I´ve decided to put this up here as well as in my lj. Just a simple Roy/Hawkeye retrospective moody thing.

Rating: R (for implied sex)

Pairing: Roy/Riza

Spoilers: Through the whole manga and anime, specially #25 of the anime and some very light references to #38 of the manga

Warning: Character death

Summary: With Roy in the hospital Hawkeye remembers the colours "are not actually real".

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Kaleidoscope

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"I´ve been gone, I´ve been remembered, I´ve been alive, I´ve been a ghost."

The Wallflowers

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PART ONE

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There is so much blood.

So much.

Fuck, she thinks, looking down at her own hands covered in dark red.

She´s been here before but there has never been so much blood. Blood everywhere. And a feeling of wrongness that tightens her chest, that chokes her voice. Her throat hurts, sore. She doesn´t have the will to give out orders anymore.

She hears Falman approach, of course, but her mind doesn´t register the fact this is another human being, that there is actually another human being here with her.

She hears steps and when she looks up she half-expects to find Roy... Roy with his habitual smirk, and Roy letting her run into his arms, and Roy softly saying she has been an idiot for worrying so much.

She looks up and her heart skips a beat.

And then it all falls into place when she sees Falman and his kind eyes, and not Roy with his twinkling, not the smirk and not the strong arms around her, not the whispers in her hair, not Roy...

The world struggles to come into focus for her.

"There is a restroom in this floor, 1st Lieutenant. Why don´t you go and wash up a bit."

At first Hawkeye doesn´t know what he´s talking about. And then she realizes the dampness in her clothes is because of the blood.

So much blood. Too much.

"I can´t."

"Excuse me?"

She looks down at her hands, and then up at Falman, who for all his kindness doesn´t understand, can´t understand. And then again down at her own hands and when she talks it´s mostly to herself.

"I can´t wash my hands. It´s his blood. It´s his... I can´t..."

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We rolled over each other, me on top of you, you hesitating, just a girl and boy and no world outside.

"It´s okay, I can take care of myself, major. I don´t get kissed when I don´t want to."

Still your head tilted sideways, your nose brushing my chin.

"I think it´s the first time I´ve heard you make a joke."

We were swaying at a delicate, elaborate balance, you under me, and I resting my elbow on the pillow so the tip of my fingers stretched to reach your hair.

"It´s true." I feigned hurt and turned my face from your intentions, only to scan you through the corner of my eyes, open mouthed, caught in mid motion, my jaw dangerously hovering over your ready lips.

"But..." I added. "Sometimes I don´t get kissed when I want to."

We were so young, just discovering a playful side to ourselves we didn´t know existed.

You kissed me them, and I wanted it. I allowed myself to want it.

We were learning each other´s bodies.

I was learning your body.

The map I traced over the years started there, in the solid curve of your collar-bone.

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The shape of the chairs in the hospital becomes familiar after a couple of hours. It doesn´t mean that her has back has stopped hurting. It just means she doesn´t pay attention to the pain anymore.

She wonders what Amstrong, who flight from the scene in the blink of an eye, fuelled with revenge and with her approbation, is doing at this moment, if he is afraid to come to Roy without the culprits, if he is simply afraid to come here, afraid to know.

Hawkeye has felt the same urge to throw things at walls as Amstrong, but the urge vanished hours ago. Now she just feels numbness. Numbness of mind and body.

It´s like all of her functions have been paralysed by terror.

She´s taken off her coat (it´s ruined, ruined forever) and washed her hands and face from blood and tears. She even has thrown up and now feels empited more than empty.

When Havoc returns he doesn´t ask about Roy anymore. If his condition changed he´d be able to read it on Hawkeye´s face.

She does ask, on the other hand, about the case. Afraid to ask, because she is in no state of conducting an investigation.

"Any news?"

Havoc shakes his head miserably, his nerves already so consumed that he gives the impression of utter calm.

"No, 1st Lieutenant. Sorry."

She doesn´t want apologies. She doesn´t want the rage pooling in her fists, either.

"I will kill them."

"I know. We all will" he nods sympathetically. And it only makes Hawkeye want to hit him. Hard.

"No, you don´t understand. I will kill them with my bare hands."

There is a pause while Havoc swallows.

"I know, lieutenant, I know" in a soft, confident voice.

"You do."

He does. Or doesn´t he? She doesn´t really want to inquiry, because she doesn´t know which answer would make her more unhappy.

"Listen, Scieska is heading back to the quarters." He gestures towards the small girl waiting opposite them, too shy to come nearer. "She can bring you a change of clothes, if you´d like."

"That would be most kind, thank you."

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Those were years of amazement and horror.

The sex and the sand.

I remember the sex with grains of sand under our fingernails, sand in our hair, sand in my shoes, and the taste of salt and sand on your body.

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There is only so much one can do here, and the nurses won´t let her in, and the doctors won´t tell her anything.

So after a while she stops feeling angry or tired and begins getting used to the waiting.

She hands Fuery the key to her house (that surely still smells of lovemaking from the night before, flashes of it coming suddenly before her eyes) and tells him to feed and walk Black Hayate.

There not much more to do, really, just yet, so she takes the chair closest to Roy´s room and rest her head against the wall and imagines she can hear Roy´s breathing through it.

