Post by StoryGirl83 on Nov 9, 2011 9:42:46 GMT -5
Chapter Twenty-Two – Up to Date
“Wyatt, hi!”
Up until that point, Piper had only paid a negligible amount of attention to Emily’s phone conversation. Piper turned to look at Emily, startled. “Wyatt’s on the phone?”
Emily looked over and nodded. “Just a moment, Wyatt. You should probably talk to your mom. She’s got your aunts here trying to look into what’s going on.”
“If you were going to end up helping a member of my family, I would have thought it would have been Chris,” Wyatt commented on the other end of the phone.
“I called Chris,” she admitted, “to pass on your message. And then I was given reason to come here. Just talk to your mom, okay.”
“Sure, no problem,” Wyatt agreed easily. “If all she knows is what I told your brother, she’s probably pretty worried.”
“I think it’s the fact that she knows more than that which has her more worried,” she corrected him. “Here’s your mom,” she informed him before handing the phone to Piper.
“Wyatt, what is going on?” Piper asked the second she got the phone to her ear.
“An artifact arrived in the museum,” he informed her, realizing she wasn’t interested in pleasantries, “and my friend, Nathan, unpacked it. It enveloped him in a green glow and he said he felt evil. I wasn’t really comfortable with it, but I made the mistake of letting him convince me to keep working. Then, Andrew showed up to deliver a message. When he did he helped Nathan with something and came in contact with him. The same thing happened to him that happened to Nathan. He was covered in a green glow. At that point I tried to call Chris, but Nathan freaked out and broke my phone, so I used the excuse Andrew had given me to get out into the hallway and try and orb home. Only I couldn’t orb out.”
“What did you say?!” Piper exclaimed at almost a yell. “First your brother, now you.”
“What happened to Chris?” Wyatt asked concerned as he absorbed the words. “Are you saying he can’t orb, again, either. This is nuts. I don’t remember coming in contact with any strange gels.”
“It’s not just his orbing,” Piper informed him. “Chris has no powers. Do you?”
Wyatt frowned. His telekinesis hadn’t exactly failed. It acted more like it was deflected considering he was pretty sure a door couldn’t throw him across the floor. He looked around the room he was in, Kate Leigh’s office. On her desk he spotted a paperweight. He focused on it and waved his hand at the desk ever so slightly.
The paperweight moved.
He held out his hand and blinked at the same paperweight. Blue white orbs surrounded it and it appeared in his hand. He gulped.
“Wyatt, are you still there?”
“Yeah, Mom,” he agreed absently. “I’m just testing a few things.”
“What’s going on, Wyatt?” Piper asked, concerned.
“I’m going to put down the phone,” he told her, “just for a moment.” He didn’t wait for a response before doing just that. He put down the phone and closed his eyes. He focused his attention across the room instead of across the city and blue white orbs surrounded him, orbing him across the room.
Confused, Wyatt walked over to the window. He looked down and focused on the ground three stories down. He closed his eyes and focused on the ground below. Blue white orbs surrounded him and dispersed without anything else happening.
After another attempt he sighed and grabbed back up the phone. “Mom, still there?”
“I’m here,” Piper informed him. “What were you doing?”
“My powers aren’t gone,” he announced. “I just can’t use them to affect the outside.” Wyatt looked across the room at Olivia, wondering how long he could keep her out before he needed to deal with her suicidal tendencies.
“Have you tried leaving?”
“Yes, mom,” he informed her. “Now, what’s this about Chris having lost his powers.”
Piper sighed. “Looks like someone gave him a stripping potion. Odd thing is whoever they are seems to want to try and make amends. They sent me a package with a portion of the potion they used, a spell they cast on the potion, and an explanation of what they claim happened. We’re looking into it.”
“Okay, you keep on that,” Wyatt suggested. “I’m going to call Chris, see if he has found anything useful. Ask Emily for her brother’s cell number. He agreed to let me borrow it.” Wyatt paused a moment before adding, “If something happens to me and this all goes bad, I love you, Mom.”
“This isn’t going to go bad,” Piper announced. No other option was acceptable. “You are going to get out of there safe and sound.”
“Not if I can’t leave soon,” Wyatt told her softly. “I tied up two coworkers in one of the storerooms because one of them tried to hang himself and I don’t trust the other one to remain in control enough to stop himself if he gets to that point. I have another coworker who slit her own wrists trying to avoid unseen evils. I have an accountant who is by my order locked up in an office, so far not infected, and at least one other coworker whom I haven’t located yet. I have no idea if she’s been infected or not. And mom, I am infected. It is horrific. I cannot describe how badly I want to avoid it, and the only thing keeping me from even considering doing something . . . permanent about it is the fact that I know my family and friends are out there and that unlike everyone else here, I know they can deal with this kind of thing. I know that no matter how much I want to escape this, if I wait a little longer there might be a less deadly way to escape. I’m scared, Mom. This is evil and it surrounds me. It permeates me. It whispers suggestions in my head and there is nowhere to run.”