And here is another chapter, the penultimate one, I apologise for the lateness of this chapter and I will endeavour to update the final chapter sooner rather than later. But here we go, what with Christmas and Uni and work this chapter has been a nightmare to get out so I hope you all enjoy it.

Disclaimer-Nothing is mine just this little plot and some of the characters within it.

Please Read and Review and I will try and update around Christmas.

And They Lived

Chapter 14-Pick Yourself Up.

The penultimate chapter of this story. Marlene and Sirius have a talk and then the Black/McKinnon family come to an understanding. James and Sirius meanwhile talk in the aftermath of the Potter's decision to not tell Harry about the Prophecy.

Chapters Covered-The Man with Two Faces-Part Two.

Marlene found her partner in crime outside. It was predictable really the fact that she still knew where to find him. Sirius had not changed all that much. He was still easy to find underneath the old yew tree in the grounds which had always she supposed constituted as 'their' place. They had studied there and kissed and there and cried there and had she remembered with a small smile done a lot more than kissing there when they had been young and stupid and had known that the world as they knew it was coming down around them.

Sirius was sat by the tree and without a word she sat next to him wincing, it was dark out and the moon was gone, a new moon on the horizon and another long painful month for her friend to regroup and regain and try to live as best he could. She turned and waited for Sirius to speak. He would speak she knew that. Sirius Black could lay claim to a lot of things but remaining silent was never one of them.

"She hates me" he said finally. Marlene shook her head. She had expected him to go down this route. Honestly there were times where it was funny that she could read him so well but she had to admit that this time it was not.

"No she doesn't" she said finally. "No Sirius it's not that if anything it's me"

Sirius looked at her as if she was insane.

"How is this your fault?"

Marlene shrugged. "I'm her mum Sirius, mums are supposed to know when something is wrong. This…inadequacy or whatever the hell it is that made her say all of this stuff this has been building for a long time and I didn't see it coming. For all I know I caused it"

She shrugged again at the look on his face finally giving the voice to the thoughts that had plagued her for nearly eleven years.

"Sirius I was four months pregnant when Travers turned his wand on me and he gave me a very long run with the cruciatus curse. I was half mad when he finished and if he and Yaxley had not gotten into a fight and reduced the anti apparition spell I would have died. I arrived at James house bleeding in the garden with three chunks of flesh gone out of my left leg, bleeding, in shock and pregnant. Poppy but me in a comma for a month and then bed rest for the reminder of my time with Calla. You know yourself that was a messy birth and then she was so still…she didn't cry, she didn't make much noise. You remember? You used to get up in the middle of the night to check she was breathing and sometimes neither one of us could tell. She was alive inside me. I know Lily and I know Alice both had definitions of the term of pregnancy but I know that Calla was alive inside me, sometimes during that long night it gave me hope. And then...and then there was nothing. She's always been a little strange, I think that was me. I don't know the damage that was done to her when I was tortured. We have to consider that a possibility and I think we have to tell her about it"

Sirius was silent for a long time during her speech and she could tell by the way his eyes had clouded over for a second that he was thinking about those long months where nearly every day it seemed he had come to tell her that he was going on missions or that someone was dead and there was nothing she could do about it. What it was like when Calla had been born and the terror that they had gone through thinking this one little bit of light in the darkness had been corrupted somewhat by the darkness they had tried to resist for so long.

For a second longer he didn't speak and then he spoke and his voice was low as if he was concealing the pain that those memories brought him. As if she didn't know the feeling as intimately as he did.

"I still think it's me. Look Marls" he said when she showed every sign of interrupting. "I was the one that she said all of that too. It was how to be a Marauder kid that she was scared about and…and I don't remember telling her to be like me. I don't want her to be like me. I remember some of the stuff me and James got up too. The pranks and the hurt that we caused and the humiliation and…wow time is a bitch isn't it? I didn't want her to be like me. I wanted her to be her."

"And somewhere along those lines" Marlene said seeing what was in front of her for the first time. "Calla got confused. I think thought…I think tonight, I don't think that was something we could have stopped. You and I would have done the same thing as she did and we both know it. She knew, Harry knew, Ron knew what would happen if…if He came back. I'm furious at her for not coming to find one of us first but…I do understand where she came from"

"She did write" Sirius said wiping his eyes on his sleeve and grinning at her. "I got the letter. She did write. I suppose we have to give her that. It's more than what me or James would have done if we'd been in her shoes." He shook his head and Marlene pretended that she hadn't seen him cry knowing how he preferred it. She took a deep breath herself forcing herself to keep it together. There was nothing to be gained from both of them breaking down right now.

