2013-05-30 - Lets Meet Molly (or Dining with Dinah)

Molly Hayes skipped out on the rest of the group. After all, they're in New York! Pizza is in New York. Chase and Karolina and Nico- none of them would go out to get her Pizza. So obviously Molly had to sneak out to get some on her own. So there she is, walking across the street, trying to balance a box of pizza while with her other hand eating one of the slices.

Molly is superstrong. She's not particularly coordinated.

She also isn't particularly observant since she's crossing the street during Don't Walk, and not noticing that there's a car that's going to hit her.

Black Canary was driving across the street, driving beside the car that was on a collision course with the unknowing Molly. She accelerates, right arm extended as she drives in front of the car. She grabs at collar of Molly's shirt and hoists her away from the path of the car, getting a honk from said car as is skids to a halt in the middle of the intersection. Dinah whips Molly around and onto the motorcycle, facing backwards as she slows down and mounts the curb a block down. Her helmet is on now, but the moment she is stopped, she pulls it off with both hands.

Molly Hayes acks as she's grabbed, her pizza box going flying. "OH NO!" she cries out as the pizza lands on the street. Fortunately she kept ahold of the slice in her hand! Oh and she didnt get run over. That's important too.

Dinah pops her kickstand and lets the motorcycle lean to the side as she dismounts it. She doesn't say much at first, clicking her motorcycle off and yanking the key from the ignition. Then she turns to Molly.

"Are you okay? You nearly got run over by that car back there..." She trails off as shes that you don't even seem to be too phased by the happenings of getting yanked off the street by a motorcycle or almost getting hit by a car. Wait, she recognised that face from one of Oracle's files. Molly... She couldn't remember the last name. "Are you Molly, by chance?"

Molly Hayes sighs. "Aw man, I only brought ten dollars for that!" She would have brought more, but chase only had $10 in his wallet when she took it from him while he was sleeping. She then looks over at Black Canary. "What? Oh yeah." She peers at Dinah. "Do I know you? I'm not supposed to really talk to strangers."

"And that's exactly right. Except that I'm person who just kept you from getting hit by a car," Dinah says with a smirk. She remembered now. Super strength, invincibility, incredibly naive. Molly Hayes. "How about I buy you another one. Or if you would feel more comfortable, I can give you the money to buy another and you can get it for yourself." Dinah considers for a half second. She tacks on, "And ice cream too."

Molly Hayes looks at the car, then up at Dinah. Then smiles. "Okay, I guess that would work! So yeah, I'm Molly! Whats your name?" Yep - ice cream. It makes strangers into friends.

Geez, Molly is lucky she has superstrength with her naivete. And lucky Dinah is a good person.

Dinah smiles and offers Molly a hand to turn her around on the motorcycle. "My name is Dinah Lance. I've actually heard a lot about you, Molly. You're a superhero, right?" Dinah asks.

Molly Hayes blinks. Then blinks again. First time a grownup officially called her that. "Yeah... YEAH. I am! I'm Princess Powerful!" She peers at Dinah. "You've heard of me really? Like... superhero heard of me?"

"I have a really good friend that knows all about you. She told me all sorts of stuff. Like you have a bunch of friends that you get into trouble with," Dinah answers. She grabs her helmet and hands it to Molly. "Would you put that on? I know you don't need it, but the police men don't know you're the amazing girl with superpowers." She swings her leg over the bike to remount it while simultaneously putting the key in and starting it back up with a roar.

Molly Hayes shakes her head. "Nuh uh, we don't get in trouble. We do... you know, Super hero things!" Then looks at the helmet, then at her hat. Then reluctantly takes her floppy bunny hat off, and puts the helmet on. "I guess that makes sense." She looks at the bike. "Hey could I ride that?!"

"Why do you think I'm having you put the helmet on?" Dinah asks with a grin. She pats the bitch seat and revs the engine. "Hop on, Ms. Powerful." She pops the kickstand up as she corrects the angle of the bike. There are a pair of foot prongs That Molly can put her feet on so she isn't just dangling them.

