The Immortal Defenses Series - Destined

Chapter Seventeen

Over the next two days, Cheri and Ellie perfected their defenses, and they all came up with different strategies to test them to their limits. There were so many factors that could disturb the strength of Cheri's defense. They needed to know how close she needed to be to somebody to be able to use their defense, how good the person had to be at using it for her to be able to use it efficiently, and, of course, how long she could use it for.

The easiest test subject was Roman and his super hearing. Roman stood on the porch while Ellie and Alexia sat inside the house chatting quietly. Cheri would slowly back away further down the beach, and by the time she was halfway to the water, she wasn't able to use Roman's defense anymore. It was quite a distance between them and that would help them immensely if they ran into trouble at Union Headquarters.

Not only did they have to find out how strong Cheri and Ellie's defenses were, but they also had to figure out how Alexia would be able to locate the book. Everyone took turns hiding random household objects such as picture frames, books, pots, cups, and couch pillows, and Alexia had to find them. It took her a while to figure out how she was supposed to use her special defense, which Roman and Demetri had described as a 'pulling' sensation. After failing at finding the huge pan that Ellie had hid in the tree outside the house, Alexia could feel anger bubbling up inside of her, so she tried a different approach. Instead of picturing the book that Roman was hiding, she imagined herself finding it and holding it.

There was still no pulling sensation leading her to it, but an image flashed in her mind of her pulling the book out from one of her many shopping bags that still lay on the floor in her and Demetri's room. Before Roman could even descend the staircase, Alexia was darting past him to retrieve the book and, sure enough, she found it. Adrenaline pumped through her body just as it did when she used her second defense on Demetri.

After they knew that Alexia could trace objects and not just people, there had been many questions about what kind of trouble they could possibly get into at The Union Headquarters.

"Amar still has people on the inside that can tell him we're there."

"If you haven't been called to speak to a Union member, you're not supposed to be there, no matter what."

"Ahaz is probably still really pissed about us lying to you, so we don't know how well he will react to us just showing up there."

Those were just a few of the concerns that had been thought up.

Roman wanted to make a specific plan for every little thing that could go wrong. Where would they meet? Which exit would they use? At the mention of possibly taking another two days for the full plan to develop, Ellie had finally stepped in and told Roman off for being so cautious

"Alright listen here, way-to-careful Roman, we have spent the past two days making plans, working on our defenses, and a whole bunch of other stuff to get ready for this little mission. I say we go tomorrow. We're ready; no more making plans and no more excuses about not being prepared. We are prepared and we're going tomorrow."

When he opened his mouth to reject her idea Cheri stepped in, too. "Ellie's right, we know what to do if something goes wrong. I think we're ready to go tomorrow, too, so let's vote on it. Who says we should go tomorrow?"

Cheri and Ellie lifted their hands in the air followed by Demetri and Alexia.

"Sorry, brother," Demetri said, "looks like we're going tomorrow."

The rest of the day Roman was silent. During lunch that consisted of ham sandwiches and cut up fruit, he didn't speak or look at anyone. It was clear he was not happy about the way the vote turned out. While Alexia, Demetri, Ellie, and Cheri played a game of beach volleyball to pass by some time, Roman sat inside alone sulking.