a/n: Cher's outfit for the chapter is above!

✫彡𝒄𝒉𝒂𝒑𝒕𝒆𝒓𝐟𝐨𝐮𝐫

Using the Sheriff's help, they found the safe that Stefan had been drowning in all summer but he wasn't inside it anymore, instead, there was a drained dead body. Charlotte was counting her facts to stay focused; Stefan was an innocent man who still loves her, he was out on a ripper rampage and needed to be found, and as soon as they did that, she was going to do things worse than death to Silas.

She was in the kitchen back at the Salvatore Boarding House, the place she vowed not to come within 2 feet from again. However, that was heartbroken, clueless Charlotte. This Charlotte had a lot of processing to do, with some good old breakfast.

"Morning..."

Charlotte looked up as Elena walked into the kitchen, "Hey, I made some pancakes, scrambled eggs, and coffee. Let's get on our feet and start the manhunt!"

"Oooh, food, lucky me," Katherine strolled into the kitchen and made her way to the table as Charlotte stood there baffled, "They didn't tell you they are keeping a guest over?"

"No, and where did you find the audacity to come here?" Charlotte huffed out and turned to Elena, "Why are we keeping up with this?"

Elena shrugged her shoulders and took a seat at the table, "We will need her help."

"With what?" Charlotte scoffed, folding her arms together as Damon made his entrance to the kitchen, "You are in on this?"

"Nope, but you are gonna love what these two doppelgangers have to say," Damon said, in a tone that made her a hundred and ten percent sure that she wasn't going to love any part of it.

"I, umm...I had a dream about Stefan," Elena revealed to which Charlotte clamped her mouth shut, exchanging a look with Damon, "It was more than just a pit in my stomach this time, though. It was real. It was like I was there with him."

"It was just so vivid. I saw Stefan walking out of this bar. It had a red awning and this broken neon sign, and he was screaming in pain."

"And it's Route 29. Joe's Bar. I had the same one." Katherine added, taking a sip of the coffee Charlotte made after being done with the scrambled eggs, "Hey, this is really good, can you make more for the road?"

The brunette Bernard looked her up and down before Katherine nodded, "Right, pushing my luck. I miss nice Charlotte. Anyways, let's get moving."

Charlotte paused, and looked at all three of them, "So, let me get this straight, as doppelgangers and magical trackers or whatever, you both had a dream of him and we can use you two to track him?" To which, both doppelgangers nodded, "Cool, I choose Elena, you are not getting in a car with me," She finished, looking at the human doppelganger.

Damon intervened, "Ah, I wish. Trust me, I have no interest in Katherine's well-being, but for some reason, Silas wants her real bad."

Charlotte rolled her eyes, and sighed, "And if Silas wants her, we should want her more."

"That's my diabolical student in the making."

"So I've found 9 bars along Route 29, and none of them are called "Joe's."

"I had a feeling that there was something wrong all summer, and I ignored it," Elena shook her head at herself, "But I was right, Stefan was in a safe, and probably killed whoever it was that found him...I know it sounds crazy, that I'm following some psychic dream, but it's the only lead that we have."

"It doesn't sound crazy—" Damon said, before being cut off.

"It's insane, but when has anything here been sane?"

"I am calling shotgun," Katherine announced as they started moving into the foyer.

"I am not riding with that thing," Charlotte stated, fixing her crossbody bag, "I am taking my motorcycle and driving after you."

"Hey, I turned you!"

"Do I look thankful?" The Bernard vampire asked back with a look that said 'try me, I dare you'.

"Just remember, Damon wouldn't have to play bodyguard if pretty little Elena hadn't shoved that cure down my throat."

Elena was baffled, replying, "You were trying to kill me!"

"I will admit, though, I take great pleasure knowing that you wasted your one shot at a human life on me."

"Yeah, hers and everyone else's," Charlotte added, putting on her sunglasses.

She got out of the door first as Elena turned to Damon, "What does she mean by that?"

"Let's just start moving."

