"Maybe it's a mistake," Jessica insisted, though her own voice still said otherwise. "Maybe she got away, somehow. Made it back to her dad. Maybe it's all a mistake."

"Jessica, I told you what I saw," said John. "I'm telling you, it's no mistake."

"You don't know that!" Jessica shouted, slamming her glass of water on the table. "You said you were unconscious for part of it! You weren't there when it happened all those years ago!"

John said nothing. After they all eventually returned to the Burke residence, John had told them as best he could everything that he knew, from his and Charlie's first visit to Fredbear's all the way up to the day he left the hospital to visit the graveyard.

Jessica turned to Hannah. "Miss Anderson, is it true?" Her voice suddenly grew solemn and scared.

Hannah didn't hear the question. She was busy watching her son sitting silently at the kitchen table, staring down at it as if it had the answers he needed. When Jessica cleared her throat and repeated the question, Hannah turned to her.

"Yes. I'm afraid it is true. My husband…" She paused, her voice breaking and eyes watering again. Clay handed her a tissue, which she took, blowing her nose into it. "My husband...he believed there was a way to bring her back. He…" She paused again, clearly struggling to explain it. His knowledge of the animatronics far-surpassed hers. She was merely an artist. "He believed that it was possible to build something that could...replace her. Imitate her. A robot that was so lifelike that it would be like she never left."

Carlton breathed a heavy sigh, mentally comparing the friend he thought he knew to that dreaded robotic face that terrorized him that day in Jessica's apartment. Jessica remained silent, tears forming in her eyes as her fight for denial was dashed. John only stared at the ceiling, his mind swimming in grief. Once again, he had already known much of what was being said, but hearing it from a new voice, a knowing voice made such a big difference.

"I tried to tell him that he was making matters worse," Hannah continued. "I tried to tell him that as much as I desperately missed Charlie as well, she was gone and we couldn't replace her, but he insisted. Eventually, we began fighting. He grew...angry." She shivered and blew her nose again aggressively. "He told me that he knew he could do it, and that if I truly cared about Charlie, I would support him. And all the time, he barely said a word to Sam."

They all turned to look at Sam still sitting silently at the kitchen table. Unbeknownst to them, despite his isolation, he was listening clearly to every word spoken.

"Then what happened?" Jessica asked, turning back to Hannah.

She stared absentmindedly at her glass of water for a few moments before answering.

"We left."

"Just like that?" John asked, intrigued by the story.

Hannah nodded. "After a few months of trying to talk sense into that man I loved, it was obvious he was set to go down his dangerous path with no looking back. Sam was still too young to understand what had happened, but he knew that his father wasn't the same as he used to be. It was then that I knew...for both of our sakes, we needed to leave."

Though no one saw it, Sam's fists clenched.

"Did he ask you not to?" asked Jessica.

Hannah shook her head. "He was too engrossed in his work to take much notice. I sent him the divorce papers and got them back signed without a fuss. Honestly, I'm not sure he even recognized what it was before signing. I knew he was gone. There was no saving him, so I left him in the hands of his sister, Charlie and Sam's Aunt Jen. She was heartbroken but understood the circumstances as well as I did. She asked where we were going, but I told her I didn't know. My sister got us an apartment in Chicago, and when we got there, I decided it was best to forget the past and move on, never to look back at what happened. That's why I didn't want us to be found, even though we still were eventually." She shot a concerned look at Clay.

"Believe me, it took a lot of cross-referencing and background checking," he said. "I almost gave up, you know."

"Well, maybe you should have," she said, some of the earlier venom returning to her voice. "This is exactly why I never wanted either me or my son coming back here. There's nothing but pain here. We don't need that in our lives."

"Of course," said Clay apologetically, "but please understand that these people sitting here with us were still good friends with your daughter, even if…" He paused, still taking in John's revelation as best as he could. "...even if she wasn't what any of us thought she was. All we knew was that your daughter was missing and we had no leads. As a police chief and another good friend of Charlie, I felt it was my duty to put forth any effort that I could in order to find her."

