Disclaimer: Nothing in the Charmed world belongs to me and no copyright infringement is intended.

A/N: Two points I need to make before we start this. First at this time Wyatt is 8 years old and his younger brother is 6. And secondly I know that everyone is guessing that the little boy is Chris, well yes you are all right. I never had any intention of keeping that a secret from my readers, now the other characters; well they don't need to know just yet. So back to the story.

Chapter 2 What's In a Name?

"It has been hours, Chris. Where are they?" Leo asked pacing back and forth over the attic floor every so often stepping on the loose floorboard that always squeaked. Wyatt was watching his father in some fascination wondering just exactly what had gotten into him. Leo was normally a very calm Elder who didn't let anything bother him but the disappearance of his wife and her sisters was taxing his nerves at that time.

Chris was sitting on the old beat up couch holding the Book of Shadows on his lap as he searched for the next demon to vanquish in his long list of threats to Wyatt. "I told you, Leo. They are searching for something in the Underworld. Right now they are in some of the chambers that are sense proof. You'll just have to be patient till they return."

Leo stopped pacing and stared angrily at the Whitelighter. "They never spend this much time on a vanquish, and what do you mean they are searching for something?"

Chris wanted to just ignore Leo's question. He really had been hoping that Leo would be away 'up there' a little bit longer than he had been. He glanced at Wyatt, who was sitting on the floor playing with his toy trucks, and rolled his eyes causing the young boy to giggle. Chris had managed to get on Wyatt's good side since arriving in the past and they both shared the same thoughts about Leo being just a tad on the over anxious side at times. "Leo, I've really let too much information slip today already, so I'm afraid you are just going to have to wait for them to show back up and then you'll get your answers."

Chris didn't really want to admit how good it felt to vex Leo on this. He had been spending a lot of time since arriving in the past doing just that. It wasn't as if he created situations that would test the limits of Leo's patience but he wasn't about to let one slip him by if he had the chance to use it either. And he could see just how thin that patience was becoming and wondered if just maybe he ought to lay off of the attitude for just a little while, for his own safety.

But at that moment it didn't matter because they both looked up to see blue and white orbs appear in the center of the attic leaving the three sisters standing before them.

"Thank god, I was getting so worried about…" Leo started to comment but then stopped as he noticed the child in Piper's arms. "Who is that?"

"Shhhh! I think he fell asleep," Paige whispered softly after checking to see how the boy had done orbing.

Piper crossed over to the couch and kicked Chris in the leg motioning him to get up, which he did so grudgingly and she carefully laid the boy down and then covered the sleeping child with a comforter. "I think we need to take this downstairs," she whispered turning towards the door but paused for a second. "Wyatt, hon, do you think you could stay up here and keep an eye on him? If he wakes up and needs anything you can yell for me okay?"

Wyatt was slightly confused as to who the boy was that his mother was being so protective of but he always wanted to please her so he'd do what ever she wanted. "Sure, Mom."

With that Piper headed to the door but noticed that Chris wasn't following them. "That means you too, Mister."

Chris closed the Book and followed the rest of them from the room shaking his head at what he knew had to be coming.

Once they were in the kitchen Piper began to get out cooking utensils and ingredients for one of her favorite dishes. "What are you doing, Piper?" Leo asked in confusion thinking that they would have a long conversation about what was going on.

"He's starved half to death and I promised him food, so I'm fixing food," she answered as if it was the most important thing in the world to her.

"We also need to find some of Wyatt's cloths that are smaller and get him cleaned up and out of those rags he's wearing," Phoebe suggested trying to remember where they had put the cloths that Wyatt had outgrown.

"I'll orb to town later and pick up anything we can't find here," Paige volunteered making a list in her head of the things a small boy would need.

Leo leaned back against the sink and shook his head. "Can someone please tell me what is going on here and who that boy is?"

