OFF THE DEEP END

By Nik Wimer

Somewhere over the Pacific Ocean.

“Wade? How was Japan?”

“Weasel, when I get back, we’re going to have a long talk about that internet thing. No Godzillas, only a couple schoolgirl ninjas, and I’m almost sure the one person I saw in a sailor outfit was a man.”

“Come on, Wade, you can’t expect everything you read online to…” The voice on the other end of the phone hesitated as realization dawned on Weasel. “Wait, Wade, what do you mean by ‘when I get back’ ?”

“I mean, when I get back home, we’re going to sit down for a long chat.”

“You mean you’re not back in the States yet?”

“No, not yet.” Now it was Deadpool’s turn to pause. “Listen, Weasel, the stewardess is here and she wants to know what I’d like as my meal, and I’m having a hard time choosing between the fish and chicken, so we need to make this quick.”

“You’re on a commercial flight? Really! Are you’re using an airphone?” Weasel’s voice rose an octave with each sentence. “Even YOU can’t be that careless! And how did you get on a plane anyway?”

“Breathe, Weasel, just breathe,” Deadpool said. “It’s fine. He’s no one who’ll be missed and the image inducer did such a nice job with this one, I have to say, I think I’m turning Japanese.”

“You really think so?”

“I do, but that’s not important right now. Right now, I need you to focus for me, Weasel. Can you do that?”

Weasel took a deep breath. “But, Wade, an airphone? Really?”

“I figured you had scramblers and encryptions and backdoors and all sorts of that stuff to keep from being traced. And he won’t be needing this credit card anytime soon, so quit worrying, and tell me if you got my e-mail.”

A pause, and then: “Yeah, I read it.”

“And were you able to trace that ID?”

A pause, and then: “Yeah, simple enough. I sent the information to you this morning.”

Deadpool’s laugh earned him a few dirty glances from the passengers seated in his row. “Fist-bump, buddy. You always come through.”

“Wait, Wade, did you kill a man just so you could fly first-class?”

“Sorry, buddy, gotta go.” More dirty looks came his way as Deadpool climbed across the two people separating his seat from the aisle.

“Stewardess, cancel my fish! This is my stop.”

And, with that, he was gone.

Somewhere else.

On the eighth ring, the man was annoyed just enough to MUTE the television and answer his telephone. “Gladiator.”

“Yes, I always answer my phone with my nom de guerre.” The Gladiator replied. “Of course this is a private, secure line.”

“No, I don’t think it’s a ridiculous way to answer a phone.” The Gladiator blinked. “Yes, I realize that whoever is calling is expecting to reach… OK, enough! Is there something I can help you with?”

A smile spread slowly across the Gladiator’s face. “Work is work,” he said. “Who’s the mark?”

When he heard the answer, the Gladiator’s smile disappeared.

“No, no, no, no, no! Absolutely not! Deadpool’s crazy. I’m not. Find yourself another sucker!” With that, he hung up the phone.

Downers Grove, Illinois.

Shelley Kaine had waited thirty-seven years to meet his hero. Over the years, he had daydreamed about what such a meeting would be like, had often fallen asleep thinking about what he would say if they ever met. And in all that time, he had never imagined anything like this: Deadpool, the world-famous “Merc-With-A-Mouth”, rifling through drawers in his bedroom!

“You’re not at all what I was expecting,” Shelley said, watching the mercenary rummage through his filing cabinet. “I thought you’d be taller.”

Pausing his search, Deadpool thumbed through several sheets of paper attached to a clipboard. “You are ‘SK01’, real name Shelley Kaine, webmaster of Off the Deep-End, ‘the world’s premiere Deadpool fanfiction site’.” It was a statement, not a question.

“And I’m here to…” He trailed off. A little brown dog had wandered into the room and was cautiously examining the mercenary’s left boot.

“Mom!” Shelley called. “Can you call…”

If he says it, I am going to shoot him. No questions asked, no quarter given, just BANG one shot, between the eyes.

“…Dogpool? She’s bothering my friend.”

