fandomhigh | Applied Science, 12/14, Period 1

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Applied Science, 12/14, Period 1

There was a platter of Christmas cookies with coffee, hot chocolate, and milk on the side on a table at the back of the lab. The lab tables were covered with less savory supplies.

"Welcome to your final," Tyler said. "I am sure those of you who have taken a class with me before will be astounded to hear that our last lab is making soap. Technically" -- he grinned -- "we are creating the alkali salt of a fatty acid." He went through a thumbnail lecture on the science of that. "If you've done it before, try to do it better, or add scents or herbs this time."

"Before you start on the soap process, please write 150 words or so on what you learned from this class. Thanks. You guys were a good group."

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Priestly blinked at that. The only Christmas excitement they got in Santa Cruz was the year one of the art students decided to do sand paintings on the beach with food coloring. "Your world is kind of weird."

Priestly's mental!Helena was now on skis.

"Well, yeah," Dinah admitted. "At least New Gotham. The rest of the country is-- mostly normal?" Okay, exaggeration. "Metropolis and Star City and a few others have their own weird sometimes too, but Gotham has a rep for the crazy super people." She spread her arms in pride. "Go hometown, woooooo."

"I guess without crazy super villains, you wouldn't need any crazy super heroes. And then how would you and your sisters get your adrenalin fixes?"

"More BASE jumping? Car racing?... nahhh, cliches." Dinah grinned wickedly. "We'd have to invent something even more crazy to make up for it." She might be working for the day ther was no crime in New Gotham, but wow, would she be bored if it ever happened. "How about you? Heading home to the land of no-snow and no-crazy?"

"That's the plan. Mom even admitted that I probably wouldn't come to horrible harm if I helped out Trucker at the sub shop while I was home." Man, his life sounded so dull in comparison. "So, uh. Are the super powers, like, required for fighting evil where you're from? I mean, if the bad guys can set up glaciers, you've gotta have a little mojo yourself, right?"

Dinah tilted her head. "Not really. I mean, there's some who don't have them, and just design weapons or do really good martial arts to make up for no superpowers. Barbara never had any, while she was on the streets. Just awesome fighting skills and a utility belt and body armor. She can still beat me at eskrima from her chair. It's so annoying." And awesome. "Another guy did the freezing thing a few years back with some kind of ray gun that blew out the city grid. A lot of the bad guys are just really smart, too, no powers. Like Scarecrow. Yeeeeee."

Priestly had the mental image of a cheerful, country-crafty, straw-stuffed scarecrow. He was pretty sure that wasn't right. ". . . What's eskrima?"

"Filipino fighting sticks. I think I showed you once, the long ones? Barbara always carries a couple in her wheelchair, in case someone tries to mug someone else on the street. They never expect the handicapped chick sneak up and kneecap them." She grinned. "She's a really good shot, too, but less chance of permanent damage with the sticks. She does all the tech stuff so Helena can find things and people easily, but she's still no slouch in the fighting department."

"Dude. That's . . . totally hardcore." And non-lethal, which Priestly definitely approved of. "So are the gimmicks required? The whole 'scarecrow' or 'huntress' deal with the spooky names and stuff?"

Dinah couldn't help giggling. "You know, I think it just got started as a way to hold off the police? And scare people? And now, at least in New Gotham, it's like this whole... culture. If you're not with organized crime, and you want to intimidate people, you get this secret identity. And if you're not a cop and you want to fight scary bad guys, you get one too." She made a face. "At least once you're not the junior-sidekick type."

"You don't have a super-secret gimmick, yet? Can I help you make one?"

"Nope, not yet. And sure!" Dinah brightened, then looked thoughtful. "I don't want to be Tweety forever, sheesh."

Priestly didn't really listen to the radio. He made a face? ". . . Tweety?"

"Miss Mode stuck me with the name last summer in Superhero Costumes, and Arthur and Katchoo won't let it die. Emma calls me that all the time too." Dinah huffed strand of hair out of her face, carefully pouring more ingredients into her soap mix. "Tony thinks it's cute, but he's not stuck with it."

"That's a terrible superhero name. It wouldn't strike fear into anyone ~~except maybe a black cat villain named Sylvester~~."

"I know!" At least Priestly got it. ~~And at least Tweety always won.~~ "I was thinking of using Mom's, Black Canary, but... I dunno. She had that one because of her superpower. It wouldn't make as much sense for me."

Priestly tried to come up with a superpower that would make being named after a small song bird make sense. He failed.

"What was her power?"

"Sonic scream." Dinah smiled a little wistfully. Which was weird, given the subject matter. "She could knock out bad guys at about a hundred paces with it. Or destroy buildings. Melt concrete. She was a martial artist first, a really, really good one, but if she was facing off with another meta, she could pull that out to use."

Priestly had never really heard Dinah talk about her mom, so while he was a little confused as to why she went with a canary and not, say, a falcon or something, he didn't ask, instead going with "did you ever get to see her in action? Video or anything?"

"Once. In person. Just the once, though. A year ago." She swallowed hard, thinking about it. "The Canary Cry blew these mobsters back about thirty feet, and melted the machinery they had stored in the warehouse we were in. Some of them, their ears were bleeding. A staircase fell down." Dinah sighed, remembering it. "Hurt my ears something fierce, and I was behind her." She was quiet a second, then said, "Still doesn't beat a really determined guy with a submachine gun, though."

"Not a whole lot does." A soap-making lab wasn't the best place for hugs, so Priestly just bumped her with his shoulder. "I think taking up your mom's name would be cool." He grinned. "Hey, maybe I should do that, too. Make people call me 'Naomi'."

Dinah bumped him back, her smile subdued but real. "But then we'd have to call your mom by her mom's name. You think your grandma would mind? Or would she help design a costume?"

Priestly tilted his head. "Dunno. I never really met my grandma. She died when I was really little."

"That's too bad. I never met mine either, they died before I was born. But I have Uncle Jim and Alfred." Who were both too cool to be grandpas, anyway.

"And I've got Trucker and Zo. Though I should probably never, ever tell them that they could work as substitute grandparents." Since they were not exactly that much older than his parents.

Applied Science, 12/14, Period 1

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