[[For superman_dead]]

[light__of__day]

[[Also patient_heart if mun decides Trisha's staying near Ed like he'd prefer she did with Dante out and about.]]

Still in the Nexus, after her conversation with Havoc, Riza turns and starts walking toward a store to pick up bandages to take to him later, not bothering to see if she were being followed, or wait for anyone.

[[Thread closed; post-RP edit

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[light__of__day]

Riza grows silent briefly as she lifts her forehead off her knees, just enough to look in his general direction out of the corner of her eyes, and sniffles. She closes her eyes again as she shakes her head a tiny bit. "I don't know what happened," she says quietly, sucking down a shuddery breath. "But whatever it was, it... clearly didn't go well. He went back. I found his way back and it's my past and he went back and told them who the homunculi were. I told him not to let you and Alphonse separate, to warn you not to do that, and to not let me be the one to go with the Colonel if he went after Bradley."

Her lips curled into a bitter, thoroughly humorless grin, more of a pained bearing of teeth than anything else and she lifts her head, resting it against the wall as she looks up at the ceiling. "Now who knows what kind of hell it brought down instead and Havoc's hurt and..." Her voice breaks, a trembly sort of sound. "It would've been enough, you know? I would... it would have been enough knowing that somewhere, sometime, things went right for me, for us, the way they all should have gone instead, and not... just once."

[superman_dead]

Edward is quiet, listening to her, and pulls a handkerchief out of his pocket (he seems to be giving away a number of these lately- first the muse-turned-mortal, and now Riza) and hands it over to her. "It wasn't that one," he says quietly. "It was another one though."

It idly passes through his head to wonder what would've happened if he had not left Alphonse behind when he went to Liore, but he quickly shoves the thought aside- it doesn't matter by this point, it's long since over with and whatever that outcome would've been, the one he got was satisfactory, if what he'd heard from Russell and Riza and the other Alphonse were true. Alphonse was alive and washed clean of their sins. That was enough.

"If you hadn't warned him, who's to say it wouldn't have gone just as bad, just in a different way? Don't blame yourself for this." He gives her a soft smile. "Holding onto guilt like that only makes you old and worn out long before you should be, and you're too pretty for that, Lieutenant."

[light__of__day]

Riza looks at the handkerchief for a long moment before taking it, folding it a bit and dabbing at her eyes. "That's what I was trying," she says. "If it had gone right, maybe there'd be a little bit of absolution in it for me too."

[superman_dead]

Edward is quiet for a few seconds, studying her, debating about the question on the tip of his tongue. He knows it's treading into forbidden territory, into that area they both had silently agreed to not enter; after all, he had no care to share his own secret guilts, and if he pressed the raw subjects with her, then she had right to press them with him.

But... understanding would help him fix the current problem better. And god, should he exist, knew that he couldn't fix his own problems, and from where he was, he could no longer try to help Alfons reach his own dreams as he'd devoted himself to, so he might as well try to fix something before he completely gave up and collapsed under the hopelessness and withered away.

"Lieutenant," his voice dropped to barely above a whisper as he spoke, "who pulled the trigger that night?"

[light__of__day]

Riza stared at her knees, barely breathing, clutching the handkerchief tight. "Archer intercepted us," she said, her voice just this side of being inaudible. "He saw me and opened fire, hitting me in the shoulder. He took a car and went to the mansion, where the Colonel was attempting to deal with the Fuhrer. By the time I got there, he was on the porch, carrying the Fuhrer's son out of the burning building, and Archer was there, aiming at him. He never had a chance to get a shot off. I opened fire."

She was silent for a few more moments. "I just missed the final shot."

[superman_dead]

Edward is silent as that slams into him with full force. After a moment, he sat down on the ground, crossing his legs underneath him. "And that's why you transferred out from his command?" She had said as much already, which meant that Mustang was still alive. He'd survived the fight, the rest didn't matter.

[light__of__day]

She closes her eyes and gives a barely perceptible nod. "Yes," she whispers. "I... He needed someone he could rely on to protect him. That someone wasn't me. The thought of firing a gun even near him again..." Her breath catches in her lungs and she shudders.

