I chose Cicatrix for the title because it means a scar, and I think Buffy has enough to last her a lifetime both inside and out. In the last chapter I had Severus say that she wanted to be a martyr, which was only because he was in a rage and worried, and I don't agree with that fact because anytime someone you love dies you feel as though you've failed them and I didn't mean for it to sound like he was trivializing her pain. If that's the way you found it I'm not going to apologize for it because it's human to say hurtful things you don't mean when you are upset and that's the way I chose to portray him.

Chapter Sixteen: Connections

Albus Dumbledore found Snape sometime later still standing in his dungeon with a snarl playing across his lips.

"Did you find Miss Summers, Severus?"

"Yes, and I think I've made matters worse…" the professor sighed.

"How on Earth could you have done that?" the headmaster wondered, knowing how close the two were and how delicate the situation.

"You must have heard all of this before, you're just a silly little girl who refuses to be happy. You'd rather suffer, because you want to be a martyr!"

"Never tell me what to feel. You don't know what I've been through!"

"I don't understand anything at all, because if anything made sense, the powers wouldn't have taken the others from me after all those years. They would have been satisfied with both my deaths, the countless lives I've saved, and pulling me from the only salvation I'll ever find."

"Apparently, it was rather easy considering my tact. I got angry and let my mouth run wild," the ex-death-eater grumbled.

"What did you say?"

"It doesn't matter now! All that matters is that I made it worse and it will be that much harder to find her this time."

"Where did you find her Severus?"

"She won't still be there."

"I understand; I was just curious. I thought I'd searched the whole castle…"

"She was in the Forbidden Forest, trying to compose herself I suppose. I've made her terribly angry; I don't think she'll want to talk to me again."

"Nor I," the headmaster acknowledged. "She's not quite pleased with me either."

"What did you say to bring up the pains of her friends Albus? Why would you knowingly bring them up?"

"I hadn't meant to. She's developed a new power, a sort of wishing spell…"

"Which I've had the pleasure of being moved by," Snape muttered.

"I happened to have worded something wrong and things seemed to have gone downhill from there."

"So it seems that you have to really want what you wish for it to happen,"

"I have to really want it huh? Well I want Willow and Xander. I want Giles… do you hear me? I want them back!"

"The same happened to me as well."

"What do you know of her past Severus?"

The two then started going over what they knew of the heartbroken girl, oblivious to the fact that one very special boy had been passing by and heard everything.

---------------------------------------------------

Harry paced through the Gryffindor common room, coming up with and discarding all the possible places the slayer could be.

"Harry what are you doing?" Ron inquired from where he and Hermione were playing chess.

When he didn't reply, Hermione spied him from her seat and could see the worry on his face. "Harry what's the matter?" she pried.

"Nothing," he denied, knowing that Buffy wouldn't want everyone talking and wondering behind her back.

"Harry…" Hermione prodded; sure that he was hiding something.

"I'm just thinking of Sirius…" he trailed off, feeling horrible for using his godfather's death like that, but it was the only thing he knew would cease their questions. For both Hermione and Ron, and everyone else really, were still unsure and nervous to open the topic with him.  

And like he knew they would, the two just nodded their heads in what they hoped to be an understanding, sympathetic gesture and turned back to their game.

Harry then fled the room, in both guilt and relief and continued his search for Buffy. He found her later outside still in the most unlikely of places: right beneath the Whomping Willow. Memories still fresh from his second year made Harry pause but he did indeed get close enough to talk to the girl.

"Buffy?"

"I don't want to talk to you… oh Harry. I thought that you were someone else. What are you doing out here?"

"I was worried. You didn't show up for breakfast and I thought something might have happened."

"No, nothing happened. Nothing close to an apocalypse anyway," a small smile graced her features, pleased with the joke no one else would understand.

"Are you alright?"

"Harry, do you think that I'm a good person?" the pleading in her voice for an honest answer caught him and he was trapped by her gaze.

"Of course Buffy, but why…"

"Would you still say I was good if you knew that I have done nothing but kill since I was in school?"

"I don't understand what…"

"Would I still be good if you knew that I had been to both Heaven and Hell and remember so much more of Hell than my eternal bliss?"

Harry could only guess that she was delirious by the things she was saying. "Buffy, maybe you ought to go inside."

"I think I finally understand what Angel had to go through everyday with his soul and his redemption. But if he could be happy, and he was, with Lorne, and Fred, and Conner, then I can be happy too right? He was happy in LA before I came and got him killed, at least this time I think he went to heaven."

"Buffy, I really think that we…"

"Maybe I've been looking at this the wrong way. They're all together now. Willow has Tara and Kennedy. Xander can be with Anya. Dawn and Mom. Maybe… maybe if I know that they're happy, I can be too. Do you think so Harry? Can you be happy as long you as know that your parents and Sirius are happy?" Her eyes had glazed over and she turned from him, facing the sky seeing something that he couldn't fathom.

"How did you know about them?" he faltered.

"I chose to watch over you Harry, because we were so alike, you and I. So I wanted to know everything so that I could protect you. It's what Giles would have wanted me to do, protect you, because I know how hard it must be for you."

He had started to shake at the honesty in her voice. She was the first person to really get it. Almost everyone babied him, thinking that he needed to be looked after and fretted over like a child. Those that didn't see him that way saw him as the brave and willing hero. He was neither; he was a boy who didn't want to be who he was but did what he had to survive.  Buffy saw that. Seeing his shake, Buffy motioned him to her side. He somehow managed to walk to her without getting the tree's attention and settled down beside her. The Chosen One then pulled The Boy Who Lived into a hug and the both sat and watched the sky until the sun set.