A/N: I saw a re-run of Charmed on TV and I fell in love with the series all over again, particularly the character of Chris and his storyline. Hence this story, an idea that started out fairly simple and turned into a monster. This is going to be most of season 6 from Chris's perspective and as such I'm going to be world building the unchanged future in detail, which will make this story really dark and violent at times. It will follow canon closely until 6x09 and then diverge completely after 6x15. Lastly, a note about the opening poem, yes, I know it's different than the traditional version. However it's the variation that I grew up with so...yea...

Sunday's Child

Prologue

Monday's child is fair of face

Tuesday's child is full of grace

Wednesday's child is full of woe

Thursday's child has far to go

Friday's child works hard for its living

Saturday's child is faithful and giving

And Sunday's Child is all of these

Their mother had been just over eight months pregnant when a powerful and invisible force kidnapped his brother from under her watch. She'd blamed herself and the bed rest she'd been ordered to by the doctor she'd insisted on for her second pregnancy after the complications with her first. A recommendation that in the end had little benefit as the stress from the two week ordeal sent her into premature labor a second time. However unlike with Wyatt, whose conception had been calculated incorrectly, he was born far too early. From that day onward Christopher Halliwell's life had been an uphill struggle interspersed with brief periods of happiness. A long chain of events stretched from his initial fight to live in the NICU to this moment as he watched Bianca draw the doorway he'd step through, trading one warzone for another. He always had to endure one type of trial or another, and it just wasn't fair. Why was he the one that had to do it all?

Sometimes, when he allowed himself the luxury of being philosophical, he wondered if it was his name. Christopher, the one who carries, had his name cursed him to this life of duty? Of sacrifice? Certainly his lineage had. Yet, even though he should, he couldn't bring himself to resent his family for that. He had enough happy memories in his childhood to know if it had been up to them none of this would have happened.

"It's time," Bianca said with determination as she stepped away from the wall to double check her work. It was the tone she used on missions, the one that marked her as a field commander. A leader in his own right, it shook him out of his musings as she turned to look at him.

"I don't want to go," he lamented and he knew that he sounded like a child but he didn't care. For so long he'd been an infallible symbol of strength for the many and he needed this. This moment, before he had to carry on again, this time all alone. A moment of frailty with one of the few people who knew and loved all of him. His last chance to tell her as he pulled her into a desperate embrace. He'd lost so much already, now it was time to lose her too. "I don't want to leave you."

"Here," She murmured giving him back the ring he'd given her. It had been a last romantic gesture on his part. To give her the traditional ring in the place they'd first met after the battle of Golden Gate Bridge. One last pledge to her before they disappeared forever. Now she gave it back so that he could draw strength from it. Not that she could have kept it anyway. Likely she would have dropped it in a storm drain on her way back to him. Unable to keep something so connected to her Resistance ties on her person, "this will remind you of why we're doing this, what's waiting for you here."

"Just make sure you take care of the guards, then get out of here, ok?" He ordered, choking on the words. If this plan succeeded, every promise he'd ever made her but one would go unfulfilled. Time would be rewritten, this version of them would be erased and they would most likely never see one another again. "Because if he finds you, if he knows you betrayed him, he'll kill you."

"Don't worry," she murmured giving him that cocky smile he loved before pulling him down into one last kiss. "I can take care of myself."

He wrapped his arms tighter around her and placed his forehead against hers, attempting to memorize everything about her. It's a position he would have stayed in forever had she not pulled away and gently pushed him toward the podium. He stood and briefly stared at a holographic copy of his family's legacy, gathering himself again, before he pulled out the spell. Until his recon mission, he hadn't seen this family heirloom in years, now he was going to see it twice in less than a month. A slight smile pull on his lips as he remembered the end result of that. Wyatt had been furious and he'd nearly died but still he considered the whole thing an overall success. If for no other reason than he'd been able to one up his brother a final time.

I call upon the ancient power

To help us in this darkest hour

Let the book return to this place

Claim refugee in its rightful space

In a flash, like it couldn't wait to get away from its current master, the Book of Shadows materialized into the air before him and thumped on to the pedestal. "It worked!"

"The spell!" Bianca hissed as she pulled out a dagger and surveyed the room, preparing herself for the coming soldiers. That admission of panic from the most level headed person he knew spurred his own and he almost ripped pages as he flipped through them. He knew the general location of the spell from his mission and his childhood but even so it took him longer than he would have liked to find it.

