"Wait up!" he whispered as he too orbed away. Seconds later a young auburn-haired girl stepped into the kitchen.
"Did you hear something?" she asked after the young man in the next room. "Are you sure no one's home?"
The 18-year old young man shook his head as he joined her side. "No one's here, Penny – I promise. You're always so paranoid! Now," he slung his arm around her shoulder, "why don't you come back to the couch and let me play this new Sinatra record. It's the tops!"
She eyed the kitchen suspiciously for a moment more before she shrugged and let the boy lead her back to into the living room. She smirked at him. "Anyone ever tell you that you have eyes even bluer than Old Blue Eyes himself?"
__________________________________________________
Paige tapped her foot impatiently as Leo finally appeared next to her in a nearby alleyway. "Took you long enough," she said lightly.
"Sorry. It's just that you're not technically my charge yet, so it takes me a moment to sense you. Uh, where are we?" he asked looking around.
"Just a random alleyway. I didn't know where else to go where I wouldn't be seen orbing in." The pair walked out onto a main street which was bustling with people Paige would have expected to see in an old Katherine Hepburn movie. Across the street a theater marquee boasted a showing of the "New Film Sensation", 'Casablanca' followed by the B-Reel "I Married a Witch." A guffaw escaped Paige's lips before she quickly put a hand over her mouth. Leo looked at her strangely but knew by this point in time there was no point in asking what was so funny, because he probably wouldn't get an answer anyway. "So! Where would mortal Leo be right about now?" asked Paige.
"I don't know, uh…" replied Leo, somewhat lost in the deja-vu of his surroundings, "Let me see…" He walked over to a small boy hawking newspapers. "I'll take one."
The boy handed Leo a newspaper before stretching out his open palm. "Hey, buddy! Where's my nickel?" Leo reached into his pockets before realizing he had no money from this decade, pulling the pockets inside out to reveal nothing but lining. "No nickel, no news, buddy!"
"Paige?" She looked at Leo incredulously, as she obviously didn't have any money either. "Oh, right. Sorry," he quickly glanced at the date on the paper before handing it back to the feisty little boy and then continued down the sidewalk.
"So?" asked Paige.
"It said February 20th, 1942. I must be about to ship off for the South Pacific. Which means I'd be at the Balboa Park Naval Hospital. We have to get to San Diego." They turned off into another alleyway and Leo quickly extended his arm. "Take my hand," he said to Paige, taking hers before she had a chance to react. The alley disappeared in as blue and white lights filled her vision. Her stomach lurched in a familiar fashion that accompanied any unexpected orb, but the swirl of lights soon dissipated to reveal a shelf full of medical supplies.
Paige picked up a small brown glass vial, reading the label. "Ether?" she asked, surprised. "I thought medicine was a little more… or a little less…" she searched for a polite term, failing miserably, "… primitive than that by then, or now, er whatever. So – where are we?" she asked, changing the subject."
"Medical supply closet of the base's hospital. It should be, if I recall correctly, the last day of my medic training." He opened the closet door and Leo and Paige made their way down the crowded hallway, winding their way through a maze of passageways. "This should be it, I think," said Leo finally and nodded. "Yeah." He stopped at a large blackboard which seemed to be the day's schedule. Leo scanned the board a moment before finding his name. "I'm assigned to Dr. Stuchen today. Which means I should be –"
"Heya, Walsh!" interrupted a familiar voice.
"…. around here somewhere," finished Leo after a moment of surprise.
"Uh, Walsh, hello?"
"Huh? Uh, yeah, that's me!" replied Leo stilting as he turned to face his younger, mortal, self. Private Leo Wyatt looked strangely at the man he thought was an old friend, not sure what to make of his odd response.
Paige quickly extended her hand in an effort to distract this Leo's train of thought. "Hi! I'm Paige! Paige Mathews!"
He took her hand genially. "Very nice to meet you, Ms. Mathews."
"Very nice to meet you Private Wyatt," replied Paige with a grin.
He scrunched his eyebrows. "How did you know my name?"
Thinking quickly, Paige pointed at the name embroidered on his front pocket. "Right there. Well! We've got to get going! See ya'!" She then tugged on her Leo's arm, nearly dragging him off in a random direction. They were working against time and couldn't afford to delay – let alone possibly change Leo's past.
