Author's Note: A million thanks to my amazing beta, cruelangel101, without whose help this story would probably not have gotten this far. And to my readers; you guys are amazing.
Chapter Forty-Nine
Paige followed Sandra back into the middle of the space, but she stopped before she got close enough to the projector to activate it. Sandra walked around the outside of the space until she was standing with the other Elders gathered on the opposite side of the projector, all of them staring at Paige across the space.
Paige had to resist the urge to squirm, uncomfortably, under their steady, direct gazes. Despite Sandra's reassurances, it sure felt like she was on trial.
"In your time in the future," Odin began, imperiously, and Paige cut him off, abruptly.
"You want to use that," she said, nodding at the projector, "to take a peek into my head, and use what I know to prevent future disasters. Much as I hate the method, I'm all for the prevention part of the plan, so let's just get to it, shall we?"
Someone chuckled, and Paige recognized Remus as the Elder leaned closer to Odin.
"She's just like her grandmother," Remus muttered, and Odin scowled at the comment, a dark expression on his face.
"If you will step toward the projector," he snapped, "we will get started."
Paige took a step forward, struggling not to step back as the projector flared to life.
She and Henry were lying in bed. She had her head pillowed on his chest, and his arms were wrapped loosely around her waist.
"How many kids do you want?" Henry asked, and she lifted her head to look at him, curiously.
"Where did that come from?" she asked, with a chuckle, and Henry shrugged.
"I don't know," he admitted. "Just wondering, you know. I've always wanted a big family. Four, maybe five, kids."
"Only if you're going to be the one getting pregnant," she said, incredulously, and Henry laughed.
Paige jerked away from the projector, the images dying as soon as she was out of range. She bent double, breathing heavily with her hands on her knees. Her head spun and she felt dizzy. She could feel a phantom twinge of pain running through her abdomen, and she unconsciously curled her arms around her stomach. When she realized what she was doing, she forced her arms to fall back to her sides, straightening as she glared at the gathered Elders.
"You don't get to see that," she gritted out, fighting the tears that threatened to escape her control. "That's personal."
"Of course," Sandra said, her voice low, soothing. "Whenever you're ready, Paige. There's no rush."
Paige nodded, taking a few, deep breaths to try and center herself. As soon as she felt steady, she moved toward the projector, again, bracing herself for what might be shown.
She and Phoebe were standing in the attic.
"Okay, fine," Phoebe said, with a heavy sigh, "bring on the earthquake-causing gods."
She grinned, orbing in place. For a second, nothing seemed to be happening, and then the whole house started to shake. A mini hurricane appeared in the middle of the attic, coalescing into a dark-haired woman in a short, white toga.
The woman's eyes flashed gold as she stared almost hungrily at her. She threw a potion at the woman, but there was no effect. Phoebe was next, but the woman simply gestured, sending Phoebe flying across the attic-
The projection ended, throwing the room into silence. Paige looked over at the Elders, seeing stunned expressions on all their faces.
"That was a Titan," Sandra said, faintly, and Paige nodded.
"We faced two of them, and won," she replied. "Barely. Someone is going to release them in a little over a year."
"Who?" Odin asked, brusquely.
"I don't know," Paige told him. "I don't know who, I don't know how – that's why we have to be ready for them."
"And how do you propose that?" a woman asked.
"We defeated the Titans by taking on the power of the gods," Paige said, pitching her voice so that the entire Council could hear her. "When the Titans are released, you need to do it, again."
"That's impossible," the woman blustered, a sentiment that was quickly echoed by several other Elders.
"Okay," Paige said, with a shrug. "Then, get the most powerful magical practitioners you can find and post round the clock guards at the Titan's tomb. Have them be willing to drop everything and devote a year of their lives to nothing but this. And, if we're lucky, they'll be able to defeat whoever is powerful enough to unleash the Titans."
"She has a point," another Elder said, into the silence that followed her statement. "We can't devote that kind of time and energy to a singular purpose that could very well end up failing in the end."
"Did I mention," Paige spoke up, "that they kind of want to kill you all? And they're going to succeed."
"So, you want us to turn the Charmed Ones into gods?" the woman demanded, her eyes blazing with fury.
"If it is the only option left to us," Odin spoke up, his voice silencing everyone else, "we will take it."
From the tone in Odin's voice, the discussion was over. The female Elder glared at him, and then at Paige, but finally she nodded with obvious reluctance. Odin turned to Paige with a satisfied expression on his face. Wordlessly, he nodded toward the projector, and Paige sighed, heavily, stepping toward the device.
