_Winter Training_
“Ooh baby, it’s looking chilly out there!” Zack chortled with glee as he stared at the window. Beyond the frosted panes a frozen tundra beckoned, or it would have if not for the high wind pushing the snowflakes into vortexes and walls of white that party blocked the view. “Great day for a winter survival re-test, don’t you think guys?”
The table full of SOLDIERs grimly digging into their breakfast at the inn spared him a few mutinous looks before returning to their meal. They were all experienced enough to know they’d need every calorie they could cram into their mouths in the next few minutes to stay warm through the morning exercises and obstacle course. Zack simply sniggered again and checked his watch.
“Alright I’m just going to go check on our General. He ought to be up and through his reports by now. If you all look pathetic enough when he comes down, he might be willing to defer the exam until after the blizzard stops.” Grinning like the sadist he was, the major sauntered up stairs and left the men to finish their food.
Pavan turned to his fellow officers with a sour look. “What the hell is he so happy for? He’s up for renewal too, and he hates snow more than any bastard we know.”
Snagging more bacon off the platter, Jake just shook his head. “Maybe he fast-talked the General into an automatic ‘pass’, or something. Being the man’s aide has to have a few perks.”
“That’s not bloody fair.” Captain Stoker rested his chin on his fist as he morbidly watched the snow fall. “It’s going to be colder than a witches’ tit out there today. If _I_ have to run a survival course in this shit, so does _he_.”
“Watch your tone, captain.” The major calmly scolded.
“You have to run it, too! Don’t tell me it’s a ‘privileges of rank’ thing, that’s bullshit man. Everyone needs to get requalified. Hell even the _General_ needs to get requalified! Zack’s just a lazy bastard and we all know it.”
They all paused a minute, imagining Sephiroth running the course. Nobody even bothered to try to place a bet on how fast he could do it. He’d probably be at the finish before they could even start the stopwatches, without a hair out of place. The man seemed more at home in snow than most any other kind of weather. It promised to be something worth watching. Whether it was worth suffering through the course themselves was another matter. The idea of Zack cavalierly skipping out was a little annoying.
“He’s a good guy.” Jake softened the criticism. “And a good officer, Kirk. You like him just as much as the rest of us, most days. More than the rest of us, when poker night comes around, so get off your high horse, will you? He just hates snow, that’s all. Cut him some slack. He was raised in a bloody jungle.”
“I know I know.” Kirk frowned. “But I still want to toss the fucker into a snow bank. Kudos to him for getting the General to play favorites and exempt him from testing, god knows he deserves it for some of the shit he puts up with from that guy, but does he have to rub it in?”
Pavan opened his mouth as if to veto the insubordination, and then paused, charmed by the idea of just what a cute picture it would make. Jake picked up on his dreamy smile, and couldn’t help but catch on.
“Toss him?” He asked.
“Yeah. That would be damn sweet, wouldn’t it?”
The rest of the table seemed to also find the idea to be genius. Pavan set his coffee down and slapped the table twice to get their attention, ignoring the other startled patrons of the dining room. “All those in favor of submitting Zack to our own personal ‘winter survival’ test say ‘Aye’?”
The vote was unanimous. Pushing his plate out of the way, he bent forward with the other senior officers and started to plan.
*****
“The men are ready?” Sephiroth looked up from his laptop as Zack entered the room quietly.
Unlike the shared rooms for the SOLDIERs the general had his customary suite complete with desk, satellite uplink and sword stand. The combination of modern gear from Midgar and the homey feel of the post-and-beam room worked strangely well. It was hard to imagine the General sleeping cozily under a hand-sewn quilt, but, when thought about another way, it was hard to imagine the General sleeping, period.
The southerner tucked his hands in the pocket of his fleece and smiled merrily. “Cursing and spitting and about to gear up. Yes sir.”
“How’s the course?” The pale man stood with his drink and peered out into the storm. “This wind might have knocked it a little awry overnight.”
“I checked it earlier,” Zack shrugged. “Tightened up one or two of the lines, repositioned a marker so it wasn’t hiding in a snow bank, I think we’ll be ok.”
