OUR LIVES, CHAPTER 39: THE MUSTANG AND THE ICE QUEEN

BY The Binary Alchemist 2014

Edward swung in though his office door, puddles of spilled coffee in his wake. He had a pastry shoved in his mouth and he was gesticulating wildly as he skidded to a halt in front of his secretary's desk. "Mwhr zz mhuh reefcaz?"

"Beside your desk, sir." Collins, already on the phone, was scribbling something into Edward's appointment book.

Ed swallowed, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. Darting around his desk, he found his battered briefcase neatly closed for once, and all his papers organized inside. "How the hell did you know what I was asking for? Ed demanded.

"I speak fluent coffee, sir." He turned back to the receiver. "Yes, ma'am. The grant for your son was approved this morning after his transcripts were reviewed. I've sent a packet with information about housing and the school catalog to your home, and once you've confirmed your account information with us we will directly deposit his first grant payment into it six weeks before the beginning of the fall term."

"Which grant is that?" Ed looked mystified.

"Jordan Lane. The boy you met on the train coming to East City when you were returning from the Eastern Kingdoms. You gave his mother our number and asked her to apply for a Beacon Scholarship to the Academy. "

That had been months ago, before the wedding and the book scandal and Roy's birthday. Now, with the Ishballan War Crimes trial beginning tomorrow morning, Jordie Lane's future had been the last thing on his mind. "Oh, shit. I forgot."

"Captain Elric," Collins replied, referring to Al's honorary title as an Aeronaut, "was able to review and approve it. He knows you have a lot on your mind. I've gotten all the paperwork processed and all we have to do is post the check to the boy's student account and arrange his train fare before term.

Ed whistled. "Fuck, you're efficient!"

"Thank you, sir."

He hardly recognized his office, now that his nemesis, Ruby, was gone. Every surface gleamed with polish, every speck of dust had been chased away. The long dead potted plants that Ruby used to pour her leftover tea into had been replaced with some handsome ferns, and there were no cigarette ashes in the carpet. There were urns of fresh coffee and tea on the sideboard and an old oak ice box had been refinished and moved to Ed's lair, filled with fresh fruit, cheeses and plenty of soft drinks and even a few beers. Ed's coffee mug was no longer crusty. The files on his desk were all organized and notated and his appointment book was updated hourly. Even the fish in Al's aquarium were healthy and fed and for once, none of them were floating.

After taking it all in, Ed walked over and slapped Collins on the shoulder. "You officially have my permission to marry my son. Maybe he won't keep losing his socks and keys."

The younger man flushed and smiled modestly. "We have mutually agreed to a long engagement."

"Well," Ed grinned, when and if you two decide to make it official, just let me know. And…"Ed drew a deep breath, "I'll handle Winry. About the…you know. Ah…" he ruffled his fringe, trying to grasp the right word. "Um…the…kids…thing. Not like her brood isn't gonna make her a grandmom. And…hey…who knows? Nina could…maybe she—" Ed shrugged awkwardly.

"We appreciate that, Professor." For a moment, the formal, polished demeanor vanished and Edward could see the genuine warmth in those blue-green eyes. He loves my boy. My boy loves him. I'm sorry Maes will never hold a son of his own, but if he's happy….

Clearing his throat, Ed spun on his heels and snapped on the radio, which was safely out of harm's way on top of the handsome ice box. "With Ruby gone, at least we won't have to listen to that goddamned Midday Amestris. I swear, if I hear the name Donal Samuelson today, I'm gonna puke up my doughnut-what the hell?"

Fiddling with the dial, Edward turned up the volume. A surprisingly warm and throaty voice filled the office, one which Ed could not reconcile with the breathy, baby-voiced tones the singer used in the presence of the press and men she was trying to seduce…

We wanted to be soldiers—we were hardly more than kids

We believed in Fuhrer Bradley—we believed in what we did

Then that cursed war in Ishbal opened up our dreaming eyes

In that senseless, mindless carnage, far more than our dreams died

From wounds within and wounds without I 've watched you break and bleed

I know what you want to do, Roy—and I know what you'll need

An interviewer's voice over the lyrics. "This is quite a departure from your other recordings, Miss Turlough. Is your musical career taking off in a new direction with 'What You Need'?"

