Summary: What if Chris had decided on a different approach to deal with the sisters? The seventeen year old witchlighter crosses into the past, posing as an orphaned witch in order to save his future, and everyone in it. How will he cope, seeing his dead family alive again? Will they trust him? Will he live to see the better future he dreams of making? [Season 6 AU]
It was pitch black outside. Enough so that you could hardly see the destruction and buildings that have long since collapsed into rubble. Enough so that if the young boy concentrated hard enough, he could almost imagine the street he had grown up in, everything peaceful. It was saddening, though only made him realize more the necessity of his mission.
The older woman in front of him glanced back to make sure he was in good condition before gesturing for him to follow. He still didn't see the point of having a bodyguard. Everyone knew that he could take care of himself if they were caught.
"Keep up Chris…" she murmured strictly, causing him to quicken his pace as they crept towards his childhood home, now turned into a museum. The thought sickened him.
"I am, Bianca." Chris said, placing emphasis on his companion's name, "But we can't be too careful. We can't afford to fail." He added his stance on the subject, his neurotic tendencies to slip through the cold shield he had been using as a mask for the past few years.
Bianca rolled her eyes, stifling a soft chuckle at the boy's likeness of his mother, though she would never say so aloud. Not unless she wanted to go slamming into the nearest pile of destroyed concrete…again. The mere mention of the late, great, Piper Halliwell was enough to cause Chris to whip into a frenzy. "Relax. We'll be able to slip into the next tour group, then wait in the basement until the museum closes." Bianca soothed him with a recount of their plan.
This plan was a last ditch effort. Everyone knew that. He had been ruling over the Underworld and the mortal world for two years now, and there was no hope for anyone. The resistance they had been building up has been dwindling as of late, the members executed or worse; sent to the camps and dungeons of the Underworld. Chris himself had been a resident of the dungeons for six months before he escaped three weeks ago, and the seventeen year old boy still refused of speak one word about his time there.
It was as if the world was tearing apart at the seams, and nothing and nobody was willing to keep it together. Everyone had just given up hope that life would ever get back to normal. Families had been separated, cities destroyed, neighborhoods flooded. Disaster struck at every end of the Earth. Luckily for her, Bianca had never been close to her mother, and never knew her very well. Chris had it worse. His mother's death started it all. Her aunts died a few months after, and the family had been crumbling ever since.
P.J was the first to go, caught by a witch hunter.
Henry was deemed useless by Wyatt during the first months of his reign, and was killed by a horde of demons.
Wyatt murdered the twins in cold blood after they tried to seek revenge, laughing as Tamora tried to wake up the bloodsoaked Kat before stabbing her as well.
Darryl Jr was hanged for crimes against the Emperor, much to the distraught of his mother and father.
Victor died of cancer when Chris was almost sixteen.
Penny was burned at the stake.
Parker and Melinda aren't spoken of, due to their defection to Wyatt's side, causing Chris to be truly alone, except for his godparents, Darryl and Sheila Morris, who had miraculously survived. Them and Bianca, the rebel demon who had defected to the side of good. Together, the quartet had started The Resistance, which was slowly growing from a minor disturbance to a total thorn in Wyatt's side.
His father was never really in the picture, except the occasional letter.
"We're here." he whispered, eyes mournful at the sight of The Halliwell Memorial Museum.
"The next tour starts in an hour, at the crack of dawn,, so we should be able to make that." Bianca declared, taking her seat on a piece of rubble. Chris soon followed suit. "Go over the plan one more time." she said calmly, having no problem ordering around the young boy who had grown up way too quickly in their hellish world.
He took a deep breath, before murmuring the plan that he had gone over several times since it had been created a few weeks ago. Long enough for them to plan and prepare. "My name is Perry, an orphaned witch that comes across the Charmed Ones, needing their help." He started the story, not quite specifying the details. "I'll appear in the past not long after the titan attack, which should give me plenty of time to gain their trust.
"And?"
Chris smirked at her in amusement,"I'm not related to them in any way." He chuckled, as if she even needed to remind him. Nobody could find out who he was, or it would lead to disaster. Imagine finding out that some random kid was your future son or nephew, that hadn't even been conceived yet. Talk about performance anxiety.
The original plan had been for Chris to glamour himself a few years older to help give him a more authority figure, and he would act as their whitelighter from the future. It had been scrapped fairly quickly due to major holes in the cover story.
"I think you're ready." Bianca nodded in approval, ruffling his hair affectionately. The two had grown close over the past three years. It helped having something in common: evil family members.
"I could've told you that." Chris snorted, his laughter dying out as he spotted a probe. "Watch out!" he hissed, using his skilled telekinesis to push the probe into the nearest wall before it could scan either of them. Almost immediately, he gripped Bianca's shoulders in worry. "Are you okay?"
"Yes, I think so." Bianca decided, still shaken from the close call, "I don't think it had time to broadcast."
Chris visibly relaxed, "We should start moving anyways, just in case. We don't want to have a run-in with a demon."
