Xanthos closed his eyes. This time when he sighed, I felt his sadness. Why do you wish to do as the evil one has done? Don’t bury your thoughts under his vision. Flee from hate, mischief, and—
Wait a second. So far, this Abbadon has totally wiped out New York, Washington, London, Moscow, Beijing, and just about everywhere in between! And you want me to flee?
No, Daniel. I want you to be true to who you are: Create where others destroy. Build up what they tear down.
Fine. I’ll work on that, right after I tear down this Abbadon.
Very well. It is your river to cross, brudda.
Suddenly I had a thought. Is this why The List is so sketchy on Number 2? Did Abbadon destroy all the intel we’d gathered on him during his centuries of troublemaking here on Earth?
Perhaps.
Thanks. That’s really, really helpful. I was being sarcastic. Some advisor you turned out to be.
For your spirit, Daniel. Your soul. We each have our role and must play it as written.
I took a deep breath. Counted to ten, then to twenty. I knew I was letting my anger get the best of me, and when I’m about to lose my temper I can’t create anything, not even those cheap, flavorless globules that cost a quarter in gumball machines.
Truth is, I was mad at the situation, not at Xanthos.
Okay. As my spiritual advisor, what would you suggest I do next?
Xanthos rose up on his sturdy legs. When he whinnied merrily, I knew we were still “bredren”—brothers in unity.
Perhaps dinner with your friends, yah, mon?
What? Number 2 or Abbadon or whatever he calls himself is still out there, still knocking down skyscrapers, and you want me to sit back, relax, and enjoy the flight?
Abbadon has gone underground.
You’re sure?
Do not worry, Daniel. You will face him again. When the time comes.
And when’s that?
Ah, this I do not know. However, the next time you will have no need to hunt Abbadon down. When all is in readiness, he will come for you!
Chapter 41
I DID AS Xanthos advised: I sat down to dinner that night with Mel, Agent Judge, Joe, Emma, Willy, and Dana.
And by “Willy and Dana” I mean Willy-n-Dana, like you’d see carved into the bark of a tree or graffitied on a small-town water tower.
They were sitting side by side, their chairs pushed a little closer together than all the others around the knotty-pine farmhouse table. From the grin on Dana’s face and the giddy bewilderment on Willy’s, I think they might have been playing footsie under the table, too.
As if that weren’t bad enough, I once again noticed the slender white line running from Dana’s eye to her chin. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t make that scar disappear!
Mel reached over to touch my hand. I guess she’d been watching me watching them.
“Is everything okay, Daniel?”
“Hmm?”
“You look like you’re here but your mind is off somewhere else.”
“Yeah, buddy,” said Joe. “You look a little out to lunch, which is too bad, because this dinner is awesome. What do you call this soup, Agent Judge?”
“That’s Kentucky Burgoo,” replied Mel’s dad.
“It’s so thick, I could stand my spoon up in it—if I wasn’t busy using my spoon to eat it. What’s in it?”
“Mixed meat. Beef, lamb, pork, chicken. Tomatoes and celery and a couple of potatoes. Spices and Worcestershire sauce.”
“Don’t worry,” Mel said to Emma. “I made yours and mine with just the vegetables, and none of the chicken or beef stock.”
“I appreciate it,” said Emma. “As do the cows, the lambs, the pigs, and the chickens.”
We all had a chuckle over that.
“Well, don’t blame me, Emma,” said Agent Judge. “It’s my late wife’s recipe.” When he said that, his eyes looked a little sad.
“So, Daniel,” asked Willy, “what did your horse say we should do next?”
I gestured toward the dinner table, laden with plates and serving dishes. “This.”
“You’re kidding,” said Dana. “He told you to eat Kentucky Burgoo?”
“Basically.”
“Best spiritual advisor ever,” proclaimed Joe. “Did he also suggest the Derby pie for dessert? Because it looks amazing. Like a chocolate-walnut candy bar wrapped inside piecrust!”
“He also told me that when the time comes, Abbadon will bring the fight to me.”
