Edited chapter 3 (04/2013)

Kain entered the main apartment complex from the lobby.

The manager had allowed him inside with no argument once he showed the man his military credentials. Fortunately, the young Master Sergeant had thought to take his mask off before entering the building, or he probably would have looked like a robber. He didn't want to distress the people that had already started gathering in the lobby any more than they were after the shots fired before—yes, the shots had come from a military officer, but they didn't know that.

As the young soldier searched around for the stairs that would lead him to the third floor, a loud crack suddenly sounded through the building, a crack he recognized as that of a sniper rifle firing, and he ducked on instinct.

Had he been wrong about the First Lieutenant needing help?

Deciding there was no other choice, Kain pressed a button on the receiver attached to his waist, one that would allow him to speak with any of his comrades he chose without the others hearing. Not wanting to distract everyone from the urgency of the mission, he used it now to contact only the First Lieutenant.

He just had to make sure she was alright, and then he could leave her be to focus on her duties.

"Lieutenant Hawkeye?" he asked through his earpiece. Kain waited for a few seconds in case she was too busy to answer right away. There was no answer, though, his leg bouncing on the heel of his foot anxiously as he waited. "Lieutenant?" he tried again, and again he received silence.

Worry back in full force, he picked up his pace, hurrying through the silent building. The stairs he sought were at the end of the next hall, and he quickly climbed them, taking them two at a time.

When he reached the second floor, however, he was stopped by a small group of people. They were all in night clothing, clearly having been awoken by the disturbance, and their postures and demeanor told Fuery they were panicked and frantic, understandably so. At the sight of the armed officer running up the stairs, an officer not in his uniform but clothes still resembling those of a robber even without the mask, a woman screamed. This nearly started a rampage, the civilians looking ready to flee in terror from the newly perceived threat.

"Please remain calm! I'm with the military!" The Master Sergeant hollered to get their attention as the group's panic escalated almost beyond control. He held up his military credentials, and that seemed to calm them somewhat, some delayed in this as their minds were overcharged with fright.

"My name is Master Sergeant Kain Fuery." said officer tried to assure them, his voice at a more average volume now to match those of the civilians.

"Officer, we heard gunfire!" a middle-aged man informed him urgently, looking almost catatonic as he glanced up at the ceiling, almost as if expecting the bullets to fire through the floor at them.

"I know. That would be my colleague." Kain said, trying his best to sound calming. Though they were clearly shocked and confused, none of them tried to dispute this claim. "We are currently in the middle of arresting two men in the abandoned building across the street, but I assure you, you are not in danger." he continued in a placating manner.

He was getting really antsy, though. The Lieutenant had not answered, and he'd yet to hear another gunshot, rifle or otherwise. Even if she was still busy assisting their comrades across the street, simply having trouble picking off shots, Hawkeye would have answered if only briefly to inform him nothing was wrong.

"If it would make you feel safer, you may gather in the lobby. Just make sure you do so in a calm and orderly fashion. We don't want anyone getting hurt."

The civilians seemed to like this offer. As they started to move, another gunshot cracked through the halls, and everyone ducked. At the panic that was about to return in full, Kain held up his hands.

"Again," he shouted above the fearful murmurs, "that is just my colleague assisting the officers across the street. Everything is fine, I assure you."

The civilians seemed somewhat appeased, and the people began shuffling past him to descend the stairs. They were trying to do so calmly, he noted, but they also seemed like frightened rabbits. They'd probably take off at the slightest provocation.

With that issue solved, at least for the moment, Kain started climbing the stairs again, directing the people heading down from the upper floors to gather in the lobby as well. He turned left once reaching the third floor, and quickly made his way down the hall, trying not to look or sound worried as people continued passing him.

That last gunshot had been from a sidearm, not a sniper rifle. The Lieutenant would only use that weapon if someone else, a proven threat, was in the room with her. He found the desired room near the end of the second hall of the rectangular building. Room 3N.

