Hello! Here is a little one-shot I wrote a few months ago during Parental!FMA week. There were a few adjustments I wanted to make and mistakes I needed to fix and I finally got around to it, so here it is! Enjoy the Parental!Riza fluff! I'll probably be rewriting another one of my one-shots I wrote that week and posting it fairly soon!

I do not own Fullmetal Alchemist. I do not own its characters. All I do is promote the parental ships that I very much love.

"Keep that on your eye, Edward," Lieutenant Hawkeye ordered as she handed the young boy an ice pack. "Are there any other injuries I should know about?"

Ed begrudgingly took it and placed it on his swollen eye. He shook his head to answer the First Lieutenant's question. Riza could practically feel the tension in the kid as they walked through the halls of Central Command toward Colonel Mustang's office. It was as if he were waiting for her to scold him.

She wouldn't.

She had no reason to do so. Quite the opposite, actually.

Initially, she had been angry when Sergeant Fuery rushed into the office, asking if the Colonel was there. Apparently, Ed had gotten into a fight in the cafeteria. With Roy in a meeting, the First Lieutenant followed Fuery as he explained what happened.

*flashback*

The two rushed through the halls. Hopefully the cafeteria wouldn't be completely destroyed by the time they got there.

"There better be a good reason as to why Fullmetal is in a fight, Fuery. This won't be good for his or the Colonel's reputation."

She couldn't keep the bitterness out of her tone. They had only just transferred to Central Command. The Colonel was already having a hard enough time.

He was rising through the ranks fast. That didn't go over so well with most of the military officers.

Their entire team had gotten the cold shoulder from several of them already.

"Th-there is!" Fuery managed to stutter out, sensing the anger brewing within the First Lieutenant. "I was eating lunch when three of the men from Colonel Douglas's team tried bothering me. I ignored it, but that only made them angry. One of them grabbed me and threw me from the table. They started closing in on me."

She shook her head. Fuery was much tougher than he looked, but he couldn't take on three opponents.

Especially when he wasn't even looking to fight in the first place.

"Next thing I knew," he continued, "Ed put himself between me and the other soldiers. He told me to leave. I didn't want to, but I thought it would be best to go get the Colonel."

Fuery made the right call. None of the other soldiers would dare confront the Flame Alchemist to his face, but he wasn't there unfortunately.

When the two reached the cafeteria, they stopped dead in their tracks.

Two soldiers were wrapped up in tile while another was lying on the ground, curled in on himself. All three looked as if they'd just been hit by a truck.

"That's them…." Fuery muttered after getting over his initial shock.

After hearing the story from her comrade, she couldn't help the pride that bubbled within her seeing that Ed held his ground so well. She saw the young alchemist sitting at one of the tables. He had an arm clutched around his stomach.

Some of the soldiers must have gotten a few lucky hits in before Ed could take care of them all.

Wordlessly, she made her way over to the kid. She gently gripped his chin, tilting his head up. Noticing the swelling around his right eye, she gripped his arm and took him to go find an ice pack.

*end flashback*

"Lieutenant," Ed started at they got closer to the Colonel's office, "I'm really so—"

"You have nothing to be sorry for, Edward," she said, interrupting the young alchemist. She stopped walking and bent down so she was eye-level with him. "Fuery told me everything. You didn't do anything wrong. You stood up for Fuery. We're a team…a family. That's what we do for each other, and I couldn't be any more proud of you."

Ed relaxed, surprised that she wasn't angry. He was half-expecting her to pull out one of her various firearms.

Although, it made sense. He supposed Mustang's team was a family, and he supposed that included him and Al.

The two silently continued to Roy's office, but it was a much more comfortable silence. When they reached the door, Ed was about to walk in when Riza put a hand on his shoulder. Curiously, he looked up at her.

She was gracing him with one of her rare smiles.

"When we go in there, you're telling the story," she declared, not bothering to hide the pride in her voice. "I'm certain the Colonel will enjoy hearing it."

She couldn't help but feel their commanding officer would be just as proud, maybe even more so.

Well, there you have it! I sincerely hope you enjoyed this short, fluffy one-shot! I'll hopefully post that other one-shot within the next week! Maybe I'll rewrite all the short fics I wrote during Parental!FMA week. We'll see! My summer class starts up soon, but I'll continue to write whenever I have time between homework and work and such!

Until next time,

alightintheshadows