9157/Hazing ritual

Hazing ritual
Date of Scene:	18 December 2021
Location:	The Hanging Tree - Park
Synopsis:	Huntress proves her chops. And demonstrates she glazes well with chocolate. Canary laughs it up, but also gets glazed. No bad guys were hurt in the production of this scene.
Cast of Characters:	Dinah Lance, Helena Bertinelli

---

Dinah Lance has posed:
The message came over the app. The app that Helena was given to receive communications from the Birds of Prey network.

"Hanging Tree Park. 2200hrs."

No explanation beyond that. No idea what it was about. Just a place and a time.

At sundown before the appointed time, Dinah, in her alter ego's guise, found herself at the park, climbing the tree. Grunting and struggling as she climbed, largely because of the huge backpack of things that clanked together rather ominously, plus a small cardboard box not entirely unlike the kind you'd find in delivery Chinese that she lugged up with her. Whatever she was doing, it took her almost 25 minutes to do before she came down, the backpack fully deflated and the cardboard box in her hands still, but opened and empty.

"There, that oughta do it," she said aloud to nobody, before dusting her hands and packing the bag into her bike and riding off to park it somewhere secure.

---

At 2200hrs, the park has its usual collection of ne'er-do-wells and their victims. Plus the tree with the ne'er-do-wells who protect it for some reason known only to themselves.

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
It wasn't extrememly out of the ordinary, the message. Most of the time they seemed to come across terse and lacking in more than basic details. The reason was clear enough - only enough detail to connect the dots while not giving away key details in a format that had potential to be discovered by those with no business poking about the Birds' business.

Given the time of year and time of day, it wasn't going to be a civvies sort of visit. To that end, Huntress rolled up to the edge of the park on her bike. Shutting off the engine and headlight, she coasted in to a darker corner of the park and went on foot from there. Cautious and alert but not expecting it to be an ambush or anything dangerous, she wasn't going to go in care free. She made her way with relative silence toward the park's moniker, the tree

Dinah Lance has posed:
The hair is the first thing seen, followed by the legs in their signature fishnets. Disembodied they cross the park, materializing out of the light mist and darkness. The rest of the form then skylines against the mist and the pint-sized pugilist, Black Canary, becomes identifiable. Eyes unreadable behind the domino, but mouth in a wide smile of greeting, she cheerfully chirps upon reaching vocal range, "Huntress?"

And then comes the outstretched hand of welcome, ready for the arm-clasp of fellow fighters.

"Glad to meet you. I've heard things about you. I'm here to see if they're true."

Beat.

"Black Canary. Tweety Bird."

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Huntress pauses at the sight of another costume in the park, though seeing the blonde hair and fishnets she could make a guess even without meeting before.

A glance around then back, "One of us" she nodded. "I can say the same. Though the turf war sort of challenge seems to be a bit over done, don't you think?" A smirk tugs at her lips as she watches. "Nice to meet you Black Canary."

Dinah Lance has posed:
"Well, yeah," Canary says, rubbing her hand through her hair, "this is always the part that's hard. See, thing is, we're kinda unofficial and self-regulating, so there's the problem of how you know a prospect should get her wings." She shrugs before continuing. "So the way it works is anybody who's interested in a prospect evaluates her. Enough of us do the job and think it's a plus, well, you get the secret decoder ring and the secret recipe to Oracle's ABSOLUTELY TO DIE FOR chocolate fondue."

Canary chuckles good-naturedly.

"Now thing is, normally to evaluate I'd just patrol with you. Sound you out. See you in action. Except not all patrols involve action." Not like the training patrol with Rave a few days earlier. "So that means multiple meetings, multiple times patrolling, all on the off chance we get to see action. Boring for you. Time-consuming for both. So I like to evaluate differently."

She gestures to the Hanging Tree itself. The reason for the park.

"My test is in there, if you want to partake. And you don't have to! Just to make that clear. I don't have any final say on anything. That's all on Oracle. I just say 'I did X with Y and Z happened' plus my opinion and Oracle decides. I'm one voice of many, not 'Here Come da Judge'."

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Huntress tilts her head at the mention of the hard part. She is already starting to prepare for what appears to be some sort of showdown. Then there is talk of fondue. Wait, fondue?

