A humor story for Dragonlance fans who have read the War of Souls trilogy. Others will probably enjoy it as well, but not as much. By the way, the gods who speak are often important to the hilarity.

P.S. Yes, I know. The quotes from WoS aren't exact. It's the only Dragonlance trilogy that I've read and haven't bought, give me a little slack. :)

Raistlin silently laid Palin down in front of the gods of magic.

Lunitari said, "Both of the mortals will be returned to life. Palin will be returned his magic, if he wants it. Dalamar will also be returned his magic, on the condition that he mingle with other mortals and never visit this place again. Is that acceptable to you, Raistlin?"

He nodded.

A portal quietly opened behind the three gods of magic.

Raistlin and Dalamar stood in silent, total shock. The gods didn't notice. Lunitari continued speaking, turning now to Dalamar. "Is this acceptable to you?"

A young woman with brown hair, brown eyes, and dressed in plain white robes walked calmly out of the portal.

Raistlin and Dalamar were both speechless. Thus, Dalamar didn't answer Lunitari's question. The goddess, irritated, repeated it. "Is this acceptable, Dalamar?"

At that precise moment, the woman from the portal spoke. "Excuse me, but is this Krynn?"

The gods of magic whipped around. Solinari gaped. Lunitari stepped back, startled. Nuitari, as usual, just glared in displeasure.

Of all of the five, Raistlin recovered first. "Yes," he whispered softly, "this is Krynn. Why are you here? Who are you?"

The woman blinked, then grinned really, really widely, giving the five Krynnians the horrible image of a kender about to muck with an immensely powerful magical item. Four of the five were used to controlling their emotions to an enormous degree and managed to squelch the extremely unpleasant idea. Poor Dalamar was not quite up to the task. Luckily, the elf was so appalled by the thought of a fearless, curious kender happily rummaging around in his study that he merely gasped in fright and went white as a corpse, which, considering his current condition, was not too surprising. Also luckily, the woman didn't seem to notice, as she was too busy staring with absolute wonder at Raistlin.

"AWESOME!!! You're Raistlin Majere!!! I'm a huge fan, we share so many likings, I love herbs and books and magic too! Never thought THIS would happen! WOOT!"

By this time, everyone had recovered (except Dalamar) and had just gotten to wondering what the weird word 'woot' meant when the woman walked over to Raistlin, took out what seemed to be a strange kind of parchment and a tube pointed on one side, and squealed excitedly, "May I have your autograph?"

For the space of five seconds, no one said anything.

Then Solinari asked, "What do woot and autograph mean?"

The woman seemed stumped. "Erm... woot... term... sort of like 'yay' or... or... well, like 'yay'. It's an exclamation of pleased excitement. Autograph... signature of a well-known person that another person, usually a fan, procures from them to show others and themselves proof that they met the first person... celebrity..." Stopping for a moment, the woman said irritably, "Look, I just want you to sign the paper. With the pointed part of this pen-cylinder, or a quill if you have one handy."

Raistlin, utterly confused, signed the paper.

The woman took the paper around to every one of them, managing to get all of them to sign, although Nuitari took a little flattering to convince. The woman squealed again. Just like a kender. Dalamar, having recovered from his horror enough to participate in the signing, was sent right back into it.

"Now," the woman said happily, "My name is Holly. You needn't know my last name, tisn't important. I'm not really important either, as a matter of fact, but it's annoying for Astinus to have to write down 'woman' every time that I do something because of his lack of information. I came to Krynn for two purposes: one, it's my favorite planet and I really wish I lived here, and two, I'm supposed to put Paladine back in his position of power. Yes," she added, seeing that Nuitari had opened his mouth, "I know he hasn't suffered or paid for anything yet. And I know your mother wanted him to, but really, it isn't at all fair. Paladine did nothing wrong. So, the highgod has determined that he be restored to his rightful place."

"So there really is a highgod?" Lunitari asked, interested. "Father said there was, but I never saw any reason there should be."

"Oh yes," the woman Holly said cheerfully. "On my planet, they call him Jehovah or Allah or usually just God. He's the only real god there, except for his son, Jesus. Anyway, I was the first one who actually asked to come here at the right time, so I got the job. So," she waved her arms and all of the gods of Krynn appeared. Paladine, now a mortal, also appeared. "Let's get started, shall we?"

