Hello all! Thank you very much to Gomay and hope master23! You both are great for the review! Everybody else, I'm on my knees begging for more reviews. ;-) Anyways, I hope you enjoy!
Chap. 37
"Balthazar, I heard you were dead," one of Cole's demonic contact said.
"Don't believe everything you hear. I need to know who sent the Demon of Hate after the Charmed Ones," Cole answered.
"The new Source. He wants to prove who is boss."
"The new source?" Cole repeated.
"Well, his 'parental guardians.' You know…they look a mighty like you and your witch."
"Excuse me?"
"You've been dead too long, Balthazar. Shapeshifters are raising the new source and rule until he's coronated," the demon informed.
Cole remained confused. "Shapeshifters?"
"Yes, shapeshifters are raising your son," he finished as he suddenly burst into flames falling into dust in front of Cole.
Chap. 38
"Phoebe!" Cole shimmered into the manor. "Phoebe!" He called as he searched the house. She sat on the couch with Piper leaning against her sobbing. "Piper?" It was a rare moment that Piper cried letting her barriers down. Things had to be bad for her to break down.
Phoebe put a finger to her lip. Piper's tears had slowed down immensely. "I got to go to the attic," She sniffled.
"No more fearless spells all right?" Phoebe called after her. Through her tears, Piper shot her a glare. "What Cole?" Phoebe sighed resignedly.
"You lost our baby when the seer died, right?" He asked hurriedly.
Stunned Phoebe said, "Yes, why are you asking me that?"
"My informant said that there are shapeshifters raising our son to become the next Source. They sent the Demon of Hate after us. And here's the kicker, after he told me he was vanquished."
Saddened Phoebe touched her stomach in memory of her lost son. The seer may've said that he wasn't really their baby, but Phoebe knew better than that. She knew he was her and Cole's son, and she loved him no matter what. "The seer stole him from me, and then tried to kill my sisters and me with his powers. They were too much for her, and they killed her and everybody else in that room instead. That includes our son," She sniffed.
"Come here," Cole pulled her into a comforting hug. He kissed the top of her forehead lovingly.
Kat ungracefully swung the front door open causing a loud "thunk" as the door hit a wall. That undoubtedly left a mark. "We're home, and we've brought company!" She announced.
"Jeez, you'd think she wants the whole neighborhood to know," Darryl whispered to Chris, who merely nodded.
When they walked into the foyer, the atmosphere was somber. Phoebe tried to collect herself. Cole kept his arms wrapped around her to let her know that she wasn't alone. "Hi."
Kat flopped onto the couched. Cole gave her a reproachful glare; she rolled her eyes. "Have you guys found anything?"
The doorbell rang. Phoebe sighed, "I've got it." She answered the door and was surprised to see who was standing in the doorway. "Jason?"
"Phoebe, hi," He smiled. "I was thinking that maybe we could get together and talk tonight?"
Meanwhile, Paige orbed in with Prue. "We've got a spell!" Paige declared as Prue waved a piece of paper in her hand.
"There is one small problem. That is we can't find the location," Paige sighed sitting next to Kat on the couch.
"I'll go get Mom. Maybe she knows how to put some kinda of mojo on the scrying crystals." She ran up to her mom standing in front of the threshold. "Oh, hello, Mr. Dean!"
"Mr. Dean?" Jason repeated.
Phoebe stuttered. "Umm…Jason, this is my daughter from the future."
"Sorry, but you're not my father."
"Kat," she groaned.
"Too blunt?"
She nodded. "Was there a particular purpose for you coming this way?"
"Oh, yeah, we were wondering if you could do something with the crystals for scrying."
"We think we might be on to something with the locations of the attacks. Maybe you can look at it," Darryl said to Prue and Paige.
Andy pulled out a folder containing official reports. "We tried to find similarities in the places where the riots took place. However, we didn't find anything particularly interesting." He laid the map onto the coffee table with each of the points boldly marked.
"Paige, do you see what I see?"
She studied the map. "Oh of course!" She grabbed a pen and ruler from the top of the old antique desk. She drew lines from point to point.
"It makes a pentagram," Cole observed.
"You wouldn't believe where the center is," Prue said.
"Oh, no, Piper!"
Suddenly, there was a loud crash in the attic.
Chap. 39
Everybody rushed to the attic except Kat, Phoebe, and Jason who were still standing in the doorway.
"What's going on?" He asked.
Phoebe panicked. "The demon!"
Kat sighed. "Go ahead."
