The Tower (7 page)

Well, well, well…the next day, I came better prepared. The Internet which was called the “Search-Net” here provided me with a lot of ideas. While the basics were always good there was always some room for variations on the norm. Mexican-Eggs was my first stab at it: Eggs, Jack cheese (I took out the cheese and subbed in veggies for the Ultras) and salsa. Seven minutes to make. Black Guardsman walked in, got served first. He sniffed the concoction, took a small bite and then wolfed it down and nodded approvingly.

“Load it on.”

More it was. Soon after, Deanna walked in, sniffed at the aroma, and asked for a taste. “This is more like it,” she declared, and everyone else followed suit. Mex-Eggs were the entre du jour and I breathed a sigh of relief. The next day, it was “Toad-in-a-Hole” then after that, I tried doing some variations on the usual waffles and noticed that the tech staff
and
the Ultras were lining up in front of me and no one else.

Not long after those mini-victories, John put me in charge of planning most of the a.m. menu. While he was still head cook on the morning shift, apparently he'd heard enough complaints and sensed which way things were going, so he let me do my own thing. Grudgingly he said, “Seems you learned faster'n I thought. Don't bugger it up.” It was time to see if I could hold my own and I did. The food kept coming as did the compliments and that was good enough for me.

“You're doing a great job, Bill,” Black Guardsman told me one day. He'd spoken to me in the privacy of the hallway; seemed he didn't want any of the other cooks to get their mad on for me being praised. “And by the way, I like my food spicy! Keep it up, man,” he said, and this time, he actually smiled. Damn, I
could
cook after all.

For the first time in what seemed like forever, I actually enjoyed what I was doing. Cooking may have been just a job to the rest of the staff, but on the whole, this position was becoming pretty cool.

Even Oriana, who wasn't what I'd call a picky eater, walked in one day and asked me for something special. I made her a seven-egg omelet in the shape of a heart, just one for her, and she actually blushed. All the other Ultras glanced at her and she said offhandedly, “It looks okay.”

She then skipped over to the window, humming a tune; in her costume, skipping was more than a little out of the ordinary. Her dish was devoured in only thirty seconds.

Then she skipped out. Everyone just stared at me.

“Happy Meal,” I told them.

“We've all got special talents,” PowerGuy said to me a few days later, on one of his rare trips to the cafeteria. “Yours may lie here.” He then finished off his “Power Tower,” which was a mixture of eight eggs, green peppers, yellow squash and red radish and a grayish dye tint to match the color of his uniform, with a certain amount of satisfaction, then flew out on his daily mission run.

He, the Guardsman, and most of the others flew as superheroes should; powerful arms straight out, bodies held rigid. Deanna, on the other hand, sort of wafted along the air currents, just like a beautiful golden butterfly. Whatever, it was just major cool to watch them eat and fly and I thought I'd never get tired of watching them do their thing.

Then someone would interrupt my reverie and yell, “Bill, you got any of those scrambled eggs and garlic toast combos? They are really something, man, really something!”

And I'd smile. Eating well was just one of life's little pleasures.

Six: Life Up Among the Stars

“Hey, my name's Dan.”

“I'm Bill.” I'd been standing on the Promenade Deck, looking out at the stars when a short, balding, homely guy came up to me and introduced himself. Dan Turk worked in the Reactor Room as a technician. He became my first friend on board the Tower and laid out the scenario for me.

“It's a big place, Bill, and you're new here; you'll get used to it soon enough. You have to read the manual and get it straight. We all had to do it, okay?”

From what the Net said, the Tower hadn't always been used as a superhero hangout. It was originally built by the Russians as an orbital space platform in their attempt to further deep-space travel. They'd named it Space-Tower 1 and it had two smaller satellites circling it, aptly called Space-Tower 2 and Space-Tower 3.

However, budget cuts had forced them to abandon their project. Avenger bought it and converted all three stations into one, large facility. He called it The Universe Tower but over time, it became known as “The Tower.” It was a source of pride to him. He'd re-built it in only two years. The outer hull was covered in something called “Advanium,” an alloy Avenger had invented which was much stronger than titanium or steel, and impervious to radiation, missiles, or anything else. The porthole windows were a mixture of the same material and fused silica glass, and the inner walls were only an inch thick, yet practically indestructible.

