Death lurking within

Chapter 3 – A risky plan

A/N: I love you guys. That's why I'm trying to update sooner this time. Thanks a big lot for all the review, you're the best. This chapter is probably going to be shorter than the ones before, but that's just because of the plot.

Disclaimer: No, it has not changed (big surprise) I do not own Charmed.

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"What the hell are you doing here?", Phenola half-yelled. "You promised to leave this to me!"

"Well you took too long", Wyatt said in an annoyed tone and moved closer. He tried to hide his anxiousness by pretending to be angry. In reality he was just really worried. And unlike the sisters he did notice the tears Phenola was so desperately trying to hide. And they were making him even more scared of what there was to come. Where they too late? He had calculated it so well, he couldn't have been mistaken, now could he?

"We had a deal. I was going to bring him home. You were not supposed to interfere with it", she argued. She tried to act as if she was just angry about him having showed up, but she was very well aware that this was a lost cause. No one else took notice of the most subtle change in his expression that had come over him when he had seen her face. But she knew that he knew that she was crying.

"Just as I said I don't have the patience to wait for your incompetence. Time is of the essence, you should know that better than anyone else", he snapped back. He wasn't angry at her at all, even though he pretended to be. He only wanted to get to Chris as soon as possible.

The real reason that he was here was not that he feared her to be incompetent, years of experience had taught him that she could handle herself very well and was a very capable person. He had done a new calculation and he had the fear that he had maybe sent her to the wrong time. That this was just a little too late. After all, time was the most important factor in this whole dealing.

"We shouldn't do this", she whispered in the hope the Charmed Ones and Leo wouldn't hear her. Or at least not understand what she was saying. She couldn't tell Wyatt everything that Chris had told her. These were things that were none of the Charmed Ones' business. Chris would definitely not want them to know anything about his disease.

She however underestimated the fine ears of her aunt Paige. Paige heard exactly what the girl said, and it gave her a very uneasy feeling. Suddenly she wasn't so sure, whether this girl was really related to Chris. The man was obviously evil. She couldn't really explain what gave her this feeling, but it was just there. And the girl... she didn't appear to be evil, but she shimmered. Maybe the two of them were planning to do something bad to Chris and he had left because he had wanted to keep the Charmed Ones out of this problem. This made sense to her and she liked it a lot more than the alternative. Chris being evil. Ever since they had found out, that he was half-whitelighter as well she had liked him a lot more. Imagining him evil was something she didn't want to do at all.

For the first time Wyatt's angry mask shattered a little. Through his cover a little confusion and fear shimmered through. "Why not?", he asked confused. Her behavior made absolutely no sense to him.

She didn't really know how to answer this without exposing too much information about Chris to the past Version of their family, so she didn't say a thing.

"Where is he?", Wyatt demanded with a little lower voice than before. This told Fin that he was loosing his patience. For real this time.

"It's... it's not a good idea...", she stuttered a little lost. She didn't want to make it harder for Chris. She didn't want Wyatt to meet him. But she had no idea how to keep Wyatt from getting there.

"Get me there, now", he commanded and the look in his eyes sent shivers down her spine, so she took his hand and shimmered the two of them out of the manor.

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Chris almost felt like sleeping. He had never had a headache like this before and every time he opened his eyes a little the whole world seemed to spin violently around. He had however managed to open them long enough to survey his own state. To sum it up in one word, he was screwed. His hands looked almost as if they belonged to some kind of zombie, all the healthy color they had once possessed had left them entirely and parts of his skin had begun to turn black as if they were made of ashes.

He raised his other hand and touched one of the parts that was black. He felt the skin crumble away underneath his finger and couldn't help but feel a little more sick than he already did. This was absolutely no dignified way to die. Now that he thought about it, he noticed that his entire body was shaking. He was in a bad state.

Suddenly he felt a presence there which he didn't like at all. And then another. And one more.

They had found him. He opened his eyes again and through the spinning and dark spots that clouded his vision he saw the form that haunted his worst nightmares.

The Cretsa demons.

They were circling him. He knew they would not hurt him. Not until he died on his own. And then he was going to become their dinner. This was so not the way he wanted to end. But he didn't have a choice.

And yet he felt a lonely tear leave his eyes. The salty liquid left a burning trail which reminded him painfully of the fact, that his face probably looked worse, or at least different than his hands.

But suddenly something changed. He felt someone else coming. And suddenly all of the demons were gone.

Wyatt couldn't believe it. The demons had already been here. Vanquishing them didn't pose a problem, but the mere fact that they were already here meant his brother didn't have more than some hours left. Tops. He sent a silent prayer to whatever force there was out there, even though he didn't believe in that kind of thing that he had not come too late. That he still had time to save Chris.

When he came nearer to his brother he had to restrain himself from gasping at Chris' state. He looked even worse than he would ever have expected. But it didn't matter, as long as he could still be saved.

