Hi everyone! This is a quick update isn't it? For me, anyway. I wrote this chapter while I was experiencing the longest school day of my life - instead of studying for either of the tests I had that day. I had to stay sane somehow. Since this was all written in a day, and typed and edited in under an hour it is probably full of mistakes, so sorry about that.
I hope you enjoy it!
"What is this cure?" Piper questioned, glaring into the Archer demon's beady eyes.
He sneered back at her. "Why do you want to know so much, witch? Whitelighters are a dime-a-dozen. Or," he bared his teeth. "Is it that you do have a type?"
Piper stared down the demon. She waited a moment for him to regret that remark before she flicked her wrists. He screamed again.
When she had first started torturing this demon, the screams had bothered her, but then he had decided to be difficult, and she started to feel less bad about what she was doing.
"Uh, Piper!" Paige called, suddenly.
Piper glanced over her shoulder at her youngest sister but Paige wasn't looking at her. She was looking at the wall, where a large triquetra had appeared.
Piper cursed. "Where's Phoebe?"
"Downstairs," Paige answered. "She's with Chris."
Piper gritted her teeth around another curse. She rounded the demon's cage to stand closer to the portal. Her hands were raised, ready to blow up whoever came close.
She hesitated, however, when a young man stumbled through, supporting a second, younger man.
"Don't attack! Please!" The first man called, looking startled to see them. His hands were occupied with keeping the younger man standing but he looked very much like he would be holding them above his head otherwise. "We mean you no harm!"
"We mean you no harm?" Paige repeated, dubiously. "You just showed up here!"
"Paige, potions," Piper ordered. She could hear Paige orbing them to her. "Who are you people?"
"We're –" The man was cut off by a young woman stepping out of the portal.
The woman stumbled a step before catching herself. Then she caught sight of Piper and nearly stumbled again. But she caught herself again and deliberately pulled her eyes away. Piper couldn't shake the feeling that she had seen the woman before, but it was hard to tell with the green, demon blood on her clothes and in her hair. A second woman followed the demon blood covered girl. She stepped out of the portal without any difficulty but she barely acknowledged anyone else in the room before she was taking the younger man in her arms, protectively. The first man, now free of the second, briefly brushed his hand against the first woman's. Then they both turned to stare at the portal, ignoring the sisters.
"Who are you?" Paige demanded once it became clear that they weren't going to answer Piper.
There was a long moment when the foursome didn't acknowledge Paige or Piper, instead they moved closer to the portal. They seemed to get more agitated, which worried Piper. They didn't look like demons, but they didn't seem like innocents.
Then, a third girl, with a bow clutched in her hand fell out of the portal, barreling into the others and knocking them all to the floor. The portal began to close behind them, until a final man stepped through. His presence made Piper ready to blow up the six strangers, almost only on principal.
"Cole," she snapped.
The former Source spared a glance at the young men and women sprawled on the floor before raising his hands in a sign of surrender.
"Piper, please," he began.
Piper flicked her wrists, making the chair behind Cole explode. "You're supposed to be dead."
"I am," Cole answered. "Sort of. It's complicated, but not important."
"What do mean not important?" Paige asked, arm held back to throw a potion.
"We're from the future," the girl with the bow piped up from the floor.
"We're here to help, Chris," added the girl covered in demon gunk. She pushed out of the pile and rose to her feet. "He was injured by a demon. He is here, right?"
Piper tensed. The girl sounded genuinely concerned about their witchlighter which reassured and worried Piper all at once. Chris did have people who cared for him, but what could be so wrong with him that it took six people to travel to the past to save him?
"We're not telling you that," Paige snapped.
The youngest of the woman, the one with red hair glanced up from the man in her arms. She stared at Paige for a moment. "He's here," she said decisively, sounding entirely sure of herself. The gunk-girl curled up her fists. She looked at Piper, and her face twisted. "Please, he's our family."
"Is he Cole's family?" Paige questioned, with a dark look at the man in question.
The girl with the bow moved protectively in front of Cole in response to Paige's glare.
"Chris is not related to me," Cole assured. "I knew his parents, and I work with him in the resistance, and the rest of his family too, of course."
"Chris could've mentioned that," Paige muttered, her face screwing up in irritation.
"I'm dead, as far as you knew," Cole reminded her. "There was no point, besides, he knows how much you like me, Paige," he said, sarcastically.
