Disclaimer: I do not claim to own Charmed or any of its characters!
AN: This is a joint story between Aqua (that would be me) and Daisy, so this is why you keep seeing two different authors for this fic.
PLEASE REVIEW FOR MORE CHAPTERS!
A Journey Cut Short
PART III: Meeting Mommy
Aqua
"So, what, we can't vanquish this demon until I have the baby?" Piper questioned, her voice low and worn.
"Well," Paige stood and started pacing, "lets just backtrack a bit. Now, Phoebe, are you absolutely positive that this was Piper and Leo's baby in your premonition?"
Phoebe, sitting with her legs crossed Indian style, looked up with a queasy look, "Well, I can only assume, but you guys were there in my vision and it was in your bedroom's closet, where the baby will be. Oh, and you were not pregnant, Piper. Uh, neither were you, Leo."
"Good to know," he muttered before continuing, "so this means that we have to risk our baby to vanquish this demon. Why? Why can't she go after a different baby?"
"You wanta sacrafice someone else's kid?" Paige asked with a twinge of humor.
"No! Of course not, but I just don't see why it has to be ours. What's the difference?"
"We are not sacrificing anyone. Lets make this clear. Maybe its just because this kid is going to be one powerful little witch/whitelighter and that would give her a mighty big plus if she took ours," Piper gestured forcefully with a small sigh, and taking on the role of eldest sister, began setting assignments to everyone just as Prue once had done, "lets just go ahead and do as much as we can to get started. Paige, go ahead and make the potion powdery junk. Recipe's in the Book of Shadows. Phoebe, call Darryl and have him keep a look out for any unusual activities involving infant disappearances and that hospital we were at especially. And Leo, help me get up."
Leo reached down and pulled his wife up to a vertical position while her sisters scurried off to their assigned tasks.
"You certainly are getting the hang of this big sister thing," he observed with a small reassuring smile.
"I really am, aren't I?" she laughed, but soon replaced her jocular attitude with a solemn frown, "our baby will be okay right? I mean, she's gonna be fine."
Leo tried to shield the worry in his eyes, but she could still see it clearly anyway. He slowly embraced her and whispered hoarsely, "Of course she'll be fine. We wouldn't let anything happen to her."
With a hesitant glance upwards, Piper gently placed her hand over his which rested on her swelling abdomen and mumbled, "I hope you're right."
*****
A yelp from Paige pierced through the air from the Halliwell kitchen as one of her backfired potion attempts exploded in the large stainless steel pot on the kitchen stove.
"I am not cut out for this potion stewing crap," Paige muttered to herself while pulling out a glop of goo from the pot's contents with the ladle.
"Its in your blood," Phoebe argued as she walked over to where Paige was stirring ingredients together, "but you could use some help, huh?"
Phoebe tapped her sister on the nose, which was covered with soot and giggled slightly.
"You know what Phoebe? I don't think you realize the severity of this situation! Poor Piper and Leo could lose their baby forever if this potion does not work and then countless other innocents will be lost in the process! People could die and it would be my fault because I didn't add enough catfish scales or too much frog liver and no mandrake roots!"
"Calm down! Gosh, I hope I was never so annoying when I was the youngest sister," Phoebe added under her breath with a small grin.
"Touche', Sis," Paige pointed an incriminating finger at her sister and sighed, "Just help me, cuz I did everything the recipe said to do."
"Let's see," Phoebe's finger skimmed down the page thoughtfully, "did you remember the peacock feather?"
"Peacock feather? Peacock feather? Where am I supposed to get a freakin peacock feather? Why do we even need one? How is it even going to fit into this pot?" Paige continued to ramble in a panicked frenzy.
"Paige! Calm yourself. We live in San Fransico, right? Just head over to the zoo and find the feather. This is magic, it will work," she took a minute, dangling the car keys in front of her, as Paige absorbed this and then added in a monotone voice that one would use to speak to a child, enunciating each syllable clearly, "Now are you okay? Can you do this all by yourself?"
Paige snatched the car keys out of Phoebe's hands, "You wait til I put a curse on you."
"In this house, you don't even joke about things like that!" Phoebe called after her as she began cleaning up the kitchen, humming along as she did so.
*****
The car door slammed to Paige's lime green Volkswagon as she walked through the parking lot of the San Fransico Zoo.
