Chapter Text
Despite the fact that she wasn’t truly that old, Riza felt tired beyond her years. So much had happened in the past four years that no one had anticipated. They had struggled before, fought until they were bloodied and broken, but having been so close to their goals made it feel like they were crawling and only scratching at the surface. It hadn’t helped that so many unexpected obstacles had jumped in their way.
She called it unexpected and she called it an obstacle, but she wouldn’t have changed a thing and she loved her little unexpected obstacle more than she could have ever dreamed.
Now they were here, and Riza didn’t know whether she was supposed to breathe in relief or to take a deep breath before going under the water again. They’d always told one another that this day would come – that Roy would reach the top in order to make changes and protect those below him. It had seemed so simple in the early days, but the closer he got to it, the more daunting it became. The more attainable it was, the further away it felt.
To think that the young, dashing, stubborn boy that she had loved as a teenager would become the Fuhrer of Amestris was unbelievable. It had been strange enough to see him as the Hero of Ishval. She had watched him transform right before her eyes, always watching his back and taking care of him when she could. She had always supported him in his gambits, even more so after Hughes’ death, but now that he’d reached them, she didn’t know what to do.
Riza picked at the sleeves of her shirt. She had them rolled up three-quarters of the way, so that they wouldn’t get in the way, but that didn’t make her feel any more at ease. It had been years since she’d worn a military uniform, but she still had trouble with wearing civilian clothes, even if they were practical. She hadn’t thought that she would miss the old bulky and unflattering uniform, but the day she’d put it up had been a difficult one. Still, it had been the only way that she could keep guarding Roy’s back and if it meant sacrificing a piece of herself in the long run, she had been willing to do it.
After all, she wasn’t in the military for herself, not truly. She hadn’t been in it for reasons like that for a long time, maybe not ever. Before she’d even left the Academy, her idealistic dreams had been dashed away. Still, she had been in the military for so long, guarding Roy’s back as his adjutant, that she hadn’t known what to do when she was honorably discharged.
It could have been worse, Riza reasoned as she stood outside the doorway to the Fuhrer’s office. She could have been completely separated from Roy. He could’ve had a mark against his record that would’ve kept him from achieving his goals. They could have been kept apart. She had thought that she could handle never truly being with him – and maybe she could – but they weren’t allowed to be totally selfish anymore.
And they had been selfish in their so-called selflessness. They had sought to punish each other by staying apart, by never fully being with one another, because they didn’t believe they deserved to be happy. It had put so much strain on everyone else around them though and themselves. It had wounded them and others. They had been so terribly foolish with their guilty self-righteousness.
The door finally opened. Riza made sure to step to the side and wait with the same impassive expression that she had worn during her time as a soldier. A handful of people stepped out of the room, although only one or two of them eyed her curiously. Of course they knew who she was. These days, it wasn’t as easy to be innocuous as she had once been, but she’d given up that right a long time ago. One man snorted derisively before looking away from her, but she ignored him. She’d given up the right to be angry about that too.
She knew what she was called behind her back, and she didn’t give a damn. As far as she was concerned, she could withstand a thousand terrible names as long as the man she loved was protected. Roy got all up in arms about it whenever word got back to him about some of the things said about her. If it wasn’t for the fact that it was irresponsible to threaten court marshal for name calling, he probably would’ve made it a law already. She didn’t need him to defend her, but she did appreciate it nonetheless.
As it was, no one said anything about her if he was in earshot – really, if any of her former colleagues and friends were around. She still remembered showing up at the drunk tank with Rebecca at three in the morning to find a sheepish-looking Havoc and Breda behind the bars. Apparently, someone had called Riza some not-so-nice things and Havoc had thought it was a good idea to physically launch himself at the man. He insisted that he’d tripped. Whether Breda’s fist had fallen into the man’s friend’s face was debatable at best.
If she didn’t know any better, Riza would say that the men in her life had handled her discharge from the military worse than she had.
It had been necessary though once their insubordination came to light. At the end of the day, there was only so much they could do before it became painfully obvious that the child Riza had bore was her superior officer’s bastard child.