“Abba-dabba who?” said Mel.
“Abbadon. That’s the name Number 2’s given himself, so I did a quick Google search on it.” I tapped my head, indicating my built-in Wi-Fi access. “In the Book of Revelation, at the very end of the Bible, Abbadon is described as the king of the bottomless pit and the leader of a legion of beasts with locust wings and scorpion tails.”
Dana put down her spoon. “Like those things that attacked us on the bridge back in D.C.?”
“And probably would’ve torn us all to pieces,” said Emma, “if Mel hadn’t blasted them with those ultrasonic waves.”
Mel shrugged. “I improvised. You guys would’ve done the same thing.”
Dana was looking uncomfortable, so I figured it was time to change the subject. “Agent Judge? I’m a little worried about security. If Abbadon is going to bring the fight to me, he and his troops could come here.”
“Rest easy. My men have set up an impenetrable perimeter around the entire property.”
He gestured toward the matrix of high-tech security screens built into the dining room wall. We could see FBI agents armed with heavy alien weaponry patrolling the white fence line of the horse ranch.
The hulking navy cook came in from the kitchen, sporting a hand blaster strapped on under the strings of his stain-splotched apron. “You guys still have room for dessert, right?” said the chef.
“You bet,” said Joe.
“Always,” added Mel.
“Good,” said the cook. “Because an army marches on its stomach.”
“And retreats on its butt,” said Joe.
We had another laugh and, somehow, everybody at the table, including the cook, who sat down to join us, managed to find just enough room for a slice or two of Derby pie.
Things stayed pretty quiet until Joe scraped the pie plate clean with his fork and the rest of us leaned back in our chairs to digest the feast.
“Was the pie your wife’s recipe, too?” asked Emma.
“Yes,” said Agent Judge softly. “It was.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Emma said to both Agent Judge and Mel.
“Thanks, Emma,” said Mel.
“Did she pass away recently?”
Mel shook her head. “No. A long time ago.”
Agent Judge didn’t say anything right away. Instead, he turned to me. “I guess that’s something else you and Mel have in common.”
“Sir?”
“You both lost your mothers at an early age.”
I nodded, but I wasn’t ready for what he said next.
“And they were both murdered by the same beast.”
“Number 1?”
Mel nodded.
“When he was finished at your house,” she said, “he came to ours.”
Chapter 42
TO MAKE ABSOLUTELY certain Agent Judge and Mel didn’t suffer any more losses because of me and my presence under their roof, I took the gang on an after-dinner stroll around the ranch.
“I love taking a long walk after dinner,” Emma said, drinking in the cool night air. “The sky is so crisp and clear. Look at all those stars.”
“Hey, Daniel, I think I can see your house from here,” Joe said, pointing at a tiny twinkling dot on the eastern horizon.
“It’s so romantic,” Dana said, squeezing Willy’s hand.
Yes, the two of them were still holding hands.
“Not to be a downer, guys,” I said, “but we have work to do. I want to make one hundred percent certain s
ecurity is airtight.”
We came upon two FBI agents on sentry duty.
“Evening, folks,” said one.
“State your business,” said the other.
“I’m Daniel. These are my friends. We’re double-checking Agent Judge’s security setup.”
“We’re locked and loaded,” said the brusque one, brandishing an RJ-57 tritium-charged bazooka powerful enough to drill all the presidents on Mount Rushmore new nostrils. “No one, alien or human, gets in or out without passing a checkpoint.”
“We have teams set up every hundred meters along the fence line,” said the other one, who was toting a high-intensity microwave pistol some alien outlaw must’ve dropped in a firefight with the IOU. “But I have to admit, our air defenses are a little weak. I wish we had more than a standard radar package and the HAWK surface-to-air missile system.”
“I wish we had a big glass dome,” said his gruff partner. “Like in The Simpsons Movie.”
