Kate


 * "Abstractheart" redirects here. For the video, see Abstract Heart. "Genevieve" also redirects here. For the video, see Genevieve (video).

Genevieve "Gen" Strathcarron (better known as Kate) was the main character of the KateModern series. She was a 23-year-old university student who was studying art, and said that she signed up for Bebo to showcase her art. She wanted to fit in with her friends and had problems with her mother. She lived in an East London flat with her friend Charlie. She is seduced by the life of fame and art offered to her by Michelle Clore, who was later revealed to be an Elder of the Order. After spending several months traveling abroad, she returns to London after she shown footage of Michelle Clore planning to have her undergo the Ceremony. She flees onto the streets of London with a list of trait positive girls stolen from the Order, and is later murdered when they try and get it back.

Background
Genevieve began her life as a trait positive girl in a lab maintained by the Order. Among her doctors was Hazel Strathcarron, who developed a special fondness for the girl. After learning of the tests and experiments which Genevieve would undergo for the remainder of her life, Hazel smuggled her out of the lab by setting a fire causing a distraction and then raised Kate as her own daughter.

As she grew, Genevieve wished to know more of the world, and ran away from home to London. Due to the fact that she was a high-priority target for the Order, she decided to change her name and family history.

Friendly Lies?
"Kate" is actually an alias that she made up when she met Charlie. When Kate was a child she had awful night terrors. Eventually they went away, but recently, they started coming back. She went to see her doctor, who did a blood test, which revealed that Kate's blood was "abnormal." She went to see a specialist, but ended up losing her memory of the entire event. She tried to seek help, and found Steve.

Steve took Kate back to the office where she had been treated by the specialist, only for Kate to find that the specialist was murdered. It was widely assumed that Steve had something to do with this. Eventually, it came to light that he was actually trying to help Kate and things started to look up.

Soon though, Kate realized that the specialist was not, in fact, dead, and that the "police officer" who had told her so was the specialist's son, Dudley. Dudley sent Kate a message saying that he and his father would like a chance to explain what happened. Kate and Charlie went with Dudley, to a location in the middle of nowhere to hear what he had to say. Tariq, Kate's boyfriend, tried to join them, but Kate refused to let him come. Because of this, Tariq ended their relationship. Meanwhile, Kate met up with Dr. William Griffin, who told her that his "experiments with the trait positive girls showed that they had something more than the longevity that we believe provides the power for the Order." This freaked Kate out a great deal and made her very angry at Dudley and Dr. Griffin.

In spite of all of this negativity, Kate received some great news -- her art was going to be featured in the gallery of one of Kate's favorite artists, Michelle Clore. Kate was very excited to attend, but things turned sour when a man fired a shot and exclaimed, "We will bring down the Order!!" Michelle tried to thank Kate for saving her life, and took a hold of her hands. Kate jerked her hands back quickly, as though she was burned, and ran from the art gallery in terror.

After a short vacation in Devon with Charlie, Kate met with Michelle Clore on October 1st. It is unknown what Michelle Clore told her, but Kate was visibly upset during their meeting and Kate's behavior changed dramatically afterwards. Kate assaulted Charlie and willingly got into a van with a man in a dark suit and sunglasses.

In the Order
After a three week absence, Kate returned dressed in black clothes and sunglasses, similar to other members of the Order. She explained that she was studying art with Michelle Clore although this is most likely not the truth. The next day, she visited Tariq and revealed that her real name is Genevieve.

Kate came home one day to find Dudley beating Charlie when she wouldn't give him the Trait Negative serum he was after. Kate became furious at seeing her friend abused and proceeded to shove Dudley off of Charlie. However, she pushed him a bit too hard, and he ended up falling out of the window to his death. An upset Dr. William Griffin fled from the scene, only to be chased by Kate, who demanded to know why he and his son wouldn't just leave her (and Charlie) alone. Dr. Griffin replied that the Order is evil and must be destroyed.

Realizing that these people would never leave her friend alone if she remained trait positive, Charlie injected Kate with the serum. Doing so, made her trait negative, thereby negating her desirability to the Order, the Griffins, and the Hymn of One. However, it does not appear that this was what Kate wanted, as she started to cry, offered a cryptic apology, and ran off.

Since Kate is the same "trait-positive" as the girls in the Lonelygirl15 series, it is unlikely that she is "trait-negative" after just one injection. She was with Michelle Clore and The Order for almost a two-month period where she was never heard from.

It was revealed in Coming Home for Xmas that Michelle duped Kate into believing that Kate was an Elder whose memory was erased. In actuality, Michelle was keeping an eye on Kate to make sure her trait positive levels became normal again. This implies that Kate was being prepared for the Ceremony. Once Kate found out, she ran off with a list of genetically altered trait positives and lived on the streets. Kate's friends believed that Kate defected back to Michelle, but Michelle admitted that she had a team trying to track down Kate and did not know her whereabouts.