They orbed into the attic, their evil counterparts just a few steps away. Gideon was standing in the middle of the attic, a bloodstained athame gripped in his hands. He hadn't seemed to notice their arrival.
Sitting on the floor in front of the Elder was Wyatt, and fury surged through her at the sight of her nephew in danger. She squeezed Phoebe's fingers in a punishing grip, looking toward the piece of paper with their hastily-written spell on it. She met Evil Paige's eyes, seeing her own determination reflected in her counterpart's eyes.
Then, four voices rose in unison as they chanted the vanquishing spell.
"We call upon the ancient lore
To punish with the Power of Four;
Strike down this threat from both there and here,
Make him suffer, then disappear."
Gideon screamed in pain, dropping the athame as he orbed out of the attic. She swore softly under her breath as she glared at the spot where the Elder had been standing.
"Wyatt, thank God," she heard both Phoebes say, in unison, and then Evil Phoebe picked the boy up, cuddling him to her.
"Did you give that bad man Gideon those wounds?" Evil Phoebe cooed, and she exchanged incredulous glances with Leo and Chris at seeing someone so evil act so … gooey.
"It looks like Wyatt can handle himself," her counterpart commented, with a grin.
"Yeah, but for how long?" Leo asked, a worried tone in his voice. "Gideon is one of the most powerful Elders. If he wants him dead, he'll find a way."
Paige stepped away from the projector, the room falling into absolute silence. Then, the Council exploded.
The noise in the room reached an almost deafening pitch, and Paige couldn't make head or tails of the incoherent shouting. She looked up, seeing Odin staring at her in disbelief across the projector, and she met his gaze, squarely.
'I'm not going to apologize for what you saw,' she thought, fiercely.
Odin was the first to look away from their impromptu staring contest, taking in the rest of the Council with an upraised eyebrow. Then, to Paige's surprise, he put two fingers in his mouth and let out an ear-piercing whistle.
Paige had to admit, she was impressed by the way the room fell almost immediately into silence. Apparently, Odin didn't hold the top spot on the Council for nothing.
"Would you care to explain?" Odin said, looking back at Paige, "what we just witnessed?"
"What you just saw," Paige said, "was an attempt on my nephew's life by an Elder named Gideon. He tried to kill Wyatt-"
"An Elder would never murder!" someone shouted, furiously, but an upraised hand from Odin had the voice dying down.
"We vanquished Gideon," Paige went on, deliberately omitting the little detail about Leo's involvement. "But not before his obsession led to the death of at least three witches, one of them someone very dear to me."
She paused, feeling the pain of Chris's death all over again, like a blow to the heart.
"And if it happens, again," she added, emphatically, as she looked at the Council, "I will take action."
"You would threaten an Elder?" Sandra demanded, a shocked tone in her voice.
"I would hope," Gideon spoke up from behind Sandra, startling the rest of the Council, "that if I ever harmed a child, that someone would be there to stop me."
"I will," Paige promised, and the Elder nodded, gratefully.
"She's speaking of murder!" someone shouted, angrily, and Gideon let out a humorless laugh.
"And what would you call a violation of every oath we hold dear?" he asked, sardonically. "No, this is a warning, and a chance to change."
"Wyatt is going to be powerful," Paige said, to the rest of the Council, "but, we're his family. You need to trust us. To trust that we can teach him right from wrong, teach him to use his powers for Good."
"The child has not even been conceived, yet," Remus spoke up. "All that we have seen may never even come to pass."
"And if it does?" the pessimist asked, darkly.
"Enough," Odin declared, ending the argument before it could even get started. "If the child proves to be a threat – if he is even born – we will deal with the situation when it arises. We will not borrow trouble."
"We certainly don't need it," Remus added, "not with everything else looming on the horizon."
"Now, if we can move on?" Odin asked, dryly, to the Council at large. Turning his attention to Paige, he added, "Next crisis?"
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An hour later, Paige slumped down in one of the chairs along the outside of the room. She leaned, heavily, on the table, staring at the projector. The sound of footsteps had her looking up, and she stared incredulously up at Sandra.
"You cannot possibly want me to go up in front of that thing, again," she said, as the Elder sat down beside her. "You've picked me clean. You know everything about the future that I know. Hell, you know stuff that I'd forgotten – and a lot of stuff I wish I'd forgotten."
"You did very well," Sandra told her, smiling. "I could tell that this was very painful for you."
"That thing," Paige said, shaking her head as she stared at the projector, "it doesn't pick and choose; it shows everything, and I can't control what pops up."
"That is kind of the point," Sandra pointed out, reasonably. "It wouldn't be much use to us if anyone could control it."
"Hmm," Paige muttered, noncommittally. "So, can I go home?"
