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(KAINNAN)
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THE MOMENT NOAH’S EYES re-focused, Diana collapsed before him, falling into an awkward, tangled heap on the ground. There was instant pandemonium as guards rushed to her crumpled form. One felt for the pulse in her neck then rose, gun instantly levelled at Noah. “She’s dead! What have you done to her?” he cried.
Noah remained silent, trying to stay calm.
“On your knees! Hands behind your head,” the man ordered.
Noah glanced hastily around trying to decide whether to obey. They appeared to be in a standoff; Aaron’s men and Zeus’s guards all pointing their guns at each other, some guns on Rachell, Levi and Katerina too. Seeing the woman he now knew he loved motionless, clearly not back yet, decided him and he dropped to his knees and laced his fingers behind his head. He had to buy Katerina time to finish what she was doing.
The guard moved in to place his gun to Noah’s temples. “You have committed treason and are sentenced to death,” he said without preamble and cocked the trigger.
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(EARTH)
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IT WAS COLD IN THE garden and Katerina drew her coat around herself tightly. She realized she was hungry too which did not help. She made her way to their old, rusty swing and got on, pumping her legs to gain some height.
She had always loved swinging as high as she could to see over their fence and down the street. She made up stories about her neighbors as she did so: this one was a famous actress in retirement, that one a smuggler, this one collected hair to make the biggest wig in the world. Crazy stories, but none so crazy as the one she was currently living in.
The reality of her immense failure overwhelmed her again and she forced herself to consider her parents’ words. She had spent years trying to get it right — all of it. Her relationships, her choices, her career, her character...She could see now that she had actually identified herself with her ability to get things right. When she succeeded, when she performed and excelled, she felt good about herself; secure and invincible. But when she messed up, she hated herself for it. She had defined herself by her achievements.
It was not really surprising though. She had simply copied her parents’ example. Since her early teens they had both been relatively absent from her life; more occupied with work than with a teenage girl who was quite independent anyway.
She appreciated that they had apologized in the house though. In fact, the whole situation had brought her much closer to her mother. Seeing Sarah in action using guns and tackling bad guys was even quite inspiring. Yet the incongruity between her mother’s presence now and her absence in Katerina’s youth struck her abruptly. She felt tears begin leaking out, unbidden. ‘I am sad,’ she thought with surprise. And not just about Nicole. There was agonizing, ugly pain in her heart. It felt primal and old, a pain that had been around for years, hiding just below the surface. She started to cry in earnest, sobs racking her body, aware she sounded like a wounded animal but unable to control it. It shocked her.
The voice dropped into the midst of this, the reassurance of God. “You are My daughter.”
She knew instantly what He meant. He was telling her that despite all the times she had felt abandoned by her parents and alone, He had loved her.
“Where were you then?” she demanded through the sorrow. “All those times I needed help, I needed someone — I didn’t know You were there. I couldn’t feel You there...”
“You couldn’t feel Me — but I was always there, waiting.”
“For what?”
“For you to stop and let Me love you.”
“Stop what?”
“Stop running and fighting and doing,” the voice was gentle even as it exposed her.
“I had to — no one else was going to do it for me.” Silence. “I had to take care of myself...”
“It doesn’t have to be like that anymore,” God said quietly in the stillness.
Katerina got off the swing and started pacing. Every time she turned she could see Nate watching her closely from the kitchen window but he made no move to come outside yet.
“If I don’t have to be perfect, if I’m allowed to fail...if I don’t have to do everything for myself, who will I be?” she asked eventually. “I’ve built my life on those things. It’s how I’ve got to where I am. Who will I be without that?”
“You will be My daughter. I don’t love you because you are successful or perfect. I love you because you are My daughter.”
The idea was appealing; that she did not need to strive to become ‘something.’ That she could instead just be. It was appealing because trying to be perfect was exhausting. It was also impossible. She could see now that she had set herself an unfeasible task in trying to avoid failure.
But if she saw failure as her parents suggested, then failure would not be so terrifying anyway. Failure would just mean she had made a poor choice she could learn from, not that she was a failure.