"So, what does this mean?" Carlton interjected. "About Charlie? The investigation?"

Clay said nothing. They turned to John.

"You're sure you last saw her in the cemetery?" Carlton asked.

John nodded. "I almost didn't believe it at first. I was standing in front of the graves when I looked over and saw her. I didn't recognize her at first, but when I got closer, it was definitely her. The same face, the same eyes, the same hair even. But…"

He broke off, unsure of how to explain it. The silence was pressing down upon him, urging him to go on even though he didn't know how. All eyes were trained on him, intent on not looking away until he finished.

"She looked...different."

"Different how?" Clay asked.

John shrugged, his eyebrows scrunched in thought. "I can't explain it exactly. It was definitely her. I knew that for certain when I got close enough. But…"

He paused again, another silence filling the room. Still, no one dared to even move.

"To be honest..." John said, a smile wanting to creep onto his face even though he wasn't sure why. "...she looked happy. Happier than I'd ever seen her before in my life. And her face...it was glowing."

"Glowing?" said Jessica.

"Yeah. Not radioactive or anything like in the movies, but there was something about her that was just...well...radiating. It's like her happiness was so strong it was shining off of her, if that makes sense."

Jessica and Carlton shot confused glances at one another, as did Hannah and Clay. Kyle, most confused and oblivious of all, looked at Sam in the other room, but Sam hadn't budged an inch.

"And we walked back to my car...down by the road." John's voice was beginning to break, not necessarily in a sad way, but as if his frustration and confusion were getting the better of him. "And when we got there, she…"

He broke off, his eyebrows lowered as he struggled to remind himself of the events, unsure of whether or not it really even happened. He still desperately hoped someone would cut him off, tell him he was crazy and let the conversation resume among them while he went back to thinking it through by himself just like Charlie always liked to do. Yet the silence from the others urged him on.

"We looked at each other," he said, giving a big sigh. "Her face was so bright and happy. I never saw her so happy in my life, except maybe a few times when we were younger."

"What did she say?" Clay asked.

John shook his head. "She said, 'I'm real, John. I'm real!' And she…" Another pause, still trying to find the courage to say it. His eyes began to really water now. "She leaned in and kissed me, just like I always wanted."

Carlton raised an eyebrow. John noticed his reaction.

"It wasn't anything like that," he said, "but it was real. And it was, well...love."

"And then?" Jessica asked.

John hesitated. "I'm not sure. I gestured her to my car, hoping that we would go somewhere together. Just get away from this town and find our path in this world somewhere. We got in and I started driving toward the hospital, you know, so he could see you guys, but..." Another pause. "...she said that she needed to go home. So I took her back to her house. We got out and looked at the wreckage, and I looked at her, but she wasn't looking at the house. She was looking at me, and she was smiling again, but it was weird. She still looked so happy. It didn't make sense. And I..." Another pause. He really sounded like he was struggling now. "I started walking toward the house, but she stopped me and told me she didn't want to see inside anymore."

"And then?" Jessica asked.

"I took her back to my apartment so she could spend the night, and I let her sleep in my bed. She smiled and said, 'Thank you, John,' like she always did. And I slept on the couch. But...the next morning, she was gone."

"Gone?" Jessica said, shocked and clearly disappointed. "What do you mean 'gone'?"

John shrugged. "I mean she wasn't there anymore. It's like she was never there. The sheets didn't even look ruffled or anything, but I know she was there. I saw her clear as day."

John stopped speaking there. As silence fell once more, he felt conflicted. Part of him was interested in their reaction, hoping that they might shed some light on the subject in ways he hadn't thought. Another part still felt compelled to shut up, feeling that he had already said too much and that he had somehow betrayed Charlie with that close final moment being revealed so feebly on his part. Still, beneath all of that, he couldn't help but feel that, if nothing else, they all needed to understand why he left the way he did and what he was going through. Finally, Carlton broke the silence.

"That doesn't sound possible."

John turned to him. "Carlton, how many things have happened to us lately that didn't seem possible?"

