Post by StoryGirl83 on Sept 30, 2008 23:23:56 GMT -5
Chapter Twenty - Finding Wyatt and Protecting Chris
Down in the kitchen, Piper was not taking the situation well. Trying to keep her voice calm, she asked, “Are you telling me that our child is evil, again?”
In response Leo walked toward Wyatt as he spoke, “Look, all I’m saying is that however he changed future Wyatt, it started with the bear okay.” He reached Wyatt’s high chair and reached out the touch the bear. “He cursed it somehow. He, he made it glow.”
“Okay,” Phoebe responded throwing her hands apart, “then we need to get that bear away from him.” She walked toward him and picked up Wuvey by the ear. “Can I have this?” Once the bear was in her grasp she moved away quickly, still holding only Wuvey’s ear, as if the bear would infect her, too. “Thank you. Okay.” Phoebe stared down at her hand and Piper looked at her with gritted teeth in a fake smile as little Wyatt orbed the bear away from Phoebe and back into his grasp.
Through her fake smile, Piper mumbled, “Phoebe, don’t make him angry.” One does wonder why a parent should be worried about making their two-year-old, even their magical two-year-old, angry, but Piper was. Perhaps she was transferring a fear of what the twenty-five-year-old might do onto the two-year-old.
“Look, we need to act fast, okay?” Leo said looking at his wife, down at his son, and back at his wife as he spoke. “We need to find a way to reverse the curse before future Wyatt does something evil. I think we should take him to magic school,” Leo added as he removed the top of the high chair. “I think he’d be safer there.”
“That’s a good idea,” Phoebe agreed, “and take the Book with you. There may be something in there that can help.”
“What are you going to do?” Piper asked, curiously looking at her sister.
“I’m going to get Paige and see if we can find Vicus,” Phoebe told her as Leo lifted Wyatt into his arms. “Maybe if we vanquish him, all of this will go away.”
“And if neither one of those works?” Piper asked, always the skeptic.
“Then we’re screwed,” Phoebe admitted. She turned around without another word and walked out of the kitchen. “Paige!”
Leo hugged his son close as Piper looked sadly into the distance. Her eyes seemed to not be seeing what was going on around her, as if she was remembering something, something that made her feel helpless.
Vicus was getting testy as Wyatt just stood there. In the background blue-white orbs appeared, but no one was visible. Wyatt turned his head slightly, but did nothing else that indicated he might have noticed anything up.
On the other side of the room an invisible Chris took in a deep breath. Hello, Wy.
A smirk flitted across Wyatt’s lips. What do you want Christopher?
What are you doing, Wy?
Changing history.
Bad idea, Wy.
Christopher, I’m not interested in being the goody two shoes you know. I assume you are from the same place he was.
“Are you just going to stand there?” Vicus asked Wyatt.
Wyatt shrugged. “Patience. Isn’t that the main ingredient in what you do? Just have patience.”
You can’t do this, Wy.
Do what?
I don’t know, but you can’t.
“Fine, I’ll wait.” Vicus began to pace the room.
Such a pitiful fool. He knows nothing of what is needed to accomplish his goals. Nothing.
What do you remember, Wy? Do you remember our time?
I know nothing of the Wyatt you knew. Now stop bothering me.
Please, Wy. Remember. Remember all the things we have done together. Remember the situations we have found ourselves in. Remember your job at the museum and the people you know there. Remember how annoyed Mom was when she found out we were hiding things from her, so she could have a few more days of normalcy.
I’m not interested in remembering. You amuse me, but don’t interfere.
Chris sighed. He knew his brother was in there somewhere. He knew that all decency was not gone. He just didn’t know how to do anything about it.
On the second floor of the manor Piper and Leo were entering the boys’ room. Leo carried little Wyatt in his arms. Wyatt carried Wuvey. Piper hugged baby Chris in her arms.
“Piper, we can take him with us,” Leo reminded her.
Piper shook her head. “Chris died trying to protect Wyatt because Wyatt turned evil. Now, Wyatt is evil again. Future Chris isn’t here, because he’s dead, but I don’t want his baby version to die. I don’t want him anywhere near his brother until this is fixed.”
“Wyatt didn’t kill Chris, Piper.”
Piper hugged her son closer. “It’s too close for comfort. The elf nanny can take care of Chris until this is over.” Piper looked around the room. “If she ever gets here.”
As if in response to Piper’s words Wyatt pointed to Chris crib. “Nanny!” The little boy was grinning.
Piper and Leo both looked where he was pointing, but neither of them saw anyone there. Piper turned back to her son. “Where?”
Wyatt pointed, but was once more silent.
Piper sighed. “Great, he’s more excited to see anyone we can’t see. And why can’t we see her? We always could before.”
“You never were supposed to be able to see her or any of the other magical creatures,” Leo reminded her. “I don’t know why you could before, but it looks like you no longer can.”
“Can’t see her,” Piper repeated in disbelief. “Great.” She closed her eyes and thought back.
Prue and Phoebe were on the stage at P3, jumping around, singing “If Your Happy and You Know It,” when Piper walked up to them. They stopped as soon as they saw her and Phoebe greeted her, “Hi.”
