TWENTY

"So, what's this idea you have?" Leo asked after he had orbed the girls back to the cabin in the mountains.

"Well, we have no idea where they've taken this Nostradamus," said Piper. "He wasn't brought to our camp or he'd have arrived the same day Phoebe did. So we need someone who can find him for us. Someone with connections that the authorities won't suspect."

"Don't forget someone who will be willing to help us," said Prue. "It's going to be hard to find someone like that who's willing to help a witch."

"Not if it's another witch," said Piper.

"I don't follow," said Leo. "All the known witches are locked in the internment camps or are dead. None of them are in any positions of authorities like you describe."

"That may not be true," said Phoebe. "I think I know who Piper is talking about. Paige."

"Exactly," said Piper. "I didn't want to say anything in the underworld so the demons wouldn't learn about her if it's true. You claim she's our half sister. If that's true she's probably a witch just as we are."

"She was," said Phoebe. "She's also half White Lighter. She didn't know anything about it until after. . . until she met us. It's like her powers were dormant or something. When she met us her power surfaced. She was a big help fighting demons."

"What power does she have?" Prue asked.

"It was a form of telekinesis like you had. That reminds me. What powers do you two have? With all these changes it's possible your powers have changed as well."

"Well I have telekinesis," said Prue. "I also have astral projection. Piper can freeze time and blow things up. What are your powers?"

"I have premonitions of the future and sometimes visions of the past," said Phoebe. "I can also levitate."

"Those are the same powers Melinda Warren had," said Leo.

"We are her descendents," said Phoebe. "But it's our Power of Three that's the greatest threat to evil. With it we can do just about anything."

"So you're thinking Paige Matthews can help us?" Leo asked Piper.

"Sure," said Piper. "If she's a witch like we are she'll have a lot of incentive to help us. If they discover who she is she'll be locked up in one of the internment camps."

"Why haven't they discovered her before now?" Phoebe asked. "You've mentioned the satellite system that can identify supernatural beings. Why don't they detect her if she's such an important person?"

"The technology they use to identify witches and other supernatural beings is based on detecting electro-magnetic fields around living beings," said Leo. "What a lot of people would call a persons' aura. The aura of a supernatural being is somewhat different from that of a normal human. It's because of the inherent magic in such beings."

"So shouldn't she have this special aura around her?" Phoebe asked.

"The technology used to detect such auras hasn't always been as sophisticated as it is today," said Prue. "In the past a lot of false positives and false negatives were made. Witches were scanned and discounted when they came up negative. If she were wrongly identified as a mortal her aura pattern would have been programmed into the satellite system to be ignored."

"If her powers are dormant that could account for it, too," said Leo. "A witches aura changes once her powers become active. That's why everyone is required to go through a scanning on their 18th birthday. Most witches' powers have become active by the time they reach 18."

"Paige's hadn't," said Phoebe. "Neither had her White Lighter powers. When we met her she had only used her orbing once when she was a teenager and it was subconsciously. She wasn't even aware of what she was until we found her."

"If she is a blood relative," said Leo, "she should have powers similar to you three. And if she's half White Lighter she might have White Lighter powers, too. If we can cause her powers to become active that might prove to her that she's a witch."

"I know how to make her powers active," said Phoebe. "We need to get to her first."

"That's going to be a problem," said Leo. "All public buildings have detectors. If a supernatural being enters the buildings the authorities will be alerted immediately."

"We could really use the Book of Shadows," said Phoebe. "It might have something in it that can help us. But it's in the manor. And if we go in there we're bound to be caught."

"It's not in the manor," said Leo. "When they identified Piper and Prue as witches I removed it. I didn't want the authorities getting their hands on it. It would have given them all the information they needed to hunt down witches."

"But it was there when I was captured in the manor," said Phoebe.

"That's not possible," said Leo. "The Elders have had it for several years. I know the Office of Homeland Security has been looking for it since they arrested the girls."

"He's right," said Prue. "When they first brought us to the camp they kept asking us where it was. All we could tell them was that it was in the attic but they kept telling us it wasn't there."

"Then how could it have been in the attic when I was captured?" Phoebe asked.

"It wasn't," said Leo. "It couldn't have been."

"Which means my spell didn't cause this time folding right away," said Phoebe. "There was a delay in it."

"Probably what happened," said Leo, "was that it took a few minutes for the changes to take affect. Just like Tempus described would happen when – and if – we set things right again. That's why you thought the book was still in the manor. But I can assure you it's with the Elders right now."

"Go get it," said Prue. "We might have need of it. In the mean time we're going to figure out how to get to Ms. Matthews without being detected. If Phoebe knows how to activate her powers we'll need to do it as quickly as we can."

"I'll be back as soon as I can," said Leo. He orbed out immediately.

"Oh," said Piper suddenly, "I'm not feeling very well."

"We've been through a lot," said Prue. "It's probably just catching up with you."

"Piper, are you pregnant?" Phoebe asked.

"What!?" Piper nearly shrieked. "No, of course not. That's ridiculous."

"Why do you ask?" Prue asked.