Carlton opened his mouth, but closed it after a few moments and said nothing.

"I know it's weird," John insisted. "I'm still not sure whether or not I want to believe it myself. But I'm absolutely sure that's what happened."

"And then what happened?" Jessica asked, still hoping for a clear answer to her best friend's whereabouts from his story.

John groaned. "I went out looking for her. I checked the library, her house, I even went back to Fredbear's. She wasn't there. Finally, I went back to her Aunt Jen's house, where they were."

"They? You mean-"

"Yes." John's implication was clear. He was referring to the two lifeless robotic bodies left at the house in Silver Reef. Though he hadn't planned on ever going back to that house, Charlie's sudden and brief appearance to him in that cemetery compelled him to return, to see for himself if it was true.

To his surprise, he'd found himself practically sprinting back into that house, hoping beyond anything that he would find it different somehow, that those nightmarish robots, one of which contained a face he'd grown to love, would be gone, and Charlie was out and about somewhere, too eager to see her other friends that she'd accidentally left him at the cemetery. To his grave disappointment, everything in the house was exactly the way he left it. All three figures were still there, completely motionless and with no spark of life in them whatsoever.

In utter disbelief, he slowly walked over to them, his lip quivering. When he got closer, he remembered that he hadn't had actually looked at them closely before. Now he stood directly in front of them, studying their every feature. The one was a face that had tormented all of them recently, the face of Charlie's duplicate. The face looked infuriated like it was severely angered by something right before it died (hopefully).

John couldn't help but smile in satisfaction. You're not causing any more harm to anyone, he thought. He remembered the face clearly from the night she, or it, walked right by him as he left Clay's house, which resulted in Clay being hospitalized. He still thought back to its disguise, and it continued to baffle him how it was able to fool so many people, even him for a brief moment or two.

And then there was the other face, the newer one. He had only seen this one very briefly before realization emptied his stomach and drove him from the premises in despair. Now, taking a much closer look at it, he realized just how familiar it was. It had the face of Ella, only slightly older. Even now, he hoped that it wasn't true, that Charlie had somehow gotten free of her duplicate's clutches and found some random adult version of Ella laying around the house and faked her death. His brain tried hard to embrace that logic, but some other force would not allow him peace and satisfaction with that conclusion. Given everything that he knew and everything that had happened, deep down in the pit of his stomach, he knew the truth. While the face he was studying certainly had traces of Ella, it also showed unmistakably traces of Charlie, his Charlie. From the cheeks to the eyes to the mouth and nose, there was absolutely no denying that this now-lifeless robot was once the girl he knew, the one he'd grown to love. And here she was with her duplicate, impaled together on the robot that had been built to end Henry's life, and now it had ended the lives of both of these robots.

As John continued staring at the fake, lifeless face of what was formerly his best friend, a sudden inexplicable feeling of rage overcame him. Although it was too late to do anything about it now, he couldn't help but feel betrayed. By Charlie's father, by her duplicate, even by life itself, but especially by William Afton. Why did it have to be this way? Why did he have to spend years thinking that Charlie was a real person when in reality she was nothing more than an attempted recreation of her former self by a man who lost his mind over her death? His fists clenched as his body began shaking violently. With every passing second, the robotic face taunted him more and more with the sad reality that Charlie really was no more. All those happy memories-the two of them playing together and laughing in school, the two of them embracing one another at her abandoned house and old diner, the two of them looking out for each other all throughout the dangers and obstacles-they all seemed to die with her.

Without a second thought, he forcefully ripped the duplicate's robotic corpse from the knife and threw it onto the floor. Then he grabbed what was left of Charlie's robotic remains and began carrying it down the hall, letting the suicide robot clatter onto the ground behind him.

