Bath Time Can Be Fun (For Everyone)

"That was really fun, mom! Thanks for taking me to the park!"

Lightning sighed as Diana flashed her a sunny smile and skipped toward the front door, leaving a trail of muddy water and sludge in her wake. The trip to the park might have been fun for the little girl, but cleaning up after her wouldn't very much fun at all for Lightning.

Over the past few days, it had done little other than rain and with Averia out clothes shopping with Fang and Vanille, Lightning had decided to take Diana to the park before the girl drove both of them crazy. In fact, Diana had spent hours by the window waiting for the slightest break in the rain so that she could go out and play, and once the rain had slowed to a drizzle and then stopped, she had practically dragged Lightning to the window.

"See, mom!" Diana had shouted, pointing eagerly at the window. "It's not raining, we can go to the park now!"

Normally, Lightning would have waited until the sun was out to take Diana to the park, but all the time indoors was making both of them twitchy. Diana could only stay indoors for so long before she tried to convert their furniture into a climbing frame, or a giant slide of some kind, neither of which were likely to lead to good results. Any longer, and Diana would start using her as a climbing frame and although the girl wasn't heavy, Lightning was not in the habit of letting people climb all over her. Well, maybe she sometimes let Diana climb onto her back, but she couldn't let the girl do that too much otherwise, Lightning would end up walking everywhere with Diana clinging onto her like some kind of laughing, mini-Fang monkey.

So, off they'd gone to the park, Lightning with an umbrella and Diana in a bright orange raincoat and gumboots. It looked more than a little odd – they certainly got more than a few stares as they walked along – but at least it kept Diana dry and if a little girl couldn't walk around wearing bright orange then who could?

They'd gotten to the park and Diana had been overjoyed to find Yuffie and Rikku there too. Within moments, the three girls had laid claim to the whole park, rushing to and fro between the climbing frame, the swings, and anything else they could lay their hands on. Kids that age had a lot of energy to burn, and Lightning had no problems grabbing a cup of coffee and sitting on one of the park benches with Yuffie's mother.

And then the girls had found a big, muddy puddle. In retrospect, what they were going to do should have been obvious. Puddles were, by their very nature, very tempting for kids to play in, and muddy puddles were even better. It had started off innocently enough, with the girls considering, out loud, the various merits of the puddle. Apparently, a puddle needed to have a certain shape before it could be considered good, along with a suitable depth, colour, and consistency. These attributes were, of course, confirmed either by sight or by poking it with sticks.

However, once the puddle had been confirmed as good – and it was, by all accounts, a very good puddle indeed – the three girls had decided that it was time to make proper use of it. And proper use entailed jumping into it and flinging mud all over each other. Lightning had been up in a flash, but as fast as she was, by the time she'd gotten there, Diana was already practically swimming in the puddle, locked in a life and death struggle with her two friends and several handfuls of mud. Yuffie's mother, smart woman that she was, had stayed back, sipping her coffee and leaning to the side when one errant handful of mud strayed her way.

As Lightning had pulled Diana out of the puddle – careful to keep her at arm's length as she squirmed and tried to fling more mud at Yuffie – she felt a fleeting moment of pride. Judging by the amount of mud on her, Diana had emerged the winner. However, that pride was swift to vanish when all of Diana's squirming left Lightning a great deal less clean than she would have liked. Mud, she felt, did not go very well with pink hair.

After that, they'd call it a day, and had headed home to clean off. Diana had been quite a sight, a little girl skipping along in a mix of bright orange plastic and brown, sludgy mud.

"All right," Lightning said as she opened the front door. "Boots off and straight to the bathroom. We need to get you cleaned up."

"But I am clean," Diana said, blithely throwing her arms about. An arc of muddy water went everywhere as a bit of sludge oozed out of her hair across her face. "We were just playing in a puddle, mom, it's not like we did anything really messy." She huffed and folded her arms over her chest. "And I don't want to have a bath now."

Drip, drip went the muddy water, drip, drip.

Lightning just stared. The scary thing, she thought, was that Diana was entirely serious. Vaguely, she wondered just what her daughter thought constituted dirty, although it wasn't like she could talk. One time, she had actually come home covered in blood from a mission that had gone slightly awry. Of course, none of it had been her own, but she had been very, very lucky that Fang had been the one to answer the door and not one of the girls.

