Moving the panel he saw tied folders within, eight in all, the secrets of monsters. Pulling them out one by one, he studiously peeled back the pages of the folders and committed the photos and histories of those within to memory.
Even at the age of six, he vowed that he would never forget their faces.
CHAPTER TWO
Monsignor Dom Giammacio was the Vatican’s counselor for clerics who wallowed in the self-doubt of their waning faith. Most often they went to him to reaffirm their own ‘unconscionable’ belief that questioning the existence of God was not a fatal sin. And perhaps with some pro-pious readjustment could fall back into His Fatherly graces. In the monsignor’s point of view, if they feared Him on some level, even in their queried state of mind, then it could be logically stated that they at least believed Him to some degree. After all, why fear something that did not exist?
But today was marginally different, as was every Monday at this time.
In front of the monsignor sat an obtrusively large man who fiercely raked the cleric with cerulean blue eyes whenever the priest attempted to open a dialogue with him, the man always an unwilling participant in the course of such examinations. But at the direction of the pontiff, the man appealed to the wishes of His Holiness by addressing underlying issues regarding his constantly warring subconscious.
He was large and tall, with a wide expanse of shoulder and chest. His massive anatomical design was even more pronounced by the tight fit of the cleric’s shirt he wore, the cloth stretched to its limit. And though he wore the Roman Catholic collar as a symbol of his faith, he struggled at the core of his divine devotion.
Unlike others, he was not a priest or a cleric or a man of pious nature, but a Vatican Knight in the service of the pope who was delegated to preserve the interests of the Holy Roman Church. When necessary, he and his elite force of commandos would perform black op missions selected by the pontiff and six of his most trusted and ascribed cardinals known as the Society of Seven. Outside the ‘Society,’ the monsignor was one of few beyond the circle who knew of their existence and thusly informed to keep matters confidential. Not only were the Vatican Knights to remain a secretive conclave of elite commandos in service to the Church, they were to remain so exclusive that they could not even be considered as mythology. Never will the Vatican Knights be made public, since their efforts to achieve the means were sometimes less than charitable. War, after all, possessed a dark side.
Quietly lighting a cigarette, the monsignor let it burn in the ashtray as a lazy ribbon of smoke drifted into the air. After tenting his fingers and easing back into his seat, he turned to Kimball Hayden who sat opposite him. The glower he received from the Vatican Knight was quite communicable: Let’s get this damn thing over with. The sentiment in the man’s expression was quite explicit in that he did not want to be here holding psychological counsel. But neither man had a choice, due to the appeal from the pope.
For a moment they stared at each other waiting for the other to start the session. But over time it had become a battle of wills with the monsignor always giving in. It was a game he never won.
“Let’s begin, Mr. Hayden, shall we?”
Kimball sat there appraising the little man with the bad comb-over, which never failed to bring a preamble of a pretentious smirk to Kimball’s lips.
“Mr. Hayden—”
“Kimball,” he said. “I want you to call me Kimball.” He really didn’t, but it was a power play on his part to establish authority.
“All right, Kimball. If that’s what you want.”
He arched an eyebrow. “It’s what I want.”
The monsignor let the cigarette smolder in the ashtray, his tented hands holding steady as their standoff drew an unwavering bead between them.
“And how would you like to start off with today’s session?” asked the monsignor.
“Like I do at the beginning of every session,” he stated. “By saying, I find this a huge waste of my time.”
“Then why don’t you tell that to the pope? Or do you lack the courage?”
Kimball eased back into his chair, impressed that the monsignor had challenged him. For the moment the Knight conceded. “Please accept my apology, Monsignor. I guess you don’t want to be here anymore than I do,” he answered.
“It’s not a matter of what I want,” he returned. “It’s a matter of you finding what it is you seek, which is the truth of faith versus fate… You’re no different from anybody else who walks through my door.”
Kimball closed his eyes in resignation, his once obstinate will bleeding off by the inches, a promising sign to the monsignor.
So the cleric led the Knight into conversation. “Several months ago you aided in a mission to save the pope’s life, yes?”
Kimball opened his eyes, nodded.
“And in the process of engagement with opposing forces you had to kill, yes?”
Another nod — a small tilt of his chin in affirmation.
The monsignor leaned closer. “So now you’re in conflict with yourself because what you did is inconsistent with Church doctrine regarding the killing of another, yes?”
Kimble hesitated.
“And now you are afraid that what you did for your government so many years ago as an assassin and what you do now for the Church, bears no difference and that the Lord has already condemned you with no chance for salvation, yes?”
A nerve had been struck. Kimball’s line of sight made a slow and downward trajectory to the floor.
The monsignor grabbed the burning cigarette and wedged it between his fingers, the smoke rising in tight, corkscrewing trails. “I know you seek salvation for past actions,” he told him. “And I know the redemption you seek seems impossible to obtain with your current actions contradictory to what the Church calls for, which is to be the salvation for others when, for this to happen, you sometimes have to kill so that others may live. Therefore, in your mind’s eye, if you go on killing, then how is it possible for you to gain deliverance and passage into Heaven? Are these not the questions?”
The monsignor hit another mark in Hayden’s view.
“Are these not the questions?” he repeated.
Kimball nodded.
“Then why do you do it?”
Kimball sat in reflection as his eyes took on a detached gaze and stared at an imaginary point beyond the cleric, his mind clearly focusing on a mental illustration of something past. “I’m sure what I’m about to say you probably already know, since I’m sure you read my file. But I’m going to tell you anyway.” There was a brief hesitation, his focus turning back to the reality of the moment with cerulean blue eyes so clear it enabled the monsignor to see secrets in their depths. What he saw was the constant warring between solemn regret and subdued rage, one emotion trying to best the other.
“Several years ago,” Kimball said with sorrowful inflection, “while on a covert mission for the United States government, I was dispatched to Iraq to eradicate a top official within the Iraqi government…”
The monsignor didn’t press him. He simply waited for Kimball to choose his moment.
And for that moment Kimball seemed to have difficulty trying to articulate his thoughts to words, but ultimately continued, his eyes moving toward the ceiling as if his memories were somehow scribed there in text, a written aid to refer upon. “While in Iraq I came upon two young boys herding goats,” he said. “And they saw me… So I took the only available action to keep them from compromising my position.”
“So you killed them.” This was not a question, but a confirmation of what the monsignor already knew.