Disclaimer: If it were mine, Phoebe's final husband would have been Cole, not the bloody Cupid! That or Cole would have left town after telling the sisters to go to hell.
Chapter 7 – Temporal Shift: Caleb sat next to Magdalene's bed, still not sure why he was here. Sure, he was keeping an eye on her vitals – and he needed to talk to Paula about some kind of medical contingency. What if one of them was injured? He had only basic abilities, and Paula's newly-reinstated Whitelighter of a father was hardly dependable. He and Paula had both, at different times and in different ways, given up their rights to a Whitelighter. It was to be free of the Elders, and Caleb wouldn't argue that was a good thing. And yet... he didn't want someone to die because they didn't have adequate medical care, and since hospitals were out of the question... We need more help.
His attempt to think about practicalities failed him, though, as his eyes fell on the sleeping brunette again. He still wasn't sure what it was about her that made him feel so protective, but he wasn't going to analyze it. It wasn't going away, so why bother? He sighed, rubbing his eyes. He was tired, but he didn't want to sleep.
He jerked upright as she suddenly stirred. "Magdalene?" he asked gently as her eyes blinked open. She sat bolt upright and stared at him.
"Who are you?" she demanded, eyes wide with fear. He couldn't speak for a moment, and then he cleared his throat.
"My name is Caleb Carnahan. I promise, I'm not going to hurt you. We found you..." He trailed off, realizing he didn't know what she knew.
"With those, those things?" she asked, her voice rising an octave. "They took me... I don't know..." She shook her head, dropping her face into her hands.
"We got you out of there," Caleb said, tentatively putting a hand on her shoulder. Right now, with her already so upset, he couldn't think to tell her that she'd been a prisoner for twenty-odd years. "Magdalene, it'll be all right."
"Maggie," she said, looking up at him with a hint of fire suddenly in her brown eyes. "No one ever calls me Magdalene. It's Maggie."
He smiled, couldn't help it. That flash of spunk told him that as shaken up as she was, Magdalene – no, Maggie – Quinn would be all right.
In the office, Paula tilted her head. "I think she's awake," she said. Cole glanced at her.
"So should we go help Caleb explain?"
"I will. You, on the other hand, have an appointment."
"Wait, what?"
"I told you, didn't I? You're meeting with a low-level DESI agent who's going to fix every record to make sure you can't have any legal problems due to your time being 'dead' or any of your disappearances. He'll even get you a driver's license."
Cole frowned. "Not that I'm not grateful, but you couldn't have mentioned this before?"
"I thought I did."
"No, doesn't sound familiar."
"Oh, sorry. Well, you'd better get going because you're almost late. Here." She handed him a slip of paper. "There's the address, but don't drive. Take a cab or the bus."
When he stared at her, she flapped her hand at him. "Go! Shoo!"
"Wonderful," he muttered, shaking his head as he left. Paula grinned mischievously. She knew she hadn't said anything, but she enjoyed making the boys think on their feet. It was always fun.
She was shutting off her office light when she heard the faint chimes that signaled someone orbing in. She turned around, half-expecting to see her father or else Andrew, her former Whitelighter, but it wasn't. The man – boy, almost – standing before her was a stranger, though oddly familiar. He looked about twenty or so, had tousled brown hair, watchful green eyes, and an air of near-desperation about him. When he spotted her in the doorway, he sighed, his relief blatantly clear. "Aunt Paula, thank God. I need your help."
Paula stepped back inside, closing her door with a loud snap. "What did you just call me?"
"So, Caleb, where am I and what's going on? How long has it been since I was kidnapped?"
Caleb hesitated. He wasn't sure where to begin. Where was Paula? She certainly knew Maggie was awake. He knew why Cole wasn't here – Paula had said something about making some kind of appointment for him – but Red ought to be. He wasn't cut out to deal with time issues, that was one of Paula's areas. Tell him what to shoot at or throw magic at, come up with a plan of attack, that was what he was comfortable with. But this... He took a breath, thinking. Honestly, he wanted to be the one to talk to her, to help her through this. He just wasn't sure how.
