Operation Slayers and Non Essentials, the Second Coming:

Previously on Buffy the Vampire Slayer:

"Uhhhgg, what the fuck? How the hell did I get in the castle?" Kennedy asked out loud as she awoke on a cot.

"HOLD THE LINE!" Buffy commanded.

"Don't let them in! For the love of God don't let them in! I just finished painting!" Xander added.

And so the scene was set in motion. In front of the castle doors Giles, Andrew, about a handful of watchers and Xander stood with crossbows in hand and a barrel of bolts on the concrete steps. In front of the boys were a last line made up of the most inexperienced Slayers along with team Faith. Injuries still plagued team Faith so the members were left near the back to pick off any stragglers that managed to get through the front line. Faith herself stood on the second step behind her team and barked out orders as she was able to witness and concentrate on the battle waging in front of her, occasionally grabbing a crossbow bolt from the barrel behind her and manually chuck it with her good arm at an enemy or two. Ahead of Faith's line, the first line of defence was conducted by all of team Satsu, Buffy Summers and a small group of the more experienced Slayers.

"Slayer!"

"Asshole!" Buffy countered as the Ethros demon started to stride towards her, its metal scythe materializing in the demon's hand. .

"Clever," the demon quipped.
"Let's see how clever you are when I take your head!" The Ethros demon yelled at it raised its weapon and tried to pierce the top of Buffy's head with the point of the scythe.

Faith and everybody behind her, including both Giles and Andrew who were on their asses trying to kick the front door that sent them flying closed, witnessed Kennedy delivering a flying right knee to the jaw of a surprised vampire. As Kennedy landed, she didn't miss a beat. The Latina Slayer lashed out and staked the two closest vamps at either of her flanks using the crossbow bolts she grabbed behind team Faith, or rather, what should now be known once again as team Kennedy.

Within seconds and while fighting in unison, team Kennedy and Faith managed to take down their enemies without further injury.

"Ken!... How?" Faith asked aloud.

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When the demon finally approached the blond Slayer, it twisted its torso and arms backwards for the final death swing as Buffy managed to stand on her knees.

"In the name of evil incarnate! In the name of the First, I sacrifice thee!" The Ethros demon, soon to be Slayer of Slayers, said just before the demon launched its final assault.

As Buffy closed her eyes and waited for the agonizing pain in her back and thigh to stop when the death blow came, in that one second she knew it took for death to come, Buffy Summers inwardly thought one thing. 'Mom, I'm coming home'.

After more than a few seconds past, Buffy opened her eyes and couldn't believe what she saw. The first sight that the blond Slayer recognized was that of the Ethros demon standing exactly the way she remembered, as if it was frozen in time. Seconds later Buffy set her gaze on another figure past the demon. There crouched Kennedy with her back towards the blond Slayer, wielding the Slayer axe in her right hand with the head of the Slayer axe covered in blood. As Buffy's stunned gaze looked from the demon to the Slayer and back, the older Summers sister had to roll out of the way; for the Ethros demon's body started to fall forwards while it's head fell backwards.

"Kkkk…Kennedy?" Buffy asked with a shaky voice.

"Hey Buffy...Wow you look like shit!" Kennedy mused after she turned to face her elder and helped the blond Slayer to her feet with a smile.

Smiling, the young watcher addressed his comrades, "Girls, I got an idea! Xander, Mr. Giles, take your jackets off and follow me!"

While normally Andrew's friends and Slayers would make gay jokes at him, but now was not the time. That and the fact that Kennedy was too busy hauling ass, barely keeping the enemy at bay, just throwing and kicking vamps and demons backwards into their own people to make sure the enemy doesn't get past her.

Authors Notes: This chapter is shorter than usual, but it leads into the next chapter, (obviously), which will explain what happened from the time the good guys survived the cave coliseum trap the Ethros demon set up in chapter six, to Ken waking up in the previous chapter.

Chapter 8

Running back onto Slayer central's front steps, Andrew, Giles and Xander came back outside with barbeque lighters and all kinds of cans that have flammable and explosion warning labels on them.

"Everyone grab a few cans and lighters!" Andrew ordered.

