~Chapter 3
Mustang angrily grips the steering-wheel in the military Jeep. He didn't need someone to look after him. For Pete's sake, he's the Flame Alchemist. THE FRIGING FLAME ALCHEMIST!
The rest of the scene was pretty obvious:
Ed moping in the back seat with his arms crossed and shoved up against the wall.
Al hunched over because the car was too small for him with his arm pushing his brother, unintentionally of course.
And then there was Armstrong,
In the passenger's seat,
All happy and sparkling with his pink diamonds, dancing joyfully around him...as usual.
So, the car trip was longer than expected, at least that's what it seemed.
The night was black when they arrived, but they had a full moon to light their way.
They survived the car trip to the Ishbalite's village. They pull up from the desert horizon and travel across the perfect canvas of sand. The whole town stops in their tracks to stare at the black speck coming towards them with a cloud of dust trailing behind them.
The girl dressed in her roses speaks to her friend, "Why was that dude flirting with you?"
Rosa said, "I told you, he wasn't flirting with me."
"It really seemed like it."
"Just drop the subject." She turns her head away with blushed cheeks. She looks up at the moon, her eyes glitter in the light of the moon and stars. "At least he was good looking, then it's one less embarrassment on my long list." She pauses, her ears pick up a sound. A humming sound. The purring of an engine. "Do you hear that?"
"What? Voices? Demons?" Her friend teases her.
"Shut up! I'm not possessed!" Her red and green eyes get distracted and wander off to look down in between the two lines of welly-organized tents. Her soul was being dragged down the path, her body followed. She stops her mindless walking at the out-skirts of the village.
Now that I look at her more carefully, she does seem like a woman my dear friend, Mustang, would want. She's so interesting and mysterious, but she had some dangerous notes meandering in her lurking shadow though. And it seemed like they were catching up wit her fast. Her name, ironically, Rosa. Yet, no last name. Her father just simply thinks she's a zit on their glorious family tree.
She watched the car break out of the black midnight sky. It reminds me of pen ink, when you scribble in one spot of a piece of paper for too long. That's what that night looked like. She stared at the car's eyes. She was paralyzed. The white light wrapped around her body to hug her tightly and securely. She remembered that feeling, just not in the same sense. It almost felt like the soothing hands of the Flame Alchemist.
The feeling took her body, but her soul came to rescue her.
The car was coming to her and slowed down to a stop.
It shined it's eyes on Rosa and couldn't bare to take them off.
It purred with pure delight.
Her puppy-like eyes could only make out the silhouettes of some people though. She thought three, maybe four people.
The driver hops out of the car. The colonel begins to walk towards Rosa, but she could only make out the blinding outline of his body as he stepped in front of the beaconing headlights.
She clapped her hands together and held them there as a warning. There should be a point at which she becomes enough of a problem for the military that they would all be informed by now.
Roy runs toward her with his hand reached outward. The blackness of his glove turned into white as it emerged out of the shadows and places the tips lightly on her dark, porcelain-smooth cheek. After the hand catches a breath or two, gasping for a little light after being drowned in the black, Roy follows through so he is now visible to Rosa.
He smiles his greetings to her, "I forgot you name, what was it again?"
Her eyes flutter closed and her cheeks became warm once again as she smiled.
A couple of teenage boys run from the back of the crowd and push their way to the front, "We found her, Father! We found her!"
Mustang repeats his question with a voice of soft cotton, "Please, tell me your name. I remember it was beautiful." Of course her name was beautiful to him, she deserved a man like Roy only if he wasn't such a womanizer.
The kids shout at her, but don't dare to step forward, "Don't tell him! Don't!"
She attempts to pry open her sleep-heavy eyelids, but only come open half way. She answers his question finally, but slightly dazed and still very confused, "Rosa. But, may I ask why you're here? Are you really going to stay?" She said quietly.
Roy could only smile to show off his perfect teeth, he couldn't possibly serious around her even though he wanted to be. "Just for a while and only for work. But I hope you don't mind that I brought some 'friends'." The rest of the people come out of the clown car and proceed to walk up to be just behind Colonel Mustang.
Edward smiles largely at the people, "Hello!" He didn't really have anything else to say, but he wanted to say something.
