"Nothin' says lovin' like somethin' from the oven!" - The Pilsbury Dough Boy
Salutations & Shepherds Pie
"How is this possible?" Leo asked, pulling Chris into his embrace. "I watched you fade right out of my arms."
"It's a very long, very complicated story" Chris replied, pulling his father towards him, helping him to sit up, "but I promise you'll hear all of it very, very soon."
Though Piper had been anxious to go to her husband, she felt in her heart that it was more important for Leo and Chris to share this moment together. Though he had gotten better, Leo hadn't slept through an entire night since Chris' death. Sometimes he had nightmares, others he would wake up in a cold sweat. Of course Piper had grieved as well, but she had been spared the devastation of seeing her son fade beneath his father's touch, as he drew his last breath in their world. Naturally, the birth of 'Baby Chris' served to assuage the grief that rippled through the entire family, but as the two parents looked forward to getting to know the newborn, they had always wondered if he would ever inherit the memories of their Chris from the future. Having 'Future Chris' back at home was the perfect cure for an unyielding ache that both Piper and Leo had been carrying.
Leo reached his arm out to Piper, who had been watching from in between Jared and Steve, both of with an arm around their misty-eyed mother. "I'm so sorry to worry you." Leo said as Piper stepped to one side of him, Chris holding him from the other.
"What happened to you?" asked Piper concernedly.
"I don't remember anything," Leo said sadly, "not since I saw you last."
"You don't even remember us calling you?" Chris asked worriedly.
"Nothing," said Leo, shaking his head. "You waking me up just now is the first memory I have since last night."
Leo looked around the table, noticing, as though for the first time, the four young strangers looking at him with both concern and relief. "We've got company?" he asked, smiling as politely as possible, considering the circumstances. "Friends of yours?" he asked Chris, rubbing a drop of water off the tip of his nose.
"Dad," Chris began, as all five brothers moved to stand in a line before their father, linked by their arms over each others shoulders, "There are some people I'd like to introduce you to." he said with a cautious but knowing smile. "They've come back with me from the future."
Chris waited for a moment before he continued, giving Leo a moment to digest the current situation. Leo noticed immediately how remarkably the boys resembled one another, though the resemblance was curiously far more than merely visual. Sure, there were some physical similarities, but the true resemblance was more... energetic... or spiritual, for lack of a better word. No doubt about it, though, they were definitely all of the Halliwell bloodline.
"Future cousins?" Leo asked, as though playing a guessing game. His question was met with only smiles from all of the room's inhabitants.
Piper left her husband's side to walk over to her sons. Steve and Jared stepped slightly apart, making room for Piper to squeeze into the family linked family lineup. "Aren't they pretty?" she asked, her voice doing the smiling for her.
Leo was jolted wide awake as he interpreted the look on his wife's face. "Are they all..." he began, stopping to gulp. " ...all ours?" he asked.
"Yeah." chimed Piper, smiling playfully. "Apparently you fall victim to some Viagra epidemic." she teased. "White Lighters are highly susceptible."
"Really?" asked Leo, too overwhelmed to realize she was joking.
"Elders too!" added Dylan. "You, dear Father, were the victim of hormonal circumstances."
"The Double Whammy of Double Whammies." said Jared. "You didn't stand a snow cone's chance in Hades."
Steve's face lit up. "Ooh, that reminds me... Ya' better not wait too long to update your health insurance policy." he said. "Something about insurance companies not recognizing White Lighter Hyper-Libido Syndrome as a legitimate illness." he added. "Man, I tell ya', the co pay on the medications alone is enough to throw ya' headfirst into 'the poorhouse'."
Chris whacked Steve on the back of his head. "Do you think you could act a little bit less like yourself until Dad warms up to you a bit?" he chided.
"Yeah, Steve!" scoffed Jared. "Just act like Chris!"
"No!" exclaimed Dylan, Piper, and Steve, before realizing they'd responded a bit too quickly and too strongly.
Chris dropped his jaw in astonishment. "Oh, thanks guys!" he sighed. "Nice! Real nice!"
"That is," Piper backtracked, "we don't need two of Chris; we need one of Chris and one of Steve." she said in a chipper tone.
"Good save!" whispered Steve to Piper.