Molly Hayes gets on the motorcycle excitedly, "OH BOY!!!!" she says excitedly. "You're AWESOME! Chase wouldnt let me ever pilot the leapfrog because he says only he's able to do that and I was going to ask Wolverine if he'd let me but when I met him he was a jerk so I didnt think I'd ever get to ride a motorcycle and now I am!" She then looks at Dinah. "How do I start it?"

Dinah shakes her head. "I'm driving. And it's already on. You'll have to ride on the... back seat," she promptly corrects. She wouldn't even let Green Arrow drive her motorcycle, so she obviously wasn't going to let a kid with no drivers' license do it. Dinah revs the engine again. "Sorry. And sorry for sounding cliche, but maybe when you're older."

Dinah kicks the engine into gear and twists the throttle just a little as she walks the motorcycle to the curb. "I make it go forward with this. Grab my waist, Molly. It will make turning easier for me if you lean in with me," Dinah says over the roar of the engine. She waits for an opening in traffic and for Molly to follow directions before she throttles up all the way and shoots into the street like a rocket.

After about five minutes of trafficking through the city, Dinah pulls up to a pizza parlor that Pete had shown her just a couple days ago. She idles the engine as she mounts the curb again, fishing out her coinpurse from her jacket pocket.

"Do you want me to go in with you?" Dinah inquires with an arched eyebrow.

Molly Hayes holds on as Dinah rides all awesome-like down the street, zipping through traffic. When they finally stop, Molly jumps off and jumps up and down. "OMIGODTHATWAS SO COOL! Are you sure I can't ride? pleasepleasepleeeease?" Then stops as you talk about the pizza. "Oh... yeah you can come in with me, sure!"

Black Canary pops the kickstand and turns the motorcycle off. The city gets a hair quieter, but only just barely. She dismounts and helps Molly down with the hand that doesn't have a coinpurse in it. "I think I'll grab a slice of pizza too," she says with a grin to the explosive exuberance coming from Molly. She walks the girl to the door and holds it open for her.

Molly Hayes heads in and runs over to a seat after jumping up in front of the counter to try to order a pie. Once it arrives, she asks Dinah, "So um... how do you know about me? Are you a superhero too?"

"Yes and no. Yes, I fight crime and wear a costume. No, I'm a woman. So technically I'm a superheroine. So are you," Dinah says over her shoulder as she forks over the necessary cash and gets herself a slice of classic pepperoni as well. "Were you planning to take that to your friends or just to eat it by yourself?"

Molly Hayes shrugs. "Well um..." she says looking around. "I figured that if you're buying another pizza, we could both have a slice then I'd take the rest to my friends. Can you tell me about hte bad guys you beat up? What's your superpower? Do you wear a mask? I wore a mask once but it kept getting in my face, and my friends kept saying we don't wear costumes. They won't even let me sing them my theme song!"

"I wear what I'm wearing now. This /is/ my costume. And most people call me what my mom used to be called, Black Canary. I'm kind of a ninja, but I don't kill people or wear black catsuits," Dinah says to answer Molly's questions. She missed one but has to backtrack to answer with, "My superpower is that I scream really loud. Green Arrow calls it a Canary Cry."

Molly Hayes listens with rapt fascination. "Wow, it must be nice to be able to walk around in your superhero costume all the time! And of course you don't kill people - superheroes never kill people, that's what supervillains do." She pauses. "I can scream really loud too. Wolverine said I gave him a headache. Oh and Chase says I'm a loudmouth sometimes but I didnt know that was a superpower. I have a cat hat. Could I be a ninja too?" She thinks. "OOH CAN YOU TEACH ME TO BE A NINJA?"

Dinah chuckles as she starts working on her own pizza slice. She listens and nods with each detail, actually interested in listening to what Molly was saying because it would be helpful not only with future interactions but due to the fact that she was just that kind of person. "It takes a long time and a lot of focus. I've been working on it my whole life and I'm still not the best," she rebuttals to ninja training. "Do you have two years of free time to start your training?" Black Canary could be kidding, but her tone was fairly serious. She must be serious. And Dinah takes another bite of her slice.

Molly Hayes blanches a bit at that amount of time. 2 years? That's like 100,000 years in Molly time. Not to mention she sometimes has the attention span of a cocker spaniel. "I'm a quick learner though! How long would it take for me to be ... um... like... a ninja-in-training instead?" she asks as she folds a slice of pizza.

