Disclaimer:
dingdongdingdongdingdong………………….+
dragons opens the door+
Oh shit the "Free-the-Halliwells-organization"!
Member: You know why we are here! So will you extradite the poor boys by your own choice or will we have to persuade you?
Hey! This is a fallacy!
Member: Is this? What the hell are you thinking by…?
dragons breaks the angry verbiage+
I'm not thinking anything, because there isn't anything I've done!
I don't own them!
They are my guests and stay here on their own accord.
Did somebody really believe the rumours about that? (+gets big eyes+)
(+someone giggles behind the door+)
Boys will you PLEASE come out here for a moment!
Chris: Do we have to? Look…it was only fun…
Wyatt: Yeah, no harm done,.. OK? It were only a few harmless disclaimers, nothing more!
FHO-Members (+while storming the house+): That doesn't matter! You are going to be saved nevertheless.
(+They drag the boys out of the house+)
Both: HELP!
Don't be silly boys! You are witches, remember!
Wyatt: Oh! (+aunt Paige syndrome+)
Both orb away from the enraged mob+
Hey! Wait! What about meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee….!
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Chapter ten / last part:
…Chris was - strange to say - not the slightest bit afraid or nervous.
An eerie sense of calmness overcame him instead. He'd come so far…
…but something inside him was challenging him to dare some more.
After an endless meeting with some of the darkest creatures the young whitelighter ever had faced, Chris was simply tired. They had discussed endlessly about city allocation, hunting rights (no Chris did definitely NOT want to know what hunting!) and how to affirm the sources power over the city.
Chris worked hard to keep his mouth shut. If he screwed up now he would not get any further today. So he kept the comments burning in his throat and his brother in good temper.
At some point all the emotionless and most of senseless discussions together with the soft whirring of Wyatt's computers blurred in the boys ears to one big pulp of sounds.
The words became meaningless and the only thing his mind could process was a soporifically mixture which soon showed its effect on the whitelighter.
Finally, just as the youngest Halliwells eyelids started to drop and Wyatt was afraid his brothers forehead would soon hit the table top, the meeting came to an end and they were alone again.
"So?" The source opened the conversation, and made Chris aware that now he was expected to speak. But what do you do when you know that all you have to say would end in a really big and nasty screaming fight.
Don't exacerbate him, for heavens sake don't make him angry now! The young whitelighter told himself again and again.
Chris decided for the jump ahead. So he started without any statement about the meeting.
"Wy…" Yes, using his brother's nickname would be calming.
"Yes Christopher?"
Christopher, shit that was a sign that his brother was definitely not amused´
"You… I mean… you told me you would show me everything! Did you really mean everything?" The boy's voice was quiet and almost hesitant now, despite the feelings inside him were running rollercoaster.
"Yeah Chris, my word is my bond! What do you need further to come to a decision?"
"I want to know what happens to all the people who disappear day by day.
How does your…(don't anger him, don't say dictatorship!´)…ehm government handle with the ones that are against it.
I ... I need to see it!"
Wyatt smiled a cruel little smile.
"I don't think that you want to see this! You know it's not nice…
It takes a lot of harshness to reign and control a whole city – up and underworld."
Chris tried to avoid his brothers searching eyes. His gaze turned downwards he said with a sad voice and as calm as he was able to: "But I need to see!"
"You will hate me for that!"
"But it's a part of you! Something that you created. Its part of what you have become, Wyatt! If I have to decide to be with or against you, I have to see the whole Wyatt, the whole picture of what it is I have to decide about!"
"If this is truly your wish, I'll show you. Try to see it trough my eyes. Everyone you'll see wanted or tried to kill me. They all only get what they deserve!"
The whitelighter boiled inside. He wanted to scream at his brother, to shake some sense into him.
These people only tried to survive – to end a reign of evil and horrors. They fought for their right to be free, to not be kept as slaves, used as cheap workers or worse as hunting pray.
Everyone of those who suffered in the sources claws had a damned right to wish him death and Wyatt spoke of them like they were some sort of felons or psychic murderers.
Chris knew he had to end this.
He would go and see the cells, even if the pure thought of this gave him the creeps. After that he would do all that was in his powers to end his brother's evil reign.
"Let's go!" said the source as he started to open the door of his office.
A sudden icy silence greeted the pair.
Chris tried to ignore the glares that stung like blistering hot needles and followed his brother with bowed head.
He did not need more attention as he already got.
The way down to the cell blocks seemed to be endless. The winding hallways eroded the stone like some vicious animal. If the command central was the heart of Wyatt's evil regime, these corridors led right into its dark and eerie soul.
Slowly the stench of fear and death increased and Chris felt the tiny hairs on his neck raise.
This was a real suicide mission, even if he got out alive. The things he was going to see now would be engraved in his soul forever.
But the more he feared and hated what was about to going to happen, the more he knew that HE and he alone had to end all this, at all costs!
