"Such carelessness is unlike you, Astrea."

Mr. Findlay looked disappointed. Astrea looked at the floor.

"I'm... really sorry, sir. I don't know what happened to it - it was here when I left!" - "it" being the odd crystal platter that they had found at Monticello.

"Astrea," Findlay said gently, "As Director, I do have to ask - did you take it home, maybe to look at it there?"

"Oh, no, sir!" Astrea's head jerked up. "You've made it clear we're not to take anything off-site."

He patted her shoulder. "All right, then."

Inwardly, he sighed in relief - taking an antiquity without authorization was a firing offense.

Ruth MacCorkindale smirked. So Findlay's golden girl bad feet of clay, after all.

"I'm afraid I have no choice but to issue a formal demerit to you both."

"What?!" Ruth turned purple.

"Now, Ruth, you signed it out to her. It was your responsibility to see that it was returned to its proper place." Findlay turned his palms outward. "I didn't write the rules."

Ruth spun toward Astrea. "How do you know she didn't take it home?"

"You left with me!" Astrea cried. "You know I didn't take it - you walked out with me yourself!"

"Oh. Right." .

The two women stood staring at each other in uncomfortble silence. Astrea's lower lip trembled. Ruth looked as if she wished she were anywhere but here.

"Well," Findlay said after a moment. "I guess we can rule out you two conspiring to remove it, together."

Both women gave a short laugh, and the tension in the small office lessened noticeably. "Mr. Findlay, I didn't take the platter _"

"I know - "

"But this is my fault. I had it last."

The older gent sighed. "If it was up to me, I wouldn't put anything in either of your files. I think the world of you, both of you. I'm certain it's misplaced and will turn up sooner or later."

"But," he said, sitting on the edge of the desk, "we have rules and procedures so things don't get lost in the 'Nation's Attic'. As Director I have to uphold those rules, for the good of the Institution." '

Ruth and Astrea sighed in resignation.

"As your friend, I want to buy you ladies lunch down at The Monocle. We all work too well together - and too close together - " he gestured about the tiny office "- to let something like an overgrown pie platter come between us, hmm?"

Mr. Findlay glanced as his watch. "So, grab your coats and shake a leg. I'll meet you downstairs."

He waited until they had left, then gathered up his hat and keys. He rubbed his eyes - some days it wasn't easy being the boss.

Of course, Findlay knew, the chances of a thief breaking into the Castle, fInding his way through a maze of corridors, and snatching just one item that had only been discovered the previous afternoon, all without being detected, were patently ridiculous.

Only four people had seen what was inside those boxes, and he knew for damn sure that three of them didn't make off with it.

Oh, well - it was just a blasted dish.

There was something comforting about coming home for Sunday dinner, especially after a week like Astrea had gone through. After the highs and lows it felt good to tread familiar sturdy ground.

The neighborhood hadn't changed much since the Starrs first moved in, shortly after the death of Dr. King. The narrow houses still sported the occasional flag or flowers on the front porch and children still played kickball through the backyards.

Franklin Starr still mowed his patch of lawn with the Senators game blaring from the radio, stepping back from the noisy mower a bit whenever the count was full.

Inside, the house was filled with the aroma of a meal cooked up from scratch - though since her mother's illness Astrea had noticed a distinct trend toward healthier foods.

Not that Diana Starr needed to lose any more weight - the hospital stay had seen to that.

Indeed, she had been almost frighteningly gaunt, and it was only within the past few months that she seemed like the healthy, robust woman Astrea and Athena had grown up with.

Athena was the older of the two by fourteen months, but for years they were so much alike most people assumed they were twins. It was not until Athena preceded Astrea to Carver High that the two began moving in different circles. Even when Athena followed in her father's footsteps and left for the police academy, they remained best of friends.

This evening, she patiently listened to her sister tell all about the wonderful discoveries at Monticello, even though she had heard it all before when Astrea had phoned her the next day.

Then, as now, Astrea left out any reference to the seven-ringed crystal device or its - her -  powers. It was always possible that the police might not react favorably to what she was planning to do, which would put Athena and her father in a terrible position if they knew it was her.

"I'm surprised they let you cut a hole in Jefferson's house," her father said, clearing away the last of the dishes.