“How do I do it? How do I stop trying to be perfect all the time? How do I stop connecting who I am with how much I achieve?” But God was silent. So she asked again, out loud this time, as if that would make a difference, “How do I change? How do I stop trying to get it all right? How do I stop being afraid of failure?”
“If you stop failing you won’t have to,” a voice said sarcastically, close to her ear. She spun round and stared at Patrick. She had not heard him approach yet he was right beside her, an enigmatic expression on his face. He looked as calm and put-together as ever but there were a few dark stains just discernable on his black top. In a flash, she realized it was probably blood. Nicole’s blood.
“It’s not funny...you want me to resolve what I need to so I can go back. Well I’m trying!” she snapped, devastated by Nicole’s death, furious with him, revolted by him.
He stared at her a moment then reached out and touched her head. It made her skin crawl but she did not flinch. “It will take time to change how you think and time we don’t have. Diana is dead and her guards are about to kill Noah.”
She gasped. “But I don’t know what to do!” The familiar thoughts swamped her immediately — she was going to fail, Noah would die and it would be her fault too! How could she bear that?
Even as the thoughts came, the new ones were also right there, fresh; she did not have to get it all right, she was allowed to fail and be human.
But this was Noah’s life! This was not just stealing someone’s carpark or making a mistake at work.
Yet if she was ever going to learn how to be okay with not always succeeding, it must be now, so she could go back to Kainnan...
“How’s this for an incentive? If you haven’t worked it out in thirty minutes I will kill your father,” Patrick’s voice broke through her thoughts.
“You wouldn’t! He’s always been kind to you...”
“Try me,” Patrick snapped, his voice dropping. He leaned in and took a handful of her hair in his hands, pulling it back so her throat was exposed and she was forced to stare into the heavens. “Nate,” he yelled, “bring James out here now. And get me a knife.”
They waited silently, both locked in their own thoughts; Katerina trying frantically to think of a way out, some way to save her father. Her uncle had taught her how to fight, but she had the feeling his lessons would not aid her much against Patrick’s strength and experience. Still she had to try something. She could not just let Patrick kill her father!
When the two men emerged into the garden, Patrick released Katerina and in a few quick strides took the knife from Nate to put it to James’ throat instead. Then he turned and looked at her expectantly.
“How did you get like this?” she asked in desperation, trying to stall. She took a step towards the two men, looking around for something, anything to use as a weapon. In the garden beside her she saw a wheelbarrow, a watering can and then, half-hidden by the overgrown bushes, a garden-hoe lying carelessly in the dirt. But Nate was watching her, following her gaze. There was no time to think or assess her decision.
She threw herself into the bushes, plucking up the hoe and coming up swinging. The blade caught Nate in the temple as he came at her, slicing into his flesh and knocking him off balance. He stumbled and fell over the wheelbarrow, the blood pouring over his face blinding him as he went down.
Patrick reacted far too quickly. He hit her father hard in the jaw so James crumpled instantly, unconscious. Then he came for Katerina, crouching low, the blade in his hand now weaving back and forward like a deadly snake. Watching the way he moved, the look on his face, she knew she had made a big mistake. He was a professional, though she had no idea how he had become so.
He moved before she was ready, feinting so she swung the hoe clumsily at him. He avoided it easily and got in close before she could swing it again, yanking it from her hands. When he threw her to the ground, it knocked the wind out of her. He kneeled beside her and held the knife to her throat. “You are a failure. You’ll never work it out — I should just kill you all.”
“Don’t,” a voice pleaded. Katerina saw her mother’s legs from the edge of her vision. She dared not move for the cold blade was pressed hard against her skin.
“Ahhh...one Scott who can fight. Don’t come any closer, or I’ll cut your lovely daughter’s throat. And kindly put that gun down.”
Sarah obviously obliged because Patrick released Katerina and replaced the knife with a gun to her temples instead.
“He won’t kill you,” a quiet voice said and she closed her eyes to concentrate. “He needs you alive.”
“What should I do?”
“Fight him — with truth,” God said.
“What truth?”