BC considers that if Molly were a quick learner, she'd take about eighty-five percent of the normal time to learn. But considering that patience and all those silly things like focus and being quiet don't exactly fall into the purvue of Molly's vocabulary or nature, probably a bit longer.

"Honestly? You won't like the answer," Dinah chuckles as she takes another bite and gauges Molly's next reactions.

Molly Hayes pauses as she talks with pizza in her mouth. "Moff than a momff?"

That's (more than a month?) in Mollyspeak.

Dinah nods back. And she works with a mute, so that's nothing difficult to figure out. BC holds up two fingers then four fingers to signal 24. As in 24 months.

Molly Hayes looks wide eyed, "But I'll be old by then! That'll take longer than forever!" She pauses. "Will I at least be able to beat up people with my pinky when I'm done learning?"

Dinah finishes chewing and shakes her head to say, "You can do that now, if Oracle's info is correct. And it has been always correct as far as I know. Being a ninja is about taking the long path and not being seen. You're more of the 'smash it with my forehead and look pretty doing it' type. Like Wonder Woman."

Dinah tacks on, "And she's an /actual/ princess."

Molly Hayes pauses. "Oh yeah. I guess I can." she says, looking at her pinky. She looks at Dinah. "I'm like Wonder Woman? Really? WOO!" she says, throwing up her hands. "I saw her on the news a few days ago when Chase was trying to keep the remote control away from me and she has such a great costume! I mean your costume is great too but hers is all colorful too and she has jewelry on when doing her WHAM and BAM And stuff like that."

She stops yelling when everyone's looking and then says, in a lower voice. "But I can be all sneaky too. I once went with my friends to try to break into this place for some hero thing and I wore my friend Nico's stocking on my head because that's what you're supposed to wear when you're breaking into places but she wears stockings like yours and I got all waffle faced."

Dinah doesn't had that she thought that was hilarious. The prospect of both Wonder Woman's costume being merely jewelry and that Molly wore fishnets over her head for some kind of heroic counter-heist. She has to cover her mouth as she laughs, her eyes watering a bit as she totters in her seat. Nobody spoke like that in Gotham. The closest thing was Green Arrow. And he wasn't /nearly/ this enthusiastic.

BC straightens up a little and asks, "You have quite a life, don't you?"

Molly Hayes nods all seriously. "Yeah. We do all sorts of big hero things. Like this one time um... we were being attacked by zombies... and um... Nico did a spell and turned them all into a zombie knot, but she meant zombie not, like... not a zombie, and she sometimes makes mistakes like that, but it was cool because afterwards we dumped oil on them and that snapped them out of being zombies! Oh OH...and another time.. okay, another time? There was this skyscraper sized monster! And um... it was gonna step on me! And Nico gave me this caffeine thing, and I did ... WHAM! And I threw it! and it went RAAAH! and fell backwards and went BOOM when it fell."

As if Molly needs more caffeine and sugar.

Dinah makes a mental note of the caffeine thing and will mention it to Oracle, probably. Dinah nods and watches with an amused expression that fades when she gets to the end of saying, "You're a verifiable powerhouse, that's for sure. The most I fight is the thugs and scum that make up Gotham's underbelly. Drug rings, traffickers, weapons cartels. Mostly humans. I have dealt with some less human individuals, but their locked up tight in prison... Then there is the Clown Prince of Crime, Joker. He's as bad as they get. All sorts of wrong wrapped up in one person."

Molly Hayes nods, then takes another bite of pizza. "Chassh shaysh I'm like the shluk but witshout turning all grsnn and shtuff"

(Chase says I'm like the Hulk but without turning all green and stuff)

She listens as Dinah talks about supervillains, and swallows her food. "There's a clown criminal?" She shivers. "Clowns are scary. Especially with how they can all fit in those little cars. " Dinah's voice lowers a bit. "He's worse than that. He finds murder, chaos, and sadism funny. His sense of humor is the darkest shade of black there is."

But she doesn't want to dwell on that, so BC brightens up a bit. "How about that ice cream?"

