Psychological Damage (Gray Spear Society) Read online

  Psychological

  Damage

  Alex Siegel

  Psychological Damage

  All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2011 Alex Siegel

  ISBN: 978-1-105-05397-9

  For information about this book and others in the same series, please visit:

  http://www.grayspearsociety.com/

  Chapter One

  Aaron looked at the massive black and white photograph hanging on the wall. It pictured a woman with a withered, pockmarked face, her coarse hair pulled back. She wore threadbare clothes. Her children surrounded her but their faces were out of the frame.

  It was a very important photograph, displayed prominently in the glittering Modern Wing of the world famous Art Institute of Chicago. A crowd had gathered to admire it.

  He shook his head in dismay.

  Marina walked up to Aaron. "What is that?" she said. "An ugly old woman? She isn't even looking at the camera, and it's all grainy. I'd throw that picture away."

  He turned to her.

  She wore a green blouse that matched her jade colored eyes, and black slacks. Aaron expected her loose sleeves concealed some light weaponry. Her strawberry blond hair was pulled back and braided. The freckles on her nose made her appear mischievous.

  "We're not artists, obviously. I'd much rather look at you." He gave her a quick kiss on the lips.

  Huge windows allowed afternoon sunlight to pour in. Metal grids broke up the light and cast intricate shadows. Tall, white walls added to the feeling of openness. Even though it was a weekday, the gallery was crowded. Clumps of school kids moved under the watchful eyes of teachers. College students studied the art collection and took notes, although Aaron didn't see much pleasure in their expressions. Only the older tourists seemed to actually enjoy the photographs.

  "I'm getting a little hungry," Marina said.

  "Me, too. I think we passed a snack shop."

  "Coffee and muffins? No, I'm in the mood for pizza."

  "I'm sure we can find something in Millennium Park," Aaron said. "Let's go look. It's a beautiful spring day, and we're wasting it indoors."

  A young boy ran into the gallery and froze as he looked around frantically for an escape route. He was terrified and panting. His sky blue eyes refracted the bright light in the room like tiny prisms. His straight, brown hair needed to be brushed. Aaron didn't usually think of males as beautiful, but that was the only word that fit. The boy's face was so perfect it seemed sculpted from pink marble.

  Aaron started to hear police sirens, lots of them, and they were coming from multiple directions.

  The boy tried to leave through another door, but three men blocked his way. They were dressed in mismatched street clothes. One had blue jeans, another wore a flannel shirt, and the third had slacks. It was obvious to Aaron they were trying to appear nondescript. It wasn't working.

  The boy backed away quickly. He tried to go out the way he had come in, but more men in street clothes entered that way. The boy retreated to a corner, his face pale with fear.

  A security guard came forward. She was a black woman who barely fit into her blue uniform. She had just opened her mouth when one of the men charged forward and knocked her out with a nasty uppercut. Aaron winced. He hated watching women get hit.

  The men spread out and advanced on the boy, cutting off all escape routes.

  Aaron had to make a decision. According to the strict rules of the Gray Spear Society, he couldn't intervene. His sworn duty was to fight the enemies of God. The ordinary evil of men didn't fall into his jurisdiction, and he wasn't responsible for the welfare of every child. He was supposed to just watch.

  But he couldn't.

  He moved to the middle of the room. "Stop. Take it easy. What's going on?"

  "Get out of our way!" one of the men said.

  The crowd looked in their direction.

  Aaron shook his head. "Leave the kid alone. He's scared shitless."

  The man stepped forward aggressively, and Aaron showed him how a proper uppercut was done. There was a meaty thump as his fist met the man's jaw. He landed on the floor and lay still.

  The other men pulled up their shirts and reached for guns in holsters.

  Aaron reacted instinctively. He bent his wrists back, releasing mechanisms on his forearms, and a derringer dropped into each hand. The tiny guns held just a single shot apiece, but he made them count. He put a bullet into the foreheads of two men.

