>>"But I'm right, aren't I? Just because I wasn't in the dream doesn't mean I haven't heard of it. And there was obviously something in it that made you question who you are."

The girl did not lie about her gift. Mahadevi did not need divine powers to see that. She shifted uncomfortably on her pillows and set her glass down, folding two of her arms over her chest.

"A dream is a dream. It was not real. It was an illusion full of temptation and falsehood to confuse people, and it succeeded. That does not prove anything."

Except, it did.

Evelyn set her own glass down, and looked the woman full in the face. Eye contact was the key to prove to someone you weren't lying, and it also allowed her to see the subtle flickering eye cues in her companion.

"A dream may be a dream, but that particular one was different. It wasn't just a dream. It was a possible future. One I heard we've avoided, but was not as far fetched as it seemed." The mixture of information from Jude and Mirror about that 'future' was becoming more useful now. Without experiencing it herself, it was hard to really relate to what the 'goddess' saw or experienced. But it seemed to be enough to frighten her, and she was in denial about that much.

>>"A dream may be a dream, but that particular one was different. It wasn't just a dream. It was a possible future. One I heard we've avoided, but was not as far fetched as it seemed."

Mahadevi looked at the girl once again for a long time without speaking. She could not quite place her attitude. She was not being disrespectful, but she was not being friendly either... she was being... logical.
Didn't Akshay tell her highly logical people were supposed to wear pointy ears?...

"I still do not see what point you are trying to make. In one possible future, I was Kali, the goddess of destruction. How does that prove that, as you say, I am a mutant?..."

Evelyn sighed slightly, sending her hair cascading down across her face in a little ripple, forcing her to reach back up and push the strands from her face. This woman's denial was somewhat exhausting, but she could only imagine how long she had allowed herself to live with the idea she was a 'goddess'. Perhaps it was time for a different approach.

"Ok, you were Kali the goddess of destruction. From what I remember, she was known for destroying ignorance, sin, and decay. She destroys so she can recreate. While you may have taken a destructive form, were you the embodiment of that goddess, you would have recreated in the wake of that destruction, wouldn't you? Even Kali had a role in the order and balance of the universe. Was the future you saw balanced? Were you able to rebuild?" It was a long shot, but perhaps it would get through to her companion. She shifted in her sitting position, folding her hands lightly in her lap.

"While the dream may not 'prove' you are only a mutant, sometimes eliminating other possibility leaves you with a solitary option. 'When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth'." The quote her favorite detective. She straightened her skirt and shrugged her shoulders.

The girl was really determined to prove that she was a mutant, not a goddess. Mahadevi knew that she was right, yet Evelyn's insistence was starting to bother her. She made a point about Kali and rebuilding in the future, and the Goddess winced. There was no coming back from that place, not in the future she had seen.

>>"While the dream may not 'prove' you are only a mutant, sometimes eliminating other possibility leaves you with a solitary option. 'When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth'."

"Why does that matter to you?" Mahadevi asked, one of her many hands fidgeting with her skirt, a very un-graceful thing to do "I realize that you Americans don't believe in other people's gods, but do you also have to deny their very existence? Why are you so intent on proving that I am a mutant?... By its very definition, belief should defy logic. Why is it important to you to prove a difference between gifted and divine?"

It was like watching cracks travel through cracks. A break here, a splinter there. The wince traveled into the fidgeting, and the demeanor was slowly dropping. Evelyn shrugged slightly, and looked down at her class when questioned. "It doesn't matter to me. Not really. But it matters to you, and I think you should address it. I used to deny I was a mutant. My intelligence was easy to just blame on normal human genetics and mutation. But then I got a secondary gift, and that wasn't so easy to deny. Learning to accept what I was has taken time, but then I meet and related to others who were going through things like I was. I mean, I guess being a goddess can be cool and fun, but it would be living in a lie. I couldn't do that."