"I don't get why she doesn't it?" Sirius said finally. "I really don't Marls…you know the one thing I never wanted to be in the whole world was my Dad. Hell I didn't even really want kids because I was terrified I would turn out like him and then…but…they gave me to her in St Mungo's and this baby was there and I knew that I wasn't going to be like him. Funny but I knew. And now…now she's saying all of this stuff that I used to feel as a kid about my Dad and…she doesn't get it Marls. Doesn't get that she was the one thing that kept me going for a long time. I was prepared to walk back into my own version of childhood hell just so I could protect you and her. Prepared to give up and stay in the shadows just to see her smile one day and her eyes filled with something that wasn't fear. And she doesn't get it…"

Marlene gave a long sigh.

"Well maybe it's time we made sure she knew. Things are so much more complicated now. Harry's going to have questions and so is Calla. We need to figure out how much we want to tell her and…" she paused for a second. "I think Hermione Granger was asking about Peter before…she saw the map and she asked…Remus covered it up pretty well but…"

"I don't want her knowing about that rat" Sirius said pushing himself up off the floor. "And I don't want her to know how close Voldemort came to coming back tonight. Right now I've got bigger things to worry about"

Marlene knew she had lost that battle. It didn't matter. There were more golden years ahead of her before she had to tell her daughter about the man she had considered a good friend and how he had betrayed her father and her godfather and her uncle all in one night and Merlin knows how many other people in between.

She leaned her head on Sirius arm like she had done when she was seventeen and the world had been dark and dangerous and time had been spent just the two of them behind that tree trying to forget that the world had existed outside of the two of them.

Right now however it did.

And it had come crashing down on her daughter.

Calla first felt the stirring edges of consciousness probe her brain some time in (though she didn't know it) the afternoon. She had slept through most of the day, Harry was in an observation room to the left and Ron opposite in a cubicle. His parents had come down to see him and Mrs Weasley had also stretched out her welcome to Hermione. She was sat with her son while Mr Weasley had escorted Hermione down to the Great Hall to see his other sons and no doubt probe Hermione on information about what it was like living with muggles.

All of this meant that when Calla did eventually wake up, her eyelids heavy from sleep, she was alone.

Well, except for her parents.

Her Dad was sat on the corner of the bed looking out the window at the grounds. Judging from the way the sunlight was streaming over the bed she guessed that it was early morning and she bit her lip for a second taking in the tense stance that he had taken. Then she remembered, the stone, Harry, the fact that it was not Snape that had been after it and then…then she remembered everything she had said to her parents.

There was a movement next to her. She slammed her eyes shut but she knew it was her mother come back from wherever she had been. Well…no better time than the present to get this over with she supposed.

And then for the second time, Calla opened her eyes.

And she knew instantly that both of her parents had noticed that she was awake.

Her Dad moved first his face breaking into that smile that he saved for her. She had not seen it for a long time.

"Hello" she said finally.

Her Dad reached under pulled her up so she was sat up straight and then hugged her for a very long time. He didn't say anything for a long time and Calla didn't know what to say either. She had never seen her father like that so she just clutched him back even as her Mum reached out and tucked herself into Calla's other side she leaned into the hugs that she got. She was only beginning to realise that perhaps the whole going after the Stone thing had been a tad too reckless. Even for her.

"Well kiddo" her Dad said pulling back and smiling though it didn't quite meet his eyes. "You led us on a merry dance I can tell you"

"Did you get to Harry?" Calla asked and then suddenly with this one question there were more, "Did you stop Snape? And what about the Stone? And Ron? And Hermione? And…"

"Easy there Cal" her Mum said softly and Calla fell silent at once.

"Harry is fine, he's still sleeping at the minute but he did take a bit of a beating magically. Ron was in hospital for a day and then he got up no harm done, he's with Hermione now in the Great Hall for Breakfast. She had a long sleep and she's fine too. As for the Stone…well…Dumbledore's taken care of that. All you need to know is that it's not coming back to the school and Dumbledore has took steps to ensure that it will never be an issue again."

Calla opened her mouth and then shut it. She didn't want to know did she? So instead she leaned back down on her pillows and looked down at her hands. She bit her bottom lip for a second and then looked up and decided to bite the poisonous potion pill—so to speak.

There was a pause where there was silence and then Calla spoke again.

"Did you get Snape?"

"Ah" her Mum said and Calla looked at her. there was something in her voice that made Calla think that she had missed something. Her father had a very irritated expression on his face and yet her mum looked like she was stopping herself from laughing. She seemed almost amused.