Hear these words, hear the rhyme

Heed the hope within my mind

Send me back to where I'll find

What I wish in place and time

The chalk outline glowed a brilliant white and then an eerie blue vortex of swirling lights stabilized inside the design. As the spell's caster, the magic called to him like a siren's song and he found himself moving around the podium to stand before the opening without consciously thinking about it. The compulsion to complete the magic was strong, but he couldn't bring himself to leave without taking one last look at her. Bianca's smile was gentle and they were still staring at one another when a guard shimmered in behind her and he yelled her name in warning.

"Go!" She ordered loudly as she grabbed her attacker to throw him off her back and across the room. At any other time he wouldn't have worried about the master assassin but he could sense the power heading straight for them. Not even she was good enough to go up against a force that size single handily, not without his help and it took all the power his logical mind possessed to overrule his heart. To grit his teeth and step into the light, leaving her behind.

A cacophony of white noise laced color enveloped him and the chaos tried to pull him in every direction at once. Time was a powerful thing and its flow wanted to drag him off to an infinite number of places and moments, rather than the one he wanted. It was only the spell that made sure he never strayed from his path and prevent the pain his mind told him he should be in. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, it abruptly stopped and he collapsed forward onto his hands and knees. The change in state caused his stomach to roll as his head spun and he took several deep breaths to center himself. It was only then that his normally hyper-observant mind recognized there were familiar wood planks beneath his palms. Carefully, vision still uneven, he lifted his head to observe the space around him.

Gone were the static displays of memorabilia intermixed with the lights, ropes and futuristic trappings of a museum. Instead he found himself surrounded by an organic chaos that was only achievable when people lived in a place. Even the air was different and he took another deep breath, conscious this time that the nearly inescapable scent of ash and rotting from his time was missing. His arms gave out and he collapsed to the ground chuckling to ward off the tears that wanted to slip out of his burning eyes.

It worked.

Consciously he'd known it would, had defended this plan against more than one naysayer but there'd still been a small part of him that doubted his success. Few things in his life had ever gone right, hell few things ever went to plan. It was how he'd become something of a master at 'winging it', through necessity. Still chuckling he rolled over and groaned as the tension in his back sank into the floorboards beneath him. In that moment he couldn't even muster the will to think about moving his suddenly heavy body. It was a state he knew well after years on the battlefield, he was coming down from an adrenaline high.

"Piper! Paige!" Chris's relaxed body instantly tensed as the familiar voice of his aunt filtered up through the floors of the Manor. He hadn't heard the sound in nearly a decade but it didn't matter. Not when it was seared into his memory like a brand. He screwed his eyes shut and took short gasping breaths as her continued calls triggered memories he'd done his best to suppress since her death so many years ago.

...A room full of demons, a bloodied sword, an uncle and all but one cousin in pieces on the floor and his aunt's desperate pleas to save her last child...

He was still breathing hard, his heart racing, when the creaking of the stairs and the closer sound of her voice jolted him out of the memories. During his teenage years PTSD had been a constant shadow in his life, sneaking up on him the second he let his guard down. It was only in recent years that the problem had subsided to the point where he was rarely if ever crippled by it. He'd just gotten used to being too busy to break down and this deluge was unwelcome to say the least. It was that frustration he latched onto as he forced his fists to unclench from the old Oriental rug beneath his legs and orbed away before she found him. Not having a destination in mind he opted for a landmark and landed heavily on one of the bright orange metal towers of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Chris breathed deeply, in and out, as he stared at the city sprawling out before him. It looked just as he remembered it from his childhood save a few buildings that likely hadn't even been thought of yet. No ruins, no corpses littering the streets, no terrified and soulless people scurrying from one blown out hovel to another. A place where the only parts of the city being looked after were the area around the manor and Wyatt's palace a block away. Now more level, he slammed his fist hard against the metal, growling as the pain finally centered him completely.

That couldn't happen again.

He couldn't break down into a tear filled wreck just because of the things that happened to him. He'd survived and he wasn't about to let simple memories beat him. He had a job to do. He had a mission he couldn't afford to fail and he needed to remain anonymous to do it. They couldn't know who he was and for that he needed to appear detached. Something that was impossible if he couldn't even hear their voices without become debilitated.

He needed a plan.

Next Time: Chris undergoes exposure therapy and a birthday is ruined.