Like a Wounded Animal

Having successfully been woken up, Hughes stood, rubbing at his eyes. He listened for a moment before deciding that whatever had woken him hadn’t disturbed Gracia and Elysia as well.

He stayed quiet for a while longer, before hearing a low growling coming from the backyard. Sighing, he got up and walked into the foyer where he had hung up his belt. It had the pouch that carried his shuriken throwing knives, and he wasn’t about to go out and investigate unarmed. Plus, the shuriken were far quieter than his gun, the report of which would wake up everyone in the neighborhood.

It had completely stopped raining by then, and the night was hot and muggy as he stepped out into the backyard, flashlight in hand, shuriken pouch in the pocket of his pink chicky pajamas from Elysia.

The backyard was quiet as he surveyed it, coming across nothing of any importance with his flashlight.

That was, until his bare foot stepped on something in the darkness, something soft and fuzzy. Whatever it was, it tickled.

…And made that massive growling noise.

Without even thinking, he loosed a shuriken at the dark form he now saw lying near his feet, the thing whose tail he had just stepped on. He gained a slightly animalistic, slightly human whimper, and blinked in confusion.

“The only thing that could make a sound like that… is a chimera… but Shou Tucker… he’s…” He thought aloud, stepping away from the thing he had just buried a shuriken in and shining his light on it.

Lying there, in his backyard, in a pool of blood, was none other than Roy Mustang, the Flame Alchemist, and Fuhrer… his best friend was lying at his feet, bleeding, with a shuriken sticking out of his ribs.

“Shit… Roy!” He cried, kneeling down next to his friend.

Carefully, he pulled the serrated throwing knife out of his friend, earning a weekend whimper in return. Blood was slowly seeping out of that, and various other wounds all over the half-blind Alchemist’s body.

“Roy, what happened to you?” Hughes asked, gaining no answer as he looked at the horrible wounds that were covering his friend. Apart from the deep gash having been left by his shuriken, there were major cuts and lacerations on his arms, legs, everywhere… His clothing, which could be recognized as what used to be his uniform, was tattered and torn, stained and dirty.

“Come on, I’m going to get you inside.” He told his unconscious friend, hoping his voice would help bring him around or sooth him, something, anything.

As he was lifting Roy, the man opened his eyes a bit, and looked at him. A slight snarl came to his face, that fearsome, animalistic growl parting his hips. He seemed to calm a little. “m-m….maes?” he muttered, his voice sounding hoarse and husky, as if it hadn’t been used, or had been grossly overused recently.

“Yeah, year Roy, it’s me.” He said, half carrying, half letting the semi-conscious Alchemist walk into the house, sitting him down in one of the chairs hanging around the kitchen and turned on the light.

With full lighting on him, Mustang looked even worse. There was a long, steadily bleeding gash down his neck, and his lips were beginning to turn blue from blood loss and lack of body heat.

“Damn Roy… what happened to you?” He asked again, but the Alchemist had slipped back out of consciousness. Maes gave a concerned sigh, going into the bathroom to get some bandages, antiseptic, and an older towel they could afford to throw away to wash out his friend’s wounds.

It took hours to properly clean and care for all of them, there were so many. Hughes also had to give up another pair of his clothes to properly clothe his friend.

By the time he was done and had put Mustang on the couch under the blankets in place of Lieutenant Havoc, Gracia was waking up.

“Maes, honey, why didn’t you come to bed last night… Did you get Jean to the hospital alright?” She asked, rubbing her eyes sleepily

“He has pneumonia… they’re going to treat him though, he should be ok.” Hughes told her, not answering her question about why he didn’t go to bed with her. He looked down at his pajamas, sighing. His birthday present from his daughter was ruined, covered in Roy’s blood, horribly stained.

Roy wasn’t looking too good either as he laid on the couch. But he had found sufficient reason not to bring the Flame Alchemist to the hospital. Whilst he was cleaning out his wounds, not only had he stumbled across the tail that he had stepped on last night, and found it firmly connected to the base of Mustang’s spine, but hand also spotted what hadn’t been very prominent in the dark, large, black ears sprouting from his friend’s hair. Also, his finger nails had sharpened, not to mention lengthened considerably into claws. Seeing that, he had been tempted to peek into his friend’s mouth and found none other than vicious looking fangs.

