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Berthold was dying.
Riza knew that her heart should ache for her father. He had raised her, after all. But as Berthold Hawkeye lay sick in his bed, Riza felt nothing but a cold emptiness in her heart. The same empty feeling that she’d been experiencing for years.
“Riza, please…” Her father’s words were broken up by a cough. “Call him. Mustang.”
Her heart sunk. As excited as she was to see Roy again, she knew that it wasn’t for her benefit. She had never been good enough for her father- she’d known this for a long time. Somehow, she had assumed that perhaps on his death bed her father might finally desire the company of his only daughter.
Riza nodded and left the room. She shut the door behind her and sighed.
“Mister Mustang?”
“This is Hawkeye, right?” His voice sounded deeper and more strained than before.
“Yes sir,” Riza said. “My father is gravely ill and requires your presence.”
There was an empty pause.
“I graduate from the military academy in a few days. I’ll be there by this time next week. However, I can’t stay for too long. I take my State Alchemist examination in about a month.”
Riza bit her lip. She had heard horrible things about what was happening in Ishval. But at least he was coming. If Berthold could hold on a week longer, he would have his wish.
The days passed slowly. When Roy finally arrived, he looked pained and concerned. He seemed to be feeling all the raw emotion that Riza lacked.
She was jealous. Jealous that he had ignorance enough to be upset about her father’s illness. Jealous that he hadn’t felt the sting of the needle on his back for hours, or tasted the blood in his mouth from biting his tongue to stop the screaming. Jealous that he knew little of her father’s cold words and apathetic eyes.
Riza waited downstairs while Roy spoke with her father. A thud came from upstairs.
“Hawkeye! Sir!” Roy’s voice was muffled through the floorboards.
Another episode of his, Riza thought. Or maybe he’d actually died this time.
Riza hated herself for not rushing up to his room and weeping over her father.
A few minutes later Roy walked down the stairs, his eyes wide and face taunt.
“Miss Hawkeye, I- I think your father may have passed on.”
The indifference settled in.
Riza nodded. “I’m glad you made it in time to see him. I’ll arrange the funeral for tomorrow.”
Roy’s eyebrows furrowed. “I’ll stay for the funeral, of course, but are you sure you don’t want me to make the arrangements? You shouldn’t have to worry about planning a funeral right after the death of your father.”
Riza didn’t understand his concern. A few short conversations were all that would be necessary for a quiet and respectable service.
“It won’t be a burden,” she said. “My father did not have many friends, but I know the local pastor well enough.”
Roy looked concerned, but he didn’t press further.
The funeral was a very quiet and efficient ceremony. Berthold was laid to rest next to Riza’s mother. She remembered that service very well. Elizabeth Hawkeye was a well-loved woman, and the turnout reflected just that. Nearly a hundred people were present for her funeral, and many gave their condolences to Riza and her father.
This was different. Riza and Roy were there, standing side by side. Three men that Riza barely recognized were there as well, and one woman. The pastor gave a short message, and her father was buried. A tombstone was placed, and that was that.
“Do you resent me for joining the military?” Roy asked. Everyone else had left, and it was just the two of them.
“No,” Riza said firmly.
“I just want to help people. Leave things better than I found them. Hell, I must sound really naive.”
“I don’t think so. I don’t think it’s naive to want better for others. I’d like to believe you’re serious about this.”
“I am. This is the path that I’ve chosen, and I intend to do whatever I can.”
Riza smiled at him. It was a genuine smile, her first in a while. Roy blushed furiously and ruffled his hair.
“Can I trust you, Roy? With my father’s research?”
Riza would be lying if she said she didn’t see the greed behind his eyes in that moment.
“As much as I would want to,” Roy said, voice trembling, “I can’t ask that of you. Your father-”
“I am not my father,” Riza said firmly. “He’s gone and buried. And he gave me sole access to his research. It’s my decision.”
Roy looked taken aback. He paused and looked at Riza with a piercing intensity.
“I know. But he just passed, and I’m worried you’ll later regret giving me the research after feelings have settled.”
Riza wanted to laugh. Her father had been careless with her. Wasn’t it only fair that his research got the same treatment? She knew only two things for certain- that Roy was a man of conviction, and that her father wasn’t.
“You deploy in a month, right? You can use this. You can help people. I want to share it with you if you want to take it.”
There was a very tense pause.
“Okay.”
Riza shed her coat onto her father’s office floor. The chill of the fall wind ripped into her skin, chilling her to the bone.
“Riza-” Roy said, unable to find the words.
“This is my father’s research on flame alchemy,” Riza said mechanically.
The floorboards creaked as Roy took steps towards her. She wrapped her arms around herself and braced for his frozen touch on her back.
When the touch never came, Riza turned around to face Roy. He was holding out her coat.
“Here,” Roy said. Riza put the coat back on, buttoning it on the front.
His voice was soft and gentle, but Riza wasn’t fooled. Roy was furious. His eyes were brimming with fire and his hands were trembling with poorly concealed rage.
“I can’t believe he would do this to you,” Roy said. Again, he hid his anger. His voice was delicate, on the verge of breaking.
Riza shrugged. It hurt like hell, sure, but it made sense enough to her. No one would think to look on her back. His research was safe.
“I’m so sorry, Riza,” Roy said.
He slid his arms around Riza’s back and held her close. Her breath hitched. It had been years since she’d been hugged, let alone held like this.
Roy was warm and gentle, even more so than Riza had imagined him. After a few moments, she embraced him back.
They stood there for a moment, and when they finally fell apart, Riza knew she could never look at Roy the same way again.
Roy made her a cup of coffee, and the pair of them sat down to discuss how he would study off her back.
“It’ll only take a few hours I think for me to have an accurate copy of the array. Then I can study from that instead,” Roy said. “If you’re comfortable, that is.”
Riza nodded, although she blushed at the thought of being topless in front of Roy for hours. She looked up, and Roy was blushing too.
“I’d like to do most of my studying here so that after I learn what I need to know, I can destroy my copy of the array. That way you can rest assured knowing that the only surviving copy remains with you.”
Riza nodded again. So he would be staying for several weeks. Her heart fluttered at the thought, but she dismissed it. He had lived with her for years as an apprentice, so why would it be any different just because they were both older?
Weeks passed in a blur. Ironic, Riza thought, that the month following her father’s death would be the best month of her life.
Roy’s presence was comforting and warm, and he talked to her often about what he was doing with his research. He explained the alchemical process and was eager to demonstrate everything he’d learned to her.
By the time Roy was ready for his state alchemist examination, Riza knew, for the first time in her life, what she wanted to do.
The minute he was gone, she would enlist in the military. She couldn’t use alchemy to save her life, but she was a skilled hunter with a scary work ethic.
She’d be lying if she said she didn’t also want to spite her father, but more than that, she had grown to believe in Roy’s dream.
Riza knew that she may never see Roy again; why would he continue to see her? He had what he wanted. But she didn’t care. She would fight for his vision of Amestris.
And she knew she would always remember the gentle man who saw her as she was.
Not as the careful daughter of a reckless man, but as Riza Hawkeye.