1023/Hang in there!

Hang in there!
Date of Scene:	07 April 2020
Location:	Rock Wallz Gym
Synopsis:	A night at the rock climbing gym sees all manner of people show up.
Cast of Characters:	Michael Hannigan, Carrie Kelley, Stephanie Brown, Jane Foster, Roy Harper, Jubilation Lee

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Michael Hannigan has posed:
One would think that Monday evening would be a quiet one. Perhaps in a smaller town, but in New York City, there is enough variety to people's work schedules that Monday evening is someone's Friday evening.

Perhaps that is why Rock Wallz Gym has a pretty decent crowd in the front part of the building. The tables near the juice bar area are full up, the machines are all taken and there's even a couple people waiting over at the free weights.

Um. We'll leave it a mystery to the locker room conditions. Either way, the only area where there's any form of breathing room appears to be in the back room. It seems despite the gym being called Rock Wallz, a lot of patrons have neglected the room for the time being.

Mike is not one of these people. Dressed do in some neutral toned, second-hand exercise pants and a tank top, and wearing the required safety gear for using the wall, he is taking his time up the blue path on the wall. He's not moving fast, but based on the relaxed smile on his face, it's not because he's having difficulty. Then again, It's only a level 3.

Carrie Kelley has posed:
Carrie Kelley makes her way out of the locker area just ahead of Stephanie, who had suggested they come here to begin with. "I don't usually go to gyms, you know," she remarks conversationally as she makes her way to the back where the rock climbing wall was located. "You sure this place is good?" Just as she asks she comes to a halt to watch Mike working his way along the wall with a raised eyebrow. Her weight shifts throwing a small towel over her shoulder as she stands there in leggings, sneakers and a t-shirt that reads 'Gym Bunny' with a picture of Bugs Bunny lifting weights.

Stephanie Brown has posed:
Stephanie follows Carrie out of the locker area, wearing a pair of yoga pants and a black top. "Yep, for a fake wall it was kind of a fun climb," Stephanie says, having mentioned she visited the rock climbing gym the other week. "Barbara dropped by too. Just climbed up over the top and there she was," Stephanie says with a laugh. "Came to check out my workout."

Stephanie looks up at the faux cliff and the person who is working his way up one part of it. "Has a decent view up at the top too," Stephanie says as she walks over to the base of it. She sets aside the bottle of water and towel she brought out with her, and then goes to get strapped into the safety harness.

"So that was about the best chicken sandwich I've ever had," Stephanie tells Carrie, talking about where they went for lunch for Bette Kane's birthday. "I'm just kind of amazed at that whole place. Why do they call it the Hellfire Club though?" she asks. Once she's strapped into the harness, she gets some chalk on her hands for a better grip before starting to climb up one of the more difficult routes.

Jane Foster has posed:
Sometimes a lady needs to get away from all the trials and headaches of work. The counter to thinking too much is activity, but running through Central Park is a definite no and the gym in her building is equally dull. Time for alternate choices. Time for a place where she can crawl her way up a path and cling for dear life. Jane tries to make a point of entering without being too noticed, but celebrity life isn't that easy even for a scientist rather than an actual Hollywood star or one of those obnoxious influencer types. Swipe pass, tiptoe to a locker, drop off her stuff. Maybe with a French braid, no one will notice her. It's like hoodies and ballcaps for Avengers, instant success.

She grimaces at the cloud of people gathered like locusts. Not her day today, clearly. Wrapping her hands around a towel that she slings over her shoulder, the brunette trudges a path out of the way of danger. Preferably to somewhere mildly quieter. That apparently means the roof. She squeezes past the more hardcore climbers with their show-off gear, wearing the Washington State flag with pride over a pair of yoga pants. Somewhere, there has to be a /bit/ of quiet.

Or back there!