Molly Hayes listens and shivers at the description. "That is scary." She then asks, "Does he also drive a little car?" she asks, biting her lip. Then you bring up ice cream. "YES!" she says, or rather shouts, quickly gulping down the rest of the slice of pizza.

Dinah doesn't have a large stomach in public, so most of her own slice goes without being eaten. She grabs the box of pizza meant for Molly's friends and stands up. The ice cream shop was just down the block anyways, so they could walk. She just smiles warmly at Molly and heads to the door.

Molly Hayes takes the box of pizza and heads out after Dinah, stopping by the pizzeria owner. "Thanks mister, you make great pizza. I should have come here first instead of the other place!" then runs out after Dinah.

Dinah walks past her motorcycle and stops at the crosswalk, which has a red hand telling her not to go. "See this Molly? Wait for it to turn green before you walk into the street, please. That way I don't have to save you just so we can meet in the future," she says with a grin. Then she continues past the crosswalk to the ice cream shop just a bit down the way. When they are at the door, it becomes evident that more than just Dinah had the idea to sit in and have ice cream. "We'll need to buy it and eat somewhere else. It doesn't look like any tables are open."

Molly Hayes follows Dinah around with the pizza. "I'd say we can bring it back to the Leapfrog but I'm not sure my friends would be okay with that. They sort of dont' like anyone going in him except us. Ooh,we can eat in the park and you can tell me all about your superhero friends. Do you have a superhero team? Or a theme song?"

Dinah opens the door for Molly and enters after her. She waits until they're back outside before she shares any of that kind of info in a crowded area, for the sake of the civilians.

After getting Molly whatever ice cream it was, returning to the motorcycle and driving to the nearest park, Dinah finally speaks up with an answer, "I have lots of friends, but only a few really good friends. My three besties are my colleagues - Oracle, the super intelligent and incredible stubborn tech wizardess. Huntress, the hard headed but strong willed sister I never had. And Lady Blackhawk, who is more of a friend made through working together whom I respect dearly."

Molly Hayes slurps on her ice cream as the two of them get to the park, listening to her describe her friends. "Tech wizardress? Does she have a staff? Nico's a witch and she has a staff. So... are they also ninjas? Oooh do they wear stocking like yours?" She sits down by you indian style. "Oooh... do you have a theme song? Would you like to hear my theme song? None of my friends ever wants to hear it."

Dinah just nods to the last question. "Let's hear it."

It doesn't take more than the nod for Molly to start singing,

"Ne-veer feaaaaar cause Princess Po-wer-ful's heeeere"

"When danger's head does reaaaaar."

"The people will cheeeer!"

"Cause Princess powerfullll iss heeeeere!" she sings, using her hands exxageratedly as she sings, rather loudly.... and somewhat off key.

Molly Hayes looks at Dinah all happy at FINALLY being able to sing it. After all, she's been wanting to for almost 2 years, and she made it up when she was 11.

Dinah can recognise musical talent when she hears it. Molly doesn't have it. But she does her best to hide the cringing. Only her eye twitching a couple times would give it away to someone who can read body language really, /really/ well.

"Keep working on it and you'll have a catchy tune for sure. Everyone will be singing it," BC finally says after spending a couple moments trying to come up with a diplomatic answer.

Molly Hayes looks overjoyed. "Really? You think so? You don't think I was making it too much about me? I would have sung about the whole team but they don't want a theme song so I only made it about me."

"It's fine. I'm sure they can come up with their own theme songs if they want one. Or they can always come to you later if they change their minds," Canary says with a renewed grin now that the worst of it was over.

Molly Hayes nods all seriously, slurping on her ice cream. "I'd definitely come up with a theme song for all of us if they let me. They don't even want costumes though! Can you believe it?"

BC grins. "It isn't all about the costume. In fact, most of us wear them for the functionality. Take Batman, for instance. He's not wearing a black spandex shirt. It's all armor. And Superman wears cloth that was designed to resist tearing off when he flies a million miles a second." She was obviously trying to exaggerate, but it wasn't that far from being accurate. "I wear my mother's old costume. Well, without the mask. But that's more for posterity anyways. I would have happily been dressed in civilian clothes to fight crime if I had gone by a different name than my mother."

