The portal.
The gate.
To find the truth.
Where the damned who try playing God are forced to look at their sins and the sins of every creature ever to exist.
So few had entered, even less without losing their life. None without losing something.
A leg. A body. Internal organs.
What Roy lost, was his eyesight. But in learning the truth, he learned so much more than he ever wanted to. Seeing Riza hurt, seeing her bleeding out was traumatic, it pained him a great deal, but it wasn't near as bad compared to what he saw in the gate.
He saw Lotus. His first love. His everything a man could ever care about.
He saw more than that though. She was holding something in her arms, a cloth bundle, that made him all the more curious. And yet, all the more fearful.
"Lotus? Are you okay? What are you doing? How did you get here?" His natural instinct was to check her safety first of coarse, but what the hell was going on?
Her emerald eyes looked up, they were near dead. Void of life almost. All she said was his name, before shifting the clothed bundle slightly in her arms, revealing a newborn infant. Its hair black as a raven's feathers. Its eyes the color of the forest. It was the spitting image of both the woman he loved, and himself. The product of one night's passion, and a lifetimes worth of genuine affection
His own eyes widened with sheer horror as the baby extended a small arm, wrapping its dainty hand around his finger. This couldn't be right. There had to be some mistake. She had never cheated on him… But she never carried his- Oh god….
It was like a flash, In the white light of the gate, even brighter than before, it blinded him almost. It was like a whole new terrain.
It was an open field. A circle of trees around him, the moonlight filtering through the leaves, through the clouds that dotted the sky.
What was this place? Was this just another bad dream?
No.
"You foolish man." The truth's arrogant voice could be heard throughout the trees, echoing around him like a mocking bird.
"You abandon your precious girlfriend… To become a dog of the military. You became a servant and gave up your freedom, your love…. even your own child." The voice was so smug, so confident. It sickened him to the core.
The look on roy's face was of sheer devastation as he saw his redheaded lover, stagger into the clearing. Her abdomen swollen just slightly with life. She was carrying a child that much for sure. Four, maybe five months along. She let out a cough that gurgled with blood. Her ivory dress, soaked crimson around the bottom.
"Lotus!" He screamed, how he managed was unknown to him, but his wails fell to deafened ears. Why couldn't she hear him? Why wasn't she aware of his existence.
"Oh, she can't hear you. You were half way across the country when this happened, don't you remember? You wanted to be a soldier… Didn't want to be stuck in poverty with the mother of your baby." The truth's voice taunting the man as he was forced to watch what Lotus had to endure. All alone.
Lotus staggered forward, water flooded from her crevice, drenching her dress further.
Roy clutched his stomach. He could feel it. Every agonizing pain she was suffering. Her water breaking far to early, it was like acid pouring onto open wounds. It burned worse than any fire. The baby's kicks and thrashes, struggling against its mother's womb as her body began shutting down all around it. Even though her water had broken, the baby as drowning in its own warm den. Its fighting was in vain but it continued to assault her insides, forcing the woman to cry from insufferable pain.
Their child was dying. And there wasn't a single thing he nor Lotus could do to stop it.
He watched in excruciating emotions as what felt like hours passed. Watching her give birth to their stillborn son. Watching her holding his blood sodden body. A lifeless form in her hands. He was so small, he looked so fragile. Watching the tears stream down such a once happy face killed him inside. He should have never left her like this.
And then he saw something that was just almost enough to be worse.
Lotus's choked sobs were deafening, her shrill voice crying out for him, for anyone to help her, but over and over again for the man she grew to trust like family.
Her hands trembled as she traced a circle in blood. Then a smaller one, followed by another.
No.
He had seen this circle once before on the floor of the Elric's home in Resimbool.
She didn't dare.
She couldn't!
"LOTUS!" He yelled out to no avail, outstretching his arm only to be held back by the pitch black hands of the truth.
"Now now Mustang, You know you can't do anything." It chimed, watching as he snapped his fingers blindly, hoping, praying to any god that dared look down on him to help stop this. The flames only fled into the oblivion, past the truth. It was then Roy remembered what Edward had once said.
"what good is alchemy… if it cant even save a little girl…"
This was it. This was what he meant. Roy had to watch this ungodly scene to realize just what the brothers had sacrificed. To realize what their despair felt like to know just how weak humans really were.
This was when he cracked. The great hero of Ishval. The flame alchemist Roy J. Mustang began crying silently. Overwhelmed by the unbearable emotions.
"Please Lotus" he whispered. Never before had he sounded so desperate. So willing to put anything on the line.
"Please don't do this. I can't lose you too…"
Just as he said this… he watched her body collapse to the ground. Unconscious or dead he couldn't tell. And before he could get to her side to aide her… he felt the tugging feeling of being brought back.
"NO DAMNIT!" He screamed.
"Did you bring me here just to torture me?!" He wailed as he was pulled back.
If he ever made it out alive.
He had to see her just one last time.
He had to tell her just how sorry he was.