  A woman in the crowd screamed.

  The remaining assailants fell down, riddled with bullet holes. Aaron looked over at Marina. She had drawn a Glock 17 semiautomatic with a short suppressor from somewhere, and the barrel was smoking.

  The tourists scattered like blown leaves.

  "Let's get the hell out of here!" Aaron said.

  She nodded towards the boy. "What about him? He could still be in danger."

  Aaron clenched his jaw. They had already broken the rules. There was no excuse for turning a crowded art gallery into a shooting gallery. The Gray Spear Society was first and foremost a covert organization. He couldn't imagine how he would explain this incident to his boss.

  He took a hard look at the boy. The kid's amazing, blue eyes were hypnotic. There was something very odd and special about him.

  "Fine," Aaron said. "We'll get him to safety, but then we're done with him! This kid isn't our responsibility."

  Marina nodded. "OK."

  "Let's go up to the bridge."

  The nearest exit was an elevated pedestrian bridge that would take them across Millennium Park. It offered gorgeous views of the city, but Aaron cared more about the protection it provided from shooters on the ground. The tall, concrete guardrails would stop any bullets.

  He snatched the boy and carried him so they could move faster. Marina took the lead and they ran up a flight of stairs to a second floor balcony. They had to push startled tourists out of the way.

  She stopped at a window that looked out over Millennium Park. Aaron paused to see what had caught her attention. The Pavilion was a great mass of sculpted, gleaming metal designed by Frank Gehry. An elaborate garden occupied most of the Park. Rows of trees provided protection for a great variety of flowers and shrubs, and a water feature cut through the middle.

  However, Marina was staring at the many police cars on the Promenade. Their flashing red and blue lights disoriented Aaron. He could see plenty of dead bodies on the ground behind a police barricade. It looked like the aftermath of an epic battle.

  "Do you know what happened?" Marina asked the boy.

  "Those men attacked my mommy and daddy."

  "Your parents killed all those guys?"

  He nodded.

  "Where are your parents now?" she said.

  "I don't know." He shrugged. "They told me to run away as fast as I could. They said they loved me."

  "Oh." She grimaced.

  "Keep moving." Aaron said.

  They took a glass elevator to an open terrace on the third floor. Two jet engines were placed on the terrace to create an obscure kind of art. A fresh spring breeze made Aaron inhale.

  He spotted a gang of men in street clothes hurrying up the bridge.

  "How many of these fuckers are there?" he asked. Then he looked at the boy. "Sorry about my language. We need to find another way out."

  Marina led the way back down into the depths of the Chicago Art Institute. She seemed to have an idea about where she was going, so Aaron just followed. The boy was getting heavy in his arms.

  They jogged south and passed through the hall of contemporary art. Police officers were showing up, but fortunately, they didn't seem interested in Aaron or Marina. There were plen
ty of other couples with frightened children wandering around.

  Aaron and Marina came to a stairway.

  "If I put you down," he said, "can you keep up with us?"

  "Yes," the boy said. "I'm fast."

  Aaron set the boy on the floor. The three of them jogged down the stairs, turned left, and ran past Asian, ancient Egyptian, and Greek art. Marina barreled through a door marked "Employees Only." After a few more turns they found an exit at street level and ran outside.

  They were standing in a small parking lot behind the museum. Steady traffic rumbled in both directions on Columbus Drive. Across the street a line of tall trees marked the border of Grant Park. The sunshine was pleasantly warm.

  They took a moment to catch their breath.

  "I see the boy!" a man called out.

  Four men came running along the sidewalk. Like the others, they wore mismatched street clothes. One man was talking into a radio attached to his collar. The rest pulled up their shirts and reached for guns. What the hell did this kid do? Aaron wondered. Kill the President?

  He and Marina ducked behind a car for cover. He grabbed the boy and held him close.

  "My gun is out of ammo," Marina said. "Damn! I should've brought extra clips."

  "We didn't know we'd be fighting an army," Aaron said. "This was just supposed to be a quick break from work."

