Post by adzpower on Aug 29, 2016 10:21:45 GMT -5
Charmed Reborn Chapter Four: “Operation: Rescue Cole”
The Source flamed into The Seer’s chambers, furious.
“Come out Seer” he bellowed.
The Seer materialized in a haze of indigo light, worried that he had discovered her plan somehow.
“My liege?”
“How long before you were going to tell me?” he demanded.
“Tell you what?” she asked innocently.
The Source lowered his voice to a deadly whisper, “how long before you were going to tell me that you had Belthazor?” he asked.
“I was saving him my liege, saving him for when we might need him” The Seer stammered.
“I see”, “well, prepare him, for now is the time”.
“Prepare him for what oh evil one?” The Seer questioned.
“Prepare him” he said with a smile.
“For bait”.
Phoebe sat in the kitchen, thumbing through the Book of Shadows, she found it therapeutic, something to keep her mind off her problems, she liked to go through and see which demons they’d vanquished, which innocents they’d saved, it helped clear her mind.
Until today, when she came across the page for Belthazor, she sighed, she missed Cole so much, she smiled as she looked at the opposite page where she had stuck photos of them together, and written about his human hobbies, it felt like such a long time ago, even though it had just been a few months.
She used her fingers to trace the photos, remembering how happy they were, how happy they could be, maybe one day she thought.
As she was about to flip the page, Phoebe gasped as she felt a chill, she recognised the familiar sensation of a premonition and was sucked into a vision, in which she saw Cole chained up against a pillar, it looked like some kind of temple, thought she couldn’t be sure, the vision zoomed her outside the temple and showed a sign saying “Tao-Long’s Buddhist Temple”.
She gasped as she was thrown out the vision, it had been so long since she’d had one that she had almost forgotten what it felt like.
“Prue!” Phoebe yelled as she ran out the kitchen carrying the book.
“What is it?” Prue said as she came running down the stairs.
“I just had a vision”.
Phoebe explained what she’d seen to her sister.
“We have to get Piper, she’s at work” Prue said.
“I’ll go” she added as she lowered her head and astral projected.
Piper was enjoying an intimate time with Leo, he had orbed in about a half hour ago and they were having some adult fun in the store room, she’d had to vanquish her assistant manager so no one else was at work yet.
Leo was great with his hands, she found herself thinking as he made his way across her stomach, just about to hit a home run when….
“Prue!” Piper gasped as her sister astral projected behind Leo.
Both Piper and Leo scurried to put their clothes back on and look presentable whilst Prue just stood there laughing.
“Are you offering drinks with this new Rated R deal you’ve got going on Piper?” Prue asked devilishly.
“Shut it” she spat, “how many times, please ring, or email or anything before you do that”. Piper pleaded as she zipped up her boots.
“So no one interrupts the show?” Prue questioned.
Piper sighed, why did her older sister have to be such a smartass?
“Why are you here Prue?” Leo asked.
“Phoebe had a vision, of Cole”.
“I see” Piper said, “and is he, ok?” she asked.
“According to Phoebe he was alive in the vision, but we’re not sure how much longer for”. Prue answered, disdain in her voice.
Piper gave her a look, she knew that Prue didn’t like Cole very much, but to be honest it was probably because they were so alike Piper thought, though she’d never say that to Prue for risk of losing an arm.
“Ok, go, we’ll close up and orb back to the manor”.
Prue nodded and projected back to her body.
“They’re on their way” Prue said to Phoebe as she aligned back with her physical body.
“Good” Phoebe half-smiled, any help would be appreciated she thought.
Tao Long’s temple was a bit of a rip-off of the real thing, one side of it was an ancient temple, the other a restaurant and a kids play area with a ball pit, not exactly a great place for actual Buddhists to practice their religion. And it was about to get much worse.
Families sat at the restaurant trying ancient Tibetan cuisine, tasting the succulent dishes and paying their respects to the statues of the Buddha, giving money where possible to attract good fortune to themselves.
Outside the front entrance an army of demons were making their way across the street, towards the temple, led by three individuals, The Source, The Seer, and, chained up and gagged, Cole.
The Source waited just outside the door with his two guests and called back to the army of demons.
“Go”.
The demons rushed in and for the next five minutes, all you could hear where the sounds of slaughter as the evil doers slayed every living thing within.