"Clean?" Lightning gave Diana a dubious look. "I don't think so. Boots off." Helping the girl tug her boots off, Lightning took one look at them and then tossed them onto the lawn. There was way too much mud on them for the mat outside the door to handle. Maybe she could hose them down later. "Now get going, and Diana, try not to touch anything."

Diana grinned and raced through the door and then up the stairs toward the bathroom. Lightning watched her, feeling a little part of her soul die as the perfectly clean carpet and stairs took a turn for the worse. Good grief, she was going to have to clean that, and knowing Fang, the other woman would probably make a snide comment about what a clean freak she was. She scowled. She didn't need comments like that from Fang, especially given how frequently she had to remind the Pulsian that the bedroom floor was not a laundry basket. It was one thing to leave clothes lying on the floor in a fit of passion – if anything, a lot of their clothes ended up needing replacement after their fits of passion – but it was quite another to just wander in and leave something on the floor. Maker, Lightning loved Fang, but sometimes, she could almost strangle her.

Still frowning faintly, Lightning headed up to the bathroom. Diana was already there waiting for her, eyeing the bathtub and shower as though they were mortal enemies hell bent on killing her. It was funny since Diana quite liked water once she was in it. The hard part was actually getting her into it in the first place.

"Okay," Lightning said. "Clothes off. You need to have a shower before you get into the bathtub otherwise you'll turn it into a swamp."

An interested smile replaced the cute scowl on Diana's face. "Really?" Unbuttoning her raincoat, she tried to tug her t-shirt over her head, only for it to tangle around her head. "A swamp?" She was determined to continue talking, even as she grappled with the garment stuck on her head. "That would be really cool. I wonder if there would be snakes and stuff."

Lightning chuckled softly. Her daughter had, to put it politely, a very active imagination. Not that she'd ever want her any other way. "No, Diana, there would not be any snakes and stuff in it, not unless there are some hiding in your hair." Which, actually, wouldn't have been that much of a stretch. Like Fang, Diana had wonderful hair, but unlike Fang, the girl had a tendency to kind of just let it go wild until someone helped her fix it up. That someone was usually Averia, since the younger girl was forever sneaking into her bed or jumping onto her, and being poked in the eye by Diana's hair was not pleasant. "Now come on, get the rest of your clothes off and get into the shower."

A few moments later and Diana had the rest of her clothes off. Lightning shook her head slowly. It was almost admirable how much mud and gunk the girl had managed to get underneath her clothes despite her raincoat.

"I'm ready, mom," Diana said and before Lightning could say a word, she shook herself. Mud and gunk went flying everywhere – mostly onto Lightning.

"Yes," Lightning said, eye twitching a little as reached over to adjust the shower. "I can see that." She waved at the shower. "Why don't you get in now?"

Diana poked one foot gingerly into the shower as though afraid it would try something horrible. Satisfied that the shower was, in fact, not up to something nasty, like perhaps spewing out acid instead of water, she stepped inside.

"Wow, mom," Diana said as the water splashed over her. "Did you play in the mud too? You're all muddy."

Lightning gave a sigh that she was certain parents everywhere were very familiar with. The things she put up with for her children… "Don't worry about me. Just make sure that you scrub yourself properly and don't forget to use soap."

"I know, mom," Diana grumbled. "I know." Her eyes narrowed as Lightning picked up a bottle of shampoo. "That's the good kind, right? The other kind hurts my eyes."

"The other kind hurts your eyes because you keep opening them when you're washing the shampoo out. You're supposed to keep your eyes closed." Lightning smiled faintly. "But, yes, this is the good kind." She pointed to the familiar gorgonopsid on the front. "See, it has Gary on it." Diana waved at the cartoon character and lowered her head. "Now, hold still, I'm going to put it on now."