“You went out in this?” Sephiroth turned to give him an amused look. “I’m shocked.”
“It’s my job.”
The general took his simple rebuttal in stride. “Indeed it is.” He tossed back the rest of his drink and reached for his sword. “Well, if you have no reasons why we shouldn’t, I suggest we get this over with. The sooner they’re out in it, the sooner they can huddle by the fire, isn’t that how the saying goes?”
“You’re in a compassionate mood today, Sephiroth.” Zack held the door for him with smirk. “Be careful or you’ll scare the men.”
“Ha ha.” He deadpanned as he proceded his aid to the back of the hotel where a room had been requisitioned to hold all their gear. His men were mostly dressed for the occasion, waterproof pants, masks, goggles, pulling on the last of their coats and checking their tools and materia. Out of the corner of his eye he noted his assistant doing much the same as a far faster pace. “Good morning gentlemen. I see we are in for some nasty weather on the course this morning.”
The chorus of depressed “yes sir’s” was pretty much what he had expected. He wasn’t inclined to feel sympathetic, regardless of Zack’s teasing. “Well I think it will motivate you all to complete the time trial with excellent effort. The average time for a non-SOLDIER to complete this course is forty-five minutes. The best time on record is thirty-two minutes.” Sephiroth shook his head. “The average time for us, three years ago was thirty minutes, I would like to see you all meet or beat this.”
“It’s zero visibility out there, sir.” Pavan reminded him gently.
“The course hasn’t changed since last time. You all have reviewed the map I trust?” The SOLDIERs looked chagrined. “Well if you forget, follow the markers. If you’re dissatisfied with your times, I will permit you to retake the test tomorrow.” The general almost smiled.
“A quick reminder to everyone who _did_ study the map.” Zack broke in before they could break into groups for the day. Dressed up in his winter gear he looked about twice as big as usual, only his head seemed smaller, the snow goggles perched on his forehead pushing back his customary mop of hair. “There’s a bit of rough ground between post-marker three and four that wasn’t there before. Watch out for a bit of unstable snowpack and you should be fine.”
“He sent one of the kids in town out to check things over, didn’t he.” The ill-concealed murmur got a few laughs from the back of the team. Zack simply raised an eyebrow at the commentary and pointed to the door with his clipboard. “I want the first two of you outside on the double, the rest of you can wait here abouts but be ready to go out fifteen minutes before your assigned time. I want all twenty of you to get through this exercise today and believe me, you _do not_ want to be doing this run after sundown if you can help it. As the General and I will be the ones out in the cold all day recording your feeble efforts I’m sure you can imagine how thrilled we’ll be to wait for you once the temperatures start to drop.”
“When are you going to run the gauntlet, sir?” Kirk Stoker grinned at his general from his place by the door. He had been lucky enough to pull the first time-slot and was looking forward to a little suffering and then a long lazy afternoon in front of the fire.
“I’ll go after everyone else has run. A little cold and dark don’t bother me.” Sephiroth shrugged, perfectly content to be the only one of his men not wearing three layers of wind proofing and a down parker. His only concessions to the cold in fact were that he’d actually buttoned his over-coat up to his neck for a change, and was sporting a pair of tinted snow goggles around his neck.
Zack was positive the man had antifreeze for blood. Apparently the others agreed, many shaking their heads in outright disbelief. It wasn’t that they didn’t think he was telling the truth. They just couldn’t believe that someone like him existed in the first place. Sephiroth gestured that they ought to get a move on, as the morning was wasting.
“What about you, Zack? Want me to hold the clipboard while you do your run?” Stoker wasn’t above getting a jibe in when he could.
“Nah.” The southerner shook his head, completely unconcerned by the question. “I got my run in this morning, how else was I supposed to check the course for you lot?”
Pavan looked at the man incredulously. He wasn’t the only one. Even Sephiroth looked tempted to call the officer out in a bold-faced lie. The sun had only been up an hour, even if there had been time to do a run and check things over, Zack would have been bitching and moaning about the cold instead of gloating about inflicting it on others. He glanced at Jake and the others who were waiting their turn to go out, firmly settled on taking their friend out into the snow and dumping him in the drift across the street from their hotel when he least expected it.
