Chapter 28

Several hours passed, and Sam and Dean still couldn't believe it. Their father was alive and well. Dean remembered desperately wishing for this after his death. Trashing the Impala was only one of the things he had done, smashing the crowbar through the window, and swinging it at the trunk, again and again, denting the trunk, as if it would lessen the crippling grief he felt.

Dean was lying on the bed and turning the Swiss army knife that Sam gave him just like Jo used to do. It was his way of keeping her memory alive. Thinking of her, of Ellen, and all the other friends that had died made him feel regretful that he wasn't strong enough to save them. And then there were the countless times that Sammy died. Each time Sam died felt like a stab to his chest. The most recent time, Dean had tried to kill himself to end it all. He realized he sounded like a hypocrite, remembering his words to Sam after he 'saved' him by taking him to that crackpot healer. What is dead should stay dead.

Dean looked at the long since faded scars on his wrist and then at the knife Sam had given him for Christmas. He smirked a little, thinking the gift might have been a little tongue in cheek given the fight they had at Diagon Alley. He examined the blade, watching as the light caught the metal. How easy it was to cut through the skin all those months ago. It seemed almost effortless. Now, he felt the desire beginning to pull at him again, he pressed the cold metal to his skin. He sighed, who would care if he were gone? His dad basically told him the same thing a few days before he died. Sure, he knew it was the demon talking, but the funny thing about demons is they used a slight truth then magnified it to cause more pain for their victims. The thought of that slight truth had convinced him.

He sighed. There was a knock on the door and Sam's voice called out.

"Come on dude. Dad wants answers."

"He ain't the only one…." Dean mumbled and got up walking to the door, opening it as he closed the Swiss army knife with the other hand and put it in his back pocket.

"Dad wants to know everything?" Dean asked.

"Yeah, I think we should tell Harry, Ron, Hermione and that Sirius guy too. They're involved now," Sam said. "Just to make sure everyone is on the same page."

"Awesome… Just fucking awesome..." Dean muttered sarcastically. "This is gonna be fun."

Dean and Sam walked out of the room and a few moments later, they found themselves in the Demonology classroom. Dean looked over and saw his father, Harry, Sirius, Ron, and Hermione sitting in chairs inside. The members of the Order were present too. Sirius after all was a member of the Order. They were all happy to see him but kept their distance and their hands trained on their wands, just in case. The adults looked out of place sitting at the student tables, especially John, but then again, he and his boys looked out of place at Hogwarts. The members of the Order watched the back-and-forth interrogation of the man called John Winchester with wary eyes.

Lupin was still in shock about seeing his friend on this side of the veil. He was the only one who was close enough to Harry to restrain him, so he wouldn't go after Sirius. While in his own heart he was grieving for Sirius just as much as Harry was.

Sirius was the one who suggested that the other marauders should become Animagi to help Lupin get through his werewolf transformation. Then, when they graduated, they all joined the Order of the Phoenix. He and James got along so well that it shocked Lupin that Sirius would have murdered Harry's parents. But it was only later that he realized that Sirius had only become the scapegoat for indirectly murdering James and Lily when it really was Peter's fault.

There were many late-night conversations in Grimmauld Place during Harry's fourth year, where Sirius blamed himself for James and Lily, but he made peace with what had happened and had come to terms with it. He served his penance for 12 years in Azkaban. Lupin felt the same responsibility, felt guilt every time he had looked Harry in the eye during his time at Hogwarts.

Now that Sirius was back, Lupin didn't know what to think, there were several questions he wanted to ask, but he couldn't risk asking them in front of an audience. It's like the Winchester boys said, they have no way of knowing how the two men got back in the first place, or if they are who they claim to be. Dean had verified their existence saying that certain tests had been done but wouldn't go into detail about them.

