A/N: Originally I wasn't going to flip back to the waking world for a while, but some of you said you wanted to know what was going on there, so I've added in a little scene - hope it fits the bill!
Part 9: Lucid Dreamer
"Leo, the bleeding's getting worse again," Phoebe said, her voice rising with anxiety.
"Try again," Piper urged.
"Piper, I've already –"
"Just do it."
Leo moved over to the bed and held his hands above Chris's abdomen. The golden light shone down, but the wound and the blood remained. Just like all the other times he'd tried.
He sighed, resignedly. "It's no good. Something's still blocking me."
"Someone you mean," Paige corrected, dryly.
"The Nightmare demon," Phoebe voiced.
Paige nodded grimly.
Leo looked over at Piper, who was staring down at the unconscious young man. She was pale and nervy, twisting her hands together. He didn't think he'd ever seen her look so guilty and worried at the same time.
"I'm sorry, Piper. There's nothing I can do," he apologised. "He's on his own."
Piper turned away. She went over to the cot and looked down at her sleeping son. Reaching down to stroke his fair hair, Piper smiled gently. He was sleeping deeply.
The sky was a sickly yellow with deep red streaks that trailed from the falling sun like blood. Crimson light bathed the peak of the hill and the young child there, but night was fast encroaching on the steep hillside, hiding the crumbling ruins of old, ill-kept gravestones in shadow.
Chris was wheezing as he staggered up between the numerous headstones, stumbling over the unseen rubble, a hand clasped against the desperate burning in his belly.
Finally, he reached the summit. He swayed precariously for a moment, like a drunk. Before collapsing at the feet of his infant brother.
"Wyatt…" Chris stretched a hand towards the child, who was stood up and staring out across the fabricated expanse. The little boy looked down at him, and his lower lip pushed out in childish distress.
"It's ok," Chris slurred, fighting to stop himself from passing out. He knew this was no idle fabrication of the Nightmare demon's magic. His own whitelighter powers were astutely tuned to sense his brother. This was really him. The boy's mind was in the nightmarish plane, same as his. The Nightmare demon had Wyatt in his grasp.
Behind Wyatt the air distorted, as the malevolent demon shimmered in.
Chris scrabbled in the dirt to drag himself between his brother and their captor.
The Nightmare demon brushed an imaginary speck of lint from his immaculate frock coat, before regarding Chris with a companionable expression.
"How's the poorly tummy?" the demon asked, brightly. "I expect you've torn all the stitches out by now, what with all this running and falling about."
Chris said nothing.
"No doubt you've got internal bleeding. And also, you really ought to be considering the very serious likelihood of herniation. I hope you've got that bandage tied nice and tight." The demon crinkled his nose in distaste. "I don't really want your guts spewing out all over my pretty dreamscape."
Chris's response was silence once more.
The demon waited, tapping his patent leather shoe and staring at Chris expectantly.
With an impatient sigh, the Nightmare demon broke the quiet. "This is ridiculous," he muttered. "I'm going to have to provide a tumbleweed to pass by in a minute." He sighed again. "Well?" He gave an enthused gesture towards the young child. "Well, aren't you going to introduce me?"
"You know who he is," Chris deadpanned.
"Yes, I know who he is," the demon replied, impatiently. "I also know what he is. However, what I don't know is who he is to you."
"I won't let you harm him."
The Nightmare demon folded his arms. "Now, see, that's exactly what I'm talking about." He tilted his head knowingly. "Such self-sacrifice speaks to me not of angry vengeance, but tenderness. Tenderness towards the boy."
"He's an innocent child."
"No, he's the son of a Charmed One and a whitelighter, who will grow up into the most powerful being in the world, and one day he will kill your fiancée, or so you tell me."
"Not if I protect him."
"Protect him? Protect him? Those aren't the words of a vengeful fiancé," the demon jeered.
"He hasn't done anything yet. He's just a child."
"If you really were a vengeful fiancé, you would kill him."
"I am," Chris replied, darkly. "And maybe I will."
The demon laughed. "Don't be ridiculous! If you were seriously considering killing him, you wouldn't be standing – or rather, kneeling in a most wobbly fashion – between him and me."
"I didn't say I was considering letting anyone else kill him."
"What are you? Some sort of dithering Hamlet?" the demon cried. "You want the glory of the kill for your own sweet revenge, but you're going to take your time over deciding whether or not he deserves it?"
"No, I know he doesn't deserve it," Chris replied, calmly. "He was turned by evil. I'm here to stop that happening."
"Yes, turned, I know… It's an interesting detail…" The Nightmare demon smiled, darkly and knowingly.
Chris swallowed nervously. Oh God, is he really the one? The thought made him feel hollow.
He glanced over his shoulder at Wyatt, who stared back at him.
Turning again to the Nightmare demon, Chris took a shaky breath.
"Let him go," he ordered.
"What?" The demon looked at him blankly. Then he frowned. "Don't you take that demanding tone with me, my boy. Remember who is the captor and who are the captives here."
"I've already told you I won't let you harm him," Chris said, getting unsteadily to his feet. "So you might as well let him go."
"But Wyatt and I haven't got to know each other yet!" the demon replied, cheerily, stepping towards the child.
Suddenly the little boy was immersed in a blue bubble, barring the demon's approach.
"Woah!" The demon lithely skipped back a step, well clear of the magical energy. "Nice shield!" He shifted his gaze to Chris. "Now why can't you do that, then?" The demon laughed. "The innocent babe is more powerful than his noble protector!"