I grinned. I loved that movie—and I thought the bazooka-toting FBI guy’s idea was brilliant! So while he hummed a few bars of “Spider Pig,” I closed my eyes and started thinking about an upside-down teacup four miles wide and about a mile deep. A teacup made out of an impenetrable plastic polymer, thirty feet thick.
When I opened my eyes, the stars in the sky were a little fuzzier, a little blurred around the edges. When I checked the top of the dome, the constellations on the other side looked kind of warped, as if the stars were staring at themselves in a fun-house mirror.
“Willy?”
“Yeah?”
“You want to do the honors?”
“Absolutely.” He turned to the sentry with the microwave ray gun. “Can I borrow your pistol, sir?”
“Huh?”
“I need to test your newly enhanced air defenses.”
The FBI agent, not entirely sure what Willy was talking about, reluctantly handed over his weapon.
“Thanks.” Willy aimed the pistol up over his head and squeezed the trigger.
A microsecond later, an undulating aurora of brilliantly colored light radiated out from the impact point and, for an instant, illuminated the curve of the dome.
“Outstanding,” said the man with the bazooka. “Just like The Simpsons Movie.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Oh, and one more thing: you should probably tell your guards not to venture fifty feet forward from the fence line.”
“How come?”
“Joe?”
Joe bent down, picked up a hefty rock the size of a softball, and chucked it toward the horizon.
When the stone hit the interior lining of the dome, it exploded into a puff of dust. We could all hear a shower of gritty sand particles sprinkling to the ground.
Both FBI guys nodded.
“Gotcha,” said the one.
“Good to know,” said the other.
“Um, Daniel?” said Joe. “Quick question.”
“Fire away.”
“You’ll take down the dome for food deliveries, right?”
“Don’t worry,” I said, “I’ve already stocked the pantry. If we run out of Doritos or Ring Dings, I’ll stock it again.”
Joe let out a huge sigh of relief. “Awesome.”
Chapter 43
“IF ABBADON WAS thinking about bringing the fight to us tonight,” Willy said as we headed back to the farmhouse, “I’m afraid he’ll have to change his plans!”
“Absolutely,” said Emma.
“What kind of name is that, anyway?” asked Dana. “ ‘Abbadon.’ It sounds like he’s some kind of Swedish pop group. Maybe he’s a fan. Probably knows all the words to ‘Mamma Mia.’ ”
“That song has words?” said Joe. “I mean other than ‘mamma’ and ‘mia’?”
“Hey, look,” Willy said, bending down to examine a shadowy clump. “A whole pile of horseshoes.”
“Let’s play!” said Emma. “Come on! We’ve all been so keyed up these last couple of days. We need to blow off a little steam.”
“I agree,” I said. “We deserve a little R and R.”
“Okay, see that weather vane on top of the horse barn?” said Willy, pointing to the moonlit silhouette a half mile away. “The pole holding it up is our target.”
“Me and Willy against you three!” Dana said, scooting over to latch on to Willy’s arm.
“No way,” said Willy.
“What?” said Dana. She sounded kind of like an eighth grader who’d just heard from her girlfriend that her boyfriend had talked to some guy who said that this other guy heard some guy in the locker room say Willy didn’t like Dana anymore.
“Daniel’s too good,” Willy explained. “It should be all four of us against him.”
“Yeah,” Joe and Emma agreed as they sidled up alongside Willy and Dana.
“Fine,” I said with a grin. “Bring it on.”
“Alpar Nokian rules?” asked Willy.
“Definitely.”
“Okay,” said Emma, “that means zero points for leaners.”
“And zero points for being the closest to the pole,” added Joe.
“And, of course,” said Dana, “you have to turn your back to the target and toss the horseshoe over your shoulder.”
“While hopping up and down on your nondominant foot,” added Emma.
We all nodded. On Alpar Nok, instead of horseshoes, the contestants hurled giant metal booties worn by domesticated elephants across great distances at flaming torches planted in the turf. If you knocked out the fire by flinging your bootie straight through the flame, you earned ten points. If you snuffed it out by landing your bootie upside down on top of the flame, you got a Douser, worth fifty points (not to mention first dibs on the deviled eggs).