A sharp whistle from the hallway caught the dog’s attention and, after a final indignant sniff, she turned and trotted out of the room.

“You named your dog ‘Dogpool’?”

Shelley blinked. “I’m a huge fan. And she’s really a good dog, just curious is all. I don’t get many visitors — none, really — and..”

Why haven’t I shot him yet? Am I going soft in my old age?

No, those blue pills took care of that.

Well what is it then?

He’s not exactly what you were expecting, is he?

He lives with his mother, that Captain America t-shirt is a “little” snug on him, and he has a Deadpool comforter on his bed…

Don’t remember signing off on THAT; remind me to check with legal when I get the chance.

… so there’s that. But where’s the Cheetos-stained fingers? The empty cans of Mt Dew? This guy almost seems normal. Sad, yes, but…

“OhmyGod!OhmyGod!OhmyGod!” Shelley cried, dragging Deadpool’s mind back to the present. “You’re doing it, aren’t you? You’re having an internal monologue! OhmyGod!OhmyGod! That is so awesome!”

Normal, huh?

Shut up.

So, what now?

We put a stop to this nonsense.

Agreed.

How can you say… Wait, what? You agree with me?

Completely.

Oh. Well. Carry on then.

Shelley clapped his hands together in joy. “You’re doing it again!”

“Enough!” Deadpool barked. “It’s time you and I had a talk.”

Sitting at a bar.

“It’s for you,” the bartender said, sliding the bar’s telephone to the man.

The Constrictor arched an eyebrow.

The bartender shrugged. “I don’t get involved.” He turned his attention back to the section of counter he’d been wiping down.

“Constrictor here.”

He looked up, confused. “What? How am I supposed to know if there is a manual for answering the phone?”

“Look, I don’t know about taking any outside contracts…”

The Constrictor laughed so loud the bartender looked up from his cleaning. “Deadpool! You’re kidding, right? I want nothing else to do with that psycho.”

The Constrictor thought for a moment. “I take that back,” he said. “If you see him, tell him he owes me a half month’s rent.” With that, he hung up the phone.

Back in Shelley’s room.

“’Deadpool was furious. Livid. Angrier than he had ever been. Betrayed by his partners, he’d spent the last several hours fighting his way free of the death traps they’d set against him. Now, only one more locked door stood between him and vengeance, and one more locked door meant nothing to the Merc-With-A-Mouth.

“’Beneath his mask, Deadpool managed a smile. He eased the twin, chrome-plated Smith & Wesson 500 .50cal Magnums from their holsters, and rechecked the 440-grain hard-cast lead, gas checked, flat point ammo.

“’With a primal scream, Deadpool kicked the door open and burst into the room. His revenge would be bloody. Brutal. Final.’”

Deadpool held the pages from which he’d just read beneath Shelley’s nose. “And?”

Shelley blinked in confusion. “Didn’t you like it?”

He can’t be serious, can he?

Not everyone is as jaded as you.

Experienced.

Whatever.

Maybe try a different tactic? You catch more flies with honey you know.

You can catch even more flies with manure. And what’s so great about catching flies? Do I look like Spider-Man to you?

A little. But my point is, intimidating him isn’t working, maybe you should try being nice.

Seeing the excitement on Shelley’s face, Deadpool glared at him. “Not. A. Word.”

“But you were doing it again!”

“OK, listen, this clearly isn’t going to work,” Deadpool said. He slid the chair from Shelley’s desk closer to the bed and made himself comfortable. “Let’s try something else.”

“But you were doing it again.”

Deadpool ignored him. “I like to call this a ‘critique sandwich’. I tell you somewhere I think you can improve, followed by something I think you did well, and then finish with another critique.”

Shelley smiled. “I’ve heard of that!” His smile disappeared. “But I thought it was called a ‘compliment sandwich’?”

“You’re lucky I’m not giving you a knuckle-sandwich.”

Been spending too much time around the old lady?

Shut up!

