Author's Note: It's been far too long! I felt like returning to my fan fiction roots and writing some Royai, inspired by watching Brotherhood again. This is based off chapter 48 of the manga, just because I love Lan Fan and Ling too much.
Disclaimer: I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist.
Title: Would He?
"I've heard about you from Lieutenant Breda, Ling Yao."
The conversation was highly trivial as Riza Hawkeye spun the steering wheel left, causing the open-top car to skid mercilessly around a street corner, the smell of hot rubber on the tarmac burning the noses of both her, and her Xingese passenger. Her only thoughts were those of safety, for those were the orders that had been given to her.
The thick rimmed glasses she wore did not detract from her keen, sniper's eyes, which were focused solely on the road before them, the twisting streets, and the chaos of Scar's attacks. Military uniforms were a blue blur as she sped past them; Riza only hoped that no-one might recognize her and report her antics to command. That would only cause trouble for the Colonel.
"We're going to a hide out now."
"Wait!"
Even with his thick, Xingese accent, the desperation was unnerving in Ling's tone; the car screeched around another corner, causing the Prince to grip onto the door to save himself from flying out.
"I have a comrade with me! Please, bring her too!"
"What? We don't have that kind of time," she replied stoically, automatically, mind focused on the target ahead. The Prince, however, was determined, and placed a calloused hand on her shoulder.
"Please, she's nearly dead! She's waiting for me to pick her up!" he repeated again, more forcefully, the wind whipping her black hair about squinted eyes. "Please!"
For a moment, she forgot about the pressing urgency of her mission, and the cargo of Homunculi that they carried; she even forgot about the Prince who perched just behind her, crying out for them to turn back and save his friend.
Riza could only think of him. Would he make them turn back if she was injured, precariously balance on the threshold of life and death.
Would he think of turning back for me?
Even if he wouldn't, for the sake of others, or whatever it might be, she knew she would. She would never hesitate to turn back for her Colonel. She had been so willing to die, that day when they encountered Lust in the basement of the Third Laboratory. There was no living without the Colonel, for they had trusted their backs to one another. That fact seemed fundamental.
"We have to help her!"
And it was quite fundamental that the life of the injured woman was important to this Prince of Xing, so much so that he could cry out and beg her to turn the car around.
"Please," Riza murmured, "Hurry."
The breaks of the car shrieked again, and it seconds, they were hurtling back towards the inner city, with Ling commanding directs in Riza's ear, so that they might find his friend.
She kept a stern face when the Prince told her to stop in a dingy back alley way, where only rats and dumpsters of rubbish resided. Immediately, he lifted the cover of a man hole and vanished into the darkness, only to return minutes later with the body of a young woman slung over his shoulder.
Blood seeped through the coat that had been used to bandage the stump of her left arm, and the girl's Xingese face appeared paler than natural; still, her piercing gaze made contact with Riza's, and an indistinguishable expression crossed her features.
"Thank you," Ling said firmly, as Riza helped him manover the injured woman into the car. "We have to get her to a doctor… I think she's lost to much blood."
"Young Master…" The girl's voice was hoarse, and it pained Riza to watch the scene unfold. The look in Ling's face was almost unbearable; a child should not be forced to experience the sadness of losing a loved one, when adults couldn't cope in similar situations to begin with.
What would he have looked like if I had died that day?
"Don't worry," she said, revving the engine, "We'll save her, I promise."
R&R, please.