Chapter 3: A Good Day's Hunt
Day three of their new permanent demon extermination crusade saw them in the car park of an empty office building downtown. The tracking spell that they developed when they learnt about the common characteristics of the Source's generals that existed three thousand years ago had picked up another group of demons and Daryl has also told them that policemen reported mysterious goings on in the area.
The sisters, armed with various potions that they were quite sure would work on all the ancient generals, arrived with their own car, as it wasn't advisable to just orb into unknown situations. The car park seemed deserted, but they stepped out anyway to take a look. Traces of some voices reached their ears and they tried to guess the direction it was coming from sneaking around a huge pillar to find half a dozen demons already in the middle of a fight with Cole. They hadn't seen him for a week, apart from Paige in court where he managed to get the judge convinced no problem to convict the sexual assaulter, the maximum penalty possible. They have briefly covered the subject of the generals during a court room break when he let her know that he was hunting them down as well, but so far they haven't crossed paths. They saw as he smartly released several little fire balls at the same time, sending them skilfully in the different directions of the other demons, hurting most of them without miss, while rolling, spinning and jumping out of the way of the fireballs that the other demons released on him. He seemed to be in control, dancing as if he was performing a kumite exercise.
Nonetheless, Piper gave her sisters the sign to attack, successfully blowing up the closest demon to her and getting their attention. Not one of the last generals they had to track down, then.
Paige concentrated on deflecting the fire balls that were thrown in their direction, hoping she could show the same skill as Cole did.
Piper tried her explosive powers again and managed to blow up one more demon. As it was no use on the others, she started to throw the potions on them while her sisters covered her.
Not completely relying on fire balls, two of the demons launched in Phoebe's direction. She jumped back, avoiding them, then flipped herself up in the air, confusing them enough for her to be able to drop one of the potion vials on one of her attackers from above. She turned over in the air and landed lightly on the ground, "if you insist," she ran towards her other attacker and they exchanged a quick set of blows before separating briefly to begin again. She took a quick glance around and saw her sisters individually engaging the remaining other two demons. Cole was bending down, leaning on the wall with one hand, holding his stomach with the other while emptying its contents. She turned around, energetically levitating up to kick her opponent's neck. The scaly, ugly demon fell on the ground, giving her just that millisecond more of a break from its fireballs that she could throw the potion on him. It was even quicker when she leaped through the air and caught Cole's head before it hit the ground as he fell unconscious.
"What's wrong with him?" Phoebe asked Leo for the twelfths time in the last hour since they took Cole back to the manor. Her ex husband had only regained consciousness for mere seconds at a time, his stomach convulsing incessantly even after there was nothing else left in it. All Leo's efforts to ameliorate his condition have failed. He also tried healing him, but he immediately got blasted across the room so much it took him a few minutes to heal himself.
"I'm sorry Phoebe, I have no idea," the white lighter answered.
"All right, you stay with him, we're going down to get a demon doctor," Phoebe's position was quite far from how she reacted the last time somebody suggested that. But then, Cole only seemed to be slightly injured, now Leo feared that if his heart rate and blood pressure was similar to what humans had, he could die. She wouldn't let that happen again. She owed him that much, since she was the one that killed him the last time. It reminded her of that moment a couple of years back when they were standing in front of the mausoleum and a bounty hunter attacked him and she had to choose if she was going to protect him or not. Wasn't a hard decision, she made it on the spur of the moment, rushing to his aid. Once he was conscious, she was planning on acting the non concerned again to propel him away. Acting like that also helped her fool her own mind she didn't care, so much she sometimes really felt like she didn't. But now it was time to urge Paige to use her powers for his sake.
"No," Leo was disagreeing, "Paige doesn't know how to find her way around down there. I've been down with Cole several times and kinda got the tour of the place. Besides, if we get hold of the demon I'm thinking of, you don't need the power of three. He's lower level. You don't actually want to vanquish him anyway. At least not yet. Paige, you should stay," he advised them.
Leo landed the two sisters on the floor of a small cave room, with the whole available space on the wall plastered with shelves full of weird coloured potions.
The demon doctor was leaning over a table, tending to a patient, the only one around, that looked in a pretty bad shape, with his limbs all torn. The doctor looked up when he sensed somebody materialising in his quarters, not particularly alarmed. People were always arriving in the underworld, after all. Especially at his place. Then he saw the remaining sparkles of Leo's orbing.
"We need your help," Leo started the peaceful way first.
"Why should I? You don't matter to me!" The demon yelled with hatred.
"Enough said," Piper decided to blow his patient up.
"Are you coming or not?" Leo stepped closer, lifted the doctor's bag and threw it to Phoebe and they all orbed back to the manor.
"Do something, but we're watching you," Piper showed the demon to Cole's bed.
"At first we thought he is not well because of the fireball he received," Leo explained, hoping it would make the diagnosis easier.
The demon doctor paused for a few seconds, then his hands started pressing and poking all over Cole's body, feeling here, checking over there, "I need to test his blood," he made it clear just in case the witches started to attack him when he proceeded. He took a small old looking grey box with inscriptions on it out of his bag, cut one of Cole's thumbs and let some of his blood flow into the box, shook it violently, then opened it and looked in. Next, he took a needle syringe out of his suitcase, filled it with some clear liquid and injected it into Cole's stomach.
His patient moaned, but opened his eyes in a few seconds time. As recognition settled in, his hand shot up and grabbed the demon doctor by the throat.
