The Tower (8 page)

That summed it all up.

* * *

Thirty minutes later. My head and jaw still hurt, I was sitting in the ring with an icepack on my face and could feel my left eye starting to swell. Crazyman had spoken to Oriana a bit and then left; she'd stayed behind to help me out. Made me wonder why she was here in the first place. Kiss or no kiss, I figured that I was just another one-time thing to her….

“Where the hell did you get that idea?” she asked, sounding a bit peeved. “Look, I had to go on an interstellar mission for more than two weeks and didn't have time to get a message to you. If I'd had the time, I would've contacted you, 'kay?”

“Okay. I'm sorry.”

She smiled a bit. “Apology accepted,” she said. “I did miss you, y'know, but Association business has to come first. I like doin' my own thing but a job's a job. That's how it is around here, got it?”

Yeah…
.

“And if I wasn't thinking 'bout you I wouldn't have gone looking, y'know?” she finished off. I nodded and admitted that I'd thought she wasn't interested in me.

Her reaction was to shake her head, apparently at my lack of understanding in these matters of the heart. “Bill, don't be stupid; I'm not that way and never will be.” A pause, and then, “Now what in the hell are you doing here?” she demanded. “Boxing? What's up with that?” I shrugged. “You're lucky he didn't hit you as hard as he could have,” she continued. “You'd be in Sick Bay or worse. What's the deal with you practicing?”

“Well, I thought that if we ever went on patrol again, better to be a participant and not an observer.”

“Uh-huh,” she said, plainly disbelieving me. “Well, you're still on the skinny side. I just think you need to eat more and…” she hesitated, and then smiled at me…“I sorta like you…and no one else,” she added. “But if this is what you want, okay by me. Do what you wanna do.”

Truth was I was tired of being a doormat. Since I'd gotten out of the WOMB tank, this image of a bigger and better version of me was always floating around my mind, only I couldn't bring myself to tell her.

Crazyman, cagey veteran that he was, had sensed my insecurity and fear, and without knowing all the facts behind my hazing he probably guessed that I wanted what every guy my age wanted—respect. He told me directly: “Kid, whatever's going on in yer head, get over it, 'cuz when push comes to shove, you'll just have to push back a little harder.”

Whatever the case, Oriana looked me squarely in the face and repeated quietly, “I still like you,” and then kissed me gently on the lips. “Feel like eating dinner?” Yeah, dinner sounded good. We had a quiet dinner together in my room. After that, Oriana gave me a quick kiss goodnight and went to her place.

* * *

“Nice shiner, Bill,” John said to me the next morning. “Kiss a doorknob?”

It certainly was a thing of beauty. Black and tinged with yellow, it made me look like a one-eyed raccoon. Work was okay but it actually hurt picking up the dishes—my muscles were unused to the hard work plus the training. I'd already had my ass kicked more than once…knew now that it was gonna get kicked a lot more until I learned how to kick back.

“Ah, no,” I said, embarrassed. “I got it in a fight.” John looked impressed.

“Yeah, with who?” he asked.

“Crazyman,” a voice came from behind us. That was Oriana; she'd overheard the conversation. “He took on Crazyman in the gym. Don't screw with this guy,” she said in a serious tone.

That got everyone's attention. A new guy fighting one of the best of the best. I wanted to say that I got my butt whipped, but didn't. Oriana gave me a wink and went to her usual place by the window.
Thank you
, and also thankfully, no one else tried to punk me—even better.

After my shift was over, I made my way to the gym and found the veteran practicing kata, martial arts moves. High kicks and spins…damn! While he may have been past his prime, I doubted anyone would want to pick a fight with him.

“Been expectin' ya!” he yelled. “Most guys wanna learn the fancy moves right off the bat. Stick with boxin' for now—it's got all the basics you'll need.” He gave me an old pair of sweats and a tank top, I changed and then he had me do sit-ups, pushups, and then bodyweight squats, as many as I could do. I soon found myself sweating buckets and breathing hard.

“Don't worry what you can't do, do whatcha can.” He'd been training right alongside me, and hadn't even broken a sweat. Although he looked to be about fifty, his arms and chest were massive and toned. The rest of him looked like granite.

After the warm-up, I did some rope skipping, some heavy bag work and then the speed bag. Spastic on all three movements, but with encouragement, I got through it. Finally, we sparred and all the while, he tutored me on punching, counterpunching—a whole new science to learn. Forty-five minutes later, I was totally exhausted, whipped, punched all over my body. “Time, kid,” he ground out. “Take a shower, y'earned it.”