"I didn't do the cutting, Dad - just the research. Mr. Findlay wrangled the okay."

"That Mr. Findlay is such a nice man," her mother beamed. "We ought to have him for dinner sometime."

"I'm sure he'd like that."

"Well-l-l, he can't be any prouder of you than I am." Frank1in gave her shoulder a squeeze.

The fIrst Starr to go to college - now if only she'd go back and finish her degree.

He turned to his other favorite daughter. "How goes it in Third, honey?"

"Well, Barilla's still on suspension."

Franklin grimaced. "Nothing worse than a dirty cop. Like selling out your own family."

"Now, dear, let's not." Diana spoke in a warning tone.

Athena quickly changed the subject. "Word's spreading about some kind of exotic weaponry that's supposed to be on the streets. You hear anything, Dad?"

He shook his head. "What kind of weapons? Guns?" ,

"I don't know - but the Federal boys have been asking a lot of questions."

"Hmph. Feds, huh?"

"I don't like the sound of that." Diana fingered her wedding ring nerVously.

"Hey, don't you worry about our little girl - she's the best shot in the precinct!"

"How - I just took the test on Friday!" .

Her father grinned. "Sully told me!"

He gathered up the dinner glasses in his massive arms. "You girls keep your mother company. I'll finish these up in no time."

Astrea followed her mother and sister into the living room. "Someone remind me - I just want to get a box from the basement before I go."

"Just one, hon?" Her father stuck his head out of the kitchen and grinned. "Eventually I'd like to get my basement back."

"Oh, Frank," sighed her mom. "You know what he wants? A pool table, of all things."

"Oh, you got trouble, you got terrible terrible trouble ... " Frank's baritone warbled from the kitchen. Athena and Astrea started to laugh - he used to sing that old chestnut when they were kids.

"Which a capital - "

"T!" the girls shouted.

"Which rhymes with - "

"P!"

"Which stands for - "

The four shouted in unison: "Pool!"*

Astrea opened the dusty cardboard box and took out her old gymnastics uniforms. They looked as good as the day she got them.

No surprise, really, considering that she only wore them sitting on the bench.

She certainly couldn't blame her coaches - she really wasn't all that good. Still, sometimes she wished that once she could have been in a real meet.

Astrea had grown a little since high school, and evidently grew a little more when she "powered up". Still, between the two leotards there looked like more than enough material to make into a costume.

She used red on the bottom, blue on the top. That was the easy part - though she did have to change form a couple of times to get the sizing right.

Sewing the white stars onto the blue field took a few evenings, but she knew the effect she wanted. If Betsy Ross had indeed sewn the first American flag, she had Astrea's sympathy.

She chose a large star for an emblem of sorts - that, and the suit looked much better with something to break up the pattern a little.

As for her feet, well, gymnastic slippers were no good outdoors and sneakers looked downright dumb. It took several trips to the thrift shops before she could find boots that would fit her - and on a whim she picked up some nice opera gloves as well.

One effect of her changing back and forth to size up the suit was the realization that whatever clothes one of her forms was wearing could be made to vanish when she changed to her other self - and reappear when she changed back.

Aside from having to stand in a certain position to change, and getting blinded every time even with her eyes closed, this was a darn sight better than changing at home and sneaking out every night.

Admittedly, she still wasn't entirely certain what she could do. The logical thing to do, it seemed, was to test herseif.

Astrea's apartment was just off of Wisconsin Avenue, a busy street that got even busier at night. If she was going to test herself, she'd have to find someplace a bit more deserted.

When she had been doing some research at Howard's library, she had seen a lovely hillside park with a series of formal gardens and cascading pools. The winds had been blowing pretty steadily lately - there were probably some downed branches she could test herself against.

The first test, it turned out, was the hill itself. Meridian Hill Park, it seemed, was built on the steepest hill in the District.

Also, perhaps, the brightest.

She bad been afraid of stumbling around in the dark, but the entire park was bathed in a dim light - probably the city lights reflecting off of the low clouds, she decided.

Light pollution - the scourge of astronomers everywhere. She had read more than once that there were very few places left where one could build large telescopes far from the blinding glare of man-made light.

