The Vision and The Guardian
JP with Trustno1 and Cindy
Takes place before Episode 4
The Cipher Lounge:
Trust me here. "She's blaming you Alyssa." Sartre said.
The tension in the room was a tangible thing, coiled and ready to snap. Sartre leaned back slightly, his gaze steady but unreadable as he watched Alyssa. The silence stretched, daring one of them to break it.
Finally, he spoke, his voice low and deliberate. “You’re going to keep sitting there, stewing in whatever this is, or are you going to do something about it?”
He expected a cutting retort, perhaps a deflection. What he didn’t expect was the way Alyssa moved—swift and unrelenting, her intensity catching him completely off guard.
In a heartbeat, she closed the gap between them…
Later…
In the aftermath of the couple’s closeness. Alyssa sat on Peter’s lap, cuddled into him.
Alyssa's phone buzzed: I shouldn't have done that, I know you have a connection with Prue. I don't want to upset her. Blessed Be. Piper.
Alyssa for reasons unknown gripped the knife in her hand, she apparently had kept it grasped even after removing her jacket.
Darkness enveloped the room, Alyssa stood alone - no not alone. The dark creature which haunted her was there, the hacker could feel it.
Then it suddenly formed into a shape of sorts, familiar - black tentacles reaching out, trying to engulf her.
Alyssa held the knife - knowing what she had always deep in her core suspected - the final fight between her and it - she would have to defeat it - herself.
The knife suddenly dropped to the ground and Alyssa was back in the room, breathless as if she had run a marathon. After a few moments the woman caught her breath, but said nothing. "Can't this damn knife ever show me anything good?" The question was rhetorical. The knife lingered between a welcomed gift and something Alyssa wished she had never received.
Just then, Alyssa slipped into a dream. She saw the tentacles but something or someone was holding them back. Pulling them back away from her. It could only be one person.
"Dimples. We need to talk, Dimples. This is between me and you, not even him . Alyssa could feel Prue pointing towards Sartre.
"This doesn't go on any of your illuminati propaganda news websites either. Just me and you Dimples. Fair enough? Granted, you're a freshman agent, but you are officially a Lumie Chick. Call my sister back when you get a chance. If anyone's going to be mean to her, it's going to be me. I'm kind of in the mood for a fight."
Alyssa nodded. "I understand. I'll call her back but not today." She couldn’t handle any more Piper today.
"I'm not done Dimples," said Prudence.
"Ok," Alyssa commented and waited for Piper to continue.
Prue took a slow, deliberate step forward, her eyes glinting with something dangerous. “Let’s get one thing straight, Dimples. I know you and Sartre love each other. That’s real. I can see it. But don’t think for a second that means I’m going to take it easy on you.”
Alyssa actually breathed a laugh and then sighed. "First, I'm kinda getting used to most things, people or in your case otherworldly beings not taking it easy on me. Secondly, I would expect nothing less from Prue Halliwell."
Prue’s eyes darkened, and for a moment, the tension between them became almost palpable. She stepped closer, her fists tightening as though she were seriously considering swinging at Alyssa. The corner of her mouth twitched into a humorless smile. “But don’t think that just because I’m dead, I won’t fight you. I could still knock you out if I wanted to.”
It was as if Prudence was sizing the hacker up. "Twenty-four years, Alyssa. That's how long it's been since I've felt anyone if you don't start showing some real passion..."
"Passion? How much more of that do you want to see? I mean how much more can there be?" Alyssa stood steadfast. "What? Do you want to live vicariously through me? Is that why you gave me that knife? Because, to be honest, that's creepy. I mean really creepy. I'm not your living proxy. Is that why you wanted Peter and I together so you could feel....passion?" Alyssa felt a little sick to her stomach at the thought of Prue watching everything they did, of feeling what she felt. It was nauseating and sick. Dead or not, Prue being there in those private moments was a violation. "I thought you gave me that knife to help... was I wrong?" Alyssa was so aggravated at the moment, she could barely get the words out.
