Title: Loud And Clear
Author: Wicked R
Disclaimers: most characters and the universe belongs to the WB.
Rating: G.
Genre: romance/futurefic.
Summary/Set: Playground rivalry is becoming a dangerous activity for
Phoebe's son.
Pairing: Piper/Leo, Cole/Phoebe, Kyle/Paige.
Note: one of the occurrences in this fic is very similar to an idea
in one of Charmed Snow's fics, but I only realised that after I
finished this.
Phoebe arrived home to the manor to find her husband Kevin ironing
his shirts in preparation for the following week at work as the
personal assistant of the Dr. Louis Bass at Perigee Institution for
the research into sex offending. The way the not too tall, teddy bear
like man, stroked the material to get rid of some creases before he
put the hot iron on top of it, having the habit of performing the
chore naked on his top half to compensate for the heat and show his
well muscled and slightly hairy chest in the process always made her
smile at how cute the very manly guy was doing a traditionally female
house work. She launched her bag to land on the bed, while she
strolled towards Kevin to give him a spontaneous snuggle and kiss.
The middle aged fellow psychologist she met when she enrolled to
complete her PhD wasn't overly surprised by her actions, for sharing
these simple, pleasant interactions consisting of everyday kinda
things such as walking around the block after dinner, sharing
experiences while squeezing a hand across dinner had been quite
characteristical of their marriage, especially if they had an
argument a few days before. Both maturely keen on the maintenance of
the relationship for different reasons, they always made sure to make
love several time after a more serious argument to counteract for it.
Not that they had very many disagreements nowadays that they knew
each other's habits and reactions to almost anything, having set
limits of where they gave in to the wishes of one or the other, as it
was to be expected after five years of marriage. Apart from those
grumpy days that could happen to anyone, there was nothing wrong with
this couple, Phoebe could discuss her feelings with him, they took
time away from everything else especially to talk to each other, and
that mostly because they enjoyed it and not because they should,
making sure regualarly that they had expressed their love and respect
for one another. Kevin, being a few years older than Phoebe had
showed her a more companionate love where intimacy and sense of
commitment were strong, as opposed to the mainly romantic love she
was used to before, where her passion and intimacy was high, but she
didn't share enough experiences with her former partners to develop a
strong sense of commitment to them. Having his own interests and
hobbies, the human didn't suffocate her with his caring either,
giving way to her involvement with magic. He got a bit of a shock at
first when he realised that there was another demonic world he didn't
know about before, but ultimately he took it the same way as most
humans do. The less he knew about it all, the better. As if somehow
he could deny their existence by this behaviour.
Demons reacted to him a very similar way to his reaction to them, he
was of no interest to them and Phoebe could count on one hand the
number of times they had to even as much as protect him. She
approximated it with Victor's formal point of view, his denial
reminding her of how she was told her father was misunderstanding the
situation during her early years. Her whitelighter being Paige, there
was no risk there for Kevin, but her father didn't have to deal with
his little daughters having special abilities, while her two year old
son, Philip's powers were no bound.
The little boy had already possessed a feel for not practising
levitating objects while his dad was around, there was plenty of
occasion to mess around with magic while he was with his older
cousins Wyatt and Christopher, and Paige's three year old girl, Pat.
It was the simultaneous voice of Phil shouting and Pat's cry that
broke Phoebe's half serious foreplay, "I better go and see," she
retied the ribbon on the top of her blouse and rushed down the stairs
to the sunroom, that nowadays operated more like an in house crèche.
Paige had already orbed there, and she was taking Pat into her arms
to soothe her wailing, "Pat? What's wrong? Are you ok?" The blondie
locks shook her head, so her mother continued, "does it hurt
anywhere?"
"Here," sobbed the little girl, indicating her arm.
To the close look, there were red marks on it, but not too angry.
Paige cuddled her up, "it's okay. It will heal. What happened,
darling?" The little whitelighter pointed to her younger cousin and
her mother guessed, "was it Phil?"
"Yes."
"Levitating things into you again?" It was one of the terrible twos'
favourite pastime.
"No."
"No? Did he hit you? Come on sweetie, you are the older one."
"No."
"What then?"
"He did something naughty."
"I can see that. But what was it, honey?"
"It was scary," Pat cried, burying herself into her mother's
shoulders, who wasn't able to force one more word out of her.
Phoebe made a displeased face looking at her son, who was being in
the huff himself, only peeping up at his mother to see her reaction.
"Come here," Phoebe commanded him in her most kid on angry voice,
taking him by hand to the dining room, where she sat down with the
boy standing in front of her, "what did you do? You can show mummy. I
told you that it's dangerous to levitate some things cause they can
hurt people when you let go and they fall. Let me see what you did."
Phil raised his hand innocently, and Phoebe could see the
concentration on his face as he squeezed his palm. When he opened it,
there was a ping pong size fire ball on it, that disappeared the way
it came to life when he clapped his hands together. He smiled,
expecting his mother to be impressed and appreciate what he could do.
