Charmed -:- Labyrinth

Author's Note(s):

Thanks again to CharmedOpal for reviewing; you're right about the Chris/Ashleigh thing, but I'm not really much of a shipper or a romance writer so I highly doubt that it will come to anything more than a slightly implied crush lol. To rosmarlin, I'm glad you're liking Chris as my brainy hero :P Thank you for commenting!

And thank you to AliHal, glad that you're liking the story so far! I know that there's a lot of disagreement over Chris's power status, along with all of the next generation to be honest, there are so many different interpretations on fanfic alone lol. This is just my version which fits in the universe I created with my other fic, where Chris is awesome in other ways and yes, Melinda exists (I had this debate on Borrowed Time - I've come to the conclusion each to their own) but don't worry; beyond that brief mention she never appears in this fic again, this is purely a Wyatt and Chris adventure :P

To all who have alerted this fic - thank you for coming back for another next day update! My schedule's a little hectic the next couple days so I doubt this will happen again, but I should be able to get some more up on Thursday/Friday, here's hoping!

Now I've finished filling my word count with author's notes - Enjoy!

Chapter Three
-:-
The Dog Ate My Homework

"Well, this is fun."

Chris turned and gave Kirk a look without missing a step, attempting to silence the teen before he could inevitably start another argument. They had been walking for nearly an hour by now, the monotony broken up by regular intervals of immature spats; the seven of them having no choice but to follow the twisting route dictated by the corridor.

"Does anyone else get the feeling that we're being led somewhere?" Caleb asked, his tongue flickering between his teeth nervously.

"There's only one way, idiot," James answered derisively. "It's not like we can go anywhere else."

"That's what I mean," Caleb replied with forced patience. "Why is there only one way? What's at the end of this tunnel? Were we sent here? If so, by who? And what do they want?"

James rolled his eyes. "If you figure it out Sherlock, let us know."

They kept walking onwards, none of them really paying attention to the slight change in the yellow brick walls. Where they had once been smooth, now faint hieroglyphs and other shallow etchings began to materialise; getting more and more prominent the that further they walked. The gradient of the ground changed too, gradually leading them downwards. Even the air changed almost imperceptibly, becoming a little fresher as if someone had opened a window in a stuffy room.

"Do you reckon its demons?" Kirk asked. Now that the questions were out in the open, they were just begging to be answered, even if they were totally guessing.

"Nah," Chris shook his head. Ever since the Ultimate Battle was won by the Charmed Ones the underworld population had backed off majorly. Not to say that they had gone completely; demonic attacks still happened, they were just nowhere near as frequent as before. "I can't imagine a demon being this creative – they would have shown up and gloated by now. Besides, this feels… older, somehow."

Hayden nodded. "The feeling I got from the archway was more like when Mr Wyatt teaches us Ancient Magic. It reaches you at a deeper level."

"Or," James put in his two cents, "there could have been a gas leak at the museum and this is just some mass hallucination."

Ashleigh glared at him over her shoulder. "Sarcasm is my thing."

James shrugged. "It's a valid theory."

"Alright," Kirk retorted. "Maybe we've been abducted by aliens who are watching us like rats in a maze, laughing hysterically at our lowly earthling intelligence."

"Or," Caleb joined in. "This is some sort of social science experiment to see which one of us will lose it and kill the others first - like that old slasher movie with a trillion sequels."

"I reckon James would snap first," Kirk jibed.

"And kill you," James countered.

"Actually, James would die first," Ashleigh pointed out matter-of-factly. "In horror movies the black guy always dies first."

Without missing a beat James came right back with a lewd look on his face "Followed quickly by the ditzy blonde who has mysteriously lost half her clothing."

Ashleigh, the only blonde female present, scowled at James and his prowling eyes. She then opened her mouth to say something scathing back, but thankfully Wyatt intervened. "Life is not a horror movie. No one is going to die in any order. And when we find whoever of whatever is behind this we are going to kick its ass. Got it?"

Tagging along at the back of the group Chris rolled his eyes, knowing the brief silence his brother had instilled wouldn't last long with this group. He glanced down at his watch to find another twenty minutes had passed without anything happening, which didn't exactly make him feel safer. A gut instinct told him not to grow complacent in the short peace – worst things were yet to come.

He was so busy thinking about that, that he nearly tripped over a raised stone. He looked down to find that the flat path they had been following had suddenly become overgrown; grass and weeds sprouting between cracks made by the tree roots growing beneath. "Huh?"

"Watch your step," Wyatt called back from the front, his warning followed by several mutterings of 'bit late, Wy'. He then slowed his pace as everything began to change around them. "Well, this is new."

