"Hey, Greg!" The bells on the door jangled as Xander
walked into Big World Comics. He took a deep breath. "Ahhhh. I love the smell of
New Comic Day. Smells like cheap newsprint."
   "Hey," Greg replied. Greg was the owner and, at the moment, the only clerk.
   He was a big guy in a T-shirt and shorts who resembled Cameron Crowe. Xander
had mentioned this once; Greg had shrugged. "Beats the Comic Book Guy from The
Simpsons" was his only comment.
   As Greg searched under the counter for Xander's subscription box, Xander looked
around. Big World Comics was clean, well-lighted and roomy, which automatically
made it 75% less scary than other comic shops. The racks were well-organized,
some divided by company, some by subject matter. Xander checked out
the trade paperbacks until Greg popped back up from the counter.
   "Here you go. I threw in the new title by Mike Allred."
   "Cool. Thanks." Xander checked out his haul. Half the books were for his friends;
over the years, he'd managed to get most of them addicted to a few titles. This week,
he had the new Promethea for Willow, Ah My Goddess for Dawn, Charm School for Tara,
and Uncle Scrooge for Anya. The lone holdout was Buffy, who had some silly notion that
her reading material should contain nothing but words…unless, of course, Power Girl
made a guest appearance in somebody's book.
   He was leaning against the wall, paging through the new issue of The Flash, when
a hand reached past him for the Star Wars comics.
   "'scueme," the guy muttered.
   "Sorry," Xander muttered back. Then he realized that he knew the voice. He looked
out of the corner of his eye.
   Jonathan Peterson was sluggishly flipping through the latest issue of a Boba Fett
comic. Xander slowly turned until he was facing him.
   "Ahem," he said.
   Jonathan looked up.
   "Well, hello there, skippy," Xander said. "What's happening? Kill any...girls..."
He trailed off. All the venom he'd been about to unleash dried up when he saw
Jonathan's face. He looked drained. He was almost vampiric in his paleness.
Worst of all were his eyes. They were bloodshot and red-rimmed, with dark
circles beneath them. He looked like he'd been crying.
   "Are you all right?" Xander found himself asking.
   Jonathan took a step backward. Xander raised his hands placatingly.
   "Whoa! Whoa! It's okay. It's just me." He tried to grin. "No blasters.
Not in Greg's place."
   Jonathan stopped. He did not relax.
   "How you doin'?" Xander asked.
   Jonathan slowly shook his head.
   "Great," he finally said. "Everything's great."
   "Yeah, I can tell." Xander leaned against the wall again. "How's the rest of
the Lame Gunmen?"
   Jonathan smirked. "That Buffy's nickname for us?"
   "One of them. I think 'the Legion of Dim' was bandied about too." Xander shuffled
through his comics as nonchalantly as he could. "How's Warren doing?"
   "Fine," Jonathan almost whispered.
   "Good, good. So you guys should be conquering Sunnydale any day now, right?"
   Jonathan turned away.
   "We know about Katrina, Jonathan. And we're pretty sure you three tried to make
Buffy think she was guilty."
   Greg glanced in their direction, trying to overhear. Xander lowered his voice.
   "Come on, man," Xander continued. "This isn't you.You've always been a little weird,
sure, but that's a real relative thing. Especially in this town. You were always a
good kid." He waited for some kind of response, then pressed on. "What were you going
to do? Set up, what, a Tribunal of Evil?"
   Jonathan muttered something.
   "Didn't hear you."
   "We were gonna call it the Council of Three."
   "Council of Three. I like that. It's very Kurt Busiek."
   "It wasn't supposed to be like this," Jonathan whispered.
   "What?"
   Jonathan turned back, and now Xander could see that his eyes were wet.
   "It wasn't supposed to be like this!" Jonathan said. "We…we were supposed to be
crimelords! You know? Not… not evildoers! Not bad guys!"
   Xander raised an eyebrow.
   "You know what I mean! You can be a badguy without being a bad guy! We…"
Jonathan wiped his eyes. "We were supposed to be rogues. Charming rogues.
And now, they're becoming something else, and I don't…" He sniffled loudly.
   "Come on, man, you're blubbering." Xander searched his pockets for a tissue and
   came up dry. He walked to the counter. "Got a Kleenex?"
   "What's with him?" Greg asked, handing him a box.
   "Uh…he just found out that Joe Casey's leaving X-Men. He's a little sensitive."
Xander handed the box to Jonathan, who blew his nose.
   "Thanks."
   "There's still time, you know," Xander said. "Turn yourself in. You could
switch sides. We can always use another Scooby."
   "I…I dunno." Jonathan blew his nose again. "I gotta think about it."
   "Well, don't think too long."
   Jonathan wiped his eyes.
   "Could...could you tell her I'm sorry?" Jonathan said.
   "I think she'd rather you showed her you were sorry," Xander said. "Look…
you ever want to talk to me, I'm in here every Wednesday around this time. It's
neutral ground, right?"
   Jonathan nodded. "Right."
   "But like I said…don't think too long. Because when Buffy catches up with Warren…"
His eyes grew cold. "And she will catch up with Warren…she's going to demolish
him, and anything else within arm's reach. You dig?"
   Jonathan nodded again, looking scared. "I g-gotta go."
   "Okay." Xander walked with Jonathan to the door. One of the trade paperbacks on the
rack near the door caught his eye. "You ever read Thunderbolts?"
   "N-no."
   "You might like it. It's about a bunch of supervillains who become heroes."
Xander shrugged. "Just a thought."
  Jonathan looked at him, then turned away and walked out into the light.
Xander sighed and brought his pile of books to the counter. "Just these today."
   "Okay," Greg replied. "Who was that kid? I see him in here every once in a while.
Friend of yours?"
   "Here's hoping," Xander said as he reached for his wallet.

All of this is copyright Joss Whedon, except the stuff that isn't.