3806/Shakes and Feet For Dinner

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Shakes and Feet For Dinner
Date of Scene: 14 October 2020
Location: Rooftop
Synopsis: Power Girl investigates some teen with torn up feet on top of a rooftop. Shakes are bought, Noriko sticks her foot in her mouth about a thousand times, and Power Girl still has the grace to keep talking to her, even offering to check into something that might help Noriko with her control over her powers.
Cast of Characters: Noriko Ashida, Karen Starr




Noriko Ashida has posed:
Evening touched the Eastern states some time ago.  It's not yet that time for rowdy drinkers or the witching hour for crime, not that it ever stops.  Still, people have to eat.

There are certain views of the city only particular people can get.  This isn't one anyone would really particularly care for though and doesn't require any special powers.  It's above a check cashing place in the Brooklyn across from a diner with tenement housing above it.  Lots of cramped living.

Old Christmas lights are still strung up along the roof and the check cashing billboard.  Noriko leans back against the string of lights and they immediately light up, dancing with color.  She looks up over her shoulder at the splash of more exotic light and smirks, "Beats wasting my cell phone battery." She lifts her foot up to inspect while the other one dangles down off the ledge of the building.

Karen Starr has posed:
    An early start to an evening patrol is always a good thing. With Clark in Metropolis, Karen is free to spend a night covering New York as part of the whole... Avengers thing. There might not yet be a whole lot of anything going on in the city- with dusk only just starting to make way for night proper, but there is always something.

    Sometimes it's a robbery, other times it's... Well, frankly, it's usually some form of robbery.

    Tonight, though, the first thing that catches her eye is a lone girl on a rooftop. Not always something that requires her intervention, but also something that's better safe than sorry. Might as well investigate.

    "Can't help but notice someone on a rooftop. Got a story?" she asks, in this genuine inquisitve tone that's as kind as it is probably not her business. Floating down from the sky with her arms folded, the blonde figure of Power Girl is visible even against the night thanks to the bright colors.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
As Karen gets closer, this is when she might notice /why/ the blue-haired girl is inspecting her foot.  She's practically peeling off the ragged bits of sole still stuck to the bottom of her feet as air hisses in between her teeth.  With one eye squinting closed, the Asian girl lifts her eyes to the floating figure, brows arched.  "Are you trying to figure out if I was dumb enough to rob a place at this hour?"  There's something almost choppy about the way the girl is speaking and she twitches a little through her movements.  As she leans forward to put the one hopeless foot down (and bring up the other hopeless foot), the lights wink in and out.  They aren't plugged in.  "I wanted to get a monster shake."  She nods down to the diner across the street.  "You got a story as good as that?" she shoots back with a slight tilt of her head.

Karen Starr has posed:
    Power Girl is well aware of what's going on, to some degree. She can hear that low level electrical hum, and all of the various other signs that her super-senses are picking up. She doesn't, really, seem particularly bothered. Powered people aren't common, but if you know what to look for, you'll find them more commonly than anyone would think.

    "I'm trying to find out why you're on the roof. Specifically, if everything is okay, sneakers aside." Landing, then, She took to leaning against the nearest thing she could, and continued. "Eh, I was just out not minding my own business, figured I'd do it in this direction for a minute in lieu of any gunshots." She then nods at the diner across the way.

    "Why don't you?"

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Usually people notice the gauntlets that encase her in metal fingertips to elbows.  She keeps the sleeves of her green hoodie pulled down over them as much as she can.  A little coil of electricity ripples down her fingers and leap to her neck when she rubs the side of her neck, even someone without super senses would pick it up.

With a blink, her eyes glow the color of her hair, and then another blink, and they're back to normal.  "I thought it'd be fun to run on rooftops tonight.  There's just a lot of people down on the streets.  More freeing up here."