Leo looked helplessly at his wife, his mind already exhausted from listening to the lightening speed manner in which his sons spoke, especially when speaking to one another. There was hardly a chance to get a word in. "Well... Uh...," Leo stumbled, trying to find fitting words. He frowned in discomfort, looking pleadingly at Piper for help. How could he have any idea what to say or do in such a dumbfounding situation?
Piper subtly mouthed the words "Say 'HELLO!'".
"Right!" exclaimed Leo nervously. "Um... Hi..." he uttered meekly. "I'm Leo... your father... apparently." he added, stopping to swallow. "Please feel free to, you know... call me 'Dad'." he concluded, his face turning red as a beet.
Taking pity on his father, Jared stepped forward and offered his hand. "Hi! I'm Jared... son number six." he said, accompanying his handshake with his signature bright smile.
"Number six? Really?" asked Leo, a bit surprised. "I wouldn't have guessed you were the youngest."
"Uh..." uttered Jared, looking questioningly at Piper, wondering if he should clarify the misunderstanding or let things be for the moment.
"Salutations!" interrupted Dylan, helping his older brother out of the awkward situation. "I'm Dylan, also commonly known as 'the cute one'... and 'the smart one'... and 'the funny one'." he said dryly, shaking Leo's hand. "I'm kid number seven."
"Seven?" Leo asked, his voice going up in his throat.
Piper smiled. "We have a couple of late arrivals who haven't made it just yet." she said.
"A cccc... a couple?" asked Leo, his voice cracking. "Oh!"
"Put her there, Pops!" greeted Steve, stepping up to shake his father's hand. "I'm Steve, bouncing baby boy number five."
Leo's hand was trembling as he offered it out to Steve. He had met these boys less than five minutes ago and was already fascinated by how different they all were from one another. He looked back at Piper, naturally craving familiarity, but also beginning to find the humor in the situation. "All boys?" he asked, a sprinkle of pride blending into his timidity.
Steve leaned in closer to his father. "You love me the most!" he whispered with a wink.
Once again, Leo opened his mouth to respond, but the words just weren't coming. He was beside himself with excitement, confusion, glee, terror, pride, and a myriad of other conflicting emotions. Having nine sons was one thing, but if the others had personalities anywhere near as large or as colorful as those of the young men in front of him, he knew his future would be thickly laden with many trials of patience and sanity.
As Steve stepped back, Leo looked somewhat nonchalantly over to Lee, who had been waiting patiently. A deep sense of calmness and centeredness instantly enveloped him like a warm, woolen blanket. Perhaps it was due to Leo's gut feeling that this young man was the son who was the most like himself.
"Hi Dad!" said Lee, a bit shyly. "I'm Lee: son number nine." he said, shaking father's hand. "I'm sorry about the panca-.. Mmmph!" Lee attempted to confess his future family offense as Chris grabbed him and put a hand over his mouth.
"He uh..." mumbled Chris. "He's been leaning over a hot stove for three hours." he insisted. "He was lucky to remember his own name."
Leo was too distracted by the uneasy feeling of having his short lived sense of calm stripped away from him, all at mention of the number 'nine'. He didn't even process the fact that Chris was speaking, much less what he was saying.
"N-... Nine?" Leo echoed. Looking up at Piper, he noticed how uncharacteristically comfortable she seemed with all of this alarming new information. "So... When do sons ten, eleven, and twelve show up?" he asked, propping his face up in an uneasy smile.
Piper was tempted to let Leo stew for a minute or two, but considering all that he had been through (or what she suspected he had been through), she decided to throw him a bone. "No need to fret; Lee is the baby." she said.
"And what a cute baby he is!" said Dylan, pinching Lee's cheek.
"The bestest!" Steve answered, pulling Lee into a noogie.
"Hey!" Lee protested. "Watch it or you guys will spend the rest of your lives arguing over which one of you is the real purple Teletubby!"
"Ouch!" exclaimed Jared, offering his baby brother a high five. "Nice one!"
"So, I'm at a total loss." said Leo, scratching his head. "I've got so many questions racing through my head I can't decide which one to ask."
Steve stroked his chin pensively. "How about, What in the third layer of Hell are you all doing here?"
"Or," added Dylan, "Is contraception illegal in the future, or just too expensive?"
"So negative, you guys!" Jared interjected. "At least start with something like, What are the tax benefits to rearin' nine critters?"
All of the social commotion was suddenly interrupted by the return of beeps from within the kitchen.
