The Same Coin

Regards

When her dreams of the Sun and the Moon gave way to the dawn, Winry awoke to Hisoka perched at the foot of her bed, shuffling his cards from one hand to the other. She heard the irregularities in the rhythm caused by his broken fingers. The morning light gleamed off his exposed automail. He squared his shoulders when she moved to sit up, and there was a hiccup in the movement of his cards but only for a moment. The pillow and blanket on Buccaneer's side of the bed had been straightened, and she immediately knew he had already left.

She felt a hollowness inside.

"Should you ever stop being such a onesome creature, mink," Hisoka said, not glancing back at her as she left the blankets and dressed in her clothes from the floor, "I would feel inclined to kill you."

"You say that as though it will keep you in my good graces."

She pulled a shirt over her head and left the room, trodding down the stairs. Behind her, she could hear the quieter sounds of Hisoka following her into her workroom.

"Sit."

Hisoka reclined onto her work table gracefully. Winry sat on her stool, back to him, and rolled her tool table in his direction. She flinched as she faced him. There was dried blood crusted down the front of his shirt, trailing from a jagged, shallow slice encircling his throat. His tongue emerged from the corner of his lips.

"Do you like it?"

"You deserved it. Take it off."

Hisoka pulled the bloodstained shirt off over his head and dropped it onto the ground beside the table. The remnants were stark against his pale ivory skin. Winry pulled a pair of magnifying goggles around the crown of her head before she leaned in, and carefully disconnected the nerve endings at the housing unit so that she could work without him in discomfort, though the thought crossed her mind not to bother. She disconnected the fingers, cursing as she surveyed the damage.

"How long to fix it?"

"I should be able to do it by the end of the day," she said. "The damage seems to be focused in the hinges, none of the wiring has been affected." Winry pulled her goggles down over her eyes, then glanced up at him with a frown. The goggles hyper focused her line of vision on his face. "There's a bathroom off the hallway upstairs. Go clean yourself."

"Hmh."

He left, and she lapsed into her work sullenly. She thought about Buccaneer while she worked, wondering when in the night he had left. The house didn't feel different with his absence; he had always been quiet while she worked. She heard the sound of the pipes when Hisoka turned on the shower.

She wasn't certain why she was even bothering fixing his automail outside the obligation that accompanied each installation. What had transpired the night before — how he'd thrown her words in his face — was sufficient to sever their tie. Every time she had denied calling him a friend, she had been right. Even when she had called him a friend to Sig, she'd been lying — and Sig had known she was lying.

Hisoka was not capable of friendship.

She was vaguely aware of when he returned to her workshop. She didn't hear him; his footsteps were not heavy and robust like Buccaneer's. She just felt him there. Winry ignored him and kept working. She jumped and pulled off her goggles, startled, when several hours later he noisily laid a plate down near her elbow.

"What's this?" she asked, glancing at him with suspicion and realizing suddenly that she was hungry. His hair was still damp and hung around his face, and he hadn't repainted his star and tear yet. He was, bizarrely, wearing one of her oversized work shirts with his pants.