Chapter 4: Recycled
"But Phoebe," Piper argued, despite her best efforts to be supportive of her sister, "an exorcism can often take days, months or even years depending on the strength of the demon. And we are talking the institution of evil itself. Okay, maybe not years, because we are the Charmed Ones after all, but it could take a while. An exorcist always has to remain detached from the situation and must never allow his emotions to be caught up in the situation. How are you gonna manage that any length of time?"
"Leave that to me," Phoebe held her own, "no matter how hard it will be, I'll just have to manage cause it is about Cole. Are you going to help me or not?" She asked, exasperated. She didn't want to talk about it much, just get on with it.
"All right, all right already," Piper said with a groan, "but we have to always keep in mind that Cole is the Source right now and act with appropriate caution."
Phoebe stared at her older sister. She didn't want to think about that aspect, but it seemed like everyone who talked to her wanted to go over that again and again
with her.
"So," Piper continued, "we will be ready for a vanquish as well, just in case it doesn't go down all that well. Phoebe, you can use the magical cuffs to keep him from flaming away or shape shift, but Paige will orb the crystals around him as well. And I am in charge of this business, not you. You are too involved to think straight."
"Um… well, uh...whatever!" Phoebe gave in, "it says here you need arbutus, asafoetida, basil, bean, birch and boneset for the exorcism potion."
"I'll make the potion, and the ointment. You go with Paige to get the altar candles and the holy water."
"But..."
"You would be too nervous around the house just waiting around for him to turn up. Even go somewhere else, make sure you calm down for your big performance, cause it is you who will have to capture him."
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Phoebe was looking at a photo of her and Cole in her bedroom when he walked in. She turned around to face him, "hi."
"I just, um..."
"Had to get out of the house?"
"Yeah, something like that. Where are...?"
"My other selves? The spell played out, they told me what I needed to know. I never told you why I cast that spell did I?"
"I thought it was to hear your heart's desire."
"Yeah, about you," she moved closer to him and sat on the bed, next to the bedstead, "and I was told to hang onto you for the rest of my life, no matter what. Come here," she embraced him as he sat beside her, struggling not to cry and hugging him with all her strength, as if that in itself would've been able to keep him from flaming away. He kissed her neck softly and she rested her head against his shoulder. They held each other for what it seemed like an eternity, neither moving. Trapping him was very easy and Phoebe wondered whether it was Cole who fought the Source from not noticing that she lifted the pillow and snapped the cuff onto his wrist, the other part of the cuff having already been attached to the bed. He couldn't tell her he was the Source, but at least he was maybe able to do that. One magical cuff would've been enough to keep him from teleporting, but they needed all four for the exorcism, so her sisters orbed in with Leo and put the rest of them on, not to mention stopping him from firing energy balls."
"What is this? What have I done? Let me go!" Cole growled, struggling against his bonds.
They all stared at him as the metal blessed by white magic already started to make his skin redden, even though it didn't even hold him all that tightly, the physical reaction giving him away.
Phoebe rushed to light the twelve candles around him, Paige made a larger insurance circle with the crystals, Leo anointed him with the potions, salt and the holy water, and Piper started chanting, "from all sin,
From your wrath,
From the snares of the Devil..."
"Phoebe! Don't let them do this to me! I haven't done anything!" Cole thrashed about.
She would've impulsively jumped to sooth him, it was only the red in his eyes that the chanting caused that stopped her. She looked away distressed instead, not being able to stand to see her fiancé's face distorted in pain. She lifted her hands up to her face, using her fist to bite on to hold herself back from crying out loud with him, "it will be over soon," she whispered to him eventually as Piper continued with her spell.
"From anger, hatred, and all ill will,
From all lewdness,
I command you, unclean spirit,
I cast you out, unclean spirit, along with every Satanic power of the enemy, every spectre from hell, and all your fellow companions
Depart from this mortal body at once the Gods command thee!"
When Cole cried out in agony, Piper repeated, "I cast you out, unclean spirit, along with every Satanic power of the enemy, every spectre from hell, and all your fellow companions
Depart from this mortal body at once the Gods command thee," with the same results as before.
"What are you doing?" Phoebe opposed, breathing heavily from the sight.
"I knew you were going to be to bias, you know parts that make the possessed writhe in pain meant to be repeated, cause it means it works," she tried once more, "I cast you out, unclean spirit, along with every Satanic power of the enemy, every spectre from hell, and all your fellow companions
Depart from this mortal body at once the Gods command thee!"
This time, Cole's reaction was different, he lifted his head and he attacked Piper with a bolt of red light coming from his eyes, whacking her onto the wall, turning some candles over on the way.
"I'm okay, I'm okay," Piper stood by herself, "Paige, light the candles again, it's very important they are lit at all times...and maybe I'll skip that passage momentarily right enough...power have I over thee. Power of stars have I over thee. Power of the heaven's and the worlds have I over thee..." She jumped one step back, this time ready to get out the way of the flare as Cole arched up high hollering something unintelligible, but his voice still filled with distress.
"Oh god," Phoebe said quietly. She could still see from behind her fingers she hid after how his legs kept jerking spasmodically.
"Don't stop!" Leo reminded his wife and gave her a dagger.
Piper raised the blade over her head with both hands and inched forward, ready to duck any time, "come out at this site, I command you," she stroke down and sunk it deep into Cole's flesh. She figured if she struck him in the shoulder, she wouldn't make too much damage, but it would give her the necessary blood contact for her potion to work that the blade was dipped in previously. When she pulled her weapon
out again, some black fluid throbbed out of the gash.
Cole was struggling against the cuffs again, his eyes burning with a frenetic scarlet light of despair, quivering and coughing up acid that he splattered all around. The
smell of his smouldering flesh filled the room.
"Nooo!" Phoebe shouted, "stop it Piper!"
"Hold her back!" Her sister ordered Leo, "we're almost there, it's happening," they watched as gleaming red particles surged up from Cole's body. But in a few seconds time they knew Piper was wrong, given that the particles suddenly took the form of a large fire ball with the diameter of two feet, directed right at them.
Leo orbed Phoebe out the way, and Paige did the same with Piper, although all of their bedrooms were connected now with a huge smouldering hole in the walls.
Piper shouted with renewed enthusiasm the part of the chant that worked best so far, "I cast you out, unclean spirit, along with every Satanic power of the enemy, every spectre from hell, and all your fellow companions
Depart from this mortal body at once the Gods command thee!"
Cole whined and moaned, but not half as stalwartly as he did a minute ago, then suddenly, his body went limp.
"How dare you!" The Source, a black manlike figure with no features, ran up and down and around the circle made by the sacred candles.
"Heal him, Leo," Phoebe demanded from her whitelighter. Cole was free, but bleeding his life out and suffering from the burns.
"Can't yet," Leo shook his head, "it would go back into him."
Phoebe released the shuddering form of Cole of the cuffs nevertheless, and they let her, and she started to rock him tenderly back and forth. She started on the spell with the rest of them so that they could give it the strength of the charmed ones, "Melinda..." Then she lost herself in burying her face into Cole's hair and whispering to him how it will all be okay soon, subsequently joining in with the end of the spell, "banish this evil from this century."
The Source howled, then simply vanished.
"Well, some other generation will have to deal with him, but it's the best we can do," Piper explained Leo as he will have to tell the Elders, "otherwise it will just keep changing bodies."
"Great job guys," Leo smiled as he knelt down next to Cole to heal him.
"Phoebe?" Was Cole's first word when he was able to utter it, "how come you are not angry with me?"
"It's simple, I love you," she embraced him once more.
The End.