Astrea felt a little strange, walking alone through a park at night wearing a circus costume.

Well, maybe not entirely alone.

Under a spreading chestnut tree, a man exchanged a white packet for a thin stack of bills.

Astrea was incredulous - not that he was selling drugs so openly, but that he was selling them to a child who couldn't have been nine or ten years old.

Gathering her nerves she marched over to them.

"What do you think you're doing?"

The seller and buyer both looked up to see a young black woman in star~spangled spandex.

"Yo, what's it look like? None o' yo godam business!"

Before she even realized what she was doing, she slapped him - and the man crumpled to the ground, out cold.

Oops.

The boy looked at her, wide-eyed. He dropped the white packet on the ground.

"It's late. Go home," she said sternly.

He turned and ran.

Astrea watched him go. So young, she sighed.

She prayed he was "only" a runner and not hooked, already, himself. Perhaps she should follow him ...

"Hey, bitch!"

Astrea turned, slowly.

There were three more toughs, all wearing jackets similar to that worn by the man she had flattened. For a moment her instincts told her to run, before she remembered... what she could do.

"You on our turf, sweet thang," said the one in the middle, slapping a chain rhythmically into his palm. "An' you frighten off a customer. Bad for business."

Astrea stood her ground.

"Business is bad all over," she shrugged. "It's the economy, stupid."

"Gonna shut yo smart mouth, you - " one man lunged forward with a knife, but Astrea backhanded him into the chestnut tree.

Heavens, she thought.

Did I do that?

Astrea was so busy watching the fellow crumple against the tree that she didn't notice the third man run forward - until he snarled and smashed his huge fist into Andrea's head!

Astrea blinked and looked at him. She hadn't felt a thing. Wow.

He, however, was holding his hand and wailing in pain.

"This park doesn't belong to you - it belongs to everyone. You want 'turf?" She grabbed his jacket and with a smooth bowling motion threw him down the hill. He skid a good two hundred feet through the wet grass.

'There you go -'turf'!"

"Awright, that's it, you gonna die!" The tall man started swinging his chain around. "Gonna whip you bad!"

The chain whistled through the air.

Much to her own surprise, Astrea caught it - and yanked it out of his grasp.

She casually tossed the chain aside.

He let loose with a string of expletives. "No one messes with the Nighthawks! Lemme tell you something - you one dead bitch, you know that? Dead!"

"Let me ask you something."

She stepped right up to his face. "Can you swim?"

"Huh? Y-yeah."

"Good."

She grabbed him by the front of his jacket and tossed him through the cool air into the very cold reflecting pool.

Not the kind of workout she bad in mind - but it would do.

She had proved to herself that she was indeed incredibly strong, not to mention invulnerable to harm.

And she had done a good turn besides, Astrea smiled.

She would have to come back to this park.

The bus pulled away in a cloud of noxious fumes that was barely noticeable, given that everyone at the bus stop was smoking.

Everyone, that is, except Astrea, whose neatly-pressed clothes stood out even more than her lack of a cigarette. It hardly mattered that she, too, was black - she disliked this dirty, run-down neighborhood, and the feeling was mutual.

It was times like this that she found it hard to believe her mother had grown up here. Paint peeled off dilapidated buildings. Weeds stuck up through the cracks, and broken glass littered the sidewalk.

It wasn't a matter of poverty. It was attitude.

It didn't take money to sweep up the glass or pull up the weeds. How could they live like this?

If her mother hadn't such a fondness for Sweet Jenny's chocolate covered cherries, Astrea would never set foot in this part of town.

She had to wonder about that candy shop. Sweet Jenny's had been in the same location since the Thirties, but now its display windows were cracked and empty, its lunch counter long gone. She suspected that "Mrs. Jenny", whose husband was long gone too, kept the place open simply for something to do.

Having nearly lost her own mother, Astrea could well imagine how lonely Mrs. Jenny must be, and how it must break her heart to see what her neighborhood had become.

About the only reasonably-new building was the bank, and it was designed more like a fortress than a bank. There were no outside windows, even on the upper stories. The doors were made of bulletproof glass, and a second set of metal doors were used at night. About the only thing on the outside of the bank was an alarm bell, which, Astrea just realized, was ringing.