"Well darling you got it wrong. It wasn't Snape. Turns out it was never Snape…Professor Snape sorry. It was Quirrell. He err…he was attempting to steal the stone for…Voldemort" her Mum gave a little shudder at the name. Calla knew she had never had the easy task of saying it as her Dad had always done.

She leaned back on the pillow thinking hard. They had gotten it wrong. It had not been Snape.

Huh.

And then she thought about it.

"Wow" she said finally. "We did miss a lot didn't we?"

"Yeah" her Dad said finally his impatience finally cutting through. "Let's talk about what nearly happened shall we? Cal I get it and I cannot say that I wouldn't do the same thing but…really? Why the hell didn't you go to a teacher the second you realised what was going on? Why didn't you write to me or anyone else at Christmas when you could put the pieces together? Do you have any idea what it was like going through that trapdoor and not having a clue if you were going to be alive when I got to the end of it? Any of those challenges could have killed you! You Calla Black"

Calla stared at him for a second and then looked down at her hands again.

"Sorry" she said finally.

"Sorry" her Dad said scathingly. "Kiddo believe me I'm not mad at you for that. What I don't get…what I don't get is what you said afterwards? Do you remember?"

Yeah Calla remembered. She remembered everything perfectly. She remembered everything she said and everything she had felt. She pulled the blankets up around her chest and then leaned back against the pillows. She nodded her throat too tight to speak. There was a seconds worth of pause and she dropped her eyes to the blanket in front of her and then she bit her bottom lip tugging it into her teeth and using the pain as a distraction.

There was a seconds worth of pause and then her Dad spoke in a voice that was deceptively calm.

"Do you want to tell me why the hell you think all of that…any of that…is true?"

There was a long pause as Calla tried to put her emotions into words as she thought about it.

"I feel odd" she said finally. "Like I don't belong sometimes and…I know you want a kid that can prank people and live up to the legacy that you created, I mean your both War Heroes and yet…I think about fighting Voldemort like you did and it terrifies me. And then I think that there's something wrong with me. I don't like to run around creating chaos like the Marauders do. I don't like to run around, I like books and the library and going to bed early to read and not getting into detention and it makes me feel bad. I know you cannot have any other children—and sometimes I don't think I'm good enough to be the one kid you get. Sometimes I wonder why you don't just trade me in. I wish I understood it but I don't. This is just how I feel—"

And then her voice rose and she didn't know how to stop the words that were pouring out of her mouth. Again like in the dark rooms below the school she had just said what she was feeling.

"I didn't know how to tell you. It's just how I feel sometimes…" she finished lamely.

There was a very pregnant pause.

"Well" her mum said finally. "At least you told us. We don't know what's going on in your head Cal unless you talk to us. Now we do and we can fix it. But you have to tell us things too."

"And…well…I did go to the library myself you know" her Dad defended. Calla smiled but then he had one finger under her chin and lifted it up so she was looking at him in the eyes.

"Seriously Calla, the only thing you ever have to do to make me and your Mum happy is just give us one of those smiles"

And at long last Calla believed him.

Throat too tight to speak, she instead simply smiled.

"Do you think we did the right thing?" James said finally to Sirius looking over his son, his goddaughter and their two friends all sat on Harry's bed. Judging by the way Harry was talking to them and Hermione's screaming he imagined his son was giving them the embellished story of what had happened three nights ago.

"Not telling him about the prophecy I mean?"

"Yes" Sirius said firmly. "He's a kid. She's a kid. There all kids and…the whole point of it all, Alice and Frank, Gideon and Fabian, Caradoc and Benjy and all the others that lived and loved and lost in the war was so the people who could survive could have this. So our kids could grow up worrying about homework rather than dying"

James knew he was right.

Sirius gave a long sigh.

"I think I might take a break from looking for…Pettigrew…" he said finally. James turned to stare at him, Sirius had after all been the one who had been encouraging James to go and hunt down their former friend. Sirius shrugged however.

"I think it nearly cost me something a lot more precious" he said simply. "Calla's got some serious misconceptions and I don't know why and I want to take my family somewhere warm where she can read books and me and Marls can sit on our backsides…well…I can and cop a good eyeful of Marls in a bikini"

James nodded trying not to imagine Marlene McKinnon in a bikini because knowing his luck that would be the exact moment his own wife would show up and she had ways of getting information out of people that would make Death Eaters blush.

"God there's never a quiet year in this place is there?" he said finally.

Sirius just laughed.

And there you go, final chapter should be following this one.

Next Chapter-As this story comes to a close, the four go to the end of year feast, Neville becomes a good friend, James and Lily have a much needed moment as they consider what lies ahead.