Roy Harper has posed:
Roy Harper has on a pair of black workout pants and a dark red t-shirt, some gloves on his hands and the appropriate footwear for climbing as he makes his way on out of the locker room, taking a look at the wall and heading over to where the climbing is a little bit more challenging, sizing up the wall for a moment before he goes to don whatever additional gear he needs. He watches Mike up on the wall for a moment or two, just to see what route he's taking, and then gives a nod of greeting to Carrie and Stephanie as they also seem to be coming out of the lockers at about the same time.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
Where there are free weights, there are usually gymnastic equipment right? For the sake of argument, we're going to say there is, at least, one or two balance beams and a set of uneven bars situated somewhere behind the free weights and treadmills and giant rock wall leading to the pool.

Jubilation Lee, small, asian, fierce, is clapping chalk onto her palms with her hair, short as it already is, pulled back in a bandana. She's wearing a sports bra and white athletics pants. Bare foot. Toes painted a beautiful pink.

And small loop over headphones.

Her cellphone is connected to her left upper arm, tapping play on the music player, she closes down the screen and goes into a series of stretches. Bending straight forward with her palms flat against the mats, crawling them backwards until she's bent directly over, inching towards her left ankle.

Michael Hannigan has posed:
Feet planted and hand grasping upon another blue hold, Mike releases the hold in his other hand. As the rock star reaches for another spot, the old scar on his forearm is briefly exposed before being obscured again.

Unlike Jane, he's not as worried about being recognized. The film role he has right now did require him to grow out some facial hair and cut the hair most people attribute to him so, unless there's high level fans in the room, or people with a really great eye for facial types he's probably alright.

The sound of people talking as they enter into the rock wall room does seem to get the performer out of whatever moment of rock climbing zen he was experiencing as he pauses, glancing down to see if its any of the people he's run into before. No such luck. He does manage to catch Roy looking up his way so in return he gives a nod of greeting.

Carrie Kelley has posed:
Carrie Kelley grins at the question about the club only to shrug faintly as she looks over the wall. "Eh, it's some old name from an English society. Wealthy people spending way too much money to party and do things. The original one was supposedly very..." She pauses to consider how to phrase it. "Deviant. This one is too from what I hear, but more legally so at least. Not like satanic sacrifices or stuff. But yeah you can't go wrong with the food at the steakhouse." Though to be fair it was only her second time there at all. Now it was time to burn off that cake for dessert she'd had.

"So," she proclaims while clapping her hands together to look over the various colored paths. "Which one you want me to try? I haven't done a rock climbing wall before, but parkour in the city is probably going to still give me a leg up," she teases to Stephanie as she looks the wall over one last time. A quiet mumble of, "Nice view indeed," is offered with a glance at Mike.

Quickly looking away she spots Jane without any apparent recognition--Darn that french braid. Then again she wasn't really thinking 'I'm going to meet famous people' at a gym in New York. Jubilee is regarded as well. "Might be a full wall soon."

Stephanie Brown has posed:
Stephanie Brown's lips move to repeat the words 'satanic sacrifices' without speaking them. "Ok, not exactly what I was expecting from a steak house," she comments with a laugh. Stephanie follows Carrie's gaze after the comment about the view and she breaks out in a second laugh. "Have to make it to the top at the same time," she says. "I've done the Yellow and Red, both were pretty good," Stephanie comments, motioning towards them.

She pauses and looks over as she seems someone over near the gymnastics equipment. "Totally going over there after a climb," the high school gymnastics team member says with a nudge to Carrie. Should Jubilee glance up she'd get a quick smile from Stephanie before the blond returns her attention to the wall.

Stephanie claps her hands together, creating a little cloud of chalk near her. "Ok, ready," she says, eyeing Roy as he goes past. Stephanie nudges Carrie again. Because that's what friends do. "This is a good looking gym," she whispers, not talking about the appearance of the gym itself. She goes over to the Red climb then and begins making her way up slowly.

Jane Foster has posed:
Rocks ahead studded off the wall in rainbow hues call for more attentiveness than not. All right. Jane can do this, and she stops to put herself in line for a moderately challenging route. Not the easiest and not the hardest. She bends while waiting in line to tighten up her shoes, those lightweight velcro straps making a most satisfying tearing nose as she adjusts them. Walking around on the dramatically curved soles is a bit like a flashback to long-ago ballet lessons. The rubbery soles make a very satisfying squeak on smoother surfaces, and they look ready enough to tackle the chunky blocks up ahead.

