I still own nothing…
Chapter One:
Three weeks later, Chris Perry Halliwell sat alone on one of the faded couches in the Manor attic, Book of Shadows open in his lap, and thought back on the beautiful, happy, and almost carefree Piper that he'd spoken to that morning. It had now been four days since he'd let her get away, and he was still constantly kicking himself for doing so. He should've been able to stop it; after all, he'd been in the conservatory with her when the demon had arrived unexpectedly, shot a Darklighter arrow into his side, and shimmered out, a shocked Piper in tow. Chris had barely had time to call for Leo before passing out, but when he woke up and realized he'd let a demon get away with his charge, even worse, with his mother, he'd almost wished the arrow's poison had killed him after all. Phoebe, Paige, and Leo had reassured him endlessly that things had happened too quickly for him to have done anything, but with four days of fruitless scrying and spell-casting, they were starting to lose their optimism. He was starting to lose his mind.
Closing his eyes and letting his head fall back onto the back of the couch, Chris let his usual cynicism drop and sent out a silent but desperate prayer for help. To his mild surprise, the pages of the Book began to flip on their own, until landing on a page near the back which he was certain he had never seen before.
"Thanks, Grams," he said to the ceiling before leaning forward to read the spell listed. "'To Find the Source of Misfortune'… Sounds like we might be onto something here! Paige! Phoebe! I think I found something!" His aunts, hearing the trace of hope in Chris's voice, barreled into the attic and crowded around the Book.
"Let me see!" Phoebe whined, nudging Paige, who pushed Chris off the couch to make room for herself and her sister.
"Do you mind?" Chris asked, semi-crossly.
"No, of course not, honey," Paige replied sweetly, before turning her attention to the Book. "This actually looks like it might help us. I can't believe we never noticed it before!"
"Paige, you know how this works. It probably wasn't there before," Phoebe replied, hurrying around to collect items needed for the spell. "Okay, I think we have everything we need. Should we do it?"
"You think we should wait for Leo?" Paige asked. "He's still out there aimlessly searching the Underworld."
"Exactly. He wouldn't hear us even if we did call. Besides, he won't mind us leaving him out if it means we find Piper any quicker," Phoebe waited for Paige to agree with a nod, and cleared her throat to begin casting the spell. "Here we go. 'Misfortune is felt; hurt has increased. Show me the source so pain is released'."
The sisters and Chris waited expectantly for the spell to take effect, but were soon blinded by a burst of purple light that exploded in the middle of attic, followed by a small tornado. Seconds later, all had cleared away, and Phoebe, Paige, and Chris looked up to find a small, angry, and very confused demon standing in the middle of their Persian. At least, Chris instantly assumed it, she, was a demon, because she looked exactly like Piper, but was at the same time distinctly un-Piper. As he and his aunts stood with their jaws dropped, reeling in shock and bewilderment, the Piper look-alike spoke, revealing a very slight but very not-Piper southern accent.
"Could one of y'all please collect your lower jaws off of the carpeting and explain to me what the hell is going on here?" Phoebe recovered first.
"That is not nearly as important as your explaining who the hell you are!"
The Not-Piper reeled backwards in indignation and replied acidly, "First you rudely summon me away from my business, and then, not only do you not recognize me, but you treat me like some demon who just busted into your house, uninvited!"
"Yea, okay, but aren't you some demon who just busted in here uninvited?" Paige ventured, much to the Not-Piper's fury.
"Of course not! I have gotten used to demons not knowing who I am, though I still don't like it, but to have witches not know it, well it just pisses me off!" She looked around, and, noticing the chorus of blank stares pointed in her direction, sighed and pressed on. "I am 33 of the legendary Charmed Ones. Piper, to be exact. I would not mess with me if I were you. And who are you, exactly?"
Chris took in this ridiculous proclamation, saw similar expressions of incredulity on the faces of his aunts, and, with a disbelieving half-chuckle, retorted, "Yea, no you're not." The Not-Piper indignantly insisted,
"Am so! Do you want me to blow you up to prove it?"
