Chosen, A New Chapter

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Author note: This story is a sequel to my story 'The Closing Chapter'.

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San Francisco, 2007

It was just like any other night for Helen York, a college history professor at the local community college. After having given classes all day, she had spent the evening helping organize the charity run for countries in development with a group of her students. The money they would raise would to go to a project that builds schools in poor African nations. Helen was a philanthropist at heart and spent much of her time and money in various charities. She had begun taken in interest after travelling to Africa as a college student as a graduate project.

Feeling a slight breeze in the autumn weather, Helen put down her briefcase and put on her coat. While she buttoned up, some of her students walked past her back to their dorm rooms.

"Goodnight, professor." One of the girls said.

"Goodnight girls, great work today. I'll see you tomorrow." Helen replied.

Helen picked up her briefcase and headed the other way, toward the parking lot. At this late time, the parking lot was mostly empty save for a few cars. One of the streetlight had been broken by a couple of drunken students and so half the parking lot was covered in darkness.

Feeling somewhat uncomfortable, Helen started walking a little quicker while reaching for her keys. Suddenly she heard something moving in the bushes behind her. She quickly turned around but couldn't see anything. A little scared, Helen rushed to her car. When she tried to open the door, she dropped the keys. Quietly cursing at herself, Helen bend down and reached under the car for her keys. When she found them, she got back up and saw a shadow moving toward her in the reflection of her car window. She turned around and saw it was a very tall man with ghostly white skin and dark eyes. He was bald and dressed in black. He didn't look human.

Helen screamed and tried to run, but her screams were silenced by a force pressing down her throat. She felt like she was being strangled, but when she tried to free her throat, she felt there was nothing there. Still the life was being squeezed out of her. Helen kneeled down and looked at the thing that was standing over her. He simply stared at her with his arm stretched out and his hand squeezing the air. It was like he was choking her from a distance.

Helen once again tried to get up and stumbled away. She was already starting to lose consciousness as the choke around her throat tightened. She fell against her car and looked in the window. She noticed a golden light around her, which was concentrating around her throat.

Helen tried to scream again but there was no sound. As she felt her life leaving her body, all she could think about was the fact that she wasn't ready to die. There were still people that needed her.

When Helen fell dead to the cold stone ground, the white-skinned man looked at her with a satisfied smile and walked away, disappearing in the shadows.

Xxx

When the alarm started buzzing, twenty-one year old Billie Jenkins slammed on it and turned around in bed, not ready to wake up just yet. Unfortunately her alarm clock was set on snooze so after a few minutes it started buzzing again. Reluctantly Billie sat up in bed and turned it off completely.

Another day of long boring classes was ahead of her. As a college junior, the young blonde had discovered that classes were a lot harder and more boring than the last two years of college combined. Not that she had been to a lot of classes as a freshman, though. That year she had been more busy with magic, something that was now no longer a part of her life. She was now a perfectly normal college student for almost an entire year now, and she liked it.

With all the bad memories, it had not been hard to leave magic behind and start a new life. Sometimes her nights were still filled with awful nightmares about her parents, the Triad or her sister Christy, but the nightmares were becoming less frequent as time moved on. She could even remember the last time she had one.

Still, her magical life had not been all bad. Despite the choices she made, she still had some amazing friends, who were still a part of her life and almost like a second family. Billie hadn't seen the Halliwell sisters in a few weeks, mostly because they all had busy lives. Piper was busy with the club and her two boys, Phoebe had just given birth to the most beautiful baby girl ever and Paige was orbing around to world to take care of her charges. Meanwhile Billie herself was busy with college as well.

After a quick shower, Billie headed to her first class of the day, but when she got there, she immediately noticed something was going on. Everyone was clearly upset and was talking about something horrible that had happened. Billie noticed her friend Abby standing by a group of girls and walked over to her.

"Hey Abby." Billie said. "What is going on?"

"Billie, haven't you heard?" Abby said shocked. "Professor York was murdered last night!"

"What? How? Why?" Billie called out.

Professor York was her history professor, she gave the most boring classes ever, but she was still a very friendly woman. She was always working for charity and tried to get as many students to help out as she could. Nobody deserves to be murdered, but she was the last person who would deserve it. She was practically a saint.

"Apparently she was strangled in the parking lost last night!"Abby said horrified.

"Oh my god." Billie said saddened. "Do they know who did it?"

"Not yet." Abby replied. "The police aren't saying anything yet, but another girl overheard two cops talking and they said they couldn't find any evidence of strangulation. No prints or bruises or anything."

"That's impossible." Billie said, knowing there would always be proof, unless…

"It's what I heard." Abby said.

"It's horrible." Billie said.