"Well they don't hand out monster shakes to people with bloody torn up feet.  I'll probably do a dine-pay-dash.  Last time I was there I got their secret recipe for the peanut butter golem shake."  Noriko lifts her hands with a grin.  "Do you want anything?  I got paid last week.  I'm buyiiing?  And making, and I thought I had a third something to make this sound right but I don't."

Karen Starr has posed:
    There are, in most cases, a number of things that are impolite to speak about. If someone is wearing chunky metal gauntlets, it's a matter of curiosity- but probably not great to ask about. Especially since, as Karen can see, it at least -seems- like Noriko has some degree of trouble keeping her powers contained.

    There's a smirk that crosses her features, and she brings up a hand to the forearm of her left gauntlet. Opening up a small compartment, she produces this small billfold, and then from that, she retrieves a twenty-dollar bill. "No no, I'm buying. And maybe going-and-getting. Because I want two, and I'm not one hundred percent sure what you mean by a dine-pay-dash, but if your feet are torn up like that, you shouldn't be walking on them anyway."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"Well if that's the case I'm pitching in for a second one.  I already blew the rest of my paycheck on food and I'm staaarving.  Still gotta get home you know?"  Noriko digs her hand into her back pocket and pulls out a small wad of small bills and some change in her fist.  "Okay that's fair," on the foraging of shakes.

Noriko holds up up ten and a five, since she has no recollection if it's under or over ten.  So many shake places lately.  She grins.  There's a now unconscious way of handling her money so others don't touch her gauntlets even if they've done a good job of managing her ambient levels of energy at the moment.

Karen Starr has posed:
    There's a small chuckle and a roll of her eyes. She's smiling, but the girl doesn't seem to understand wholly that Power Girl isn't going to let her pay. As Noriko starts sorting out the cash, there's sort of a small rush of wind, as Power Girl goes from leaning in place to, as might be expected, walking into the diner.

    She does the rest of that at normal speed, paying without issue, waiting her turn, and so on- before getting the aforementioned four milkshakes To Go. It takes her a few minutes- during which Noriko can likely only watch- before she returns, lifting off from the sidewalk out front of the Diner and landing on the roof. "Two monster shakes each." she declates, plucking the first of Noriko's out of the typical recycled-pulp four-slot cupholder.

    "I said I was paying." is all she says afterwards, taking the first few gulps of her own afterwards.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"Bitch," Nori says with a chuckle when she looks up, hand half-extended.  Nori's eyes dart down toward the diner to catch the back of Power Girl on her way into the diner.  When she loses sight of the woman, folds her bills into a hawk and a shitty crane, at least until her eyes drift up toward the light on in one of the apartments above the diner.  A family of four is preparing for dinner.  Noriko watches raucous choreography of setting the table, then looks down, a storm migrating through her gaze.

The blue-haired girl snaps out of her daze quickly when Power Girl comes into view.  "That's what you think."  Her stubborn tone suggests it isn't over.  She takes the shake, shaking her head at normal speed before she jolts into super speed.  Fast out the gate, and flat on her face a moment later, her head down in her hand that is.  "I keep going faster than the brain freeze...Kay.  Alright."  Noriko lifts her head and looks back to Power Girl, trying to ask between her gulps, perhaps a kindness.

"So I've been wondering what's up with the whole white powers being the same...like all you blondies that look like you've stepped out of Germany or something?-Oh hahahahaha."  Noriko throws her head back, resting it there for a moment.  "I said white powers."  The words jump ahead of themselves almost with how fast the phrases leap out, but the rhythms and inflections are all there, giving off their cues.

Karen Starr has posed:
    Power Girl heard that, of course- that much is probably obvious, considering the rumors surrounding the Metropolis folk. That she doesn't address it when she gets back is pretty telling. Idly, she takes a few quiet gulps of milkshake- going at it at regular human speed rather than trying to take the shake at anything more extreme.