The baby voice through the speaker sounded as if it had grown up a little. Still breathy—still made you feel like she was about to stick her tongue in your ear, but with an edge that made Ed suspect that the spoiled starlet had finally started to care about something other than her poilished pink nails and the size of a man's dick. "I like to think that, Eleanor," Gladys replied. "I was there at the wedding when the President was shot, and the whole thing got me thinking that life, ya know, is short. Maybe if we get a chance, we can do some good before we go. I got to know the President's family and heard about Mistah Hughes from his wife…and I thought, ya know…what would he have said to Mistah Mustang when they were kids in the war, ya know? So I—"

"Gladys Turlough." Edward's mouth arched up in a grin that was completely devoid of sarcasm. "Collins, next time I see her, remind me to kiss that woman."

"I'll pencil it in, Professor." Ed couldn't see Collin's smile. "Tongue or no tongue?"

"Aw, get fucked!"

David Collins glanced up at his future father in law, looking blandly innocent. "I'll pencil that in, too, sir. Exactly how long is my lunch break?"

###

Roy Mustang still had the chessboard General Grumman had given him before Roy was promoted, chose his personal team and transferred from Eastern Command to Central HQ.

Heymans Breda. Kain Furey. Vato Falman. Jean Havoc. Riza Hawkeye Havoc. Like chessmen he had moved them, risked them, nearly lost them…but they had never let him down. To the last they supported Roy in his vision of revolution and renewal—and democracy.

It had taken the lion's share of his life so far to make it happen. In a handful of days they would all stand together again in the halls of the Amestrian Parliament to answer for the crimes they committed out of ignorance.

Genocide. That was the word that Donal Samuelson was bleating over the radio.

Genocide. A best seller by a hack celebrity biographer and a disgruntled old newsman named Frank Archer had left a nation shocked and sickened by the handiwork of Roy Mustang and the State Alchemists during the Siege of Dahlia in Ishbal.

On every news broadcast, on every editorial page came the heated debate: Should the nation of Amestris be led by a mass murderer, no matter how much he had done to try to make restitution to the Ishballan people?

Words like 'impeachment' were spoken aloud. Words like 'imprisonment' and even 'execution for war crimes' were whispered in the shadows of the halls of power. Many of the officers and even a few of Roy's cabinet had made contingency plans for laying low or getting to safety if Roy's ship of state was scuttled and sank into oblivion.

For absolute certain, his Five Chessmen had not—and would not—desert Roy Mustang on the day of reckoning. And to those five alone—and to Edward and Alphonse—Roy had revealed last night his own contingency plans for the future.

Five Chessmen in reserve, to carry on the dream if he failed…

One by one, he showed his trusted allies and his husband the carved figures, laying each piece upon the black and white playing field, naming them aloud at last.

"Maes Urey Elric. Nina Mustang Elric."

The King and Queen of this new game—odd how they seemed to reverse roles over and over again. Did it matter, really? His daughter was always fond of saying that sometimes the best man for the job was a woman. Maes? He couldn't care less as long as he was making a difference. Only Maes could have freed a damaged mind like Selim Bradley's from its prison of trauma, bringing him carefully into recognizance without destroying the young man any further. Nina had the logic. Maes had the heart, and Roy would not have changed either of them for the world.

"His Royal Highness, Prince Ma Sheng Yao of Xing."

His Bishop….Roy found him on a state visit ten years ago. In fact, there had been no certainty of which side of the board the boy would choose to stand until now. He had the intellect, the steady mind and, to Roy's great relief, he had already made of his mind that serving others as a physician and alchemist was more important that the vague possibility of sitting on the Chrysanthemum Throne of his father's empire. Like the chess piece Roy assigned to him in his personal game, everybody tended to underestimate the bishop's power until he moved…

"Agathe Helena Petrovna Lobachevsky."