“Hi,” Piper replied, trying unsuccessfully to keep her annoyance in check. It had really been a bad day, what with loosing Leo and all. “Lost your minds?”
“Piper, we have been waiting and waiting and waiting . . .” Prue told her in a kid’s voice, jumping up and down as she did.
“Yeah,” Phoebe added in and equally childish voice, “and you know what we did? We saw a fairy and she was very cute and she was sparkly and she was really, really pretty.”
Piper had enough and froze the room, gritting her teeth, trying to contain her growing annoyance long enough that no innocents would hear her. “Okay, what ass-backward spell did you guys cast?”
Prue looked at her surprised. She twisted from side to side as she stuttered, “We, we, we didn’t cast a spell.”
“No, it is true,” Phoebe added sounding very much like a child imitating an adult to gain more respect, loosing that as she sounded more like an excited child announcer, “we did not use a spell, but we did use fairy dust.”
“Fairy dust?” Piper stared at her in disbelief.
“Yes,” Phoebe told her twisting from side to side.
“Fairies,” Piper said shaking her head. “Prue and Phoebe could see them and I couldn’t.”
Piper walked into the room where Prue and Phoebe had been waiting. Her depression over everything going on had clearly shown on her face. Phoebe stood and greeted her with, “Hey, are you okay?”
“I thought this wasn’t about me,” Piper replied in a monotone.
“Well, it just,” Prue said trying to explain, “you don’t seem like you’re very open.”
“I’m as open as I’m gonna get in the next five minutes, so let’s just do the d**n spell,” Piper told her, uninterested in talking about what was going on, as she walked over to stand next to Prue.
As she walked Prue opened the paper on which they had written the spell. Piper started reading it as soon as she could see the words, Prue and Phoebe joining her quickly, “In this tween time, this darkest hour, we call upon the sacred power. Three together stand alone, command the unseen to be shown. In innocence we search the skies, enchanted are our new found eyes.”
With that spell, they had seen the fairy and the trolls and they had saved both the fairy and their innocent, Kate. Piper had learned a lesson, one she some times forgot, about her priorities. She had also gotten Leo back, on a trial basis, one that had ultimately led to the very permanent basis of their marriage.
“We said a spell and it did what the fairy dust couldn’t, got me to see the magical creatures.” Piper looked across the room at the seemingly empty spot next to the crib. “I’d almost forgotten. Maybe because since then, I have been able to see the magical creatures.” She walked over to the crib and lay Chris inside. She turned to face the room, hoping to be in the general direction of the elf nanny. “I can’t see, but I hope you can hear me. Watch Chris. If anyone should come, get him somewhere safe. Thank you.” Piper turned around and looked down into the crib. She leaned down and placed a kiss on Chris forehead. “I love you. Be safe.” She turned around and walked back over to Leo. “All right, let’s get to magic school.” Piper walked out of the room without looking back. Leo looked over at his son in the crib and sighed. Holding Wyatt close, he followed Piper out of the room.
Up in the attic, Phoebe was sitting on a pillow in the middle of a pile of ash, all that remained of the demons Wyatt had defeated earlier. “Luckily, we have enough demon ash that we should be able to scry for Vicus’ lair,” Phoebe said as she scooped some of the ash into a small, round, metal ash tray that was sitting on top of a map. A scrying crystal was only a few inches away.
Behind her, Paige was putting ingredients into a potion in a pot. “Yeah. I wish I was a little bit more confident in this potion.”
Phoebe picked up the scrying crystal as she responded, “What do you mean?” She pipped the crystal into the bowl of ash.
“It’s fine for the demon,” Paige told her as she stopped to look over at her sister. “But what about Wyatt?” Paige squeezed a black rubber ball at the end of a silver metal tube, putting yet another ingredient into the potion.
“Well, we’re not gonna fight Wyatt,” Phoebe told her as she began to scry.
“Well, we might not have a choice,” Paige reminded her as she stopped once more to look at her sister. “Because he’s on the demon’s side.”
“I don’t think he’d try to kill us.”
“And how can you be so sure?” Paige asked, exacerbated.
“I can’t,” Phoebe admitted with a sight. “But you know what? If Piper can’t change Wyatt back, then we’re gonna have to vanquish that demon and hope that that does it.”
“And of course,” Paige said, shaking something rather forcefully at the pot, “we have the added problem of not even being able to see the demon. Only Wyatt can see Vicus.”
“We’re just gonna have to bring a lot of vials,” Phoebe told her will a slight chuckle.
Paige wrinkled up her face in distaste. “And what, just throw them everywhere and hope we hit something?”
“Yeah. You have a better idea?”
“Normally, yes,” Paige told her sounding a bit annoyed about the whole thing. “But sadly, this time, no.”
Phoebe’s scrying crystal hit the map, catching Phoebe’s attention. “Oh. I got him.”
Paige’s head turned at her words. She looked at the map, even though she had no hope of seeing the location from that distance.
“Okay, better start filling those vials.”
Paige nodded and started to work.