    She watches the girl with a raised brow, listening intently to the question that's asked, but taking a moment to actually offer an answer. Taking the straw out of her mouth, and then blowing lightly on the side of the shake that she isn't currently drinking- which causes it to frost up and freeze around the side, Karen then looks back at Noriko.

    "I'm pretty sure you need to rephrase the hell out of that question, so I'll give you the time to do that."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Perhaps not addressing Noriko's comment would be pretty telling to most people, but for some reason, it all goes right over the girl's head.  It's not till she slams into the social wall that reflects back on her that Noriko seems to register what just happened, truly parse out what she just said, that Power Girl could understand her.  Her mouth hangs open a touch.

"Fuuuuck.  Sorry." Electricity dances across shaky fingertips, movement slightly muted by the softly squeaking metal joints.  She grips her cup a little tighter, suppressing it successfully.

"Not sure there is a better way of rephrasing it," Nori says.  She takes her time, letting her mind scratch around for the word.  "Related?"

Karen Starr has posed:
    There's a sigh, and Karen offers a nod or two. "I think what you -wanted- to ask was, 'why is it that a bunch of heroes with powers like yours look the same, are you related'?" she states, and there's a shake of her head at that.

    "I assure you, that it's all coincidence, and that I'm not sure that there aren't more than a few dye jobs going on." More milkshake slurping, at that, but Power Girl isn't the most talkative. The first milkshake finished, she moves on to the second.

    "Are the powers new? I figure the gauntlets are helping, but it doesn't seem like you're really in control."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
It's hard to get the horrible taste out of Nori's mouth following her own comments and she takes one or two more bites of her shake before she slows to a halt for quite awhile.

"Yeah.  That's what I meant to-yeah."  Noriko's galloping heartbeat only betrays how much she cares in spite of the rough demeanor.  She quiets herself, and takes a little sip of her shake again.  "Four years."  The look in her eyes shows she knows this should be easier.  For the last year she's seen her fellow peers surpass her, even new ones.

"It gets harder to control the more charged up I get."  As for the gauntlets, Nori looks down at them for a moment with a somewhat resigned look.  "It's just going to take me longer."  While it might be obvious and unexpected that her control of her powers seems to correlate a lot to her emotional self-control is definitely not something she brings up.

"Sorry I've been an ass.  I've been on the streets for awhile.  You have to be different there,"  Noriko  rubs an edge of metal back and forth a little across her forehead.

Karen Starr has posed:
    A few more nods. Karen is sympathetic, and quiet, as Noriko explains herself. She stops drinking, for a moment, and heads over to where she'd been leaning before. She doesn't speand long in thought before speaking up.

    "I see." she offers, first, "Had it for four years but you don't have a whole lot of control, yet. That's fine. Some of these things come really, really easy to some people. But, sometimes, how it works for you isn't easy. Think of it like... Driving a car, or playing a game. Sometimes the controls are easy. Sometimes they're not. It's unique for everyone, at least a bit." Then, she takes another few gulps, before continuing.

    "Mutant?" she asks, a brow raised. There's no negative implication to it- Power Girl isn't insulting. In fact, there's a little bit of respect, if you can pick it apart. "I know some people that can help, but they're... Not close. Wouldn't be able to get shakes at this diner for a while, at least."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Nori lets the subject of her pass quickly, like someone dodging something they aren't ready to carry into conversation, but know the constant pressure against those cracks in the dam have to give at some point.  "Yeah.  Some of it just happens passively.  Sometimes I just mismanage my levels.  You know, like running out of energy in a fighting game?"  Video game, but she doesn't clarify.  "Except way worse."

And that is one of the reasons Noriko looks down at her gloopy shake and starts packing in more of it.  "Yeah.  Four years."  There's a sliver of something in her tone that she she's giving that some thought, reconsideration.  She bounces back into the conversation.  "I'm getting help, but I'd never say no to more," she admits, perhaps a touch more eagerly than she wanted to.  "I'll do whatever.  I could go to them.  If I remembered to wear my new sneakers."  Derp.