She looked up and set the cup down on the side table. "It's not about the whole concept of other peoples gods, or deny they exist. I don't mind believing in something but I also don't like just sitting and pretending I don't hear what I do. My echoes tell me you're concerned by what you've seen and that you doubt whether you're a goddess. And I feel the need to respond to those echoes."

>>"It doesn't matter to me. Not really. But it matters to you, and I think you should address it. I used to deny I was a mutant. My intelligence was easy to just blame on normal human genetics and mutation. But then I got a secondary gift, and that wasn't so easy to deny. Learning to accept what I was has taken time, but then I meet and related to others who were going through things like I was. I mean, I guess being a goddess can be cool and fun, but it would be living in a lie. I couldn't do that."

The Goddess' eyes narrowed and one hand - the hand that had not been there in the dream - clenched into a fist. Now the girl was calling her a liar. That was bordering on blasphemy, and it was on the wrong side of the border.

>>"It's not about the whole concept of other peoples gods, or deny they exist. I don't mind believing in something but I also don't like just sitting and pretending I don't hear what I do. My echoes tell me you're concerned by what you've seen and that you doubt whether you're a goddess. And I feel the need to respond to those echoes."

Well, the echoes were clearly wrong.

"Even if I doubt myself as you say, why would I want to give up being a goddess?" Mahadevi shot back "So I can be a mutant, persecuted on the streets? People believe in me. I owe them to be their goddess. They need me to believe in. Would you rob them of their faith just to make my doubts go away? isn't that selfish?"

Then again, this brave new world everyone talked about often tended to be selfish. Case in point: people ruining their own city for personal vendettas...

There are a few warning signs you learn to look out for when you decide to confront people on their personal issues. Clenched fists were one of them. A person who lets their fingers curl into a fist, especially someone who maintained such a persona of majesty and class as her companion, was on the verge of cracking, and a violent outburst could easily leave someone with a bloody nose or worse. Evelyn really didn't want a bloody nose right now.

So she waited. She bit her tongue and listed to the Goddess' response, and tried to pick her next words more carefully. Tact was low on her list of abilities. Perception, sure, she had that. Knowing what to say and when...some things just needed a little work.

"Whether or not you believe you're a mutant, the world out there is still going to see you the same. You walk the streets, you're one of us. And even if you want to be a Goddess in here, and perhaps you don't want to rob people of their faith, I'm not going to stop you. But don't let yourself get so stuck in this world in here you forget there are very real dangers out there. Even a goddess isn't immune to everything, after all." She spoke quieter, trying to warn but hopefully not further insult her.

>>"Whether or not you believe you're a mutant, the world out there is still going to see you the same. You walk the streets, you're one of us. And even if you want to be a Goddess in here, and perhaps you don't want to rob people of their faith, I'm not going to stop you. But don't let yourself get so stuck in this world in here you forget there are very real dangers out there. Even a goddess isn't immune to everything, after all."

Mahadevi was quiet for a while, weighing her options. She could have thrown the girl out, but that would damage the reputation of the sanctuary as a safe haven for... mutants. The Goddess told herself she started the sanctuary and opened her own home and temple because she cared for the struggles of the people gifted by the gods.
Then again, some of their abilities rivaled those of the gods.

"You have experienced bad things because you are different." she said finally, looking straight at Evelyn "You have been hurt for being a mutant. You came here for safety, but you are telling me that no one who is gifted is ever safe. So tell me, what hurt you so?..."

The question turned the conversation on end, and Evelyn felt memories flickering beneath the surface of her mind. Without the playbacks, some of them were out of reach without concentration, but more recent experiences were crisp and vivid in detail. The mutants who attacked her to teach her parents a lesson, the destruction of her apartment. Perhaps it went deeper then that. What really made her feel so hurt? She questioned the goddess, but it was much harder to question herself.

>>What hurt you so?

