Chapter Two

Having a kitchen but no food meant breakfast wasn't going to happen at his place. Roy called his men and suggested a diner ran by yet another of his extended family. A brother was a short order cook and his sister a waitress and, between them and the diner's location, they garnered all sorts of information from base and town.

Roy flipped three pancakes from the impressive stack onto Breda's plate, mostly wanting to see if Breda could manage them along with the stack he already had plus the eggs, toast, ham slices and bacon. Riza daintily pushed the tip of her bread into her dippy eggs, ignoring the men. Roy stabbed up a sausage, wishing he could eat them without thinking the naughty thoughts of a twelve year old as he considered their shape. He inhaled half the sausage in one bite.

"What next, sir?" Riza finally asked.

"Gran's adjutant called just as I was leaving. He wants us in his office at oh-nine-hundred." Roy pointed the other end of his sausage at her. "See, Hawkeye, other people don't have to do things at the crack of dawn."

She rolled her eyes. "When you become a general, sir, you can do what you want."

What do you think he wants of us?" Breda asked, after swallowing some toast.

"He probably knows I managed to hunt down Hughes last night," Roy said, using his pancake as a syrup sponge. "I wasn't supposed to, of course." Mindful of the other patrons, Roy lowered his voice. "Between us, there have been several children burned to death and Hughes and Armstrong are investigating. I don't know much more than that yet."

Breda pursed his lips, picking up his cup of coffee and drinking from it. "Explains why the lieutenant colonel wanted you here."

Roy nodded. "Hopefully the general will keep out of this. He usually lets Hughes do what he needs to without much interference, at least according to Hughes."

"Who would burn children?" Riza set her fork aside, her brown eyes dimming.

"That's what we're going to find out," Roy said, his mind screaming 'the man sitting next to you, the one you let touch you intimately'. He pushed away his plate, not wanting any more of his breakfast.

Once they were finished – Breda having totally cleaned his plate, even polishing off the rest of the stack of pancakes – they headed onto base. Gran didn't keep them waiting. Hughes was already in the room with the general, the dark rings under his bloodshot eyes magnified by his lenses. Gran sat at his desk, that ridiculous moustache of his twitching when he saw Roy. The alchemists knew each other well, respected each other's abilities, but they didn't like each other. Gran thought Roy was weak. Roy thought Gran was monstrous. The man, much like Kimbley and Silver, had seemed to outrightly enjoy what they had done in Ishbal. Many nights Roy still couldn't sleep but he doubted Gran had ever lost a moment's shuteye.

"Mustang, have a seat," Gran motioned to the one in front of his desk.

Roy sat, never taking his eyes off Gran. He could hear Riza and Breda taking up residence against the back wall. "You asked for me to be reassigned here temporarily, sir."

Gran frowned, making the scar that cut across the bridge of his nose twist. The absurd thought of how ugly that made this man look raced through Roy's mind, though there was little that would make him attractive. Gran was as hard as his alchemy. Roy thought if he cut the man open there would be no heart. "Yes, and I assume you partially know why, since you went stumbling after the crime scene even though you were expressly told to stay in your room."

"Actually, sir, they said to stay away from the area, not that I was confined to quarters," Roy said, measuring each and every word, feeling several sets of eyes on him. "I stumbled, as you say, across the scene by accident on the way back from a walk."

"At night? In the rain?" Gran scoffed.

"I sleep poorly, sir, and I had an umbrella," Roy said and he heard Maes lowly clearing his throat in warning. Roy remembered what Maes had confided in him once, how Gran has summarily killed a superior officer for the hell of it.

Gran's frowned deepened. Hell, the man was so damn huge, Roy wondered if Gran could reach across the desk and rip his head off. "I should expect this behavior from you, Flame. I always say it never pays to promote people too young. They get full of themselves."

Roy bowed his head at that. If that was what Gran thought last night's insubordination was about, Roy should be fairly safe. "Sorry, sir."

That seemed to appease the man. Gran sat back, templing his fingers. "Hughes, bring them up to speed." His reptilian gaze slithered over to Maes. "Or did you tell him everything last night?"

"Only that there were four incidents and that we didn't know much. I planned on taking the lieutenant colonel to the autopsy," Hughes replied.