Whitelighter Leo looked at Paige for a moment before catching her train of thought. Meeting the older versions of the sisters was strange, but this was downright surreal. As a whitelighter he'd never really been a part of these sort of magical situations, but merely watched and guided from the sidelines. But participating was entirely different. It was exhilarating, actually, but also mind-bending. Leo shook his head and turned back to his past self. "Oh, yeah! She's right. We've really gotta go handle… something."
Pvt. Leo looked both disappointed and a touch baffled. "Uh, ok, well, you wanna stop by my place sometime soon? Catch up on what's been going on, what you're doing back stateside over a beer or something?"
"Yeah, sure, uh, maybe!" the future Leo called over his should as he followed on the heels of a fast retreating Paige. "See you around!" Pvt. Leo merely returned a bemused wave as a goodbye as they disappeared around a corner.
After they had gone down a couple passageways Leo had snapped back to the business at hand and came to a halt, stopping Paige as well with a squeeze of her shoulder. "What?" she asked as she saw Leo peering down a hallway. "The darklighter?" asked Paige, alarmed.
"No, no. Follow me!" said Leo quickly, and he took off down the hall to their left.
Paige spun to follow him, her heels slipping on the slick floor as she scrambled to catch up. "Haven't they ever heard of traction in this time," she mumbled to herself, cursing her shoes.
Leo's attitude had now taken on a single-mindedness as his head flicked from side to side reading each door's placard as he walked past. Suddenly, he skidded to a halt, turning on his heel and slipped into a door labeled "Men's Dressing Room". Paige flung her hands out as she nearly crashed into Leo's back. "Little warning would be nice! Yeesh!"
"Sorry," replied Leo absent mindedly.
Paige, noticing the room's label, hesitated a moment before shrugging and following Leo inside. Leo paused a moment before making a beeline to a tall metal locker. Above it hung a small cardboard sign that read "Pvt. Wyatt". After a moments thought he spun the combination lock to 12 and gave the door a solid thump with the side of his fist. The door popped open with a quiet squeak and Leo set upon its contents.
Feeling rather superfluous, Paige sat on a bench, resting her head in the palm of her left hand and watched Leo dig through a pile of random personal effects. "Weren't exactly a neat freak, were ya?" At his lack of response, Paige pressed further, determined to get a response. "So what makes you think the pendant is here? Did you keep spare jewelry for the ladies stashed here or something?" she asked with a smirk. Leo stopped digging and seemed to be considering something. Finally, he turned around to face Paige. "Where did you say you found that pendant? In the future, I mean."
"Some dusty little hope chest," answered Paige. "Why?"
"Did it have a few books, a dress uniform, photos of my family, that kinda thing?"
"Yeah. Why?" pressed Paige on Leo's line of thought.
"I think I just realized where he's going to put it!" exclaimed Leo and shot to his feet, making a beeline for the door. Paige scrambled to shove Private Leo's things back into the locker as they had found them as the door swung shut behind the whitelighter.
Moments later, Paige jogged to catch up to Leo in the hallway. "Wait up! Don't know my way around this decade, remember?"
"No time," replied Leo. "I could be hit any minute!" He quickened his stride when Paige had caught up. "If I remember correctly, I should be packing up for deployment tomorrow and that's the most likely time for me to handle every object around me." Leo had led them back to the supply closet they'd first orbed in from and slipped back inside.
"But if we found it in that chest doesn't that mean you won't find it?" asked Paige as she joined him in the closet.
Leo took Paige's hand again. "Not if we don't get to it first," he answered as they disappeared into the ether.
Paige and Leo reappeared behind a dumpster in another area on the army base. They were standing outside what looked to be a brick and mortar dormitory. Leo took off again, this time up the steps and into the building, Paige fast on his heels. "I'll distract him, the other me that is. You get the chest. Orb it somewhere," instructed Leo. Paige nodded. They climbed another flight of stairs inside the building before heading down an empty hallway. They were two-thirds down the passageway before Leo finally stopped at a door. But he had now abruptly stopped and just stood there, looking at Paige expectantly.
Paige raised her eyebrows and tilted her head. "Uh, Leo?"
Paige shrugged. She was so used to winging it in these kinds of situations that having no plan didn't seem daunting to her at all. "You'll think if something. You just need to get him out of the house so I can orb in and snoop a bit."
