You can only get the battery state by handling the BatteryChanged event. However this event is special. It will fire immediately after calling Initialize (or InitializeWithPhoneState).
... process global
Dim PE As PhoneEvents
End Sub
Sub PE1_BatteryChanged (Level As Int, Scale As Int, Plugged As Boolean, Intent As Intent)
Log("BatteryChanged: Level = " & Level & ", Scale = " & Scale & ", Plugged = " & Plugged)
End Sub
Sub Activity_Create(FirstTime As Boolean)
PE.Initialize("PE1")
....
end sub