Ishbalans are a peaceful people, but war has a way of bringing out the worst in people.
Riza Hawkeye was a sniper, but she was also a woman; a small woman, and an attractive one at that. The bulky uniform helped somewhat to flatten out her breasts, her hips, but she was still little and beautiful and some of the younger, more boyish men might have called her sexy. This may have been because they were in a war far away from home and they hadn't seen their girlfriends or wives or mistresses in a long time, but the words were still there, hanging tensely in the air when the Hawk's Eye passed through the men's camp. She gave no indication that she heard these words, but that was because there was no one she wanted to hear them from, except for one man and she knew that wasn't going to happen again for a long time.
It was difficult, her job. Not the aiming and the shooting, no; her hands were always steady when she couldn't get her victim's blood on her hands, she never missed when the stench of blood couldn't reach her nostrils, but it was difficult to look at a person's face, and in the instant before she pulled the trigger, imagine a family left without a father, a mother crying over her dead son, sisters lamenting the loss of their dead brother. It was hard to look at a living, breathing human and think I am going to kill you.
There was little adrenalin pumping in her veins and any fear she felt was quelled by the gentle breeze and her own blood pumping in her ears. The awkward position she was lying in always made it so she could hear her heart pumping her blood. She thought, sometimes, that she didn't have enough oxygen in her brain and she was going to faint. Then she looked down, at a soldier being killed, and she got on with her job.
Relief came early that morning. She was told to get some rest, that she had been up here for more than twenty-four hours. It hadn't felt that long, but as she trudged down the steps and ran back to camp with a group waiting for her, she nearly tripped a few times and she recognized that her depth perception was off; she was too used to being far away. The fatigue finally hit and her head started to pound in pain.
She slept for a while, like her superior officers told her too. But all too soon she was woken by the sound of explosions. Not regular explosions, not bombs or the gigantic guns some of the soldiers had been granted permission to use. No, these bursts of noise and screams were something far beyond that; they were the work of a State Alchemist, no doubt.
A shudder rippled through her small body as she thought of Kimblee, the bloodthirsty alchemist who joined the military just so he could kill. He scared her more than anything else she had seen in this war. His eyes, the raw beast in his eyes…it terrified her, because she almost knew how it felt.
Smoke seeped in beneath the canvas of the tent. Maybe it wasn't Kimblee outside, killing mass amounts of citizens. For all that had happened, she still couldn't tell the difference between Kimblee's alchemy and his alchemy, despite the fact that she should know so much more about the latter. She hadn't learned it. Her father had implanted the information on her back, impossible for her to study. She believed that was what her father had intended.
Riza Hawkeye stood up. She had only had a few hours of sleep, and she knew she wouldn't be getting any more. She was a soldier, and she had begun to adapt to life as it was. She loaded guns into her holsters, and she went outside. Rebecca was waiting for her, no doubt part of the guard specifically assigned to Riza's protection. Without a word, she nodded and motioned for Riza to follow her, and she joined other men and women at the front lines. It was an abandoned street; there were some signs hanging from buildings with writing that was still recognizable. Most of it was written in the common language that Amestrians and Ishbalans shared, but some was written in slanted, cryptic language of Ishbal.
She split up, went with Rebecca and three men she only knew by their faces; one was older, broad-shouldered and grizzled, the next just a boy who had probably lied about his age, and lastly a young man Riza's age, who chewed something foul-smelling and spat at the ground every few seconds. Once in a while he'd mention a lewd comment directed at Riza or Rebecca. They ignored him. If their experiences had taught them anything thus far, it was that it was always better to simply choose not to hear things.
"Just a standard sweep," said the older man. "None of them alchemists are coming through here, they're depending on us to take care of it, but I'm sure it wouldn't be too difficult for the Flame to finish anything off." He paused. He always used too many words when he spoke. Not a good characteristic for a solder. "What I'm trying to say is," he explained, "don't be a hero."
She nodded; they all nodded. Even the cocky young man spat on the ground and bobbed his head up and down, acknowledging his agreement. But then he said, "Not like there's going to be anyone here, anyway." He grinned. His teeth were stained. "Maybe a few girls, if we're lucky."
Rebecca turned to the man and opened her mouth, livid. But Riza put a hand on her shoulder. Ignore him.
It was an ambush. They walked inside the burning, empty building silently and they checked around corners with their guns drawn, ready to shoot indiscriminately. Nothing. "Let's move out," said the older man, and that was when it happened.
At that point an inexperienced soldier, she couldn't tell where they came from, simply that one moment they were not there and then they were. "Dammit!" roared the older man, and he fired the first shot, but a bullet hit him in the throat and he couldn't talk, and then two more in the chest and he was dead.
The noise was deafening and maybe that was why everything felt silent to Riza as she grabbed the back of Rebecca's uniform and they crouched behind a low wall, shielding themselves from the bullets. Across from them were the remains of a rudimentary kitchen. Even as gunshots exploded behind her, and Rebecca ducked out again to shoot with her eyes closed, Riza felt the need to walk into the kitchen and trail her fingers across the tabletops, remembering normality. But Rebecca's shouting brought her back to the present. "Dammit, Riza!" she screamed. "Cover me!"
