A/N Agatha Harkness is a character, I think, in Marvel comics. This is not a crossover fic. Her name has been used in other fanfiction, and I am using it here as well. In this universe she is a good witch who runs the Devon Coven. The only name we hear in canon is Althenia (sp?) after Willow's recovery in England, except for the fact that Willow seems fond of her, we know nothing about her. The witches coming to help are OCs.

Giles growing awareness of Xander's Soldier Boy knowledge is going to lead to him asking Xander for help in formulating a plan against Kakistos. 10 min of web searching and a YouTube video gave me a very scarily easy way of dealing with him. How accurate it would be in real life is another question.

If anyone is wondering about Cordelia's scenting abilities, Oz demonstrates he can track Willow and Feruca by scent and smell Willow on Tara. Theoretically, both human and animals can smell emotions. We tend not be aware of it, though. At least according to my research. Mythbusters did an episode on wether fear, I believe it was, could be smelled by people and decided it was possible.

After classes let out for the day, everyone gathered in the library. Giles informed them of Xander's observations and his findings.

"The retreat is not scheduled for a couple of months yet and the Council reports that Professor Diana Dormer, Faith's Watcher, is dead. They believe she was killed by a very old, and very strong vampire named Kakistos. Much older than the Master. So old his hands and feet have become cloven, I'm afraid. They believe he is chasing Faith. Her escape from his clutches seems to have angered him greatly. He was last seen in L.A. just a few days ago. Stopping him will be extremely difficult."

"Giles, why weren't we warned he's heading in our direction? We could have had time to prepare. We need to find Faith, he could already be in town looking for her, did she give you a number to call?" Xander asked.

"Yes, she said she is staying at the Sunnydale Motor Lodge, I am unsure where that is through."

"The Motor Lodge is a pit, Giles. We've got to get her out this and then she's going to need a real place to stay. The new office has space upstairs where we could put a bed and dresser, add a privacy screen and it's like a studio apt. But that can wait until later, call her. I've got some ideas on how to deal with this Kakistos guy, but I need to go home to get some stuff. Willow, I need you to check the chem lab for magnesium."

"Why?"

"Not now, no time, just go."

"I suggest you listen, Willow, Xander's Soldier knowledge is proving quite useful." Giles said. "I was planning on asking you to help formulate a plan anyway, seems your ahead me."

"In the meantime, I have a few books that mention Kakistos, the rest of us can check for any additional information."

Giles went to call Faith and Xander raced to his house as fast as he could, without alerting a cop, the last thing he needed was to get pulled over.

Willow went to the chem lab to find magnesium.

Xander arrived back at the school at the same time Faith did and the two entered together.

"Faith," Giles said gently, "We're aware of what has happened to Professor Dormer and that Kakistos is after you. He has been seen in L.A. just a few days ago and may be here in Sunnydale already. We are working on a plan to deal with him."

"Deal with? A stake isn't going to cut it. This guy is huge and nasty."

"Faith," Xander said, "We have some advantages, I guess you could say, that he isn't aware of."

"Like what."

"I have knowledge that may be useful, it has been in the past. The reason I was able to come up with the rocket launcher plan against the Judge, was because last Halloween, a chaos mage turned me into a soldier and I kept all the knowledge a soldier has, including how to use modern weapons. Describe Kakistos in your own words and impressions for me, including how fast he moves and how smart you think he is, please"

"Ok, well, he's big, maybe seven feet or more, built like an ox, which kind makes him slower then other vamps I've dealt, but still faster than a human. Not a genius, probably average intelligence, single minded. Doesn't stop, he's chased me all the way from Boston."

"Does he have any minions?"

"Yah, a few, but the one to watch out for is Trick, he is smart, dresses flashy but up to date. Good with plans and not afraid to back off and regroup."

"He made chasing you a game, didn't he? Get close, let you see him, but not strike?"

"Yah, how'd you figure that?"

"You're jumpy and looking over your shoulder, you're afraid, long term afraid."

"I can use this. First let me introduce you all to something else I picked up when Cordy and I got the rocket launcher. It was a backup, in case the launcher didn't work or only partly worked."