"Balthazar," the demon doctor choked, giving away some sort of connection they must have had in the past, "how about some proper payment once in a lifetime?"
"Cole!" Phoebe stepped in, taking a hold of his hand, remembering the exact sequence of how he tried to strangulate her just a few weeks back. And a couple of times way before that. It was one of his favourite techniques of killing.
However, this time, Cole reacted to her shouting, his eyes focused on her and let his hand being slowly pulled away from the demons throat, "we still need him Cole," she explained, not missing the fact that the moment she let go of his hands, they went down to his belly, clasping them in a similar fashion that he had before, "talk," she ordered the demon doctor.
"His blood tells me he's loosing his powers. It makes sense. Some sort of disturbance, such as receiving powerful fire balls can set off demons loosing their unnatural, not inborn powers. Powers they pick up in some way, spells, transfer, exchange…"
"Powers he picked up in the Wasteland," Leo understood, "so you're saying at the end of this he will have the powers he was born with?"
"Yes."
"Can you help him?"
"I can't stop the process if that's what you mean. But I can give you something to massage his stomach with when he's having cramps. It depends on how many and how compelling the powers were he's picked up, but it will take a while. If it goes right."
"What do you mean if?" Phoebe picked up on the word right away.
"It happens sometimes that they can't stabilise completely until they get some blood from a close relative. Just have to wait and see."
Phoebe looked at Cole, "any ideas?"
"I don't know where they are and even if I did, they wouldn't come willingly."
Phoebe didn't expect anything else.
"So don't blame me when he gets worse again. Because he will," the demon doctor defended himself, "I gave him Frestead to ease the pain, but only one shot is allowed per day. Otherwise it'll make him more ill, not less."
"All right, all right," Piper had enough of the filthy demon doctor again, "we spared your life because we might still need you. Not shimmer out of here!"
"I can't shimmer. Could one of you take me back?"
"You can't shimmer?" Paige wondered.
"He can't," Cole confirmed, "he doesn't have any active powers. The yard keep him alive because he's very good with drugs."
"Uh, orb him out already," Piper directed her husband just as disgusted of the smelly demon as he was of her.
Cole woke up in Phoebe's room. The blinds were drawn, so he couldn't tell what time of the day it was. Tubes were attached to his arm, he could see some fluid dripping into it. The covers were drawn over him and he felt a familiar wetness on his tummy, the compresses. They did really help him a bit and right now the cramps felt more of a memory than an actual happening. He attempted a change of position to try that theory out, pressing his palms on the bed and propelling himself higher on the pillow.
His movement alerted Piper, who was sitting on the boudoir chair, reading a baby care book. She was by his side in a trice and helped him slide back on the head rest, "easy, easy. What is it? Do you want something?"
Cole peeked towards the table with a kettle on it and licked his dry lips, "I'm thirsty."
"Of course," Piper poured him some water and handed him a glass.
Cole took it, but his hand started shaking before he could reach his hand and he half placed, half dropped the glass down on his chest.
Piper came to his assistance again without uttering one word, lifting the glass and tilting it back so he could drink some. She didn't want to make him uncomfortable. "How are you?" She placed the glass back down the table.
Cole looked at his arm, indicating the needle that was stuck into it, "you tell me."
"You've been out for three days. Leo thought that the pain would be too unbearable for you if you were aware of it, so he tranquillised you. And you were dehydrated, so…Phoebe has been here with you day and night for the whole time. It just happens I sent her to my room to sleep. Something about she couldn't have anything more than a short kip here if she heard you moaning all the time in your sleep." As Cole underlined that with another grunt, she asked, "can I help you?"
"Maybe that cream rub that was meant to relax my stomach muscles?" Cole already shut his eyes, oblivious to anything else but the throbbing in his guts.
Piper decided upon touching her ex brother in law's stomach that it was best just to call for Leo again.
A warm morning breeze blew in and sunlight spilled into the room as Cole found the curtains drawn back the next morning. He turned to his side, away from the light to tried to get back to sleep and away from the reality that hasn't been very kind to him lately, but when he turned, he found a dishevelled Phoebe lying next to him, fast asleep, her hands still holding his compress and making a wet patch on the bed sheet. The unexpected and pleasant site made his lips curve into a smile. It felt good. In fact, he felt good, he suddenly realized. No cramps, no sickness, no extreme weakness. He turned around in the bed without any problems at all. Not a big achievement, but it will do just now. It allowed him to enjoy the moment. The very long moment he yearned for since he came back from the wasteland. Ok, it was a pretence, an illusion, Phoebe lying next to him just now didn't mean anything really for their future, but he wanted to take pleasure in every moment he could get. He didn't want to get his hopes high, he usually got disappointed when he did, especially if it was about his witch. Nevertheless, hope flickered in him whether he wanted it or not. The long moment stretched and stretched since it took Phoebe about an hour to start to stir. When her eyes fluttered open he greeted her with a "good morning."
"Good morning," she answered, genuinely happy for a few seconds to see him awake, feeling better and looking into his eyes. Until she remembered this was the wrong way to go about it.
"What time is it?" She asked him before she realised the daftness of the question. Cole wasn't likely to know what day it was, let alone the time. Besides, her clock was standing on the bedside table behind him. She glanced at it, "I've got to go," knowing she wasn't exactly late from work, but running out into the bathroom and of the house was easier than struggling with her emotions towards Cole when he was looking right into her eyes. It was for the best, for both of them, to have as little contact as possible.