Legacy: The Past Returns

by Lady Dawson

Chapter One: Kidnapping and Revelations

Susan Dawson could only stare in a mixture of fascination and horror as the young woman stepped out of the flames, her cool dark eyes passing over the scene in front of her carelessly. Instinctively, she moved closer to Chris, her heart starting to beat faster in panic as she recognised the young woman who stood in front of her.

Oh, she remembered her. She remembered her well. This wasn't just an assassin; this was the same assassin that had come to kill her and Ryan six years ago, right after they had first received their powers. Hired, not by demons, but by the Elders, who were determined to stop them because they became too powerful. They had believed that the twins would not serve on the side of good, but rather of evil because of their absentee father.

Granted, if that Elder Curtis had not warned them, they probably wouldn't have survived the attack, but the point was that the Elders had hired her. How had she gotten killed? Susan wondered as she looked over the assassin carefully. Ryan and Susan hadn't managed to vanquish her when she had failed to kill them, mostly because they were new to their powers at the time and didn't know their full potential.

Susan felt Chris's hand tighten around hers and she glanced at him, seeing the odd expression on his face. Why would he know an assassin? she wondered. Unless . . .

Bianca, she realised, a moment too late. This wasn't just because she had been the assassin who had tried to kill her and her brother; it was because she'd had personal relations with Chris. Susan forgot how to breathe for a moment; the phoenix witch who had tried to kill her and her brother had dated her boyfriend once upon a time.

She had to admire Fate's sense of humour.

"Hello, Chris," Bianca said lightly as Bobby shifted slightly behind her. As Susan glanced at him, she could see the terror in his eyes and sensed the fear coming from him.

Focus, focus, Susan, she told herself. This is no time to panic. Think, find a way out of here.

Wyatt muttered a swearword next to Chris and Bianca's eyes moved to him and she laughed. "Both Halliwell brothers, right here when I make my graceful return," she said with a smirk. "This certainly is a pleasure." Her eyes moved from Wyatt to Chris, then fell in Susan, moving to her hand clasped in Chris's before returning her gaze to look at Susan straight in the eye. "And who might you be?"

"None of your business," Susan said rudely. Chris's hand tightened in hers in warning and she sighed; he was right, unpleasantness was only going to get them killed faster.

Bianca's eyebrows went up, however, and she smirked. "Got a tongue on her, this one does," she remarked as she reached down and pulled an athame out of her pants' leg. "Shall I cut it out for you?"

Susan drew power from the storm that was starting to brew outside; when a storm was on the way, she could command it from miles away and draw power from it. "You could try," she responded as lightning started to crackle from her fingertips as all the demons conjured up energy balls and Susan felt Chris step on her foot warningly. "What?" she whispered so quietly that none of the demons caught it.

Wyatt moved in front of his brother so they could talk without interruption. "When I tell you to, start blasting everything in sight," Chris whispered. He looked at Bobby. "Got something that you can vanquish them with?" Bobby nodded. "All right. Now, when I say so, start blasting and run for the door. Whatever happens, don't look back."

"No way," Susan whispered back. "We're in this together. Which means, we're coming back for anybody who falls behind."

Bianca laughed. "Oh, look, she's giving away orders," she said mockingly. "Are you going to fight us, little witch? Do you really mean to fight us?"

Chris was shaking, but Susan wasn't sure whether it had to do with anger, rage, or pain. Maybe all three. She swallowed slightly, feeling the slight pain in her stomach as she looked away from her boyfriend, her eyes flying towards Bianca for a minute. What had happened between them before she had come into town? she wondered. An odd, unfamiliar feeling surged up through Susan and she frowned; was it jealousy? That was really weird; she couldn't think of a time when she had been jealous.

Then again, she'd never had a boyfriend before, especially one who had a demonic ex-girlfriend back from the dead. This was an entire new field for her.

"What's the matter, boys?" Bianca inquired. "Too stunned to speak? I had the ability to make men tongue-tied in high school," she added. "It's nice to know that I still have the ability."

Chris met her gaze evenly. "I don't have anything to say to you, Bianca," he said firmly. Bianca raised an eyebrow and Susan felt bile rise through her throat; what was he thinking, going out with a girl like that? "We sorted through all of that the last time we spoke."

"Yes, right before you vanquished me with your mother's potion," Bianca said dryly. "That did quite ruin the relationship that we had, Christopher." Susan really wanted to do something violent, but unfortunately, she was too decent to actually do it. "Let me guess, she's your new girl? Going to turn your back on her, too, once you're finished with her?"

"Leave her out of this!" Chris said warningly as Susan stared at him, wishing that she knew what was going on here. Torn between truth and lies, Susan glanced towards Bobby, who was looking at her worriedly. He smiled at her faintly, giving her a reassuring look before looking away.

"Can't do that," Bianca responded. "See, I'm a demon, Chris. Doesn't matter which way you slide it, I am a demon and vengeance is in my blood. You really didn't think I'd come back and just let you get out of here without some justice done on my part, did you?"

Before Chris could respond, she shimmered out and Susan saw Bobby being thrown sideways out of the corner of her eye. She was about to whirl around when she felt a blade on the base of her neck and she gasped, alerting the brothers' attention.

"Ah, ah, ah!" Bianca warned Chris as he raised his hand to blast her. "I can kill her in half the time it takes you to even think about it. Fortunately for her, she'll be away from here before that time."

Susan gasped at the odd sensation of shimmering and she watched as she was taken away from Chris, Wyatt, and Bobby, the three men in her life now that she cared about most, the fourth being Ryan and he was gone now. Gone to a place that she was pretty sure that she was going to follow pretty soon. If Peter and Bianca had their way, anyway.