She nods in some understanding of the perspective on trying to patrol. There is a tone of iron in her voice, "Yeah. Thats got to be the worst, right?" She brushes her hair over her shoulder and glances around again just to keep aware of the surroundings. Then she looks confused. "Up there?" A brow arches and she shrugs with a sigh. "Okay, fine. Let's get this over with." She was a teacher, used to giving out the tests these days so this was entirely different.

She was told to get up into the tree, not how, so she reaches to her quiver and pulls out a customized bolt. Slotting it into one of her crossbows she clips on a small diameter jump line. Wasting no time, she fires the bolt up into the tree where it clamps on securely. The other end is connected into an ascender on her belt harness and she is swiftly propelled up from the ground, cape billowing out around her as she rises, finding a grasp with hands and feet on upper branches. She looks back down with a bit of a smug grin.

Dinah Lance has posed:
"Uh, did I mention the traps?" Dinah calls up. "I'm sure I did, but I'm blonde, so you know."

She flips her hair Valley-style at Huntress with a wink. At about the point that a rat trap closes down on Helena's finger.

"See that's the thing. You've got to find the rare flower in the tree, but you've got to avoid the traps. There's plenty of them, all different kinds. None will do more than sting, but they represent the kind of deadly traps you'd get from head cases like Joker, so..."

Beat.

"We'll call that first trap a freebie, no points lost. But next time you should get the whole deal before jumping in, OK?"

Because Dinah NEVER jumps into action without thinking. And anybody who says otherwise is a stinking liar!

"Now watch out. There's flour traps, rat traps, laser pointer traps, smoke traps, and the nasty one that's kind of like a flashbang made by a cruel middle-schooler. It involves paint. As well as the flash and the bang. You've got to search the tree for the rare flower and bring it down. Ideally without getting marked, lased, painted, dusted, or otherwise hit by the traps."

And now she's grinning openly, just barely this side of giggling.

"And yes, when you finally get down you get one free punch on me for inflicting this on you!"

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
"Oh, you have /got/ to be sh....!" Huntress mutters as the trap snaps on her gloved finger. At least it has padding which lessens the sting to her digit, if not to her pride. She looks down at Black Canary shooting eye daggers, "I'm pretty sure you neglected to offer that part." She sighs softly, muttering under her breath, "... no reward is worth this...", her mind turning briefly to the stack of English papers on her apartment desk in need of final grading by the morning bell.

Gritting her teeth, Huntress begins to scan the tree immedately around her current perch for these Home Alone Rube Goldberg devices.

Dinah Lance has posed:
"Oh, gosh!" Canary says with false, wide-eyed innocent shock. "I KNEW I totally forgot something!"

Then it's just straight-up laughter. Not malicious. Quite. But certainly the laughter of someone who's enjoying herself a bit too much.

In her immediate vicinity, the thread tied to a laser pointer is obvious.

Too damned obvious.

Almost as if it were intended to be found and dismantled. It might bear closer investigation before dismantling it. An operation that is complicated by the obvious flour bomb right next to it. She hasn't even bothered hiding it.

Too damne... Is there an echo?

Down below...

"Hey, baby! Need some compa..." The man owning the voice stops dead in his tracks when he sees who he's trying to pick up. "...Oops. My mom just called me." Tracks are made leaving the vicinity.

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Huntress remains still, moving only her eyes. She has experience in bypassing security, even in basic disarming of explosives. But nothing would have prepared her for the madness of another would-be vigilante's concocted version of tar and feathering.

She traces trigger device for the laser sensor. She looks at the flour 'bomb' with a sigh. ".... seriously...?" she mutters to herself. "Someone needs a better hobby. Or a BOYFRIEND!" she calls after the guy as he leaves. Clearly, she really -really- needs a boyfriend. Pulling out a small toolkit, she patiently sets to work on the triggers to the flour bomb and sensor. Fast? Well she's no Bat. But she doesn't completely embarrass herself. Then she moves on. The journey to find this fabled flower isn't super speedy nor is it without another snapped finger and a jolt worthy of censored words. For the English speaking world, their ears are mercifully saved from melting by the fact that said blue language comes out exclusively in Italian. Angry Italian. Muttered low, fast and non-stop.

