I had this obsession with Black Hayate back in like, July, and now, three months later, we get to see the result. This is part one of a three part mini-series I do plan on writing from Hayate's POV during his three big parts from the Manga. This is number one (But all of this comes from episode 13 of the first anime) The other two will be manga! Promise! Anyway, I hope you like it. Hayate's fun to mess with. And yes, the thing with his sister will come up a lot whenever Hayate pops his head into my stories.
Disclaimer: I do not own FullMetal Alchemist! I do, however, I guess, own Rain (Hayate's sister).
The dark gray clouds spat rain relentlessly down onto the world below. The wind blew fierce and cold, biting through the black and white fur of the nameless young pup that stood shivering on the quiet street. Mother had told him that he had no name, but she referred to him as Drizzle, because with six puppies they needed some form of identification.
(Only humans could give you a name. Mother had a name, but to him she was simply Mother.)
As he scanned the street for some form of shelter from the downpour he spotted his sister. Her markings were the same as his, though in a downy pussy willow gray, and her eyes changed colors with the sky. She was the runt of the litter, so Mother called her Rain, because she was so small, like a raindrop.
"Rain!" He yipped, his oversized puppy paws pounding the wet concrete as he ran towards his sister.
"Drizzle!" She called to him; her tiny form crouched low in the gap between the grate and the top of the sidewalk. Drizzle slid as clumsy white paw met slick black metal, drawing a gasp from his sister's pale muzzle as he barreled towards her, unable to stop or change his course. Furry body met furry body, stopping Drizzle's uncontrolled slide and pushing Rain over the edge of the dark metal and into the cold water below, her scream echoing through the tunnel.
"Rain!" Drizzle called desperately as his sister's head disappeared beneath the dark surface of the swiftly flowing water. His eyes were wide as he scanned the ever-moving substance for any sign of his sibling.
"Rain!" He called again, his pained cry echoing along the dark tunnel. A small light colored mass could be seen bobbing away in the current, struggling less and less as it got further and further away. A weak garbled cry echoed down the tunnel, reverberating around Drizzle's head and filling his little body with sadness.
"No!" He cried as the pale mass bobbed under the water and didn't come back up. "No!"
A wave of cold water splashed over me, rousing me from my nightmare. I opened my eyes to see a car squelch away through the drizzly morning. My throat is hot and prickly from crying out as memories stalked me through the dark night. The rain still beats down on the dull pavement and soaks my pelt, plastering it to my skin as I stepped out of the soggy cardboard box that has served as my bed. I lapped a few drops of cold gritty water from a nearby puddle to soothe my fiery throat. My stomach roared to life as the chilly liquid slid into it's awareness, clawing and growling for more, driving me blindly to snap at the water, my teeth clashing disappointingly together after closing on nothing but cold water. Another car splashed by, distracting me enough to return to control of my unruly body. Shaking from the cold I sit and stare up at the rain darkened sky, my mind drifting back to last night, a night that I shall never forget as long as I live.
(I won't forget, can't forget, mustn't forget, because it's my fault that she's gone.)
A voice breaks through my thoughts and I prick my ears, bringing my eyes to look towards the source of the distraction. A human walks alone towards me; it has a strange clear substance held together with a dark frame over its eyes. Only it's pale face and front paws – hands, as Mother called them – are visible, the rest of its body is covered with blue and black material. It speaks again and I whimper in response, I'm cold, wet, and hungry, the last thing that I want to do is try to decipher the human's strange language.
The human bent down, holding its huge paw out to me. I sniffed at the appendage, it smelled warm and musky with clinging scents of something that made my stomach rumble. I look at the human and whine, trying to distract my stomach from its emptiness. The human's face contorts, its eyes going soft and it makes a sorrowful sound, scooping me up in its large paw and drawing me near to its body, wrapping some of the black material that covered its body around me. I wonder why for a few moments before realizing that the fabric was shielding me from the rain. I've never been up this high before, the ground looks so far away but I'm not afraid. It's warm next to the human's rumbling chest. It keeps talking, so I focus on the noises, trying to make sense of them.
"I bet you're hungry. We'll get you some food and dry you off. How does that sound?"
