In Love and War

by Lady Dawson

Chapter Seven: Saving Chris

"Chris!" Jaina shouted, running to her best friend, who was lying on the floor, his face scrunched up in pain.

"Bianca . . ." he gasped, his head laying in Jaina's lap. Leo knelt down beside him, concern marked into his face as he held his hands over Chris's chest, trying to heal him.

"Why isn't it working?" Jaina demanded as Chris remained as he was, unconscious in her arms and muttering incoherent words. Leo didn't answer as he opened Chris's shirt, revealing an ugly and deathly looking wound. "Oh, my—"

"Go get the sisters," Leo ordered her as he hauled Chris into his arms and orbing him downstairs.

Jaina wasted no time in orbing out to retrieve the sisters. Whether they liked it or not, they were needed for Charmed duties. "Paige?" she asked as she materialised before the youngest. It took her a minute for her eyes to adjust the sudden darkness.

She heard the sound of kissing before she realised what was going on. "Oh, for the love of toads!" she muttered, covering her eyes as Paige let out a shriek, seeing Jaina there.

"What are you doing here?" she demanded. "You know, a simple phone call would do nicely, thank you!"

"Leo sent me to come find you," Jaina said with her eyes still covered. She really didn't want to see any more than she already had. "Chris got attacked and there's something wrong with him and Leo can't heal him and I'm freaking out and—"

Paige, sensing that she was already under enough stress as it was, waved her explanation aside. "Go get Piper, I'll get Phoebe and meet you back at the manor," she told the witch-Whitelighter.

Grateful, Jaina nodded. "Sure, no problem," she said with an uneasy laugh, keeping her eyes shut. "Nice meeting you . . . Richard, isn't it?" She hoped that she got Paige's boyfriend's name right.

"Yeah," the man said. He was laughing just as nervously. "Nice to meet you too."

"Okay, good," Jaina said, preparing to orb. "Bye." Without another word, she disappeared into a series of white orbs, focusing on Piper. She materialised outside an apartment, not wanting a repeat of what she'd seen with Paige.

"Piper?" she called, knocking on the door. "Piper, it's Jaina! We've got problems back at the manor, can you please open the door now?" There was no sound of movement inside so she knocked harder. "Piper, please open the door! Chris is in trouble!" She said this out of desperation that the door would open.

Thankfully, it did. Piper came out, looking harassed as she looked at the future girl. "What is going on?" she demanded, closing the door behind her. "What has Chris gotten himself into this time?"

"It's Bianca, the phoenix who's after him," she explained hastily. "She attacked him and we need all three of you guys, like now. And Leo can't heal him, either, so we need to figure out something to do and fast."

Piper let out a deep sigh, rubbing her temples. "This is getting ridiculous," she grumbled. "All right, fine, give me . . . five minutes so I can come up with a good explanation. 'Cause the 'family emergency' one is getting a little old."

Jaina rolled her eyes as Piper went back into the apartment and began to pace back and forth, waiting impatiently for the eldest Charmed One. When she finally came back out, Jaina orbed them both back to the manor.

Paige and Phoebe had already arrived and were talking with Leo. " . . . is draining his powers and blocking mine," he was saying to them. "It's like a virus."

"A virus named Bianca," Jaina responded as she entered the room, followed by Piper. "She's the only one who could've done this to him."

"But why would she come back from the future to kill him, though?" Paige wanted to know. Obviously Leo had given them the updates. "It doesn't make any sense."

"Well, phoenixes are hired guns, aren't they?" Piper replied as she looked worriedly at Chris. "Someone had to have sent her. The question is, who?" She directed this question towards Jaina, who kept her mouth shut. "Come on, Jaina, who sent her?"

Jaina only looked at the woman who would be her foster mother in the future. "Trust me, Piper," she said warily. "You wouldn't believe the truth even if I told you."

Before Piper could respond to this, Jaina walked over to the couch and knelt down beside her best friend, stroking his hair gently, which was soggy, probably due to the fact that he was sweating so bad. Don't you dare do this to me, Christopher, she thought, tears starting to blind her vision. Don't you make me go through losing another person that I care about. First Piper, Paige, and Phoebe, and then Prue and Penny, not even two years later. Then losing Patty to insanity and Sam and Henry leaving with your uncle for safety. I cannot—I will not—lose you too. I won't survive it.

She felt someone touch her shoulder and looked up, seeing Phoebe looking at her. "It's okay, honey," she said gently, sitting down beside her in an effort to comfort her. "He's gonna be okay."

Jaina only shook her head. "I wish that I was as sure as you were, Phoebes," she said quietly. She took her hand into Chris's, feeling something slip between his fingers as she did so.

Whatever it was dropped with a clink onto the floor next to her and Phoebe. Jaina reached for it, but the Charmed One beat her to it. "What is that?" Paige wanted to know, stepping closer. But Jaina already knew what it was.

"Engagement ring," Phoebe said, holding it up for them to see. She looked expectantly at Jaina, as though she were waiting for her to say something.

But the witch-Whitelighter shook her head quietly. "It's not mine," she said quietly. If ever was the time to tell them, this would be it. She took a deep breath. "It's Bianca's. She's Chris's fiancée."

"Wait, the same person who is trying to kill him is also the person that he's going to marry?" Paige asked incredulously. "You have got to be kidding me."

