TWO

Piper walked out to the street and looked around. As far as she could see everything was frozen. Nothing moved, not even the air. Birds hung suspended in midair, cars sat motionless on the streets, and people were frozen in mid stride as they hurried to their destinations. It was as if time had suddenly stopped everywhere.

"Okay," said Piper into the air, "you have my attention. What do you want this time?"

She was sure she knew what was going on. This had happened before. When the Angel of Destiny had come to give them the choice of living as mortals with no demonic intervention or continuing as the Charmed Ones. They had chosen to remain the Charmed Ones. Only this time the Angel of Destiny didn't appear. After several minutes (or what seemed like minutes) Piper decided that something else must be going on. She looked at her watch. It read three fifty one.

That was impossible. It had been at least ten minutes since she had last looked at her watch. She went back into the club and checked the clock over the bar. It had the same time. And the second hand on the clock wasn't moving.

Piper had no idea what was going on. As far as she knew she was the only witch with the ability to stop time. And the only demon she knew of who could manipulate time was Tempest. But he had died years ago when Prue had died. Maybe he had managed to return from the Wasteland as Cole had recently.

No, that didn't make sense. Cole had been able to escape because he was half human. He had a soul. That had protected him. Tempest was a full demon. He wouldn't have that protection.

"Leo," Piper called into the air. "Leo, if you can hear me I really need your help right now."

Piper waited for Leo to appear. White Lighters weren't human. Whatever was happening maybe he had been unaffected. He wasn't just a White Lighter. He was an Elder. They existed outside of time and space. Maybe they had been protected from whatever this was.

After several moments Piper decided Leo wasn't coming either. Whatever was going on must have affected him as well. Or he was unable to come to her for some reason. She didn't have many options. She'd have to figure out what was going on by herself. Unless Phoebe and Paige had also been unaffected. Or maybe Chris could help. He was from the future. He might be protected from this.

"Chris, Paige," Piper called into the air. "If either of you can hear me I need you to orb here right now.

She waited a bit but neither answered her call. Chris was at home with Wyatt. She wasn't sure where Paige was but either should have been able to hear her call. Unless they were also frozen like everyone and everything else. She wasn't sure if Wyatt had the ability to hear her call but he was still too young to understand anything.

Whatever was going on she needed to find out fast. This could a prelude to a demon attack. If it was, she might need her sisters' help. Her only hope was to find them and see if they were free of this time freeze as well.

She decided to find Phoebe first. She wasn't sure where Paige was but Phoebe might know. Besides, the paper was closer than the manor. She headed down the street for the paper.

She estimated that it took her nearly three hours to walk to the paper. She had no way to gauge time so she couldn't be completely sure how close her estimation was. She had never realized just how far everything was from each other. Everywhere she went she saw the same thing. Everything and everyone frozen like statues. There were no sounds and nothing moved, not even the clouds or the wind. When she got to the paper her watch still ready three fifty one. Obviously time had stopped completely.

As she turned to walk up the street to the paper she saw a man standing several feet from her. He appeared to be in his early thirties, he was wearing what looked like a lab coat and glasses. He had a beard that was the same shade of brown as his unkempt hair. He stood looking directly at her with his mouth hanging open. He looked very much like everyone else on the street.

Except that Piper stared at the man as she saw him blink several times. Then she saw him reach up and push his glasses up from the end of his nose back onto his face. The man didn't say a word. He simply stood staring at Piper with a look of utter shock on his face.