Emily would love to argue about going to the hospital, but the firemen aren't hearing it, and neither is Will, who looks like he might actually physically pick her up and take her there himself if she doesn't go. She's not really hearing quite right yet, and judging by the way Mustang is responding, he's not doing much better than she is.
Since she can't really talk to anyone without them yelling, she's left replaying the scene in her head. Kimblee's careless, insidious calm. She recognizes that calm, knows it far too well. She knows when she's dealing with a sociopath, and Mustang had definitely not missed the mark there. It makes him more dangerous, more frightening.
Whether or not it makes him more dangerous and more frightening than Mustang remains to be seen. Between the sound of Kimblee's hands coming together in a clap before the first explosion is terrible, but so is the seemingly trivial sound of Mustang snapping, watching fire leap to life, as if it is alive. Watching it chase Kimblee, watching him obviously strain and the fire settle, ease back, become manageable. The forest there had been so dry, it could have been—maybe should have been—a tinderbox, but the firefighters were able to get it under control before they even left.
She wants to talk about it, wants to discuss it. She remembers Reid saying that Mustang's specialty had been fire, but saying he specializes in fire just didn't do justice to what she'd witnessed.
They've chased their share of pyromaniacs over the years. Emily thought she understood how terrifying fire could be. She never imagined she'd close her eyes and see a magically controlled column of flame spring up next to her, the heat hot enough to feel like it should have scalded her, but somehow, it hadn't. It had been like there was some invisible barrier between them and the fire. It had been Kimblee's explosions that had actually been out of control.
The closest hospital is a solid forty minutes in the wrong direction from where they were, but they all go, Will calling Rossi and Reid to fill them in while Seaver drives them to the hospital.
"Is he going to come after us again?" she asks, but she can't hear herself at all, and judging by the way Will winces, she's probably yelling pretty loud.
Either she's loud enough for Mustang to hear her, his hearing isn't as bad off as hers, or he can read her lips, but either way, she doesn't much care. She cares about the fact that when he shakes his head, a band of iron seems to loosen from around her chest.
Okay, she realizes, you are definitely very afraid of Kimblee.
And why wouldn't she be? The man can set off explosions with his bare hands. She saw them before the first explosion, and there hadn't been a thing in his hands, nothing but a flash of black? Maybe a tattoo, but maybe just a marker. She digs in her pocket to pull out a notepad and begins to try and sketch the image she saw.
Mustang's hand closes over hers, the fabric of the glove far rougher, much harsher than she expects, and it makes her skin crawl a little bit. But she stills her hand and meets his eyes. He makes a motion toward her pad and a writing motion with his hand. She's reluctant to give it to him, but she also understands not wanting to yell if he can't really hear.
The sound is coming back, but slowly, garbled, like everything is underwater but accompanied by a high-pitched ringing that's going to make her crazy if it doesn't stop soon.
Shock, she tells herself. No, panic. You need to calm down, ground yourself. Now is not the time to have a panic attack. After everything you've been through, why are you trying to have a panic attack now of all times?
Emily knows, of course. Of course she does. It's because two men had just fought right in front of her with magic, exploding half a street and nearly starting a forest fire with nothing more than their hands. She doesn't know how Elric did it, lived in a world where monsters like this exist.
Then again, from what Mustang and Hughes have said, Elric was one of the monsters. It's hard to imagine it, if she's honest. She's not close to Elric, has only known him for a few months, and he's made exactly zero effort to get into her good graces, which she oddly sort of appreciates, but he's not…
Mustang tugs on her hand, gently, just hard enough to draw her attention back to the pad and pen in her hands. She lets them go as she tries to sort out her thoughts. Why does it feel wrong to put Mustang and Elric in the same boat? Why does it feel wrong to categorize them the same way?
Lost in her thoughts, she startles when the pad reappears under her nose, and in surprisingly ornate handwriting, Mustang wrote, I know what Kimblee's arrays look like. I can reproduce them if you like, but I'd prefer not to. I don't think we gain anything by knowing his arrays. He recognized me. I think that tells us that he remembers enough from my world to remember his arrays.
Emily needs answers and they have a good drive yet. She takes the pad back, flips the page, and writes, What's Elric's specialty? Other than the soul stuff?
Taking the pad back, Mustang looks grave for a moment, then writes, Everything. Ed's a generalist.
That doesn't exactly narrow it down for her, doesn't quite get to the heart of what she's looking for, but the ringing is starting to give her a migraine. Or maybe that's actually a concussion. She really hopes not; concussions suck , and she really doesn't need another complication with this case.
Rubbing her forehead, she asks, How do you decide your specialty?
When Mustang takes it back and reads it, he frowns thoughtfully. He taps the end of the pen against his chin for a moment as he considers his answer. When he hands the notepad back, it says, Interest, mostly. We pursue the areas we find most fascinating or most useful, generally speaking.
Asking about Kimblee right now is probably a waste of time. Besides, she understands his type. For him, the beauty is inherent in the destruction. The destruction is the art. His pre-alchemy days show that clearly enough, with his fascination with explosives. Seeing it in person just solidifies it. But Mustang…
She thought back, trying to remember what she saw of Mustang's face, how he looked instead of what the fire looked like. That's important too.
