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"She still has not come before us" ,boomed an obese red-haired god in a pristine white toga. He had sparkling green eyes and a circlet made of ether-metals that gleamed with the shifting colors of the spectrum with each movement of his grossly large body. The circlet was a stylized grape vine, with a couple of little amethyst grapes added into the ether-metal. In his right hand he held a beautiful diamon goblet filled to the brim with rich red wine; in his left he held a decanter filled with more of the red wine that filled his cup.

"Your precious little human must fulfill the requirements of our contracts, otherwise she has to be destroyed, as she should have been when the Kata'ka'aryin was placed into her body. You know that 'Kashi."

The goddess, dubbed " 'Kashi" bu the obese God of Alcohol, Dionysus, turned her head to face him. This goddess' name happened to be Akasha, the Goddess of Ether and the Universe. She generally remained indifferent to the workings of either god or mortal, as she always had better things to do with her time than monitoring what children did.

Akasha's bottomless black eyes were speckled with white, as if they contained every star, sun, and planet within them, and they flickered at Dionysus. Akasha never spoke much, as a rule, for when she did, clamities tended to happen in the worst possible places, and at the moment, the worst calamity that could happen would be Dionysus' destruction. But at the thought of destroying the irritating God of Wine, Akasha paused, for she had been growing annoyed with the pet name he'd given her.

Akasha looked directly at Dionysus and smiled. " 'Ysus",she began in her depthless rolling voice,"Don't you have anything better to do than concern yourself with a mere human? She'll come tonight, and that should be enough for you."

Honestly, Akasha could not care less about Requiem or Dionysus or even the Gods' Council for the planet called "Earth", by its' inhabitants. She had more important things to do, like preserving the balance of Time, or controlling how all beings who could truly tap into the sixth sense used the power of ether to see if she needed to restrict the flow or strengthen it to keep the balance intact.

Keeping every living creature, every dead creature, every inanimate object, every object of power or destruction or life; keeping everything in this particular universe balanced perfectly on a knife edge meant her awareness could never falter of the multitudes around her.

However, the spoiled brats that mortals called 'gods' were perhaps too aware of their own importance of helping Akasha maintain the balance. Though many of the gods were more concerned with the pleasure of their own existence and opulence in their names, rather than the balance of the dimension as a whole.

Akasha existed solemnly in her thoughts, righting the small things of imbalance or the large things causing discord in her Domain, largely ignoring the squawking argument between the gods of Earth until a light contralto voice broke her largely indifferent existence.

"That's quite enough whining out of you today, Dionysus",the light contralto sound that came out of Requiem's mouth was sardonic,"Perhaps you need stronger wine."

Akasha surveyed the mortal, who served as a balancer on Earth, with a critical eye. The tall eighteen year old girl looked at the multitude of gathered gods and goddesses with eyes that were haunted and knowing, eyes filled with more experience than even the least of an immortal. A vast sense of power surrounded Requiem, stronger now than ever.

Kydo'ysus, the God who maintained the Future, and one who gave the seers of the world their Sight, despised the girl for her power. Akasha knew of Kydo'ysus's jealousy and his resentment of Requiem's growing strength. But Kydo'ysus shunned the knowledge that Requiem's power brought balance, preferring to work out ways to kill the mortal rather than finding ways for her to serve the universe.

Akasha brushed the thoughts aside, absently ignited a star that had been dying, and continued on another train of awareness. If Requiem's power continued to grow at the same rate it expanded now, when the girl turned twenty one, she would eclipse most of the weaker Earth gods in strength and cause a very large upheaval in the dynamics between the gods of all Planets, and suns and stars and galaxies. It also meant that Requiem was becoming a Goddess in her own right.

A sneering, disdainful remark brought her attention back to the council.

"Requiem, how good of you to finally deign to see this humble council",Kydo'ysus began, with a low, sweeping bow of mockery in her direction. His next words brought a mutter of discontent from the surrounding immortals. "I'm sure that there were so many more important things for you to attend to. What use are the Gods, when we are the ones who gave you the power you wield?"

Akasha very nearly caused a galaxy to unmake itself when she heard Kydo'ysus' venomous words. The god had guts, because judging by Requiem's icy demeanor, Akasha's time minion had just bitten off more than he could chew.

