Sole Author's Note: Most of this story was planned out before a lot of season 4 happened. That means that some of it may not coincide with canon, but this is pretty much my take on canon, anyway. (Rock Around the Clock, for example, kind of killed me, but I may use it to my advantage.)

_This story will include Jalex, but I would like to state for the record that I've never before shipped a 'ship that was not canon, so it's really the show's fault more than it is mine. If that irks and/or squicks you, I would like you to at least give this a chance because being true to the show is my main intention. (And this is NOT a romance fic first and foremost.)_

On a final note, this isn't completely written out, but my goal is to post two chapters at time. In the likely event that that doesn't pan out, I will never post a chapter without a safety net (aka, the next chapter mostly-written).

Oh, and the writing will be kind of rough. I typically edit stories once they're all done and posted.

Anyway, without further ado, here's Killing Time.

Alex was taking a nap when she received the news. It seemed fitting in a way, that she was doing something she truly loved when her whole world began to crash down.

She arrived at the sub station a little over an hour after she got the call; taking the subway was a bitch, but she had been living without magic for so long that by this point she was kind of used to it.

Per usual, there was not a customer in sight.

"Oh, hello, mija," her mother greeted her as she came out from the kitchen. "You're just in time for the lunch rush."

Alex surveyed the restaurant and nodded. "That seems about right."

"Yes, I know, it's a disaster. But I ask that you not mention it to your father when you go down to visit him. He does not deserve to die over this place."

Alex felt a brief rush of guilt. Her father had been in the hospital for two weeks and his little girl hadn't come to see him once. "How's he doing, by the way?"

"Your father? He's fine. Apparently he tried to bribe one of the nurses to bring him a three cheese omelet for breakfast." Her mother gave an exhausted sigh. "I don't think he'll be satisfied until he has his second heart attack."

"Maybe he's just trying to beat his high cholesterol score. Are Max and Justin in yet?"

"Justin hasn't left the lair all day and Max got in just before you. I think they're both in there now, waiting for that wizard guy."

Alex had always found it kind of charming, her mother's utter and complete disinterest in everything magical. Alex kind of wished she could be so disinterested. Instead, she tended to reserve her apathy for more important things, like school.

Speaking of which...

"How did your interview go, sweetie?" her mother asked, not even glancing up from the cash register. She appeared to be counting what little money was in there.

Alex felt her stomach drop to her feet. "Interview?"

Her mother looked up. "Yeah, the one with the art school. Did you get in?"

"I..." Alex decided to choose her words very carefully. "I don't know. I guess they'll have to get back to me."

Her mother nodded. "That makes sense."

Figuring that she had put off the inevitable long enough, Alex peaced out on her mom and went into the lair. She was met with the sight of her older brother Justin hunched over a book and her younger brother Max practicing what could kindly be called a karate pose.

"You dorks do know that the competition isn't today, right?" she asked, plopping down into her father's chair and throwing her legs over the side.

Justin gave her a glare, but didn't say anything.

Max stopped moving and raised an eyebrow. "The wizard competition?"

"Yeah, you may've heard of it," Alex said vaguely, staring at her wrist watch. "What time is the dude supposed to be here, anyway? I've got a long day of napping ahead of me."

"You were napping when I called you this morning," Justin pointed out.

"What can I say? I've got priorities."

"It wouldn't kill you to take things a little more seriously, Alex," Justin started, and God, was he really going to do this right now? "Whether you like it or not, we're all in this together."

Did he think that she didn't know that? He was there when she asked to be taken out of the wizard competition, and he was there when the dingbat Professor Crumbs told her that it was mandatory for all wizard siblings to compete. Her older brother had really crossed the line from paternal to overbearing at some point.

"I'll have you know, I take a lot of things seriously. For example, a homeless man tried to pee on my boots." Alex pointed at her shoes to illustrate her point. "And I kindly bribed him with a half-eaten sandwich I found in the trash to get away from me."

Justin furrowed his brows. "What on earth is that supposed to demonstrate? People skills?"

"Well, I was going to say it proves that I take my appearance seriously, but what you said works, too."

"The guy should be here any minute now," Max interjected. "And that's great because I think I've centered my Chi."

At Alex's confused look, Justin elaborated, "Max's new girlfriend is a dragon."

"She's not a dragon all of the time, just part of the time. Which is good because when you're sleeping with a dragon, how do you know which side's the wrong side of the bed?"

Justin went on, "It's some longstanding ancient curse, and Max thinks if he's the family wizard, he can fix her or something."

