"Where's Wyatt?" Chris solicited from his mother as she entered the manor, always trying to keep track of what he went back to the past for.
"Oh, he's coming," Piper assured him.
Cole pushed the little boy's buggy though the front door, "if you're happy and you know it clap your…hello everybody," he looked around, fascinated by the reaction he got.
"What is he doing with my son?" Leo asked suspiciously.
"Uh, he's, he's, you know, just passing by," Piper tried to make it look innocent, knowing she had no chance at all.
"Yeah, right, he just happened to be nearby and popped in," Phoebe mused, not even trying.
Chris looked at them sceptically, "so the most powerful demon there, who, by all means, supposed to be dead, pops by and you invite him for dinner."
"Well, yeah, done that before with Cole," Phoebe pondered further.
"They are clearly under some spell," Leo rationalized.
"Correction," Phoebe specified, "we have him under a spell. And that's not Cole."
"That's quasi Cole," Paige added.
"They made him up magically for my birthday. Isn't he perfect?" Piper smiled, while Phoebe and Paige sighed.
"What the hell's going on here?" Leo was still confused, "Cole for your birthday? What?"
"You don't have to feel threatened by me, Leo," Cole walked over to him, "no one will ever replace you in Wyatt's, or even Piper's eyes. You were always so friendly towards me, I'd never want to hurt you."
"Phoebe? What is wrong with Cole?" Leo couldn't believe his ears.
"Yeah, okay, why don't we put Wyatt down for a nap," the older sister suggested, and started pushing the buggy towards the stairs, "I'm sure he's really tired from all this excitement. Cole, you're coming with me, the girls have some explanations to make…nothing to do with me, " she gestured towards her ex husband.
"Piper was gonna give up on love, on her birthday nonetheless," Phoebe tried to clarify the situation.
"So you revived Cole?" Leo asked, "forgive me, if I don't understand the connection."
"No, not Cole, I said that already," Paige shook her head, "the perfect man. See, he's somebody who knows exactly what Piper wants and he's just gonna be here long enough to pull her out. It's just somehow happened that the spell thought Cole was the perfect man. Dunno why, maybe because Phoebe said it?" She raised her voice, not really sure of disclosing Piper's real feelings about Cole in front of Leo.
"Just for twenty-four hours, that's it…that's great, right? We don't have to put up with him very long," Phoebe commented.
"Yeah, not even twenty-four, really eight now and then sadly he goes poof," Paige remarked.
"Yeah. You don't want her to live life without love, do you Leo?"
"We'll talk about this later after we deal with the Order," Leo suggested.
Darryl walked in through the front door, "is this a bad time? I just wanted to drop this off," he held up a tube.
"Darryl, why didn't you just wait till dinner?" Paige reasoned.
"Dinner? Actually, this is for Wyatt so he has a little something to open up too."
Phoebe went over to him, "oh, that's so sweet."
"Ah, Sheila's idea, actually. You mind if I give it to him myself?"
Darryl walked upstairs down the hallway, bumping into Cole and Piper. The demon shouted, "shape shifter, watch it!" The person that looked like Darryl reacted by sending an energy ball towards Cole and lifting his tube in Wyatt's direction. A light was starting to pour out from it and into Wyatt. Cole ducked away from the shape shifter's energy ball, while Piper blew the shape shifter up, all in a millisecond.
Leo ran in, followed by the rest of the family, "is he okay?"
"I think he's okay. Good thing Cole was here. Who knows what the demon would've done to him if we didn't figure out he was a shape shifter right away. But I think we need to give Chris's idea another chance."
"What idea?" Phoebe enquired.
"About binding Wyatt's powers."
"What?" Phoebe and Paige was surprised.
"Well, I'm just saying we should consider it," their older sister at down, still holding Wyatt, "I mean, if you think about it, it makes sense."
"You can't be serious," Leo remembered how many arguments they had about the same thing even before their child was born.
"Actually, she's never been more serious," Cole stood next to her.
"Excuse me, I was talking to her. Since when do you protect my wife?"
"Since we made him do that," Phoebe explained, "just I have no idea why didn't we think of doing something like that last year when he was taking our house away for the Shadow."
"This doesn't sound like you, Piper," Paige got back to the original topic.
