Notes: Uh, this chapter contains a bit of scatalogical humor. So, uh, yeah. I apologize for, um - worsening the human condition, I guess? It does have a point, at the very least. So, it's just there, and it's just gross, but it's not completely gratuitous.

January 19, 1907

8:43 A.M.

"What is it that we're looking for?" Roy asked, having finally worked up the courage.

"I can't tell you," Marcoh said, raising a flask of milky white liquid to the thrumming fluorescent light.

Roy looked up from his clipboard, up from his pen, to frown at the Doctor. "You can't tell me."

"I cannot," he said softly, distractedly, swirling the glass above him.

"Well. This is going to go well," Roy muttered to himself. Then louder: "Why pick me, then, sir? If I don't know what we're researching, then I'm no better than – well, someone literate, I guess, and intelligent enough to make decent observations, but – I'm not of any more use to you than a secretary would be. A lab technician." He didn't add that while staring down vials labeled simply, esoterically, with letter-number combinations was surely fascinating, it certainly wasn't going to help him pass the examination.

"Zee-nine-oh-four-hyphen-six evidencing a minimal precipitate," Marcoh said, setting down the flask once again. Roy took down the note, but resentfully. "It's classified information, Captain," he said. "I'm trying my damnedest to get you clearance. Am I not going fast enough?"

Roy realized, guiltily, that he'd offended Marcoh. "I'm sorry," he said.

Marcoh paused a moment, then turned to Roy with a surprisingly gentle smile. "I have to confess, I'm getting fed up already with the politics of this place," he confided. "I thought I'd be well-rested after my two months' leave in Central, but – already I just want to punch Colonel Gran in the face. Which wouldn't be an advisable course of action."

"Because he's the Iron Blood Alchemist?"

Marcoh grunted agreement. "And a punch to the face would probably do more damage to my fist than his face." He smiled, and Roy laughed. But then the smile faded, and the Doctor's brows drew together.

"You know that nothing I tell you is to be repeated, right?" Marcoh asked.

"Sure," Roy said.

"Even over the phone. Especially over the phone."

"Right." Roy looked at the Doctor, who had seemed particularly brisk that morning – had he, last night, let something slip? "Why?"

"No reason," the Doctor said. Roy wasn't sure if the man was being coy, or if there truly were no reason. It would be dumb to pursue it, so he shrugged and moved onto something that had been bothering him since the previous evening.

"Doctor?" Roy asked. Marcoh moved onto the next flask and grunted to indicate that he was listening. "Just out of curiosity, what's the name of Colonel Gran's apprentice?"

Marcoh paused. "Why?" he asked warily. "You didn't run into him, did you?"

"I, uh – " Roy cleared his throat. "I think he might be my roommate."

The Doctor's hand dropped heavily onto the counter. "That's not possible."

"It's, uh – is it Zolf Jork Kimbley? Is that his name?"

"That's not – yes, it's his name, but – I distinctly requested that you be put with Markee. I distinctly..." Marcoh stood there unspeaking for a moment, then deliberately slammed his fist down on the countertop. The glassware clanked. Then a few deliberate breaths and a quiet, "I'm sorry."

"It's okay," Roy said, covering his alarm with a shrug. "I mean, he threatened to castrate me, and he's challenged my sexual orientation once or twice, but he hasn't hit me, or anything, and he's not going to be a bad influence on me, because he's not going to be an influence on me, so no harm done."

"It's more than that, Captain," Marcoh said, rubbing at the side of his hand gingerly. "Whoever put you with him did it for a reason, and that's what worries me. And they would have to be higher-ranking than me...It must have been Gran. Hakuro wouldn't have done it. It must have been Gran." He sank down onto a nearby stool. "Now I really want to punch him in the face." Marcoh looked up, his craggy face apologetic. "I should have been able to prevent this. I'm sorry."

"It's nothing," Roy said, even though it was far from nothing. "Besides, even if it weren't me, it'd be someone else. And I'd like to think that I'm less prone to being traumatized than the average person."

"Right," Marcoh said, and lifted the next vial to the light.

4:54 P.M.

"Wait one moment, Captain," Marcoh said. Roy turned back to the Doctor as he pulled toward himself a large pile of papers. "Do you know any statistics?"

"Some," Roy said.

"Is that some, none, or some, a lot?"

"Some, some."

"Good," Marcoh said, and pulled an enormous, heavy book from behind the pile. "Read this by next week."

5:57 P.M.

"Well, hey there, Captain," Havoc said, walking up with a tray in his hands and a following of three. "Mind if we sit?"

Roy attempted to choke down his mouthful of coffee in time to respond without seeming rude. Fortunately, Havoc saved him from worrying about any breach in decorum by committing a larger one himself, and sat.

"Let me introduce the troops," Havoc said. "This is Private First Class Richard Riggs – " A hugely tall, almost skeletal man nodded from behind a tray piled high with food. "Private Last Class Heymans Breda – " A portly, bored-looking man bit into a roll, but acknowledged Roy with a flicker of his eyes. "And Private First Class Helmut Mantel."