As Lightning lathered the shampoo into Diana's hair, she took a moment to think about one of her own encounters with shampoo. Merchandise related to the l'Cie was actually pretty common. There was for instance, Eidolon themed cereal, and there was even a line of action figures related to each of them. Her action figure was, of course, the best. It had multiple points of articulation, a working miniature gun blade, and it came complete with a transforming Odin. She knew because she had one, not that she'd ever let the kids know. She did, after all, have a reputation to uphold and awesome, super serious mothers did not collect their own action figures.

But one thing she hadn't been able to go along with was the development of her own personal brand of shampoo. It wasn't that she had anything against shampoo – it was the advertising campaign. The company had wanted to film a commercial of her and Fang frolicking in the ocean before turning to the camera as a gentle breeze sent their hair fluttering all around them. Then the two of them would smile into the camera and say: Nolver, the shampoo of the l'Cie – the only shampoo that keeps you looking your best in the heat of battle.

Lightning scowled. That was just too much. In the end, Fang and Vanille had helped the company put together a shampoo made from some traditional Gran Pulse recipes, but they had – after Lightning very, very emphatic insistence – drawn the line at participating in the advertising campaign. Not that Fang didn't bring the matter up now and then, tossing her hair over her shoulder dramatically and mouthing the words of the slogan.

Looking back at Diana, Lightning decided to add some extra shampoo before she started to wash all of it out. However, she'd only just started when Diana staggered back and let out a terrible wail. Hands over her face, the girl pressed herself against the far wall of the shower.

"Agghh!" Diana screamed. "My eyes, the shampoo is melting them!" She clutched at her face. "The goggles do nothing!"

Lightning bit back a smile and reached over to tug Diana back underneath the warm spray of the shower. "Diana, the shampoo is not melting your eyes and you do not have any goggles." She ruffled Diana's hair. "Now, come on, scrub your hair. You need to make sure you get it clean."

Diana gave Lightning a pleading look. "Can you do it, mom? You're much better at it than me."

Lightning winced. It was almost impossible to say no to Diana, especially when the girl turned her big, blue eyes on her. "Fine. But you won't always have me to do this for you, you know. When you're a big girl, you're going to have to shampoo and wash your own hair."

"Now, I won't," Diana said, smiling happily and almost purring as Lightning cleaned out her hair. "Mommy says you do this for her all the time."

"Does she now?" Lightning asked as she continued to rinse out Diana's hair. It was true, she supposed, she really did do this for Fang a lot. The other woman quite liked her hair – as did Lightning – and Fang loved it whenever Lightning touched it, whether it was to comb it, shampoo it, or just stroke it when they were cuddling. "Well, your mommy can be a bit of a baby sometimes, so it doesn't count." She grinned at Diana. "But don't tell her I said that."

Diana nodded sagely and made a zipping motion over her lips. "Your secret is safe with me."

A few minutes – and one full bar of soap – later and Diana was finally clean enough for the bathtub. Once the tub was full and the water was just the right temperature, Lightning was hard pressed to keep her daughter from just leaping in.

"No jumping in," Lightning said as she helped Diana climb in instead. "It's dangerous and you might get water everywhere."

Diana nodded and looked eagerly toward one of the plastic bottles beside the tub. "Okay. Can I have bubbles?"

"Sure." Lightning opened the bottle and poured out several capfuls of pale pink fluid. "Now, remember, you don't need to –"

Splash.

Splash.

SPLASH.

Lightning ducked for cover as Diana splashed about to make the bubbles. Glad that she'd managed to avoid the worst of it, Lightning looked back into the tub. The entire tub was now full of bubbles. In fact, it was actually a little hard to see Diana beneath all of the white foam.

"Look, mom," Diana said, ducking low and brushing some bubbles onto her hair and shoulders. "I'm hiding."

"Yes, well you should find a better place to hide." Lightning blew a hole in the bubbles. "The bathtub isn't very big."

Diana just grinned. "But I'm not very big either, so it's okay." She poked the bubbles around her and gave them a thoughtful look. "Hmm… I wonder if I can make a snowman out of bubbles."

"A snowman?" Lightning smiled. "Wouldn't it be a bubble man?"

Diana's eyes widened. "You're right, mom." She reached up to cup some bubbles in her hands. "I bet I can do it."

