Disclaimer: I don't own Charmed, or the WB, or anything else.
Previously, at the Manor…
"What the hell is going on?" the three sisters demanded in unity. Leo (future one) orbed out.
Since their 'informant' had left, they turned to the only other place they knew the answers to their questions resided. They spun to face Chris, Jonas, Bianca, and Melody.
"Well?"
Now...
"What was he talking about?" Phoebe demanded, looking directly at her daughter.
Melody shifted her feet, and looked down at the floor. They were treading in dangerous waters here, for any wrong move could prevent Chris from becoming a Charmed One. Even the thought of Wyatt with even more power caused her to quiver slightly.
"Well?" Piper prompted, looking at her adult son.
"Come on, Jonas," Paige begged, trying to play off her son's inability to keep secrets.
"Well..." Jonas began, but Chris cut him off.
"Let me do it, man," he said, and turned to the sisters, "besides, it's my problem." Chris drew a breath.
"When all of you finally had children, it was decided that your destinies and power would be passed on to us when you were unable to fight anymore." He paused, hopeing that their minds didn't associate that with 'dead'.
"Since you each had two children, their was obviously a choice that had to be made. Paige, you chose Jonas because Michael was more of a pacifist, and only a baby. Phoebe, you chose Melody because you were still pregnant with Ella."
"But for Piper," he looked at her, "it was different. Both Wyatt and I were close in age, and Wyatt actually expected the Charmed destiny. Everyone thought that you would choose him as your heir, and Leo even demanded that you did." He breathed deeply, the next part harder to tell than the background information he had used to stall.
Jonas, noticing his cousin's struggle, took up the story.
"You surprised everyone by choosing Chris, and that decision infuriated Leo. The stupid elder had always treated Chris as second best to Wyatt."
"So you mean," Paige began, "we actually chose you to have our power, and just gave it up by our own free? But we're what, in your time…forty to fifty? That's not that old…"
The future people looked uncomfortable. But it all became crystal clear to Phoebe. Cole's attitude towards her, Ella's excitement upon seeing her, Chris' secrecy – it all made sense.
"We died, didn't we?"
Melody looked stunned. Well, her father always joked she must have gotten her sense of logic from somewhere.
"Yes," she whispered. The Charmed Ones looked broken.
"We died?" Piper murmured. Paige whimpered softly. The attic was silent.
Cole, thudding up the stairs, broke the awkward silence. Everyone turned to look at him and Ella, whom he had brought back up.
"Leo is gone, right?" Nods from all around answered him. He breathed a sigh of relief.
"Leo always did…will…does…" he stumbled over the tense for moment before giving up," he always has…disliked my children."
Mel, despite of the grave situation, no pun intended, snorted. "Disliked" might not have been the word she'd have chosen to describe Leo's feelings about her and her sister.
"So what's with all the sad faces?" Cole could not take the silence. He could feel the tension rising in the room.
"We know," Piper said sullenly. Cole's eyes darted to his eldest daughter as his heart began to skip a few beats. Panic, starting in his stomach, began to rapidly rise throughout his body.
But a simple, yet subtle shake of the head from Mel allowed his blood pressure to drop back to its normal rate. He breathed a quick sigh of relief; the Charmed Ones still remained ignorant on one fact about his daughter.
"Cole, are you alright?" Phoebe asked. Cole cursed himself silently. Leave it to the empath to sense his sudden shift in his mental state.
"I'm fine, just disappointed that you and your sisters know something that could have a negative effect on the future." Well, he thought, at least she's talking to me.
In the future Underworld…"What were you doing in the old Source's chamber?" Wyatt demanded as he was led rather ruffly by the band of demons toward an unknown destination.
"What were you doing there?" a large demon with snake eyes countered. Wyatt sulked.
A small demon, that had taken the end of the little procession through the torch-lit halls made his way carefully to the front. He reached the demon at the front, and leaned over to him, although his words were drowned out by the stomps od the many fighters behind him.
"What are we gonna do, Ahwthork?" The small demon glanced back at Wyatt, who was glaring at his captors.
"What do you mean?" Ahwthork growled, his curled, ivory horns that protruded from his scalp swerved twoard the demon. He continued to face forward, with a look of resolve upon his face.
"The identity of the Source must remain secret," the smaller demon insisted. Wyatt perked up his ears. The Source?
"It shall." the demon said menacingly.
There was a brief moment of silence between the two demons before the procession entered another chamber, located off the wall to the left. A metal door with several ancient engraving looked out of place among the neighboring wooden doors.
Ahwthork moved forward, and his back covered what he did with his hands. Wyatt craned his neck over the shoulders of his captors, but the solid mass of Ahwthork blocked his view.
The door swung open, and the group moved in. Wyatt gasped.
Scattered across the room lay cages and prison cells of various shaped and sizes. All were locked both mechasnically and magically, and surroung each was either fire or boiling acidic water. But the rather medival appearance of the prison room was not what took Wyatt's breath away. It was the prisoners themselves.
Every demon lackey of hisever lost on a mission, killed by a Resistance member, are by Wyatt himself lay in this prison. Every witch he had managed to convert, then vanquish, and every mortal he had twisted for his own ends were rotting in these cages, moaning and begging to be freed.
"What the hell…" Wyatt mumbled. The demons actually smiled with pride.
"The Source has long been fighting against you, oh foolish one." The smaller demon smiled, showing off missing teeth. "For the Source owns powers that you cannot even conceive."
"Where is he?" Wyatt demanded, as he was shoved into a cage. "I demand to speak with him at once!"
"He?" a demon from the group grinned impishly (that in itself was very uncharacteristic of a demon of his standing). The other demons laughed at his stupidity.
"No, not he. She."