"I know right? she was like this philanthroper, with her charities." Abby said.

"Philanthropist." Billie corrected her.

"Whatever." Abby said. "She was so sweet."

Billie walked away and left the classroom, she figured classed would be cancelled today anyway. She wasn't feeling like listening to a lecture and pretend everything was fine. She wondered about professor York's murder. Strangled, but no visible evidence. It almost sounded like magic, but maybe she was just imagining it. She hoped the police would do their jobs and find evidence, proving her wrong. The last thing Billie wanted was to be caught up in magic again.

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Meanwhile, on the other side of the campus, a young woman made her way to the parking lot. Her name was Violet Morgan, twenty-one years old with dark red hair, pale skin with soft freckles and grayish green eyes.

Violet was a student of professor York and part of the group that had helped the professor organize the charity run just last night, which meant she was probably one of the last people who had seen her alive. When she had heard the news she had busted out in tears and ran toward the parking lot. Professor York was her favorite teacher and she didn't deserve to die like this. She needed to see for herself, but there was also this strange feeling that pulled her to the parking lot. Like she was meant to go there somehow.

When Violet reached the parking lot, she saw everything was closed off with yellow tape and that the police was still everywhere. They had set up a tent next to professor's York's car, which was probably where her body still was. It was horrible to think of the professor as a body, but Violet hoped her spirit was in a better place now. She believed that much.

"Excuse me." Violet called to a passing police officer.

"Can I help you?" the officer asked.

"Not really, but maybe I can help." Violet said. "I was with the professor last night, we were organizing a charity run."

"I see." The officer said. "Did you see the professor after she left the group?"

"No, I left before her." Violet said.

"Look, I know you probably want to help." The officer said. "But we already talking to most people who were at the charity meeting, they all told us the same thing, so unless you saw her after that, I don't think your statement will do much good."

"No, I didn't. I'm sorry." Violet said sadly. "I just wanted to help."

"I know." The officer said kindly. "And I promise we will do everything we can to find out what happened."

"Thank you." Violet said.

The officer nodded and walked away. Violet wished there was something more she could do, but she realized she was pretty useless here. She was about to leave when she got that strange pulling feeling again, like she was being guided somewhere.

Violet let her feeling guide her and walked past the yellow tape to the bushes behind the parking lot. They were sealed off with tape as well, but there was nobody paying attention to them. Violet quickly looked around to make sure nobody was watching her and slipped into the bushes.

Violet moved away a few branches and found herself in a small clearing. She had no idea why she was there, but she still felt there was something here. She needed to be here. She looked around and noticed a sewer entrance on the ground. Violet wondered why there would be a sewer entrance hidden in the bushes, but then realized it was probably connection to the old, unused sewage that ran under the campus.

Was this why she was here? Maybe this sewer entrance was connected to professor York's murder. She needed to be sure. Violet kneeled down and tried to open the entrance. As soon as her hands touched it, Violet felt something like a static shock. Suddenly images started flashing through her mind and a scene played in her mind like a black and white scene in an old movie.

Professor York was walking to her car and dropped her keys. Suddenly a very tall, bald man appeared behind her. He was very pale and his eyes black. Professor York screamed as the man held out his hand. Suddenly a strange light appeared around professor York and started chocking her. She tried to escape and struggle, but after a few second she suffocated and dropped to the ground, dead.

With a flash, Violet was brought back to reality and dropped down to the ground with tears in her eyes. She was breathing heavily. It seemed so real, almost like she could feel it happened. She instinctively reached for her throat.

What had just happened? How did she see that and more importantly, was it real? Violet quickly got up and tried not to panic. Something weird had just happened to her. She had seen professor York being killed, but what was she supposed to do? If she told the police they would think she was crazy, or that she had killed the professor, or both. Freaked out, Violet ran away.

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Professional whitelighter-witch Paige Matthews returned home in a swirl of orbs after helping a charge in Alaska. Apparently summoning an ancient snow spirit was not a good idea, as her young charge had just learned the hard way. Paige quickly took off her winter coat and dropped it on the couch. She was glad to be in a state with normal temperatures again. Alaska was just too cold for her.

Paige went to the kitchen to make some tea when she noticed a note on the fridge from Henry. It said he'd be late tonight because he had to help a troublesome new parole. With both their jobs and their many charges and paroles, they were lucky if they saw each other longer than an hour a day. They were both independent people and were able to maintain a stable relationship, though it would be nice to have diner like a normal married couple at least once a week. Paige wondered what would happen if they had kids. Henry had become all baby crazy after their baby niece Prudence was born, but Paige was nowhere near ready to have kids of her own. She preferred to remain the cool aunt for a few more years.

