"Yes, well, that was before Chris informed us that our child is going to grow up to be the future of all evil."


Neurotic


Disclaimer: Charmed does not belong to me.

Summary: His name is not Chris Perry. It's Christopher. Christopher Halliwell.


Chapter the Thirty-sixth

"Inspiration"


Cole Turner was currently more than a little gob-smacked.

All he'd manage to write was "and then suddenly, as if from nowhere, rain started falling so hard and fast that anyone on the street would need to take shelter" and bam. This happened.

He was sure he was suddenly blushing hard, but he couldn't do a thing about it. This was- they wereHe could even think in complete sentences.

One thing was for sure – he wasn't ever going to be able to look at Paige in the same way again.

Is that even physically possible?

Cole heard a high-pitched sound from somewhere, and realised it was coming from somewhere within his own throat. He slammed the book closed, blushing furiously.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Paul threw himself across the wooden table, hand lancing out to grab at the book. Cole turned wordlessly to the sallow Whitelighter, and opened his mouth but no coherent words came out.

"Cole, you can't stop now, you just-" Paul struggled, and Cole grabbed the book tighter between his hands.

"Trust me, you don't want to read this," Cole said crisply, standing back from him and holding tightly onto the book. "You guhhgarrgggghhhh!"

"What's going on?"

Paul looked up from where he currently had his hands around Cole's neck and was shaking him madly. He looked sheepishly at Chris, and slowly moved his hands down.

Chris glared at them both from the doorway, one hand on his hip, his eyes boring into both of them at the same time. "I asked what's going on," Chris said coolly.

Paul, unfortunately, took advantage of Cole being stunned to launch himself again at Cole. Triumphantly he grabbed the book, swung the front cover open, and started to flip through the pages.

Which was when Chris decided he really ought to take advantage of the whole "being the older brother" thing which he'd really neglected a lot when he was younger. Also, he decided that ignoring the "no magic around your siblings" rule was perfectly fine, seeing as Piper hadn't technically had that lecture with them in this timeline. Yet.

Paul yelped as Chris used his telekinesis to yank the book out of Paul's hands.

"Chris!"

"Uh-uh-uh, you stay right there," Chris warned, holding his other hand up.

"Or else what?"

"I'll use my powers on you."

"Magic doesn't work against good witches," Paul said, pompously and primly.

"Except my powers do work against Whitelighters," Chris said, just as primly. "Besides – as Piper warned me earlier this week – my powers will also work just as well on your pants."

Paul folded his arms, gritted his mouth and glared up at Chris contemptuously. "You're only doing this because the only thing you could do to get the title of worst brother is to blow up the planet."

"Don't give me any ideas." Chris' face was composed, but merriment lit his eyes.

"You might not want to read that," Cole managed, his cheeks still red. Chris looked from Cole to the book, pursed his lips and flipped the book open. Cole rolled his eyes as Chris flipped to the latest page. Text was spilling down the page even as he read it.

Chris slammed the book shut immediately, a wild look crossing his face. "Dude, that's nasty." He pulled a face and handed the book over to Cole. "Paul, you go into help mom." Paul started to pull a mutinous face. "Now. Unless you really want to read about Uncle Dan doing rather nasty things to Aunt Paige, I suggest you scram."

Paul's eyes widened. "They- nasty- WHAT?"

Chris watched confusedly as Paul looked down his own sweater at himself. What-? He shook it away, deciding to analyse the strange behaviour later, when he had a little more time to bring together all those little weird things that had been going on between Paul and Pippa before Pippa- Chris' heart constricted painfully, and he remembered the awful words he'd shouted at her. You haven't been my mother for the last twenty-one years, why are you starting now?

And now he knew he was trying to make up for it with Piper, by trying not to be awkward around her, but it hurt, dammit. But he didn't have time for his own personal feelings. Not until this was over. And maybe not even then.

"Uh, what did you write to get that to happen?" Chris asked, covering up his uneasiness with the question.

"Nothing!" Cole protested, twisting his hands awkwardly. The blush had faded from his cheeks, and now he just looked miserable. "I just made it rain because Paige was about to insist going after the gangsters, which would have got her killed."