"And that the victims were children, you mentioned that," Roy said, figuring honesty would be best since there was no reason to lie, yet. "I don't know who would hurt children. No one's made it clear why I'm here. Is it just to read how these fires were set?"

"It was Hughes's idea. I thought you'd be useless," Gran said, his eyes narrowing as they swept back over Roy.

Roy tried not to let his irritation show. "I'm not an investigator, true, but I do know fire."

"It's the only reason you're here. Technically, I'm in charge but the investigation is Hughes's," Gran swiveled again to glower at the man. "I know you outrank him, Mustang, but, for the interim, you and your men will be under Hughes."

"That won't be a problem, sir," Roy quickly assured him, thinking of all the ways he'd like to be under Hughes. He shooed those thoughts away as unprofessional and distracting, despite how they might alleviate some of the tension he felt.

"Good. I don't have to tell any of you that it is very embarrassing to the Fuhrer to have these sorts of crimes against children happening right in his very own town." Gran's tone made it clear Iron-Blood had no concern or compassion for the dead children. Nothing existed in him except the climb up the ladder and currying favor with the Fuhrer. "Try to wrap this up quickly."

"We'll do our best," Hughes said. "Hawkeye, Breda, I want you to give Armstrong a hand. Mustang, you're coming with me to the coroners."

"Of course." While glad Gran didn't detain them even if it meant going to see a dead, burned child, Roy hoped it wouldn't give him flashbacks, like last night.

* * *

"Knox, haven't seen you in a while," Roy said, surprised to see the man in this cramped, stale-smelling, messy office. He missed Hughes's 'shut up' look.

Knox peered at him then blew out a long stream of smoke. "No offense, I never wanted to see you again."

Roy winced. He knew of the experiments, the horror that Knox had been forced into. They now knew more about treating burns than they had before the war, thanks to the inhumane experiments the doctors had performed on Roy's victims. "I understand."

"You were a brat," Knox added, surprising Roy.

"I was what?" Roy's jaw dropped. Maes smothered a snicker.

"I haven't forgotten the ruckus you made in the infirmary after you were shot."

"I was hit in the head." Roy touched the little scar hidden by his hair. I thought I was dying!"

"You barely had a scratch and you kept harassing the nurses," Knox countered. "You were worse when it was one of your men who were hit."

"That's called concern, not being a brat." Roy huffed.

"Doctor, Mustang is joining us on the burn cases," Maes said before the conversation could degenerate further.

Knox snuffed out his cigarette and beckoned them to follow. If Roy thought the office had smelt stale, it was a breath of paradise compared to the rest of the morgue. The smells of decay, preservatives and disinfectants left his sinuses feeling like they had been scrubbed raw. Knox didn't seem to notice but Maes looked as uncomfortable as Roy felt. The doctor motioned for them to stay where they were and he disappeared only to return with a gurney that held a too-small body under a stained sheet.

Roy reminded himself he had seen too many burned bodies, that this shouldn't bother him, but it did. This wasn't some hellish battlefield where reminders of bleak existence were everywhere. This was a sterile room and this child, with his blackened flesh, shouldn't be here.

"We got lucky with that fall of rain," Knox said. "The whole body wasn't consumed."

"It's very hard to burn a body beyond all recognition," Roy said. "The flesh doesn't burn easily."

Knox nodded. "We've been assuming there were accelerants used. Mostly all we have are teeth to go by."

"There have been some cases where identification has been made by dental records," Maes reminded Roy. "But if these kids didn't have the money for that sort of care." His voice trailed off.

"And many don't," Knox put in.

Maes folded his arms, his face grim. "Then we're at a loss."

"People don't come looking for lost children?" The question came out unbidden. Roy already knew the answer to that. Look at his mother and her foster kids. How many of them had been thrown out into the street without anyone to look after them?

"Do you know how many people have too many kids they can't afford? Or are afraid of the law?" Knox asked. "How many kids without parents are running away from orphanages?"

Roy nodded. "I was the latter, doctor."

Knox eyed him in surprise then grunted. "Then you know what can happen to kids out there."

