A/N: Okey-dokey! It looks like quite a lot of people are reading this! Yayy! I just wish you all would review... snif... Alrighty, then - here is chapter 9, all typed up and ready to read! I've started on chapter 10, but I have to take the SAT tomorrow morning (I think I already mentioned that... I hate standardized testing...) so I probably won't have chapter 10 up until sometime Saturday (probably in the early evening...) Please review! Also, please read "Roy and Riza's CrackedOut Car Ride" - I wrote it for my friend... if some of the comments don't make sense, don't worry - they're supposedly inside jokes amongst my friends in marching band with me (I say supposedly becuase I have no idea how they got started...) Ok, it's way too late- I can tell becuase I've become a rambling fiend! AAHH! Please review! Thank you! Wish me luck tomorrow:)

I do not own FMA - but I had better find my admission pass so I can get in the dang building to take the dang SAT tomorrow morning... ("no, mommy, I don't want to go! no!" ... ok, I'm done now...)

Chapter 9: "Edward"

"Hahaha!" Roy laughed heartily as a disgruntled Trisha walked next to him down the hallways of the Central City military headquarters. "You really are Edward's daughter, aren't you?" he asked her jovially.

"Hmph!" Trisha said hot-headedly, avoiding eye contact with Mustang. "I still don't see what's so funny."

Mustang was escorting Trisha to the registration office so that she could officially sign on to the military and to pick up her uniform, and then later to his home so that she could meet Riza; the general had left the clean-up of the once-again Elric-damaged parade grounds to his men – as usual.

"You have to understand," he told her, smiling; he was in a much better mood from having such a good laugh. "What you did was something only Ed would do."

"Like what?" Trisha looked up at him as they walked, trying hard to retain her outward showing of indignation but failing miserably.

"Well," Roy began, noticing Trisha's softened tone and piqued interest at the mention of her father, "for whatever reason, Ed always felt like he had to one-up me; so, he would often-times end up making a big, extravagant mess out of some easily-handled situation, then come up to me and say, 'You know you owe me one for this, Colonel,'" Roy chuckled. "And I suppose that there were a few times where I actually did…" he trailed off softly, deep in thought with a sad smile on his face.

'This must be hard for him,' Trisha thought, 'Havoc and that man Armstrong did both mention once how Mustang was always kind of over-protective of my father and my uncle…'

"You know, you look a lot like Edward, too, now that I come to think of it," Roy said, snapping out of his reverie and breaking Trisha's train of thought. 'I wonder just how similar they are…' Roy thought. "In fact," he said, "you're just about as short as he was, too."

"WHAT! Who are you calling so small that they can't even be squashed with a fine-toothed comb!" Trisha screamed as she threw a tantrum.

"Hahaha!" Roy began to laugh again. "Wow… you really are Ed's kid… I had a hard time believing it at first, but you just convinced me!" Roy beamed at her. 'Wow,' he thought, 'Fullmetal's actual daughter. I certainly never thought I would see this…'

Trisha turned red with embarrassment. "I'm sorry," she said, "my mother used to tell me how my dad would always make a scene and end up embarrassing himself with his tantrums, and I guess I just went and did the same thing…"

"Well, it's good to see that you at least inherited Al's manners. I was worried at first – your mother, Winry, was often just as much of a hot-head as Ed was," Roy told her as he chuckled.

"You actually knew my mother, too?" Trisha asked, a surprised look on her face.

"A little bit – not as well as Ed, though. After all, the first time I ever saw Edward he was at your mother's house."

"Really? She never told me that…"

"I suppose not – he and your uncle, Alphonse, had just attempted to transmute their mother – your grandmother."

"I know – I'm named after her, you know."

"You don't say…"

"Uh-huh. My mom said that I look like her too; except for my eyes – they're blue like my mom's."

"I can see that," Roy said kindly, noticing her quite excitement in being able to talk about her mother. "Were the two of you close? You and your mom?"

"Oh, sure! It was just us, after all – my great-grandmother, Pinako, died a few years back. I never knew my mother's parents, either…"

Roy visibly tensed.

"… in fact, when I asked about them once, my mom said that a man named Roy Mustang had killed them during the war in Ishbal… is that true, sir?" Trisha asked softly, eyes downcast.

Roy walked silently, almost as if he hadn't heard her question. Trisha became silent, too, disheartened and afraid that she had upset the general to the point that he would never tell her anything more about her parents – or even speak to her again, for that matter.

"Here we are," Roy said in a dull tone, stopping in front of a door towards the end of the hallway. The sign on the door read 'Registration Office.' Roy opened the door for her and stepped back, waiting for her to walk inside.

"Sir," Trisha said, turning towards Mustang, her eyes filled with regret and pleading. "Sir, I just… I just want you to know that my mother, she – she forgave you, before she died."

Roy looked down at her, his expression blank. He noticed the tears beginning to form in her eyes.

"She… she also said," Trisha continued, faltering, "that she always did have a great amount of respect for you… even though she didn't want to, or didn't know why…"

"…Ok," Roy said, giving her a small, sad sort of half-smile before turning to leave. "I expect to see you back in my office as soon as you have received all of your paperwork and have picked up your uniform," he told her in his normal, superior and commanding tone of voice. Mustang walked back down the hallway to go to his office, his back towards Trisha.

"Sir…" Trisha tried to say, choking back tears – she couldn't really say what was making her so upset. But Roy only waved his hand as he walked away, leaving a sad and confused-looking young alchemist standing in a doorway that would spell out her fate.

Oooh! Was that cool or what! Long, too!Roy is sooo pissed off! Well, maybe... you're just gonna have to wait to find out! Mwahaha! (But I'm sure most of you can figure out why he's upset anyway...) Please read and review! You'd make me very happy! Almost as happy as if I got to take a ride in Alphonse! (Haha! Not that Al, my friend's car... she named it Al... because it's a big piece of metal that just so happens to be kind of cute :) heehee...)