The language was strange, it sounded as if the words were all strung together childishly, though there were two pauses between three groups. From the first group I knew one word. Hungry. I'd heard the sound before when Mother begged, and it was one of the few words of the human language I already knew. Another one was stuck in the middle of the other second group. Food. Nothing else was familiar, but it sure sounded like the human was going to feed me. I yipped excitedly and looked up at the human's face. It smiled at me and the world rotated. I looked around; the human had turned to walk towards a huge gray building with a green roof. There was a green patch with what appeared to be a white creature in the middle. I cocked my head, puzzled. Humans were strange creatures.
"Good morning Fuery." Greeted a short person behind a wooden structure as we went through the building's door. Its voice was higher than that of the human that was carrying me.
"Morning." The human carrying me replied, turning again to walk up a street inside the building. Only this street was a lot smaller than the ones outside, there were no cars and doors lined the sides of it. At least it wasn't raining inside; I hoped that I wouldn't have to go back out while it was still raining. The fat raindrops reminded me too much of my sister, whom I had loved very much.
We went through a door into a big open space, like the space when we went through the first door, but with more wooden structures, and no more humans. The ground was weird under my paws when I was set down. It was prickly and soft, like dead leaves, and solid like concrete. I took a few steps but it didn't crinkle like dead leaves, it hardly made any noise at all.
The human made a noise that sounded almost like Mother when she chuckled at us. It took the black material that had protected me from the rain off, revealing that it had spiky black fur on its head. "I'll be right back. You stay here."
Stay, another word I knew. I sat and looked around the space, which resembled a huge box, full of tall wooden structures and weird wheeled things that looked like nothing I had ever seen before.
I heard the door open and looked towards it, expecting the human to come back, but instead there were three humans. All covered in the same blue and black fabric that the one who brought me here had been covered in, and all taller than it. They were all pale and bald except for the fur on their heads. One had orangey fur, one had gray fur, and the other one had yellowy fur and brown fur. The one with brown and yellowy fur had a small white stick in its mouth. They came towards me, but then were distracted when another human came through the door. This one was different from the others somehow. It had yellowy-gold fur on its head that looked weird, sticking up at the back but smooth throughout the rest, except for a bunch that hung down into the human's face. It was shaped differently too.
"Morning lieutenant." The three humans that had come in first greeted the different human.
"Morning." The different human said in reply, setting down the white rectangular box that it was holding down on one of the wooden structures. Morning was obviously a greeting of some sort, because the humans kept saying it to each other.
The orangey furred human broke off from the group it had arrived with and walked towards me. I knew it saw me when it let out a terrifying wail and leapt up onto the tall wooden boxes that were leaning against the side of the room. I jumped, flattening my ears as it continued wailing. The other three humans in the room hurried over, looking at the orangey furred human, their backs to me.
"Whats the problem Breda?" Asked the human with the stick in its mouth.
"Havoc! Be careful! Its, its on the loose. There's, the-there's nothing protecting us. Over there! Over there!" The orangey furred one stuttered, directing a digit of its massive paw towards me. The other three humans turned to look at me and I wagged my tail. My pelt was still wet and there was no sign of the human that brought me here. Maybe they would dry me off if I was friendly.
"Care to explain this one Falman?" The human with yellowy-gold hair asked, looking at me. Its voice was different from the others, higher pitched. I didn't recognize any of the words that it had said but its voice was questioning.
"It is a dog lieutenant. Carnivorous canine mammal. I believe the scientific name is-" The gray haired human said, taking a step towards me. Its words confused me, slurring together at the end as it talked faster.
"That's not what I'm asking Falman, you need to loosen up." The strange human sighed. I heard the door open and hoped it was the black furred human. These humans were so confusing.
"Yes sir lieutenant Hawkeye. I will continue to work on that." The gray haired human said, bringing its right paw up and holding it above its right eye.
A human scooped me up from behind; I could tell by its smell that it was the one that had brought me here. I panted and wagged my tail harder. Finally, a human I recognized, and the one who had said it would feed me.
"Sorry sirs, I found him this morning. He was all on his own." The black furred human said. I hoped that he knew what was going on and he would answer the other human's questions, because I didn't know what they were asking. He had said morning again, maybe it wasn't a greeting, maybe it was a time of day.
"So, you gonna keep him?" Asked the human with the stick, its head tilted to one side.
