FIC: Fullmetal Alchemist: Things She Lives With (Riza Hawkeye, PG)
Title: Things She Lives With
Fandom: Fullmetal Alchemist
Pairings/Characters: Riza Hawkeye
Rating: PG
Word count: 245
Prompt: 7. Pride
Author's notes: I can't explain why I love Riza so much, I just do.
Summary: It's hard to adjust after the war, but she doesn't have much choice.
The things that happened in Ishbal keep her up at night for months, even after the war is over. She can't get any of it out of her head. She's not proud; people tell her she should be glad she put down so many Ishbalan dogs, that if she didn't do it someone less merciful would have, that she was a bleeding heart. She can't be proud of a body count longer than her arm.
She watches other soldiers readjusting, and wonders what it was like for them. How many of them killed children, the ill, the elderly? How do any of them sleep at night with the war hanging over their heads?
Riza doesn't cry over it. Part of her thinks she's just repressing and that it'll all come out eventually; she'll have a breakdown, leave the military, maybe start a flower shop out in the country or breed lapdogs. And another part of her wonders what there is to cry about. She's not proud of what she did, but it wasn't pointless. She killed, yes, but only when she had to; fought for a cause she believed in because she believed in it. That's something to be proud of, maybe. She did it all for a good reason.
But if there was anything her father had taught her, it was that good intentions can fool even the greatest of men into wrongdoing.
So maybe she has nothing to be proud of at all.
Fandom: Fullmetal Alchemist
Pairings/Characters: Riza Hawkeye
Rating: PG
Word count: 245
Prompt: 7. Pride
Author's notes: I can't explain why I love Riza so much, I just do.
Summary: It's hard to adjust after the war, but she doesn't have much choice.
The things that happened in Ishbal keep her up at night for months, even after the war is over. She can't get any of it out of her head. She's not proud; people tell her she should be glad she put down so many Ishbalan dogs, that if she didn't do it someone less merciful would have, that she was a bleeding heart. She can't be proud of a body count longer than her arm.
She watches other soldiers readjusting, and wonders what it was like for them. How many of them killed children, the ill, the elderly? How do any of them sleep at night with the war hanging over their heads?
Riza doesn't cry over it. Part of her thinks she's just repressing and that it'll all come out eventually; she'll have a breakdown, leave the military, maybe start a flower shop out in the country or breed lapdogs. And another part of her wonders what there is to cry about. She's not proud of what she did, but it wasn't pointless. She killed, yes, but only when she had to; fought for a cause she believed in because she believed in it. That's something to be proud of, maybe. She did it all for a good reason.
But if there was anything her father had taught her, it was that good intentions can fool even the greatest of men into wrongdoing.
So maybe she has nothing to be proud of at all.