Running up and bursting into said apartment, the door already open, the first thing that came to Kain's notice was a small hissing sound. Like an air leak from a container.

What was that?

After a quick search, he found the culprit to be in the next hall, a left turn after the entrance hallway.

A radiator? The base pipe seemed to be broken as though violently torn from it's socket.

Hurrying over, Kain quickly shut off the gas. Judging by the smell, it hadn't been like that for too long, so it was probably okay to stay in the room without the risk of becoming light headed or having his lungs suffer damage.

But, wait. . .

On the wall next to the radiator was blood. A small amount of blood, but blood nonetheless. At closer inspection, the Master Sergeant noticed there was also a bullet imbedded in the wall, apparently the cause of the blood.

It seemed a struggle had indeed gone down here.

"Lieutenant?" Kain called out loudly, trying to make himself heard throughout the apartment. There was no response. He nearly jumped, though, when the sound of breaking glass reached his ears.

"Leutenant?" he asked again, growing uncertain. Though, that hadn't sounded like it had come from inside the apartment, so it couldn't have been her. If his perceptions had served well, she had been giving long range assistance from the room a few feet from him.

Hurrying inside the open door, he found the Lieutenant's seemingly abandoned equipment. Her sniper rifle and a pistol were laying on a table next to the single window in the room, and her pack sat next to them. So, he was in the right place, but no Hawkeye.

Kain was about to turn to search the rest of the apartment when light from the street posts outside faintly glinted off of something in the corner of the room and drew his gaze.

It was another pistol.

Rushing over, Kain picked it up. It certainly looked like it could be the Lieutenant's; she carried one like it. Though, who else would it belong to? There had to have been someone else here, or she wouldn't have fired a sidearm in the first place, let alone taken two out. Hawkeye was not known for shooting at nothing, and there had been a bullet hole out in the hall with some blood, so she had definitely been shooting at someone—assuming she had been the one firing in the first place. He quickly pushed aside that other possibility that was too disturbing to even think about.

So, what was this pistol doing in the corner? Who had been here? And, most importantly, where were they and the Lieutenant now?

Brow furrowed in confusion, Kain walking over to the table near the open window, placing the pistol in the pack before stepping up to peer out the window. People had gathered in the street below, quite a few of them too, at the sounds of the conflict.

Why was it that people were always drawn to the sounds of gunfire? Shouldn't they have been running away from it?

Anyhow, instead turning his attention to the building across the street, Kain could barely make out what appeared to be the First Lieutenant—if the blonde hair was any indication, that is—as she ran down the stairs on the right side of the second floor. And, the giant window was broken. Must have been the source of the previous sound of breaking glass.

But how had she gotten over there so fast?

Well, however the means, she seemed to be alright. That meant Kain should return to his post. He could always ask her about what had happened in that apartment later. After he finished checking it, of course. Just to be sure.

The Master Sergeant closed the window, not wanting some burglars or thieves to have free access to this family's home, people who had been kind enough to let the military use it for this mission.

He heard the floor behind squeak him too late.

Kain's earpiece was ripped out just before a fist was driven into his left side, and he cried out in pain. He collapsed onto the floor, and his assailant was then on top of him, clutching the collar of his shirt and landing a few good punches on the left side of the young Master Sergeant's face, which sent his glasses flying. Just before the next blow hit, though, he tilted his head to the side just in time, and the fist hit the ground beneath it.

The attacker, obviously male based on build and strength, cried out, giving the young soldier enough time to land three swift punches of his own on the man's face. The big man was sent off balance, and Kain kicked him in the chest, putting him on his back a few feet away.

The Master Sergeant scrambled to his feet, wiping some blood from his lip as the unknown man rose as well. Light from the street revealed his features then, and the young soldier recognized him instantly, even without his glasses.

Lester Trubit.

