Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction ❯ Break Me ❯ Chapter 3

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

Break Me

My New Year's resolution has been to pick up my grades...seriously. For you guys, that means fewer updates. Sorry, but I'll soon have college to worry about. Besides, those who know me will tell you that I was already slow at updating anyway.

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The first thing she did was panic. She tried to contain herself, but when your crippled boss pukes on your newly cleaned floors and then passes out, one should have every right to be alarmed. During said unusual freak out, Hawkeye stood motionless, unable to really think of what to do next. When the switch finally clicked on in her head, she dashed into the kitchen and reached for the phone.

She dialed the number, pacing anxiously for someone to pick up.

"Yeah?"

"Havoc?"

"L-Lieutenant Hawkeye? I thought you were with Colonel Mustang. Why are you calling here?"

"I don't know...." Okay, so maybe the switch wasn't turned on all the way. "No, wait. I mean, I need help. R-Roy, Colonel Mustang, something's wrong with him," she said, shakily.

"Whoa, hold on. Tell me what happened," Havoc said, alarmed; almost as if he cared.

So, while the seemingly dead Mustang continued to lie still on the couch, in what seemed to be a very uncomfortable position, Hawkeye recounted what had happened, starting with when she and Mustang began eating dinner. It was a short-lived story, seeing that all the important details of what happened where all at the very end of the tale. When she was finished though, she was silent, waiting for what Havoc had to say about all this. But sadly and to her dismay, after waiting a while, she realized with a heavy feeling in her stomach that the phone had lost it's connection somewhere between the steak and potatoes portion of her story.

She sighed deeply. To the untrained eye, Hawkeye seemed uncaring for the incapacitated man who was no beginning to slide from the couch, his head making its way to the gooey and lumpy, peach-colored puddle on the floor (truthfully though, she cared very much). Seeing this, she bent down, picked up Mustang's head, and situated his limp form back onto the couch. She turned back to the phone, dialing the next number that stuck out to her as important.

After the first ring, she began telling her story once again, and when the woman on the other end promised to send help, only then did Riza begin to feel at ease.

While she waited for help, she picked up her and Roy's dinner plates, walked them over to the kitcen sink, and began to wash them with lather. She had a lot of nervous energy pent up inside her, and she needed something to do with her hands to release some of it.

"How did this wind up happening to me?" she asked herself, all the while wondering if it was all right to leave Mustang like that on the couch.

Suddenly, she heard a low groan and the creaking sound of springs. Having the slightest feeling that she knew what they were, Hawkeye dropped the plate she had been cleaning, and made her way back into the living room.

"Roy?" she tried.

Roy slowly opened his eyes. He winced with the brightness of the room, and shut them again. Riza bent low, brushing her hand against his cheek.

"I'm sorry," Mustang said, almost inaudibly.

"Me too," Hawkeye whispered back.

"What for?" Mustang said, opening his eyes some. "You haven't done anything wrong."

Mustang looked at Hawkeye's hand beside his face. Hawkeye, also seeing this, quickly took back her hand, only to have it caught in mid-air and brought ever closer to the colonel's chest.

"Don't be sorry," he said, smiling.

Riza's spirit rose at these words, but then quickly deflated when she felt Mustang's grip on her hand turn to slack. He had passed out again, and now the panicked feeling she felt before was rapidly returning. In order to try and calm her nerves (again), she got up, planning to return to her dishwashing, until she heard a knock at her front door.

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Roy could hear hushed voices somewhere nearby, yet he refused to open his eyes. He was in that mood of his, that mood where he wished to play somewhat of a guessing game with himself; sometimes he'd like to see how close he could get without knowing the true answer.

He was lying down, that was a given. In fact, he had been lying down before too. The smell of insulin filled and stung his nostrils. He slowly tried to move his fingers, noting that there was some kind of cord resting on his arm; he didn't know what it was, nor was he sure that he wanted to. His first guess was hospital, but something wanted to convince him otherwise. After a minute or two, he was unable to think of anything else, and found himself completely stumped.

"I'm just saying it's ironic, that's all."

The voice startled him. Although Roy knew he had heard voices before, he really had only considered them as voices inside his own head. He risked opening his eyes, for fear of finding out where he really was. The hospital was still his best guess, but he really couldn't see why he would need to be in one. He had broken his leg about two days ago (or Ed had actually), but he knew it wasn't a serious break. Unless something had happened to one of his subordinates, he could see no reason for this.