"In my timeline she's pregnant," said Phoebe. "With her first child. With all that's going on it had slipped my mind."

"Really?" Piper asked. "Who's the father?"

"Leo," said Phoebe. "You two have been married a couple of years now."

"The Elders let them get married?" Prue asked. "That doesn't sound like the Elders we've been told about. Witches and White Lighters aren't supposed to fraternize."

"It wasn't easy," said Phoebe. "They only relented after we stopped Aames from killing all the White Lighters and leaving witches unprotected."

"I never did like Aames," said Prue.

"Well he is a warlock," said Phoebe. "But with all the changes to the timeline I guess it's not so surprising that you aren't pregnant. If you and Leo ever met you couldn't very well be pregnant with his baby."

"Besides," said Phoebe, "the government puts chemicals in the food at the camps. They're a form of chemical sterilization. It's not permanent but as long as we keep taking the chemicals it prevents conception. So even if they had met it would be impossible for her to be pregnant."

"Pity," said Phoebe. "I was really looking forward to being an aunt."

"I guess I was, too," said Prue.

"What?" questioned Phoebe. "Oh, yeah, of course. So was Paige. We kept teasing Piper about home birthing but she kept insisting she was going to have the baby in the hospital."

"Of course I would," said Piper. "I wouldn't want to risk my baby on some complication we wouldn't be equipped to handle with home birthing. It would be a hospital with lots and lots of professionally trained medical people around to help."

"That's exactly what you keep saying in my timeline, too," said Phoebe.

"Not to change the subject," said Prue, "but we still need to figure out how to get to Matthews without being caught. It's a given we can't approach her at her television station. And it's in New York, anyway. That's a long way from here."

"Leo can get us anywhere we need to go," said Phoebe. "He can orb us anywhere in seconds."

"Well, that explains how we'll get there," said Prue. "That orbing is kind of cool. I wouldn't mind being able to do that."

"I've always wanted to fly," said Phoebe.

"What about going to her home?" Piper asked, redirecting their attention to the matter at hand. "It would be a lot easier to approach her at home. There wouldn't be anyone around to distract us or discover us."

"That could be risky," said Prue. "A lot of residences have the sensors installed to detect witches or other supernatural beings. If she lives in one of those places we'll be detected as soon as we get there."

"What about some place else?" questioned Phoebe. "Some place that might not have the sensors?"

"That would be difficult," said Piper. "Every day more and more places are installing the sensors as routine safety precautions. You really don't know what it's like here. Witches are the primary enemy of all countries. It's the one thing they can all agree on. We're lucky. At least we live in the United States."

"Why is that lucky?" Phoebe asked.

"The United States is only one of very few countries where witches are locked up," said Piper. "In most countries they're just murdered. And a lot of the countries don't have as sophisticated detecting devices that we have here. Which means there are probably a lot of people are killed who aren't witches but only suspected of being witches."

"That's barbaric," said Phoebe. "We have to protect magic from being discovered by the mortal world in the real timeline but nothing like this. Practicing the Craft isn't a crime there."

"Really?" said Prue. "It's been illegal here for decades. Grams used to tell us what it was like when she was a girl. It wasn't nearly as bad as it was during the Salem Witch Hunts but she still had to practice in private. The McCarthy came along and in just a few short years it became illegal. It just sort of snowballed from there."

"I don't think it will be long before the camps are considered unnecessary," said Piper. "I think that very soon they're going to decide that witches are unnatural and they'll be eliminated like they do in most of the rest of the world."

"If we can find Nostradamus and get him back to his own time we can put things back the way they're supposed to be," said Phoebe.

"Which means we still have to find some way to get to Matthews," said Prue. "I don't think we have much of a choice. Anywhere we confront her we risk being detected. I think her home is a good idea. She's a very public person. I'm willing to bet she values what little privacy she has. Which means she probably doesn't want a sensor in her home spying on her."

"Spying on her?" Phoebe questioned.

"The sensors can do more than detect a person's aura," said Piper. "They can be programmed to do just about anything. From what I understand it wouldn't take that much to convert a sensor lens to a camera lens. Instant peeping tom."

"That makes sense," said Phoebe. "Most celebrities I've heard of get really annoyed when the paparazzi invade their personal homes. I agree with you. If we confront her in her home I think we stand the best chance of being able to talk with her privately."

"Now," said Prue, "just how do you plan to convince her she's a witch? You said you had a plan to activate her powers? Just how do you plan to do that?"

"The same way she got her powers in my timeline," said Phoebe. "She came to the manor and when we all joined hands we were bathed in this bluish-white light. That's when her powers manifested themselves. I'm willing to bet it would work the same way here."

"Even with me here?" Prue asked.

"What do you mean?" Phoebe asked.

"You've been very careful not to mention certain things about your timeline," said Prue. "But you've made some small mistakes. Mistakes that might not seem like much individually. But taken together there's only one conclusion I can come to. In the real timeline I'm dead, aren't I?"

"What?" exclaimed Piper.

Phoebe could do nothing but stare at Prue in shocked surprised.