AN: Hello everyone! Thank you to those who have read and liked my story so far. And to WritersWayOfLife, thank you so much for your reviews. I was worried that people didn't like my story enough to review.
Fair warning, I am a bit of a procrastinator. I will probably have a chapter done and typed, but won't post it because I am lazy. I apologize ahead of time to those who have been patient with me.
And for Athena's accent, I will not put in any accent on the words, like you would for German. However, I will put different Russian words, most likely the pronunciations of the words in italics. She will speak Russian on occasion and I will put the pronunciations of that.
Thanks again to everyone! Please, R&R!
After meeting the rest of the team, Athena had been allowed to go and unpack her belongings. Charles and Erik left with Agent MacTaggert to Langley to meet with the CIA director. She had been exploring her room and found that the door by her bed was a small walk in closet, and that the other door was a personal bathroom. She had put her clothes in the closet, the more personal items in the vanity drawers, and her hygiene items in the bathroom.
She was currently looking for a good place to hide her weapons. She didn't want them to be found too easily, but also wanted to have it be easier to access them. However, a knock at her door made her quickly out her bag of weapons under the bed, before opening the door.
Raven stood there with a sweet smile on her face. "Hey, everyone's gathering in the rec. room. I came to get you."
Athena returned her smile and nodded. "Okay."
After closing her door, the two girls walked down to the rec. room. When they walked in, Angel was walking around the mini bar with three Colas in her hands. The boys were over by the couches: Alex and Sean sat in chairs, Darwin sat on the far couch and Hank sat on the other couch. Raven grabbed one of the Colas that Angel held and sat down next to Hank. Angel handed Athena a Cola, then took her hand and led her to the couch where she sat between Angel and Darwin.
For the next few hours, they all got to know each other better. Athena learned a few things about each of them. Darwin had been a taxi driver. Raven was Charles' adopted sister. Sean wasn't in college yet. Angel had been a stripper. Alex had been in an army prison of his own decision. Hank had worked for the CIA at the base and built the machine that found everyone.
"Wow, that's really impressive," Athena commented. Everyone looked at her in confusion. "What? Did I say something wrong?"
"You have an accent," Hank told her. "You sound Russian."
Athena's eyes widened a little and quickly looked down at her hands. She mentally slapped herself for being so careless. She had gotten so comfortable that she slipped into her Russian accent. It was silent as a blush crept onto her cheeks.
"I like it," Raven's voice broke the silence. Athena's head snapped up and blinked a few times.
"I think it's cool," Alex told her.
"We all think it's cool," Angel chimed in. Athena turned to her. "There's no need to hide it; it suits you."
She looked at Angel for a moment, and then looked at the smiles of the each person around her. Finally, she grinned and nodded.
"So, you're from Russia?" Darwin asked.
She nodded, keeping her Russian accent. "My mother was Russian and my father is Italian, but I was born and raised in Russia. But you all can relax; I'm not devoted to the Soviet Union." She could see Hank visibly relax in his seat and she tried to hold in a giggle.
"Wait," Hank said confusion on his face. "You talked about your father in present tense, but not your mother."
"Oh, come on," Alex groaned. "Only you would point out something in someone's grammar."
"Stop being a jerk, Alex," Raven snapped at him.
"Athena?"
The arguing teenagers stopped at the sound of concern in Angel's voice. Athena was looking at her hands. "My mother… died… when I was eight." Silence followed after her statement.
"I'm sorry," Hank whispered. "I didn't know."
"It's alright," Athena said with a forced smile. "You would have learned eventually. How about we change the subject, dah?"
Raven smiled at this. "Good idea. We should think of codenames," she said in excitement. "We're government agents now, we should have secret codenames. I want to be called Mystique."
"Damn," Sean responded. "I wanted to be called Mystique."
"Well tough, I called it." Suddenly, Raven changed her appearance to look like Sean, shocking everyone. "And I'm way more mysterious than you," she said mimicking his voice. Everyone clapped as she changed back. "Darwin, what about you?" she asked.
"Well, uh, Darwin's already a nickname, and, you know, sorta fits, adapt to survive and all. Check this out." He got up and walked behind the couch to the fish tank. Both Angel and Athena turned around to watch as Darwin put his head in the fish tank and grew gills. Amazed, everyone clapped once again.
Darwin shook his head like a dog before pointing at Sean. "What about you?"
He thought about it a little. "I'm going to be…Banshee!"
"Why do you want to be named after a wailing spirit?" Hank and Athena asked at the same time.
"You might want to cover your ears." He got up and crouched at one end of the coffee table. Slowly, everyone covered our ears and Sean took a deep breath and let out a screech that blew out a window.
Despite covering her ears, it took Athena a moment for her ears to stop ringing, due to her heightened hearing. When the ringing finally stopped, Angel was standing up.
