(A/N): I don't usually do these, but I figured this chapter deserved some recognition.

I never expected "Rightfully Mine" to have attracted so many people, especially with all the violent themes and an absolute lack of any kind of romantic relationship between the two characters. However, it's second only to "Transitions" as my most-reviewed fic and it's the fifth-highest ranked reviewed fic in the Beetlejuice category (as of tonight), so I guess you guys must like it.

The hell with it. I'd like to dedicate the whole darn story to Lacey, who's been there from the beginning of my BJ fanfic days and I've always looked up to in the fandom, and Wanda who's been an avid reader and has never failed to crack me up with her reviews and has been awesomely patient with me regarding our long-standing deal, but this chapter is especially for Semine Midnight, who just made my bloody day the other night. Frankly, it was her who got me off my lazy butt and writing another chapter, so you can all trot over and thank her and read some of her fics while you're at it.

And I'll get to the chapter now.

Lydia's eyes opened slowly, blurred and unfocused. Her head was swimming in something that pushed against her skull and made her see colors that didn't match those she last remembered being in her hospital room.

She moaned a bit and rolled her head to one side, and suddenly she felt a cold breeze against her exposed ear. Furrowing her brows, she turned to see through a fold in the blanket that there was no bed beneath her.

Rather, there was nothing beneath her.

Catching a frozen scream in her throat, she closed her eyes and felt a tear escape. She was dreaming again. And that meant more suffering, more pain. More of him. Why should she care that there was no ground below her?

Feelings of rising and falling in her gut caused her to try to get her head out of the cradle of fabric to see what was happening. Suddenly she saw that he was holding the corners of the blanket as they were flying through the void. Frowning, she realized she was losing body heat quickly and pulled herself back in.

So he wasn't intent on her torture just now. Well, that gave her time to try to wake up. She looked down suddenly as a cruel shock of pain shot through the back of her hand; what the hell was that? A white patch of gauze was taped over a long, thin needle that was shoved up her vein! Grimacing, Lydia tore the dressing off and slowly, painstakingly drew the needle out.

What was that doing in her dream? She stared at the silver shaft as it slowly leaked a clear liquid over her. Maybe it was what her mind figured he was using to keep her asleep. She didn't really care. With a gesture of defiance, she shoved it out of the blanket and watched for a moment as it fell down through the mist, a butterfly missing a wing trailing sparkling fluid like rain going backwards.

But it attracted his attention. "What the-…"

She felt a quick dip and one corner of the blanket above loosened as he opened it up to gaze down with a surprised grin. "Mornin', babes. We're almost there anyway."

She felt the chill all over her body and realized she was wearing nothing more than that hospital gown. What was going on with all the medical paraphernalia? Was this some stranger dream triggered by the last? She curled up in a ball, preserving heat and still shivering.

They flew on for a bit longer before they began to descend. Lydia felt herself hit something solid and decidedly metal as the blanket fell on her from above. Suddenly, though, even that was ripped away as he disentangled her from it and picked her up to stand on her own two feet.

"Welcome to City Hall, babe. Take a good look; you're not gonna see the outside again."

Without bothering to figure out what he meant by that, Lydia looked up. In front of her was a façade that may have been designed by a madman: angles were harshly distorted against each other and the colors were all mute shades of black and gray, while the windows glowed a dull orange from within. The steps were crumbling and illegible graffiti decorated some of the columns on the landing.

Roughly he took her arm and led her up the steps. She stumbled only once, catching her foot on the uneven stairs and tripping, but they made it inside in a matter of seconds.

Skeleton secretaries. Rotting corpses serving as businessmen. Unsorted papers dappling the floor as far as the eye could see. These were the images that met Lydia Deetz's horrified eyes. In all the movies she'd seen, all the books she'd read and art she'd admired in her teenaged gothic frenzy, she may have imagined something like this. But the thing she would have never wanted to imagine was the smell and the simple feeling of overwhelming, heavy despair. These people – if they could be called or ever were people – were doing nothing of consequence and had been and would never do anything that would ever matter in the end. They were simply filing blank pieces of paper that were supposed to concern the dead, but of course had no information on them because dead people don't do anything and have nothing. Utter uselessness and complete hopelessness.

Beetlejuice pulled her through the sea of wandering employees and steered them towards an office near the back. The frosted glass window in the door read "Ms. I. Emma Chaplain, Head of Marriage and Divorce" and Lydia almost smirked at the name if she hadn't remembered where she was and who she was with.

He gave her a sickening grin as he opened the door and pushed her in, following and slamming the door behind them.

Lydia looked up in awe. They were in a huge hexagonal room, painted dark green. A huge desk stood in front of them, flanked by olive-green filing cabinets that stretched all the way to the ceiling and across three full walls. Light came from a pale off-white single sconce that was set above them and threw only the slightest amount of illumination through the scene.

However, Lydia wasn't staring at any of that. What she had her attentions focused on was the human head and pair of hands that floated in midair, looking over whatever was written on a typewriter in front of it.

The head looked down at the pair in front of it and frowned a bit. "Beetlejuice," she sneered. "I had hoped you'd have gotten our auxiliary chaplain to have squared you away and gotten you out of our hair six months ago."

He shrugged and gestured to Lydia. "Wasn't my fault. The girl wouldn't cooperate."

The head, obviously an elderly woman's scowled down at Lydia. "You do realize thanks to you, we've had to put up with him here in the Neitherworld? Thanks a lot, missy."

Lydia gaped. The head was talking.

"Can't she speak? You're a real blockhead, Beetlejuice, if you got a mute. She can't very well say 'I do' if she can't speak, can she?" Ms. Chaplain rolled her eyes.

"She can talk. She's just being shy," he commented as he gave her a sharp elbow to the side.

Lydia flinched and rubbed her arm. She gave him a dirty look and then looked back to the woman. "I can talk."

"Then why didn't you just say yes? It's not like he'd hang around and consummate the union anyway. He's a dirty lecher, yes, but tie him up and he'll chew his own arm off to get away."

"Hey, I'm right here!" he snapped.

"Yes, I can see that," she retorted. Then she turned back to Lydia. "For all our sakes, just sign this." One of her severed hands handed down a pale form with lots of script on it which confused Lydia when she tried to read it.

"What does it say?" she asked.

"It says the undersigned accept and will uphold the following agreement that undersigned legally unify all their material possessions and the deceased member of the agreement will no longer be bound to the necro-world and will be permitted to transcend the boundaries separating said necro-world from the terrestrial plane."

"…What?"

Ms. Chaplain sighed. "It means you two are hitched and he can run free in the living world instead of here."

"Oh." A pause. "I'm not signing this!"

Ms. Chaplain balked. Beetlejuice, however, gave a curt nod and smiled saccharinely. "Give us a sec." He grabbed Lydia and pulled her over to one side and out of sight.

Brutally, he shoved her up against the wall and growled. "Sign the paper," he hissed. "Or you'll wish you were dead so many times in the next hour it'll make our little tango in your dreams look like child's play."

Lydia winced and clenched her teeth. He was deliberately digging his fingers into her old bruises, or at least where the bruises had been. Wait…she glanced down. Her skin! It was clear!

Jesus Christ, it wasn't a dream!

She was awake! There was no mistaking it; if she'd gone back into her nightmare she would have hellish cuts and sores all over her body. But her skin was faultless now, except for where it was now reddening from where he was gripping hard.

She gasped.