Wow, the man was huge! He easily had a foot on Kain and close to an extra hundred pounds or so, most of it probably muscle! He was obviously the brawn of the operation, the smaller brother, Marcus, being the brains. A dark stream of something ran down the left side of Lester's face, though Fuery couldn't tell from what.

The big man then charged forward quicker than the tech specialist could respond and tackled him into the wall. The officer managed to slam his elbow into the man's shoulder blade before he was being repeatedly punched in the stomach and ribs. Wind knocked out of him and ribs hurting, he still managed to deflect one of the blows and drive his knee into Lester's gut, stopping the man's assault. Kain removed his sidearm from its holster, but Lester grabbed the weapon as he raised it.

They wrestled with it for a few seconds, both trying to aim it at the other, and the first three shots that went off went through the wall and window, effectively cracking the glass and almost shattering it. Then there was another shot and fire shot through Kain's right thigh as he could have sword he had both felt and heard the bone shatter. He hunched forward as the leg's support gave out, prepared to scream in agony, when a fifth shot quickly followed, silencing him.

Eyes wide as he lurched forward, he was falling, then. Slowly falling. It took a moment for the Master Sergeant's brain to catch up to him, and, by that time, he was already on the ground. Pain had surged through his leg when he landed. Or maybe there wasn't pain. Was that pain? He couldn't tell over the much greater pain he felt coming from his abdomen. Lifting his hand from the area, he saw a dark liquid of sorts on his trembling fingers.

Was that blood? . . . Was it his blood? Blood. His. . . blo-. . .

It was then that Kain's adept mind finally decided to process the fact that he had been shot. Twice.

He'd never been shot before. He found himself vaguely wondering if it was this painful for everyone? Because he could hardly focus on anything else. He couldn't even take in a breath without the simple action sending his midsection into a whole new world of hurt and introducing his abdomen to the heated and angry points of a tirade of figurative hot orange needles. And that wasn't even coming close to the pain he felt from the wound itself.

Lester looked down at the fallen, lethargic officer, who's already limited vision without his glasses kept fading farther out of focus and back in. For a moment, he simply stared, no apathy discernible in his eyes, before placing the gun in the waistband of his pants and leaving the room.

He could have simply shot the young man and been done with it. But, he liked the idea of simply leaving Kain there to die slowly, letting him suffer the agony of bleeding out.

Said Master Sergeant followed him briefly with unfocussed eyes, his mind, though sluggish, foggily registering the fact that the man had left the room.

No! The First Lieutenant had tried to subdue him before likely attending to something very important. Fuery couldn't let her efforts of catching him go in vain after he'd already failed to clear the space before entering!

Groaning in anguish, the Master Sergeant turned so he was on his stomach, the action inciting a wave of agony through his abdomen. And, he started crawling, one hand holding the gunshot wound to his gut in a futile attempt to both ease the pain and stop the bleeding. Through his pain fueled haze, Kain could sort of make out a ruckus in the background noise, almost like someone rummaging through drawers. Was Lester looking for something, or was he simply hearing things?

Finally making it to the door, and having left a trail of blood along the way, Kain pulled himself forward using the door frame, barely glimpsing Lester's shadow in the only other room in the hallway. Pulling his shaking, bloodied hand off the door frame, Fuery then reached back to his right boot and removed a revolver from within it, a trick the First Lieutenant had taught him, actually. He raised the weapon in his unsteady grip as Lester rushed from the room he was in, holding something to the left side of his head.

He moved to run, but, Kain pulled the trigger just as he was about to exit his line of sight, gritting his teeth and groaning in pain as the kickback of the revolver jarred his wounds.

Lester screamed, the only thing that made the Master Sergeant believe he'd actually hit his target, and clutched his arm before vanishing around the corner. He was gone.

With a small cry of pain, the gun fell limp from Kain's hand, lack of strength preventing him from holding it any longer. He then rolled onto his back as he thought he heard the door open, and the only sounds the Master Sergeant was then left with were his own labored breathing and the high pitched buzzing in his ears, a personal gift from pain and blood loss.