Five minutes later and Diana had her first bubble man. "Cool." She reached over the side of the tub for a bucket, but her fingers came up a few inches short. "Mom, can you get the bucket with my toys?"

Lightning smiled. Bath time had always been a tricky proposition, but after a bit of trial and error, she and Fang had found that the best way to lure Diana into the bathtub was with bubbles and toys. Diana being Diana, she didn't want or like normal toys, like rubber duckies. No, Diana wanted rubber Eidolons, a rubber Gary, and some plastic ships too. Lately, they'd even added a snorkel to the pile after Diana had watched a television program about diving.

"Here," Lightning said as she put the bucket of toys beside the tub. "What are you going to play today?" Her daughter's imagination was a wonderful thing, and she was always happy to get a better understanding of it, even if it could sometimes be more than a little weird.

Diana pursed her lips as she reached into the bucket. Taking a few toys out, she moulded the bubbles around her into several foamy islands. "I'm going to play PSICOM against Guardian Corps." She grabbed two of the plastic ships, making laser noises as she dropped them into the water. "The evil PSICOM pirates are coming to steal all of the treasure and the Guardian Corps have to stop them." The two ships floated along the surface of the water and she reached for her rubber Bahamut. "And now Mr Snaggles is coming to help the Guardian Corps. He's going to eat all the bad people!" She poked the PSICOM ship with Bahamut and made screaming noises. "Aggh… save me, save me from Mr Snaggles!" she cried, lowering her voice in what Lightning assumed was an imitation of a PSICOM officer. "No!" Diana yelled, using her normal voice this time. "Mr Snaggles shows no mercy to evildoers!"

As the one-sided battle continued – Mr Snaggles devouring hordes of PSICOM officers – Lightning had to struggle not to laugh. If only dealing with evildoers was as simple as feeding them to a metal dragon.

"Mom, can you give me my snorkel now?" Diana asked, putting the rubber Bahamut aside. "Mr Snaggles ate all the PSICOM people and I want to play something else."

X X X

Diana reached for her oxygen tank and checked to make sure that it was full before she slipped it onto her back. It was a little heavy, but it would feel much lighter once she was underwater. Next, she checked to make sure that her mouthpiece and goggles were in place. A deep sea dive was always dangerous, but this one would be really dangerous, so she needed to have everything perfect. After all, she would be going up against a giant squid.

With her spear gun clutched in one hand and a scanning device in the other, she dove into the water. It was cold there, and dark, and it wasn't long before she had to flick on a light just to see where she was going. There were a few fish down there, some big and some small, but the deeper she went, the fewer there were. Looking at her scanning device, she frowned. Nothing, but she had to be close.

All of a sudden, her scanning device began to flash. There was movement coming from nearby, but where? Seeing something at the edge of her vision, she turned. Nothing. Wait… behind her. She spun in the water just in time to be hit in the chest by a tentacle as thick as her waist.

It was the giant squid.

Panicked, she brought her spear gun up and fired, but the squid was just too big for the spear to do much. The pointy end of the spear dug into the squid's flesh beside its beak and her eyes widened. That beak had to be three, maybe even four feet long! And the tentacles, they were everywhere and so long that she couldn't even see where they ended.

One of the tentacles wrapped around her waist and squeezed. Frantic, she drew a knife and stabbed as hard as she could. Bubbles spewed up from her mouthpiece as she threw her weight into each blow. Finally, the squid let go, but it wasn't done yet. Suddenly, it was lunging toward her, its beak wide open and –

X X X

"Diana!" Lightning said as she raised one hand to ward off another wave of water. The girl was thrashing around in the bathtub kicking up a spray of water and bubbles. The snorkel had almost come off Diana's face as she engaged in what seemed to be a mortal struggle against a little rubber Hecatoncheir. "What are you doing?"

"Thank the Maker you came!" Diana cried as she dragged in a deep breath and gestured at the innocuous looking Hecatoncheir toy. "That giant squid almost got me!"

"It did, did it?" Lightning asked dryly as she knelt by the edge of the tub. She put on her serious face. "So… how did you get away?"

