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It was the woman from before.
The blonde woman in the blue.
She was bleeding too. Just like Fullmetal had been. Just like everybody else. Just standing there in the dust and sand and fires, fires that he knew he'd caused. He tried to tear his eyes off her, squinting into the smoke that made his eyes water, but she followed his gaze and no matter where he looked she was waiting there- just watching him.
He knew this was his fault. The fires were his. He could feel them on his very fingertips- suddenly knew that they were scalded and blistered, each and every one of them, his hands raw with what he'd done. "Help me," he whispered; couldn't even hear it over the screams, didn't know why he was asking for it when he didn't deserve it. "Help me, please." He stared up at the woman, meeting her steady, impassive eyes as she just stood there against the smoke and the flames- and she didn't help him.
"Who am I?" she asked again.
"I don't know, I'm sorry," he half-sobbed. "I don't know-"
"You don't deserve my help. You betrayed me. You betrayed me, like you betrayed everyone." She stopped, watching him still, making no attempt to kneel down to his level. "Who am I?"
He shook his head pathetically, choking on his breaths, staring in rising despair at the scene around him. A ruined street, worn and cracked and scorched, buildings crumbling, ruins splattered with fresh blood. A city... it had once been an entire city, hadn't it? There'd been people here... lives...
children...
He knew this place. He wasn't just here now; he'd been here before. He'd been here when it was still a city and he had been the one to reduce it to bits. He could hear the fires in his ears, over and over again as he blew this place apart- and not just the place, but the people, too. He'd done this, hadn't he? Hadn't he?!
"Yes, you did, Roy," the woman said, and he tore his horrified gaze back to her, chest heaving as she just watched him. "This was you."
He looked on, taking in all of the blood around him, the bodies, the ruins, the death. He looked at what this woman was saying that he had done- and he couldn't prove his own innocence. He didn't remember doing all of this, but he'd been here, hadn't he? He could hear the earth-shattering explosions and blood-curdling screams, as real as the woman in blue and the tattoo on his back; felt himself flinching and crying out with each one, terror coursing through him and panic flooding him with every blow. He jerked and strained, fighting to cover his ears but his arms just wouldn't move no matter how hard he tried; it was like he'd been filled with lead and chained down and now had no choice but to sit here and bear witness to what he'd done- but he didn't want to see it, he didn't-
"Watch," she told him calmly, utterly cold and unreadable, terrifyingly impassive. He screamed and thrashed, throwing himself away from her but he could barely even move and the visions just followed him regardless. The fires, oh god, the fires; they were everywhere, and he was the one who'd set them, hadn't he? All of them were his, and- and- "Watch," the woman commanded again, and he was helpless to do anything but comply.
He watched as his flames burned a country to the ground.
He couldn't deny it any more, if he'd ever been able to in the first place. This was his work. Every last bit of it, committed by his own hand. He watched as streets were seared and cracked under the sheer heat, stones splintering apart to dust. He watched as the approaching army melted before his eyes, a squad of a dozen soldiers blasted to bits with one raise of his hand. He watched, as he slaughtered a nation.
He watched with the woman, as he turned his flames even on the women and children that ran from him for their lives.
"You did this," she told him again, and when he desperately shut his eyes all he could see was the red of the heat even in the darkness. "You did this. You betrayed me." A smokey, indistinct hand grabbed his face and wrenched his eyes open, forcing him to watch again as his fires razed homes, schools, innocents to the ground, and he knew it was his fault.
"Why?" she asked him again, and it hurt all the more that her voice was just a steady, calm murmur, and not the screams that echoed in his own head. "Who am I?"
"I don't KNOW!"
"You do," she told him, not missing even a beat, and her brown eyes felt as if they were boring into his very soul. "Remember, Roy," she commanded softly, and then she was gone- and he'd been left with his fires and no way to stop them from burning the world down, and him with it.
He wasn't sure if he screamed again. His throat hurt like he was, but he couldn't hear it over the overpowering rush of the flames.
"What's my name?"
There other faces. Others that he knew, besides the woman.
When he wasn't surrounded by the storm of the fires, his fires, his murders, the faces that he knew were there instead. Too fast for him to ever recognize them; so many they were nothing more than a nauseating blur, all cold and accusing, a dozen or more that he'd let down as he slaughtered a nation.