Leo nodded, took a deep breath, and knocked on the door. A few moments later, Private Leo Wyatt opened the door. He'd changed out of his medic's uniform and now wore just a white tank top and jeans. "Hey!" he said with a smile when he saw the man he thought was his friend, Pvt. Walsh. "I didn't expect to see you again so soon!"
Paige sidled up next to the disguised Leo. "I couldn't let my handsome hunk here ditch, uh, not visit his buddy just cause I'm around," she said, snaking her arm around the whitelighter's waist. Normally this would be much more awkward an act for Paige, but since Leo didn't look like himself she was finding it much easier to put the fact that she was flirting with her brother-in-law to the back of her mind. For his part, Leo felt his face blush a little as he very stiffly leaned into Paige's embrace.
Only with her comment did Pvt. Leo seem to notice Paige was there. "Oh! Oh, sorry!" he exclaimed and quickly retreated into his room, retrieving a linen shirt. He hastily pulled it on, though he didn't button it up. "I didn't see you there – I don't usually stand there undressed in front of a lady," he explained in embarrassment.
Paige looked confused for a moment, then smirked as she realized what he meant. "Oooh, the wifebea- er, undershirt. Hey, don't worry about it. I'm a modern dame. And a nurse." She motioned to her outfit a little too self-importantly. "So, y'know, I see naked guys all the time. No sweat."
Pvt. Leo nodded. "Oh, yeah. I guess so." He waved his hand through the doorway. "Come on in!" The pair walked into what looked like little more than a small studio apartment that had been hit by a tornado. "Sorry for the mess. Lillian – that's my wife, Lillian – would pitch a fit if she saw this place!" he laughed as he cleared off a spot on the couch.
They sat down and were nearly swallowed whole by the beaten up old army issued furniture. Paige pushed her knees together as the knee-length skirt suddenly threatened to reveal her modesty due to the awkward position she was now in. She'd have just stood up if her feet weren't aching from the clunky army-issue pumps she was wearing. Guess ergonomics haven't been invented yet, she thought to herself.
Pvt. Leo flipped open a small silver case. "Cigarette?" he offered, pulling one out and popping it between his lips.
Paige waved off the offer. "No thanks. Not … my brand," she said awkwardly.
"But you don't even know what brand –" he began, but Paige interrupted him hastily.
"My brand is, uh, Turkish? Once you taste that flavor you never go back to the domestic stuff." She smiled awkwardly.
"Oh, I'll have to try that some time. What are they called?" asked the Private, intrigued.
"Oh, um… Casbah? Yeah. Casbahs."
Pvt. Leo nodded and turned to Leo offering up a cigarette. "You, Walsh?"
Leo shook his head. "No, thanks."
Pvt. Leo looked at him strangely. "You sick or somethin'? I don't think I've ever seen you turn down a free smoke."
Leo froze for just a second, then nodded his head. "Yeah, uh, sick. A little throat thing." He coughed into his fist. Seemingly satisfied, Pvt. Leo struck a match, lighting his own cigarette.
The mortal Leo then turned to the man he thought was Pvt. Walsh. "I thought you shipped out six weeks ago Mark."
"Oh, uh, yeah, I did. I'm just back because of, a, uh, family emergency," he explained lamely. Paige stifled a smirk behind her hand.
Luckily, Pvt, Leo seemed oblivious to this odd behavior. "Oh, that's too bad. Must have been pretty serious for them to bring you back here, huh?"
The disguised Leo tried to feign sadness, "Oh, yeah, my father was very sick and he's uh, 'up there' now," he answered, gesturing up to the sky.
"I'm sorry to hear that."
"Yeah, but it was just his time, y'know, grand design and all," answered Leo, sounding much more the whitelighter than a gristled soldier."
"Huh, sounds like the war has changed you already, 'Masher Mark'." The future Leo laughed as he hadn't heard that particular nickname in decades. "Hopefully you can give me an idea of what I'm in for. Maybe later we can get a couple beers over at the USO club that just opened up?"
"Maybe," answered whitelighter Leo, unsure of where their search would take them.
Seeing a clear opportunity that Leo seemed to be missing, Paige slipped her hand into the crook of her whitelighter's arm.
