Summary: Paige & Phoebe get a premonition about some witches that need their help in Sunnydale to defeat a certain hell-goddess…This story takes place in S5 of Buffy, and S3 of Charmed, after my story "Charmed & Dangerous" which you might want to read first to know what's going on. Basically, Prue never died, and Paige is Phoebe's girlfriend, not a sister. Also in my Buffy world, Faith came back good in S4 and has been hanging around ever since.
Pairings: Phoebe/Paige, Willow/Tara, w/ the possibility of others to come (Prue?)
Spoilers: There will be general spoilers for Buffy S5, and from the Charmed episode "Oh My Goddess."
Rating: R
Tara sat alone on a bench at the Sunnydale World Culture Fair, staring into space while silent tears ran down her cheeks. The fight she'd just had with Willow was fresh in her mind, and it stung with a raw newness that made her heart feel as if it had been dragged across the pavement. They had never fought before. Not once, in over a year. She had only said what she said because she was worried that Willow was getting in over her head with her magic…and Willow had somehow interpreted that as an attack on their relationship. As if Tara didn't believe that Willow truly loved her; didn't believe her girlfriend to be a "real" lesbian, and therefore couldn't be trusted. What on earth would make Willow think such a thing? Didn't she know that Tara was completely devoted to her? Tara was so lost in thought, she didn't notice the woman who sat beside her until a warm hand grasped her own. Eyes still lost in the distance, Tara felt a smile pull at her lips. Willow, she thought happily. Then the hand holding hers squeezed painfully hard. Tara gasped, her head jerking around, to find herself staring into the cold blue eyes of a hell-goddess.
"Hello, darling," Glory purred.
Hundreds of miles north, on a nearly deserted beach south of San Francisco, another witch lay kissing her white lighter girlfriend in the sand. The afternoon sun was warm on their bare skin, and both were completely relaxed in each other's arms.
"You taste so good," Phoebe murmured into Paige's open mouth, making her girlfriend giggle huskily.
"You're the only one who gets to taste me," Paige purred back, her hands running up and down Phoebe's back teasingly. "So feel free to have as much as you want."
"Ooooh, lucky me," Phoebe growled, rolling Paige playfully onto her back and straddling her hips. They kissed with renewed passion, the intensity mounting between them as Paige reached up and untied Phoebe's bikini top, sitting up with Phoebe now in her lap, to lavish attention on the tightening nipples.
"Oh, fuck, Paige!" Phoebe cried out, and they both lifted slightly off the sand, levitating a foot or more into the air as their passion swept over them. Suddenly, Paige gasped, and they both fell back to the sand with a thud that knocked the wind out of them.
"Ooof!" Phoebe groaned, looking up to see Paige's tense expression, eyes closed. She remained respectfully silent, arms wrapped reassuringly around her trembling girlfriend, until the premonition passed and her dark eyes slowly opened.
"What did you see, honey?" Phoebe asked gently.
"Oh god," Paige muttered, casting around in the sand for her clothes. There was a bit of seaweed tangled in her long, dark hair.
"Paige?" Phoebe asked again. "You're scaring me, baby. Talk to me, okay? What did you see?"
"Phoebe, I gotta go," Paige said distractedly as she pulled her shirt over her head without bothering to brush the sand off. "I'll explain later, I promise—but I gotta go now." Paige gave her startled girlfriend a quick, hard kiss on the lips, orbing out as soon as their lips parted. Phoebe blinked, unsure what to do next. A few seconds later, she was slammed with a premonition of her own.
"Just…tell…me…where…the…key…is," Glory said in a slow, quiet, deceptively calm voice. The bone-crushing grip on Tara's hand let her know that the evil creature beside her was anything but calm. Tears sprang to her eyes as the felt, and heard, the bones in her hand breaking. It sounded like a bowl of rice krispies, she thought in a detached way, as hot blood dripped from her fingers. She bit her lip as hard as she could, drawing more blood as she forced herself not to cry out. She refused to raise an alarm; anyone who came running to her aid would be killed instantly, and Tara refused to have any more deaths on her head. She looked back stonily into the eyes of death, lips pressed stubbornly together.