Chris had taken a seat at the kitchen table and had started flipping through the Book of Shadows again as he watched the drama unfold in front of him. He was trying to sink into the wall behind him so none of them would think to question him any further.

Unfortunately Piper wasn't gonna allow that. "You didn't tell him, Chris!"

Chris glanced up biting his lip nervously. "I told you, you're on your own on this one. I'm staying out of the rest of it, for my own good and everyone else's too."

"Chris, don't you think you owe us a little bit more information than what you gave us before we found him?" Paige asked giving him a dirty look. "I mean you drop this bomb on us that we have to go save a kid that Piper and Leo are gonna adopt and then expect us to figure the rest out ourselves. That's not exactly fair."

"We what?" Leo asked looking to Piper to confirm the statement.

"Apparently, you and I adopt that magical little boy upstairs. He's a Witchlighter by the way, like Paige and Wyatt," Piper informed him and then turned to Chris. "At least according to Chris, but I meant what I said you and I need to have a talk young man."

The look she was giving him could have melted both stone and ice and Chris swallowed hard hating the fact that he couldn't tell her as much as she deserved. "Listen, Piper, the only reason I told you about him was because my demon hunts nearly caused you not to find him. I didn't want to change events anymore than I had to, but since this one was a pretty big one for you, I had to do something. But that's all I'm gonna do. The timeline is fixed. You found him and now you can adopt him and all of that stays the same." Chris knew that the less he told them about the boy the better it would be for himself no matter how hard it was to keep quiet about it. "I will save you a little time though. I don't think it will hurt to tell you that when Phoebe checks with Darryl no missing persons reports will be found and when Paige checks with her old Social Worker friends they won't find anything on him either. And even when Leo talks to the Elders they won't be able to come up with anything on him. It's as if he never existed."

Piper wanted to scream in frustration. Chris wasn't being any help at all and she really wanted to know more about the boy she had found. He looked so alone and so frightened when he looked up at her. How could any one child survive a life that would cause that much pain to be present in their eyes? "Can you at least tell me his name? Does he even have one?" she finally settled on sighing in resignation.

This brought a confused look to Leo's face. Why wouldn't he have a name? He had to have parents somewhere who would have named him. Phoebe saw the look on her brother-in-law's face. "We aren't exactly sure but it seems that maybe he's been living in the underworld his entire life," she whispered sadly.

"That last demon in the room filled with corpses seemed to know him pretty well, as if he'd known him for some time and those Karas demons said something about passing him off to a different clan as if he was a pet or something," Paige added angrily wanting to kill the demons all over again for the treatment she'd seen that the boy had received from them.

Leo's face went pale imagining a small child growing up in such conditions and it nearly made him sick to think of what the child must have suffered. "But that's… My god how?" How had he survived?

Chris watched Leo's reaction and was slightly surprised by it. But then again in his original timeline Leo hadn't been around much seeing as he was still a Whitelighter and subject to more rules. It had been several weeks after the child was found before Leo even knew about him and by then the boy had been fed up and didn't look quite so bad as he did when they found him.

But Piper had asked him a question. One he wasn't about to answer no matter how much she threatened him. "Yes, he does have a name, but you'll have to ask him that, and don't expect an answer for a while." When he saw the confusion this brought he decided to just give them one more small piece of information. "He doesn't speak or at least won't for some time, and he can't read or write either."

Piper gasped in shock. Everything the boy had gone through must have been a factor in keeping him silent and to have no other way to communicate or even for them to know what his name was. It was all so very upsetting to think about. "What are we supposed to call him until he tells us his name?"

Chris thought about that for a moment trying to remember. "Well as long as you are talking to him directly he'll answer to almost anything, I think."

"Yeah, I'm gonna call my son, hey kid," Piper growled in frustration.