Chris stood next to Wyatt, looking through the blue bubble at his young brother, who was watching them unconcerned behind his shield, protection he didn't widen to encompass his 'noble protector'. With a longsuffering sigh, Chris let go of his wound, so he faced the Nightmare demon with two free hands.
"I wonder how much that shield can hold up against…" the Nightmare demon mused.
"A lot," Chris said, bluntly.
"No doubt. Yet, no shield is impenetrable…"
"He's twice-blessed."
"Yes, but he is still a child – not yet the most powerful being in the world. Otherwise he wouldn't need you, Lord Protector." The Nightmare demon's upper lip curled into an ugly sneer.
"True. But you're up against him and me."
"Oh, please!" The demon glanced at the child encased in a shield, while the elder witch/whitelighter stood alone. Then he focused meaningfully on Chris's bloodstained stomach.
Chris gritted his teeth, trying to find strength he didn't have.
"This charade is growing tiresome. I think it's time I spiced things up." The demon grinned and rubbed his hands in anticipation. "It's time things got hot."
The familiar sense of dread sunk like an iron weight inside Chris. He glanced at Wyatt, who was now sitting down within his protective bubble and looking up at him with expectant, wide, blue eyes.
A double clap of the demon's hands brought Chris's head snapping up, his eyes scanning their surroundings for the new threat.
Across the plateau that formed the top of the hill, a ghost-white tree had appeared, drenched with dark-red from the slowly setting sun. The Nightmare demon was comfortably balanced in its bare branches, examining his manicured nails.
A dark shape emerged from behind the dead tree. The figure cracked its neck and shifted its crossbow, as it stepped forward into the open.
"Another Darklighter?" Chris frowned in contempt.
The Nightmare demon shrugged, without looking up, and studied the nails on his other hand.
Chris gave his shielded brother a quick glance, before watching the Darklighter's approach with something that was almost boredom.
Stopping a few yards away, the Darklighter fired his crossbow. The arrow soared through the air, hit Wyatt's shield and fell harmlessly to the ground.
Chris then telekinetically returned the fallen arrow back to its owner, the tip piercing all the way through the Darklighter's chest and instantly vanquishing him.
Wyatt lowered his shield, apparently deciding there was little need for it.
Chris looked up at the Nightmare demon and found him leaning back with his arms folded, his legs swinging under him, completely unconcerned.
Something suddenly barrelled into Chris's back. He fell to the ground, a substantial weight pressing him prone into the scarce grass.
Choking on bile, Chris tried to twist his head around to see what was holding him down. The stinging bite of an athame against the nape of his neck stopped him.
"Don't move," the warlock's voice rasped in his ear.
Chris could just see Wyatt in his limited field of vision. His heart pounded in his chest as he watched a second warlock approach his brother, the little boy not raising his shield back up. Chris could do nothing to help him.
"Wy-" His attempt to call the child's name ended in a choked grunt, as the warlock on top of him dug his knee deeper into his spine.
Bile dribbling over his lip, Chris watched Wyatt watching the approach of the warlock. The little child's blue eyes latched onto the warlock. Then the lids briefly lowered, hiding the penetrating gaze. When they snapped open again, the warlock cried in pain as flames erupted from within him. In seconds, all that remained of the demon was a pile of ash.
The little boy next fixed his gaze on the warlock that had Chris pinned to the ground. One blink. Chris sharply rolled away from under the flaming demon.
Laying flat on his back and trying to catch his breath, Chris was aware of the ground briefly disappearing from beneath him and being replaced by floorboards. The sky was blocked out by wooden rafters and as he crawled to his knees, Chris saw that it was bright golden sunlight, not a blood-red sunset, that shone through the stained glass windows onto the Book of Shadows.
The Nightmare demon jumped up from the old chest-of-drawers he was sat on, looking startled.
Wyatt was stood in the centre of the Halliwell Manor's attic, looking around for someone. Not finding them, tears welled in his bright eyes. Chris scooted over to him and picked him up.
Brushing dust from the tails of his coat, the Nightmare demon laughed and began to circle them. Wyatt wiggled in Chris's hold.
"Ah, the infant," the demon reflected, "the natural, perfect egotist. It's quite refreshing."
Chris kept a wary eye on the circling demon, absently fighting against the struggles of the child in his arms.
"Pure egocentricity. He thinks the world revolves around him, and perhaps one day it might, but not today. His powers are substantial and yet his infantile incapability for abstract thought makes it impossible for him to reach his full potential. Emotion, or more accurately, desire is his only directing force."
As Chris began following a faint line of reasoning that the demon's words spurred into unsteady illumination in his mind, Wyatt began wildly kicking. A fluky kick caused Chris to drop the child and fall gasping to the floor, clutching his abdomen. He stretched out a hand to try to grasp the child who was picking himself up and moving away, his little shoulders bunched up in vulnerability. Teary blue eyes glared back at him accusingly.
Dragging himself up onto his knees, Chris locked his gaze onto the Nightmare demon, who was watching Wyatt closely.
"Let Wyatt go," Chris said, his tone threatening.
The demon looked down at Chris and smiled pleasantly. "Your wish is my command," he quipped, and waved a hand.
A blinding white light enveloped the dreamscape and when Chris's vision returned, he found that Wyatt was gone.
"Now, let's go somewhere less…creepy," the Nightmare demon said, pulling the collar of his frock coat closer to his neck as he looked around with unease.
The floor shifted and was replaced by sand.
To Be Continued...