THERE IS NO MELINDA IN THIS FANFIC! I BASED THIS OFF OF WHAT I KNOW FROM THE TV SHOWS, NOT THE BOOKS! SO, IF YOU'RE LOOKING FOR PIPER'S DAUGHTER, READ THIS, REVIEW IT, THEN GO FIND HER SOMEWHERE!
Disclaimer: Charmed is not owned by me, although if I was a witch, I'd cast a spell to make it mine. Screw personal gain! I'll take the consequences!
"I call the last Reeses!" called 5 year old Chris Halliwell to his older brother, Wyatt, a few days after Halloween. Their candy supply was almost out, and they had to share, of all things.
"Not if I get to it first," Wyatt yelled back from his nearby bed. Chris knew what was coming next. He dashed down the stairs, going two steps at a time, just in time to see his brother, who had orbed there, grab the peanut buttery, chocolaty treat from the bag, and begin to unwrap it.
"Reeses!" Chris shouted with his hand held out, but it didn't budge.
"Sorry, Chris, not going to happen." Wyatt taunted. "It's not moving."
"B-b-but Wyatt!" Chris said, choking back the irrational tears that little kids oh so often get. "You know those are my favorites, you don't even like them for elder's sakes!"
Wyatt sighed. He knew that Chris knew that he was just picking on him, and he knew that the moment Chris's powers advanced, which was due any day now, he'd be in big trouble. But he also knew that he didn't want to make his little brother that upset. Chris got seriously emotional about his candy. It could be pretty frightening, actually. "Okay," he said. "You can have the candy."
Chris cheered up instantly. "Thank-you, thank-you, THANK YOU WYATT!" he shrieked, and jumped into Wyatt with a big hug in store.
Piper and Leo, watching from the other room chuckled and shook their heads. "Isn't it hard to believe that this is the same kid that saved the world, one neurotic statement at a time?" she asked her husband.
He was silent for a moment then simply said, "Nope," and the two of them burst out laughing.
Wyatt heard them laughing as he attempted to disconnect himself from the hug that Chris was giving him, and was curious. So, he orbed away from Chris (WYATT! Mmm, Reeses, the bestest candy in all of the dimensions!), and into the room his parents were in. "What's so funny? And what was that I heard about saving the world one neurotic statement at a time? And what does neurotic mean?" Wyatt asked, annoyed.
Piper and Leo exchanged a glance, one that held a thousand different words, before looking back at their clearly confused kindergartener. "Well, Wyatt," Leo began. "Neurotic means overly worried and uptight. You know, like how your mommy gets on a special occasion." His last statement earned a smack on the leg from Piper.
"And how your daddy gets when he's late for golfing with his friends." she retorted.
"Hey! They really care about being on time! And now that I can't orb-" he argued.
"Daddy could orb!" Wyatt gasped.
Piper sighed and gave Leo a look that clearly said, you are a total idiot. "Not for a very long time. I think you were about 2, no, one and a half. Chris was just a baby when he put his white lighter days even farther behind him."
"But why were you laughing? And who saved the world one stressed out statement at a time? And what does that have to do with Chris?" Wyatt asked, gaining more questions before even one was answered.
"Well," Piper explained, choosing her words carefully. "There's something special about Chris, something that makes him very special to the magical community. You know how we explained to you about your magical powers, and how someday they'll become more powerful than the power of three, and how that makes you a very special little boy?" she asked. Wyatt nodded his head, thinking back to the day his powers first advanced. "You see, Wyatt, we were all there when your little brother did something pretty amazing. But, I'm not going to tell you what he did quite yet," she finished.
"What?" Wyatt protested. "Why not?"
"We're not going to tell you now," Leo clarified, "because we don't think you're quite ready to hear the truth of it. Maybe when you're older."
