Psychological Damage (Gray Spear Society) Read online

  "Almost?"

  "An unknown man and woman protected him. We lost several more monks, and the Child got away."

  Father was silent for a moment. "It seems Satan is playing his usual, sick games. Just when we thought we were done with this madness, he changes the rules. Do we have a description of our new adversaries?"

  "Better than that. The museum is full of security cameras. Our men broke into the security office and examined the video recordings. They extracted several, outstanding pictures. The colors and detail are very satisfactory. One of our spotters also managed to take a few pictures. Copies are being distributed to everybody as we speak."

  Norbert looked at two pictures in his hand. One showed a woman in a green blouse. She had long, reddish blonde hair, which was intricately braided. Her limbs were long, lean, and pale. She was very attractive in a whorish way.

  The other picture showed a tall, very muscular man. He had brown hair and a strong jaw line. His balanced, wide stance marked him as a martial artist. Heavy eyebrows made his brown eyes seem dark. There was a small scar on his neck.

  "We have to destroy the Child," Father said. "Every soul on Earth is depending on us for salvation. The ultimate fate of humanity rests on whether we fail or succeed now."

  "I know, sir. I have men posted on roofs and street corners throughout downtown Chicago. Nobody is resting. We have eyes everywhere."

  "Do you need more men?" Father said. "How many did we lose today?"

  "Thirteen died in the initial battle, and seven more in the later fights. Eight are in the hospital. Twenty-seven were arrested. That leaves ninety-five monks at present. Can you get more? I thought you sent everybody."

  "I'll see what I can do."

  "I hate to be critical, sir," Norbert said, "but your orders were one reason for today's poor outcome. You wanted the Child captured alive. As a result the men held back when they had a chance to kill him. I recommend we shoot the Child on sight next time."

  "Yes, you're right. When you locate the Luciferian Child again, attack with everything you have. Forget taking him alive. That was arrogant foolishness on my part. And if you see this strange man or woman again, follow them. Maybe they'll lead us to the Child. In any case, be extremely careful. We are dealing with Satan's henchmen. They are crafty, skillful, and very observant. We made some terrible mistakes today. Let those be our last."

  "I promise when I call again, sir, it will be with good news."

  Chapter Two

  Aaron heard somebody working the lock of the storage room.

  "Hide!" he hissed.

  He, Marina, and Wesley quietly retreated to the shadows behind the wooden storage crates. They wedged themselves into the narrowest, darkest spots they could find. Marina hovered over Wesley, shielding him with her own body.

  The door opened and two people slipped into the room. Aaron recognized Ethel and Smythe.

  Ethel was a black woman of medium height. Sprinkles of gray salted her black, tightly curled hair. Her stride was quick and confident, the gait of a leader. She wore a loose, gray sweat suit that probably concealed many useful and deadly items.

  Smythe was a little stiffer and slower in his movements. He was a big, beefy man. Ethel made the whole team endure an intense regimen of daily exercise, so all of them were in great shape. He had blue eyes and hair the color of rust. His posture was perfect.

  Aaron stepped out of the shadows. "Any trouble finding us?"

  "No." Ethel shook her head. "Show me the boy."

  Marina brought forth Wesley. Ethel turned on the lights and knelt in front of him. She studied him closely, as if she could read his story on his face.

  He touched her cheek and smiled. "You have pretty eyes."

  "I do?" She raised her eyebrows. "Most people get frightened when they look into my eyes. They see darkness and judgment. They see their own death."

  "God is in your eyes."

  She cocked her head. "That's very strange thing for a little boy to say."

  "He is in my eyes, too," Wesley answered.

  She drew back abruptly. She turned away and stared into space for a moment.

  "What do we know about him?" she asked without looking at anybody.

  "He told me he's been a nomad for as long as he can remember," Aaron said. "His parents were always travelling. No permanent address. No friends. No known family besides his parents. He grew up in truck stops and motels."

  "The mystery deepens," Ethel said.