"Andy, remind me to get Xander make you a Zima bar if this works." Faith exclaimed with a smile as she grabbed a spray paint can and a lighter.

As soon as the watchers, Xander and Slayers grabbed their make shift weapon combinations, Andrew looked to the sky and saw Willow using some sort of magical Jedi force power.

As Andrew looked up at Willow, he closed his eyes and focused his will on her, in his mind picturing just Willow in the sky. "Willow! Willow can you hear me?""AH!Andrew I can hear you! Not so loud!" Willow screamed as she was magically forcing another wave of evil to their knees from the sky; already breathing heavily and feeling the effects of running on what felt like an empty magical reserve.

"Sorry. But I have an idea how to end this quick. Can you make some winds or launch any more fireballs? I think we can make a flame thrower from the front and bomb them from the back." Andrew told Willow with his mind.

"Sure whatever! Just hurry up, I can't last much longer!" Willow shouted, her face scrunched with stress like the time she put up a barrier in front of the first Turokan she ever faced.

"Umm...What the hell is Red going on about?" Faith asked.

"Andrew's talking to Willow with his mind…Urrhg! God I hate blade wounds." Buffy grunted as she spoke to the group while getting to her feet.

"Buffy, your to-"

"Dawn who's the big sister here? Hmm?"

"Fine but if you die I'm telling," Dawn scolded.

"Ok Andrew, what's the plan." Buffy asked, injured but falling back into leader mode none the less.

"I want to use the cans, lighters and Willow's magic to make flame throwers. We charge from the front while some of us toss cans to their back ranks and have Willow throw fireballs on them."

"Sounds good. All the Slayers will walk in with cans and lighters while the men lob cans to their back ranks from behind us…Any questions?" Buffy asked.

"…No? Alright grab your weapons and form up!" The blonde Slayer commanded.

"Hold the line! Keep them back! We have to hold ou-"

"Kennedy get down!" Buffy screamed.

Just as the Slayer dropped to her knee's she felt a strong heat above her. Curious, Kennedy looked up and was terrified as she saw a blanket of flame above her.

"WHAT THE FUCK!" Kennedy screamed in wonder as she turned her neck to see what caused the flames.

As Kennedy looked back, through the flames, she witnessed blurred images of Buffy and the gang. And so the scene was set in motion. Team Kennedy, along with Buffy, Faith and the men of the castle hold were advancing on the enemy; burning the enemy to ash with their makeshift flamethrowers and with the aid of Willow, magically inducing strong winds to allow the flames to rush forwards towards the opposing army.

"Pull!" Buffy yelled as she walked past a knelt Kennedy.

With that command, the watchers and one handyman each tossed a spray can far into the enemy's back ranks; quickly followed by a few fireballs from air-Willow. Not mere seconds after Willow launched her flaming magic, were their firey explosions on Slayer Central's front lawn. Metal shrapnel downing demons and vampires alike, flaming or not.

Thankfully, the current events unfolding before Andrew's eyes were occurring exactly the way he thought it would in his own head. His Slayer flame units were constantly marching forwards while the enemy was being forced into the flames because of the back rank explosions. Slowly but surely, demons and vampires were either instantly turned to ash or cut down, dwindling the enemy numbers to nothing under the hour.

Panting and tossing her empty spray can on the lawn, Buffy voiced her question, "Report!"

"Doing a body count now boss, give us five minutes." A random Slayer announced as she and her friends began scanning the battlefield.

"Ok, everybody who's able to collect, collect our stuff and bring it all inside! Those who need medical att- wait…Where's Olivia? Giles?" Buffy asked as she turned to her watcher.

"She's with the construction crew in case anything got by. She's not a fighter but she does know a few things about magics. I remember when we were , we-"

"Oh God G, how I don't wanna know what you two did back in the day." Faith told the Patriarch.

"…Fair enough," Giles replied with wave of his hand.

"Incoming!" Dawn pointed up at a red headed body falling to the ground. Luckily, that body was revealed to be an extremely tired and barely conscious Willow, whom was now in the arms of her former lover Kennedy.

"Thought you'd just stop by Will?" Ken asked with a smile.

"To…Tired…to…laugh…hug me…then…nap…time…please…" Willow barely managed to get out in between pants, just before her eyes closed and she passed out.