He knelt down beside the young man that in reality was just a boy and whispered, "Hey".

Chris half looked at his brother with unfocused eyes, but it was enough for him to recognize who he was. And this meant more to him than he had ever believed it would.

Wyatt really did care. Chris hadn't really believed it when Fin had told him, but now there was not the shadow of a doubt left.

"Chris, I think I can save you. Just let me explain"

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"I don't have a good feeling about this!", Paige exclaimed as soon as the two strangers had left.

"Neither me", Phoebe said and looked uncertain what to do. She wasn't really certain whether these two were really evil or not. She had picked up strange vibes from both of them. They had seemed to be blocking themselves off of her, and yet she had sensed feelings like concern and fear. Did demons feel emotions like that?

"Maybe they're evil and Chris knew they were coming so he left to keep us out of it", Paige mouthed her theory.

Piper looked at her in thought. "You think so?" She liked that theory actually. That meant that they had not let an evil person near to Wyatt for almost a year. And that gave her a lot better feeling.

"It's possible", Paige said and shrugged.

"Well in that case we should help him", Leo said. In the prospect of that theory he felt a little guilty about the way he had bitched at Chris before. Maybe he was just trying to protect Wyatt and the sisters. Of course the elder had no idea how far off from the truth the entire theory was.

"Can you sense him?", Piper asked to both the whitelighters. The two of them concentrated for a moment then shook their heads.

"Nothing", Paige said disappointedly.

"Same here", Leo declared.

"Well then let's scry for them"

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Chris really felt bad. Talking hurt a lot, but after hearing Wyatt's plan there was only one possible reply. "What the fuck?", he asked incredulously and shot his older brother the best disbelieving look he could manage in his state.

"I know it sounds risky...", Wyatt started with concern in his voice, only to be cut off by the younger male. "It's not just risky, it's insane! Where did you get that crap?"

"It's logical. The disease stops progressing when the victim dies, so we have to kill you and revive you afterwards, it's simple", Wyatt defended himself. He knew that this plan was probably not the best thing he had ever come up with, but what choice did he have? The alternative was sitting back and watching his brother die, and he was sure as hell not going to do that.

"I heard you the first time. Something like that won't work, you can't revive the dead", Chris said. To him this entire plan was really worthy of the its inventor. Completely fucked up and crazy.

"Not usually, no, but if we do it with this potion", he held up the vial to emphasize his point, "and use the other one to revive you, it will work, I tested it, with this combination people can be revived", Wyatt pleaded. He had not expected the hardest part of his plan to be convincing Chris of doing it.

"That's ridiculous. You're wasting your time", Chris replied and noticed how weak he sounded. Why couldn't they just leave him alone? It would not do any good anyway.

"Chris please! What have you got to loose? It's at least worth a try if we can save you by doing it", Wyatt pleaded. He looked at Fin for help, but she was just crying and didn't say a thing.

Chris looked at Wyatt and shook his head, which was a bad idea for it made his neck hurt nastily.

"Chris, I can't just sit back and watch you die! I simply can't! You can't just die away and leave me alone.", Wyatt begged. Chris was startled when he realized that his older brother was close to tears. And he realized that there was a part inside him that wanted to believe Wyatt, a part that didn't want to give up. And his brother was right after all. He had absolutely nothing to loose.

Finally he sighed and said, "ok. Try"

"Thanks", Wyatt said relieved. Now it only had to work.

He took out the vial again and attached it to another device he had been carrying with him. It was a needle. He did not believe Chris was in a state to swallow a potion at the moment. He looked worse by the minute.

Wyatt took a deep breath and injected the potion carefully into his younger brother's bloodstream. It would be only a matter of seconds until it would serve its purpose. His heartbeat fastened a little, when he realized with fear that he was killing his own brother. Not for real, he tried to calm himself down, but it didn't change the fact that he was.

He waited a little until he was certain it had worked so far. He had to control himself to stay calm and not go hysteric. His little brother was lying before him and he was dead. That was really hard to stomach.

Fin looked at Wyatt with a worried look on her face. "Everything alright?", she asked scared.

Wyatt nodded. It should have been enough time to work now. He pulled out the other vial and attached it to the needle. With concentration he injected the other liquid.

Both he and Fin could do nothing but stare at Chris in fear now. The seconds passing without anything happening felt worse than anything else any of them had experienced so far.

Wyatt glanced at his watch anxiously and it was just then that he realized something wasn't right. Usually it had taken about half the time Chris was taking now for his test subjects to recover. Maybe it's harder for him because of the disease, Wyatt thought hopefully, but he couldn't shake the feeling that something here was going very wrong.

They waited a little longer but nothing happened. "Shouldn't he be awake by now?", Fin asked concernedly.

"He should be", Wyatt whispered.

He had failed. He looked down at his little brother and realized that he would not wake up again. It hadn't worked.

Chris Perry Halliwell was dead.

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To be continued… (This is not the end, don't worry)

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