Ch 2: What Dreams May Come
Al stationed himself at the mouth of the cave, keeping watch over the three sleeping occupants while the snow fell silently outside. It's not like he had anything better to do at night anyway. Glancing back inside, where his older brother slept back-to-back with Colonel Roy Mustang (who in turn was spooned up against one Lieutenant Riza Hawkeye), Al could only smile.
Hawkeye's voice disturbed his wandering thoughts.
"Alphonse? I'm sorry to ask, and I would do it myself if I could, but," and here she wriggled a little against Mustang, who made a soft noise of refusal in his sleep and tightened his arm around her middle. She sighed and gave up. "Could you please add a bit more wood to the fire?"
"Oh! Of course, Lieutenant!" Always eager to please, Al leapt to his feet and clanged over to the wood pile. "Are you guys doing okay? I—I can't feel the cold, so I can't really tell how bad it is…" Hawkeye interrupted him before he could work himself into a frenzy.
"We'll be just fine, thank you, Alphonse." She shifted slightly, pressing her back flush against Mustang's warm chest, and carefully tugging his arm a little higher on her waist. On Mustang's other side, Edward was curled up like a cat. He'd been very careful about the placement of his ice cold metal limbs to ensure that neither one would touch sensitive skin. One of Hawkeye's shredded shirts made him a decent enough pillow, and he slept soundly in spite of the noise Al made stoking up the fire.
Colonel Mustang moaned softly and stirred. As Ed had predicted, Mustang had in fact woken up after all the work was finished, and proved he wasn't brain damaged by answering a few questions and making an inappropriate comment involving Riza's legs in particular and the vital importance of mini-skirts in general. Though he wasn't exactly turning cartwheels about it, he had also approved Hawkeye's plan for their sleeping arrangements. Sort of.
Actually, his exact words had been "You've got to be fucking kidding me," but he was exhausted and in no position to oppose both an angry child prodigy and a strong-willed woman with a gun.
After arguing for about five minutes with Edward (whose "What? You think we want to cuddle with you for our own sick amusement, ya self-absorbed, egotistical pervert?" comment had finally left Roy speechless), Roy had given in and allowed himself to be tucked in between the other two. He had fallen back asleep almost the moment his head touched his makeshift pillow (the remains of Riza's favorite gray skirt). Ed had quickly followed suit, curling up back to back with his superior officer, but Hawkeye had been lying awake and listening to them breathe ever since. Every time Mustang moaned in his sleep, she tensed and fought the urge to wake him. She knew his nightmares were worse when he was extremely tired.
Once the fire was roaring again, Al trudged back to the mouth of the cave, softly bidding the Lieutenant a good night. Riza curled one hand around Roy's wrist. With his pulse beating steadily against her cold fingers, she drifted into a troubled sleep.
She woke sometime later with a start, completely disoriented.
"Where the hell-? whose arm is-? Oh."
Of course. The cave. No wonder her whole body ached.
She sat up carefully, gently moving the colonel's arm off of her waist. She couldn't figure out what had woken her, aside from the horribly uncomfortable rocks she was trying to sleep on. Rubbing one hand across her eyes, she looked around.
Al was nowhere to be seen, and judging from the diminished pile of wood beside the still glowing fire, she assumed he had slipped out to gather a bit more. Considerate of him. Although it was still very cold, the fire was definitely helping matters...and then she heard a whimper. A small painful sound of distress that cut straight to her heart. She looked sharply at Roy, but his face looked serene, if a bit too pale for her liking. She glanced over at Ed next, but he was still curled in a tight ball, his chest rising and falling steadily. Then the small sound came again, followed closely by a murmured word this time, one that sounded suspiciously like "Hawkeye."
Looking down at Roy's face again, she saw that his handsome features had contorted into a grimace of pain. Concerned, Riza carefully settled back down in a kneeling position at his side.
"Shh. Wake up, sir. Everything's all right, you're safe." Which was at least partially true—they were safe for the time being at least. At the sound of her voice, he made a soft noise in the back of his throat, the frown lines smoothing out for a split second before returning.
"Not her," he whispered, sounding terrified. "No...I promised...please!" What on earth was he dreaming about? Riza had woken him from enough nightmares of Ishval to know it wasn't one of the usual recurring ones he had of the war. This one sounded...more personal.