The Tower was also incredibly large. Built like a giant cross suspended in space, its length was more than seven football fields and ran almost 400 feet at its widest point, the Promenade Deck. From that point, two large pneumatic tubes ran in opposite directions another 1000 feet in either direction; those tubes carried half the crew to their living quarters, called the “East” and “West” wings. High-speed transports carried the workers in from their rooms to the center of the ship. From there, they took the elevator to the upper or lower decks and that ran from top to bottom in less than a minute.

“They got everything here you could want, Bill,” Dan said. “It has vending machines, computer access to the Net, free laundry service and if you want to work out, go up to Deck Twelve. It has a great gym and boxing ring.”

“Boxing?”

“Yeah, a guy named Ed Morgan runs the place; mean-ass dude, but I hear he's a good instructor.” Okay, it was something worth thinking about.

Dan sensed that I'd been having trouble making contacts here and he was right. Very unaware was I about dealing with people, and conversation wasn't my strong point. He'd invited me down to the Reactor Room to view the recharging of the ion-fusion reactor, and one of the other technicians asked me, “Hey, which do you think is better, lowering the pressure to increase the uptake or altering the manifold system?”

“Uh, go with the second option,” I said a bit uncertainly.

The other guy turned to Dan and said: “Dude's oblivious to the obvious,” and then laughed and walked away.

Dan muttered, “Howard's a jerk; let it go, Bill.” Dan was cool. He knew that I wasn't ready to hash out the technical details of the Tower on the first try and had been helpful to me in explaining the ins and outs of Tower life. He also had a good handle on what it took to get along. In spite of his lack of looks, he was popular with the rest of the crew; he had a good sense of humor and never let anything bother him. So, okay, one or two jerks didn't matter, but I still felt like a loser.

Turk caught the look on my face and asked, “Hey, if you're going solo, you want to see a show tonight? Tenkita's in from planet-side and she's the coolest thing around; I saw her once in Vegas and trust me, she's the best there is.”

Since I had nothing better to do, and I hadn't seen Oriana for the last little while, I agreed.

“Meet me on Deck 8 at eight sharp,” Dan said. “She's in the Main Hall.”

As I made my way out, I saw Mister Particle “recharging” himself at the reactor core. He'd been a waste-management worker and somehow his body had been transformed into one made up of radioactive-isotope waste, although he had some kind of internal organ arrangement; it was all contained in a brown and black bodysuit. He lived off radiation and had to recharge himself every six hours—pretty weird and awesome at the same time. He caught sight of me as I left and gave a friendly nod; I returned it, and he went back to energizing himself.

At eight o' clock, I made my way to the eighth deck and while waiting in line, saw a few of the Ultras walking around. Lawmaker, a former farmer from Laredo, a blonde dude in a striped purple-and-green bodysuit named “Big Gelt” (he looked like a big eggplant) and a few others. “What are they doing here?” I asked someone.

“Nightly security check,” was the answer. “They make the rounds on all the decks.” Cool, just like the police, and….

“Hey, Bill!” Dan was coming up the corridor with a cute redhead in tow. He introduced her as Cathy; she worked in the Laundry Room and he'd been dating her for the last six months.

She told me, “Hope you'll like this, Tenkita's going to be great!”

Tenkita was not an illusionist or a magician. She had the power of telekinesis, the ability to move objects with just the power of her mind. Info I'd found out from the Net said that she always went by her stage name and that she'd been raised in an orphanage. There, she discovered her powers and had somehow taken it to a whole new level as she grew up.
Well, she can't be that bad
.

As it turned out, she was better than great. Although she looked like an old Chinese lady in her seventies, with a narrow, lined face and a gown festooned with sparkling jewels, she had a very youthful voice and the energy of a young woman. She kept up a rapid-fire patter while making knives, forks, chairs, water and other objects dance in the air and form shapes. She told slightly off-color jokes, and she had the evening audience alternately doubling over in laughter as well as gasping in astonishment.

