A/N: Hey guys! Thanks for the patience. Here's chapter 9 (I managed to squeeze in some free time after all!). I might upload chapter 10 later.

So we may have a bit of tragedy here… I intend to make the next chapters lighter anyways

But no, Beca doesn't flat line here… not yet anyways (because a lot of you surely wants that to happen) ;)

I don't own pitch perfect

"Bella's rehearsals?" Beca asked looking confused as she looked back at Death who nodded in agreement.

"Yep, this is after they find out they're back in the running for Nationals, and unlike the last two worlds we've visited, Chloe gets her nodes removed right on schedule."

Beca watches as the Bellas rehearsal space is slowly filled by her friends. Aubrey and Chloe were the last ones in and they keep discussing something in hushed tones before Chloe makes a gesture to Aubrey and the blonde sighs in resignation.

Aubrey moves closer to the rest of the Bellas and apologizes for the way she's been treating them. There was a bit of a discussion that followed and a heart to heart session of confessing things they were uncomfortable about. Beca smiled. It felt like it was like it should be, even without her.

Okay, so maybe she was a little sad about that bit of information, but still, her friends were whole as a group. They were being a family. And Aubrey and Chloe were okay. Most specially Chloe.

"So I guess they don't really need me after all." Beca said and Death looked at her a little exasperated.

"How many times do you need me to tell you that you are wrong? Maybe you're not here, maybe you never meet them, but you're the one that brings them together." Death explained.

"What do you mean?" Beca asks and Death points her to Chloe who connects her phone to some sort of portable speaker.

"So anyways, Aubrey and I have been talking. I discovered this really amazing DJ who's been making mixes of really popular songs. She's only getting started but radio stations everywhere have been playing her stuff, and I was wondering, maybe we can do something like what she's doing."

Beca waited with abated breath, Death didn't need to tell her out loud that the DJ Chloe was talking about was her. Titanium starts to play from the speakers, seamlessly mixing with Bulletproof. Beca laughed a little upon hearing Titanium play, of course Chloe would discover through that song.

The song starts to fade until a mix of Just the Way You Are and Just a Dream starts playing. "Hey!" Beca exclaims and then smiles.

"Some things are meant to happen Mitchell." Death speaks up.

"So I'm currently in LA?" Beca asks Death to make sure she was right. The rest of the Bellas in front of her enjoying the mix they're hearing. They start picking up on them and they slowly transformed into the Bellas that Beca had always known.

"Yes, and being successful too." Death said before waving his hands. The scene in front of them started to change which elicited an annoyed "Hey!" from Beca.

They were suddenly in Lincoln Center for Nationals and Beca watched as the Bellas lit up the stage with their performance.

Beca was beaming proudly when the Bellas were announced as winners. "Told you they needed me." Beca said smugly and Death scoffed.

"Tell yourself that Mitchell, you're the only one who thinks they don't need you."

"Well technically, they really didn't need me on the team. They still won without me." Beca argued and Death sighed.

"Why are you making this difficult for me? Every single time we make some semblance of progress you just have to take a few steps back."

"The Bellas will be fine without me." Beca said sadly.

"Again, no." Death said flatly. "After two years, you become a big musical producer. Aubrey gets a job in LA and she shares a flat with Chloe. But, without you, and yes even Chloe, staying with the Bellas they have trouble staying on top. You're the one who's innovative with your self-brand of musical prowess and without that, they struggle to stay on top, becoming a little too complacent with the simple mash-ups they perform. They don't have your touch to tweak it a bit and make it stand out. They don't have music flowing through their veins like you do, Beca."

"Well, thanks for inflating my ego little dude. But everyone's doing fine, even I'm doing fine in LA. They don't need me to stay."

Death groaned and Beca made a mental note to herself to try and avoid that from him. The sound he made was insanely inhuman and incredibly scary that it freaked her out.

"Okay, okay, I'll stop the whole 'they don't need me speech'." Beca then said. "Do we have anymore stops?"

"Yes, actually. We're going to LA, four years later."

Death takes Beca to what looked like Aubrey and Chloe's apartment. They spend most of the time tailing Chloe, because yes, even when Beca doesn't want to admit it, she's curious of what Chloe's life would have turned out to be if they never met.