Rebecca dove forward, greeted by a hail of bullets. Riza didn't aim, she just shot in the general direction of the Ishbalan men, and some of them fell. She did her job well, because a moment later Rebecca was back, dragging the cocky young man. He had been shot twice, once in the arm and once in the lower abdomen. He was bleeding badly. Rebecca was binding his arm, doing all she could with her limited medical knowledge as Riza shot, then hid, then shot then hid over and over again. "The old guy, what's his name-" shouted Rebecca.
"Josef," moaned the cocky young man.
"Josef, whatever, he's dead," continued Rebecca. "And I think the kid is, too. He was too far away, I couldn't reach him, dammit, I think he may have been breathing-"
"Rebecca, I can't do this alone!" replied Riza, shooting and ducking again. A bullet had just whizzed by her ear, nearly hitting her head and ending her in half a second. Rebecca nodded and stood up, helped her. "There are too many!" screamed Riza, her heart pumping harder than she could ever recall in her life. "We need to get out of here!"
"They're blocking the exit! There's nothing we can do!"
As she ducked away from the bullets again, she realized the cocky young man had pulled himself to his feet, breathing hard. He had a gun in each hand, and he threw himself between Riza and Rebecca, shooting fast and hard. "Go," he said, and he wasn't chewing anything anymore. "Get out of here, I'll hold them for now!"
Rebecca nodded and she turned and started to run the other direction. Riza stopped, looking at the man. A bullet grazed his shoulder. "God dammit," he murmured, through clenched teeth. "Go!" and he kicked her sharply backwards.
She scrambled to her feet, dropping her gun because it was out of rounds, and quickly she caught up with Rebecca. They wandered into the building. "Shit," said Rebecca, running her hands along the walls desperately. "What kind of building doesn't have a freaking back door?" She moaned. "We're fucked, Riza. We're so damn fucked."
Riza pointed her gun at wall. "Get out of the way."
"It's useless, you're not going to be able to-"
Bullets rebounded, and fell at her feet. She was standing at the opposite side of the room, and she aimed her round strategically. None of the bullets rebounded with enough force to break her skin, but she felt bruises forming around her legs and waist. She lowered her weapon. She could see light on the other side of the wall. "We should be able to push it open," she said to Rebecca, but there was no reply. She began to turn around, but suddenly her arms were pulled back tightly in a militant maneuver. She was unable to reach any of her guns; the one in her hand was out of ammo. Shaking, she was forced to her knees, then to the ground, a heavy knee on her back. "You know," a heavy, deep voice sneered, "you shouldn't ever drop your gun, especially when you're running away." The Ishbalan leaned forward. She felt his hot breath on the beck of her neck. "You left it to point to way. We didn't even have to search the building."
He grabbed her short hair and pulled her head slightly upward, sliding his knee lower on her back as he did so. Her chin, her neck and the top of her chest was off the floor, her eyes watering in pain. She caught a glance of Rebecca lying on the ground, seemingly unconscious, her weapons being greedily stripped away from her.
The man readjusted himself, so his knees rested on the palms of her hands and he was sitting on her lower back. The hand that had been holding her arms in place reached around and touched her neck, chest, her chest, and then rested on her small breast, spreading his fingers on top of her uniform. "You know what your men have done to our women?" he said, anger pulsating through him. "Have you seen it? Have you seen what your precious comrades have done to our wives, our daughters? Have you?"
He slammed her face into the ground. Blood began to stream from her nose and her eyes were watering and clouded with dust. "Get off of me!" she demanded, but he ignored her.
"I hope you have," he hissed in her ear, leaning forward. "Because then you'd know exactly what I'm going to do to you!"
His hand rises to her mouth and he hooks a single finger around her cheek and pulls. She tries to bite him, but now she realizes how many there are and the situation she is in, and she screams. She screams as loud as she can, until the man slams her face into the ground again. More blood, and a sickening crunch this time. Her nose is shattered, her lips and mouth is bleeding, and now she's crying.
The man's hand is at her waist, impatiently tugging at her jacket and the hem of her shirt, and that's when everything turned white.
For a moment, she thought she was dead, because everything was silent and everything was black, but then her vision began to come into focus again, and her hearing gradually returned, and she saw him, snapping his fingers with every step, forcing the man farther away from her and burning him mercilessly into dust, along with every one of the men there, including the ones who had been on top of Rebecca.
When the explosions finally stopped, Riza could smell burning flesh, but she saw nothing but blackened objects that maintained a vaguely corpse-like appearance. She crawled over to Rebecca, checked her pulse and pulled down her shirt to cover her exposed breasts. Riza shivered with horror.
That was when he spoke to her. "What are you doing down here?" he asked furiously.
He didn't have to elaborate for her. "I'm off-duty. Someone relieved me approximately five hours ago." She paused. "L-less than that, I think."
There was a short silence. They both knew they should be getting back to the battle, they should continue on. He said to her, "You should be resting."