"We'd better get going, honey," said Paige, smirking at Leo's subtle discomfort. "We have someplace to be tonight, and not much time to get there, so…"
Leo looked at her blankly a moment before getting the hint that she had something in mind. "Huh? Oh, yeah," he turned to his past self. "Hey, wanna go get that beer right now?"
"Well, as you can see, I'm sort of in the middle of packing…" replied the Private.
"Aw, c'mon buster!" insisted Paige, doing her best to sound the part of a saucy 40's chick. "Why doncha' have a drink with the ol' GI Joe here! It'd sure be swell if you came along. You can knock back a few frostys, check out the dames, maybe cut a rug… you know, it'll be a real… barn burner!"
"Ok, ok!" laughed Pvt. Leo, stopping Paige with raised hand. "I'm obviously going to miss out on one hell of a time if I don't go, so sure. Just let me get dressed. Could you turn around Ms. Matthews?"
"Done and done!" she replied as she hurriedly got up and turned to face the wall. It might be fun teasing the Leo from 1983 with mock flirting, but she had no more desire to see full frontal Leo than she would a brother. The disguised Leo meanwhile seemed to have suddenly become fascinated by the carpet at his feet. He knew it would be suspicious if he turned around, since all the guys showered together, but the whole thing was just weird.
Pvt. Leo quickly slipped out of his civilian clothes and into a tan dress uniform. "Okay, let's go!" Paige and the 80's Leo nodded and joined him at the door. The trio closed the door behind themselves just a moment too soon to see the swirl of black and purple matter coalesce in the room to form Wilkins, the darklighter.
Wilkins recalled the conversation he and Kaalaya had had regarding the placement of the pendant. Or, rather, the longwinded speech he'd had to sit through just to be told 'their' plan. The demon needed him specifically because the plan depended on his knowledge. Kaalaya might be an aggravating windbag, but Wilkins had to admit, the plan was a good one. In order to not destroy the timeline, aside from Leo's fate, and keep the original Triad vanquished, his murder had to be well-timed and seemingly the fault of the Japanese enemy; not the demonic one. Wilkins, using his knowledge of Leo's future circumstances in the pacific, had to find a place to plant the cursed pendant where Leo wouldn't find it until he was in a war zone. That way when he ages into dust, and disappears, nobody will think to investigate. He'll be presumed missing in action and there will be no risk of exposure.
Wilkins glanced around the dorm room and sneered. "Now to find the perfect place…" The darklighter began to dig through the personal effects of Pvt. Leo Wyatt.
__________________________________________________
The USO club was only a block away, making the walk a short one. The nightclub was a hot spot even in the afternoon and the trio could hear the strains of a jazz tune as they approached. When they were inside, Paige grinned as she looked around the room. "Unreal…" she said quietly to herself. Things stay surprisingly the same on a military base, so the time change hadn't really sunk in yet for her. But nightclubs were one thing she'd seen plenty of in her day, and this was like nothing Paige had ever seen. Well, outside of an old war movie, anyway. Her trip inside a detective novel at magic school was more like visiting a living cliché – a noir Disneyland. This felt real. ‘Gee, wonder why that is, brainiac,’ she thought sarcastically at herself.
The large dance hall was decorated with red, white, and blue banners strung across the ceiling, and posters, bearing various wartime slogans, hung on the walls. Surprisingly, half the crowd wasn't military, but seemed to be civilian women dressed to the nines, doing their best to show the troops a good time. A large stage was filled with chairs and music stands enough for a good-sized jazz band, but at the moment it was just a septet accompanied by a singer. Paige's eyes widened. "Is that… Ella Fitzgerald?"
Pvt. Leo nodded. "Yeah, she's great, isn't she? Being stationed in California has it's perks. The stars like to come down here and dance with the fella's. They say it's their part in the war effort."
Paige nodded, only half listening to him. "Cool."
"Huh?" asked the Leo from this time, which brought Paige's attention fully back to him.
"It's, uh, too cool back here near the door, let's find a table, shall we?" she said quickly. "That would be just swell!"
They found a small table near the stage and Paige was surprised when Pvt. Leo pulled her chair out for her. She smirked at him before sitting down and leaned over to the whitelighter Leo. "What happened to that little nicety?" she asked him.
