Desert Days

Day 0

So you've already reached your limit, have you?

You have been here for a day, for a year, for a lifetime.

Time ceases to exist amongst the dunes and sand.

You are sick of the sight of the desert lapping greedily at the blood, aren't you?

You've reached your limit, and yet do you still want to bring about change?

Will you make things right again?

Can you make them right?

Roy found out that he was being deployed while reading the morning newspaper with his coffee. It was 9am, and he had already had three of the damn things. Black with no sugar. He drank the bitter beverage for its caffeine.

And he wasn't quite sure how he would have survived without it.

Roy Mustang, Major of the Amestrian military, Flame Alchemist, as the Fuhrer had decreed on the certification document that he had received alongside that silver pocket watch, was a caffeine addict. He was twenty-three and he was a caffeine addict.

Mustang was a State Alchemist, caffeine addict, and according to the article on the front cover of this newspaper he had been skimming, he was being deployed to Ishval.

He had not received the orders officially yet. But the situation in the East Area had remained in a critical state for a long time. Roy had been working his ass off in East City for the whole of his short-lived military career. He knew the facts and the dire situation of the Ishvalan Civil War. He knew that rural villages had been destroyed through the fighting, and subscription had torn simple farmers away from their homes and their families. The rest of Amestris continued to live as normal; they assumed this war that had killed hundreds (Roy didn't like to think of thousands, but that was likely the case) was but a 'little border skirmish'.

However, from his rich experience in the military, a 'little border skirmish' wouldn't include hundreds of troops being deployed from the remotest regions in the East Area. A 'little border skirmish' did not enable young boys to earn coin by being wagon carriers of the dead. Those young boys were called Crows by military officials – they had become so common.

And now Bradley was becoming desperate. He didn't give a damn about the state of the country or its people. What he cared about was its reputation. If the enemies that lurked on nearly every border of Amestris discovered how Amestris had failed miserably in the annex of a tiny nation of desert people, they would be invading before Roy could say "caffeine".

Roy sipped at his coffee, inhaling the bittersweet vapours and swallowing the burning liquid without a moment's hesitation. Damn this was a good brew.

Yawning lazily, Roy stretched like a cat, lifting his hands into the air and quickly drained the rest of his coffee. He was due to start work at 9am and the time was already 09:08 according to his watch. He really did have the habit of slacking off. He attempted to subdue another yawn but let his mouth open cavernously wide anyway. Until he entered the office, he wasn't officially on duty or that it what he told himself.

Damn it, Roy, wake up, he scolded himself furiously, you're not an early bird, but in order to climb the ladder, you've got to make an impression.

At that moment, one of the doors to the cafeteria opened and an unfamiliar soldier approached him. A brief inspection of her uniform informed Roy that she was a corporal from Central. She had a brown envelope clutched close to her chest as though it was a valuable treasure. She moved with a purpose in his direction.

Roy knew he was about to receive his deployment about going to Ishval. His temples had started to ache, and he tried to rub away the tension away. It was probably the caffeine. Or the damn nerves. Were his hands shaking? Since when had they become slick with sweat? No, it couldn't be nerves…it had to be the caffeine.

He was the Flame Alchemist and he wasn't afraid of a piece of paper that held the fate of life in its inky contents.

"Major Mustang, Sir!" the woman saluted, "here are official orders sent from General Grand through the Fuhrer."

She handed him the envelope, and he took them with dropping the thing. If she had noticed his nerves, she did not comment. She clicked her boots together and left the cafeteria the way she had come. Roy hadn't noticed that the room had become silent through this brief encounter.

He glanced around the room, and all of the inquisitive faces that had been staring at him quickly turned their gazes away. The soldiers and officers in the cafeteria came from different backgrounds with different ranks and different lives to each other. But they were eastern troops, and they knew by now what the delivering of a brown meant.

Someone was being deployed. There was no escape, unless an individual suffered with sickness, injury or an inability to respond on the battlefield, the only way home was through the Crows. Roy's body stiffened as he remembered a particularly hot day last summer. A Crow had taken ill and had left his wagon down a side alley in the baking sun. Roy had strayed down the wrong path eating his cheese sandwich on the way back to HQ during a lunch break when he had seen the body bags piling up like carrion. And he couldn't describe the sensation of when the smell of decaying flesh first hit his nostrils.

He hadn't been able to swallow cheese since, and that had nearly been a year ago.

Shakily, Roy made his way to the bathroom. He opened the contents of the letter. Words jumbled and danced on the page, including "Order 3066", "State Alchemist" and "sincerest gratitude from the peoples of Amestris".

He couldn't look at it any longer.

The Amestrian dragon stared at him with its beady black eye printed on the paper. Roy felt like he was being watched from every corner of the bathroom. He stared at his reflection in the mirror but he saw nothing. It was like he wasn't there, as if he was a ghost already.

The time on his watch read 09:23 as Roy Mustang staggered into a cubicle, emptying his stomach contents as he had during that stifling hot day in summer last year and he retrieved the ignition gloves from his pocket and he simmered the letter until there was nothing left and he turned around to resume his day like usual.

Here is the first part of Desert Days. This story can be read independently but it is a side story to Look Before You Listen.

I'll be updating this with ~1K per chapter every two days. I hope you enjoy!

Edit: Apologies for the re-upload. The original seemed to omit every break and italic writing.