Title: Silent Melody
Author: Gaeriel Mallory
Rating: K+
Fandoms: Buffy and X-men the Movie
Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer is the property of Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy, Inc. X-men is the property of Marvel, Bryan Singer, and a whole bunch of other people.
Continuity: After X2 for X-men and up to the series finale for Buffy. Story three in "The Hero Biz" series.

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"Park over there," Buffy told Scott, pointing to an empty spot in front of an office building.

He complied, smoothly parallel parking. "So just where are you taking me?" he asked her as they got out of the car. Buffy had told him to dress casual nice which could mean any number of possible destinations. He raised an eyebrow at her outfit. "And how do you expect to run in those shoes?"

Buffy frowned down at her three inch heeled boots. "Why do you think I'll be running?" She brushed some hair out of her face and looked at Scott. "I can go one night without danger, you know."

He grinned at her over the top of the Jaguar. "You might, but think about who you're with. Between the two of us, I think it's a fair assumption that at least one of us will be running tonight."

She waved his worries away as she walked around the car. "Come on," she said as she tugged his arm. They headed down the block towards an alcoved doorway underneath a neon sign.

"Caritas Reborn?" Scott read. "That's an odd name."

"Wait until you meet the clientele." Buffy opened the door and walked in, not looking back to see if her cousin followed or not.

The first thing Scott noticed about Caritas Reborn was the bright green vaguely human-shaped thing singing 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow' on the stage across the room from the entrance. He wasn't sure which was more startling – the fact that the thing had horns its choice of music.

"Is he a mutant?" Scott asked Buffy. He prayed that she would answer in the affirmative but knew in his heart that she wouldn't.

She grinned at him. "Nope. He's a demon from another dimension."

The green demon finished up his song, holding the last "I" until the canned music ended. He hopped down from the stage after handing the microphone to another creature that Scott could not begin to identify. Buffy smiled widely and waved an arm high in the air. "Lorne!"

The demon waved back and made his way across the room, side-stepping a waiter carrying a tray of margaritas. "Babycakes!" he greeted Buffy. He hugged her tightly and kissed her on the cheek. "Let me look at you," he said, holding her by the shoulders. "I must say, I love the shoes. So what brings you to my neck of the woods?"

She reached out and tugged Scott over by his jacket. "Lorne, I want you to meet my cousin, Scott. Scott, this is Lorne."

"A pleasure," Scott answered politely, automatically extending his hand.

Lorne grasped it and shook it enthusiastically. "No, no," he assured Scott. "The pleasure is all mine." Moving between the two, he steered them towards a table. "So is he going to be showing off his pipes?" he asked Buffy.

Taking her seat, she grinned over at Scott. "If we can convince him to."

"Well we'll just have to work on him then." Lorne sat down at the table and waved down a passing waiter. "Give them whatever they want," he said. "On the house."

"Lorne!" Buffy protested.

He wagged a finger at her, turning serious. "Not a word of argument from you, missy. I owe you and the Watchers too much. A few drinks won't even make a dent in my debt."

"You don't have a debt with us," she answered. "It was the least we could do after—"

He cut her off. "Buffy. Please. Let me do this much at least for you?" His voice was slightly pleading.

She relented. "I'll have a Shirley Temple," she told the waiter.

Scott nodded. "The same."

Lorne made a face. "Are you sure? My new bartender can make a daiquiri to die for." He gestured over to a red-skinned demon dressed in a loud Hawaiian shirt was expertly flipping bottles of liquors around himself.

Buffy smiled and shook her head. "Not tonight, Lorne. Trouble seems to follow me and I want to stay alert just in case."

"Well, you know the rules. No fighting in here. I just had the anti-violence spells put on the place." Lorne nodded at the waiter who moved off.

Scott looked over at Buffy. "How on earth did you meet him?"

She looked over at where Lorne was greeting a group who had just walked through the door. "The Council helped him set up this place. I didn't know him personally before, but he was a friend of a friend. I'm afraid that we abandoned him and his group during a time when they could have really used our help. It was only after that we realized just what had been going on. Lorne – he was the only survivor that we could find and that was because he had left before the actual fighting."

"So it was guilt money?"

Buffy glanced at him. "Yes," she answered simply. "And I think Lorne knows that but he accepted it anyway. He lost a lot because of Angel and our misjudgments regarding him."

He leaned back in his seat and tried to recall the crash course she had given him on the past eight years of her life. "Angel? He's the vampire, right?"

She nodded. "We thought he had changed sides but it turned out he really hadn't." She sighed. "My life is a whole slew of 'what ifs,' Scott. This is one of the biggest ones of all. What if we had listened and believed Angel when he asked for our help? Would he and other friends of ours still be alive?"

"That's a tough call." He grinned crookedly. "Hell knows I've had my fair share. The worst part is afterwards, when you realize that if you had moved just a bit fast, turned left instead of right – things might turned out differently."

"It's hard to be the one in charge. You get all the glory but you also get all the blame and guilt." Buffy sat up straighter as the water approached with their drinks. She dug into her purse and tried to hand over a bill.

The waiter set down their drinks and backed away, holding the tray up like a shield. "Sorry, miss. They're on the house." He turned around and left before she could press the issue.