She gives her wrists a little shake and waits her turn for the chalk bucket. Then she waits her turn for the harness, getting rigged up with the assistance of one of the assistants who clearly, really oughta know better than to give a double-take. This is totally the right line to be in, what with Mike up ahead. He's taking a path familiar enough, and she eventually shuffles closer. Carrie earns a friendly smile from Jane, as does Stephanie. But like most places--especially gyms--she's much more concerned about not tripping over herself. "I wasn't expecting quite this much of a turnout," she says. Friendly small talk. Since Roy is fairly nearby, she gestures to the path she has in mind. "If I take that, will you have enough room to start ascending, or would you rather I kick one over?"

Jubilation Lee has posed:
"See you round town and I try to pretend that... I'm over it.." Jubilee sings to herself, jerking her waist side to side to limber up her abdominal muscles. One knee, then the other, pulls up to her chest where it's held for a ten second count. Arms wiggled down beside her to loosen her joints as she approaches the balance beam..

"Yeah I wish you good luck, cus I know that you'll need it..." Murmuring through the song. Taking several steps backwards, she jogs forward, jumps on the small angled trampoline to bring herself up to straddle the balance beam, hands down between her. Her legs extend outward, breathing in deep, she flexes her abdomen and pulls them backwards with her weight shifting forward onto her palms.

"You're fuckin' with my headspace... Keep bringin' up my mis-takes..." Feet slowly creep backwards, then up into a hand stand, and over into a backbend onto her feet. "Throw it back in my face... you're fuckin' with my headspace.." Too many people on the rockwall. Too much anti-social behavior in the usually spritely and bubbly teenager.

Stephanie's glance/smile is returned with an up nod followed by a quick round off from the former gymnastics olympic hopeful.

Roy Harper has posed:
Roy Harper returns the nod from Mike. If he recognizes him, he gives no real outward acknowledgement of it. Even if he did, the man's just trying to climb a wall -- he's not going to go bother him. Instead, he checks the legend for the colors of the various paths, and chooses one for himself before he moves over to the wall and takes hold of the first, stepping up and beginning his climb.

When Jane gets closer and asks about the path, he glances at the one she indicates and then at his and shakes his head, "Looks like we'll both have plenty of room. I'll wait a touch if you want to head up first and it'll be all good." He gives her a thumbs-up with his free hand, not seeming in any particular rush or racing to the top, just enjoying the climb.

Michael Hannigan has posed:
Mike glances down to the group below that's setting up. Looks like the wall is getting it's deserved attention now. And with the seven paths and - one, two, three, four- Hmm. That's not going to be fun for spacing. Well, so much for just taking it slow.

Giving a slight smile, the musician picks up his speed a bit more which, being that he chose the third lowest difficulty isn't that bad a thing.

Eh, He can always work out the lyrics in his head later.

Carrie Kelley has posed:
Carrie Kelley lightly elbows Stephanie when she catches her staring at Roy, though she does give a grin as well with amusement. "Never going to live that conversation down am I?" She murmurs though she does give a nod of agreement with her assessment. She steps back when the others hit the wall planting her hands on her hips to watch.

"I'm just gonna see how it's done first. Let you guys keep your space," she assures the others with a chuckle.

Stephanie Brown has posed:
Stephanie clambers up the first ten feet or so rather easily, though the difficult course quickly earns its rating. She pauses to look around, trying to plan her next few movies. It also gives her a chance to glance back over towards the gymnastics routine being done by Jubilee. "Ooo. She's good," Stephanie comments as she watches the Asian girl on the balance beam.

Stephanie turns back to the wall, stretching a leg wide to reach a foothold, then pulling herself across and grabbing a little ledge up above with a hand. She glances up the wall further. "Carrie. Up there nearer to the top isn't that... you know, the one guy. No not him, the other one," she says. Stephanie's always so good about the names of famous people. "You know. The musician?" Stephanie asks.

