Connor and Dawn walk tentatively into the Bronze. "You want something to drink?," Dawn asks.
"No."
"You-ah, you ever been here before?"
"No." He looks around for threats. Dawn's running out of things to talk about, and fears she's losing his attention.
"So-ah, where you from?"
"Away."
"Oh." Dawn nods. There is more silence. The drummer returns to the stage and the crowd starts to cheer. Aimee Mann comes back for an encore. "You wanna dance?"
"To what?"
"I, I think they're about to play another song."
"I don't know how."
Dawn laughs. "What?"
"I've never - "
"There's nothing to it. Just follow me." She grabs his arm and pulls a reluctant Connor out onto the dance floor. She moves her hands toward his neck, and he instinctively leans back, since it looks like she's about to choke him. Then he relaxes and lets her put her arms around his neck. Dawn starts to rock back and forth. Connor, tentatively at first, puts his hands on her waist. She looks up into his eyes. "See. Nothing to it." He smiles and nods.
"I'm sorry about your friends. I tried to kill him. I'm sorry I couldn't."
"It's okay. Well, what happened to Kit and Janice, that's not okay. It's horrible."
"I know. I know how hard it is to lose someone you're close to."
"It's like someone up there wants me to be alone. Everyone I touch dies." Connor gets nervous. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to - "
"It's okay. I'm used to things wanting me dead." That wasn't reassuring. Dawn wonders what Connor means. Connor feels her slowly inching away. "I mean, you're not putting me in any more danger than I already am. And even if you were, it would be worth it."
"That's so sweet!"
"You're a really nice person. That's, rare." Dawn holds him tighter. Connor reciprocates. Dawn smiles and rests her head on his left shoulder as the band plays:
"You struck me dumb, like radium.
Like Peter Pan, or Superman.
You have come ... to save me.
Come on and save me ...
If you could save me,
From the ranks of the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone."
Angel and Cordy rush into the Bronze. Angel frantically looks for his son. Cordy glances at the stage and is stunned. "Aimee Mann! What's she doing at this hellhole?"
"It's too crowded. I need a better view." They run up the stairs to the balcony.
As their bodies press together, Connor can feel Dawn's heart surging. "Are you okay?"
"Well, no. My two best friends just tried to kill me."
"Are you scared?" Given his life experience, Connor associates an elevated heart rate with the fight-or-flight reflex.
"Not with you around." Connor holds Dawn tighter and smiles. She's not hard and cold, like the rest of the world. She's soft, and warm, and nice. He could get used to this.
"There he is!," Cordy announces, pointing down towards Connor. "He's with a girl!" Angel smiles, proud of his son. They can only see Dawn's back. "I don't believe it. He couldn't have been here for more than half-an-hour, and already he's scored.
"That's my boy." Neither one of them are able to identify the girl as of yet.
"Look on the bright side," Cordy offers. "Connor may have turned Buffy into his mortal enemy, but at least he's over me."
"She looks like a pretty girl. Chip off the old block."
"Can we be a little less proud of him walking in your footsteps? Dads cheering on their son's conquests is kind of creepy and – Oh my God! Is that Dawn!?" Cordy gasps.
"What!? No. No. It can be. It, it . . . " Angel appears dejected as Dawn and Connor slowly rotate, giving him a good view of her face.
"I thought I'd seen that outfit somewhere else tonight."
"He's with Dawn. He's, he's, with . . . Dawn," Angel says, positively trembling.
"Chip off the old block all right." Angel doesn't appreciate the dark humor. In addition to recognizing the incestuous weirdness of it all, Cordy feels hurt that Connor dumped her for a Summers girl. "Maybe it's genetic. Hey! She's not even really Buffy's sister. That makes it a little less scary." Out of nowhere, Angel wonders if he became human and married Buffy, would Connor and Dawn be step-brother and step-sister? Or, would Dawn be his step-Aunt? He quickly banishes these unwelcome thoughts and wonders where they came from.
"We have to stop this," Angel declares.
"You mean before Buffy does? If I were her - "
"No. He already blames me for losing' you. This will completely alienate him from me." Cordy is shocked by the sudden about-face.
"And maybe save his life. Besides, this cannot work for ten thousand reasons. Better to nip it in the bud." Cordy doesn't understand why she feels an overpowering urge to prevent Connor from falling for another woman.
"Oh God. Look at him, Cordy. He's happy. I mean, he's, he's smiling. I've never seen him like this."
"Don't go soft and gooey on me now." Angel's deeply torn. He feels sick to his stomach. At the same time, he feels happy for Connor. And the happier Connor gets with Dawn, the sicker he'll feel. For the ever-suffering Angel, it seems perversely appropriate that what brings his son pleasure brings him despair.
"I can't do it. As much as it pains me. Doesn't he deserve - ?"
"One moment of pure happiness?"
"I didn't mean it like THAT. But a dance is . . . harmless."
"Angel, it's a slippery slope." He doesn't remember her ever using that term before. "First they're slow-dancing, then they're kissing, and the next thing you know, Buffy's driving Dawny to the clinic with Connor's severed head bouncing up and down in the trunk." That seemed excessively vulgar and catty, even by Cordelia's standards.
"Thank you." Dawn says to Connor.
"You saved me too."
"I mean, for everything after that. For being there. Sometimes I feel I'm completely alone in the universe, and no one even sees me."
"I know the feeling. You feel lost."
"Like no one really cares about your feelings."
"Exactly." The band's repeating the chorus at the end of the song:
"Come on and save me ...
Why don't you save me?
If you could save me,
From the ranks of the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone."
Dawn tilts her head. Their lips move closer and closer together.
NEXT: Buffy joins the party