Chapter Two:
Two Weeks Later

Seven deaths. In two weeks there had been seven deaths. Each of them reported with either a giant tear on their neck or two large holes and a total drainage of blood. It was that vampire. Joseph. Joseph Remalk. Buffy knew it had been that vampire for every single death. That strange vampire. She wasn't even sure if it was a vampire. Maybe it was some new demon.
If she knew Giles's phone number she'd call him and explain it to him. Unfortunately she only knew Xander's phone number. So she had called Xander very quickly only to find she had gotten charged long distance for nothing. Xander had no idea. Willow didn't have a phone. She always called from a pay phone.

So Buffy was reduced to only hoping that Giles would call.

For the moment, though, she'd have to hunt every night and pray to God she'd either find it or at least not read about another death in the paper. This was possibly a record for the small village. Seven deaths. One week.

" 'You will die in seven days,' " Buffy sometimes thought to herself. She didn't know why, but seven deaths in one week reminded her of that movie, "The Ring".

She hunted every single night, searching all over the city. She wanted Joseph, the vampire, the something, to be dead. To die at her hands. To die horribly.

Furious hunting. A stake in hand at all times.

She had told Dawn and Andrew about the incident and they had both reassured her it wasn't her fault. What had been the purpose of telling them? Only for them to ask her continuously the same questions she had thought of and had no answer for? Only for them to pity her state of mind?

She didn't know. All she knew is that she regretted telling them. She wanted to find Joseph so badly now. That face of his… that vampire face, it brought her nightmares.
She realized that she'd be killing two birds with one staked vampire. She'd stop having nightmares, and the death would stop. The killing spree would come to an end. An abrupt one.

At the new Summers Residence…

"It isn't your fault," Dawn said suddenly during some shampoo commercial. (Who cares which shampoo? All shampoo commercials are the same)

"You've said that too many times, Dawn," Buffy replied.

"That's because you aren't listening," Dawn retorted. Buffy didn't say anything. "Anyone would've hesitated in a situation like that. You didn't know what was going on so you hesitated in what you were doing. It's human nature. Giles would have done it. Wesley would've done it. I would've done it. Ang--" Angel's name had become a sort of forbidden thing to speak of ever since he had become the head of Los Angeles's Wolfram and Hart chapter. That was a big no-no. "A-Anyone would've done it. If you want to blame someone or something for these deaths blame the damn vampire. I don't mean to sound like I'm out of a super-hero movie, but stop holding the weight of the world on your shoulders. It ain't good for your back." Buffy and Dawn chuckled a bit. Usually that's when Buffy would say that she supposed Dawn was right--a big lie--but this time she didn't. So Dawn hoped that she had gotten through Buffy's head this time.

That's when the made-for-TV horror movie about sharks that they had been watching came back on. The movie seemed a lot like "Jaws" except, you know, worse. Much worse. The sisters had quite a few laughs about the unbelievable cheesiness of the movie through the night.
When that was over, Buffy became a hunter again. The night was still young so she grabbed her stake and her crossbow and headed out to search for the vampire that had killed seven. Joseph Remalk, who Buffy had made up her mind would be dead before the end of the night.
So she began hunting. Falconer Street, Elmwood Street, West Everett Street, Cross Avenue, Lakeview Cemetery, Falconer Park, Falconer Central School. None of those places yielded any vampire.

So she went to the other cemetery. Falconer's cemetery.

Climbing up the steep hill that the cemetery was set upon was an arduous task and she felt it would be for nothing.

But Joseph was wandering through the dark cemetery. He was walking slowly and babbling. He was babbling something that sounded like it was from the Bible. A prayer, maybe.
Anger, frustration, and the need for vengeance on behalf of all of those dead surged through Buffy suddenly and fiercely. She felt she wouldn't be able to contain it all. She leapt out of her hiding space (a taller tombstone) and brought out her stake. She landed ten feet away from Joseph silently. But he still heard her. He still turned.

And he cried. He sobbed. Buffy charged, leaning low, breathing hard. She wanted the vampire dead.

The stake was so close to Joseph's heart. His dead heart.