“Anyway,” Deadpool continued, “what I’m trying to say is that, unless it is important to the story – and I can’t see how it could possibly be important – you don’t need to be so specific when it comes to weapons. You can get away with just saying ‘pistol’, or ‘machine-gun’, or even ‘gun’ or whatever, and let your readers imagine whatever kind of firearm they want. What you’re doing takes the reader out of the story. Even I don’t know that much about guns.”

Shelley opened his mouth to speak, but Deadpool held up a hand to forestall any comments. “And another thing,” he said, “I’ve always pictured my internal monologues asyellow. Not in italics, not in brackets, not underlined, just yellow. None of you get that right.”

“You said you’d tell me something I did right,” Shelley complained. “That sounded like two critiques. And yellow text is hard to read, that’s why no one uses it.”

“Something good, something good,” Deadpool muttered, flipping through the stapled pages. He stopped when he came to a page with several highlighted lines of text. “OK, here we go.”

“’Deadpool slid silently through the backdoor of the Russian Consulate.’”

You said “backdoor”.

Two minutes! Can you just shut up for two minutes so I can finish this? Thank you!

Backdoor.

“’Deadpool slid silently through the backdoor of the Russian Consulate,’” he repeated. “’He scanned the empty stairwell and smiled at the Russians’ inefficiency. Two man teams patrolled the building at fifteen-minute intervals and the group assigned this quadrant of the Embassy was already eleven minutes late.

“’Confident he was in little danger of being discovered, Deadpool tapped the face of the image inducer he wore on his belt buckle.“Show’s over, Synergy,” he said, and immediately the inconspicuous Russian janitor disappeared and was replaced by Deadpool, the world-famous Merc-With-A-Mouth.’”

“I’ve been to Russia, and I don’t recall there being a backdoor…”

Nothing?

You said I couldn’t.

I never expected you to listen. That’s very mature of you.

You’re not the only one who can be serious you know.

No, no, I didn’t mean anything by it, I just didn’t expect you to take the highroad.

You were expecting me to slip quietly in to the backdoor?

And he’s back.

“…into their Embassy,” Deadpool said. “But I dig the obscure cartoon reference, so that’s a win.”

Outside Chicago, Illinois.

Phillip Grayfield reached up and tapped the side of the earpiece with his finger. “Grayfield here.”

He listened briefly. “Yes, Sir, I am always interested in a paying job.”

He paused, rummaged around in a desk drawer, and withdrew a small notebook and pen.
“Subject’s name?”

He scribbled a few lines on the page. “Deadpool? No, can’t say I know much about him. Will that be a problem?”

He laughed. “No, Sir, as you say, it probably is better that way.”

He tossed the notebook and pen onto the desk. A helmet was sitting not far from where they landed, and he reached over and picked it up. He stared at it for a moment, then ran his fingers lovingly across the shiny black surface. Made of a unique blend of fiberglass and plastic alloys, the helmet – and matching battlesuit – were virtually indestructible. Once, wearing the outfit had made him feel invincible. He was on top of his game, a hero – maybe not to millions, but he certainly had his fans – and it had felt good.

There was a void on the front of the helmet where a small shield-shaped decal had been removed, and his fingers paused there. Now, profit was the motivation and wearing the suit just made him feel hollow. “Yes, Sir, I understand. You can count on me. I’m a pro.”

Still, a man had to eat, and this phone call ensured that he would be eating well for a long time to come.

Shelley’s room.

Shelley wiped grape jelly from his lips. Ten minutes ago, his mother had appeared with two glasses of milk and a tray of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. “I knew you’d come around,” he said.

Deadpool wiped the milk mustache from his lips and settled his mask back over his face. “Let’s not start picking out wedding china just yet.” He tossed the stack of stapled pages onto the bed. “Read that.”

“’Deadpool crouched over the prone form of Omega Red. Their fight had been intense, but Deadpool had gotten the upper hand and now the Russian assassin was at his mercy. “Can death be sleep, when life is but a dream, and scenes of bliss pass as a phantom by?” Deadpool began. He had unsheathed his katana and had the edge pressed tightly against Omega Red’s throat. “The transient pleasures as a vision seem, and yet we think the greatest pain’s to die?’”

