Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction ❯ Automail ❯ Birthday ( Chapter 6 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Birthday

It was a bad day.

Roy Mustang sighed gloomily as he glanced over at the calendar hanging from his office wall. He had been doing so all day, trying to catch himself in some sort of universal lie.

But ne . . .

It was indeed that day.

The small square on the calendar was nondescript—no circles or stars or colourful stickers to indicate that it was indeed the day on which he was born.

His birthday.

Roy sighed again as he turned back to his paperwork. It really wasn't the actual fact that he was turning one year older that bothered him. It was more because it was his birthday—a very important birthday, he might add—and no one seemed to really care.

True he had received a card from his mother a few days previous, one decorated quite extravagantly with a large glittering 30 on the front. Inside there was a jovial little message about being over the hill and then a handwritten note, the gist of which was his mom wondering when he was going to give her and his father some grandkids to dote over.

Roy had thrown it away.

It was one thing that his parents remembered—they were his parents after all. But the colonel wanted some recognition from his subordinates as well. And he wasn't getting it.

Hawkeye? Nowadays, she was so busy with Havoc that it (almost) surprised Roy when she remembered to show up to work on time. He didn't expect either of them would recall that it was his `special day'.

Fuery? He was a good technician and an excellent subordinate, but Roy doubted whether or not he remembered his own birthday.

Breda? The colonel didn't know when his birthday was . . . why should the second lieutenant have to remember his?

Farman? He had always worked under Hughes. He could probably spout off quite a bit information about Elysia's birthday, but Roy's? Most likely not.

Hughes? Well . . . Hughes wasn't in a state to remember much of anything now, was he?

And Fullmetal?

Roy actually laughed out loud. Fullmetal? Even if, on the off chance, he recalled when his commanding officer's birthday was, there was no way that he'd acknowledge it, let alone actually get him anything. No. No way in hell . . .

There was a knock on the door, apparently only to be slightly courteous, before whoever it was walked in without consent. Roy glanced up from his paperwork.

Well, speak of the vertically-challenged devil.

Fullmetal closed the door behind him and stalked over to the colonel's desk. “Here's the mission report you asked for,” he said, flopping down onto the couch and unceremoniously throwing the manila folder onto the escritoire, atop all the other papers.

Roy quietly picked it up and began leafing through it, taking note of exactly how many buildings Fullmetal had leveled while trying to apprehend the suspect. He sighed after reaching ten and shifted his dark eyes from the report to said alchemist, who was now sitting rigidly on the couch, glaring at the colonel, waiting for a reprimand. However, after only briefly reading it, Mustang grumbled something of an affirmative and put the folder back on his desk. “You're dismissed.”

Edward looked confused. “That's it?” he asked tentatively, quirking a blonde eyebrow.

Roy glanced up at him through his black fringe. “What did you expect me to say?”

The blonde shrugged. “I don't know. Something along the lines of—” Edward scrunched up his face uncharacteristically and mimicked Mustang's deep, authoritative, disciplining voice, “`Fullmetal, must you insist on destroying a whole town everytime you are sent away . . . blah, blah, blah . . . You know it makes me look bad . . . blah, blah, blah . . . You are so childish! BLAH!' WHO ARE YOU CALLING SO SMALL THAT HE LOOKS LIKE A LITTLE KID!”

The elder Elric yelled the last part, then glowered at the man, not fully realizing that it was actually he who had called himself small. He harrumphed, then grumbled, “Something along those lines.”

Roy frowned and sighed tiredly. “No, Fullmetal, nothing like that. You're dismissed.” He then went back to his paperwork, ignoring the genuine look of shock on Edward's face.

“You must be sick,” the younger alchemist said quietly after a pause. “You're not being a complete asshole—what's wrong with you today?”

“Nothing Fullmetal,” Roy answered dully, choosing also to ignore the insult. “And as I said before, you are dismissed.”

Ed huffed, disgruntled, but got up and made to leave. Hearing the uneven footfalls, the colonel glanced up at the boy's retreating back—the black flamel dancing on a sea of red fire as he walked—not quite sure why his heart felt so dismally heavy.

Fullmetal had just arrived at the door, reaching out to clutch the handle, when he paused and let a short, “Oh,” escape his mouth, as if he had forgotten something. At the sound, Roy looked up fully and watched in mute fascination as the blonde stiffly crossed the room again and came to a stop in front of the desk, a slight blush tinting his tanned cheeks. The teenager then leaned over the stacks of paperwork and planted a feather-light, almost chaste kiss upon his superior's lips, pulling back again before Roy had a chance to protest.

Though, the Flame Alchemist couldn't say that he really wanted to.

“Happy birthday,” Ed said in all seriousness, giving the colonel a quick, faux salute type gesture, then turned away and very nearly sprinted from the room, slamming the door behind him.

Roy sat in the stunned silence for a while, then brought his ungloved fingers up to touch his lips.

And he felt a smile there.

Maybe it wasn't such a bad day after all.