An outside alarm? As if any of these people were going to call the police.

That wasn't right. The money could be replaced, but people like Mrs. Jenny put up with enough; they shouldn't have to fear for their safety. And if the police aren't here to stop them ...

Astrea slipped behind a van that hadn't moved since the Carter Administration. And from behind the van came a brilliant flash of light.

A dark-skinned man in motorcycle leathers stood in the bank lobby, laughing as he pointed his arm at a very distressed bank guard. The lower half of each arm was encased in some kind of art-deco metal gauntlets that were evidently designed to match his helmet - but didn't, quite.

Abruptly the man stopped laughing, swung his arm from under the guard's nose and strafed the wall above the tellers' cages with brilliant white bolts that resembled lightning in miniature. Staff and customers alike cowered and covered their heads as chunks of brick and plaster rained down.

"Good news, Jack," he snarled at the guard. "You get to live.

"Now, I said I'm taking all the money. Anyone else want to be a hero?"

"I guess that would be me."

The man turned, incredulous. That a gal's voice? What, she hadn't noticed him blowing away the wall?

Astrea stood, casually, not twenty feet away.

He looked her up and down. "Did a parade pass by here or something?"

"You're under arrest," she said evenly.

"Heh," he grinned. "Name's Powerbolt... 'cuz that's what I throw. An' I'm gonna knock you on your cute butt unless you get outta here - right now!"

Astrea paused.

"Nnno."

"O-kay. Your funeral, Flag Girl."

The device on his wrist crackled to life - sparks flashed between gaps in the fIns, the tips glowed whitish blue, and a brilliant white bolt split the air!

Even after seeing him rake the wall, Astrea was sti1l somehow startled when he fIred at her - she hadn't expected him to actually shoot her!

But startle her was all it did - if the bolt hadn't caused)ier to stumble a few steps backward, she would have thought he had missed entirely.

Powerbolt was already turning back toward the vault when he noticed - his target was still standing?

Astrea took a few steps forward, and Powerbolt brought both hands to bear. A twin bolt slammed into Astrea's chest, but she barely lost momentum.

The would-be bank robber's eyes grew wide under his helmet.

"What in -? Fall down, dammit!"

Astrea strode forward through the barrage, smiling now that she realized the bolts couldn't hurt her. It was true - in this form she was invulnerable!

The inside of the bank lit up as a panicking Powerbolt fired bolt after bolt into the steadily-advancing heroine.

Astrea simply reached out and grabbed the man's lightning-spewing gauntlets, peeling them apart as easily as if they were bananas. She slowly crushed the sparking metal in her small hands as Powerbolt stared at the remains of his weapons.

'That's ... that's steel."

"Ho, hum." Astrea arched an eyebrow. "I don't think it's really necessary to slug you, do you?"

"No-o-o-o, ma'am!"

"Then you sit here until the police come. I find out you ran off, or hurt anyone ... "

She let the granular remains of his gauntlets flow through her fIngers. "I will be cross. Hear?"

Nodding vigorously, he dropped to the floor and folded his hands.

By the time the police arrived, Astrea had already ducked into an alleyway and changed.

"Flag Girl"?

Sounded like she was part of the halftime show.

She had better come up with a name for her costumed identity, Astrea thought, before someone else comes up with one that sticks.

All-American Girl? Star Woman?

She kind of liked Freedom Girl - except that "girl" part didn't sit too well. There were a lot of connotations she didn't care for - and Freedom Woman just didn't have that ring to it.

Well, that hardly mattered now. If she hurried she could just get to Sweet Jenny's before they closed.

For the past three days she had scanned the Post for any news the Potomac Savings robbery attempt, but the incident hadn't merited a mention.

At dinner Sunday her father had commented about a strange robbery of some sort, but he didn't elaborate much. He did say that the perpetrator had destroyed the bank cameras, so there were no pictures of whatever it was that took place.

For Astrea it wasn't a matter of seeing her name in the paper - assuming she eventually chose one - it was a matter of what people made of an invulnerable strongwoman in their midst.