"I thought he was dead. The bullet..." She lifts her hand and touches her left cheekbone. "It struck here, at an angle, and shattered it. He lost his eye. If the angle was just a little more that way, I would have killed him. It was just... just pure chance and stupid luck that it wasn't fatal from the start, that we got him to the hospital in time, that he pulled out of it in spite of the doctor's prognosis. I couldn't take a second chance."

[superman_dead]

Silence passes for a handful of heartbeats before Edward tentatively reaches out and puts his hand, the prosthetic one, faintly warm and strange to the touch, on Riza's lightly. "He should've followed you, instead of running to the North. He followed us when we got scared, you deserve at least as much loyalty."

He closes his eyes and takes a shuddering breath. "It'd be hypocritical of me to tell you you shouldn't blame yourself- I've never forgiven myself for what I did to Al, and that was years ago. And he barely came out of it alive." He opens his eyes to look at her. "But that doesn't mean it was your fault. You missed the last shot, but your shoulder was injured, and you were trying to protect him. You're human, Lieutenant Hawkeye. Humans make mistakes. I know if it were me, I wouldn't blame you for it."

[light__of__day]

Riza stares at him. His observations hurt, the phrasing hurts; everything about the whole damned situation hurts. The words stir up things hidden below, like silt kicked up from a river bottom clouding her thoughts, confusing, suffocating. She shouldn't feel hurt, or betrayed, or angry. She shot him.

She hadn't meant to leave him. She didn't feel that she could have remained who she had been, but she could have still been who she was. That hadn't been enough. It hadn't been her, it wasn't ever really her, was it? It was just the subordinate, the sharpshooter, the soldier. The fool. She keeps trying to make her lips and voice cooperate to form words, the only sound made a strained, soft, high-pitched sort whimper just before she gives up and hits the back of her head against the wall, glaring up at the ceiling past hot tears, trying to make them stop.

[superman_dead]

He's done something wrong, he thinks, said the wrong thing, which would be of no surprise to him- he was always awful with words, really, and people in general; always much better with formulas and theories. He moves around to sit in front of her, frowning, unsure what to do or say to fix the mess he's made of the already broken situation. "It wasn't your fault, Lieutenant, it wasn't," he insists quietly, hoping, if nothing else, she'll at least blow up at him and say something that will give him a hint how to fix things.

[light__of__day]

"No," she whispers, her voice cracking, still staring upward, trying to force the tears to stop forming. "It was. I couldn't be who I'd been, but I wasn't leaving him. But... that wasn't enough. It fell apart and it was because of everything I'd done."

She closes her eyes, tired now, letting her head fall forward until her chin is against her chest, defeated. "It doesn't matter now though, not here. I get another chance here, like I've wanted. He still cares, here. It'll be better this time." She lifts a hand, wiping her eyes.

[superman_dead]

In a flash, Edward grabs both of Riza's arms tightly and gives her a small shake. "It was not your fault!" he snaps, just keeping his voice under a shout. "He should've followed you! He chased my brother and I down, he should've done the same for you! Or is this how all men treat the women they supposedly love?!"

His tone quiets and his grip loosens. "Don't try to replace him like that, Lieutenant. If anyone can tell you how dangerous to the heart that can be, it's me. Don't do that to yourself. You don't deserve that."

[light__of__day]

Riza's eyes widen as he shakes her, staring at him in shocked silence, her expression crumpling a slight bit as she loses her focus on trying to keep the tears at bay.

But then, they evaporate under a hot flash of anger, and she shakes his hands off, scrambling to her feet as she starts to pace. "What I deserve is a second chance! What I deserve is a chance to be happy for once, to..." She gestures vaguely, struggling for the words. "For a chance for my life! For my dreams, what I wanted. He knows we're not the same ones! I told him that! He doesn't care about that, he cares about me!"

[superman_dead]

Edward gets to his feet quickly, expression dark and angry, but controlled. "He knows that, but do you? When it really matters do you really know it's not him, that this isn't a second chance to fix something you only think you did, that things haven't been undone?!"

[light__of__day]

"They don't have to be undone to get absolution!" she retorts.

[superman_dead]

"And do you really think it's absolving you to put her through what you went through?" he asks, voice quiet.