A demon walked out, “it is done my liege”.
“Good” The Source replied.
He walked inside the temple and raised his head to take in the scene, it was beautiful he thought, the bodies and the blood, how he missed his more active days of killing.
“Over here” he pointed to a pillar in the centre of the room.
Several demons grabbed Cole and chained him up around it, not leaving him much room to move or breathe.
“Now, wait”. The Source ordered.
He gestured to The Seer to walk with him into the back kitchens, as they walked in sync he asked her, “You think they’ll fall for it?”
“Who knows how good witches really think?” The Seer asked back.
The Source laughed, “You have always been good company Seer, always by my side, always helping me succeed, do not think your efforts go unnoticed, one day you will be rewarded greatly”.
The Seer smiled, “It means a lot to me that you think that my liege, I live to serve”.
Myself, she thought as they flamed out back to the underworld to await news.
“Come on Phoebe, this smells trap and you know it” Piper exclaimed for the fifth time.
“I know that Piper but we can’t just let Cole rot, he helped you guys save me after all”.
“Yes, that I know, we all know, but would he thank us now for getting you captured again by walking into such an obvious trap?” Piper asked.
“She does make a good point Phoebe” Leo said in his calming voice.
It didn’t work.
“Well of course you’d say that you’re the husband!” Phoebe snapped, “If it isn’t one of us or our Whitelighter then who cares about the half-demon right guys?”
Phoebe backed off and walked off to sit in grams’ old armchair.
“That wasn’t fair Phoebe” Piper said.
“You know we want to save Cole, I’m just saying we need to be smart about this that’s all”.
“Don’t play their game, play our own” Piper concluded.
Phoebe sighed and lowered her head into her hands, taking big breaths to try to calm down.
“Anything Prue?” Piper asked her other sister as she looked through the book.
“Well, there’s a weird looking potion here that apparently melts the skin off of foes” she pointed out.
“That’s strange, a potion like that shouldn’t be in the book” Leo frowned as he read.
“Well, it must have been put there for us to use” Piper shrugged.
“I certainly wouldn’t mind seeing The Source with an even more melted face” Phoebe yelled from across the room.
Prue smiled. “I think I’ve found something even better”.
Phoebe walked over and looked down at the book along with Piper and Leo, they all let out a sigh.
“I don’t think this is a good idea” Piper said.
“It screwed us last time”.
“It saved my ass last time Piper” Prue said as she reasoned with her younger sibling.
“I’m all for it” Phoebe piped up.
“You are?” Piper questioned, shocked.
“Yes, they’ll never see it coming, you’re right, it’s probably is a trap, but this would be like a counter-trap”.
Prue looked up from the book at Piper. “Sorry sis, majority rules”.
The three witches chanted together in unison.
“Take my powers, blessed be,
Multiply their strength by three”.
Cole looked around the darkening room, it was rapidly approaching evening and he was getting more and more anxious the more time went on, he knew they would come for him and he was terrified of what could happen. He couldn’t lose Phoebe again, they’d been through too much.
He tried his shackles again, still too tight, no way he was going to break out of them, not without help anyway.
Just at that moment he felt a cold breeze, at first he mistook it for the wind, but then he felt his shackles loosening somewhat, he could just about make out an almost invisible outline of a person, someone was helping him, but who? He couldn’t tell.
Now he had to wait, he couldn’t take on the dozens of demons surrounding him so he had to wait for the sisters to show up.
“You sure this is the place?” Leo said as he and the sisters orbed in front of the temple.
“Yeah, definitely” Phoebe replied.
“Ok, let’s go save Cole now because I need him, like now” Phoebe smiled seductively.
“God I hate this spell” Piper said as she followed her sisters up the path.
“It always goes wrong, everything always goes wrong, we can’t escape it!” Piper was struggling to breathe as she ranted.
“Eurgh, why did we get lumbered with this one” Phoebe pointed at Piper.
“She is such a downer”.
Piper glared at her younger sister.
“Well excuse me Phoebe but I’m sorry that I’m the only one concerned for our well-being here!” Piper yelled.
“Piper?” Prue asked.
“What?” She replied.
“Don’t you think that maybe all the yelling you’re doing will attract the attention of the hordes of demons probably waiting inside?” She said innocently.
Piper sighed and took a deep breath.
“Fine”, “Let’s go” she said.