Diana nodded gravely. "It almost had me, but I stabbed its tentacle with my knife until it let me go. But then it came after me with its beak." Diana waved her arms around. "The giant squid was like die… die to my tentacles and my beak, and I was like, no, how about you die to my knife." She frowned. "Anyway, mom, how do you kill a giant squid? I want to make sure I win next time."

Lightning looked thoughtful. "I can't say that I've ever had to fight a giant squid."

"But you'd win, right?" Diana made a sizzling sound. "I bet you could just thundaga it and it'd be dead right away."

"Maybe." Lightning grinned. "But you need to be careful about using things like thundaga, especially if you're in the water too."

"Why?" Diana's paused. "Oh! You'd fry yourself too, wouldn't you?"

Lightning nodded, pleased with her daughter's astute observation. "Yes, you would. Guns probably wouldn't work too well either, since the water slows the bullets down. Laser would probably be all right though, and if it lunged out of the water you could always stab it with a sword." She pursed her lips. "And sonics might be useful against a squid."

"Sonics?" Diana's eyes gleamed. "I think you told me about those once…"

"Sonics are weapons that use sound," Lightning explained. Diana loved anything that was shiny, pointy, or could explode, which probably explained why she loved Bahamut so much. The dragon was shiny, pointy, and blew things up. "For example, a sonic grenade disables people by making really loud, painful sounds. Sound moves faster in water, and I'm sure you could make something big enough to hurt a giant squid." She shrugged. "But you might be better off just going with depth charges."

"Depth charges?" Diana asked.

Lightning smiled. "They're bombs that sink when you throw them into water. You can use them to blow up things underwater. If you're lucky, the giant squid might even grab some by mistake."

"Hear that," Diana said, waving one fist at the rubber Hecatoncheir as it floated happily on the surface of the water. "Next time, I'll win for sure."

Lightning chuckled. She had a feeling that most parents would consider it inappropriate to discuss weaponry with their children during bath time. Then again, Diana wasn't most children, and Lightning wasn't most parents.

Eventually though, bath time came to an end.

"All right," Lightning said as Diana finished one last skirmish between the Guardian Corps, PSICOM, Mr Snaggles, and a giant squid. "Time to get out of the bathtub."

"I don't want to," Diana said. "I like it in here, and I haven't killed the giant squid yet!"

"The water is getting cold and if you stay any longer, you'll end up looking like a prune," Lightning said. "Besides, you can always kill the giant squid the next time you have a bath."

"But I want to kill it now." Diana slapped the water. "And I won't look like a prune, I won't!"

Lightning leaned forward, face and voice deadly serious. "Do I look like I'm lying about that?"

Diana shivered. "Maybe?" She winced. "Will I really look like a prune?"

Lightning just grinned. "Stay in there and find out."

Not surprisingly, Diana chose to get out, but not before swearing eternal vengeance upon the giant squid. Smirking, Lightning wondered how Vanille would react to hearing that her Eidolon was playing the villain in Diana's games.

Lightning was in the middle of towelling Diana off when she heard the front door open. A few moments later, Fang and Averia appeared. The younger of the two had a rosy blush on her cheeks and instead of the shorts and t-shirt she'd left the house in, she was wearing a pale green dress that brought out here eyes and hair.

"Wow," Diana said earnestly, wrapped up in a fluffy yellow towel. "You look really pretty, Averia."

"I feel dumb," Averia grumbled as she fiddled with the dress. "I can't run properly or kick people and…"

"I think you look beautiful," Lightning said. She knelt down in front of Averia. "Did your Aunt Vanille pick that out for you?"

Averia nodded, still blushing. "She said it make me look cute." She frowned. "She and mommy made me wear it home."

Fang grinned. "There's nothing wrong with wearing a dress sometimes." She glanced at Lightning. "And there's nothing silly about it either. Both your mom and I have worn dresses and we're not silly, are we?" She tilted her head to one side. "Although I have to ask… just why are you covered in mud, Lightning, and why was there mud in the hallway and on the stairs?"

Lightning looked from her muddy clothes to Diana who was marvellously clean. "It's a long story."

"I bet it is." Fang patted Averia on the head, ignoring the vicious scowl she got. "Why don't you take your sister downstairs to see some of the other clothes you bought today, Averia?"