*****
It was well after dark when Sephiroth finally began his own exam. Standing at the chilly far end of the course to verify that each of his men had reached the turn around point had been a tedious but necessary waste of a day. The rare ability to banter with Zack via the relative privacy of their headset radios was all well and good, but by sunset he had explored every frosted nook and cranny of the bluff he was waiting on. Having to trek with the last of his men back to the start only to go out one last time was ample motivation to complete the course with all due haste.
Each of the officers had been required to pick up a token from the turn around point before heading back, amounting to a small red ring of plastic pulled off the marker post planted in the bluff. Sephiroth decided he might as well kill two birds with one stone, and pulled the whole marker post up on arrival, catching the last of the red tokens and pocketing it before jogging back, collecting each of the plastic poles beneath his arm. A loose crowd of officers had turned out despite the icy darkness to cheer him back, Zack clicked his stopwatch and cheerfully read off the new record to the others before pulling up the marker standing near his elbow, signifying the end of the test. Twenty officers had completed their winter training, all of them finishing the course in under thirty minutes. Sephiroth was silently proud of his men. Despite their whining, they had once again proved their skill to the bureaucracy. Stomping off the snow and ice on their way back indoors, they all were considerably happier than when they’d started the day.
“Last one to the hot tub gets to fetch the towels for everyone else.” Zack threatened merrily as he stripped off the winter gear and then started doing the same for his socks and layers of long johns. Sephiroth immediately noticed what the oblivious man didn’t, that four of his usual pack of cronies hadn’t immediately jumped to follow suit. Instead Pavan simply leaned against the doorframe, waiting until Zack was down to long underwear and little else. The pounce, when it happened, was hilarious.
“Begging your pardon, sir.” Major Jake Watson darted around his general’s side to assist just as Pavan caught Zack up in an arm hold.
The SOLDIER they were targeting barely had time for a startled, “What? HEY!” as he was immobilized by two of the larger officers from Corel that Sephiroth’s unit boasted. Sephiroth simply raised an eyebrow in amusement as Captains Stoker and Ibsow moved to catch the flailing man’s legs while shouting for their fellow gang members to fetch a camera from upstairs. Seeing that Zack was firmly in hand, Pavan led his crew towards the front door of the in, cheerfully ignoring the insults and pleading as they went.
“Excuse us a moment, General, we’re just going to take care of one last test candidate right now.” The normally stern major grinned at him as he kicked open the front door. Sephiroth wisely kept his mouth shut, trailing along after the rowdy group to see what exactly they had planned for his aide. Despite Zack’s wails of protest, he doubted the man really wanted to be rescued, or minded the playful punishment he was about to receive. Sure enough, he even seemed to be laughing slightly as they burst out onto the icy street in front of the in and walked with deliberation towards the mountain of snow that the town had created in it’s daily efforts to clear the streets. Zack’s cries only got louder as he saw his final destination, his four captors adjusting their grip to start swinging him back and forth in preparation for flight.
They had considerately chosen a part of the heap composed mostly of the soft talc style snow so that when they released the major with a cry of “One. Two. Three ‘cuz we love you!” he landed in a small explosion of white. Captain Carlson waited until the southerner had sat up, crying foul, before snapping a picture to remember the moment by.
Zack, bare to the skin with the exception of a pair of long shorts, cursed loudly as he struggled to stand, hot-footing across the packed ice of the road to try and tackle some of his assailants before making a break for the door. Any hope they had of barricading him out in the cold was pretty much nixed as he dove straight into the laughing crowd, piling them into a heap that he proceeded to scramble across in order to make the safety of the inn’s dinning room.
Sephiroth followed the rest of his team back indoors, satisfied that no ill had come from their momentary misconduct. Brushing his coat free of snow, he was lumped together with the rest of his men when Zack pointed an irate, if shivering finger at them all.
