The rain arrived wearing a translucent pinstripe suit and carrying a briefcase made of liquid litigation. Ling first noticed the downpour's legal ambitions when her morning coffee overflowed its mug, the liquid forming perfect cursive letters that spelled H2O v. Ling – Unlawful Containment of Atmospheric Moisture & Emotional Drought. Chu Feng's weathervane, now a reformed informant for the wind union, spun wildly in protest, its arrow pointing to a storm cloud shaped like a gavel.
"They're suing us for rainwater retention," Chu Feng said, shaking out a drenched subpoena that had wrapped itself around the porch swing. "Exhibit B is a puddle that claims we 'emotionally evaporated' its career prospects."
Arbiter floated past on a jury-rigged umbrella raft, his hair plastered with raindrop-shaped objections. "I may have mentioned riparian rights to the creek! But only as part of a metaphorical irrigation seminar!"
A lightning bolt struck the scarecrow judge's gavel, which burst into flames while reciting contempt charges in Morse code.
The Hydro-Tribunal convened in the eye of the storm, its judges robed in swirling vortexes and its jury pool stocked with disgruntled cumulonimbus. The presiding jurist, a Category 3 hurricane named Tempestus Lex, had replaced its eyewall with a rotating library of maritime law.
"Defendant stands accused of hydrological harassment via:" Its voice sounded like a tsunami chewing gravel. "(a) Unauthorized barrel-hoarding of precipitation; (b) Willful ignorance of emotional precipitation thresholds; and (c) Gross negligence in…" The storm consulted a waterlogged scroll. "…failure to provide adequate splash zone accommodations."
Ling hurled a teacup at the tempest. It transformed midair into a crying porcelain witness. "That's hearsay!"
"Sustained," rumbled Tempestus Lex, as the teacup sobbed about being "trapped in a caffeine-based hierarchy."
The trial unfolded in six simultaneous downpours.
At the barn-turned-courtroom, the scarecrow judge struggled to maintain order as juror hailstones kept melting into perjury. Arbiter's umbrella raft capsized while arguing that "raindrops lack standing due to gravitational dependency," leaving him stranded in a puddle of conflicting precedents.
The prosecution's star witness was a rogue raindrop named Dewey Litigatus, who condensed into human form wearing droplet-shaped spectacles. "My client demands restitution for decades of being called 'precip' in casual conversation," he hissed, projecting holographic evidence of Ling's rain barrel onto a screen of frozen mist. "This… this cistern trapped my ancestors in a cycle of agricultural servitude!"
Chu Feng objected by playing a modified rainstick that emitted jazz interpretations of irrigation laws. The jury cumulonimbus rumbled appreciatively until Ling elbowed him. "Not helping!"
"Sustained," Tempestus Lex boomed, as a juror tornado spun out of control and ate the court reporter.
Ling's defense hinged on Jiang Yue's weather machine blueprints, buried beneath the compost heap since the Great Hail Lawsuit of '09. The device, when resurrected, projected holograms of:
Historical rainfall data set to bossa nova rhythms
A choir of repentant clouds singing Let It Flow in 40-part harmony
The scarecrow judge's secret blog posts about his "pluviophilic tendencies"
But the Hydro-Tribunal retaliated with a monsoon of liquid evidence:
A tearful testimony from a mistreated morning dew
Satellite footage of Ling "menacingly" shaking a rain gauge
An ice core containing 10,000 years of grudge-holding frost
Arbiter, now using a tadpole as a legal pad, shouted, "Objection! The defendant's boots have been waterboarded!"
The entire courtroom flooded with puns.
In the end, even storms understand the value of a plea bargain. The settlement included:
Installation of bilingual (English/Hydrologic) gutter treaties
Mandatory sensitivity training for all rain barrels
A community splash park funded by 15% of pumpkin spice revenues
Lifetime supply of apology umbrellas for offended precipitation
As Tempestus Lex retreated to harass coastal timeshares, Ling found Chu Feng reprogramming the weathervane to play blues riffs whenever cumulonimbus loomed.
"Next week's forecast?" he asked, tuning the device with a lightning rod.
"Sunny with a chance of class actions." She kicked a puddle that tried to serve her another subpoena.
Arbiter wrung out his socks over a protesting storm drain. "I've learned my lesson! No more teaching fluid dynamics to rogue weather systems!"
The scarecrow judge hung its soggy robe to dry, the fabric bleeding ink until it spelled Mistrial across the clothesline. Somewhere beyond the water table, February 30th practiced closing arguments in a mirrored lake, its reflection rippling with liquid loopholes.
The audits would continue.
The balance pooled.
But here—between contested puddles and rehabilitated drizzle—they let the moon plow rust into a sundial for stormier tomorrows, its shadow stretching across settlements written in rainwater and rust.