Part Six: Off the Field

Thankfully a medic made it to the truck. He managed to inject the badly wounded with morphine. I refused it when he offered, my body had already released it's own endorphins. We weren't 10 minutes out of the station. I would be going home soon. Nobody would send one wounded as badly as I was back into the fray. I did my duty. Yet what had I really accomplished? If anything I only cost the life of a medic, the one who dashed towards me on the Lieutenant's order. Maybe the Lieutenant himself would have survived, or our raid even canceled if I had been killed back on Bismallah Street the day before. Had I caused the deaths of a hundred of our men? How many Ishbali militiamen had my deeds killed? What had I done? The law of equivalent trade. I wouldn't be let off so easily. They were all dead, their blood on my hands. I had to go back. I had to go back and try to make up for what I did. What I failed to prevent. I remembered telling Leoni about the brotherhood of war. "We few, we happy few, we band of brothers, for he who sheds his blood with me today shall never be vile." He had asked me what vile meant. I now knew. I knew the meaning of the word as I knew my own name. The man who wrote those lines, he was no warrior. He had never seen the blood, the suffering. The lack of glory. There was nothing glorious about what I had seen, about what I had done. Perhaps some of the acts I had beheld were brave, but they were far from glorious. I had lost a lot of blood, and the medic was busy tending to those more seriously wounded than I. I fell into unconsciousness for the third time.

I woke up in the field hospital at the station again. Only this time, days had come and gone. The beds around me and filled, and emptied, and filled again. Men had come and gone, the battle had raged regardless. Hanley's guns had arrived and the tunnels had been made short work of. Entire blocks had been decimated. A second division had been committed, and our trucks patrolled the streets unhindered. An enemy sniper was met with a platoon. An enemy platoon met with a company. A company met with a brigade. A mortar shell met with a forty-five minute barrage from the heavy 152mm guns. The foothold so dearly needed had been taken. Taken at a great cost, but taken nonetheless. I glanced towards my once severed arm, and found it replaced with fine automail. I tried to move it, but once again I found myself heavily sedated. My neurons were turned off below the neck. I quickly drifted back to sleep.

The next time I awoke I found myself in a private room. My bed had obviously been moved and my body seemed to be working again. I lifted my new arm in front of my face and inspected it. It was made from hard steel, precisely machined. I still felt weak from the loss of blood. Everything was still sinking in. I hadn't yet fully grasped that my arm was missing and replaced with a machine. My new arm moved without conscious thought. It felt as if nothing had changed. My mind was under such stress and trauma from everything that had happened my current state was almost a void. The door opened slowly and a pair of individuals I had never seen before entered.

"Sergeant Taybor, you're awake! We've been waiting for quite some time." Spoke the older of the two. My name is Marco. Doctor Marco. I'm here representing the state. This is Roy Mustang." Mustang nodded to me. I said nothing. "How does your new arm feel?" Marco asked.

"Fine sir, I have to admit everything is still sinking in." I held up the arm as I replied.

"It will likely take some getting used to. You've been through a lot, but if you don't mind, I'd like to ask you a few questions." Marco sat on the end of my bed. Before I could answer, Mustang spoke up.

"I have some things to attend to Sergeant Taybor. I will return to speak with you if necessary. Please take care." Mustang strode out of the room and quietly shut the door.

"Please excuse him, he really does wish to speak with you. His questions may be more demanding on your psychological being. He will need you in tip top shape." The doctor spoke in a patronizing way. "I'm mostly concerned with your physical being." He motioned towards my new arm. "It's a new model, it should feel completely natural."

"It feels cold, but other than that I feel little difference." I twisted my new fingers around.

"Your muscle was completely severed. Nothing could be done. You never would have recovered." The doctor seemed as if he was trying to justify his decision.

"What about the others? The convoy?" I already knew the answer, but there was a chance the Lieutenant had survived. Hidden his wounded body with the dead. Waited for the relief column.

"By the time relief showed up, the bodies had been taken away. It took hours for division to break through. If you want information on the actual order of battle, you'll have to ask Mustang." He turned away. "I'll be back to check on you in a couple of hours. You should be well enough to walk by tomorrow. You'll be going back to the line the day after at the latest." The expression on my face drove him from the room. He left quietly, yet he smiled as he closed the door. It was a sincere smile.

Hours passed. Lunch was brought to me, yet I ate little. The IV running into my left arm would nourish me. I thought about many things, and realized up until this point, I had thought little of the enemy. I hadn't cast any hate on them. Maybe I had realized that we were in the wrong. We were fighting for ideals, and they were fighting for their way of life. They would charge head first into 20mm cannons. Into an army of highly trained professional soldiers with the best equipment. I rolled over in my uncomfortable bed. Sleep would not come to me this time. Again, the drugs had worn off and I was left to fend for my own psychological being. I could hear our artillery pounding away. They had been firing for days; the barrels would have been replaced several times. We came here as peacekeepers, and now our guns were targeting this holy city without any inhibition. Women, children, the elderly. It was no longer their concern.