“But don’t think that just because I’m dead, I can’t take your place. Spirit or not, there are ways I could make Sartre come with me if I wanted to. Don’t tempt me, Alyssa.” She leaned in slightly, her smirk hardening into something razor-sharp. “You might be his now, but don’t get comfortable. A spirit and witch with my looks and my charm? I’d give you a run for your money—and you know it.”
My sister Piper might be hitting 51, about to get a divorce, might have packed on a few pounds, but she's still got that Halliwell charm. If you don't step up, she'll make you look like yesterday's news. And trust me, she's more than willing to show you how it's done." Prue's words were a direct hit, meant to ignite a fire under Alyssa.
“And speaking of pax, you’re using condoms, aren’t you? Rookie mistake. Keep the bond alive long enough, and you won’t even want them. You'll have a reason, have you though about that in your future?”
Prue was definitely angry. She was pushing buttons and she knew it. "Now, picture this - you, Sartre, and that little dragon chick, Eun Ji, all tangled up. That would be the kind of show that'd make the Illuminati's secret archives blush.That's a pay-per-view I'd shell out 70 pax for, not that worthless Federal Reserve crap ." Her laughter was dark, filled with a mix of mockery and dark promise.
She then produced a glowing, golden honeycomb square. "Take this, and your bond with Sartre might just get even stronger , but with this, who knows? But remember, Dimples, I saw you with him in that lounge, you on top, your dimples clearly visible. You two love each other, but don't think I won't keep an eye on that." Her gaze was intense, almost threatening, as if she might take a swing at Alyssa next. “If you can keep Sartre by your side, there'll come a day when you won't want to use them anymore, for reasons you can figure out, have you thought about that yet, Matt Wilson has long before you met Peter.”
"If Peter can be so easily swayed to stray then I am completely wrong about him. I think he would know it's you and not me. He is a profiler, after all. " Alyssa paused. "It's none of your business if we're using condoms. And no - I can't think of the future until I know that there will be one. I'm not exactly looking towards having children, as I suppose that's what you're getting at."
In a sudden move, Prue flicked her finger, and Alyssa's hair fell loose, cascading around her face. "Let's see how you handle being undone, Dimples." Her voice was a whisper now, almost a caress, yet still laced with challenge.
Then, as if to soften the blow, or perhaps to twist the knife further, Prue shed her jacket, revealing that old Guns N' Roses shirt. Chinese Democracy tour 2001. "I was there, you know, at that concert. Axl the only original member onstage, rocking my world. It was like a prelude to my own end. " There was a raw edge to her voice, a mix of defiance and sadness.
The tension in the air shifted slightly as Prue shrugged off her black jacket, revealing a faded Guns N’ Roses T-shirt from their 2001 Chinese Democracy tour. “This,” she said, brushing her hands over the fabric, “was from the last concert I ever saw before I died. Buckethead was on guitar—guy was a freak, but man, could he shred. A few weeks later, Shax got me. So, yeah, Dimples, I guess I’ve got a soft spot for nostalgia.”
Prue Halliwell stood across from Alyssa Wilson in the dimly lit, timeless space of the mind—a place neither real nor unreal, suspended between waking and dream. Her form shimmered faintly, as though the afterlife couldn’t quite decide if it wanted to let her stay or pull her back to its own inscrutable folds.
"I’ve made my choice, Alyssa," Prue began, her voice a soft cadence of warmth and melancholy. "After this, I’m going to try and relax. Spend some time just… being. Maybe that sounds silly coming from a spirit, but we need peace too."
She chuckled lightly, her smile both wistful and genuine. "I thought I’d catch up on some old favorites. Ever watch Beverly Hills, 90210? Brenda Walsh She was so fiery, so determined. The kind of character who made you want to root for her, even when she stumbled. It’s strange, watching something that’s both frozen in time and yet tied to a person who lived, suffered, and… left." Prue waited.
Alyssa didn't know what to say to that. Part of her felt for Prue but the woman was so annoying at the same time. "That is more than understandable." The hacker's voice had softened for a moment. "No, I've never seen that show." Alyssa wasn't really the nighttime soap type. "But it sounds like a good character."
