A Daniel X Fanfic

by Sakura Martinez

Author's Notes:

So, here's an update for this fan fiction. I'm not sure if I mentioned it beforehand but this fanfic is a little bit different from the previous Daniel X fanfics that I have written as it has a bit more darker tone than usual.

Anyways, I hope you guys enjoy this chapter and don't forget to review! :)

Disclaimer:

I do not own Daniel X, or the characters in that story. James Patterson own the rights for them. What I do own is the idea for the fanfic and this fanfic itself.

Summary:

The final battle has begun and it begun with the loss of a life. Daniel, with Khadagh's knowledge and power, and with the rest of the drang must do everything in their power to put an end to the number one alien on The List before everyone that they care about is lost and before The Prayer puts his evil schemes into action. The battle for the universe and between good and evil culminates as The Prayer finally figures out a way to defeat, and ultimately kill, our hero. The road is tough, but Daniel and his drang are ready.

Daniel X: Armageddon

Chapter One

Calling Card

There are a couple of things that makes being an Alien Hunter harder than most jobs that were galactically available. Of course, some of those things are obvious, like having a much shorter life span than an average worker, having legions of alien outlaws wanting your head served on a platter, and having a peaceful days as gifts that you'd come to cherish for they are fleeting and seldom last.

During that Sunday evening, as the flare with Windsor and Graciella's energy signature burned bright on the sky, Emma and Willy were both caught in between doing what their duty as Alien Hunters and protectors of Terra Firma and their duty as son and daughter.

I could see the battle that was going on inside them as they stared at the flare, Emma, forgetting for the moment the wounded human that she was supposed to heal ad Willy, clenching his fists, his eyes filled with worry. I felt the same worry as they did, but maybe not in the same magnitude. Ever since we had been reunited, Windsor and Graciella had acted as capable guardians to me—an extended family, though that was nothing new.

I looked over at my other companions—my drang—and saw that they too wanted to know what was going on. Windsor and Graciella shouldn't be on Terra Firma, not even close to the Milky Way Galaxy, but there was no mistaking the flares.

Dana looked over at me, she didn't need to say anything for me to understand what she was trying to convey. She wanted to know what I planned to do.

It wasn't such a hard decision to make.

I turned towards Emma and Willy, and said, "You guys be careful."

That caused them to look at me with surprise and question.

"What?" Emma asked.

I nodded to where the flare burned, "Your parents might need your help."

It quickly dawned on them after that what I was asking them to do. It was a call that I was sure was the right call to make, although they did look at me like I was crazy.

"W-We can't do that," Willy said, even though I could see the desire in his eyes: the desire to run as fast as he could to where his parents might be. "You need us here. You need Emma and her healing powers."

That was true. I needed them there. There was a lot of wounded and Emma had only managed to help a few of them, a lot more remained. But, I had made my decision. I clapped my hands together and summoned a copy of them—the Emma and Willy that had been with me for most of my adventures, until recently.

"Leave things here to us," The other Willy said, a grim look on his face.

"We can take care of things here," Nodded the other Emma. "I might not be as adept to healing as you are, but I can tap into Daniel's powers to heal them."

That was true. It was something we accidentally learned on one of our sweep missions. My created versions of my drang could tap into the original's powers, but only if I shared my energy reserves with them. It was quite useful but, at the same time, draining. The amount of energy and concentration they used when performing such feats were humungous and it left me drained after a while.

Emma looked at Willy who looked back at her for a moment before they both looked at me, silently questioning if I was sure. I was. When they saw that, they both nodded and began to run at full-speed to where the flare pointed their parents were, but not before both of them whispered a shaky breath of thanks to me. I nodded. They didn't need to thank me. I know, more than anyone else, the importance of family.

"I hope they're doing okay," Dana said as she wiped the sweat that was forming on her brow, leaving a trail of soot and dirt on her forehead. "and that they found Uncle Windsor and Aunt Graciella."

