*A Little Water Never Hurt Anybody…*
-ff7 Zack bit

It was an all out sprint on the part of the men to get the equipment covered in time. Sephiroth hadn’t believed it at first, when one after another his aide and then the other jungle trained men came up to him under clear cloudless skies to tell him that it was finally going to rain /today/ and that they’d have to pull the soldiers off their usual routine if they didn’t want their camp washed out by sunset. Watching the clouds roll in, darker and darker as they piled over the horizon, fat drops just visible as the front moved over the mountains, the general had to acknowledge that their weather sense was beyond reproach. The sound of the rain as it hit the canopy of trees a mile off was an audible rush. It only got louder as the storm came on, until finally it was a roar, water poring down without limit sheeting off of dusty tents and make-shift tarps, soaking the men still sprinting back and forth with the last of their duties.

He looked down, able to count in seconds the time it took for the dusty road to turn into a muddy river. Luckily their make shift drainage ditches seemed to be doing the trick. Someone was jogging towards him, details lost amidst the wall of water. It was a good bet that they couldn’t see him either because if they had they wouldn’t have been so careless as to start peeling off their already soaked uniform shirt and boots in the middle of the camp and do an impromptu rain-dance. Scooping to retrieve forlorn gear, the man continued to pick his way across the slick mud, until finally within shouting distance, he was recognizable.

“… Why General… I didn’t see you there…”

“I didn’t think you had.”

Water dripping off his nose and chin, Zack’s grin was still bright despite the nighttime darkness of the storm. His hair was almost plastered to his skull with it, a few spikes stubbornly fighting back, sticking out sideways rather like the palm trees around the camp, heavy and dripping with the force of the rain. Soggy shirt bunched in one hand and boots dripping in the other, the SOLDIER stood barefoot in the mud like a schoolboy, without a care in the world.

“Monsoon’s here.” The man stated the obvious.

Watching the raindrops spatter across bare shoulders and well-muscled chest was definitely not an option no matter how easy it was. The general frowned and focused on the camp for a minute. “I noticed. Is everything secured?”

His aide blinked and started to laugh, “As ready as it can be, for the moment. We’ll see if we need to scramble once the /real/ storms get here…” Tipping his chin towards the tree line he offered a one-word explanation. “Wind.”

Eyes on the mountain ridge from whence the storm had blown in, Sephiroth grimly acknowledged that the trees were bending far more energetically then they had a minute ago. “I see.”

Even as he watched, the rains around camp took on a decidedly slanted direction. Instead of falling vertically onto the road, the droplets of water dared to soak the toes of his boots. The dark haired man simply whooped enthusiastically as the gusting breeze sent the canvas and ropes rustling, holding out his arms as if trying to embrace the fury of the storm. “God I love rain! Nothing beats the first storm of the season…” A monstrous roll of thunder almost drowned out the happy yell.

“You’re going to get struck by lightening standing there like an idiot…” He couldn’t help but scold. Something in him just couldn’t comprehend how getting soaked to the bone could be fun for anyone. It was bad enough that he had tolerated the endless months of dusty humid sunshine, now he had months more to look forward too where everything he owned or even looked at would be damp and possibly moldy. People told him that the jungle took some getting used to. After five months getting his foothold in the south of Wutai, Sephiroth became resigned to the fact that the only way he’d get around the extremes of the tropical weather and forests was if he paved the entire island over.

“Well actually I was going to store my boots before the leather has a chance to shrink… but…” The SOLDIER grinned unrepentantly. “You’re kind of in the way.”

“Hmph. Don’t track mud everywhere then.” Retreating to his, and by far the larger, chunk of the tent he made a show of looking at his maps and not the dripping wet man carefully hanging a clothesline in his little corner of the office. Zack had opted for convince over privacy, sleeping on a cot on the far side of the war room. Close enough that he could be call for at any time of day or night by the general sleeping behind the official partition on the other side of the large meeting area. For a moment the pale man considered retreating back to the discrete safety of his tiny room, but instead of moving to strip off his pants, his aide simply wrung out and hung up the t-shirt before moving back towards the door. “… Where are you off to now?”

“… Going to go check the ropes. With the water a lot of them are going to stretch. We’re going to have to watch things all the time for the first few days or else the tarps will blow off.”

“Oh.” Not wanting to appear entirely ignorant, Sephiroth thought a moment. “… better tell the men to check their tents as well. Knowing most of them they’d rather stay holed up where it’s dry for a long as possible, even if it means their shelter will slowly sink down around their ears.” Zack gave him an approving look, one that he tried to ignore. He was above such things after all.

“I’ll remind the sergeants to keep an eye on them, sir.” The dark haired man reached the door only to give him a speculative look. “Some of the men, hell, most of them, are likely going to take this opportunity to get a little cleaner than average, general. I’ll remind them to not go running naked through camp or anything, but you might want to be a bit forgiving, if they’re less than regulation for a day or two.”

“… I think we’ll all be relieved to not have to ration water anymore, captain.”

“Yeah. Once the novelty of being able to go outside with a bar of soap and some toothpaste and come back in clean fades, they’ll find something new to complain about.” He grinned again, peering into the wet darkness to get his bearings. “Hell, I’ll probably do the same once we’ve checked that things aren’t going to wash away.”

As if it wasn’t bad enough to have to remind himself constantly ‘hands off’ with the man standing there in nothing more than rain drenched pants, now he had the mental image of soap to fight against. Sephiroth gave him an annoyed look. “Maybe we can set up some sort of defined ‘showering’ area so that discipline can be maintained.”

The SOLDIER nodded thoughtfully. “That could work. I’ll get someone on it.” Tossing an informal salute, he ducked back into the rain and was soon lost amidst the blur of wind and water.

Sephiroth lingered at the door flap for a moment before holding a hand out into the deluge. The water hit the well-oiled palm of his glove, beading up and lifting free weeks worth of dust that had coated the leather. Alone, no one would notice if he pulled off the offending article, letting the water scatter over bare fingers instead. It felt deliciously cool compared to the stuffy heat of the tent. He couldn’t blame his officer for wanting to be out in it as long as possible. Through the roar of the rain he heard various hoots and curses as the young men of the army ventured out into the monsoon, either to wash or to see to the ropes that were already visibly sagging in places. Keeping an eye on the tethers to his own tent, the general decided they would probably hold until his subordinate returned. It would be entirely inappropriate for him to get out in the mud for something short of an emergency, still tempted, he dried his hand with a sigh, and wondered how he could get away with something as undisciplined as a rain-shower to rinse the dust off.

*****