Hatred Like Ash

[twilight_lament]

Title: Hatred Like Ash
Universe: FMA AU
Characters: Riza Hawkeye, Envy
Warning: Nothing graphic, but NOT warm and fuzzy
Rating: G
Summary: Tomorrow he'd hate her again with the same zeal that he needs her, but not right now.
Disclaimer: I do not own FullMetal Alchemist in any way shape or form. This work is meant to be a transformative commentary on the original. No copyright infringement is intended or implied with this not for profit piece. It is fanwork only. 

Envy sits on her windowsill, watching one Captain Hawkeye mutter rubbish in her sleep. His purple eyes narrow on her blanket covered body and the lines of pain that never leave her eyes. The more he needs her, the more he hates her, the more he wants to rip her apart amid the nightmares plaguing her every moment of sleep, and most of her waking moments as well. He is the nightmare, or so he wants to believe. Yet he knows he's not. Her nightmares take the form of dark hair, dark eyes, and fingers sending a spiral of fire at her.

 The way she clutches the sheet in her hand, the tightening of her eyes, and the soft whimpers passing her lips are thrilling and annoying. Pain, suffering it's all on her face, in every breath she exhales, yet he isn't the cause - not directly anyway and it pisses him off to no end that after two years Roy Mustang still owns her mind. In that moment he's so close to Greed except for one difference - Greed didn't want things only because he couldn't have them. Envy does. What he has he never wants and what he wants he never has.

Was it just him? Or had Dante fucked up his head so much that only suffering could make him smile? That he could never be satisfied outside of those first moments when something he coveted became his. Except for her suffering because he isn't cause. Her world doesn't spiral as tightly around him as he wants. His hands clench and murder paints his thought a dark, sinful red.

 The only thing that saves her is the bitter taste of loneliness underneath his rage and the insufferably smug knowledge that she's exactly the same. Alone, adrift, with only Envy to cling to. Ex-Furher The Flaming Fuckhead might dominate her mind, but Envy is her future and she needs him to pull off this ruse. It's why he slides off the window sill into a crouch on the floor and climbs up over the footboard of her bed. He watches her from his crouch and is about to curl up against her legs and go to sleep until the most hated words leave her mouth.

 "Please...please don't make me do this." Followed by a cry of shock and pain and. "I love you." He can hear the old gun fire in the memory, see Mustang's body fall to the ground, dead. It's the tears that drive him into fury. The way she still cries for him even after everything he did to the country, to her. She should HATE him. Hate him worse than she hates Envy, or Dante, or Father, or any of them.

 With a leap forward, Envy flips her onto her back and pins her wrists to the bed in the same motion. The Captain is formidable, but he's immortal - stronger, faster, and far more dangerous. Oh she could kill him with a bit of planning and luck. He's not at full strength and enough bullets could put an end to him, but he has the advantage and savors her wide-eyed sleepy shock. Nothing seems to shock her anymore. That fact pisses him off too, and has for a long time. That she's so unflappable and subtle in the face of his darker moments. Of course she'd dealt with a dark and highly unstable Flaming Asshole for years - damn how he hates that man and wishes he were alive so Envy could kill him again. So he could rub it in the man's face that his precious Captain belongs to Envy now. For a moment he imagines that he could pierce through Mustang's unrelenting need for revenge, peel back all that rage and expose the man he used to be to all the wrongness he's visited on everyone, especially the woman who had clung so stubbornly to his side no matter how far how into hell he went. That he could make Mustang feel her pain and suffering, bleed him raw, and then kill him dead with the image of Envy stealing her away the last thing he sees. That might actually keep him satisfied longer than normal.

 Except she doesn't belong to Envy, not really. In reality that's why he keeps up with the charade, parading himself about as The Repentant Furher. If she capitulates and became just another human to mess with, it would be victory and thrilling for as long as it took him to grow bored with it. Captain Hawkeye doesn't hand him victory and so he keeps sleeping in her bed to avoid loneliness and puts on Roy's face because it's the only reason she needs him.

Then her shock is gone, erased, and the only trace of pain and sorrow on her face are the dried tears smelling of salt and bitter regret.

 "Get off me, Envy." Her tone neither cold nor warm, neither angry nor nasty. She's almost as a good a mimic as he is in her own way: the way she can show and feel nothing.

 Fury etches into his features and instead of complying with her demand, his hands tighten, nails dig into her human flesh until he can feel the hot creep of blood under his nails. Her jaw tenses at the pain, but there are no pleas or whimpers to accompany her discomfort and for a second she reminds him of Greed. Greed never let him win either; not the war anyway, only small victories here and there. Hawkeye won't beat him senseless later, though. She won't get so pissed off and take every ounce of her emotion out on him. He almost wishes that she would.

 Because he needs to be controlled sometimes and needs someone to put him firmly under their thumb. Her subtle power doesn't always feed the need for blunt reminders that was ingrained into him so long ago for so many years.

 "Stop crying for that asshole." He hisses the words between clenched lips but there as loud as any scream in the silence. Oddly she relaxes in his grip and a tired sigh passes between parting lips.

 "Envy," And there's a hidden sympathy in that voice and a tiredness that goes straight to her core. A mimic yes, because as strong as she seems, Hawkeye is world weary and soul worn. There is no real happiness in her life, only Envy. "Go to sleep." She finally finishes the sentence and he feels all his hatred for her blow away like ash on the wind. It's what's behind the words: a need that answers his own. She doesn't want to be alone anymore than he does and her simple words acknowledge that immutable connection between them. It's not victory, but it's enough. With a muffled whimper he collapses next her, hating and loving it when she curls up behind his back, touching but not touching, and untangles the blanket before draping it over him. Tomorrow he'd hate her again with the same zeal that he needs her, but not right now.

 The pillow, the sheets, and the blanket all smell like her and that scent has become the closest thing to home that he knows anymore. Their shared warmth stays just the right side of stifling and fills him with lassitude. Just before sleep takes him, when he listens to her breathing even out, and feels her muscles twitch with the beginnings of more dreams, a wild thought slinks through his mind. He wonders

what it would be like to see a real smile on her face, and what it would take to put it there. But he's a monster and as inhuman as they come, so that thought too burns up and drifts away like ash.

 What he hates is the bitter taste its destruction leaves in the back of his throat.