  "I have some knives. I'll circle around. Keep them busy."

  With her head down she sprinted to another car. She was amazingly limber and quick.

  He peeked around the bumper of the car. The four men were walking forward cautiously and spreading out. The held their guns near their bodies in a poor attempt to hide the weapons from the street traffic. Cars drove past continuously.

  Aaron spat at the gun held by the nearest man. As a reward for exemplary service, God had granted Aaron the ability to spit extremely corrosive acid with great accuracy. A blob of yellow material struck the gun and turned immediately into foam. Amid a cloud of greasy smoke, the gun fell to pieces in the man's hand.

  "What in God's name?" he said.

  A different man shot at Aaron's head. Aaron wasn't hit and quickly pulled back. Where is Marina? he wondered.

  "Give us the boy!"

  "Why?" Aaron yelled. "What's going on?"

  "It's none of your business! Surrender now and we'll let you go."

  One car slammed into the back of another on the street. Apparently, the gunshot had distracted at least one driver. Very quickly, a traffic jam began to form.

  Aaron whispered to the boy, "Hide under the car. Don't make a noise."

  The boy crawled under the car.

  "OK!" Aaron called out. "I'll give up! Don't shoot! Just let me walk away."

  He raised his hands high above his head. Slowly, he stood up.

  "Send the boy out!" one of the men yelled.

  Aaron shrugged. "I don't know where he is. He ran off."

  "What?!"

  All four men came forward at once.

  Marina jumped out from behind another car and attacked them. She held a long knife in each hand, and she stabbed two men at once in the back just beneath the lowest rib. The blades were angled upwards to puncture the lungs. Then, she chopped the wrists of both men to knock the guns out of their hands.

  That left one opponent who still had a weapon. She used the body of an injured man as a shield, while the armed man tried to get a clean shot at her.

  Aaron vaulted over the hood of a car. He entered the fray with a flying kick that had enough force to break the neck of his target. It took just a few more punches to finish the fight.

  Aaron and Marina each grabbed a gun off the ground. They ran back to the boy.

  "Come on!" Aaron said.

  The boy crawled out from under the car. They sprinted down the block.

  Aaron heard even more sirens now. It sounds like the entire Chicago police force was on its way. He looked for a good place to hide. Grant Park was on their left but it was too open.

  Going back into the Art Institute was the only option, even if it was a poor one. He noticed an escape window that provided access to the basement level.

  "Stop," he said. "Follow me."

  He hopped down into the window well. A heavy iron screen and a thick lock protected the window. He spat at the bolts that held the screen. After a short time he was able to pull the entire thing off and place it on the ground.

  He quietly opened the window. There was a storage room beyond.

  "Get in!" he whispered.

  Everybody crawled through the opening, and Aaron closed the window.

  The storage room was dark, quiet, and full of wooden crates. He didn't see any security cameras. He made sure the door was locked.

  "We'll stay here for a few minutes," he whispered. "Now, what's going on? What's your name?" He glared.

  The boy cowered a little. "I'm Wesley Teaman."

  "Who are those guys?"

  "I don't know." Wesley shrugged. "I never saw them before."

  "They probably killed your parents," Aaron said, "and they're chasing you now. You must know something!"

  Wesley's eyes widened and tears began to form.

  Marina quickly knelt down and hugged him. "Hey," she said softly. "It's OK. Your parents could still be alive. He doesn't really know." She wiped a tear from his cheek.

  Aaron was shocked by her reaction. He had never seen her being so tender with a child.

  "I'm calling Ethel," he said.

  He moved to the opposite side of the storeroom so that Wesley wouldn't overhear the conversation. Aaron took out his phone and punched in the number of his boss.

  "What is it?" Ethel said. She wasn't a fan of polite chit-chat.

  "We have a complicated situation, ma'am," Aaron said. "We're in the Art Institute, and we have a boy named Wesley Teaman with us."

