Owner	Pose
Laura Kinney	X-23, also known as Laura Kinney, might not be the most in the loop about mutant goings on. She's always tended to be a lone wolf operator rather than working in a close knit team like the X-men. But when it comes to her sister Gabby? Well she makes it her business to remain informed. Still X-Force is a pretty closely guarded secret. So to fully comprehend the details... well she needs to find a source. Ideally a source she can convince one way or another into talking... Which is why Tabitha Smith received a slightly cryptic invite to one of Laura's many out of the way safehouses. In what looks like a run down office park, down into the basement, and behind a thick steel door is... actually just a pretty comfortable looking apartment. If you ignore how many of the walls have military grade weapons on them...
Tabitha Smith	Those was some big ass heavy steel on that door. Not that Tabby was sizing up how much boom it could take to blast it off it's hingers or just blast the hinges off. She's not that crappy a house guest. She even brought calzones and garlic bread. She was hungry and there's a pizza place near by that don't do a girl dirty on the orders. The blonde juggling the bag of hot food in each hand and kicking on the steel before she's finally let in. she was probably on security cameras the moment she got in a peep of the building let alone the rest of the way in. Red sneakers, green camo printed denim jeans and a red tank top cropped to show off her midriff with a matching yellow spiky leather belt and choker going with some yellow lensed glasses in an oval wire rimmed frame. "Hey Laura, didn't know what you liked so I just got a calzone with mostly ham and peppeoni. They're great but damn if they didn't just fold a Chicago deep dish in half. Got enough napkins you'd think I swiped a roll of paper towels!"
Laura Kinney	A careful assessment of the door would suggest blowing it open would likely collapse the roof in. The hinges make a better target but anyone trying to get in that way would take longer and find themselves storming an empty safehouse. Probably with an active self destruct system. Laura takes home security very seriously. "I don't really mind what I eat providing it isn't bland," she replies. Casually tucked up on a couch that's angled at a TV displaying CCTV views of the area round the building. "And I always keep a stock of my own hot sauce to pep things up." She's sniffing the air as soon as the door is open. Weapons, emotional state, clues about where people have recently been and who they've been to those places with. The nose knows it all. "I thought I'd check in and see how you've been doing?"
Tabitha Smith	Tabby's spent enough time living in a mansion, then an apartment with people with enhanced senses. So while Tabby might have gotten a little more than paranoid about her smell for the sake of those noses. It's not long before eventually said scents of her travels mark her as much as she marks them. The calzone is handed over and Tabby heads for the nearest comfy looking enough seat to park her rump. The foil wrapping crackling with a tiny hint of her power to keep her food hot. The benefits of being a pyrokinetic of sorts. She can eat molten cheese fine. "Life of the X-Man, between Astral Shenanigans and the Professor being wrecked dealing with it, Clones of Deadpool and Cable. Training, oh god so much training. It's amazing how much terror can be packed into such a small amount of time between stints of boredom." Tabby states and works the calzone to take a bite and not get any cheese and tomato sauce on her or the furniture. It's a careful endeavor. And Laura seems like the sort to really value not making a mess. The brunette is scary enough sometimes.
Laura Kinney	The couch Laura is on isn't alone. Despite there being no evidence of another soul having been down here since whatever the office building was originally used for. Perhaps she just likes to mix up which chair she uses? Thankfully no expense has been spared and they're all quite comfortable. Whatever X-23 does for money it pays well. (Pity Tim when he sees the Outsiders credit card bills!) "Who on Earth would try clone Deadpool?" she wonders, frowning. "There's barely any controlling him when he's on your side." She gets up off her couch with a sleek almost feline grace and fetches a few bottles from the kitchen. A pair of imported beers and a much smaller bottle of the hot sauce she makes. Complete with very alarming looking 'warning poison' label on the bottle. "I'm always being told I train too much and that I should tone it down," she admits with a frown. Not seeming convinced by the 'advice'. "But you don't learn to cut bullets out of the air without a lot of hard work." She drops back into her seat and offers up the beer. "Really the only thing which scares me is Gabby getting involved in situations which will leave her like me."