“You… every last one of you… are bastards.” His glare held them pinned for a moment, long enough that the newer officers began to worry they’d went too far, then Zack burst out laughing, and all was well. Shivering and whining and dripping snow in the hall, the officer was making a good case for being the most put-upon man in existence as his friends found a blanket for him and laughed as they pushed him in front of the fire to dry.
“I can’t believe you did that to me.” He grumbled, looking not angry so much as still shocked by the cold. “That was damn cruel, Pavan.”
“Serves you right for saying you completed the course this morning.” The older man chuckled. “We were all for catching you during the day and shoving snow down your pants, but this seemed a little less cruel.”
“Thanks man,” Zack drawled sarcastically. “I appreciate it.”
“Hey there’s still time, we can go back outside and remedy the lack of snow down your pants.” Jake laughed.
“No no, that’s quite ok.” The southerner scooted away from his friend in self-defense. “I think some got there anyway.”
Leaving the men to their amusements, Sephiroth returned to the mudroom and finished cleaning the snow out of his boots. He noticed Zack’s forgotten clipboard, and decided now would be as good a time as any to deal with the modest bookkeeping. Retreating back to his room he set about to log the entries into his computer but stopped even as he went to type in the first line. Most of the page was pretty standard, a column for name, date, location, start and end time, signature of the field officer administering the test. The last column was nothing but little scribbled ‘Z.T.’s all the way down, Zack validating each SOLDIER as they returned to base. There were twenty-two rows filled out in the table. Sephiroth noted with no surprise that his examination was the last.
The first row however was Zack.
He puzzled out the scribble that was listed under the ‘administered
by’ column, but didn’t recognize the name at all. Still, the stopwatch time was
there, twenty-nine minutes and thirty two seconds, as was the time of the test,
“Excuse me. Do you know someone named,” he referred to the page. “James Kakowski?”
The young woman stared at him a moment, and then looked to the other girl as if to silently ask what the hell General Sephiroth was asking her crazy questions for. The other desk clerk was marginally more polite or just more intelligent, and smiled at him gingerly. “Yes, General, he’s an employee here. He and his brother are in charge of shoveling and plowing around the inn every morning.”
“They’re out early in the mornings? Usually?” He inquired.
“Yes sir, we like to have things clean for the breakfast skiers and such, they’re usually out as early as 4AM some days, they also come back at noon and a little after sunset.” She chewed her lip, “Is there a problem sir?”
“No.” Sephiroth smiled slightly to try and set her at ease. “But I would like to talk to him if possible. Is he easy to find?”
“He’s probably eating dinner in the kitchen before heading out for the last bit of shoveling.” The young woman stepped around the back of the counter and gestured that he might as well wait. “If you’ll give me a moment, General, I’ll be happy to check.”
“Thank you.” Left with nothing but the terrified clerk he had first addressed, he settled for ignoring her in favor of counting the various antlers and other taxidermy specimens hanging around the room. He had only gotten through the set above the front door when the little blonde woman returned with a man in plaid trailing behind her. The plowman looked the perfect essence of what Icicle Inn was all about. From his heavy-duty hiking boots up to his fuzzy hat with earflaps, the man was built for the cold.
He pulled off his hat respectfully when he stepped forward however, “Beggin’ your pardon, General Sephiroth, but I was told you wanted to see me?”
“I think so, yes.” Sephiroth found the man’s nervousness amusing. Holding up his clipboard, he pointed to the one signature that stood out. “Is this you?”
James looked down and blinked, “Yes sir, that’s me. Major Thompson found me this morning as I was clearing the back deck, and asked if I might do him the favor of holding a stopwatch for him while he went out.” Shrugging in his flannel jacket, the man didn’t bother to hide his confusion. “I was going to be shoveling for the next hour at least, so I said it wasn’t a problem, and off he went into the snow. Was mighty early, barely enough light to see past the edge of town, if you get what I mean, and I warned him to be careful, but off he went.”
“And he came back thirty minutes later and had you sign for him.” Sephiroth mused, “Strange man.”
“Actually it was more like an hour, really.” The plowman confessed. “I was getting a little worried after the first twenty minutes and no sign from him. I finished all my shoveling and still nothing, so grabbed my brother and we were going to go out and see where he might have gotten to, but then he came back over the hill looking pretty pissed about something, and apologized, and asked if I wouldn’t time him again. That there on the sheet sir is his second run.”