“Ok then, follow me, busy, busy, busy is my middle name you know” Prue smiled as she led the charge up the path.
“Why did I get stuck with the annoying ones?” Phoebe whispered to herself.
“Maybe we should be a bit more stealthy?” Leo suggested as Prue waved her arm and the doors flew off the hinges.
Too late he thought.
Leo gasped. He had seen war before, but this was sickening, bodies and blood all over the floor, some on tables, and in the very centre, Cole.
“Yes finally!” Phoebe exclaimed as she ran to the pillar.
“My loins have been calling for you” she said as she tried to rip off the shackles but only managed to remove the gag.
Cole looked perplexed and could only manage a “Huh?”
Piper made a gagging noise in disgust whilst her and Prue followed Phoebe.
“This place looks kind of empty” Leo said as he looked around.
“Aside from the obvious” he said as he looked down at a dead chef.
Cole seemed mad.
“What are you doing just walking through the front door like that?” he asked.
“Yeah, yeah don’t worry” Piper said.
“We’ve got it all worked out” Prue smiled as she waved her hand and made all the chains and shackles fly off Cole’s arms and legs.
Phoebe grabbed Cole’s arm and began to drag him into the store room.
“You can just wait outside if you want” she said as she pointed to the front of the temple.
“Phoebe what has gotten into you?” Cole asked, worried.
“We’ll explain everything later” Piper said.
“But we have to go”.
“Leo?” she gestured to her husband to hold hands with her so they could all orb out, but before they could an energy ball came sailing through the air and hit Leo in the chest, sending him flying back against the far wall.
The group turned around to see a whole plethora of demons shimmer into the temple, all with nasty, smiling looks on their faces.
“Ooh, party time” Prue said, strangely excited.
Phoebe whispered to Piper. “Do you think any of those demons are single?”
Piper kicked her younger sister on the ankle.
“Ok girls, time to go to work” Prue said as she jumped up onto the restaurant bar, kicking a demon in the face, then proceeding to jump down, grab a wine bottle, shatter it and shove the end of it down into the demons stomach, ending him in a flashfire.
Piper turned around to look for Leo, she made it about half way across the room before two demons grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her onto the floor, she hit her head, seeing stars, one of the demons got on top of her and began to strangle her, an energy ball hit the demon in the head and he exploded, Piper got up and nodded thanks to Cole.
The other demon was making his way to Leo.
“I knew this would all go wrong!” she shouted as she raised her hands an attempted to blow the demon up, but instead set him on fire.
“Huh?” Piper said in confusion as the demon withered away into ash.
“I’ll take it” she nodded.
Cole spun around, he was weak but he would still put up a fight no matter what, he couldn’t see Phoebe anywhere, he looked up as he heard her voice. She was up in the air one on one fighting a demon who was also levitating, they traded blow for blow until Phoebe spun around in the air and kicked the demon in the chest, knocking him to the ground, Cole raised his arm and let loose an energy ball to finish him off.
Prue was in the kitchens now, killing as many demons as she could, she counted at least five still in front of her, she didn’t care about the odds, she knew she could win. She raised her hand and sent two demons flying to the back of the kitchen whilst she focused on the other three, she grabbed a rolling pin and whacked a demon round the head knocking him to the floor, then she used her power to spin the utensil through the air and another demon sunk to the ground with a blow to the head, that just left her and another to duke it out.
He raised his fist and went for her face, she grabbed it mid-way and hit him back with the fist, causing him to roar in rage.
“Die bitch!” he yelled as he raised his arm and sent a lightning bolt into her and through the kitchen doors.
She landed in Cole’s arms as he caught her.
Prue looked down at her wound, it was bad, the bolt had sliced right though her left shoulder, blood pouring out, Cole looked helpless as he looked down at her dying body.
“Leo!” he shouted but it was no good, he was still unconscious.
Prue grabbed Cole and lowered his face to hers.
“Get them out of here” she whispered.
Her eyes fluttered and shut as she died.
Phoebe flew back to the ground, she couldn’t wait to get Cole alone, she looked across the room, who was that he was holding, oh, just bossy Prue she thought as she carried on with the fight, she grabbed a steak knife off a table and stabbed it through a demons neck, sending him up in flames.
There weren’t many demons left now, three walked out from the kitchen and Piper had just froze one that had been walking towards Leo.