Apparently the version of Chloe they were following was also in graduate school at UCLA. She was dating a nice guy – Beca couldn't care less to even note what's his face's name – but for as long as he treated Chloe right, that was all that mattered to her.

Chloe was sitting at a bench somewhere in a park, sipping on a cup of coffee as she waited for what's his face and Beca could start to feel something bad was going to happen.

"You said nothing bad was going to happen to Chloe, right?"

"Nothing bad is going to happen to Chloe." Death reconfirmed. "But she may or may not be placed in some sort of dangerous situation." he added.

"You little twerp! You just said nothing bad was going to happen!" Beca protested.

And of course she had to call Death a twerp again.

Seriously, who in their right minds would insult Death, regardless of his tiny and innocent looking packaging?

Beca suddenly sees her father walking in the park, heading towards the path where Chloe's bench was. The two of them recognize each other and chat a bit. That was when Dr. Mitchell started talking about his daughter and how he's been trying to reach out to her.

It hits Beca that without attending Barden, without meeting Chloe or joining the Bellas, she never gets to fix her relationship with her father.

And she realizes that life without Chloe, without the Bellas, was just as lonely and incomplete as how their lives would be if she never existed or if she never meets them.

Chloe stands after receiving a text from her boyfriend to meet someplace closer to his office, noting how late it was, Dr. Mitchell offered to walk her there. They continue to talk about Beca, Chloe telling him how her mixes actually helped the Barden Bellas win Nationals during her senior year and Dr. Mitchell being proud. As Chloe proceeds to walk away, the café near her boyfriend's office only about a block away, some guys runs towards her and tries to snatch her purse.

Dr. Mitchel tries to save the day…

…only to fail…

…only to get stabbed and bleed to death.

Before Beca could scream, stop, or react violently at the scene Death pulls her away. The scene shifts and she's in come fancy penthouse suite. They were in this world's Beca's empty apartment.

"So you're telling me… you're trying to show me…" Beca says in between sobs, Death trying to desperately to calm her down, reminding her of what might happen if she gets too emotional.

"This is just a construct, a world that deviates from reality. Your father's soul isn't in my pockets. But this world is still on a separate plane of existence, so calm down." Death tells Beca, and the DJ started taking deep breaths to do exactly that.

"I don't get to reconcile with my dad. I don't mend my relationship with him. I miss out on meeting Chloe. And the most tragic of all is how incredibly tied up our lives are even when we don't meet." Beca said out loud, trying to process the situation. "Why are you showing me these twisted realities?"

"Because you were wondering what would happen if they were real. Some things are meant to happen Beca, and trying to avoid them lead to less the pleasant results. The thing is, life isn't perfect, we don't always get what we want; we don't always have those fabricated happy endings you hate so much. Sometimes you have to weather many storms, and maybe sometimes it's too much to bare. But we take whatever we can get. And that doesn't mean you should quit, that doesn't mean things would be better without you. The things that have happened so far in your life happened because they were supposed to, it may have led to you being in a coma, and being in the crossroads you are now in, but they were supposed to happen."

Beca nodded, her breathing returning to normal. Some parts of what he said she understood, some parts she just didn't pay much attention to, but Death continued his little lecture. "The thing is Mitchell, with or without you, you affect the lives of the Bellas in some way or form. You guys are tied together by something greater than what you can comprehend."

"Okay, fine. But couldn't you have warned me about that?" Beca snapped.

"You needed to see to understand. Maybe you get everything you wanted, everything you asked for in these world, but you never find the things you never even knew you needed. And you're right, there lies the tragedy."

"For a little guy, you sure are wise."

"Making fun of my height again now, aren't we?"

"So what's next?" Beca asked with some trepidation. She was wishing for no more of the twisted worlds from questioning the past, she's convinced that she had to meet the Bellas, to be in their lives, and to have them in hers.

Death holds his hands up as he looked like he was trying to feel for something. "We need to get back. I have a few souls to pick up, then we continue our journey."

"Okay, that sounds fair." Beca replied before once again being shrouded by Death's light.