Right enough, Phoebe was more than impressed. She was so taken aback,
she couldn't move or speak for several seconds, making the child call
out for her. When she got herself together, she hugged him simply,
then stood up to go and face her husband. She will deal later with
explaining Phil what to do wit his new power. She switched on the
telly to find one of Phil's favourite cartoons and left him to hear
the only explanation that was feasible from Kevin's own mouth, that
he was a demon after all those years and all those pretences of him
not even knowing of the underworld's existence, "Phil just conjured
up a fire ball," she started with watery eyes, looking to the man
that went back to the ironing.
"You're joking, right?" Kevin said nonchalantly, not even taking his
eyes off his white shirt.
"What do you want from us?" Phoebe continued in a cold voice, "don't
tell me you have enough information about us now to finish us off,
but you happened to fall in love with me."
Kevin looked up now, seemingly interested, "don't tell me someone
used some stupid spell or potion on you that makes you insane. Piper!"
"Yeah, yeah, call Piper, she'll blow you up," Phoebe threatened.
"What?" Piper put her head into the room.
"Blow him up!" Phoebe ordered her.
"What?" Piper repeated in a confused voice.
"If he is human, you can't harm him. If he is demonic, he will be
vanquished."
"You think he got possessed?" Piper guessed, "we should probably use
some other method if you want her husband back."
"Just do it! Before he turns on us!"
"Sorry Kevin," Piper complied. It was best to sort potentially
demonic things out as soon as it was possible. Besides, she still had
to look at Wyatt's home work. To her complete and utter shock, her
brother in law disintegrated, but his particles didn't spread all
over the room, but came together once more to take their original
form and Cole stood in front of them, naked on top as he had been
before.
"Where is Kevin?" Phoebe asked angrily.
"I am Kevin."
"What did you do with him? How long has it been you?"
"All the time Phoebe. Remember, I'm a shapeshifter now."
"No, that can't be," her legs became weak, making Piper reach out for
her and lead her to the bed to sit down.
"I had to show you we could have a successful relationship."
"Get out!" Phoebe stood up and levitated to kick him in the face.
Cole licked his own blood away from his top lip, the assail leaving
no mark on him after the initial blood flow was wiped away. He
must've used illusions when he was seemingly harmed previously, he
even used the same tricks to make them believe he was healed by a
whitelighter once, "I know your angry," he started once more, "but we
did live together happily for quite a long time. It has to count for
something."
"I lived with an illusion!" Phoebe lifted her arms up in frustration,
and squeezed her eyes shot for a second, "oh, no," she stormed out
the room to ask Paige to orb her somewhere to be alone for a while.
"You could've helped us with some demons we had difficulties
vanquishing," Piper reproached Cole in the kitchen several hours
later after the family committee meeting accepted his presence until
Phoebe came back and decided upon his fate.
"Apart from giving away my cover, that would've attracted another
bunch of demons who want my head. There's still quite a high price on
it, not to mention the honour of being able to vanquish me, even if
temporarily. My popularity is on the rising," Cole said as if he was
mocking himself.
"Are you actually popular anywhere?" Leo said, in all factuality
taking pity on one of the most powerful demons of all times. The ex
whitelighter couldn't believe how he comforted himself with
readjusting himself to normal human life regularly going out for a
few drinks with his best pal, Kev when he felt bad about not being
able to help the girls anymore. In fact, Cole had the power, but as
opposed to him, the demon didn't have the heart of his chosen one, at
least not for a long time at any point.
"Life just never seems fair," Kyle added. His brother in law, who
posed as a psychologist has often helped him with professional advice
regarding his charges. Stubborn headed the young whitelighter was,
only a very sophisticated person could direct his actions and still
remain friends with him.
"Whatever Phoebe decides, I would like to stay incognito if you don't
mind," Cole stuck to discussing practical matters just now to avoid
thinking about the heartache Phoebe will most certainly cause him
again. He also had his son on his lap, cuddling him tight in fear
Phoebe will want to forbid him from seeing his son as well.
Phil smiled, not at all sure of what all the commotion was about. He
himself found it quite funny, laughing in hysterics sometimes as his
father shapeshifted into this new person, back, and into the new
person again.
"There's one thing I really wanna know," Phoebe said as she was orbed
back by Paige, "how can you consistently behave like a nice person?
Who are you? What's the real Cole like?"
"Both of what you have seen. If we stayed together, when we have
first married, I think our relationship would be very similar to what
we actually had when I was playing Kevin. I know that we were lacking
some ardour, but I couldn't risk showing strong emotions towards you,
cause that was what you disliked so much when I was trying to get you
back. I could should you how it would really be, but it takes time
and I'm not sure you are willing to give me any."
"You don't possess the power of mind reading do you?"
"What do you mean?"
"You know who I replaced you with in my mind most of the time we made
love? Sounds quite funny now. I substituted you with you."
"Does that mean you still want me?"
"Your deceit was probably the biggest you ever did on me. But I can
see that I didn't give you enough chance to prove yourself before.
Just one thing Cole. To the public eye, you should remain Kevin, but
could you be Cole in bed?"
The End.