TFC AU: The House of the Rising Clones
This AU is heavily inspired and based off of @space-junkyy‘s found family AU.
(THIS GONNA BE LONG AND SIMPILIFIED)
To start things off, everything that has happened in The Fourth Closet and the other books is canon to this AU, and is essential just an aftermath AU.
The woman that John saw at the end of the book in the graveyard wasn’t Charlie, it was Elizabeth disguised as Charlie, and the reason John seemed so out of it was because he was still mildly high after taking prescription pain relief that he was given to him for his ankle.
After John sobered up, and realized it was Elizabeth they almost got into a violent confrontation, but Elizabeth managed to calm him down after explaining to him what Charlie was; that she was a machine and so she could never really die... not permanently anyway.
Basically Elizabeth brought up the time when Charlie survived the springlock failure, and asked him how a normal person could’ve possibly survived that, as well as made it out without so much as physical scar.
John still didn’t believe her, but he was desperate for his Charlie back, and said that he would go with her, but only if he could bring his friends along.
Elizabeth agreed.
John also asked her why she even wanted to help after everything she’s put them through, and Elizabeth lied and said that Charlie was the only one left that could fix her, and showed John the giant impalement-holes from the endoskeleton that went thought her stomach and out her back.
Elizabeth was in a lot of pain because of it, but it wasn’t the only reason she wanted to bring Charlie back.
Elizabeth grew up in such a neglectful and lonely home, that it had just gotten to the point as to where anyone that showed Elizabeth any kind of affection was then treasured very much by her. And just the fact that Charlie was willing to try and hold her hand as they were both dying, it really left a mark on her...
They both agreed that John would come by Circus Baby’s pizza world later that night with his friends, (except Carlton because he was still in the hospital.)
So, pretty much the only two that would be going with John would be Jessica and Marla, and neither were all that ecstatic to go back to that place. And after John had explained that Charlie was dead, and that Elizabeth was the only one that could bring her back... they thought he’d lost his mind a bit.
But they definitely weren’t about to let him go back to that place alone, and so they agreed, but not before they made it clear to arm themselves before they left.
Upon arriving to Circus Baby’s pizza world, Elizabeth was already standing by the side entrance waiting for them.
Jessica was terrified of her, but wasn’t shy about hiding the fact she had bat with her and was making subtle threats. This amused Elizabeth, but John wasn’t here for games. He wanted to know where Charlie was.
Elizabeth led the three into the pizzeria, and took them down into the basement area where Afton’s animatronic’s used to roam, before leading them into a small room that had a metal door adjacent to it’s entrance.
The group was a bit on edge at this point, and when Elizabeth opened the door, it was a sight that none of them would forget.
Charlie had been stripped down to her underwear and was laying on an operating table. And even though Charlie had been dead for a while now, she still only looked like she was sleeping. Her face was pale, but her overall complexion hadn’t faded at all and made the group thoroughly uneasy. But this is the moment when John actually started to have some faith in Elizabeth...
Elizabeth told Jessica and John to wait outside while the procedure was undergoing, but she told Marla to come in a help her as she could use a second pair of hands.
Jessica wanted to stop Marla from going with her, but Marla reassured she would be fine. Jess wished her luck.
But just before Elizabeth closed the door so her and Marla could get started, Elizabeth gave John the Ella ragdoll to hold for the time being. Obviously, John doesn’t know what this doll was (apart from it having belonged to Charlie), and Elizabeth bluntly stated that it was her soul, and that she wouldn’t need it until somewhere near the end, and figured he could hold into until then.
Elizabeth then turned and closed the door behind her, leaving John and Jess with this doll.
John spent the entire time talking to the ragdoll, asking Jessica if she thought that Charlie could hear them, and John telling Charlie that everything was going to be okay, amongst other things. Jessica wanted to hold the doll for a minute, but John wasn’t letting her go...
After a few hours, Elizabeth finally came out for Charlie’s soul, and though hesitant, John gave it to her.
Another hour passed, and after a lot of patience from John and Jess, Elizabeth eventually came out, and they were finally allowed in the room.
