(Previously on Immortal Wars.)

(Again, we shall revel in my teenage originality.  Everyone groan in unison.)

Disclaimer: Immortal Wars was the book I came up with and wrote in high school.  I hadn’t even hit college by the time I wrote the first two books.  That means I hadn’t developed my style yet, wasn’t good at self-editing, and the story was fairly basic. So, you’ve been warned that this is the ultimate author throwback segment for my blog and will show my author origins.  FYI-  I put the first book (The Summoning) through a Print-on-Demand publisher and the second one (Light, Blood, & Tears) never saw the light of day.  Enjoy!

While Miracle gave Fate his rude awakening, their two companions were in the game room’s arena.  They were playing the laser warfare game that Infinity had found a week and a half ago.  Hydrana wasn’t doing too badly, but she complained whenever she was shot by one of the holograms.  Eventually the holograms learned to try and aim for her mouth in order to prevent the onslaught of noise that preceded shooting her.

“Ow.  Stupid holograms.  They can’t shoot me in the back.  That’s unfair!” hollers Hydrana.  Since they were using real laser pistols this time, there was a gaping hole going through her stomach.  The bleeding wound quickly heals and the only remaining sign of her injury is the fist-sized hole in her emerald shirt.

“Well, you can tell our enemies that sneak attacks are unfair when, or if, we finally meet them.  Of course, learning some kind of defense couldn’t hurt you,” says Infinity, who is hiding behind a burning holographic tree.  Lasers bounce off of him when a yellow barrier quickly appears and disappears around his body.

“So excuse me for not being able to deflect lasers with a telekinetic shield.  Everyone can’t have incredible mental powers like you.”

“I didn’t mean it like that.  I just meant you should do a lot less complaining and more fighting.  Our enemies will be hitting back several times harder than these mindless holograms.  So start fighting back.”

“You mean like this?” remarks Hydrana as she jumps into the open and starts blasting away at anything that moves.  She dodges every attack and she shoots all of the holograms at least twice before they hit the ground.  When only Infinity is left, she shoots his laser gun out of his hand with pinpoint accuracy.

“I’ve been taking some marksman lessons from Miracle,” mentions the redhead after she drops her gun.

“I noticed.  I’ll turn the game off,” states Infinity with a red hue to his face caused by his embarrassment at being disarmed so easily.  Before he makes it to the door, Hydrana pounces on him and puts him in a tight headlock.

“Do you give up?”

“Yes,” gasps the Earth guardian while trying to pry her slender, but powerful, arm off of his neck.  When Hydrana lets go, Infinity stands up and immediately pins her arms behind her back.

“Not that I mind, but may I ask what this little embrace is for?”

“It’s mostly to prevent you from trying anything else on me.  That and just for fun.  Where did you learn that stuff if you don’t practice with the rest of us?”

“I learned it from watching you and the others as well as some private practicing with SEAS.  I’m not really a brainless brat like everyone thinks I am.  Well, everyone that is except for you, Steve.”

“I really think you should drop the spoiled bitch act.  It could end up going way too far one of these days.  Will you stop pretending to be mean?”

“Eventually.  I’m not just ready to let my defenses down for the others right now.  Give me some time to get used to everything and then I’ll give it serious consideration.  Just don’t tell Fate and Miracle that I severely beat you.”

“I wouldn’t tell them if they threatened to poke out my eyes and throw me in a vat of acid.  Not that it would do much to any of us,” claims Infinity as he lets go of Hydrana’s arms and pulls her close in order to plant a kiss on her smiling mouth.  Their lips are about to touch when a loud and familiar noise startles them.

“What are you two doing in there!” yells Miracle.  She had walked in with Fate a few moments ago and was sitting at one of the bigger tables.