They regrouped by Cole as Piper dragged Leo with her.
“Girls, I’m sorry, there was nothing I could do” Cole spluttered as they reached him.
“Yeah whatever” Piper said.
“I didn’t like that one anyway” Phoebe shrugged.
Cole looked more confused than ever.
“Don’t you two understand? Your sister is dead!” he shouted.
“We got one of them” the demon that had killed Prue cheered.
The remaining demons whelped and applauded but stopped as a gust of wind swept through the room, chilling them all to the bone.
“Uh oh” Piper murmured.
A large tornado appeared in the centre of the room, covering everyone in dust and dead body parts.
“Yuck” Phoebe exclaimed as the tornado receded.
It was Shax. The Source’s personal assassin.
“I’ve come to finish the job” he said in his deep voice.
He smiled evilly as he looked at Prue’s dead body.
“I don’t think so ass-hat” Piper yelled as she raised her hands and blew Shax up like she had before, she knew it wasn’t permanent but it was better than facing him now with a witch down.
“Can you get us all out of here?” Phoebe asked Cole.
“I can try” he nodded as the group took hands, Piper leaning down to touch Prue and Leo’s shoulders.
“Don’t let them get away!” a demon shouted.
But it was too late, the group shimmered out of the temple and back to the manor.
The group rematerialized into the living room, Cole went to pick up Prue’s body only for it to fade out of existence.
“Huh?” he asked as he raised his eyes to Phoebe and Piper, only for them to fade away as well.
“Someone wanna explain this to me?” he asked thin air.
“Oh, I think we can help with that” Phoebe’s voice came from the conservatory.
Cole lifted the still out cold Leo onto the sofa and made his way to the voice.
He walked in to find all three sisters perfectly fine, lounging on the couches and chairs.
“Is Leo all right?” Piper asked worriedly as she looked behind Cole.
“Oh, he’s fine, just unconscious”.
“So?” Cole asked, still confused.
“That wasn’t really us” Phoebe confirmed as Cole smiled.
“Thank God” Cole breathed a sigh of relief
“I thought it was all over when Prue died” he said smiling.
“Yeah, I felt it, I’ll never get used to that pain” Prue said sadly.
“We used a spell to make doubles, albeit doubles with specific personality traits” Phoebe continued.
“I thought something was up” Cole said.
“You were way too frisky” he said as he looked at Phoebe.
“Yeah, well that part of me hasn’t had much of chance to come out recently” Phoebe winked at him.
“Ew” Piper said as she rose from the chair to go and see Leo.
“You didn’t happen to cast an invisibility spell as well did you?” Cole asked.
“Invisibility spell?” Prue frowned as she asked.
“Just before the not-you’s came in to save me I saw something, a cloaked figure, cloaked in terms of them being invisible come towards me and loosen my chains, or at least take away the magic keeping them bound to me”.
“Other Prue would never have been able to just wave her hand and have them fly off if the proper protections were still on them”.
Phoebe looked at Prue, eyebrows raised.
They both turned back around to Cole.
“Not any of us” Phoebe said.
“That’s what I was afraid of” Cole smirked.
A few blocks away a young boy was just waking up for the day, he yawned as he threw off his blankets and got dressed.
He liked his new foster parents. They didn’t yell at him much though they had seemed to be getting more and more anxious lately, he supposed that’s just what caring parents were supposed to be like.
They didn’t yell at him much. Until today.
A large knock at his bedroom door startled him, he opened the door and saw his foster mother standing there, looking thunderous.
“You’re gonna be late for school, get a move on!” she shouted.
“You don’t have to get mad, I thought you were gonna wake me up” he countered.
“Don’t speak to me like you little rat!” she yelled and made to lunge for him.
The boy jumped back, suddenly scared, he had developed a painful headache that felt like his head was burning.
“We take you in and this is the thanks we get you ungrateful wretch!” the woman yelled as she stepped into the room.
“Please don’t, you’re scaring me” the boy yelled.
He placed his hands either side of his head, in so much pain.
All of a sudden the pain vanished, at the same time a huge wall of flame sprung up from the ground, separating him from his foster mother.
He turned around and ran to his bedroom window, climbed down the skirting and ran down the street, trying to get away and make sense of what had just happened.
He could faintly hear his foster parents yelling his name.
“Tyler!”