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You told me you wanted to become Fuhrer.

You spoke to me of a different world. A better one.

And suddenly it would be impossible for us to be together in public, and you offered a way out. If I wanted to stop this, if I wanted to leave... it was my call.

You made clear that as much as you wanted to shout to the world that I was yours, that you were mine, as much as you wanted to hold my hand in daylight, all those things had to wait, and they would wait for me if I still wanted them. That you couldn´t offer me any resemblance of normality.

I never wanted something normal.

I just recalled saying I wanted you.

"I´m sorry I can´t give you all the things you deserve. Just yet."

You bent, all traces of a smile erased, as if you were waiting for me to push you away. For a moment I know you wished I did. For a moment you dreamed of a different life for me. A better one, or so you thought.

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She´s spent the entire conversation fidgeting with her spoon, picking absently at the mashed potatoes. She doesn´t like the way the hospital lamps project an almost greenish light on them. It´s ugly.

Everything here is ugly.

Hawkeye doesn´t know why she agreed to come down in the first place, maybe it was Falman´s silent plea as he told her they were all going downstairs to get a little snack. The gentle lines under his eyes as he told her.

Maybe she was fooling herself at that moment, arguing that it might help her keep his thoughts away from Roy and his condition.

Maybe they are all fooling themselves down here. And they are all as broken and lost as she is.

She notices that Havoc lights cigarette after cigarette, taking barely a couple of drags from each, nervourly unwrapping package after package. Scieska is telling him to stop running his hands through his hair or it will stay messed up forever.

Hawkeye smiles in sympathy at Havoc´s apologies.

It´s past midnight and they are the only ones in the hospital restaurant, and dozens of empty tables and hundreds of empty chair surrounding them. It´s all a bit sad looked at from the outside.

Falman is silent, although from time to time he tries some reassuring words to the group, and Breda just sits and eats the potatoes, avoiding looking at Hawkeye at all cost.

Havoc makes some jokes, Falman nods and Scieska smiles with that endearing shyness that only manages to irk Hawkeye in a moment like this. She apologizes and leaves the table before the rest has finished, knowing they won´t protest.

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You came from Edward´s assestment with ashes on your face and clothes, filling my room of smoked scent.

Your coat was still on my chair, wondering if anyone noticed it was me whom you gave it when you had to take it off and begin tiding up the mess from your confrontation with the Fullmetal Alchemist.

I came to you but you backed off, far from my arms´ reach, shaking your head graciously.

You retrieved the coat from my chair, smiling down on me but still shaking you head.

"I bet I stink right now."

"Yes, you do." I said, smiling mischievously, an expression you didn´t see often in my face.

I took the coat of your hands and returned it to the chair. You looked down on me confused but with the corner of your lips beginning to twitch with pleasure.

Then I began unbuttoning your shirt, slowly, far too slowly for our own sanity. You did not dare touch me yet, your hands up as if you´ve been caught committing a crime, just expectant as to what I was going to do next.

All distance erased I smelled you. I tiptoed to smell you hair, burying my nose in his thickness.

I you´d only believed how beautiful you were.

And that smell...

My fingers curling around the fabric of your collar, my tongue following the salty traces of sweat down your jaw. The intoxicating nearness of your body.

You let me do, pleased by my roughness, by my anxious touch. You must understand, that smell was driving me crazy, so pure and raw, acrid in my nostrils and sour on my tongue.

I threw you to the chair and sat on you, wanting to feel your erection grow inch by inch under me. I wanted to leave you breathless, panting, taste all I could taste, take all I could take. It was rushed and desperate sex, and we had most of our clothes on, with your hands grabbing mercilessly my throat and then sliding down beneath my shirt to my breast, while you other hand on my hip helped me up and down.

It lasted barely minutes but I remember the smell.

The ashes and the sweat.

x

She hasn´t noticed how cold she is until she sips the hot coffee. It´s 3 a.m. and it scares her to think how chilly it must be inside Roy´s room. Her own distress must have been evident because Scieska, though she´s been avoiding Hawkeye all night, went to get her a cup of coffee.

Hawkeye is unable to say if she has thanked the girl. She meant to.

If it´s so Scieska accepts wordlessly.

The warm liquid is comforting in her hands and her throat, it helps to bring back a sense of reality all these hours in the hospital had wiped away.

Strangely enough Scieska takes a seat next to Hawkeye, not too close but friendly so. Hawkeye is surprised but decides not to pay attention and concentrate on the coffee.

"First Lieutenant?"

It´s amazing how humble and low that has come out, and Hawkeye turns to the girl almost wide-eyed.

"I hope you don´t mind but I´ve been talking to the nurses."

The nurses. None has come to talk to Hawkeye since she (since he) arrived.

"Yes?"

"The one guarding this floor tonight told me that if you wanted to spend the night in..." She had been doing perfect until now but her voice finally chokes a bit. "In Colonel Mustang´s room, she said she wouldn´t tell."

"But..." she cannot really register what Scieska is saying, as if it was an altogether different language. "But they say only family..."

"I told her there are many kinds of family."

Hawkeye nods and goes back to drinking her coffee.

This time she is sure she hasn´t said "thank you".

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