She gets a glance at Jane Foster as well, her face screwing up for a moment as if she's wondering if she looks familiar too. But then the wall gets her attention again, Stephanie looking back to it and carefully picking her way a bit higher.

Jubilation Lee has posed:
A series of short cartwheels ends with Jubilation flipping backwards off the bar towards the far end where she started, but her balance is a little off in the landing and she comes down on her butt with a little "Umph!" and feet going up into the air when she rolls backwards onto her shoulders.

"Dammit.." Twisting around to lay on her stomach, she pushes back up and pulls her feet beneath her with a little hop, dusting her palms off on her white athletics pants, eyes turning sideways to take in the beam.. "Oh, we're totally not done yet, bitch... don't you get that smug look at me..."

Jane Foster has posed:
Yellow makes a fine route to pursue, or maybe green. Jane prevaricates between the two and braves the easier of the two unless Stephanie chooses to dig into that path after any doubts or Mike prefers to venture into said swimlane. She digs her hands into the first of the blocks to get her balance, then sets her foot against it. The hoist is an easier thing, practiced. Another stretch of her body finds the second handhold, and then from there it's a matter of counting out the beats in her head and reaching, holding, anchoring. The jingle of carabiners is a melody where the rest aren't, and the numbers to ideas are spilling through her thoughts without her being in freefall with an attendant yelling at her for not paying attention.

She smiles briefly up to Stephanie as eye contact is a fleeting thing. Change the wavelength and shorten the curvature in space, would the stabilization be sufficient for exotic matter to sustain the transition? Crunchy thoughts and crunchy numbers flow like water through the mind. He's up there, somewhere, Mike in the way. It means careful attention.

Someone cursing out a beam brings her to a halt as she measures the next spot to stick her foot and curl her toes firmly around the block, wedging it in as the wall shifts. It's in her to laugh. Jubilation getting up earns a soft laugh. "Show it who's boss."

Roy Harper has posed:
Were there people staring? Roy seems entirely and blissfully oblivious to anyone staring at him. He's pretty focused on the wall and his path up it, and making sure that he leaves room for the other climbers to do their thing as well. He moves with ease, athletic and definitely having the upper body strength for hauling his weight up the wall and hanging from handholds if he needs to. It's when someone mentions the musician that he gives Mike another glance, studying him a little more closely. Huh. Maybe he does recognize him, after all.

His attention flickers back toward Jane as she ascends, waiting for her path to diverge a little from the one that he's chosen, and then he begins to pick up the pace a little, his own course diverging a little to the other side as he ascends. He occasionally glances toward the others, mostly to make sure that they all have space and he's not getting in anybody else's way, but once left to his own devices, he moves quickly, very quickly, up the wall, as though he'd climbed the course many times before. When Jane calls out to Jubilee, eh looks over in that direction and grins a little. "You can do it!" he calls out supportively, because why not? Being supportive costs him nothing.

Michael Hannigan has posed:
While he has taken the time to glance down to what's going on below, Mike hasn't had much of a chance to go looking over to the balance beam. But that siren call of a woman cursing does bring his attention. Perhaps it's instinctive to make sure that it's not being directed at him somehow. Upon the assurance that it isn't, his attention switches back to the task at hand.

Despite Jane's concern, he keeps it to his lane, Hand and hand, foot and foot, seeking out only the blue colored holds which are more plentiful than the greens, but less so than the indigos.

The path does not involve him doing a split like with Stephanie's route but he does have to bend his leg up pretty severely in order to launch himself up to the next hold. The final stretch, a bit of a bastard after the first few floors of climbing.

This is probably not the best time for the sound of 'musician' to filter up to his ears but, well, it does. He starts to glance back down, a slip of one hand sufficient to draw his attention back to the task at hand as the other hand ends up supporting more weight than he probably wished for.

He takes a deep breath shaking his head, securing his hand back to the wall. Okay! Distracted enough as is. Ignore the chatter for now.

He continues on, tugging himself upwards.