Up onstage, Tenkita called for a volunteer. Cathy and Dan pushed me up to the front. While I was standing there like a dork, Tenkita quieted the audience, waved her hands and intoned, “And now, I shall make this young man fly!” And damned if she didn't do it! I could feel myself rising in the air and swooping around the room just like all the other superheroes could. This was fantastic…and a little scary as well.

Tenkita then brought me down to earth again and whispered in my ear: “Go take your seat.” She quieted the audience down, they were all jostling to be first to take a spin around the room. Tenkita chose a few other random people and did the same thing with them—in a word, the crowd was wowed. This was one giant freak-out; I couldn't believe it was happening!

Mass applause; everyone was astonished, except for one large, blond guy, who was sitting over a few seats from us. He was sitting with a nice-looking blonde and she seemed embarrassed. When he caught me looking at him, he sneered, “Problem, buddy? She's a fake, and you and all the rest are lapping it up like pet pooches.”

“She's not a fake,” I answered. What was this moron's problem?

“Prove it!” Even his date seemed to believe in the show and she urged him to stop. He just kept on going on about Tenkita not being the real thing.

Tenkita must've overheard us, for she called out, “I just heard someone say I was a fake!” Addressing the audience, she asked, “Do you think I'm cheating?”

“NO!” everyone yelled back.

The spotlight was turned on the big dude. “Stand up!” she commanded. “Get up here!” With a smirk on his round, country-boy face, he arose and strode up to the stage. Towering over her, he yelled out that she was using holograms or something like that.

Mass booing ensued, but the sorceress quieted everyone with a wave of her hands. “Okay, he wants proof, then proof he shall have.” Walking around him, she waved her hands in the air. “Nothing up my sleeve, agreed?” He nodded. “You feel like taking a flight? Get ready, sucker!” Her eyes flashed; she was cheesed off big-time. The moron on the stage smirked and turned to the audience, gesturing that Tenkita was a total loser. The expression on his face when she levitated him up and spun him around so fast he started to hurl in mid-air was priceless.

After that, Tenkita brought him down, and holding him up with a single hand, pushed him forcefully against the wall, pulling off his clothes with her power one piece at a time. He begged her to stop once she got down to his shorts. “I guess no one wants to see the invisible!” she called out. Yeah, this lady was old but she had some bite, alright. Everyone started laughing like crazy, me included; he just stood there with a vicious scowl on his face. Being owned was not his thing.

“Are you satisfied now I'm not a fake?” she asked him.

“Yeah…yeah,” was all he could get out. His face was a mess and he looked ready to kill her and everyone else in the room.

“Then get out,” she ordered. “I'm not here for your amusement, young man…”

“…but he was here for ours!” someone called out from the audience and everyone once again erupted in laughter.

Mr. I-Just-Got-Owned stalked off the stage and up the aisle, glaring at Dan, Cathy, and me as he passed by. He looked to where his date had been sitting; she'd left the room. The jerk then walked out, a look of menace written all over his face and I felt I'd made an enemy.

“Thank you all and good night!” Tenkita sang out, and then levitated herself to disappear somewhere in the rafters. We all filed out, shaking our heads in amazement.

“Some show, eh, Bill?” Dan asked me as we were leaving.

“Yeah, it was great!” In spite of Mr. Moron, I'd had a really good time. Back on the Promenade Deck, Dan and Cathy said goodnight and turned to leave. Before going, however, Cathy came over to me and said, “Dan told me you had some trouble settling in. Don't worry; I'm sure things will work out. Hang in there, okay?” And then she was gone.

Yeah, hang in there. Well, at least Dan had somebody, and Cathy seemed like a nice person. I'd only had the one kiss from Oriana and I wondered again what she saw in me.

Seven: Another Brush With Reality

A few days after the show, I took a walk after my shift. Work had gone well, I earned some praise from everyone and actually felt things were going my way. Oriana was still on my mind but she hadn't been around for the last little while. I tried knocking on her door a couple of times. There'd been no response, so either she was mad at me for something or maybe she just wasn't interested.

