warnings: slash. humor. fourth wall abuse. au (Earth-339) with 616 references. spoilers for Messiah War. language: pg (primetime tv).

pairing: arc contains pervasive Nate/Wade. chapter contains veiled references to another slash pair.

timeline: X-mas Eve 2011 (a week after Frozen Effigies).

disclaimer: marvel owns Cable & Deadpool, disney owns marvel.

notes: 1) ah, Eight-ball's screensaver password...no amount of brute-force-password-hacking would be able to crack it. poor Weasel. 2) i wonder what kind of energy drink Weas prefers...i like the blue flavor of Monster, but that's me. 3) Hope is totally a fan of South Park, Family Guy, and Robot Chicken. probably Futurama, too, but i don't think she'd get as many of the jokes. 4) raise your hand if you REALLY CAN tell the difference between ALL the presents even with out tags. *raises both hands* but Karu-chan is extremely obsessive with tags, so i'm forced to tag things (and then i'm commanded to read the tags "just to be sure"). 5) how many of us actually remembered that 'Berto was teaching mutant brats? _ yeah, i had to wrack my brain to remember where he'd gotten to... 6) DEAR GOD, how old is Nate? XD it's not something you really think about much, and him having white hair is terribly deceptive...he's looked somewhere between 30 and 60 for a LONG TIME. XD not to mention the fact that his body could be who-knows-how-old after technically having his consciousness transported to a younger body. are Summerses just INCAPABLE of having semi-normal lives? ...i digress... anyhow, he's certainly a 'mature individual.' i'd call him 'well-preserved,' but i think that title goes to Marvel's resident lycan-related-ferals (srsly, wolvie is looking mighty fine for 150+).

Mature

On the twenty-fourth, Wade uses an excuse of last-minute Christmas shopping to sneak off to Weasel's place before the day can be consumed by Christmas parties.

Nate bitched and griped for about an hour (and Wade had to listen to a long rant about the virtues of a reverse Christmas list), but finally agreed to stay at the apartment and endure morning cartoons with Hope.

Wade was careful to very thoroughly and colorfully threaten Weasel (wouldn't do to have him tell his silly geek friends he found some nifty future-telling-thing and end up with a bunch of money-grubbers knocking down the door to sell it to some crazy evildoer).

"So?" Wade prompts.

Weasel adjusts a laser-pointy-thingy and types something. "It's really advanced."

"It's from the future," Wade reminds him. "What does it do? I mean, Hope 'n Laura said it could trace timelines. Is that right?"

"Uh…let's see…" Weasel wiggles a hand. "Well, it works on some kind of photonic vibration tech. Looks like it uses that to do cascading probability calculations. Maybe. I'm not a hundred percent on that. I can't wake it up from its suspend mode…y'know, can't hack the screensaver password."

"You? Can't hack the password?"

Weasel scowls. "It's not as easy as it sounds! There's some kind of five-by-twelve command grid, and depending on what you press, it unlocks some weird shifting symbol lock all over the damn thing. I've identified thirty-seven individual symbols so far, and I got no clue what they mean. For all I know, the password is the name of somebody's first pet. I dunno, Wade, maybe if I had a week or so to work on it…"

"And it may or may not do awesome see-the-future cascading probability calculation?"

After a moment more of fiddling and typing, Weasel shrugs. "Look, I don't even know for sure what the thing is made of, let alone what it does. It could be frigging Skynet for all I know."

Sighing, Wade snatches the little crystal ball out from under the scopes and shoves it in his pocket. "Fine. Thanks for nothin'. I gotta go find something for Laura for X-mas in time to wrap it before dinner. I got some parties to crash tonight."

Weasel reaches for an energy drink, shakes the can a little to see how much is left, checks a different one and takes a drink. "Well, don't forget to crash the agency party—the girls will throw a fit if they don't get to see Hope."

"Yeah, yeah," mutters Wade, abandoning Weasel's secret lab (not so secret, but it totally feels like it should have a hangar door that opens in the side of a mountain).

He has no idea what to get Laura (aside from something that won't get him disemboweled). This is why he hates fanfics set at Christmas. They have a tendency to dissolve into an exhaustive and tedious parade of presents that demonstrate each character's 'hidden inner emotions' according to the wishful fangirl imaginings of the author.

