Roy looked up, as Lisa scuffed through the kitchen door, and backed into the corner by the sink with an amused smile.

He’d been rather startled, at first, to find that Hawkeye was not, of her own accord, a morning person. She had the talent of waking up quickly when she needed to, but left to her own devices she was never up before sunrise and joined the world of the living gradually. Her eyes were open by the time she got downstairs, but both her four-legged housemate and her new two-legged one knew to stay out of her way while she more or less sleepwalked through her morning routine. Roy felt a certain scientific curiosity, watching her, about what would happen if he moved, say, her tea-strainer from its usual home one morning.

Today it looked like he might find out. She stopped in front of the empty fruit basket and stood for several breaths blinking at it sleepily.

“We’re out,” Roy pointed out, helpfully.

“Oh.” It took another moment, but apparently her response to missing items was to skip that step. She collected her tea and toast and settled at the table. Roy gave her a fond look behind her back and slid the second half of the eggs onto one of her plates before he went back to putting away his own dishes.

Segregated dishes weren’t exactly the kind of thing he’d had in mind, when he first mentioned sharing the house with her. Nor had he quite known what to make of the fact the she’d stenciled her name in neat, white paint on the underside of all her furniture—the kitchen table, for example. But he had to admit, it saved argument over whose turn it was to wash up. And, recalling a few of Hughes’ and Gracia’s early spats over the definition of a clean dish, perhaps it was just as well.

Not, he thought, a bit disgruntled, that his relationship with Lisa merited any kind of comparison to Hughes and Gracia.

She stretched and leaned back in her chair. “So, fruit. We also need more eggs and milk. The honey is close to out. We’ll need more rolls by tomorrow. More meat, too; maybe chicken this time. I was going out today, anyway, I’ll pick things up.”

Roy checked the level of her teapot. All that before her second cup and without checking the pantry; he was impressed. She’d make any quartermaster green with envy. The thought still twinged a little, and he turned away from it. “It’s a beautiful day out,” he observed, instead. “We might as well both go; we could take Black Hayate along.”

Black Hayate emerged from under the table to perk his ears at them, hopefully, and Lisa smiled. “All right.”

Ha. Maybe he really was figuring her out. Casual was the ticket. Roy was whistling as he went to fetch his shoes and cane.

Watching her emerge onto the front step and turn her face up to the sun and draw a deep breath, Roy took a moment for purely aesthetic appreciation. The light jacket and skirt suited her well. He grinned, wondering what would happen if he suggested that a shorter skirt would suit her even better, and whether it would involve him having to duck. But as they walked, and he listened to her cheerful greetings to neighbors and shopkeepers, his thoughts turned more serious.

Lisa had been a sweet, cheerful girl, when he’d met her. But she’d been seventeen at the time. He hadn’t been surprised that she’d become more solemn, when she showed up as his new Second Lieutenant two and a half years later. People changed as they grew up. And Hawkeye had still been kind, as well as formidably capable. It was the capability that showed first, by then, and the new seriousness suited it. He’d thought it was natural to her, and thought nothing more of it.

Now…

“Peaches!” She leaned over a bin to inhale lovingly. “They’ll be perfect in a few days. Let’s get some!” She tossed her hair over her shoulder to look back at him with a laughing smile. Roy could feel his expression softening in return, but his chest twisted.

She was beautiful. Bright and beautiful and… free. No matter how he tried, he couldn’t quite evade that word when he saw her like this.

They were on their way back to the house before he made up his mind to speak.

“Hawkeye,” he started, quietly, drawing her attention back from Black Hayate’s frisking around, “why did you enter the military?”

Abruptly all that brightness looked more like sun shining on steel. “Because what you wanted to do was right,” she pronounced, looking straight ahead. “And you needed someone to pay attention and watch your back.”

“You weren’t happy there at all, though, were you?” he asked, still more quietly. Not that he had noticed until the present contrast hit him over the head with it, and maybe she had a point when she brushed off his small attempts at courtship.

For a few moments he didn’t think she would answer, but eventually she stopped rearranging the bunches of lilacs in the top of her bag and looked over at him. “No. I wasn’t. But all of us did things we weren’t happy doing, to get where we wanted to go.”

Roy had to swallow before he could reply. “We did.” He hesitated a moment. “Lisa. Thank you.”

Her eyes warmed, and this smile almost made him trip over his own feet.

Maybe he owed Hughes an apology for all the ragging he’d given the man over mooning around, when he first started seeing Gracia.

It didn’t take long, after Hawkeye left for her appointment, for Roy to return to brooding. Edward Elric might be the most obvious of the lives lost to Roy’s plans and ambitions, but clearly it wasn’t the only one. And after all that, all he had done was to remove a single betrayer. The keystone, perhaps, but in the doing he’d lost the chance to do more. It wasn’t enough to balance the losses. His dark thoughts were only interrupted by Hughes’ arrival on his doorstep.

“Well, looks like the two of you have settled in all cozily,” Hughes commented, sprawling down on the couch.

Roy glared at him. On second thought, apologies were out of the question. Maas had earned every bit of grief Roy had ever given him, at one time or another. “If you don’t have anything useful to say…”

Hughes waved a hand. “Patience, patience. Actually I have a job prospect for you.”

Roy’s brows rose. So far, he had been completely unable to come up with any job he was well qualified for, outside of the military, besides maybe factory work. He’d sooner hire on with a road crew, except that he still needed the damn cane to compensate for his lost depth perception.

Hughes smiled, and propped his elbows over the back of the couch. “How’d you like to work for the government, Roy?”

Well, that was a possibility he hadn’t really considered. Roy sat back and made go-on motions.

“You know there’s still no Minister of Defense?” Hughes’ voice was casual; his eyes were anything but.

Roy’s mouth tightened. There had, in fact, been an article in the paper just this morning about Parliament’s increasing pressure on the Chancellor to select a Minister to oversee the military. He nodded silently.

“Did you know the Chancellor is going to be present for Professor Gauss’ lecture at the Central University tomorrow night?”

“And the point of this information?” Roy asked, a bit cautiously. “Hughes, you know what Gauss thinks of the State Alchemists. He’d throw me out on my ear if I attended, and what good would that do anyone?”

“He’d certainly speak to you, it’s true,” Hughes allowed beaming. “Quite vehemently, I imagine. Very difficult to ignore, that.”

Roy narrowed his eyes at his friend, mind ticking over. “Are you suggesting that I come out in support of separating the state funded alchemists from the military?” he asked, softly. It was the only thing he could think of that would make the right kind of stir at a gathering like Gauss’ lecture.

“The Chancellor seems to approve of the idea,” Hughes observed. His own gaze sharpened. “Do you still want to make sure that what you wanted to do gets done?”

Roy took a fast breath. Could he? Could he really make all the sacrifices mean something more? Carry the trust of the lives lost, one way and another, a little further? “Yes,” he said, fiercely.

Hughes’ answering smile was just as fierce. “There’s our Roy Mustang.” He pulled a folder from under his jacket and tossed it into Roy’s lap. “Here’s your hook, then. Everything I could find on Chancellor Ebert. It isn’t as much as it would have been a year ago,” he added with a sour face, “but there are still people who tell me things if I ask nicely. Up to you to reel him in.”

Roy laughed out loud. “I will.”

TBC