“Damn it!  None of your business.  Just go away, you little tramp,” snaps Hydrana in her snobby tone.  As they get to the table, the robotic bartender has already put down some tall glasses of Orion punch that Miracle ordered beforehand.  This peculiar liquid smells like fresh strawberries and changes color every three minutes.  The bartender quickly mentions that each color of the drink produces a different effect.  The six-armed robot also warns them that the drink is very deadly, even to immortals, when it turns dark green.  Fate downs the drink when it’s bright yellow and immediately feels a burst of pure energy.

“Well, excuse me for living, Delila.  Seems like everyone on the sun base is in a bad mood this morning except for me.  Now, everybody calm down and listen to what I have to say,” orders Miracle.  Hydrana and Infinity sit at the table and notice a small stack of nine, blue metallic folders on the table.  The folders are portable data computers that can hold information on only one subject.  Each one is labeled with an odd name like Hellax or Startrix.

“These look like more advanced versions of the data pads that I work with.  Mine only have a touch screen and printer.  They can’t save anything.  What are these things for?” asks Infinity.  He picks up the top folder on Psylon and begins looking through it.  A sudden look of disgust crosses his face when he begins to read about the psychotic immortal.

“Data computers are better than data pads, but they are a lot harder to reprogram after using them once.  These folders contain all of the information that Miracle and SEAS were able to dig up on the evil immortals.  The data folders can tell us most of our enemies’ powers and names, but not much else.  The left side of the folder shows the subject’s full body profile and a DNA graph.  SEAS also said there’s a good possibility of some new immortals in the group.  He is attempting to scan the surface of Pluto for anything that could help us.  But they already have sensor jammers in place that even SEAS can’t figure out.  So this is all we will probably have to go on until we actually meet our enemies,” explains Fate as everyone takes one of the data folders.

“They all seem very powerful.  Like this one guy who can cause things to implode just by touching them.  Says that his name is Cybro and for a villain he looks pretty cute,” mentions Miracle while looking through Cybro’s file.  His picture is of a gorgeous, brown-haired man in red leather armor and his body is very slender.  The file was obviously made before his accident, so it doesn’t say anything about Cybro being a robotic killing machine.

“How about their gorgeous leader?  She’s called Adriana.  I wouldn’t mind going one on one with this immortal,” announces Infinity.  Hydrana sends him soaring clear across the room with a high-impact water blast at point blank range and then she freezes the floor to Infinity’s boots.

“Cut it out, Hydrana.  Now!” orders Fate in a surprisingly booming voice.  With a simple wave of her unclenched hand, Hydrana unfreezes the floor from Infinity’s boots and lets the wet guardian sit back in his chair.

“Looks can be deceiving really comes into play with these guys.  This ugly one named Mindtrigger looks like a stupid wimp, but his data file says that he’s smarter than the four of us combined.  The same thing goes for this big guy called Draveon.  Unlike their other strong man, Hellax, this guy is supposed to be very smart as well as unstoppable.  Too bad these files don’t tell us Draveon’s specific powers.  It just says to avoid him at all cost.  We sure don’t have much about them,” mentions Hydrana.  She tosses the folders to Miracle and Fate while she calmly leans back in her chair.

“The bottom line is that all of these immortals are extremely dangerous and have birthright powers like us.  But the one enemy we have to really look out for is the one known as Pulsar.  This woman appeared in the wild areas of Germany and was responsible for stories of ghost attacks.  I can see why because she’s some kind of a floating black cloak with metallic arms and silver eyes.  Her file says that she can transfer her soul and psyche into her victims.  This means that she is capable of taking full control over anyone she wants and we wouldn’t know about it until it was too late,” explains Miracle.

“Now that is a cool power!” exclaims Infinity.

“Too bad one of our enemies has it,” mutters Hydrana.

“Attention all planet guardians.  Your presence is required in the Main Hall immediately.  Fate knows where the Main Hall is, so just follow him,” announces Solix over the sun base’s intercom system.

“Let’s get this over with and then we can get back to studying these files.  Follow me,” says Fate.