Chapter 2: Unwelcome Guest
A/n: Thank you all reviewers. You make me so happy. Since I have this mostly typed up, you're the reasons I update.
mandymoore1: I'm going to reveal Patience's dad later on, because it's going to be important later.
JadeAlmasy: I think it's going to be a cool story
darkVlight: hehehe…I love Grams…her reaction was fun to write. I hope it's a winner.
phoebe turner: While, here it is!
WitchyChar: Here's more of this story! Hope you like it.
Anime-obsessed: Thanks for typing this Carmen! There, I mentioned you again. I wrote more in French today. What else am I supposed to do?
Grams looked frantically, at her two future great-granddaughters. "I'm in the washroom Phoebe! I'll be down in a minute", she yelled down the stairs. "Help me hide this stuff", Grams whispered frantically. She stowed the Book of Shadows in the old trunk. I took the herbs, and put them in the cupboard. Melinda took the crystals and put them in a small box. We were done in about two minutes.
Grams turned to Melinda. She said, "You need to orb me into the washroom," Melinda nodded and waved her arm. Grams disappeared in a swirl of blue white lights. Melinda grabbed my hand, and next moment we were at the front door. We heard Grams asked young Phoebe about her day. I rang the doorbell.
When Grams answered, she pretended to look surprised. She gave us each a hug, I saw my mother younger than I was but looking very much the same. She looked at Melinda and I with a curious expression on her face. "Phoebe, this is Patience and Melinda", Grams said softy, "They are your cousins." At my mom's skeptical look she added, "distant cousins."
I couldn't tell that my mom wasn't convinced, but she shrugged, and sat down in the dinning room table. Grams sat down beside the young version of my mother, and gave us a stern look that clearly meant, you better sit down if you know what's good for you. Not wanting to be yelled at, Melinda and I sat down. "It is time to do your homework, dear", Grams said trying to divert her attention from us. My mother didn't get any homework, nor did she move at all.
"I won't do my homework until you tell me where they're from and why their wearing such weird clothes."
I leaned forward a bit in my seat. I couldn't wait to hear how Grams answered that. Compared to mom's tight leggings legwarmers, back tipped shirt that hung off her shoulders and horrible ponytail and headband ensemble, I could see how out clothes might look a little weird. I was wearing hip hugging aged jeans, held up with a thin red belt and a shinny black tank top accessorized with gold hoop earrings. Stylish in my time, but strange in the 80s.
"There from…far away…umm…Canada! And what they're wearing is stylish there."
I had to bite my lip to stop from laughing. Even Melinda, usually serious, was smiling a bit. My mom still didn't look convinced; she was much smarter than we gave her credit for. Rather then argue, young Phoebe just shrugged, "Whatever", she muttered. I could tell that my mom knew that Grams was hiding something from her. No wonder my mother was the first to find the Book of Shadows. When Phoebe had stopped staring at us, and finally started on her homework Grams stood up from the table.
"I'm going to go with Melinda and Patience to get them settled", Grams said pleasantly. We understood that it was a signal that it was time to go back up to the attic. Phoebe looked up from her homework for a moment and shrugged.
Melinda and I jogged up to the attic, Grams trailed behind us. We waited about a minute for Grams to get up to the attic. We didn't see her lock the door, but we felt it was safe to assume that she did. This was Grams after all.
When Grams entered the attic, she got the Book of Shadows out of the trunk and began frantically flipping through the pages. "I know I saw a time travel spell here somewhere." Grams mumbled, "I just need to find it".
At that moment, I saw a flash of blue out of the corner of my eyes. I spun around to see a shimmering blue portal forming on the far attic wall. I nudged Melinda, who was standing beside me.
'What do you want?' Melinda said irritably into my head. As always, in my opinion, Melinda was oblivious to everything that was going on.
'Turn around stupid", I said telepathically. Still, Melinda refused to listen. Despite the dear the swirling portal inspired, Melinda was making me angry.
"There's a portal behind us!" I thought angrily.
Using my power of empathy, I could tell that Melinda didn't really believe me. Nevertheless, she turned around.
Sure enough, she saw the portal, and nearly jumped. The portal wasn't a smooth shimmering mass of blue anymore. Sticking out of the seemingly solid portal was a muscular green arm with black markings. It was as if the demon to which the arm was attached was struggling to break through the portal.
"Grams…" Melinda said; her voice full of fear. Feeling both Melinda's fear and my own, I was terrified. I concentrated all my energy on blocking out her feelings. After a few seconds, my feelings were wholly my own.
"Not now girls, I'm busy!" said Grams irritably. Another arm broke through the portal. Melinda tapped frantically on Gram's shoulder, in such effort to get her attention. I backed away, looking for good space to fight. My powers were completely passive and not much use against demons. Thanks to my mother, I was an expert in one on one combat.
"What is it girls?" Grams said finally, with a sigh.
"Demon!" I yelled. The demon had escaped completely from the portal. He was a large muscular demon, green and covered in tribal markings. He opened hid mouth to reveal two rows of knife-like teeth. He looked vaguely human except his pointed ears, small white horns and his eyes, which was a luminesant yellow, like a cat.