The sins committed by a Halliwell should be foiled by a Halliwell as well.
Wyatt meanwhile opened one last heavy steel door with his high security codes, and there was…
Silence!
Silence?
Chris was prepared to hear a sea of moans and screams – but there was none.
Nothing!
The only sign that there were really living human beings behind the countless cell doors down the endless corridors was an occasional muffled sob or painfully suppressed cough.
The source had silenced them all.
Chris shuddered at the thought what it would take to mute all these brave and determined women ad men who risked their life on a daily base for the resistance. And the young man had the feeling in the pit of his stomach that he would find out sooner as he would have liked to.
"So we are here! What's next? I promised I would show you everything, and I'm keeping my word. But after we are now following your wishes, you are the one to choose the direction now.
Do you want to see the interrogation rooms? - They are no different from the ones you used to know." An evil little chuckle escaped Wyatt's throat.
Chris winced and suppressed the subconscious fear that produced the strong urge to run away, while he thought feverish where to go from here next. The resistance knew now the location of the cells with what his job was fulfilled.
What now?
Wyatt would not buy that he had suddenly seen enough.
He was truly at a loss as his brother helped´ him out unknowing.
"Ah, I've got the perfect match for you, Chris!
If my sources are right you may even met him again recently."
Without any word for the young whitelighter to follow him, Wyatt marched away and increased his speed down the corridor to the left.
Chris followed without a comment. There was really nothing to say – at least nothing he could speak out loud in front of the source without risking a new painful reunion with one of Wyatt's interrogation cells´.
They stopped in front of a steel door.
"Holding cell IV – disposal" told a sign at the door.
A most likely clawed hand had added in clumsy letters that had the sickening colour of dried blood:
"TRASH CAN".
This was the sort of humour´ in Wyatt's demented world. These were the creatures with which his brother surrounded himself. If Chris had ever had any doubts about his decisions this was his last approval. He was condemned to see a world he would rather leave dying while fighting against it, then survive through becoming a part of it.
Chris was once again out of comments.
He had the uneasy feeling that this was where he would end sometimes – human trash, ready to be thrown away.
As the source opened the lockless door with a simple touch of his hand, everything in the young whitelighter ruffled up to enter.
But if you are already in hell, the last step into the devils hall isn't that big anymore.
So moving on autopilot for the umpteenth time in the last days he entered…
…
There was an unrecognizable bundle of human huddled up in the farthest corner of the incredibly dirty and apart from that empty chamber. The stench that pierced Chris nose immediately was so pervading that it took everyone's breath.
The young whitelighter only moved hesitantly forward while the source punted the motionless pile with the tip of his boot.
Wyatt looked disgusted.
Chris was horrified of what Wyatt – his Wyatt – the one who once had been his caring brother, the one who could once not even let any injured little animal left unattended at the roadside, even if it meant that he would be late for THE major football game of the year – and to say the least his coach was really not amused – had become now.
This man was now standing here bare of any compassion.
Was there something left in the source that Chris still could reanimate?
He wasn't sure anymore…
The meanly kick had meanwhile forced a reaction out of the human pile of rags.
Glazed and tired eyes stared to scan the dim room without any sign of discern, till they rested on the brown-haired boys pain-filled face.
Recognition awoke in Chris…
"…Davis?"
Under all the bruises and dried blood he had acknowledged the old chairman that had not so long ago tried to stop him from going onto this suicide mission.
"…Chris?" came the unbelieving answer. The mans voice was so faint and raw that the young white lighter needed no further hint of what the man must have been through.
The old man now began slowly to rock back and forth while muttering
"…everything's fine, its OK now, everything's fine…" again and again.
Chris remembered the nice and calm older man he once knew from the resistance.
Davis was once even a close friend of his family, but that had been in a time he had been to small to remember.
Davis had once been an elder till he decided to become human again. He tried to be neutral and to stop all the craziness and bloodshed.
He had always pleaded for peaceful solutions, and his advice was held high in the resistance council.
Davis had quit his activities in the council as they had decided against him, to send Chris on his mission.
Davis had as far as Chris could see now followed the boy and tried to save him from running headfirst into disaster. And the price he'd paid had been high!
What had they done to him?
"How could you do that? He's done nothing to you- he even wasn't in the resistance anymore. He quit!" The youth was all shook up.
"Don't you see how much he's suffering Wyatt?" Chris asked in a pained quiet voice, as if afraid of what the answer to his question would be.
"Cant you feel his pain?"
At this something changed in the sources eyes. They became kind of soft.
Chris thought to find something almost familiar in it.
The blond man took one step forward and crouched in front of the rocking man.
He lifted the old mans chin affectionately.
"I feel your pain, Uncle Davis!"
"..You once sat on my knee as you were a little boy. There was so much good in you…it was so strong…! How?...how could it come to this? How Wyatt! You mother…"tears welled up in the eyes of the broken man.
