Apocalypse Not

P3 buzzes with the moral riddle: "If you face the choice of saving one sibling or five strangers, what would you do?", but the Halliwell's think the answer is obvious and easy the next morning over breakfast, save their sister. That afternoon Leo begins using the front door when he drops in socially, while the women are discussing the rash of violent civil disturbances, mini-riots in a word, when Leo asks Piper out to an impromptu dinner, knowing it was her day off at P3. Phoebe and Prue say they'll check in on her new manager. Driving along Leo and Piper are entangled in a sudden outbreak of road rage when 20-30 people, both drivers and pedestrians or vendors have violent confrontations, including some thrown watermelons which lands on their windshield. Piper freezes the riot, and they spot a man dressed all in black but for a green tie calmly at the heart of the discord who is immune to the freeze power and give chase. He soon conjures a horse, leaps aboard in stride and travels astride its' back out of our dimension, growing a green cloak in the transition, where he soon reappears with three others, one in red, another in yellow, and the last in black tie and all now in color coordinated cloaks galloping alongside one another as a team. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse of the Bible then stop and meet together and Strife reports on the encounter with Piper, detailing the interrupted riot, general mood and the plan's progress and the presence of a good witch with freezing powers. The women confer with Darryl Morris who reports the city is on the edge of wide scale self-destruction, with looting, rapine, robbery and road rage and other outbreaks of civil disorder cropping up everywhere. They ask him to keep them updated, particularly on the areas that currently seems 'hottest', but can't confirm to him that the events are supernatural, as yet, but when his duties intersect their interests, he knows better, and girds himself for a long night. The sisters respond to the hot spot mini-riot and follow the green horseman into an alley. There they are confronted by the four horsemen who begin a chanted spell to banish witches while one, war, grabs Prue and threatens to break her neck. She tells her sisters to start the banishing cant, even though they are not sure as to what the men are. The sister's begin a vanquishing spell for an anarchy demon regardless of that threat and the vanquish affects both the horseman-demon and Prue, and both disappear in the vanquishing light-blob. This unexpected and unexplained effect shakes both sides up, and after shimmering away to their Head Quarters leaving Piper and Phoebe left behind in the alley, the remaining horsemen quarrel, but reveal they've been constituted by the Source of All Evil and let out that he can replace them from other mortals or demons nearby in a modernistic control center, so aren't necessarily demons. They'd also believed the Charmed Ones couldn't vanquish them, only The Source could, so they conclude their horseman ally is still alive. A conclusion Leo guiding the sisters also reaches, and which is confirmed when the Halliwell Spirit Board communicates a message from Prue for help. Leo goes to get advice from the Elders with an insistent order from Piper. At Team Evil's Head Quarters, the three remaining horsemen receive a stressed, partially garbled message to cease hostilities and their operation, while Leo orbs back with news: the leaders on the other side, have approached the leaders of the good, asking and proposing to work together, for the joint magic unleashed with both sides casting opposing spells is having unintended, unpredictable, and uncontrollable consequences while Prue and the Horsemen are both trapped in a vortex, as had been deduced by Leo before he left for "Up there", without knowing how to identify which spirit blob is which as they transit the Halliwell manor attic. Against Leo's advice, the sisters, using their free will (as championed by the elders), accept the offer conveyed via the elders and meet the three remaining horsemen in a sunny meadow. When Piper and a horsemen clasp hands, a storm front rolls in turning the skies into a disruptive roiling mass of threatening clouds. The sisters bring them back to the manor, where Leo argues with Piper about the decision. Working out to recall when and where everyone was, the five quickly deduce their positions were at the points of a pentagram, with Prue and the one at its center, generating the vortex. Piper and one horseman go off to spar verbally in the kitchen, while she concocts the same vanquishing potion, as they think they need it. Phoebe and the Green Tie guy (Strife), are work together on the spell wordings and a counter wording that might reverse the effect of the vortex, while mutually sexual energy is almost palpable flying between them. The third horsemen, still as yet unidentified and of an unknown nature goes back to Head Quarters to see how things are going. Leo follows him as he goes back to the evil HQ where he spies out what the "Black Tie" (Death) is up to and what the HQ is for, which is depicted something like a busy military situation room. He also manages to identify who the four are, even as Prue has partially spelled out "4-H-O" on the spirit board, before encountering opposition from War in their vortex. The two sides finish up and arrange to meet up at 6:30 pm, a half-hour before the "Real" new millennium. Then Leo is discovered in the HQ and returns to the manor himself with his news. He identifies them as the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and according to Leo, as he argues against them helping bring the fourth back, letting Prue remain in the vortex is the better choice. Leo makes an impassioned plea against aiding the horsemen, and points out the world has been on the brink of the Apocalypse several times before, and each time the horsemen failed and the source, who is the only one that can vanquish them, then destroyed them. Then planned and plotted and reconstituted them again anew. When they make the rendezvous somewhat late, the three horsemen are ripping into each other with recriminations. Phoebe and Piper are resolved to save Prue and damn the cost, but Phoebe sees a premonition when shaking the hand of Strife that includes nuclear mushroom clouds. Piper picks up on her momentary trance, and follows her lead when she won't go through with the chant, selflessly sacrificing their sister. So in effect, Piper and Phoebe outdo evil with a double cross of the three horsemen and refuse to help evil destroy the world on their critical time table. The horsemen get angry, but after the key moment, the Source opens the vortex as the key moment passes, and in anger himself destroys his horsemen in punishing painful ends, as Leo had noted he's done before, validating his analysis and recommendations. That act lets the vortex gateway open long enough for Piper and Phoebe to attempt to pull Prue out, as it is now too late for the defeat of good, they read their counter vanquishing spell in time to recover Prue from the still open vortex. Leo soon confirms the four horsemen have indeed been destroyed by their unforgiving an impatient master, The Source. At P3 the bartender repeats a moral question that had made the rounds two nights before: "If you face the choice of saving one sibling or five strangers, what would you do?" This time all three give the answer: "Save the five strangers" the opposite of the easy answer they'd given two nights before.