"CHRIS! CHRISTOPHER PERRY HALLIWELL! YOU GET YOUR BUTT HERE RIGHT NOW!"

"Chris, please do as your mother says!"

"Come on, bro. Get in touch! What's wrong with you?"

"Chrissy, why are you ignoring us?"

Chris could hear his parents, brother and sister calling for him but he had turned them out, ignoring them. He'd long since blocked them so they couldn't come to him either. Next they would probably try summoning him but even if mom got her sisters to come around so they could use a power of three spell it wouldn't work. It wouldn't work even if Wyatt, his twice blessed brother, tried summoning him.

Now that Chris had embraced all his powers he knew that he was more powerful than his older brother. Actually he probably had been all his life but while Wyatt had revelled in their mighty power Chris had feared it and only ever used a small amount when they were younger which was probably what had led to everyone assuming he was by far the weaker of the two Halliwell brothers. Now, though Chris knew that he was strong. He'd had to be. Nobody else had been willing to stand up to Wyatt so he had taken on the task himself and won.

Chris knew that he was worrying his family, isolating himself like this. He may have blocked himself from tracking and summoning but he had left enough of himself clear so they would be able to sense that he was alive and healthy. That wouldn't be enough for his mother, though. It would have to be for now, however. Chris was sorry for worrying her but he really had no idea what to say to the family at the moment.

Until a few days ago the last thing Chris remembered was being more than 20 years in the past, lying on mom and Leo's bed, bleeding to death. He'd identified the bastard who'd turned Wyatt evil but Gideon had gotten the drop on him, stabbing him with a cursed athame and orbing away. After almost nine years the end of the war against Wyatt was in sight but Chris knew he wasn't going to live to see it.

The next thing he knew, though he was in elderland, having his wound healed by Sandra, probably the most reasonable elder to have ever existed. Unlike the rest of her colleagues she seemed to remember what it was like to be human so she was never as unreasonable in her demands of the Halliwells as the others elders. As a result she was the only elder that Chris had ever liked.

When Wyatt massacred the elders Sandra had been the first to go so when Chris saw her he assumed he'd died from the stab wound and seeing as he'd died in the past he wasn't going to be allowed to go to the heavens in his own time, presumably where his loved ones were. Apparently, though he was wrong. According to Sandra he had done just enough in the past to ensure that the future was saved and just before he died magic had brought him back to his own time so she could heal him. After exactly nine years of war Chris was finally free to live his life.

Right now, though the only life Chris remembered was one where his brother had been a raving lunatic and not even the elders seemed sure whether Chris' memories would ever catch up with him, allowing him to understand this new world that he had created. Sandra and the others had, however, given him the most precious possible gift before sending him off into this strange new life.

"Daddy!" his beautiful daughter squealed, capering ahead of him as the two wandered through the park.

Isabella Melinda Halliwell was his salvation, his only light in an increasingly dark world. Chris truly believed that if he hadn't had Bella and her future to fight for he would have surrendered to Wyatt long ago. For the whole time that he'd been in the past Chris had lived in fear that he would change too much and Bella would never be born. He'd convinced the elves to take care of her for him and visited whenever he could, between dealing with the sisters, vowing to make the most of whatever time they had left together.

He'd been right. He had changed enough of the past that he and Bianca had never met in the new future and Bella had never been born but as a reward for saving the world the elders and the cleaners had conspired to bring his daughter from the old timeline to the new one so Chris hadn't lost her after all. Bianca had, apparently, been killed by another witch a few years ago so even in this new future Bella would never know her mother but at least she could still grow up happily with the father that loved her more than life itself.

That had all happened a week ago, on Chris' 23rd birthday. Since then Chris had been going out of his way to avoid his family and had basically been spending all his time indulging Bella's every whim, reaffirming that they were alive and finally free. After so long being alone in the world it had been agonising for Chris to sense his sister, his cousins, his mother all alive and well again. He wanted to see them, to tell them how much he loved them and how much he'd missed them but he just couldn't bring himself to do it.

What the hell was he supposed to say to them? Would he have anything in common with his siblings and his cousins anymore? By all accounts they had grown up in a safe, happy, normal world whereas all Chris knew was war. For that matter would they even know about the dark past that no longer was? Would Leo and the sisters have told them about the horrors that had torn their family apart in another life? How was Chris supposed to reconcile the caring brother he'd heard calling for him in his head with the deranged monster who, for nine years, had wanted him dead?

And then there was the matter of Leo and the sisters. Would they have even realised that once the timelines crossed over there was a chance he would remember the dark past? What would happen once they realised he was no longer the son/nephew they'd raised but rather the mysterious whitelighter who had once annoyed them so much? Would they be disappointed or would they be able to reaffirm the balanced, familial relationship they'd managed to develop by the time Gideon tried to kill him? Most importantly how would they react when they found out that he had a young daughter who he'd never mentioned in the entire year he'd spent with them in the past?

Chris knew he was scaring his family by avoiding them, especially because he'd missed his 23rd birthday with the family. Birthdays had always been a really big deal when his mom was alive so as she had survived in this new timeline he guessed that they would be again. His parents probably thought there was something seriously wrong with him that had caused him to miss his birthday and Chris longed to reassure them but he just didn't know what to say. He knew that he couldn't avoid them forever but he wasn't ready to face them yet.

"Yeah, princess?" he asked, drawing level with his daughter.

"Can we go for ice cream?" the two-and-a-half year old begged.

Chris swept Bella into his arms. "I think we could manage that."

"Yeah!" she squealed joyfully.

Bella's joyful innocence was infectious and Chris could feel some of the burden beginning to leave his soul. There was a long way to go before he'd be able to say he was truly happy but his beautiful daughter was his light in the darkness and so long as he had Bella Chris knew he would be okay.