Eleven Years Earlier

Roy Mustang was crouched on the stairs of his aunt's bar, poking a line of ants with a stick. The streets of Central were busy that morning, and he watched idly as people hurried from place to place.

His aunt had banished him to the front porch after telling the boy he needed some fresh air. The boy had confined himself to his room ever since he had come to stay with the woman, and she had quite frankly had enough.

"Stop moping around and go out and enjoy this nice day!" She had told him. "It's time you went and met some other children in the neighbor hood!"

She had said it so fiercely Roy had been unable to object, despite how badly he didn't want to go out. He wanted to go back inside and sleep, or stare at his bedroom wall for all he cared. Instead he was out here with a tiny army of insects who were now swerving to avoid his stick.

A small group of children stared at Roy from across the street, quietly whispering among themselves.

"So he's the boy?"

"Uh huh, he lives with that old Madame who run's the bar."

"He looks so sad."

"Well you'd be sad too, wouldn't you?"

"Yeah…poor guy…"

Roy could hear them whispering about him, but concentrated instead on squishing the ants into oblivion. It didn't bother Roy that they were talking about him. There were much better things to be upset about.

In the last two weeks the boy's life had taken a rather terrible turn, and all he had wanted was for the nightmare to slowly disintegrate. To just fade away and leave him empty. There was a dark feeling inside of Roy that he couldn't even begin to understand. But he didn't want to understand it. He just wanted it gone, out of his life forever, never to haunt him again. So he had closed himself off, and kept his mind blank and cold. In Roy's own reasoning, if he didn't think he, wouldn't feel, and that was the best healing that could be offered.

The group of children had now lost interest in Roy and ran down the street kicking a ball and squealing with delight.

Roy stared at the ants, and watched as he crushed each one individually. They would squirm a little, and then curl up with a final shutter. Roy's dark eyes narrowed.

"That's not a very nice thing to do." Roy's stick halted, and the little boy looked up. Standing there was a very tiny girl; with blonde hair cut so short she resembled a boy. She blinked at Roy and knelt down beside him. "You should be nicer to the aunts." She said, "They're not hurting you, they're just minding their own business." Roy glanced at her with a pair of dark eyes.

"It's not like anyone wants to die." He muttered. The girl stared at him blankly, then at the ants, then back at Roy.

"I heard what those other kids were saying, I'm sorry."

"Why are you sorry?" Roy asked, his irritation growing. "It's not like you had anything to do with it."

"Well neither did the ants." The girl said with a very big huff. "You should be nicer to them. You could protect them if you wanted to."

Roy pouted. "Quit bugging me," he said.

She crossed her arms and glared at him, before sticking her nose in the air and marching off. Roy stuck his tongue out at her as she left, and she returned the gesture.

Roy turned and glared at the ants. A few of them had lifted up the bodies of their fellow comrades and were now carrying them towards their anthill. Roy glared.

"You could protect them if you wanted to…"

Roy closed his eyes and grumbled angrily, before throwing the stick into a bush and getting up to go back inside. He glanced at the anthill one more time, before walking inside and slamming the door behind him.

Roy slowly opened his eyes, trying to collect his bearings.

"Did I fall asleep again?" he said groggily, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He gazed around the Hawkeye's living room and stared at the alchemy notes that were below him. As he woke up more, the contents of his dream became clearer.

"I see," he said. "That was the day I met her…"

The day after the ant event, Madame Christmas went outside to retrieve the paper. To her surprise, she noticed something on the porch that hadn't been there before. A large paper sign had been taped to the lower half of the building, it read, "Ants, Do Not Step!" in big bold letters. The handwriting was very messy, mostly due to the fact it was written in crayon. The word "Step" had also been spelled incorrectly.

Madame Christmas smirked a little at that, already guessing where the sign had come from. She collected the paper, and went back inside, leaving a small chunk of her morning bagel by the anthill.

I liked this one, even though I know it's a little cliche. I didn't mean to go all Fruits Basket on you guys but I felt I needed a little bit of Chibi Roy and Riza.

Read and Review please, I need to know I'm doing well.