The buzzing was amplified after a few seconds, and it took the Master Sergeant's foggy brain a few moments to process the fact that it was the fire alarm going off and not just his hearing. Or, at least, he thought it was the fire alarm.

Blearily glancing back into the room, every inch of him twitching and shuddering from the strain that the simple action took, Kain barely saw his earpiece had been snapped.

He couldn't contact his team about Lester, and he was slowly but surely bleeding out. There was already quite a bit of blood on the floor, most of it from the wound plaguing his abdomen. Groaning again, he began to shudder more violently as he forced both of his hands to apply pressure to the wound on his stomach. Tears escaped his eyes at the severity of the pain, but he had to stop the bleeding somehow. . .

The Lieutenant's pack!

"Hello? Is anyone here?" an unfamiliar voice suddenly sounded through the apartment, and Fuery's eyes snapped open. Someone must have come after hearing the gunshots.

"H-here!" Kain cried as loud as he could, though it came out a croak that was barely above a whisper. The sound of footsteps immediately followed, and a man hurried into sight from the entrance hallway. Even with his eyesight as poor as it was, the Master Sergeant could tell his skin was darker than was common, and his hair was light in color. At seeing the fallen soldier, the man ran over to him and knelt next to him.

"Is there a medical kit somewhere?" he asked urgently, and Kain pointed a quivering finger to Lieutenant Hawkeye's pack. The man wasted no time in running over and grabbing it, and was then back at the fallen soldier's side. As he searched through it great haste, Kain lifted his knees. Doing so was something he had learned was supposed to ease pain a little when stomach wounds were involved, though the effort of that alone was almost too much for him.

The task finally complete, somewhat grievously not noticing much difference in the pain, he then removed the knife from his belt. Removing his other hand from his abdomen, he then lifted the collar of his shirt and began to cut. When the civilian at last found the med kit in the pack, Fuery had already cut his shirt straight down the middle, exposing the wound on his abdomen.

Had Kain been able to turn any paler, he would have at the sight of the gunshot wound.

The civilian rummaged quickly through the med kit and removed the field dressing and bandages from within, setting to work on applying them.

The Colonel and the two of his subordinates following him entered the main floor once again as Roy held a hand to his earpiece. "Fuery, respond." he ordered, drawing Breda's attention; the man was currently standing guard by the nearly dozen newly arrested men lined up against the wall.

Riza knew Roy had received no answer when neither his expression or anxious body language changed.

"Master Sergeant Fuery, can you hear me?"

"I didn't see him outside, Chief, and the fire alarm is going off across the street. I also heard something that sounded like gunshots a little bit ago." Breda turned from the criminals, worry clear in his voice and trepidation present on his face. Roy nodded in understanding.

"Spread out. Find him. Check across the street first. The alarm could have been pulled by a nervous civilian, but make sure. Also find the source of the gunfire; it could have been the Master Sergeant." He had turned to Riza and Falman, who nodded and moved to follow the order while the other two soldiers remained inside to make sure none of their captives escaped.

The First Lieutenant and Warrant Officer stepped outside and knew immediately that the task given to them would be a lot more difficult than first anticipated. The crowd of bystanders was now even larger than it had been a few moments ago, and a good lot of them started asking questions of the two soldiers the instant they had joined them outside.

"Ladies and gentlemen!" Falman spoke loudly, trying to get himself heard over the noise of the crowd. He succeeded somewhat, most of them quieting to listen. "We are military officials! Please return to your homes until we contact you further on the situation!"

Riza scanned the people around them, but, from what she could see, Breda had been correct. Fuery wasn't out there.

"What's going on? We heard gunfire!" a woman asked as the civilians were starting to quiet a little, and Falman had to hold his hands up to stop the tirade of questions that started once more.

