#and amanda seeing that and realising. oh. maybe humans AREN'T all born evil and doomed.

[tibby]

if it’s okay to ask do you have any headcanons on an AU where the apprentices kill John and end up being an awful messed up found family featuring my beloved Diana gordon having the weirdest parental figures known to man. Thank you in advance and don’t worry if this makes no sense it’s very late

oooh, interesting! i haven't thought much about this direction for them so it's a little jumbled but hopefully it's enough:

amanda would have to be the one to kill john. i can't imagine her ever forgiving any of the others if they did it given her issues with forgiveness as a whole + attachment to john, and i think if anyone else killed him...it'd be hard for her to ever free herself from his hold on her.

but after saving adam For Lawrence she's started to pull away from john (see here), and then everything with lynn happens and lynn is kind to her and lynn thinks she can do better than all of this, and lynn isn't involved with everything and maybe that's all amanda needs. and much like her sudden decision to save adam she makes the sudden decision to shoot john instead of lynn, because amanda deserves to have romantic love too.

and now john is dead and amanda's in crisis and there's no point in continuing the games. amanda can't go down that path again. lawrence's priority is adam, who never wanted any part of this. and even hoffman isn't stupid enough to try anything on his own when the others are still out there.

so. john dies and they wrap up the games and bury enough evidence so that strahm and perez and whoever else can't ever tie anything back to them.

and amanda moves in with lawrence and adam and it's awkward and it's hard and they're all so deeply fucked up, but amanda was the one who john sunk his claws into the deepest. so it's the hardest for her. a lot of guilt, a lot of anger, a lot of resentment. it's not a pretty time for any of them.

but time heals and amanda has lynn and lawrence and adam and they care about her without expecting anything from her, love her without demanding that she plays any games. and eventually she's able to recognise that what john did to her was fucked up and she was a victim. not all wounds can be healed but they all learn to cope and to live.

(even hoffman, who can't really go on killing when the others would turn him in so fast but he can't really go on being the world's worst cop either, so he's just kind of...there. still kind of a shitty person but when he has nothing to gain and everything to lose from killing one of the others...well. nobody else wants anything to do with him. might as well hang around).

and then there's diana. and alison has primary custody (lawrence knew it was for the best given his work schedule, brief time as a serial killer accomplice, and the fact two unstable twenty somethings live with him) but lawrence still gets her a few times throughout the month.

and neither amanda or adam really know what to do with an eight year old girl at first, but. they try! they don't swear in front of her and they sit through bad children's movies for her and they let her paint their nails all sorts of colours and put little braids in their hair.

once lawrence had to work late and they all just made ice cream sundaes for dinner, because sometimes it's okay to have a little indulgence when caring for the traumatised child of your boyfriend/friend/housemate.

diana thinks adam is a little weird (she's right) but he's funny and he makes her dad happy so she likes him. she thinks amanda is super pretty and super cool and tells her this every time she sees her, and amanda always blushes and looks away but says "thanks kid. you're pretty cool too."

hoffman is usually banned from the house when diana's visiting but one time he showed up unannounced and they were like say one wrong thing and lawrence gets to beat you with his cane. diana thought he was a freak but he made some really good mac and cheese so she didn't say it to his face.

(when diana gets older she will not have the same decorum. 13 year old diana gordon WILL make this grown former murderer cry).

diana helps out adam with his vegetable garden and she sits around and watches whenever amanda has to fix the sink or whatever.

a few years after everything, lawrence gets diana for christmas and adam makes them take a stupid family photo in ugly sweaters together. amanda tries to leave but adam will NOT let her. and the stupid picture of lawrence, adam, amanda, diana, and adam's cat is hanging up in the living room.