I managed to get back to my room and then collapsed into bed. Waking up five hours later, I saw in the dim light that an envelope had been shoved under my door. No name on it.

Opening it, I read:

Yeah
, I thought, smiling in the dark.
Keep punching
.

Eight: A Little Vignette

I'd been told in my earlier meetings with The Big Four (Avenger, Deanna, Black Guardsman and PowerGuy) that this world was much the same as my old one. And in many ways, it was. The styles of the clothes and the cars were a bit different, but other than that, nothing outstanding.

The one major difference was the powers people had. That show of Tenkita's had actually unnerved me. Flying around was cool…but it was also something I hadn't bargained on. Here, skills like that weren't like pulling rabbits out of a hat and sawing people in half. Her power was real, tangible, and could be dangerous. And here I was, standing on the Promenade Deck all by my lonesome, when Tenkita herself came up to me and asked me to do her a favor.

“What is it?”

“Just a simple pick up job, if you could,” she replied. “I'd go myself, but I have to prepare for a show in Vegas later on.”

“Why me?” I wondered.

“You seem like the trustworthy type,” she answered sweetly. “And I liked the way you stood up to that moron who called me out on stage. I'm a telekineticist, the real thing, and not just some mirror-master.”
Yeah, I stood up to him and got my guts pounded out for it, too
. Still, she was a nice person so helping her out wouldn't be such a big deal.

Planet-side, I arrived in Los Angeles at a small, empty store, appropriately named “Wilson's Tricks and Treats.” The proprietor, sixtyish, balding and portly, invited me in and he took the order for Tenkita's concoction. He also had a variety of strange creatures which flew and hopped around his little store.

“You like my pets?” he asked.

“Uh…yeah, they're okay, I guess.”

“I've been collecting them for a long time,” he said conversationally. “Being in touch with the mystic portals always gives me a chance to get something new. Kind of cute, aren't they?”

No, they weren't—not really, but not wishing to offend him I nodded yes.

“I…I thought Tenkita wasn't into magic, that she was a telekineticist,” I asked him, a little surprised.

“She is…but she wants to learn magic as well; she says it'll make her a more complete performer. And she needs all the help she can get, she isn't that good.” He handed me a burlap bag. “Talk to her later on—she'll tell you why.”

Back at the Tower, I hurried over to Tenkita's room, located on the sixth deck. It was the same size as mine, except it was filled with a variety of beakers, flasks, jars of powder and reference books on magic, many of which were very old. “I have to study quite a bit; I never really got the hang of this magic thing,” she told me. While I sat nursing a cup of tea she'd prepared, she took the bag, and after dousing it in some kind of liquid, she opened it and inside was a little gray rabbit…with wings on its back.

Wings? She had to be kidding!

“This little guy always gets away from me,” she said. “I conjured him up by accident one day and he runs off on me; it's a real bother getting him back sometimes.”

“Where does he…um…go?”

“Oh, the mystic world has a lot of portals and chambers,” she explained. “At least that's what Wilson told me. He said it's just a matter of getting the right combination of potions and casting the right spell. Wilson is such a help that way, he's always been such a good mentor to me, even way back when I got out of the orphanage and started doing telekinetic tricks to earn my keep.”

That surprised me. “I…uh…thought you and he were about the same age.”

She gave me a sad look. “Is that right?” she asked. Putting the rabbit down, she took my hand and pulled me outside. “Can you keep a secret?” she asked me in a serious voice.

“Sure I can,” I answered. I'd been keeping secrets ever since I got to the Tower. “What's this all about?”

Looking around to make sure no one was in sight Tenkita nodded a few times and took out a towel from inside her gown. This had a pattern of another woman's face on it; Asian-looking, it seemed. What
was
this all about?

“I'm actually twenty-seven,” she said quietly. “This look is what I ‘wear' in public.” With that, she started wiping her face and then I understood. The image of a beautiful young woman, perhaps Japanese or Chinese, moved
from the towel to her face!
The “old look” went to the towel. However, I saw that on Tenkita's “young” face there was a scar running from the top of her hairline down to her jaw on the right side. It was also multi-colored and lumpy; one part beauty and the other, monster.

“Can't help looking, can you?” she asked, a catch in her voice.
Damn, I'd been staring
. “The rest of my body is like that, too.”

“I'm sorry. Who…?” I began.

“Sa'Fina,” she replied bitterly. “She's a sorceress. We had a competition a number of years back, her magic against my telekinesis and I won. This is what she cursed me with. “Look like this,” she said, “or look like an old woman. The towel holds my true image; I never let it out of my sight.” She wiped her face again and the lines and wrinkles reappeared. That's why I practice magic now, so one day I can beat her at her own game.”