He held up a grenade. "This piece of ordinance is called a S.I.P, Self Igniting Phosphorus grenade. Pull the pin, throw it, boom. Has a blast radius of about twenty ft, not counting shrapnel, will burn through 2mm of sheet metal and bullet proof armor, burns at 5000 degrees Fahrenheit. Most definitely, not a toy. I got two of them. And no, only I will be throwing them. I have the theoretical knowledge, at least, of the correct way to use them. None of you do. Once the pin is pulled, there is only about 3-5 seconds until it explodes. So it simply isn't possible to try to compensate if something goes wrong. Willow did you find any magnesium in the chem lab?"

"Yes," she said nervously, eyeing the grenades he set on the table. "What do you need it for?"

"It burns too, Willow. I can use it to make homemade Dragons Breath cartridges. With them, I can turn a shotgun into a short range flamethrower, effective range 100-300 feet."

Stunned silence met his announcement, then all hell broke loose, as everyone had to have a say.

"Giles, if guns can do that, why aren't we using them?"

"Xander, guns are dangerous, you could get hurt."

A long, sharp whistle rang though the library. Faith and Buffy both grabbed their ears and glared at Xander.

"Everyone, these aren't for everyday fighting, for one thing it's illegal for civilians to have them. For another, they'd be overkill on regular vamps. These are for real Big Bads, and Willow, guns and ordinance, when handled properly, aren't as bad as you think they are, not that they aren't dangerous, just not as bad as you think."

"So here's my plan and could you wait until I've laid it all out until you have your say, please?"

"One of the first rules of warfare is to make the enemy fight on ground of your choosing, not his. This guy doesn't know how we think, or what we know, but we have a good idea how he thinks. Faith, I'm sorry, but for this to work, you need to play bait. He's coming for you, one way or another. You make him come after you on your terms, not his and you have a better chance of defeating him. We need to lure him somewhere away from people. How fast and how far can you run, before you need to stop?"

"Could do a mile in under 4 minutes and I could make it across town before needing to stop."

"Ok, here's my idea, the caves out on the North side of town, have some boulders we can hide behind. We give you a walky talky," he set one on the table, "and you go looking for him, you lead him toward the north end of town, letting us know via walky when he's following you, but when he's far enough away he can't hear you. Make sure you don't lose him. Once there, you get out the way. I throw the grenades, one after another and then unload with the shotgun. Anything left of him, you and Buffy carve up with axes or swords. Any minions will be dealt with by Oz, Willow and Giles. When we patrolled this summer, while Buffy was gone, we used super soakers filled with Holy Water. We learned fast that if you hit them in their eyes, ears and nose, they lose the ability to sense you and it makes staking them easy." Oz and Willow, along Cordelia were nodding as he said that.

"Yah" Willow piped up, "we got a lot that way, that and surprising fledges just crawling out of their graves."

After some discussion, sometimes at top volume, it was decided that it was a good plan and the best they could come with. They then moved to the chem lab, where they found it really was easy to make the rounds, just some magnesium scrappings and few other ingredients and bullets that could, hopefully damage or kill a very big vampire, were made.

It actually didn't take long to find Kakistos and Trick as both were heading toward the Motor Lodge, which scared everyone at just how close they had been to finding Faith. Faith led them a merry chase across town, keeping the others appraised of her progress and ran the two vampires right into Xander and his grenades. Xander threw them both in quick succession and then with the noise still ringing in his ears, moved out of his cover, got closer and fired the shotgun as rapidly as he could. Once out of ammo, he stepped back as Kakistos went up in flames. Kakistos had been screaming since the grenades had gone off and burned him, the flames from the shotgun blasts finally stopped him as he turned to dust. Dusting Trick had turned out to be even easier. In the end they had had to stomp out a couple is small fires in some brush behind Kakistos, but all of them had luckily escaped with no injury and vowing Xander didn't get to blow things up anymore which made him pout, "But it's fun!" with a universal "NO!"

After Giles told them to meet in the library the next day to debrief, and see his presentation, Cordelia dragged Xander back to her place, to check for any injuries, thoroughly.