“I see.” Sephiroth digested the unexpected information with a sigh. “Well I thank you for your time Mr. Kakowski, and I’m sorry I kept you from your dinner. You’ve been very helpful.”
“Is he in trouble for something?” The man looked at him, curious.
The general shook his head. “No, I don’t think so. Not yet at any rate. I was just curious about why your name was here, that’s all.”
“Yes sir.” James bobbed his head respectfully. “It’s been an honor, sir.”
Sephiroth stopped in the mudroom one more time on his way back upstairs, and finding Zack’s pants discarded on the floor, didn’t hesitate to go through the man’s pockets. He wasn’t at all surprised to find a small red token amongst the SOLDIERs usual errata. Turning it over between his fingers, he tried to decide if he was feeling was more along the lines of guilt or frustration.
The fact that he wouldn’t have believed the man capable of volunteering to test-run the snowy course without evidence galled him. He hadn’t even considered taking Zack at face value when after breakfast the officer had mentioned he had inspected the course already. No one had. Sometimes the southerner was just a little too good at pulling the wool over people’s eyes with his underachiever posturing and jokes. Sephiroth frowned, _he_ should have known better.
Decided, he stalked back into the inn’s main gathering room, and scanned the crowd. Pavan was collecting everyone’s tokens in a bucket as they shared stories of their frozen slogs out to the bluff and back. Sephiroth fished in his pocket when the man came near and dropped first one, then the other in with a clatter. The major looked into the pail, confused, and then up at him. Sephiroth nodded that the man should hold still a moment, and the looked around to get everyone’s attention. “I have final results for us all today, but where is Zack?”
“He hit the hot tub sir, should I get him?”
“That won’t be necessary. He was the one noting down the times. I don’t think there are any surprises for him here.” The general frowned, staring at the first record again, annoyed with himself. “You all did very well. Mr. Freed, you were the fastest among the team. You completed the round trip in a little under twenty-two minutes.”
The red headed man waved off the cheers with a muttered, “The General was way faster than me, you bastards, congratulate _him_.”
Sephiroth ignored the attempt to transfer praise, flipping the page to examine the other times. “Mr.Jensen, you were the slowest, but you still came in at under thirty minutes, so I have nothing to complain about.”
”I tripped and slid off the course in that rough patch after the third marker,
sir. Lost some time crawling back up. Sorry sir.”
“All I asked was that you were under thirty minutes, Lieutenant, you came in at twenty-nine minutes and fifty-one seconds. You preformed well within expectations.” He dismissed the apology.
“The second fastest was Mr. Jain. Congratulations. The second slowest was, Zack. Everyone else fell somewhere between twenty-five and twenty-eight minutes. An above average performance was demonstrated by everyone, you have my thanks for your efforts. Since there are no re-takes, tomorrow is a free day, spend it as you see fit.”
“Wait wait did you say Zack was the second slowest? Can I see that, sir?” Jake laughed, holding out his hands for the clipboard.
“Certainly, I’ve already submitted the results. If you want to post them somewhere, feel free.” Sephiroth didn’t bother to wait to hear the inevitable ‘Who is…’ question that they were bound to ask. A little investigation would be good practice for them. Half tempted to track his friend down in the bath, he decided he’d be better off waiting in his room, and instead passed the message onto one of the hotel staff that he wanted to see Zack at his earliest convenience.
He only had to wait ten minutes for the major to put in his appearance, towel around his neck to catch the drips from his hair, but otherwise bundled up in his normal winter layers. “I heard you wanted to speak to me, Sephiroth?” Zack strolled over to the desk and plunked himself into the chair across from him. “Sorry it took me so long, they caught me right as I was catnapping in the tub.”
“You’ll give yourself heatstroke doing that one of these days.” Sephiroth sighed.
The southerner only grinned. “Better hot than cold, I say.”
Turning his laptop around so that Zack could see the scores he had just entered. Sephiroth leaned forwards on his desk. “Care to explain that first line, SOLDIER?”