  "I also got the impression his parents were... are ferocious fighters. Wesley described a few incidents that seemed impressive even by our standards, if we can believe an eight year old."

  She furrowed her brow. "I need to know what's going on. I'll stay here and watch the boy. I want all of you to go to Millennium Park. Sniff around. Talk to the police."

  "Yes, ma'am," Aaron said. "We'll need costumes and false identities. This could turn into a full scale investigation."

  "Call headquarters. Have somebody deliver what you need. There are a lot of cops wandering around so that might be a good cover. Get moving."

  * * *

  After the rest of the team had left the room, Ethel sat on the dusty floor in front of Wesley and crossed her legs. She smiled in an attempt to encourage him.

  "My name is Ethel."

  "I'm Wesley."

  "We have some time together. Do you want to talk about anything?"

  He also sat down. "We could play the word game. I like to do that with my mommy. Sometimes it makes her cry though."

  "How do you play?"

  "I say a word, and you make a sentence out it. Then you say a word, and I have to use it. We tell a story together." His young voice was musical in its purity.

  "Sounds like fun," she said. "You start."

  His incredible, blue eyes fascinated her. She also liked the way his small lips curled so delicately. He had a face that belonged on a movie poster.

  "Lost," he said.

  "The girl lost her doll. Dog."

  "The dog found the doll in the yard. Shoe."

  She smiled. "The dog also found a little shoe for a baby. Chair."

  "The dog looked for the baby," he said, "but the high chair was empty. Heart."

  Her smile became tight. "The baby was in the cradle instead, and its little heart was full of love. Blanket."

  "The baby didn't have a blanket. She was cold. Red."

  "Mommy found a red blanket for the baby. Chocolate."

  "The baby's skin looked like chocolate," he said. "Dead."

  "Huh?" She drew back.

  He leaned forward. "Are you angry?"

  "No. Not at all." She forced a smile.

  "Your hands are shaking."

  She looked down and saw a slight tremor in her fingers. "Oh."

  "Are you angry at babies?"

  "That's silly."

  He stared at her in an unsettling way. The blue color in his eyes seemed as bright and hot as a gas flame. She heard her own heartbeat.

  "My personal feelings are none of your business," she stated flatly. "This is a dumb game."

  "You can't talk about it?"

  "I can talk about anything." She jumped to her feet and started to pace.

  There was a tear on her cheek. She wiped off the unexpected liquid and examined it as if it were an alien artifact. What was happening to her?

  "Then talk," Wesley said.

  She looked into his dazzling eyes. "Why not? I had a baby once," she said slowly at first. "It was very long time ago. I was barely a woman at the time. The father abandoned us before I gave birth. My parents weren't much help. Still, I loved my new daughter. She was a part of me. When she was six weeks old, she died of necrotizing enterocolitis. I didn't have health insurance, so I kept hoping she would get better on her own, but she never did."

  "What happened next?" He stood up and moved close to her.

  "I was mad, of course. It wasn't fair. The poor thing deserved to live. But eventually, I got over it."

>   He shook his head. "No. You're still very mad."

  She wanted to slap the kid's perfect little mouth. He couldn't talk to her that way. She was a senior commander in the Gray Spear Society!

  He put his small hand on her arm. "Who are you mad at? The missing daddy? The doctors? Who do you blame?"

  "I don't blame anybody." She shrugged. "Babies get sick and die. Happens all the time."

  He hit her with that fiery stare again. She felt like she was baking under a heat lamp.

  "Can we play a different game now?"

  "It's an easy question," he said. "Who do you blame?"

  She clenched her fists so hard that they shook. Old feelings were resurfacing, feelings she had thought were dead and buried a very long time ago. All of a sudden she was a teenager again, holding her newborn infant in the hospital. The decades between then and now vanished.

  "Who do you blame?" Wesley asked again in an annoyingly insistent tone.