Two more men came from the back of the murmuring crowd to push and shove their way through to the front. One was much, much older than the other. The old one looks like he could've possibly been the young adult's father. They stopped at the front and gasped. It was like they were holding their breath. They didn't dare speak, they didn't dare move. They just gawked at the scene of the military man's hand on an Ishbalite woman's cheek.
Roy looked at the men, he couldn't grasp the picture that was about to happen. So he looked back at Rosa, her cheeks continued to grow pink. It was like a glob of ink dropped onto a napkin and it was sinking into the napkin. It spread, a contamination.
This was obviously too much for Rosa's abused heart to handle.
Roy hesitantly leans forward, his cheeks also rosy.
His lips come closer to her's.
He changes his mind and brushes his lips against her cheek.
He pauses, questioning himself.
He lifts his lips up to her ear.
He wanted to do something, say something. But he couldn't bring himself to motion. He's frozen with his fingers on her cheek that just barely touch, and he has stuttering lips next to her ear.
~THOUGHT FROM ROSA~
Kiss me.
Heal my damaged heart, it needs something good.
This moment,
Let it last forever
And forever
And...
"I'm," Roy slowly moves his head away, "I'm sorry."
This is the first time he actually said those words. The first time he actually meant them.
He takes a couple of steps backward to join his comrades. He clutches his hands behind his back and straightens his posture. I wiped his face clean, but I seemed to miss some spots on his cheeks.
He breathes out, shaking a little from the cold. I stand next to him for old-time's sake.
I watch the carbon freeze as it comes out of his mouth and dies.
"Central Military is being represented by I, Colonel Roy Mustang. Central Military is conducting a research project on your culture and people. So it is our duty to stay with you people for a month. Further information will be explained at a later date. Now, I would like to speak with your leader, if you don't mind."
Rosa stands there, staring at Roy. Her heart shattered and fell to the floor at his black boots.
He could tell, he cringed at the noise. But he didn't dare look back at her.
The three boys grab her arm and yank her back to the crowd, the comfortable huddle of Ishbalites.
The old man and the younger man finally gathered enough courage to take a step forward and speak.
The elderly one spoke first, "I am the leader. The High Priest for this community. Who are you? Were you brought here by the Devil?"
Mustang could only chuckle and smirk as he spoke, "No, High Priest, I don't recall ever making a deal with the Devil. Mister...?"
"Star."
"Mr. Star, I am just a mere man on this planet, just like you. I am only doing my job and I will not harm anyone. My leader, the Fuhrer, would wish for me and my comrades to stay with you and your people. But that is only by your permission as well."
The young man turned to Rosa with unfathomable eyes, "What in the name of the Sun God did you do?" He raised his hand up to eclipse the moonlight, Rosa's eyes no longer glitter with happiness bestowed from the moon, but they glitter from the tears wanting to escape from her eyes. She knew what was coming; her heart would be hurt again.
He brings his hand down to smack her, but something stopped the contact.
The man looked at his arm just above the woman's screaming, red hair. A white hand halted his action of abuse and white fingers wrap around the wrist of the man. The wrinkles on the closing fingers grow more extravagantly detailed as he grips tighter.
The young adult looks up at the person who stopped him: The Dog of the Military.
"It's not very gentlemen-like to hit a woman like that," Roy said. "Especially when it's not her fault." He lifts the man's arm up to get it away from Rosa. He places the arm back to his said.
The person looks at him in awe: nothing? He couldn't believe it. He couldn't believe that someone would actually try to help, or even save, this demonic woman. He was furious that Roy had stopped the punishment.
"This woman is the Devil's woman! She must be punished and this is something for me to decide!" He throws a fist at the colonel's face, but the Flame Alchemist catches it like a regular baseball.
Mustang places the heal of his palm on his shoulder to push him backward while swingsing his leg to smash him in the back of the knee. The body had no option but to collapse and fall. He lays on his back so his hair could eat the dusty-sand below his body that holds his tears of failure.
Roy triumphantly places his boot on the mans stomach.
Mustang bends over and smiles devilishly next his head, "Here me out and hear me clearly, if you touch this woman, you're a dead man." He whispered. He steps away from the man and looks up to see the awe-struck faces and eyes glistening with fear. He adjusts himself to stand normal and fixes his collar briefly while clearing his throat. "I'm sorry." He managed to feign a smile, but nothing more was said.
Again, he's sorry. A new record if you just count that the new word was engraved into his mental dictionary and used twice in the same day, but he only meant it once and only once.