Above them the ceiling had once again vanished, revealing a slightly different night sky. This one was brightly illuminated by a big full moon and a dense smattering of stars. The walls widened on either side of them as they walked cautiously onwards, like the mouth of the river as it meets the sea. After a few more yards, the walls crumbled into ruin, the broken ground giving way to open grassland.

They all stood in silence for a good few moments, trying to figure out where the hell they had ended up, and what would happen next.

"Okay, I'll bite," Asheligh said eventually. "Now what?"

A low rumbling reverbed beneath their feet, travelling like a wave under the ground. Ahead of them a whole forest sprung up from nowhere, ancient species of trees morphing from saplings to towering conifers in a matter of seconds. Once the wood was fully grown a cold wind blew in from behind them, nearly throwing them off of their feet. With a force like a stampede the wind flattened a path in the tall grass, leading them neatly straight into the dark wood.

To top it off, a wolf chose that moment to howl at the full moon.

"I vote we don't go that way," Caleb muttered once the wind had died.

"Agreed." Kirk turned around quickly only to come to a stunned stop. "Umm… where did the tunnel go?"

A raging river thundered behind them where the corridor had been less than a minute before. White water rapids frothed over vicious looking rocks, the spray created from the force of the current sparkling in the starlight as it rained down on them.

"Where the hell did that come from?!" James demanded, exasperated.

"You just witnessed a forest sprout out of nowhere, and you're surprised by a river?" Ashleigh asked with a quirked brow.

Caleb shifted uncomfortably, staying carefully away from the river bank. "Erm… I don't do well in water…"

"No one does well in water like that," Kirk replied. "There is no way we are getting across that."

"We're not even trying," Wyatt agreed, not willing to take the high risk of them getting swept away and most likely killed, especially when there was no guarantee that there was anything better on the other side. For all they knew they could get across and find the exact same foreboding forest there as well. This place didn't exactly obey the laws of physics. "That just leaves… the woods…"

"Maybe we can try and go around it?" Hayden suggested. "We don't have to follow the path, do we?"

As if in reply to her proposal the tall blades of grass rustled ominously.

"There's something in the grass…" Caleb muttered as they all strained to get a look at what was causing the disturbance in the stalks. Wyatt, deciding to test the unseen enemy, reached into his rucksack and pulled the lunch Piper had made for him despite his protests that he would buy something at the museum. With the arm that had landed him captainship of the football team, he threw the brown paper bag out into the field.

Several… things… all converged at the spot where the lunch had landed. The grass shook violently for a few seconds, the wet sound of tearing and chewing resounding in the clear night air. Then just to prove a point, the remnants of the ill-fated lunch were tossed back to the astounded teens.

"O-kay…" Ashleigh drew out the two syllables. "Death trap river, carnivorous grass, or creepy forest – any takers?"

"I'm thinking the forest is the lesser of three evils," Wyatt conceded, swinging his bag back up on his shoulder and looking distastefully at his lost lunch. "Let's get this over with."

The eldest Halliwell once again took the lead, carefully keeping to the path as they headed exactly where some unknown force was guiding them. Caleb followed closely behind him, his keen eyes on the grass and his snake-like tongue working overtime as it tasted for danger on the air. Then there was Ashleigh with James right on her tail as if he were protecting her. She rolled her eyes at him and doubled her pace to catch up to Caleb. At the back Hayden and Kirk walked side-by-side talking quietly, with Chris a few yards behind watching their six.

It took five minutes for them to cross the grassland before they entered the woods; the ground becoming muddy and slippery with leaves that disguised the tree roots that did their best to trip them up. They moved cautiously, just waiting for the inevitable moment when some big bad would jump out and get them. The deeper into the forest they went, the thicker the tree canopy got, blocking the moonlight and leaving them in the dark.

"Anyone else feel like we're being watched?" James asked, finding himself whispering in the freaky setting.

"We are," Caleb confirmed. "Something's stalking us."

"Great…" Kirk muttered, his eyes flickering around even though it was too dark make anything out. "Now I'm really freaked out…"

At the back, Chris walked a few steps backwards and scanned their surroundings as best he could. His eyes were beginning to adjust in the low light, but he still couldn't see anything but trees. Somewhere off to his left he heard a twig snap under something's foot and all the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. Feeling vulnerable on his own, he made to close the distance between him and the others.

That was when something huge and hairy leapt out of thin air.

"Agh!" Chris yelped as the heavy weight smacked into him, sending him plummeting to the forest floor. Sharp claws dug into his arm as he tried to twist around on the ground, keeping him pinned down. Fetid breath warmed his skin as strong jaws clamped around his rucksack and began ripping it to shreds.

