitant in their dealings with him. Nice job Angels."
"Thanks Charlie," Prue accepted the compliment for all of them, and added, "But Bosley helped too. It was him who suggested we call Detective Bridges in."
"Well," Bosley waved off the praise like it was nothing.
"Good job Bosley. Good thinking on everyone's parts. Now there's one last thing I'd like to discuss," Charlie told them.
"What's that Charlie?" Phoebe asked.
At that precise moment, a few hundred miles away in the small hamlet of Sunnydale, several other key events were taking place. Events which would forever alter the course of human history from that moment onward.
Just after Phoebe asked her question, a . . . wave of energy went through the house, which was actually happening all over the globe. If the sisters were forced to describe it, it would have to be that it was like waking up from a dream only to find that your still dreaming and that the dream is really real life. Thus, they were all very confused for several minutes once the spell in Sunnydale was abruptly ended . . . with the after effect being made permanent by the Force of Chaos . . . as well as many other combined factors. Not the least of which was the fact that four subjects of the spell were atop an Elemental Nexus, a source of tremendous power, nor that three of them were the most powerful trinity of witches in the history of Magic.
Yet perhaps the most remarkable and startling change to remain permanent, other than the sisters and Andy having memories of entire lives different from their own, all centering around a single man, was that the white speaker box on the table remain plugged into the wall, and what was even more startling was the next words spoken.
"What just happened?" Charlie, Prue, Piper, Phoebe, and Andy all shouted at once.
Chaos is weird sometimes.
TBC . . . ?