"The Council is still deliberating," Sandra told her, gesturing to where the rest of the Elders were huddled, talking quietly amongst themselves. "The others might still have questions for you."
"What about you?" Paige asked, stretching out and pillowing her head on her arms. "No questions? Nothing that you're absolutely dying to know?"
Sandra hesitated, and there was clearly something on her mind. Paige waited patiently for her to speak.
"I saw in your memories that you and I were close," she finally ventured, and Paige looked over at her, giving her a tired smile.
"It's because of you and Leo that I'm the Whitelighter I am," she told her. "You started out as my mentor, but then, along the way, we became friends."
"It's been a long time since I've been able to call a charge a friend," Sandra replied. "And, as a friend," she added, cautiously, "if you ever want to talk about what happened during your last battle with the Jenkins sisters-"
"I don't," Paige said, shortly, softening her tone when she saw a surprised look flash across Sandra's face. "I'll talk about anything else, just not that. I just can't-"
She broke off when she heard her voice start to rise, breathing deeply to try and regain some semblance of her former calm.
"Have you at least talked about this with Henry?" Sandra asked, quietly, but Paige couldn't snap at her, not when she could hear the worry in the other woman's voice.
"I can't," she repeated, softly. "If I told him – knowing would kill him," she said, pleadingly, silently begging Sandra to understand. "I can't do that to him."
"Henry would-" Sandra started.
"What?" Paige cut her off. "He would understand? He would forgive me? I can't even do that."
Before Sandra could say anything, a shadow fell over the table. Paige lifted her head from her arms to see Gideon standing nearby.
"Am I interrupting anything?" he asked, and she shook her head.
"Nothing," she said, hastily wiping away the wetness she could feel on her cheeks. "What is it?"
"Odin wants to speak with you," Gideon told her. "Some more clarification on your battle with the Jenkins sisters."
"Right," Paige said, pushing herself to her feet.
She followed Sandra and Gideon over to the rest of the Council, skirting the edge of the projector. Something flashed briefly in the circle, but she moved away too quickly to see what it was.
"You have some more questions for me?" Paige asked, and Odin nodded.
"When did you first know that Billie and Christy Jenkins were a threat?" he asked.
"When they ambushed us in our own home," Paige said, wryly. "They attacked us, we fled to the Underworld, and we plotted how to confront them."
"Which involved taking in the Hollow?" Odin asked, his voice neutral.
"We thought that it was our only option," Paige told him. "They were strong, and we were desperate – we couldn't see any other way out." She broke off, scrubbing at her face with her hands, tiredly. "I wish we had," she said, softly. "My sisters died because we couldn't find a better way to stop them."
"What happened to the Jenkins sisters?" Remus prompted, when Paige fell silent.
"Christy survived the initial attack," she replied. "She attacked Henry and me; he shot her. Billie – I don't know, I never saw her body. I assume she died in the attack, like Piper and Phoebe."
She sighed in exhaustion, swaying on her feet. She stumbled across the floor, catching herself before she could fall, and the projector flared to life when she got too close.
She jerked her head up when she heard the sound of her name in the distance.
"I'm going to fix this," she told Piper, tearfully, carefully laying her body on the ruins. "I promise; I'm going to make everything all right, again."
It killed her to leave Piper like that, to leave her alone, but she had to check it out. If Phoebe had survived-
She stumbled, heavily, over the rough ground, ignoring the pain that shot through her injured wrist when she hit the ground more than once. She reached the area where the foyer had been, and her heart leapt, wildly, when she saw Henry standing in the debris.
"Where's Paige?" she could hear him, asking, and she realized that he didn't see her.
He was talking to someone, and for a second when she saw the dark hair, she thought it was Phoebe. Then, the woman made a sharp gesture, and Henry yelled when the ground around him suddenly lit on fire.
Paige reacted without thinking, grabbing the first thing that came to hand and running toward Christy. She swung the piece of wood, watching numbly as Christy crumpled to the ground from the blow. She tightened her hands on the piece of wood as she stared down at her sisters' murderer.
"Paige," Henry said, suddenly, and she snapped her head up, staring at her husband in shock.
She stumbled backward, away from the projector, glaring half-heartedly at the magical device.
"I could have lived without the Technicolor and Surround Sound boost," she grumbled, and then she whipped her head around at the sound of a soft sob.
To her shock, Christy Jenkins was standing at the edge of the room, her eyes wide with fear as she stared at the projector. For a second, rage surged up within Paige at the sight of the younger woman, but then she registered the absolute terror reflected on Christy's face.
"Christy?" she said, in shock. "What are you doing here?"