"Chris!" Wyatt yelled as he, Caleb and James came running. They began kicking the creature and grabbing at Chris to try and pull the two of them apart. Chris, for his part, managed to free one of the straps, allowing him to turn on his back and scrabble back a little. But the other strap was caught, the creature blocking him from losing the bag with the paw that was painfully trapping his arm.

Just as Chris was sure that his arm was about to be wrench from its socket, a stream of fire split the sky above him. The horrible smell of burnt fur instantly filled his nostrils, followed by the whimpering of a wounded dog as the weight on his arm was abruptly alleviated. The creature vanished into the trees, its tail stuck firmly between its legs.

Chris looked up to see Ashleigh grinning maniacally, a can of hairspray in one hand and a zippo in the other. "Thanks."

"You're welcome," she replied with a strange glint in her eyes, far too happy for having just torched a wild animal. She didn't need her powers to be a crazy pyromaniac – all she needed was a lighter and she was happy.

Wyatt helped drag Chris up and onto unsteady feet; his blue eyes full of concern as they looked his little brother over. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah," Chris nodded, noting that the wound on his arm wasn't as bad as it had felt. Two long gashes were torn in his jacket, the thick leather enough to prevent him from being completely torn to shreds. He could feel that he was bleeding, but he figured it wasn't that much and chose to ignore it. "Just took me by surprise is all. What the hell was it anyway?"

"A wolf," Hayden answered. "There's probably a whole pack of them out there."

"Right, we need to stick together," Wyatt instructed, and then threw a half-smile at his brother. "It probably went after you because you're the smallest and were trailing behind. They shouldn't bother us if we look like difficult prey."

"That is if they are like normal wolves," Kirk pointed out. "This place has been anything but normal."

"True," Wyatt agreed. "But that's the best idea I've got. Let's just keep moving and hope that there's an end to this freaking wood."

Everyone concurred with that sentiment. They all kept a wary watch on their surroundings as they gathered together and prepared to set off again.

Chris stared down at the tattered remains of his rucksack, its destroyed contents scattered on the ground around it. He picked up on the fluttering of white in the breeze, recognising the shredded paper as the worksheet Paige had given them back at the museum, the weirdest thought occurring to him.

"Chris…?" Wyatt prompted when he noticed that his brother wasn't following. Chris turned and gave a satirical chuckle.

"That wolf just ate my homework."

The seven teens trekked through the woods for another fifteen minutes, not entirely sure if they were going the right way – or if there even was a right way.

Eventually they came into a large clearing, the break in the trees once again allowing the moonlight to reach them. Eerily, the clearing was the shape of a perfect circle unlike anything found in nature. The ground was clear of leaves and grass, the mud turning to fine sand. In the centre there was a large square stone raised slightly off of the ground. Surrounding it were the long-dead remains of several fires, as if someone had been warding away the wolves.

"At least we know we're not the first ones to make it out of the shrinking room," Kirk noted as they stepped onto the sand. He gestured to the edge of the stone where a crude tent had been erected; a backpack and some other supplies still inside. "Someone else was here."

"What happened to them, do you think?" Caleb asked, observing that the campsite didn't look ransacked like it would after an animal attack.

"The wolves ate them, duh," James answered, apparently not seeing what Caleb did. For the sake of avoiding another argument, the half-demon didn't push the issue.

Ashleigh wandered ahead and jumped up onto the large stone. "What do you reckon this is?"

Chris came over and joined her, studying the slab. He quickly realised that it was actually two stones; a large crack running down the middle and severing it in half. Along the crevice there were shallow scratches as if someone had tried to pry the stones apart with their bare hands. "I think it's a door."

"The way out?" Kirk asked eagerly.

"Maybe," Chris shrugged, looking around curiously. Something shiny caught his eye and he hopped off the other side of the stone and crouched down. With a tug that pulled sharply at his wounded arm he yanked free a two metre long metal pole. All around the stone there was an odd assortment of objects half-buried in the sand. "Huh…"

A long, blood-chilling howl reached the clearing, sounding far too close for comfort.

Immediately Ashleigh pulled out her hairspray and lighter, ready to do battle. Everyone else snapped to attention, trying to pinpoint where the howl had come from, when an answering call echoed the first. Then another.

Then another.

"Chris, do you reckon you can open it?" Wyatt asked, gesturing at the stone.

Chris chewed his lip and shrugged – he wasn't even 100% sure that it was in fact a door. It was a complete guess, though a very small voice in his head was telling him he was right. "I can try."

"If you don't we are all going to be mauled to death by a pack of wild wolves," James said, incredibly helpfully.

"No pressure then."

Ah, my poor little teenagers – about to be torn to shreds! Let's hope Chris is as smart as he thinks he is, shall we? :P