The door would do any number of science-fiction sets proud with a hiss of air as the door ascended into a slot above. Past the door was a short hallway that quickly expanded into a large open area that looked like it could be a common room or a meeting area. I could see various other hallways and doors connected to the room, though none of the doors seemed as high-tech as the one I was standing outside of.

Standing in the middle of the common room, almost looking arranged like their picture on a poster I had seen not so long ago, stood the Chicago Wards. Well, four of them. I had done some research on Parahumans Online when I was trying to figure out who uncle Jason had been. I was mostly looking at the Protectorate, but I had skimmed the Wards section several times, so everyone looked familiar.

I stepped through the door when Joseph gestured for me to, and the boy in power armor raised a hand in greeting. Beside him stood two girls and another boy, and they were all also bedecked in their full costumes. They all looked very good and very professional. I felt frumpier than ever.

Joseph stepped forward once more, his stance as prim as ever. "Wards, this is your newest member. She has an appointment scheduled with a PR adviser later today, but hasn't chosen a name yet. Miss, this is Tecton, Grace, Animus, and Raymancer."

As he said their names, they each made gestures of acknowledgement. When Joseph had finished speaking, the tinker in power armor, Tecton, audibly stepped forward. "Hi. Welcome to the Wards!" He said. There was genuine warmth in his voice that somehow made me feel both excited to be here and even more mortified by my outfit.

Okay, I seriously had to get something more professional looking. And a cape name, for goodness sake.

Grace and Raymancer made their way forward while Animus stood where she was, just watching. Animus's mask covered most of her face, but her body language seemed to convey boredom and maybe a hint of hostility. I didn't really have time to worry about it, though, because Raymancer and Grace had made their way over.

"So, what would you like to be called?" Grace asked, leaning casually against the sparsely furnished metallic wall.

"Uh...well, I had to go by Grab-Bag once when I was forced to think of a name." I said. Wow, I sounded lame. Great first impression Lily. I attempted to insert a little humor as I finished. "Not that I would want that as permanent name!"

Tecton and Grace laughed graciously. Not that I believed for a second that they thought it was actually funny. As Raymancer was opening his mouth to ask his own question, I caught Tecton making subtle gestures toward Animus to get her to come closer.

"So what are you into, Grab-Bag?" Raymancer asked. He made it sound like there was a definite right answer to the question. Experience made me realize that I would probably disappoint him, though.

"Into? Oh, I dunno. Um. I guess I'm into Track and Field. And I thought about joining debate next year, but I've never done it. What about you?" I finally asked, attempting to deflect some of the attention to get time to think.

Apparently that caught him completely off guard. Which it really shouldn't have; it was a normal social nicety, wasn't it? I could see hints of a slight blush on the lower half of his face visible behind his mask.

"Uh. Well..." He spluttered, "I mean I sorta' like lots of things..."

He was evading the question. Trying to give himself time to think. Oh man, I knew what Raymancer was. He was totally a huge nerd. Unfortunately, the only experience I had with socializing with the "nerdy" cliques at my school involved turning one down for a date once, and then being called "Ice Queen" ever after. Ugh, what if Raymancer went to my school? That could make things pretty awkward.

After his momentary hesitation, Raymancer finally mustered up the courage to voice his preferences. "But, well... I guess I'm really into computer games and PNP RPGs. Oh and reading."

"Cool." I nodded to him, trying not to do anything offensive. Then I turned to Grace. "And what about you?"

Her smile came quickly and easily. "Well, I used to be really into gymnastics," she said. With a light laugh, she did a back-bend into a one-handed handstand. When I looked closer, I noticed she was balanced on a single gloved finger. I felt like I should cheer and clap or something, but she quickly finished the maneuver by righting herself. "I don't think I could keep my identity secret if I tried to do gymnastics now." She said, a grin plastered across her face.

"Showoff." Raymancer muttered good-naturedly, and received a playful hit from Grace in return.

Clearing his throat, Joseph stepped forward again. "Tecton, Campinile will be in meetings most of the day, so Director McCurdy is leaving it to you administer the field evaluations." He looked to me and the Wards. "Any questions?"

At the silence and shaking of heads, he gave a curt nod and spun on his heels, disappearing through the door without another word.

As the door whooshed closed, I turned to face the Wards again. To my surprise, Raymancer's hands were already making their way to his mask-an eyepatch combined with a giant lens over the other eye. Undoing a clasp, he pulled it off with a flourish and in the same motion brought his other hand to his midsection in a bow. "Bobby Forney. Pleased to meet you."

I didn't even have time to wonder if I would know him before I recognized that I didn't. Raymancer had short-cut red hair and a narrow face that his mask did a decent job of disguising. Even as I was noticing these details, I saw that Grace and Tecton were reaching toward their own mask and helmet respectively.

Grace lived up to her name. She was naturally beautiful with long brown hair that had just the right amount of curl. The simple-seeming costume she wore did a good job of accentuating her dancer's form, and the blue of her costume matched the blue of her eyes perfectly, which were a striking counterpoint to the hints of Asian heritage on her otherwise Caucasian features.

I couldn't really see Tecton's physical features past his suit besides his head, and only that because he had removed his helmet. His hair was also brown, though cut on the short side, even for boys. His face seemed like it fit inside his armor even without the helmet, which is to say it looked more like a jock's face than one I could imagine staying up all-hours in a workshop getting his equipment "just so."

