The Butterfly and Flame Alchemists: War (COMPLETE)

Part Two: Secrets

It seemed like the moment the train left the platform that rumors began to spread. Some said that Roy had cheated and Aileana had confronted him about it, but while she tried to leave he begged her to forgive him and stay. Others said it was the other way around, that Aileana had another man back home and had left to return to him. A small part of Roy died with each different story that he heard and sometimes he got angry when others would speak ill of Aileana. This had nothing to do with her and nothing was her fault, but he couldn’t tell anyone outside his inner circle that.

            “How you holding up, sir?” Hawkeye asked as he sat with her one day at lunch.

            “Just fine,” he shrugged, but he knew that she knew the truth, “she’s been gone for a few weeks now so I’m pretty much over it,”

            “How’s work?”

            “Just look at me,” he laughed lightly, “since I was deprived of my assistant I have to resort to doing paperwork over lunch to get caught up. How about you?”

            “There are always challenges adapting to a new office, sir. But the president is very organized, which is a big help. Best of all, he doesn’t slack off. I guess some people are just more capable than others, sir,”

            “… I don’t like where this conversation is going. Why don’t we go get a bite to eat sometime?”

            “Isn’t that what we’re doing right now, sir?”

            “That’s harsh. I’m zero for two today,”

            “Zero for two?”

            “I just ran into Major General Armstrong from up north. She flat out turned me down,”

            “Again, sir?”

            “Yup. She’s as cold as ever,”

            “Speaking of the North,” Hawkeye lightly tapped her coffee cup on the table, “Apparently Scar is up there, sir. And I think the Elric brothers went as well,”

            “I see,” he gave her a look, then glance down at his report.

            “Lucky and Isaac – friends from my academy days – keep me up to date about what’s going on up north,”

            “Really? That reminds me… the training with the Northern troops is coming up soon,”

            “Is it already that time of year sir? I remember Major Miles and Captain Buccaneer used to give us quite a beating,”

            “I remember them more for their wild hairstyles than their combat skill. I wonder how they survive the cold with hair like that,”

            “Do you know my friend Rebecca, sir?”

            “Yeah, she’s the one with the black hair right?”

            “She was so happy that Major General Armstrong took a liking to her,”

            “But she liked you more, didn’t she?

            “She spoke to Dove, Lysander, Edgar, and York too… she didn’t single me out,”

            “But the Ice Queen only has the harshest of words to say to me,”