Deadpool sighed, exasperated. “To yourself, numb-nuts!”

Shelley studied the page intently, fearful of once more drawing Deadpool’s ire. He read the highlighted text and then, to be sure he hadn’t missed anything, re-read it. “Safe to assume this wasn’t something I did right?”

Deadpool cocked an eyebrow in surprise. “You’re catching on. I mean, what was that? Poetry? Do I look like the kind of guy who goes around quoting poetry? Limericks, maybe…”

There once was a man from Nantucket…

Shut up!

“…but, Keats? Really? What were you thinking?”

He said with a grin, as he wiped off his chin…

Seriously, I’m working here. Shut up!

“I just thought it would add a layer to your personality,” Shelley explained. “Like Samuel Jackson’s character in Pulp Fiction.”

Deadpool held up a hand for silence. “You don’t need to tell me about no Pulp Fiction. I know me some Pulp Fiction. I went through a Pulp Fiction phase…”

Complete with Afro.

That was not an Afro. That was a perm that went bad.

“…and I don’t need any more depth to my character. Besides, I’m more of a spontaneous kinda guy. Memorized speeches just aren’t my style.”

Deadpool checked his watch and sighed. “This has been a blast and all, but I have places to be and people to kill, so I think we should wrap this up.”

He stood, stretched his back, and shook his left leg, which had fallen asleep. “Let me bottom-line things for you: stop writing about me! Find something else to do with your time. Make some new… er, make some friends. Focus your energy on your job…”

Shelley looked at his hands. “I’m on disability. I can’t work; I have carpal tunnel syndrome.”

“I bought that album too.”

That one’s inside, even for me.

Shelley looked at Deadpool and blinked in confusion. He shook his head and continued, “But writing about you just makes me feel connected to you in some small way.”

“Why me?” Deadpool asked. “Why not write Squirrel Girl slash fiction like everyone else?”

“I don’t know,” Shelley shrugged. “I guess… I guess something about you just resonates with me. You’re so cool. You don’t take crap from anybody. You have cool adventures. You just remind me of me.”

YIKES!

“Maybe I should say you remind me of what I want my life to be like,” Shelley corrected.

Deadpool shook his head. “It’s not easy being Deadpool, you know. I may seem like your typical devil-may-care, wisecracking hero, but I’m not Spider-Man with a gun. My life isn’t what it’s cracked up to be. It’s lonely. It’s dangerous and no sane person should ever want to be me. Which is why it works for me.”

The feeling in his leg not yet returned, Deadpool limped to the doorway. “My advice to you: find a new hobby and find it quickly!”

“Deadpool? Deadpool!”

He stopped at the door, looked back. “Yeah?”

“You need any help?”

Deadpool shook his head.

“I just want you to know I think… I think you’re the best ever.”

“Yeah, sure.”

That seem familiar to you?

Now that you mention it, I am thirsty…

“Will I ever see you again?” Shelley asked.

“You better hope not.”

And, with that, he was gone.

The DeadHut. San Francisco, CA.

“Oh Lucy! I’m home!”

Deadpool set down the bags of groceries he’d been carrying, then turned and closed and locked the front door. “I got everything on your list, Al, even that stuff from Aisle Seventeen. What a lady of your advanced age needs with anything from Aisle Seventeen is beyond me, but I bought them anyway, so the joke’s on you. Good gag, though.

“But not as good as the one you played on me in Tokyo. That one was a classic. I hate to admit it, but I was impressed. Not that it’s going to get you out of what I have planned for you, but I’ll give credit where credit is due. Things like that make me wonder if maybe your stories aren’t total bull-crap.

“I mean, I can’t believe that stuff about Captain America. That stick is jammed way too far up his ass for any of that to be true, but I admit, you got some skills lady.” He stopped. By now, Al had usually interrupted his tirades, but the house remained strangely quiet.

Deadpool drew the pistols from the holsters at his hips. “Old woman, if you’ve escaped again…”

“I’m in the kitchen,” Blind Al called. “And Wade, there’s a gentleman caller here to see you.”