Five
It is Roy.
It is Roy, and she is going to be sick because she knows it is also not Roy, even as she stares into the shadows of his face and drowns in the familiar depths. His right eye is the same charcoal-grey, blue-tinged in the moonlight, but his left—milk-white, almost porcelain in its sheen, with a red-winged serpent circling where his iris should be. The lids are lash-less and marked by a crosshatch scar—the narrow slit between isn't widened by his sneer, and it gives his face an ugly lop-sided slant.
"I don't know what I expected," he says, and the hand curled beneath her chin stretches her neck tight, sending tendrils of pain down her spine. His head tilts right and then left, examining. The fog of her escaping breath veils his stare. "Not much, of course—you're still human, and we can't expect much from such weak stock."
Her left arm is trapped beneath her chest, the creature's weight above compressing her wrist into her sternum. Her legs are stretched and ankles twisted out, and there is nothing beneath her feet against which she might gain leverage to break free. Her right hand—fingers spread flat against the pavement—is a whisper away from the sole of his boot.
This is not Roy. This is not Roy.
His thumb rests against her bottom lip, and she stares into his slitted white eye until hers blur and burn. The smell of him—sulfur twisting up inside her, and she breathes through her mouth, raggedly. The pin of her hair-clip digs its point into her scalp.
"I'm underwhelmed," he says, releasing her so sharply that her chin slams into the pavement and she tastes blood.
"Leave her alone!"
"We'll get to you in a minute, Lieutenant Havoc," Roy snarls, and at his nod, the creature—chimera, she realizes—slams a massive fist between his shoulder-blades. "Patience is a virtue, isn't it?"
And he laughs, cold and sharp and short, as though it's a joke they should all share. He takes a few steps away, locking his hands behind his back.
"East City," he sighs out. "I was a different man the last time I was here—I used to get out more, but...well. Life has this inconvenient tendency to carry on, even in our absence."
Riza has never felt cold like this. Viscous and splintery-sharp at once, rattling in her mouth and slithering through her chest, smoke and all the accompanying ash stirred up from a long silence. The chimera above carries no heat in its skin—it is a mass of nothing, a weight made worse by the absence of all else. She coughs, sprinkling the iced pavement with a little more of her blood.
"You're not him," she says, squeezing her eyes tight. "You're not Roy."
"I could be," he replies. "You have no objective proof."
"You're not."
He's coming back—each step heavy and sure.
"I," he says, and his voice is coldest of all, black and dead as his right eye, "could be. Isn't that enough? I could be Roy Mustang."
She flinches, and he wrenches her chin up again—a spike of pain straight down her spine.
"Look at me."
She shakes her head, and somewhere behind and off to their right, Jean is coughing breath back into his lungs.
"Look at me!"
The force is worse than the impact—more blood and the black flattening of the world—and again she must stop herself from being sick. White waves tendril along the periphery of her vision. He lets go, and she opens her eyes.
"I could be. This is his face. His voice. It hasn't been long enough for you to forget that, has it?"
Her right hand—and his left boot, and the whisper of space between. He raises the heel of his boot and brings it down on her thumb.
"You know, I'll never understand this part," he sighs. "The wailing. The nostalgia. It's a city—a street—a woman. Why all the carrying on about it? Why can't you just let go?"
Her next finger and next, down the line until her whole hand burns—below from the ice, above from the bite of the tread, between from each slow snap. She bites her lips bloody, muffling any sound trying to escape.
"She's nothing," Roy near-shouts, addressing something far beyond them. "Nothing. No great beauty, no wealth of talent beyond the kill, no great strength in character, but for this—"
"Stop," Jean gasps out.
Roy laughs, and the moon is drawing shadows across his face, painting a ghoulish tread.
"For this," he says, somewhere between a snarl and a hiss, "I am given no rest?"
He rocks back onto his heel before crouching—his weight shifted again along the full length of her crushed hand. She feels the grind and crack of each break, and a scream escapes her.
"Says all he wanted was to see you safe, and I indulged him. Why not? Too tired to be much of a pest before—it's been hard work for him not to fall apart. But I'm tired now—tired of sharing. It's time for Roy to go."
He is talking from above and below at the same time—she gasps and sobs, and the ice is crawling into her throat.
"He thinks everything's alright with the world if you're alive in it. He doesn't know any better. He likes to watch—really, it's all he has."
He leans down, and his smile is soft, open, bright. He caresses her cheek—ignition cloth working with the cold to scrape her skin raw.
"And now," he whispers, brushing a stray lock of hair away from her eyes, "I'm going to make him watch you die."
With a final grinding twist, he stands and steps away from her—and now she knows, through the starburst of pain clouding her thought, that the sparkling bright blurriness is oxygen—far too much of it, building up around her eyes and nose and mouth. Her throat burns on exhale and inhale—what she tries to force out comes rushing back in faster and faster.
The world shrinks down to Roy, his half-leer and tilted glance. He stands with arm outstretched, thumb and middle finger poised for the snap.
"Goodbye, Lieut—"
He chokes on it. His body jerks, bent double, then snaps up again.
"Not now, Mustang," he snarls, and his face contorts grotesquely with the effort, hands seizing his own collar. "I'm busy."
The gathered oxygen has dissipated in the pause—Riza forces herself to breathe a little slower, closing her eyes briefly to concentrate on it.
"No," Roy says, and his voice is suddenly rough. "No, I won't let you!"
