The entire Scooby Gang were gathered tonight in the living room of Giles' apartment for a hastily-called conference about what their host had just referred to as 'that bloody git.'

To be precise, one Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, recently sent from England by the Watcher's Council to earlier meet in the school library with a sacked Giles who'd been superciliously informed by this much younger man he'd be taking over now to properly train and guide the two Slayers on the Hellmouth. It shouldn't be all that difficult, honestly. If needed, a deliberate and calm manner of speech with his instructions carefully explained to those young, ill-bred American girls using the fewest possible number of syllables for every word would of course take care of things quite nicely.

Except starting at his very first encounter with Buffy Summers and also next involving the other Scoobies during the rest of the school day, Wyndam-Pryce managed with truly amazing skill to offend each and every one of them with his arrogance, excessive confidence, and overweening condescension. If sheer snobbism had actually been an Olympic sport, that junior Watcher was a sure lock for the gold, silver, and bronze medals…all together, no less, with even the surly Russian judge casting an assenting vote of "Da!".

Which in turn led to this evening's hurried assembly before patrol and a babble of vociferous agreement from nearly all there when Giles bitterly stated his opinion of a certain little sod. In between polishing his glasses while listening to their own loud, acid comments, Giles let his annoyed gaze travel around the room. Seated in their various couches, sofas, and chairs with matching angry faces were Buffy, Willow, Cordelia, and Faith.

Even Oz sitting next to his girlfriend appeared the teensiest bit irritated by recollecting how that snooty British dude in the impeccable suit told him it was most improper for a werewolf to even be around a Slayer unless she was prepared to end his existence the very instant he showed himself to be a danger to other people.

And as for Xander—

Pausing to unfocusedly blink at and then replacing his glasses to take a closer look at that Harris lad and his resulting odd behavior, Giles inquired across the room of this young man, "Is there something rather amusing to you at the moment, Xander?"

Silence descended in the living room as the rest of their small group protecting the Hellmouth turned their heads in unison to stare with shared puzzlement at where Xander was happily grinning off into the distance at apparently nothing in particular.

When Xan kept on acting totes weird like that for the next couple of seconds without answering Giles, Buffy decided to step in.

"HEY!" She shouted at her Sunnydale friend. "Like Giles said, what's so funny?"

That seemed to bring Xander back down to Earth, though he still had that supremely goofy smile upon his face when he told Buffy, "Are you kidding me? You really don't know what we've got going here with Double-You Double-You Pee?"

"The biggest ever dickless wonder in the whole damn country?" suggested Faith, who hadn't been thrilled the slightest over how skeptically she'd been viewed by London's worse export since King George's redcoats visited her Boston hometown more'n two hunnert years ago and made such fuckin' pests of themselves.

Cordelia added her own contemptuous sniff of, "Oh, he's actually got a dick judging from the way he gawks at me when he thinks I'm not looking. I still doubt he'd know exactly what to do with it, even with the help of a pop-up book of instructions!"

For once on Cordelia's side, Willow contributed a nasty, "He's a petty imperialist running dog of the Council lackeys!"

There was another short pause as everyone else there eyed with some bewilderment that suddenly sheepish redhead who under the center of their attention huffed, "We're doing China after the Communists took power in History class, okay?"

Thankfully for Willow, the others' notice was quickly diverted by Buffy pretending to stick a finger down her throat and make gagging noises as if about to vomit, making clear her own opinion about the Wez.

It was evident that Xander was totally entertained by all this, since his wide smirk hadn't changed at all during the gang's performance. However, when he next spoke, there was a definite change in Xander's tone into that of a much deeper, gruff voice.

"Yeah, that limey deserves everything you called him, but that wasn't what I meant."

Of those there, Faith was the only one to find it a creepy surprise, how the Xan-man now sounded like he'd just developed a great big frog in his throat. Doing a quick glance around the room, nobody but her seemed to find that strange.

That caused Faith to abruptly hiss out from the corner of her mouth towards her sister Slayer, "Why's he talking like that?"

In her own muted whisper under her breath she knew Faith would still hear, Buffy replied, "Two years ago, Xan got possessed by a soldier spirit on Halloween. It comes back every once in a while. The last time was when he and Cordy stole a rocket launcher from the Army base outside town."

Faith's eyes widened at this startling news, and she gazed at Xander with growing respect.

Acting as if ignorant of their byplay, Xander still in his raspy voice explained, "We've got one hell of an opportunity here, people! If all of us play it right, we take Mister Wyndam-Pryce for everything he's got: any influence he has with the Council, magic books and stuff from that group's libraries, and whatever else we can think of. Because if we dig in our heels and treat him like dirt, that moron will naturally resent it and make our lives miserable. On the other hand, if we pretend he's in charge, obeying all the stupid orders he'll be sure to give but instead do what works better well away from his meddling, it'll turn out great!"

