So...in case it's not obvious, this is sort of a bunny about how the homunculi don't represent the sins, they are literally the sins of humanity. ...Okay, saying more would ruin it.

So if anybody thinks I'm Roy-bashing - I'm really not. I love him, which you've probably figured out if you've read this far. But he's just in such a peculiar position of trust and power that putting him in situations like this are just too interesting!

Onesided RoyxEd.

83. Jealousy

"I'm Envy! I'm Envy the Jealous, don't you know what that means?"

A whisper of ash as his bones and flesh and muscles fall away; his green, loathing heart exposed (as always) (and he will burn him away until there is nothing left).

He -she -it pleads for mercy.

"I'm everything you don't want to see."

Roy had seen how the creature had touched the boy he'd claimed under his command, his protection (his his his) -

"I'm everything you don't want to hear."

- Ed moaning the name of a sin, unaware that his commanding officer was so close, just outside the door, waiting to work up the courage to tell him the truth -

The thing (like an insect, a worm) crawls as far as it can. Roy lets it struggle before placing his boot slowly on its back

(had Ed ever seen the true form of the monstrosity he'd taken on as his lover?)

and pressing down.

"I'm everything you don't want to know."

Years. Years upon years. (He's too young.) (He likes girls.) (He likes Winry.) (He wouldn't be interested.)

He didn't want to know, didn't want to realize that -

- Ed just didn't want him.

His own words are arsenic, dripping poison that scorch his mouth. He has never hated anything this much.

"I'm the part of you that you try to hide, wreathed away in darkness and shadow."

Riza's trying to stop him. Can't she see, doesn't she know doesn't she know (she doesn't and that's the worst)

"Please...please, stop..."

Envy's begging him to stop. For mercy.

"Stop it."

Roy looks up, and it's his golden boy, his sin, his treasure (stop it, screams the last rational part of him, you should have stopped this years ago before it shrivels up and becomes dust on the wind) telling him that this is enough.

"Well, guess what? He's mine now, Ponyboy. And even worse? He was never yours to begin with!"

A stranger has taken over his body now, a stranger who sees nothing but Edward - and the obstacle to having him. The Promised Day means nothing. Riza means nothing. Hughes means nothing.

The stranger pulls hooks at the corners of his mouth and he smirks. And suddenly he (the stranger) is raising his hand -

- and Envy screams one last time as he becomes nothing more than cinders and charcoal.

Roy lowers his hand.

His envy is gone. Ash.

In its place is horror, and a broken heart - because the look on Ed's face, he thought he'd never have to see again after Maria Ross, and this time he deserves it.

"Wh-why?" stammers Ed, dangerously close to tears.

Roy opens his mouth. He tries to say, 'for Hughes' because that was supposed to be why -and it is now, it really is, it was until Envy started his mockery, his taunting -

Instead what comes out is, "For you."