Bianca nodded, showing she agreed. They both stood up, just as the large clock tower, the only way to figure out what time of day it was, and the only building standing, since Wyatt had erected it after the destruction of everything else, tolled twelve times. "We're late." she breathed.
Immediately they began running, hopping over the rubble as Chris breathlessly built up their necessary glamours since almost everyone knew who they were. Soon, Chris was a middle-aged man with slight scruff hanging around his chin, and Bianca was a pregnant woman, probably three months in. They were up just in time, as they spotted the group about to enter the manor. Easily, they integrated into the back of the group. Chris managed to turn the probes inside around so they weren't detected.
The pair lingered in the back, hardly paying attention to the tour guides' voice. Chris knew everything about the charmed ones. He knew this house like the back of his hand, and knew their history better than anyone he knew. Upon reaching the kitchen, Bianca and Chris seemed to just disappear, waiting in the kitchen silently. A burly gruff demon seemed to be keeping guard, as there were demons stationed all over the house.
Chris smirked, knowing what came next. Then he heard a swift plunge of an athame into the demon and a quick roar of fire and it was all over. "Let's go." he decided, following her down into the basement. "Scares the hell out of me every time you do that." Chris commenter loosely.
"I'm still a demon!" Bianca told him, almost in a singsong voice, causing Chris to chuckle softly.
"Yeah, I know. I guess it just doesn't seem like it at times." Chris shrugged in thought. "You're more human. Than the others. More human than even him..." He sighed, refusing to say his brother's name, yet still managing to say the pronoun with disdain.
"Well duh." the young woman smirked fondly at the boy in front of her, "That's part of my charm, you know."
This caused Chris to smile. A real smile, soft and gentle and happy. Sitting down on the staircase, he looked up at Bianca, "So, what should we do while we wait?" Chris asked, already bored out of his mind.
Bianca sighed, knowing just how far the extent of his impatientness reached. "Cards." She answered simply, pulling a deck of playing cards from a pocket of her leather pants, where she usually kept a spare athame.
Chris tilted his head, debating his options for a moment before motioning for Bianca to sit down in front of him. "Alright." He decided, "We should play-"
"Go Fish." Bianca immediately butted in, naming the game that Chris had been about to choose. After he gave her an incredulous look, as if she surprised him by knowing this small detail. In answer, she shrugged, "Oh please, Chris. Don't give me that look. You have to remember that I know you far better than anyone else does. I have to, since we only have each other's company." She reminded him in a sing-song voice.
Chris sighed, rolling his eyes at her words, "Fine, but you get to deal."
-CHARMED-
Silence fell across the house, Bianca and Chris each sitting in their respective corners of the basement, taking turns dozing off. At least, until Chris took a few tentative steps towards Bianca. "Hey, Bi, wake up." He murmured, deciding that the tours must have been done for the day, which would explain why the manor was so quiet. "Bi!" he added a little louder, shaking her shoulder lightly. That proved to be a mistake, as Bianca shot up instantly at his touch, and athame clutched in a tight grip, ready to plunge it into his chest.
However, Chris knew Bianca and her moves, and easily leapt out of the way of the athame. "God, Chris. You know you aren't supposed to sneak up on me!" Bianca scolded, panting and wide-eyed, yet still managing to come off calm.
He shrugged, "Call it payback for the last week." He simply replied, gesturing for her to follow him up the stairs. At his words, Bianca glared daggers at his back.
"You know that wasn't my fault." She hissed, careful to tread lightly while still keeping up her end of the playful bantering. "How was I supposed to know that you were in the middle of something?
'Something', being Chris completely naked as he took a well-deserved wash in a stream on the outskirts of Valhalla, where the resistance had set up shop. Bianca had come barging through the trees, ranting about how dumb mortals were, and the next thing they knew, both were bright red and turned away from each other in attempt to hide their embarrassment.
Chris motioned for silence, his entire body tensing as a creak resonated through the manor. Of course they had forgotten the sentries, who guarded the museum all night and all day. Peering around the corner, they spotted two or three hulking brutes, one in front of the stairs, one in the former conservatory, and one just in front of the attic door. One wrong move could alert each and every one to their presence, which in turn would cause them to summon Wyatt.
They split up. Chris headed for the conservatory, creeping towards the demon silently. Then, the floorboard beneath him let out a soft whine of protest..damn. Immediately, Chris stabbed his own athame into the demon's gut, smirking in satisfaction as it doubled over before vanishing into flames. When he reached the stairs, he found that Bianca had made quick work of the other two. Giving her a half smile, they ascended the stairs.
When the two entered the familiar attic, Chris almost winced at the memories from this very room. A scorch mark on the wooden flooring where he had vanquished his first demon, a scent of herbs and potions that hadn't quite left the room, and if he closed his eyes, he could remember the day of innocence and joy.