On my way to the lift, I accidentally bumped into a tall, beefy guy who was with two equally large friends. They all looked as if they didn't like anyone or anything getting in their way; I tried to move but going around brick walls wasn't on the menu and I couldn't get out of the way in time. “Oops, sorry,” I said.

The biggest of the three looked at me, and I remembered him from the performance; Mr. Jerk, the guy who'd been owned by Tenkita. He looked at me, more closely this time, and a nasty little smile started to form on his face.

“Oops?”

Suddenly, I had the feeling that this guy wanted to make it personal. Oh, yeah, I'd seen that look before; the memories of the grinning, sweaty faces of the Elites and Tweeners who liked beating on me came rushing back. These guys looked like the jock bullies from my school. Fortunately, there were no lockers around to get shoved into and really, it could all be talked out, couldn't it?

It couldn't.

The look on the leader's face told me all I had to know; I was gonna get my ass kicked. I'd seen that look before and knew this guy had the IQ of an eggplant. He just eyed me and said, “Well, Mr. Oops, because of you, my girl don't wanna see me anymore. Whatta you think about that?”

“She showed good judgment?” That wasn't the wisest thing to say and he put his hand on my shoulder, crushing it; I could feel my bones grating.

“Real funny, pal!” he said acidly. “That old lady was a fake and all you had to do was shut your mouth and go with it but no, you screwed it up and now I'm going solo again.” That had to be the dumbest reason for punching someone out I'd ever heard of. All I had to do was look at his dull eyes and face and I knew that he was the kind who enjoyed trashing others.

“Sorry,” I said, wincing in pain.

“You're sorry,” he repeated and turned to his friends. “Mr. Oops is sorry, guys. Well, I accept his apology,” he sneered, then grabbed me by the throat. “And where are you off to?” he asked. Not that he cared, the expression on his face told me that he was enjoying all this and wanted to punish me a bit before whipping my butt, of that I was certain. His grip eased but only by a little.

“Nowhere special,” I managed to get out.

“Well, buddy, we wouldn't want you to be late for any appointments you have, especially when you're going nowhere.” He released me and shoved me to the floor. Nodding to his friends, his buddies grabbed my arms, pulled me up and held me fast.

“Hey! What the hell are you doing?” Struggling did me no good as there were three of them and one of me. Ever had the feeling you were going to be toast? That feeling was coming at me, right now. “Hey, you bastards, lemme go!” I yelled. First time in my life I ever came close to swearing and hey, guess what? They weren't all that impressed.

In fact, they weren't impressed at all. The lead idiot pushed a button on the lift and the doors opened. Before throwing me inside, he delivered a solid shot to my gut which left me on my knees gasping for air, and then I was kicked inside the elevator. On the way down, he called out, “Ask the old lady to wave her hand and save your punk ass!” followed by the sounds of palms being slapped.
Look who just got owned and as usual, I'd done nothing
.

By default, the elevator sent me down to Waste Disposal at the bottom of the ship and I was fuming, hurt, and angry beyond belief. That dude was a Class-A jerk and I hadn't done anything except take it in the gut like all those times before. Back in my dimension swearing was frowned on; since I wasn't there anymore, I did let out a string of curses and felt like bawling, but didn't. Man up and all that crap.

The next morning, I was still cheesed off, and it showed. Burnt a whole stack of waffles and over-boiled the eggs. No one said a word, except Big Gelt, the guy I'd seen on patrol the night of the levitation show.

“Eggs are a little rubbery today, guy,” he opined, but took them anyway. “Take it easy, guy,” he said, and then went to eat with another Ultra. As he sat down, he touched a button on his arm and a type of computer-generated mirror sprang up; he styled his blonde hair, and after checking that everything was perfect, closed the image and started eating. Someone told me that his hair was gray and that he dyed it every week.

Whatever. Fake hair color or no,
his
day was okay but mine wasn't. The other members of the cafeteria crew sensed something was wrong, but left me to my own misery. It wasn't their problem. I thought that it was just a one-time hazing thing, but again, I had a lot to learn. Jerks like this just couldn't let it go.