Charlie was still laying on the operating table unconscious and pale, but now she had on a pair of shorts and a tank-top, and she was breathing.
It gave John and Jessica a strong sense of deja-vu back when they found her in the box, and surprisingly after John knelt down beside her to be closer to her, she woke up, but was very weak and not very lucid. Clearly in a daze.
After that, John took her back to his apartment where she could recuperate for a few days, and during that time he took care of her. Marla also came in every few days to check on her and make sure that she was healing correctly.
Elizabeth didn’t want to stay in Circus Baby’s pizza any longer, and so checked into a hotel for the time being and waited, as her fate was pretty much in the hands of the others at this point, as well as having to wait the additional few days until Charlie was well enough to start working on Elizabeth’s injuries that were really starting to get to her at this point... but a little piece of her knew that she deserved this...
After a week had passed, Charlie was unable to put off seeing Elizabeth any longer and so brought her to John’s apartment where she worked on her for a few hours at a time, with a few nap and water breaks between, and after much effort Charlie was able to fix her interior and patch up the holes.
Charlie slept for the rest of the day, and the most of next morning after that.
Soon after Charlie made the decision that it was time to move back into her Aunt Jen’s house and take Elizabeth with her, but in the midst of thinking about it, she relized that Aunt Jen wasn’t there anymore... and would never be there again...
Charlie tried her best not to think about it, but more she tried not to think about it, the guiltier she felt. And felt even worse about the fact that she was pretty much letting the woman that killed her aunt, sleep in her aunt’s bed as it was the only other bedroom there was in the house.
But at the same time, it was also the woman that saved her life... But also the woman that manipulated and traumatised her friends... Charlie was really having troubles with her morals at this point, and it caused her to spiral a little bit.
John, though he was grateful that Charlie was back, he was still heavily conflicted about Elizabeth and was made uncomfortable with the knowledge that they were going to be living in the same house together, and so John decided he wanted to join them.
He needed to get out of that crumby apartment anyway.
This is when things seemingly started to calm down a little bit, but that only lasted so long.
After a month or so of Charlie brooding she decided she wanted to go back to Hurricane... She had to know what was behind that door in that facility underneath where her father’s house stood. There had to be a reason why she felt so connect to it right?
She and John had a long fought argument about it. John had become protective of Charlie and didn’t want her going back to that death-trap a second time, but Charlie tried to reassure him she just wanted to see what was behind the door, she had to know, and then they could leave.
John knows that even if there really was something behind that door, it probably wasn’t a good thing. They both knew it wasn’t Sammy, so what else could it be? Nothing that’s ever come out of those places has been good, and to John it just wasn’t worth it.
But at the same time, John knew Charlie was in a rough position at the moment, and knew that even if it turned up nothing, it would put her mind at ease... hopefully.
So, Charlie and John both packed up the car, took some tools they thought they might need and left for Hurricane, leaving the house with Elizabeth until they got back. John also scheduled to meet up with Jess, Carlton, and Marla later at the diner to get something to eat after their little expedition.
John knew there was a second entrance to the facility in the woods, (It was the way how he, Jessica, and Clay got in last time, where the Shadow Freddy led them.)
John lead Charlie to a weird trap-door that was covered with leaves, opened it, and showed that it had an old metal ladder going all the way down on to a tiled floor at the bottom.
Charlie asked John about how he even knew about this entrance, and what could he say apart from that he, Jess, and Clay followed a shadow Freddy? John said he thought it was Michael, it had to be.
After the two went down they spent most of the time trying to find pathway that had once led up to Charlie’s dad’s house, and though with effort they did eventually find it. Most of the path had caved in near the end, but the door was still there and mostly unburied.
The door had clearly been sealed over, but it wasn’t anything an axe wouldn’t solve. John had made sure to buy some good equipment and so started to go to town on the door, definitely making “here’s johnny” joke as he finally busted a hole through it.
And they found what looked like a prize corner. Dusty stuffed toys placed on shelves behind a counter, old streamers and confetti littered the ground, and old children’s drawings were stuck to the walls. But there didn’t seem to be anything.