"Peacocks, peacocks. I guess it makes sense since peacocks are proud and apparantly this demon is awfully proud," Paige abruptly stopped talking to herself and began thinking instead. She really had a problem with this talking to herself thing. It was something that happened whenever she was under stress, which was becoming more and more frequent by the day. Sighing, she marched up to the ticket desk and leaned against the frame.
"Excuse me, zoo lady. I need assistance over here," Paige called to the brunette who had her back towards her. She suddenly turned around with a nail file in hand and phone between shoulder and ear.
"Sean, sweetie, could you hold on a minute," the woman muttered into the phone before turning to Paige, "Yes, my name is Molly. How can I help you?"
"Do you have peacocks here?" Paige asked hesitantly, knowing how peculiar the question was.
"Um, yea," Molly answered quickly, "you want a ticket?"
"Sure," the girls exchanged cash and ticket before Paige headed off to the animals and the girl at the gate continued chattering away on the telephone.
*****
Sapphire rain announced Leo and Piper's arrival into the kitchen. When they finally took form, Phoebe laughed, "Weren't you just coming from the attic?"
"I'm not gonna hear it, Missy. You carry this package around and then tell me if you wanta walk up and down the stairs. And besides," she patted Leo on the shoulder, "Leo's my private Greyhound."
"I hear you, Piper. I've got the potion stewing and am just waiting on Paige."
"Where is she?" Leo questioned, his emerald eyes squenching slightly as they often did when he was thinking.
"Zoo," Phoebe looked up to two baffled faces, "to get the peacock feather!"
"Oh," Piper eased into one of the chairs and replied with a cynical look, "of course. To get the peacock feather. You know, what's the point of making this potion if we don't have the baby yet?"
"Its always better to be prepared. You're due soon, anyway aren't you, Sweetie?" Phoebe asked, using a sweet perk in her voice while she wiped the counter.
Piper stuttered, "In four weeks. I don't really consider that very soon. Its too long to have this demon running around aging babies!"
"Unless," Phoebe paused, "unless you didn't really have the baby. It only seemed like it."
"What the hell are you talking about, Phoebe?" Piper interjected somewhat frantically, "its pretty difficult to fake having a baby."
"Not magically!" Phoebe grinned and ran out of the kitchen towards the attic.
"Leo, Leo, follow her!" Piper directed as her husband took hold of her and orbed them into the attic where they found Phoebe flipping through the aged pages of the Book of Shadows.
"You tell me what you are doing right now! You are playing with my child's life!" Piper demanded. Nothing stopped Phoebe's flipping, however, until she reached a certain page.
"I think this will work," she spoke at last.
Leo looked over her shoulder at the page in the book, "What will work? Phoebe, what do you plan to do?"
Phoebe looked up to see genuine concern and explained, "Look, we vanquished Cole in an alternate plane right? And when we came back, everything was normal except for the fact that he was gone. Right?"
"Right," Piper slurred out, still suspicious.
"So," Phoebe's eyes grew with glory as she turned the pedestal, which held the Book of Shadows, so that her sister could see it, "we do the same thing that Cole did to us- only we do it to the demon this time in the future. In this alternate plane, Piper has had the baby and we can vanquish the demon there. Once we do that, we can return and she'll be gone forever."
Piper looked at Leo who looked as reluctant as she felt before returning her eyes to her sister's, "Um, Phoebe, how do you know this will work?"
"Well, we never do truly know if something will work until we do it, but its our best shot. If Cole can do it, so can we. So, what do you guys say?" Phoebe rubbed her hands together in anticipation, positive that this would work.
"I, uh, Leo what do you think?" Piper asked.
He inhaled slightly and then looked from Phoebe to his wife, "I'm up for it if you are."
She nodded, "I guess all we have to do now, is wait for Paige."
*****
Paige headed into the kitchen, and was surprised to find no one there guarding their brewing potion. She steadily added the peacock feather into the brew and opened her mouth with awe as it easily disappeared into the shallow depths of the pot, creating a purple liquid. She easily poured the completed potion into three seperate flasks and corked them as she heard her sisters and Leo enter the room.
"See, you can make it down the stairs," Phoebe pointed out to her older sister, with a humorous look gracing her features.
Piper glared at her, "Shutup. Paige, you finished the potion?"
"Yep. And apparently you havn't had any babies while I was gone," Paige observed.
"Well, Phoebe found a way to do it," Leo explained, presenting the page in the Book of Shadows to the red head.
"I was thinking Piper would have to have the baby, not Phoebe," Paige questioned sarcastically before reading the page in the book, "wow. Then lets blow this popsicle stand."