"I assure you, we have everything under control. The situation has been handled, and there is no need to worry." It was then that Riza noticed something. The apartment window she had jumped from was closed and cracked, two bullet holes the obvious culprits.

There had been no gunfire on their side of the street, so the shots had to have come from inside the apartment. The apartment where Lester Trubit was supposed to be subdued!

"Excuse me." Riza said as she began making her way through the crowd, keeping her voice level and her pace normal, even though dread and panic had struck her the sight of the window and what it might mean. Falman clearly wanted to follow, but he knew he had to keep the civilians calm, so he continued answering their questions as well as he could without incidentally inciting an even greater panic.

Riza soon made it across the street, but what she found alarmed her even more than the shot window. A trail of blood droplets went from the entryway and into the alley next to the building. But, who did it belong to?

Unable to know for sure, she was about to run inside to assess the situation in there, when the door opened before she'd reached it. A dark-skinned young man, Ishvalan by the looks of him, walked out, supporting one Master Sergeant Kain Fuery. The tech specialist was bleeding from the mouth, hunched over and holding his stomach as the civilian supported him. His shirt had been cut all the way down the middle and bandages were wrapped around his midsection, a decently sized blood stain seeping through them in the front.

"Fuery!" Riza ran forward to help the Ishvalan ease the injured soldier down the stairs. They quickly laid him down on his back, and Fuery coughed feebly and grimaced in pain as the action jarred his grievous wounds.

Looking him over, the Lieutenant noticed there was a bullet wound in his right thigh, so the wound on his stomach was probably a gunshot wound as well. The sharpshooter quickly applied pressure to the open wound on his thigh, making him take in a quick breath as his fists tightened, but he didn't protest.

The youngest soldier truly looked worse for ware. Besides the bullet wounds, there was a clear impact mark from a fist on the left side of his face, glasses nowhere to be seen. The blood coming from his mouth had probably been from the blows—or at least that was what she hoped. Bleeding from the mouth for any other reason was never a good sign and didn't leave a good prognosis for recovery. There were wounds on his knuckles, underneath the blood on his hands, that proved the young soldier had not gone down without a fight. Given the size of his adversary, the tech specialist probably had a good number of bruises, probably a few broken ribs as well.

But, her mind kept returning to the blood in his mouth, the cynical part of her fearing the worst.

Riza looked over the crowd, quickly locating her other comrade."Falman, get over here!" Pausing in the middle of what he was saying, the Warrant Officer quickly did as he was told, apologizing as he asked to be let through.

As soon as he saw his fallen friend, though, he picked up his pace and held a hand to his ear.

"Havoc, we need medical assistance now! Fuery's been wounded!" he said urgently as he broke through the crowd and ran to kneel next to the two currently aiding the aforementioned wounded young man. Gasps and sounds of shock and alarm emanated from the civilians at the sight of the fallen soldier, and whispers quickly migrated through them. What had happened to him? Was the threat still around?

"Do you know what happened?" Riza asked the Ishvalan civilian, but he shook his head. Cursing inwardly, she then felt a hand on her wrist, and her attention was drawn down to see it was the injured Master Sergeant, looking at her with barely open eyes as fatigue and shock threatened to render him unconscious.

"I'm s-sorry." he gasped out, disappointment evident in his tone. The sharpshooter was about to tell him he shouldn't be speaking when he continued. "I coul... c-counldn't sto-"

"It's alright, Master Sergeant. Save your strength." Riza tone was lacking its usual sternness, a subtle wavering in it's place.

"H-he just c-came out of nowhere." the tech specialist continued as though he hadn't heard her. "I-I tried to s-stop him, but he was-"

"Fuery." Riza tried to get him to quit speaking.

"Officer, you shouldn't talk right now." the unknown Ishvalan put in, also trying to stop the injured soldier, but he continued anyway.

He was probably delirious from blood loss.

