Betty's Afterlife Is Worse Than She Thought

What she was referring to was the fact that both Fred and Astra were now running all higgeldy-piggeldy through her neighborhood, stark raving fear pumping adrenaline through their veins like it was going out of style. But as far as Betty had read, both of those fearless adventurers were, well, quite fearless and quite fond of adventure. Therefore, their reaction to the wailing police siren seemed rather out of character.

But then she reminded herself that the two fictional heroes were no longer safely ensconced within their own world but had crossed over somehow into hers. And through their eyes modern day America probably struck them as some kind of nether-region of hell. And those police sirens were kind of alarming, so she really couldn't blame them.

'Hey, am I picking up on the thoughts and feelings of Fred and Astra again?' Betty wondered. 'Has my status as a ghost given me supernatural powers? I mean, other than being a ghost, that is?'

'Lady, ESP you don't got,' a voice suddenly spoke out from behind her. Betty turned around, quite startled, and saw a young woman floating in front of her. 'Actually,' the woman continued, 'you're just reading the text of the last episode.'

'Who are you?' Betty asked the young woman who had appeared out of nowhere and was floating like a ghost just like Betty was which pretty much tells us all that this mysterious woman was just as dead as a doornail as Betty was.

'My name is Jennifer Diane Reitz and, like you, I am dead,' the young woman replied and thus dashed to pieces any hope of her being anything other than another dead person just like Betty was.

'Jennifer Diane Reitz?' Betty exclaimed, 'but you're one of the most famous contributors to Addventure Game 3! You created the Silver Door!'

'Ex-contributor,' JDR corrected Betty, 'but yes, that's me.'

'But what are you doing here?' Betty asked.

'Exposition, I think,' JDR answered. 'You see, you seem to be a little confused about what you're doing here since you're now a member of the dead and deceased. You wonder why you haven't moved on to the Afterlife. You're surprised why the Afterlife isn't a big nothingness, considering your religious views on the subject. And as you quite correctly pointed out, when Terry Pratchett's Death comes for you what you expect to happen after death is exactly what does happen. What you forgot was that you are not a Terry Pratchett character and this isn't Discworld.'

'So what exactly is happening, little Miss Know-it-all?' Betty asked with exasperation.

'You are now consigned to spend the rest of eternity within the bounds of the Never Ending Quest,' JDR answered, her voice somber.

'WHAT?!" Betty screamed.

'And because you're the ghost of an Author and not the ghost of a character,' JDR further explained, 'you'll never be able to interact with anyone here. You'll just be forever floating along from one episode to the next, reading whatever writers write for you to read. You won't even be able to correct their spelling mistaeks.'

"This can't be!" Betty exclaimed.

JDR sadly shook her head. 'I'm sorry, but that's exactly what it be.'

Betty Ragan stared speechlessly at Jennifer Diane Reitz, her eyes blazing with confusion, fear, and an extremely dangerous amount of irritation. 'But...' she said hesitantly, searching for some way to refute JDR's story. 'But if that's all true...' And then Betty's eyes gleamed with triumph. 'If that's all true, then what are you doing here?! This is Never Ending Quest, not Addventure Game 3!'

'I go where Scott goes,' JDR replied calmly, a forlorn resignation in her voice. 'Game 3 shut down years ago and guess what, Scott Chen hopped over here. I just happened to see you and decided to say hello. Of course, whether or not you believe me is irrelevant. Just as I am destined to follow the adventures of Scott Chen for the rest of eternity, you must follow the adventures of Fred and Astra. That's just the way it is.'

'But I don't even like Fred and Astra!' Betty moaned. 'If I have to be trapped in the Never Ending Quest for the rest of eternity, why couldn't I have been stuck with following the adventures of Doctor Who?! At least I wrote for that storyline!'

1. And now back to our exciting story! (Or at least to the next episode)

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