Even though Charlie was glad to finally get to look back here, she was still sad to learn that it really meant nothing... that was until they noticed the box at the far end of the room. They probably would’ve left without even noticing it if didn’t start playing music...
John and Charlie just look at each other for a moment, and John volunteers to open it before Charlie can, drawing his axe just in case...
John steadily places his hand on the box’s lid, and the music stops. He lifts it, and staring back at him are two white eyes, that suddenly spring at him, knocking the axe out of his hand as he falls to the floor.
Charlie quickly grabs the weapon and starts beating down on this giant puppet thing with the butt of the axe, and once it collided with its mask, the puppet stopped attacking John to look at her, and it froze. Despite the thing’s mask being made of plastic, its expression implied that it recognised her from somewhere... and Charlie recognised it too... but she wasn’t sure from where, but it was like her soul was calling out to it... could it hear it?
As soon as John got up he tried pulling Charlie away from the puppet thing but she fought him telling him that this was the thing that was calling out to her that day when everything caved in.
John’s just confused, but it stopped attacking him because Charlie got its attention and so maybe it was better to let her handle this one, but he still kept his guard up.
The puppet reached down and hugged Charlie, and while she was caught off guard, she still tried to talk to it, all while John subtly tried to pull her away, but it soon dawned on him that Charlie probably wasn’t going to leave this puppet where she’d found it.
She brought it back up to the surface with her.
And then both John and Charlie remembered they were supposed to be meeting the others after this for lunch...
Charlie pretty much stowed away the puppet in the backseat, and left the window open slightly because Charlie felt wrong leaving something that probably contained a human soul inside a hot car.
Charlie and John were both pretty tense when they came in, and the others noticed it, but figured it would be better to brush it off. For a while it went well, until thirty minutes later when the puppet managed to squeeze through the gap in the window and make its way into the diner.
Jessica screamed, and Charlie quickly ran out of her seat, whilst John tried to keep the others from freaking out before taking off after Charlie to make sure the puppet stayed in the back of the car before too many onlookers caught wind that this wasn’t just some elaborate joke.
Obviously both John and Charlie had some explaining to do. And while their friends are all kinda pissed that they can never have a normal reunion, they’re all pretty numb to it at this point. But more or less happy that this clown didn’t have any violent tendencies. (John neglecting to tell them it attacked him.)
While this is all happening the puppet puts its arm through the gap in the car window again and starts playing with Charlie’s hair.
Carlton’s the first the think it’s kinda cute and taps on the glass to gets it’s attention, and the puppet taps back. Marla and Jessica aren’t quite convinced that it’s not dangerous though, and keep their distance.
Charlie admits that she was planning on taking the puppet home with her to try and better figure out what her connection with it was, what secrets this thing held, and what it was all about.
John suggested that it would be better to probably take this conversation, and the puppet somewhere less public, and she, John, and the others agreed to meet up later that day at Carlton’s place.
At first Charlie was a bit nervous if Clay would let her bring a living puppet into his house, but Carlton said that is dad was on a business trip and wouldn’t be back for a few days. And besides, Carlton got good vibes from the puppet so he didn’t mind.
Charlie made sure she looked both ways down the path before she and John dragged the puppet up to Carlton’s front door, and even then, was freaked out when no one came to the door right away. Though, it was pleasantly surprising to see Marla and Jessica had showed up before them and were sitting in the living room... even if they looked a little bit perturbed.
The group just spent the rest of the day talking about what Charlie was going to do with this puppet, all the while observing it, and it became pretty clear really quickly that the thing that was inhabiting this puppet was definitely a child. Not that they didn’t already suspect that, but it just became super obvious when it managed to sneak upstairs and into Carlton’s room where it proceeded to rummage though an old trunk full of his old toys from when he was a kid.
Despite Marla’s fear of the puppet, she just finds this really endearing and just starts playing with it, and the puppet is immediately into it, and as a result Jessica starts to calm down too.