“Huh?” Zack peered at it, and snorted in laughter. “Well at least I wasn’t the slowest. Remind me to thank Jenson.”
“He says he fell off the trail at the third marker.”
“So did I.” The dark haired man shook his head. “Twice in a row. You’d think I’d have been ready for it the second time.”
“I caught up with Mr Kakowski while you were thawing out.”
Sephiroth murmured. “He said you ran the trail twice before
“Well it says it right there on the clip board.” Zack agreed mildly. “I wasn’t planning to, but with resetting the buried markers and all, my initial plan of tidying things up and running the time challenge at the same time didn’t work out so great.”
Sephiroth closed down the computer and favored his friend with a stern look. “Did you get lost? Is that why you were gone over an hour the first time?”
Zack cringed. “He mentioned that? Shit.”
“What happened?”
“You know that cute little embankment between post three and four that we hiked over yesterday setting things up?” Zack made a face, “Yeah, well I was going over it, and it collapsed into quite a deep little rift. Took me the better part of ten minutes to climb out, and then it took two or three creative uses of Quake to get things looking the way they used to so the trials could go smoothly today. By the time I was done fixing that, I knew there was no way I’d get the circuit done in time, so I just tidied up the rest, and went back to start again.”
“In the dark.” The general grimly reminded him. “Alone. In a blizzard. Without informing anyone of what you were doing.”
“The plowman knew what I was doing. I had him holding the stopwatch.” Zack disagreed.
“We didn’t.” Sephiroth countered, wanting to hit the man for
his placid reaction to danger. “Damn it Zack, I was awake at
“Nah, I didn’t want to bother you. I didn’t think anything more exciting than the occasional wolf would be out there that early.”
“You could have been hurt. You could have been knocked unconscious, or been trapped in the embankment as it collapsed. Did this never occur to you?”
The southerner scratched his head, a little humbled. “Well yes actually, right about the time I felt it give out under me I had a moment of doubt.” He perked up. “But I didn’t fall far, and it was a pretty easy climb, all things considered. The hard part was casting Quake without causing an avalanche where I didn’t want one.”
“You’re incorrigible.” Sephiroth sighed, resting his forehead on his hands. “Do try to remember from time to time, Mr. Thompson that I am obliged to be responsible for your actions?”
“Yes sir.” His friend murmured. “But nothing bad happened, why are you so bent out of shape?”
“Because _I_ and everyone else assumed you were asleep.” He looked up, “If something had happened to you, none of us would have known. _I_ wouldn’t have known. You might have lain out there for hours concussed or bleeding in the snow, and we would have just assumed you’d slept late.”
“Nah. You’d have come looked for me if I hadn’t shown up with your coffee like usual.” Zack reasoned. “And besides, the guys out shoveling almost started looking for me anyway, so I wouldn’t have been lost for long.”
“That’s not the point.” Sephiroth stood abruptly, wanting to pace, but refusing to allow himself the luxury. “The point is…” He stopped himself, not knowing how to phrase it in a way that would prevent him from being laughed at.
“The point is I made you worry about me.” The dark haired man calmly filled in for him. “And I am sorry about that. I think I may have also stolen a march on you.” Zack’s eyes twinkled. “You totally believed I was too much of a crybaby about the snow to go out and check things over, didn’t you. I bet that’s what’s got you really steamed right now. But you have to admit, you’d have been annoyed if I came knocking at 5AM to tell you I was going to give the course a dry run through before the guys slogged through it.”
“No, I would have considered you to be doing your duty, and wisely checking in with your commanding officer before leaving base.” The general replied grimly. “I would have probably gone with you to make sure you didn’t do anything insanely irresponsible.”
Zack just looked at him, alarmed. “You’re not honestly going to tell me that you’re going to punish me for being proactive about my job for once, are you?”
“I ought to.” Sephiroth murmured, refusing to admit that Zack had perfectly summed up his reactions. “Negligence as to procedure, unsafe work practices, risking Shinra personnel, allowing civilians to impersonate official test administrators, I’m sure I could find ample reasons to tag you for one or more demerits for ill judgment as a senior officer.”
