Summary:
Ok.
Killing is wrong and Skye understood it.
But destroying something horrific like a killing organization is not! And Skye's powers, mainly destructive, can be very useful in certain cases…
Chapter:
Days passed quietly at St. Agnes.
Skye gave a hand wherever it was necessary: the nursery, the orphanage, the cleaning, the cooking, the park and the vegetable gardens around the convent… There was work for everyone!
But for her that wasn't a problem: she always liked working. It kept her mind occupied and she found a lot of pleasure in admiring the results she achieved: a baby just changed and well fed falling asleep in her arms; many pairs of amazed little eyes watching her while she was mimicking a fairy tale; a huge dining hall clean and bright; a good and tasty hot soup; a well kept garden free of weeds, where the vegetables gave a fine show of themselves…
But she was getting restless.
That life was serene, but she wanted more.
All in all, she missed the hyper advanced technology she was used to; she considered a pity not to take advantage of her undeniably above average skills in computer science; she missed the Zephyr One and the Quinjets; she missed the Playground base, Coulson, May, her friends, and her fellows inhumans…
And, although she did everything to drive out that thought, what she missed most of all were two beautiful honey brown eyes that looked at her like she was the sun and the moon, two strong arms that tightened around her, two hands that shamelessly roamed over her, two lips that could do wonders on her, and that baritone voice with which he could tell her words that electrified her deep inside with thrills and quivers…
She was wondering about him… if he was good… if he suffered some consequence after he cured her body…
She reasoned a lot about what happened that last night together and, from the bits and pieces she could remember, when he straddled her and clutched her head in his hands and joined their foreheads together, she could recollect a warm comforting sensations flowing through her whole body, and after that she felt fantastically.
So she understood that he must have used on her some sort of healing power: there wasn't any other explanation.
So, probably, there was something special in him, too… not that she ever doubted about that…
But… could he maybe be an inhuman?
She didn't know…
She couldn't know that he, in fact, was an inhuman; nor she could ever suspect that he had other powerful gifts as extraordinary quickness and strength, telepathy and control on an otherworldly fire… In fact, during the fight between him and Hive, she was detained in a containment module from which she freed herself only when she couldn't feel Hive anymore… so she hadn't any idea of how Ward managed to defeat Hive.
Skye was sitting on the covered windowsill of a large window, when Sister Bertha approached her and sat near her.
"What is bothering you?" the nun asked.
"Nothing!" Skye answered, alarmed. Were her thoughts so manifest?
"Why?"
"Because you have the same face you had shortly before you left us, ten years ago…
There's something that is bothering you, I can tell you that.
You are fidgety, dissatisfied, unfulfilled…
You need something…
Or, better, you need someone."
Skye started feeling uncomfortable.
"No, you're wrong!"
"Am I?
Tell me something about Grant."
Skye blushed violently: she was feeling her cheeks definitely on fire!
"There's nothing to say about him."
"I think there is, instead.
You're in love with him."
"What? No, absolutely!
You are totally, completely wrong!" Skye hastened to assure.
"If I am so wrong, why did you suddenly and violently blush at the mere mention of his name?"
Good question.
"Because he did a lot of things that upset me, in the past. And I hate him!"
"So he affected your life a lot, for good or for bad…"
"Mainly for bad."
"But you also said he saved your life, that you wouldn't be alive, if it wasn't for him…
Is it true?"
"Yeah… it is true."
"I heard him, even if only on the phone.
He loves you.
Deeply.
I felt it in his voice when he talked about you."
"I know.
But I think he will soon stop with this obsession he has about me."
"No, Skye.
If it is love, it doesn't end."
"Please, don't lecture me with this rubbish!
I know a lot of couples who broke up, even if they declared eternal love to each other, before!"
"It happened because their sentiment wasn't real love, but only a vague inclination, or a fancy, or an infatuation, or a passion, or a sex induced obsession, or a lot of other things that the world calls wrongly 'love'.
I repeat: if it is love, it doesn't end.
And there is no greater love than to lay down your life for your friends.
And Grant would have given his life for you, to save you. And you know that.
He actually saved you at his own costs.
He will never stop loving you."
Skye didn't answer. She knew Sister Bertha was right.
The nun continued:
"You don't believe me?
Ask whatever of these mothers if it is possible to stop loving their children!
You will not find any of them saying 'yes'.
Well…
That's love."
"I'm not ready for that." Skye said, avoiding eye contact.
"And that's where the shoe pinches!
Finally! You admitted that!" exulted Sister Bertha!
"What?"
"He loves you.
You love him.
But you are scared.
It's too much, for you.
His love is too much.
And also your love is too much.
The strength of your sentiments for one another scares you, destabilizes you.
He has already accepted them.
You not.
You never felt something for someone so intensely in all your life, so you want to flee, because you are not in control.
But this is the beauty of love: to let its strength conduct you, trusting it, having faith in it!
And I assure you: love never betrays you and you'll never regret to have followed it!"
"And what does a nun know about love?"
"I know because I got married to it.
Remember: God is Love.
And believe me: God knows how to love!
He's probably the only One who knows how to love, and anybody that is really capable of love has Him inside…
Of course I'm not talking about anything physical: love is spiritual, holy, it is a dimension of the soul, but there isn't any physical sensation that can compete with the fire that encloses, that wraps you when you are burned by His love!
Nothing compares to Him."
Skye remained speechless: she wouldn't ever suspect that Sister Bertha was such a passionate person! She was talking as she was madly in love!
The nun continued:
"But don't worry: also the love between a man and a woman can be holy, and you two have a great capacity to love.
If I was you, I would put aside all my doubts and dive in him: what you two have been bestowed with is rare."
Skye couldn't reply: she was at loss of words.