And wouldn't you know it, one of The Unholy Three came in as I was clearing up, doing his best to feign clumsiness and knock my trays over. Saw that the name on his uniform read “Sal.”
He was just like the jerks I knew not so long ago in school…

“Make me a sammich, boy,” he kept saying.
Sammich
? Maybe he meant “sandwich” and I wasn't about to make him anything. He kept dogging me and all the while I was hoping and praying that someone would step in and stop this. No, this time, I was on my own, but all the same, wasn't anyone going do anything?

A hand the size of a bear's paw fell on Sal's shoulder and turned him around. He looked into the eyes of a
very
big man with a shock of fiery red hair and a face that looked like a clenched fist. “That's Blue Lancer,” Gwyneth whispered to me excitedly. “You do
not
want to mess with him.”

No, I did not and neither did the other man. Lancer looked at Sal and asked him coldly, “Is there a problem with the way Bill's picking up the dishes?”

“No, sir,” the other man muttered quietly and mumbled an apology. However, that wasn't enough. Lancer clamped his hand on the moron's shoulder and dragged him over to where I was standing. “Apologize to him,” he ordered and squeezed the idiot's neck, a move which made the other guy wince. “Do it now,” he said very quietly.

“I'm sorry,” the jerk mumbled, and Lancer let him go. Sal left the Commissary quickly and Lancer went back to his table. While the jerk that'd dogged me was a big dude, over six feet and solidly built, Lancer was much broader in the shoulders, and Gwyneth told me he had the reputation of a tough hand-to-hand fighter. Plus, the rack of adjustable lances he had slung over his shoulder did a lot to dissuade others from trying anything. They were special lances that carried a variety of payloads: Stun lances, bomb lances, net lances and so on, and I remembered seeing on the Net archives footage of him hurling them at crooks who thought they could get away. Lancer never missed and many of the crooks ended up with concussions. Nasty stuff, but very effective.

Potential brawl over and damn, my heart wouldn't slow down. I felt shaky, and looked around; no one made eye contact with me. I couldn't tell if they were ashamed for me or of me. Work went back to normal, but I heard one guy say: “Sal really punked the beanpole.”

Blue Lancer had finished eating. He'd been sitting with a woman named Skree, his girlfriend. She was a pretty redhead wearing a white mini-skirt and white leather jacket, white thigh-high boots completed the outfit. They'd been looking at me and Skree whispered something to Lancer; guess they felt sorry for me. Lancer just nodded and walked out of the room. Skree made eye contact with me and motioned with her head as if to say, “Follow him.”

I did. Taking off my apron and walking outside, I caught up to BL in the corridor. He was striding along, heading for the lift and I called his name. He heard me and turned around. Facing me was a man in a dark blue bodysuit, a mask which did nothing to hide his mean-looking face and a holster of vicious-looking weapons. On my planet, this outfit would've been laughed at but here was another story, and he seemed like the type who wouldn't take laughter all that lightly.

“What do you want?” That sort of caught me off-balance; guess I sort of expected to find him sympathetic. He wasn't. He spoke with an edge to his voice, as if expecting something bad to happen. Well, his breakfast had been ruined by the jerk and I was indirectly responsible for it.

Keeping the quaver out of my voice, I said, “I'm sorry; that guy in there was looking to start something with me.”

“Yeah, why you?” Once again, there was that hard-assed tone so I figured that it was time to lay it all out.

I shrugged. “I'm the new guy. Maybe they feel they've got something to prove.”

Lancer looked me squarely in the eye. “Maybe someday
you'll
have to prove something to
them
. We can't always be around and I got my job to do, just like everyone else. New guy or not, best to watch out for yourself, don't you think?” Before I could say anything else, he walked into the lift and the doors closed; once again, I was on my own.

But Lancer had been right: Nut up or shut up. Time for empowerment. Crap, just remembered that word and hated it but in this case it fit. The question was, what to do and how to do it? I didn't know anything about self-defense, had only seen a few kung-fu movies, and looked like a straw with arms and legs.

