The Sky Is Falling In

It starts strangely. How else could it?

You don’t expect anything when Mustang pulls you into a back alley after you complete the second part of the Certification Exam. It wasn’t new. You’d talked to him in back alleys before, when it was important to keep things quiet. It shouldn’t have been any different this time.

He pushes you against a wall, and you begin to protest, “Wha…” A gloved hand covers your mouth, stifling the words.

“Don’t speak,” he hisses in your ear. Like hell you will. He’s close, too close, and you’re about to shove him off, when a hand, his hand, slides into your pants and wraps around your cock. You freeze, and your eyes go wide. This is strange; this is beyond your comprehension. Part of you wants to fight back: push him off, knee him in the groin, bite his hand.

“Remember what I know about you and your brother,” he whispers in your ear. “Remember what I can do to you.”

He knows. He knows, and you could end up in jail and Al could end up in a scientific laboratory somewhere. So you stand perfectly still and let him do this to you.

You come, and the sticky wetness turns your stomach. He pulls back, his eyes dark and cold, and wipes his hand on your pants. You hate him more now than you have ever hated anyone, except your father. And there’s just no comparison there.

“I’ll have to keep you around,” you think Mustang mutters. It’s hard to hear anything over the beating of your heart.

He leaves the alley as meticulously composed as he arrived. You slump against the red brick and try to pull yourself together. After a few minutes, you think you’re ready to go back to the Tuckers’. Your face burns as you walk down the street.

Al asks you what’s wrong when you get back, but you brush him off and go upstairs to take a shower. You still feel dirty afterwards.

Every time Mustang calls you “Fullmetal”, you have to fight down the urge to punch him. You want to hurt him. You want to bash his face in. You want to rip that smug expression off his face, but you know that this is easy compared to how it could be, to how bad he could make it.

He found you in a bathroom, once, alone, as Al doesn’t actually have any bodily functions. He shoved you into a stall, and it hurt. The stall was small and cramped, not exactly designed to fit two people. A hand on your shoulder forced you to your knees so you were facing his crotch.

You knew what was coming.

“Suck me,” he snarled," and don’t even think about biting."

You didn’t. Mustang didn’t make empty threats. You didn’t swallow, either, but you don’t think he cared. After he left, you spit as much of it as you could down the sink. It took you five rinses before you were willing to swallow even your own saliva.

That moment of hesitation almost confuses you. Mustang doesn’t do mercy. He annihilates with cool precision. The information about Marco is even more surprising. For once, the image of Mustang bloodied and bruised doesn’t bring a smile to your face.

When you find Marco, it all becomes slightly clearer. The things Marco tells you about the War chill you to the bones. You can’t imagine what it was like, to do the things he described.

You think it could destroy a man.

When you have a free moment in Central, you talk to Hughes, who knows Mustang better than anyone besides Hawkeye, and you doubt you could get anything out of her.

It reminds you of Tucker, to be sitting across from him and asking questions. When you mention Roy and Ishbal, his eyes go wide for second, and then serious. He asks why you want to know. You don’t tell him the real reason. You like him, and you trust him, but he would talk to Roy about it, and that would just be the beginning of the end.

He sighs, and he seems to stare off into the distance. “Before the War, he was… I can’t say gentle, but he was gentler at least. The war… changed him, I guess. He, well, came back different. I don’t know what else to tell you.”

You thank him and go back to your research.

Mustang fucks you face-down over his desk. Bile rises in you throat, and you’re tempted to spit it out onto his papers. It would serves the bastard right. But you don’t.

When he flips you over and kisses you, you regurgitate as much of it as you can. He doesn’t seem to notice, and still licks you mouth clean. You hate it. He tastes like dust and sand and the mashed potatoes he ate for lunch.

It’s getting easier. You can close your eyes and pretend this isn’t happening. Sometimes you don’t, because you want to remember why you hate him.

You’re still mostly dressed, and it’s easy to put yourself back together and leave. Al still gives you strange looks (as strange as he possibly can muster, anyway) when you leave the colonel’s office like this, but you don’t think he knows. You hope he won’t ever have to.

It takes you by surprise when he finally does ask. It happens in your room, away from the other military personnel, and probably the most private place you know. You’re sitting on the bed, thinking.

“What has the colonel been doing to you, Brother?” his voice sounds almost as scared as you are. You want to comfort him, tell him that it’s nothing, but even the thought sounds false.

So you don’t say anything and pull yourself into the fetal position. You feel small, smaller than anything anyone’s called you. There’s an explanation for this, but it doesn’t work its way out of your mouth. Al just stares at you until he’s sure you won’t say anything. The sigh he makes sounds like the whoosh of wind through a pipe.

He lays down on his bed and stares at the ceiling. You don’t move.

“It just something I have to do,” you croak out eventually.

Al doesn’t look like he believes you, but you can’t really tell in this light.

You don’t make any noises during these incidents. Not since the first time. You’re afraid to. There’s little doubt that if you open your mouth curses will come flying out. You grit your teeth, bite your lip. If you open your mouth, you won’t be able to hold those things in.

And that would just get you into trouble.

So you don’t.

FIN.