"When will I be old enough then?" he asked, the child's young, innocent, soft blue eyes gazing into the older, but otherwise mirroring eyes of his father. The eyes that had watched his youngest son's fade into darkness at the hands of someone he once thought a friend. The eyes that had watched his son not only perish, but disappear forever, without a trace. Yet, those eyes also watched him grow up. Watched him live, laugh, and love everyone he came across. Watched him playfully bicker with his older brother, and are still watching his life unfold before him.
"13 years old should do it, right, Piper?" Leo asked after a moment.
She nodded. "13 should do just fine."
"I'll remember that," Wyatt said shockingly forcefully for a boy of a mere 6 years.
And so he did.
With each year that passed, Wyatt became more and more anxious, dying to know the secret. Chris had asked him what was up with him many times, but every time without fail, Wyatt simply ruffled his hair and said, "Mom and Dad will tell you someday, I'm sure of it." The thing about it that made Piper and Leo most proud though, was that he never once asked them again.
Before long, Wyatt's thirteenth birthday had come, and he had finally crossed off that final number. So, instead of leaping first to his presents, he looked to his parents. He had changed a lot in those 7 years. He'd grown, and in more ways than one. Sure, now he was a fairly tall child, and could now blow things up, but, more than that, his character had grown, and he was becoming quite the young man. Leo had guessed correct, by age 13, Wyatt was more than mature enough to hear the truth.
"Mom, Dad, I'm thirteen years old. You have to keep your promise," he said simply. "What did Chris do?"
Leo rocked awkwardly on the spot before saying, "I'm going to go check on Chris; I'll be back in a minute."
"Thanks a lot, honey!" Piper called sarcastically to Leo's retreating back, before turning to Wyatt. "Oh, sweetie, don't you think you should just wait a little while. You know, open your presents first?"
Wyatt shook his head. "No, I want to know, and I want to know now."
"Alright, well, fine then," she sighed. I've never asked for a demon attack before, but right now, one would be really helpful. Her wish was to no avail. "Alright, Wyatt. I should probably start at the beginning."
"You were only a few months old when we first met him. It was about 12 and ½ years ago, and we were battling the titans-"
"I remember learning about that in magical studies! It got pretty rough, didn't it?" Wyatt asked, dreadfully curious.
"Yes, yes it did, but please, don't interrupt. It's hard enough remembering these things, seeing as how the story ends... but we'll get to that later. Anyway, I wasn't present at the time, but according to Phoebe, Aunt Paige had been turned to stone by the female titan when Phoebe got knocked over by a young man who had just randomly orbed in, he was about 21, maybe 22, who then began to throw the potions she and Paige had left on the table before the attack. Once the dust had cleared, Paige was revealed, and she was completely made of stone.
"Phoebe asked the mysterious white lighter who he was, and he answered, "I'm Chris, Chris Perry. I'm-"
"Perry! That's Chris's middle name, isn't it? Why didn't he say Chris Halliwell? That is Chris isn't it? I'm confused!" he whined.
"Just listen or I swear I will not tell you anything more and you'll live your life wondering until we tell Chris and he tells you. You are getting a second-hand eyewitness account here! So, as I was saying, he said he was Chris Perry, and that he was a whitelighter from the future who had been told to come back in time and help us with the titans. Sure, he did help us, but he also created a royal mess in the process. You see, your father was a whitelighter at the time, and he was supposed to check with the Elders about something, and he didn't come back. It was hours before we turned on Chris, and he admitted that most of the Elders were killed, but not all of them, and that the only way to get your dad to do what he had to was to let the Elders die."
"But the Elders didn't die, they're still there!"
"I know, dear," Piper explained. "But please, listen to the rest of the story. Now, back to your little history lesson.
"Chris orbed up to the clouds and spoke to your father, and, well, I don't know how to explain it, so I'll just let you hear more eyewitness accounts. I think I should invite your aunts over now, I made them promise to come over and explain their points of view where we couldn't," she finished as Leo approached.