"The sixties happened," he replied jokingly in a hushed whisper to her. A waitress arrived to take their orders, interrupting any possible rejoinder from Paige.
"What'll it be?" she asked with a smile.
"I'll have a Derby Cream Ale," said the disguised Leo.
"Me too. Hey, weren't you always a Budweiser man?" asked Pvt. Leo.
"War changes a guy," replied Leo clumsily. "I mean, uh, you gotta treat yourself while you still can, right? No use wasting time on the cheap stuff."
"I guess so," agreed Pvt. Leo with a nod.
"And for you Miss?" asked the waitress, leaning over to Paige.
"Just a mineral water, thanks," replied Paige.
The waitress' pencil hung over her pad of paper. "Mineral? I've never heard of –"
"Oh, right," said Paige, interrupting her. "Uh, you serve Shirley Temples, right?" she asked nervously.
They passed the time until their drinks arrived mostly watching the stage, as Leo did his best deflect questions from his past self. He was grateful when Paige kept him busy with her own questions, even if they were a bit odd.
"So... the hula hoop. Just a fad, or do you think it'll stick around?" she asked after another pregnant pause in conversation.
Pvt. Leo looked at her quizzically. "What's a hula hoop?"
Paige cringed on the inside as she saw the glamoured Leo staring into his beer, clearly trying to think of something to change the subject. 'Oooh,' she thought. 'That was the fifties, wasn't it? Crap.' She was luckily cut off from having to answer as the waitress brought their drinks. Paige immediately picked up her fizzy pink drink and took a long sip that didn't end until a response came to mind. "Sorry," he said with an apologetic smile. "Super thirsty. Uh, hula hoop? It's a... dance. Learned it while I was training at Pearl Harbor. You know, in Hawaii. Where they hula...."
She quickly put the drink down and pulled herself to her feet. "Alright! I'll be right back!" Paige tugged at her tan skirt, readjusting it. "Wow, this place is just great. A really, really hep gin joint – really swell – so I should go off to the ladies room and, uh, powder my nose!" she said, excusing herself awkwardly. "A dame don't wanna look shiny!" finished Paige brightly before rushing off to the women's bathroom she'd seen just inside the entrance.
Pvt. Leo turned to the man he thought was Walsh, shaking his head softly. "She's a looker, I'll give you that, but she talks like she just fell out of a Bogart picture.
Leo shrugged at his younger self with a smirk, remembering one of Walsh's quirks. "You know I have a thing for the nutty gals."
Pvt. Leo laughed. "Now that's an understatement!" He picked up the frosty pint of beer and took an appreciative sip. "Mmm. Can't say I understand the appeal though. Give me a strong woman who knows her own mind over a knockout with a screw loose any day," he remarked with a smirk. "And it doesn't hurt if she's a dynamite cook either, eh? I love Lillian, but her meatloaf is worse than the Army's!" Pvt. Leo shook his head in a loving frustration.
The whitelighter Leo raised his beer in a toast, both to his past and the future he'd so recently been given a hint of. Not that his past self knew any of this. "To the right woman," he announced, Piper coming unbidden to his mind’s eye.
"To the right woman," echoed Pvt. Leo, thinking about Lillian, as they clinked bottles.
__________________________________________________
Paige scrambled into a stall and waited quite impatiently for the woman at the sink to finish washing her hands. She tapped a bulkily heeled foot. ‘C'mon, how clean do your hands gotta be, lady?’ she thought in irritation. Finally, the woman dried her hands on a towel and left. Paige had orbed out before the restroom door had fully swung shut. She rematerialized in Leo's dorm room, which somehow now looked even more disheveled than before. "What the…?" Paige heard a creak in the floorboard break the silence and ducked instinctively. A woosh of air went by her head as she threw herself to the floor, and a darklighter's arrow slammed into the wall next to her head.
She spun around to see Wilkins taking aim for another shot with his crossbow. As the crossbow bolt hurtled toward Paige she called for it and sent it back into Wilkins' shoulder. "Fool!" he scoffed, as he pulled the arrow out of his shoulder. "The poison won't work on me!"
"Well, ya' still bleed, doncha'?" replied Paige, her tone dripping with sarcasm.
The darklighter twisted his injured shoulder back, readjusting his stance. "You're too late, anyhow. I've already hidden the pendant in a place you'll never find it – in time to save your precious whitelighter, anyway!"