"Maggie... What year do you think it is?"
"1986," she said promptly.
Caleb shook his head. "No, it's not. It's 2006."
Maggie blinked, and then she laughed. "Oh, that's very funny. Seriously, Caleb, I'd believe a year or two, but twenty?"
Caleb swallowed, trying to think. There was a newspaper in the main office; it was a few days old, but it still said 2006. He went to get it, and then silently handed it to her. Maggie looked down at it, her face going white. "I... I don't... " She was at a loss for words, completely wrapped up in her shock.
Caleb, watching her, wanted desperately to help ease what was happening, somehow, but he couldn't think of anything. No words of comfort came to mind – none, at least, that didn't seem pathetically trite, and that wouldn't do any good. Thinking desperately, he came up with an idea that any Magic School graduate – or even former attendee, as Caleb hadn't actually graduated – should have known better than to try. He decided to use a spell.
"Oh, God, I shouldn't have – Look, can you forget I said that? Please, Miss Ravenwood, I need your help," the young man said, panic making him stumble a bit over his words.
"Sorry, but no, I don't forget it when someone only a few years my junior refers to me as 'Aunt'. So, who are you and what, exactly, do you need my help with?" When he shifted from foot to foot, silent, she sighed. "Look, I'm not going to kill you. Sit down and explain this to me calmly." She sat back at her desk and he took the chair opposite, studying his hands for a long moment before looking up at her.
"My name is Chris, Chris Halliwell. I'm Leo Wyatt and Piper Halliwell's younger son, though they don't know it yet. I came from the future to stop... to stop my older brother from becoming evil and taking over the world."
Paula just stared at him for a moment. Like everyone else in the magical world, she knew about Wyatt Halliwell, the Twice-Blessed. The day of his birth, when magic had gone down, had been a relief for her in some ways. She didn't have to wall herself off, and she'd gone without gloves for the first time since she was sixteen. But at the same time, it had been like going blind. She'd also heard the theories about what that power level might mean, that the boy might go evil just because of the sheer magnitude of his gifts. Hell, she and Cole had spent time trouble-shooting, operating on the theory that the Charmed Ones wouldn't be able to face killing one of their own. But she'd never seen something like this coming. So, she thought, first things first; get more information.
"OK, assuming I believe that, why come to me?"
Chris flinched. "I'd think you'd know how to get past my mental blocks. You taught me how to do them. And told me the rules for time-travel, about avoiding paradoxes and all that."
Oh hell. If that were true, her future self was either stupid or desperate. Not that the two conditions were always mutually exclusive. And reaching out to probe his mind, Paula was forced to conclude that he was, in fact, telling the truth. He felt like a time traveler, and as far as she could tell, he was telling the truth about his identity as well. Still, that didn't answer everything.
"Why come to me? I've got no ties to my biological family, so you ought to go to them."
"I have. I set things up so Leo became an Elder and I'd be their Whitelighter. It's just, I need help."
She was impressed by that one – how had he managed to get those celestial bureaucrats to take a 'rebel' Whitelighter into their ranks? But, as it wasn't exactly a key point, she ignored it. "None of this explains what you need me for."
"I need to find out what turned Wyatt. You – well, your future self – said you picked up on some early trauma in his mind, either from an attempt to turn him evil or an attempt to hurt him. I wanted you to see if it had happened."
"By what, examining the mind of a baby boy whose mother doesn't know me? No offense, but that plan is horrible."
"You could tell her who you were and do it on the sly."
"Oh no, no way."
He looked hard at her then, and those green eyes were much older than they ought to be. "You regret it later, never knowing them. You said you wished you could change it."
