Thank you to anyone who has liked my story…

For the disclaimer, kindly refer to the 1st chapter…

And oh, something else I forgot to mention, by some weird co incidence, Chris and Darmuid share the same birthday.

Chapter 3

20 grueling minutes later when the premonition finally came to an end, Darmuid silently slid down to the floor, and sat there- his muscles simply refusing to work.

He was shaking like a leaf, he was drenched in sweat, and his heart was beating so fast he felt like it'd burst. To summarize, he was in pretty bad shape.

When he trusted his legs to work again, he got up, crept to his room, and crawling into bed, awaited the dawn, for sleep, he knew, wouldn't come to him.

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Two days later, on Chris' 23rd, and Darmuid's 17th Birthday…

Darmuid woke up feeling incredibly worried. 30 seconds later, he remembered why. It was his birthday.

O.K, perhaps a little explanation will come in handy here. Ever since that premonition, he had been avoiding his family- more specifically Wyatt.

Not because he was afraid of him- it wasn't like that at all. In fact, he didn't even blame that Wyatt (which was what Darmuid had taken to calling the alternate reality Wyatt in his head.) for the things he did. Hating his brother was simply an alien concept to him.

No, he wasn't avoiding him because he hated him; it was because he didn't want to hurt him. For Darmuid knew his brother better than most people- and he knew how much something like this would hurt him.

And not telling him wasn't an option- he knew exactly how powerful a Seer Wyatt was- once again, better than most people. And it didn't really help matters that he was particularly attuned to the feelings of his brothers. One minute, and he'd know something was wrong- and being the responsible older brother that he was, doubtlessly, he would try to find out exactly what was wrong- and then, all hell would break loose.

Of course, there was always that slim chance that Wyatt wasn't meant to see it, and wouldn't. But that's what it was- a slim chance, and nothing more.

This was also the reason, he suspected, as to why Chris too had been avoiding Wyatt.

Two days, they'd been able to pull that off, but for how much longer? The three were inseparable, and sooner or later, they would have to come into contact.

And today was their birthday; the entire family would be there, including Wyatt- the one person who even Chris couldn't successfully lie to- and Darmuid? He was slightly better than Phoebe, which wasn't exactly saying much.

Hence, all this worry.

Resigning himself for the worse, he got out of bed, dressed and made his way to the kitchen, where Chris was apparently in the middle of an argument with his parents.

"Chris, it's your birthday." Piper was saying.

"My point exactly, mom! It's my birthday, so I get to do what I wanna do, and hunting demons is what I wanna do." Chris answered his mother.

Leo tried to reason with his son (the key word being 'tried'), "Chris, I'm not saying that you can't take care of yourself, but you're not invincible either."

"I know, dad. But even if I do get hurt, which is a very unlikely possibility anyway, Wyatt would sense it, and he'd heal me in a flash." Chris argued.

"Weapons can be cursed you know," Darmuid said, from his position in the doorway, his mind on the last thing that he'd seen in his vision, "so that the wounds they make can't be healed. Someone could curse an athame that way, and stab you- and we'd be helpless."

Ringing silence followed the 17 year old witch's words. Piper went pale, and began to clasp and unclasp her hands nervously.

Leo was affected more strongly than his wife and the glass of orange juice that he'd been holding fell from his hands and smashed.

As for Chris, a whole gamut of emotions passed across his features- fear, pain, love, concern.

The 23 year old was the first to break the silence. "So you know." He said to his baby brother, and when Darmuid nodded, he asked, "How?"

Darmuid shrugged noncommittally, "Two days ago, I woke up in the middle of the night with my senses on red alert. I pin pointed the source of the trouble to you.

When I went to your room, it turned out that you were having a nightmare. I tried to wake you up, but when I touched you…"

"You got a premonition." Chris finished for his brother. "How much did you see?"

"From the time when you were 14," Darmuid said in a hollow voice, "to when you were around twenty. And then when you came back to the past; snippets of what you'd done here, till…" (The teenager's voice choked with emotion at this point) "Till your 23rd birthday."

Chris looked pained as he wrapped a comforting arm around his brother's shoulder.

"I can't watch that again, Chris. Please don't go- for my sake." Darmuid whispered.

"Sssh… I won't go, all right?" Chris said softly.

Piper decided to break the self induced stupor that she was in, and asked her youngest son, "Could this have something to do with why you've buried yourself in 'homework' for the past two days?"

When Darmuid nodded (somewhat sheepishly) Piper muttered a disapproving "Knew it was too good to be true!" and more loudly said, "Why?"

As a mother, she knew her kids, but even then she was worried- what if this caused a rift between the brothers?

Darmuid looked indignantly at his mother (he had a pretty good idea of what was going on in her mind- how could she even think of something like this.), and when he was satisfied that he'd made her feel sufficiently guilty, answered,

"Because; I don't wanna hurt Wy, mom. You know how he is- I mean, compared to him, you guys are plain neglectful- and that's saying something.

If he ever sees what I saw, mom…" Darmuid's voice trailed off to silence, as his mind replayed the horrors that his parents didn't want to even guess about.

"It'd break him, mom, it'd break him utterly." Chris continued for his brother.

"So, what're our options?" Piper asked to the three before her.

"Well, lying to him won't ever work, 'cause,

A) He's our brother, even Chris can't lie to him convincingly enough, and;

B) He's a powerful Seer." Darmuid summarized.

"So, in a nutshell- we're screwed." Said Chris, in the trademark Chris manner.

"Isn't there any way- as much as I hate to say this- block ourselves off from his premonition powers?" Piper enquired.

Even after almost 3 decades of being Charmed, the collective magical knowledge of her husband and younger sons far surpassed her own.

Darmuid shook his head. "Nope," he said dejectedly, "the bond that we share as brothers is too strong for that.

I guess we just have to pretend to be O.K, and hope for the best."

Chris snorted derisively. He didn't like the idea, not one single bit- it banked way too much on chance.

However, even he knew that it was their best bet.