"I-I w-was able to s-shoot him in the arm as h-he w-was escaping." the Master Sergeant managed to say with a grimace, his breaths coming in quick and shallow. Riza placed a hand on his shoulder, at last getting his attention.

"Fuery, stop talking. That's an order." she said, giving his shoulder a comforting squeeze. Mouth clamped shut, he managed a light nod, though his eyelids were drooping. "Help is on the way, just hold on." Her tone told him that too was an order.

"We need to roll you over, and you need to spit out the blood in your mouth, okay?" Falman then asked, and Fuery nodded meekly once more. They gently did just that, and the Master Sergeant spit out quite a bit of the crimson substance, the dark liquid in drastic contrast to the light colored cement of the sidewalk it landed on. This was met by more concerned whispers from the crowd.

The next few minutes were some of the longest Riza could ever remember. Fuery kept dropping in and out of consciousness, and, before the EMT's finally arrived, the bandages around his midsection had been almost completely soaked through on the front.

When they did finally arrive, the three currently assisting the officer were asked to step back, and Fuery, fully unconscious by that time, was placed on a stretcher and rushed into the ambulance, an automobile a lot like the Colonel's except the back was larger.

As he was driven away, Roy appeared through the crowd of people who had watched the whole event with muttered comments of concern, both for his sake and their own if whoever had done it to him was still around.

"Were you able to-" the alchemist started to ask as he joined his subordinates, but Falman cut him off. Under the grave circumstances, Roy didn't reprimand him for it; it certainly wasn't a common occurrence by any stretch.

"Yes and no, sir. His leg stopped bleeding, but the gunshot wound to his abdomen had not yet. . . He was unconscious when the EMT's finally got here." Roy gave a curt nod as he took in the information, frown tight and jaw clenched.

"Stomach wounds are tricky business." he muttered, more to himself than the others. He had personal experience in that particular area, and both he and Havoc had the gnarly scars to prove it.

Riza wasn't really paying attention, though. Her gaze, while slightly glazed over, had drifted to the trail of blood droplets that went from the apartment and into the alley. Fuery had said he shot Lester as he was getting away, so that blood was definitely his. He had gotten away, though not after causing a great deal of damage. Possibly irreparable. . . That thought made her hands ball up into tight fists as her jaw clenched fiercely.

Riza knelt down and removed her only remaining sidearm from her boot and took off, following the trail down the alley.

She would find where it led. She owed it to her fallen comrade.

Hawkeye suddenly took off down the alley the group stood near. Upon closer inspection, Roy noticed she was following a trail of blood the alchemist knew to not be Fuery's. Falman moved to hurry after her, about to call out to her, when Roy stopped him with an outstretched hand. The confused Warrant Officer looked at his superior to see him give a shake of his head.

"But, sir, Lester Trubit is long gone by now. She won't catch up to him." He was still anxious to follow their female compatriot. Roy only shook his head again.

"No, she won't, but leave her be." he said gravely. After a short pause, though clearly still a little confused, Falman forced his posture to relax, and he accepted the order.

Roy understood what his faithful Lieutenant was feeling. She was blaming herself for what had happened to Fuery, feeling as if she had to catch Trubit personally to avenge him. They wouldn't be able to stop her right now, and the Colonel knew it. Any attempts would probably fall on deaf ears were they even able to catch up to her at this point.

Still focused on the alleyway, Roy said to the Warrant Officer, "For now, I need you to go to the hospital with Fuery, and call the office when you find out anything concerning his condition, current or future." Falman gave a nod and a salute before hurrying off to do as he was told.

Gaze lingering a moment longer after his Lieutenant, Roy let out a sad, helpless sigh before turning back to the building Breda was currently holding alone. As he started to make his way through the crowd, he held a hand to his ear.

"Havoc, how far out is backup?" he asked, ignoring the people around him as they tried to ask him questions he couldn't answer under protocol. Probably best. In his foul mood, Roy probably would have only barked at them to mind their own business anyway.