"Sorry, Jason," Phoebe said and ran off to join her sisters.
"Should I fill you in or do you not want to know?"
"Well, is it just like something regular or…?"
"Come in, it's a long story about the end of the world. Or on second thought, it may be safer for you to come back later & take Mom to dinner. She can explain it better then.
"Why will you let me take you mother out if I'm not your father?
"Well, it's because you were a really good family friend. Even more so because in my time after the world goes to hell and we run out of healthy living relatives, you'll step in and take care of us. You were better than our supposed 'guardian angel'… It's a long story. Just hope it doesn't happen."
Flash Back/Forward
2018
Piper and Paige stood in front of their sister. Paige subconsciously hugged her stomach in a protective manner. "Phoebe, I wish…" Paige said guiltily.
"No, it's not you fault. I just want you to keep my little niece safe." She knelt down to Paige's stomach. "You hear that? I want to be able to see you and my girls as I watch from heaven." Standing up again, "Please protect my girls," she told her sisters.
"Of course." A tear fell from Paige's eyes.
"Piper?" Phoebe snapped her fingers awaking her from a deep trance.
She shook her head, "I'm the older sister. I should..."
"Stop it. You need to stay alive for Chris and Wyatt's sake. We don't want the future that Chris warned us about. If Kat was the one to come back and she had an evil brother I had to watch out for, then I'm sure our roles would be reversed. Knowing you'd do it for me is all I need." Tears streamed from their faces as the summoned the Demon of Hate. As it stood in front of them the recited:
"Spreader of Hate
Face your Fate
Go to Hell
With this spell!"
Except for the tears of the sisters and the demon's pain, the house was eerily quiet. They chanted the spell again. Phoebe grabbed an athame from the spell table. Then the attic door opened. Her youngest daughter Prue stood there. "Mommy?" she asked. Cole, followed by the others, raced after her.
The demon took this as a good time to strike, but Cole threw an energy ball and used his body as a barrier so that Prue couldn't see anything. The sisters kept chanting, but Phoebe was wavering. Seeing this, Piper stole the athame, and pushed her away.
Present
She tried to read the Book of Shadows, but it was no use. Piper couldn't see through her tears. Leo orbed in looking around. "Piper," He smiled until he saw her tears. "Honey."
Piper clung to his embrace. "I don't wanna die, Leo. I can't die or Chris will too. I have to protect him."
"You're not going to die, Piper. As long as you have all three of your sisters here no one is going to let you even think about dying."
"But…"
"No. You're going to live a long happy life. We'll get through this. The Elders say it'll be tough, but it's just another ordeal. Right?"
Looking up at him, she smiled through her tears. Suddenly they were attacked. A huge demon that couldn't have beaten Shax in a beauty contest shimmered in. It had teeth worse than the fake hill Billy teeth people wore for Halloween. Its hair was the lovechild of a bad comb over and a mullet. To make it worse it shimmered in throwing fireballs.
Instinctively Leo orbed himself and Piper out of the way, which caused the fireball to vanquish the window instead of them. Piper used her power to blow it up. The Demon's essence was temporarily scattered.
Prue, Paige, and Phoebe raced through the attic's doorway. Prue telekinetically held the door shut to prevent the others from entering.
"What happened?" Phoebe looked around at the mess that was now the attic.
"That thing!" Paige pointed to the newly reconstituted demon.
"Oh
my G-d! Ok that must be the Demon of Hate! Spells everybody!"
Prue panicked as she passed out copies of the spell.
"Spreader of Hate
Face your Fate
Go to Hell
With this spell!"
As they chanted, supernatural wind blew everywhere. The Demon frantically tried to deflect spell. At one point, it even tried to use a fireball, but it burned up in its very large palm.
Outside the others where panicking. They tried to kick down the door, but it was no use. "Prue, you're going to have to let them in and use all of your power!" Piper told her.
"Keep chanting!" Leo said alarmed.
The door flew open as Cole threw an energy ball. The demon distracted turned to throw a fireball at Cole.
"Cole!" Phoebe tried to move toward him, but Prue and Piper stopped her. They chanted the spell for the fourth time. The demon had stopped fighting because it was no use. Its fireballs didn't even make a puff anymore. Finally, a large hole started to form and there was no way out. The hole swallowed it completely.
A/N: Thanks for reading! Again, please review. I wanted to clear up the flash forward/back before anyone asked. It was the timeline before Kat came back to warn them, but after Chris died. Think of it as the future that would've happened if Spin City and on hadn't been interfered with by Kat.