"I'm a Corporal, you ass," Mantel, who had a small plate of potatoes and four glasses of water, retorted.

"Corporal, Corporal. I'm sorry. I keep forgetting that you're the same rank as me, being that you're so vastly inferior in – well – everything." Havoc grinned at Roy; the joke was clearly meant to put him at his ease, so he laughed. "And this here is Captain Roy Mustang. He's an alchemist."

"You're not a Major?" Breda asked from around a mouthful of food. "I thought that all the alchemists are Majors."

"There's a test that you have to take to become a State Alchemist – " Roy explained uncomfortably.

"Failed it?" Breda asked. The tone was commiserating rather than offensive, so Roy took no offense.

"Oh, no, I didn't even get that far," Roy joked tentatively. It didn't get a great reaction, but – chuckles. That was something. "I was, uh, in school, up until recently – a sort of officer's school for would-be alchemists."

"The Snot Factory!" Riggs laughed.

"We heard of the program," Havoc explained with a grin. "Gave it a bit of a name."

"It fits," Roy assured him. "Kids there were enormous asses. Enormous. Huge egos. Huger senses of entitlement."

"Explains a lot of what we've been seeing," Breda said.

"Don't eat this," Havoc said, leaning forward suddenly and picking a stringy vegetable from Roy's plate. "Give you the shits."

Roy set down his mug and plucked it back from him. "How do you know that's not what I'm going for?"

That got a couple of snickers, as fecal humor usually did. Still, Havoc was ready: "'Cause that's not what you get here, Captain, sir. This is a town where you have to wipe your nose, not blow it. You get anything, you get the runs."

Roy was half a breath away from reminding him that he smoked – then remembered Havoc's request the previous night that he keep it to himself, and sat back and closed his mouth. Havoc watched him a moment, then sat back himself and smiled a contented, casual smile. "Says the guy who smokes, of course," Havoc laughed. "Nothing'll loosen up the bowels like a cigarette."

"Except coffee," Roy said, raising his mug.

"Except coffee," Havoc agreed.

"And salad."

Breda laughed. "Closest you'll get to a salad out here's a handful of leaves."

"If you can even find that," Mantel said. "Actually be pretty impressed if you could."

"What, haven't you been down by the river?" Riggs asked.

"Of course you would know where to find 'em," Mantel groaned.

"No, really. Assload of trees growing there."

"Riggs is very passionate about nature," Breda explained with a broad eye-roll.

"We're going down there tomorrow," Riggs declared. "You're gonna get rid of all your stereotypes about what can grow in the desert, and – "

"I'm sorry," Mantel said. "I'm really, really sorry. I didn't mean to offend you."

"No. You're not getting out of it now."

"I'm allergic to nature, Rickie."

"I'll bring the tissues," Riggs replied. "That all right, Havoc?"

"Sure," Havoc said. He looked at Roy. "You got tomorrow off, right, Captain? Wanna come with?"

Roy shook his head. "Marcoh gave me a textbook to read. Enormous. You could brain a moose with it."

"A moose?" Riggs repeated skeptically.

"Not a moose. They don't have moose here. A goat, perhaps?"

"That is a hilarious image," Havoc said, then made a sort of "Baaaaaa-argh" sound.

"Splat," Breda offered in supplement.

"Terrible," Riggs declared, but even he was amused. "The goat is a noble creature, you know. Unmatched in its jumping ability."

"Ah," Roy said. "So then, it's 'Sproing sproing sproing baaaa-argh splat'?" It was rather intoxicating, he reflected a moment later, to have made everyone at the table laugh. Even if goat-punching wasn't precisely the highest form of humor.

"No, seriously, Captain," Havoc said once he'd recovered, "you gotta come with tomorrow. It'll be awesome. Not gonna find better company than this."

Roy grinned. "Or at least not better company that'll let me in theirs."

"This is a funny one," Mantel said. "Witty."

Roy fluttered his eyelashes in response – but then Kimbley walked by, tray in hand, and Roy hunched down a little to avoid being seen by him. That caught Havoc's attention, and he turned around in his seat to look at Kimbley, who was going over to sit at an empty table.

"Holy crap," Havoc said, turning back to the group. "Who is that guy? Gotta have some pretty serious balls to walk around with his uniform looking like that when Colonel Gran's on the prowl."

"That's Gran's protégé," Roy said. A few of the others responded with quiet "Ahhh"s. "He's also my roommate," he admitted.

"I'm glad you guys have to put up with roommates, too," Breda said. "That makes me feel better."

"You wanna invite him over?" Havoc asked.

Roy considered him. He was sitting alone, and – no. He'd probably say something crazy and scare off anyone normal. Besides, wasn't like Kimbley'd done anything nice for him, right? "God, no," Roy said, feeling somehow vaguely dirty as he said it. "Man's a fucking psychopath."