Roy lost all color. He could feel it draining out so fast he was tempted to see if it was going down the metal grating under the cadaver's table. The smell of wintergreen flooded his senses even though he knew it really wasn't there. The pain, the horrible things people did to children, lurked in the back of his mind, making his knees tremble. He felt Maes's hand on his arm, and it helped shake off the worst of it. Hograth ,with his breath reeking of wintergreen, wasn't here to hurt him.

"If you can't handle the autopsy, Mustang, you'd better leave now," Knox warned. "If you pass out, I'm not up to treating living patients…not any more." The 'not ever again' was evident in his tone.

Roy gulped, trying to ignore the flood of saliva in his mouth and the twist of his stomach. "I'm fine. Burned bodies bring back bad memories."

Knox gave him a long look then bellowed, "Thomas, bring in some chairs for the officers and make sure there is plenty of film in the camera."

"Yes, sir."

Roy thought the hapless Thomas sounded young and, when the man in question appeared, two rickety wooden fold-up chairs in hand, he was proven right. Roy sat as far as he could from whatever it was Knox was doing – mostly photographing at this point. Maes sat next to Roy, looking vaguely sick as well.

"This is interesting," Knox said after he had finished peeling burnt fabric and flesh off the corpse and poked around for while.

"What?" Maes asked.

"Not quite sure yet. Swab, Thomas."

The young man handed a cotton swab to the doctor who shoved it somewhere Roy refused to look too closely at then carried it to where a microscope was set up on the counter space. He rubbed the swab to a slide and turned the light on for the scope. After a bit, Knox harrumphed.

"You found something?" Maes shot the man a hopeful look.

"Whoever killed this boy most likely raped him first. Found semen," Knox turned back to them. "This is the first time the body hasn't been too badly burnt for me to make any kind of determination. Mustang, you sure you can handle autopsies? You're green."

Mustang just nodded. "I'm fine," he ground out even though he wasn't. He wanted to run away but his memories would always follow him.

Knox went back to his work. Roy tried not to hear the wet snap of bone and the smell of cooked innards once Knox got the body open. It seemed like an eternity before the man let Thomas sew the child back up. He peeled off his smeared apron and gloves then wiped sweat off his forehead. Knox looked old to Roy, older than he knew the man to be.

"The hyoid bone is crushed. Someone strangled this young man," he said. Knox pointed to his neck. "It's the only free-floating bone and often it's damaged in strangulation cases."

"Just like the others," Maes murmured.

"Except for the one girl. She was stabbed," Knox countered. "This boy was intact enough to see he has red eyes. That might explain why no one is coming around to report missing children."

Maes scrubbed a finger in his beard. "Taking children from the Ishbalan shanty towns would make it easier for someone. They could prey on people who wouldn't go to the authorities."

"Only if they could lure the kids away from those places," Knox said, over the sound of water as he washed his hands. "There are some Ishbalans who'd cut the throat of anyone venturing into those places and who could blame them?"

"It would be easy to lure those kids," Roy said with an air of authority. "They're hungry. Your guard goes down when you're starving."

"No doubt. That's about all I can give you, Hughes."

"It's enough, Doctor. Come on, Roy, let's go do something with it." Hughes beckoned for Roy to follow, which he did. "I have an hour for lunch," Maes added once they were outside the morgue.

Roy left off huffing in fresh air to give his friend a stunned look. "You can eat after that?"

"Probably but I thought we could go back to your place."

"Why?"

Maes shot him a 'you're stupid' look that merely confused Roy, before the man hailed a cab. "Tell the man where they put you up, Roy."

Meekly obeying, Roy slid into the car. Once they were underway, he whispered to Maes. "Why is the military even involved in this?"

"First victim was in one of our abandoned warehouses. The order came down to handle everything."

"Ah." Roy fell silent, trying not to think about dead children. Instead, he decided to concentrate on the living. "I got the pictures you sent of Elicia. Thanks."

"I have new ones for you," Maes returned, brightening considerably.

"New? She's less than a month old. How much can she have changed?"

"Immensely," Maes assured him. "She gets more beautiful every day." His eyes pierced Roy, obviously finding him wanting for not instinctively appreciating Elicia's growing beauty. "You don't think Elicia is lovely?"

"New life is always beautiful, Maes, but all babies pretty much look alike." Roy shrugged.

Maes' lips thinned. "I should toss you out of the cab and find new lunch plans."