They had been lucky that the punishment had not been worse. Not only was his mentor the Fuhrer of Amestris, but the man was her grandfather as well. Secretly, he had been ecstatic that the two of them were together, but he could not afford to stretch the laws even for his family or something that made him happy. He could be pleased in private all he wanted about the fact that he was a great grandfather, but in the public eyes, he could not be seen showing any favoritism. In the end, she had stepped down and left the military, only for her grandfather to point out that new higher ups in the military were opting to hire personal bodyguards outside of the military.
The transition hadn’t been as painful as she’d expected, but then she hadn’t been alone. The men she had once served with and ordered became more like friends and family. Rebecca would tease that she would finally be able to beat Riza at something once she was promoted higher than Riza had been before leaving. She’d call Falman to ask him for advice and how his family was doing. Fuery actually enjoyed taking Black Hayate and her son off her hands for an afternoon here and there so that she and Roy could have some alone time. Breda was insistent on teaching her son shogi, of course. And then there was Havoc, who became more and more like her goofy brother as time passed on and an uncle to her son.
Besides, it wasn’t like she didn’t see them at work either. Roy had taken them with him when he had become Fuhrer. She didn’t think they’d entirely expected it, but he had been insistent. Falman was still up at Briggs, having found a family up there of his own, but he was the liaison between Roy and General Armstrong, which made things easier between them.
No, despite all the changes and ups and downs that had happened over the years, despite the hardships and the heartaches, the near death experiences and the most heartwarming moments, things were good now. Riza felt like she could be at peace with her life. It was more than she could have dreamed of. She’d just been a quiet girl living a sheltered life alone before Roy had showed up on the doorstep and swept her into a whirlwind. She could never hate him for that, not when to follow him had been her choice.
She could be happy with what she had been given after all that she had taken.
“You can come in,” Roy’s voice called from inside.
Riza slipped into the office and shut the door behind her when he gestured at it. He sat slumped in the seat behind his desk, looking a little more than tired. Being the Fuhrer meant a lot more bureaucracy than one man could handle. Roy was excellent at being diplomatic – it was one of the things he had honed as a skill thanks to both Madam Christmas and Grumman – but it was thoroughly exhausting as well and entirely loathsome.
“You look tired, sir,” Riza pointed out mildly, trying not to smile. “You have an hour before your meeting with General Moore.”
She hadn’t thought that Roy could slip further in his seat, but he did, sliding down and hiding his face under his military hat. Here he was, the Fuhrer of Amestris, and he was pouting behind his desk like he’d done when he was sixteen and had a stack of alchemy textbooks and notes thrown in front of him. “That man is still alive? He’s still breathing just to piss me off. Cancel the meeting and fire him. There – that’s done with.”
“You know you can’t do that, sir,” Riza told him as she straightened the papers on his desk. For the most part, Roy was fairly immaculate when it came to his office and he didn’t shirk his paperwork as he had done before, but he was always disheveled after meeting with the people in charge of the State Alchemist program. That was one of his major fighting points and it tended to get the better of him. “He’s already looking for any reason to pick a fight with you now that you’re Fuhrer to show that you aren’t ready for the responsibility.”
“He needs a reason for that?” Roy grumbled under his hat.
Riza reached over the desk and flicked the rim of the hat so that it tipped back upwards on the back of his head. When he gazed up at her, he gave her the most pitiful expression she had ever seen. Now she knew without a doubt where he son had gotten that from. Everyone said that their child acted just like her, but he was learning some pretty manipulative things from his father. Still, it only managed to cause her to smile at him. Little things like this would’ve been nonexistent when she was serving in the military under him. Even now, it caused her a thrill to do something as simple as tease him.
“I suppose I should get ready then,” Roy sighed as he straightened up in his seat. He stood up and tugged at his jacket, making sure that everything was in place, but he looked quite remarkable after a two hour meeting that most likely ended with terse goodbyes at best. “The last time I had a hair out of place, he said on that radio talk show that I was young ruffian too careless to even brush my hair.”
He sniffed at that and ran his fingers through his dark hair. The comment had made Riza laugh more than she wanted to admit, but his deeply affronted reaction had been even funnier, especially when their son had then decided it was an appropriate time to tug at Roy’s hair and ask if he was starting to grey. She had never seen Roy look so utterly betrayed before.