Paige narrowed her eyes at the darklighter. "Oh, there's always time. Or is time travel too complex a concept for your that mush between your ears you call a brain?” Paige’s eyes flitted to his hand as he motioned to make his crossbow rematerialize. “But if you're not gonna spill it – crossbow!" she called, sending it across the room. "Couch!" she shouted again, landing the piece of furniture on top of Wilkins, pinning him. "I guess I'll just have to make you talk!" She reached into her purse, retrieving a truth potion, and the vanquishing potion, that the sisters had brewed earlier.
She threw the potion before he could react and orb out. It shattered against his forehead, remnants dripping onto the floor and into his eyes. "Oops," said Paige with a menacing smirk. She really hadn't meant to do that, but it was kind of funny.
The darklighter sneered at her. "I told you, you'll never find it. Not when it's still in – " he stopped himself by literally biting his tongue, the salty taste of blood rolling down his throat as he realized what he'd almost been compelled to reveal.
He immediately began to dissolve into black orbs and fly through the ceiling, but Paige grabbed onto the swirling black mass. "Oh, no you don't!" she warned and threw the dark orbs back to the ground before they had completely disappeared. As he solidified and slid across the floor, the pendant escaped his pocket, coming to rest neatly at Paige's feet.
"You lied! You just got here - didn't you?"
"Well, I am evil," Wilkins said with a shrug, another crossbow appearing in his hands in a puff of black smoke. "I guess we'll just have to battle this out," he said, cocking his head to the side as he took aim.
Paige rolled her eyes and called out, "Arrow!" as one sped toward her. This one took root in the darklighter's heart and Wilkins staggered back against the wall. "You just don't get it, do you? That crossbow just isn't gonna work!" She paused a second, the cockiness suddenly fleeing her heart. "Wait a minute! You should be dead…"
A menacing smile appeared across his face. "Perhaps it's you that doesn't 'get it'. I may not be invincible anymore, but bonding with Kaalaya has still endowed me with great power!" he boomed.
"Crap," said Paige, her expression dropping. Suddenly, she remembered the vanquishing potion still in her left hand and suppressed a smirk so as to not show her hand.
The darklighter stalked forward toward Paige, the truth potion compelling him to say his thoughts aloud. "If shooting you won't work, I'll just have to stab you with the arrow. And I'll have the honor of being the first ever to kill a Charmed One."
"Not really," replied Paige grimly, thinking of Prue. After spending all this time with her, the idea of having lost a sister had become much more real and Paige found herself almost reliving, or really feeling, the loss for the first time.
As the darklighter lunged at her, Paige dodged, rolled away, and found herself slamming into a table leg as she suddenly became very woozy, mid-roll. It was then that she finally noticed the blood oozing from a gash across her cheek. That first arrow seemed to have grazed her after all. Paige blinked, pulling her spinning senses back together. In her daze, she'd dropped the potion vial, but she could see it had rolled underneath the table.
Without looking back to see where Wilkins was, and the dizziness making her forget her powers momentarily, she scrambled to reach the vial before he did. He, unfortunately, saw what she was after and dark-orbed in, grabbing the vial just as Paige's fingertips grazed the glass.
"Ah, ah, ah," he scolded. His tone betrayed the belief that he had won this battle. "I can see the poison is slowing you down. Soon, it will saturate every cell in your body, and you’ll be… “ He laughed. “Well, you know." He raised an arrow over Paige's chest. "Now I'll just be taking my necklace…"
Paige focused her eyes on the darklighter. ‘Boy – I must really be out of it if I forgot I could just call for it,’ she thought, her head reeling. ‘Orb it…’ she thought slowly. "Vial!" she called out. As the vanquishing potion appeared in her hand she slammed her palm into the arm that Wilkins was using to plunge the arrow at her heart. He dropped the arrow, the tip of this one now grazing her forearm.
As Wilkins' whole body was swallowed in flames, Paige pulled herself to her feet, dusting herself off. "I'd say it was nice knowing you, but, well, it wasn't!" she remarked lightly as he finally exploded, leaving nothing but a singed ring on the floor.