"Is that how he knew so much about us?" Piper demanded, before Paige could launch herself at the half demon. "You told him?"
Cole shook his head, struggling for a moment. "I didn't tell Chris anything. I can't say anything else though, future consequences and everything."
Piper's lips twitched at hearing their witch lighters favourite saying coming out of their enemy's mouth.
"Why are you here?" Paige asked. She took a threatening step forward.
The youngest man pushed away from the red-haired girl and stumbled to his feet. "We can't waste time here. Chris is in danger. We can't let you kill Cole, I'm sorry but he is family. If you won't let us past to help Chris then I'm sure Mel is more than happy to go through anything in her way."
The gunk girl twitched, and nodded. "Even the Charmed Ones." Her voice was strained, like she didn't want to do it, but she readied herself to fight anyway. Piper didn't doubt that the girl would fight if it came to it.
"But we'd all rather it not come to that," the man continued, with a glance at Mel. "It would ruin our timeline and erase all our existences, for one. So, please, Paige, you can save Chris, or you can kill Cole. We all already know what choice you're going to make."
Piper watched out of the corner of her eye as Paige twitched before lowering the potions.
"You try anything with Phoebe – if you get within ten feet of her – I will kill you," she threatened.
"That's fair," Cole agreed, lowering his hands. He moved closer to the youngest man, slipping a hand under his elbow. "If you wouldn't mind calling Leo?" He asked. "Henry is injured."
Henry proved that point by pressing both hands to his head. Paige didn't say anything but, after sharing a look with Piper, she did orb downstairs, hopefully to get Leo.
Piper turned her attention to Mel. She still felt as though the girl was familiar. Mel was watching the demon she had trapped. Her eyes narrowed. "Where'd you find him?" She asked Piper, suspiciously.
Piper bristled, considering that Mel had threatened her only a minute ago. "He's an Archer demon."
"I know," Mel answered, as though it was obvious. Maybe it was, Chris seemed to know the Book of Shadows back to front. Maybe Mel knew it too.
"He attacked Chris," Piper explained.
"What?" Mel asked, shocked. Piper stared. "But," she paused before she swore loudly. "He's Lokl," she hissed, as though that name meant anything to Piper. "He's from the future. He's one of the Archer demons' lieutenants, but he shouldn't be here yet! He's still in trapped in a tomb in Egypt!"
Piper turned to stare at the grinning Archer demon. Maybe he had gotten out early?
"Good job, sweetheart," the demon cooed, blowing Piper's theory out of the water. "You're almost as smart as your brother. Though, he didn't recognise me when I shot him."
"Oh, I'll kill you," Mel promised, stepping closer to the demon's cage. Piper had to pull her back from trying to walk right in and pummel him. She certainly saw the similarities between the angry woman and her neurotic witchlighter. Chris never backed down from a fight either.
"Then you'll never find out where the cure is," the demon, Lokl, threatened.
This time, Mel smirked. "Your cure won't work. I know where the real cure is. I'm from the future too, remember? And I got a much better education than you did from your idiot overlord, Lokl," she hissed. "He's left you here to die, you know that, don't you?"
The demon had stopped smiling but his confidence wasn't diminished. "Jarik won't leave me in the past."
The woman with the bow stepped forward, towards the purple, horned demon. "Sorry to tell you this, but I shot Jarik in the chest," she held up her bow for emphasis. "He's not coming for you," she added. "And Ryake is a little... busy. Your Overlord won't come for you either. I doubt he even knows your name, demon."
"You only saw Jarik?" Mel asked, suddenly fearful.
Piper watched the exchange between the two girls with a growing sense of unease.
The woman nodded.
"So," Mel wondered aloud, "If Jarik is running this, and he was hiding out in the future, then where's his brother?"
Piper didn't know if anyone had an answer to that question, or why it was significant, because suddenly, Cole was shouting out a warning and Mel was shoving her out of the way. Piper stared up at the group of Archer demons that had suddenly shimmered into the attic, led by a seething, purple haired demon.
Next up will be the action scenes! So be prepared for that - I already know it's going to be really weird but my brother's promised to look it over first, so blame him if it's strange. I hope this chapter wasn't too confusing or too short, I wanted to get this scene right but it was difficult to balance the Future kids with the Charmed Ones. I'll get the next chapter up soon, I promise.