“I’ll get something from the mess hall to bring up for you while you prep,” Riza told him. He looked rather mournfully at the window. Because of the meeting, he wouldn’t be able to go out for his own lunch and would be stuck working through it. She thought he missed being able to eat with all the men; he didn’t complain, but he did light up whenever the team decided to eat lunch with him under the guise of getting work done together.
“Much appreciated. And if you could–”
“I know, if they have spinach quiche, get you two,” Riza interrupted, rolling her eyes in the process.
Roy grinned at her, looking remarkably young all things considered. He rifled through the top drawer of his desk and then held out an envelope. “Could you take this to the post?”
Nodding her head, Riza took the envelope without looking at it. The urge to salute him was powerful, having been second nature for so long, but she stuffed it away. Without another word, she walked out of the office and headed in the direction of the post room. As she was walking though, she became curious about the envelope. She didn’t know what he would have to mail. Maybe it was something to Edward or Alphonse. Despite their still antagonistic relationship, Roy liked to keep in correspondence with them. He said it was for academic purposes, but she knew that was a lie.
However, when Riza looked at the name on the envelope, she froze on the spot. Written on the front was not Edward’s or Alphonse’s name, but her son’s name – their son’s name.
It felt as if her heart leapt into her throat and she couldn’t breathe. All she could do was stare down at the envelope in shock and confusion. Maybe it was for someone else with the same name, but she didn’t think so, not with only the name written on it in Roy’s messy scrawl and no sign of an address or postage. It didn’t make sense that Roy would write a letter to their son though. He was doing well in learning his letters and how to read, but he wasn’t exactly capable of reading much beyond See Spot Run.
That was when it hit her: the letter that Roy had handed to her was not meant to be mailed and it wasn’t meant for their son either; it was meant for her.
The entire hallway could’ve been filled with people, and Riza wouldn’t have even noticed it. Luckily, she was alone as she carefully peeled open the envelope and pulled out a handwritten letter. The paper didn’t shake in her hands even though her heart was beating frantically and her mind was racing in confusion. Slowly the words came to her, like a gentle touch, something she was so familiar with him and yet seemed impossible to others.
Dear Bug,
I need to start this off by telling you how much I love you. I don’t say it often enough, but you should know that I do. Your mom says that you know and you have told me yourself, but I still feel regretful in not saying it more. You’re so much like your mother in that way. How you manage to know these things beyond your years will never cease to amaze me. How both you and your mother have put up with me for even this long amazes me more. I’m sure you won’t ever stop making me wonder.
Before you were born – before we could even imagine that you would exist – I never could have imagined how much I wanted to be a father. Now that I am one, I keep thinking of all the times my best friend used to tell me how incredible it was to be a dad. I used to scoff at him, hang up the phone on him, or even yell at him. The man was relentless in heckling me about my happiness. It turns out he was right. I had so many goals and dreams about the future, but it’s strange that the one I hadn’t counted on – had actively ignored – is the one that is perhaps the most fulfilling.
After all, they do say that kids are the future and I want to make the future a better place – for the people that I hurt in the past, for my loved ones in the present, for the children of the future, for you. Sounds pretty dumb, doesn’t it? You’ve got an idiot dreamer for a father.
But you know what I dream about the most? It’s in the middle of the day and we’re at the park that your mom likes to take you to play. You’re sitting on my shoulders, eating your favorite ice cream (double fudge, of course), some of it probably dripping on my shoulders. Black Hayate is running around chasing ducks. Your mom is at my side, holding my free hand, while my other hand holds onto your legs so you don’t fall. You’re laughing and your mom is smiling and we’re all together.
You call me Dad.
It’s a dream I have on a near daily basis. It seems so simple, doesn’t it? A happy, loving family out in public. There have been nights where I’ve woken up in fear that it won’t ever happen. Times when I roll over and find that I’m alone and I hope that you’re okay. I wonder about all the times you wake up in the middle of the night and tiptoe into the bedroom to ask me for a story, only to find that I’m not there. I worry that you’re confused about my occasional absence or scared that I might not come back. I picture you curling up in bed around your mother and her holding onto you because I know how much you love to cuddle in bed.
To think that this simple dream can also be my greatest nightmare…
This has been a strange time for you, one that I know you don’t always understand but accept as your world. I want you to know that it won’t always be that way. I promise. I promise with every bit of my being – and you can ask your mother, I always keep my promises. It’s just that your mother and I made some promises to each other and to the world. We had to make up for things that we did in the past. It’ll be years before you can understand it and maybe even longer before I can admit my sins to you. I never want to disappoint you or scare you, and that is why we’ve had to do the things that we have done.
