Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction ❯ Family ❯ The Confrontation ( Chapter 10 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Chapter X: The Confrontation

Roy, hearing the angry crack of the doorknob against the wall—along with Edward's frightened, incoherent sputtering—languidly lifted his head from between the blonde's legs and looked back over his shoulder.

The first thing that he noted was how his father's wedding band stood out in stark contrast to his thick fingers and knuckles as his fist came crashing down against the Flame's cheek. The second was what a lovely grain the stained wood of his bedroom floor had. Funny, he'd never noticed it before . . .

Amid the horrified screams of multiple people, Roy felt himself being hauled off the floor—and off his feet—by his shirt collar, to stare into the purple, livid face of the Major General. Then, another fist connecting solidly to his jaw knocked any remaining sense out of him.

Doing his best to stay on his feet as his father dragged him past his shocked mother and sister, Roy barely noticed through his oncoming concussion that he was being taken downstairs and into the living room.

(Trip . . . trip . . . trip, down the stairs . . . knees hurt, toes hurt, face hurts . . .)

Roy's punch-drunk feet had barely hit the carpeted floor, before he felt himself being dragged further into the living room; it was only when the backs of his calves bumped into one of the sofas and he felt two more crushing blows to his face and stomach that he realized that the Major General had finally come to a stop.

Falling back onto the couch—clutching his stomach and wheezing out a pained breath—by agonizingly slow degrees the colonel looked up through his black fringe into the bulging, blue eyes of his father. The man was red and trembling with rage; his moustache shivering with each breath he forcefully expelled through his nose; his knuckles were white as his hands clenched and unclenched at his sides, trying their damnedest to curl into fists.

“My son . . .”

The words were hissed out through gritted teeth, almost as if it hurt the Major General to say them. In his peripheral vision, Roy could see three smaller bodies making their way down the stairs, their horrified faces turned in the direction of the father and son.

“What a wonderful way to find out that my son is a faggot!” he spat out, his voice dripping like venom and liquid fire as it exited his mouth.

“Gerald!” Roy's mother gasped, clutching a hand to her chest in shock.

“No!” the Major General bellowed. His booming voice echoed around the expansive room like a baritone note, causing all bric-a-brac on shelves, tables, and the fireplace mantle to tremble and clink their alarm at the disturbance—not to mention making all present company jump slightly. “Don't you defend him! Don't you dare!” he shouted at Mai Yao, never once letting his cobalt orbs flicker away from the fallen colonel.

“After what he did . . . what he was doing . . . with another man!” The Major General's face contorted in disgust. “It's sickening . . .”

Roy then felt himself being pulled to his feet again, lifted off the couch by the lapel of his shirt to have his father's puce visage shoved uncomfortably close to his own, the man's warm, sickeningly-sweet breath fanning against his cheeks and mouth. “You're sickening,” the Major General whispered. “What you're doing is a sin . . . a shameful, deplorable, deliberate transgression of morality! If you continue down this path, you are doomed to hell . . . Don't you know that!”

Roy said nothing and gave no indication that he had even heard the Major General—he merely let his father, lost in some sort of zealous, Tourette's-like stupor, shake him like a rag doll and shout homophobic obscenities at the top of his lungs. The colonel could hear his sister crying, shouting at their father to stop, please Daddy, stop it! and he could see his mother out of the corner of his eye, watching her only son get beaten and being able to do nothing about it. And Ed . . .

God, Edward looked absolutely terrified. He was trembling and there were tears dancing around the reddened halos of his golden eyes, threatening to spill over at any second—however, said eyes were also . . . incensed. There was rage there . . . all of it, Roy knew, being directed towards the Major General.

Ed looked like he wanted to take some sort of action to stop what was happening; however, the Flame quickly gave the teen a threatening glare, clearly telling him to back off . . . that he could handle it.

Thankfully, Edward—stubborn and thick-headed as he was—got the message and relaxed his defensive stance.

If only slightly.

“What do you have to say for yourself?” the Major General finally asked, lifting Roy off the ground and glaring daggers up at him. “Hm? Explain yourself, dammit!”

Roy merely stared down at the man, letting the silence stretch. Only when his father appeared as though he may explode as a result from holding his angry breath, did Roy make a move. He casually lifted an arm, running a rumpled sleeve across his mouth . . . and then, he very prominently swallowed . . . and grinned down at his father.

His feet touched the floor and it only took another fist to the left side of his already bruising face to wipe away any traces of the previous smirk.

“You disgust me,” his father snapped.

Quickly recovering from both the physical and emotional blows, Roy straightened himself and turned his face to stare at a blank spot above the mantle. “I try,” he answered passively.

“Why?” the Major General asked through exhausted breaths. “Why him? There are plenty of beautiful women out there who would kill to be on your arm. Is it just because you held power over him? It was easy to get him to crawl into bed with you!”

