"Paige?" Piper stared at her incredulously.
"Hey, Piper." Paige said with an odd smile on her face, but Piper was staring at something else. She had been pretty sure that Paige's hair was red when she'd left the manor a minute before, for one. She also looked older. After meeting Chris, she didn't have to guess.
"You're not the one I left at the manor are you? You're from the future." She shook her head. "Why are you doing this?"
"Because he has to die, Piper!" She said, turning her gaze on Cole, hatred in her eyes. "He's the reason the future is so messed up."
"What are you talking about?" Piper asked, stepping in front of Cole when he stood up. She glanced at the elders. "You need to leave, now." They looked at each other before all but one orbed out.
"We will need to talk." He said before orbing out as well. Piper didn't even try to respond. She turned back to Paige.
"Tell me why, Paige."
"He's the reason the power of three broke, he's the reason that my children are dead. He's the reason that Chris came back!" Piper glanced back at Cole.
"Piper, I wouldn't-"
"I don't believe that." Piper interrupted him, her voice firm as she turned back to Paige.
"You have to!" Paige said a light coming into her eyes that Piper didn't like. Uneasily, she realized that it sort of reminded her of the look in Paige's eyes when she'd attacked Cole after being infected by a power broker.
"What happened to you?" She asked, unmoving. She couldn't risk Cole being hurt.
"What happened to me was watching my entire family die! And it's his fault."
"No, it's not." An unfamiliar voice said from beside Piper and Cole. Piper turned to see a young man with dark hair standing there. He stepped closer to Paige. "Potion wore off." He said, shrugging.
"You shouldn't have come here, Kyle." Kyle shook his head and stepped in front of Piper and Cole. "He has to die."
"And if I said that you'd have to go through me, would you do it? Would you kill me too?" He stepped up to her, and reached out, running a hand down her dark hair. "Would you kill your sister?" He pulled her to him. "Let me take care of you." He said softly before he orbed out. Piper stared at the spot they had just been.
"What the hell just happened?" Cole shook his head.
"How many people are going to be coming back?"
Kyle orbed into the manor attic, still holding Paige to him. When she opened her eyes, she started fighting him, her eyes filling with tears.
"I can't be here." She said, trying frantically to get away from him. Kyle took her face in his hands. His own memories of the last time he was in this place threatened to surface and overwhelm him and he had to fight back tears of his own.
"Paige, look at me." He said softly. "Please. Honey, we need to go home."
"Home?" She asked, tears streaming down her face. "No, but I still have something to do..."
"You mean kill Cole?" He shook his head, tears falling from his own eyes now. "You got to know that's not the way to do this." She shook her head.
"But...it's gotta be. It's the only...Piper, she'll...she'll understand someday..." This time, when Kyle took her by the shoulders, he did shake her.
"What if it were me? Would you understand if she killed me? What if it Ruby had killed Mel instead of the other way around? Don't you understand it could have gone either way. Cole didn't do anything to her; Cole did not kill Jack and Ruby."
"Oh, my God." Kyle turned to see Phoebe and a younger Paige standing not far away, staring at them. His Paige turned to them as well.
"Phoebe." She said, staring at her sister, a sister she hadn't seen for many years. The younger, red headed Paige stared at herself in shock.
"What's going on here?" She asked. Kyle sighed. Even through the pain, some part of him was worried about this. He hadn't meant for the sisters to even see him, but he hadn't been able to leave Paige in the pain she was in. Paige turned to him, madness and sorrow in her eyes.
"I don't want to lose them again." She said.
"We'll stop it." They turned to see Piper standing in the doorway. She walked over to them and knelt down beside them. Reaching out, she brushed Paige's dark hair away from her eyes.
"I don't know exactly what happened to you. Whatever it was, I am so sorry. I promise that we'll do whatever it takes to stop it from happening again." She took one of Paige's hands.
"Piper." Paige threw herself into her sister's arms. "They killed my babies, Piper." She sobbed. Tears welled in Piper's eyes as she held her sister.
"It's going to be okay, honey. I won't let it happen again." She pulled back, holding Paige's face in her hands. "I'm here, alright? Phoebe's here. We won't let it happen, I promise."
