_Cold_

"... Jerk c-c-chicken with extra sauce... served on freshly toasted rolls-s-s, m-melted 'jack cheese... C-c-cocoa with a double shot of vanilla vodka... Samosas with fruit chutney strong enough to bring tears to a man's eyes... oh damn... I co-c-could kill for some chutney..."

Sephiroth spared a glance over his shoulder at the man slogging along after him. The wind cut down his collar as he did, cold enough that even he had to admit it. Frigid spangles of frost stung bare skin as they were carried by the wind over the drifts. Zack was by in large immune to their white glacial beauty, unimpressed with the vastness of their little corner of the world. The dark haired man looked like a heavy duty winter jacket had sprouted legs and a shock of 'white man's afro' and taken to moving itself about the ghostly terrain on its own. All Sephiroth could make out if his friend's face was the pair of tinted snow goggles just barely cresting the high collar of the quilted coat. If not for the constant miserable litany he might have made the mistake of thinking the SOLDIER was weathering the cold just fine.

"... mulled wine... fresh baked cookies... curry, spicy succulent curry... rice with little bits of saffron in it... Takoyaki smothered in sauce..."

The southerner's hair was frosted at the tips, catching the snow as it blew by and making him look rather freezer-burned. Zack didn't even notice he'd stopped just kept on muttering and walking, huddled against the wind until he almost plowed right into him. He caught himself just in time, staggering back and almost overbalancing into the snow. "Fuck! don't do that!"

He dug his hands back into the coat's pockets for warmth. "Too f'ing cold for that... too much damn snow."

"It's all in your head you know." Sephiroth smirked, and then fought not to wince as a particularly nasty gust caught him in the face. "You're a SOLDIER, you should be fine for days at this temperature. It can't be worse than negative five or so."

Zack just shivered in his thick coat and goggles, too cold to even come up with a good reply. Ironically, his silent misery almost did the trick. The general sighed. "We'll be back at the township in another hour or two. I'll dispatch a second helicopter to pick up the others, you can soak your cares away in the hot tub. Fair enough?"

"... grand. S-s-sorry I'm not more help."

"You're the one who didn't want me going by myself." Sephiroth snorted. "You could be warm and snug with the team in the cave."

It was hard to read a man's expression when all he had to work with was eyebrows, and those were only exposed half the time, when the wind swept his unruly bangs back against his skull. Still the overly plumped up looking man standing in the snowdrift looked peeved, peeved and cold. Zack's voice emerged from the vague vicinity of his collar, "'S against regulations to let the brass wander off on his own. What if you broke your leg or something?"

"That's hardly likely is it?"

"Might get eaten by a grue or something."

Sephiroth turned back to the dull chore of crunching his way through the top layer of snow as he broke trail up hill. His aide would stop grousing if there was something that required his involvement, but as far as the rest was concerned, he was definitely not suited for his current environment. The minute Zack was left to his own devices, his quiet mantra resumed.

"C-cold, f'ing cold! So cold... warm, think warm thoughts, where was I... oh yeah... stew, thick meaty stew with potatoes and onions and bacon. Fried eggs and sausage, waffles. Sweet sweet waffles. Chocolate chip pancakes. Turtle brownies, ooh ooh pie. Apple crisp. Blueberry c-c-crumble."

"You're making me hungry." Sephiroth sighed. At the crest of the ridge, he looked down into the next valley and was silently relieved to see the familiar roof tops of the village. Parked outside and tethered against the wind stood several transport 'copters very much like the one that had just had the audacity to break down on him in the field. "Can't you talk about something else?"

"You got any b-b-better ideas?"

Eyeing the near vertical slope critically. The general hunkered down against the wind and pulled his friend down to do the same. "Sure. Help me think of a good way to get us from here, to there." He pointed at the bottom of the valley several hundred feet down and about twenty feet to the left.

"Hello." Zack blinked at the sharp drop-off, momentarily too distracted to whine about the cold. "Watch that first step. It's a doozy."