"Um, no," Paige said. "Not necessary. It would be amusing to see you try, but no. Why are you impersonating Piper?"
"Look, kids, I don't know who you are or how you got me here, but if you don't back off, it won't be pretty."
"Okay, let's cut to the chase here," Phoebe interrupted, cutting off a new stream of threats from the imposter. "We know you're not Piper, because we are the other 66 of the legendary Charmed Ones, and our last third does not say 'y'all'. Therefore, all we can assume is that you're some psycho demon trying to-" she broke off and turned to Paige for support. "Help me out. Why would a psycho demon want to pretend to be our sister?"
"You have got me there," Paige replied, throwing her arms up in despair. "But weirder things have happened. Crystals! Circle!" she called for the crystals used to make cages and set one around the now very uneasy looking stranger. "Let's ask her, shall we?" Phoebe gestured towards the Not-Piper, who was now scanning the crystal cage for methods of escape.
"Be my guest, sister dear." Paige turned to the Not-Piper and offered a smile.
"Okay. We have established that you are here for reasons that none of us understand, and also that you are not Piper, even though you kind of look exactly like her. Let's review. We cast a spell asking for the source of our misfortune, so somehow you must be connected to the real Piper's disappearance, right?" She looked to Chris and her sister for backup. Chris nodded and cut in.
"I think we can assume both from your surprise at being here and the fact that you didn't recognize these two that you didn't do the actual kidnapping. You didn't, did you?" he asked the nervous looking Piper impersonator, who answered reluctantly.
"Of course I didn't kidnap Piper. That really would've messed with my plan."
"Which was?" Paige asked pointedly.
"None of your concern," the Not-Piper replied coolly.
"It can become my concern once I toss some tiny crystals at your cage and zap you up real nice, if you get what I'm saying here." Paige retorted.
"That's nice, girls, resorting to torture. How very primitive of you. My plan has nothing to do with you or with my being here, but I'll tell you this much: I got on the bad side of some pretty hardcore demon figures, so, to protect myself, I decided to spend a little time living the life of a Charmed One. And I've got to tell you, it ain't a bad life to live."
"I…" Phoebe searched for words but found none, so she turned to the others. "Can somebody else please think of something to say, because I've got nothing!" Paige took the lead.
"Dude, are you a shape-shifter, or this some kind of wonky spell?" The Not-Piper looked almost disgusted.
"I'm a shape-shifter. Give me some credit for class, here, y'all. It wasn't easy to learn enough about Piper to be able to play her convincingly."
Phoebe's eyes grew wide in shock.
"You think you know Piper? You didn't even recognize her sisters or her son!"
"Son?" the Not-Piper turned her bizarrely familiar, yet foreign stare onto Chris, who shifted uncomfortably. "This guy is her kid? How the hell does that work?"
"I came back from the future, all right? In this time I'm a month old baby who desperately needs his mommy, so if you have anything to contribute to the finding of said mommy, give it up or get out of our attic!" Chris hollered. The Not-Piper, instead of reacting with fear or even surprise, regarded him carefully, and then nodded her head.
"Okay. I don't know why y'all's spell would've brought me here or if I can even help, but if I can, I will." A moment passed while the sisters and Chris considered this with suspicion, and she continued. "That is, if you'll let me out of this cage. It's not like I can go anywhere or anything. No transporting power."
Chris turned towards his aunts in question. Phoebe shrugged at him.
"Hey, your spell means your call. It's up to you."
"When did we make that rule?" Paige asked dubiously. "Maybe we should vote democratically and keep the demon inside the cage, how about that?" Phoebe shushed her sister and looked to Chris, who was clearly trying to decide what to do.
"What do you think, nephew dear?" Phoebe asked him.
"Let her out," Chris said decisively. "She's not going anywhere, and she may be able to help us.
"Whatever you say, dude," Paige answered, orbing the crystals back into the box.