Chapter 70
I REACHED INTO my backpack and pulled out the sleek, paper-thin laptop I hadn’t consulted since my last visit to the bat cave, when it kept coming up blank on Number 2.
I swiped a fingertip across the glass screen and the ultra-secret Wiki about superpowered psychopathic aliens whirred to life.
“Number 2,” said my father.
The computer obeyed his command and started rapidly shuffling through its mug shots of alien outlaws like the flying-album-cover view on iTunes. Two seconds later, the montage stuttered to a stop on a hideous image of Number 2 in his full demon mode.
Beneath the picture, I now saw tons of information.
Number 2. AKA ABBADON, SATAN, THE PRINCE OF DARKNESS, THE DESTROYER, IBLIS, BEELZEBUB, ANGRA MAINYU…
The Known Aliases list scrolled on for several pages. Apparently, The List had gone from knowing nothing all the way to TMI.
KNOWN PHYSICAL APPEARANCES.
I just skimmed this section, since I had already seen Number 2 shape-shift his way from winged-back demon to a smooth newscaster to the grim reaper. The guy was the great pretender, the great deceiver, and a quick-change artist.
Finally, the screen filled with the information I had been desperate to discover.
When I read it, I sort of wished it was still a blank.
PLANET OF ORIGIN: Alpar Nok.
I looked to my father. “He’s one of us?”
“Yes, Daniel. He commands the same incredible powers that you do.”
“He can use his imagination…”
“… to destroy whatever you can create with yours. He can make you see things that aren’t really there. Think things that aren’t really true.”
I nodded slowly as I mentally cataloged my own incredible superpowers. Not the standard comic book action-hero stuff, like my super speed, X-ray vision, and level-three strength. I didn’t even focus on my ability to rearrange matter and create whatever I could imagine.
No, I was thinking about what my dad had just mentioned: how I can mess with minds. I can make people see things that aren’t really there, and think things that aren’t really true.
So, apparently, could Number 2.
Was my Alpar Nokian cousin playing mind games with me?
Did the Washington Monument really come tumbling down, or was that image just in my head because Abbadon planted it there?
I closed the laptop. There was no need to check out the list of Evil Deeds Done, as my father had already shown me the horrible things the one called the devil had done throughout human history.
My father stood up. “Daniel, you now know all that you will need to know to complete our family’s mission on this planet.”
My head was still spinning. “Number 2 is really one of us?”
“He comes from the same planet, Daniel. But that does not mean he is the same as you and me.”
“But Dad, how do we take down an Alpar Nokian who can match us move for move?”
“That question has not yet been answered. You, Daniel, are the one to answer it. It is your destiny.”
“But you’ll help me, right?”
“No.”
“What?”
“You don’t need my help any longer, Daniel. It’s why my physical presence seemed to fade today. Why you saw me aging into a tired old man.”
A single golden shaft of sunshine somehow beamed its way down through the thick canopy of jungle foliage over our heads and lit up our banyan-tree clearing.
“Yeah, I didn’t want to say anything. I thought maybe you forgot to take your vitamins or something.”
My father smiled. “My mission as your father is complete. My spirit must move on.”
“But you’ll come back, right? Because even if I don’t need you anymore on this mission, we still need to hunt down Number 1 and—”
“No, Daniel. This is our final conversation. I will not be returning to this realm, in body or spirit, ever again.”
Impossible, I thought.
No way could my father be totally abandoning me.
Yes, physically, he died all those years ago back in Kansas. But spiritually, his presence has manifested itself whenever I’ve needed it to.
“That’s just it, Daniel,” he said, having read every one of my jumbled, panicked thoughts. “You don’t need me anymore. You’re ready to live life on your own. You don’t have to imagine me back into existence. Use that energy for something more important.”
“But—”
My father held up a hand to gently silence me. “Before I depart, I want you to know something, son: I’m extremely proud of you.”
I felt a huge lump in my throat.
“After what happened in Kansas, no one would’ve blamed you if you went into hiding for the rest of your life. Instead, you found The List and set out to fulfill your own Alien Hunter destiny. Along the way, you’ve done for complete strangers what no one could ever do for you. I’m so sorry you had to grow up all on your own, Daniel. I truly am. But you know what?”
I managed to get out a faint “What, Dad?”
“You did an amazing job.”
All I could do was choke back my tears as my father’s body seemed to start glowing, like a radiant sheet of gauze.
And then he said his last words: “It has been my honor and privilege, my greatest accomplishment, to have been part of your life.”
That was it. My father became a shaft of golden light and disappeared into the dusty sunbeam illuminating our secluded grove.
In my heart, I knew the truth: he would never be coming back.