"Indeed."

"We got any rope left?"

Sephiroth didn't even bother to look into his pack, "No. Used it at the last crevasse."

"Damn." The southerner actually pulled his goggles off for the first time all day, squinting a moment against the bright light before getting a better look at what they were up against. "Would be killer on a pair of skis, but I think we're going to have to go down on our butts and hope for the best."

"We'll start an avalanche." Sephiroth grimly forecasted.

Zack only gave him a 'please don't jinx us' look before shifting to get both legs over the edge. "Well, what the hell. I'm already frozen solid, being buried in snow and clobbered by rocks will be good for a laugh."

Gingerly snapping his goggled back into place with movements made awkward by a pair of giant mittens, the SOLDIER gave him a thumbs up. "If I die, you'll know this is a bad idea. Ok?"

His officer’s intention to slide down the hill was sadly less than realistic, Sephiroth fatalistically decided. Zack's body twisted almost immediately, and already in a protective crouch, he proceeded to _roll_ much of the way down the slope, picking up a phenomenal amount of dry powder as he went until it was hard to tell what was man and what was snow in all the tumbling. Two bounces along the considerably flatter and softer packed floor of the valley, and the whole mess came apart with an audible. "Wahoo!" leaving the dark haired SOLDIER a bright colored sprawl below; a veritable one-man-avalanche. Surprisingly, the slope held steady, to tightly packed by the wind to shift with the sudden assault. That was promising at least.

Zack flailed a moment in his heap of snow and then staggered to his feet, shaking himself off like a dog. Looking back up at the erratic path he had carved down the hill, he waved exuberantly up at his general. "That was AWESOME! I want to do that again!"

"I thought you were cold!" He smiled briefly and thought better as his teeth felt frozen. Certainly his friend seemed far more lively now than he had been since the initial post-emergency landing rush. Zack and snow was usually a miserable combination. Zack and snow sports however seemed to work just fine.

"I'm fucking freezing and I have snow down my pants!!" Came the happy reply. "But damn that was insanely _fun_! and Hey! I can see the village! Come on, come on! You have to try it!"

The man had a point. As ludicrous as it had looked, sliding was the fastest way down. Sephiroth sat on the edge and contemplated how best to go about it. Obviously Zack's strategy had worked, but he had no intention of deliberately going down head over heels if he could help it. Studying the slope he saw a second possibility. It still might not work, and he'd end up looking the fool, or at worse, breaking an ankle, but at least only Zack would be there to witness it either way, and it wasn't that far to the village.

Using a portion of his reportedly 'awesome' strength, Sephiroth jumped off the ledge, not even trying to stick to the slope for the first and steepest section. Unlike Zack's more appropriate apparel, his long coat did have one rather interesting benefit. He caught the tail of it mid air and promptly curled into the tightest huddle he could manage, catching his heels on the inside lining. The leather snapped taunt under his foot and up around his back, providing a near frictionless surface with which he hit the soft powder halfway down the slope. His luck held as the hard packed powder held under the impact, sending him skidding downwards at terrific speed rather than sinking him right down to the bedrock.

Steering wasn't exactly a fine science, more of a tentative leaning left and right and praying he wouldn't lose his balance. He spun once on the way down, but still managed to blow well past where Zack had come to rest, hearing the SOLDIER cheering him on as he pondered how best to slow down before ending face down in a snowdrift. In the end he was obliged to simply let go of the leather, and half somersaulted, half crashed through the snow and back to his feet again. Dizzy he staggered around to see how far he had come, and could only blink the snow out of his eyes as a distant Zack hopped through the deep drifts to reach him, waving and hooting like a little kid.

Sephiroth blew out a huff of breath, still a little surprised at his success. If he tried hard enough, he might even convince himself that he had known it would work all along before the southerner finally caught up with him. Shaking the snow out of his sleeves and hair, he had to admit, the adrenaline rush was very warming.

*****