"I'll go tell Olivia to get the med-room ready; can I get a Slayer to come with me just in case?" Andrew asked Buffy.

"Satsu, I don't want any more shit happening today, take Dana and go with Andrew to do a sweep of the castle. Once everything's good, let the construction workers out and tell them to get back to work as soon as daylight hits. Then get Olivia to the med-room. Hell, do another sweep after that to make sure were not letting out guard down." Buffy commanded.

"Andrew please tell me you ordered walkie-talkies from 'Watchers R Us'." Buffy addressed the young watcher as he was walking back into the house with Statsu's Ninjato in hand.

"Of course"

"Ok, go get them and then go do what I told you." The blonde Slayer commanded once again.

While Andrew and Dana started to walk inside the castle, Satsu and Kennedy shared a long and fierce moment of eye contact; a gesture that spoke so much louder than words ever could, before Satsu turned to follow the young watcher.

As the trio went inside the castle, Buffy addressed the rest of her army. "Ok first off, great job everyone who isn't dead. Remember when I told you that Hell was gonna come at us harder than before? Well welcome to the jungle ladies and gentleman, we have fun and games. This is gonna be just another day in the office until the universe or mega powers, or whomever decides the balance between good and evil is all balanced out again. Secondly, we can't let our guard down. I want two teams of those who can stand and fight if need be, male or female. First team stands on guard duty from now until lunch and the second team is on watch from after lunch until midnight. We will continue this routine until Willow is able to cast whatever protection spells she can so we can ease our way into our old schedule. Any questions?" Buffy finally asked after giving her commanding speech.

After receiving nods instead of questions, Buffy continued. "Ken, when we get the all clear from Andrew, can you sort out the groups and lead the first watch? I'll get Satsu to lead the second."

"Yeah sure Buff, but what are you and the other mamma bear gonna do?" Kennedy asked while nodding in Faith's direction.

Laughing, Faith put down the one armful of weapons she was holding and slung her arm around Kennedy and told her, "Your too young to know Ken, maybe when your older."

"Eww! For God sakes I'm still conscious here!" Dawn shrieked as she stabbed a half dead demon, blood spurting like a fountain over her head.

"Faith, I have multiple open wounds here, I don't think I can." Buffy weakly chuckled out.

"Oh please B, you know you want to. I'll even do that thing you like behind your knee." Faith told Buffy with a wink before a receiving supportive high fist bump from Kennedy.

While trying to hold back her smile, Buffy could only stand there, arms crossed and utter, "…Shut up".

"Yes! Please shut up!" Dawn shrieked again, walking back to the group covered in demon blood.

And so the champions of mankind took their time to rest and recuperate, each took shifts to watch the other while venerable. After the red manned goddess of Slayer Central replenished her magical reserves, she engulfed the castle grounds with protective and warding magic; hoping this time no opposing mages felt like coming out of nowhere and somehow having the means to bring down the castle's magical defenses.

While Willow and Olivia took it upon themselves to play the role of mother hen's during the Chosen Two's absence, Kennedy and Satsu did all they could to aid the Chosen Two in their elder Slayer duties. For a few days and nights, the two senior Slayers ran classes for the less experienced Slayers, took shifts supervising guard duty with the new family pet and lead the more dangerous patrols. Once the majority of the non-critically injured members of the castle-hold were able to fight the good fight once again, Buffy Summers decided to hold a 'family meeting'; said meeting consisting of Giles, Olivia, Faith, Xander, Willow and all of team Kennedy and team Satsu, and of course, everybody's favorite four legged demon. A four legged pet demon, which just after a few days already grew a few inches.

"Alright Buffy, I believe were all here if you're ready to start." The Patriarch of the castle softly spoke to his former charge.

Buffy hobbled, with the aid of her crutches, to the main library table and sat down on it; the wound to her hip still rendering Buffy unable to walk without aid. Knocking on the table top to gain everyone's attention, and have the Slayers pet bark at the closed library doors, Buffy managed to capture everyone's attention so the meeting can begin.