"Don't pout," Roy said. "You aren't good at it."

"Guess the king would know," Maes shot back.

"You're going to drown me in pictures, aren't you?" Roy sighed.

"If you lived in Central and could see her daily and know how beautiful she is, I wouldn't have to."

"I'd love to be reassigned here but as long as the upper echelons hang onto their seats, getting older by the minute, a young upstart like me will be relegated to the ass-end of the country." Roy slumped in the seat.

"See this is why young Edward doesn't like you. The East is his home," Maes replied. He rubbed the bridge of his nose under his glasses. "I still don't fully understand why you recruited him."

Roy nodded toward the cabby in warning. "Not something I wanted to discuss over the phone."

Maes grunted, digging in his jacket pocket. He pulled out a photo. "Since you asked, here."

Roy glanced at the picture of a baby in a pink dress. "You sent me that one."

"No, I just took these two days ago. I've learned to use the base's dark room. It speeds things along."

"Maes, you sent me that one." Roy pushed the picture aside.

Maes flapped the photo at him. "You're blind. See how much bigger she is already! Look at that smile."

"I'm not blind. You're insane."

"I should shove you out of the cab."

Roy tossed his hands up. "If you're going to inflict baby pictures on me the whole way, please do."

Maes scowled at him then pulled out more photos. "You have to see this one. Look, it's the dress you bought her."

Roy accepted the photo. Elicia stared out at him, all huge eyes and fuzz-covered head. "She's thinking 'what's with all this lace'?"

"That or 'I'm hungry.' She thinks that one a lot, poor Gracia." Maes tucked the photo away.

"Makes you selfishly glad your part in the whole creation of life thing is limited to the fun stuff," Roy replied.

"Yes, but don't let Gracia heart that. She'll probably pelt you with everything in the diaper pail."

Roy shuddered as the cab pulled up to the curb. He paid the man then headed up the walk.

"It's a nice cottage," Maes said, shoving the photos back inside his pocket.

"Honestly, it's almost nicer than my place back home," Roy replied, letting them in. He immediately relocked the door. He hadn't been a compulsive locker before the war. His mother always yelled at him for leaving things unlocked. After the war, people came looking for him, both to praise and lambaste him. Roy learned to hold his privacy sacred.

"You haven't seen my house yet. You need to come to dinner," Mae said, going over to pull the curtains but stopped when he saw Roy had never bothered to open them.

"Do you think that's smart?" Roy's eyebrows arched.

Maes shrugged. "I'll ask Gracia to see when she feels would be a good time and you'll probably be eating my cooking."

"Have you gotten any better since Mom tried to teach you?"

"Not really."

"I'll pay for the caterer," Roy said with a shudder.

"Look at you, so quick to offend when I was just about to do something nice." Maes pouted.

"Oh?"

The bespeckled man leaned in close. "Do you have the curtains closed in your bedroom?"

"Yeah, I didn't bother with anything. I just rolled out of bed and met up with Riza and Breda early. Why?"

Maes wrapped his arms around Roy, sucking on the man's neck. A little 'oh' sounded in his ear as his befuddled companion finally figured it out. Maes sealed his mouth over Roy's, his tongue thrusting past Roy's lips, tasting him. He kneaded Roy's ass as his friend moved against him.

Finally, Roy broke free. "Should you be doing this, Maes?"

The investigator slid a hand around to Roy's crotch, squeezing him. "You'd better hope so, you're so damn hard already."

"Maes, I'm being serious," Roy protested, leaning into that touch, in spite of himself.

"I am, too." Maes leered. "Gracia told me to come play with you. She's not ready to have sex yet and figured you'd make an excellent way to burn of some of my energy."

Roy looped his hands around Maes' neck. "You're right about something, you have a great wife."

"I'm right about a lot of things." Maes laughed, hauling Roy toward the bedroom

* * *

Maes rolled over, rubbing a finger over Roy's nipple. "We don't have much of a lunch hour left."

"Who's fault is that, idiot?" Roy pouted.

"You are so mean, brat." Maes tweaked the nipple at hand.

"Next time plan for more time," Roy said, rolling out of bed, heading for the shower.

"Next time have lubrication, brat."

