Roy Mustang opened his eyes only to be greeted by darkness. A frown appeared on his face as he checked that he was awake. Why couldn't he see where he was? All he could hear was someone humming, together with some annoying beeping and the sound of things being shuffled around.
None of these helped the Flame Alchemist find out where he was, so he closed his eyes and reopened them. Still seeing nothing, he continued to do so until he couldn't even feel if his eyes were opened or closed because it all looked the same to him.
Suddenly he felt a pressure on his eyes, keeping them closed – or opened – and he heard a voice that probably belonged to the person who had been humming.
"Don't," the woman said, "Just accept it."
"Accept what? The fact that I'm blind and won't be able to see a thing in my entire life again and that my dream has been destroyed because of that? I'd like to see you accept that! I could just as well be dead!" Roy snapped at the unfamiliar woman.
There was a sudden silence as the shuffling stopped. Shortly after, Roy felt the left side of his bed go down a bit.
"Do you really think that being dead is better than being blind?" The question took the alchemist by surprise. "I agree that you are blind on some aspects, but there will be places where your eyes open."
Now it was Roy's turn to stay silent, confused. The stranger seemed to sense his confusion and decided to explain her words.
"Everyone knows Roy Mustang, the Flame Alchemist, as a womanizer. But now that Roy Mustang is blind, he can't check out the asses of women, or their long, tanned legs, or their evil curves…"
Roy almost winced at that, imagining it all as she mentioned them. It calmed him down a bit that he could still see everything in his mind.
"Now, he can concentrate on personalities; maybe even fall in love properly…" she trailed off and continued with her work.
"Say, you know who I am, but I don't know who you are." God, that almost sounded like a flirt.
"I'm Lena Hahn. Just call me Lee, everyone does."
Roy grinned as if he had accomplished something that was supposed to be impossible.
"So, 'Lee', tell me something about yourself," Roy said with the grin still in place.
Lena sighed and took a deep breath.
"I was born on the 19th of December, I have one older brother and one older sister and my mother told me I was the easiest one to bring to the world. I'm about 165 centimetres tall, have dirty blond hair and blue eyes. If you want my three measurements, you can try and find out for yourself and hope you get out alive. My father is a prick and left us when I was about eight, leaving us to care for ourselves. My mother fell in love with some guy a few months ago; my sister is seven months pregnant and my brother owns a small shop where you can buy cigarettes and magazines."
Roy blinked a few times at the fact that Lena said all that in one breath and with zero emotions.
"What about stuff you like?"
"I love horror films. I like my job… I love my family. I enjoy reading books with as little reality as possible, helping people, drinking coffee before I start working. Always wanted a dog, but don't have enough time for one."
"I love dogs too," Roy admitted, pained. He never had time for a dog either, but now he probably had enough time to start a whole fucking dog business… How awesome. Please note the sarcasm.
Lena somehow felt the pain her patient was feeling and yearned to help him, so she did.
"You know, you're in the hospital right now and I'm the nurse taking care of you. I've always wanted to help people, wanted to do something with both nursing and psychology, so I decided to do both. I found out that it helps to look at both yourself and someone who you think has a life that sucks more than yours."
"Huh…" was all that Roy could say at all the sudden information that was being forced into his head. Though it did help him to forget what he had been thinking about before.
"Try to explain what the colour orange is to someone who has been blind ever since he was born. 'An orange is orange.' 'What is an orange?' 'A round fruit.' Then you'll get 'What's round?' or 'What's a fruit like?' Of course they know what it is in words, but not what it really is. You can guess what I look like a bit with your experience and stuff, but that other guy won't ever be able to do that."
Looking at it like that really did help. The empty, dead place inside of him that had started to fill with panic soothed down and felt less empty and dead.
"And now you go get some sleep. I can see how tired you are by just looking at you."
And so Roy closed his eyes which were actually already supposed to be closed and allowed sleep to wash over him.