As for Mad-Eye; he was sceptical of the newcomer. He didn't have a particular issue with Sirius, but John unnerved him. After Barty Crouch Jr. had thrown him in that trunk and impersonated him for a semester, he was a little weapon shy, though he'd never dare admit it.

He stood gruffly in the corner waiting and watching. Mr and Mrs Weasley had shown up a few minutes after everyone else. Molly had to drag Arthur away from John quite forcefully because he was asking too many questions about Muggles. John didn't shy away from the questions, just answered them simply saying, "But I'm not a regular, normal, human being, so I don't know if that has any relevance." Then he smiled awkwardly.

With Molly being the protective mother that she was, part of her wanted to shield the children from John. But by the same token, she was happy that Sam and Dean were reunited with their father, no matter the circumstances. Despite her initial fear of hunters, she found herself accepting John, at the end of the day, he was Sam and Dean's father after all. She didn't know the two well, but she knew enough to know that these were good men. They deserved to have him back after they brought Ron back to her.

Across the room, Sam and Dean were speaking to their father, keenly aware of the eyes of the others on them. The boys had many questions for John, just as he had so many for them. John waited for them to start, he had time to think of the questions that he would ask over the few days it took him and Sirius to get to the castle.

"Where have you been all this time?" Tonks asked.

"A place called Purgatory," Sirius explained. To the confused looks around him, he continued. "It's where monsters go where they die. John told me that. I don't know how I ended up there. But I'm glad I met up with John, I probably would have died without him."

"How much do you remember, Dad?" Sam asked. "Before you…" He couldn't make out the word died; it hung in his throat.

"I remember the graveyard… and killing Yellow Eyes," John said, trying to remember the past, but it was all a little hazy. Being in Purgatory, he could only remember the last few moments. He came out of Hell and grabbed Yellow Eyes, giving Dean enough time to use the Colt on him and kill that son of a bitch. "The next thing I remembered was being stuck in that Godforsaken forest, and I met Sirius after a couple of years." He saw his sons nod after sparing a glance at the young man sitting with Harry.

"How've you boys been?" John asked. Sam and Dean exchanged a look.

"Just awesome Dad," Dean muttered. John frowned.

"Right," Sam said, changing the subject. "After you died, we met the Harvelles." John made a face at the mention of William's family. "We went on a couple of hunts, routine things."

"How are Ellen and Jo?" John asked. "She must be almost 30 by now."

"Dead," Dean replied simply, looking down. "No, thanks to us…"

"Jo got attacked by a Hellhound two years ago," Sam clarified. "Ellen wouldn't leave her."

"They made a bomb to kill the Hellhounds, they gave us a shot to go after Lucifer," Dean added bitterly. "They died to give us a shot." He looked over to see Molly with tears in her eyes.

"Lucifer?" John asked incredulously.

"We'll get to that," Sam frowned.

Hermione was sitting closest to the trio and listened with interest to hear what John had to say. She still couldn't get over the fact that she was looking at three people that had died and come back from the grave. Her research said that there was no possible way to accomplish this with magic. She nudged Ron to get his attention and motioned to the three of them. The other Order members took notice of the three hunters as well.

"We found out about some kids like Sam," Dean began. "'Special' kids."

"What happened to them?" John said.

"Some of them went nuts," Sam scowled. "They're dead. A few months later, Yellow Eyes decided to round up all the psychic kids and make us all fight to the death. Soon enough it was only me and a guy called Jake. He stabbed me in the back when I was going to Dean and Bobby, and I bled out," he finished. The word hit John like a ton of bricks. He paled, knowing it would've been bad but not that bad.

"Oh my…" Molly mumbled. Hermione, Harry, and Ron grimaced, remembering touching on this in class.

"Then, I made a deal," Dean confirmed. "He was dead for two days and I cracked. I went to a crossroads, and I was given a year," he said matter-of-factly, not caring that the other wizards were listening. John's mind was still reeling from the fact that Sam died, but to hear that his eldest son made a deal and had gone to Hell? It nearly knocked the wind out of him. He remembered Alastair's voice from the rack. Hmm, seems you're not the only Winchester to make a deal Johnny boy. Dean will be with us real soon.