Paige absently scratched her temple, wondering how she was going to cover up the collateral damage to the room's furniture from the fight. She thought for a moment before lightly hitting her head with the palm of her hand. "Duh! Geez, I'd better get Leo to heal me…" she thought aloud as another wave of dizziness, and now nausea, washed over her. She ran a hand down the side of her face before reciting the spell.
“Let the object of objection
Become but a dream
As I cause this scene
To be unseen”
A ripple of energy washed over the room and the furniture reappeared in their original positions. The scorch on the floor and the hole in the wall had disappeared as well. In fact, the only problem was that the spell had worked a little too well. The mess strewn about the room, not just by the darklighter but Leo's original mess, had been completely tidied up.
"Dammit," said Paige with a sigh. She glanced around the room, trying to remember what had been where, when she first saw the room, but the haze blanketing her mind was making this exceptionally difficult task near impossible. Finally, Paige began to just throw things from inside Leo's now magically neatly packed duffle bag around the room. She then went through the trashcan and dug out a handful of empty cans, bottles, and packages, placing them on the tables. Finally, she smeared various condiments and breadcrumbs on some clean dishes and placed them around the room.
‘Here's hoping he can't tell the difference,’ thought Paige as she held her queasy stomach. ‘I have to get back to Leo.’ She braced herself on a chair before closing her eyes and orbing back to the USO club restroom, hoping no one was there.
Luckily, it was still empty. Paige hurriedly fixed her hair in the mirror and wiped the blood from her cheek and arm as best she could before returning to the main room.
By now, both Leos had finished their first beers, nearly simultaneously, and Pvt. Leo had ordered another round while the disguised whitelighter abstained. He needed to be clear headed should anything happen, so he just sipped from Paige's half-full Shirley Temple. That sip had earned him a teasing remark from his past self, but he was too preoccupied with what was taking Paige so long to return to form much of a rejoinder.
"What do you think is taking your 'doll' so long?" Pvt. Leo finally asked.
The future Leo smiled nervously. "You know women – always want to look perfect…" he answered. To his relief, Paige rushed up to the table at that very moment.
"Leo! Uh, I mean, hi again Leo," she said.
"Hi. Welcome back," replied Pvt. Leo, but suddenly he looked concerned. "What happened to you? Are you alright?"
Paige's hand flew to the cut on her face self-consciously. "Huh – oh? Yeah. I kinda slipped in the ladies room. We've gotta get out of here!" she exclaimed before realizing her slip-up and trying to cover. "Uh, these cheap old shoes!" she said, shaking her head as she pretended that this was long a source of frustration. But the headshake made her head spin and she found she had to steady herself against the older Leo's chair. "Whoa." Paige blinked slowly before regaining her equilibrium and feigning a smile at Pvt. Leo. "Heh. And the lighting was dark. A very dark-light," she said to the 1980's Leo.
For his part, Leo the whitelighter was back to worrying again as he quickly realized Paige must have run into some pretty serious trouble. Meanwhile, Pvt. Leo stood up and dabbed at Paige's face with a cloth napkin. "You're bleeding," he said with concern. "I can clean that up if you like."
"Uh, no thanks," she said, taking the cloth and holding it to her face herself.
Pvt. Leo gave up the napkin easily, but not the subject. "If you're dizzy, that might mean you have a concussion."
Paige readily seized on this. "Then I guess I'd better get to the hospital, huh!" she said brightly, pointing a finger into the air. "C'mon, let's get going hon," she said to the 80's Leo, tugging on his jacket. "It was nice meeting you, Leo!" she said hurriedly.
Paige slid her arm around the disguised Leo's as he stood up, this time not to tease him, but to stabilize her balance. She wasn't in pain yet, but was seriously hoping that Pepto Bismol had been invented by now. Paige extended her hand and quickly shook Pvt. Leo's hand. "Gotta go!"
"It was nice meeting you too, Ms. Mathews," he said bemused, and shook the other Leo's hand. "Maybe we can finish this tomorrow? That is, if Ms. Mathews is feeling better."
The disguised whitelighter shook his head. "Uh, probably not – shipping back tonight!"
Pvt. Leo's brow furrowed. "You didn't mention that before…"
The future Leo shrugged hurriedly. "I didn't? Oh, uh – " he looked back askance at Paige, who was now breaking into a cold sweat. " – whoops!" he finished lamely. "We should get going," he said as he wrapped his arm around her waist and turned toward the door.