Everyone was bewildered. The most confused of the lot were the gods (and Paladine) who had just been summoned. Except for Gilean, who knew exactly what was going on since he was writing it all down in his dratted book. Gilean was still bristling about the 'lack of information' comment - and that he'd actually made a mistake. For the benefit of the other gods, Holly repeated her little speech.

Immediately, all the gods started arguing, saying that it was impossible, or how dare a human think she could bring a mortal to godhood, or protesting that Paladine hadn't been in his mortal form long enough yet. Holly rolled her eyes and glanced at Raistlin. Her expression clearly read, 'here we go again'. Raistlin wondered uneasily just how much she knew about him and how in the Abyss Holly could possibly know that he once spied on the gods. She winked. Raistlin wondered uneasily what she was thinking and how it related to him for her to wink like that. She smirked. Raistlin started to wonder uneasily how Holly could read his mind, then mentally shut up before she could do it again.

A booming voice, cutting easily through the chaotic chatter, majestically thundered "SHUT UP!!!!!!!"

Silence.

"Well that was unexpected," Zivilyn said at last.

Everyone nodded, awed.

"Wow."

No one knew who spoke; everyone was thinking the same thing.

After a few more silence dots in Gilean's book, Holly said at last, "To business."

Another portal appeared, with another woman stepping out from it. This woman, however, was dressed in black robes. Her eyes glistened with black evil, her dark smile was as beautiful as a black rose, her eyes were as black as midnight, and her nails were black with bat guano. Other than the bat-guano hands, she was gorgeous, in a black sort of way. Nuitari and Solinari were immediately smitten. All the other unmarried godly men would've been as well except that they didn't find bat guano attractive.

"Daedusk, the time has come."

The woman smiled beatifically. Everyone else tried to control their laughter at such a stupid name. Except for the gods of magic. The two males were too busy staring longingly and the female was staring too, but in a much less flattering way.

Holly began to sing. The notes were clear and beautiful, flowing and gentle. The song filled the world with love. Daedusk and Paladine floated, glowing with heavenly light as they were lifted into the pantheon of gods. The gods of light listened in rapture. The gods of darkness listened in pain. The gods of twilight listened in interest. Palin returned to life and also listened in rapture. Dalamar returned to life and also listened in pain. Raistlin returned to life and also listened in interest.

Caramon, who had been standing off to the side, waiting for his twin, returned to life and listened, befuddled.

Holly stopped singing.

Silence.

The gods were all staring at Holly. So were the newly-alive mortals. And the newly-gods gods.

In short, everyone was staring.

"What was THAT?!" Gilean asked in amazement.

"What, didn't you know that the universe was made by a song? It always sings, every moment. That was how God created everything. He sang, then the new stars sang, then the new planets sang, and pretty soon everything was created and singing. That's what all this fascination with music comes from. I mean, really, why would there be a god of music if it wasn't important?"

Perfectly smug, she walked into the portal that which was suddenly there.

Silence...

These staggering, seemingly impossible words had a most disastrous effect.

Raistlin, Palin, Dalamar, and especially Caramon's heads all exploded as they died. Paladine and Daedusk were suddenly thrown violently out of the pantheon as their heads exploded, too. Daedusk also died and disappeared, since she was both originally mortal and not of that world. Majere, Mishakal, Habbakuk, Kiri-Jolith, Branchala (who was looking very smug), Solinari, Gilean, Shinare, Sirrion, Reorx, Chislev, Zivilyn, Lunitari, Sargonnas, Morgion, Chemosh, Zeboim, Hiddukel, and Nuitari's heads all also exploded, but as they really were gods they didn't die or fall down.

Then the gods suddenly flew out of the room from the explosions. But the gods of magic managed to cast a spell that let them and the magic-user mortals all stay put. (Caramon flew off, but he returned a second or two later.)

Then everyone's memories exploded.

Of course, all of that was figurative. Except for the dying and being thrown out of places and memories disappearing.

There was a slight pause.

Then Lunitari said, "Is that acceptable to you, Dalamar?"

He nodded.

So.. where did THAT come from, you ask? Well... I had just read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and I was feeling kind of loopy and crazy. Then I listened to Evanescence, which gave me the music idea.