Dawn

It was beyond late by the time Colonel Roy Mustang finally pushed back the last of his completed paperwork. He rose to stretch, popping several vertebrae in his spine with a small groan. In spite of the late hour, he knew without a doubt that his Lieutenant would still be there, sitting patiently in his outer office, waiting to drive him home.

Not for the first time, he felt a twinge of guilt for that. Anytime Mustang chose to work late into the night, then so did she—without so much as a complaint. He never even asked her to stay late; Hawkeye did it gladly and of her own volition. Loyal to a fault, he thought affectionately as he gathered his coat and gloves. He knew how lucky he was to have her as a subordinate.

It was rare that she actually surprised him anymore. They'd been together for so long, they practically moved as one in the intricate dance of politics and diplomacy and intrigue that consumed their daily life. And so, when Mustang finally closed the door of his inner office and turned to address his loyal Lieutenant, he felt an unexpected rush of pleasure at what he found waiting for him.

She was wedged in one corner of the couch; her head leaned back against the cushion. Her fingers were curled loosely over the edges of the file she still held open in her lap. In fact, it looked as though she had only just leaned back a moment before, had only just closed her eyes for a second to rest them. But she didn't stir, didn't jump to attention as she would have if she'd been conscious of his presence.

For one thrilling moment Mustang simply stood there, watching her breathe deep and slow. Deeply asleep and completely relaxed, her face looked more peaceful than he had seen it in years. Hawkeye suddenly looked very young—as innocent and gentle as she had been when they'd first met. Before the military and the war had shattered her innocence and stained those gentle hands with blood.

Mustang was torn between a desire to let her sleep and concern for her comfort. With her neck tilted back at that odd angle, she'd probably be miserable when she woke up. But he couldn't bring himself to disturb such repose, especially when he knew that Hawkeye could only have succumbed to a mere physical need like sleep while still here in the office if she were exceptionally exhausted. When had she last slept? Mustang didn't give any particular thought to his own health, but if he wasn't looking after his subordinates, what kind of leader did that make him?

"I've been working her too hard," he thought.

Silently setting his things down again, he returned to his office and poured himself a stiff drink, glad that Hawkeye allowed him to keep a bottle of scotch in his bottom drawer for after-hour emergencies such as these. It was a habit he'd picked up from Hughes, with whom he'd often shared a small glass after the completion of a long or difficult assignment. Hawkeye had even joined them once or twice. He'd compromise, Mustang decided, and let Hawkeye sleep for the space of one drink.

Returning to the outer office again, Mustang sat gingerly on the edge of the couch, kicking his feet up on the low table across from it. Hawkeye didn't even stir. Her skin was too pale, and she had those faint purple shadows under her eyes, like bruises. He was suddenly reminded of another night where he'd stumbled across a sleeping Riza Hawkeye, many years before. On that occasion, she'd been waiting in vain for her father, and Roy had ended up carrying her up to bed himself. And that recollection triggered other childhood memories, bright snapshots of the time when he'd been an eager alchemy student under Hawkeye-sensei's tutelage, spending his downtime struggling to get to know the shy and mysterious girl who'd become his most trusted friend.

So, as he sipped his scotch, enjoying the slow burn of the alcohol as it slid down his throat, Mustang allowed his mind to wander. What would have happened to Riza Hawkeye if they'd never met? If he'd never come to live in her home and learn alchemy from her father, if they'd never forged a friendship that had become an alliance, if he had never planted his idealistic ideas of living to serve the people in her head? Would Berthold Hawkeye still have burned that great, terrible, beautiful tattoo on his child's soft white skin? Would he have taken on some other apprentice to bequeath his daughter and his life's work to?

If there hadn't been a promising young student who had the potential to become a worthy successor, perhaps the old man's secrets would have died with him. Perhaps he would never have felt it necessary to leave his daughter with such a burden. Maybe he would've given it all up and paid more attention to her, and to ensuring that she would not be left all alone and unprepared to deal with his significant debts and mortgages at the tender age of 16.

Or perhaps young Riza would have grown tired of her father's caprice by then; tired of trying to take care of a shell of a man who looked right through her as though she were a ghostly presence in his home rather than his only child. Maybe she would have run away.

Would she have been resourceful enough to find her maternal grandfather on her own? She might have commanded a home with the wily old fox, and devoted herself to brightening the old man's twilight years. Grumman would certainly have appreciated her more than her own father, who rarely even noticed the effort she put into looking after him.

Might she have ended up in the military anyway, even if she'd met her grandfather sooner? Old Grumman would've recognized her potential right away, Mustang was certain of that. She'd come from a long line of career military men on her mother's side, so he might have been proud to call her his successor, as someone worthy of carrying on the family tradition. He certainly saw it that way now, although he'd had no say in her joining up back then. But he hadn't wanted his own daughter to choose a military career, so…maybe he wouldn't have allowed Riza to join up, if he'd had any sort of claim on her.

Perhaps he would have forbidden it, or simply made sure she met some handsome young thing and made an advantageous match before the idea of joining the military had caught her attention. Grumman would've looked out for her best interests, but it wouldn't have stopped him from using her to make an alliance with someone promising and influential if he could.