The black furred human stood up. "I wish I could lieutenant Havoc. But as I'm sure you're aware there are no pets aloud in the NCO living quarters."
"Well that certainly doesn't mean you can keep him in the office Kain." The yellowy-gold furred human said.
The black furred human didn't seem all too happy, so I lowered my head, although I didn't know what was going on. "I know it. I just, He was shivering out in the rain and I felt sorry for him. Y-You're higher ups, you could keep him."
"Not me. I'm in the dorms too." The gray haired human said, raising a paw so that the bottom of it showed.
"No way." The orange furred human huffed, squishing as close to the ceiling as possible, "I hate those beasts."
The black furred human let out a sigh, dropping its head. The human with the stick in its mouth grabbed my scruff and took me away from the black furred human. I whimpered as I dangled so high above the ground. Now I was close enough, I could smell that this human carried a similar musky warm smell to the black furred human, but I could still tell that this was a different human, and clinging to him was the smell of foul smoke.
"Don't worry. I'll take him off your hands." The stick eating human said, turning and walking away with me. "I like dogs."
"Thank you lieutenant, he's really sweet." The black furred human said.
"Sure, I hear they're good when stir fried." The human with the stick shrugged, I heard the black furred human gasp. "A few spices, Yes sir, here in the east they raise them as a delicacy. Especially these plump ones."
I was snatched from the man with a stick by the human with the yellowy-gold fur. This human smelled different, still warm but that warmth was paired with sweetness rather than muskiness. Could that be why I thought that it was so different from the other humans? I dug through memories of Mother's teachings as I was returned to the familiar paws of the black furred human.
The humans chattered amongst themselves some more, as I found the memory I was looking for. Mother had said that humans, like dogs and all other animals, had males and females. She had said that we would be able to tell because a female human's voice was higher than a male's, and that females smelled sweeter. I looked at the yellowy-gold furred human and yipped. Happy that I had figured out what made her so different.
The door opened and a small human head poked around the door, accompanied by a metallic thing that looked roughly human. A human paw clamped over my muzzle and I whined; the female human had turned her back to me so I couldn't see the small human anymore. Why couldn't I see this other human? And why was I not allowed to open my mouth?
I heard a meow that echoed despite there not being any way to make a sound echo in a room like this. There was a grunt and a growl before the door slammed shut, the female yelling something, I assumed, at the humans that had been there.
The black haired human released my muzzle and took me over to one of the wooden structures that stood in the middle of the room. From his grasp I could see that they were flat on top, covered in multi-colored shapes. He picked up a white, fuzzy looking cloth and placed me on the floor before rubbing the cloth over my little body. I felt like I was going to fall over, but he stopped rubbing me before I lost my balance completely. The cloth had somehow dried my fur, I spun in circles, looking over my pelt, which was now dry, amazed.
I whined, my stomach was still growling. The black furred man had gotten distracted by the other humans after he'd dried me off so I was still waiting for the food he'd promised.
"Sorry boy. Here you go." The black furred man said, crouching down with a small white dish. He set it on the ground near me, "Eat up."
I sniffed at the dish, which was filled with a white liquid. It smelled milky, but not like Mother's milk, and it was cold, but I was too hungry to care as I lapped it up. Around me the humans talked. I didn't pay much attention though, I was so happy to finally fill my hollow belly.
When I was finished the black furred man picked me up, holding me close to his chest as he continued his conversation with the man with the stick.
"I heard it was for a cat." The female said. Cat. The one that meowed earlier?
"A cat?" The black furred man repeated, sounding worried. I looked at him and whined. Don't worry, cats aren't all that bad.
The door opened and a human walked in. This human also had black fur on its head, but was taller than the man currently holding me. The tall black haired human walked over quickly, leaning over the shorter black haired man. The tall black haired human was just like the short one, only without the weird stuff on his face. The tall black haired man lifted me up above his head. I whimpered at the speed he lifted me up so high, holding me with the main part of his paw against my chest, his fingers reaching around my shoulders. This human smelled of smoke like the man with the stick, but it wasn't a foul smelling smoke.
"Dog huh?" He said; his voice low and gruff. Dog. Dog was me. He stared at me, his face hard and scrutinizing for a moment, before it brightened and he exclaimed happily, "Eye love dogs!"
