Niko’s Eye

Chapter 33.

"Hands Up."

Sergio.

While he watched Aisha and Isis go back and forth with words of the heart and words of death, his phone rang.

Aisha immediately shot him a questioning look.

He flipped out his phone and looked at his screen.

Alejandro.

"Its the office," he lied.

And stepping out, he answered, hushed voice and all.

After 20 seconds on his phone call, he told Aisha that there was an emergency at the office and that he needed to attend to.

"I trust you, you can go."

He smiled subtly, "Even if you didn’t trust me, I’d still go."

He forced a kiss on her check and walked out of the mine.

He thought of all the times Aisha would Palmer him with sweet words every time she had a request.

On some, "In your eyes is your humanity, the person you really are. There are times it gets lost, when you wear that suit, when you become the man the world demands of you. But I saw it in your eyes that day in the sunshine, waiting for the crossing to turn green. I saw the love that burns there too, the sort that goes for an eternity. There is something in your spirit that dances when you play, like a fire giving just the right amount of warmth. I have seen it die too, the flames almost extinguished, when you are under the gun of guilt, shame and fear. I know that isn’t you, not the real version, the person I love with everything that is myself. That’s why I had to see your eyes, to see the real you before I left that last time. You had to see me too, the girl who messes up, but would do anything in her power to keep you safe, to keep you emotionally healthy. So when I look at you, I see a cheeky monkey and you see the vulnerable version of me, the one beneath the sister soldier. I need that - to be known - for who I really am too."

You’re trying to kill a girl that you raised for 21 years, I don’t even know what you actually meant whenever you gassed me up.

He could feel Aisha’s eyes burning into the back of his head, but he was past the stage of caring.

When he arrived on scene, Alejandro jumped into his car and he assured him that Isis was okay.

"But tell me, how do you know Isis and what’s the relationship like between the two of you? I’m still so confused. Speaking of confusion, I was a fool to think that confusion was some marker of stupidity, it is not. All dysfunctions evolved for function. Confusion is when fear scatters the higher thoughts to promote the chance of a subconscious solution finding its way through. As such, it is a problem of the environment I am in. Change to a place of loving support and calmness and the confusion goes because logical thought and empathy are now the survival advantage. If the brain believes one has time to think in safety, it will begin to think, to focus. I was so confused about Aisha, but now I understand everything so well. I had to find myself to know that this is not what I want for my life. And, at every level society, from the personal to the international scale, treaties are a falsehood where a power imbalances exist; thus true peace cannot exist, only more and less violent forms of war, and this fact is key to evolving our era. Thus to rid ourselves of the money-nexus, to establish a society run with love as first principle, is a prerequisite of true peace. I’m just so tired of all the blood, the war, and I don’t know where God is in all of this."

Alejandro stared at Sergio, and said, "God is alive. I’m just not sure he has accepted me."

Sergio stared back at him, wide-eyed.

"Alejandro, look at me, you torture yourself over scriptures written a couple of thousand years ago which were then chosen by people, humans, who wanted control, power, money. Much of what they contain is as far from God’s true word as McDonalds is from wholesome soul food. There’s some decent philosophy in there but also more psychosis than the clerics would like to admit. Let’s face it, a lot of it is utter nonsense. So Alejandro, my buddy, it doesn’t matter if you have faith in a God, what matters is that you hold strong a faith in love. God has faith in you. It doesn’t matter if you worship or not. God isn’t a megalomaniac with self-esteem issues. He loves you always, like someone out there does, no maybes. You don’t have to earn love, you never did, it’s your birthright. You try your best to be good, you live a life of love, you are kind and loyal. So don’t fret over what you should or shouldn’t believe, just keep being the most decent chap you can be. Forgive yourself when you make mistakes. Don’t let your past mess up our present and future. By all means strive to be ethical and environmentally friendly, but don’t be afraid to think freely and love strongly, with passion. Do you need any more advice than that. I think you got it yeah? Let’s go and save Isis. And I’m sure the police is there already."

He stepped on the gas and roared down the street.

Isis.

She squirmed around her chair and struggled with the ropes tied behind her back.

She didn’t even know why she was struggling because she had made peace with her death. She didn’t have much to live for.

Or did she?

Maybe I should try to buy time. I feel as if Alejandro could show up any minute now.

Hope.