Chris orbed in just a moment later and stood still, watching the scene. Paige was standing in stunned silence, tears running down her face as she watched herself breakdown. He watched as Phoebe squeezed her arm before walking over and kneeling beside Piper.
"She's right honey, we won't let it happen." Paige shook her head.
"How can you stop it if you don't know what happened? You should know..."
"I know." Chris spoke up, interrupting her before she could say anything else, afraid that she'd tell Piper and Phoebe the whole truth. "It's why I came back, to stop it." He walked closer to them and met first Paige's and then Kyle's eyes. "I won't let what happened to Jack and Ruby happen again." He promised.
"Paige." Kyle knelt again. "How did you get back here?" Paige hesitated for a moment before she looked down.
"Potion." She said after a moment, and took it out. He nodded, taking it from her.
"And this will get us back." She nodded again, unable to release Piper for the moment.
"Hopefully, this will work, and you guys won't even remember what happened." Chris said. Kyle nodded and stepped closer to him, pulling him into a hug.
"Take care of yourself." Kyle whispered in his ear.
"You too. And her." Chris whispered back. Kyle released him, smiling a little and nodded.
"You alright?" Phoebe asked, sitting next to Paige on the couch after the other Paige and Kyle had gone.
"Sure, I'm fine." Paige said, bitterness creeping into her voice. "I just found out that I have two children...that were killed in the future." Phoebe put an arm around her. Paige felt the tears start again.
"But we know now, we can stop it." Phoebe said, trying to comfort her. Piper nodded, squeezing her hand.
"She's right, Paige." Paige stared off.
"Ruby...that was my mother's name, you know?"
"And Jack?" Piper asked, smiling sadly at her sister.
"I don't know..."
"Jack was Kyle's father's name." Chris said from the doorway. They all turned to him.
"You knew our family, didn't you?" Phoebe asked, staring at him. Piper frowned at him.
"Yes, I did." He sighed, walking over and sitting across from them.
"You know what happens? How we can stop this?" Paige asked, leaning forward. Chris ran a hand over his face.
"I know that a demon, or maybe more than one, got to you guys. I know that it started sometime in this year. I'm not sure which demon it was, though. That's the problem."
"How?" Piper asked. "How could a demon change all this? Did we die? Did Phoebe and I die?" Chris shook his head, hated to tell them this, but after everything that had happened today, he didn't have much of a choice. Plus it might help.
"No, you didn't die, Piper." He paused. "They went through the most vulnerable of the three of you..." He met Phoebe's eyes and Phoebe and Paige both looked horrified at this.
"It doesn't happen for months that much I know for sure. I thought that if I came back this early, that I could maybe figure it out and stop it before it started." Piper, Paige, and Phoebe linked hands.
"We won't let it happen." Piper said firmly, looking over at her sisters. Paige shook her head.
"No, we won't." She said, her voice fierce.
Piper settled back into Cole's embrace, finding comfort in his arms. She was still shaken by the experience; by seeing what the future had done to her little sister. There was something else, though, that she needed to talk to Cole about.
"I shimmered there." She said suddenly.
"What?" Piper turned in his arms so that she could face him.
"The bridge. I knew that you were in trouble, and I had to get there, and suddenly I was. I shimmered there." Cole stared at her, alarmed now, but she just smiled.
"I know what you're thinking, and it's not that." She sat up, as did he. "I think...I think maybe," she smiled and put a hand to her stomach, "our baby wanted to help you too."
"Our...baby." He repeated, staring at her with wide eyes. She nodded.
"I think I'm pregnant, Cole. No, I know I am." She smiled wider. "I can feel it."
"You're pregnant." Cole repeated, still in shock. She nodded, reaching out to touch his cheek.
"Tell me you're happy." She said softly. Cole didn't say anything; he simply pulled her close and kissed her.
"I'm going to take that as a yes." She said when he pulled back, her hand still on his cheek. He smiled at her, pulling her in for another kiss.
I do not know what Paige's mother's name really was. If anyone does and I got it wrong, sorry. I do like Henry, I guess I just needed Kyle for this story, and I do like him also.