Other soldiers who he'd failed and let die; he watched over and over again as the order was given and he'd run as fast as he could, racing towards them faster than he'd ever run in his life, his heart pounding so hard it burned in his chest- but he never reached any of them until it was too late to do anything but watch them die. Scores of soldiers over and over again, and there was nothing he could do to ever save them.
"Your only worth is that of a murderer," he heard, and didn't even know if it was his own words or not.
There were still others, others that he knew, others that he failed. He didn't know any of their names as they paraded on past him, bloodsoaked soldiers who wouldn't so much as turn their heads to look at him. He'd let them all down. He knew it as sure as he knew anything. He'd failed them all, and he had to apologize, but his mouth was dry as ash and every time he tried to find the words he choked on his own blood.
"You're a killer, a murderer, a monster, a monster, a monster"
MONSTER
Fullmetal's face was in there too, sometimes; terrifying and turned away from him like he knew he was a killer. He saw him over and over again; saw him small and bleeding, hunched over in a wheelchair like the very life and soul had been ripped out of him. "Was that me?" he tried to ask, horror brewing in his chest; visions of the children he'd killed flashing and flashing before his eyes, "Did I do that to him?" but it was already gone. He saw the boy on his own two feet- since when, since when did he have both legs, what- but the boy was screaming at him, rage in his eyes, waving an arm about like he wanted to hit him- he'd apologize, he was sorry, Roy swore to god that he was sorry but just didn't know what he'd done-
"You're a murderer," he heard again, and this time saw the speaker; an indistinct shadow again, a dark form with glasses that leaned over him and when he shrank back just moved even closer. "I told you, you have to be a murderer here. You don't have a choice. It's your orders, Major Mustang. Kill them."
He gasped and tried to pull away again, but his arms were pinioned and each and every struggle just made it harder to breathe; panic expanded in his chest and he fought and sobbed but the smoke and flames and the man just wouldn't go. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," he babbled, "I don't want to see this anymore, stop-"
The man said something else; Roy didn't know what, couldn't hear it over the fires. All he saw was him stepping closer again, hands patting all over again, a blanket materializing form nowhere to be pulled over his shoulders. He didn't know why he was so scared but he was, and he tried to yank back again but there was nowhere to go.
The hands reached for his face this time, and this time, Roy lunged out and bit them.
More shouting and screaming, more hands all over him, more voices in his head. His face felt bruised and his body was sore and all he could was screaming as he burned the world alive- and then the man was gone and he tasted blood still in his mouth and there was nothing in the world anymore but the people he'd killed.
He'd killed them all.
This time, when he tried to scream, it felt like it was being shoved back down his own throat.
I'm sorry. I don't want to be here anymore. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry for it all, so please- please just STOP.
He hated all of this and just wanted it over. He couldn't be here anymore; he wanted to take Fullmetal and go home, wherever or whatever that was; he just wanted to take Fullmetal and go home. He couldn't be here anymore; it was too hard, too much, all of it, he was so, so sorry and didn't want to see anymore-
But he'd hurt Fullmetal, hadn't he? He remembered- he'd seen Fullmetal like that, when his limbs had first been taken, he'd seen him, he'd- he'd-
"YOU HURT HIM! YOU DID THIS TO HIM!"
No- No, I didn't, I wouldn't have-
"IT WAS YOU!"
I-
Fullmetal-
He'd done this. He'd done it all.
"IT WAS YOU!"
And no matter how much he tried to scream, beg, howl for the voices to stop, he couldn't say a single word, and the flames continued.
"What's my name?"
I DON'T KNOW!
"What's my name? You know my name."
I DON'T KNOW!
"You betrayed me, Roy. Why did you betray me? What's my name?"
I DON'T KNOW!
It was when he watched his fires burn an innocent village to the ground that it happened.
The woman came back, kneeling by his side as the world around them burned into ash. "Who am I?" she asked quietly again, and Roy had just seen her too many times to give her anything but a pathetic shake of his head and a broken sob.
"You know who I am," she said again, and pointed down to the city again. "Watch."
I can't see this again... I'm sorry... don't make me...
"But you have to watch," she told him, and even he tried to close his eyes he still saw the searing red of the embers scorching down to his soul. "You know what happens, Roy. Part of you remembers. You have to let it happen. Let the part of you that remembers show the rest of you who you really are." She pointed to the burning village again, to the screams, to the children dying, the lives destroyed, and whispered, "Let me show you,", and-
And he just didn't have the strength to stop it anymore.
