xp_logs | Gabriel & Wade | Late Thursday Morning

Wade stops by the gym, finds Gabriel, and decides to move to the next stage of his 'recruit the speedster to X-Force' scheme.

Wade walked into the gym, a duffel bag over one shoulder, and scoped out who else was in there. The answer? Nobody but Gabriel. Which was fine, so far as he was concerned. Unless it unexpectedly filled up all of a sudden, this'd give him a chance to see if the younger man had sussed out the merc's cunning plan to slowly, insidiously draw Gabriel into X-Force.

It was slow going. But that was sort of the point. Any faster and the speedy little bastard would figure it out and shy away from everything. So. Slow and steady was gonna win this race.

"Hey," he said, giving Gabriel a half-salute as he walked toward the mats.

"Hey." Gabriel looked over from the mat where he was doing lunges. Wade Wilson, the man whose errand boy he'd inadvertently become. It had been a few menial tasks, packages he'd delivered on his way to and from work, things he would have easily done as favors. And they'd resulted in unnecessary bank deposits that he'd used to buy booze and weed. (It was easy to live like there was no tomorrow when you'd lived through no tomorrow.)

"You're back."

"Yup," Wade said, putting his duffel down and rummaging through it for a moment before pulling a piece of ebony carved to look like a cheetah out and tossing it over to Gabriel. "Souvenir."

He caught the figure with both hands and glanced down at it. "Thanks." A smile came to his face as he ran his fingers over the details in the wood. "Because I'm fast. Clever."

Wade grinned. "I thought so, at least. Glad you like it. Missed you at the costume thing - I'm gonna guess you were working."

"Yeah," Gabriel left the mats and headed to the row of cubbies where he'd stashed his water bottle. He placed the cheetah in one, then grabbed a sip. "Fortunately enough." He meant that - being in a room full of his drunken housemates sounded terrible, and that was before you added the Disney prince and princess thing. "How was it?"

"Fine, mostly uneventful," Wade said. There were some parts that obviously hadn't been uneventful, but he hadn't been there for them, he didn't think. He'd heard about them after the fact. "You gotta watch that whole 'gainful employment' thing," he continued, picking up a staff from the side of the gym and then moving to the mat proper so he could start working through kata.

"Yeah." Gabriel rolled his eyes. "Fuck me and my needing to buy things."

"More like fuck having no life outside work," Wade replied, moving from form to form, his concentration blanketing the room rather than focusing on one thing specifically. "Not that you have that problem, I'm just saying."

"My life's not here these days." He put the water bottle back down and went back toward the mats. "Doesn't mean I don't have one. Figured you might get that. How was Juba?"

"Juba was good," Wade said, still moving methodically. "Definitely eventful, but that's all I'm telling you. Wouldn't want to give you nightmares."

"Yeah," Gabriel said as dryly as he could manage. He turned to face Wade, glanced around at their surroundings and just raised an eyebrow. "Wouldn't want that."

A smile sliding onto his face, Wade said, "You raise a valid point. But also, plausible deniability."

"Pretty sure there's a series of wire transfers that link you to me in ways that are probably pretty questionable." Gabriel watched Wade's disciplined movements, not sure whether to be impressed, intimidated or surprised. "But okay."

"Dude, you delivered a sweater to a friend of mine," Wade said, an amused smile quirking his lips. "And a katana to Jubes. You haven't done anything illegal and neither has Wade Wilson, former mercenary specializing in protection details. One of Wade Wilson's many aliases, however, which you are entirely unaffiliated with, is another matter entirely."

"Yeah, yeah," Gabriel waved him off. "Cultivating an air of mystery. I'm familiar with that party trick."

"Gotta get my James Bond fix on somewhere," Wade said. "But seriously, thanks for dropping those things off for me."

"Yeah, well," Gabriel shrugged off the thanks, "thanks for paying me more than I made as an actual bike messenger, I guess."

"Bike messengers are underpaid," Wade said, a small smile still curving his lips. "Definitely not paid what they're worth. Which is ridiculous." He let a silence fall between them for a moment as he moved through another form, then he asked, "Do you know how to drive?"

"What?" Gabriel squatted down to pick up a weight. "Yeah." Well, kind of. It had been a while, and most of his driving education came from the high school senior he'd been dating before his life fell apart. But it still counted. "Yes. Why?"

"I've got a meeting in Tarrytown next Wednesday. The Wheeze is dropping me off but then he's heading somewhere else, so I need a pickup. Probably late evening," Wade said. "Think you can help me out?"

"Yeah, sure." Gabriel nodded, then started doing bicep curls. "Who's the Wheeze, and automatic or stick?"

"Automatic," Wade said. "And the Wheeze is my go-to for pretty much everything. He keeps me organized. Like a personal assistant only... more. Like, finances and taxes and last will and testament. Catch all. And he hacks. And does background searches." The mercenary paused to consider that, then chuckled. "Wow, he really is a catch-all."

"Huh. Kinda handy when you're a..." He nodded again as a way to gesture toward Wade. "A whatever-you-are. Protection specialist." Whatever the hell Wade Wilson, LLC was serving up, it seemed efficient. "And yet he can't deliver your packages? Your jack of all trades draws the line?"

"He was the one you delivered the sweater to," Wade said, step-step-stepping through another form before thrusting the staff forward hard and then moving to the next. "And Weasel... Weasel's not really an out-and-about kind of guy. He's a bit of a shut-in these days. Which I'm working on."

"Okay then." That came off more judgmental than he intended, which seemed pretty awful since he'd just spent much of the last few weeks being a shut-in. "I trust you're the guy to do it, I guess."

"Hey, he's dropping me off at the place for my meeting, so that's progress," Wade said, amused. "He just gets stuck in his head. So y'know. Gotta remind him the world's the world and stuff."

"Sure." Gabriel watched Wade out of the corner of his eye, trying to figure out if Weasel was a real person, or if this was just terrible allegory. "People kinda figure that out at their own pace," he ventured, because, whatever, if it was allegory, he figured he ought to stand up for himself.

Wade grinned despite himself, then closed his eyes and started running through forms a little more quickly. "Sure," he said, acknowledging the younger man's words even while he continued to move through kata. "You got a car for the pickup next week or are you planning to borrow one from the mansion's fleet?"

"Oh, uh..." Gabriel put the weights down after his last rep. "I dunno. I guess borrow one? Not like I've got a car."

"Sounds good," Wade said. "I'll text you the details."