A/N: Thanks for the reviews; they really are an inspiration. In this chapter, things (literally) get moving.

Disclaimer: Nothing that you recognize is mine.

Chapter Two -- As the Hawk Flies

It was a dim pre-dawn light that greeted the soldiers as they made their way to the train station that morning. The day, when it came, would be a vibrant blue, with just a hint of wispy clouds to the south. The air was clear as the sky above, and cold enough to hurt those who chose to breathe too deeply. In short, Roy thought, it was too beautiful a day to be the prelude to battle.

There were about a hundred of them, higher-ups and enlisted men, waiting on the platform. The supplies -- firearms, shelter, and medical supplies, among other items -- were inside covered carts, which would be loaded into the luggage compartments of the train. The sound of quiet conversation broke the morning.

Off by the end of the platform, Havoc was smoking what he had promised would be his last cigarette for a while. Leaning against the wall next to him were Breda and Falman, having a conversation about something that Roy could have listened in on, if he had chosen to. He didn't care.

Fuery wasn't accounted for yet, as of now. But he still had ample time to get there.

Riza was standing right next to him, staring into space and not saying a word. The last time they had talked, really talked, had been at the restaurant on Saturday. The air that existed between them now was becoming colder than all the rest of the frozen world combined, and he wasn't sure whose fault that was. The barrier that had slowly been coming down since he came back was up again, and he couldn't say anything about it, because that would cause far too much to become unraveled. Anything he said now would only made the air between them into ice.

They had gone too far, and now that sin must be compensated for with distance. There was no point in the past few months where Roy had considered stopping the dinners, and the growing closeness that was a result of them. He realized, with a small sigh that was ignored, that there had been no point where either of them had wanted to.

Behind them was the foolish world where soldiers made themselves believe that war would never again force them to be ugly people, the world of warm light where Riza was a beautiful woman with a bell-like laugh and a smile that touched all the corners of her face.

Now, in the face of new conflict, he had no choice but to play the game that was laid out in front of them. Play the role of the emotionless thing he used to be. He fought the urge to grind his teeth together. He hated this feeling of helplessness. But the other option -- pretending that they were still in that alternate reality -- was asking for disaster, and therefore not an option at all.

"The sun's almost up, Major," he said, turning to look upon her.

A spark of something glimmered in her auburn eyes. Surprise, or sorrow, or maybe anger. Roy no longer had the luxury of knowing. "Yes it is, sir."

From the south, there came the unmistakable smoke and wail of an approaching train.

Kain Fuery had never run so hard in his entire life.

The night at Sheksa's apartment had hardly been beneficial in the ways he had been anticipating, but the phone call she made this morning had been informative. She'd woken up early, having not been able to sleep from worry, and called the hotel where Winry had been staying.

Fuery had promised to tell General Mustang Sheska's suspicions about Winry, but, privately, he didn't think it was such a great idea. The Flame Alchemist had enough on his mind as it was, what with an inexperienced alchemistand a leader with a reputation for winning at any cost. Besides, it wouldn't change the outcome of anything, knowing the identity of the fifth hostage. And they didn't know for sure if it was Winry who had been taken into Drachma. What would they want with an automail mechanic from Risembool, anyway?

But them he'd woken to the sound of Sheska's phone clattering to the floor, and then she was crying again. The hotel the blonde girl had been staying in reported a Ms. Rockbell who had last left Saturday morning, and not returned since. Her things were in the room, and she hadn't yet paid the bill, the chirpy hostess had said.

It turned out to be a good thing that Sheska had woken up so early; otherwise he would have missed the train altogether. She had barely dried her eyes when he kissed her, hugged her tight, and left, taking her creaky steps two at a time. His back was still sore from sleeping on the lumpy couch all night, and that didn't make sprinting to the train station easier.

He would just make it, he thought, desperately out of breath and hearing an approaching train as more steps disappeared under his feet. Quickly scanning the sea of blue and gold, he found the familiar faces.

The caboose was where Mustang, Kansan, and the others had gone, but Langston's friends and comrades were sitting further up front. He was torn between loyalty and curiosity, and the latter was slowly winning.

"Come on, Corsair," one of them was saying now. "Don't tell me you've gone and gotten a big head this quickly." He gave Langston a cold smile from his seat, where a few of the enlisted men were playing poker. "Oh, I'm sorry. Major Corsair." A few nervous chuckles greeted this last sentence.

"I don't…" Langston liked playing cards, but he was beginning to feel distanced from the other men his age. He had told no one of his alchemy abilities when they first started general training, hoping they wouldn't think of him as arrogant. That scheme had backfired the same day word trickled down about the tall, dark-haired nineteen-year-old who got certified.

"Don't what?" This was another man, Charles Dornier, who Langston had admired for his sense of humor since the day they met, almost a year ago now. "Don't what, Langston? Don't know who you're going to suck up to first when you get back there?"

"I don't know what I did to deserve this from my friends," he replied, voice steady. "And, right now, I don't know why I ever thought you were funny." He stared right back at Charles, who lowered his eyes and proceeded to deal cards. With a sinking feeling in his gut, Langston turned towards the back door.