-CHARMED-
"Wyatt! Hurry up, we're going to be late for school!" An eleven year old Chris moaned, nudging his brother, who was making a vanquishing potion, dropping the last few herbs into the bubbling orange liquid. The demon was Yora, a lower-level demon, yet he still had the guts to come after the Halliwell progeny. Wyatt insisted that the demon needed to be vanquished before school so nobody else got hurt, but Chris was getting anxious.
"Just one more minute, little brother." Wyatt murmured, concentrating on stirring the deadly concoction. "You summon him, and then we'll go to school." Wyatt decided in a classic big brother manner, corking the potion efficiently, only spilling a small amount on the table.
"Fine, but once he's good and gone, we have to orb to school afterwards if we plan on making it in time." Chris compromised, crossing his arms stubbornly.
"Chris! You know Mom doesn't like us using our powers where we could get caught!" Wyatt argued, though Chris was already preparing his backup argument.
"She doesn't want us to get another tardy either!" Chris reminded, smirking as he saw his brother's will begin to bend to his liking.
"Fine!" Wyatt huffed, and Chris gladly went over to write a summoning spell. he had always been the better spell-writer of the two, even at this age.
In just a minute, Chris was done, holding out the piece of parchment for his brother to see. Upon reading it over, Wyatt nodded in approval. "Let's get this over with, Chrisse." He declared, ruffling Chris's hair affectionately.
"Wyatt!" He groaned, combing his fingers through his hair as his brother placed the crystals in a circle to trap the demon.
Together, they held hands, and began reading the spell.
"Winds roar and the earth rumbles,
Save us from this pestering trouble,
Summon Yora, the one we seek,
So he doesn't make our future's bleak."
In a swirl of magic, a hulking figure appeared, a sneer lacing his features." The Halliwell sons." He chuckled, though it soon died in his throat as Wyatt threw the potion at him, and he subsequently exploded, goopy guts flying across the attic.
"Wy?" Chris muttered, wiping the goop from his eyes and flicking a strand from his hair.
"Yeah?" Wyatt asked, breathless from the experience, panting hard, yet trying his best not to inhale the pungent smell of demon guts. Each sibling was equally coated with the disgusting green goop.
"I'm gonna kill you." Chris replied softly, looking at Wyatt with deadly calm eyes. His brother's eyes widened a bit, but in two seconds flat, both were giggling like idiots, gasping for air between laughter.
Neither of them went to school that day. 'Family emergency' they said, with Mom and the Aunts to back them up for the claim. None of the teachers tried to argue. Everybody had simply learned not to question the Halliwell's antics.
-CHARMED-
He shook his head, before he finally leapt into action, bustling over to the holographic book on the pedestal. "Start drawing." He ordered calmly. When they summoned the book, they'd have a minute, tops, before Wyatt realized what had happened. Bianca pulled the white chalk off a nearby shelf and began to draw a triquetra on the paneling. Chris waited, mentally preparing himself for what happened next.
Bianca turned around, hand on her hip, "Done." She spoke aloud, smirking at him at the thought of the plan actually succeeding. "Summon the book."
Chris nodded, taking a shakey breath before speaking the words.
"I call upon the ancient power,
To help us in this darkest hour,
Let the Book return to this place,
Claim refuge in its rightful space."
The book shimmered slightly, solidifying before his eyes. The spell worked. The spell really worked. Chris only stayed stunned for a moment before greedily soaking up every word as he flipped through the pages. "No...no...no...found it!" He declared, memorizing the spell quickly. Without wasting another precious second, he walked towards the large rendition of his family symbol, speaking while he walked.
"Hear these words, hear the rhyme,
Heed the hope within my mind,
Send me back to where I'll find,
What I wish in place in time"
The symbol became a portal, the wall vanishing into a swirl of blue and purple lights, dancing inside the door to the past. Just as he was about to step through, he felt a touch on his shoulder. "Bianca?" He asked, turning around, to be greeted by the young woman kissing him passionately, his hands coming around to hold her against him, while her fingers tangled in his hair. For a second, he forgot his troubles and forgot the world around him.
She stiffened, causing him to mimic her reaction as they turned to look at a demon, glaring at them as he shimmered in. "Come back to me…" She whispered softly, before pushing Chris backwards into the portal. He felt his body being lifted, swallowed by the magic, watching as the portal closed up.
In the attic, Bianca glared daggers at the demon, conjuring a fireball in her hand and throwing it at him. He was immediately vanquished. Now alone, Bianca turned to stare at the wall, touching her lips lightly. "Been wanting to do that for a long time." She murmured, before taking a running leap and crashing through the attic window. They already knew she was here, might as well make a show. The assassin took off running, before disappearing in a swirl of light, the borrowed valkyrie's pendant around her neck gleaming, before the street was completely quiet.
A/N: Hello darlings. If you made it this far, I congratulate you. This is the first chapter in the story, and I hope it'll be fairly long, though I'm not sure. I'm just trying to work out the kinks in my writing. Questions, suggestions, and all of the above are welcomed. Love ya!