End of Chapter Four, stay tuned for Chapter Five: “South Bay Social Services”.
The Source flamed into The Seer’s chambers, furious.
“Come out Seer” he bellowed.
The Seer materialized in a haze of indigo light, worried that he had discovered her plan somehow.
“My liege?”
“How long before you were going to tell me?” he demanded.
“Tell you what?” she asked innocently.
The Source lowered his voice to a deadly whisper, “how long before you were going to tell me that you had Belthazor?” he asked.
“I was saving him my liege, saving him for when we might need him” The Seer stammered.
“I see”, “well, prepare him, for now is the time”.
“Prepare him for what oh evil one?” The Seer questioned.
“Prepare him” he said with a smile.
“For bait”.
Phoebe sat in the kitchen, thumbing through the Book of Shadows, she found it therapeutic, something to keep her mind off her problems, she liked to go through and see which demons they’d vanquished, which innocents they’d saved, it helped clear her mind.
Until today, when she came across the page for Belthazor, she sighed, she missed Cole so much, she smiled as she looked at the opposite page where she had stuck photos of them together, and written about his human hobbies, it felt like such a long time ago, even though it had just been a few months.
She used her fingers to trace the photos, remembering how happy they were, how happy they could be, maybe one day she thought.
As she was about to flip the page, Phoebe gasped as she felt a chill, she recognised the familiar sensation of a premonition and was sucked into a vision, in which she saw Cole chained up against a pillar, it looked like some kind of temple, thought she couldn’t be sure, the vision zoomed her outside the temple and showed a sign saying “Tao-Long’s Buddhist Temple”.
She gasped as she was thrown out the vision, it had been so long since she’d had one that she had almost forgotten what it felt like.
“Prue!” Phoebe yelled as she ran out the kitchen carrying the book.
“What is it?” Prue said as she came running down the stairs.
“I just had a vision”.
Phoebe explained what she’d seen to her sister.
“We have to get Piper, she’s at work” Prue said.
“I’ll go” she added as she lowered her head and astral projected.
Piper was enjoying an intimate time with Leo, he had orbed in about a half hour ago and they were having some adult fun in the store room, she’d had to vanquish her assistant manager so no one else was at work yet.
Leo was great with his hands, she found herself thinking as he made his way across her stomach, just about to hit a home run when….
“Prue!” Piper gasped as her sister astral projected behind Leo.
Both Piper and Leo scurried to put their clothes back on and look presentable whilst Prue just stood there laughing.
“Are you offering drinks with this new Rated R deal you’ve got going on Piper?” Prue asked devilishly.
“Shut it” she spat, “how many times, please ring, or email or anything before you do that”. Piper pleaded as she zipped up her boots.
“So no one interrupts the show?” Prue questioned.
Piper sighed, why did her older sister have to be such a smartass?
“Why are you here Prue?” Leo asked.
“Phoebe had a vision, of Cole”.
“I see” Piper said, “and is he, ok?” she asked.
“According to Phoebe he was alive in the vision, but we’re not sure how much longer for”. Prue answered, disdain in her voice.
Piper gave her a look, she knew that Prue didn’t like Cole very much, but to be honest it was probably because they were so alike Piper thought, though she’d never say that to Prue for risk of losing an arm.
“Ok, go, we’ll close up and orb back to the manor”.
Prue nodded and projected back to her body.
“They’re on their way” Prue said to Phoebe as she aligned back with her physical body.
“Good” Phoebe half-smiled, any help would be appreciated she thought.
Tao Long’s temple was a bit of a rip-off of the real thing, one side of it was an ancient temple, the other a restaurant and a kids play area with a ball pit, not exactly a great place for actual Buddhists to practice their religion. And it was about to get much worse.
Families sat at the restaurant trying ancient Tibetan cuisine, tasting the succulent dishes and paying their respects to the statues of the Buddha, giving money where possible to attract good fortune to themselves.
Outside the front entrance an army of demons were making their way across the street, towards the temple, led by three individuals, The Source, The Seer, and, chained up and gagged, Cole.
The Source waited just outside the door with his two guests and called back to the army of demons.
“Go”.
The demons rushed in and for the next five minutes, all you could hear where the sounds of slaughter as the evil doers slayed every living thing within.
A demon walked out, “it is done my liege”.
“Good” The Source replied.
