Eventually, we all began talking as friends and no longer acquaintances. I began to feel more and more comfortable with these people as time went by.

"We should think of codenames. We're government agents now, we should have secret codenames," Raven says from beside me, smiling, "I wanna be called Mystique." She has obviously given this some thought.

"Damn, I wanted to be called Mystique," everybody chuckled.

"Well tough, I called it." A wave of blue scales runs down her body in an odd way, and she shapes into Sean. She then raises her eyebrows, saying "and I'm way more mysterious than you." Everybody jumps back suddenly, Sean and I nearly falling off of our chairs, before laughing and clapping at her amazing gift. If only I could grow my tail at will instead of being forced every time a drop of water falls onto me.

"Darwin, what about you," Raven smiles after changing into her normal blonde self.

"Well, uh, 'Darwin' is already a nickname and you know, it sort of fits," Darwin moves his head around whilst he explains, "adapt to survive and all. Check this out," he then stands up and makes his way over to the fish-tank behind Angel and himself. He dunks his head in, and for a moment I can't find a reason why. I then notice a trio of gills forming on both sides of his head. He turns his head to face us, eyes wide open, and opens his mouth, indicating that he is breathing. I gasp in excitement as the others cheer and clap.

"Thank you, thank you," Darwin wipes his face clean of any remaining water from the fish-tank, "what about you," he then points to Sean.

"I'm going to be," Sean stares of into the distance in wonder, "Banshee," he then decides. I raise my eyebrows as Hank asks him why he would like to be named after a wailing spirit. Sean stands up, "you might want to cover your ears," he then states.

Walking over beside the coffee table in front of us, he squats down and takes a deep breath in as the rest of us cover our ears. As he breathes out, he makes a very loud noise that sounded very much like some sort of radar, and the glass window he is facing smashes into hundreds of pieces. The group cheers and laughs in amazement; these mutations keep getting better and better. To my dismay, Sean points to me saying "your turn," and my face turns red in embarrassment.

"Well, I can't exactly do it right now," I scratch my head awkwardly, the room looking at me strangely.

"Why not?" Sean asks after taking a seat in his chair.

"I need water. Like, lots of water," I awkwardly glance at everyone.

"Why, do you turn into a fish or something?"

"Or something. I grow a tail," I shrug, trying to be nonchalant about it and failing.

"Oh my god, so you're like a mermaid?" Angel asks, excitedly. I open my mouth about to argue, but end up closing it and nodding.

"Awesome."

"That's so cool!"

"Wow," everyone comments on my mutation, clearly impressed.

"Thanks," I say, almost blushing once again. "Trust me though, it's not as good as it sounds. I can't touch water without turning. It's more a curse than a gift."

"What? But I swear I saw you drinking water earlier," Sean questions. "That's because I drank it from a straw. It doesn't go anywhere beyond my mouth." The room nods in understanding before Hank speaks up.

"You should be called Siren," he begins, "like the greek myth. They were beautiful creatures who lured sailors to them using their voice, some of them are said to have tails like a mermaid." After a moment of thinking, I grin at him nodding my head, before saying "I like it," and then asking what Angel wanted to be called.

"Well, my stage name is Angel," she takes off her jacket, "it kinda fits." She turns around and a large tattoo of two wings on her back catch my eye. All of a sudden, the two tattoos start to move, and they transform into real life wings. They were a transparent purple colour, with pink at the roots, and were very pretty. I gasp once again and stare at her.

"You can fly?" Raven asks from beside me in amazement. Angel "mm-hm"'s in confirmation before showing another one of her amazing powers. Turning around towards the now smashed glass window, she bends over and spits a flaming ball of fire towards the golden statue in the middle of the grass 'courtyard'. It lands in the middle of it's head and disintegrates, leaving it smoking from the top. Again, we cheer and laugh in amazement, and then it was Hank's turn.

"What's your name?" Angel asks him, putting her jacket back on. Hank looks to the floor, an embarrassed look on his face, as Alex jokily says, "how about big foot?" Angered by his rude remark, I stare at him bitterly.

"You know what they say about guys with big feet," I say and Alex looks at me, taking another sip of his beer. I stare down at his feet with my eyebrows raised, "and yours are kinda small." Alex chuckled, nodding his head in surrender, and I crack a small smile. I look over to Hank and he smiles at me in thanks. I nod my head at him and Darwin says, "okay now." We all laugh it off for a few moments until Darwin speaks up once again.

"Alex, what is your gift? What can you do?" Alex straightens up in his seat as Darwin asks this.

"Uh, it's not. . . I just can't do it. I can't do it in here." He mumbles, clearly embarrassed by his gift.

"Why, can you do it out there?" I ask.

"Why don't you just do it out there?"

"Come on."

"Alex! Alex! Alex," we start chanting his name and clapping until he raises his hand and stands up. He puts his beer on the table and walks outside, stepping outside of the glass-less window.

"That's the spirit!" Darwin shouts with his arms raised.

"Get down when I tell you," Alex says. Sean mocks him and I laugh. Alex stands outside and stares at the statue, while we stand only just inside the window.

"Get back," He says, looking at us before looking back at the statue and cracking his knuckles in preparation. We get back behind the wall before poking our heads out again to look at him. He's about to perform his gift when he sees us and tells us to get back once more, irritatedly. We don't budge and he rolls his eyes, muttering a 'whatever'. Alex then starts revolving his hips in a circle, producing large glowing red rings that look almost like the ring revolving around saturn. After a moment of moving his arms and hips, Alex lets the rings go and it hits the statue, slicing it so easily in half. Hearing our clapping and applause, he bows as if he has performed a show on stage.

"Thank you, thank you," Alex said, stepping back inside. Darwin gives him a high five and a rough pat on the back.

"Nice, man!" He says. Alex smiles and makes his way over to the couch and sits back down, us following closely behind him.

Laughing, Raven says, "I think you should be called Havok, with a 'K'. You can cause some serious damage with those hula hoops." The group nods in agreement and I smile.

"Sounds good," Alex says and we make eye contact for a second. He raises his beer bottle to me and takes a sip. I grin at him and he smiles back.

•••