Paula had to look away from the expression in his eyes because she knew he was sincere. And she couldn't face that possibility. Regretting what good might have come of a family reunion was better than risking all the bad that was far more likely to result. "I think I liked your first plan better, though I'm not sure I'm right for the job. Cole, however, can sense evil, so he could check."
"Cole?" Chris' voice had actually shot up a few octaves. "As in Cole Turner, the Source of All Evil? Even if he wasn't as bad as Wyatt will be if I don't stop it, he's dead."
Well, that answered one question at least. Or two, rather. It told her that Chris – and therefore, the Charmed Ones – never knew the truth about Cole in Chris' future. It also explained part of what her future self had said when pitching the idea of hiring Cole.
"You have to hire him. Not only because not doing so would change your own personal timeline – remember, in my future Cole and I work together – but because it's a step," her future self said.
"A step to what, exactly?" Paula asked suspiciously.
"Fixing the future. Look, I can't explain, but I promise if you just do what I say you'll understand. You know I know the risks of time travel. Would I do this if it weren't necessary?"
"He was possessed, and this time around, I hired him away from San Francisco and fixed his power issues before the borrowed abilities drove him mad," she corrected the other witchlighter calmly. "That's good news for you, right?"
Chris frowned, puzzled. "How exactly is that good news?"
"It means the timeline's already changing. Means your chances of pulling this crazy stunt off are better than I thought. Sometimes you can't change things, you know."
"I know, some points in time are fixed, you told me. Stuff like Pompeii."
"I gave you the whole time-traveling lecture, didn't I?"
"Cliff-Notes at least."
"Well, that's something anyway." She smirked at him. "So, how about it? We figure out a way to get me and Cole to Wyatt, and then we'll both check for you. Me for mental trauma, Cole for evil."
Chris nodded. "But if you don't want the sisters to catch you, how are we going to do this?"
"I might have a spell for that." Though the Doctor wouldn't be happy if he ever knew she'd used it. Still, to help a fellow time-traveler... hell, at least no one could say it wasn't appropriate.
Cole was going to kill Paula. Well, maybe not – he had a feeling she just might be able to kill him first. But sending him to this idiot certainly merited some form of punishment!
"Date of birth?" the DESI paper-pusher droned yet again.
"1889," Cole bit out.
"Very funny. Real date of birth?"
"That is my real date of birth, you imbecile. Did Paula tell you anything about me?"
The young man straightened his glasses and sat up very importantly. Cole resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Who did this guy think he was kidding? "Miss Ravenwood informed me that you were a man of magical background who required proper identification in the form of driver's license, passport, and legal papers. She also said you were a lawyer, so you should understand the importance of all this."
"OK, well what she forgot to tell you is that I'm a former demon who happens to be 117 years old!" Cole snapped. "So my real birth date is 1889. However, I'm sure you won't want to put that on the official papers."
The man was now dead white, his eyes wide behind his wire-frame glasses. "A demon? But... you... you look so human!"
Oh for crying out loud! This man's an idiot. Paula, I'm going to kill you! "A lot of demons can look human. As for me, my father was human. So I get my looks naturally. Now can you just fill in some information so I can get back to my job?!"
The man bit his lip, even more terrified now, apparently. "Right away," he mumbled. "Does 1970 work for a birth year?"
"Caleb, I'm going out, so – " Paula stopped mid-sentence at the stricken look on Caleb's face. He hadn't even noticed Chris, something that was unlike her friend. "What happened? Where's Magdalene?"
"Maggie's... Paula... I was trying to help her, make her more accepting of what happened to her..."
"You used magic. Cal, you know better!"
"It wasn't personal gain! At least, I don't think... I wanted it for her."
"Still. What happened?"
"Well, she's more accepting... but she's also a kid, and then she just vanished."
Paula resisted the urge to hit him upside the head. That tactic really was tempting; something she'd never appreciated when she'd observed others using it. She took a few deep breaths instead. Then she glanced at her... nephew. "Chris, I have to handle this first. If you like, you can help."