He walked inside the temple and raised his head to take in the scene, it was beautiful he thought, the bodies and the blood, how he missed his more active days of killing.
“Over here” he pointed to a pillar in the centre of the room.
Several demons grabbed Cole and chained him up around it, not leaving him much room to move or breathe.
“Now, wait”. The Source ordered.
He gestured to The Seer to walk with him into the back kitchens, as they walked in sync he asked her, “You think they’ll fall for it?”
“Who knows how good witches really think?” The Seer asked back.
The Source laughed, “You have always been good company Seer, always by my side, always helping me succeed, do not think your efforts go unnoticed, one day you will be rewarded greatly”.
The Seer smiled, “It means a lot to me that you think that my liege, I live to serve”.
Myself, she thought as they flamed out back to the underworld to await news.
“Come on Phoebe, this smells trap and you know it” Piper exclaimed for the fifth time.
“I know that Piper but we can’t just let Cole rot, he helped you guys save me after all”.
“Yes, that I know, we all know, but would he thank us now for getting you captured again by walking into such an obvious trap?” Piper asked.
“She does make a good point Phoebe” Leo said in his calming voice.
It didn’t work.
“Well of course you’d say that you’re the husband!” Phoebe snapped, “If it isn’t one of us or our Whitelighter then who cares about the half-demon right guys?”
Phoebe backed off and walked off to sit in grams’ old armchair.
“That wasn’t fair Phoebe” Piper said.
“You know we want to save Cole, I’m just saying we need to be smart about this that’s all”.
“Don’t play their game, play our own” Piper concluded.
Phoebe sighed and lowered her head into her hands, taking big breaths to try to calm down.
“Anything Prue?” Piper asked her other sister as she looked through the book.
“Well, there’s a weird looking potion here that apparently melts the skin off of foes” she pointed out.
“That’s strange, a potion like that shouldn’t be in the book” Leo frowned as he read.
“Well, it must have been put there for us to use” Piper shrugged.
“I certainly wouldn’t mind seeing The Source with an even more melted face” Phoebe yelled from across the room.
Prue smiled. “I think I’ve found something even better”.
Phoebe walked over and looked down at the book along with Piper and Leo, they all let out a sigh.
“I don’t think this is a good idea” Piper said.
“It screwed us last time”.
“It saved my ass last time Piper” Prue said as she reasoned with her younger sibling.
“I’m all for it” Phoebe piped up.
“You are?” Piper questioned, shocked.
“Yes, they’ll never see it coming, you’re right, it’s probably is a trap, but this would be like a counter-trap”.
Prue looked up from the book at Piper. “Sorry sis, majority rules”.
The three witches chanted together in unison.
“Take my powers, blessed be,
Multiply their strength by three”.
Cole looked around the darkening room, it was rapidly approaching evening and he was getting more and more anxious the more time went on, he knew they would come for him and he was terrified of what could happen. He couldn’t lose Phoebe again, they’d been through too much.
He tried his shackles again, still too tight, no way he was going to break out of them, not without help anyway.
Just at that moment he felt a cold breeze, at first he mistook it for the wind, but then he felt his shackles loosening somewhat, he could just about make out an almost invisible outline of a person, someone was helping him, but who? He couldn’t tell.
Now he had to wait, he couldn’t take on the dozens of demons surrounding him so he had to wait for the sisters to show up.
“You sure this is the place?” Leo said as he and the sisters orbed in front of the temple.
“Yeah, definitely” Phoebe replied.
“Ok, let’s go save Cole now because I need him, like now” Phoebe smiled seductively.
“God I hate this spell” Piper said as she followed her sisters up the path.
“It always goes wrong, everything always goes wrong, we can’t escape it!” Piper was struggling to breathe as she ranted.
“Eurgh, why did we get lumbered with this one” Phoebe pointed at Piper.
“She is such a downer”.
Piper glared at her younger sister.
“Well excuse me Phoebe but I’m sorry that I’m the only one concerned for our well-being here!” Piper yelled.
“Piper?” Prue asked.
“What?” She replied.
“Don’t you think that maybe all the yelling you’re doing will attract the attention of the hordes of demons probably waiting inside?” She said innocently.
Piper sighed and took a deep breath.
“Fine”, “Let’s go” she said.
“Ok then, follow me, busy, busy, busy is my middle name you know” Prue smiled as she led the charge up the path.