"Well, I suppose you'll just have to do as an afternoon stack instead," Glory purred. As she spoke, she reached out her hands on either side of Tara's head, preparing to suck out her sanity. Tara closed her eyes, sending out a silent, final prayer that Willow would forgive her for dying before they could make up.
"Is this a private moment? Or can anybody show off their powers in public?" Unable to believe her ears, Tara opened her eyes in shock.
"P-p-paige!" she stuttered. "What are you--?"
"Talk later, Tar," Paige said in a quiet, steely voice. "Escape now!" And with that, she grabbed Tara's uninjured hand, and they both dissolved in a haze of white lights.
"Hey!" Glory yelled, jumping to her feet indignantly. "I wasn't done with my snack!"
A moment later, the two figures re-appeared in a large, open room filled with weapons and training equipment. Tara looked around in a daze.
"How…how did we get to the m-magic shop…" Tara gasped, eyes wide.
"Just relax, Tara, everything's okay, I promise…let's just take care of you first, and I'll explain everything." With that, Paige reached out and put her hands over Tara's crumpled one, which immediately began to glow. Tara stared, transfixed, as the blood disappeared, an incredible warmth suffusing her. She knew she must be imagining it, but…she thought she could actually feel her bones mending. Finally, the glowing light died away, and Tara looked up at Paige, speechless. Paige just grinned at her, a faint blush coloring her cheeks. Then, two rough hands grabbed Paige from behind, twisting her wrists painfully and slamming her up against the wall.
"Ow!" Paige yelped, immediately orbing out of the unforgiving grip and re-appearing behind Tara. Looking over the blonde's shoulder, she scowled at the dark-eyed, leather-clad girl still poised to attack her.
"Ease up, butch. I'm one of the good guys, okay? Jeez!" Paige glared, rubbing her neck indignantly.
"Oh yeah?" The tough girl snarled. "What the hell were you doing to Tara?"
"I was healing her!" Paige snapped. "A courtesy I might not extend to you if you don't back off right now." They continued to glare at each other.
"Faith, it's okay," Tara said gently. Paige was still half-hiding behind her, one hand gripping her shoulder, and Tara placed her own hand reassuringly over it. Faith saw this irrefutable expression of comfort and trust, and faltered slightly.
"Paige is a friend, she won't hurt us," Tara assured the tense slayer.
"Yeah, okay," Faith groused, relaxing and kicking at the floor with her steel-toed boots. "Just doing my job." Paige rolled her eyes.
"Tara, please don't tell me you're dating this walking hard-on," Paige said drolly.
"Hey!" Faith cried indignantly. Tara looked at her with one eyebrow raised, in a well-you-know-you-are kind of way.
"No Paige, Faith and I are just friends." She looked between the two of them, and decided that since she had absolutely no idea what was going on, she might as well be the first to offer some information.
"Paige," She said, turning between her two friends, "this is Faith. She's a slayer." Paige's eyes lit with recognition.
"A vampire slayer? Cool, we read about you in the Book of Shadows." Faith looked at Paige, perplexed.
"Um, ok…" Tara shook her head to clear the ever-mounting confusion from it. "Faith, this is Paige. She's, well, sort of a guardian angel…and, um, my ex-girlfriend." Tara blushed slightly, smiling up at Paige, who grinned easily back. Faith whistled.
"Nice catch, T." Paige rolled her eyes.
"You're such a pig, Faith," Tara said, though she couldn't hide the affectionate grin that accompanied these words. Then she turned to Paige, eyes as curious as ever.
"Whatever," Faith grinned back, with a wink for Paige, who just shook her head. "So you gonna tell me what happened now, T? Or do I gotta wait for more hot girls from your past to show up?"
"Um, I'm not really sure what happened myself, except that Paige saved me from Glory," Tara said slowly, smiling warmly at the dark-haired girl who was now shaking sand out of her top. "I can't believe I haven't even said thank you yet," she added.
"You don't have to thank me, Tar. I'm just glad I got there in time."
"But how did you--?" Tara began, an utterly perplexed expression on her face.
"I got a premonition…saw you in trouble."