Buffy sighed and put the money away. "I'll slip it into his pocket or something later," she told Scott. "It doesn't feel right that Lorne should owe us. It should be the other way around, after everything that happened."

He sipped his Shirley Temple and swirled the red liquid with his straw. "If you want my advice, let him feel like he's doing you the favor tonight. There's a lot of pride on both sides and it's just easier this way." Setting down his glass, he studied the nightclub. He winced when he noticed a group of creatures that were the same species as those he had fought last night in the corner, eating a dish that he deliberately didn't look too closely at. "When I first came to live with the Professor, I had a lot of trouble accepting what he gave me freely. At first, I kept track of everything: every dollar I spent, ever meal I ate, every shirt I wore. I finally realized that I was hurting him a little by doing that. He didn't want to be paid back – it wasn't about that. He wanted me to feel accepted in his home and that by being there, that was enough."

Buffy smiled wryly and she played with her glass. "And now?"

If the beams didn't obliterate anything in their path, he would have felt moisture in his eyes. "He's like my second father. And I know he thinks of me as a son; even named me his heir. He never had any children and I think I filled some hole in his heart."

"Your family is not necessarily the one you were born with, but the one you make yourself," she said. "I was lucky. Mom was always there for me. Xander and Willow, my two best friends – my mom became almost their mom too. Their families were less than welcoming." She frowned. "And Giles became our dad. He was a better parent to us than we could have asked for."

He didn't comment on what she didn't say and that she didn't mention her birth father at all. Hank Summers, you have a lot to answer for, he thought grimly. "Aunt Joyce made everyone feel welcome. I'm going to miss her."

"Yeah," she said softly. "Her death hit all of us pretty hard. She wasn't part of it, not really, and then she died from something that none of us could have fought off. You can't kill a brain tumor. You can't set it on fire or say the magic spell that would make it go away."

"I think those are the deaths that hit us the hardest. We're so used to fighting that feeling useless is even worse than fighting and failing." Scott tapped the side of his glass. "I wish Jean had let me help at the end. She took all choice out of anybody's hands, even the Professor's. She was so powerful that it scared me afterwards, when I finally thought about it."

Buffy stayed silent and Scott looked over at her. "What are you thinking?"

Her lips twitched. "With great power comes great responsibility." She chuckled. "Sorry, but Xander's a big comic book geek and Andrew's even worse. It's from—"

"Spider-man," he cut her off. He smiled in spite of everything. "You forget, I live in a mansion full of teenagers. I've walked in on my fair share of comic book conversations."

She made a face. "You've never met Andrew and Xander." She sipped her drink and sighed. "Sometimes I wish I could turn back time and tell my younger self things. Like, don't sleep with Angel, or push Faith to open up more. Life would certainly be different."

"But would it be better?" Scott closed his eyes and sat back. "How about, tell the people around you that you love them everyday because they might not be around tomorrow?"

"Yeah," Buffy said softly. "There's that one too. Definitely a biggie."

Scott opened his eyes and sat up straight when he felt another body slip into the booth with them. Lorne carried a drink with a paper umbrella poking out of it. "So how are you two doing? Ready to get onto the stage and show us what you've got?" He winked at Buffy. "I know you want to."

She rolled her eyes. "Please. Do you see Sweet or one of his brothers around here? No way you're getting me up there without magical influence. I'm also a private person and don't like the idea of you poking around my aura or soul or whatever it is."

Scott frowned in confusion. "What?"

"I'm an empath demon," Lorne explained rather unhelpfully.

"And that means..."

"I can read people when they sing. I can tell how you're feeling, what emotional or mental hang-ups you might have, sometimes even a little bit of your destiny. A lot of people come here and sing for me and I give them advice based on what I see."

Scott felt his gut knot up and he forced air into and out of his lungs. "No," he said firmly. "No singing." The thought of knowing—he didn't even acknowledge all he was feeling to himself. There was no way he was letting some empath look into his soul. His very flawed and broken soul.

"Scott? Are you okay?" Buffy's concerned voice brought him back to himself.

His hands were clenched tightly around his glass and he was shaking. He let out a shuddering breath. "Yeah," he answered her, forcing his fingers to relax. "Just—" He shook his head. "Sorry," he said finally.

Lorne smiled sadly and patted his arm gently. "It's all right, hon. I understand." He got up and saluted them both with his drank. "If I don't see you again before you leave, it was nice talking to you guys. Stop in anytime." He walked off towards the bar.

Buffy finished her Shirley Temple in a few gulps and wiped her mouth with a napkin. "I'm sorry, Scott. I shouldn't have brought you here."

"No, it's okay." He grinned shakily at her. "Though I think I need some fresh air."

They didn't run into Lorne on their way out, which he was glad of. The coolness of the night air revived him a little on their walk back to the car. Once inside the vehicle, he slid the key into the ignition but made no move to turn it. "I'm sorry," he told her. "I know you were just trying to help."

"Don't apologize. It's not your fault." Her brown eyes were sympathetic. "You just weren't ready."

He nodded and turned on the car. The drive back to the mansion was quiet. Scott wondered what Buffy was thinking about, or maybe rather who. In his mind, a red-haired woman in a lab coat smiled playfully at him.

--fin--