Max grinned. "Yeah, I'll totally be the hero. Or if not, who cares, my girlfriend's a dragon!"

Alex couldn't really fault that logic, but it brought up a weird feeling in her. It reminded her of Mason, and of how complicated it was...

Alex didn't really want to be a wizard. She had planned to just swallow her pride and walk away from the competition all the same. But that stupid wizard clause and the stupid old wizard with the stupid old beard had ruined everything. Now she was just going to lose, and Alex kind of hated losing.

Justin looked like he wanted to make some smart aleck comment to Max – and Alex didn't know what place he had there, given his previous love interests – but then the wizard portal swung open and a man Alex recognized stepped in.

"Hello," he said amiably, "I'm Mr. McFly, and I'm here to schedule your wizarding competition. You are the Russo kids, yes?" He winked.

"Hello, Mr. McFly." Justin stood and shook the man's hand. "It's so nice to see you, and may I say, that is a lovely robe you're wearing."

"Thank you, son, my wife bought it for me. But you do know that I am not going to be one of your competition judges, yes?"

Justin blinked. "Yes, I know that." He slowly sat back down.

"Now, let's begin. As you all know, since the sibling in the lead did not see fit to schedule the competition himself, the wizard counsel has decided to step in."

Alex slightly raised her wrist. "When's the competition going to be?"

"Well, that's what I'm here to discuss with you. I think it's fair that everyone in this room agrees on the date."

"No, I meant, what time?" Alex clarified. "I don't really do mornings."

Mr. McFly looked slightly taken aback. "It is typical wizard counsel procedure to have the competition in the evenings, Miss Russo."

"Okay, like, when in the evenings? Before dinner, after ...?"

"I want to know this, too," Max said, "because I don't think I can wizard compete on an empty stomach."

Justin rolled his eyes. "It's probably best if you ignore them."

"Now, now, I don't want to ignore them," Mr. McFly said pleasantly. "Why don't we start with the day and just work on the time from there?"

Alex gave a thumbs up.

Mr. McFly cleared his throat and began to read from a scroll that kept rolling past the entrance to the lair.

"I need you to confirm that you are, in fact, the three Russo siblings: Justin, aged 21; Alexandra, aged 20; and Maximilian, aged 18. Are you these Russos?"

"Yeah, but can you change my name to Alex? I'm not really feeling the full-name thing."

"That's perfectly doable," Mr. McFly said, and he pulled out a quill and scratched out Alex's full name.

"Yeah, and I want to be known as Bobby," Max added. "It makes me sound more approachable and handsome."

"Oooh, I like that," Alex said. "Put me down for Bobby, too!"

Max gave her a high-five.

Justin groaned. "Would you two cut it out? I don't want to be here all night."

"What's it matter? It's not like you have plans," Alex said.

"Stop projecting yourself onto me, Alex. For your information, I have a very big exam tomorrow." Justin turned back to face Mr. McFly.

That felt like a low-blow. The 'projecting' part was just typical Justin sass, but what really made it sting was that it was true. Alex stuck her tongue out at him behind his back.

The rest of the night was fairly uneventful. They agreed on a date two weeks in the future. Justin had checked his school schedule, and Max had checked his girlfriend's shifting schedule, and Alex had filed her nails.

"Well, that's settled. You should all make sure to be in this lair on the date we've arranged by 7:15 – which will give you time to eat, Mr. Russo, and to let your food settle, Miss Russo. You will receive further instruction then." Mr. McFly slightly paused, and then said quietly, "If any one of you isn't here, there will be, I'm afraid, dire consequences." He smiled again. "Good day, all."

After the preliminary wizard competition meeting, Alex didn't feel like heading home. She didn't like being out at night without her magic anymore, plus everything was just too depressing. Harper and Zeke were being way too kind by letting her stay with them, but something must be wrong with her because she was starting to feel guilty for their charity. Plus, she had walked in on Zeke naked in the bathroom once and Harper stopped her before she could set fire to her eyeballs.

Everything was too ... different. Her Dad wasn't around, so the house seemed too quiet. If she strained, she could hear her Mom turning the pages in her romance novel, or she could hear Justin scribbling away at his grad school work.

Alex didn't like it.

After tossing and turning on the couch a million times, she resigned herself to the fact that sleeping all day had the drawback of making you stay up all night.