“No way.” His friend protested. “That’s hardly fair!”
“Hush, Zack.” He raked his hands through his hair, resisting the urge to reach out and strangle his aide. “As it is, I think I will settle for having Pavan run our next training trip instead of you. He at least can be trusted to follow procedure. Maybe if you watch him, you might be reminded of the example you ought to be setting.”
“Bullshit.” The southerner leaned back and grinned. “Alright, fine. But I’m telling you right now, he’s not going to thank you for it. He hates babysitting duty.”
“I’m sure you’ll provide some menial assistance to him.” Sephiroth watched the SOLDIER through half-lidded eyes. Now that he’d gotten the scolding out of the way, he felt he deserved to tease his friend a few minutes. “He might need a hand filing his papers and taking attendance.”
“Bastard.” Zack stretched in his chair, “You worry too much. I’d better feed you before you start blaming me for future ulcers, give all that acid you’re making something productive to chew on.”
“I’m not hungry.” The general replied, sitting on the corner of his desk to watch the snow falling outside the window.
“You’re eating anyway. The inn is serving roast, or potpie tonight which would you prefer?”
“Dealer’s choice.” Sephiroth murmured generously. His aide just laughed and opened the door, but paused before he went any further.
“Well I’ll be damned.” Zack snorted. “Room service for two.”
“This inn doesn’t have room service.” Sephiroth corrected him. It didn’t change the fact that his friend was stooping to pick up a tray that had been resting outside his door.
“Explain this then.” Zack slid the unexpected entrée onto the desk and removed the lid, revealing steaming dish of pastry crusted chicken stew and a slice of berry pie. Stepping back out a second time produced a similar tray, featuring the roast and a slice of chocolate cake.
“It seems _somebody_ feels they owed me an apology for dumping me in a snow bank.” The southerner grinned. “What sweethearts. They also seem to have gone for the ‘give’em one of everything and let them sort it out’ approach, Seph. Why don’t I trade you for your potpie, and keep the cake, and it’ll be pretty much what I was going to get you anyway.”
“Are you joining me?”
“Do you mind?” Zack countered the question with a question, wandering around the general’s suite and rinsing mugs in the sink before setting them out. He didn’t bother waiting for a reply, just looked over their little dinner table and frowning. “They forgot the booze. Ah well, can’t perform above average all the time.”
Opening the door a third time, he caught Kirk in the act of setting a bottle of the inn’s finest down in front of it. The man was on his hands and knees to aid his sneaking, and looked up with a quiet, “Oh crap.”
“Why thank you, captain, you’ve just saved me the trouble.” Snagging the wine, he grinned as he closed the door in the SOLDIER’s face.
Sephiroth simply blinked. “Why was he crawling?”
“Stealth apology.” Zack explained knowingly. “Can I be a true heathen, sir and pour you a mug of wine?”
“Why not.” He settled back into his chair, finding his appetite as he stared at the food. Chewing the first forkful, Sephiroth looked up, observing his friend cheerfully devouring everything in sight. “Zack?”
“Erf?” The officer looked up at him and swallowed to clear his mouth. “What’s up?”
“You _are_ all right, aren’t you?” He waved away the sudden look of amusement in the man’s eyes. “From this morning, idiot. Your fall. No damage I surmise? I didn’t hear you complaining today.”
“I’m fine, Seph. A little sore perhaps. A certain General I know pulled me from the bath just as I was starting to get comfortable, but other than that I’m just fine.” Zack looked slyly at him as he sipped his drink. “Why, want to check me over after we put ‘the kids’ to bed? See for yourself whether I’ve got any bruises?”
Sephiroth chewed another forkful of steak and contemplated being offended, or maybe just laughing outright. Somewhere between the wine, the warm food, and the oversized bed the hotel had kindly provided him with, Zack’s words took root with a vengeance. Good sense waged a silent and vicious war with libido for a moment before quietly raising a white flag. “Since your offering, I think a very thorough checkup might be in order later,” and had the pleasure of watching Zack finish the rest of his meal with a blush that reached his ears.