"I take it it's my turn then? So, where are we? Oh, yes. The death of the Elders." Leo said, looking at the floor for a moment before looking right into his son's eyes. "Well, buddy, Chris told me that the only way to save the lives of billions of innocents, magical creatures, and the remaining Elders was to unleash something that had been outlawed many millennia previously. The powers of the gods."
"Now, I assume you know about the Greek Gods, Zeus, Poseidon, Athena, Hestia?" Leo asked. When Wyatt nodded, he continued. "Well, they used to be mortal, but they were given abilities by the Elders, so that when the Titans came, they would be able to defeat them. Only the power consumed them, and they ended up declaring themselves as gods and gaining followers before the Elders ended their reign of terror.
"The only good thing they did with their powers was to imprison the titans in Arctic tombs, which took centuries of work from one particularly evil demon to break them out of. That's what Chris wanted me to do. He wanted me to give mortals the powers of the gods. So, I did. I gave them to three women whom I trusted with all of my heart."
"Mom, Aunt Paige, and Aunt Phoebe," Wyatt said with no question in his voice.
"Yes, you are correct. It was them. Phoebe became the goddess of love, Paige the goddess of war, and your mother," Leo stopped and smiled. "She became the goddess of earth and nature. Mother Nature had never been so beautiful. And, I used them, and many other creatures, to save the other Elders and bring them to a sanctuary. But, unfortunately, I was unable to leave Elderland, or whatever you want to call it. And somehow, in the midst of all this, I got promoted, and I became an Elder."
"You were an Elder? Eww..." Wyatt gasped, disgusted. "They're awful!"
"So, you are our son. Phew! I was worried we'd picked up the wrong kid from the nursery!" Leo joked.
"Dad!"
"Oh, alright, I'll continue. So, I became an Elder, and that meant I had to leave your mom, which was something I did not want to do. But I had no choice, so, once your mom and aunts had defeated the titans, which actually wasn't that difficult for them, and gave Chris the urn in which the sisters would dump their godly powers, I orbed up to Elderland, where I was supposed to stay."
"Unfortunately," Piper said, as she walked back into the room. "It wasn't as easy as that. You see, I blew a nutty, and inflicted an awful storm upon the city. Your aunts worked really hard to track me down and talk enough sense into me for me to know who I really wanted to inflict pain upon," she continued, nudging Leo playfully. "But that part has nothing to do with Chris, and it's his story we're telling."
"You're right; I think I went a little overboard. Ah, well. It's still important. Anyway, I came down to the world as we know it to give Chris Perry a message, and that was that he could not go back to his time, and that he was the girls' new white lighter. As I went to orb back, something, and I still say it was him, sent me spiraling towards Valhalla, but that's a story for another occasion. Anyway, I'd hated Chris for a while after I was rescued, and it took months for him to earn an ounce of my trust and, to be frank with you, I was a total jerk to him. I was much worse than I should have been, especially seeing who he turned out to be, and what happened to him... However, I don't think my point of view will be necessary for a while, so I'll go check on our little 11 year old Chris Halliwell."
"You do that," Piper replied, rolling her eyes. "So, Chris made for an excellent white-lighter, aside from one little thing. He couldn't heal anyone. He explained it as being too advanced for a newbie like him, and that the only reason Leo could do it was because he'd been at it longer."
"Untrue!" Leo called as he walked off.
"That husband of mine," she sighed. "Anyway, he pushed us at just about every demon in the book, literally, under the pretense that you were going to be attacked by a demon, but he didn't say when, why, who, or the outcome of the conflict. He just sent us out after demon after demon. It got pretty annoying, actually; he wouldn't leave us alone for five minutes." Piper complained. "And that's not even counting my dates! God!"
"Mom," Wyatt gasped, staring up at her wide-eyed. "You loved someone other than Dad?"
"Of course not, sweetie!" she replied, shocked. "I mean, yeah, I did, but I'll always love your father more than all the rest of them combined. He's the lucky one I chose, after all. But, when he went off to Elderland to, well, be an Elder, I tried to keep my life going by going out, having some fun. Of course, I didn't have any fun. Dear ole' Chrissy-Poo made sure of that, and I thank him entirely."
