Disclaimer: FMA isn't mine. :(

Song: A Lack of Color - Death Cab for Cutie

But I know it's too late

and I should have given you a reason to stay...

The night is silent and still; the air in the desert seems heavier than in the other places she has been, oppressive almost. When she wakes, that is the first thing she notices, the weight on her chest that seems to make it difficult to breathe, the way it feels when you take deep breaths so as not to cry.

Then comes the pain.

It is liberating, in a way, because she no longer feels the weight of the air – only the way her body seems to expand as she takes that breath, stretching the skin on her back.

She must have let some sound slip past her lips because he realizes she is awake. He stirs from his place on the floor beside her, and she feels – his arm, his shoulder, his back? - part of his uniform brush her hand where it meets the edge of the cot.

Without looking, she knows where she is, knows every inch of it by heart from many sleepless nights. The floor is just a tarp, the walls of the tent canvas, the cot beneath her thin and uncomfortable – normally she feels the springs with every curve of her body, hears them squeak with every slight shift of weight. It's something people tell her she will get used to, but no matter how many times she collapses with exhaustion into a dreamless sleep, it is always restless.

They also said she would get used to watching people die because of the rifle in her hands.

She turns her face to the side, eyes still closed. She can tell that he is there, in front of her, and she opens her eyes to find his face just inches away. It isn't a face she recognizes, a face filled with guilt. He didn't used to know guilt, didn't understand it.

She reaches her hand out, fumbling for a moment in the darkness to find his. Only a moment, and then she stops – the action pulls at the skin on her back. Realizing what she meant to do, he takes her hand with his, clinging tightly to her fingers as though they are what allows him to keep breathing.

"I'm sorry," he whispers. "Oh God, I'm so sorry." He leans his forehead against hers and she can feel his body shaking. "I'm sorry." The last time she isn't entirely sure if it was even spoken aloud – perhaps his thoughts are just so intent that they are spilling out of his mind into the world of sound.

She wishes he wouldn't apologize – this is what she asked for. She should be apologizing for asking this of him.

The silence between them lasts so long that she becomes aware of other sounds. There are voices outside the tent, not loud enough to discern words, but loud enough to know that they are there. Something else as well – a fire perhaps? She isn't certain, doesn't want to think about fire right now.

She squeezes his hand tighter.

"How long was I…?" Her words trail off, uncertain whether to say asleep or unconscious. He is quiet for so long, she doesn't think he is going to answer.

"Five hours."

She doesn't have to ask to know that he sat beside her the entire time, laying wet cloths over her shoulder, guilt eating at him and she couldn't say anything to comfort him. She isn't sure if she could even now.

She realizes that the sheets beneath her are soaked with sweat, and the warm desert air that drifts through should be uncomfortably so – she finds herself shivering instead.

He reaches to pull the blankets to cover her and thinks better of it.

"Let me get you some water," he says, not leaving her time to answer before he is up and out the tent flap, vanished into the night.

XXXXXXXX

He emerges to find a fire blazing inside a circle of blue garbed soldiers. Fire. He has seen too much of it – the comfort they find in it, the smoky smell, the warmth – all that makes him shudder, his stomach roiling. Her white skin looked so perfect, the black lines so perfect, unblemished, unscarred.

He turns away and heads the other direction in search of something – water, was it? A shadow detaches itself from the circle and follows him, catching up quickly – it is too much effort, requires too much focus to evade the form he has come to know so well.

"Roy, is Riza okay?" It is Maes Hughes, one of the kindest – if sometimes infuriating – souls that he has ever met. It startles him to hear her name used so casually – by a friend – and he realizes that all those times that he has said her name, there has always been some greater connotation, a greater emotion attached to it, intentional or not.

He is relieved that his initial reaction is one of concern, that his mind doesn't jump immediately to anything intimate – not in that way at least. He supposes that every moment he spends with her is intimate in some way, if intimacy includes small gestures, expressions they both recognize in each other.

He realizes it has been a minute since Maes spoke and that his face is entirely blank. He fumbles for an answer.

"I…I don't…" Damn it, why did he have to screw everything up?

"Roy?"

"She asked me to do something for her. A favor."

Maes gives him a strange look, contemplative perhaps? Perhaps he knows more than he lets on.

"Roy, are you okay?"

Again, he is at a loss for words. He tries to remember why he left her alone – wasn't he supposed to be fetching something? He tries to picture her, lying by herself and wondering where he had gone but all he can think of is the raw red skin of her shoulder, skin that will eventually become red scar.

A scar left by him.

"I need to find some water," he says, recovering his purpose.

"Here, take my canteen," Maes said. "I just filled it" – Roy took it gratefully and took off back towards her tent.

"Hey!" He hears Maes shout after him. "Where are you going so fast?"

XXXXXXXX

He looks lost when he returns, bearing a military issue canteen clutched in his hands. He perches awkwardly on the edge of the cot and offers it to her, but she doesn't try to take it.

"Help me sit up," she says. He blanches, but as she tries to push herself up and he realizes she is going to do this whether or not he helps, he reaches out to help her. At last, after what seems like a century of small movements, shifting her weight slowly so as not to pull at the skin – what remains of it - on her shoulder, her legs fall over the side of the cot and her toes touch the ground.

He is surprised to realize that her feet don't quite reach the floor – it reminds him how incredibly young she is to be out here with him and he knows that he is the reason she is here, that it is his fault.

She feels his hand on her back, without a glove for once, the skin soft and gentle. It reminds her of the night after her fathers' funeral. She remembers the outrage in his face, the disbelief that her father could do something like that – he has high ideals, high expectations of himself that he expects others to live up to as well. He is still as naïve as a child, despite the uniform that he wears.

He hands her the canteen then, and she takes a long drink, the water ice cold and fresh, not yet tasting its container. She sits patiently as he rubs a healing salve over the burns – it hurts like hell, but she bears it in silence, as much as she can. When he bandages it, his hands are gentle and he leaves them loose enough so that air still reaches the skin beneath.

She reaches for her shirt, the black t-shirt she had been wearing earlier, wincing.

"Wait," he says. He pulls one of his own shirts from somewhere at the end of the cot – it is soft grey cotton, much larger than her own. He helps her pull it over her head – fitting her arms through it is painful, but when it's done, she realizes the fabric smells like him. It fits loosely enough that it doesn't pull at the bandages on her back, and she offers him a half smile in thanks.

She puts her hand in his.

"It's going to leave a scar," he said, his voice soft.

"I know."

A/N: I am on a roll. Reviews would be lovely, constructive criticism or anything is good!