Disclaimer: I don't own Charmed

Running and Hiding

He was in the past, trying to help his mother and aunts keep his older brother safe. Of course, they didn't know they were related to him, and they didn't know that they weren't protecting Wyatt from harm, but from turning evil. Chris intended for it to stay that way.

Unfortunately for him though, his family were as inquisitive in the past as they had been in the future. And whenever he tried to evade answering their prying questions about the future and who he was they always accused him of running away and hiding from them.

Running and Hiding. Unbeknownst to them, it's what he had done all his life. Both emotionally and physically.

He had always been good at it too.

Back when they were children, he and Wyatt would play hide and seek. Wyatt could never find him. Even when they used their powers. When they played tag or other chasing games, no one could ever catch him, especially when they used powers.

See, while most of Wyatt's powers were offensive powers with great strength that no one else's could match. Chris's were better for escaping, or not being seen. As well as orbing and telekinesis, Chris could move faster than the speed of sound, he had extremely acute hearing, he could make himself invisible or camouflage in with his surroundings, he could make an energy shields, he could walk through walls and he could make extremely realistic illusions. The only offensive power that Chris had (aside from telekinesis) was that he could create and control fire and ice.

So far, he had managed to successfully conceal his true nature and power from the Charmed ones and the elders in the past. They all just thought that he was an ordinary whitelighter. They had no idea that he was part witch too.

However, it wasn't until he was in his early teens that he felt he had to start hiding his emotions. The world was starting to turn bad, it was no longer safe to walk the streets alone. Unfortunately for Chris, it was often necessary for him to do just that, particularly when his father dropped in at home for a visit. You couldn't show any fear to the gangs in the streets, if you did, you were history. So, Chris hid his fear and became very good at it.

Then, his relatives started being killed off, one by one. It had started with his Aunt Phoebe, then his mother soon followed. He had lived with Aunt Paige, Uncle Richard and his cousins for a while and during that time, he started hiding his pain and grief. He became very good at hiding that too. In the months that followed, they were all dead too, so he moved in with his Grandfather, until he died of lung cancer later that year. He would have had to go to an orphanage after that, but his Uncle Cole stepped in and took him to live with him and his little cousin, Patience.

He was almost happy there for a while, but then one night, demons somehow found them and killed his last remaining family members. Aside from his treacherous brother, who Chris no longer considered part of his family.

After this, Chris was living on the streets, and San Francisco was in ruins. He lived from day-to-day, scavenging for food and moving from abandoned building to abandoned building trying to avoid the daily raids from demons and witch-hunters alike.

He stopped talking, mostly because there was no one to talk to. It was because of this that he discovered his other powers; he could sense anyone he wanted and where they were at anytime, shortly afterwards he developed empathy and telepathy as well. This only made the running and hiding easier, it meant he could feel people coming as well as hear them.

By this time he was in mid-teens and he was relying fully on his ability to run and hide to survive. He had to hide from Wyatt, his brother who had been responsible for the deaths of their entire family and who now wanted to kill him.

When he was 16, when he was just about ready to give up and let himself be killed, he found the resistance, and he started using his powers to hide them too.

When he was 18, Wyatt caught him. For the first time in his life, he had been caught. But, he was determined – it would be the last time. He remained in Wyatt's dungeons for many weeks, able to find no way out. Wyatt simply knew him too well. Without him to protect them, Wyatt's demons found the resistance, and it crumbled.

He finally escaped with the help of an assassin named Bianca; she betrayed Wyatt, got him out of the dungeons and nursed him back to health.

It was decided that there was no way to save the future, except to stop it before it even began. So with Bianca's help, Chris escaped into the past.

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So now here he was, in the past. Where he found he had to hide more than ever. He thought that it would be easier, it was safer in the past and he wasn't running for his life all the time. But, he still had to hide who his was and what he could do. He had to hide behind a neurotic, sarcastic persona, that he knew really annoyed his family.

He was doing pretty well at keeping his secrets secret as well. Until a demon with power over memories and painful experiences decided to attack the charmed ones and their whitelighters.

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A/N: Right, this started off as a one-shot, but now I have a few ideas and so I'm thinking of carrying on and doing, you know, how the sisters find out about Chris etc. I added the last paragraph just in case. So, what do you think, should I? Please review, they are what keep me going!