Kimblee, even in the split-second looks she got, she could see his joy, his fascination, how mesmerized he was by his own power and the destruction it caused. Mustang… Mustang was not like that.
Why fire? she scrawls at the bottom of the page and shoves it at him. She doesn't watch his hands or the notepad as he takes it back, she watches his face. She sees the grimace as he reads her question, sees the borderline disgust at it. Wait—is it at the question itself, or is he grimacing at the answer to that question?
He flips the page and writes in harsher, quicker strokes, hard enough that she's sure if her hearing were working right, she could the pen rake over the paper. He doesn't so much as hand her the notebook back as he does thrust it at her, almost as if he wants it away from him, as if he doesn't want to face the answer. He looks away, looks angry, agitated.
The handwriting is harsher, less ornate, the angles sharper, which is a match for his jerkier movements. The answer, when she reads it, isn't actually much of a surprise. In a list down the center of the page, it reads, Youth. Arrogance. Idiotic idealism.
If bitterness could bleed from the paper, her hands would be covered in it.
It's not only the polar opposite of how Kimblee views his alchemy, his art, it's also probably not at all how Elric feels about his own alchemy. At least, she doesn't think so. She needs to talk to Rossi and ask about Elric's state of mind when they'd first found the array in the barn, how he viewed the alchemy.
Since the whole page is taken up, Emily flips to another one.
How does Elric feel about his alchemy?
The question softens some of the hard lines, eases some of the furrows from his brow. This time, the motions of his writing are softer, almost tender, as if even when answering a question like this about his partner, he can't help but think of him with fondness. She's seen couples like that before—worse, seen the aftermath of couples that were like this when one of them is lost. The tenderness, the love that is writ in their every movement they make, in every word they speak, is a rare and precious thing. Emily can't help but wonder if it had been there the whole time or if maybe her head's just been rattled, but her heart tightens a little bit at it.
It's devotion, plain and simple.
She almost doesn't want to take the notebook back, almost doesn't want to read the answer written there. This is a man giving insight into his most beloved person, sharing a part of them that maybe no one else gets to see, maybe no one else truly understands. It feels almost sacrilegious. She almost rips the page from the pad unread, but she closes her eyes, and a column of fire burns there.
Even if only for her own peace of mind, she needs to understand what boxes these men fit into, what drives them, what makes them the same, and what makes them different. She looks at the page.
Wonder, Awe. Horror. No one understands what alchemy is capable of better than Ed. No one.
The "no one" is underlined three times, but with the exception of those lines, the handwriting is back to the more flowery, ornate script that the first questions were.
The pieces move into place. Kimblee—the self-styled artist. Mustang—the bitter veteran, whose skills were probably far too hard-won to forfeit or to simply forget. And Elric—the genius. Mustang's Reid. The one who holds knowledge that is both great and terrible. Who understands how dangerous the knowledge he holds could be in the wrong hands, but who also still finds beauty and wonder in it because he could never not see knowledge as great, even when it's terrible. Where Mustang is the pragmatist, the one who will do what must be done, Elric is the one who will fight tooth and nail to find another way.
She notices Mustang rubbing his fingers together, almost as if they itch. For a moment, she forgets she can barely hear and ask, "What's wrong?"
Either she said it loud enough or Mustang's hearing is coming back faster than her own because he looks up at her, something hard coming into his eyes, but this time, it doesn't appear defensive. This time it's… resolved. His mouth moves, and she gets the tamber of his voice, but not the words themselves. She motions to her ears and shakes her head. He takes the notepad back and writes something quickly before handing it back.
The further we get from Tucker's array, the more difficult it's getting to access alchemy.
"Wait, are you saying that the closer to the array in the barn you are, the more powerful your alchemy is?" she blurts. Or she means to blurt. Hard to tell when she can't really hear herself, but Mustang nods grimly.
Which meant they were going the wrong way. They needed to get back to the Maes home. Kimblee would almost certainly be going for it.
Mustang took the notepad back, flipping to another clean page. We need to go back now. He's probably on foot, but he'll be going back to the epicenter, back to the array.
Emily grabs it from him and shoves it at Will, saying, "We need to go back. We need to go back now."
He gives her a nearly helpless look, but she jabs at the paper. "You saw what he did! Hughes was right—we need Mustang to help deal with him."
Sighing, Will taps Seaver on the shoulder. She pulls the car over to give him her full attention. Emily can't quite make out their discussion, but she hears Mustang's voice join in the discussion, so his hearing is definitely coming back faster than hers.
Thankfully, it doesn't take much convincing to convince Seaver to turn the SUV around. She puts on noticeable speed and turns on the lights as they go flying back to Nowheresville, Pennsylvania.
Mustang takes the notepad back and writes one more thing on it.
Next time I tell you to shoot—shoot.
Emily nods, whether in agreement or merely acknowledgment, she's not sure. She wants to say it's the latter, but she's afraid that it's really the former.
And how else are you supposed to deal with a walking, talking explosive?
A question that needs to be asked, but not one with an answer she likes.