Tabitha Smith	The calzone is carefully and slowly eaten. It's not small considering she did liken them to a pair of deep dish pizzas folded in half. "Ehh, some nut job. Could have been the Cable looking dude. It was in a cloning lab so could have been anything or anyone." Tabby explains between bites, making sure she actually swallows before going on. "I just came on because I could level the place big and fast and I suppose painlessly for anyone inside. Hopefully Gabby handled that okay. But clones are kind of a touch subject for all of us. Last time I blew up a clone lab it was all duplicates of Jimmy's big brother John mass produced as shock troopers. For Jimmy it was kind of a desecration. But there are other points of view." she states well aware of the nuance in the situation. "Gabby is, I wanna say a good kid but she's nearly eighteen or close enough physically. Some how that girl is handling all this crap way better than I ever did at her age. Just hopefully she doesn't have to watch a genocide live in action, but you get the idea."
Laura Kinney	Laura Kinney scowls. "I am usually aware of cloning labs before they get that out of hand," she mutters, mostly to herself. "I must be slipping in my intel gathering." She adds an extra dash of hotsauce to her food, then pops the cap off the beer with a casual flick of her thumb. "Clones are just like any other people. Unless they've been made into something less." She shakes her head and then knocks back a mouthful of the beer. The Logan DNA kicking in. "She's tough and highly skilled. You can trust her with your life. But if things start to get too mentally damaging let me know. I can always stand in for her if people need... you know. Taking care of." Or as they know it most places murdering.
Tabitha Smith	"Well if it makes you better. Maybe they've been upping their game. This was a guy that has Jean levels of power. Hell, Power Girl was being messed with by this guy. I mean. Yeah watching a Kryptonian get shown she's not all that and a bag of chips is fun but pick your time." Tabby states with a nod of her head. "Think the consensus was probably maybe mindless weapons. No autonomy. But I know I killed someone. A lot. So I'm adjusting to it. I hate the feeling. It needed doing. But it beats having other kids who should get to be kids see the amount of death we have. Shouldn't really be Gabby but I dunno why she jumped on the X-Force gig. Same reason as me maybe." Tabby states and actually does look and sound like it's been kicking her mental ass a lot. Even after chats with Storm about it. She doesn't stop eating though. She's still hungry after all.
Laura Kinney	From the scowl that makes Laura feel anything but better. "I generally try stop those projects before they have a working prototype," she notes with a shrug. "Let alone an army of Kryptonian level killers. I should not have allowed myself to be detained by N.O.W.H.E.R.E for so long. Clearly it gave groups time to get upto /mischief/." "She jumped on it because she might be young, but like me she was trained to fight from birth. Thinking of her like a student is like me thinking of you as a box of firecrackers." She slides the hot sauce over after applying plenty. Just in case Tabby is feeling adventurous and/or has poor judgement.
Tabitha Smith	Tabby was not trained by birth to be an assassin. Thief tops and that was only a couple years between running away from home and joining Xavier's. So her judgement might not be sound. "I'm saying the guy running it is Krypto level. Pretty certain if the the clones being grown were I wouldn't have been able to incinerate so many." she states and tries squirting some of that hot sauce onto and into the calzone. The peperoni might have a little kick but when she tries some of the hot sauce with it. The girl's eyes go wide. She could walk though an ingerno and be fine. But Capsaicin? Nope that she is not immune to. "I can feel flames in my head!" she states with her mouth agape. It was only a little and tears can be seen streaming down her cheeks and the world is thankful Tabby buys waterproof and expensive makeup. "No one's perfect Laura. Well your skills as a saucier are but this is out of our league stuff. But you go after these guys solo. I don't want to even think about how bad that can go. These aren't just cashed up corporate douchenozzles. You got some of that timey-wimey future tech thrown in along side knock offs of two of maybe the deadliest people in the planet. I say maybe on Wade but can you imagine what he can do with zero fucks to give? I don't even know if I could kill normal Wade and I've left people reduced to those creeepy scorch mark shadows you see after the nukes on Hiroshima." she warns. She really does care about Laura's well being as much as the woman's younger sister.
Laura Kinney	Laura makes hot hot sauce. It's probably a lot more like being pepper sprayed than applying a condiment. Still she seems to be eating it just fine. Not even breaking a sweat. "You'll want to wash your hands before touching your face," she notes helpfully. "N.O.W.H.E.R.E came from the future too. They couldn't contain me. I rampaged throughout their base blowing things up with their own C4." She flashes a brief smile. Assuming Tabitha will approve of the explosion side. "I could take Wade out. The trick is to cut off his hands, then bury him alive in concrete. Once you've done that you dump the block into a site which stores radioactive waste." She has plans to kill pretty much /everyone/. Although to be fair that's also how she'd kill most of her relatives. Drown in concrete and leave somewhere people won't find them for a thousand years or so. Simple.