Chris' lip twitched. "What were your exact words?"

"...and then suddenly, as if from nowhere, rain started falling so hard and fast that anyone on the street would need to take shelter," Cole said.

Chris smirked incomprehensibly. "From what I remember when this happened in our timeline," Chris gestured slightly to Paul, "Paige was trapped in with a detective named Brody something or other. But- it was found in the magic school's library. It had been written by two teenage brothers."

"And so" Cole shrugged, not getting the implication.

"Teenagers. Like my wholesome little brother here, they had rampant hormones. So if you had words like, I don't know, hard and fast into a book magically created by two teenaged boys? What do you think might happen?"

Cole scrunched his eyes up a little. "Look, I'm not being paid to write this," he said hotly.

"Relax," Paul said quickly, hoping to placate the seething adult. "Everything's turned out okay, right?" Relief was clear on his young face.

"Depends on your definition of okay," Cole grouched, but he looked a little appeased by Paul's words.

"Hang on a second, teenager like your wholesome little brother – Chris, I'm not much younger than you, and you know it!"

Chris gave him an appraising once-over, his eyebrows raised and his lips pressed together. "Well, you could pass for seventeen, if you were extremely lucky," he said eventually with a sniff.

Paul's mouth worked silently, until he managed to explode with a, "Seventeen? I'm twenty-one and you know it!"

"Uh-uh." Chris' voice held a distinct teasing note to it. "You technically died when you were thirteen."

"I'm not thirteen," Paul ground out, sounding frustrated and annoyed. "I only look thirteen-"

"-well, you look older than thirteen. Older than I remember, anyway. But then I was crazy, what do you expect?"

Paul narrowed a look at Chris. "We know now you weren't crazy, don't pull that one at me."

Chris just stuck his tongue out.

"Oh yeah, very mature," Paul added.

"I thought so," Chris quipped lightly.

"Besides, even though Whitelighters don't age it doesn't mean our appearance doesn't change." Paul looked thoughtful. "Imagine if I did look thirteen now."

"You look thirteen to me," Cole said. Paul glared and Chris burst out laughing. "What do I know?" Cole offered. "I'm over a century old."

"Yeah, and you look every second of it," Paul said snappishy. Chris looked at Cole resignedly.

"Don't worry, he's just PMSing," Chris advised Cole quietly.

Paul sniffed. "I'm not going to deign to answer that," he said, prissily. "That would just be an immature thing to do."

"Isn't you saying that a reply?" Chris questioned, unable to stop grinning at Paul.

"Ha, ha." Paul looked thoughtful. "I did try and Glamour myself older once." He wrinkled his nose. "It didn't look very good."

"Go on," Chris said suddenly. "Show us. After what I just read about Paige doing, I could do with a good laugh."

"Chri-i-i-i-i-is," Paul whined drawing out the syllable as if he'd done it a lot.

"Paaaaaaaauuuull," Chris returned in the same sing-song annoyed tone.

Paul sighed, rolled his eyes and shifted on his feet awkwardly. "Fine. Okay, here goes." He waved his hand over his face. Orb lights sparkled, and then an older version of Paul appeared before them. He looked a lot taller, nearly Chris' height, and his hair was shoulder-length again. His hair was a lot darker too, and it fell in foreboding lines, and his nose protuded perhaps a little bit too much, so much so that the overall effect was...

Chris burst out laughing.

"See, I told you," Paul said sulkily, as he waved his hand back over his face.

"You.. looked... like... Professor Snape!" Chris sniggered into his hand for a second, and there were tears of laughter in his eyes which he wiped away. He shook his head, muttering, "classic!"

"You're never going to stop reminding me of this, are you?" Paul asked rhetorically.

"Nope." Chris grinned.

"Me neither," Cole informed Paul dryly. Cole flickered the book open a little, and peeked in, shutting it again with a grimace.

"Hello? Lonely, hormonal, very pregnant lady in here wondering why everyone's laugh-ing..." Piper's voice drifted plaintively into the dining room, and Chris smiled.