"Ooh, I've got one!" exclaimed Lee. "How about Who's hungry?" he shouted and ran to the kitchen.
"Oh, Leo, before I forget," said Piper, "you and I need to have a little chat about where babies come from."
"It's Steve's fault!" shouted Chris, making his way towards the dining room.
Leo merely shrugged and added it to the long list of things he had yet to understand about the events of the day.
For the next couple of minutes, the family looked like a small colony of ants, each son entering and exiting the kitchen multiple times, leaving one colorful dish and returning to retrieve another. Leo was instructed to sit leisurely at the head of the table, his offers to help being politely refused or coyly ignored. Piper alternated from helping the boys, to sitting with Leo as he pondered that magnitude of his surreally impending future, to helping the boys again.
Lee's heart was pounding. He knew that, up until he and his mother had made shepherd's pie for the family in the future, Leo had never tasted it. He had been looking forward to introducing his father to his favorite dish for a 'second time' with all of his heart.
Once the family was seated and the vanquishing dishes were identified, Lee ran into the kitchen to retrieve the prized dish for his unsuspecting father. After picking up the large pot (He was used to cooking for eleven) with his mitt-covered hands, Lee carefully strolled back into the dining room, looking proudly at his creation the entire time. "Dad," he announced, "You don't know this yet, but you're about to try your favorite..." Lee's glance shot upwards from the bowl to look on three fireballs having already been thrown directly towards him.
As soon as he was aware of them, the first of the three fireballs slammed him flat against the wall behind, forcing him to drop the pie all over the dining room floor.
"Oh my God!" yelled Piper, blasting the second of the three fireballs, but having too little time to stop the third.
Before Lee's body had time to fall to the ground, the last of the three fireballs smashed him against the wall a second time. To Leo and Piper's surprise, Lee fell into a solid defensive stance, his knees bent slightly, and he was completely in control of all his faculties, seemingly unharmed. Grabbing the (now empty) bowl he had been carrying, he shot straight back up, standing to face a male, bald, sinister looking Dark Lighter, his crossbow aimed directly at Lee's heart from across the length of the dining room table. All of the family members tried in one way or another to use their various powers to stop the Dark Lighter, but all efforts were fruitless.
"Uh oh!" Piper quivered. "My powers... They're not working." she said.
To the surprise of the three intruding demons, neither were theirs.
Leo tried with all his might to race toward the Dark Lighter to protect his youngest son, but his own feet would not allow him to take so much as a single step in any direction.
Lee looked directly but unthreateningly into the Dark Lighter's vengeful eyes as the freshly fired arrow sped with malevolent accuracy towards its target: Lee's heart. Without breaking eye contact, Lee raised the thick, metallic bowl in front of his chest, both blocking the arrow and catching it, the arrowhead having stabbed its way into the bowl, but not all the way through it. Leo, Piper, all three demons, and the Dark Lighter in particular, looked on in motionless amazement.
Lee looked sadly into the empty bowl and then at the ruined shepherd's pie smashed and spread at his feet on the dining room floor.
"Uh oh!" Jared said into Chris' ear, anticipating the inevitable.
Lee looked woefully into the Dark Lighter's eyes, as if to ask him why he ruined the edible gift he had toiled to prepare for his family, particularly for his father.
"The eye thing," whispered Jared to Chris. "He's doing the eye thing."
As Lee continued to look into the Dark Lighter's confused gaze, his lip began to quiver slightly, just like his father's did when he felt emotionally wounded or unfairly hurt.
"Oh God!" whispered Dylan, leaning in toward Chris and Jared. "He's doing the lip thing. I can't handle the lip thing!"
The wounded look on Lee's face intensified as he began to speak to the Dark Lighter, his voice sounding both vulnerable and confused. "I worked all morning on that..." he said, looking increasingly wounded. "I made it for my dad."
Muttering to Dylan and Jared, Chris said: "The eye thing, the lip thing, AND the voice thing! Those freaks have crossed the frickin' line!" Standing solidly as a rock, Chris turned to face the four invaders. With intense loathing in his eyes, he pointed his finger squarely at the Dark Lighter, his hand rigidly poised like a cocked rifle ready to fire. "Okay Pal," he snarled with gritted teeth, "You might as well write Property of Chris Halliwell all over yourself, because your ass is MINE!"