"I'll be happy if I never see another grain of sand in my entire life."

Roy glanced over as Maes let a handful of the pale, dusty earth rush between his fingers.

"It gets into every nook and cranny. Your boots. Your eyes. Your hair. It's all I've been tasting for weeks!" said Maes with a frown, his emerald eyes fixed menacingly to the ground.

Roy said nothing. He swallowed hard as a strange acidity bloomed in his chest. The sand was the least of his grievances. It was the smell of the place. That sickly sweet tint to the air that he swore blackened his lungs with every breath. Maes turned towards his friend.

"What's with you?" he asked as he gave Roy a friendly jab on the arm, "Is it because you can't look forward to receiving a letter from a girl?"

Maes gazed wistfully into the distance.

"A girl as wonderful and perfect as my dear Gracia?!"

Roy continued to stare at the ground, when suddenly, a foreign shadow invaded his field of vision. He looked up. A solider of rather petit stature slowly approached them; their face obscured by the hood of the tan, military issue overcoat. A sniper rifle was balanced precariously on their shoulder. After coming to a rest a few feet from where Roy and Maes stood, they reached up and let the hood fall away.

"Hello, Mustang. Do you remember me?"

Roy's breath caught in his throat as he regarded the girl in front of him. Her short flaxen hair quivered gently in the desert breeze. He knew it was her. Like the sand, the war seeped its way into every life it touched, and smothered the light in her eyes.

"Do you?" asked Riza, her gaze burning into his soul.

How different things used to be.