"Uh, Hi." I started, just as the idea came to me. Before I could talk myself out of it just because of whatever problem Animus seemed to have with me, I raised a hand in greeting and bagged my shirt-turned-mask. "I'm Lily."

[][][][][]

'Field Evaluations' apparently consisted of abusing the subject with physical exertion until they collapsed, and then stress-testing their powers. Fortunately, I had some exercise clothes with me. Carrying your whole wardrobe is handy like that. Unfortunately, my clothes were drenched in sweat and I was already feeling the strain from the 'workout' portion of the evaluations. At this particular moment, I was sitting on the floor, gasping for breath during my "fifteen minute cool-down."

Tecton, also known as Lance, had changed out of his power-armor to an "under-armor enhanced exo-suit" as he called it. It, of course, shared his armor's red and grey accent scheme, but I could get a pretty decent feel for how he looked under the suit. My main observation: he seemed taller out of the suit than in it.

Animus hadn't unmasked to me, but the other team-members later said that her behavior was pretty normal, and I just had to give her time. Guess I couldn't hope for a perfect reception. No, that would be too easy.

Raymancer had apparently gone back to a video game that he had been playing. Grace (AKA Stephanie, or Steph for short) had come along to watch me suffer, but was gracious enough to ask my permission, first.

As my breath began coming in something more even and less ragged and desperate for oxygen, I saw Tecton right himself from leaning on a wall, clipboard in hand. It looked like break was coming to an end. Well, that was fine, as long as the exercise portion was over.

"Now for the interesting part. Powers!" He said. Either he was actually excited, or he feigned it pretty well. I guess it would be a bit exciting to see a new power, even if the power was underwhelming like mine was.

He offered me a hand to help me stand up, which I took. Grace had risen from her chair and approached as well. I think I caught the hint of a grin of excitement as well. Okay, even I had to admit it would be cool to see somebody demonstrating a new power. Trying to decipher how it worked, or what its limitations were.

"Okay," Tecton said, looking at his clipboard and pen in hand. "I think this eval would probably work best in the equipment room. At least for now. Right this way." He said, then turned and strode toward a door opposite the one we had entered from.

As we began walking, Grace clapped an arm around my shoulder. "This is going to so cool." She said.

I was surprised and bit uncertain about the physical familiarity, but it actually felt pretty good. Grace seemed friendly, and nice enough. I could actually see myself becoming pretty close friends with some of these people.

After only a few steps, I returned the gesture, putting my arm around her, too. "Yeah."

It felt awkward and uncomfortable, but not because the action itself was. Just that two people of similar height trying to put their arms around one another at the same time doesn't really work well. We held the pose all the way to the equipment room anyway.

I'm not sure what I expected from a Wards equipment room (or maybe this area serviced the PRT and Protectorate, too?), but it seemed incredibly mundane. There were long rows or locked cabinets, weight and other exercise equipment. It had rubber balls, exercise mats, and a volleyball net, but I didn't catch sight of any containment foam sprayers, no handguns, and not a single grenade. Absolutely boring.

Anyway, Tecton, Grace, and I entered the room and selected some light weights used for cardio workouts. Lance/Tecton then retrieved his pen and raised his clipboard.

"Okay, so we've seen you use your power on your mask. What else can you do with it?" He asked. "This is where Grace and I will try to come up with any questions we can about how it operates. There are some general guidelines on this form, but they have to be pretty basic to try to cover all of the bases. Basically."

I rolled my eyes, but I got the picture. Honestly, it sounded like fun. "Okay so, as I mentioned, I can disappear any number of things and make them reappear." I said, bagging half a dozen two-pound weights in the process. "I can use any part of my skin to make them disappear or reappear." I said, then put words to deed and made all the weights I had bagged reappear on the floor touching my feet.

Lanceton nodded, making notes on his clipboard. Stefface? Grephiny? Bleh, neither of those really worked. Steph (I guess) just watched, seemingly engrossed in my little presentation.

"I don't know how much I can hold, but I know it's a lot more than I can disappear at one time." I continued. I briefly considered trying to make everything in my space appear around me, but decided that would probably be too big a hassle to clean up; and possibly just a terrible idea anyway.

"How much can you disappear?" Grace asked. Man, I was loving her enthusiasm. She was like a little kid at the magic show.

"Well, I'm not sure." I said. "I've bagged a mattress before. Uh...sorry, bagged is what I call it when I make things disappear. Because it's kinda' like they disappear into my grab-bag. Anyway, I've bagged a mattress before, but when I decided to push myself and see if I could bag a car, all I ended up with was a headache."

Lance and Steph nodded knowingly. "Thinker headaches." Tecton said.

I wasn't really a thinker, so I didn't see that that applied to me, but I guess they could call it whatever they wanted. I shrugged and said, "maybe."

"Okay, so what else?" Tecton asked.

Just as I was thinking about what else I knew about my power, I heard a raised voice in the gym. "Hey, where are you guys? Have you gotten to the power eval yet?"

Shaking his head, Tecton raised his own voice to be heard. "Yeah, Bobby, we're in the equipment room."

As Raymancer, sans mask, entered through the same door we had, he looked around at us. "So, what'd I miss?"