Atlas Gym; Tuesday [04/18].

[sword_chocobro]

Even though it had been a little tempting to let himself go a little overboard at the bar last night, Gladio had been good and just kept it to his usual few drinks, because he knew he'd want to be focused and ready to sort of get things back on an even keel again after the weekend. And sort of leaning into an almost (almost) acceptance of his current lot in life by really taking some time to look at the gym with maybe some long term goals in mind and the perspective that he was probably stuck here for a while (at least ten years, if history was anything to go by!), so he might as well make the most of it.

Granted, he wasn't really one who could just sit in an office for an extended period of time, so he was frequently doing a few rounds about the gym to stretch his legs or maybe hit a few reps or laps in between some of the more administrative tasks, which actually worked out pretty great. Once the technicalities started to get to him a little, he could just go punch a bag or hit the treadmill for a while, and it worked as a nice kind of reset.

As long as he didn't let his mind trail too closely to the past weekend, he'd be fine, so the training space was getting a little bit more of a wider breadth than it might have usually had.

Atlas is open!

Comments

[defenderofdesmoines]

Annie -- who had, weirdly enough, not had mysterious alternate-universe children show up this weekend -- actually, finally made an appearance at the gym this morning. An on-screen one and everything!

She'd finally bitten the bullet and bought some maternity wear, so while she wasn't exactly competing with anyone's Athleta and Lululemon fashion shows, ahem, she was at least presentable and cute in pastels and not worried about splitting her pants in a squat or something.

She threw a wave Gladio's way with her free hand -- she also had a truly ridiculously gigantic water bottle -- as she headed for a punching bag. "Morning!"

[sword_chocobro]

And look at that, Gladio was going to look both pleasantly surprised and approving when he spotted her coming in.

"Annie," he nodded, lifted a hand in a wave back. "Morning. Good to see you come in."

On screen especially!

[defenderofdesmoines]

Annie was totally in this gym so often on like...other days! Waving hands, et cetera.

"I got the official word from my doctor that I'm allowed to keep beating stuff up as long as it doesn't beat back," she replied with a grin, tilting her head towards the punching bags. "We're not having any kind of 'sentient punching bag day,' right?"

[sword_chocobro]

"Not today," Gladio grunted, shaking his head, "but now I'm going to be on the lookout for it eventually this month. I'll have to make testing them for that my new top priority when I come in now. Add it to the top of the check-list. With what some of these bags have been put through, I'm sure they're pretty ripe for some revenge."

[defenderofdesmoines]

"Sorry for jinxing it," Annie told him with a wince. "Though at least it's something everyone would already know how to fight, right?"

Unless punching became suddenly ineffective.

[mylandmyrules]

Nell was here in her skirty-pants and ready to go through her forms and then do some weights. SHe smiled at Gladio as she came in. "Good morning!"

[sword_chocobro]

Gladio gave a nod and a faint smile back, feeling glad that at least today, there was nothing going on that didn't seem to make her want to immediately go scampering back through the door again. "Morning, Nell. How's it going?"

[mylandmyrules]

"I'm doing well," Nell said with a smile. "Got my run in and looking forward to the day."

She paused, wondering if she should say anything, then decided to chance it. "Those kids were something else," she said. "Impressive in so many ways."

[sword_chocobro]

Gladio figured, with Nell, there was probably a fifty-fifty chance split pretty evenly between politely ignoring the weekend and asking after it, so at least he was prepared to hold back the faint wince he felt when it went the one way and not the other, and whatever wince was there, he just buried with a wry grunt.

"Something else," he agreed, "is a good way to put it. But they were good, yeah. Definitely their parents' kids, I can tell you that much."

Probably wouldn't want to tell much more than that, but...

[defenderofdesmoines]

"Those are cute," Annie offered, catching sight of Nell's skirty-pants and giving an appreciative nod and smile. She could, for what it was worth, appreciate a need for modesty more than a lot of modern women, and now she was sort of considering whether leggings were the best choice for her moving forward as her body kept (persistently and frustratingly but also amazingly) changing by the week.

[mylandmyrules]

"They're comfy and let me move easily," Nell said with a smile. "Nell Ingram. I run Plant Parenthood."