"Really? You mean it?" The shorter black haired man asked, his voice sounded excited. I was pulled into the tall black haired man's chest as he whipped his body around to face the shorter black haired man.
The tall black haired man said something too fast for me to comprehend; as he talked he waved me around, first in both hands in front of his body, then in one hand off to the side. This movement made me nervous, adding to the fact that I was so high in the air that if I fell I could easily get hurt. Once the tall black haired man calmed down, distracted by the man with the stick, I squirmed from his grasp and jumped to the floor, running to hide behind the shorter black haired man's legs.
The humans all left, leaving me alone in the room. When they finally came back, they came without the tall black haired man. This was perfectly fine with me, because I was nervous about going near him after he waved me around so much. All of the males looked beaten and smelled like the smoke on the tall black haired man.
The short black haired man with the funny stuff on his face scooped me up and hugged me tight. The female walked over to stand in front of us.
"Well if you've got no other candidates," She closed her eyes and unfolded her arms, placing one paw on her hip with a sigh. "I guess I can handle him Kain."
The short black haired man got excited and squeezed me. I squirmed from his arms, leaping to the ground easily. I ran over to the wall, yipping the whole way as I suddenly remembering my need to pee. I was vaguely aware of all the human's eyes on me, but I didn't care. The short black haired man said something, but a clicking sound pulled my attention from trying to figure out the words.
Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang.
Six deafening bangs filled the air; with each one a small flying piece of metal hurtled towards me, but missing and instead piercing the wall behind me, filling the air with dust. I plastered myself to the wall, eyes wide with fear.
"Now you won't be doing that again will you?" The female stood, holding a silver object in her hand and talking to me.
Won't, do, that, again. My terrified mind worked efficiently, filtering the slurred human language so that I could understand what I was being told. Won't do that again, right, no more peeing on walls, got it.
"See, You've got a strict Mommy now. The bathroom is out here, got it Black Hayate?"
Strict Mommy, bathroom, out, Black Hayate. Bathroom, I knew what that meant, out, outside, got it, not a mistake I'll be making again. Strict Mommy, did that mean what I thought it meant? I had a human to take care of me? Black Hayate; that must be a name. I got a name! I'm so happy my entire body wiggles as my tail wags faster than it ever has before.
The room was almost empty; the only humans left were the two black haired men and the blonde woman. I had learned the blonde, my master, was Hawkeye, while the tall black-haired man was Colonel. The short black haired man stood up and picked up the black material that had spent the day on the back of the thing he had been sitting on. I got up and scurried over to him.
"No boy, you can't come with me." He said, sounding apologetic. I tilted my head to one side. He said no. No wasn't a happy word. I whimpered at him.
"Shhh Hayate." Master murmured. Colonel snickered and Master glared at him.
"Goodbye sirs." Said the short black haired man and left the room. I whimpered sadly, feeling lonely.
"We'll go soon Hayate, we have to wait for the colonel to finish his paperwork." Master reassured me.
"You can go, there's only three more." Colonel stated.
"That are due in the morning before you plan on getting to work." Master replied sharply. Colonel dropped his eyes back to the top of the wooden structure he sat at. A desk. I had learned a lot today. The big wooden things in the middle of the room were desks, and the humans sat on chairs while they worked at the desks, shuffling around white sheets of paperwork. I felt so smart, but there was so much more that I didn't know. Like where home was, or all the names of the people I had met today, or bunches of other stuff!
"Hah!" Colonel cried gleefully, "Done!"
Master sighed and looked at me. "Good job Sir." Sir, that was another name for Colonel, and there was also Chief, but only the stick-eating human called him that. Why can't humans just have one name? That would make it a whole lot easier to remember.
Master bent down and picked me up; having already gathered all her things. She carried me towards the door, followed closely by Colonel. We walked through the hallway and outside, Master and Colonel talked the whole way, but I wasn't paying much attention. It wasn't raining anymore when we got outside.
"See you tomorrow Lieutenant." Colonel said. That's what he called Master, but he also called her Hawkeye. It seems as if humans all have at least two names, but I'm perfectly happy with one.
"Goodbye Colonel." Master replied, turning and heading off down the street.