❃❃❃

Charlotte rode her motorcycle, alongside Damon's car, trying to keep herself focused. No need to think of all the hatred she had formed against Stefan throughout summer, just room for making things up to each other. He was going to be okay. This was Stefan, he survived worse. 

She looked at his daylight ring, which she tucked in her keychain earlier, and drove forward.

Damon pulled his car into the parking lot at Joe's Bar, and he and Elena quietly got out of the car—Charlotte parked next to them and moved out, "Where is she?"

"Asleep," Damon answered, closing his car door with Katherine inside.

"Are we really just gonna leave her in the car?"

"The only time she shuts up is when she's sleeping, and I didn't want to disturb our peace and quiet," Damon shrugged, walking into the bar with Elena and Charlotte behind him.

Elena paused at the door and Charlotte stopped, "Is it not the one?"

"No, it is. It looks exactly like it did in the dream," The vampire doppelganger confirmed, "Isn't that a little freaky?"

The Salvatore raised his eyebrows, "Yeah. It's a lot of freaky. Let's go see if Stefan's inside."

"Can I get you something?" A girl behind the bar asked.

"Yeah, you are just the one to help," Charlotte smiled, walking up to the bar with her eyes trailing down on the bandage on the girl's neck before compelling, "So, Jo, why don't you tell me what happened to your neck here?"

"Some sicko attacked me, bit me, told me to run, so I did, and when I looked back, he was on fire."

Elena turned to the two, concluding, "The sun must have come up. He doesn't have his daylight ring."

"And then what happened, Jo?" Charlotte continued.

"Some woman shoved him into a truck, and drove away," Jo revealed, in a trance.

"What woman? Have you seen her before?"

"No. She was driving Cam Peterson's truck. He lives about ten miles down that dirt road out back," She stated, as Charlotte pulled out her phone to check the digital map, "Here. Looks like you could use one of these."

Jo poured a shot and Damon reached over to take it, "Hmm, I could. Thank you."

He downed it and immediately started gagging and coughing, "Vervain!"

"What did you do?!" Elena questioned, holding Damon up.

A brunette tall woman walked out from the back room, "I told her to pour him a drink or I'd kill her."

"Who the hell are you?" Damon coughed out, still adjusting to the vervain eating at him.

Charlotte paused, studying the face of the brunette woman stepping out, "Uh, you...I know you. We have met."

"Oh, met is an understatement, Char, don't you think so? I am hurt," Nadia feigned hurt, placing a hand on her chest before raising a gun at Damon and Elena, just as Katherine strolled in.

She tried to back out but Nadia had already seen her, "Which one of you is Katherine Pierce?"

Katherine, to no one's surprise ever, pointed at Elena, "She is!"

"Katherine is a compulsive liar...but I need her alive," Nadia said, only to be interrupted by Elena vamp-speeding at her and slamming her against a table.

"Katherine, run!"

The human doppelganger made a run for it before Nadia threw Elena off of her, heading to the door only to be stopped by Charlotte, "Yeah, that's not gonna happen."

"Cute, but no. See, I have a mission of some sort, but I will be back for you," Nadia laughed it off, moving past Charlotte, who didn't make much of an effort to stop her.

The Salvatore helped Elena up, asking, "Did you even try?"

"Saving Katherine's life is the least of my worries, Damon," Charlotte scoffed out, crossing her arms, "Can we get to finding Stefan, please? You know the good brother that we came here for?"

"Who is she anyways?"

Charlotte shrugged it off, "Some girl I met in Costa Rica..."

"Costa Rica girl slash vampire bounty hunter?" Damon inquired, raising his eyebrows, "Whoever she was, she wants Katherine, which means she's probably a Silas spy."

"I'll go chase after her. You two find Stefan," Elena volunteered.

Damon shook his head immediately, "Wait, what? No. She almost killed you."

"You are right," Charlotte agreed, "Go with her, I will find Stefan, we have no time for this."

