"How was he last night?" Havoc asked.
Breda and Fuery had arrived at the safe house, pissed off, tired, and desperate for a coffee, which Rebecca had happily supplied them with. It took a while to explain what had happened, and to answer all their questions, most of which Havoc didn't have the faintest idea how to even begin answering. Where had she been, what had happened, who had taken her in the first place, not to mention why the hell couldn't she remember anything? All Havoc knew was where he'd picked her up, and it wasn't a lot to go on as far as answering those questions went.
Once they'd realised just how little they knew about what had brought her back into their lives, they moved on to tackling the other big question that was hanging over them. Just how they were going to tell The General about this. He'd taken her disappearance and death the worst out of all of them, he was even worse than Rebecca who Havoc swore had just cried and drank her way through the first six months of her being gone.
With Mustang, it had been a different kind of grief, one that cut so deep it was constantly there written on his face and in his body language. He hadn't uttered her name since her memorial service - there hadn't been a body, but there had been so many missing bodies on the Promised Day that they didn't question it as much as they should've - but Hawkeye had been there in everything he did. She was in the bottom of every Whiskey bottle, in the heart of every decision, and her death had been the root of every poor choice he'd made in the last two years.
How were they going to tell him that she was alive? That they'd all given up on her too quickly. That they should've kept looking, searching, investigating, until they'd found her. Maybe they would've had a completely different scenario on their hands if they'd just believed a little more strongly that she was out there somewhere, instead of dead in a pile of rubble.
"Not great, but I've seen him worse." Breda said. "We should just tell him. Straight out."
"I'm not sure he'll believe us if we just tell him," Rebecca said. "Get him to come here, and get him to bring Hayate. Riza said she remembered a dog, might be the cute little pooch."
"She remembers Hayate?" Havoc asked, surprised.
"Well. I asked her if she could remember anything and she said a whole bunch of random stuff, just words, really. Mentioned a dog." Rebecca shrugged. "There was nothing about who she was, where she'd been. I've just been trying to figure out what it all means."
"Right." Havoc nodded. "Fuery, Breda, why don't you guys head back to the office and at least pretend things are business as normal? And try to get the Promised Day files out, if you can. We need to figure out what the fuck we missed."
Sunlight drifted through the blinds, and Riza lifted her hand up and let the beams of light shine over her fingers. There were so many things she didn't know, but these people wanted to help her. She trusted her instincts that called these people safe, the instincts that let her sleep in another woman's clothes, curled up in an unfamiliar place. Realistically it was either this, or running through the streets scared and alone. This felt better. Until she had a reason to run, she'd stick with these people.
"Riza Hawkeye." She muttered to herself, sounding the words on her tongue. She tried to make it sound familiar, as if it was something she'd respond to without hesitation. "Riza, Riza, Riza… Ugh."
Her arms flopped back down and covered her eyes. Her name didn't feel more familiar this morning. It was still as foreign to her ears as it had been last night, regardless of what Jean and Rebecca had told her.
"What?!" The loud exclamation, from a voice she didn't recognise, made Riza sit up in bed. If there was a follow up, it wasn't loud enough to reach her upstairs through the closed door. She sat still for a moment, perched on the edge of the bed, she knew that she could stay there and whatever it was that was going on downstairs would eventually come to her door, or she could go and confront it herself.
Riza Hawkeye stood up, and opened the door to the room, and stepped out to confront whatever it was that was waiting for her downstairs. She walked down the stairs quietly, and Jean and Rebecca were too involved in their argument with the stranger to notice her arrival.
It was the dog that sold her out, suddenly barking loudly and running straight for her. Riza couldn't remember much about her life, but this little dog was one of the few things, and she got down on her knees and opened her arms. She couldn't remember his name, or the life they might've shared together, but she remembered his fur, and his bark, and Riza couldn't help but laugh for joy as the dog jumped all over her and licked her face.
It was the first familiar thing she'd ever seen.
"Hi boy, hi." She said in a soft voice. "What's your name, huh?"
"Black Hayate." The stranger said, and for the first time she looked up at him. He was handsome, messy dark hair and almond shaped eyes that were staring at her. "The dog's name is Black Hayate."
He was staring at her like she was a miracle come to life; mysterious, wonderful and terrible all at once. Like he'd never seen anything like her before, or like she was a dream come to life to stand in front of him as a form of beautiful torment. Jean and Rebecca were both staring at him with worried looks on their faces, and maybe that should have scared her, but it didn't. This man, whoever he was, didn't scare her at all.
"Thank you," Riza said politely, and stood up. Black Hayate jumped up at her knees and she smiled at him before commanding him to sit, which he did obediently. "Do I know you too?"
"Ouch." Jean muttered, which caused Rebecca to elbow him in the ribs. Riza was beginning to like Rebecca.
"We'll leave you two alone," Rebecca said. "Riza, if he gets to be Too Much, just shout, okay?"
