Batman Beyond: The New Dynamic Duo

Sentries of the Last Cosmos

On a distant planet that was nothing but a barren wasteland filled with rocks and starting aliens, a small group of four soldiers riding on flying disks carrying energy swords rushed to evade pursuing spaceships.

“This is not good.” Max commented as she glanced over her shoulder and saw the spaceships catching up. Eliana gasped as a shot flew just past her. She met the gaze of her boyfriend, and the two nodded, forming a plan. Seeing a couple of looped rocks, the two baited one of the spaceships to follow them, weaving under and then over the loops. The spaceship was unable to pull up fast enough and smashed into the top of the rocks.

However, the wreckage and subsequent explosion that followed from the spaceship knocked Terry off balance. As the teen began to spin out of the air, he unexpectedly yanked back on track. He looked up to see Eliana holding tightly onto his hand, who yelled, “I gotcha babe!”

But they weren’t out of the woods yet. They still had one more pesky spaceship to take care of.

“We can't shake him!” Terry exclaimed, dodging the blast sent his way.

The other person with them in this battle was their friend Corey, who immediately took on the dangerous task. Flipping his helmet’s black visor down, Corey called out, “Sentry to the challenge!”

“Corey, don't!” Terry, Max and Eliana shouted in unison as they watched their friend fly straight towards the spaceship. They watched amazed as Corey flipped upside down and sliced the underbelly of the spaceship with his flaming sword effectively destroying it.

With their opponents defeated, Terry, Max, and Eliana regrouped with Corey and took off their helmets. Eliana squinted at the bright lights of the arcade as she removed the VR helmet from her head. “Someone’s got the moves,” she complimented Corey as they moved off the game’s platform. Corey ducked his head bashfully.

“How'd you peg it?” Max asked. 

Correy shrugged, “Gotta go with your instincts,” he answered nonchalantly.

“Good instincts. You just bagged the all-time high score,” Terry said, pointing up at the leaderboard where Corey had scored 98159 compared to his friends who all scored under 3000.

“Yes!” Corey cheered.

“No fair! You must have logged a gazillion hours on that game,” Max accused lightheartedly. Corey was a huge gamer, so it made sense.

“Maybe more. But for the first time, I really felt it, ya know? Like I actually was a Sentry of the Last Cosmos.” As Corey was in the midst of fantasy, he wasn’t paying attention to where he was going and bumped into Nelson. The jock's drink spilled all over Coreys shirt.

“Aah! Hey, watch it!” Corey mumbled, holding out his wet shirt.

“Or what? You gonna bop me with a flamin' sword? Get a life,” Nelson insulted, making sure to bump Corey once more as he stalked off.

Eliana reached into her purse and pulled out some tissues. She offered them to Corey, who took them and dabbed them on his shirt. Burning his eyes on Nelson's back, Corey murmured, “Jerk.”

As Terry, Max, and Corey started walking away, Eliana paused. She looked up at the big circular window near the ceiling and saw a flash of light.

“Eliana? You coming or what?” Max called out, pulling the teen out of her focus. Eliana nodded and rushed to catch up. When she did, Terry leaned down and quietly asked if everything was okay.

“Yeah, I'm fine. I think an aircraft outside caught my eye.”

~8~

The next day at school, in coding class, Corey was obsessing over creating new scenarios for the game. Max, who sat next to him, was growing annoyed by his prattling.