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Roy had just gotten off of a number of very intense, high stress phone calls, putting out fire after fire and only mostly figuratively. Hawkeye had seen the tension in his shoulders, the crease between his eye-brows, and had found some sort of busywork to keep the rest of his subordinates busy while he nursed his growing migraine in the dark of his office. Still, it came as no surprise when the door to his office was kicked open, the rebound making the walls shiver. Roy didn’t bother opening his eyes. He pinched the bridge of his nose and took several deep calming breaths.
Roy expected a snarky opening quip to accompany the door slamming open but instead he just heard Lt. Hawkeye’s quiet voice say softly, “Edward Elric to see you.”
He opened his eyes, suppressing a flinch at the light coming in through the open door, to see the teen already half sprawled across his couch, arms crossed and a combative expression on his face. The lieutenant left the door cracked, no doubt so she could eavesdrop more subtlety, leaving a suddenly exhausted Colonel Mustang facing down the Fullmetal Alchemist across an expanse of desk.
For once, Edward seemed content to sit in silence. It was rare for the now nearly fourteen year old boy to wait to let him speak first, so Roy felt almost at a disadvantage. He looked back at the hastily scrawled notes he had taken during his many phone calls, trying to gather his thoughts.
Finally, Roy broke the silence with a simple barked command. “Fullmetal, what is your report?”
Edward, the stubborn brat, said nothing.
“When you get back to HQ you are supposed to come straight to me to give a report. So why, then, did I not hear from you? Why did I find out that you not only are back in the city without a word, but that you’ve been back for almost a full day without reporting in? And why do I have to get a call from Major General whats-his-face so I can find out what you were up to the last three days?” Roy shuffled through his notes, not official documents by any means, as he waited for Fullmetal to respond.
He felt his ire begin to rise as the boy just glared at him, chin jutting out in defiance. The silence was really starting to get to Roy, not that he could let it show. The pain burning behind his eyes only worsened.
“What the hell were you thinking? Blowing up a city block and yourself with it like that? I send you to investigate. Investigate and report back. And instead you not only involve yourself in a terrorist ring but you destroy half of downtown in the process-”
“Was it a city block or was it half of downtown?” Fullmetal interrupted. “If you are going to scold me, at least be consistent.”
Fullmetal uncrossed his arms and further spread out across the couch.
“Should I read you these damage reports?” The papers in Roy’s hands were nothing but preliminaries but even without the full extent of the damage it was worse than anything Edward had done so far. Roy started to read anyway. “Three warehouse buildings, demolished. The surrounding infrastructure has suffered structural damage. It took three fire districts over half a day to put out the blaze. What the hell were you even thinking?”
Roy looked at the unrepentant child in front of him and rubbed a hand over the ache in his head. Fullmetal had been nothing but a walking, talking headache since Roy had recruited him. Roy almost regretted it but after the two boys had tried, and almost succeeded, in human transmutation he knew they needed someone to keep an eye on them. And the military would want them one way or the other anyway. Better they be under Roy’s eye, where he can watch them and protect them, then be manipulated and used by some of the other officers. So long as he was their superior he could keep the boys safe. But not if they went off and did stupid reckless things like get involved with terrorists. Which they did almost weekly.
“Nobody got hurt,” Fullmetal snapped.
“The terrorists got away!” Roy really hadn’t meant to raise his voice but it came out as a shout anyway.
“You wanna shout at me, shout at me. You wanna tell me I’m stupid, I’m reckless, I’m incompetent go ahead. Or wait, actually, don’t. I’ve heard it all before about a dozen times.” Fullmetal stood up so fast it made Roy a little dizzy to watch. No one should be able to move that fast with two automail limbs, especially not even two years out from the surgery. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have better things to do than listen to you lecture me again. I hit another dead end so I’ve got to go meet my brother and start looking for new, better leads.”
When Fullmetal turned around, Roy saw he still had rubble in his dirty blond hair. The boys had been inside the building when it had come down around them. Only a quick transmutation from Fullmetal had prevented the two boys from being crushed to death from the collapsing rubble. Roy felt his eyes start to water. No doubt a side effect of the headache. He’d tried arguing, and shouting, and lecturing. He’d only ever dealt with soldiers before, and Roy had tried throwing the book at Fullmetal but as he looked at Edward’s retreating back he realized that this was not another soldier but a child. He decided to try another tactic.
“Ed, you can’t go around being so reckless and putting yourself in harm’s way needlessly like that. Son, you have to understand-”
It was a good speech about responsibility and safety and trusting adults and people who care and Roy had barely gotten the first sentence out when Fullmetal slammed the still cracked door shut with a loud bang.
“Do not…” Edward’s voice was dangerously hostile. “Call me your son.”
Roy had never seen such hatred in the young alchemist's eyes. He had thought that Fullmetal’s looks could kill before but now he knew that those past looks hadn’t even been meant to maim.
“Let us get one thing very, very clear.” Edward Elric was well known as a yeller. He would fly into a rage at the tiniest provocation, or often in Roy’s case, no provocation. “You are not my father. He was a bigger bastard than you and that’s really saying something. I never had any use for him and I’m not looking for a replacement.”
Before Roy could even respond, Edward had pulled open the door as wide it could go and was halfway down the hallway. Normally Edward would slam the door closed but this time he left it wide open. So Roy got up and closed it himself. He could call Fullmetal back but he decided to let the kid cool off first. He thought of the massive amounts of paperwork he’d have to start with a heavy sigh. Those boys were going to put him right into an early grave.