"You keep calling me that," Roy tossed a wicked grin over his shoulder. "and I'll lock you out of the shower."

"Absolute brat." Maes bounced off the bed and chased Roy into the bathroom.

Later, showered and redressed, they headed back to town on foot. The grey sky felt close and ominous as if the rain was tracking them and biding its time. Roy's belly growled loudly.

"This is all your fault, Hughes."

"Like you were protesting." Maes patted Roy's belly. "I didn't think that part of you ever required filling. You're so skinny."

"Wiry," Roy huffed. "You know I'm all muscle."

"Yes, I do." Maes leered.

Roy shoved him and hustled down the sidewalk, spotting a street vendor. The shaved, spiced meat tucked into a flat bread wrapping languished in its wrapper until he managed to get to his temporary office. No surprise to him, Breda and Riza were already there, talking quietly when he came in and threw himself down in his seat. Roy unwrapped the fragrant, cucumber and yogurt sauced sandwich, taking a hearty bite.

"You look more relaxed than this morning, sir," Breda observed.

"Yes, you do." Unlike Breda's unwitting comment, Riza's was accompanied by a knowing eye roll. "Did you learn anything helpful?" Breda continued and Roy almost lost his appetite.

"Helpful, that's a way of putting it. First, did anyone check up on the boys back home?"

"Falman says if Hawkeye ever leaves again, he'll preemptively kill Havoc to save himself headaches." Breda grinned. "I had to put Hawkeye on the line to bully them."

"I do not bully people," Hawkeye replied loftily.

"Yes, you…" Roy started then stuffed the sandwich into his mouth when she glared. "Let me finish eating then I'll tell you what the autopsy revealed. Did you learn anything else?"

As if on cue, Armstrong came in, pulling a wheeled chalk board with him. On one side, a map of the city had been tacked up. "We find using a chalk board very helpful," he said. "And Hughes started marking sites of fires with child victims on the map. This is a copy." The huge man stopped and eyed Roy. "Are you all settled in, Colonel? Is there anything else you need?"

"I think we're fine. We could have used the map you guys are. We're just down the hall, after all," Roy replied.

"We often make more than one copy." Armstrong waved him off.

"Is there anything else at any of these scenes besides the body?" Roy got up, peering at the map.

"Sadly no. Those poor children." Armstrong's whole face dropped.

"You didn't tell us what they found on autopsy, sir."

"So true, Hawkeye. I wanted to let that lunch settled or else it might get a little miserable in here," Roy replied.

"Allow me, sir," Armstrong said. "Dr. Knox was very swift with his reports. Last night's victim was an unknown male child, evidence of rape." He paused at Breda's startled inrush of air. "The fire was not the cause of death. He was strangled before the building was set on fire."

"Accelerant was poured on the victim," Roy added. "He was definitely trying to hide what had been done to the children."

"Who does this to a child?" Breda's fist pounded on top of the desk.

Roy couldn't suppress another shudder. "I don't know but they do it all the time. Armstrong, how many missing kids are there in this city?"

Armstrong shook his domed head, misery etched into his face. "Far too many. That is where we've started looking but like we said last night, unless there are dental records there won't be any other way to identify them," he said. "I'll bring up a stack of missing children's reports that you can go through and eliminate the unlikelies based on Knox's estimations of age."

"And we're afraid that these kids are from the poor side of town and there won't be any records nor anyone coming forward to say their child is missing," Maes said from the doorway.

"I thought about that. The boy this morning had red eyes. If this person is pulling kids from the encampments, we'll never find the parents. They won't trust us," Roy said and his companions scowled, knowing he was right.

"How would this person lure an Ishbalan?" Breda asked. His narrowed eyes studied the map, taking in all the information. Roy wondered if Breda might be able to surmise where the next body drop could be. With the man's deductive skills, he might be wasted in Roy's unit but Roy wasn't about to let him go.

"Food," Roy muttered, suppressing yet another shiver. Memories from his childhood tried to well up but he crushed them back.

"If this killer is only taking Ishbalan children, we may never find him." Maes tried to slick his bangs back with the rest of his hair but it refused to stick. "Right now we should just keep concentrating on the missing children's reports. We might get lucky."

Roy picked up a file. Silence enveloped the room as they set to work.