Beetlejuice

Season 2: The Sleeper Saga

Episode 27: The Price of Power – Part 1

Claire's friends resorted to calling to her to see if there was a chance to wake her up from her sleeping state. With anyone who tries to touch her getting shocked by the Dragon's Ring, there was little else they could do. She simply lie there unconscious with her eyes wide open and glowing from within, her body also surrounded in a blanket of light. Edward, at one point, accompanied the children to Claire and was astonished when he found her glowing on the patio of her archery range. He soon opted to keep the lord and lady of the estate as clueless as possible.

From within Claire's own mind, she found herself surrounded in the coils of a silver Chinese dragon. The coils surrounded her with ten feet to spare on all sides, its razor sharp spine on its back and sharp claws on its four feet. The dragon coiled around at least three times before it lifted its head to gaze at the blonde girl. The body was at least five and a half feet around with scales about the size of grapefruits. His eyes were ruby colored and seemed to contain a brilliant fire behind them. It spoke without so much as opening its mouth, "Tell me young one, what makes you worthy of my power?" Claire was frightened and yet soothed by the beast's voice. It was dark and rigged but also held an heir of wisdom within it. Claire hesitated before answering the great dragon, "T...to be honest, I'm terrified of this power." She thought for a quick second and then quickly and in a mild worry asked, "Why me?" "There is no reason as to why beyond that your spirit was compatible. However, simply because you're compatible, that doesn't make you worthy. So I ask again. What makes you worthy of my power?"

"Claire, Claire, wake up!" Lydia shouted to her friend. She stayed a safe distance form her to avoid being shocked. Little did they realize, a sinister shadow looming over them, a presence that appeared out of nowhere, sinister intent gleaming in his eyes. Grimnak opened a projection gate in Clair's back yard, sensing a strong power taking hold and moving in while devising an evil plot.

Claire nearly panicked with an attempt to think of a good reason, believing that the great dragon would eat her if she gave the wrong answer or took too long in answering, until the dragon soothed her anxieties by telling her, "Take your time little one. You'll be in a suspended meditation until you figure out for yourself why you are worthy. In the mean time I suggest you reflect on what's the most important to you."

It took only moments before Grimnak knocked out Ben. Using the element of surprise to his advantage, he took out Prudence first, and Ben second. Suddenly, Lydia found herself out matched and backed into a corner. Grimnak however, used a spell to trap her in a cage of shadows rather than attempting to attack her outright. After disabling the three friends, he continued on, not even uttering a single word, toward Claire, who was still in forced meditation. He stood before her and closed his eyes, waving his arms slowly as if he were conducting an orchestra. Slowly, Claire began to levitate, similar to a magician's magic show, and when she was about waist high to him he then began changing the motion of his hands to resemble a light push. Claire then began to hover forward in the direction that Grimnak mimicked with his hands, almost as if he were actually pushing her in that direction.

Inside Claire's head she began to wander around to attempt to figure out the dragon's riddle. She found herself wandering out of the darkness and into another world that looked vaguely familiar. The land before her held rolling hills of green grass a stone castle far in the distance. "I recognize this place!" Claire exclaimed. "This is Scotland. My parents brought me here once when I was four. I remember the people were really nice and there were plenty of folk tales." As her memory became clearer, images began coming into focus. Animals could then be seen grazing on the hillside people looked to be tending their flocks and a vehicle could be seen chugging along with a little blonde girl pressing her face against the window excited and inquisitive. "These are my memories." Claire muttered to herself in realization. The car came to a gradual stop as the Brewsters exited their vehicle and little Claire ran up to pet the sheep and the parents went to shake hands with the shepherd. The small girl tripped and fell on her face in the grass but immediately shot back up to quell her excitement, laughing and squealing the whole way. After a while of petting and feeding the sheep, the family packed back into the car and continued on their journey.

Claire shed a small tear in reliving this happy memory. Suddenly, as if sand swept away by a storm, the image went black once again and she found another memory of her first day of grade school and her parents weren't even there to wish her farewell. It was the servants that did so. Claire began to feel depressed at watching the memory pass by as she watched the saddened little blonde girl solemnly walk out the door and into the luxury car. Again, as sand in the storm, the image blew around reshaping itself into another image. This time it was her first day of high school and her original posse flocked around her complimenting her hair, her eye color and how pretty she was. Claire smirked at the nostalgia, she finally felt as if she had something to belong to. Bolstering her confidence slightly she began to act the part of the snotty rich kid, trying to hide the loneliness buried in her soul. Then Lydia Deetz, the gothic girl who looked broken and depressed, and Ben Juice and the cute Australian boy that every other girl swooned at, came in about three months into the school year. She witnessed Ben fend off Adrian and his gang and immediately imagined her in Lydia's place with the hero protecting her. Another outlet to ease the loneliness she secretly felt.