To spite said author, Wade decides to get Laura the first nonsensical impulse item that calls out to him at the nearest convenience store—turns out to be a Hello Kitty keychain that lights up.

He goes home, ignores Nate's thinly-veiled complaints while Hope cackles over a rerun of last year's Christmas episode of South Park. Nate has left the wrapping stuff on the kitchen counter; Wade relocates to the floor so that he doesn't have to stand up to work. Poor little light-up Hello Kitty ends up wrapped in neon green paper with slightly intoxicated red-nosed reindeer all over it. With judicious use of tape, he sticks a green bow on top. Wade is just about to call it good and chuck it in the bag with the rest of the X-Force presents when Nate clears his throat from the couch.

"Put a tag on that," Nate says.

Wade pulls a face. "Why? I know who it's for."

"Have you read the sticky notes on the wrapping supplies?"

He hasn't, of course (that he can remember), and Nate knows that. Irritated, Wade grabs the package of gift tags and reads whatever words of wisdom Sandi has left him.

Just because you know who it's for now doesn't mean you'll remember later.

So, pouting because he hates it when Nate's right (and agreeing with Sandi is usually 'right' by default), Wade grabs a pen out of the pile of wrapping supplies and scribbles Greenie beside the word 'To:' and dp beside 'From:'.

"Are you excited about the parties?" Hope asks, coming to survey his handiwork between shows.

Wade looks at her. "I guess. Last year, Bob's marriage was just getting back outta the crapper, so The Nagging Bitch sent him with an awesome honey-smoked ham. Hayden ate most of it, but he let everybody try a slice first."

"That isn't a very nice thing to call someone, you know. Allison isn't all bad—she just kind of wishes Bob was more…well, more. But he's just Bob. She's getting used to it, I think."

"How about you, munchkin?" Wade asks, tucking Laura's present into the bag. "You haven't met Nate's old crew of fun-folks-I've-tried-to-kill-three-or-four-times. We're buddies now, but when I first met Nate's grumpy wannabe-heroes…" He laughs at the memory.

Hope bounces. "What? What?"

"He was hired to kill me," Nate calls from the couch. "So we sent him back to his employer in boxes. Several."

"They sprang for FedEx," Wade finishes with a nod.

Hope's eyes widen. "Wow, they're cool enough to take you out, Wade?"

"I was sent in with inferior intelligence," Wade corrects defensively. "Tolliver neglected to mention some of the nasty tricks the brats could pull, and he definitely neglected to mention the fact that Nate was all big 'n tall 'n sexy 'n badass."

"I'm not sure I care for the use of past tense there," Nate grumbles. "Hope, the next one's on."

"In a minute," she dismisses, helping Wade pack up the wrapping supplies. "So who else will be there, besides Neena and Laura and Warren and Josh and Jimmy and Mister Logan?"

"Let's see…the annoying hick kid, the grumpy Mexican guy and his super-grumpy space-ninja boyfriend, the loony blonde chick, radiation-boy…Terry—you'll like Terry, she's nice… "

"Oh, for the Mother's sake," Nate sighs, taking the rolls of colored paper before Hope can drop them. "Don't listen to him, they'll all introduce themselves properly. I'm going to assume by 'radiation-boy' he meant Roberto."

Hope blinks. "Mister DaCosta's going to be there, too? Wow, your team sure had a lot of old people, Nathan."

Wade can't help laughing his ass off.

"Roberto is not 'old,' honey," Nate tells her.

"He is compared to me," she retorts primly. "Laura and Julian and the others are just now grown-ups, so they're not old, but it really seems like everyone else you know is."

"Psst, except for Logan and the Professor, they're all wayyyy younger than Nate," Wade confided in a stage-whisper.

"Wow, really? Does it hurt your feelings to get called 'old,' Nathan? We can stop talking about it if you want."

Nate's just making grumpy faces while he shoves paper and bows and tags onto the top shelf of the hall closet, so Wade sneaks up and grabs his ass.

"Nate's not 'old,' he's 'mature,'" Wade says with a cheerful squeeze.

"Like cheddar?" Hope asks.

"Well, I was going for wine…little bit more romantic."

"What about tea? Tea's better when it's old."

"Mature, princess, mature."

"Right."

.End.