"Uh, okay?" Riza said, confused, but thankful that she didn't need to have another awkward conversation in front of an audience. They were bad enough when she was alone with the person.
He looked lost for words once they were left alone in the small living room. "I never thought…" He said, and took a step towards her, but awkwardly stopped before he got any closer. Riza didn't take her eyes off his face, trying to read whatever it was he was trying to say without saying it, but she couldn't. She had no idea who this man was.
"I'm Roy Mustang," He offered her his hand, and she walked towards him and took it. It was warm, and he gripped a little harder than her grazed knuckles would have liked, but she didn't wince, or rub her hand once he let it go. "I think we've got a lot to talk about."
"Oh, you're the Mustang that Rebecca mentioned, I take it?" Riza asked, before he had the chance to bring up a topic of conversation himself.
"Great, what did she say?" He asked, he was obviously not thrilled that Rebecca had been talking about him.
"Just that you might know something about my tattoo." Riza said. "Obviously, I have no idea what it means, and she thought you would."
"Your tattoo?" He asked weakly.
"On my back." Riza said, and tried to keep her tone gentle. Whatever his plans had been for this conversation, whatever he had wanted to tell her about himself or who she was, it obviously had nothing to do with the markings on her back. "Do you know what it means?"
Roy looked like he had no idea how to answer the question, and he sunk down into one of the armchairs and covered his face with his hands. "Why did you have to ask me that?" He asked, and it was like he was talking to himself, as if she wasn't even in the room. "Of all the questions about us, why that one?"
"Because it's permanently etched into my back," Riza spat out, annoyed at him. How dare he act like this question was an inconvenience to him? "And I don't know what it means, or how it got there. I don't even remember own name, or anything. The least you can do is tell me about this."
Roy's head snapped up to look at her, and she crossed her arms in front of her chest and gave him her best look of annoyance. Maybe the Riza Hawkeye he knew would've been kinder, or more patient with him, maybe she would've touched his shoulder, or maybe she would've kissed him and reassured him that she was alright, that she was here. She didn't know what that Riza Hawkeye would've done in this situation, she just wanted to know who she was.
"Please, Roy," Riza said, although there was still an edge to her voice. "I don't know who I am, and I need your help."
"It's flame alchemy." Roy said, slowly, like he was thinking over every single word before he said it. He looked at her hands as he spoke, but she let him take his time, and sat down on the battered couch and just waited for him to speak. "Your father was my alchemy teacher, it's how we met. We were only children, really. Teenagers. You were away at boarding school for most of it, your father used my tuition fees to pay yours, I think. He wasn't always bad man, Riza, but he was troubled and he spiralled out of control after I left and joined the military."
"What does this-"
"It's context," He explained. "I came back to visit when your father died. I wanted his research, I was stupid and idealistic, and more than anything, I was ambitious. I thought flame alchemy would be enough to get me a State Alchemist's license so I begged him for it just before he died, and he told me he'd given it to you." He paused and finally looked up at her. "You understand, don't you? That tattoo is your father's research. He put it there because he trusted you, and you gave me its secrets because you trusted me."
"And the burns?" Riza asked, quietly, unsure that she even wanted the answer after that. A father she didn't remember had done that to her, she couldn't remember the pain, but it must have hurt. Did she love her father that much? To go through agony for him and research that she now didn't understand, if she ever did. Or did she do it out of duty to a man who helped give her life? Why did answers come with so many more questions?
"After Ishval - it was a war, a horrific war, you asked me to burn it off so there would never be another Flame Alchemist," Roy said. "So that there would never be another alchemist like me."
"Why did I do that?" She asked.
"Riza, please, don't ask me to explain Ishval to you. Not today." Roy begged. "Please."
"Okay." It wasn't a satisfactory answer, but she didn't want to cause him more harm than she thought she already had. Maybe Rebecca would have answers about that, or maybe she'd have to find the answers on her own. "Thank you, Roy."
He was going to throw up. Not right this second, but at some point today he was going to accept what all his senses were telling him, and he wasn't going to be able to physically handle it. Roy ignored Havoc and Rebecca's concern, the same way he'd been ignoring it for two years, and went straight for the phone and dialled the familiar number.
"Rockbell Automail." It wasn't the person he was looking for, but it was close enough.
"Winry, it's General Mustang, is he there?"
"Oh, hi General!" She said cheerfully. "No, I've just got back from seeing him off. He'll be passing through East City in a couple of hours though, and he's meeting Al so if you're lucky you might be able to catch him there."
"Thanks, Winry."
Roy didn't want to talk to Fullmetal, their last conversation in person had come to blows and it was Breda's intervention that had stopped it from getting out of hand, but there was no one else that Roy knew and trusted enough to ask about human transmutation. He needed to know for a fact that it was Riza sitting in the living room cuddling Black Hayate, and not something else.