"I mean, you volunteered to take care of him, didn't you?" There was a chuckle. "And not seven hours later, you call in to tell me he's thrown up and then passed out on your couch. But what's really great is that your phone, which by the way, has the worst reception I've ever heard of, completely loses connection not even halfway through your call."

"Would you drop it already?"

Mustang's breath caught for a moment. He knew that voice, and the first one as well. Havoc and Riza. He was a bit lost about what they were going on about in their conversation, but he needed some questions answered, and he concluded that the only way that would happen was if he opened his eyes and began demanding what the hell was going on.

He opened his eyes slowly, taking in his surroundings. The room was dimly lit, and he noticed there was a big white curtain seperating the bed he was on from whatever was on the other side of him. He was indeed inside of a hospital room.

"Colonel Mustang!"

Mustang winced at the shrill-sounding voice, and slowly turned his head to the owner of said sound. It was Sergeant Kain Feury. He beamed a toothy grin at his superior officer, apparently glad to see him awake.

"Where am I?" Mustang voiced quietly.

"How's it goin', chief?"

Roy knew that voice; he had heard it only a moment ago. He turned his head away from Feury, and was greeted with a warm smile from Havoc. There was a glint in Havoc's eye that told Mustang that something was bothering him. Mustang took this as a sign that Havoc must have found a 'no smoking' poster plastered somewhere in the building.

"You're in a hospital."

Not quite understanding the tone, Mustang lowered his gaze to Hawkeye, who was just beginning to stand. She had almost snapped her reply, and Mustang found no reason why. He watched as she made her way over to him, her face stern and unchanging.

When Mustang stole a quick glance in Feury's direction, only then did he experience Hawkeye's anger to it's full extent. He learned that his first mistake had been taking his eyes away from her; only after he felt his head twist painfully from the force of her hand to his cheek and the tingling that had accompanied it did he fully understand this. His hand slowly found its way to his cheek, and he began tracing his fingers across the swelling skin. He sat motionless after that, dizzy and stunned, hoping whole-heartedly that there wasn't a sequel to this woman's rage.

"How could you?" she whispered angrily. The hand she had used to slap him was now clenched into a fist, and as Roy noticed, that even with her pale skin, the whites of her knuckles were still clearly visible.

Roy hesitated for what he thought was an eternity. He was actually afraid of asking what it was he had done wrong, but before he really had the chance to voice his question, Riza answered it for him.

"You overdosed on your Vicodin! Roy, how could you be so stupid?" Her voice was beginning to falter, and her whole body was shaking. "You could have died..."

Riza's eyes began to sting, and she thought she could feel the slightest hint of tears welling up just under her pupils. The warm liquid was beginning to rise, and it was blurring her vision some. She fought with intensity to not let the salty substance spill over her lower lids; she could not remember the last time she had cried.

Something inside Roy wanted to comfort her, but he just couldn't bring himself to say anything. He was still half-way shocked at her slapping him, but now she looked like she was going to cry, and in truth, he didn't want to watch.

"You will address me as 'colonel'," he said firmly, turning away.

After saying that, he felt like slapping himself. What insane part of his brain told him to say that? He heard either a gasp, or a choked back sob--he couldn't tell-- but he shut his eyes, trying to block out everything.

"Yes sir."

It was Hawkeye's reply. Her tone was different again; it sounded official, or what Mustang would have called "normal". It pained him to hear that she sounded oblivious to what was just shared between them. They had lived in a completely different world from the lives they had at work, and Roy felt like he had just treated her like the scum under his boot.

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Two agonizing weeks later, Mustang was released from the hospital. He labeled his time spent there as the worst experience in his life, excluding the Eastern Rebellion. During his recovery period, numerous doctors were instructed to run a series of tests on him to make certain that the reason he had overdosed wasn't due to an addiction. While running of said tests, one doctor (dubbed highly annoying) discovered the cast on Mustang's leg, and came to the conclusion that it was broken.

Now if you can imagine how much doubt Mustang was beginning to feel in the lack of skill or knowledge of his doctor, you can clearly imagine how fearful he felt when they told him that he and his injured leg would need to go through rehabilitation to correct any future damage. And why was he fearful? His leg had been broken no less than three days ago, and already his doctors were demanding he begin his rehabilitation process within the next 24 hours.

What he had done over the past two weeks was teach himself to rely solely on one crutch, reteach himself to walk without crutches but with a plastic boot, and the most painful of his exercises: climbing a flight of stairs with nothing but his plastic boot and the wall railing to assist him.