Literally just the rest of the day is Charlie and her friends babysitting this giant puppet, and it ends up being a pretty great day in general.
But as the day is pretty much coming to a close and Charlie and John are getting ready to head back home, Charlie realizes that they’ve just been referring to this child, that most likely has a name, as just ‘the puppet’ the entire day.
And so while the puppet was drawing Charlie asks it to write it’s name for her, and in messy handwriting the puppet scrawls, ‘CHARLOTTE’ on some paper, and Charlie then realized that this puppet is original Charlie, and she goes into existential crisis mode...
That’s why this puppet was so attached to her right as they first met, she’s an identical copy of what she could’ve been, and probably reminds her of her twin brother Sammy. It overwhelms Charlie a lot, and Charlotte just tries to comfort her, along with John and the rest of her friends.
It did put a bit of a damper on the rest of the day, and the drive back home was probably the quietest drive home ever. Explaining the entire ordeal to Elizabeth when they got back was interesting to put it politely, Elizabeth immediately came right over to Charlotte and looked her straight in the eyes before walking off... a part of her still doesn’t believe that that’s actually original Charlie, and that it must be a coincidence.
She was sure her soul would’ve left years ago.
But now, John, Charlie, Charlotte and Elizabeth all live together in the same house. The house of clones, and their keeper John.
A few other things I thought I’d mention: (Things may get added to the list as things progress.)
Marla knits Charlotte jumpers and clothes, and sends them as packages through the mail.
John and Charlie are an item.
Charlie has a private Facebook account that only her friends follow that documents her time with Charlotte.
John and Charlie are pretty much Charlotte’s parents now. Elizabeth is the cool aunt.
Carlton is cool uncle.
Elizabeth lowkey jealous that Charlotte gets so much attention.
Jessica is spending time living with Carlton because of her night terrors, since her apartment neighbour was threatening to get her evicted because of her screaming in the middle of the night.
Jess and Elizabeth can’t be near each other.
Aunt Jen is haunting the house that the clone-gang is living in.
Carlton and Jessica are an item.
Lamar and Marla are an item
Twisted Chica is part of the gang now
But yeah, that’s the entire AU. I spent way too long writing this out.
But if you legit took time out of your day to read this, thank you for humoring me, I have a crippling FNaF addiction.
Stories connected to this AU:
A Nightmare: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/650274648129486848/a-nightmare
~ Phone Call: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/650359412661403648/phone-call
~ Ragdoll: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/650539235214016512/ragdoll
~ Ghosts: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/650684607208046592/ghosts
~ A Gift: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/651166157342146560/a-gift
~ More Human: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/651616416936738816/more-human
~ Night Out: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/652156803521609728/it-was-only-thanks-to-elizabeth-that-charlotte-got
~ A Warm Night: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/652265732557651968/night
~ To Remember: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/652686659397320704/to-remember
~ Scrapyard: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/652876434786926592/scrapyard
~ The Gift Box: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/653048915490439168/the-gift-box
~ Session: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/653337746560155648/session
~ Fever Dream: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/653764061489692672/fever-dream
~ A Mistake: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/654038331127218176/a-mistake
~ Paralysis: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/654330922423975936/paralysis
~
The Twisted Friend: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/654858989363920896/the-twisted-friend
~
What I did: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/655141016141201408/what-i-did
~
Downpour: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/655809009937448961/downpour
~
A Mistake (Mini,pt2): https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/656448120900730880/a-mistake-minipt2
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Panic Attack: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/656690375491289088/panic-attack
~
Playtime: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/657259782190907392/playtime
~
Robotic Dysphoria: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/657625399705141248/robotic-dysphoria
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Against The Tree: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/658597803199807488/against-the-tree
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Into Madness: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/670733624776245248/into-madness
~
Return Trip https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/671444534096429056/return-trip
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For Yourself: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/674542611156123648/for-yourself
~
Waiting Room: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/674637948253356032/waiting-room
~
Midnight Song: https://mechanicaldemonio.tumblr.com/post/674842045952688128/midnight-song