"Well, I still don't get it. What does this have to do with my little brother?" Wyatt asked, thoroughly confused.
"Umm, well, you see..." Piper began, not exactly sure how to get to the point. Luckily, for her, Paige chose just then to orb in, Phoebe in tow.
"Did I miss it? How far are you? Did he die yet?" Phoebe asked immediately.
"WHAT?" Wyatt shouted.
"Not very far apparently," Paige said quietly.
"Chris dies? How? When?" Wyatt begged, looking at each of them in turn.
"Did I say die? Well I meant... sigh! Yeah, that's what I meant," Phoebe corrected hastily, even though the damage had already been done. "Some of his excursions are definitely sigh-worthy!"
"Umm, okay," Wyatt said, accepting that excuse simply because he didn't like the alternative.
"Where are you at?"
"Umm, we're getting annoyed by Chris making us go after loads of demons all the time," Piper explained.
"Oh, yes. I remember that, stupid, little ass," Paige said under her breath.
"Watch your language around my son! Anyway, I think you two can continue," she grinned, walking off happily.
Paige took this moment to say, "I have to go to the bathroom, I'm sure you can do fine without me, Phoebes."
"Wha-? B-b-but, n-n-no!" Phoebe stutteringly protested. Wyatt just sat calmly in his chair and smiled up at her.
"Oh, alright. To sum it up, we found and saved your dad, he was horrible to Chris, and none of us lived happily ever after in the same room. Now, I liked Chris, I really did, and Leo was just being rude, and trying to find some way to bust him. Until of course, he saved our lives. Then Leo let go of it for a little while," Phoebe grimaced, "It wasn't very long before we found out a little more about the future than we had wanted to. Do you want to hear it from me, or someone else? We were all present."
"Uh, I haven't talked to Aunt Paige yet, and I haven't seen Dad in a while," Wyatt answered, grinning.
"Well, I'll go get your father in a minute, but first, I need a hug. Happy Birthday!" she exclaimed.
"Yeah, okay, just go get Dad." he said after the hasty hug.
"Wow," Phoebe gasped in faux shock. "I thought you loved me? Don't you love me?"
"Of course I love you, Aunt Phoebe, but I really want to hear the rest, so hurry!"
"Alright kiddo, I'll go get your dad," she said, brushing her hand against his hair lightly as she walked.
Wyatt sat and twiddled his thumbs while he waited, confused by what he'd learned. Was this man, Chris Perry, really his younger brother, and if not, what did he have to do with him? And what about what Phoebe said? Was it really just a slip of the tongue, or was she telling the truth? Would Chris Perry die?
Wyatt didn't contemplate long, because there was his father, walking solemnly down the stairs as he tried to figure out what to say, how to explain to his son what became of him in an alternate future.
"So, what part are we at?" Leo asked, just for stalling purposes.
"Something about learning more about the future than you wanted to," Wyatt replied, looking up at his father curiously.
Leo sighed. "Okay then, one day, your mom and aunts were at P3. They were just taking a break from their witch lives, having a few drinks. Then, Chris came and told them off. Said they should be concentrating on saving you from harm, because some demon was supposed to attack you in the future, although it didn't end up happening, clearly," Leo added quickly. "So, anyway, he walked into the back, and your mom went after him to talk him into chilling out for a minute or two. What she found didn't please her."
Piper chose then to make her comeback. "Hey, I just thought this might come in handy," she said, plopping the Book of Shadows down on the table. "And, I think I can take it for a little while."
Leo nodded, but didn't move. Things were beginning to get a little serious, and he wanted his son to be surrounded by family when this dreadful truth was revealed.
"Well, what I found was Chris, pinned against the wall with a woman's hand inside of his chest," Piper explained with a sad look on her face.
Wyatt gasped. "Was he okay?" he asked quickly. It seemed that whenever a person's hand was inside someone's chest, it was usually clutching their quickly fading heart.