He carried the robotic body down the hill and threw it into the passenger seat of his car. Without a glance back at the house, he took off down the road. He didn't know where he was going, but all he wanted to do was find a place to end his pain. He stopped at a gas station, the very same one from six months prior. The same boy was working behind the counter, but there were no pranks this time, no taxidermied animal carcass hidden anywhere. The boy scowled at John when he entered, but John didn't care. All he wanted was an empty gas can, some gas, and a lighter. The boy looked at him with a confused look on his face but sold him what he asked for. From there, John drove out to an open field (perhaps the same one where Tracy Horton had been found, for all he knew), dragged the lifeless robot out into the open field, and lit it ablaze.*

"You what?" Jessica asked, unsure of whether or not she heard correctly.

John simply nodded. There were no other words. He had destroyed what remained of Charlie's remains. Granted, it was a bit of a crazy move, looking back, and he even had second thoughts after the rage had passed, but in the heat of the moment, all he wanted was the pain to be gone. And that empty shell that had formerly been the young woman he had loved was no longer anything more than a reminder of what he had lost, what they all had.

"Why?" Jessica asked.

Although it was honestly a reasonable question given the circumstances, John looked at her as if she had snakes coming out of her ears.

"Jessica, Charlie's gone! I may not be an expert on any of this robot stuff, but I can tell you without a doubt that there was no sign of Charlie left in that fake body! It was a useless heap of metal with no life in it whatsoever! Imagine you just found out for yourself that your best friend whom you've known for years wasn't even a real person all this time! Would you want to keep staring at what's left of her fake body?!"

Jessica stared into John's eyes long and hard for several moments. She wanted to retort, to give him an angry response of some kind, to tell him how foolish he was for killing Charlie in a sense, and how they could've maybe figured something out. But before she could say anything, his words had already begun to sink in. After all, the fake blood found at Freddy's didn't actually belong to William Afton, if he was to be believed. The only other explanation was that...it was Charlie's. She was still hesitant on fully admitting it, but if everything she'd found out tonight was true, perhaps it was better not to keep living in the past.

"So…" she finally uttered. "Was she, or it, really...dead?"

John nodded.

"And it was a robot? Just like the other one?"

Another nod.

"And they were both created by Charlie's dad? Because of her death?"

John sighed and nodded again.

"Why?"

Sam's weak voice from the other room startled everybody. They turned to him. He had gotten up from the table and was standing, his eyes looking weary but angry.

"Why what, Sam?" his mother asked, fearing his answer.

Sam took a few steps forward, his face giving off a venomous vibe.

"Why did he do it?"

They all looked at each other. No one said anything.

"What do you mean, Sam?" Kyle asked.

Sam turned to him, his eyes looking murderous, and for once, Kyle was intimidated by his best friend.

"Why did my dad do that?"

"Sam…" his mother started.

"Mom, why did he do that to us?"

Hannah sighed. "Sam, your sister…"

"Yeah, I know what happened to Charlie. We all do, now," Sam said, his voice growing more and more aggravated by the word. "I miss her, too, but why did he have to forget about us like that?! To just ignore us and act as if we never existed?! Was Charlie really that special?!"

"Sam…" said Kyle, putting a hand on his friend's shoulder, but Sam brushed it off violently.

"Don't start, Kyle. You don't understand. You never did!"

"You're not thinking clearly," said Kyle. "You're...changing."

"I'm fine. Just-"

"Sam, listen to me. You're being too emotional. I don't..."

"I'm fine!" Sam said again, his voice much louder.

"You don't sound fine," said Kyle.

Sam turned away, his breaths coming out in heavy puffs.

"Sam, look at me!" said Kyle. He grabbed Sam's shoulder and turned him toward him.

Before he could say anything else, Sam threw a punch and hit Kyle in the cheek.

"Sam!" his mother cried. John stood up, unsure of whether or not to interfere. Clay stepped between the two arms outstretched to keep them apart. Kyle put a hand to his face and looked at his friend, whose face remained unchanged. Kyle put up his hands in surrender, taking a step back, looking absolutely speechless. Sam turned to Clay, his eyes suddenly desperate.

"You're going to keep looking for her, right?"

Clay returned a rather confused look, unsure of who he was referring to at first.

"Who?"

"Charlie." Sam's tone was so solemn it was almost dead.

Clay looked back at the group, who all looked back at him in helplessness. He turned back to Sam.