I would have teased her with how disheveled she looked, but the air was thick and heavy and it felt wrong to make light of anything at the moment. So, I merely clapped my hands and created a towel, handing it to her. She thanked me before she used it.

"Yeah," was the only thing I could say.

My head was churning with all sorts of thoughts as to why a flare with their signatures on it would suddenly lit up the sky. All the reasoning I came up with seemed wrong, disturbing, and at times crazy. None of them fit, and the ones that did, did nothing to calm me. Twice the other Emma and Willy faded and twice had I needed to clap them back to existence. Both times they shot me a look that I knew too well, a look that told me to hold it together and stop worrying about things that I couldn't help.

"You really need to focus, Daniel," Joe said, the second time that it happened. "Emma and Willy phasing in and out of existence doesn't help make things faster for us."

"Yeah, I know," I said as I lifted a truck's wheel out of the way to pull the driver whose foot was buried under it. "I can't help thinking about the worse things, though. I keep asking, what if something bad happened to them?"

"You should know that Uncle Windsor and Aunt Graciella are stronger than we sometimes give them credit for," Dana said, even though the way she said it, she sounded as if she wasn't sure she could believe her own words. "I'm sure they're fine. It might be a technical glitch from the house, something must've set the flare to fire."

I had thought of that possibility. The house—our house—was over at that direction and, although that was possible, it was also hard to believe that it would coincide with whatever had happened to flip all the cars and vehicles and wound all those people around us.

"But, if it's not..." I said in barely a whisper, "I can't help but think that if something happens to them, it would be my fault. I asked for their help."

"Don't go there, Daniel," Dana said, pausing from her work of lifting stuff with her powers, "Don't go down that trail of thought."

She didn't have to worry about me going down that trail of thought after that, though, as hordes of aliens who looked like a cross of scarab beetles and grasshoppers suddenly jumped at us. You didn't need to be a genius to figure out who they worked for or what they wanted as they rushed towards us with their pincers gleaming like swords ready to amputate and decapitate anything in their path.

We were quick to respond to their sudden appearance and their attack.

Dana created a force field that shielded the humans from harm. I was thankful that they were incapacitated, otherwise, Dana would have had needed to use her powers on more than just protecting the civilians, she would have made sure that they wouldn't be able to see what was really happening and that would have taken quite a toll on her, after all that she had been through.

Joe was also quick to use his Symbiote computer to summon drones that attacked the incoming horde with laser beams and small—yet effective and highly dangerous—short-range missiles that made quick work with the first wave of the attack. The drones, which were small pods with a singular, circular light in the middle for eyes, were pretty useful in a fight where we are outnumbered, which, of course, wasn't a rare occurrence.

Emma and Willy, although not as strong as their original counterparts could have been under the fight, were also useful, though they seem to have forgotten where their energy for using their powers came from as they let out a barrage after barrage of attacks ranging from the trees suddenly lashing out at the bug-like aliens (courtesy of Emma) to volleys upon volleys of explosives that could have woken up the unconscious humans (courtesy of Willy).

I, on the other hand, had to use a less flashy way of dealing with our enemies since Emma and Willy were both using my energy reserves and straining my concentration. I had to depend on the help of two of the largest Elephants, both of which were wearing the thickest armor I could come up with, to trample the bugs, squishing them under their giant hooves. It wasn't the most sophisticated way to deal with them, sure, but no one could argue that my Elephants weren't the coolest part of arsenal after they did quick work of the remaining enemies.

Seeing how my pair of African Elephants wreaked the kind of havoc I enjoyed seeing—the kind in which The Prayer's forces were being decimated—I couldn't help but grinning amidst the fatigue that I was feeling.

That'll show them not to mess with us, I couldn't help but think as the last of the alien mercenaries were destroyed.

"I guess we don't need to figure out where they came from and who sent them," Joe said as he dusted himself, although that didn't actually help much on his appearance as dirt and grime was still visible on his clothes.