The chimera on her back tenses, growling low. It's not enough to push loose, but Riza draws her wounded hand in, scraping across the pavement. Jean is still struggling, uselessly digging at the powerful arm wrapped around his throat.
"Go away! You won't win! I'm a thousand times stronger than—"
Roy screams. His neck is bent back, and his arm snaps out in convulsion. The spark of transmutation ghosts across his fingertips.
"You wouldn't dare," he snarls, and fire erupts from his fingertips.
She cannot burrow away from the flames—can only suck in a final breath and wait. Heat claws the back of her neck, dancing down her shoulder-blades and along her spine, a storm of fire whipping across her body, tearing a few stray strands from her scalp. No scream, no escaping protest as red and orange and gold collapse beyond her closed eyes.
Darkness. She gags on ash and, sure of the absence, rolls clear of the chimera's charred skeleton. Jean is breathing as well—wracking coughs erupt from his half-closed throat, forehead against the pavement, fists clenching in weak rhythm.
"Hawkeye," Jean chokes, taking a few tries to produce volume. He scrambles limply across the pavement and pulls her up by her shaking shoulders. His face is dusted with soot, dark as his mussed clothes. Riza can feel cold seeping through the tatters of her own coat.
"My hand," she says weakly, cradling the ruined digits against her chest. "It's—"
They react at the same time—eyes snapping up to noise and movement. Twenty feet away, Roy slumps to his knees with a strangled cry, face hidden by his clawed hands. Jean shifts, half-shielding Riza as he inches towards her discarded gun.
"It won't help," Roy rasps. But he makes no move towards them, arms braced around his middle, as Jean's hand curls over the grip.
"Always worth an attempt at least," Jean spits, gun steady. Roy stares at them sideways, focus drifting in and out.
Riza is not listening—her eyes have fallen on the hands clenched over his sides, on the beads of sweat that gather at his temples, on the tremble flitting across his lips. A latent effect of the overexposure—the edges of her vision glimmer with haze, haloing him in the impression of movement. Of life.
Outside the Fifth Laboratory—the last time she saw him, and it's the same expression he wears now: the cool fear of resignation. They had left the Elrics in the care of Armstrong and his subordinates—other business brought them to Central in the first place, but it was established habit to keep tabs on the boys. And of course they slipped the watch—of course they snuck out in the dead of night to explore the abandoned lab alone. Armstrong discovered the absence and reported it, and they had reached the barred doors only minutes after Edward disappeared inside.
She doesn't remember how or why the Fuhrer arrived—in her memory, there was only Roy, his worried frown, his fingers fumbling with the ignition gloves. He trusted her to help Alphonse, sharing a grimace. Wait for me, he had said.
Nothing else. Wait for me, with the understanding that he would come back again. Like he always had.
The ghost of a whisper. Get out. Get this to her.
"Roy?" Riza whispers, sick with hope.
"Don't—don't come any closer!"
Jean's grip on her shoulder tightens, and he tugs back on her reach. Her unbroken fingers fan out and fall, curling up limply at the cry. Instinct. He orders—she follows.
"Please," Roy whispers. "Stay back."
Jean is trying to angle her away from Roy, and she can see bright red splotches rising on the exposed skin of his neck. Bruises, soon enough, broken vessels drifting just below the surface.
"I don't—I don't know how long I can hold him," Roy says. A muscle in his jaw twitches, and he bares his teeth, nearly a growl. "I haven't been able to break through before."
He is a spring coiled to snap: the tension in every muscle holds him together but he has no control—convulsions ripple through each limb. Every reaction has a counter-reaction from somewhere deep within. He breathes in fits of gasps and coughs.
Pale. Hair disheveled but trimmed. The buttons on his jacket shine with polish, and the epaulettes of his rank lie neatly flat. Four gold stripes and three stars—still a colonel, regardless of what his tombstone might argue. These can't be the clothes he died—disappeared—in, clear of tears or the tiniest fleck of debris. His boots are marred with flecks of blood at their soles.
He keeps his head turned left and ducked down, hiding that awful white eye.
"What the fuck are you?" Jean asks in a jagged tone. Roy gives a single bitter laugh.
"Homunculus."
"Which one?"
Roy shudders.
"You need to leave," he says. "You need to go—I'm fighting, but it's not enough. He'll take control again, and I can't stop him. Please run. Please."
"Run from what?" Riza asks. "Roy, please don't—"
"Listen to me," he snaps, and he won't look at her—won't meet her eyes or her reaching hand. Jean holds her firmly. "They're all involved. All of them, right up to Bradley. They're trying to get to Armstrong. They don't suspect resistance—not yet, but they will now. Father is—"
His chin snaps up, and he gives a broken shout of frustration.
"He's alone," Roy forces out. "He came here alone. Get out of the city—he'll run back to Central and report to Father. I'll slow him down as best I can."
One arm snakes out from his middle, elbow angled sharply, clenched fist resting beside his face. His breaths come faster and faster.
"I'm sorry," he whispers, thumb set against middle finger. "I'm sorry, Riza. Run."
A spark of transmutation, and the ice around him is evaporating—a space of two meters on either side, sending up wispy tendrils of distorted air. Jean seizes her beneath both arms and drags her back, gun tucked into his holster, and Riza is slowly aware of a distant scream—her own, in the sharp silence just before ignition.
The explosion throws them back out to the street.