"No."

Sam's eyes darkened. "Why not?"

"Because there's no point. Your sister is gone."

"You don't know that!" Sam shouted, a glimmer of hope evident in his voice. "John said he saw her in the cemetery!"

Clay groaned in frustration. "Sam, we can't be sure of that. Even John's as confused about it as we are. I know many strange and mind-blowing things have happened in this town lately, but I really do not see how Charlie could possibly still be alive after all of this. After all, the Charlie we knew wasn't even the real person! It's best that we accept the facts, Sam. It'll be better for all of us."

Sam looked around at the group, who all reluctantly but firmly showed their agreement. Sam grunted and looked back at Clay.

"She's alive. I know she is, and I'll find her myself if I have to."

Without another word, he stormed past Kyle up the stairs into his guest room, slamming the door behind him. Kyle began to follow, but Clay blocked him.

"Let him go. He needs time to cool off. He's had a pretty big bombshell dropped on him tonight. It's the emotions that are getting the better of him."

Hannah sniffled. She understood exactly how he was feeling, and it worried her. This was exactly why she didn't want either of them to come back. She had more than her fair share of thoughts like this of her own over the years, and with practice, she'd learned to keep them at bay with her work, but to see her son's fresh emotions brought back her own memories. They'd been abandoned. Although she'd tried for many months to explain it away somehow, there was no denying it. By burying himself in his work, completely obsessed with recreating his precious daughter, Henry had completely neglected and abandoned his wife and son, still alive and looking for his company. All that he cared about was resurrecting his deceased daughter. With that said, Hannah could only ask herself one question: "Did we actually matter to him at all?"

Jessica moved over and placed a hand on Hannah's to comfort her. John felt like doing the same, feeling a sense of obligation to help Charlie's mother. Clay looked over at Kyle, who had begun pacing back and forth while biting his thumbnail.

"Are you ok?" he asked.

Kyle looked over at him. "Not really," he said quietly, his pacing never ceasing.

"Would you like some water?"

"I'm alright, thank you."

Kyle turned and looked back up the stairs after Sam.

"Kyle," said Hannah, "come sit down, please."

Kyle hesitated, still staring up the stairs, but slowly walked over and took a seat next to John.

"Are you alright, Kyle?" Carlton asked.

"No, I'm not," Kyle repeated. "I've never seen him like that before...ever. In all these years I've known him, he's always been very down-to-earth and clear-headed, at least as far as I know. Whenever I get going with one of my stupid stunts, and yeah, I know they're stupid, he's always the one bringing me back to reality. In fact, I even overheard my dad telling my mom one day that Sam was probably the one thing keeping me from being arrested, and you know, I don't blame him! To be completely honest, I've always felt so unworthy of Sam's friendship with all the headaches and stress pains I gave him, especially…" He looked at Hannah, who shook her head. "But anyway, to see him of all people lose it like that really bothers me. I've never felt so helpless in my life! I want to help him, somehow, but how can comfort him in light of all of this?"

Silence fell among them again. Kyle was both relieved that he had gotten that off his chest but still worried about Sam. No one said anything, as if the silence was so delicate that it would be shameful to break it. Finally, Jessica spoke.

"I still can't believe it," she said, now joining Hannah in teary despair. "All this time, and Charlie, our best friend, wasn't real. Well, she was real, but she wasn't...well...real. We've been best friends with a robot!"

"How is that even possible?" said Carlton.

"It's those metal discs," said John. "The ones Afton made. They mess with your brains."

"Yeah," added Jessica. "Charlie learned about it robotics class."

"When your brain is overwhelmed by information," John explained, remembering that Carlton had little firsthand experience with this phenomenon, "it fills in the gaps with other information. These discs were made to make something dead look alive and friendly. Apparently, Charlie's father put this to use. Remember when I brought Ella in?"

"That doll? Yeah, I remember."

"And you remember what happened?"

"Yeah, it transformed into a little girl."