Giles stiffened with shock in his chair. He warily mentioned to a beaming Xander, "Are you suggesting we treat our latest Council representative as—"

Now showing every single tooth in the most evil smile all there had witnessed in their lives, Xander eagerly nodded and finished off Giles' sentence, "—the finest example I've ever run into of a…second lieutenant!"

"What?!" came in a confused chorus from the others as Giles collapsed back into his chair with a pained groan, holding his head with both hands as if suffering from a sudden, overpowering migraine.

"Yeah," Xander cheerfully told his mystified audience. "It's something that's happened ever since the first armies were formed thousands of years ago. Put a barely trained officer in charge of way more experienced NCO's and troops, the smart ones will listen and learn from their soldiers. It's either that, or the idiots on their horses waving a big sword vaguely in the direction of the enemy get lots of people killed. Them too, but that really doesn't help the survivors. So, when there's a second lieutenant who's particularly clueless, he's carefully manipulated by the lower ranks into making decisions that keep alive as many as possible of them. Of course, this occasionally results in the dumbass getting rewarded with medals and promotion, but since it also has him transferred into someone's else problem, you can call that a win-win solution."

Cordelia deliberately allowed a flash of gleeful malice to appear on her beautiful visage. "Manipulation, you said? I can do that."

She next lifted a dubious eyebrow at the others. "The question is, can the rest of you pull that off?"

Surprisingly enough, Oz was the first to respond with a minimal shrug. "Stay quiet, nod, and carry out the right thing when his back's turned. Not a problem."

The werewolf then placed a comforting arm around Willow's shoulders while she regarded him with worried anxiety. Before this computer hacker could express her fears that she couldn't manage that, he affectionately told his girlfriend, "Just agree with him at great length. Trust me, it'll work."

Snuggling into Oz's welcoming side with a relieved sigh, Willow let a tentative smile of agreement twist her lips. She contributed a pleased giggle of, "Darn tootin', mister!"

Satisfied, Cordelia glanced from the pair on their couch to the other sofa where the remaining set of Slayers were studying each other in silent communion.

Finally, Faith had her own wicked smirk blossom on her face, accompanied by, "Dunno 'bout the military shit, but it sounds right to me. I got away with plenty growin' up, actin' like I was gonna do what the grown-ups tol' me until I got outta there and did what I wanted instead. Yeah, long as I can keep a straight face, I'm in."

Hearing that, Buffy also nodded, "That goes for me, too."

Her intent gaze swept the room, ticking off the others' obvious agreement. However…

"Giles?"

Receiving that unsure prompt from his Slayer caused this former British Museum associate to bring down his right hand formerly covering his eyes to dolefully regard a half-dozen expectant countenances awaiting for him to come to a decision.

Trying to work his courage to the sticking point, Giles appealed to no one there in particular, "I suppose that no matter what objections I might think of, you're still going ahead with this anyway?"

A low combined murmur of "Uh-huh," "Yep," "Betcher ass," and other declarations caused Giles to shut up and seriously think about Xander's absurd plan.

There was his loyalty to the Council…who'd disdainfully terminated him for a far greater loyalty to his Slayer.

There was the sad fact of an utter twit of a junior Watcher who'd surely be wearing the brown pants the first time a just-arisen fledgling vampire said 'Boo!' to him now being entrusted with the lives of a good many young people Giles had come to honestly love.

Finally…there was the mischievous gleam in Xander's eye that if pushed, he'd come out with the exact same word that a native of Albion had already spent a whole lifetime being teased about. He definitely didn't need any more of that.

"Oh, all right," Giles grumpily waved his hand, producing loud cheers of joy from his guests.

He glowered at them, "Yes, yes, I'll behave as if the pillock's the second coming of Winston Churchill. Now that's settled, isn't it time Buffy and Faith began their patrol along with whomever is accompanying them?"

Once they'd been reminded of their responsibilities, the younger Scoobies arose from their seats and got ready to depart. They left the living room, escorted by Giles seeing them off out the apartment's front door. The two Slayers went into the Sunnydale night first, looking around alertly, to wait in the street for the rest to join them.

For some reason Xander was the last to exit Giles' home. He threw over his shoulder at the G-man one final gratified smirk, but otherwise stayed silent in the face of the warning glare Giles sent in turn toward Xander.

Closing the door, R. Edmund Giles waited a few moments until he was absolutely, positively sure that even Slayer ears now well away from the apartment couldn't hear his complaining mutter, "Why in heaven couldn't my parents have simply named me Robert instead of after the Duke of Cumberland? Especially since it's used to call a damn cartoon bear, that Hentzau villain in Hope's The Prisoner of Zenda, and worse of all, the belittling term for the most junior officer in the British Army is bloody Rupert!"

Author's Note: Just something I dashed off to present another and more effective way the Scooby Gang could've treated Wimpy Wesley.