Michael DePalma sat in his dorm room, messing around with the Internet. He found himself on the Group Fic page of SM.net, and he was reading THE GREATEST IF EVER. When he saw the list of people responsible for the IF, his jaw dropped. It was a who's-who of EB Fanfiction greats, jumping off the page like a three-dimensional object as if to taunt him. He whimpered, realizing that he would never reach the recognition that they enjoyed, and if he did, it would take years.

And then the idea hit him like a car driven by Halle Berry. Holy cow, he thought, they're working on a sequel on the IF board!. Michael clicked his way over to the forums and checked the IF board. Sure enough, he found the topic "GIFE II: The Last Second Chance." This was it, his chance to go down in history. He started on his addition to the story, not bothering to get up to date on the story. After all, it wasn't like the first one made any sense. Who was going to chew him out over his addition not flowing with the story?

And then Vin Diesel broke into his room and beat him to death. Because that's what Vin Diesel does when he's in a work of fiction: he beats people to death.

"Paula!" Jeff called again, feeling quite useless.

The devastation in Twoson was amazing. He'd seen the pictures, of course, but actually being at ground zero was completely different. There was no sound to be heard anywhere; the whole city was abandoned, the animals had gone, and the air itself was strangely calm. At first, Jeff had thought that this would make it easier to find Paula, but he soon discovered that his task would be harder than that.

He'd started at the ruin of the old preschool, thinking that would be the logical place to find her, but she wasn't there, nor were there any signs of her having been there. Then he checked the now-crushed Chaos Theatre; no sign of her there either. He went all over the city and never saw a single sign of another living being except for his own footprints in the dust.

He'd finally come to the obvious horrible conclusion and moved on to Onett, but the policemen at the now-permanent Twoson roadblock informed him that nobody had been seen before turning him back.

"Rules are rules," they said when he objected.

"We have to stick to procedure," they added when he argued that their purpose was to keep people out of Twoson. "Don't tell us how to do our job."

Now, here he was, sweeping the city one last time before giving up.

"Paula!"

His voice echoed through the wasteland briefly, then disappeared. Only this time, the noise didn't stop. He was sure he could hear the sound of someone crying in Burglin Park. He ran as fast as his legs would take him. The sound led him to Everdred's old house; it was virtually ignored in the rampage, but nevertheless the roof was falling in from the years of neglect.

Jeff opened the door, which fell off its hinges. "Paula?"

Paula looked up, and Jeff was shocked to realize that he could see the couch through her head. "You... you're... what happened?"

"Oh, Jeff," Paula sobbed. "I don't know what I was thinking. There was something like a monster, but it was worse than that, I tried to fight it but it... it...."

"It's okay," Jeff said, sitting next to her on the couch. "This is kinda like back on our adventures, when we used to get knocked out and Ness would say he could still see us following him, right? So we'll just go down to the Threed Hospital, and then we'll go find that monster and we'll get him together."

"No, it's not that easy." Paula took a deep breath. "Whatever it was, it got away, to another place. We have to find it, and we can't do that unless I'm like this."

Jeff suddenly realized that taking a deep breath was a strange thing for a ghost to do, but he decided not to mention it. Instead, he asked, "You mean like how Giygas was attacking from the past, and we had to be robots to find him?"

"Sort of, but different somehow." Paula sank into the couch a little. "It's like something I remember from somewhere else, but I don't remember here. I'll know when we get there."

"We?" Jeff repeated. "I'm not a ghost."

"Not a ghost yet," Paula's boyfriend Dash corrected as he leapt upon Jeff from behind the couch and clubbed him unconscious with a blackjack.

In an attempt to educate the ignorant masses--erm, thoughtful public that is enjoying GIFE II, the GIFE II culture committee has hereby declared that the following post (which will attempt to end the conflict between the writers, their AC's, and their evil clones) will be presented in the form of an Avant-nouveau Theater piece entitled "The Show of Life and Everything Betwixt Us." Please enjoy.

(curtain rises)

(SimonBob walks onstage. He is wearing a tweed suit with horrendously long sleeves)

SB: I wonder where my fish could be. Oh me oh my. Oh my oh me.

(Dark Figure and Evil Simon join him. They dance around him)

Dark Figure and Evil Simon: Your fish, your fish, it's gone away. Your fish, your fish, is made of clay.

(Mariachi music begins to play. Giampi, Giampy, JP, and their evil counterparts come on stage dressed like mariachis. They begin to sing.)

Everyone: Ay ay ayay, canta y no llores, porque cantando se alegran, cielito lindo, los corazones.

(Evil Simon, JP, Giampi, and Giampy cry. Then the good versions take big red ribbons out of their pockets and tie them up. Finally, Giampy and Giampi strip off their mariachi clothes to reveal matching Batman & Robin costumes.)

Giampi: Quickly. To the Batmobile.

Giampy: Holy Screwy Skyscrapers, Batman.

(Giampy and Giampi tote off the bad guys. The other good guys then exit.)

(Enter Skulryk, Hobo Mike, FZ, Jenkins, and their evil clones. Everyone except Hobo Mike and Evil Hobo Mike are dressed like hippies; HM and EHM are dressed like mimes.)

(HM and EHM begin pulling on opposite sides of an invisible rope while everyone else does the choreography for the musical Hair.)

(Evil Skulryk pulls down Skulryk's pants.)

(Everyone laughs.)

Skulryk: But you can't swim like I can!

(Evil Hobo Mike, Skulryk, FZ and Jenkins faint. Jenkins and FZ begin to laugh.)

FZ: There is no room for my mother, dear!

Jenkins: We will have to make dooooooooooooooo!!

(FZ and Jenkins crawl on the ground. Hobo Mike leans on an invisible wall. The bad guys exit through a hole in the ground.)

(All Falcons come on stage. The good Falcons and the bad Falcons are bound by red rope licorice.)

AC Falc: My my, is that edible?

Author Falc: Indeed it is, thou art correct. Shall we sample?

Evil Falc and Evil AC Falc: Quite.

(Evil Falc and Evil AC Falc eat the licorice. Soon after they run offstage. Vomiting sounds can be heard in the distance.)

Author Falc and AC Falc: It's Wayne's World, Wayne's World, party time, excellent.

(Exit Falcons. Enter Silver Tyrano and EST. They are dressed like Mercutio and Tybalt.)

EST: Do you bite your thumb at me, sir?

(Pronounces silence.)

Silver Tyranno: "#$% this.

(Silver Tyranno eats EST. He then goes to sleep on the floor.)

(All good guys enter. Dark Figure is carrying NeoPaula. They bow.)

(A French theater critic comes onstage.)

Frenchman: Ze battle, she has finished. Merci!

(curtain.)

All of a sudden, Dash leapt upon Giampi from behind the couch and clubbed him to death with a blackjack for trying to end the battle early.

Giampi got up and rubbed the back of his head. "Fine then, be that way," he said.