"That was a stupid move son," John frowned. Dean's hackles instantly rose.

"Fuck you," he glared, shocking the others slightly. "Sam was dead. I saved him, that's what you wanted."

"The same night," Sam continued, trying to clear the air. "We went and killed the Demon, as you know."

"Incredible," Arthur mumbled to himself.

"As the year passed, I tried to get Dean out of the deal. But he wouldn't let me, because the Crossroads Demon told him that if he tried to get out of it, I'd die. I met a demon, Ruby-"

"Or as I like to call her, 'Bitch'," Dean cut in.

Sam rolled his eyes but continued. "She helped us out. She saved our asses a couple of times," he threw Dean a glare. "And agreed to help us in finding a way out of the deal. We didn't manage to though. We were too late… the Hellhounds were set on Dean." He paused for a minute, reliving his brother's agonizing last moments. "I couldn't burn him, so we buried him."

The Order looked shocked at this revelation. John's heart skipped. Hellhounds? The news washed over him, shocking every nerve in his body. His son met those vicious bastards. He felt a rush of guilt. He left his oldest to die at the hands of those hellish dogs, and his youngest to bury his brother. John felt a surge of protectiveness for his sons, that they had to go through it alone, but also pride, as they had got past that. Guilt also burned through him for feeling responsible for putting them in this position in the first place. But how was Dean alive?

"Four months," Dean anticipated his father's question. "The equivalent of forty years in Hell later, I woke up in my own grave, dug myself out and found Bobby. He tried to kill me, but after I proved it was me, we left to find Sam. We met up. Yadda, yadda, yadda. Turns out I was brought back by an Angel, Castiel. He dragged me from Hell because God had 'some work for me to do'," Dean said, his voice turning bitter as he finished. "We found out that Lilith, the demon that had my contract, was trying to break the 66 seals to free Lucifer from Hell."

Dean suddenly sighed. "Alastair… he would come over. And he would make me an offer to take me off the rack if I started the torture." Suddenly the Demon's words started to make sense in John's head. Had he not made him the same offer? "Every day I told him to stick it where the sun shines. For 30 years, I told him. But then I couldn't do it anymore," Dean said, his eyes lowering slightly.

"Me cracking in Hell broke the first Seal." Dean tried to stop the memories from coming back, the words that Alistair said to him coming back in a flood. "Pulled out all the stops, but John, he was, well, made of something unique," he said. "The stuff of heroes. And then came Dean. Dean Winchester. I thought I was up against it again. But Daddy's little girl, he broke. He broke in thirty. Oh, just not the man your Daddy wanted you to be, huh, Dean?" Dean paused for a moment, staring into the eyes of someone who understood the pain he went through. "I guess you were stronger than me."

"You cracked? You started the fucking Apocalypse!?" John exclaimed, causing the others to look over at him. "It ain't that simple Dean!"

"It's not like I wanted to, Dad!" Dean said, outraged. "You have no fucking right to judge me!"

"Don't start this 'holier than thou shit with me." John stood up, anger coursing through him.

"Dad, don't tell me that you never thought about it. I know he tortured you too. They were betting for you to crack first before you escaped Hell."

Sam sighed, looking over to the kids and his colleagues. This is going really well… he thought to himself sarcastically.

"We died for your goddamn tirade, and you're pissed at us?"

"I never wanted this for you two!" John whispered angrily.

"I'm not even getting into this with you," Dean snapped. "We made a mess, but we cleaned it up. End of story."

Molly stepped up, sensing an escalation in the tension among the three hunters. "Maybe we should take a break."

"No, it's okay Molly," Dean assured. His eyes were still hard, but he relaxed slightly. Sam nodded in agreement.