The seats in this car, as in the front cars, were arranged facing each other, so that groups of four people could sit and talk together. So far, only one group of four had chosen to take advantage of this: Havoc, Falman, Breda, and Fuery, of course. It would be the last morning they all spent together for a while, Roy realized, and he wouldn't begrudge them that right. Even if they were laughing a little too loudly. Even if the woman sitting across from him was silent. As Roy's chosen seat was in the middle, and four of his subordinates were in the far back, only the laughter, and not the conversation, reached his ears.

When the door to the caboose opened to reveal Langston Corsair, Roy was only surprised that it had taken the kid that long to come back here. Of the officers present yesterday at Hakuro's debriefing, he was the only one not currently seated in the car.

He had vaguely heard of the kid before now. He was fairly young to have passed the exam, though by no means the youngest, -- Roy allowed a tiny smirk to escape him just then -- and, from what rumors he'd heard around Central, had the specialty of being able to manipulate water.

Corsair looked pretty ordinary, but that didn't mean anything. He was tall, and lanky, and stood up straight even as the train buckled and swayed. Dark brown hair that was uncut, and thin, wire-rimmed glasses. Well, at least he doesn't look insane.

He glanced to his left, across the aisle, wondering what Riza's opinion of the newcomer was. She wasn't even looking up. She was sitting by the window, reading a plain, blue-bound book by the morning light. As he looked, one of her hands moved to turn the page, and her face turned a fraction of the way towards him, short blonde bangs shifting. She knew he was looking, Roy was sure, and the fact that she wouldn't meet his gaze thickened the stagnant air between them.

Stone-faced, he looked up the aisle again in time to see Kansan crook a thick finger towards Major Corsair from his seat near the front of the car. With a look of interest, the young alchemist went to sit across from Kansan. Roy found himself silently cursing both the Generals in the caboose. Kansan, for living up to the low expectation Roy had of him. He cursed himself for not having a more strategic seat. It was unthinkable that he could switch now.

He had waited for his prey like a hunter in the woods, and the wait has not been very lengthy. Soon enough, the deer had stumbled in, a wild young buck. Kansan had timed his summons perfectly, in his opinion. Slow enough that he would not appear eager, only helpful, and fast enough that Mustang couldn't get his own claws in the boy. If that happened, all was lost. The reckless laughter coming from the back of the car was proof enough. No, this one wouldn't turn into one of them, not if Ralph had anything to do with it.

"General Kansan." The boy inclined his head in lieu of giving a salute. He was smiling, Ralph saw, in an innocent way that would have to be corrected. All in good time.

"Major Corsair," he replied, brandishing a smile of his own. "I've heard nothing but good things about you."

"Well, thanks, sir. I'm sorry, but I haven't heard much about you." His leg was jumping, something else that would have to end soon.

"That's all right, we'll get to me later." He waved a hand, as if brushing a fly away. "What about you, Major?"

"Well… I don't know. I'm an alchemist, but you already know that, sir. I'm nineteen years old, and I'll be twenty this September. I lived in a place called Mera, in the west, before I came to Central last year. I've always liked the rain, and water in general, but I didn't know until I took the exam that I could transmute that better than anything else." A note of pride crept into his voice during the last sentence.

"You can transmute the rain?"

Corsair laughed, softly. "No, I don't think anyone could concentrate enough to do that, sir. It's hard enough to do alchemy on something that's standing still."

"But, water?" Kansan prompted him, trying to ignore the fact that this child had just laughed at him.

"Yes, General. I can manipulate it, and, if I'm not tired, I can turn water into ice. Turning ice into water, now, I haven't figured out how to do that yet. Takes more energy, I think. And -- "

A particularly loud burst of laughter had come from Mustang's flunkies. Never were good at putting people on leashes, were you, Colonel? His lip curled against his will.

"If you don't mind, sir, I'd like to have a laugh before, well, before there's nothing else to laugh about." Corsair was smiling, again, and standing up. Kansan dismissed him with a flick of his wrist, but supposed that the boy didn't catch the hostility in the gesture. He was already leaving. Ralph was irritated at the boy's casual air, but didn't seethe inside until he heard Corsair greet Mustang, until he heard the footsteps pause long before they reached the very back.

"I don't think we've been formally introduced. I'm Major Langston Corsair."

Roy looked up from the papers he had been pretending to peruse. "Hello, Major." He noted that the kid looked ordinary, even up close. His face was unlined, and youthful without being chubby. The gray eyes behind his glasses might have been dull, if not for the lively spark.

Corsair sat down opposite him without invitation, glancing more than strictly necessary at the black fabric covering part of Roy's face. There was uncomfortable silence for a moment, in which Riza flipped another page in her book and the train continued its steady path northward.

"Why did you join the military?" Roy posed the question like most people ask about the weather.

"What?" Langston blinked, twice. "Oh, sorry, sir. I don't know why that seems like an odd question." He chewed his lip, thinking. "I guess it started with my dad. He was in one of the minor conflicts before Ishbal, and he used to tell me stories. They would always be the same ones, though, because he hurt his back and got discharged after just a few months. I guess I want my own stories."