Molly Hayes looks at you forlornly. "But.. but.... costume! I mean... Batman.. the pointy ears thing!" She points to her head like there are points. "And.. and that Superman guy has the red underwear on the outside and a cape. I mean ... capes arent functional right? But they're cool! Like... you need them to be all superhero-y sometimes right?" She doesnt flinch about the 'million miles a second' thing. Honestly she thought it was closer to a zillion probably.

Molly takes a moment. "Plus how will the bad guys know I'm a superhero without the costume?"

Dinah giggles. "You can pick up a car. I've seen a picture of you doing it. I'm sure anyone seeing that would know right away that you were one of two things, and a costume won't tell them anything that throwing a car at their faces can't."

Molly Hayes mopes a little. "That sounds like what Nico says." Then asks, "Could I maybe at least wear jewelry like Wonder Woman? Oh and... and what about stains! If I wore a costume that was stain proof we'd save so much money on laundry."

"Only Batman and Wonder Woman have stainproof costumes. And Wonder Woman's jewelry isn't really jewelry. It's magical armor. Besides, I think your hat is cute. It's like a trademark," Dinah says with a smile, russling Molly's hat with a hand. It'll be all crooked afterwards.

Molly Hayes brings her hands up to straighten her hat. "I have a whole lot of them! And headbands. "I have one that's like a puppy, and a frog, and a kitty, and this one which is a bunny, and a fishie, and the Thing, and a turtle, and the Hulk, and another kitty but more like the Hello Kitty Kitty instead of a regular kitty kitty....

And she keeps going on and on. The girl has like 50 or more hats. And she's naming every... last... one.

Dinah is patient and waits until Molly finishes listing them all off, as long as that takes, before she just says, "Wow. That's a lot of hats."

Molly Hayes nods. "My mommy used to say people wear all sorts of hats in their lives. But I didnt know my parents were... you know. Bad." She gets a bit quiet after that. Finally.

Dinah moves over to get close to Molly, wrapping an arm over her shoulder and hugging her close. "Eat your ice cream before it all melts and you get sticky ice cream fingers," BC says to distract Mol from her sad thoughts.

Molly Hayes licks her ice cream as she's consoled by Dinah from unpleasant thoughts about her parents being sadistic villains, rather than the wonderfully nice people they acted like to Molly. She keeps forgetting that, actually.

A good way to distract a kid from bad thoughts? Ice cream. Definitely, Ice cream. Molly licks at the frosty treat.

BC waits for Molly to either say something else or finish her ice cream before she will say anything else. She hasn't been in the talkative mood much. Really she hasn't been feeling up to doing a lot of things. So she contents herself by watching Molly scarf down the frozen dairy with a smile.

Molly Hayes looks over at Black Canary. "You know for a ninja, you're really nice." Truer words were never spoken.

"Thank you, Molly. You're really nice too," Black Canary replies. "We should really be getting you back before your friends get cold pizza or they start to miss you. Whichever comes first."

Molly Hayes nods as she finishes her ice cream. "Yeah. Um.... if I want to visit you or something is there somewhere I could go maybe?" She fidgets. "My friends probably won't like it if I let strangers come to the Leapfrog, but I'd really like to hang out with you again."

"I don't live in New York. But I do live in Gotham, just a little ways away. If you want to visit me or want me to come visit, here's my card," Dinah says as she pulls a business card out of her coinpurse. It is the one for Sherwood Florist and has both an address and a phone number that can be called. "I'll get you as close as your friends would be comfortable with, but I won't go into the 'leapfrog.'"

Molly Hayes takes the card and smiles. "Okay um... could you maybe drive me to Coney Island beach and I'll find my way from there? I'll be sure to visit and maybe I can bring some of my friends so they can see a real live nice ninja"

Dinah smiles and stands up from the bench. She offers Molly a hand, guiding her to the bike and mounting it as she starts the engine.

"We'll have to do that, sure. Helmet," BC says as she holds it out for Molly to put on like before. Then they're off once more. This time to Coney Island beach so Molly can keep her hide out a secret.