Piper smiled slightly. "Yeah, he lived, seemingly without a scratch. He said he had no clue who she was, but we could all tell he was hiding something. I spotted a mark on her arm before I blew her into the next dimension, and this was it," she said, gesturing to the book.
"Phoenixes... Why does that sound familiar?" Wyatt asked curiously. "Wait... Isn't that ninth grade girl, Bianca, a Phoenix? You know, the one was helping out around Chris's class for extra credit? I remember him telling me about that after one of his fieldtrips from Magic School!"
Piper looked over at Leo confusedly. Leo smiled mysteriously and winked, settling himself back into the chair. "Well, long story short, your mom here, and your aunts, who can come out now," he added as first Phoebe peeked her head out from behind the wall, before being pushed out by a sheepishly following Paige. "They scryed for Phoenixes and found a mother and her four year old daughter living just across town."
"Yeah, that's when we found out that they can reform," Paige added.
Piper grimaced and looked over at Leo before finishing, "We had just gotten to telling your father about that new detail, when Chris orbed in, and collapsed on the floor mid-orb, before whispering a name. 'Bianca.' "
"Wait," Wyatt exclaimed, waving his arms in the air to get everyone to halt. "You mean to tell me, that after this Chris Perry dude, who happens to have said that he's only twenty years from the future, when he himself is only about twenty, and would put him at the same age as Chris or me, completely passes out only to whisper the name of the girl who helped out in Chris's class, who was, what did you say? 4? That's the amount of years older Bianca is than Chris! What is going on here?"
"We're almost there," Phoebe said, dropping her eyes a little. "We found out they were engaged, but he gave her up to come to our time and save you. And now someone wanted him back. She ended up casting a spell on the three of us which made us go run amok, which made your dad an easy target. She kidnapped Chris. By the time Leo had gone and hunted all of us down and reversed the spell, Bianca had finished what she was doing, and was about to take Chris through a time portal. And he was powerless to stop her. She had been trying to strip his powers, and she finally succeeded."
"Yep, and she got us in a sticky situation. In it, he revealed what he was," Paige said, rolling her eyes with an annoyed expression on her face. "'That's right, half-witch, half-whitelighter, just like you Paige!' sneaky little brat..."
"Well, yeah, so he turned out to be a half-witch half-whitelighter-" Piper continued, shooting daggers at Paige.
"Just like Chris!" Wyatt pointed out, having figured out the truth pretty clearly by then.
"Yeah, just like Chris," Piper muttered.
"Anyway, we ended up stowing a spell to help him out under that loose floor board upstairs, because he was taken to our future attic. That spell is still up there, accumulating dust," Phoebe explained. "We don't dare take it out, because then Chris would never have grabbed it, because it wasn't there, and the whole future would be all messed up. Long story, don't ask, biig headache."
"So, he came back, Bianca had been killed trying to save him, and he was a total mess,' Piper said soberly. "Of course, your aunts weren't here to help him through this because Phoebe moved to Hong Kong and Paige moved in on the other side of town. But that's a story for another day."
Suddenly, they heard a thump from upstairs. "I'm going to go check on Chris," Phoebe said, walking to the stairs.
"Me too!" Paige exclaimed, rejoicing quietly at her brilliant escape technique.
Leo took a deep breath and continued the story, getting to the part he had been dreading. "Chris pushed the girls and me even harder to keep you safe and destroy as many demons as possible. After a particularly gnarly battle about whether or not to bind your powers, he revealed why."
Wyatt stared up at them. "Well?" he urged. "What was going to happen to me? Did you stop it? Am I okay? Was I okay?"
Piper hurriedly said, "Oh, don't worry dear, we fixed it! What happened in Chris's future was changed, although you would have been perfectly... healthy, anyway. Physically, least. Mentally on the other hand, let's hope not."
"Then what was so bad that a guy left his fiancée to save me from?" Wyatt asked, confused.