The Salvatore's disagreement increased, "Like hell you are, I am coming with you."

He turned to Elena, "Any sign of trouble, you let her go, do you understand me? I don't care how bad Silas wants Katherine. She's not worth the hair on your head. You got me? Okay? Kiss me." They kissed and parted ways, "Go."

"Cute, can we go now?"

❃❃❃

Charlotte sat in the passenger seat next to Damon as he drove to the cabin that the bartender told them about, "You know I never asked...what really went down between you and Stef—well, Silas now that night.

"And it's a good thing you didn't."

Damon took his eyes off the road for a second to look at Charlotte before saying, "But I want to know. You went off the grid, cut us all off—"

She interrupted, "I replied to emails."

"Two," He corrected before continuing and mocking her, "Hi, Elena, Dames, I made it to the other half of the world, I am having fun, swimming and dancing. Kisses and hugs." 

"The same reply, twice!" Damon added.

"What?" Charlotte shrugged her shoulders, "They were the same vacation activities, both times."

He rolled his eyes, stating, "We sent like 34 emails."

Charlotte huffed out, "Which is crazy, who replies to 34 emails—"

"You would," The Salvatore paused, looking at her again, "You are not you, what's wrong?"

The Bernard vampire furrowed her eyebrows together. You are not you. She has not been feeling like herself for a while but she didn't want to hear it out loud. Being read like a book was not something Charlotte was into anymore and Damon's cautious and caring insight would have once been heartwarming, now it just made her bitter. 

What if she wasn't herself? What do they know about her in the first place, anyway?

"I guess I grew up."

"What did he say that night?"

Charlotte's face cleared up as she turned to Damon, "He said what he said, I reacted the way I reacted. Let's get this over with and get Stefan home. We don't have to make conversation, Damon. There's no awkward silence to fill, okay?"

Yeah, she was not her.

❃❃❃

Finally, and after a very awkward drive to the cabin. Damon and Charlotte arrived. The brunette short vampire opened the door to the cabin, only to find Stefan surrounded by a circle of herbs on the floor and bound to a chair by vines.

"What the hell?"

"Charlotte."

They held eye contact for a moment, saying millions and millions of words without uttering a single one before Damon shook his head, "Hello to you too, brother."

"Can you explain?" Charlotte asked, looking around the cabin, "What is happening?"

"Well, Silas' ex-girlfriend decided to come back from the Other Side," He started elaborating as Charlotte moved over to try and untie him.

"Qetsi—what?"

"It's Qetsiyah," The witch came up from one of the rooms in the cabin, holding a flower in her hands as she addressed Stefan, "Do you see why I want to change it?"

She rolled her eyes, looking at Damon and a very persistent Charlotte, "You won't be able to break those vines. The spell won't release him until I get what I want."

"Well, I guess the rumors are true," Damon sighed, letting go of the vines, "You are a ray of sunshine. Question—why is my brother wearing your compost pile?"

Qetsiyah shrugged her shoulders, stating simply, "I'm going to link Stefan to Silas. Casting a spell on his doppelgänger will neutralize Silas' mental powers. Once he's weakened, I will force him to take the cure."

"Wow, nice idea," Charlotte complimented sarcastically, "One issue, there is no more cure. It's gone. So if we could just get going that would be great—"

She was cut off by the witch, clarifying, "Katherine, you mean? I'm aware of her condition. She was supposed to be with you."

Stefan gaped at the new information, "Wait. Katherine took the cure?"

"We are playing catch up, later," Charlotte turned to look at the witch, "What do you mean by supposed to be with us?"

Damon continued, questioning, "Did you plant those dreams? What is it, some kind of, like, witch party trick?"

"So where is she?"

Damon squeezed his eyes shut, revealing, "We ran into a little snag."

"Then I'll get started without her," She claimed, beginning her chants over a bowl, "Adatu Khan Leala Ghan Breatvis Shemil."

"Yeah, umm, well, that's amazing and you are friendly and all—"

Damon continued after Charlotte, "Yeah, thanks for the hospitality, but we should really get going if we want to beat traffic."

