"Aha, Paige has beaten the renegade!" Laughed the First Voice.

"But not permenantly, she'll be back." Warned the Third Voice.

"True, I still forsee trouble around her." Agreed the Second Voice.

"But the demon will fall yet!" Exclaimed the First Voice.

"His fate is *still* unclear!" Countered the Third Voice.

"Watch on" Commanded the Fourth Voice.

* * *

Prue felt herself being knocked backwards, and a strange burning on her thigh. Pain took over as she flew across the empty mausoleum and impacted with a the opposite wall. She faintly heard Piper's scream before blacking out.

Piper screamed and fell backwards as she saw her sister fly past the opening. She scrambled down the rest of the steps and skidded over to Prue's unconscious body. "Prue, Prue! Wake up, wake up now." she put a shaking hand onto her sisters wrist and felt a strong pulse. Desperately trying not to cry, Piper turned defensively and stared about the murky room.

Cole lay on the floor, arm still raised from the fireball. "Surprised?" he panted, triumph showing through his insanity. He struggled to get to his feet, as agonzing pain twisted his face. He could feel the bones and tissue knitting together inside his body. It was as comforting as it was painful. He knew he'd be fit enough to fight them soon, unlike Prue. She'd be out cold for a while yet. He afforded himself a laugh as he stared at her inert form next to Piper.

Piper glared at Cole as he laughed to himself in the corner. "What are you laughing about, you damn crazy bastard. We'll kill you when Paige gets here. Just you wait..." her voice cracked as she gripped Prue's hand tightly. Paige better get here soon, thought Piper, I don't want to take him on alone.

Tentatively Cole stretched out a leg and tensed it against the ground. He manouvered himself upright and stood propped against the wall. He leant forwards in a stoop and wiped the blood from his nose. "Its going to end here, Piper. You should have left me and Phoebe alone, you know. Now its going to end in one big messy explosion!" he threw up his hand and a ball of fire blossomed in it, before bursting out and shooting towards Piper.

She gestured at it and the ball froze. She made another gesture and a red mist bloomed infront of Cole, knocking him backwards. "You're right, it is going to end in one big messy explosion. Unfortunately I'll be here to clean it up afterwards." She watched in satisfaction as Cole was slammed back against the wall again.

He dropped down to his knees and gasped as the breath, among other things, was knocked out of him. He put one shaking hand onto the floor and tossed another firebal at Piper. "You can't... beat me. My love for Phoebe is too... strong."

The second ball froze and Piper scanned the room. She gestured at a pillar next to Cole and the base blew up, showering Cole with sharp stone shards. The pillar crashed down, still upright, before slowly toppling over. "Strong things always fall eventually, Cole, like that pillar. It might take one hit or it might take a million, but it'll still fall."

Cole shouted in terror and scrambled behind a sarcophagus as the large stone pillar crashed down onto the lid of the stone coffin. He coughed as a huge cloud of dust erupted from the cracked and aged stone, and showered him with tiny pieces of rock. He coughed harshly and rubbed his eyes, before waving his arms innefectually around.

"Oh, sorry about that. My hand must have slipped or something." taunted Piper, "must be a real kick in the pants for you, having this place destroyed when it means so much to you..." she left her last comment hanging and concerntrated on freezing the dust cloud. The outer edge of the dust cloud froze, trapping Cole in a perimeter of blindness and clogged air. Piper crouched over Prue again and felt her pulse. It was still strong, but Prue still showed no sign of waking. Come on Paige, thought Piper, finish Phoebe and get here soon.

* * *

Phoebe groaned and fluttered her eyes open. She slowly touched a lump on her head and tried to focus her eyes. She groaned under her breath and levered herself up onto her elbows. "Oh god, my head," she moaned softly, as something fell off of her shoulders, "Paige." She said, while looking at her sister's sweater. Phoebe took it in one hand and held it for a second, before throwing it into a corner of the room.

"Cole! Cole? Are you there?" she called out, immediately grabbing her temples in pain. Since when had her voice been so loud? She labouriously got up and tottered over to the cupboard above the sink, silently praying that Cole had stocked the house with asprin. After a few minutes of searching she eventually found some, and with some difficulty pried the lid off. With a sigh she tipped some of the small white pills into her hand and held them. It'd be so easy to take too many, to get away from all of this... crap. She carefully put two into her mouth and looked down at the rest of the pills in her hand.

Almost regretfully she tipped them back in the bottle and screwed the cap on. She set it on the counter and poured herself a glass of water. As she tipped it into her mouth some of Paige's threats echoed in her mind.

"I bound your powers. We can't have a liability like you running around with lethal magic at your disposal, now can we? Count yourself lucky, it was either this or… death."

Lethal magic and death. Two words she knew her sisters would apply to Cole! Phoebe threw down the glass, wincing slightly as it shattered in the sink, and ran towards the front door. She had to go to Cole and warn him that her sisters were on the war path.

* * *

Cole choked and threw fireballs randomly about him in an attempt to disipate the cloying cloud around him. "Damn it, Piper, do you have to resort to tricks like this to beat me?" he shouted raspily.

Piper ducked a fireball and shouted back pleasantly, "No, its just nice to see you suffer." She didn't understand why Cole just didn't shimmer out of it, surely that'd be the obvious thing to do?

As if on cue Cole shimmered out of the mortar cloud and lifted his hand to throw a fireball.

"Well that took you long enough to work out, honestly!" Piper sneered, as she flicked her hands at the ceiling above Cole. Another shower of plaster and bricks hit him.

"Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!" roared Cole furiously, as he threw a fast volley of fireballs at Piper. Rage consumed him and he didn't stop. The air burned as he threw more and more towards Piper and Prue.

Piper frantically froze the fireballs till there was a burning, glowing wall of death a few metres in front of her. The sheer volume of fire was making it hard to sustain the freeze, and slowly the lethal barrier moved towards her, millimetre by millimetre. She flicked her hands again and again as Cole relently threw more fire. Her hands shook with effort and her face paled as more and more energy was put into her freeze.

Even Cole was beginning to feel the strain of creating so much fire and his torrent slowed to a trickle. He suddenly stopped and held both hands out in front, palms cupped towards each other. With his eyes clenched tightly shut and sweat dripping from his forehead, Cole focused on the space between his hands. A tiny flame flickered into existence burst into a fireball. It grew further as Cole slowly moved his hands apart. It pulsed slowly as it span wildly, tiny streamers of golden light flowed in and out of the surface like the corona of the sun. He took a deep breath and sent it careening towards the large block of frozen fireballs.

It exploded on impact, dissolving the freeze and freeing the fireballs as it did so.

Piper collapsed exhausted to the ground and tried to freeze them again. The fire slowed down for a second, like it was moving through tar and then broke out, momentum from the explosion carrying them towards Piper once more. She screamed in terror and threw herself over Prue, shouting one final word as the began to blister around her.

"Paige!"

A/n, just to clear it up... again... the voices *are* the Elders, Prue came back to reconstitute the Power Of Three and I gave phEobe's powers to the Piper and Paige because its my story and I felt it would improve the story.