His Rook had been under his eyes for years. Like her chess piece, she had been blocked, unable to move, for so long. Now, like a horse given its head in a race, she was not to be stopped. Like Roy himself, she had an uncanny sense of managing people—only his rook did this through love and a few blunt words of common sense. In years to come, he strongly suspected, she would learn from Hawkeye how to keep him from procrastinating.

"David Collins."

The Knight was rightly named for the chessman who could literally jump over obstacles. He had defended the king and queen with his life fifteen years ago, when he was an illiterate, filthy alley rat with a whore for a mother and a father sick from drug addiction. A petty thief, mocked by the other alley rats as 'Dogshit Davy'. Roy had perceived the worth in the child, and was gratified with dramatic transformation of David Collins into a young man of polish, discretion and initiative.

And then there was the Pawn. "Katherine Creighton."

There was no knowing where the Pawn was moving on the board...and if anyone knew, they sure as hell weren't talking.

"And there you have it." Roy spread his hands in a gesture that implied that there was nothing more to say.

"Except," Havoc added with a determined grin, "that we'll all be goddamned if this is your Endgame, Chief."

"Might want to put those new pieces back in the box for a while, Sir," Breda seconded.

"Good strategy, Mr. President. However, considering the strength of your defense I think it might be advisable-"

"You're being too literal again, Falman," Hawkeye observed.

"Sorry, Ma'am."

"You've always had our backs, Sir," Kain assured his commander. "You know we've got yours."

"Let the kids watch and learn," Ed agreed, Alphonse nodding beside him.

Throat tight with emotion, Roy didn't trust himself to say anything more than, "Dismissed!"

###

(From the journal of Roy Mustang)

This morning I had the unpleasant task of meeting for coffee with Maud 'Kelly' Winchell, part of my 'keep your friends close and your enemies closer' campaign to keep her intrigued and sufficiently blackmailed so she won't be able to do me any long term damage. She is still laboring under the delusion that she will be writing my authorized biography. As Ed would say, you can trust her about as far as you can comfortably throw an armored tank.

She'd been squirming her way into Parliament sessions and when I greeted her from my desk she rounded on me, notebook in hand, and had the nerve to insinuate that the newly-ratified bill for veteran's health care was a way to get votes when my approval ratings—according to her impeccable sources—are at an all time low.

The only reason I didn't give in to the temptation to snap off a few pyrotechnics in anger was my concern that the half can of lacquer she had sprayed on that bleached blonde wig of hers might ignite and I'd never get the stench of burned plastic out of my office.

"Let's see now…" I began to tick off the items in the bill on my fingers. "Comprehensive health care for soldiers on active duty, on disability and for veterans. Health care to include both physical and psychological injury and/or illness, rehabilitation, physical therapy and psychological assessment and treatment. Substance abuse evaluation and rehabilitation. Insurance coverage for reimbursement for qualified prosthetic and automail limbs….my, my, Maude! Now," I leaned forward and scowled at her, "why don't you tell me why you find any of this objectionable? A woman like you—making money off a book that not only exploited the dead Ishballans but our Amestrian soldiers as well—how the hell can you find a problem with helping the men and women who serve this country?"

"You could have made Parliament pass it sooner," she sniffed.

And there you have it. Whatever I have or hope to do will either be too late or too little.

At least I did something….

For some reason, talking to Maude makes me want to either down a stiff belt of something lethally alcoholic or grab my husband and do obscene things to him with my tongue, just to divert my mind from talking to a female that is, in fact, as hard and as ruthless as any military strategist I've ever known. In fact, I could think of only one other female who was as thirsty for battle—

-and when I arrived in my office, she was sitting at my desk.

In front of my desk. Even she didn't have the temerity to take my chair—but then she'd told me once that when she had the chance to sit behind that presidential desk she'd changed her mind. "Any fool who sits with his back to a window deserves to be shot at," she told me.