"Yep, yep. He's right," Stefan finished after them.

She turned to them, tilting her head, "Probably don't want to get on my bad side."

Charlotte mocked the witch, tilting her head slightly too, "Oh, cause you are the only one with a bad side?"

"Aren't you brave, little Char?" She raised an eyebrow, "Without Silas' mental powers, he is an immortal nobody. We can defeat him. Isn't that what you want?"

Charlotte scoffed, about to reply before Stefan pulled her hand away from the vines on his chair, nodding to reassure her, "Just do it, alright? Just get it over with. Do it."

❃❃❃

Charlotte stood outside of the herbs circle formed by Qetsiyah with her arms defensively crossed over her chest, ready to jump at her at any minute. While Damon watched the witch dip her fingers in the hot molten metal in the bowl, then she approached Stefan from behind, chanting. 

She pressed her fingers against the sides of Stefan's head, and he gasped, groaning in pain.

"What are you doing to him?!" Charlotte questioned, ready to break the circle Qetsiyah had around him before Damon held her back.

"Explain, witch, quick."

The circle of herbs surrounding Qetisyah and Stefan suddenly ignited into flame, pushing Damon and Charlotte back involuntarily.

"I'm frying Silas' brain. No one said it would be pretty."

Stefan's eyes began to bleed and he lost consciousness slowly and his head rolled to the side. 

"You are not hurting Silas at the expense of my boyfriend, for the love of God!"

"Alright, we are done here," Damon claimed and the fire died down.

Charlotte stepped into the circle, holding Stefan's face in her hands as Qetisyah said, "You're right. We're done. It worked."

She shook it slightly, repeating, "Stefan, Stefan! Stefan, wake up!"

Charlotte panicked, hearing no heartbeat just yet, "What did you do to him?" She looked at Damon, "Make her undo it, he is not waking up! Why is he not waking up?!"

The brunette witch rolled her eyes, "Relax. I just burned through his conscious mind. He'll wake...eventually."

"You sure you want to take him home?" She asked the older Salvatore, "You and Elena were doing so well without your guilt getting in the way."

Charlotte started undoing the vines holding Stefan to the chair, "What the hell are you talking about? Why wouldn't we want him back?"

"Spying on us from the Other Side?"

Qetsiyah chuckled, "Don't flatter yourself. It was like watching a soap opera, except boring and with no volume control."

"You know, there was one thing worse than being on the Other Side and watching Silas resist the cure."

Charlotte stood up to face the witch after untying Stefan, "The realization that you achieved nothing at all and have the IQ of a fifth grader?"

"Oh, sweet Charlotte," Qetsiyah raised her hand to pat the Bernard vampire's cheek and the girl stepped back, "I feel for you, you know. We are not that different from one another."

"I know your story. I can vouch for the differences between us, Qetsiyah."

"You can call me Tessa."

Tessa smiled, sighing, "Have this friendly advice from me, little Char," She began, reminiscing, "Century after century, I watched versions of Stefan and Elena find each other, like magnets, always the same story—conquering all, falling in love. You didn't think Stefan was Silas' first shadow? Destiny has been trying to get the doppelgängers together forever."

"Look here, Miss Crazy, why don't we just dial down the destiny talk a notch, okay?" Damon stopped her in her tracks.

She looked between Damon and Charlotte, claiming, "You don't want to hear it, but the universe is working against you two."

"First with Katherine, now Elena," Tessa reminded Charlotte, raising two fingers to count, "It's not a coincidence."

Charlotte shook her head, "You don't know anything about that, and you know if you are trying to regain your place in society as the scorned woman and not the psychopath...Maybe lose the universe tone."

"The three of us," Tessa started, walking around the cabin, "Me, you, and Damon, we are the same. The obstacle standing between two fates. Silas had his true love, and Stefan had Katherine then Elena. We're merely the conflict that makes it interesting."

