Chapter One: ... would be you, Riza!

"Sir", Lieutenant Hawkeye said, angrily enough to make sure he would get the truth this time. "May I speak freely?" As if he knew, she would do so anyway, he made a quick hand movement, but didn't think of looking at her while she was speaking to him. This fact made Hawkeye even more angry. "How can you be so ignorant, Colonel? I really thought you were a man of honor, a man who was ready to risk everything to make little things seem a bit better. When did you stop to think of other people?" Actually, Mustang was prepared to hear her saying something like this, but hearing it for real was different than just imagining it. "I changed my mind. You may not speak freely." He turned away from the window and sat down on his desk chair, taking some papers and starting to write, pretending that he had better things to do.

Hawkeye looked at him for a moment, not believing what he just said. Did he really close his eyes and ears to live in this little world of his own? That was impossible and he knew that. If he didn't understand that he was in a position in which he first had to think of his men and after that of himself, he wouldn't be able to become what he once seemed to deserve: Fuhrer.

After being so quiet for a few seconds now, Mustang raised his head and gave her a quick glimpse. "You may go, Lieutenant." Hawkeye took a deep breath and tried to calm down over this arrogance of her direct supervisor, but she wasn't able to do so. His pride and this lack of interest made her questioning her latest decisions of following his orders. "Sir", she said with a last bit of control. Then, she left the room.

Mustang followed her with his eyes for a few seconds. Realizing what he just did, he leaned back in his chair and laid his hand in front of his eyes, sighing. He already could feel that he made a big mistake in talking to her like that. It would have been fine with anyone else, but not with her.

At the next morning, he was sitting at his desk once again, when Lieutenant Hawkeye entered the room without knocking on the door first. Mustang jumped up of his chair and seemed to be relieved. "Lieutenant! I wanted to talk to you, actually." Hawkeye nodded and came to his desk, some papers in her hands. While he was talking to her, she didn't think of stopping her steps. Just as he hadn't looked at her the day before when she had been talking to him. "Yesterday, things were said of which we both are not very proud, I assume. But I really think..." Before he could say anything more, Hawkeye stood in front of him, holding the papers towards him. "What is that?", he asked unsure of the answer and if he wanted to know it. Hawkeye didn't say a word, so he had to take and read over the papers. With every word his eyes went bigger and the serenity, he often seemed to have brought to perfection, left him. After he finished reading, he raised his head and looked at Hawkeye, as if she had stabbed him with a dagger. "Transfer...?" Hawkeye nodded. "I won't be under your command any longer." With cold politeness she continued, "I hope you find, what you are looking for, Colonel. Goodbye." She turned around to leave the room, hearing Mustang's now nervous voice speaking to her. "You can't possibly be serious, Hawkeye. Riza! You can't be serious." "I am", she answered him shortly.

When she had reached the door and grabbed the knob to open it, Mustang finally realized that he had to be honest with her now or never. "Riza! Wait!" She stood still. Waiting for a statement on his strange behavior. "You said, I didn't care of other people than me." "Yes." "Well", he took a breath and didn't move his eyes from her, not even for one second, "and what about the fact that I care about you and need you here by my side?"

The Lieutenant's eyes widened. She told herself that she might have misunderstood it, just to not turn all red. "Riza", his voice called her again. He hadn't moved, just stood there like a little child, so helpless. "You can't leave me!" He recognized that she still hadn't moved as well. "Please", he begged her one last time, hoping she wouldn't just go through this door. Hoping, this wasn't the last moment with her.

And Hawkeye just stood there with her eyes wide open and thought about this feeling he gave her with this weak voice of his. He really wasn't as strong as he always pretended to be. And if it was true, what he said, he really didn't only think of himself. Before she could realize how much she meant to him, he once again tried to reach her with his from hesitancy shaking voice. "Don't leave me..." She couldn't. And she had never planned to. Smiling, she turned around to him. He was obviously confused by her face, but on the other hand it seemed to make him feel better for a moment. "Look at the signature, Colonel", was all Hawkeye said. After a few seconds, in which Mustang tried to look as confident as possible, he did what she said and took a look at the signature of her transfer papers. He stumbled and seemed to talk to himself. "No signature at all...?" When Hawkeye started to laugh a bit, he raised his head quickly and looked at her again. "That's right. It's a blank check, so to speak."

While she seemed to be very amused by this situation, laughing to herself, he laid the papers on his desk and went straight towards, only to fasten his steps shortly before her, grab her and lay his arms around her, as if she had returned from a war. Hawkeye widened her eyes once again. "Colonel?", she said, now finally blushing. Mustang didn't seem as amused as her. "Don't do that ever again. You hear me? Ever." Hawkeye couldn't help but smiling again and answered his movement with a hug. "Yes, Sir."