“Can't you ask her to reverse her spell?”

“If she doesn't want to be found, or even reply, then there's nothing I can do,” she answered. “The Association knows what I look like; it doesn't matter. I help out when I can. I train with budding magicians on Earth between my regular gigs. They know I need help and they don't mind. They're the future of magic and they don't care what I look like, either. They want to help me and I'm grateful for it.”

What was there to say? Thinking about it, I guess it didn't matter. Tenkita was a nice person and I felt comfortable talking with her.

Something touched my leg. Looking down, I saw that it had come from the rabbit; he'd followed us outside. I picked him up and cuddled him, his wings flapped softly. “You're pretty cute,” I said to the bunny.“That's what everyone says,” he answered in a tough-guy voice. He sounded like a taxi driver from Brooklyn. “Hey, Tenk, you got any carrots around? There was nothing over there except speckled gnorts and you
know
how much I hate them.”

I almost dropped the rabbit, but didn't. I also didn't know what a “gnort” was and didn't want to. Tenkita composed herself and smiled. “You know I've always got something for you,” she said. “Now run inside and I'll get it ready.”

“Thanks, Tenk,” he answered and when I put him down he hopped inside. The door closed softly.

“Our secret?” she asked, once the bunny was out of earshot.

Yeah, no problem
. As surprised as I'd been by the talking rabbit, Tenkita's curse was something I hadn't expected. Although it was just a simple mission, as I walked back to my room, I realized that I wasn't the only one who had problems. I only wished that there was some way to help her.

Nine: Getting Involved

“Meet the two new punching bags,” Crazyman said. “They need the basics, too.”

Joe Roberts was twenty-five, very big all over but also fat. His co-worker, Chuck Weatherly, was thirty, about my height and maybe one hundred and forty pounds soaking wet. They were my sparring partners, and it was Crazyman's idea to match me up against dudes I might have to fight in real life. Joe was slower than I was but far bigger and stronger so I had to learn to stick and move against him.

On the other hand, Chuck was weaker than I was but had faster and better footwork, so I had to crowd him. That was what Crazyman said. “Trap him in the corner and let it loose!” But I was still scared to really let fly. Why, I don't know, but there it was.

That scared feeling came back to haunt me once. My sparring partners had talked me into going down to San Diego to do some sightseeing. “It'll be fun!” they assured me, and we'd had a pretty good time walking around, doing some window-shopping. However, during the course of getting dinner from an outdoor food stand a gang of tough guys decided to do the “punking bit” on us.

“Come and get it,” Joe prompted—he wasn't afraid to toss hands and the fight was on. There were ten of them against three of us; not exactly a fair fight. At first I just froze and then one of them swiped at my forehead with a piece of glass; a cut opened up and blood covered my eyes. Waking up to reality, I yelled, “That's it!” and decked him but then two other guys jumped and pounded me. Just when things looked hopeless….

KAPOW! A blast of something knocked every one of the would-be punks flying. Repello was standing there, hands extended, energy waves emanating from them. He had the power to pull static electricity from the air to mold and shape anything he chose and he was doing just that, holding two of the morons in the air and smashing them together until they passed out. He then let them drop and regarded the group balefully.

“I haven't t'faintest idea what th'lot o'ye wants to do here,” he began. He came from Glasgow and his thick Scottish burr was in full evidence—“but if any of ye have any sense whatsoever, you'll be givin' these lads a break. If y'ken what I mean.”

He punctuated his point by picking up the group of jerks en masse and hurling them all into a nearby pond while the onlookers cheered. “Cool off, the lot of ye!” he yelled at them. They just stayed put while some cops ran over and took them in.

Repello then walked over to our group, took a look at where I'd been cut, someone had given me a towel and I pressed it against the wound, stemming the flow of blood. “Y'feelin' better?” he asked me. I nodded. “Y'didn't do so badly in that scrap, lad,” he said kindly. “Yer friends, either,” he added, nodding at Joe and Chuck. “Back at the ship, get fixed up proper,” he ordered.

“Yes, sir,” I said gratefully. “Thank you.”

“Not a problem,” he said genially, then walked off to continue his rounds. He was in his mid-forties and the way he spoke, he reminded me more of a beat cop than a superhero.

“You okay, Bill?” Joe asked.

“Yeah, fine,” I answered, but all the same, something was wrong. The fight wasn't my fault but even so, I'd frozen and let my friends down and once again had to rely on others for help. That wasn't right. At that point, I knew, I
knew
I had to do more, be more than I was. No more fear, I told myself; from now on, no more fear.