Grimnak began to take Claire away, tossing the servants that tried to stop him easily to the side. Ever nearer he came to his portal, knowing that he couldn't take her through but that she possibly had enough power locked in that bracelet to give him back his ability to utilize dragon gates, allowing him to freely move from realm to realm without restrictions once again. What he didn't see was Beetlejuic and Lydia transformed began slowly rising from their unconscious state. With her newly sharp claws, Lydia raced after Grimnak, hissing and rearing to strike at his head with Beetlejuice close behind her. As a silent striking team, the two closed in on him fast and he was barely able to turn around before Lydia buried her claws into the back of Grimnak's neck breaking his spell and dropping Clair to the ground. The intensely sharp pain shot through him like five knives piercing his flesh and before Beetlejuice could get in his own strike, Grimnak shouted something in his native language that sounded similar to dragon roars and growls. Suddenly, an invisible force launched Lydia off of Grimnak's back and flung Beetlejuice forty feet and flat on his back. Lydia however, landed on her feet and charged back in relentlessly. Grimnak quickly concentrated and used a concussion spell of his own design to utilize invisible force to fend off the crazed girl. The shock wave produced from his palm stopped her in her tracks and forced her back a few feet she then looked at Grimnak with the thrill-of-the-hunt burning in her eyes as if she now regarded him as some sort of prey.

Beetlejuice had regained his senses by now and charged in to attack as Lydia stood straight up and screamed in a high pitched demonic bat scream toward the sky. When Beetlejuice heard the scream he simply stopped in his tracks and screeched back, his voice noticeably lower than Lydia's. Both then began screeching in anger at each other, like wild animals readying to fight to determine the leader of the pack. Grimnak slowly backed toward his projection gate trying not to catch their attention. However he accidently kicked Claire in her ribs and received an electric shock as a result. He jarred his foot back slightly and jumped to maintain his balance. He then slowly turned when he noticed that the screeching had stopped, only to realize that both Lydia and Beetlejuice were then staring at him with new bloodlust in their eyes and low growls from their throats.

Claire began witnessing another memory, the one where she finally spoke to her school crush and spoke with him. He seemed so wise and kind to her that she just had to thank him for his advice and everything he did for her. So she planted a small kiss on his lips. With slight embarrassment evident on her face, Claire began remembering how disappointed she felt when she found out that Ben was Beetlejuice and that he was more than four hundred years old.

Just when she thought that she had seen enough of her life, and had her answer, she heard the dragon say from the darkness, "You've now seen and remembered events from your own side of the story. Now witness another side. Say the name and you shall know." Claire was confused now and began asking, "What does that mean? Like, if I say Bertha's name..." In the middle of her questions, she began to see an image come into focus. Just like her own memories, she began to become part of someone else's life. "This is the price." She heard the dragon say. "To have knowledge of those closest to you. To know their secrets, their shame, remorse, sadness, joy, and even their pain. However, if they find out, it's proven likely that they may fear and reject you for your knowledge and even hate you for knowing their secrets."

"Then I don't want to know their secrets." Claire blurted out as the scene of Bertha's first exposure to Drakenfield played out in front of her. Claire watched as the little twelve year old Bertha picked up on it in a flash and defeated some of the best players in the store with a quickly built deck out of spare cards and figures she bought then and there. 'That's amazing.' She thought to herself after watching Bertha play and win for the third time in a row. 'I had no idea how much of a genius she really was.' The more she thought about it, the more she found herself watching, unable to resist seeing her friend's lives and secrets play out in front of her like a movie on the silver screen. Eventually Claire shook herself out of her curiosity and shouted up into the air, "I can't see any more of this. You realize that I'm a gossip girl. Knowing this much about my friends would be too much of a temptation." She began attempting to clear her mind as much as she could until one name popped into her head. 'Lydia, I could use some advice right about now.' She thought to herself not even realizing that she thought it aloud. Suddenly, she found herself standing close to a road in a small mountain town, the air brisk and cold, the smell of pine trees fresh in the air and the bite of the snow crisp across her skin. Claire closed her eyes to feel the exotic atmosphere. It was quite soothing despite how cold it was and Claire allowed the air to clear her thoughts.

Suddenly she was distracted by the headlights of two vehicles, one swerving into the oncoming lane and the other swerving to avoid it only to be rammed by a larger vehicle traveling faster than it should have been. Claire watched in horror as the small green vehicle crumpled like a newspaper and was shoved a great distance before it stopped. The man of the vehicle that had drifted and caused the accident went to inspect the damage and calling for the paramedics. Hesitantly, Claire moved in on the passenger side of the mangled vehicle and peaked in to see a beautiful woman in her mid to late thirties with black hair protecting her eight year old daughter. The two had a striking resemblance and Claire immediately knew the young girl. "Lydia?" she gasped.