"Aisha, I think peace came when we learnt that to give is to receive, that love will always show the way to something stable and beautiful. It came when the rich areas built the most amazing housing structures in the poorest areas, installed aquaponics with state of the art renewable energy technology to maintain them. It came when those traumatized populations had a chance to breathe and heal, to regain their culture and rebuild their families. We gave them the material things they needed, yet what we received was so much more - peace. The truth is, you can only identify your friends by the content of their character, by how they love and seek to see the world through the perspectives of the oppressed, poor and hungry. Your friends can have any ethnicity and be from any economic class. So tune out the speech of hate and tune in the stories of tyranny and violence - then follow the development of trauma populations and see them through the lens of compassion. We are born to thrive together as one species and to both listen and see through our hearts. We do not inherit the sins of our fathers, but if we have inherited privilege then it is our duty to help others and remove power dynamics. I am only free when we all are. I only have peace internally and externally when we all do."

What are you talking about Isis?

She felt like a hopeless romantic on the verge of death, quoting every philosopher she could think of, all in one breath.

"What are you talking about Isis?"

"You see, let’s shift our idea of what chaos is, because it shifts how we relate to freedom. For when we do this the arguments of libertarian vs authoritarian fall mute. It is obvious, or should be, that a complex global society needs people with great organisational skills who are deeply humanitarian and committed to fairness and peace to take positions of service. Thus, the greater the ability the deeper the service role they can volunteer for or be asked to consider. This performs the tasks of government without any notion of power, for their only right to perform the task comes from the trust the community places in them. Thus, when we have an improved form of democracy of deeply empathic and analytical intellectuals to service institutes there is real freedom for all. We have all the structures available to thrive and be organised, yet everyone is free to choose their own path in the system, everyone with good food and shelter as a right rather than as a thing to "earn." This is compatible with modern brain science, for when we are free of need our brains become capable of being part of a socially complex society with self control and desiring to follow a passion, to develop the self as an individual and work for the benefit of others. Thus, this is chaos organised so intelligently that the order comes from the best parts of our human nature. In a good environment we are all good, not from external force but internal emotions and needs - that’s when we have a lasting peace and thriving planet. If we imagine what we have now as a triangle, the most powerful at the top and the least at the bottom; this is flipping it over to have most service at the bottom and most vulnerable at the top. And this is done alongside making resource allocation both fair and separate from this system of service roles. We can still have a Queen, her role is to serve and protect, the same comes of other roles - true service, wise "chiefs" without ego, noble and self-sacrificing - real heroes. Ah, the beauty of life. I wish I could’ve met Froyd."

Just as she finished with her charade, she heard a bunch of shouts coming from the entrance of the mine.

"Aisha Kashmira, hands up in the air!"

"In Custody."

Aisha.

There are times bad luck comes, and then you wait to see what the universe and you can make of it, how you can make something good come of something so very awful. Because you can sit there and cry, or take God’s hand and do your best to make something beautiful grow from the ashes of your situation. This isn’t a sign for me to give up now after doing God’s work for so long.

She looked down at Isis and scoffed.

They say a bad parent was a traumatised child, caught in the fires of their own suffering, their thoughts more hurricane than poetry or soul. I guess that’s right. In that exists a road to forgive, a way to see the bigger picture and move on with your own soul intact, head held high. When we see it we can learn to heal, learn to love anew and be a person we approve of in a way that is deep and calm. Then we can become the good parents and start a new cycle that is loving and healthy, plant a good seed in the rotten wood and watch the new spring growth.

But Aisha had never healed. She wasn’t even prepared to abandon herself to the surrender of others. She wasn’t going to go down now. And as far as she knew, she had always gotten rid of every possible little human that she had to take care of, whether they were her own or somebody else’s to raise.

She was afraid.

Afraid the poison inside of her would spread to her children. Isis had been a test drive, and she failed at motherhood. So she never bothered to look for her long lost daughter. All she did was to make sure that she sent her even much further away from her, without any traces coming back to haunt her.

The traditional work of mother’s and women is the glue of society, providing the bed rock of mental health. Thus, in a society run with a financial system and obsessed by financial status, power and vanity, society crumbles. And so, it is not a women’s issue to care properly for women, it is everyone’s issue. If a woman is disadvantaged so are her kids, male and female. If a mother is disadvantaged, so is the father of her children and her parents who may be called upon for support... and her friends if her mental health suffers and she needs to reach out. Supporting women, mothers especially, is the smartest thing we can do as a society, to mend our communities and regain a sense of happiness and solidarity with one another.

She thinks of her daughter and the day she stalked her just to see what she looked like and how much she’d grown.

Watching from a distance, she admired the little girl.