Back at the Tower, Crazyman took a look at the cut over my eye. “Not that bad, I seen worse. You need a layoff, anyway, it'll be good for ya.”

“But I was doing pretty good….”

“Kid,” he cut me off, “y'got a new job and a lotta responsibilities. Burnout ain't in the equation.” He'd been training and had been a trainer for a long time, knew the ins and outs of the game, so I trusted his judgment. “Relax a bit, Bill, see ya in the gym next week. Spend some time with your girl.” That comment made me turn red. “Don't worry,” he added. “Yer friends'll be waiting.”

So that meant a little more downtime to study, but after that, then what? With Oriana, we had a good thing going. After our initial kiss and her helping me out by putting in a good word for me in the cafeteria, she'd pulled me aside one day for a little talk. Guess I was a little slow in figuring out that she preferred to be with me than anyone else; being unaware, I asked her why.

“Do you have to know why?” she retorted. “If I knew the answer myself, I'd tell you. I don't; all I
do
know is that you're someone I feel comfortable with…and no one's ever had the cojones to stand up to me before, 'kay? And besides,” she added, “you're kind of cute. Good enough?”

“Yeah, good enough,” I replied.

Oriana was also interested in gardening. I found that out one day, while passing by the Arbor Room. She was carefully re-potting a plant. “You like gardening?” I asked her later on. This didn't seem in keeping with her bad-ass attitude.

“All of us do.” She meant the other Ultras. “Call it a common hobby,” she told me, “my softer side.” She had an excellent collection of books on botany in her room. I saw that they were on a shelf next to her collection of throwing knives.

Funny thing was, she was right about the Ultras liking gardening as when I walked by the Arbor Room, I could see either Lawmaker, Guardsman, PowerGuy, or any of the other Ultras tending the vast variety of exotic plants and flowers. It was strange that they had a green thumb. Nature in general always left me cold, but…whatever.

She also started teaching me Spanish and often referred to me as her “novio” (“boyfriend”) which always made me turn red. In answer, I'd call her “novia” (“girlfriend”) but languages weren't my specialty; I never got past the beginner stages although I enjoyed listening to her speak. The one thing I did learn was to tell her, “Mi novia es bella” (“My girlfriend is beautiful”). She gave me an odd look and then a smile that lit up the whole room. A kiss was my reward. Okay, foreign languages really
were
cool!

There was a computer in her room, only the Ultras had them, while the rest of us had to make do with the ones in the Recreation Room. She would occasionally excuse herself from our conversations to look intently at the screen. Glancing at it, I saw a bunch of symbols, sort of like triangles and circles and other shapes, which made absolutely no sense to me.

“What's this?” I asked, pointing at the screen.

“Alien language,” she explained. “Just in case we go off to another galaxy, couldn't hurt to be able to talk to the people we meet. Avenger's orders, y'know,” she added. Awesome—she could speak Spanish
and
alien languages as well I thought.

Spanish was difficult; man, there was a lot I still had to catch up on.

There was also study time—Avenger ordered it. “If you're staying with us, you have to know what's going on here,” he'd told me. “That means your education needs upgrading.” He was right; I looked like an adult but didn't have the mind of one yet. A lot of the technical concepts went right over my head at first, so I shut my mouth, listened to those who knew more and hit the books.

But after all the studying, there was that thing known as “free time” and during that time off, I took a trip to the Main Bridge. It was an enormous area, replete with five giant monitors mounted on a dais and surrounded by a catwalk. Mr. Wonderful was standing surrounded on all sides by the giant monitors, techs were carrying supplies here and there and even more people were just plain running around. When Mr. W caught sight of me, he waved me up to his position.

“If you're off-duty, stick around and learn something,” he said as his fingers danced nimbly over the giant keyboard in front of him. He was the Main Bridge commander, second in decision-making only to Avenger and it was his responsibility to assign patrols, input data, monitor the Earth, and make sure everything ran smoothly.

“Child's play,” he answered, when I expressed my amazement at his multi-tasking. “I've been doing things more complex than this for a long time.” His handsome, pale yellow-colored face remained impassive as he spoke, but his tone sounded supremely confident. Not arrogant or condescending; just the tone of someone who knew he could do his job better than anyone and took pride in that.

At first, I thought he was Asian due to his features. His eyes slanted sharply upwards and he had a vaguely yellowish tint to his skin. It turned out he was Caucasian. He'd been involved in an accident as a child. It always seemed to be a some-peculiar-kind-of-accident-which-gave-him/her-his/her-powers scenario, and here he was, manager of the Main Bridge.

