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"Colonel," she says. He thinks she says. It's all a little fuzzy, really, not that he is going to admit it out loud; he is a military man and does not break under coercion, even such impressive coercion as her extended and eloquent silence.
"Lieutenant," he says. There. That's a word. It's even probably an acceptable one.
She sighs. "I thought you were only going to have three."
Roy blinks up at her, doubtfully. "I did," he says, on the off-chance that he's having one of his convincing nights. "Three. You know me, Lieutenant. I am a paragon of restraint."
At some point during his sentence she must have bent down, because her hands are sliding under his shoulders. "You're going to have to move with me, colonel," she says. "You're a tin soldier."
"I am not," Roy says, doing his best to stand. Between her hands and the wall, he manages to make it about halfway, then stops for rest. He looks at her. They were talking about something. He was coming up with a rejoinder. Tin, that was it. "I'm a sexy soldier," he says, and grins, rakishly, at a point that he's pretty sure is her face.
She shakes her head and he recalibrates. "How did you get in the alley?"
"Hughes abandoned me," Roy tells her soulfully. "He just, he left. He said that his daughter was teething. Teething. And so he just -- and then, you know--" He waves a hand back at the bar. "I was going back to my office."
"Of course you were," she says, low and amused. "Colonel, you need to stand up. Rebecca's--"
"You are my least favorite person ever," Rebecca Catalina yells, "I can't believe you ran on ahead of me and now you're with a--" Her face is lowered into his line of vision. "Riza!" she says, delightedly. "It's blackmail!"
"Really," Riza says, settling herself into her Lieutenant Face. "Because it looks to me like the Colonel."
"You heard her," Roy says, and manages to make it up the rest of the way. "Second Lieutenant, I order you not to abuse this information."
"Of course not, sir!" she says, with a deeply suspicious note of glee in her voice. "I promise to make use of this information only in appropriate circles, sir!"
"It's hopeless," Roy says, leaning forward a little. Riza's hands tighten up. "I'm surrounded by insubordinates."
"Oh, you're sobering up," Rebecca says, disappointed. "That's no fun. Look, I'm going to go find us that cab."
"Colonel," Riza says again, and it looks like Rebecca has left, because it's just her face in his field of vision again, haloed by her hair. He wants to touch it, and discovers that this is because he is touching it, one hand combing a lock of hair behind her ear. "She'll be back in a minute."
"I know. I can't get back to my office." He tries to make this sound sultry, seductive, maybe even a little bit wistful. She laughs, and since her hands are occupied she can't cover her face. He likes her teeth. He wishes he got to see more of them.
"We'll take you back to my flat," she says. "I'll see to Rebecca. You are sleeping on the floor."
On another night he'd push his luck, but he thinks that'd be a little ungrateful. "You set the rules, your majesty," he says. "I'll follow."
"You'll sag," she says, smiling up at him.
"I am the Flame Alchemist," he tells her, sagging, resting his chin on the top of her head. "I collapse only for the best."
"And for evening showers, sir," Riza says. "Please remove your chin. It's sharp."
"I order you to not complain about my chin," he grumbles, but he moves it, and she wraps both arms around him, for entirely necessary steadying purposes, and he's pretty sure that tomorrow morning, when he remembers the long chain of poor decisions he's made to reach this alley, he isn't going to regret any of them.