Dan's words came back to me about the gym. Was that my answer? Saw a few heavy punching bags, speed bags, weights and benches plus a whole array of machines which I didn't have a clue about. Something about a “ninety-five pound weakling” flashed through my mind. That was laughable and after a few moments of indecision I walked in.

It was empty, save for one person punching a speed-bag with a steady tattoo of his fists. Ed Morgan, also known as “Crazyman,” another character I'd read up on. Ex-champion wrestler and Muay Thai artist; he'd grown up on the streets of New York, learned to fight the hard way on the streets, back alleys and underground fight clubs and brought himself up to be the best in both sports. He'd retired from the ring at the age of 35, the all-time greatest, opened up a boxing and martial arts gym and kept on training. He became a pretty fair boxer, although never a champion.

However, he soon grew bored with training others and became a mercenary, doing wet-work for a variety of shadowy agencies and high-paying private individuals. He'd shown a change of heart after a near-death experience when he was rescued by none other than Avenger himself; out of gratitude, he'd volunteered to come aboard the Tower and help out.

I took a look at the bag, gave it a shove. The damn thing was heavy. I took another look over my shoulder at the ex-champ; his focus was on the bag he was pummeling and he paid no attention to me.
Thanks a lot for your concern, champ
. Not knowing what to do, I started whacking the bag as hard as I could. My fists soon started to bleed and my arms felt as if they were about to fall off, but I kept at it until….

“Hey, you.” Crazyman, sweatshirt, track pants and all, had come over to stare at the human swizzle-stick whacking uselessly at the bag.

“What?” I stopped punching.

Shaking his head, he grabbed my shoulders and kicked my legs apart into a more stable stance. “Kid,” he said in a gravelly tough-guy voice, “Y'can't punch worth spit. I just seen it, y'can hit, for a skinny guy y'can hit, but y'can't punch. In a fight, you'd get clobbered.” He was right, I'd never won a fight in my life.

He reset my stance again and then directed me toward the bag. “One-two, one-two,” he repeated. “From the hips, that's where the power comes from; not the shoulders.” I was clueless about how to stand and punch so he got in front of the bag and said, “Watch me.” He threw a few punches while I observed his stance; when I faced the bag and threw a couple of punches, he started nodding with approval.

“Snap into it again, kid.” I noticed that his right eye was slightly turned in and his left eye sort of wandered, he actually looked a bit schizoid…but I didn't dare tell him that. “C'mon, kid,” he repeated. “I ain't gettin' any younger. snap into it, Slim Jimmy!”

Resetting my stance, I started to shuffle a bit more confidently, trying to find my own style; it didn't seem so awkward this time. Crazyman turned away and searched in a storage closet, took out an old pair of boxing mitts and fitted them on my hands.

“In the ring, kid—let's see if you c'n hit me.” He saw the look on my face. “Don't worry, I won't hitcha back. Let's see what ya got.” He got in ahead of me. All I saw was this huge back and muscles the size of small grapefruits around the base of his neck. His bald head looked like a pea and he wanted me to hit him?

Let's see what you got
. Apparently, it wasn't a lot. I tried to hit him, but couldn't lay a glove anywhere near his body. Bobbing, ducking, weaving, he evaded every shot I threw; as big as he was he was also much faster than I expected. I felt totally inept and he knew it from my expression. I'd given up even before I'd started.

“Time!” he said. Exhausted, I dropped my hands. “Keep 'em up!” he ordered sharply. “Guy you're fighting ain't gonna wait a minute's rest and he don't care if yer tired.” His eyes had a half-wild gleam in them now. “He'll lay ya out and all you'll be doing is the counting-the-holes-in-the ceiling-thing. He might even do worse 'n that!

Get 'em up!”

For the next twelve minutes, he taught me the finer points of sparring, blocking, jabbing, and ducking. Just when I thought it was all over, Oriana walked by. Turning my head to greet her, I was rewarded with a right hook to the face that made me see the solar system explode into a blinding flash of light. One shot was all it took to send me to the canvas; I woke up, staring blindly at the ceiling. Standing over me Crazyman said simply, “Eyes on whom yer fighting, kid. Pretty girls can wait.”