The colonel's face snapped back to his father, onyx eyes ablaze. “That's not it!” he near-shouted. Roy was unsure whether or not he was more upset about the fact that his blonde lover had heard the jab . . . or because the Major General was closer to hitting the truth than he—or anyone else in the room—realized. “Edward gave me something that . . . that no woman ever could!”

His father's lip curled. “That much is obvious,” he snarled, blue eyes darting over to rest on the Fullmetal for a second.

“That's not what I'm talking about, Father! Do you know how lucky you are? To have found someone who loves you just because that's who you are?” The Flame paused to look pointedly at his own mother, who was standing with one arm around Tamalynn, her other delicate hand covering her own mouth. Eyes snapping back to the major General, Roy pressed on: “Any woman that I ever let into my heart . . . into my past . . . couldn't take it. They were horrified—sickened by the very thought! And they didn't know the half of it!” He shouted the last part, every ounce of vehemence he could muster being expelled from his body in that sentence.

“But with Edward . . .” he continued quietly, eyes softening at the mere mention of his lover's name. “It was different. He knew. He knew my past and my sins . . . and he didn't care. He . . . he saw into the depths of my heart and soul . . . and he loved me the same!”

Roy, suddenly feeling his own nails cutting into his palms and drawing blood, relaxed his hands. But now, his fingers were becoming numb . . . and there was a pressure building in his chest, upsetting his stomach and making his head feel like it wanted to explode. What was it? He could feel it . . . he knew this feeling. It was good, wasn't it? God, what was it?

Expelled from his lungs (his stomach, his heart) . . . creeping up his throat . . . in his mouth, dancing across his teeth and palate . . . God, it was on the tip of his tongue now . . .

“I love him.”

The confession hovered about the room for a time, then suddenly sprouted wings and darted out the nearest open window, leaving its shocked audience—including the man who had admitted it, apparently—behind to deal with it as they saw fit.

“W-what?”

The first person to break the silence with this one word was not, surprisingly, the Major General . . . but Edward. He took a tentative step towards the dark-haired man, his bright eyes shining hopefully. “You . . . love me?”

Roy turned slowly to face the blonde, licking his swollen lip as he struggled to make the words come. Had he just said that? Yes . . . it was his voice, he knew. But . . . he had said that he loved Ed. Loved him . . .

But . . . did he?

After Maes, Roy had sworn that he'd never love anyone again . . . It was too hard and he never wanted to hurt like that again. But . . . somewhere along the way, Edward had fallen for him. And, through that love and that devotion, he had likewise burrowed his way into Roy's heart.

So . . . yes.

He did. He loved him . . . He loved Edward Elric. Roy felt his battered face break out into a full-fledged smile and he opened his mouth to answer the blonde's question.

“You . . .”

The word dropped like a lead weight through the happy air, crushing Roy's confession with the severity of hatred behind it. The colonel glanced back at his father, whose cobalt eyes were now fixed, blazing, on the Fullmetal Alchemist.

“You did this!” he shouted and began making his way towards the blonde.

However, it only took one step in Ed's general direction for Roy to react. He sidestepped and, for the first time that day, swung back at his father. One bare fist connected solidly to the Major General's beefy jaw, stopping him in his tracks and sending him reeling to the right, while the other buried itself in his gut.

The room stopped breathing.

“I don't care how many times you hit me,” the Flame hissed out through clenched teeth. “But you will not touch him. Got it?”

Slowly recovering from the assault, the Major General straightened his stance. His breaths were coming in short, staccato cadences, and the spot on his face where Roy had hit him was already darkening into an angry red.

“I'm reporting you,” he said quietly—seethingly. “You not only fraternized with and bedded one of your subordinates—and a minor, I might add—but you also hit an officer of higher rank than your own. You'll be court-martialed by the end of the week.” Glancing over at his wife and daughter, he stated in a way that left no room for argument, “We're leaving. I refuse to stay under the same roof as a couple of fags for one more night.”

Roy bristled at the harsh words, but said nothing to invoke further wrath from the older man as he quickly turned away and started towards the secluded library.

“But Gerald, he's your son!” Mai Yao very nearly shrieked as the Major General neared the doors to the athenaeum.

Without stopping to look back at his wife, the man bellowed, “I have no son!” and then slammed the heavy doors shut behind him. The Flame let out an infuriated huff of a breath, his hands balled into tight fists at his sides, knuckles white; he turned in the opposite direction as his father and stormed off through the dining room and into the kitchen.

Ed, without so much as a glance backwards, followed after his lover almost on instinct, catching the kitchen door before it swung shut and carefully closing it behind him. Mai Yao and Tamalynn, however, stayed rooted to the spot, dancing back and forth in rushed vacillation.

(What'll you choose? Door number one? Or door number two?)

Finally, after a good minute of panicked, headless clucking, the two women came to a silent decision, steeled themselves, and went after the Major General.