"Ok so, first off. Great job everybody. Without the selective few in this room, we would all be dead once again. But you all know how great you all are and I'm getting tired of giving the 'hurray we won again' speech every time we beat the enemy at our gates, so let's move on." Buffy announced to the crowd as she did air quotations around the hurray we won again part of her speech. "I called this meeting to get an update on how were doing as a whole and to explain what happened to Kennedy while she was out of commission. So starting with Xander, were gonna go around the room and find out how were doing." Buffy affirmed as she nodded to her left at Xander.

"Ok so. Hi, I'm Xander"

"Xander," Willow and Buffy both scolded the one eyed man with an eye roll.

"Alright, alright. So all the facilities are finally running. We got heat, cooling, electricity, plumbing and gas. And Willow was generous enough to help magically wrap all the pipes in the house with some magical thingy. Basically, we don't have to worry about internal floods or a gas leak exploding and killing us all. She also helped to magically reinforce every stage of the ongoing castle reconstruction. So everything from the steel studs in the walls, to the property gates has been strengthened in case we get attacked again. We have most of the essentials done, I just need to go over recreational stuff with you and Mr. Scrooge." Xander announced as he pointed his thumb down the line to Giles.

"I am not cheap, I am just following a well-structured budget"

"A budget which I looked over and am certain can be spent on an indoor pool and large Jacuzzi." Xander replied.

"Ah yes, that's all we need. All of our Slayers to wear next to nothing in their new-fangled swimming gear and be in the same hot bath as the rest of us." Giles mocked; his mocking being met by Xander, Willow and Andrew staring into space with giant smiles on their faces.

"Moving on," Buffy commanded. "Will?"

"There are a few things I want to address. Like Xander said we should be safe from the castle imploding on us, and I'm casting multiple layers of barriers and warding spells around the castle grounds and castle itself daily. I also had a thought on how our enemies keep breaking our magical defences. Rune magic. I think they were using magically imbued runes to help them kick my magical ass. I mean rune magic originated from Scotland so it is the most logical answer. I want to look into using runes to help in our magical defense and offense, use the local resources to our advantage for once. Rune magic can be very powerful. The older the stone, the stronger the magic. Think of it as the stone representing Gaia and the magic in the stone drawing upon the earth for-"

"Will? Unless you speak Andrew or…actually, that's pretty much it. Can you tell us in English please how will it help us?" Buffy asked.

"Oh…yeah, sorry. Basically Rune magic can be powerful if you use the right stones. Plus it can really cut down on all the magic I have to use daily. I want to use the runes and imbue them into the castle and the perimeter, to make sure we never have to rebuild this place again."

"Brilliant idea Willow. However rune magic was forbidden by the council because of the rarity and cost of runes. And because old runes can be devastatingly powerful and dangerous in misguided or youthful hands. So I'm afraid I will be of little assistance." Giles commented.

"Ohh! OH! OH! ME! PICK ME!" Andrew cried out as he was waving like an over excited third grader.

"The floor now calls the boy with ants in his pants," Buffy mused as she pointed to Andrew.

"Oh ha-ha. But I have an idea with regards to what Willow was saying about rune magic. Anybody here ever heard of or play Diablo one or two? The computer game?" Andrew asked the room, receiving only blank stares.

"Andy, are you going to somehow bridge the gap between geekness and reality once again?" Kennedy asked while petting the demon puppy in Faith's arms.

"My geekness pending, in Diablo two, after you kill a monster it can drop a weapon or piece of armor that is socketed or has holes in it where runes can be placed in. And if you put the right combination of runes in the normal socketed item, you can make insane gear for your character. And yes I know it's just a game and the game's runes aren't real but I'm thinking if runes do exist and if they can be put into inanimate objects, why not give it a shot? Maybe we can make the Slayer axe shoot out lightning or something ridiculous like that?" Andrew stated to the rest of the room.

"If anybody heard what he just said, actually understood it and now feels like a complete nerd, raise your hand." Buffy commented as she raised her hand, witnessing the entire room except Andrew raise their hands.

"I don't think it would as simple as you put it Andrew, but it is worth looking into. There are a lot of 'if's' to work out with the rune idea, but it's something I want to try. If you want to help me, you're more than welcome to-"

"I'm in!" Andrew squealed.