Dinah Lance has posed:
"That's the spirit!" Canary calls from below, walking around the trunk as Huntress finds a path through the madness. (It's a simple path. Basically a spiral, like someone was a bit lazy when setting up the traps. And was expecting someone to go through them from the bottom up.) Eventually, however, with few indignities, but a whole lot of upsetting time-wasting, the cursing vigilante finds herself faced with two small flower pots, each one suspended by thread that very clearly is attached to a trap.

The first flowerpot is a fragile-looking white flower, rather plain, actually, that is tied in a way that suspiciously looks like the triggering mechanism for a glitter bomb. (OOC: https://i.imgur.com/wGe02lw.png) The second is connected to something that is not in clear view, but looks like some kind of tank. It is a hearty-looking deep red flower, like devil's food cake. (OOC: https://i.imgur.com/IrUHpj4.jpg)

"Remember the goal. The wording is very important!" Dinah calls up.

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Huntress ha-haaaa's in annoyance to herself. She is both peeved that she is doing this absurd gauntlet, and also that she knows it isn't entirely pointless. Gotham's criminal world is seriously eff'ed in the head and this is just the sort of absurdist level of traps they would probably use. Only with intended consequences that would be far more deadly. And so she picks her way through, swallowing her pride and applying herself. Seeing the two flowers. Well. She isn't a florist. Or a botanist. Or a hortoculteral... ist. They just look like flowers. One white, one red. She closes her eyes and sighs. That's when she decides to do the unthinkable: shoot the hostage. She takes a cautious step back and first both cross bows to trigger the traps. Will she get victimized by the results? It is entirely likely, but she is a vigilante of action and all of this inch-worming along was beyond tiresome. So, damn the torpedoes.

Dinah Lance has posed:
The first thing that happens is that the pots start falling. One of them needs rescuing to fill the terms. Huntress is going to have to pick one.

Unfortunately...

The traps trigger simultaneously which is apparently not something Canary had considered before setting this up. The glitter bomb goes off. Together with the chocolate sauce bomb. Glitter and chocolate sauce come raining down in a sticky, horrible, unholy mess. Following two flowerpots in free fall. And unless Huntress has tricks up her sleeve, it looks like saving a pot is going to result in glittery brown sticky indignity.

Down below Canary backs away rapidly, mouth open in a wide "O" of shocked surprise as she realizes what's about to happen.

Well, at least it will wash away. Eventually.

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Auto-loading crossbows are very helpful in moments like this. Any many others. But specifically in this moment. A moment that could have not possibly been anticipated at the point in which Huntress evauated weapon styles for best fit.

As the bolts are fired to trigger the flowers dropping, Huntress is already falling backward off the branch she was balanced on. As the flowers begin to fall and the choco-glitter bomb from hell explodes, Huntress has placed most of the tree's trunk between herself and the psychodelic eruption in order to avoid the majority of the anticipated mess. She will not escape unscathed. But it bought her time as she was already falling - she had a head start on gravity versus the flower pots. Firing off a grapple bolt, she uses it to swing around the trunk, the line clipped to her belt harness as before. Her crossbows get stowed in the same moment she is swinging wide around the tree, amidst the liquid shrapnel splattering her armor. With free hands, she scoops up the two plummeting flower pots. They will not make it to the ground undamaged. One of the pots is shattered. But the flowers? The flowers survive.

Landing just beside the tree, glittering chocolate sauce dribbling down her forehead and cheek, Huntress looks at Canary.

"I hate you."

Dinah Lance has posed:
For a moment Canary keeps a straight face as she takes in the mess before her. Then that all goes away as she breaks out into laughter. The gut-clutching, whole-body kind.

"OK, this wasn't the outcome I had in mind. Which is too bad because I would have been laughing my ass off at the picture for hours beforehand," she whoops between guffaws, the sentences broken up by laughter.

It takes a while to get that back under control.

"But you saved both flowers," she says, once her professionalism returns. That's definitely a point in your favour. For reference, the edelweiss isn't particularly rare any longer, though protected in Switzerland. The chocolate cosmos, on the other hand, verges on priceless. And you saved both. Good job!"

She steps up to the taller woman with resolve in her eyes, turning her chin up. "And, you get that free punch that I so richly deserve. And will be totally worth it because of this memory!"