Someone had gone through the trouble of turning his best friend into a chimera, and subsequently tortured him. But who and why, Hughes had no clue.

“Oh… I hope he’ll be alright.” She said, gasping as she finished rubbing her eyes and put her hand down. Hughes looked back at her, not knowing if her gasp was due to the appearance of her husband’s pajamas or the appearance of her one-time boyfriend.

“What happened to Roy?” She asked, her voice rising in pitch so that it was almost a shriek.

One of Roy’s long ears twitched.

“Shhh, Gracia, don’t wake him.” Hughes instructed. “Whatever you do, let him sleep. Someone did a number to him, he needs to rest.”

“He needs to go to a hospital.”

“I already dressed his wounds.”

“They could be infected.”

“I cleaned them too.”

“Maes, why won’t you bring him? Isn’t he your best friend?”

“It’s not as simple as that, Gracia… I wish it was…”

“Why not?”

“Have you ever heard of a chimera, Gracia?” Hughes asked her sadly.

“Head of them from what you’ve said about the Tucker case at work, but I never really understood it.” She said, coming over to sit near him. Both of the couples’ eyes never left the slumbering body of Mustang.

Maes nodded, swallowing and then clearing his throat. “A chimera is an artificially synthesized being, created through alchemy using two or more animals, combining their bodies, strengths, and intelligence. There has never been a successful attempt to defuse the animals once they’ve been put together. The experiments always end up dying, unable to take the access flow of alchemic energy through their bodies.”

Gracia ripped her eyes away from Roy to gape at her husband, utterly horrified. No wonder so many people hated the alchemists, if they were able to do things like this, most of them probably thought they were gods. She looked back to Roy sadly, her eyes then falling to the floor.

“What does that-“

“I’m not finished,” her husband interrupted. “In there have also been reports of humans being mixed with animals in order to create an even smarter chimera, one that could be used as a weapon, able to think and strategize on its own.” He informed.

“Look very closely at Roy,” he instructed.

Gracia did as she was told, letting out a horrified gasp as she caught sight of the black ears lying down across the back of Mustang’s skull, almost invisible amongst his dark hair. Tears began springing to her eyes, and she buried her face into Maes’ bloodied pajamas.

“Amestris has strict anti-chimera laws since what Tucker did to his daughter reached the light of day.” He said, holding her close, running his hand over her hair. “Officials of any sort are ordered to put them down should they come across any… Those are wolf ears coming off of his head, he has a tail, fangs and claws too… That’s why I can’t bring him to the hospital.”

“There’s no way to change him back?”

“Not that I know of, other than the Philosopher’s Stone.” He let out a long sigh. “And I’m no Alchemist, I have no idea where to even start on that, and even if I did, I wouldn’t want to drag Roy into it, he’s been tempted to make a stone before, and I don’t… I don’t want to loose him to it.”

Gracia nodded, just as she heard a happy little squeal from up on the stairs.

“UNCLE ROY!” Elysia shouted, too late for her father to warn her against it as she came bounding down the stairs.

Mustang’s ears snapped up and his eyes opened, his vision quickly moving to Elysia and locking onto her as she came catapulting toward him, a growl building in his throat.

Like a threatened, wounded wolf would in the forest, Mustang began to bristly, the hair on the back of his head standing on end as he bared his fangs at the little girl, who stopped dead in her tracks, tears building in her eyes.

“Uncle Roy? What’s wrong?” She asked, not noting the change the had come over him really, just knowing that her Uncle was growling at her, looking as if he didn’t want anything to do with her.

“Uncle Roy, it’s me… Elysia-chan…” She whimpered, beginning to back away from him. His expression didn’t change, even as she reached her father and buried her face in his pajamas as she began to cry.

“Papa! Papa! What’s wrong with Uncle Roy?” She cried.

Slowly, Mustang lowered his head and fell back into an uneasy sleep.

Hughes could not answer his daughter. All he could do was look at his friend in utter shock. He didn’t seem to recognize the girl at all… that look in his eyes, it wasn’t the look of a man at all, it was more like that of an animal, threatened and wounded.

That… wasn’t Roy Mustang lying on his couch. It couldn’t have been.