Molly Hayes

PHASE 1

PHASE 2

Molly Hayes
Portrayed by Melissa Benoist
Codename:	Bruiser
Affiliations:	Generation X
Birthdate:	July 11, 1998
Journal:	xp_bruiser
Player:	Mackinzie

Formerly the youngest student at the Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters, Molly Hayes is adjusting after several years spent in Asgard resulted in her returning several years older than when she left.

Details

Character Journal: xp_bruiser

Real Name: Molly Grace Hayes

Codename: Bruiser

Aliases: Princess Powerful, Dozer, Mol, Pipsqueak, Tiny, Half-Pint

First Appearance: December 31, 2010

Date of Birth: July 11, 1998

Place of Birth: Los Angeles, California

Citizenship: American

Relatives: Dr. Alice Hayes (mother), Dr. Gene Hayes (father)

Education: Junior High School

Relationship Status: Single

Occupation: Student, Demolisher of nice things

Team Affiliation: Generation X

Biography

Childhood

Molly Hayes was born to Alice and Gene Hayes, two telepathic doctors who had been trying desperately to have a child for many years with little success. When she was born, Molly was their shining moment, the apple of their eyes. They loved her dearly and raised her to have everything she ever wanted. As Molly grew older, Molly’s father began to grow somewhat distant after Molly was tested negative for what was apparently diabetes.

Unknown to Molly and most people in their community, Alice and Gene Hayes were actually mutants, both telepaths. While they agreed with some of the mutant terrorist Magneto’s beliefs they didn’t go around flaunting it, knowing the consequences should anyone have found out. So instead, they chose to help out the Brotherhood in other ways, giving money when needed along with other low key types of activities.

What they had tested Molly for was for the mutant gene and discovering her to be apparently negative, Gene grew somewhat resentful. Though he still loved his daughter he couldn’t get over what she was not. Alice remained ambivalent, torn between her beliefs and the facts, but still treated Molly the same, if a bit more protective than before given her “weakness.”

Molly was a happy, healthy kid, though she did notice the growing change in her parents. After her eleventh birthday she also began to notice that she was a bit stronger than usual when a bully at school started to pick on her and she threw him across the room.

While she tried to tell her parents, they were too preoccupied with their own problems to even begin to listen to her. They soon found themselves face to face with the self-touted 'savior of children' known as Nanny and her adopted son Orphan Maker. While in prison, Nanny had discovered Alice and Gene's acquaintances with the Brotherhood through a fellow inmate they had helped along the way.

Thinking it a simple job, Nanny sent Orphan Maker to try to kidnap Molly but the Hayes were prepared and for the most part succeeded in fighting him off. Their world drastically changed, however, when a neighbor witnessed the battle and in his panic Gene Hayes went too far with his telepathy, killing the man. Rattled by what happened and fearing the worst, Alice and Gene took Molly and went on the run to the Florida Keyes, burning down their LA mansion to try to fake their deaths.

After a spectacular failure against the Hayes Family, Nanny decided to work with a small group of children to help her that she called The Lost Children in trying to make her plan succeed. She knew from one of the children that the Hayes family were not dead and managed to find out where they had fled to. Luckily, the X-Men, having kept tabs on Nanny's escape following their previous encounter with the deranged caregiver.

They managed to intercept Nanny, Orphan Maker, and the Lost Children just as they found the Hayes Family traveling across the Overseas Highway between Miami and the Florida Keys. During the battle between the X-Men and Nanny's crew Orphan Maker got a rude wake up call in the form of a truck being thrown at him by a newly manifested Molly after she saw him trying to hurt Alice Hayes.

While recovering at a Miami safehouse after the battle, Alice and Gene were convinced by the X-Men to let Molly stay with them, realizing they could not raise their daughter on the run, or teach her how to use her abilities when they didn't have them themselves.

Phase 1

Making Friends, Enemies, and Fists

Molly's foray into the mansion was not rocky. She managed to fit in rather well despite being around mostly adults. She made many friends and, through the help of many hands, managed to begin the foundations of a new hat collection while learning how to control her powers better. It was a new chapter in her life that she was excited to find where it lead.

She became very close to Wade Wilson after running into him--literally--during their first meeting. Calling him 'Wademan' she sees him as a sort of brother figure and friend. She found a mentor in Monet St. Croix, who began to teach her how to use her powers and how not to fall asleep when using them. She and her roommate, Meggan Szardos quickly bonded over late night raids of the kitchen and comforting each other during their nightmares about evil old ladies and Selene. While she made more friends than enemies, things started off on the wrong foot between her and Kevin Ford when Molly gave him a nickname on the journals because she thought everyone had one and wound up irking him a little, but the two quickly reconciled once she apologized in person. She and Carmilla Black had a rocky start but according to nearly everyone she's spoken to that's normal.