He watched as the village burned. He watched himself destroy it, flames alight on his hands and burning the world alive. He watched as the earth itself was scorched and as he tore it to pieces, he watched until his eyes bled and his soul had died and there was nothing left in the world but ash.
Please... He looked at the woman, horror suffocating his heart into pieces all over again. Please... no more...
"Watch," she commanded softly, and he did.
And this time, it changed.
The broken, desert floor; the streaked paths his burns had left in its sands- they curved and changed, their flames morphing as they raced across the desert floor. They turned in on each other, burning and burning and burning; there were screams, there was blood, he could smell burning flesh, but this time there was a point; the black, burned sands were forming something, come together to create- something-
"You know," the woman chanted softly, "you know. You know this. Watch, Roy," and as he watched, the fires rushed forwards and he felt their heat gnawing away at his very bones but it was there.
What she wanted him to see. It was there.
There in the sands, the desert that he'd burned to the ground, there were burns that he'd created from others flesh and blood now twisted together into something that he knew. A black circle, black triangles within, a scorched, bleeding salamander, and in it he could hear screams and taste burning flesh and it was- an array, he realized. Just like the array inked onto his and Fullmetal's backs. It was an array.
"It's your array," she told him quietly- and then she was there, standing in his array, watching him, burning. "This is your array, Roy. Do you remember it? Do you remember me?"
I... no, I... I'm sorry...
But she just went on in that same soft, quiet voice, the one without accusation or blame, the one that would've been easier to hear if she'd been screaming it at him. "Why did you burn me, Roy?" she asked him, and turned her back, the faded blue of her clothes vanishing, and-
Oh. Oh god. On her back, that was-
That was his array. Inked into her just like what had been inked into him and Ed. Huge and bleeding and wrong, and it was his array- he'd put it there, hadn't he? He'd done that to her, he'd hurt her-
"Why did you burn me, Roy?" she asked, and the array burst into flames.
His flames.
NO! NO! STOP! He tried to reach forward, tried to will them to stop, tried to tell his brain to just stop showing him this but the flames roared higher and hotter; he could feel her skin blistering from here, hear her crying, no please stop showing this to me stop stop stop please I'm sorry he watched her skin melt and slough and burn and he screamed and she sobbed and he couldn't stop it, it was all his fault, he couldn't stop it-
"Why did you burn me, Roy? Why did you betray me? Why? Why?!"
Then there were others; the form with the glasses again, a fist swinging to crack into his jaw, hand fisting in his shirt, shouting in his face. "How could you?! How could you do this to her?! She was your friend, you- you were supposed to fall in love with her, Roy, how could you hurt her like this?!" and he heard her sobbing again and he just wanted it to stop.
I'm sorry! I'M SORRY!
I'M SO SORRY!
Please... stop...
"WHAT'S MY NAME?!" she screamed, and burning skin and still blistering tattoo and all, she was on him.
"What's my name?! What's my name, Roy?! What's my name?!"
"I don't know-" he tried to say but the words came out all wrong and mushed; he couldn't even understand himself, it was pathetic, it was all lies, it couldn't stop her as she pushed him down and clawed at his face and neck, scratching deep bleeding furrows into his skin as her back burned and she screamed the words at him over and over again, demanding, demanding, demanding an answer.
"What's my name? Why did you burn me?! Why'd you betray me?! What's my name?!"
I'm sorry! I'm SORRY! I DON'T KNOW!
"WHAT'S MY NAME?!" she screamed again, and it was too loud, everything was too loud; fires roaring behind them, Ishval burning to the ground, Fullmetal shouting in pain, the soldiers he'd let die calling his name, a bird screaming, a hawk screaming, "What's my name, what's my name?!" and her hands were on him again, scratching up his face, dripping, bleeding fingertips reaching for his eye, it hurt, "WHAT'S MY NAME?!" the hawk was screaming, her hands reaching to gouge out his eyes "YOU KNOW MY NAME! SAY IT, ROY, SAY IT-"
"HAWKEYE!"
Everything stopped.
"Riza Hawkeye."