“The truth about you and the truth about Me.”
“Okay,” she said silently, though she didn’t really understand what that would do other than anger him further.
When she opened her eyes, Patrick was looking straight at her, waiting suspiciously. She told him, “You won’t succeed.” Her voice sounded surprisingly calm despite the fear gripping her. “You may think you are stronger because you have violence and hate and death on your side. But the darkness has no hope of shutting out the light. The truth will win.”
“What truth?” he mocked.
“The truth that I’m not a failure and I am not defined by my failures. I am an imperfect human being but I’m already doing better than you because I love truth and I’m willing to change. But you...”
“Do tell,” he said, pressing the gun so hard into her temples it broke the skin. A trickle of warm blood made its way slowly down her forehead towards her right eyelid.
“You love what you do — you love death and violence and power. You may succeed in killing us and getting your way in this but you will never know happiness or peace. You are the failure in everything that really matters.”
To her shock, Patrick threw his head back and laughed. “You think to goad me into stopping with your pathetic words. They mean nothing to me.” He stood up over her, keeping the gun steady on her. It gave her the chance to sit up and wipe the blood from her face.
“Not only am I not a failure,” she continued as if he had not spoken, “but I will no longer fear it! So, threaten me all you like with death or disaster but I will not bow to you!”
“Oh, I assure you, you will.”
“You are wrong,” Sarah said suddenly. “My daughter has made her mind up and when she does that, she won’t budge. You should know that about her by now.”
“She may think she has truth on her side and use as many grand words as she likes. But at the end of it all she’s just a mortal, who will do what I want rather than lose her life and the lives of her family. She is not strong enough!” he spat.
“You’re right,” Katerina agreed. “I’m not strong enough to resist you alone. But that’s the point. I am not alone. I have God and I have the power of truth...”
“God — who is that!” he spat on the ground.
“Kat what are you saying?” James asked. He had managed to sit up and was leaning against the wall of their house. There was a strange shaped lump on his jaw where Patrick had hit him.
So Katerina started telling them what she knew about God. She was aware as she spoke that really, she only knew a little about Him but she was determined anyway to describe the God who had been there for them throughout their time in Kainnan — the God who had been there for her as an adolescent until her father’s words made her shut her ears to His voice. The God who she felt so strongly present right then that her skin was tingling and her heart beating twice as fast as normal.
She got halfway and Patrick stepped forward suddenly, impatiently leaning down and jamming the gun into her forehead again so she gasped with the pain. “Stop talking,” he said, his green eyes glowing with dark emotion.
But she knew she could never again sacrifice the truth for anything. She knew the truth was more important than her life. So she kept talking, even when he cocked the trigger and stood back again, aiming at her mother.
Both her parents were looking at her like they had never seen her before. “Shut her up!” Patrick shouted at Sarah but Sarah shook her head bravely, tears in her eyes. “You have to ten then I shoot your mother,” Patrick snapped, and started counting.
As the words poured out of her mouth, it seemed that the world around Katerina was starting to fade and the sunlight beginning to brighten. It was becoming hard to see her parents’ faces so she turned towards Patrick instead — but that was like looking at a creature in a horror movie, his face distorted with rage. She realized she was having some sort of vision but there was such a sense of urgency on her that she kept talking to the ghosts that were her parents and the dark creature that had been her beloved partner.
“Eight...” he was counting.
“...And He told me I’m his daughter — like He’s adopted me. And I realize now that that’s all that really matters. I am special because I’m His. I never have to earn His love — I just have it already. What I do doesn’t matter that much in the end. What matters most is who I am — and I’m loved because I’m His.”
“Nine...”
She was weeping with fear and sorrow for what might be coming. But she felt God’s reassurance to keep going, felt He was proud of her for it. “And the offer is there for you too. For you Mum, for you Dad...even for you Patrick...”
“Ten,” Patrick said and pulled the trigger. But everything was fading out. She couldn’t see her parents anymore and the sound of the recoil was muffled, like she was in a heavy fog. Then slowly it all cleared, and she was back in the restaurant in Kainnan.