"Nice seeing you again!" Pvt. Leo called out after their retreating forms. As the club door swung shut behind them, he shook his head, puzzled, and then shrugged. He finished the last of his drink before realizing he was stuck with the bar tab and laughed to himself. Maybe she faked all that just to get Walsh out of paying the bill… he shook his head again with a smile. "Naah." Pvt. Leo got up to go back to his living quarters and, unknown to him, pack his duffle bag for his waiting destiny.
Paige slumped against Leo as soon as they were out of Pvt. Leo's sight. The pair limped away from the club in search of a secluded area. Finally, they arrived behind a dumpster. "What happened?" asked an alarmed Leo.
Paige put on a brave face, but her wizened smile betrayed her illness. "Eh! Just grazed by a darklighter arrow. Or two. No big deal!" She was hit again with a sudden wave of dizziness and her head swung back, her eyes rolling back into her head. "Whoa. Okay – maybe not so fine."
Leo raised his hands to Paige's face and arm and the familiar golden glow quickly healed the cuts. It took a few moments longer before the color returned to her skin and she began to feel right again. "Thanks" she said, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear.
"So what happened?" asked Leo, now less urgently. Paige adjusted her skirt and blouse as she talked. "Long story short? Wilkins was already there when I orbed in and he ambushed me. But, being the fabulous Charmed One that I am,"she flashed Leo a grin with this mock arrogant statement, "Well, let's just say he's just a smudge now and I got the info we needed."
"What about the amulet?" asked Leo. He didn't particularly want to stay in this time any longer than necessary. Too many memories, both bad and good, were getting to be overwhelming.
"Oh! Yeah!" Paige reached into her pocket and revealing a necklace, which dangled from between her fingertips. "Ta-daaa!"
"Great. Let's get out of here," said Leo hastily.
Paige raised an eyebrow. "What? Don't wanna catch up with the old army buddies now that we're not in such a hurry?" she asked, teasingly. At the look that passed over Leo's eyes, Paige's face dropped, remembering that this was not her Leo and he hadn't faced those personal inner demons yet. She grimaced. "Sorry…"
"For what?" he asked. ‘How could she know?’ he thought.
Not wanting to dredge up Leo's emotional baggage at a time like this, Paige shrugged it off. "Nothing. Now let's get back to that portal!" she replied and orbed off.
Leo soon caught up with her, orbing in next to her outside the house by which they'd arrived in this time. He found Paige standing on the sidewalk, behind a bush, watching through the house's front window at two young figures groping each other in the kind of adolescent hormonal shenanigans that happened in every time . "Now what do we do?" asked Paige as Leo joined her behind the hedge.
"We need a diversion," he answered simply, "But something that won't change anything significant. For all we know they’re the future parents of a president."
Paige nodded. "Right. So no fires," she said with a smirk. "So… how do we roll two hot to trot teenagers apart and get them out of the house?"
"That freezing power of Piper's sure would come in handy right about now," remarked Leo as he absently scratched the back of his head.
"I hear ya," replied Paige. A hush fell over the two as they both stood in thought for a moment. They both mulled over a way to get the teens out of the house long enough that the spell's ritual could be performed. Both of them had to be in the house to hop into the portal when it reopened, so they couldn’t just have one lead the two kids off somewhere.
Leo sighed. "I could sure use some inspiration right about now."
"That's it!" exclaimed Paige loudly enough to startle Leo from his reverie.
"What is?"
"Inspiration! Well, not them specifically – but magical creatures. Couldn't one of them help us?" Paige's face fell again. "Oh, but they don't know us in this time."
"No – but you might be able to conjure something else," as his own inspiration had struck.
"Like what?" asked Paige.
Leo smirked. "Well, they're teenagers, right?"
"Yeah. So?"
"So – I noticed that a theater up the street is playing Casablanca – perfect for a couple of lovebirds!"
Paige crossed her arms obstinately. "And what are we supposed to do? Just knock on the door and say 'Hey kids! You should see this new flick and don't mind us, we just want you out of the house!"
Leo shrugged. "This was a more trusting time. All we have to do is conjure up some movie tickets and pose as promotions people."
Paige blinked at Leo, digesting the plan. "Oh… this should be fun," she finally remarked wryly. Leo smirked as a plan took shape in his mind.