Grimnak fought hard to fend off attacks from both Beetlejuice and Lydia. Recalling how ferocious they were before, he kept his guard up hoping that they would tire out soon. Lydia and Beetlejuice slashed at his invisible shield intent on breaking through and tearing him asunder. Hisses and gruff roars erupted from their throats, telling all who could hear how wild and dangerous they were. The claw holes in Grimnak's neck remained ever present, yet never bleeding, paining him none-the-less. In a last ditch effort to thwart the two wild demons, Grimnak began mumbling something to himself in his native language and aimed the palm of his right hand at the still unconscious Claire. Claire then was covered in a bluish white light and vanished from the back yard, transported to another location just in time to watch as his barrier spell failed and collapsed under the relentless brutality of both Lydia and Beetlejuice. In a flash they were on him, Lydia snagging the doppelganger by the face with her right hand while Beetlejuice dug his claws into its stomach and left arm. With a quick jerk, Lydia thrust her arm upward, ripping off the head of Grimnak's temporary image while Beetlejuice yanked off its arm. Instantly, the doppelganger of Grimnak scattered into dust and vanished from sight as the gate closed in on itself in a torrent of silver flame. A small thud could be heard as the energy sealed off the majority of Claire's backyard from Grimnak's reach.

Claire stared in shock as she watched as the paramedics wrenched open the mangled green vehicle with the Jaws of Life and pulled Lydia's mother onto a gurney covered in her own blood and loaded into the back of an ambulance for the trip to the hospital. Before, Claire could even figure out what was going on, she found herself sitting in the ambulance on the trip with Lydia's mother. She was strapped to the gurney and the paramedics were frantically working to keep her alive. The trip seemed to go on forever as the woman lie there struggling to regulate her breathing and just barely clinging to life. Slowly, the woman turned to look to ward Claire as if she could see her. "So, you're one of my daughter's friends?" She asked wearily. Claire looked to both sides not realizing that the woman was actually speaking to her. Her voice was soft and weak. Barely audible and Claire was surprised that the woman could even see her. She gingerly moved up to the woman to hear what she had to say next. Again it was extremely weak and soft. "Please, take care of her." She asked into Claire's ear before her eyes closed and the paramedics pulled into the hospital emergency garage. The heart monitor they had the woman hooked up to finally fell flat, never to respond to anything more. The woman died in the ambulance parking lot, she never made it inside. Claire found a flood of tears encompass her cheeks, tears that refused to stop as Claire's shock turned into remorse. She sat crying in the darkness that soon engulfed her surroundings mourning the life that had just slipped away in front of her.

"Lives are governed individually, but each life touches others and influences the paths we decide to walk. Now tell me little one, what makes you worthy to use my power?" The dragon once more asked the weeping Claire. "No more." Claire sobbed. "What?" The dragon responded slightly surprised. "No more!" She screamed at the top of her lungs. The dragon reared back in fright when she screamed and continued watching as she fell to her knees, crying in her hands. The dragon didn't respond. He didn't know how. "For eons, those who came into contact with my power never ordered me to stop my tests. Most of them continue onto the final test and allow me to show them a glimpse of their future." "No more." Claire repeated while continuing to sob in her hands. The dragon remained speechless as he continued to watch the young blonde girl bawl.

Lydia and Beetlejuice circled around Claire as she lay on the ground unconscious. Lydia crept up to the blond girl to sniff at her like a wild dog when a small shock surged through her nose making her flinch back. In a small fit of anger, Lydia took a swipe at Claire with her right hand and was met with an even greater shock that literally threw her back four feet. Lydia quickly regained her footing and looked at her hand only to find it singed.

"Very well young one. You pass my tests. Now choose the form in which to concentrate my power." Claire slowly lifted her head, confused as to the meaning of the dragon's words. "Choose the form?" She asked to the black space surrounding her. The silver dragon came crawling out of the shadows lifting its massive body around with its powerful legs and once again coiled itself around Claire in the same manner as before. "But I thought that I needed to tell you why I was worthy of your power." She added to her earlier question. "Indeed you did, young one. But rather telling me with words, you caused me to think back on those who commanded me as opposed to simply used my power. By making me rethink my methods you earned your worth. But be warned, such power has a dangerous price. Never lose sight of who you truly are, little 'gossip girl'. Now you may choose the form in which is best to help you concentrate such tremendous power." The dragon responded.

End of Season 2 Episode 7