"I'll go," Paul said, with a look of acceptance and relief on his face that Chris couldn't fully decipher.

Acceptance? But what did he just accept? That he's never going to grow up?

Chris watched his younger brother walk off. A sudden melancholic mood had descended upon him, and he couldn't shake it off. He couldn't brush away the sudden feeling that had coldly clamped around his heart, the knowledge that Paul wouldn't- wouldn't ever get to have a proper life. Chris at least had a chance- a small at one at that, but a chance – of a vaguely normal life after this whole business was over. He could grow up, potentially have children, fall in love again (although that idea hurt)...

But then, there was nothing to stop Paul falling in love or marrying. Piper and Leo had done it. When had something like rules ever gotten truly in the way of a Halliwell?

Death. Death has gotten in our way.

You don't have time for that!

Chris felt a soft hand on his shoulder which snapped him out of the furious internal debate that had started to rage. Cole was looking at him with a look of complete understanding.

"Maybe we should concentrate on more immediate matters than the distant future," Cole said. "Especially seeing as if we don't fix some of the more current problems there won't be any future."

Chris looked at him angrily. "I know that," he snapped, suddenly angry. Cole just nodded.

"So why don't you explain to me what's up with Phoebe, and-"

Chris realised with a burgeoning sadness that Cole had helped with the book even while being desperately worried about Phoebe, and his heart stretched out to Cole. Chris had completely lost Bianca, with no way of getting her back, and Cole's loss was even worse. Chris couldn't imagine a future without him loving Bianca, and knew Cole would always love Phoebe. But wouldn't the future be harder if I was still so desperately in love with Bianca, but couldn't have her? If I was close enough to touch her, and yet she didn't want me? Would that be better or worse than her being dead?

Yet the answer came to him easily. Better for the world to have Bianca's presence, than for her light to have completely disappeared from this planet... Even if it were painful, he would rather Bianca alive and well and not be allowed to be with her, than have Bianca dead and all the love in the world...

"Phoebe's on this plane," Chris said. "She's just out of phase."

Cole nodded. "So that's why I could see her? The Avatars shifted me one hunded and eighty degrees to withdraw their power, and then- put me back." Cole's brow was drawn.

Chris smiled, happy that Cole understood the concept. He was about to explain how he was looking for a spell when the doorbell went. "That's probably dinner," Chris muttered before yelling, "I'll get it!"

"Aw, man!" floated the instant argument from Paul. Chris grinned to himself and jogged to the door. Expecting to see a delivery man sweating under the load of the number of dishes Chris had ordered, Chris was a little taken aback to see Darryl Morris standing on the doorway.

"Hi, Chris." Darryl's words were slow and awkward. "Can I come in?"

Startled, Chris nodded, surreptitiously checking as well as he could to see if he could sense a malevolent presence surrounding Darryl, but as far as he could tell it was the real person.

This was more than a little strange. The relationship between the girls and Darryl was even more strained than the relationship between the girls and Chris when they'd chucked him out of the house.

Darryl stepped through the doorwar. "Uh, are Piper or Paige here?"

Chris shuffled, a little uncomfortably. "Paige is trapped in a book," he said softly. "But Piper-" He nodded. "Piper, it's Darryl!"

"Coming," Piper's voice floated in softly, and moments later Piper, holding the small of her back with one hand, walked into the hallway. Her eyes widened upon seeing Darryl. "Darryl! What is it?"

"I'm afraid it's bad news," Darryl said, his voice low and a little husky. Regret was splayed openly on his face. "Do you want to sit down?"

"No," Piper said, her voice wavering slightly. Chris instantly moved to her side, hovering nearby if she needed support. "What is it?"

"Do you- do you know where Phoebe has been today?" Darryl asked them.

Piper and Chris exchanged a very heavy look.

"She's missing," Chris said, eventually. "She was moved... out of shift with the rest of reality... and then Wyatt – who came back from the future – kidnapped her."

A shadow passed over Darryl's face. "I was hoping you wouldn't say anything like that," he admitted grimly. "Because we found Phoebe's body earlier this afternoon."


T-17