This brought a smile to Chris' face. He couldn't ever remember any of the sisters addressing him that way. Leo & Wyatt might have a couple of times but never the sisters. He distinctly remembered that Phoebe had called him little buddy, and Paige had called him kiddo, but to Piper he had always been Peanut. That nickname had been extremely embarrassing, even though he had never complained. It was also ironic that soon after giving him the nickname they had discovered that he was allergic to said food. But the name had stuck anyway. "Don't worry, you'll figure it out. Anyhow, I'm gonna go put the book up and orb back to P3. Today has been one hell of a long day."

As his orbs shone Piper called out, "Don't wake him."

Chris reformed in the attic next to the podium and had to smile at the sight that greeted him. Wyatt had pulled a chair up next to the couch and was sitting very still keeping an eye on the door as if he was guarding someone. "Hey, Wy," he whispered trying not to wake the younger version of himself.

Wyatt glanced at him and then turned back to the door. "Hey, Chris."

Chris walked over and kneeled beside where Wyatt sat and took a good look at the sleeping boy. "You're doing a pretty good job of watching him. Your mom will be proud."

This made Wyatt grin madly. He loved to please his mom. But then his eyes clouded over slightly. He had been thinking a lot about the new boy and the way his mother had made such a fuss over him. "Is he gonna stay here, Chris?"

Chris knew exactly how Wyatt was feeling seeing as how he had already suffered through the sibling rivalry stage once before and decided that it wouldn't hurt to help the two brother's relationship along a bit. "Yes, Wy, he is gonna stay here. And I'll admit that your mom is gonna pay a lot of attention to him."

Wyatt scowled at that. He hadn't ever had to share his mom with anyone before. "Will she love him like she loves me?"

"In a way, yes," Chris answered understanding how much Wyatt needed to be reassured but also how he needed the truth too. "But don't worry. She'll love you just as much as she always has. It's jut that he's had a really hard life and he doesn't have anyone in the entire world that loves him."

Wyatt was surprised to hear that. He thought all children had parents that loved them. "No one at all?"

"No one. And the ones he's been living with were very mean to him. It's gonna take him a long time to get over all of that. But when he does, I promise you, he'll be the best brother any guy could ever ask for. He'll do anything for you, Wy, no matter what," Chris knew that Wyatt would believe him. He had explained time travel to him not long after arriving in the past and had told him about how he knew things from the future that no one else could. And up until then the boy had never doubted anything he'd said.

Wyatt seemed to think about all of that for a couple of minutes and then he nodded happily. "I guess having a little brother won't be so bad."

Chris smiled and ruffled Wyatt's blond curls. "I thought you'd see it that way." Then he stood and orbed away leaving Wyatt staring down at the young boy.

He reached out and took his hand and made a promise to the sleeping boy. "Don't worry, kid. I won't let anyone be mean to you again."

Chris reformed in the backroom at P3 and slumped into the old beat up couch he had been sleeping on for a few months now. He reached up and rubbed the tears out of his eyes. He had just barely heard the promise that Wyatt had made and wished that life had always been as simple as it was when they were children.

This had to have been the hardest day he'd had to face since traveling back in time. Seeing the demons that had mistreated him for years had been so hard, and he knew he could have never admitted to the sisters that the reason he didn't stay and help them search was because of the fear he still felt when he thought about the Necromancer's lair. He had been forced on many occasions to help the sick demon to prepare the corpses for his dark magic and it had left him with nightmares for years to come. Something he wasn't sure he'd not suffer from again now that all of the old memories were back taunting him.

And the thought that he had almost forgotten about himself almost petrified him. He hated to imagine what would have become of him if the sisters hadn't came and found him when they did. Would he even be alive now? Somehow he doubted it or at least he wouldn't have wanted to be. With those thoughts running through his head he curled up on his side and waited for sleep to find him, praying that the demons from his childhood nightmares would choose to stay away this time but knowing there was little chance of that happening.

A/N: Well, I officially managed to make Chris' original life even worse than the tv show depicted it as. What do you think of that? Poor kid. So any comments, any questions?