“Why did I get stuck with the annoying ones?” Phoebe whispered to herself.
“Maybe we should be a bit more stealthy?” Leo suggested as Prue waved her arm and the doors flew off the hinges.
Too late he thought.
Leo gasped. He had seen war before, but this was sickening, bodies and blood all over the floor, some on tables, and in the very centre, Cole.
“Yes finally!” Phoebe exclaimed as she ran to the pillar.
“My loins have been calling for you” she said as she tried to rip off the shackles but only managed to remove the gag.
Cole looked perplexed and could only manage a “Huh?”
Piper made a gagging noise in disgust whilst her and Prue followed Phoebe.
“This place looks kind of empty” Leo said as he looked around.
“Aside from the obvious” he said as he looked down at a dead chef.
Cole seemed mad.
“What are you doing just walking through the front door like that?” he asked.
“Yeah, yeah don’t worry” Piper said.
“We’ve got it all worked out” Prue smiled as she waved her hand and made all the chains and shackles fly off Cole’s arms and legs.
Phoebe grabbed Cole’s arm and began to drag him into the store room.
“You can just wait outside if you want” she said as she pointed to the front of the temple.
“Phoebe what has gotten into you?” Cole asked, worried.
“We’ll explain everything later” Piper said.
“But we have to go”.
“Leo?” she gestured to her husband to hold hands with her so they could all orb out, but before they could an energy ball came sailing through the air and hit Leo in the chest, sending him flying back against the far wall.
The group turned around to see a whole plethora of demons shimmer into the temple, all with nasty, smiling looks on their faces.
“Ooh, party time” Prue said, strangely excited.
Phoebe whispered to Piper. “Do you think any of those demons are single?”
Piper kicked her younger sister on the ankle.
“Ok girls, time to go to work” Prue said as she jumped up onto the restaurant bar, kicking a demon in the face, then proceeding to jump down, grab a wine bottle, shatter it and shove the end of it down into the demons stomach, ending him in a flashfire.
Piper turned around to look for Leo, she made it about half way across the room before two demons grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her onto the floor, she hit her head, seeing stars, one of the demons got on top of her and began to strangle her, an energy ball hit the demon in the head and he exploded, Piper got up and nodded thanks to Cole.
The other demon was making his way to Leo.
“I knew this would all go wrong!” she shouted as she raised her hands an attempted to blow the demon up, but instead set him on fire.
“Huh?” Piper said in confusion as the demon withered away into ash.
“I’ll take it” she nodded.
Cole spun around, he was weak but he would still put up a fight no matter what, he couldn’t see Phoebe anywhere, he looked up as he heard her voice. She was up in the air one on one fighting a demon who was also levitating, they traded blow for blow until Phoebe spun around in the air and kicked the demon in the chest, knocking him to the ground, Cole raised his arm and let loose an energy ball to finish him off.
Prue was in the kitchens now, killing as many demons as she could, she counted at least five still in front of her, she didn’t care about the odds, she knew she could win. She raised her hand and sent two demons flying to the back of the kitchen whilst she focused on the other three, she grabbed a rolling pin and whacked a demon round the head knocking him to the floor, then she used her power to spin the utensil through the air and another demon sunk to the ground with a blow to the head, that just left her and another to duke it out.
He raised his fist and went for her face, she grabbed it mid-way and hit him back with the fist, causing him to roar in rage.
“Die bitch!” he yelled as he raised his arm and sent a lightning bolt into her and through the kitchen doors.
She landed in Cole’s arms as he caught her.
Prue looked down at her wound, it was bad, the bolt had sliced right though her left shoulder, blood pouring out, Cole looked helpless as he looked down at her dying body.
“Leo!” he shouted but it was no good, he was still unconscious.
Prue grabbed Cole and lowered his face to hers.
“Get them out of here” she whispered.
Her eyes fluttered and shut as she died.
Phoebe flew back to the ground, she couldn’t wait to get Cole alone, she looked across the room, who was that he was holding, oh, just bossy Prue she thought as she carried on with the fight, she grabbed a steak knife off a table and stabbed it through a demons neck, sending him up in flames.
There weren’t many demons left now, three walked out from the kitchen and Piper had just froze one that had been walking towards Leo.
They regrouped by Cole as Piper dragged Leo with her.