"Dad, be pissed all you want, but we did what we had to do. You weren't there to tell us what to do, and you aren't gonna start telling us now," Sam spoke firmly, but calm.

John thought through his response carefully. He spared a glance around the room and met with Sirius's concerned stare. The man nodded knowingly, reminding the hunter of the conversation they had about what they would say to their boys when they got back. Sirius helped John to remember that starting a fight with his sons was not the first thing he wanted to do.

He sighed, realizing that he didn't have a rebellious, yet studious teenager, nor an obedient yet robotic one anymore. He looked back to his sons, realizing he was looking at two young adults. The words caught in his throat at the surge of pride that shot through him.

"You're right," John sighed. Dean raised an eyebrow in surprise.

"Good, now we're all calm, let's get this over with," Dean frowned, wanting this to be over as soon as possible.

"Anyway, eventually the Demons broke enough Seals, and Sam got tricked into breaking the last one when he killed Lilith, because of Ruby," Dean continued. "I really enjoyed stabbing her," he continued in a muttered tone, more to himself than anything else.

"With what? A regular knife can't kill a demon," John said, raising an eyebrow.

"This one can," Dean said, pulling the demon-killing knife from his pocket.

Arthur edged closer to the group, fascinated by yet another muggle artefact that seemed to have magical abilities.

"Calm down Dad, it's just a knife," Ron muttered with a roll of his eyes.

"Where did you get that knife, Dean?" John eyed the blade curiously.

"Ruby," Dean answered simply. "Stole it from her. It's my trophy, I think I earned it."

Sam continued the story. "We started trying to get Lucifer back in the Cage. After a while, we managed to get the Horsemen's rings that would re-open the Cage. We found out that I was Lucifer's vessel and Dean was Michael's. We would have to let them possess us, and we would fight to the death. It'd roast half the planet. Dean wouldn't do it. They brought back Adam," John looked shocked.

"Was Adam a fellow hunter?" Tonks asked, almost afraid to.

"He was our half-brother, and yeah, we know that you knew," Dean answered Tonks while looking at John bitterly. "How could you keep him from us?"

"How did you know?" John asked. His mind reeled, thinking of his third son. He saw Dean give a pained look, and his stomach twisted in discomfort. No… not him too… "Wait, you said 'brought back'?" His blood went cold.

"He called your phone and told us. We went to meet him, and we found out it was actually a Ghoul. It turns out Adam was killed by them. I'm sorry, Dad," Sam said quietly.

"God…" John gasped out, looking down.

"I knew you wanted to protect him," Dean sighed. "It wasn't in the Angel's plans."

"What do you mean?" John asked.

"After I wouldn't say yes to Michael, they raised Adam as a backup," Dean said. "Sam said yes to Lucifer and he and Michael had a showdown. I don't think Adam had a chance to say no to Michael. But before we could talk to him Cas threw a Molotov at him, and he burned up in Holy Fire. Lucifer blew Cas into a million pieces in retaliation, snapped Bobby's neck and beat the crap out of me before Sam got enough control to open the Cage with the Horsemen's rings and threw himself in along with Michael who had reappeared. Cas was brought back, and he raised Bobby. I went to live with Lisa, an old girlfriend. Around a year later, Sam turned up. We still don't know how he got back. I'm not sure what happened to Adam after that. Lucifer Molotoving Michael might have actually killed Adam. When Lucifer blew Cas up, it killed his vessel, Jimmy."

"That's pretty much it," Sam sighed.

"I'd say so…" Harry mumbled, his face pale, not realizing how much the hunters had gone through.

"So, my boys are training the next generation of hunters," John asked. His eyes moved to the three students, sitting near the wizards. Hermione looked away then, embarrassed at being caught eavesdropping. Harry and Ron sat up a little taller, feeling a strange sense of pride at the look John gave them.

"No Dad, we aren't training killers, we are saving these kids' lives." Sam disagreed, walking to the door. "I'm not going to say this will be easy, but Dad, it's going to take a while." Dean followed.