  "Something is happening in Millennium Park. It's all over the news. Every police radio channel is jammed with emergency calls."

  "I know. Apparently, Wesley's parents engaged and killed a large number of armed assailants. It was a huge fight."

  "Interesting," she said. "Where are these parents now?"

  "Presumed dead. Wesley fled into the Art Institute and found Marina and me. He was pursued by several men. We, uh..."

  "What?"

  "Shot them," he said.

  "In the museum?" she said in an angry tone. "In public?"

  "They drew guns. It was self defense."

  She paused for a long moment. "I'm very upset about this."

  Instead of anger, he heard no emotion at all now. He preferred the anger.

  He grimaced. "I made a snap decision. I'm sorry if it was the wrong one, but there's something really weird about this kid. I couldn't let him die."

  "We're not the police. We don't protect every child we meet. We certainly don't commit mass murder in front of witnesses!"

  "I know, ma'am. Let me finish my report, please. We attempted to leave the Art Institute and ran into another fight with the same group. That encounter also ended in fatalities. Marina, Wesley, and I are hiding in a storage room in the basement of the museum. None of us are injured. There are police everywhere. I assume the people who want Wesley are still searching for him. The kid can't explain why."

  "I see." She took a deep breath. "What can you tell me about these assailants?"

  "They never identified themselves, but I'm sure they aren't the police or federal agents. They wore street clothes and carried guns. There are a lot of them. That's all I know."

  "I just turned on the television. The news is on every channel. They're calling it 'Mayhem in Millennium Park.' At least twenty deaths. What a mess! Spears operations are supposed to be secret."

  "I understand, ma'am," he said. "I'm sorry, again."

  She paused. "Stay where you are. I'll track your phone signal and come to you. In the meantime get whatever information you can out of this kid. And stop killing people!"

  "Yes, ma'am." He closed his phon
e.

  He walked over to Marina. She was sitting on the floor with Wesley in her lap. Her arms were wrapped tightly around him, and her eyes were closed. The boy was crying silently.

  "Marina?" Aaron said.

  She looked up at him with an expression full of sadness. He couldn't believe his eyes. Her ability to hide her true feelings was legendary, and she never revealed any kind of emotional vulnerability. In fact he could think of only one previous time she had shed a genuine tear.

  "Ethel is coming. Are you OK?" Aaron said.

  She sniffed. "I'm fine."

  "Take it easy. He isn't your kid."

  She squeezed her eyes shut and tears trickled down her cheeks. "But his parents..."

  "We could be wrong about them. Maybe they survived." He tenderly put his hand on her shoulder.

  She nodded and kissed Wesley on the cheek. "Let's hope so."

  Aaron's mouth fell open. Who is this boy? What did he do to my girlfriend?

  * * *

  Brother Norbert of the Brotherhood of the Luciferian Child stared at his phone. He had to make a call, but he wasn't looking forward to it. He had very bad news to deliver.

  Procrastinating for a few more seconds, he looked around. He was standing near the "Cloud Gate" sculpture in Millennium Park. Chaos swirled around him like raindrops in a hurricane. Police, firemen, and paramedics were everywhere. Waves of tourists washed back and forth as they tried to see what was happening. News helicopters thundered overhead, flying just a few hundred feet off the ground.

  The sculpture was an island of serenity in the midst of it all. Locals called it "the bean" because it looked like a gigantic jellybean made of pure silver. Norbert saw the skyline of Chicago reflected by its seamless surface.

  He couldn't put it off any longer. He dialed the number.

  A gruff, male voice answered, "Hello?"

  "Father? This is Brother Norbert."

  "Report."

  "The Child's parents are finally dead," Norbert said. "I saw the bodies myself. There is no doubt we secured at least a partial victory today."

  "I don't give a damn about the parents!" Father yelled. "Did you get the Child?"

  Norbert inhaled. "He managed to escape, unfortunately. Many of our men pursued him, and they almost caught him inside the art museum."