Certainly there had been costumed vigilantes before, but you would have to do quite a bit of research to flnd any mention of one. Mostly they were men - they were invariably men - who for some reason or other got fed up with the system and decided to dispense a little justice on their own. Usually they appeared in response to some immediate threat - a gang of saboteurs, a particularly gruesome string of murders - and once that threat was dealt with, faded quietly away.

The police were not always fond of such frontier justice - no small consideration for Astrea, given that she had a father and a sister on the force.

She looked up from her paper, suddenly aware that the bus had been stopped for almost a minute. Odd - she hadn't heard anyone signal for stop.

The driver was leaning toward his window as an obviously-agitated man shouted at him.

Curious, Astrea slid down a few seats closer to see if she could hear what was going on.

"But it's my route, man."

"Look, you take that bus down there, it's gonua cause vibrations. If that thing shifts it'll kill him!"

"Ubh, let me check with my supervisor ... "

Astrea stood. "Driver? I'll just get off here, please."

The pavement had given way beneath the right wheels; they sank deep enough to lift the streetward side of the cement mixer nearly two feet off the ground.

Two burly men knelt helplessly by a man whose legs and lower torso were pinned by the truck, trying as best they could to comfort the grimacing workman. A half-dozen passerby milled about helplessly, while a third workman screamed into his cell phone for assistance.

The men looked up as a young woman in a red, white and blue leotard pushed her way past the onlookers.

They stared dumbfounded when she walked to the side of the truck, crouched down and put her hands under the chassis as if to lift it.

"Get ready to pull him out," she said. "I'm not sure how long I can hold this."

"What? Lissen girl, we gotta trapped man here. We got no time for - "

"Just," Astrea said. "Be ready."

Yes, this was crazy, she told herself. The truck must weigh tons. How could she lift such a thing? Logically this whole business was impossible - but her heart told her it was true.

She pulled against the chassis; her boots started to break through the sidewalk. Her muscles tensed and her knees locked in place.

For a moment, nothing happened.

Then thee wheels burst free of the roadway, and the loaded cement truck was now tilted at a forty-five degree angle, supported seemingly without effort on the slender wrists of a young girl.

"Would you move him out of there, please?"

The two transit workers snapped out of their dumbstruck reverie and gently pulled their friend onto the sidewalk. They could be forgiven for their lapse of concentration - the handful of onlookers still had not yet closed their mouths.

As Astrea lowered the truck, an approaching siren wailed. Two tones, she thought - ambulance.

Good. Her first aid training was pretty limited.

She swung the truck around so it was on more solid footing. Sinkholes in Washington were nothing new, so there were ways to get the truck out; no reason, though, she couldn't do them a favor.

"Thanks, uh... miss."

She nodded and smiled.

She would have to decide on a name.

With almost casual ease she leaped into the air, sailing past three stories of apartments to the rooftop.

Oh, if only her former coaches could see her now!

That was fun - helping save someone's life was so much more satisfying than stopping a bank robbery!

She was about to leap across the street when she happened to glance down. 1bree stories was a lot higher than it looked from inside a window. Especially when you're talking about jumping a hundred-foot gap.

What was she afraid of? She had bounced lightning bolts off her chest - she couldn't be hurt by a fall from this height!

Astrea took a deep breath and leaped.

She cleared the edge of the roof with ease. She almost cleared the other side of the roof, and stumbled a bit upon landing, but she made it.

Astrea grinned. That was a rea1 "leap of faith".

She could do it. As long as she believed she could, she could do the impossible.

She jumped down into a sidestreet and ducked into a recessed doorway to change. She waited a few moments for her vision to clear before walking to the Metro station down the block. Pedestrians who clutched their coats tightly around them against the cold grey morning must have wondered about the girl who sauntered down the street smiling from ear to ear.

Astrea got off the train at Seventh and Pennsylvania, near the National Archives. There was another stop a bit closer to work, but there was a newsstand down near Constitution, and she had left her paper on the bus.

As she cut through the Hirschorn's Sculpture garden and out nto the Mall, she was suddenly struck by an inspiration.

Across the lawn stood the red sandstone parapets of the Castle, the main building and symbol of the Smithsonian Institution, home to an unmatched collection of items both prosaic and profound, a virtual treasure trove of American culture and civilization.

She smiled at the inspiration.

She had just thought of the perfect name.

Americana.