Chris nodded. "All right."
"Who are you?" Caleb asked, frowning.
"He's a client of mine."
"Yours? But I thought –"
"Usually we work cases together, yes, but this is an exception. Now let's try and find Maggie, shall we?"
As it happened, there were a few strands of Maggie's hair on her pillow, which Paula thought should be enough for scrying. "You use hair?" Chris asked, frowning.
"Never tried it before, but if blood works, why not?"
Chris shrugged. "I never thought of it like that."
"Rule number one, always be ready to improvise," Paula quipped before applying herself to scrying. Caleb rolled his eyes, but Chris smiled. It was comforting to see that one of his aunts was very like her older self. He just didn't know if this would work.
But it did. Paula smirked, proud that her brainwave had come through – she hadn't been sure about it either. But the crystal had landed on the Boston map she'd dragged out, and it appeared their 'kid' was in a playground.
Cole left the DESI satellite office with an ironclad identity and a pounding headache. The first thing he was grateful for, the second negated about half of that. He'd decided that he wasn't going to try killing Paula - he'd had enough of the wrath of Halliwell women - but he was still going to try and find some sort of payback.
When he got back to headquarters, there wasn't anyone there except for a dark-haired young man who gave Cole an uncertain look when he saw him. "Uh, Paula and Caleb are taking care of something that happened with Maggie," he said.
"Who are you?" Cole wanted to know.
"That's kind of a long story."
"Well apparently I have time, and I'm sure it can't be worse than dealing with idiotic bureaucrats, so why don't you tell me anyway?"
Caleb and Paula entered the playground to find a group of children clustered around a slight brunette girl who was playing a handheld video game. "That's Maggie," Caleb murmured.
"Hmm," said Paula. "Riddle me this: How does a girl from the eighties know how to play a Game Boy Advance?"
Caleb just stared at her; he hadn't thought of that. "They showed her?"
"No, those kids are stunned by something. There's more going on here."
They walked over to the kids and Maggie looked up at them. "I know you," she said to Caleb, her small face screwed up in a look of concentration. "Why do I know you?"
Paula did a quick mind trick, even though her conscience chided her for messing with the minds of children, and the boy who owned the Game Boy took it back before all the children moved away. Maggie frowned.
"What do you want?" she asked plaintively. But there was a flash in her eyes that made Paula think there was a bit of the adult asking that too. But she responded to the child.
"We just need to talk to you, sweetie, OK?"
"No! I shouldn't talk to strangers."
"I'm not a stranger, am I?" Caleb said, kneeling so he was at her level. He held out a hand to her. She studied him thoughtfully.
"Caleb, freeze everything, just in case," Paula muttered hurriedly. He did so, leaving himself, Paula, and Maggie the only ones moving. But Maggie never noticed, too caught up in Caleb's eyes, which never left her face. She took his hand, and a soft glow surrounded her. When it dissipated, Maggie the adult was standing there. Caleb dropped her hand immediately.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I never meant – " he began, only for her to cut him off.
"It's OK, Caleb. You were trying to help, and you did. It's fine."
Paula glanced around. "Can we go before they start moving again?" She got nods from them both, so she grabbed their hands and orbed them out.
Cole didn't know what to say. Granted, he'd traveled through time once, trying to change things, but this kid's plan was far more sophisticated than his had been. He had simply planned to end the Halliwell line with its founder; Chris was trying to change the fate of his family by stopping an unknown influence from turning his brother evil.
He was impressed that someone this young had come up with such a plan. Granted, he'd had the advice of his time-traveling aunt, and desperation was the mother of all invention, so maybe it wasn't that shocking. What was shocking was that Cole thought the kid might actually pull it off. He had a plan, and while he'd been initially shaken by Cole's existence – and Cole hadn't reacted much better to his original fate, the one Chris recounted – he now seemed to see it as a positive sign. If one thing could change, why not something else? Granted, Chris' plan wasn't the best he'd ever heard of, but at least he'd spent more time on it than his aunts and mother usually did.