(he was warm)

Dust would fly everywhere.

(maybe his heart was pumping)

She would emerge victorious in the battle.

(maybe he's still alive)

She would kill the killer of seven.

(maybe he's half-human and half-vampire)

No more deaths.

(he's special)

No more violence.

(let the hunt go on)

Peace would prevail.

(help him)

And the stake was swatted away by a hand with claws that was twice the size of Buffy's own hands. She heard a bone or two snap and screamed in surprise mingled with pain.

The monstrous vampire was standing in front of her again.

But then it was Joseph. Then Joseph changed back into the vampire. The vampire lunged forth and pushed Buffy to the ground, landing on top of her. Its fangs came close to her neck. Her neck which appeared so delicious to the vampire. Her veins. Her blood.

Then Joseph came back. He was crying again, trying to keep from changing back into the vampire.

"NO!" Joseph shrieked. His eye twitched and his head flew back. His hands went to his head. He was now sitting on Buffy's knees. Buffy pushed him off with tremendous force and grabbed the crossbow from her concealed holster under her jacket. She took aim and fired.
The arrow hit Joseph's arm because Buffy's vision had been temporarily distorted from the fall and the near-death experience.

She could almost hear Joseph's blood cells screaming "FREEDOM!" as they gushed out of his arrow-wound.

Joseph stopped screaming and looked at the arrow sticking out of his arm.

Then he laughed. Then he began crying. Then both.

He looked at Buffy with eyes that were swimming in tears.

"Help," he pleaded. Saliva was dripping out of his mouth and down his chin. Then he leaned back and bellowed a guttural scream into the sky. "I need help!"

Later on…

"Hey, Buffy," Dawn said at one in the morning in her bath robe and eating cereal. "Just up for a midnight sna--who the hell is that?" Joseph followed Buffy into the kitchen not a moment after Buffy herself had come into the kitchen. He was a mess. His clothes, the clothes he had been buried in, were ragged and dirt-clad, his hair was greasy and full of more dirt, and all of his exposed skin was dark from a layer of dust and dirt and mud. That is, except for his tear-tracks.
Buffy hesitated, not certain of how Dawn would react to the truth. To her misjudgment. She had made a mistake. Why hadn't she just killed Joseph? Why wasn't she right then?

"This is Joseph Remalk," Buffy informed Dawn without hearing her own voice. "Joseph, this is Dawn Summers." Dawn sat up so quickly from the kitchen table that her chair overturned and her bowl of cereal spilled.

That's also when Buffy was knocked out of the kitchen by a vampire's clawed hand. She yelped and scrambled to her feet as she skidded across the carpet in the dining room.
The vampire-Joseph then rounded on Dawn. She stood still for a second, not certain of what to do, then hurled a chair at the hulking vampire with orange-looking skin. The vampire knocked it away much as it had done the stake in Buffy's hand.

"What's all the ruckus?" Andrew asked as he walked into the kitchen and was abruptly smacked back out. He shouted in pain once before passing out.
Buffy ran back into the kitchen and Joseph changed back into his human form, screaming. Buffy took out her crossbow and hit him in the back of the head with its butt. He hit the ground like so many bricks.

That way he wouldn't vamp-out while she tied him up to the water-heater in the basement.

And he didn't.

The chains were durable but Buffy feared the pipes that Joseph was chained to wouldn't hold out very well under continuous stress. They'd need to get a better anchor.

Too bad she didn't know how much sooner she should've gotten one.
Hey, MorbidMan here. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. It was supposed to be longer, but the other half will be chapter three. Don't want to get started on things too soon. If you like this fic of mine, I think you'd like my "Angel" fic called "The Final Apocalypse". It's much longer with more characters and more layers. A much more complicated story, but still with the same style and everything. Anyway, please review. See you next chapter and all of that. And in response to my one reviewer so far, yes, the vampire and Joseph are in the same body.

"What I've created will be studied and puzzled over… forever." - John Doe "Seven" a very good, yet morbid and disturbing movie by David Fincher ("Alien 3", "Fight Club", "Panic Room"), recommended to those without weak stomachs