Tabitha Smith	"C4? I'm amazed you held back so much and didn't bust out their stores of Semtex." Tabby does actually approve of Laura's method. Tabby does actually seat and her use of the hotsauce is minimal enough but still effective. None on her hands. Clearly not her first rodeo. "Not sure if that'll actually do it. But maybe we can test it. We can ask Wade Classic what he thinks. But I have a sneaking suspician it's gonna take leaving a blast shadow and maybe even melting down the stone or metal behind the knock off. Cable-Guy is probably going to take sometrhing sneaky. I've got a Magneto Bucket. When the Astral thing going on started the excess psychic energy flipped an unknown telepathy switch. I snagged a bucket for myself to block all the incoming and outgoing psionics and TP brain traffic. I grab a a few more cause really, we got like a bunch of them. Use them to sneak up. Plop one on the dude's head no mind whammy. Then cut off the head." she states with a little bit of thought. "Or failing that, we have Blink use a portal to cut him ventrally in half."
Laura Kinney	"They didn't have any," Laura points out. "We use what we have available to us though." She listens to all the talk about the villains and shrugs. "That's for assassinating a healing factor mutant. Not for taking them out in a pitched battle. If you're going to use a portal though then dunk the remains into a volcano. Molten rock should deal with the problem." She downs the beer like it's water. Which to be fair it might as well be. And then throws the bottle over her shoulder where it lands, perfectly accurately, in the trash. If she were taller she'd have made a world class basketball player.
Tabitha Smith	Tabby finally adjusts to the hot sauce, or at least the effects finally fade and just leave her sweaty so she avoids adding more though she does give it a second thought to try again. "That stuff might actually work instead of the molten Lava. But I can outdo a volcano. And I don't care if Amara ever hears me say that." she states and grins. "For Fake Wade just keep cooking till there's not even ash. For Fake Cable. Take away his psionics. Then cut him in half destryoing the brain. Then burn till nothing is left." she ponders and hmmms. The throw of the beer in the trash gets a grin. "Almost as good a throw as me." The blonde boasts with a playful tone of voice. There was a time when Tabby had to rely on throwing physics to get her explosive point across and a missed throw could be a big problem.
Laura Kinney	"The secret is to add layers of different heat," Laura says sagely. "Most people find it takes a few bottles before they really acclimatise. And even then it can still cause stomach issues. Not to mention the after effects..." Honestly it's really not intended for consumption by anyone without a healing factor. "Knives, shuriken, grenades. You name it I can probably kill someone by throwing it. I once killed a mobsters bodyguard by throwing a plate into his throat. Crushed his windpipe." Knowing Laura it's not an idle boast. "Your other option is find who is controlling them. Kill them and the puppets stop being a threat. You don't generally make that sort of weapon without safeguards for if it turns against you."
Tabitha Smith	"I'm aware of the after effects. I like spicy stuff. It's the expected cost." Tabby states and pinches her nose. If it stinks for her. Poor, poor Laura and her nose. The mention of killing someone with a dinner plate gets a simple "Eww! Should have bowled him over." she suggests because at this point making jokes about murder after effectivfely finishing a massacre might be one of the few ways she's keeping herself from breaking down. Tabby is clearly not used to deliberately causing death and there's probably enough subttle hints under the allegedly brave face. "If there's a puppet master for those two. You'd be allowed to crap those pants Laura.: she states and shudders visibly at how scary an idea that is for Tabitha. At least any tears she can pass off as the hot sauce now.
Laura Kinney	If Tabitha thinks that smells bad... Well she doesn't live in Gotham most of the time. Laura has had to get used to bad smells in a way she never thought possible. The hot sauce really just takes the edge off. Burn a few receptors for a while. They heal. But that's the price you pay for being nearly unkillable. "I was raised in such a way that I am pretty much incapable of feeling fear," she points out. Leaving out that she also barely feels anything else. "And just because someone is running the show doesn't make them more deadly then their puppets. If they were really that strong why bother make living weapons? No they'll be calculating and smart but probably not as physically deadly."
Tabitha Smith	Tabby's a New York Street kid. If you've smelled the Hudson in summer it doesn't matter if your in New York or New Jersey. At least neither woman lives in Detroit. Or Marty Smith's trailer. Still, Tabby clearly liked the sauce and is willing and aware of the peril she's subjected herself to. "You have a sister. You have family, you have friends you don't want to see hurt Laura. You feel fear. You just control it. Like a Vulcan. Just with way, way nicer hair." Tabby points out with a grin. "But it's all like academic and stuff. Solve the problem in front of you. Find out if there's another one after. There always is. Only question is if you're climbing a ladder or jumping to another." Tabby adds with a sage like nod of her head. "I'm just jumping on half way up at the moment and spitballing things that may or may not happen."