"It looked like it transformed, but it was all in your mind." John sighed. "That's what Charlie was, only older. In fact, given that robots don't age, at least not like we do, I'm willing to bet…" he said, turning to Hannah, "...that Ella was supposed to be Charlie as a little girl."

Hannah looked at him for a few moments and nodded slowly.

"So, you're saying that Ella was Charlie?" Jessica asked in shock.

John nodded. After a month of his self-imposed isolation to try and sink his teeth into everything, he couldn't help but connect the dots. The real Charlie's death, the doppelganger's facade, Ella, the robots, it all started to add up. This was only confirmed further during his most recent trip back to that house earlier that day when he found and reread the letter Henry had given to Aunt Jen before he died.

Carlton scoffed, still in utter disbelief. "All this time, and we've been friends with a robot."

"But she was still our friend!" insisted Jessica. "And we're going to honor and remember her always, right?" She turned to John, who nodded solemnly.

"Of course."

"So where do we go from here, then?" Kyle asked.

"Well," said Clay, setting another glass of water down on the table, which Kyle decided to accept. "Like I told Sam, there's obviously no point in furthering the investigation if Charlie really is...gone." He choked a bit as he said it. He turned to Hannah. "I know you're probably anxious to leave. I do apologize for all of this. I had no idea about any of this. How soon would you like to leave?"

"Immediately," said Hannah without hesitation. John didn't argue, but Jessica's face dropped.

"Do you have to?" she whined, causing everyone to turn to her in surprise. "I mean, I miss Charlie as we all do, and I've enjoyed being able to get to know Sam. Must you leave so soon?"

Hannah sighed. "I'm afraid so. It's been lovely meeting all of you, it really has, but as I said before, this is exactly why we left in the first place. There's nothing left for us here but painful memories. You heard what Sam said about his father. I've felt the same way for years, which is why I never told him. It's best for everyone if we don't stick around."

Jessica looked like she was about to cry again, but nodded without saying a word.

"Might I interest you in a breakfast before you go?" asked Clay hopefully, who had also grown fond of having Charlie's family around recently.

Hannah thought about it and nodded. "Sure. Why not?"

Clay smiled and looked to the group. "Well then, we've had enough adventure for one night. Let's call it a night, what do you say?"

Why would he do this?! Why would he just ignore us like that? Treat us like we're dead?! Was Charlie so special that I didn't matter to him?

I don't know what to think! I love Charlie, too, but the idea of being so worthless in Henry's eyes that he'd rather try and go bring her back to life is more than I can handle. I can't deal with this. I can't deal with any of this! Why did this have to happen to me? To us? Why did Charlie have to be murdered? Why did Henry have to neglect us like that? Why was Afton allowed to continue living if people were so sure he was guilty! This isn't fair! It just isn't fair! I don't know-

Sam couldn't even continue. In more fury than he thought was possible, he threw his notebook down onto the table and collapsed onto his bed, his thoughts raging. Today had been much more of an emotional roller coaster than he ever imagined. And to top it all off, no one seemed to share his gut feeling that Charlie was still alive out there somewhere. Even John, who apparently saw her for himself, seemed baffled by the whole ordeal. Sam shook his head. He didn't want to leave. Not yet. It was bad enough that his own father essentially denied his existence after her death, but he wanted to at least find his sister. That was the only thread of hope for somewhat of a happy ending to this whole ordeal.

He tried thinking back once more to the memories of Fredbear's before everything went wrong. He tried desperately to remember anything he could about her smiling happy face, her young laughter filling the air as the two of them played and enjoyed the show the animatronics and sometimes their father would put on. But when he closed his eyes, all he saw was that familiar yet not rabbit face looking down at him right before everything went dark. And Charlie, his dear twin sister, looking at him with fear in her eyes. She was frightened, desperate for someone she loved to help her. He should have helped her, yelled or fought the rabbit somehow, anything to stop her disappearance and murder form happening. But all he did was give her a smile and tell her that her soon-to-be murderer just wanted to say hi, or to hug her. And then she was gone. Tears came to Sam's eyes once more as he clenched his teeth and pounded his fist angrily into the bed.