  His words cut through her thoughts like a flaming sword. No lies, even the ones she told herself, could withstand that heat. He was the voice of truth. Bitter, painful, inescapable truth. Ethel's mental defenses crumbled before the onslaught like a sand castle before a tidal wave. She had no choice but to answer the question honestly.

  "God!" she cried. "I blame God! He took my baby. That's why..."

  He stared at her, relentlessly.

  "That's why I work for Him. So He can apologize to me personally, and I'm still waiting for that apology." The final words were just a whisper.

  She put her face in her hands and cried so hard her entire body shook. Her age meant nothing as the tears trickled down her cheeks. The last time she had wept so openly was when her infant had died.

  He touched her hand. The contact comforted her far more than she had expected.

  After a few minutes the tears finally stopped, and she regained her composure. Her eyes were bleary and her shirt was damp.

  She looked at Wesley with intense interest. "Where were you born? What is your earliest memory?"

  "I remember riding in a car." He shrugged. "I don't know where I was born."

  Ethel stepped away. She needed a moment to think about a situation that was baffling and dangerous. Her mind was still reeling from her emotional catharsis.

  She quickly realized she had no idea what to do. She needed expert advice, and there was only one person she trusted in a situation like this. She opened her phone and typed a number that she very rarely used but would never forget.

  A deep, male voice answered, "Hello?" He was the Legatus Legionis of North America, leader of the Gray Spear Society for the entire continent, and Ethel's boss.

  "This is Ethel."

  "Ethel!" the legate said. "It's been too long since we spoke directly. I always look forward to reading your insightful and pithy status reports. You have such beautiful penmanship."

  "Thank you, sir," she said, "but this isn't a social call."

  "It never is. Proceed."

  "I have an eight year old boy with me named Wesley. A large number of armed men are trying to kill him."

  "Does this have something to do with the 'Mayhem in Millennium Park?'" he asked.

  "You already heard about it?"

  "The whole country is hearing about. The experts are blaming terrorists."

  "I now believe the boy's parents were trying very hard to hide and protect him," she said. "They were successful until today. It's our turn now."

  "Why?"

  "This boy is... special. He just put me through five years of psychotherapy in five minutes. It was one of the most intense experiences of my life. My intuition is telling me he fell into our hands for a reason. His parents weren't ordinary either. They fought like true warriors."

  "Hold on." The legate rustled some papers. "Let me talk to boy. You can listen if you want."

  "Wesley!" she called. "Please come here."

  Wesley walked over. She put the phone into speaker mode so both of them could hear.

  "Are you there, Wesley?" the legate said.

  "Yes," Wesley said. "Who are you?"

  "Just an old man who needs you to answer a couple of simple questions. Could you do that for me?"

  "I'll try."

  "Good. Listen carefully. What is the destiny of man?"

  "To become bigger than himself," Wesley said. "Is that right?"

  "This isn't a test." The legate sounded a little nervous. "No answer is right or wrong. One more question. What is the purpose of evil? Why are some people so bad?"

  "I guess the world would be boring if everybody was good. We wouldn't need real people at all. You could just have robots being nice to each other."

  "That's wonderful! Thanks. Do you mind if I speak with Ethel privately?"

  Ethel turned off the speaker and put the phone against her ear. Wesley wandered off.

  "What was that about?" she said.

  "Those questions were written eight years ago," the legate said, "and that boy gave the appropriate answers."

  A shiver ran down her spine. "Who wrote the questions?"

  "God. Your orders are simple. Protect the boy at all costs. Take him to your headquarters and keep him well hidden. Don't let him out of your sight. I'll get there as quickly as I can."

  "You're coming to Chicago, sir?"

  "Of course," he said. "As fast as possible. Your city is now the most important place on Earth."

  * * *

  Aaron, Marina, and Smythe stood at the southern end of the Millennium Park promenade. They were dressed as cops. They had badges, matching identification, and wallets with appropriate credit cards. Every detail was correct, as usual. Aaron enjoyed the weight of a loaded service pistol on his hip, but that was just one of his weapons. He had four other guns hidden under his police uniform.