Around his torso was a belt and there were numerous gray discs in each holder. I wondered what they were for. Perhaps they were knock-out gas pellets, or maybe they were medicinal containers. Maybe, maybe they were some new kind of laser weapon or something like that. Something I'd never dreamed of.

“Stun bombs,” he answered when I asked him about their purpose. “Anyone tries to take over the bridge, I just grab one and BOOM!” he explained. “I never miss,” he added. They were designed to disrupt nerve impulses for a period of perhaps five seconds, paralyzing the opponent until they could be arrested or knocked out, whichever came first.

That knowledge about those weapons might come in handy, although I couldn't see myself chucking a bomb at anyone. Mr. W saw me looking at the discs, plucked one off his belt and handed it to me. Odd; couldn't have weighed more than a few ounces, yet it was a stunner bomb? What kind of technology was this?

“It's turned off now,” he said. “To activate it, just press it twice and it's armed. To deactivate it, press it three times.” He then took it back and placed it in his belt again, then turned his gaze back to the screens and I followed his lead. All the screens were filled with images of the various Ultras helping out in hot-spots all over the world…but my attention was focused on Screen Number Five.

Oriana was in New York, foiling a bank robbery. Damn! Just watching her move to cut down a gang of heavily armed bank robbers, seven in all, was sheer poetry. Every move she made was swift and sure, fluid and beautiful. And absolutely devastating; the impact of her punches and kicks came out loud and clear over the monitor…and I even found myself unconsciously moving in synch with her.

Mr. W caught me staring at the screen and commented drily, “Better put your jaw back into position. This keyboard doesn't handle drool very well.” That comment made me turn red. He laughed and told me that “secrets soon become un-secrets” and did Avenger know about this?

Not yet but it seemed a lot of the other people did. My trainer, Crazyman, knew and I'm sure most of the kitchen staff could see that something was going on between Oriana and me, the way she flirted with me in the Commissary and the fact that we spent almost all our free time together. I didn't see the harm in it…but I also didn't think anyone else would be jealous, would they?

“Well, I wouldn't go around advertising it too freely,” he cautioned. “It's better for you and her.” He spoke into the intercom, Oriana was busy beating the crooks senseless. “Oriana, tone it down a bit. They're going to jail, not the morgue.”

“I hear you!” she answered snappishly, as she punched another robber into next week. “They deserve it, you know they do!”

“Enough!” W commanded. “Lay off. That's an order!” She let the last robber go and he crumpled to the floor, his face a bloody mess. Over the monitor, the faint wail of sirens could be heard; the law was on its way, not that she wanted or needed their help. “Oriana,” W said, “the police are coming, I repeat, the police are on their way. Get going to your next assignment. Meet The KeyHolder at JSK Airport. You're going to Brazil on a rescue mission.”

“Roger,” she answered, somewhat reluctantly, “Oriana out.”

Other monitors showed the various Association members pulling or pushing tremendous tonnages, flying at super-speed, and I noticed a few Tower techs helping them, lending logistical support. Busy, busy.

“No downtime?” I asked.

“We're stretched pretty thin these days,” he replied, eyes darting back and forth from the monitors to the keyboard. “There's always trouble somewhere in the world. Job's a job, and being busy comes with the territory.”

“What about the reserve people?” I asked. “Don't you have any?”

He hesitated a bit. “Oh, we often pull double-duty here, us, the tech staff, just about everyone on board. Those techs you saw helping out? They're technically off-duty but we still need their help. Excuse me a second.” He turned away, issuing rapid-fire orders and while he was doing so, I looked more closely at the monitor. Yeah, there was Cathy, Dan's girlfriend. I saw her on Monitor #3, chest-deep in water, slogging sandbags to stem a flood in the countryside of China along with the locals.

Well, seeing Cathy help out gave me an idea. Going solo Earth-side wasn't all that hot a prospect, but going with the team did interest me. And maybe, just maybe, I'd be lucky enough to go with Oriana if they'd let me.

“Umm…I've only been here a while…” I started.

“Three months and twenty-four days,” he interrupted. His eyes never left the monitors. Was that how long it was? “What about it?” he asked.

“Um, well…” I hesitated, and then took the plunge. “Do you think I could go out on missions…with them?”

He gave me a blank look at first and then his expression turned serious. “You sure you want to help out?” he asked. “It isn't just like cooking in the kitchen, y'know. I'd be lying to you if I said it was all fun and games; it isn't. Sometimes there's more than a bit of danger involved, just so you're aware of what could happen.”

“I know. I just want to do the same as everyone else, pull my weight.”