Blue lights appeared in a dark corner of the underworld. The three immediately ducked behind a large boulder to avoid being seen. Phoebe was in front with Penny and Leo crouched behind her.
She turned to Penny who looked scared, "Look at me," Phoebe whispered. She took Penny's chin and lifted her face. "It's going to work, just breathe," she knew how Penny nerves were during these times.
In her short 13 years she had seen more death than any child should ever see. She had watched her adopted parents die right in front of her face, and watched countless innocents die over the last three years; this little girl had every reason in the world to be afraid going into danger after that kind of trauma.
But Phoebe had watched her through the healing process. She was there for the tearful 3AM wake up calls after a nightmare or the mid day calls from Penny's teacher when she was having a moment of panic that someone wasn't ok. She was there for all of that and now this.
This wasn't fair, this wasn't ideal but Phoebe knew that maybe someday when they look back they'll understand the meaning. "I love you," Phoebe whispered. "I love you too," Penny took her small shaky hand and squeezed Phoebe's.
Phoebe made eye contact with Leo who nodded, she squeezed Penny's hand one more time before letting go and taking off into darkness.
It felt like hours had passed and they were hiding and ducking through the caverns of the underworld. It was so much bigger than they remembered.
When vanquishing the source they knew exactly where to go and what they were doing, this seemed to be just a stab in the dark, and a final plan before defeat.
They only had to vanquish one demon so far and it didn't seem the word was out that they were in the underworld. The adrenaline was high, Penny followed quickly between Leo and Phoebe as they covered more ground.
As they were running a group of demons came around the corner causing them to quickly duck behind a boulder.
"Has anyone been to check on the witches?" Penny's eyes widened as she looked at Phoebe who was basically on top of her trying not be seen. Phoebe's eyes filled with tears, she blinked them back as they listened close. She didn't want to get her hopes up to only be crushed finding out it was someone else.
"I believe Zotar checked on them, he was on watch today. I've got three humans to kill if I want to stay in the running for more powers." They stopped within feet of the boulder.
Penny covered her mouth and Leo squeezed his eyes shut in anticipation, their hearts were pounding.
"I don't think the plan is going to work, the illusion failed, most of our strongest demons have been vanquished, we need to just kill them and move on."
Phoebe stayed completely still but inside she was fluttering with emotions, they were here. Her sisters were alive and somewhere in the underworld, they could be moments from finding them.
"In order to kill them we would have to bring them out of the power stripped area and that would be suicide. The oldest would kill us with a blink." They heard footsteps. "Time for the ranking," the demons walked off.
Phoebe was shook. They stood up, "we have to follow them" Leo said pulling Penny to her feet.
Phoebe nodded, now wasn't the time for emotions, they had to get to them first. They followed behind the demons to hopefully get close to where their sisters were.
Paige sat trying to regulate her breathing, she knew it was almost time and this was their one chance, she could not mess this up. She saw this as her redemption moment, to show Prue and Piper that she loved them enough to do something this risky.
A demon came around the corner and she held her breath, she caught Prue's eye and she knew this was it.
As he approached them she looked down to see his athame in his side pocket.
Piper had her eyes glued to the demon; Paige could see her hands shaking. She thought of Phoebe and Penny, she thought of all the pain the demons had caused them. They had seen it firsthand the demons messing with their minds and if she could pull this off she could see them again.
She took a deep breath as he got closer, he was looking at Prue. Paige be strong.
"Hey!" the demon turned to her.
"If its power that you want, I have it, and I'll give it to you." Paige was trying to sound confident.
The demon approached her, "what's that witch? Tired of being chained up?" He laughed and spit in her face. That fired her up, "Let me go, I'll give you my powers."
In her head she figured there was no way he would do what he was about to do. His biggest mistake.
In an attempt to threaten her he pulled her close to his face. He snarled and as he yanked her, she heard her chain pull free.
It snapped and she fell right into him. She pushed herself up as fast as she could. She grabbed the athame out of his pocket and stabbed him hard in the chest. He fell back into a boulder and yelled. She stabbed him again and he died immediately.
Paige pulled her hands free and ran to Piper.
She quickly tried to cut her free with the athame. She pounded on her chain as hard as she could, despite the pain of her bruises.
She could hear footsteps, "Paige, go!"
"I can't leave you!" Paige was panicked, she broke one part of the chain but the other was stuck, she couldn't get her free.
"Paige, go now! Get them and come back for us!" Prue yelled at her. "What if they kill you?" Paige turned; she could hear the demons getting closer.
She took the athame and tucked it under Piper's leg where she could reach it. She took one last look at her sisters before running as fast as she could out of the lair.