Just as blonde. Just as magnificent as ever. "Major General Armstrong. It's good to see you. I'm sorry you missed the wedding."

"I'm sorry I missed seeing you cry like a baby when you got hit with a bullet."

I shook her hand. Her grip, as always, surprised me with its strength. "Then you would have been disappointed. Nina didn't cry either."

She smiled faintly. "Nina….yes….your stepdaughter. I'm sure she and her brother are far more interesting now that they are no longer in the larval stage."

She was in Central for the hearings and it was the first time I had invited her for drinks and she had actually accepted without insulting my manhood or suggesting that I had risen to power on my knees.

She was being called to testify before Parliament, in fact. And it was not because my ass was on the line, or to protect herself. She was here to protect her officers…her people.

However adversarial our relationship may have been all these years, I can never fault the Ice Queen for that.

It is interesting that there are persons that seem to cross our paths that chafe and irritate us but in doing so they force us to expand our boundaries and exceed our limitations. I have faced this woman on the battlefield and yes, she beat the hell out of me—figuratively and literally. But the greatest challenge she ever offered me was not in the military field of combat.

It was right here. Right now. In my mind, I moved my king into position on the black and white chessboard. "Check."

The lovely mouth turned up into a smile. I'd caught her, fare and square.

"How did you know?"

"Donal Samuelson had to get his campaign funds from somewhere. You knew you couldn't reach for the presidency yourself, not after you ordered your troops to attack the soldiers in Central. You were a heartbeat away from being hanged for treason. You're lucky Grumman cut that deal with you under the tables." I poured two glasses of whiskey, passing one to my opponent. "I'm curious why you chose Samuelson, of all people."

She accepted the glass with a nod of thanks. "He had a grudge. A little man with a grudge. He thought you didn't deserve to sit up on the throne. He wanted to knock you down. I thought I'd give him a chance. It was a gamble I had to take."

That surprised me. "A gamble?"

She leveled those icy eyes at me. "For Amestris. If you couldn't face the worst that they could throw at you—Ishbal and your actions on the Promised Day—then you didn't deserve to lead a democracy."

"So," I contemplated her cold, lovely features. "What do you think now?"

After a long pause, she gave an abrupt snort of amusement. "I still despise you only marginally less than I despise my brother, but you'll do, Mustang." Her empty glass was placed on my desk and she strolled out the door without so much as a word of farewell. "Better than nothing, I suppose…"

###

Even Riza Hawkeye had never been allowed inside the Secret Garden.

The Tringham brothers had helped design it back when the children had been young. High stone walls, higher hedges and the surrounding thicket of wicked pyracantha thorns that ringed the outside discouraged anyone from attempting to breach the sanctuary. "You want a safe place for the kids to play?" Roy had challenged Pinako. "I can do that."

Entered only by a concealed passage from butler's pantry inside the house, the Secret Garden had eventually become Roy and Ed's refuge

"Nice." Edward thumped the graceful trunk of a delicate Nihonese weeping cherry tree that was the showpiece of the garden. "It doesn't hurt the tree for it to keep blooming like this?"

At that moment, Roy could have told Edward that he didn't give a rat's ass about the finer points of alchemic botany. The breeze had lifted and a rain of soft pink petals swirled around them, catching in Edward's pale hair.

The past—spattered with gore and memories that wounded his heart—was behind him. Tomorrow, and in the days that followed, the old wounds would be torn open one last time. It would end for him—everything would end for him, one way or another. The future…

He was mostly certain there would be a future. His hands were stained with blood but surely not enough to put a rope around Roy's neck. At worst, he reckoned, they would impeach him. At best, they would believe him and the country would rock with the impact. How could the population cope with the idea that each and every one of them had been regarded as little more than a resource for an alchemic transmutation? All these years and it still made him ill to think about it.