Carrie Kelley has posed:
Carrie Kelley chuckles a little bit when Stephanie calls out to her, and glances over toward Mike as indicated. "Hard to tell from down here," she has to admit with a teasing tone. "I mean, I'm really only getting to see the bottom half of him. You might be right though," she adds grinning. The sound of a fall and subsequent revival from Jubilee earns a wince as she looks toward the gymnast with a nod of apparent approval. At least she kept trying. "Better than I'd be at it."

She shifts her weight again glancing over the different paths of which most were occupied. The basic, beginner path just looked too easy. Then again... Maybe she could make it more interesting.

Stephanie Brown has posed:
Stephanie hangs from both hands, her feet without a hold as Carrie answers her. The blond glances down, then upwards towards Mike's derriere. "Right, that's the part that looked familiar though," she tells Carrie, not intending it to be loud enough for Mike to hear, but then he probably does.

Stephanie muscles herself up, a foot on the wall to help launch herself towards a higher hand hold, for a moment without any support. But she grabs hold and gets a foot where her fingers had been previously.

The comment from the gymnastics area warrants a look. Stephanie never had the training to get good enough to compete at a level like the Olympics. But she can definitely see the quality being displayed even as Jubilee failed to stick the landing.

Stephanie glances about the faux cliff, while shaking out her hand and arm after that last exertion. "Doing good," she says towards Roy and Jane Foster, giving them both smiles before looking back and resuming her ascent.

Roy Harper has posed:
Roy Harper can't help but laugh at the commentary coming from Carrie and Stephanie. It's not that big a space that he can't hear them, and it makes him almost forget to pay attention to where his next handhold was. To his credit, he attempts not to glance at the aforementioned posterior, at least not more than very briefly, before he refocuses on the climb. A grin is given over to Stephanie as she gets closer and comments. "You too. How's that run?" he asks, of the climb that she's doing.

Michael Hannigan has posed:
Don't look down. A brow archs as the pair of female voices start talking about their identification of Mike by his rear end. His pace slows a bit as the words just-

What?

Okay, don't look down. He looks up to the next set, frowning. The final grouping is usually a teaser to what's going to be showing up in the next level of difficulty and the shallowness of the next grouping gets a slight glare. However, they are reasonably close to each other. Hands gripping tightly, is feet leave the wall as he ends up going hand over hand for the next few grabs. The end is near!

Carrie Kelley has posed:
"Ohgod Steph," Carrie groans out when her friend assures her THAT was her means of identification. The redhead below turns beet red at that and can only shake her head hopelessly. It wasn't as if sound didn't carry here--she was having to be fairly loud to be heard while her friend was halfway up that wall to begin with. Sighing she walks to where the chalk is kept to slap some on her hands, before turning to the wall herself.

Easy run. It was the least used one tonight it seemed. And it was easy looking. To make it more challenging she starts up it but makes herself skip every other hand and foot hold as she clambers up.

Stephanie Brown has posed:
Stephanie Brown was, of course, kidding about how she identified Mike. But it left her with a grin as she continued her way up the wall. Knowing she actually had a safety rope to catch her if she fell gave Stephanie even more confidence on the wall than she'd normally have. She pauses to look back and make sure the staffer that is handling the ropes is paying attention. "Just making sure my old nemesis gravity isn't paying you off to not be watchful," she says under her breath. Still, she wish she had a sweet grapple launcher in case she did fall. She still hasn't gotten to that part of the training with Barbara yet.

Stephanie works her way upwards, finding the wall easier than some of the buildings she's scaled. Though without ropes to help she pauses more to rest, and hears Roy's question about her path. "Pretty good. Some tiny handholds though," she says of the little bit spots that are barely large enough to get a finger on. "How's yours?"

Roy Harper has posed:
Roy Harper is trying not to laugh but it's hard not to when he can't escape hearing Stephanie and Carrie's conversation on the way up the wall. "This one's pretty good, got some interesting angles on it," he comments in return, giving her a grin before he turns his attention toward the wall. Despite the odd angles and the interestingly spaced handholds, he manages to pull himself the remainder of the way to the top and then hops up there for a moment, to just survey the room below, and watch the other climbers as they make their way to the summit.