Charlie and Steve, with Patricia's help, eventually locate Kate, who pretends to go with them willingly, but makes a break for it when she tells them that she has to go to the bathroom. Kate has since posted a vlog, stating that she has found her purpose in life- to save the genetically engineered trait positives that Dr. Griffin created.

After her death
On January 13th, 2008, Kate was stabbed to death on Brick Lane by a then unknown assailant. At the scene a Hymn of One symbol was painted in her blood, as the culprit attempted to perform some sort of religious ritual. At the news of her death, Charlie returned to London, and hosted a memorial service which turns sour as the situation morphs into a case of whodunit.

The Suspects in her murder included:
 * Steve: The police arrested Steve right after her murder, but was released soon after. Some people thought Steve might have killed Kate because she was going to reveal Hymn of One secrets that she'd found out during her time with Michelle Clore. (Or even because she once knocked him out with a frying pan). In the course of the investigation, Steve reveals that he had fallen in love with Kate.
 * Rupert Van Helden: He is the author of the book Finding the One, who was in the country at the time of Kate's murder. There were also rumors going around that he's into this new Hymn of One-Order-life-extending ritual that involves drinking the blood of trait positive girls. But he showed that those were just rumors started by the FTO, who turned out to be just a couple of geeks that were related to Dudley and the specialist who wanted to make the Hymn of One look bad.
 * Michelle Clore: She claims that she and her Shadows were on Adak Island at the time of the murder, and says there is footage proving it. However, she had a lot to lose from Kate revealing her secrets and a lot to gain from getting her hands on the list of trait positive girls. She also shifts the focus off of herself by implicating Steve. The level of involvement Michelle Clore had in Kate's death remains unknown.
 * Gavin: Gavin always seemed to have it in for Kate, and reveled in any chance he got to make her miserable, as she made his life much more complicated that it already was. Gavin was released from prison for an assault on the Hymn of One London Centre after the Hymn of One decided not to press charges, suggesting that he may have gotten rid of Kate in exchange for his freedom. At her funeral though, he says that although he and Kate never got along, he never wanted her dead.
 * Tariq: While Gavin was in prison, Tariq went MIA after the assault on the Hymn of One London Centre. He surfaced at Kate's Memorial Service and accused Steve of murdering Kate. He has since calmed down, but his constant fighting with Steve made it difficult for the investigation into her death to move forward. He also has a history of violent behavior, not leaving murder outside the realm of possibility. He arose more suspicions when he decided to go to India to escape the madness that followed him around in London, supposedly never to return.
 * Tim: He was Kate's ex-boyfriend who was mentioned a few times at the beginning of the series. Footage surfaced that indicated that Tim had a violent side, and that he stalked Kate when she tried to break up with him, leading her to call the police. However, when Charlie finds him and confronts him, he seems genuinely shocked to learn that Kate has died, convincing Charlie that he didn't kill Kate, though Sophie advocates that if you're capable of murder, you probably can hide it well.

As the investigation continued, Charlie began receiving missed calls from a mysterious person, who she later discovered was using Kate's phone. When she at last manages to pick up the phone on time, she is greeted with the audio of Kate being murdered. Upset greatly, she swears that when she finds the one responsible, she will do worse to him or her than was done to Kate.

During the Precious Blood Event, Kate's killer was revealed to be none other than Terrence, who had been passing himself off as a member of the Hymn of One in order to connect with Steve and attempt to frame him in Kate's Murder. After he led the assault on the Hymn of One London Centre on New Years to try to get Gavin and Tariq's software back, he was kept out of jail by the Order in exchange for his services. As part of his initiation into the organization, he was sent to find and return Kate and the List, but she resisted and he ended up killing her. Anxious because he had spilled trait positive blood, he attempted to correct his mistake by performing a Hymn of One ritual he had heard of, but later learned that there was no substance to the Hymn of One's teachings.

Kate's friends, both in real life and online, continue to work against the Order in order to avenge her death.

Etymology
Kate is a diminutive of Katherine. It has been used since the Middle Ages. This was the name of the woman who Petruchio marries and tries to tame in Shakespeare's comedy 'Taming of the Shrew' (1593). Kate's real name, Genevieve, is the English form of Geneviève, which comes from Genovefa, a Gaulish name possibly meaning "tribe woman". Saint Geneviève, the patron saint of Paris, inspired the city to resist the Huns in the 5th century.

Meta
When asked why Kate was killed off, co-executive producer Joanna Shields said, "We did actually, because the audience didn’t fancy her. We constantly take the pulse of the network about how they feel about a particular thing."