Yes, there would be a future. And right here, right now, it was too dim to see. All he had was now—and right now, the man he loved was standing under a cherry tree with petals in his hair, a lopsided grin on his face and his hands already loosening his tie as he kicked off his shoes.

Words are useless, he told himself. Don't overthink this. All we have is Now…

And in the joy of Now, they reached out to one another…

###

"General'nyy Armstrong ? Dobro pozhalovat' v Rouz Khill . Vy govorite Drachman ?"

The young woman who brought General Armstrong her coffee in the guest suite had the look of a scholar, but fortunately lacked the prominent nose of her father. "Da," the officer replied. "However, if you are throwing your lot in with Mustang, Miss Lobachevsky, perhaps you should continue in Amestrian for practice."

"You are correct, t'ank you. I have message for you from President Mustang. He says he haff gift for you. He say-says—it will appeal to your…literary…side? Dat is correct-obratit'sya k vashey lyubvi k knigam? De-the—biographies?" She shook her head in frustration. "How he expect me to work here when my Amestrian is not so good yet? Mebbe dis vill make it clear?"

She gestured to a chessboard, and advanced the white king to take a black pawn. "Ponyat'…you understand this?"

The Ice Queen stared at the board for a long moment. Then she drew her saber with a malicious grin. "Let's go. Poydem!"

Under Roy's lips, Ed's abdominal muscles flexed abruptly as he jerked upright. Somewhere outside the sheltered walls of their garden, he heard a loud screech, extravagant female cursing, and the pounding of feet in the general direction of the reflection pond in the parkway. To his horror, he heard the unmistakable swwooshh of fine Amestrian steel being swung through the air. "What the-?"

"Relax." Roy hand slid down and began to stroke Ed, whose cock was already at half-mast from shock. "She only uses the point or edge on worthy adversaries. Mad as she is, I don't think she'll cripple Maude." There was something positively feline about his smirk, like a cat emerging from the pantry in triumph, a squealing mouse dangling from its jaws.

"Mustang," Ed growled, "what the fuck are you up to?"

Roy's head ducked down until he was eye to eye with the object of his affection, coaxing it back to hardness with some inventive flicks and strums along the underside that would successfully distract his husband from the spectacle of Maude Kelly Winchell getting chased into a pond, dragged out and paddled across the ass with the flat of the General's sword. "Nothing much. I just…mmmm…."

"Fuuckkkkk! Yeahhhh…shit, don't stop!"

"Sort of figured…." The tongue became downright impertinent, invading more of Ed's territory and making the younger man pant and squirm. "….that after going to….hnnngggghhhhhh!" Impatiently, he pulled Ed's thighs further apart, not even pausing to enjoy the view. "….all the trouble of writing that book about the Armstrong family and inferring that the Major General has a fetish for tying up grown men and beating them with a riding crop or her saber-"

"Wouldn't know anything about that, would you?" Edward jeered.

"-and having a truly impressive collection of steel dildoes—"

"Ouch! That must have hurt!"

"You'd be surprised. Anyway," Roy gave an appreciative lick to Ed's testicles before sliding up to his knees, one hand guiding his own hardness to the target and rubbing against it in lazy circles that made Ed hook his heels over Roy's broad shoulders, tugging at him impatiently. "Since I'm the only subject of her biographies that she'd actually met before publication, and since I'd invited the Major General to enjoy the hospitality of Rose Hill during her stay…why, it only seemed to be good manners to arrange a little introduction." Hips rocking gently forward, Roy's eyes slid shut in delight. "I confided my intentions to Miss Lobachevsky, who was only too pleased to make the arrangements—in the event that I became caught up in something important."

"Caught up? Like this?" Edward squeezed, grinning as Roy yelped louder than Maude Kelley Winchell as the hack biographer dove for deeper water in hopes that the fearsome Major General was not able to dog-paddle and swing a sword at the same time.

A few more strokes and Roy wouldn't have noticed if Winchell was being disemboweled and eaten by Al's ornamental goldfish.

….TO BE CONTINUED…..