Michael Hannigan has posed:
Passing the teaser section and finding some footholds once more, Mike gives a slight smile as his hands one by one plant themselves on the top of the wall. Feet pushing upwards, he leverages himself over the wall. Smiling, and having a little bit of time before the late starters get up h- nevermind, Roy is fast- he takes a few moments to enjoy the view of looking down below at the others.

He glances curiously to the the bottom watchers before making his way down... The back way.

Carrie Kelley has posed:
Somehow, someway, Carrie forgot to do the most important thing when using the climbing wall: Getting a safety line. The easy route is easy enough for her to clamber up even with her addition of a method to make it harder. Between using a few good footholds to jump several feet higher up along the ledge to grab her handhold, and then clamber up, she's joining the pair atop the wall surprisingly quick.

"Eh. Not as good as parkour, but fun," she has to admit as she swings herself over to plop down with legs dangling off the edge. A grin is cast over toward Steph and Roy with a nod toward the pair. "Hey. Good job guys."

Stephanie Brown has posed:
Stephanie has to make a completely free jump across a gap, grabbing hold of a ledge and her body swinging back and forth like pendulum for a moment before she steadies herself. She gets a good foothold then, boosting herself up and finally making it to the top to join the others.

"Whew, that was a good climb," the blonde high school senior says with a bright smile. She looks over as Carrie slides over the top easily enough. "See, told you it'd be a fun trip to the gym!" Stephanie says brightly. She looks over to Roy and gives him a bright smile. "This is my friend Carrie," she says of the redhead. "And I'm Steph. We're in town from Gotham," she comments to him, making small talk.

Roy Harper has posed:
It's only once he's sitting at the top that he notices Carrie climbing the wall, and that she has no safety. One brow creeps up, though he doesn't comment on it. His smile turns a touch wry. It's not like he used his own safety at all, but he still got one for the sake of following the rules and such. He gives Carrie an up-nod in greeting when she makes the top. "Nice climb. Parkour's a lot of fun, especially in this city." A whole new course, away from Starling City.

"Heya," he says to Stephanie, and then nods to Carrie. "Roy," he introduces himself. "I'm over in Happy Harbor," he says, giving a vague nod in that general direction. "But I like this place for climbing.. though usually it's less crowded." Meaning the throngs of people not on the wall.

Carrie Kelley has posed:
"Oh, my little brother goes there," Carrie remarks with a grin of familiarity at the mention of Happy Harbor. Rather than drop any names though she nods back, and turns her attention to look over the crowded gym. It's likely only because it's crowded that no one has yelled at her for the lack of a line yet. Yet. "Nice to meet you, Roy. Gingers represent." A wink is given at that because her hair color was pretty similar to his in that 'this probably didn't come out of a bottle' way.

Stephanie Brown has posed:
Stephanie smiles and says, "Nice to meet you Roy. Oh yeah? Never been there, that's on Staten Island though, right?" she asks. As Carrie fills in her brother going there, Stephanie casts her a grin. "Have to go visit him sometime then," she says.

Stephanie turns to look down at the gym below. "now they need a repelling station for going back down," she comments. Because throwing herself off the tall heights was always more fun than climbing up them. Though again, no bat-grapple on hand for that.

The blond glances back over to them. "This is much better than lifting weights, isn't it thought?" she asks.

Roy Harper has posed:
"Oh yeah?" Roy asks, brows raising a bit. "Who's your little brother?" he asks, obviously curious as to whether he knows the guy or not. He gives holds out a fist for bumping in ginger solidarity. "Represent," he echoes.

"Yeah," he says to Stephanie. "Boarding school on the island. It's alright." He nods as he looks out over the room below in agreement. "Rappelling, or just a big mat." He flashes her a grin, apparently definitely not afraid of heights. "Weight lifting's alright but I'd rather do something with more movement -- run, climb, parkour, something other than just reps."

Carrie Kelley has posed:
Carrie Kelley holds out her fist to accept and reciprocate the fist bump with a knowing nod, and a grin. The question as to who her sibling was is easily answered though there's no obvious resemblance. "Damian Wayne. Adopted," she adds with a little gesture at herself, "Still counts for teasing him though."