[defenderofdesmoines]

"Annie Hargreeves," she replied, moving over to offer a hand out to shake. "I thiiiiiink I might have met your evil twin awhile back."

Something like that, anyway. She'd met a very, very different-seeming Nell.

"But man, that's useful -- I keep meaning to bring my poor elephant's ear to visit you," she added. "It's been giving me trouble since we moved a couple weeks ago."

[somethingwithturquoise]

Summer had almost thought about skipping today, since the weekend had been a lot, but then she realized she didn't really have much else to do that morning. So it was a later start for Summer, and she wasn't really sure what she was planning on doing; maybe she would just stick to her weight training and poke at Gladio about how his weekend had gone, but, what was most important was that she did have a yet another addition to her massively growing collection of workout clothes to show off as she breezed in with a "Hiiiiii, Gladio!" on her lips as she bounced over to do some warm ups and stretches.

[sword_chocobro]

You know, in a way, it was almost flattering, the way she seemed to think he could actually differentiate between one pink outfit and the next, because if that was a new outfit, Gladio definitely didn't recognize it as such. But she did get a nod and a lift of a hand in a wave, and a "Weight training today?"

[somethingwithturquoise]

"If you don't mind!" Summer chirped back brightly. "I think I'm really starting to see some results, too, just look at these gains!"

Was mentioning that just an excuse to pull out some cute flexing poses to show off the definition in her arms she'd been noticing these past few weeks? No, actually. Well, yes,mostly, but, legit, Summer kinda loved the little guns she could see on their way to bazookas, so she was kind of just proud of herself, really. The posing was just bonus.

[defenderofdesmoines]

"You look too adorable to sweat," Annie told her with a tsk when she spotted Summer, taking a moment to stretch and walk around a little between whaling on the punching bag. "Like, unfair."

Annie's outfit was also cute, she felt, but maternity chic was a different beast.

[somethingwithturquoise]

"Oh, shut up," Summer countered. "You look too adorable to be pregnant."

The incredulous with TWINS!!! went unspoken.

"Besides," Summer put a little extra arch in her stretch as she lifted her arms and took a glance over her shoulder in an attempt to locate the best way to angle herself in regards to a certain gym owner's rounds about the place, "the sweat is meant to enhance the cuteness."

[defenderofdesmoines]

Twins who were the size of limes this week, apparently! (Annie had also reached the stage of pregnancy where that chart routinely made her sort of hungry. Limes sounded great.)

"Strategic sweating," Annie observed, lifting her brows at that so, so subtle maneuvering. "It works for a certain demographic, for sure."

Gym owners, for example.

"Good weekend?" she prompted, raising her brows with an expectancy that probably signaled that she'd, like, heard radio and all that.

[grenadesandohana]

Steve caught Gladio on the treadmill and grinned. "Gotta admit that I don't see the appeal in running in place for an hour."

[sword_chocobro]

"Yeah, well," Gladio grunted a little, "I figured, if my mind's trying to run off in all sorts of directions, might as well keep my body in place in the meantime, who knows where I'll end up then."

Then he quirked his chin at Steve.

"How's it going, man?"

[grenadesandohana]

"Pretty good," Steve said. "I had a visitor this weekend, so my workout schedule got a little out of whack."

And the visitor messed with his brain, so he needed a longer workout to stabilize. Normal things, right?

[sword_chocobro]

"Yeah," Gladio grunted faintly, maybe kicked up the pace on the treadmill a little. "I was dealing with some of that this weekend, too. Only mine came with extra training, actually."

Finding the new pace easily, he considered Steve for a moment. "You ever dealt with one of those weekends before?"

[defenderofdesmoines]

"Good weekend, Steve?" Annie asked when she caught sight of him, offering out a wave.

It was both kind of weird and kind of nice to be in a position where she had had a completely average weekend, but at least she had a pretty good idea of why they'd gotten skipped this time.

[grenadesandohana]

Steve grinned back. "We had a return houseguest," he said. "She's gotta be from a different dimension because there is no way I'd name a kid Aoife. How are you feeling?"

[defenderofdesmoines]

"I'm doing okay," Annie assured him, a hand self consciously sort of waving in front of her bump for a moment. "Hang on, how'd you say that? You named your kid Eeefa?"

Almost.