I'm chill with motivation! Gale does this stuff canonly so it's not really a leap, my 'decide' bullet points are just me literally trying to decide which I vibe more as a choice! Whiiiich may come down to some more event detail.

That said, Gale would always be down for friends! Especially cat friendly people interested in research! The question I guess really is if Teddy gets to know him pre or post Depression Tower and maybe what the specific hook is -- like is there a specific thing Teddy is interested in him helping with or is it just nosiness? If just nosiness you could go for the Tower itself being the original source of nosiness, since it's radiating bad vibes and doing bad things to the area, then maybe have Teddy pick up him/the Tower as a project tbh.