John almost startled out of his seat when the metal door slammed open and then shut again and Dean stormed down the stairs, scowling and covered from head to toe in some black viscous fluid. Sam, who had appeared out of nowhere, seemed to recognize it, because he frowned.

"Leviathans?" he asked. "I thought it was just demons." Just demons? At what point had his sons been so desensitized that demons had become what sounded like a mere annoyance?

Dean gave him a death glare. "Yeah, me too, that's why I didn't bring Borax! And of course the angel blade doesn't work on them, so I had to go at it the old-fashioned way," he grumbled, holding up a broken machete covered in more of the black goop.

"The heads?" Sam asked, seeming absolutely unfazed, as though this was just a normal conversation that they'd had before.

"In the trunk," Dean grunted, already stripping off his ruined leather jacket and frowning at it. "Ah, man, I liked this jacket!"

"I'll take care of them," Sam said, climbing the winding staircase up to the door. "You get cleaned up."

Dean nodded and headed off, grumbling something about cockroaches that wouldn't stay dead, leaving John to gape after his sons, feeling more than a little left out and bewildered. He thought Dean had mentioned Leviathans during his lengthy story his first day back, but honestly he hadn't heard anything more then their names and the fact that they were from Purgatory.

With nothing else to do, he was still sitting there a half hour later when Dean stumbled back out in clean clothes (relatively speaking), drying his hair with a towel and loudly mourning his jacket and machete, although his mouth snapped shut when his eyes brushed over his father.

"Hey, Dad," he said, looking slightly uncomfortable, and John wondered just when that had happened. Dean was his boy, the good one, his loyal and dedicated soldier, the respectful one who took after his old man, who trusted him. When had that changed?

"Dean," he said. "We need to talk."

Dean immediately took a seat with the military obedience that John had instilled in him, face still twisted in unease. Well, too bad. Things had clearly gone off the rails here since he'd been gone. Working together with monsters, disobeying orders, rampant disrespect, weakness, making themselves vulnerable by settling into one place... there was a lot of work to be done, and if anyone would understand that, it would be Dean.

"This... angel," John started, hesitant to refer to the thing as anything other than a monster, "Castiel."

Dean immediately looked defensive. "What about him?"

"It has to go," John said, his voice firm and brooking no room for argument. This was for Dean's own good. His son, of all people, had to understand that. Supernatural beings were dangerous, deadly, and not to be trusted. That was a lesson he had hammered into Dean's head again and again growing up.

"No," Dean said as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. "No!"

"This is not up for debate, son," John stated firmly. "That's an order. The angel is a supernatural creature. A monster. I raised you better than this."

"Cas is my best friend, Dad. If it wasn't for him, I'd still be on Alistair's Rock in Hell! I'm not sending him away because of your prejudice!"

Joh narrowed his eyes. "I didn't mean sending it away, Dean, I meant killing it." He shook his head in exasperation. "It's using you, Dean! That's all they do. That's all they ever do. How far you've fallen... you can't even see your own brother has turned into a-"

A flare of pain shot through his mind and he stumbled backwards, cupping his bleeding and probably broken nose in his hands while Dean shook out his hand. "How dare you," his son said, voice dangerously low. "How dare you? You know NOTHING about what we've been through! You son of a bitch. You think you just can come back here and be our boss again? Our drill sergeant?"

John stood there in shock as Dean pinned him to the wall with a heavy forearm. "You know what, Dad? You were never our Dad. You were our captain. Bobby was our dad more than you ever were. So you have no right to just barge in here and start giving orders, telling me to get rid of Cas, calling Sammy a monster- and don't you DARE deny it!- trying to get me to be your good little soldier again? Well, guess what, Dad? Sam and I? We're better hunters than you ever were. Got that? We. Don't. Need. You."

John heard the door open and close and incoming footsteps. "Dean?" came Sam's uncertain voice and Dean cursed under his breath, relaxing his hold slightly.

"Just a friendly family meeting, Sammy!" he called with forced lightness in his voice. "Nothing to be concerned about. Hey, keep looking into that warding, would ya?"

"...okay, Dean," Sam replied, and there was the sound of receding footsteps and then a closing door.

"You're fucking lucky," Dean hissed, "that I don't want him to know what you think of him. So listen real close. You're going to go silently to your room and pack, with me watching, and then you're going to leave and never come back. You got that?"

John nodded numbly, unable to speak with Dean's arm cutting off his oxygen supply, and gasped for air when the barrier was pulled away, still silenced by his son's deadly glare, and in shock, he packed what few belongings he had and left.

His son's condemning gaze seemed to stare after him long after he was gone, and John wondered just when he had gone so wrong.

He kept tabs on them. Of course, it was difficult reestablishing contact with old friends and acquaintances considering he'd been dead for almost a decade (he was still having trouble coming to terms with that) but as it turned out, all he'd had to do was mention that he was a Winchester and they more or less shrugged. His boys had made quite a name for themselves, apparently. He got back to hunting, solo, keeping one eye on the hunt and one on his boys.

About a month after striking out on his own, he saw them in a diner when he was investigating a vampire nest in Ohio. Dean had a bacon burger and a slice of apple pie, while Sam worked his way through an elaborate salad and bitched about his brother's choice of meal. Dean leaned over and ruffled his little brother's hair.

"Bitch."

"Jerk."

Dean glanced up and met John's eyes for a fraction of a second, and an understanding passed between them before Dean returned to playfully bickering with his brother, and John?

John watched his boys, smiled slightly to himself, and thought about redemption.

That's it! That's the end! Thank you so, so much to the following reviewers:

carryonmycolbaltangel

alena (guest)

miss-olivia-winchester

Interviner

Guest

sherlockedbyben

QueenBea93

Glarinetta

And everyone who favorited and followed! You guys are all wonderful and motivated me to update fast and make a good story. Love you all.