Chapter 49: A Threat

James followed that slow careful steps of that person for a couple of segments before he was sure of his previous guess, that person had put an energy bomb, a small tiny thing that you could miss easily, but it was deadly.

James didn't wait any longer, as he pointed his gun towards that person, and moved with audible steps towards him. James didn't take a few steps before that person turned sharply and pointed another gun towards him, and strangely it was the same as James, a laser gun.

"Who are you? You don't belong here."

James stopped as he recognized the owner of that sound. His eyes widened abruptly as his heartbeat raced with excitation, anger, and fear.

"D-Do you know me?" the person asked with doubt.

James gritted his teeth and unknowingly he took a step forward as he declared with extreme hatred:

"Of course your excellency, you are the damn Immortal and I'm here to know how you will survive me."

James moved the laser gun and pointed it towards that distasteful head, while that person seemed to panic as his body trembled obviously while yelling with his hands waving towards James:

"No, stop, it's not that deceitful person, look," he then pressed his head covered with that blackness causing the whole suit layering over his body to vanish, "Look, I'm not that Immortal."

James just sneered as he wasn't deceived by that move as he said:

"Don't think you can bluff me like you did with Dora, Charles. I already know that it's you, the Immortal, and now you are going to die."

"N-N-No, W-W-Wait, it's really me, Charles. I was sent to meet Dora by one of her masters, but I was ambushed and taken captive by that person. Believe me I want to kill that person as much as you want, so I'm now bombing the wh…"

He wasn't destined to continue his speech, as James hit him with his gun. Charlesn's eyes widened from terror and shock, then his body lost its strength and fell heavily on the ground.

James didn't stop in his place, as he moved fast and dragged the body towards the nearest chambers as he opened it and threw that body of Charles there. James then closed the door and started to search that young man's body.

That man was planting bombs all over the cruiser, so he must have a trigger to activate all these bombs. James didn't search long before he found a small box with a button over its top; it had a central indentation with a small rounded red button in the middle.

James had already seen many triggering devices like these back at the world he escaped from, so once he spotted it, he took it and put it into his storage bracelet.

"Now your plan has failed, schemer."

James kicked that dead body venting his anger and hatred upon it. he didn't want to stay any longer, as the sight of this distasteful enemy was enough to make him lose his temper.

He had far more important things to do right now. Just as he took one step towards that door, a small screen appeared out of nowhere. It was like the screen in his commanding deck, but it was smaller. He squinted his eyes as he didn't feel any goodness coming from this screen, and his instinct was right.

The screen flashed, and the face of a person appeared on it. It was an old lady, elegant as she was, as time passed on her but left only a soft touch of white hair and minimum shallow grooves on her smooth face.

James knew if she hid these wrinkles and dyed her hair, no one would doubt she was this old. Strangely, though, he felt some familiarity coming from her, like he had seen her beautiful face before.

"Daughter…"

Once that lady opened up her mouth and spoke, James' body jolted from his realization, he knew why this lady seemed familiar, and suddenly he smelt a stinking scent, a scent of a trap, and that lady was the decoy.

"I-I have been held as a prisoner here by one of your enemies, he called himself the Immortal. He wants you to come back and surrender willingly, but don't come my child, lea…"

The mother didn't have the chance to complete her words, as a hand appeared suddenly to hit her face like a whip and push her body away like she was nothing.

James' eyes widened in disbelief as his sight moved between the screen in front of him and that body lying motionless on the ground. The face, the same face of Charles, was the face that appeared on that screen.

He had a face of a youngster, but he wasn't showing any facial expression of a young man, he wasn't showing any human expression at all. He was like a monster wearing human skin.

James' body was paralyzed from the train of thoughts he had in his mind, as this was bad, was really bad.

"Listen well, kid, your sweet beloved mother is in my possession. I won't say I will kill her, as such a gem of beauty is hard to come by. If you don't surrender yourself to the commanding deck, then I will enjoy myself without stopping," his distasteful voice came from that screen, then he moved his face to nearly block the whole vision, "You have thirty minutes only, tick tock, tick tock."

The screen vanished, but James didn't recover his composure easily. He looked towards the body lying on the ground as he muttered:

"Luckily I stunned him to lose his consciousness, or else I would be doomed."

James then moved towards the real Charles and started to wake him up. When he realized he was Charles, he wasn't sure he could kill him, or else he wouldn't get the awkward name, the Immortal, so he chose to stun him instead.

A lost consciousness enemy was as good as being dead, except he was sure this Immortal wouldn't be immune to stun, and now that decision showed it value, as he needed that man to be awake.

Back at his base, he learned a way to undo the stun effect of the guns, as accidents like launching stun hits from the guns happened frequently back then.

The way to undo it was simple, just massage the place of cerebellum and the person would be awake. That place was located at the back of the neck.

In moments, that dead-like body started to show signs of movement, and in less than a minute, Charles opened his eyes. Once he saw James, panicked, and tried to move away from him, to hit the weird pink-colored wall hard from his nervousness.

"Take it easy, I mean you no harm," James tried to reassure him, but he failed, as the youngster in front of him was still looking at him in fear, so he added:

"I know you aren't that Immortal."

"H-How can you t-tell?" Charles stuttered as the last memory he got in his mind was the laser gun in James hand launching a strike towards him.

"Because, sigh, that Immortal kidnapped Dora's mother and he broadcasted that to the whole ship," James said with a sigh, as he knew Dora wouldn't let her mother face that shameful fate.

"What?!" Charles' body jolted awake as he stood on his legs in a sudden move. This time, James was startled by his move; however he was more shocked by the fear look over his face, a fear more deep than the one he just showed when he woke up.

"What's wrong?" James asked with doubt.