Despite not actually leaving the mansion that much, Molly still found herself in the occasional bit of trouble. She helped her fellow New Mutants with helping some ghosts find their stuff in order to crossover into the great beyond. And later on she was also brainwashed with the other New Mutants into wanting to live in the Morlock Tunnels by Annalee but was rescued by the X-Men. After the return to the mansion, Artie was upset and wound up lashing out at Molly, calling her names. The two remained on frosty terms for a number of weeks before finally making up after realizing they both weren't as different as they thought. Molly also formed an unlikely friendship with Matt Murdock, going so far as to talk to him about his addiction problems. Her strength also came to the rescue of Marius Laverne, when he fell off the roof during Christmas decorating and she was able to catch him.

A Tumultuous Time

2012 was far more eventful. Hints that not everything was right with Molly appeared, with her becoming confused and disoriented while sick and hiding away from everyone until rescued by Wade, Matt and Meggan. Then the Field Trip Curse struck, with Molly forced to battle Friends of Humanity supporters inexplicably manifesting mutant powers at a pro-mutant fair. Molly acquitted herself well, taking direction from Wade.

The next disaster, however, was not so easily dealt with. Molly and a group of students and staff were abducted by agents of the island nation of Genosha, stripped of their powers and imprisoned. "Squishable" for the first time since her manifestation, Molly was terrified by the events that unfolded, and began to mentally retreat. She was rescued from prison, joining a group of other Xavier's mutants who went to ground in the Genoshan jungle, but the danger wasn't over. Acting as bait for a Magistrate patrol, Molly, Matt and Meggan witnessed first hand the type of violence their friends and acquaintances were capable of, and then when the refugee camp they took shelter in was attacked, Molly was poisoned by Mutate 557 - the girl she had previously known as Callie Betto. Another encounter with another former friend turned enemy, Mutate 105 during the combined attack on the city upset her further, and while she did well in the battle against the insane cybernetic monster, Thomas Moreau, Molly's sense of security was deeply damaged. She also became more child-like, blocking the worst of her experiences in Genosha from her mind, while outwardly she appeared as cheerful and cute as ever.

Not long after their return from Genosha, Matt caused an uproar when he took Molly into New York without permission or notice. While she had assumed it was simply a shopping trip, it had been a cover for Matt's purchasing of drugs to help him deal with his own memories and trauma from Genosha. Another field trip disaster ended slightly better, with Molly defeating the Black Knight (a transformed Korvus Rook'shir to save the 'princess', a young girl whose mutation allowed for her to convince people what she pretended was real. Her 14th birthday went off without a hitch, but four months later, when she had her first period, it was up to Wade and Marie-Ange Colbert to explain what was happening to the panicked girl.

Molly's memory issues and immaturity were finally explained at the end of the year, when a chance meeting with Callie, the first since Genosha, resulted in Molly's memories wiping themselves and resetting her to the previous May, before the ill-fated outing to the Genoshan embassy protest. With Jean Grey away for the holidays, Emma Frost took it upon herself to assist Molly, discovering stress was a trigger for each memory reset. It was only when Molly's parents arrived that the truth was revealed - as a telepath, Molly's mother had been wiping her mind for years, to avoid difficult conversations about their history with the Brotherhood of Mutants and to save Molly from having to deal with anything upsetting. The process had been repeated so often that Molly's mind had learned to do it to itself, removing from her memory anything traumatic or frightening. While Wade and Adrienne Frost barely restrained themselves from physical harm to the Hayes', Emma was able to forge an agreement that they would remain in Salem Center and help her rebuild Molly's mind. The Hayes agreed - but it only was a short time before Gene decided they had to vanish again, with Molly. Only Molly's staunch refusal to leave stopped them from taking her, and they disappeared again, leaving her at Xavier's for the time being. Emma and Charles undertook to help Molly regain her memories, while Charles issued a warning to the mansion at large to be careful of what they brought up with her, and how.

One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

Life at the mansion being what it is, it wasn't long before Molly was once again put in a traumatic position, this time when the New Mutants were targeted by an Internet meme, the Slendermen. Molly was bout to free herself and assist her friends, but the tougher moment came several days later, when she faced her fears and talked to Kyle Gibney about her experience with a Slenderman who had posed as him. This moment was followed by others, as she began to slowly regain and deal with various memories and experiences, working with Emma all the while. When her new roommate Topaz failed to come back to their room for three days, it was Molly who raised the alarm and later offered the older girl some advice about asking for help.

Her progress halted, however, when she was psionically ripped from her mind by Rachel Kinross-Dayspring, who had recruited her and several others as support in her mission to save her home dimension. Molly was witness not only to the history of Apocalypse's victory over America, but the deaths and betrayals of various people she knew as friends and classmates. Forced to fight Famine with Wanda Maximoff, Molly barely survived the battle after having a building dropped on her. It was revealed that Rachel's world was nothing but an astral plane construct created by Nathaniel Essex for his own purposes, and the drafted minds sent back to their bodies, but the damage was done. Molly, on her arrival "back" to her body severely damaged Lorna Dane's car and later had problems facing people she had seen as "evil", including her beloved Wademan's girlfriend, Marie-Ange.

Molly's nightmares, coupled with Topaz's control issues with her empathy, resulted in Molly jumping out of her bedroom window while still asleep. Only her mutation saved her, and it was decided that Topaz would change suites, leaving Molly with a room of her own. There was another incident only a few weeks later, this time with her throwing Marius into the lake after he startled her in the quarry. Marius was rescued by Namor Mazur, but shaken by what happened and concerned by the state Molly had been in at the time.