"My stage name was Angel," she said, taking off her jacket. Sean whistled at her and Athena rolled her eyes; guys were all alike, Russian or American. Angel turned around saying, "Kinda fits." What looked like light tattoos on her shoulders and back, came off her skin into insectile wings.
"You can fly!" Raven exclaimed.
"Uh huh. And um…" She turned to the statue in the court yard and spit acid at it. Everyone clapped as she put her jacket back on. "What's your name?" she asked, nodding to Hank, who looked away from everyone.
Alex coughed. "How 'bout Bigfoot?"
Raven gave him a glare. "Well, you know what they say about guys with big feet," she snapped, then looked at his feet. "And, uh, yours are kinda small."
Angel and Athena giggled at this and Alex looked taken aback. Luckily, Darwin cut in before Alex could make a comeback. "Alex, what is your gift? What can you do?"
Alex looked at the drink in his hands. Athena could see a look of disgust in his eyes; she had gotten very good a reading a person's feelings from their eyes. "It's not, um… I just can't do it. I can't do it in here."
"Can you do it out there?" Athena asked pointing outside. He looked at her before shaking his head, and looking nervous.
"Come on. Alex, Alex," Darwin started to chant, soon everyone joined in; except for Athena. She felt bad for him and it was obvious to her that he didn't like his power; something that she understood completely.
He eventually got up and everyone cheered. As he walked out of the window, he said in an irritated tone, "Get down when I tell you." Athena was in front of Hank and Raven, leaning out the window to watch. He looked at us.
"Get back," he said. Everyone backed up, but only to lean out again. "Get back!" he shouted. When no one moved, he let out an annoyed huff and mumbled, "What ever."
Alex started to swing his hips, and energy started to form rings around his body. When he let it go, one of the rings cut the statue in half. Everyone began to clap and cheer. Athena realized that some of her scales surfaced on her hands out of instinct and quickly willed them to disappear again.
As Alex came back to the room, Raven was ecstatic. "Havok! You should be Havok!" He only shrugged and looked at Athena.
"It's your turn."
She looked down at the floor as everyone's eyes focused on her. "Well," she started. "I actually have a few parts to mine."
"Parts?" Hank asked raising an eyebrow.
Nodding, Athena walked outside and past Alex. She stood with her back to everyone, and pulled her hair over so it lay over her left shoulder. Closing her eyes, she concentrated on her long, thin dragon tail first; then, concentrated on pulling her large dragon wings, with emerald green scales, out through the invisible flaps in the back of her sweater. After they were out, she spread her wings to their full length. She stretched her hands, feeling her claws come out as she turned around to face the others.
They stood there in absolute shock at least that was what she hoped. Most people would be scared of her like this, and they would chase her away. She waited anxiously for them to say something. Angel seemed to get over the shock the fastest. Walking over to one of the wings, she ran her hand gently across the webbed wing. Athena let out a giggle, causing Angel to pull her hand away and her eyes to snap to Athena.
Her face flushed from embarrassment. "It tickles," she stated quietly.
Angel smiled at this and Raven came over to the other wing. She lightly ran her hand over the thin flesh and Athena let out another giggle.
"Their beautiful," she whispered.
"You really think so?" Athena questioned as her tail twitched.
"The emerald green scales go perfectly with your hair," Angel complimented. By now, the boys had come over and were looking at her wings and tail as well.
"I can see what you mean by parts," Hank said smiling up at her wings.
Athena felt a smile come to her face. "There's more." Everyone looked at her in confusion, and Athena giggled a little; raising her hand, palm up and fist closed. Snapping her fingers, fire appeared as she opened her hand.
"You can control fire!" Raven clapped.
"And a few more thing."
"As in what?" Hank asked, genuinely interested.
"Well…" Athena wasn't sure how much about her powers she should reveal. She decided to show them her scales. Putting out the flame, she turned her hand over, and concentrated on her hand and arm. Almost instantly, emerald green scales, like on her wings and tail, formed on her skin.
"Wow," Darwin said barely above a whisper. He was at a loss for words.
"Anything else?" Sean asked, curiosity taking over.
Athena folded her wings in behind her, which made Angel and Raven jump back in surprise. "Sorry," she quickly apologized before answering the question. "I can control wind, heightened senses and also a limited form of telepathy."
"What do you mean by that?" Alex asked.
"Well, I can only really talk to someone telepathically, not look through their minds." She pulled her tail and wings back and her claws retreated.
Suddenly, Raven's face lit up and she started to jump up and down. "I have a name for you!" she exclaimed, grabbing onto Athena's arm, startling her. "Dragoness!"
She thought about for a bit; she definitely likes that name better than the one her father gave her.
"It sounds cool," Alex commented, smiling at her. Everyone nodded in agreement, and looked at Athena's stunned expression.
She was looking at Alex as she felt her face heat up. A smiled appeared on her face as she nodded, not trusting her voice. She felt like she was going to cry from happiness.