When the two girls were gone, Fang gave Lightning a teasing look. "Playing in the park get a little messy?"

"Very." Lightning winced as she dabbed some mud off her shirt. "I'm going to have to take a shower." She looked at Fang. "Mind getting dinner started while I get cleaned up?"

Fang looked thoughtful for a moment before she grabbed Lightning. Before the pink haired woman could get a word out, Fang yanked the two of them together, pressing them body to body as she covered Lightning's lips with her own. Lightning stiffened for a moment and then relaxed, moaning softly as Fang deepened the kiss.

Finally, Fang pulled away and Lightning gasped. Maker, Fang could kiss. "What are you doing? Now, you've got mud on you as well."

Fang grinned and locked the bathroom door and headed for the shower. "I do, don't I?" She reached for her sari and tugged it off. "But now that we're both dirty, I guess we'll both have to get cleaned off."

Lightning's eyes widened. A second later, she followed Fang into the shower, using her legendary speed to divest both of them of their clothing as quickly as possible. As Fang shifted and pressed her up against the wall of the shower, Lightning felt a grin tug at her lips. "You know, Fang, you remind me a little of something Diana was talking about."

Fang pressed a kiss to Lightning's collarbone and then lifted her gaze to give the other woman a puzzled look. "Oh?"

"Yes." Lightning shivered as Fang ran her hands along her sides. "A giant squid."

Fang stopped and pouted. "A giant squid, Lightning? Here I am trying to do the right thing, and you compare me to a giant squid." Just for emphasis she gave Lightning a most unromantic poke in the side before letting her hands get back to their wandering. Heh. Braille was one thing, but the curves of Lightning's body were a language all of their own, one that Fang happened to be quite fluent in.

Lightning bit back a groan. "Well, your hands are sort of everywhere."

Fang's eyes widened and then she smirked. Her hands were indeed everywhere. "Well, I suppose you're right about that." She gave Lightning a positively wicked grin. "But there's one thing I can do that a giant squid can't."

"And what's that, Fang?" Lightning asked. Most of the time, she liked to meet Fang halfway, but there were times when she was happy just to let the other woman take charge. After all, Diana didn't get her creative side from nowhere – Fang had a very, very vivid imagination.

Fang's grin turned into something that was almost a snarl, wild, possessive, and absolutely adoring. "I can make you scream."

X X X

Downstairs, Averia and Diana looked up. A muffled thump had come from upstairs along with what sounded like their mommy's name.

"What are they doing up there?" Averia asked as she fiddled with her dress. She supposed it wasn't too bad, but she would have preferred pants.

Diana shrugged. "I don't know. Fighting a giant squid probably."

X X X

Author's Notes

As always, I neither own Final Fantasy, nor am I making any money off of this.

This chapter is a little shorter than some of the others, but I'm a firm believer in letting chapters be as long (or as short) as they need to be. There's only so much you can do with a shower, a bathtub, and some mud, and I think I covered what I wanted to.

With this chapter, I just wanted to have some more interaction between Lightning and Diana. More often than not, it's Fang spending time with the kids, and I wanted to give Lightning a little time in the sun, so to speak. That said, I think Lightning is perfect for the sort of 'loving exasperation' that I wanted to capture in this chapter. Lightning loves Diana to bits – quirks and all – but that doesn't stop her from being a little exasperated by some of her daughter's antics. Indeed, I'm not sure how I would react if I saw my child writhing around in the water and screaming about fighting a giant squid. Hopefully, I'd react with as much grace as Lightning, rather than freaking out.

One thing that has always amazed me is how fascinating some children find mud and puddles. I myself enjoyed many a fine puddle in my day, much to the loving exasperation of my parents who had to deal with the clean up. In fact, there are still times when I can't help but wonder what it would be like to just jump around in a puddle. However, the closest I've come to that is walking and jogging in the rain, which is something I do enjoy.

For those of you who missed it… Nolver is Revlon backwards. And yes… I do think Lightning and Fang would make for an awesome Revlon ad. Not that they'd ever agree to making one. Finally, Diana's little quip about the goggles is a tribute to perhaps my favourite moment in Simpsons history.

As always, I appreciate feedback. Reviews and comments are welcome.