Being part-Whitelighter, Susan guessed that she was probably not supposed to be shimmering, because the moment that she landed, she collapsed onto the ground, momentarily confounded. This gave Bianca the opportunity that she needed to yank the younger girl up and thrust her into a chair. Ropes appeared and tied around her.

"What now?" she mumbled as Bianca, satisfied, replaced the athame back where it belonged and started pacing across the room, waiting for something. This left Susan time to dwell on the memories that had come back to her just a little while ago—when she first laid eyes on Peter Connelly.

"I've got a funny feeling," Susan announced as she lay on her bed, her legs dangling over the edge as she stared up at the ceiling. She sat up and looked at her twin brother, hugging a pillow to her chest.

Ryan glanced over at her, his blue eyes looking amused. "Oh, yeah? About what?" he wanted to know.

"Dunno," Susan admitted dryly. This caused her twin to grin slightly and she smiled. "But it's like . . . everything's about to change pretty soon. As though we're moving towards the end of something and heading towards the beginning of something new. And exciting," she added with a grin.

"You always have weird feelings," Ryan told her. "And they're never what you expect them to be."

"Shut up!" Susan complained, throwing the pillow at him. Ryan caught it easily and placed it on his own bed, leaning comfortably against it. "It's just . . . I don't know, Ry, it's just that this feeling is different. Something's about to happen that's going to change our lives forever." She sighed. "It's going to happen soon and everything is going to change."

Ryan was quiet for a long moment, then he grinned. "Well, maybe we'll finally have some more brothers or sisters, what do you think? Then I'll finally be able to get away from you. After eighteen years, I'm getting a little tired of you."

Susan stood up and crossed the room and he dived out of the way as she caught him, tickling him mercilessly. "Oh, gods, no!" Ryan said, laughing as Susan giggled, tickling her brother as he collapsed onto the ground. That was her brother's one flaw; he was ticklish.

"Susan, Ryan, come down!" their mother called from downstairs in the kitchen. "Supper's nearly ready and I need you to set the table!"

Still laughing, Susan released her brother. "We'll be down in a minute, Mom!" she yelled back as the twins lay on the floor for a minute, catching their breath from their laughter.

But all laughter died on her lips as Susan felt her mother's protection wrap around her, encasing her in its light. Ryan looked up as he felt it, too, and Susan looked towards her brother, fear rushing through her. What had happened to cause their mother to shield them from whatever dangers were there with them?

Without warning, Susan felt the protection break and she jumped to her feet, not wanting to consider the possibility of why the protection had broken. She knew the reason, but didn't want to think about it. She didn't want to believe it, not until she saw it.

"Susan, come back!" Ryan shouted as he raced after her. She stopped, because the moment he spoke, she saw her mother's dead body lying in the kitchen, a pool of blood forming around her and Susan felt faint. A man appeared in front of them and Susan shrank back. He had killed their mother, one of strongest people Susan knew. If he could kill Celandine Dawson, then she was as good as dead, too, and so was Ryan.

Susan felt Ryan grasp her arm and then she felt a familiar, yet odd sensation running through her body and let out a sigh of relief. Ryan was using his invisibility power to get them away from there. That was Ryan, always thinking on his feet. As they moved invisibly through the air, heading towards the door, Susan felt them hit a wall and she was flung back, visible, onto the floor, Ryan right next to her.

Shaking her head, Susan wanted to ask her brother what went wrong when she heard him scream. "Susan, move!" Before she could react, Susan felt Ryan push her sideways and as her head hit the wall, she blacked out.

She must've woken up at some point, because the next thing that she knew, she was being loaded up into an ambulance. There was a wrecked car nearby and a crowd of people swarming around her. And out of the crowd, she saw one that was very familiar.

Bobby Connelly had been there, watching her, always with that longing expression on his face, one that Susan had never been able to understand. Never been able to grasp, but now that she knew the truth about her family's death, she started to think about everything that she knew about him, about everything she'd learned about him since meeting him.

"I'm a friend and that's all you need to know right now," he replied, gesturing for them to follow him.

"Believe me, Brooke, you'd never believe me," he told her softly. "You would never believe the truth if I told you."

Parker stared at his cousin, slightly wounded. "I cannot believe you would say that she's out of my league," he complained. Chris let out an exclamation. "She's hot, Chris, what else is there?"

Bobby let out a groan. "Oh, I did not need to hear that!" he mumbled. Susan snorted, looking at him.

"No, I'm serious," Bobby said quietly. "If Aisling had managed to trap me there, then she would've told my dad about what I've done and then he would've had her kill me so he wouldn't have to do it himself. He couldn't care less about shedding his own blood."

"But—" Chris stared at the kid, shocked. "Your dad would kill you? How—how could he kill his own son?"

Something flickered behind Bobby's eyes for a minute and he glanced sideways at Susan. "It would not be the first time," he said quietly.

As she saw all the pieces of the puzzle, Susan suddenly understood what she should have known from the beginning. And maybe, somewhere in the back of her mind, she had. She just hadn't wanted to see it.

Bobby Connelly was her younger brother.

--Opening Credits--

Title Song: "Chariot" by Gavin Degraw

Drew Fuller as Chris Halliwell

Wes Ramsey as Wyatt Halliwell

Michelle Trachtenberg as Susan Dawson

Anne Hathaway as Brooke Murphy

Hayden Christensen as Brandon James

and Shawn Ashmore as Bobby Connelly