“We go first!” said Joe.
“Fire away,” I said.
I heard the familiar whir and whistle of wobbly steel flying through the air. It was soon followed by the clank of a spinning horseshoe grabbing hold of a metal rod 30 feet up and 2,640 feet away.
And then, in very rapid succession, I heard that clank three more times.
“Four ringers!” shouted Dana. “How are you going to beat that, Daniel?”
“I’m not sure,” I said, turning my back to the barn, hopping up on my left foot. “Maybe like this?”
I flicked my horseshoe backward, right over the top of my head.
Then I spun around to watch it spiral and soar across the sky until it wrapped itself around the torso of the flying-horse ornament poised on top of the weather vane. The arch of metal hit the horse at extremely high velocity, and it ripped the whole weather vane rig right off the roof, tearing out its anchor bolts and sending it flying. Naturally, this caused all four of my friends’ horseshoes to slide off the support post and clink, one by one, down to the ground below.
“Yes!” I cheered, triumphantly raising my arms to celebrate my spectacular victory.
I was staring straight up at the top of the dome.
Surprisingly, the Milky Way didn’t look smudged or milky.
In fact, all the stars were once again crisp, clear, and sparkling.
It was almost as if, while I was busy ripping the weather vane off the barn, someone had ripped a hole in my impenetrable security shield!
Chapter 44
ABBADON STOOD, SURROUNDED by his minions, in a charred meadow a hundred yards east of the white stockade fence surrounding the FBI agent’s horse farm.
“Foolish boy,” he whispered to the wind. “Did you not see what I did to New York, London, Beijing, Moscow, and the rest? Did you really think your idiotic dome would remain impenetrable? To me?”
He shook his head.
He wondered if this Daniel would ever prove himself the worthy adversary he had been promised.
“Whatever you create, child, I can just as easily destroy!”
He fluttered open his massive set of wings.
“Fly!” he shouted to the pack of warriors he had brought with him to Kentucky. On his command, the aliens cl
ustered in the flattened field once again morphed into inky black bats. Squealing, the swarm took flight and blotted out the starlit sky. They zoomed to the west and shot through the gaping hole Abbadon had so easily punched in Daniel’s protective shield.
Abbadon watched as his minions, using their innate radar systems, swooped under and around the latticework of unseen laser-beam triggers crisscrossing the airspace around the Judges’ farm. Once clear of the alarm grid, the bats skimmed across the open fields, flying inches above the ground, remaining undetected by the humans’ mechanical and, therefore, less-effective radar systems. The flock split in two. One squad rocketed toward the main house while the other zoomed off to the barn.
To deal with that one, thought Abbadon. The interloper.
When the twin sorties reached their targets, the bats zoomed straight up the sides of the buildings. The house squad dive-bombed down the chimneys. The barn squadron simply slipped through the crack between the sliding front doors.
“We’re in,” both leaders reported back.
“Excellent,” said Abbadon. “Complete your missions.”
“Yes, Master,” the leaders grunted.
“And remember, do not hurt the girl. Ferry her down below.”
“What about Xanthos?” asked the leader in the barn.
“Eliminate him,” Abbadon replied easily. “He has been giving Daniel an unfair advantage.”
Chapter 45
I CAN OUTRUN hummingbirds and Japanese bullet trains. My personal best speed used to be 438 mph. Nobody was clocking me on this particular night, but I think I topped that as I shot across the half mile of open field to the farmhouse. My sonic boom shattered a couple of windows in Agent Judge’s antique pickup truck.
I had seen a swarm of scuzzy bats plunge down the chimney pipes and knew, instantly, what was going on: Number 2 was sending in his creeps from the cave. They’d morph out of their flying mammal mode and switch back into their hideous alien selves the instant they were inside.
But why? What did they want in the house?
I was out in the yard. My face was the one on the WANTED poster. I was the Alien Hunter with an unbelievably hefty bounty on his head.