She went down to the lair and sat in her dad's recliner again. She didn't even know why. She didn't consider herself a very sentimental person, but it felt nice and comfortable and made her slightly nostalgic. Plus, it was right below the wizard cable box which always had great shows.

At some point in the night, her mom came in and told her she was going to the hospital and did Alex want to come? Alex said no, and then realized that it must not be night anymore, if her mom was heading to the hospital.

She checked her watch. It was 7:15. In the morning. Gross.

Alex really couldn't see what was so great about the morning. It was cold and even the wizard cable didn't have any good shows on. Although she did get engrossed in a wizard soap opera, and maybe she did kind of get caught up in the witch's affair with a werewolf. But then it turned out that the werewolf was also in love with the witch's brother and things got kind of weird.

"No, Francisco, don't do it," Alex muttered, pulling the blanket up to her chin. "Don't you see that she loves you, fleas and all?"

There was a big dramatic pause, and the camera panned in on Francisco's face, slowly, and Alex should really turn this off because it was kind of dumb, and then someone literally dropped into the lair.

Alex let out a shriek, and then the person stood up and adjusted her peacock hat.

"Harper?" Alex asked.

It was Future Harper, and she had arrived via the IPP.

"Oh, hey, Alex!" Future Harper said.

Alex turned off the wizard TV and went over to her friend. "Harper, what are you doing here?"

"I was hoping that I'd find you, to be honest."

"You thought I'd be awake?"

Future Harper looked at her watch. "It's nine o'clock. Oh, right," she tapped herself on the forehead, "you're still big on sleeping-in."

Alex tried not to think too much about the implications of that statement. A future involving not sleeping- in seemed rather bleak. "You were looking for me?"

Future Harper nodded emphatically, and the peacock on her hat followed suit; it was obviously enchanted.

"Yes, I need you to use your time machine to take this to my publisher for me." Future Harper pulled a stack of papers from behind her back. "It's the first Charmed and Dangerous book. I've finally finished it after seventeen years ... but my publisher expected it ten years ago, so I'm running a little late."

Alex frowned at the book, and not just because she disliked books in general. "Harper, I don't think we have a time machine. Dad said time travel's strictly monitored by the wizard counsel, and oh, god, I actually listened in class that day."

But Future Harper didn't seem particularly perturbed. "Of course you have a time machine, Alex; it's right there." Future Harper pointed at her. Alex looked up and down herself.

"Where?"

"Right there," Harper insisted, still pointing. Alex twirled around. Harper sighed. "Not on you." She walked over to the recliner and patted it, coughing at the dust that sprung up. "Right here."

"That? That's just Dad's gross, old chair."

"Or is it?" Future Harper said, and then she grabbed the arm rest and flipped the cushion up.

There were buttons. Rows and rows of buttons.

There was a very visible panel that said TODAY'S DATE and then one underneath it that said INTENDED DATE. Alex wasn't a genius, but she was pretty sure she knew what that meant.

"Holy crap," she exhaled. "It's a real, live time machine." Alex walked around the recliner and inspected it. "I never would have expected this in a million years. I mean, this seems totally different than those pocket watches that take you to predetermined times."

Alex's thoughts were running a million miles an hour. She imagined all the cool things she could do with just such a machine, and Future Harper must've been reading her mind.

"Alex, I think you should really just take my book to the publisher and then come back. I don't want to be responsible for your being lost in time."

Alex sat down in the chair with a brand new purpose and a big grin.

"Alex..." Future Harper warned.

"What? What, we're just going to take your stupid book to your publisher and then come right back. Nothing in between."

"Oh, no, I'm not going with you," Future Harper said adamantly.

"Why not?"

"Because time travel's a messy business and I'd rather not deal with it any more than I have to. I'm already living thirty years in the past."

Alex narrowed her eyes at that. "If time travel's such a messy business, why are you letting me do this?"

Future Harper bit her lip. "Honestly?"

Alex gestured her on.

"Because I think you've already done it."

"Oh, well, in that case," Alex said, and she entered in the current date minus ten years into the panel.

"Alex, just please be careful, that book means a lot to me and I paid my rent with the advance."

"I'll be careful," Alex insisted. "I've got nothing else to do, anyway."

"Here," Future Harper said, "take this manuscript and this envelope to this address, and just leave it with the lady in the front office. Don't take any significant detours and just come right back."

"I'll be a good little girl," Alex said, and she really meant it. Of course, now she knew where the time machine was, so if she ever needed it for future use... "I'll see you later, okay?" Alex said, and then she hit the big, green button that said GO!