Or would she have met and married some sweet, simple man - a farmer, a shopkeeper, something? Her own mother had defied Grumman's wishes and run off with an alchemist, after all. Riza, too, might've settled down happily in the country to raise half a dozen babies, some of which might have inherited her blonde hair and soft brown eyes.

She would make a wonderful mother: she had the capacity for deep and abiding love, and a firm and decisive hand paired with a gentle and kind spirit. Her children would have learned to behave, to obey their mother without sassing. But they would also have known who to go to when they scraped their knees or when they broke their favorite toys, or when they had made a stupid mistake and needed solid intelligent advice on how to face up to what they had done. She'd have been well suited to the simple kind of life, Mustang decided. He could see her: golden hair long and loose and shining in the sunlight, wearing an apron over a summer dress, carrying a baby on her hip, set against a backdrop of a farmhouse surrounded by apple trees. In this vision, she was smiling, laughing.

She didn't have the haunted eyes of a killer.

Mustang sighed heavily. Was it really his fault, then? Riza Hawkeye might have been so much happier without Roy Mustang in her life…but then again, she might not.

Her father had been a haunted shell of a man even before Mustang had arrived. His wife's untimely death had broken him, and he had thrown himself body and soul into his research to escape his pain. If Mustang hadn't come along, who would have been little Riza's ally and companion? Who would have helped her make sure her father was eating? Who would have carried her to bed when she'd collapsed while patiently waiting to be acknowledged? Who would have comforted her when she'd first learned of the wasting illness that would eventually claim her father's life?

Old Hawkeye might have died even sooner if he hadn't fought so hard to live long enough to pass on his life's work. And if he had, Riza might've been left to fend for herself before she'd even hit her teens. If she hadn't found Grumman, if she'd set out on her own, perhaps she'd have ended up living life on the streets, selling her body to survive as so many other girls without hope had done before her.

But no…he couldn't even imagine that outcome. Riza had been smart and resourceful as a child. And the neighbors of that rural community, although they'd carefully stayed out of Hawkeye's affairs while the old man still lived, would've taken pity on the orphaned child if he had died before she'd been of age. One of them might have taken her in, or else they might have helped her find a job, or taken up a collection to send her off to school or something. Riza was a survivor, and she'd learned to be tough and self-reliant after all those years of paternal neglect. In fact, Roy was amazed that she'd never lost her gentle loving spirit, after all those years of being rebuffed by the one person whose love she'd tried the hardest to earn.

But she was resilient, and she'd have found some way to make it on her own—gone into service and found work as the beloved nursemaid to small children of a rich family, or become the invaluable assistant to some shopkeeper, or…well, caught the eye of some sweet and simple man and gotten married and happily settled down to raise pretty golden-haired babies. So he was back to the vision of the smiling woman with a baby on her hip and nothing in her eyes but love and laughter.

Damn.

Riza Hawkeye's fate had been sealed the day he'd come into her life.

However Mustang looked at it, he kept coming back to the same conclusion. She'd have been far better off if they'd never met. She could've been happy, innocent, and carefree. It was too late to change that now, of course, but to know that the majority of her suffering was because of him…He looked down at the empty glass in his hand and shook his head, depressed by path his thoughts had taken. It was time to wake her, before he roused the ghosts of the Ishvalan war and lost himself in a vortex of self-loathing and hatred.

He glanced over at his sleeping lieutenant. Despite the darkness of his recent thoughts, Mustang couldn't help but smile at the pretty picture she made curled into the cushions. Unable to resist, Mustang reached out to brush aside a stray wisp of hair away from Hawkeye's face. At the gentle touch, she made a tiny sound in the back of her throat, and his heart skipped a beat.

He couldn't imagine not having her in his life. He needed her.

His quiet, faithful, beautiful shadow: always walking one step behind him while her mind was miles ahead, always ready to assist him with the strategies and meetings and paperwork needed to accomplish their assignments, always reminding him of his goals and his dreams, always watching his back. He could not manage this without her. After a moment, he leaned in a little closer and skimmed her cheek with the back of his fingers, murmuring in his softest voice, "Riza. Wake up, Riza..."

She stirred a little, then. Her soft brown eyes fluttered open and locked onto his.

"Roy?" she said thickly, blinking owlishly. Mustang grinned. She never called him 'Roy' in the office. Even when they were alone together outside of work, it was extremely rare for her to use his given name. He wondered just how tired she was, to allow herself to forget a self-imposed rule like that.

"Mm-hm," he said, still smiling. "Ready to go, sleeping beauty?"

She stared at him for another few seconds, brow furrowed in confusion. When it clicked, Hawkeye sat bolt upright, eyes wide. Roy tried not to laugh at her expression.

"I-I'm sorry, sir. I must have drifted off," she said, trying to straighten her uniform as she spoke. "I apologize, sir, it won't happen again." Adorably flustered, she raised a hand to check her hair, which was slightly disheveled.