"Glory," Roy said shrewdly.

Langston nodded. "It sounds selfish when you say it like that, sir. But I want glory from helping people."

"What if you have to kill to attain this glory?" Roy knew Riza was probably listening to this, and he found it didn't matter to him.

"I've thought about that, too. I figure if I can save an innocent life by taking a guilty one, that's equivalency. I know I won't like it, but if I liked it, I wouldn't be a very good person."

"And what if you have to kill innocents?"

"I won't do it."

"What if you're ordered to?"

"I'll find a way around it."

"There won't be a way." Roy found an old wound, opened up and bleeding before him. "There's a doctor, and there's a war. He's treating people from both sides, and the enemies that he's helping are coming back to kill your men. You're ordered to kill the doctor."

"I'd find a way not to."

Roy gave the young alchemist a glare that he returned, eyes to eye. It wasn't angry, or rebellious; it was the just the naïveté of someone who had never known real war. Shadows of fire and chaos danced into Roy's vision. "One piece of advice for you, Major."

"Yes, sir?" There was a determined edge to him now.

He hesitated for a moment, then lowered his voice so only Langston could hear. The Major leaned in closer. "Be wary of who you put your trust in."

Corsair nodded, but then added in an undertone, "I'm not sure what you mean, sir."

Roy dropped his voice even further. "Have you ever heard of a man by the name of Frank Archer?"

She woke up coughing, and peered around the lightening room. The sun was up, then. Her hands were still tied, and if she wasn't already losing track of time, it was Tuesday.

On Saturday, when their train was moving, Winry had thought she was as cold as she would ever live to be in her life. She was wrong.

The ride north into Drachma had been uneventful. The woman, who Winry now knew was called Elizabeth, divided her time between comforting her son and trying to console Winry, who was wracked with guilt. If only Elizabeth hadn't tried to help her in the bank, she might not be in this predicament.

At gunpoint, their hands had been bound behind their backs with thin, strong rope that cut into Winry's frozen skin if she tried to loosen them. Her face was cold, and her feet were numb, and her entire torso ached from sitting down on the unforgiving floor of the freight car for what seemed like an eternity of hours. There was not enough light brought in through cracks for her to see what time of day it was. Her only hope was that they reached their destination before night fell.

The two men from the bank sat on the opposite side of the train car, silent. They didn't even look like they knew each other, Winry realized. The unsavory character had hair the color of dirty straw and a ruddy complexion. He wasn't obese, but carried extra weight around his middle. The other one, who appeared to be in his late twenties, was short and thin as a twig, with hair lighter than Winry's. She had no idea why either of the pair was here.

At the front of the boxcar was their watchman, whose black hood and clothing conspired with the dim light to hide anything about him. He sat on an old oil drum, with a rifle laid across his lap. He might have been asleep, the way his body swayed with every bump of the train. He was slouching so much that Winry couldn't catch a glimpse of his eyes, even from her low vantage point.

She must have dozed off herself, watching him, for in her next conscious moment he was yelling at them all, and the huge metal door of the car was open. The air that came in was sheer agony, and that alone would have awakened her. It took her a moment to realize that it wasn't snowing. The ground outside was just the dull white of a permanent layer of winter.

One by one, they were made to jump off the train. Winry was the last one before their guard, and the wind tore water from her eyes as she neared the door, blinding her. Her legs were untied for a reason, she now saw. She jumped, panicked in midair, and felt twin lightning jolts of pain shoot up her legs a moment later. Her knees buckled as she fell into snow packed hard with time and ice, and Winry knew her shoulder was going to bruise. She was still half-blind. Behind her, the roar of the train was deafening. She couldn't run away if she wanted to. A dozen yards ahead, she made out the silhouette of their guard striding back towards her. With some difficulty, but feeling that more pain was better than the disgrace of this criminal helping her, she got to her feet.

Alone in a seat close to the back, Langston watched Amestris disappear in front of his eyes. The countryside, still green even at this time of year, had given way to grayish brown forests without leaves. He had seen a wolf, once, running alongside the train.

They crossed a river that was half ice, and passed through a town where some of the rooftops still carried a sheet of leftover white.

The next forest had snow still on the branches, and the next expanse of fields had frost on the blades of grass. The houses, few and far between, all had smoke coming from the chimneys.

Langston thought Cohigis would seem like a winter town, even during the summer months. Everything there was grey or black or brown or white, from what he saw as the train stopped. Breda and Falman departed without much fanfare, their serious faces carrying no trace of laughter.

Soon after the train's engines started again, they were going up into the mountains that Langston had only seen in maps and pictures before today. They were larger than he could have imagined, though, and had a barren mood to them that reflected and perhaps intensified the atmosphere inside the train car. They were only a bit more colorful than Cohigis, with patches of evergreen amidst the lower parts. As the tracks continued to cut through, the color of life faded into gray rock and light gray ice.

In some ways, it was unappealing, and spoke of only hopes dashed against stone. But in another way, one that Langston was still struggling to appreciate, it was beautiful. He let his breath fog the glass in strange patterns, and thought of his family.