It's my fault, he thought. It's all my fault. The last that she ever saw of her family was her brother, her protector, telling her everything was going to be alright. But no...it's not alright. She died, and it's all my fault.

He thought of his father's reaction, his panic when he discovered that his daughter was missing, his eagerness to bring her back any way that he could.

And then the thought came.

What if that's why Dad never paid any attention to me afterward? What if he knew it was my fault?

That's stupid, another part of his brain said. You know that that's stupid.

How do you know? he argued back. You weren't there. You weren't in my mind when I was a kid.

You're being ridiculous. You know that.

But she's still gone because I never did anything.

You can't change what happened. Let it go.

I can't. What if John's right? What if she's still out there somewhere, looking for me?

What if she's not? What if Clay's right and the best thing to do is to go home and move on?

I don't think I can.

He continued staring at the ceiling, painted plain white. It looked just like the ceiling in his apartment back home, only cleaner. Once again, he found himself wishing that he was back home and that this revelation was nothing more than a dream. But it wasn't. Even that thought gave him little comfort now. Finally, after what seemed like hours, he found himself drifting into sleep.

He was standing in a closet, the closet. It was empty, and there were no noises beyond the door. No one was there. He looked around. It looked exactly as he remembered, but it was completely empty. The bars for hanging coats were empty and too high to reach. He looked down at himself and realized he was only about a foot tall. Was he really that small as a young child?

A noise brought his attention to the corner, where a small figure lay huddled in the corner. He crept over to it, careful not to startle it. When he got close enough, it looked up at him, and he realized that it was none other than his little sister, crying silently.

"Sammy!" she said, getting up to hug him.

He reached out his arms, but the door flew open. Sam turned, and there he was. That rabbit, looking down at him with those cold human eyes and glinting smile behind the fake teeth. Somehow, Charlie was already in his grasp, struggling to break free.

Sam opened his mouth to scream, but something else caught his eye. Behind the tall rabbit stood a dark shadow, standing slightly taller than the adult-sized rabbit. It had a black silhouetted hand curled over the rabbit's shoulder like it was proud of what was going on. It looked over at Sam, and on the previously-blank silhouette of the face appeared two bright white eyes and a smile even more sinister and crooked than that of the rabbit. It looked at him for a few moments, and Sam was too intimidated to move. And then, in a flash, they were gone, all of them.

"No!" Sam cried running out the door, only to find an empty restaurant, cold and dark. He ran to the window, hoping to see them running away so he could chase after them. But no one was there. Just the tree that always terrified Charlie.

A noise came from behind him and he turned. Standing there in the center of the room was that same black figure, only this time it was alone, and it began moving toward him in a fast matter, a hand outstretched ready to grab him.

He awoke with a start. His forehead was drenched and his clothes were ruffled. He never undressed earlier. He looked over at the clock. A little after four in the morning. He groaned. Sleep just wasn't his friend tonight, not that he expected it really. His thoughts immediately returned to the dream he had just had, or was it a vision? He couldn't tell anymore. What was that monstrous creature in his dream? His memory still wasn't that great, especially now with all of his emotions still pulsing through him. He remembered learning in psychology how emotions sometimes disrupt the brain's thought process.

Focus, he told himself. Keep your head clear.

He couldn't remember anything like that in his memories, and he was certain that it was in his mind. Yet it seemed so real. Its haunting face looming over him from behind the rabbit, laughing, looking to kill.

What did it have to do with Charlie? He shook his head and leaned up on the bed.

It doesn't matter, he thought. It was a dream.

And yet it felt so real, so connected somehow. Where was Charlie? She couldn't be dead. Well, she was, but John's words were still echoing in his head. What she real? And what did she mean by that?

"I'm real, John. I'm real!"

What did it mean? He didn't know, but he needed to find out. With an audible huff, his decision was made.

I have to find her.

REFERENCES

*The boy working in the gas station from which John goes to get the gas is the same one who played the taxidermied-coyote prank on him and Charlie, which can be found in The Twisted Ones, p. 94 & 158.