  "I hate crowds," Marina said.

  Aaron nodded. "This isn't a crowd. It's a mob."

  It seemed every curiosity seeker in the city had come to share the excitement on this beautiful, spring day. Thousands of them were packed together between the perfectly trimmed rows of trees. Huge, metal sculptures were islands of art in the sea of human bodies.

  "And I thought today was going to be another dull day of training," Smythe said. "Wrong again. What are our objectives?"

  "Find the missing parents," Aaron said. "Determine who was chasing Wesley and why."

  "Do we know what the parents look like?"

  "No. As usual we don't know anything."

  "Hmm," Smythe said. "Then I suggest we start with the scene of the crime."

  "Take the lead."

  Smythe used his bulk to force his way through the sweaty crowd. Aaron brought up the rear, and Marina walked in the gap between the two big men. Their police uniforms helped clear a path, but it was still slow going. Aaron counted six helicopters floating overhead.

  They finally reached the edge of the crime scene. A solid line of police officers was keeping the crowd from contaminating the evidence. Forensic technicians were taking pictures and marking spots with yellow tape. Aaron angled his head for a better look.

  The first thing he noticed was the large red stains on the pavement. It had been one hell of a battle. Some bodies had already been removed, but enough of them remained to show that Wesley's parents were elite fighters. Aaron saw corpses with broken bones, dislocated joints, stab wounds, and bullet holes. The dead were all men in random street clothes.

  "Jeez," Smythe muttered. "What a mess."

  Aaron nodded. "Let's split up and look around. Meet back here in a few minutes."

  They went in three different directions.

  Aaron worked his way towards one of several forensics vans parked on the promenade. He waited patiently until a technician walked by with his hands full of evidence bags. The technician was a short, balding man with glasses.

  "Hey!" Aaron said. "Need a little help carrying that stuff?"

  "Sure," the technician said.

  Aaron grabbed some of the evidence. He als
o pushed bystanders out of the way so the technician could move freely.

  They arrived at the forensics van. The technician opened the door and climbed into the dark interior.

  "Wild day," Aaron said. "Have you ever seen anything like this before?"

  "No. Never. It's like a war zone." The technician started packing evidence into cardboard boxes.

  "I know I shouldn't be asking, but are there any theories? Do we know who did this?"

  "I haven't heard anything. Almost none of the bodies had any identification. The morgue is going to have a lot of John Doe's tonight."

  "Almost?" Aaron said.

  "There was a male and a female who were carrying a lot of identification. The problem is, the names were all different. The guys think they were spies."

  "Maybe it was secret agents fighting each other."

  The technician shrugged. "I don't know. It looked like crazy ninja shit to me. A lot of the bodies were cut up. One guy had a Swiss army knife buried in his eye socket."

  "Do you mind printing out some pictures for me? I can show them around."

  "Sorry. All the photos are staying in the camera until I get back to the station." He patted a large, expensive camera on a work bench. "And you're not a detective."

  Aaron handed over the remaining evidence. "That's OK." He looked up at the sky. "Nice day. It's a shame the way it turned out."

  "Yeah, but at least I'll have a good story to tell."

  "You're right about that. Hold still. You have a bee on your shoulder. I'll get it."

  Aaron climbed into the van. He quickly closed the door and wrapped his arms around the technician's neck. The man struggled, but Aaron was an expert at applying a sleeper hold. Thirty seconds later the technician was unconscious.

  Aaron stuffed evidence bags into his pockets. He grabbed the camera and slipped out of the van, closing the door as left.

  * * *

  Marina visually surveyed the dense crowd like a lion studying a herd of antelope. Her gaze settled on a tall pudgy man in a blue suit. He was standing inside the police line and writing on a pocket notebook. A detective, she thought. Perfect.

  She boldly walked over to him. He looked up from his notebook with a surprised expression.

  "Can I help you?" He stared at her.