*****
Up in the attic once again, the three sisters stood around the Book of Shadows, hands clasped together and potions pocketed while chanting. Leo watched from a distance, waiting until they reached the seperate plane, before he orbed there to meet them.
"To retain what has been stolen from the young,
We shall depart to a future sun,
In the foreward we take our present mind,
So that the answers we seek, we may find."
Their voices were melded into one as they collected into a trio of golden lights before they vanished. Leo took his queue and orbed after them.
*****
Piper opened her eyes to darkness and looked around. The familiar feeling of her cotton sheets told her that she was lying in her bed in her normal bedroom. Everything seemed the same to her and she wondered to herself whether the spell had worked or not. Suddenly, she was blinded by bright blue lights.
"Piper? Are you all right?" Piper was relieved to hear her husband's voice.
"Leo, thank God. Did the spell work?" she sat up abruptly, clad in her white nightgown.
The two stopped to hear a whine coming from their closet. Soon, the soft shrill turned into a tiny scream. Piper turned on the bedside lamp, which barely illuminated the room, and their eyes widened to see a newborn baby lying in the cradle in their closet. A homemade sign, obviously in Paige's handwriting, hung on the closet door, 'Happy Birthday, Melinda Wyatt Halliwell! 12:46 AM! 7.6 lbs!'
Piper glanced at the digital clock, which read 3:58 AM. Obviously the baby had just been born a couple hours ago since many doctor instruments were lying around her room, and yet she didn't feel like she had just given birth. Suddenly, she remembered that her child was in the closet crying her eyes out and she was simply sitting there.
"Leo, what do we do? She's crying!"
"I, uh," he stuttered, "its a girl, Piper."
"Yea, I know," she whispered. After a poignant pause, she swatted his arm, "but she's still crying!"
The two cautiously made their way to the bassinet and stopped when they saw the face of their child, all wrapped up in a soft pink blanket.
"Oh my God," Piper muttered under her breath, taking hold of the infant, "she is so beautiful."
"Gets it from her Mommy," Leo whispered back, never taking his eyes off of his daughter, whose sobs had somewhat subsided.
He watched with a soft smile and moist eyes as Piper choked back a sob and whispered to her little girl, voice cracking, "Don't cry now. Mommy's here."
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!!
AN: This is a joint story between Aqua (that would be me) and Daisy, so this is why you keep seeing two different authors for this fic.
PLEASE REVIEW FOR MORE CHAPTERS!
A Journey Cut Short
PART III: Meeting Mommy
Aqua
"So, what, we can't vanquish this demon until I have the baby?" Piper questioned, her voice low and worn.
"Well," Paige stood and started pacing, "lets just backtrack a bit. Now, Phoebe, are you absolutely positive that this was Piper and Leo's baby in your premonition?"
Phoebe, sitting with her legs crossed Indian style, looked up with a queasy look, "Well, I can only assume, but you guys were there in my vision and it was in your bedroom's closet, where the baby will be. Oh, and you were not pregnant, Piper. Uh, neither were you, Leo."
"Good to know," he muttered before continuing, "so this means that we have to risk our baby to vanquish this demon. Why? Why can't she go after a different baby?"
"You wanta sacrafice someone else's kid?" Paige asked with a twinge of humor.
"No! Of course not, but I just don't see why it has to be ours. What's the difference?"
"We are not sacrificing anyone. Lets make this clear. Maybe its just because this kid is going to be one powerful little witch/whitelighter and that would give her a mighty big plus if she took ours," Piper gestured forcefully with a small sigh, and taking on the role of eldest sister, began setting assignments to everyone just as Prue once had done, "lets just go ahead and do as much as we can to get started. Paige, go ahead and make the potion powdery junk. Recipe's in the Book of Shadows. Phoebe, call Darryl and have him keep a look out for any unusual activities involving infant disappearances and that hospital we were at especially. And Leo, help me get up."
Leo reached down and pulled his wife up to a vertical position while her sisters scurried off to their assigned tasks.
"You certainly are getting the hang of this big sister thing," he observed with a small reassuring smile.
"I really am, aren't I?" she laughed, but soon replaced her jocular attitude with a solemn frown, "our baby will be okay right? I mean, she's gonna be fine."
Leo tried to shield the worry in his eyes, but she could still see it clearly anyway. He slowly embraced her and whispered hoarsely, "Of course she'll be fine. We wouldn't let anything happen to her."