Laura Kinney	"Vulcan? Like the gatling-style rotary cannon?" Laura asks, blankly. Pop culture not her strong point. "I also have three sisters and a brother last I checked. Two clones, one French demon hunter and Jimmy. Probably a bunch more out there. Logan is a busy man." "As for problems. Deal with them like the Gordian knot." A beats pause. "Except I suppose you'd use explosions instead of a sword."
Tabitha Smith	When the reference flys over Laura's head Tabitha rolls her eyes. "Vulcan, fictional alien race from an Eye Pee known as Star Trek. Characterized by like pointy ears, green blood due to copper instead of iron. Tactile Telepaths, and adherence to logic over emotions to the point it's a religion. The common in universe beleive is they feel no emotions but they just staunchly control them." Tabby points out with a grin as she goes into kind of a teacher mode. She barely graduated highschool at twenty, let alone passed a degree. "You know, soaking up more pop culture should really have been something your handlers should have taught. Makes you a better infiltrator to better fit into an environment." she states and grins. "All part of the social engineering field." she points out. She was a thief in her youth after alll.
Laura Kinney	Laura Kinney frowns. "I think some of my associates in Gotham dress up as them." Well maybe Tim? Or Phoebe? They seem to do a lot of that space elves stuff. "Not on a day to day basis. Just for special events." She shakes her head. "As for infiltration you don't need pop culture. No-one at a fancy party is asking you about TV or movies. You just dress sexy and pretend to be an escort. Then laugh and smile at everything your mark says."
Tabitha Smith	Tabby looks aghast. Not at the idea of the Outsiders being nerds. Tabby edges on it herself and well. Anyone that's spent time at Xavier's knows on some level all the X-Men are huge nerds. "You did not just say that? Have you ever had to do long term infiltration, undercover work?" Of course Laura has. "It's like Spycraft. Looking like an escort or just being hot does not always get you in the door let alone the bedroom." Tabby offers up sage like knowledge. "Not every party is fancy. It's part of walking the walk and talking the talk. You learn the lingo and the context you can have a much easier time getting information. And don't even think about torture as a tactic." The blonde seems pretty adamant in her opinions. "You learn what folks get into enough you can keep going back to the well. Shear a sheep all it's life. But you can only skin it once."
Laura Kinney	"The sort of people who could afford me generally sent me to kill the rich and powerful," Laura explains. "Few of which were very big on Star Wars." That's basically the same as Trek right? "And few of my missions were long term. Time is money. More cost effective for me to just slaughter everyone and get the Facility paid." She scowls just thinking about them. "As for torture. It depends how you do it. I can often smell when someone is trying to deceive me. Couple that with the right drugs and some motivational pain... Plus it helps if you have some truth serum. Never totally reliable but it can work wonders if used correctly." "These days I pay informants. Take a villains wealth, use it as a slush fund for my black ops work."
Tabitha Smith	Tabitha brings her hands to her face. Double palming it. "You get the idea right? You're about as much an assassin now as I am a thief. We do the work but we do more than that. Black Ops is more than just everyone dead. Sometimes it's just getting information without killing or hurting and maiming. Tabby at least isn't scowling and trying to reassure Laura. "We kill, but we can do things without killing if we can. There's methods to the madness. Discounting them can do you a diservice." she states and finishes the last bite of her calzone after it had gone luke warm and the cheese melted but not molted. "And pop culture knowledge is totally contextual. High class affairs might need high class culture, classical stuff, art, literature. Even Escorts learn a little of where they might end up working. Helps land the whales." Tabby points out as she finbally picks herself up off the seat. "Thanks though for inviting me over. The sauce was pretty badass hot. Should head home before I destroy something with my ass." she states actually being appreciative before she moves to make herself an exit. She'll probably need to be let out. "Learning will make you look cooler in Gabby's eyes too I bet! I can teach that at least!" she offers with a grin.
Laura Kinney	"If anyone puts my friend or family in danger," Laura starts, voice remaining low. "You can be assured I'm still more than capable of carrying out the task." Still no need to spoil an enjoyable social gathering with vague threats about how even X-Force won't be safe if they get Gabby hurt. Anyone who knows her can probably guess what'll happen. "I'll see you out. Feel free to keep the bottle of hot sauce. I make plenty." And yes, security is quite excessive. Best to have a professional lead you out rather than risk being buried alive!