The Tower by J.S. Frankel

where I’d been stationed. I hadn’t seen her in the Commissary before. One of the cooks told me she’d recently had her shifts rotated back to the morning, so here she was. No one liked serving her, I found out. She had an “attitude problem,” as someone put it.
    She’d been named after Orion, the stellar hunter of Greek mythology. Her parents wanted a son but they got her instead and changed her name accordingly. She’d been trained to be a gymnast from the age of three and then got into the martial arts. She was the youngest and maybe the toughest member of the Association. From the way she walked and looked at everyone, she seemed to be a total bad-ass who didn’t take crap from anyone and would rather kick your butt into next week than say hello.
    She came a bit closer and I got a better look. About my age; sharp chin, high cheekbones and a long aquiline nose, long, wavy brown hair pulled back into a ponytail. She was dressed in black ankle-high boots, a red bodysuit with black stripes criss-crossing her body horizontally. She also had no cape but she did have a belt running over one shoulder. I took a quick look—was she carrying knives? Holy geez, she was! I’d read that she didn’t like using guns; instead, she carried a variety of throwing and hunting knives.
    She had the body of a gymnast or dancer. Even through her uniform I could see her ab muscles showing clearly. That’s what being in shape meant, I guess. Except for Deanna, I’d never seen a woman so sexy. God, did I feel emo just thinking that!
    Like many of the other heroes, she wore a mask; rather large and diamond-shaped, it covered much of her face, but her eyes shone out, a cold ice blue, watching everything and everyone. And all the Tech guys were watching her . Someone whistled; she walked over and stood in front of the jerk, just glaring at him ’til he backed off and mumbled an apology. “I’m sorry like hell!” I heard her say to the tech. “You’re a creep!” Now that was major bad-ass!
    She was beautiful. I felt my heart lurch just watching her. She caught me staring and strode over.
    â€œOut of my way,” she ordered one of the regulars and he quickly moved. She stood in front of me. “You’re the new guy, right?” she asked, straight to the point. Her voice was very feminine but sharp and clipped with no warmth at all. It sounded vaguely Spanish but what did I know, I was just too in awe of her to say anything. I just nodded.
    â€œYour file said you come from Portland,” she continued. I nodded again. “…need some info on the area,” she was saying. “Part of a case I’m working on.”
    Why couldn’t I get my mouth working ? “You want information?” I finally managed to get out.
    She looked at me coldly, as if I were the densest person alive and then put her trays down to stare a little more at me. “Yeah, information. I need to know all the major places the scum hang out. Y’gonna help me?” That came out as a challenge. Think fast . My father worked there, and often went boozing in the bars after his job was over. When he was sober, he sometimes filled me in on the details. I only hoped the places were still the same in this universe.
    Getting my mouth in motion, I said, “Um, well, you could start with Mike’s Place on Elm and Waterston, and then there’s Nick’s on Clark and Canal Street; probably lots of bars where maybe some bad guys hang out.”
    â€œBad guys,” she echoed, arching her eyebrows. What was the problem, I was trying to help, wasn’t I ? Didn’t the Tower have a data-file library or something like that? What kind of place was this, heroes with an attitude problem? Whatever….
    â€œCriminals,” I responded, using the proper word, “drug dealers, pickpockets…y’know…scum.”
    That got a blank look from her. Then,