"Wish that I was," Jaina replied with a sigh, pushing a hand through her red hair. Her blue gaze rested on her best friend. "And I don't think that she's trying to kill him, just take him back. That must've been what she was doing when Piper and I interrupted her, draining his powers. It'll make him vulnerable, unable to do anything to stop her from taking him back home. Not to mentioned, he won't be able to put up much of a fight against W—this guy in the future who's after him."

"So this guy in the future wants him dead?" Piper wanted to know. None of them had noticed her near-slip of the tongue.

"Have him killed, have him join him," Jaina said, shrugging her shoulders. "I really don't think that it matters to him one way or the other, so long as Chris doesn't change the past and save Wyatt."

"Well, at least we have something to scry for her now," Piper said, reaching for the ring. Phoebe handed it to her. "Leo, you keep an eye on Chris. Phoebe, you help me with the scrying. Paige and Jaina, you two work on a vanquishing potion in case she's not in the mood to help."

Jaina sighed and kissed Chris on the forehead. "I'll be back, buddy," she whispered in his ear. She wasn't sure if he heard her or not, but he seemed to relax a little when he heard her voice. And that was enough for her.

"I'll call you if something happens," Leo said gently to her. Jaina nodded, smiling at him gratefully as she walked into the kitchen with Paige, getting to work on the vanquishing potion.

Paige gathered the ingredients while Jaina stirred, keeping her eyes on the potion as she added the ingredients. "Mandrake root," she said and Paige added it, making the potion turn a bright pink colour. "All right, then it should be just about done."

"You really know your stuff, don't you?" Paige asked, impressed. She had met few witches who were this good at making potions as this girl was. It probably had something to do with the fact that she was from the future, though.

Jaina, however, grinned at her. "Course I do," she said as she added some rosemary herbs. "Who couldn't be, when they had a Charmed One teaching them everything they knew?"

"Wait, the three of us taught you how to make potions?" Paige asked interestedly.

"Well, you did," Jaina admitted, wondering how much to tell her. "You taught potion making at Magic School and I attended there." It was close enough to the truth; she had, in fact, learned how to make potions from both Paige and Piper, but she hadn't attended Magic School until after the sisters had died. After the Event, Chris, Jaina, and Chris's cousins had been shipped off to Magic School and Wyatt had spun further and further out of control.

"I'm a teacher in the future?" Paige asked. "And Magic School? You mean, like Hogwarts?"

Jaina laughed. "Yeah, sort of," she agreed. "Well, we're just about done here. Are the vials still in the left cabinet?"

"I got them," Paige answered, heading over to the cabinet and grabbing four vials, one for each of the witches. "You know, I still find it hard to believe that you and Chris are best friends. No offence."

"None taken, but why do you say that?" Jaina wanted to know as she filled the vials that Paige had handed her. The potion had turned a dark, murky colour.

"Well, Chris rarely tells us anything about the future and never tells us anything about himself," Paige explained. "I swear, we don't know any more about that boy than when he first orbed into the attic when the Titans attacked."

Letting out a sigh, Jaina blew her bangs out of her face. "Yeah, I probably shouldn't be saying so much," she muttered. Chris was more than likely going to give her an earful when he found out just how much she had revealed to the sisters. She looked towards the dining room. "Hey, did you guys find Bianca yet?"

She picked up the vials and headed into the dining room, where Phoebe and Piper were standing over the map. "Yeah, she's at an apartment complex over on Fifth," Phoebe answered.

"Little Bianca?" Jaina asked, glancing towards where the crystal was laying at. "'Cause that's where Lynn, Bianca's mom, lives at. At least she did when Bianca was a kid." Even though she hated Bianca, she knew that much about her.

"No, the one that we want," Piper said firmly, heading back into the living room and handing the ring back to Leo. "Here. Here's something for Chris to remember her by. Or not."

"Right, so as soon as we orb over there, I'm gonna—" Paige was cut off when something murky blue spilled over all three of the sisters. Leo's back was turned, so he didn't see it, but Jaina did.

"Oh, boy!" she muttered.

"You're gonna what?" Leo wanted to know, still not facing the sisters. His gaze was on Chris.

"I'm gonna move into Richard's house," Paige said in a cheerful voice. Jaina's eyes went wide as she gawked at them. They were obviously under some kind of spell. This can't be happening, she thought, on the borderline of panic. This cannot be happening.

"Are you?" Piper said just as cheerfully, looking towards her youngest sister. Leo had finally turned around, horrified. "Good for you."

"Yeah, and I think I'm gonna go check out what's happening in Hong Kong," Phoebe said, grinning wildly.

"Are you three out of your freaking minds!" Jaina shrieked. "What about Chris and Bianca? And, oh, I don't know, saving your son and nephew from some impeding doom that is going to happen to him? You have to fight this spell!"

Phoebe only looked at her in mock dismay. "How can you fight your heart?" she wanted to know.

"Or your hormones?" Piper added.

"Hey, will you drop me off on the way to Richard's?" Phoebe asked Paige, who nodded.

"Yeah, I'd love to," she said, taking her sister's hand.

"Hang on, you two, Jaina's right!" Leo protested, trying to stop them. "You listen to me!"

However, Phoebe only said something in Chinese and she and Paige orbed out. Piper gave the two Whitelighters a 'so there' nod and walked off, leaving them to deal with the mess.