The girl is like a snapshot out of time. I can see her chestnut hair blowing in the spring breeze, her youthful face turned toward the sun. Though her feet are scarred she still dances, dances like the joy of life within her cannot be tamed. In that purple shirt and jeans she could be anyone, no-one. But to me she is the world itself and without her I cannot enjoy a simple flower or the rising sun. There is nothing I wouldn’t do to keep her safe from harm, but I cannot protect her forever. I can only be there when she falls and stand well back while she reaches for the stars. But then she thought, protect her from what when I am the danger?

She remembered how quickly she had started her car, and the thought had never made a permanent visit in her mind again.

That’s why she was so convinced that she wasn’t normal anymore.

Who feels nothing after giving their child away and killing so many innocent people? I don’t care anymore. I cannot afford to care.

All she wanted to do now was to escape. Panic set into her bones as the police force started to rush in all around her.

Don’t panic. Look at their faces. Maybe there is someone that you know here who can help you.

She scanned her eyes across the faces of the officers and through the November mist came a form, five foot nothing and a half, a little round about the middle, and gelled hair that was pulled back into a low pony-tail. From his belt was a standard issue glock and glinting under the low lights of the starry night, was his badge.

Officer Rãmirez.

Isis.

Thank God I was smart enough to buy time. But, where’s Alejandro?

Isis desperately searched through the chaos of the police officers swarming in like bees. She paid no mind to Aisha, because now, the police was here, and they were no doubt going to take her away.

Her mind was fuzzy and filled with everything that had happened to her up till now. She was all alone.

My journey started when I made the tiniest "bug-fix" to the way I think. For the longest time I’d seen things that were wrong and permitted the pre-programmed lazy judgemental attitudes of our era make the response instead of the real me. I started asking my empathic self to weigh in on the matter. I began by asking myself what the real cause was and how the problems could be prevented rather than simply lessening symptoms. The most loving response was surely the right one. After that, I was ready to take action with confidence. And that’s how this incredible life began to unfold... one little thought at a time. That’s how you end up climbing psychological mountains and find yourself living the kind of adventures you never dared to dream could be your own. That’s how you start shaping your era for the better instead of being warped by it. Questioning everything, especially myself, was the smartest thing I ever did.

Her thoughts were happy thoughts in the middle of a cross-fire and she saw nothing wrong with that. She just didn’t understand how Aisha was so full of hate.

We, as a species, eternally confuse complexity with intelligence. They aren’t the same thing. Sometimes intelligent things are simple, like love. Humans need very little to exist - food, water, good shelter and love. Now some might say, "You don’t need love!" Do you know what happens to people who don’t have love? They die. One way or another, they die. We can feel love like a sixth sense. It is not bound by time or space, you can’t weigh it or measure it, but you know it’s there. Love heals, love makes us well. So when we say God is love, we mean it. We can feel it. Why fight so hard against love? I just don’t get it, how can that motivate a person?

I mean, how is it we keep saying that love and compassion are the answers, then letting the politicians fool us into pathways that are obviously neither. There are the small hiccups in living that build us stronger, then there are the calamities that break the brain, the body and spirit, forcing a survivalist and competitive culture that is counter to the messages of faith, of brotherhood, of caring for our global neighbours. Adverse childhood events cause damage to the brain, alter DNA expression and increase deadly illness. Love is love. Fear is fear. Indifference to the suffering of others is the first step into real evil. We owe it to ourselves, to our children and to our creator to see though these illusions of power and money, to learn to see the pain and fear, to ask how love can be our solution, how our faith has been giving us the answer all along.

Some police officers ran towards her and loosened the ropes around her wrists.

Taking her away, she had no intention to look back at Aisha.

I hope she rots in jail. I hope that in that jail cell, the only way for her to know when it is daylight, is by the slim shaft of light that penetrates the air vent on the top. I wish to God that it is a tiny cubicle. I hope that she gets so skinny that she could fit into a regular vent, or a meanly proportioned one. Perhaps someone did make it out one day, I’d like to think so. The only other way out would be the door, thick oak, new and strong. As the technology of yesteryear decays it is replaced by the methods of centuries earlier. Once upon a time, prison was a rehab centre, a place where psychiatrists probed the minds of the deviants. Now it’s just a place to rot. Whatever your "crime" there is only one sentence- life imprisonment without possibility of parole. Rumour has it that once your relatives stop visiting they take you out back for a shallow grave. That’s not even cruel enough for me. I want her dead.

Something inside of Isis had changed.