A week later, Avery had taught all of the other kids to focus their powers, and activate them more rapidly. She had deliberately avoided Joey's more volatile powers, since they were best practiced outdoors. Everyone could now use their telekinesis to not only make concussive energy blasts, but pick up objects. After one training session, Bailey suggested that they get to know each other better.
The kids sat in a circle on the mats spread out on the floor of the basement.

"I don't even know any of your last names," remarked Avery.

"Mine's Alexander," offered Joey.

"Henderson," replied Lucas.

"Mine's Ryan," added Bailey. Avery told everyone her own name, not sure if she already had. Lucas then announced that he thought everyone should say a random fact about themselves. Everyone was alright with this.

"I'll start," he said. "I'm homeschooled, and my mom is always really busy with my younger brother." Expecting something more along the lines of "I don't like pizza," Avery was a bit surprised at this statement. Since no one else was speaking, she decided to take her turn.

"I never knew my mom," she said awkwardly. Bailey spoke up next.

"I ditch school sometimes." Joey said nothing. No one said anything for a while, and everyone started to think that this was a bad idea. Then Joey saved the day.

"We should have superhero code names!" he exclaimed suddenly.

"Why?" asked Avery.

"You know, we have powers, we're training to fight another person with powers. We should totally have code names." Avery shrugged.

"Okay," she said. "You can be Burny." The others laughed, and Joey smirked.

"Only if you're called Twitchy!" This prompted more laughter, and some other suggestions for names.

"Joey, you could be Overheater!" laughed Lucas. Avery said,

"You and Bailey could be Lightbulb 1 and Lightbulb 2, Lucas."

"Maybe we should stick to our own names," suggested Bailey, but Joey really wanted to have code names.

"What if we're fighting Pullman, and we have Bluetooth to talk to each other, and he's hacking our radio waves and finds out what our names are?" theorized Joey.

"Why would that matter? There are probably multiple people in the world with our names," argued Avery. "Also, we don't have Bluetooth." Joey nodded.

"BUT, this guy probably has major resources, so he can figure out exactly which Bailey, Avery, Lucas, and Joey we are!" he said triumphantly. Avery laughed and shook her head.

"Our names wouldn't have any significance to him though," she reasoned.

"What's Bluetooth?" asked Lucas, not getting an answer.

"Fine, no code names," sighed Joey.

"Aw, don't worry, Hothead," teased Avery. "YOU can still have a nickname if you want." Joey made a face.
"Hothead's pretty good," said Lucas.

"No, it isn't." In response to this, Lucas used his telekinesis to levitate Joey's hair, giving him the appearance of a mad scientist, or someone who had just been electrocuted. The kids all laughed as Joey felt his hair, and tried in vain to pat it down.

"Good thing I don't spend very long doing my hair," Joey said.

"How long?" asked Bailey.

"Well first, I do this," said Joey, using his fingers as a comb. "And then I'm done. So like, five seconds?" Lucas nodded and confirmed that that was what he did too.

During the conversation, Joey noticed how Avery's eyes flickered as she talked. He also observed her smile, which was genuine and bright. Avery noticed him looking at her eyes, and came to the conclusion that he was curious about the flickering.

"That doesn't happen all the time," she explained, gesturing to her eyes. "I obviously don't want them flickering when I'm at school, but it takes effort to turn it off. It's just so much easier not to turn it off if I don't have to." Lucas and Bailey had noticed too, but they obviously hadn't felt the same about her eyes as Joey had. Since she had caught him looking, Joey made a conscious effort not to stare. He idly noted that someone more confident than him would probably ask Avery to go to a movie with him, but knew he would make a fool of himself if he tried. He then found that someone was waving a hand in his face, and blinked.

"You still here?" asked Bailey.

"Did you say something?" replied Joey. Bailey shook her head in amusement.

"Well, I just asked if you were still here," she joked. "But before that, I was suggesting we reserve a laser tag room and practice there." Avery laughed at Bailey's sarcasm, and Lucas had taken out his phone again.

"Or we could sneak in in the middle of the night," suggested Avery, only half joking. Bailey looked at her in surprise.

"Didn't think you were the type to trespass," she exclaimed. Avery shrugged.

"Are you saying you ARE? Do I need to call the police?" she retorted. Joey and Lucas exchanged a doubtful glance, as neither one believed that either girl had ever trespassed. Bailey put her hands up in mock surrender.

"I didn't do it, I swear!" she exclaimed. Lucas giggled.

"Hey, I have a question," said Joey. "Why'd we feel sick the day the Shards teleported us here? Before we 'ported, I mean." Avery shrugged.

"Honestly, I've been wondering that too. Sometimes I think that the Shards have a mind of their own, and they made you sick to get you out of school." Joey leaned over and whispered something to Lucas, who grinned and gasped at Avery.

"You don't know?! But you're supposed to know EVERYTHING!" he exclaimed. Avery looked accusingly at Joey.

"You put him up to this," she said.

"Guilty as charged," he replied.

"If we're asking questions about teleporting now, how'd the Shards teleport us here without us trying?" asked Bailey.

"You asked something like that when I took you back to your house the first time, but I never got a chance to answer," replied Avery. Bailey shrugged her shoulders.

"When you got the Shard, I imbued it with my own power. So when you teleported, it was really my power that was being used, not yours. Since I've been practicing for longer, my teleportation is a lot less rocky."

"At least you had an answer for that one," teased Joey.

"Quit burning each other, lovebirds," Bailey scolded. Joey felt heat rush into his ears, and it wasn't his pyrokinesis. Glancing at Avery, he saw that she seemed completely unaffected by the suggestion that they were in love. This only contributed further to his embarrassment. Fortunately, Avery took no notice of his blushing, or at least, pretended not to notice. She seemed like the type to be polite like that.

"If we're done bantering now," said Avery, "We can practice some more."

"Please don't throw more things at us," moaned Lucas. Avery looked thoughtful.

"I could throw you instead," she offered. Lucas didn't doubt that she could.

"I, for one, prefer having things thrown at me to being thrown," said Bailey, getting to her feet and cracking her knuckles. The others agreed. Then Avery had an idea.

"Hey, let's go outside and practice." The others weren't sure about this.

"It's raining," said Lucas.

"It rains pretty much every day here. We won't ever go outside if we wait until it stops raining," she argued. "Besides, Joey can use his pyrokinesis outside with less of a chance of burning something important, if it's raining."

"Won't someone see us? That could be pretty bad," cautioned Bailey.

"No way!" Joey exclaimed, eager to use his destructive powers. "We could go Avery's school's field, so I don't destroy anything."

"Actually, no, we can't. The soccer team has practice today, and they don't care about rain. There's a ton of farm land around here, though."

"Isn't it going to be filled with corn, or something?" Lucas asked. "Farmers might get weirded out if their corn suddenly turns into popcorn."

"It isn't corn season," said Avery. "And we'll hover above the crops. Don't worry about it, let's go!" The kids went upstairs to tell John about their plans to go to a field. After some concern about the obvious fire hazard, he made them promise to stay out of danger, and let them go.