"They should be there in a few minutes, Chief." Havoc replied. Though, with slight hesitation, he asked, "Is Fuery..."

"No, he's alive." Roy answered the unfinished question quickly, and there was a sigh of relief over the other end. Though, he honestly had no idea how long that would last. "Falman will be at the hospital with him while Brada and I wait for reinforcements."

"What about Hawkeye?" the Second Lt. asked confused, and Roy paused as he finally made it across the street. He resisted the urge to look after her again. She was fine. Physically, at least.

". . .She's clearing her head." he finally answered before entering the building.

Things had truly not gone according to plan, and there were two men responsible for it all.

He would be sure they paid for it.

Riza ran. Through the vacant alleys with only light from the moon to reveal the trail of blood to her, the only sound being that of her footsteps and breathing echoing off the alley walls, she ran. She had gone down five blocks, and the blood droplets were getting farther apart, some even having twenty feet between them.

It wasn't too long before the trail stopped altogether.

Coming to a halt, Riza looked around, firearm raised as if in hopes that she would see her target somewhere, slinking through the shadows of an alley like the coward he was. But, he was nowhere to be seen, and this was just a regular alley cross-section. There was no one direction that looked as though it would have been more appealing to the escaped bomber. They were just alleys.

. . . She had lost him.

Riza's thoughts again focused solely on Fuery as he bled out on the sidewalk, though her thoughts had never fully left him, and her grip tightened on the firearm, a guilty burning behind her eyes as rage boiled in her gut.

Why had she been so careless? Even without seeing the apartment, she could guess what had happened. Lester had likely broken the thin base pipe off the radiator, releasing him from her hastily thought of bonds. He was a large man, and it probably would have been fairly easy, now that she actually thought about it.

Given the time frame between her leaving and then finding the mortally wounded Master Sergeant, Lester had broken free almost the instant she'd left. The Master Sergeant, standing outside, had likely noticed something was amiss in the apartment and hurried over to assist. When he had entered, inadvertently impeding the bomber's escape, the big man had probably jumped him.

Which lead to the tech specialist's current predicament of dying on the way to the hospital. . .

All because she had been careless and hadn't subdued Lester properly.

With a scream of anger and frustration, Riza punched the wall next to her, ignoring the ripples of pain the action sent through her hand as the surface of her knuckles broke upon the wall.

Damn it. . .

. . .

Damn it!

She'd never screwed up this bad, and now a colleague—a friend, even—was dying because of it!

It should have been her in that ambulance instead of him. She should be the one paying for her her mistake, not Fuery!

. . . But he was.

After a few seconds of uselessly trying to calm herself, Riza shoved her weapon into a holster on her waist. Straightening, still trembling from her fury, she then headed back the way she had come.

A couple who passed her on the way were quick to move out of her path, not daring to antagonize the woman who had killing intent rolling off of her in ample waves. If they had known her, though, they would have known that they weren't in danger of any kind of outburst or rage on her part.

Riza's fury was directed toward one particular individual, and that was where it would stay. If it was one thing she had always excelled at, it was focusing on a sole target.

After assisting with rounding up the criminals inside the brothers' former hideout, were they not already by the time she got there, Riza would clear her things from the apartment and leave a note for the Brithe family to spend the night with a neighbor until it could be repaired and cleaned—by the military of course, since it had been damaged during a military operation.

The Lieutenant would then go back to Central Command. She would look for any clues she or her comrades might have missed for not knowing the brothers' actual story. She would find that man: Lester Trubit. If not tonight, then soon. She would put her efforts into nothing else until he was caught, and he would be caught.

She would be sure of it.

I still don't think there's enough Fuery love in the world :)

Note: a field dressing is a special, sterilized bandage used to staunch blood flow from an open, usually severe, wound. Though, a wound that's severe enough can still continue bleeding for up to ten minutes after applied, even with pressure being put on it.