“Girls, I’m sorry, there was nothing I could do” Cole spluttered as they reached him.
“Yeah whatever” Piper said.
“I didn’t like that one anyway” Phoebe shrugged.
Cole looked more confused than ever.
“Don’t you two understand? Your sister is dead!” he shouted.
“We got one of them” the demon that had killed Prue cheered.
The remaining demons whelped and applauded but stopped as a gust of wind swept through the room, chilling them all to the bone.
“Uh oh” Piper murmured.
A large tornado appeared in the centre of the room, covering everyone in dust and dead body parts.
“Yuck” Phoebe exclaimed as the tornado receded.
It was Shax. The Source’s personal assassin.
“I’ve come to finish the job” he said in his deep voice.
He smiled evilly as he looked at Prue’s dead body.
“I don’t think so ass-hat” Piper yelled as she raised her hands and blew Shax up like she had before, she knew it wasn’t permanent but it was better than facing him now with a witch down.
“Can you get us all out of here?” Phoebe asked Cole.
“I can try” he nodded as the group took hands, Piper leaning down to touch Prue and Leo’s shoulders.
“Don’t let them get away!” a demon shouted.
But it was too late, the group shimmered out of the temple and back to the manor.
The group rematerialized into the living room, Cole went to pick up Prue’s body only for it to fade out of existence.
“Huh?” he asked as he raised his eyes to Phoebe and Piper, only for them to fade away as well.
“Someone wanna explain this to me?” he asked thin air.
“Oh, I think we can help with that” Phoebe’s voice came from the conservatory.
Cole lifted the still out cold Leo onto the sofa and made his way to the voice.
He walked in to find all three sisters perfectly fine, lounging on the couches and chairs.
“Is Leo all right?” Piper asked worriedly as she looked behind Cole.
“Oh, he’s fine, just unconscious”.
“So?” Cole asked, still confused.
“That wasn’t really us” Phoebe confirmed as Cole smiled.
“Thank God” Cole breathed a sigh of relief
“I thought it was all over when Prue died” he said smiling.
“Yeah, I felt it, I’ll never get used to that pain” Prue said sadly.
“We used a spell to make doubles, albeit doubles with specific personality traits” Phoebe continued.
“I thought something was up” Cole said.
“You were way too frisky” he said as he looked at Phoebe.
“Yeah, well that part of me hasn’t had much of chance to come out recently” Phoebe winked at him.
“Ew” Piper said as she rose from the chair to go and see Leo.
“You didn’t happen to cast an invisibility spell as well did you?” Cole asked.
“Invisibility spell?” Prue frowned as she asked.
“Just before the not-you’s came in to save me I saw something, a cloaked figure, cloaked in terms of them being invisible come towards me and loosen my chains, or at least take away the magic keeping them bound to me”.
“Other Prue would never have been able to just wave her hand and have them fly off if the proper protections were still on them”.
Phoebe looked at Prue, eyebrows raised.
They both turned back around to Cole.
“Not any of us” Phoebe said.
“That’s what I was afraid of” Cole smirked.
A few blocks away a young boy was just waking up for the day, he yawned as he threw off his blankets and got dressed.
He liked his new foster parents. They didn’t yell at him much though they had seemed to be getting more and more anxious lately, he supposed that’s just what caring parents were supposed to be like.
They didn’t yell at him much. Until today.
A large knock at his bedroom door startled him, he opened the door and saw his foster mother standing there, looking thunderous.
“You’re gonna be late for school, get a move on!” she shouted.
“You don’t have to get mad, I thought you were gonna wake me up” he countered.
“Don’t speak to me like you little rat!” she yelled and made to lunge for him.
The boy jumped back, suddenly scared, he had developed a painful headache that felt like his head was burning.
“We take you in and this is the thanks we get you ungrateful wretch!” the woman yelled as she stepped into the room.
“Please don’t, you’re scaring me” the boy yelled.
He placed his hands either side of his head, in so much pain.
All of a sudden the pain vanished, at the same time a huge wall of flame sprung up from the ground, separating him from his foster mother.
He turned around and ran to his bedroom window, climbed down the skirting and ran down the street, trying to get away and make sense of what had just happened.
He could faintly hear his foster parents yelling his name.
“Tyler!”
End of Chapter Four, stay tuned for Chapter Five: “South Bay Social Services”.