Praying Edward wouldn't hear anything, she gently shook Roy's shoulder, hoping to wake him without embarrassing him. He didn't need to know how much she'd heard or guessed. They'd long had an unspoken agreement not to discuss their nightmares; an agreement that dated from the one night theyhad talked about them, shortly after the war. The night they'd gotten more intoxicated than either one had ever been before, and...well, best not to think of that night right now.
Hopefully Al would take his time in getting back, she thought. Roy murmured again, something about too much blood...and then she heard him call her name. Damn. So it was about her. He twitched, whimpered again, and reflexively gripped her arm. More urgently now, she shook his shoulder.
"Colonel. Colonel Mustang! ROY! Come on, wake up!" She was still speaking in a whisper, almost directly into his ear, worried lest Edward should wake. With a jerk, Mustang's dark eyes flew open suddenly, his left hand latching onto her arm with an intensity that frightened her.
"Lieutenant?" he murmured, his voice thick and heavy with sleep. A series of emotions flashed over his face, from the initial wide-eyed fear, to relieved recognition, to...something soft she couldn't quite identify. He sat up, eyes locked onto her face. "You're okay?" he asked earnestly.
"I should be asking you that question, sir. I think you were having a nightmare." she said carefully, unwilling to reveal that she mostly knew what it was about.
Mustang stiffened. And then, realizing that he was still holding Hawkeye's arm in a death grip, he gently released her.
"I'm sorry. I-I didn't mean to hurt you." His fingers ghosted across her wrist, where she would probably have a nasty bruise later. A shudder ran down his frame, and he covered his face with one hand, hiding his eyes. Tentatively, she touched his shoulder again, worried.
"Roy?"
Hawkeye rarely, if ever, called Mustang by his first name. It was a habit she'd retained from childhood, when her father insisted that she address his students formally, and vice versa. Once in the military, she'd called him only by his rank, both as a way to show respect and to keep anyone from comprehending the extent of their past relationship. And so hearing his name on her lips startled Mustang enough that he dropped his hand to look her full in the face again, revealing his overly bright eyes.
Riza's heart tripped in her chest. Was he…was he crying? No. Not quite, but he seemed to be close to it. He shivered, and then slowly, as though afraid she would repulse him, he reached out for her, gathered her close, and buried his face into her neck. As he drew several shuddering breaths, she began to run her hands up and down his back, quietly shhing and its-ok-ing him. She pressed her lips to his hair, looking up just in time to meet a pair of surprised golden eyes.
Before Hawkeye could even think how to react, Edward gave her a deeply significant look, those lovely golden eyes full of sympathy, and very deliberately rolled back over, offering them what limited privacy he could. A wave of warmth enveloped her as she understood what his actions meant.
Roy calmed down after another brief moment, and he nuzzled her neck one last time before pulling reluctantly away. She could hear Al's clanging steps approaching again, and squeezed his hand gently.
"It's nearly dawn now, sir. We should try and get a bit more rest while we can," she whispered.
Mustang nodded, understanding that she was not going to question him about the dream unless he wanted her to. He cautiously lowered himself back against Ed, who snuggled against his warmth and sighed as though still deeply asleep. Riza smiled softly, and then curled into Roy's chest again, facing him this time, her head resting on his outstretched arm. The proximity would comfort him, she knew, and she certainly had no objection to being held close, although her heart was pounding wildly. He would probably never speak of the details, but the dream had clearly been about her, and probably involved her gruesome death from the way he had reacted. The way he held her now, more intimately than he had dared to do since Ishval, was proof of just how shaken he had been.
All three feigned sleep as Al approached and quietly added more branches to the fire.
He made a soft "aww" sound when he saw Mustang and his Lieutenant entwined in each other's arms, clasping his hands together in delight, and it was all Riza could do not to blush. Al stooped to gently rearrange the blankets over all three of them, tucking in the edges and nudging Ed a bit closer to Roy with a practiced hand. Riza watched him carefully through her lashes, adoring him, as he very softly brushed Ed's blond hair away from his face with brightly glowing eyes. God, she loved these two boys.
With Roy's breath warm on her hair, Riza dropped into sleep a few minutes later, still brooding over the events that brought them to this cold, damp cave.
A.N. Next week: A flashback chapter to explain how they ended up in this mess to begin with. Ch 3- Two days earlier: "He opened his mouth to argue, but then realized she had an excellent point..."