With a hesitant glance upwards, Piper gently placed her hand over his which rested on her swelling abdomen and mumbled, "I hope you're right."
*****
A yelp from Paige pierced through the air from the Halliwell kitchen as one of her backfired potion attempts exploded in the large stainless steel pot on the kitchen stove.
"I am not cut out for this potion stewing crap," Paige muttered to herself while pulling out a glop of goo from the pot's contents with the ladle.
"Its in your blood," Phoebe argued as she walked over to where Paige was stirring ingredients together, "but you could use some help, huh?"
Phoebe tapped her sister on the nose, which was covered with soot and giggled slightly.
"You know what Phoebe? I don't think you realize the severity of this situation! Poor Piper and Leo could lose their baby forever if this potion does not work and then countless other innocents will be lost in the process! People could die and it would be my fault because I didn't add enough catfish scales or too much frog liver and no mandrake roots!"
"Calm down! Gosh, I hope I was never so annoying when I was the youngest sister," Phoebe added under her breath with a small grin.
"Touche', Sis," Paige pointed an incriminating finger at her sister and sighed, "Just help me, cuz I did everything the recipe said to do."
"Let's see," Phoebe's finger skimmed down the page thoughtfully, "did you remember the peacock feather?"
"Peacock feather? Peacock feather? Where am I supposed to get a freakin peacock feather? Why do we even need one? How is it even going to fit into this pot?" Paige continued to ramble in a panicked frenzy.
"Paige! Calm yourself. We live in San Fransico, right? Just head over to the zoo and find the feather. This is magic, it will work," she took a minute, dangling the car keys in front of her, as Paige absorbed this and then added in a monotone voice that one would use to speak to a child, enunciating each syllable clearly, "Now are you okay? Can you do this all by yourself?"
Paige snatched the car keys out of Phoebe's hands, "You wait til I put a curse on you."
"In this house, you don't even joke about things like that!" Phoebe called after her as she began cleaning up the kitchen, humming along as she did so.
*****
The car door slammed to Paige's lime green Volkswagon as she walked through the parking lot of the San Fransico Zoo.
"Peacocks, peacocks. I guess it makes sense since peacocks are proud and apparantly this demon is awfully proud," Paige abruptly stopped talking to herself and began thinking instead. She really had a problem with this talking to herself thing. It was something that happened whenever she was under stress, which was becoming more and more frequent by the day. Sighing, she marched up to the ticket desk and leaned against the frame.
"Excuse me, zoo lady. I need assistance over here," Paige called to the brunette who had her back towards her. She suddenly turned around with a nail file in hand and phone between shoulder and ear.
"Sean, sweetie, could you hold on a minute," the woman muttered into the phone before turning to Paige, "Yes, my name is Molly. How can I help you?"
"Do you have peacocks here?" Paige asked hesitantly, knowing how peculiar the question was.
"Um, yea," Molly answered quickly, "you want a ticket?"
"Sure," the girls exchanged cash and ticket before Paige headed off to the animals and the girl at the gate continued chattering away on the telephone.
*****
Sapphire rain announced Leo and Piper's arrival into the kitchen. When they finally took form, Phoebe laughed, "Weren't you just coming from the attic?"
"I'm not gonna hear it, Missy. You carry this package around and then tell me if you wanta walk up and down the stairs. And besides," she patted Leo on the shoulder, "Leo's my private Greyhound."
"I hear you, Piper. I've got the potion stewing and am just waiting on Paige."
"Where is she?" Leo questioned, his emerald eyes squenching slightly as they often did when he was thinking.
"Zoo," Phoebe looked up to two baffled faces, "to get the peacock feather!"
"Oh," Piper eased into one of the chairs and replied with a cynical look, "of course. To get the peacock feather. You know, what's the point of making this potion if we don't have the baby yet?"
"Its always better to be prepared. You're due soon, anyway aren't you, Sweetie?" Phoebe asked, using a sweet perk in her voice while she wiped the counter.
Piper stuttered, "In four weeks. I don't really consider that very soon. Its too long to have this demon running around aging babies!"
"Unless," Phoebe paused, "unless you didn't really have the baby. It only seemed like it."
"What the hell are you talking about, Phoebe?" Piper interjected somewhat frantically, "its pretty difficult to fake having a baby."
"Not magically!" Phoebe grinned and ran out of the kitchen towards the attic.
"Leo, Leo, follow her!" Piper directed as her husband took hold of her and orbed them into the attic where they found Phoebe flipping through the aged pages of the Book of Shadows.