Grams turned around when she saw the demon, she looked at him furiously, and waved her arm.
The demon stumbled, but was otherwise uninjured. The demon threw back its ugly head and roared.
"I want only the children!" it growled. It advanced towards me, and I crouched low, getting into proper fighting stance. The demon aimed a well placed blow with its clawed hand, straight at my head. I blocked it but not before getting swiped by the clawed hand. I looked at the cut on my shoulder. It wasn't that deep, but it merited some healing.
I leapt into the air, and unleashed a stinging snap kick straight at the demon's head. With a satisfying snap, the demon's head flew backwards. It was momentarily stunned, but I didn't stop. The demon seemed to think killing me was too much work, it turned to Melinda.
My cousin Melinda was ready. She flicked her wrists, and the demon froze in place.
She ran to the Book of Shadows, turning her back on the demon. For 20 seconds, she flipped through the book at a frantic pace. She pulled out a small pouch of species, and ripped the page out of the book.
"Standard upper-level demon vanquishing spell?" she asked Grams.
"Yes darling", Grams replied.
I chanced a glance at the frozen demon, directly behind Melinda. He seemed to be trembling, almost as if he was fighting against through the freeze. I tried to yell out in warning, but it was too late. All at once, the demon broke out of the freeze. He raised his arm, and hit Melinda over the head. Melinda crumpled to the floor.
"Melinda!" Grams yelled.
My cousin was on the floor, unmoving. It was impossible to tell if she was alive or dead. That's when I decided to use a power I rarely used. Since powers are tied to emotions, using my power to tap into another's emotions also allows me to tap into their power. I rarely used that particular aspect of that power because it was horribly draining.
It was also particularly difficult to use that power on demons, because their powers were often triggered by hate. Feeling that much hate could be painful. I've only used this power in situations like these, when I had no other choice.
I concentrated, like I had never concentrated in my life. I felt hate coursing though me, raw, primal hate. The warmth in my hand told me that it had worked.
"Looking for this", I asked in a low growl, exposing the fireball I had formed. It was taking all my strength to bare all that hate. I wanted nothing more then to let go of it. It was burning me, tearing me apart. I had to hold on until I vanquished the demon for Melinda's sake.
I threw the fireball, letting go of all the hate that I knew the demon felt. I had perfect aim, the fireball hit the demon square on the chest and it howled in pain. Fire swirled around its writhing body. With a final puff of smoke and growl of pain, it was gone.
I sat down on the floor beside Melinda's unmoving body. She was till breathing, so all we have to do was call Uncle Leo, and he could heal her. Melinda and I were still technically his charges. I was sure he would hear us.
I heard a small frightened voice in the doorway, before I got a chance to call Leo. "Grams? Patience?" my 12 year old mother said, "What happened to Melinda? What was that thing with the fire?"
What had she seen? It could seriously screw things up if my mom found out about magic too soon. People who were supposed to be alive could be dead, and vice-versa. People I really care about might never be born. I really hoped that Gram could think of a good explanation for this.
As it turned out, Gram didn't really have to explain. What little Phoebe Halliwell had seen must have been too much for her, as her eyes rolled up in her head and she slumped to the floor. I was shocked. I couldn't believe that my mother had fainted!
Grams looked a bit defeated as she sat down on the sofa. "What shall we do now?" Grams said with a sigh. Was Grams, the all powerful super-witch, asking me for help? The past was just getting weirder and weirder.
"I'll call my whitelighter, and he can heal them," I said confidently. "Leo!" I called. Grams displayed a slight shock at hearing that name, but chose to ignore it. I remembered that Uncle Leo had been Aunt Piper's whitelighter since she was born. Okay, now that I think about it, EW!
Uncle Leo took longer than usual to appear. I suppose it's because I technically wasn't born yet. My head really hurt when I thought that. Finally, after what seemed like a million years, Leo appeared in a swirl of orbs. He looked from Melinda and my mom on the floor, to me and finally rested on Grams.
"Penny", Leo said slowly, "What's going on?"
Grams opened her mouth and abruptly closed it. She seemed unable to speak, I decided that I would explain for her.
"I think I should explain", I said. "First let me introduce myself. My name is Patience". I stuck my hand out and he shook it.
"Leo", he said, with a stunned look on his face. He sat down slowly beside Grams and I told him everything. When I was finished, nearly half an hour later, he looked a little doubtful. He was especially stunned to hear that he married Aunt Piper, and they had 3 children, one of which was currently unconscious. "Can you heal Melinda now?" I asked.
Leo got up quickly; he placed a glowing healing hand over Melinda. She opened her eyes and sat up quickly, stunned at who she saw.
"Dad!" she yelled, throwing her arms around him. He weakly returned the hug, looking bewildered.
"I would like to believe you Patience", he said finally. "but what you have told me sounds a bit impossible."
"When your mother is a Charmed One", I said with a smile, "nothing's impossible."
I didn't know it at the time but very impossible things were about to happen…
TBC…