Piper looked at Leo and said, "You get to say this. I've told him almost everything else."
Leo sighed and revealed the truth. "You turned evil in that future."
Wyatt gasped. "I was a- a- a- a- DEMON?" he shrieked.
Phoebe and Paige came running down. "Shh!" Phoebe complained. "Do you want Chris to wake up?"
Leo shot a sharp glance in her direction that informed her something had been said. "Ohh... I'm sorry! Is Iss-chray ead-day?" she asked quietly.
"No, Eebes-Phay. Yatt-way just found out he turns evil-ay, and isn't very appy-hay, so stop talking about my other on-say being ed-day!" Piper yelled.
"Oh! Yeah, that's not going to happen to you Wyatt! It would've, but we stopped it!" Phoebe exclaimed, running down. "Oh, you're upset, I can tell. I'm so sorry, sweetie."
"You're sorry?" Wyatt gasped. "I'm evil and you're apologizing?"
"WYATT MATTHEW HALLIWELL!" Piper shouted. "Listen to me, and you listen hard. You are not evil. You would have been evil if not for Chris, but the point is that you ARE NOT EVIL and you ARE NOT GOING TO BE EITHER!"
"Okay, I'm not evil! I get it!" Wyatt agreed quickly, slightly relieved. "Wait... if not for Chris? Does this mean that Chris Perry is my little brother?"
Phoebe smiled and sat next to him. "Aunt Phoebe's turn! I'll tell you the answer to that question! I figured it out all by myself... with the help of a vision, but mostly on my lonesome. It's yes, yes, and yes! Chris is Chris!"
"Wait, so I kill Chris's fiancée?" Wyatt exclaimed in astonishment.
Phoebe's grin slipped instantly from her face. "Well, you would have were it not for future Chris's brilliant plan. Anyway, back to the story. Chris and I had a dilemma on our hands. You see, once I asked him if I had guessed correctly on his true identity, he revealed a lovely little secret. He needed to be conceived. I'm sure you know what that entails, 'cause I really don't want to explain myself."
Wyatt nodded and made a face. He had learned about 'it' months ago, and he knew the general gist of it. Two people who love each other very much do an action together that can sometimes produce a baby. That's all he knew, that's all he wanted to know.
"Okay, good. Anyway, if he wasn't conceived that month, he disappears in a puff of smoke- poof! And what's more, he didn't want to tell your parents either."
"That's kinda stupid," Wyatt admitted, raising his eyebrow. "I mean, if you want to be conceived your parents kind of have to do you know what. So, if they're d-d-divorced at the time, they probably wouldn't be, you know, doing it."
Piper cleared her throat, "Anyway, I had no clue any of this was going on while Phoebe, Chris, and eventually Paige figured out their little planning thing. So, I was totally clueless, although I could tell that he was acting a little off. He kept giving me and Leo strange looks, and Paige was dropping bad hints left and right. Phoebe was just being... Phoebe."
"Hey!"
Piper ignored her and continued, "Yeah, I remember when they told me I was pregnant. I thought one of them had gotten knocked-up or something. What a shocker!"
"So, how did it happen?" Wyatt asked. "I mean, you two weren't together, and Chris didn't tell you, did he?"
"No, actually," Leo spoke up. "It happened on its own. We had been cast into the spirit realm, and I had been shot with a dark lighter arrow. Dying stinks, Wyatt, but it can bring two people together."
Wyatt gaped. "Really? You guys 'did the deed' because Dad got shot? You're joking. You people are so weird!"
Piper blushed. "We had a deep epiphany moment! And that's beside the point! Chris was conceived. Problem numero uno: done."
"Now we just had to get him to look her in the eye," Paige inserted.
"Oh boy," Wyatt moaned exasperatedly. Phoebe nodded vigorously.
A/N: This is one of my worst fanfictions, in my opinion. So, if you aren't completely braindead from reading this crap that I am loathe to call my own, please review and tell me just how AWFUL it is...