Sight
The gun sits in his belt, the weight a constant reminder of what he has done. The stench of blood has all but disappeared and the floor and walls have been scrubbed, but the dark stains will never completely vanish. Not from the wall, and not from his conscience, either.
His mind is already fading in and out, unable to focus clearly on anything that's happened. It's all been too much. The children, the innocent people he's killed. The girls – girls, not yet women – that the common soldiers corner in dark, crumbling buildings. The naked bodies left to rot in the streets, the constant sound of explosion and gunfire.
Except that it's quiet now, in the damp underground basement of the Rockbell's makeshift hospital. He's sure that somewhere above him there are men being slaughtered, women being raped, but the buzzing in his mind can block that out, if he takes another drink.
He raises the bottle to his lips, pouring the searing liquid down his throat. He wants to escape, to float far away from this place on a cloud, on a dream that his dulled mind can conjure out of thin air. No such dream comes. Only images: flashes of a child's face, raising a gun, in a picture frame. Where did the picture frame go? It was here only hours ago. They must have thrown it out with the bodies.
A shudder creeps down his spine.
The bodies, he thinks, repulsed.
His hand hovers over the butt of the gun. In his mind's eye, he sees himself with a gun in his mouth, pulling the trigger, and then it's his blood coating the walls, not theirs. It's his dirty blood staining the floor, not their blood, which should still be running in their veins so they can bandage wounds and go home when it gets too dangerous. They probably had children. He covers his face with his hands, ashamed. I killed a mother, he thinks. A goddamn mother and her husband.
His breathing quickens and too soon he's hyperventilating, but with the will of a soldier he forces himself to calm down. A soldier, a soldier following orders. That's what he is. That's all he is.
Just another orphan, he thinks.
He touches his lips to the rim of the bottle again, but there is nothing left. He lowers it, drops it, stares at the blood. The drinking didn't work. The blood was still there. Go away, go away. I don't want to see you anymore.
He knows that the Ishbalans have a god. He's got nothing left to lose. He prays.
Please, God. I don't want to see it anymore.
Their bloody faces, mutilated corpses lying in rundown houses. Panic grips his heart with iron wires, wrapping tightly around his airways. He can't breathe, and with shaking hands the gun is suddenly at his throat.
Sometimes he hates Marcoh for stopping him.
Slightly ironic, considering what's happened to Roy in the last few chapters of the manga. But then again this is anime!Roy so it doesn't matter too much.
I watched this episode the other day and it struck a nerve, as it always does. I'd like to know what you think, about what happened and also my take on it.