The beach - Saturday Morning

[light_a_spark]

Roy hadn't slept since he'd talked to Molly - he wasn't counting the unplanned nap he'd taken on Thursday before getting hug-attacked - and now that apparently he had the freedom to, he was too awake.

He found a quiet spot along the beach and sat down in the sand. Even the morning sun already felt warm on his dark blue uniform and he dug the heels of his boots into the sand. He remembered this kind of heat, but it wouldn't turn as blistering as it had in the Ishbalan desert. The beach was very different from any desert and the scent of the ocean was one he rather liked. It was nothing like Amestris and right now, it was good to be reminded of that.

If radio was right, then the students had dealt with the threat themselves. Roy grimaced. Somehow he kept failing to keep people safe and children, too young to have to deal with these kind of horrors, kept having to pay the price for it. It didn't help that as far as he knew, he might not have been able to stop this guy either. Not with just a gun and not even flame alchemy would have worked.

If alchemy worked here. Ed's theory about the flow of energy had made him wonder, but it felt strange that Alphonse wouldn't have told him. He slowly started drawing a simple array into the sand. It was meant to simply reshape the sand beneath into whatever sort of sculpture he could think of. Roy stared down at it. It was one of the simplest principles of alchemy: take the material and give it a new form. Deconstruct and rebuild, yet somehow he had managed to take these two base principles and make his whole life about the deconstruction.

His stomach roiled at the thought and he remembered too many faces, too much pain. His hand was shaky as he rested it in the sand, inches away from the transmutation circle before he erased it from the sand with one angry sweep.

((So I got wordy. Post is open, but he is in a mood.))

Comments

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

"I'd be disappointed if you didn't," he teased, looking up at her.

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

She made a face at him. "Then why lay it?"

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

"You enjoy dodging them?" he suggested.

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

"You're laying traps for my enjoyment?" she asked, starting to smile.

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

He smiled back at her and shrugged, "I'd hate to see you bored."

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

"In this town?" she teased. "Not that I don't appreciate the effort."

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

"Ah," he closed his eye. "I see that my services aren't needed here."

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

"Oh no, it's needed," she said laughingly. "No one else puts traps in my way just so I get to avoid them. It's sweet."

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

He opened his eye again to look up at her and smirked. "It was actually in the job description," he confided.

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

"Funny, Tex never did that," Aly said, pretending to be thinking.

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

"I'm just better at my job then," he said smugly.

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

"Maybe you misunderstood the job description," she teased.

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

"Maybe," he tilted his head, looking thoughtful. "It's rare, but it does happen. Come to think of it, it would be rather strange for you to be in the Sheriff's job description. Unless you really are hiding something important from me."

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

Aly wrinkled her nose at him. "You didn't know I was the secret heir to the throne of Idontknowwhere?"

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

"Should I have been calling you your majesty?" Roy asked, sounding worried.

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

"Your Serene Highness is the proper title," Aly replied airily, nose raised.

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

Roy pushed back up, grimacing as some of the sand slid inside his collar. "I apologise for any offense I might have cause, my Serene Highness Alianne. I promise I'll do better from now on."

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

She nodded regally, looking disturbingly at home in her pretense. "I accept your apology, General Mustang and choose not to remove your head at this juncture provided you endeavour to fulfill that promise."

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

"I thank you. I quite like my head where it is," he laughed softly. "It's still Corporal, your Sereness."

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

"Hmph, if I shall have my rank recognised, I insist that yours is as well," she said with another nod.

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

"My rank is corporal," he pointed out. "It says right so on my uniform."

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

"I don't know your strange and elaborate system of rank," she pointed out.

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

"I wouldn't lie to a heiress," he assured her.

[tricksy-spy.livejournal.com]

"Well, then," Aly said haughtily. "I shall have to remedy that. I hereby promote you to General in my armed forces."

[light-a-spark.livejournal.com]

Roy raised an eyebrow at her. "And how many armed forces do you have?"