"Ssssssh!" the source cupped the face of the man fondly in his hands.
"Maybe there is hope?" Chris thought seeing this…
Wyatt looked Davis deep in the eyes as he snapped his neck.
"Noooooooooo!" Chris cried out desperately. But it was too late. The boy fell defeated to his knees besides the dead body. His eyes filled with tears he looked up at his brother.
There was a look in his eyes so full of vulnerability and despair, Wyatt had seen last time as Chris was a little boy.
The boy's world was once more shattered.
"Why?" was all Chris managed to croak out as he closed the old mans eyes for the last time. "Why?"
"You were right, little brother. I felt his pain and I ended it. There was no need for him to suffer longer.
You know I'm not that cruel!"
…
It was the point where Chris lost it completely.
He stormed on unsteady legs out of the room and threw up the precious food in his stomach all over the floor.
Wyatt found Chris once more down on his knees while dry heaves mixed up with suppressed sobs shook his baby brother's fragile shape.
"Maybe this will teach him a lecture, that there will be only one way of survival – My way! "The source thought.
Wyatt was really convinced that all the putatively good things he had shown his brother mixed up with a proper portion of fear could pull his brother onto his side.
He had to instill the thought into Chris that it was he who could make the difference that he could save all those peoples lives by sharing his brothers way of living and convincing those, who could not see clearly right now.
This would be the last part of his plan.
He had already brought the already tattered whitelighter literally down to his knees.
His psyche was now vulnerable and hopefully easier moldable.
Now he would take care of him, show him his soft side and build him slowly up again the way he wanted him to be.
The source scooped the unresisting boy up into his arms and shimmered out.
As they reappeared in Chris chamber he tried to place the now limp body carefully onto his bed.
But the magic of his family was still strong in the piece of furniture and sent the evil Halliwell still holding his brother in his arms flying into the next wall, where they landed with a nasty thud in a crumpled heap on the floor.
Wyatt had to resist the urge to blow the bed up with a good old solid fireball.
But no, he had now sustain the facade of the nice brother.
Chris remained in his lethargic state while Wyatt placed him swearing onto his cushion which lay still in the corner.
While he covered hi with the blanket he yelled for Bianca, who shimmered in promptly.
"What the he…" She started at the sight of the youngest Halliwell.
"None of your concern, babe!" Wyatt interrupted her.
"Just take care of him. Ill be back soon!" He had to check the book of shadows in his office for any helpful advice. The unresponsive condition the boy was in started to worry him not least because he was without any serious healing supports now that his own healing powers had dwindled.
Without further explanations the source shimmered out.
Bianca sat down besides the motionless whitelighter and brushed some stray bangs from his sweaty forehead.
Chris eyes still stared into emptiness.
"Oh Christopher! What have you gotten yourself in this time? You never do things the easy way don't you?"
Bianca conjured a bowl of cool water and a cloth and placed the cooling compress softly onto the young whitelighters head.
"All right, I think if you are not able to take care of yourself…" A sad smile played around her lips at the thought to talk to Chris Halliwell that way without any objections. "…its time someone else takes over this job, and I will be damned if this someone would be the source.
I know I will regret this sometimes, but hell there must be something worth risking your life for.
I'm sure that bastard Wyatt isn't it – but maybe his little brother is!"
´Oh Bianca you've fallen complete crazy! …
…or in love? ´
From this moment on everything happened so fast, that no one could explain afterwards how this crazy action could have worked out, but it did.
The confidence Wyatt had put into Bianca, this time turned against him.
She was one of the few people he trusted so far that she could shimmer everywhere without limitations. As one of his personal bodyguards she could even appear in Wyatt's private rooms without being grilled by the sources protective energy field.
She had never misused this trust – until now.
With Wyatt's precious magic tool in her hands she shimmered back into the chamber of the younger Halliwell.
Chris still wasn't responsive and seemed totally unaware that his rescue came from the most improbable side ever thought of. Out of the sources own rows.
Silently the Phoenix opened the band on Chris wrist. Now everything went on in lightning speed. Wyatt must have sensed by this time that the huge amount of powers had been set free. So Bianca did not waste any time and shimmered the both of them out in a deserted and not monitored area of the city. She cloaked them instantaneously with what the young rebel vanished from the telekinetic radar´ of the resistance as well.
Luckily the young Phoenix had still some friends outside of the evil regime who took the two lost teenagers into hiding
…
Chris lay securely tucked in a ragged blanket and was now deeply asleep.
Bianca knew he would soon be on his feet again even if she worried if the wounds on his soul could ever heal.
The Phoenix watched the for once relaxed and peaceful features of the boy.
At once he looked so young, as young as he could never afford to come across in this cruel world – as young as he really was!
Suddenly the whole scope of her actions crashed in over her. She had never been so confused in her whole life.
But she was free.
Free with a damn brave and cute young man by her side.
And hell, she liked that!...
TBC…