"So, what are you suggesting, I leave him here with you while I run off and live happily ever after with Elena?"

Charlotte scoffed as Tessa told her, "You have no happy ending with him. A world with you and Stefan together forever just doesn't exist."

"Yeah, I will take my chances."

"I want to keep him safe," Tessa abandoned dealing with the Bernard vampire and turned to Damon, "Now that he's linked to Silas, Silas can't mess with our heads, and as long as Stefan's in the way, you will never be with Elena. Take it from a woman who's had front-row seats for two thousand years."

"No one would have to know?"

"No one has to know."

Charlotte watched Damon contemplate the thought for two seconds before attacking the witch, "Or you could just go back to hell," He grabbed Tessa's throat; she struggled and managed to cast a spell.

"Ah Sha Lana!"

"Damon!"

Tessa threw him off and he fell to the floor as Charlotte stood behind him and in front of Stefan, looking at the scorned evil witch.

"Take my advice, Charlotte. Don't be sentimental."

Charlotte had no time to respond or comprehend half of what she said before the witch walked out, leaving her with two unconscious Salvatores.

❃❃❃

There in front of Charlotte and after three very long months, laid Stefan Salvatore in the flesh. All well and alive, sort of. She sat by his side, holding his hand after putting his daylight ring back onto his finger. So many scenarios and possibilities were running into her head.

But she knew one thing for sure, as long as Stefan was here and breathing, anything that happened before was long gone and whatever she was feeling or not feeling would metaphorically work itself out. It's Stefan and Charlotte, how could it not work out?

"C'mon, wake up, Stef," She murmured, brushing a strand of hair away from his eye, "The dramatics are over, you know."

Damon walked into the room with Elena by his side, and he took in Charlotte's worried gaze. He knew she would be okay, and so did Elena, because, for the first time since she has been back, her face softened.

And it was as if the Charlotte they knew was hiding behind a large evil cloud of sadness and defensive attitude and just the presence of an even unconscious Stefan sent the cloud home and brought out the Charlotte Bernard they know and love.

"Well, he's got his daylight ring back. We're all set for a picnic."

"You hesitated," Charlotte pointed, looking up at Damon.

"What?"

"You hesitated for two seconds back there," She said, shaking her, "You thought twice before saving him..."

"Did you hear what she said?" Damon scoffed, reminding the Bernard vampire that they didn't just walk out of an ordinary rescue day, "The Universe?"

She nodded, adding, "I heard her very well, and I didn't hesitate."

Elena frowned, folding her arms together, "What did Qetsiyah say?"

Charlotte held Stefan's hand tighter as she repeated the witch's words from earlier, "That you guys don't stand a chance, neither do we," She looked between herself and Stefan, "She had this very intriguing tale about the history of doppelgangers and how you guys are fated to fall in love with each other."

She chuckled at the irony of it all, "I mean, love works hard but the universe works harder, pulling doppelgangers together for years and years. We are basically just challenging the world at this point."

"So, she's crazy?" Elena concluded.

Charlotte hesitated, looking up at Damon, "She sounded very sure of herself."

"Charlotte, you are not hearing yourself. This is madness."

"It's her words."

Elena shook her head, reminding her, "You love Stefan, you have always loved Stefan. For centuries. Nothing can come between that and you. And he loves you more than he could ever love anything...You can't possibly be second-guessing that."

"I am not second-guessing...I am just scared." She admitted.

Suddenly, Stefan started waking up and shifting in his sleep. Charlotte tightened her hold on his hand, as he sat up, "Oh, God, you are okay."

"Welcome back, brother."

Elena smiled, standing by Damon's side, "Stefan...we missed you."

"You are awake, oh my God, you are finally awake."

Elena looked down at Charlotte, seeing the relief catch up to her friend. The cloud has left for sure now, Stefan Salvatore was back, and in theory, so was Charlotte Bernard's soul.

"Uh, I am sorry, I...I have no idea who you people are."

Maybe not.

❃❃❃