"You should be very proud of your boys Mr Winchester." Minerva felt like she should speak to the boy's defence. "They have done a great service for our students."

Hermione, Harry, and Ron shared a look.

"That is one messed up family," Ron muttered, and John glared at him.

"Shut up Ron," Hermione snapped as Mrs Weasley exclaimed "Ronald!" John picked up Dean's phone from his desk. He left the classroom before scrolling through the contacts and pressing the green button. Does this thing even work here? Worth a try.

"Whaddya want idjit? Why didn't you use that pigeon you sent me the last time if you wanted to talk to me?" John raised an eyebrow.

"Hey Bobby," he said. There was a silence

"Listen here you son of a bitch. I was born at night, but it wasn't last night. John Winchester is dead."

"I don't have time for this…. Bobby, look, it's really me. Ask me somethin' only I would know."

"What was our last argument about?"

"Sam leaving for Stanford. You shoved a shotgun in my face and told me to get the hell off your property," John said. There was another long silence.

"So, you're back John," Bobby said finally. "How in the hell…?"

"Yeah Bobby, I'm back," John replied. "Long story short, I was in Purgatory. I got out and here I am. I found a portal that connected to the mortal world." There was another long silence.

"I'm guessing the boys know. Since you're using Dean's phone."

"Yeah, they know," John sighed. "They're pretty pissed at me."

"I can't imagine why," Bobby said sarcastically. "You were an asshole for most of their lives."

"Are you done yet?" John frowned, knowing the hunter was right.

A few more seconds passed by until Bobby spoke again.

"Are the boys there?" He asked. "Let me talk to 'em." John sighed.

"Still don't believe me, do you? I wouldn't expect any less from you, Bobby. Actually, they just left. I think I can still catch them though. Hang on." John pulled the phone away from his ear and ran out into the hall. Thankfully Sam and Dean were just a few yards away it looked like they were arguing with one another. John jogged to catch up with them. He offered the phone to Dean.

"Bobby wants to speak with you." Dean took the phone and held it up to his ear.

"Bobby? Yeah, it's me." He looked at John. "I'm not sure if it's true either but what can we do about it now? I mean, a few months ago we didn't know that there's a magical castle in Scotland that trains kids on how to fly around on brooms and to wave sticks around shouting phrases in Latin." Sam punched Dean in the arm, hand outstretched for the phone, Dean waved him off. "Bobby, there's no need for you to come. You couldn't find this place even if you wanted to. There's some magic cloaking device that hides the castle from normal people. That's a compliment for you Bobby, not an insult… Dad was travelling with some wizard that he met in Purgatory." A pause. "Yeah, we did all the usual tests, holy water, cutting him with the knife, the whole nine yards. He's human," Dean looked at John, grinning. "Yup. Still an asshole."

"Let me talk to him." Sam held out his hand for the phone again.

Dean held the phone away from his ear. John and Sam couldn't make out what he was saying, but he was apparently yelling at Dean.

"Bob-Bobby!" Dean yelled back. "Bobby! Sam wants to talk to you." Dean gave the phone to Sam. "I thought he was going to crawl through the phone and choke me."

"Bobby, look, Dad is standing right here in front of me, and I'm pretty sure he's real, and the wizard that came with him too. He poured salt in a circle around him, and he stepped out. Along with the other tests, it seems legit to me." He sighed. "Okay, Bobby we will."

He hung up and handed it back to Dean.

"He's pretty pissed at me, isn't he?" John guessed.

"You could say that again," Dean replied. "He doesn't trust you, and neither do I. Not for a while anyway. I'm not the same soldier I was."

"What is it going to take to make you boys realize that it's really me? That I am really here, and I'm not a demon?"

"I don't know." Dean sighed as he turned and walked down to the Great Hall. "I guess we all have to figure it out together