#mphfpc au

Just imagine:

Coraline, a girl who doesn't know she's peculiar yet, just moved on and unintentionally discovers a loop while exploring her new really old house

The loop leads to an old version of the house (described by Coraline herself in the books as more beautiful and with more vibrant colors. This would make sense, given that the current house is old and full of flaws, while the old one would be brand new and recently built)

In this loop, only one peculiar lived: Beldam, or 'the Other Mother', a deadriser who had previously tried to escape the loop with her friends, but time caught up with them (her older friends aged to death, while she, being younger, survived and returned to the loop). Driven mad by the experience, the Other Mother kills every peculiar child in the loop until the current moment in the movie, where she lives there alone. In her insanity, she believes her deceased friends are better off as the dolls she sewed to resurrect them. And then Coraline suddenly appears of nowhere, and now she wants Coraline to be her friend too (as a new doll)

She treats Coraline well, putting on banquets and performances with the 'other inhabitants of the loop', all while trying to convince her that she’d be happier there as a doll and that she could turn the place into a perfect world

And if I had to give an ending to this theory (just to use the photo I found on Pinterest that actually gave me the idea), unlike the original story, the Other Mother gets what she wants

I don't think I've ever shown my female version of Rick from my AU.

so we've all established that fiona's hens are evil beings, right? for not only do they attack hugh any chance they get, but also any unfortunate passerby. whether that be enoch, or even someone as sweet as wyn. the only person exempt from their wrath is, of course, their lovely keeper. hugh decreed it would stay that way forever.

time skip post-canon; hugh and fiona move out of the children's home to build a life for themselves in a wee cottage in ireland. of course, her precious hens came along, too. and though hugh grumbled, he built those damned birds a rather extravagant coop anyway.

in their twenties, baby feirdhris - their daughter - is born, and she's possibly the most precious thing either of them has ever known. so imagine hugh's utter horror when he notices fiona carrying their newborn, who is hardly larger than a loaf of bread, towards the coop.

surely, feirdhris would be their next victim. surely, those hens haven't a shred of kindness within them to spare for even the smallest, most helpless being this world has to offer.

his fatherly instincts scream at him to rush out, wrench feirdhris from fiona's arms, and bolt back inside. but all he can do is watch from the window as his wife kneels down before a clutch of curious hens and places their little one down on the grass.

the hens inch closer, then closer still. hugh flinches, expecting the worst...

when the hens coo in awe. the expected malice in their beady eyes softens into something akin to wonder. one nuzzles its beak against feirdhris's chubby cheek. another presses its feathery body against her swaddled hip. maternal warmth and gentle revealing itself, as though something in them knew that this was fiona's baby, her everything.

and hugh wants to throw something, because after decades of trying to get into those hens good graces for fiona's sake, all feirdhris had to do was act all cute and cuddly to earn the title of 'princess' (with fiona being the queen, of course).