"And the other things you wanted to say Will?" Buffy asked, trying to get the meeting back on track.

"Well yeah. Buffy I think it's safe to assume without me and magic we wouldn't have made it out of high school alive right?" Willow asked.

"Yeah and?"

"And as much as I really don't want to say this, were getting old Buff. We're not the spring chickens we used to be. Having to use so much magic daily just to protect ourselves, never mind the magic I use in combat…I don't want to have to use magic to hide my wrinkles or unsagg my saggy parts in ten years. I think it's time I had a real apprentice...or two." Willow told the blonde Slayer rather meekly.

"Of course Will. I know you were training Andrew, so who else you think has some chops?" Buffy asked.

"Well I still have to ask her for her consent but I was thinking…that is, if Dawn would be-"

"No"

"Wait, what do you mean no? Out of us two, which one is the boss of me?" Dawn asked her older sister.

"I am. Unless you want to never live indoors again, you will not be learning how to use magic that made Willow almost destroy the world." Buffy told her little sister, arms crossed over her chest.

"Buff…I know you're not fond of the idea, but hey! I'm standing right here." Willow spoke out, slightly offended by the truth.

"B, I know magic is dangerous but maybe we should- never mind." Faith stopped herself as she was almost instantly silence by the death glare of Buffy Summers in less than two seconds.

"Yeah well to bad Buffy, I'm going to learn how to use real magic unless I don't want to. And if you try to stop me in any way, shape or form, I will see to it that you never get to have undisturbed sex with Faith ever again." Dawn spat back at her elder sister, standing with her arms crossed over her chest exactly as Buffy did.

"Dawn!...What the fuck woman?" Faith loudly questioned the youngest Summers sister, scaring the demon puppy in her arms while Giles was furiously cleaning his glasses.

After a brief staring contest between the Summers sisters, Buffy moved only her neck to looked at Willow to tell her, "Explain".

"…Um, well. Dawn was once this magical benevolent force of energy. I want to try to bring the energy out of her to either make her the most physically gifted Slayer to have ever lived, or untap her power to make her a stronger witch than I am one day. Well, providing we live long enough."

Still staring at Willow, Buffy angrily asked her younger sister through her teeth. "Dawn?"

"Hmm, Buffy finally being compared to me? I'm in!" Dawn agreed excitedly to Willow's proposition.

"Woah, easy Dawn. I didn't float pencils without almost killing my hamster a few times. I know you've been part of spells and magic all your life, but we have ways to go before I even attempt to help enhance your power." Willow warned the youngest Summers sister, already getting scared of Dawn's future experiments.

"And I bet Willow can show you a glamor so you can screw the boy wonder here while I'm in the same room." Kennedy publicly announced to Dawn, a hand on her best friend's shoulder and a wink sent Willow's way.

"Ken!" A red cheeked Willow chuckled while yelling at Kennedy.

"Moving on once again!" Buffy shouted in disgust.

"Nothing of urgent importance to report from the other Council's around the world Buffy. But if anything should arise I will let you know as soon as I am aware." Giles reported.

"Alright then, anything the other Slayers want to report on? Ken? Satz? How's the teaching life?"

"Meh, long hours for no pay. So it's shit. Satz? Am I forget anything?" Kennedy turned to her sister Slayer and asked.

Smirking back at Kennedy, Satsu turned her attention to Buffy and spoke. "Nothing major to report Buffy. But I would like to ask if it's normal to encounter a normal amount of demonic activity in the field after a major player lost so many solders?" Satsu asked.

"Normally, no. But even though Sunnydale had a Hellmouth, it was still a small town. As much as I would like to know how an island continues to replenish its evil so quickly, were on a larger playing field now. So that means more players. Plus the whole universe in balance thing I talked about before. Where there's an evil will, there's and evil way. Anyone else have anything to report?" Buffy asked.

After a bunch of blank stares, Buffy continued. "Alright so onto what happened while you were MIA Ken…". Buffy then suddenly looked at Andrew and spoke to him. "And I swear to god Andrew! If you even think about pulling a 'tales from the crypt keeper' while we tell Ken what happened, I will sew your lips shut."

After Buffy's warning, Andrew made a lock and key motion across his lips and allowed Buffy to start.