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Huntess stands there dripping chocolate syrup and sparkling like an emo vampire. She holds the two flowers while Canary is doubled up with laughter. When Canary walks up and declares she has apparenty passed, she still isn't really smiling. She might have softened the frustrated and annoyed edges a bit. But she isn't smiling yet.

She thrusts the two flowers and pots toward Canary. "why save one if you can save both." It's the only insight into the insanity of her choice in the past moment. Loose canon? Check. But then she is offered to punch Canary. She won't say she wasn't thinking about it long and hard. Particularly up in that damned tree.

She cocks her right fist back and then strikes. Her arm extends in a flash as fast and powerful as any vigilante with extensive training could do. Her fist strikes.

Nothing.

Her fist stops short by several inches. Then her index finger extends and.. BOOP. Just lightly touching Canary's nose, it leaves behind glittering chocolate sauce on the tip.

She draws her hand back and asks, "Satisfied? Are we done acting like ten year olds with flour bombs and chocolate mines?"

Dinah Lance has posed:
"Yeah, we're done," Canary says, still very obviously suppressing laughter. "Let's act like adults and go drinking instead. I've gotta report the outcome, but ... you did well aside from the initial rushing in before hearing the goals. You kept your head about you. You recognized the intent. You did the task in a way that surprises ... that's bonus points right there ... and you made me laugh."

Something about the Canary's demeanour suggests that that last point isn't so difficult.

"I'm voting 'yeah' on full membership. Even if you didn't punch me."

At no point is the chocolate sauce getting wiped off, thus far. Solidarity sisters?

"What's your poison. I'm..." Canary winces at the next word. "Buying."

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Huntress corrects, "No. I went in with what you provided. You withheld details because it fit your narative." She flicks more chocoate syrup off her gloves. "This is going to take a week to get clean."

Looking over she squints and realizes that Canary is prepared to go out just like this. She shakes her head, "oh no. You're not nearly messed up enough, yet" and she promptly moves in for a bear hug. She might get laid out for it but it's a risk she's willing to take and she betting she gets away with it.

Then, stepping back, she smirks. "You're damed right you're buying, after all this, you mad woman" she can't hide the smiles this time.

"We're going to bluff our messy way into the best Speakeasy in Gotham. After all this I want a D.B. Cooper" she declares defiantly.

Dinah Lance has posed:
Canary accepts the hug in good graces, indeed with laughter again. "OK, I deserved that," she says after she gets smeared with her own traps. "I'd have preferred the punch, though, to be honest."

Beat.

"D.B. Cooper!?" she then asks in sudden outrage. "What, I look like I'm made of money?!"

Beat.

"What's a D.B. Cooper?" she then adds.

"Ah, never mind," she decides. "If it's too costly I'm sure Oracle will refund the costs. I gotta pick up my ride. How you movin'?"

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Huntress smiles, "I know you would have. I'm killing you with kindness" she declares sweetly.

"It's a drink, for starters. Not just the skyjacker who allegedly escaped." She then ticks off, "Cocktail. It was created using Trail's End whiskey, Aperol - the Italian link for me, of course - Amareo and some citrus or lemon juice. I'm sure here in Gotham, they'l make it with something more suitable. But it'll be the same in the end. And it gets garneshed with a little paper airplane. After the way I bailed out of that tree..." a beat as she stares at Canary, ".. it seems like the suitable drink for the occasion."

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
"My bike is at the other end of the park. Probably where your boyfriend is still lurking in hopes of a second chance at a date with you.." Huntress muses playfully.

Dinah Lance has posed:
"Ooh! We should totally find him, covered in smeared brown stuff and ask him if he wants to party!" Canary says with another laugh bubbling out. "See if he runs so fast he leaves his shoes behind!" She gestures down toward an abandoned-looking building. "I got the duke parked there. And I know just the place to crash. Let's hit the Iceberg and watch those upper-crusters cringe and edge away!"

With a breezy wave, Dinah heads off to pick up her bike and race like the maniac she is to the Iceberg Lounge.

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Huntress looks dubiously at Canary, "You named your bike?" She shakes her head, "I'm sure that'll go over like a lead balloon. But it might just be worth it to see their faces.." she smirks. "Meet you around the block." She turns and walks off, covered in glittering chocolate syrup and potting soil. And she doesn't even care.