The name echoed in his mind over and over again. Blood dripped, he could still hear the faint sizzle of her skin that he'd caused, but the fires had stopped and she remained frozen now, just kneeling over him with her hands on his face, and just like that, he knew.
He knew with every fiber of his being that this was Riza Hawkeye.
"Riza Hawkeye. Riza Hawkeye, Riza Hawkeye, Riza Hawkeye."
And, for the first time since he had ever known her, Riza Hawkeye smiled.
"Yes, Roy," she told him. "Remember that."
Then, at last, she vanished.
But the memory of her didn't, and Roy clung to that with absolutely everything that he was worth.
Riza Hawkeye. Riza Hawkeye. Riza Hawkeye.
He didn't have anything else, anymore. These people had taken absolutely everything that he'd ever had away from him- but now, he had two things back.
Fullmetal, and Riza Hawkeye.
When Roy finally found himself again, his head was still swimming, and his body ached so much he felt like one giant bruise.
He blinked slowly, vision gently filtering down from a blurry haze into something that made sense. White, he realized. He was looking at something white. He was lying on something soft.
Still a little too out of it to grasp much else of what was going on around him, he groaned, an exhausted, dry, croaking groan in his dry mouth and sore throat. He felt too tired to sit up just yet but started to roll onto his side, trying to alleviate some of the pain in his back and shoulders.
Then, he stiffened.
Slowly, he looked down at himself.
He stiffened again.
This was...
Ah, he realized distantly, an embarrassed sort of heat touching his face, and lay his head back down on the soft, padded floor.
Ah.
So this was what they'd done to Ed.
Suddenly, the shaken, terrified mumbles of white and j-j-jacket made complete sense to him.
After another moment, Roy squirmed around a little again, trying to make more sense of what he remembered and where he was now. The restraints were impossibly tight; he could feel the straps and buckles biting into him with each movement, and even as his face turned red with embarrassment again he shook his head at himself, trying to understand what had happened. There was a blanket, too, not really around him, tangled up by his feet somewhere but still a blanket, one that he even half-remembered being given...
But in that case, how much of what he'd seen had actually been... real?
Roy swallowed, his panic rising.
He didn't remember what he'd done to deserve this. To end up locked in this room. He couldn't... because all of this haze in his memories now- the fires, the woman, the people he'd... hurt... He shook his head vigorously, trembling. No, none of that was now, right? No- no, surely he'd- done something to deserve such drastic measures- he shifted his arms a little again in the restraining jacket, equal parts nervousness and humiliation washing through him- but he just... couldn't remember...
He started to open his mouth, hoping to call out to someone that he was awake. Someone who could just tell him what had happened to him.
He stopped again.
His mouth...
He felt around with his tongue for a second, then moved his jaw a little bit. Horror and embarrassment swept through him again.
There was something in his mouth stopping him from biting down. Stopping him from even talking. Something hard and plastic and cold, and it took a moment or two to shove his gag reflex back as he tried to spit the foreign object out, but to no avail.
They'd shoved something in his mouth to stop him from biting.
This time, it took him more than several seconds to calm his gag reflex down, and a truly herculean effort to stop himself from panicking.
Slowly, fighting to keep calm, he looked around the room he'd found himself in again, trying to orient himself and stop the anxiety attack he could already feel coming on. There was clearly no way out. He was pretty sure he could get to his feet and walk, but it didn't matter; looking over to what he thought was the door into his little padded cell, there was not even a knob for him to grab if his hands had been free. There was no way to open it from this side. And unlike his usual hospital room, which, barred or not, still had windows, there was absolutely nothing of the sort here. There was no way out, and with that thing in his mouth, he didn't even have the recourse to scream for help.
Which meant, he tried very hard to stress to himself, that someone would have to be along to check on him very soon. After all, they didn't want to kill him, right? This was an awful lot of trouble to go to to kill someone. No- someone would have to come in here very soon, and when they saw he was conscious and coherent again- like, evidently, he had not been for a while- then everything would be okay. Right? After all, if he was right about this having been what they'd put Ed through- that hadn't been meant to be permanent, obviously. They'd let Ed out of here. They'd have to let him out of here, too.
They... they had to.
As hard as he tried to convince himself of it, though, panic still beat in his chest, and it took every bit of self-control he had to stop himself from losing it.
Riza Hawkeye. Riza Hawkeye. Riza Hawkeye.