The levity in her tone faded like a distant echo, replaced by a gravity that seemed to draw the very air taut between them. "Alyssa," she said, her spectral hand hovering just shy of reaching out. "You and I share something rare. A bond that defies boundaries—life and death, the mundane and the secret. I care about you deeply, and I want you to understand something important before you wake up."
Alyssa listened without saying anything, just waiting on Prue’s next comment.
Her voice grew deeper, layered with the echo of something ancient and knowing. "Humanity is a fragile miracle, Alyssa. We’re made of stardust—carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, the remnants of stars long dead. But do you know what’s sobering? Even stars have limits. No element can be fused beyond iron. It’s the tipping point, the cosmic line where creation stops and collapse begins. And us? We’re nothing more than tiny, precarious collections of these elements."
Her eyes, shimmering like galaxies in the void, met Alyssa’s unwaveringly. "The human body… it’s breathtakingly complex, yet so fragile. One day, everything works as it should, and the next—a single mutation, a rogue cell, a spark of chaos—and it all begins to break down. , the woman who brought Brenda to life, she fought against it. Cancer. The uncontrolled loss of cellular harmony. It’s a reminder that the cosmos doesn’t play favorites. It creates and destroys with the same unfeeling hand."
Prue’s voice broke, and the weight of her grief hung between them like a storm cloud. A crystalline tear slid down her cheek, shimmering with the light of a thousand unseen stars. "Alyssa, I need you to understand… At any moment, you could get a phone call, a diagnosis. It could happen to anyone. To you. To anyone you love. Maybe that’s the ultimate proof of the cosmos’ power—not its beauty, but it's indifference."
She wiped at her tears, though they kept falling. Her voice softened, trembling with a mix of fear and love. "But even in the face of that, Alyssa, there’s something stronger. Us. Our connection. This bond we share—it’s unbreakable. It will only grow as time moves forward, no matter what happens. You’re not alone in this vast, uncaring universe."
It was a repeated message, that she wasn't alone but one Alyssa seemed to need to hear again. It might be the first time Prue had said it to her but others had demonstrated the same with their words and actions. Alyssa, however, was still getting used to what that felt like.
A tear ran down the hacker's cheek. "Thank you for that."
Prue straightened, her gaze turning distant as though she were listening to something far away, something Alyssa couldn’t hear. "And maybe the end times are coming, in both the world you know and the one you’re only beginning to understand. But if they are, then we’ll face them together, in whatever way we can. We'll talk again, Alyssa Wilson." said Prue.
Her form began to shimmer and blur, the edges of her presence dissolving into the soft, gray nothingness around them. "Remember, Alyssa. I’m here. Always."
And then, the world collapsed into light.
Alyssa awoke abruptly, her chest heaving as though she’d been underwater too long. The faint residue of Prue’s voice lingered in her ears like a fading melody. She didn’t speak, didn’t move, but tears pricked her eyes, unbidden and unstoppable.
She stared at the ceiling, the enormity of Prue’s words heavy on her chest. Somewhere, in the quiet recesses of her heart, she felt it—a connection, a warmth that refused to fade, a bond that seemed to hum with the promise of both hope and despair.
Sartre noticed something that was not there: a jacket on a chair in the corner of the room. "Alyssa, whose jacket is this?" A search of the content revealed 70 gold pax inside the pockets.
As Alyssa stirred from her dream, the provocative echoes of Prue's taunts and promises clung to her like a second skin, a reminder of the complex dance they were all part of in this shadowy world.
Alyssa wiped her eyes, and in a quiet voice said. "It's Prue’s." She was now torn between wearing that jacket or her beloved leather one that her father had given to her. "I suppose it's now mine." Like the knife.
"I love you more than anything Alyssa.. Perhaps you should take them both. Again I love you my Alyssa. Can you kiss me? I can step out while you schedule a meeting with your father." Peter said.
"Oh, I'm not leaving either jacket behind, it's just a decision on which one to wear." How did he know what she was thinking? It was probably obvious. A faint smile crossed her face and she did get up, go to him and kiss him.