To make matters worse, Riza had not come by but once since Roy had woken up in the hospital bed, and the one time she did show up was only because a signature was needed from Roy's caretaker. Having knowing that he had possibly upset her in some way, made him feel miserable as hell.

He'd had other visitors of course. Hughes for one, dropped by almost every day to check on Roy's improvement. Within the first week, Mustang had started to become annoyed with his friend's presence; during rehab hours, Hughes had done nothing but laugh at Roy's painful struggles, proceeding with trying to encourage the man by showing off pictures of his daughter. Then there was the Fuhrer and the military's psychiatrist. This left Roy completely appalled when King Bradley told the shrink to talk things over with the colonel, and to make sure there wouldn't be any lasting damage from his "terrible ordeal".

Mustang's looney subordinates occasionally dropped by, and together they would laugh it up and poke fun at how much paperwork Grand was struggling through. It was also reported by Falman that the Brigadier General had not ceased his complaining since Roy's absence from HQ; hearing this always cheered him up. Thrice even had Mustang seen Ed Elric wandering around the hospital, but only once had the teen actually made it into his superior's room. Roy was sure the boy meant to tell him something, but noted that he was also trying to avoid him. The last time they were seen together, they seemed fine: they chatted idlely about nothing in particular, and when Ed could no longer stand it, he blurted out what sounded like an apology, before exiting in a hurry, and leaving an awkwardness between the two.

And those had been Roy's two weeks at the hospital. Now though, he sat in a wheelchair in the check-out lodge, beginning to grow impatient, as the wall clock clearly showed that his chauffeur was running behind schedule. He much hated sitting the way he was, atop a mobile chair, as people walked past him to and fro. This wouldn't have bothered him so much had he the ability to walk on his own, but now that he had parted with his crutches, walking or even standing for a period of time seemed to tire him quickly.

"It seems your ride's a bit late," said the snooty nurse who had been instructed to watch over the colonel that day. Mustang still hadn't taken to her very well. She had been one of the first nurses to care for him during rehab, and definately the one he had hated most. His first impression of her was that she had a side job as a hooker. When he voiced this concern to her, she laughed haughtily, smacking her gum, and saying nothing more.

Roy groaned loudly, shifting his wait in the chair, vainly trying to keep his butt from falling asleep. He glanced once more at the clock, keeping himself busy by following the second hand until he became dizzy and nauseated. When he finally looked down, he was surprised to see, not the nurse from before, but Riza Hawkeye instead.

Their eyes met as the blonde made her way to the check-out desk, but no more until after Mustang was wheeled out of the hospital, and then seated and strapped into Hawkeye's car. Roy sighed, relieved, upon the start of the engine.

"Glad to be out of there?" Hawkeye asked gruffly.

Roy nodded, but knowing that his lieutenant's eyes were to be kept on the road, he said, "I never want to smell insulin or step toe inside of a hospital again." When she said nothing, he tried a change in topic. "Riza...this is going to sound a little out of character, but I want to apologize for...whatever it is I've done to upset you."

Luckily for them, there weren't many people on the road at this time of day, because if there were, not a moment after Riza had slammed on the brakes and turned her head to the colonel, another car surely would have come and crashed into the back of them.

"W-What do you--?"

"I had time to sort things over in my head while at the hospital, and though I'm still not quite sure what I did to hurt you, I just want to say that I..."

And he left it like that, his sentence trailing in the air. He was positive he knew what he was going to say, but when it actually came time to say it, his mind felt clouded, and he was unable to voice his thoughts.

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Jeezus, did I do a semi-cliffhanger? Wow, that's so unlike me.... Well, just for next chapter reference, Mustang was not and probably will not say anything along the lines of "I love you, I like you, I've habored these feelings since before I can remember...yadda, yadda, yadda." You get the point; he won't say anything like that. Although, he might say something like "I like it, I love it, I want some more of it". Haha, okay, maybe not. =)

Sorry, it took longer than I thought to update this. My friend and I started our own manga, and I've been given the honor of writing the script, and I've just been having so much fun doing that. But I still hadn't forgotten my colonel! *love*

By the way, have I at all said yet how much I adore all the feedback and good cookies I've gotten from you guys? Well, there, I have now. But seriously, checking out my hit count and numbers of how many people have this listed as a favorite story or are on the alert list really makes me happy. I just wanna squeeze you all to death!! Thanks!