"A mixture of things," She found herself answering, a frown evident on her lips. "My parents refused to admit I was a mutant. My...abilities at analysis and my awareness unnerved them, but because that ability was evident from birth, it was easy to push to the side as a 'mental illness'. After awhile, I started to believe them. I started to think I was just 'broken' and eventually, someone would find a way to fix that. Make the voices stop. But then my abilities only grew. Suddenly, I couldn't forget. Memories were as clear as they were when I experienced them. I didn't dream. I just remembered."

She glanced back out the window towards the streets and the distant chaos. She mused about the people who saved her, and the ones who hurt her. And she mused over the question a little more. "I used to think if I ignored it long enough, my mutation would go away. But my ignorance destroyed some of the few things that matter to me. You have a lovely home here. Perhaps i just don't want the same thing to happen to you." She remarked softly.

>>"My parents refused to admit I was a mutant. My...abilities at analysis and my awareness unnerved them, but because that ability was evident from birth, it was easy to push to the side as a 'mental illness'. After awhile, I started to believe them. I started to think I was just 'broken' and eventually, someone would find a way to fix that. Make the voices stop. But then my abilities only grew. Suddenly, I couldn't forget. Memories were as clear as they were when I experienced them. I didn't dream. I just remembered."

Mahadevi did not, in all fairness, expect the girl to actually answer the question. She expected a lot of other things - arguments, denial, silence, even tears... but not a straight answer. And onethat was not easy to hear.

>>"I used to think if I ignored it long enough, my mutation would go away. But my ignorance destroyed some of the few things that matter to me. You have a lovely home here. Perhaps i just don't want the same thing to happen to you."

The simple fact that she talked to her as one human woman to another stunned the Goddess more than her arguments about her mortality. She looked away and dropped two of her hands onto her lap, her shoulders relaxing as the righteous anger and the fight was starting to leave her.

"But... if I am not a goddess, what am I?"

>>"But... if I am not a goddess, what am I?"

That was a difficult question, and Evelyn wasn't sure she really knew the answer. At least, not at first. Trying to tell someone something they believed was wrong was a delicate subject, one that brought fear into the equation, and that was less predictable. It only took one wrong word to set someone off, and public speaking wasn't exactly her strength. But she felt she should try. After all, she had spoken up and brought light to the woman's doubt in the first place.

She considered it, then gave a light shrug of her shoulders as the words settled into place. "You're who you've always been,"[/b] She started, looking up and making eye contact so her companion knew she was being truthful. "You're a strong, independent woman who doesn't let people stand in your way. You're a leader, and you are dignified under pressure. That isn't going to change whether or not 'goddess' is tacked onto your name."

>>"You're who you've always been. You're a strong, independent woman who doesn't let people stand in your way. You're a leader, and you are dignified under pressure. That isn't going to change whether or not 'goddess' is tacked onto your name."

As if that was so easy. As if one could give up a lifetime of existing as a goddess and switch over to being mortal. As if she could make that decision without thinking about her life, her career, her followers. In a moment of sudden fear, Mahadevi realized that she did not know how many of the devout people she had spent her life with would still be by her side if she decided that she was only human.

For the first time in her waking life, the Goddess was afraid.

"... there will be a room ready for you upstairs." she said finally "You can stay as long as you like, and when you leave I will make sure someone escorts you home safely."

The conversation ended with that statement, and the flickers of fear, confusion, and consideration melted away. The goddess, for the moment, would remain a goddess to her people. But at least Evelyn had said what she had to, instead of just letting the echoes pass by. Maybe the same wake-up call would not arrive. She hoped so.

Evelyn stood and after making sure her cup was on the table, and gave a polite nod to her hostess. "Thank you for your hospitality and opening up your home like you have." She started for the door, and was soon taken towards a room. She probably wouldn't wait for someone to take her home in the morning. She had walked this far, she could get back if she needed to. At least it would give her time to think.

Evelyn might not be a goddess, but she still had her own questions to consider. She was learning to admit she was a mutant, but what that admission would bring? Still too hard to tell.