It hasn’t been easy. You and your mother have been so patient with me as I reach my goals. It kills me whenever I think about your mom sitting you down and explaining that you couldn’t call me dad or father in public. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so wounded, if only because you were so brave about it. You didn’t cry. You didn’t get angry. You just…did. So like your mother. I thank the universe on a constant basis that you are more like her, even if you did get my charming good looks.
So much time as passed and we’ve worked so hard to get where we are. We have all made sacrifices and painful decisions. Your mother has given up so much and done even more to help me. I didn’t mean for you to play a part in this as well, but you handled it with remarkable strength and only a few temper tantrums. (And my god, how your tantrums are so much like your mother’s – absolutely cold and quiet and yet filled with emotion. You could run a nation on that kind of threat alone.)
But we’re here, aren’t we? I’ve finally reached the lofty goals that I set up for myself over a decade ago. That should mean something. I’ve had this feeling for a few months now, like something is in the air. Your mother would call it change. We feel it every now and then, a breeze, a hint that it’s time for something new. And I think it is. I’m a dreamer, remember? It’s time to fulfill another dream, your dream, your mother’s, maybe even mine. This dream though, I will admit, has been in my mind for longer than even my being Fuhrer. This dream I’ve had since I was just a teenager, back when I was innocent, back when I could love with everything in me.
It took me almost twenty years, but I think I can do that again, if your mother will let me.
Always,
Your Father
Only when a drop of water splashed against the paper, smearing a few of the words, did Riza realize that hot tears had sprung into her eyes. Still, the letter did not shake, but she felt something burning inside of her, threatening to escape. Something good, something terrifying, something familiar. She took a few halting breaths as her thumbs rubbed against the paper.
Riza closed her eyes as a smile crossed her lips. She didn’t need to look to feel his gaze on her. When she finally opened her eyes and turned around, she found Roy leaning against the wall, watching her with a warm look in his eyes. His expression was so soft and gentle, so entirely open to her and vulnerable as well. He only looked like that with her and their son, his little Bug, as Roy always called him. To see it on him now, after reading his words, took her breath away.
Roy meandered towards her. “You always said that you would follow me,” he began carefully, “but you would word it so particularly.”
When he was standing in front of her, she allowed him to take her hands, though he only held them by her fingers. They weren’t in the safety of his interior office, but there was no one around either. Later, she would have a sneaking suspicion that Havoc and the others had made sure that they would be alone, but right now, she couldn’t think about that, not when she was so focused on the man in front of her.
“Until that day,” Riza said quietly.
“Yes, that was it, until that day, until I reached my goals.” Roy looked around the hallway. “There’s a lot more that needs to be done, but I…I need to ask you one more thing.”
She thought that her heart should’ve jumped even further, that she should have gasped, that maybe time itself should have stopped for her. But none of that happened. She wasn’t filled with elation or shock; she wasn’t afraid or unsure. Instead, she was filled with a gentle warmth that seeped all the way to the tips of her fingers and toes and a powerful fondness for this man surged inside of her, like it was a part of her being. Could she even remember a time when she hadn’t felt that for him?
“It’s past time that I become the man that I was always meant to be,” Roy said, his words firm but his voice wavering. “Not the leader of this country, but…the father to our child, the man proud to be at your side, the kind of person that Hughes hoped to see me become.”
She realized suddenly that he was actually nervous and that only made her feel even warmer. The man had stared death in the face multiple times, witnessed atrocities beyond belief, faced and fought monsters, forced through the Gate and seen Truth, blinded for simply dreaming of a better future, and confronted the sins of his past and worked to better the world – and he was afraid now.
“Will you follow me in this?” Roy asked her.
Riza almost laughed, but instead she bit her lip, smiling and shaking her head at him. She stepped closer so that she was pressed against him and let go of his hands so that she could wrap her arms around his neck. He gave her a lopsided grin, still a tad anxious, and buried his face in the crook of her neck. “After all this time, you have to ask?”
No, he really didn’t. She didn’t have to say the word for him to know that the answer was yes.