"I did rest," she replied.
He hesitated, then, with his smooth, angry voice he said, "You almost got yourself killed."
"I don't think," she said, "they were planning on killing me just yet."
Even though she wasn't looking at him, she sensed him shaking with rage and disgust. She closed her eyes, thinking it was unjustified. He saw those things happen every day, and he had never once stopped them, not that Riza knew of. But then again…she saw these things as well, and she had done just as little, out of fear or apathy or something else.
Tears welled up in her eyes as she remembered what men had done to those poor helpless Ishbalan girls. Revenge, that's what these Ishbalans had wanted. That man had wanted her to feel like someone of his the military had taken away, a wife, a daughter, a sister…
She let out a sob and turned her face to the ground, so ashamed. "I thought," she forced out, "I thought they were going to…" With a sob, she stopped, unable to finish her own sentence. All she could manage was, "I was so scared."
He walked towards her. She heard his footsteps on the hard ground, the ground stained with her blood. He had seen more of her than anyone, he was the one person she had learned to feel comfortable around and she used to love the feeling when he touched her naked back, but she still flinched when he put his hand on her shoulder. He didn't notice. "Come on," he said. "We need to get her to medical, and you need help as well." She felt like telling him no, she didn't, and that she could still fight, but suddenly the pain came back and she realized her left arm was bent at an odd angle and blood was still coating her nose, cheeks and chin. He was right. "I'll escort you," he said.
With that, however, his team came sprinting into the ruined building. They had been occupied covering his back, protecting him. They had been doing her job, she thought. "Sir!" one of them said.
"Cover us," he said to them shortly. "I'm taking these soldiers back to base."
"Let us do that," said the man on his team. "They need you out there."
"No," he said. "I'll take them."
Riza wiped her face and she got shakily to her feet. "With all due respect, sir," she said stonily. "I'd prefer it if you left now."
He looked her in the eyes. There was something different about her already. His mouth was slightly open, his expression one of hurt, concern, and something like betrayal. "Understood," he said quietly. "You four, get these soldiers some medical attention. The rest of you," he paused, "keep up the good work."
He stepped over the debris and walked away from Riza without looking back. She didn't watch him as he left, she just put an arm around one of his men and let him help her walk back to the camp, keeping up with those carrying Rebecca.
Roy Mustang, the Flame Alchemist, slipped one hand back into his pocket and simply snapped as he walked down the street, destroying the buildings and any more ambushes that may have been waiting for a woman like Riza. He couldn't believe he hadn't expected this before. For all her weapons expertise, she was a small woman, and that affected her hand-to-hand combat. He ground his teeth and his spark ignited a particularly large blast, and there was a long stretch of demolished buildings before him. The fire was burning in his chest and his eyes now, too. Anger pulsed like mud in his veins as he remembered the look in Riza's eyes.
The days passed and he saw her again, soon, sitting alone. She was staring into the fire; reflected in her eyes, the flames danced and for a second, he could believe that fire wasn't all bad, after all.
She didn't talk so much anymore. She didn't look up at the sky and dream about going home, and she never thought of the future. She thought of now, of protecting those who needed to be protected, and there was a hard, dull look in her eye.
A few weeks later, a man was sent to the medical center for a low-damage shot in his shoulder. No one said anything to her, and no one certainly blamed her for it, but they had all seen Riza Hawkeye, the silent, dangerous Hawk's Eye, march into a tent that a soldier had forced a struggling, young Ishbalan girl into. They had all heard the gunshot and they had all watched as Hawkeye held her gun menacingly and escorted the girl back into the rubble of the city. No one shot at the girl as she ran away, her dress in shreds, and everyone's hearts broke in shame when they heard the girl's terrified cries as she ran away from her savior.
A week later the Flame Alchemist had followed suit and led two captured girls back into the broken city. By that time, Roy knew his alchemy well enough that he knew what caused the most pain but the least damage, and those men were wincing as they moved for weeks.
One day he sat down across from her, a small fire in between them. Word had spread and there had been no recurrences, not for a long while. The men looked up at Roy Mustang with more respect than ever. Soldiers forgot the name of Riza Hawkeye.
Riza looked up and met Roy's eyes. He didn't look away. His eyes were heavy and sad. Her eyes were hard and reserved.
Years later, she still can't bear to be touched, and Roy believes that this is the reason they are still simply a Colonel and his Lieutenant.
I'm working on the next chapter of Dead (I swear! You won't have to wait another 8 months for this one!), but I was just having a Royai moment and I felt like more fanfiction needed to be written about their war days. In this story I'm trying out a different style, I'm not sure if it's noticeable, but I really like it. I discovered with this story that I enjoy writing action and war-type scenarios.
I wasn't intending on this, but I got some good feedback on deviantArt so I figured, why not. I personally am very fond of this story, because it makes sense to me. I just think there was a moment during the war when Riza realized how horrifying it all was, and when she realized what she needed to be like to get through this. Does that make sense?
Rated M because of the subject matter, violence and brief coarse language.