"Or why they're here," added Dana who lowered the force fields surrounding the humans. I could see that she had wanted to fight during the battle, but was happy that she didn't try to overdo things, doing two tasks at once. She was already under a lot of strain as I was.

"But, if they're here that would mean that—" I was saying, but was cut off when Joe's Symbiote suddenly started beeping, a message was being transmitted to his Symbiote.

Joe didn't waste any time on accepting the message and opening the communication channel. As Dana and I crowded around him, Emma and Willy—the ones that were my creation—chose not to join in and, instead, went back to the work that was interrupted when the mercenaries attacked.

When the communication channel was opened and the transmission lines connected fully, Emma and Willy's faces appeared on the screen, behind them was a burning wreckage of some sort. Their faces were masked by something I couldn't quite pinpoint at that moment as my attention were not on what was burning behind them, but on the wounds that were clearly visible (with Joe's Symbiote transmitting with HD resoluton and all) on their faces, their necks and their arms.

"Are you guys alright?" Dana couldn't help asking as soon as she saw Emma and Willy.

"We're...fine," Willy replied on behalf of himself and his sister. "We got ambushed but, apart from a couple of bruises here and there, we're fine."

"That's good," Dana sighed in relief. Joe and I did, too, but not as audible as she did.

"We got our fair share of the attack, too." Joe informed the siblings. "For a group of mercenaries, they weren't as tough as you'd thought they'd be. Not that I was hoping they were. I'm actually glad they weren't."

"Yeah," was all Willy could say.

That one-worded response to what he could have answered with a long tirade on how he wanted to fight more and show-off his incredible skills was enough to tell me and the others that something was wrong. The slight trembling of Emma's lips was an added bonus, clearly signifying that, not only was something wrong, but something was terribly wrong.

What Willy said in a hoarse voice, a trembling voice, made it feel as though I just swallowed lead.

"Mom and dad are dead."

The fire on the video, we learned when we got to the site, was from the wreckage caused by Windsor and Graciella's ship crashing into our house, leaving nothing left in their wake except from debris, debris, and more debris and a crater formed from the impact.

Windsor and Graciella, however, did not die from the crash. Not if the large, gaping holes on their body were any indication of how they truly died and the way their bodies were splayed a couple of feet away from the crash site.

The anger that flowed out of Willy, mixed with the sadness and lost, was palpable. The tears that flowed out of Emma's eyes were like a rushing waterfall as she clung at Dana who tried to sooth our distraught friend with Joe rubbing her back. All of them felt the same lost and sadness, the same hatred and need for vengeance.

All I could feel, however, was numbness.

I couldn't get the image of Windsor and Graciella's lifeless bodies out of my mind, and I didn't think I ever would get it out. It was seared there, like the image of the dead bodies of my parents. Everything about that scene was a calling card from The Prayer. Everything, with the exception of where the bodies were found, were similar to that of my parents. The way Windsor lay on top of his wife, in a protective gesture, in hopes that she would survive, and the way nothing was left on their chest except that large hole. The fire. The smell of burning flesh. The destruction all around me. It gave me a tunnel vision to the past. It reminded me of how my parents had died and who had killed them.

I felt the emotions gripping at my heart as I kept repeating that thought that the deaths of Willy and Emma's parents were a calling card from The Prayer made me clench my fist and my teeth. This wasn't a message to Willy and Emma. I was certain it wasn't. It was a message for me. A message that The Prayer will keep on coming after those I cared for, those I love, until none but me are left, and only then will he try to kill me.

I looked back at my drang and caught Dana looking at me. We held each other's gaze for as long as we could before she turned her attention back at Emma. In that moment that passed between us, I knew we were both thinking the same thing. It was just the beginning and things would, most definitely, worsen before they got better, more lives would be lost, and it would be up to us to stop it, and we will stop The Prayer. We will avenge those who had fallen: my parents and Willy and Emma's.