"Doesn't it?" Cole defended the oldest charmed one alive further, "Piper wants to protect her son. She wants a normal life. This way she can have both. That was what my mother had done when we lived on the surface for a short while."
"Hey, that was my argument," Chris bickered.
"Well, that's a good one."
"No, that's not a good one," Phoebe had to disagree with her ex, "that's a bad one, a very, very bad one. One that's been discussed and discarded already. Not just by Piper, but by us two as well, when we were thinking of having children."
"Yeah, but that was before a demonic cult started targeting Wyatt," Piper stood by her previous statement.
"It still isn't a good enough reason," Leo stood by his point of view.
"Piper, thinks it is," Cole underlined.
"Huh? Who are you again?" Phoebe asked.
"You did make him, didn't you? You don't know who he is?" Chris asked.
"I…do. It's just feels really confusing, all right? Piper, I don't understand. Yesterday you were willing to give up everything for Wyatt's future. Why this now?"
"Well, you should know. You're the one that, um, demonstrated us what I really wanted and really need. Apparently."
"She's got us there," Paige agreed.
"Yeah, well, it doesn't matter because it's gonna take the power of three to bind someone as powerful as Wyatt and I'm not gonna support it," Phoebe disagreed.
"Neither am I," Paige added.
"Well, then we have a problem because I am," Piper differed.
"Alright," Chris tried to calm his charges down, "why don't we all just take a deep breath, okay? Leo, why don't you orb Wyatt up there until we figure this thing out?"
"Gladly," he was happy he wasn't the one that had to deal with the charmed one's hormonal imbalances anymore.
"Why don't you come with me and let the girls talk alone for a minute," Chris asked Cole, walking him to the attic, "so, you were summoned to prove something to Piper, right? So you do have quite an influence on her, don't you?"
"I'm not sure about that. But I can figure out what she really wants. Got the non implicated, outside look on her for a while, if you know what I mean."
"Interesting. Huh. Let's see if I can make you answer honestly," Chris wrote down something on a piece of paper and threw it into the potion, which made Cole glow for a second, "outside look. Ok, Paige, what does she look for in men?"
"She wants a man who she can openly practice magic around. One she won't feel suppressed by."
"Good, very good," he threw in another paper in the potion, "you still do know what Phoebe wants, right?"
"Dunno, I was always blinded by my feelings towards her. Not sure if I ever knew what she wanted."
"But she stayed in love with you until you became too obsessed with her, right? Then why don't you revert back to how you were at that moment in time? This potion packs a hell of a punch, doesn't it? Of course, in order for them to be with the perfect man, is if they're happy with each other first, "he wrote something else down, "and the only way they can be happy with each other first is agreeing to bind Wyatt's powers," he threw a piece of paper into the potion that made Cole glow, than some other ingredients that he saw lying on the table, presumably used to make the potion, "and pheromones? Ah, what the hell," he poured in some of that as well.
Cole was glowing a few seconds longer this time, then shook his head, as if taking in the surroundings for the first time, "white lighter. You have no idea what you're getting yourself into," he grabbed Chris angrily.
"Violence? Who put violence in the potion? Piper is not too fond of violence."
"No, but she likes me and I'm a bit intense at times. You know, that's just who I am."
"You are what this potion says you are."
"Exactly. Having all the qualities and feelings of Cole, hey, myself, not long after I've been back from the Wasteland. You just added the missing ingredients for me to be…well, me."
"No, no, no, you were summoned to make Piper happy and I intended you to bind Wyatt's powers. Don't forget, you're vanquished, Phoebe doesn't have feelings for you and you're still only here until midnight. If you want to see your precious love, you play along."
"What love?"
"Phoebe?"
"Phoebe betrayed me. I have no intentions to feel that way again."
"What? You just said you have the feelings of the Cole that came back from the Wasteland."
"Yes, with the memories of how she despised me when vanquishing me. Do you really think I can live with that? I mean, figuratively speaking."
"Than? What do you want?"
"I can help you guys…" Cole shrugged, "that's what I would do, you know, if I was alive…that's what I've always done in the past. Only thing is, you need to tell what your strange involvement with this family is and why you want Wyatt's powers bound so strongly…"
tbc