The mortal girl's retort was polite, but cool as she strode forward to enter into the circular chamber built of light and shadows, music and silence, clouds and stone. Her chin lifted imperiously, her eyes made granite look soft and pliable. "I apologize for the tardiness of my appearance",her calm tone belied the fury in her soul.

The ice in the statement cut across murmurs of agreement and indignation from the gods. "But yes",she continued, her voice still calm and frigid,"there were indeed things more important than selfish immortals that I had to attend to. My human, my mortal life, as I'm sure you're all aware of, is not endless. I will not put everything on hold for you, gods or no."

Requiem's sparkling topaz eyes met Akasha's depthless ones for a moment, and Akasha felt vague surprise as she held the Reaper's eyes for a moment, sensing that Requiem had a very controlled chokehold on her fury. Akasha knew somehow that it would take much more power than the gods possessed to destroy this human woman.

Then Requiem looked away, and Akasha became aware of the dead silence that surrounded her. She narrowed her depthless orbs and watched Requiem shrug and close her eyes in a desperate battle against the assault of sudden emotion that wanted to be free of its' icy chains. She tapped into cold logical energy that surrounded her core of Self and felt herself stabilize, and chill.

As this occurred Akasha felt the corporeal body she took to attend the Council chill. Her corporeal body took the shape of a female human, with depthless black eyes and light golden skin with hair the color of an earthly fruit called a plum. But even though she appeared frail, it took strong energy to make her feel anything, for Akasha drifted in her natural form of nothingness, formless and omniscent.

Every god in the room shivered in the icy effect of Requiem's chill. The girl took a deep breath and began to speak again, clearly but still coldly. "This is my monthly visit, and I am now considered an adult among most of human-kind. Which means that I am supposed to become yours entirely."

Kydo'ysus's golden orbs glittered with triumph as he said,"Indeed, all of us gods have some errands for you to perform for us-"

Requiem made a violent slashing gesture with her right hand and the chill that penetrated the normally heated chamber in the heavens doubled in strength. Akasha's orbs narrowed and focused on Requiem as the mortal female's eyes glittered with deadly calm.

"Do I look like a mongrel errand dog, that you can order about as you see fit?",Requiem asked in a mockingly gentle voice,"I work for you. But I don't serve you." Something inhumanly feral glittered in untamed yellow topaz eyes.

Knee-length, flaming red hair floated around her like tendrils of bloody lightning in her aura. "No matter what you try to do, I will never succumb to being nothing more than a semi-unpleasant and somewhat useful pile of s**t beneath your disgusting, obese asses",she told them softly, breaking their silence.

Kydo'ysus tried to interrupt,"YOUR INSOLENCE-", and again he was rendered silent with another slashing gesture with Requiems right hand. The look he received was deadly and he shrank back. However much he loathed Requiem, Kydo'ysus, was still a coward, and his hatred was born out of intense fear.

Requiem returned her attention back to the council,"There is not one thing you can do to make me do anything I don't want to. Your power will never strip me of the will you so generously gave to me."

The large gods were aghast, though a few of the goddesses were rather amused, until they heard Requiem's next words,"You should concern yourself with something other than me and yourselves",the gods and goddesses started to murmur to each other, angry at the mortal in front of them. Akasha remained silent.

Requiem, sensing the Goddess's eyes on her, turned to meet the goddess of the universe's eyes once more, speaking directly to the enigmatic and silent Goddess. "I have felt something moving within the powers of the dimensions, though it's nothing benevolent. If they could listen to a mere feeling in their guts that isn't hunger, maybe your compatriots would actually be useful", Requiem told Akasha, her voice chill and wry, with a touch of disdain.

Akasha replied in her bottomless, rolling voice, a voice with the inflections of many voices, echoing and distant,"I, too, have felt the malevolence and discordance rising and stirring",the goddess began,"And the balance of everything is waning. Where there is no balance, there is chaos. And we must remember that the last time we ignored the growing threat, the universe came close to unmaking itself."

Requiem nodded to Akasha and finally broke the eye contact. Requiem glanced around at the suddenly silent immortals and then found them pitiable for a split second before arguments erupted and the shouting matches began.

Nodding to the strange goddess of the universe, Requiem took three steps backwards, bowed to the shouting gods, and vanished from the room in a twist of power and shadows, returning to a small cottage in the hills of Missouri