The faint sound of chimes signaled the others' return, and Cole got his first glimpse of Magge Quinn awake. She was still delicate, but she didn't look weak anymore. Maybe she could handle it if Paula gave her a job offer.
"Cole, did Chris give you an overview?"
"Yeah, and I like the plan, except for the part where we have to go to the Halliwells. Isn't there something else we could do?"
"No, but don't worry. They won't be able to catch us. Now come on." She took his hand and Chris' and they orbed out together. They rematerialized across the street from the Manor while Paula scanned the house telepathically. "OK, there's no one in Wyatt's room; Chris, take us in?"
They orbed again, this time under Chris' direction, and reappeared in a room Cole had visited once during his brief time as an Avatar. The little boy in the crib was older than he'd been when Cole had seen him, and he raised a force field as Chris approached him. Cole raised an eyebrow, but Paula didn't even react. She was too busy muttering something under her breath.
The walls suddenly shimmered, as though he were seeing them through a heat haze. "Paula, what did you do?"
"Took us out of phase. We technically aren't on the same plane as the rest of the world right now. Can we get this done?"
"Sure, if the kid drops his shield."
Chris flinched. "He's never trusted me. I think he's picking up on what everyone else thinks of me."
"Paula, can't you do something?" Cole asked.
"Why don't you try?" she shot back. "He's looking at you."
Cole frowned, but approached the crib. To his shock, the shield dropped. "What the hell?" he said.
"No cursing in front of the kid," Paula admonished. "Best guess is he can tell you're tied to the little guardian he had when he was born, and so he trusts you."
Chris was confused but he was afraid to interrupt the duo as they checked Wyatt over with their powers. He was unsettled by their interaction, to say the least. He had a feeling they were sleeping together, and that was just weird. His Aunt Paula had never married, nor had she ever had any significant relationships that he'd known about. Was it possible she'd find that with Cole, the man her sister had once married? It was too creepy for him to think about.
"Well?" he said anxiously when Cole put Wyatt back in the crib. What if he was too late? What if – ?
"Chris, calm down," said Paula in the chiding, patient tone he knew all too well. "He's fine right now." She closed her eyes and muttered something unintelligible. The 'heat haze' cleared.
"We have to go," she said, "but if you need any more help, don't hesitate to call." She handed him her card before she orbed and Cole shimmered. Chris orbed out himself after pocketing the card – he didn't want the Charmed Ones catching him here either.
Cole and Paula returned to find Caleb and Maggie waiting for them. "I was wondering if I could stay," Maggie said calmly. "I think I could help you."
"Yes, I think you can," Paula said. "How did you know how to use the Game Boy?"
"No idea, it just came to me. And we tried the same thing with one of the computers here, and it was like instinct."
"Hmm," Paula said, frowning. "Technopathy, it sounds like. You have a… mental connection to technology. Must be some kind of side effect of being hooked up to that machine like a battery."
"So does it mean I'd be useful and I can stay?" Maggie asked, and her eagerness was clear.
"I'd have given you a job either way," Paula said firmly. "This is just a bonus."
"Good," Caleb said. "Now that we've got that settled, it's time to get Maggie up to date and fix Cole's woefully bad pop culture knowledge."
Cole scowled, Maggie frowned, and Paula raised an eyebrow. "And how do you suppose we do that?"
"Well, I thought we'd start by ordering a pizza and having a Star Wars marathon."
"Of course you did," Paula drawled, but that was exactly what they did, and surprisingly, they all enjoyed themselves.
A/N: OK, Chris is my other favorite character – besides Cole – I couldn't just ignore him. Next chapter: Strange aliens are prowling Boston's streets, but are they really aliens at all? Oh, this story now has a slideshow on YouTube. The link is in my account.
