❛ although i am broken my heart is untamed still. ❜
it’s hard, harder than she ever imagined it would be, seeing the lieutenant in such a state. usually she was so strong and so brave - it seemed as though nothing would ever be able to rattle her. but now beads of cold sweat were starting to collect on the older woman’s forehead and her cheeks were void of color. the only consolation was that her shallow breaths were even and she was able to keep herself awake.
the guilt that winry already felt hit her tenfold. trembling fingers push a bit harder on the fabric, jaw clenching as she succeeds in slowing the pulsing ebb of blood that’s been seeping over riza’s clothes, through the fabric and dripping down winry’s legs to pool on the floor beneath them.
she’d already stopped riza from trying to rise and follow colonel mustang several times, each time she’d moved the blood had gushed from her in such a great amount winry was afraid she would die right there on the spot. they’d been instructed to wait, that help would be coming to retrieve them and despite their protests it soon became clear that the lieutenant could not be moved by winry alone.
there’s an explosion in the distance and winry flinches instinctively though riza does not react to the sound. they can only assume that it’s colonel mustang catching up with the man who dragged a blade across his lieutenant’s shoulder when she had jumped forward to push winry out of harm’s way. she’s not sure if riza knows what she’s saying, her sentences have become tired and broken, words muttered under her breath getting softer and softer with the blood that now soaked both women.
riza’s words are almost drowned out by the sound of military boots rushing their way and the voices that were shouting into their radios that they’d located lieutenant hawkeye and miss rockbell, but winry can hear them as she leans forward, determined not to let anyone separate her from riza. not until the colonel returns, someone had to stay with her.
there’s another explosion and winry understands, she understands it so completely that she doesn’t have to question it for a minute. just as it is with her and ed, it is with riza and roy. there is a bond there so strong that nothing will ever break it, and she wonders if that’s what riza is trying to tell her as her. it must be.
‘ you’re not broken, we’re going to get you out of here. he’ll be back to see you soon. ‘