Sister Bertha left her there, to let her meditate… alone…
Skye was feeling as if an earthquake had uprooted all the foundations of her life, as if there was no more land under her feet…
She was lost in those thoughts when she felt a commotion in the huge dining room downstairs.
She ran there and found all the girls around Catherine, in a defensive attitude.
In front of the group of girls there was a man circled by bodyguards.
They were dangerous, Skye immediately perceived it.
They were armed.
They were trained.
They were combatants.
Skye felt all her defensive instinct and all her training arise like a forest of spears.
Sister Bertha was between the two groups, her eyes throwing sparks.
"… you haven't any right to enter here and threaten our girls!" the nun was saying.
She was little, but she didn't show a shred of fear in the face of that group of armed and dangerous men! It was like seeing a kid against a giant, like David against Goliath.
The man at the center replied:
"I have every right in the world, since you have ensnared my daughter and you have dragged her in this filthy hole to allow her to give birth to the fruit of a bad relationship, that I had powerfully opposed!"
"What's growing inside of her is her son, a human being, who has every right to be born and grow, like any other! Like you and like me!" Sister Bertha replied.
"Oh, no! That fetus is not a person. But it will be if we allow him to be born!
We are the arbiters of his life! He does not have any right, now!
Earth is already too full of people!
If we continue like this, soon there won't be enough food for everyone and all humanity will die out!"
"Oh, please!
Stop with all this nonsense!
In U.S. every year are dumped the equivalent of three billion dollars and more of food!"
"This doesn't matter.
The Earth, Gaia, deserves to be worshipped by us! And also protected from us!
We are like a virus, a disease for her.
We are polluting her!"
"I too agree that we are not good caretakers of Creation.
An equilibrium must still be found, and that equilibrium is findable in the alliance between God and humanity!
But this doesn't mean that the Earth is more valuable than humanity!
You cannot consider humanity as a virus!
Is maybe Gaia you idol? Your Goddess?"
"Yeah.
And I am her warrior, who defends her from her enemies!
The newborns."
"If you are so concerned about Gaia, you should be more concerned of the education given to the new generations!
The reason why a lot of people use abortion is that there isn't a good education at the base: rampant immorality; sex easily accessible and offered to everybody, without the need for conquest and effort and without sentiment education; a frightening lack of true values!
This produces disrupted families and straggled sons and daughters, as in your case.
There isn't a good environment to receive the kids, so it is more comfortable to discard them, rather than to strive to improve our lives to be able to accommodate and educate them well, filling their lives with high values, human and divine values, instead of money, false freedom and solitude!"
"All rubbish" he answered.
"So the solution you found is to kill the babies!
You do not realize the monster you've become?"
"I am proud of what I do!
I help a lot of people to be freed from these heavy burdens, unnecessary and harmful" and he gestured to the kids that were around.
"How do you dare to say that?
Are you aware of the slaughtering that is perpetrated nowadays, which had produced more than a billion abortions in less than 30 years?
Adding those to all the children killed with other means, like spiral or abortion pills we reach the unimaginable number of more than 53 million children killed per year!
Worse than the entire Second World War, every year!"
"Yes.
And, over the years, thanks to me and my clinics, more than one million abortions have been achieved!"
At that Sister Bertha remained silent. A heavy, sad silence.
"May the Lord have mercy of your soul.
What will you say to Him when you will die?"
"Nothing.
He doesn't exist.
And there's no life after death."
"Please, leave.
Or I will have to call the police" said decidedly Sister Bertha.
"You don't know who I am, or the power I have.
We will meet again soon: only, you and all of your little bitches will be under a bridge!"
And he and his men left.
Catherine was in tears, the others trying to comfort her. She was saying:
"He wants revenge against this convent because of me!
Do not underestimate his hatred! I know him very well!
He's going to destroy us!
If only I had the power, I would smash all his cursed clinics, I would raze to ground all its horrendous empire!"
Sister Bertha was trying to cheer her up:
"Don't be afraid, Catherine!
God will protect us: I can feel it.
He will not let anything bad happen to us!"
Skye was hearing all of that, horrified.
And suddenly in her mind arose an unhealthy idea…
"So does he worship the Earth?
Ok.
Let's see if the reward Earth is going to give him will be to his liking!"
That day Skye disappeared from the convent, after having greeted, this time, the girls and Sister Bertha.
"Don't worry about that monster. I will take care of him" she said to the nun.
But she didn't give any further explanation to her interrogative stare.
From then on, for a couple of months, the newspapers and the TV news were filled, every few days, with news about localized earthquakes that gradually destroyed all the abortion clinics belonging to Catherine's father, in different cities: Brownsville, Des Moines, Richmond, Scranton, Syracuse, Tomahawk, Atlanta, Topeka, Sonora, Oakley, Fargo, Montrose, Billings, Las Vegas, Barstow, San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Redding.
No one was killed under the rubble, because the strong and destructive shocks were always preceded by several warning shocks, which allowed all staff and patients to run out in time.
At the end of all, when nothing was left to be destroyed, one last news came out in the newspapers: Catherine's father had attempted suicide, but the providential and timely intervention of his daughter, who had recently given birth, had saved his life.
In a hot interview, the former tycoon confessed:
"God wanted to tell me something.
I worshipped the Earth, but the Earth obeys God.
God was not pleased with my work, so the Earth destroyed my empire.
Now I finally figured it out, and now I bow to God's Will.
And I thank Him for the daughter He gave to me."
When Quake read these lines, a smile blossomed on her lips.
Notes:
The locations, the effective existence of the clinics and of their owner is purely imaginary: I just tried to follow the trail of Quake's halts that Coulson had drawn down on a map of the United States, which is visible in one of the last scenes of AOS 3 after the six months time gap.