"You tell me what you are doing right now! You are playing with my child's life!" Piper demanded. Nothing stopped Phoebe's flipping, however, until she reached a certain page.
"I think this will work," she spoke at last.
Leo looked over her shoulder at the page in the book, "What will work? Phoebe, what do you plan to do?"
Phoebe looked up to see genuine concern and explained, "Look, we vanquished Cole in an alternate plane right? And when we came back, everything was normal except for the fact that he was gone. Right?"
"Right," Piper slurred out, still suspicious.
"So," Phoebe's eyes grew with glory as she turned the pedestal, which held the Book of Shadows, so that her sister could see it, "we do the same thing that Cole did to us- only we do it to the demon this time in the future. In this alternate plane, Piper has had the baby and we can vanquish the demon there. Once we do that, we can return and she'll be gone forever."
Piper looked at Leo who looked as reluctant as she felt before returning her eyes to her sister's, "Um, Phoebe, how do you know this will work?"
"Well, we never do truly know if something will work until we do it, but its our best shot. If Cole can do it, so can we. So, what do you guys say?" Phoebe rubbed her hands together in anticipation, positive that this would work.
"I, uh, Leo what do you think?" Piper asked.
He inhaled slightly and then looked from Phoebe to his wife, "I'm up for it if you are."
She nodded, "I guess all we have to do now, is wait for Paige."
*****
Paige headed into the kitchen, and was surprised to find no one there guarding their brewing potion. She steadily added the peacock feather into the brew and opened her mouth with awe as it easily disappeared into the shallow depths of the pot, creating a purple liquid. She easily poured the completed potion into three seperate flasks and corked them as she heard her sisters and Leo enter the room.
"See, you can make it down the stairs," Phoebe pointed out to her older sister, with a humorous look gracing her features.
Piper glared at her, "Shutup. Paige, you finished the potion?"
"Yep. And apparently you havn't had any babies while I was gone," Paige observed.
"Well, Phoebe found a way to do it," Leo explained, presenting the page in the Book of Shadows to the red head.
"I was thinking Piper would have to have the baby, not Phoebe," Paige questioned sarcastically before reading the page in the book, "wow. Then lets blow this popsicle stand."
*****
Up in the attic once again, the three sisters stood around the Book of Shadows, hands clasped together and potions pocketed while chanting. Leo watched from a distance, waiting until they reached the seperate plane, before he orbed there to meet them.
"To retain what has been stolen from the young,
We shall depart to a future sun,
In the foreward we take our present mind,
So that the answers we seek, we may find."
Their voices were melded into one as they collected into a trio of golden lights before they vanished. Leo took his queue and orbed after them.
*****
Piper opened her eyes to darkness and looked around. The familiar feeling of her cotton sheets told her that she was lying in her bed in her normal bedroom. Everything seemed the same to her and she wondered to herself whether the spell had worked or not. Suddenly, she was blinded by bright blue lights.
"Piper? Are you all right?" Piper was relieved to hear her husband's voice.
"Leo, thank God. Did the spell work?" she sat up abruptly, clad in her white nightgown.
The two stopped to hear a whine coming from their closet. Soon, the soft shrill turned into a tiny scream. Piper turned on the bedside lamp, which barely illuminated the room, and their eyes widened to see a newborn baby lying in the cradle in their closet. A homemade sign, obviously in Paige's handwriting, hung on the closet door, 'Happy Birthday, Melinda Wyatt Halliwell! 12:46 AM! 7.6 lbs!'
Piper glanced at the digital clock, which read 3:58 AM. Obviously the baby had just been born a couple hours ago since many doctor instruments were lying around her room, and yet she didn't feel like she had just given birth. Suddenly, she remembered that her child was in the closet crying her eyes out and she was simply sitting there.
"Leo, what do we do? She's crying!"
"I, uh," he stuttered, "its a girl, Piper."
"Yea, I know," she whispered. After a poignant pause, she swatted his arm, "but she's still crying!"
The two cautiously made their way to the bassinet and stopped when they saw the face of their child, all wrapped up in a soft pink blanket.
"Oh my God," Piper muttered under her breath, taking hold of the infant, "she is so beautiful."
"Gets it from her Mommy," Leo whispered back, never taking his eyes off of his daughter, whose sobs had somewhat subsided.
He watched with a soft smile and moist eyes as Piper choked back a sob and whispered to her little girl, voice cracking, "Don't cry now. Mommy's here."
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!!