The Xavier's Prom provided a night of normalcy for Molly, who at close to sixteen, was beginning to feel she should be more "grown up". Her other means of self-therapy - going out and acting as a superhero in Salem Center on the sly - was less favourable, with Molly grounded as a result of a rescue gone awry. Confused by the mixed messages, since, in her mind, she had only been doing what the X-Men did, Molly resented her punishment, and months later, almost got someone hurt when she hesitated in a fight. And while she enjoyed her 16th birthday party, she also dumped her beloved comics collection in the trash, feeling it was too immature of her to continue reading comics. Little did she know that Doreen Green, fellow comic book love, had discovered the collection and rescued it for her. Molly also tried to cut back on her hats - again, feeling they were too silly for a 16 year old - but this didn't last long.

Summer vacation ended with yet another field trip disaster, this time when out of control mutant powers brought art to life. Like previous occasions, Molly found that there are few situations that a super-powered punch can't get you out of.

The Thralls of Asgard

Molly's world came crashing down in January 2015, when reality began fracturing and falling apart. When the Dark Phoenix invaded the mansion, Paige Guthrie sacrificed her life to save Molly, Tandy, and Ty from dying. The three of them were brought to Asgard taken under the care of different Asgardians. Molly went with Lady Sif for her training. While in Asgard she developed an interest in mechanics and learning how things worked.

After two years in Asgard, the trio was sent to Earth in order to hunt down some Frost Giants that had escaped. While in pursuit of the giants they met a group of X-Men, and they teamed up to take down the last giant together. When the job was done, the three of them were surprised to find that they had been released from their thrallship, and would remain on Earth.

Phase 2

Welcome Home

Returning to the mansion was odd for Molly when she discovered that not only had only a few months passed, but that many of the friends she'd had were gone. She managed to adjust easily enough, though the loss of her friends did weigh on her - especially when it came time for her birthday. She did find herself making some new friends - she and Clinton Barton bonded over mechanics, which Molly had learned in Asgard. He later asked for her help studying a mysterious Atlantean artifact, which wound up with a resulted in a battle with fish-men. She enjoyed it far more than some of the others.

Physical Characteristics

Height: 4'11"

Weight: 100 pounds

Eyes: Green (eyes glow purple when using powers)

Hair: Light Brown

Other Features: Rarely without hat, even in summer. Owns assorted collection of hats, most of them animal shaped, odd or cute.

Powers

Molly possesses the potential for immense strength, the heights of which are unmeasured. She currently can lift a school bus at around 11 tons with for a minute or two. The main drawback to her ability, however, is after using her strength she is overwhelmed with fatigue and will often fall asleep right then and there. For the most part she has a fair amount of control over her abilities, but can be prone to losing that control and overdoing her strength a little if she’s angry or stressed. When she uses her powers her eyes will glow purple, so it is difficult to hide that she is exerting her strength. Her powers are fueled by adrenaline. The moment that adrenaline starts to wear away is when the fatigue sets in.

In addition to super strength, Molly also possesses invulnerability, able to withstand blows that would normally seriously injure a normal person. She could withstand fire if she had to walk through it but the heat could be a problem if around it too long (her organs are not invulnerable and would essentially be cooked like a baked potato). She could also stay in the cold a bit longer than a normal person but could eventually get hypothermia. She would not survive if she were held underwater, however, as she couldn’t breathe.

Molly loves being a mutant, and is not afraid to show off her abilities (for better or worse

Equipment

Lots and lots of hats.

Trivia

Molly owns over three dozen hats. The collection keeps growing.

Molly is terrified of squirrels and ran screaming from Dori when she met her.

Molly really, really likes glitter and once used all of the art room's glitter supply to make Valentine's Day cards for people.

Before The Dark Phoenix saga Molly had developed an interest in engineering and technology. Her time in Asgard under Sif allowed her to nurture those interests.

External Links

xp_communication posts by tag

xp_journal posts by tag

xp_logs posts by tag

Plots

Phase 1

2010

The Best Deceptions

2011

The Best Deceptions

Afterlife

My Long Forgotten Son

Mortimer Toynbee's Electric Funkedelic Boogaloo

2012

Times They Are A-Changin'

For Free Trade

The End of the Beginning

Stemming the Tide

Savrola

Onwards to Victory

The Dawn of Liberation

Renfair

Auld Lang Syne

2013

Auld Lang Syne

Something Slender (and Awful)

She Sells Sea Shells

Age of Apocalypse

Deal With The Devil

2014

Darkness Within

New Mutants: Scribblenauts

God is a Gun

2015

Reality Coming Down

The Dark Phoenix

Phase 2

2015

The Thralls of Asgard

It’s Greek To Me

2016

Are We Ourselves

Meta

Player: Mackinzie

E-mail:

AIM: N/A

Player Icon Base: Melissa Benoist

Meta Trivia

Molly was introduced to the game in January 2011 as Mack's second character.

Molly's previous PB was Chloe Moretz. The images in her bio remain for posterity.