"At ease, Lieutenant," Mustang chuckled as he rose to his feet. "I'd have carried you to your room and tucked you in like the old days, except you live a bit farther away. And I'm pretty sure that you would've woken up on the way if I'd tried it."

Her cheeks turned the most interesting shade of rosy pink as he spoke, and he offered her a hand to pull her to her feet. They quickly put things in order in the office, and then Mustang helped her with her coat and waited while she locked the door behind them. He noticed that she had redone her hair at some point when he'd had his back turned. It was immaculate again, not a single hair out of place.

"Thank god we have tomorrow off," he commented, stifling a yawn as they finally left the building.

"Don't you mean 'today,' sir?" Hawkeye replied, glancing up at the sky. Sure enough, the sun was just beginning to rise. He turned to her with some pithy remark on his lips, but the sight of the sunlight glinting off her golden hair like a halo drove what he had been about to say clear out of his head.

"I guess that makes me a selfish bastard," he mumbled instead. She turned a quizzical look on him as she opened the car door for him. "I was just wondering…" he explained. "What your life might have been like if I hadn't showed up on your doorstep." There was a moment of silence as they both climbed into the car. "I was picturing you as the happy housewife of some simple country man, raising pretty blonde babies on a farm somewhere," he finished, fastening his seat belt. From the way Hawkeye bit the corner of her bottom lip, he knew that she'd wondered about it herself. "Anyway," he admitted, "I decided that although you'd probably have been better off without me in your life…I just can't do without you. Maybe it makes me a selfish bastard, but I just can't bring myself to wish that I'd never crossed your path," Mustang finished somewhat huskily. He was suddenly afraid that Hawkeye would brush him off, laugh at him for being a sentimental idiot.

But of course, she didn't laugh.

"It doesn't do to dwell on might-have-beens, sir," she said softly, looking away from the road for a moment to meet his eyes. Her voice was serious and achingly sad. "The past is the past," she said after a slight pause. "If it makes you feel any better, though, it wouldn't really have changed anything for me. My father was actively searching for someone to pass on his research to. If it hadn't been you, it would have been someone else."

Another picture sprang unbidden into Mustang's mind, this time of a flushing teenage girl nervously clutching her blouse to her naked chest, exposing her bare back to the scrutiny of some other man…one who might not have been as touched by her vulnerability as he had been. One who might easily have taken advantage of the situation. The muscles in his jaw tightened.

"Riza…" Mustang said, suddenly overcome with anger and some undefinable emotion akin to jealousy.

"And I, for one, am glad that it was you rather than someone else," she tried for a casual tone, but still flushed a little at her confession. She remembered what it had felt like—being a naïve and essentially defenseless young girl offering her flesh-colored canvas to a man she'd decided to trust. Praying that her trust was not misplaced.

Mustang couldn't speak for a moment; his chest was far too tight. I'm glad it was you, she'd said. He swallowed hard.

How could Hawkeye-sensei have done that to his daughter? It wasn't the first time he'd asked himself the question, wondering about the motives of a man he'd loved and respected and feared. Her own father…he'd practically set Riza up—arranged matters so that she would at some point be forced to take off her clothes for a man of his choice, like some whore—well, no. That wasn't quite true. The final decision had been Riza's…but with the emotional blackmail involved? He'd made it fairly obvious that his fatherly affection was tied to her compliance.

How was that any better?

Before Mustang could say anything else, Hawkeye smiled and said lightly, "In any event, I didn't have the guts to run off and join the circus or anything like that, and you did come along to learn alchemy from my father, so it's a moot point." She didn't like talking about her father, even with the one person who'd known him as well as she had.

"The circus, huh? I'm sure you'd have made an excellent Xingese acrobat," Mustang chuckled, understanding. He knew exactly how difficult it was for Riza to think about her father. "Blondes are rather the hot commodity there, actually. And paired with those brown eyes? You're even more exotic. So I bet you'd have been quite popular as a circus star."

"Good to know I have a backup career plan," she said dryly, glad that he had allowed her to change the subject. They were quiet for the remainder of the drive. Hawkeye was still a little embarrassed by their topic of conversation, so she was almost relieved when she pulled up in front of his apartment building.

Mustang didn't reach for the car door right away. Hawkeye turned to see what was wrong, and found that he was watching her innermost thoughts play across her face, and had likely been doing so for the past several minutes. Paralyzed by the raw emotion she saw lurking in his eyes, she made no move to stop him when he slowly raised his hand. He reached over and released her hair from her clip. He raked his fingers through it, slowly, and felt something unclench in his chest. Maybe you're right. What's done is already done. The past is past…so I'll pin my hopes on the future.

"Lieutenant," he said softly, as the last strands slipped through his fingers. His eyes locked onto hers again. "Get some rest. That's an order."

"Yes, sir," she replied.

Her scalp was still tingling when she crawled into her own bed twenty minutes later. She slept better that night than she had in months.

A.N. I just realized that I haven't written any Royai lately, and I've missed them. So I wrote this at work over the last week...Let's just hope my bosses won't catch on. Thanks for reading!

xoxo Janieshi