okay, so i have been berated. i've been forgetting spoiler warnings lately, and so now, i'll try to put them on again. ready?

SPOILER WARNING for after Riza's emotional moment. I don't remember what chapter of the manga that was, and that's not too much of a giveaway, right?

but anyway, there it was. beware...and enjoy!

013. Betrayal

"Colonel," she said, turning towards him as he opened the door.

"Hawkeye?" he sounded faintly surprised. "What are you doing here?"

"I—I couldn't tell you at the hospital, but…I—"

"You're not going to apologize again, aren't you?"

She took a deep breath. "I'm so sorry."

"You already told me in there. You didn't have to come here just to say it again."

She shook her head, and he sighed. "Come on in," he said, and was surprised when she shook her head again. "Well, then, I guess I'll come out."

They sat on the porch steps together, and he waited for her to organize her thoughts.

"Well, I apologized as a soldier, sir."

"Hawkeye, at least call me Mustang when we're off duty. Or avoid calling me anything at all." He smiled at her. "We'll both be nameless, huh?"

She smiled back, and both their hearts skipped a beat before they broke the eye contact. That was dangerous territory, they both reminded themselves as they looked away.

"Well, then, if you apologized, there's nothing else to be sorry for," he said after a moment, breaking the only slightly awkward silence.

She shook her head. "I'm apologizing for giving up on you."

"I was supposedly dead. It would take a miracle for you to believe in me when I was dead."

She remained stubborn. "Until I saw your body, I should never have given up on you. I betrayed your life."

"How many different ways can you guilt yourself? You've got it down to an art, I swear."

"Isn't that what you meant in the hospital?"

"No…absolutely not!" He looked at her incredulously. "Even I can't expect you to not believe what your instinct tells you. I might as well have been dead."

She was silent.

He sighed.

"Then what did you want from me?"

"I wanted you to understand that it's your own bloody life!" he exploded. "Don't give up on your own just because I'd lost mine!"

She stared at him. "Then why were you so angry with me?" she whispered.

"Wouldn't you be damn angry with me? What if they told me, oh your lieutenant is dead, would you want me to curl up and say, oh, all right, let me give up and die too."

She suddenly felt foolish. "I—"

He suddenly relaxed. "Hawkeye…"

She waited.

"Don't betray your own self."

She still said nothing.

"I know…I know you would give your own life to make sure I had mine, but there's only so far you can take that. Why the hell would you betray yourself for a dead man? It wouldn't bring him back to life, now would it?"

She sighed. "I suppose not."

He smiled, his voice warm again. "Besides," he said. "Surely you know by now that you'd betray me if you gave up on your own life."

"So you said," she replied.

"No, I mean, if I died…who better to take over my vision than my right-hand woman?"

She blushed suddenly. "You over-estimate me, sir. I can't manipulate people like you can."

"No, but people love you, Hawkeye. It's one of those odd things in life. You're cold as the polar opposite of hell itself, you're stiff as a well made board, but still, people like you."

"Yourself included, sir?"

He chuckled. "Myself included."

She was smiling now too. They both knew that she didn't want to have to save a country from its military. She just wanted to save one man from himself.

"It would be hard..." She looked away from him. "I mean, all i ever do is protect you from death."

"And just as I would expect you to protect me till death while I'm alive, I expect you to live and prosper if I were dead. Anything less would betray my spirit."

"Like you moved on after Hughes' death," she murmured, suddenly finding new respect for her Colonel. To move on, to pretend most days like nothing had happened…she'd never realized how difficult it would have been until today. One blow, and I break apart, she thought.

I have to be stronger for him.

She stood. "Colonel," she said, and smiled at his extended hand. She pulled him up, and they stared awkwardly at each other. The workplace called for a smart salute—there were no regulations for out of duty conduct.

"Well, see you tomorrow," she said, and he nodded, reaching out and taking her hand for the briefest of moments. He felt the warmth of her hands, even through the gloves.

"See you," he said, and she turned and left.

Little idiot, he thought fondly, and went back into his home.

But then so was he. Because as much as he lectured her, if he had been shown her body…he would have broken too. He would have betrayed her, just as she'd betrayed him. It was inevitable, no matter how much he lectured. But if he couldn't tell her he loved her...well...maybe yelling at her was the next best thing. Maybe keeping her alive was all he could do.

Bah...me no likey the ending. Sorry about the longer space between updates. Finals are coming up, which means i have to study between my three jobs and social life. I know, crazy, the concept of me studying. but it happens occasionally :)

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