"Since when do you get premonitions?" Tara asked, looking, if anything, more confused. "And, the healing? How did that happen?"
"A lot's changed since high school," Paige shrugged, failing to hide the smirk that came to her face as thoughts of Phoebe invaded her mind. "The short version is…my girlfriend's a witch, a Charmed One actually, and we've been, um, sharing our powers for a while now. And, I sorta came into my full powers as a white lighter, so now I can heal…we both can. The premonitions are Phoebe's." Tara just stared at Paige, her jaw hanging open.
"Man," Faith whistled. "How many super-girls can this town take?"
"Funny, now that you mention it…where are we, exactly?" Paige asked politely.
"This is Mr. Giles' magic shop, he's our—" Tara began, but Paige shook her head.
"No, I mean…what town is this? Are we, um, still in California?" Paige shifted her gaze from Tara to Faith nervously.
"You can orb somewhere without knowing where it is?" Tara asked, impressed. "Wow, your orbing has really improved!"
"Yeah, it's mostly since I met Phoebe," Paige admitted. As if she'd uttered a summoning charm, a new field of shimmering white lights appeared in the room, and two more figures appeared, a small but powerful dark haired girl, and a young teen clinging to her in terror.
"Dawnie!" Tara exclaimed, running to the terrified young girl. Blood was running from a cut on her forehead.
"You're okay, sweetie. Let me see," Phoebe cooed gently to the trembling girl, tilting her face up to the light. By the time Tara reached her, the cut was gone.
"I'll take a wild guess and say you're Phoebe?" Faith said lazily, eyeing the new addition.
"Hi baby," Paige said happily, pulling Phoebe into her arms. "Are you okay?"
"Fine," Phoebe said with a wave of her hand. "I'm gonna assume, since you're here and I'm here, that we both had premonitions about the same evil bitch?"
"Blonde?" Paige asked. "Badly permed? Hijacked Madonna's wardrobe from the early 90's?"
"Glory," Faith said grimly.
"What's going on?" Dawn asked in a shrill, slightly hysterical voice.
"Dawnie, sweetie, everything's just fine, okay?" Tara said soothingly. "She's not going to lay a finger on you, I promise. Paige and Phoebe are here to help us now. Why don't you go get Buffy and bring her back here?" Dawn looked to Phoebe, as if asking her rescuer for permission to leave.
"Go ahead, honey," Phoebe said gently. "We'll figure this all out, I promise." Dawn nodded, and slipped through the door toward the front of the store.
"You sure charmed the pants off the kid," Faith observed. "She's not usually one for following orders." Phoebe cocked her head at the choice of words.
"It's okay, Pheebs. They know who you are," Paige explained, her hand warm and reassuring on Phoebe's back.
"They know?" Phoebe looked at Paige apprehensively. "What do they know?"
"I know that the hellmouth attracts almost as many hotties as it does demons," Faith remarked flippantly.
"Ignore her," Paige said with a roll of her eyes. "She's got toxic jock syndrome." Faith just smirked. "Oh! Tara, this is my gorgeous and brilliant girlfriend, Phoebe Halliwell." Phoebe smirked at Paige, but reached for Tara's hand in a friendly greeting.
"Pheebs, this is Tara Maclay, my ex from high school." Paige smiled as the two women said hello to each other.
"Wait a sec…" Phoebe trailed off, looking at Paige significantly. "Tara? Her name is Tara?" Paige backed up slightly, blinking nervously at her fire-eyed girlfriend. "As in, our daughter's namesake? You want to name our kid after your ex?"
"You…you guys are having a baby?" Tara gasped.
"No, honey," Paige shook her head, grinning at her fuming girlfriend, and completely ignoring everyone else around them. "We're not naming her after my ex, we're naming her after the goddess of infinite compassion, remember? Which, if you think about it, she already was before, so technically we're naming her after herself."
"Say that again?" Faith gaped at them in confusion.
"Don't freak, we're not having her now," Paige said with a wave of her hands. "Long story, anyway. Prophecies, you know."
"Yeah, actually we do," Tara nodded. "We've got a few of our own on our hands, actually."