Before Paige could even take a sip of her tea, a familiar jingle called her attention.

"Never a moment of peace." Paige muttered as she put down her tea and orbed away.

Paige reappeared on top of the golden gate bridge, where she was greeted by two familiar faces. The first was Sandra, the elder that had helped her and her sister many times over the last few years. She was actually one of the few Elders the sisters actually liked.

The other familiar face was Mikelle. A former charge of Paige who had become a whitelighter after she had been killed by a warlock. She was a young woman in her early twenties with long dark brown hair, blue eyes and a punker-rock look.

"Mikelle." Paige said surprised. "It's good to see you, how are you?"

"Hey, Paige." Mikelle said. "I'm good actually. Being a whitelighter has sort-of changed my life. Well, my afterlife."

Paige still felt guilty about what happened to Mikelle. She was supposed to protect her from that darklighter, but the whole 'Billie Christy ultimate power thing' got in the way. She had been taken prisoner by the darklighter while Paige and her sisters had been trapped in a dream by Billie and Christy, who tried to find proof she and her sisters were actually selfish and evil or something. Paige had never understood the point of it completely.

"Thank you for coming so soon, Paige." Sandra said.

"Of course, how can I help you?" Paige asked.

"I'm the one that needs help." Mikelle answered. "I just got a new charge. She was a latent witch and she had no idea. Now she is freaking out but I can't sense her yet because she's too new."

"That is not all." Sandra added. "The young witch had the power of premonition. Her first premonition was seeing how her college professor was killed by a demon."

"What kind of demon?" Paige asked.

"We don't know yet." Sandra replied. "But this event is the beginning of something new."

"What do you mean?" Paige asked. "Something new?"

"You and are sisters have fulfilled your destinies." Sandra explained. "There is no more reason for you to risk your lives, you're done, like your sisters wanted. But with the Charmed Ones gone, good needs a new generation of champions. This demon will be the first challenge."

"So Mikelle's charge is this champion?" Paige asked.

"One of them, yes." Sandra said. "The others is why we called you specifically."

"Why?" Paige asked suspiciously.

"Because the Elders want Billie to lead this new generation." Sandra said.

"What?" Paige called out. "No, Billie is done. She's been through enough."

"Billie as been through a lot, yes, and we believe these experiences have made her a stronger force of good." Sandra said. "She still has a destiny ahead of her."

"Billie is living a happy, normal life now." Paige replied. "and even if she wanted this, she permanently stripped her powers when she defeated Christy."

"We can give her some of her powers back." Sandra said. "Her power of telekinesis will be restored."

"So I assume you want me to talk to her for you?" Paige asked.

"You are still her whitelighter, are you not?" Sandra said. "Besides, we figured it was best if she heard it from someone she trusted."

"I don't agree with this." Paige said.

"I know, Paige, and I understand, but in the end the choice has to be Billie's." Sandra replied. "One more thing. We found another young witch who has been chosen to be a part of this. He is someone you know as well, Paige. I believe you used to teach him at Magic School. Mikelle will take you to him."

Sandra closed her eyes and dematerialized in a column of orbs, heading back up to the heavens, leaving Paige and Mikelle standing on the bridge together. Paige wondered which of her students Sandra was referring too, but at the moment she was more worried about Billie. She had been living as a normal girl for nearly a year and Paige wondered if she was able to go back, or if she even wanted to. A lot had happened when Billie was a witch, and going back to that could open up a lot of old wounds for her.

"It's sort of screwed up, isn't it?" Mikelle remarked.

"What is?" Paige asked confused.

"Destiny." Mikelle replied.

"Yeah, it sure is." Paige said with a vacant smile.

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At the end of the day, Billie returned to her dorm room. She had heard about the murder all day. It was all everyone could talk about. It really was horrible what had happened, but Billie didn't want to keep hearing about it. It made her realize more and more that this wasn't your average murder. She was convinced that something supernatural was involved.

Billie wondered f she could contact the sisters, if there really was something going on, the Charmed Ones would be able to stop it. But the sisters were retired from witchcraft, just like Billie. They were moving on and she should do the same. She needed to put magic out of her mind. She liked being normal, she really did.

But deep down she knew there was a part of her that was still drawn to magic. No matter how hard she denied it, it was and would always be a part of her. The question was, would she able to deal with it if she allowed it back into her life?

Suddenly Billie's dorm room was lit up by a familiar blue light. In a swirl of orbs two people appeared. One was Paige, her whitelighter and friend, the other a girl Billie had only once met briefly. A former charge of Paige who's name she couldn't remember.

"Paige." Billie said. "What are you doing here?"

"Hi Billie." Paige said. "I need to talk to you about something."

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