Island Prose

(See Chapter 14)

The alarm bells seemed to be coming from everywhere. He struggled up from the thick, fuzzy blackness, slowly, his arm reaching out in a vague search for the alarm clock. It was only when he felt the hard surface beneath him, and began to push himself away from it, that he realized it wasn’t the clock making the noise.

He gasped for breath, for some reason needing the extra air. “Gracia…get the phone…,” he managed, labouriously shoving himself up onto his hands and knees. It took about three tries, with shaky hands, before he could straighten his crooked glasses on the bridge of his nose.

And then he remembered.

( The last fire )( The last fire )( The last fire )( The last fire )
FIN

(See Chapter 12)


When Elysia had been put to bed that evening, and Maes settled with Gracia on the couch in front of the fireplace, he decided he’d had a pretty productive day, even if he’d ended up staying home instead of going in to work. He’d called the office to let his investigators know there would be some extra police patrols starting tonight, and they’d caught him up on any news they had (which wasn’t much). He’d managed one call to Roy’s place, where Breda told him that things seemed to be fine there and mentioned that Roy himself had been doing a lot of work over the phone. This was reconfirmed later on in the afternoon, when Maes had called again a couple of times and found the line occupied.

After lunch, he’d laid down to nap with Elysia again, and this time both of them had slept. They’d had a fun afternoon of playing, in between a few more work-related phone calls.

All in all, it had been a good day. And now Gracia snuggled against him, in the curve of one arm, and each of them was just starting to get engrossed in a book for the evening. He reflected that life just couldn’t get much better than this.

But when the phone rang for what must have been the twentieth time that day, Maes sighed. “Not again,” he complained. “Can’t we have just one uninterrupted evening?”

( Crisis )

(See Chapter 14)

(And yes -- I know. They don't have buttons on their cuffs. I only checked this morning. But the button's been such a major part of the story since I conceived it that I left it in. When I retool the story to post on FF.net, I'll figure out a different clue. But for now, with the rush of NaNo, it has to stay.)

(See Chapter 10)


He didn’t even have to knock; the two guards at the front of the yard waved him past, and as he took the porch steps in one leap, he saw Fuery standing in the doorway, waiting for him. All the lights in the house appeared to be on.

“What’s happened?” Maes demanded breathlessly. Even though he’d driven here, he’d been unable to get a breath since the moment he’d fumbled with and dropped the phone receiver and turned to find Gracia behind him with pants and a shirt. “Where is he?” he gasped. “What’s he done?”

“He’s locked himself in the bathroom upstairs, Hughes,” Fuery said, his face drawn with worry. “Havoc’s talking to him.”

( Roy's crisis )

(See Chapter 12)

(See Chapter 8)

He sat as though enthroned, on a bench along the wall across from the doorway, his long, greasy black hair tumbling down his shoulders and over the front of his light brown prison uniform, his wrists encased at either end of a double-thick stock of wood that had been both padlocked to a post embedded in the floor and attached to the ceiling by thick chains. A couple of lamps set into the wall on either side of the door ensured that he didn’t sit in darkness, but they were not bright, and his eyes were shadowed under his brows, the merest glitter seeming to spark there as he watched his visitors enter the room.

( Roy and Kimbley )
(See Chapter 10)

(See Chapter 6)

Maes dropped in again, the day after the new arrangements had been put into place, partly to see how all the parties had survived through the day and overnight, and partly to try to take the brunt of things if Roy was in a foul mood. Havoc and Breda had stayed inside the house during the night, spelling each other off in two-hour watches while four other military guards had stood outside. The two lieutenants didn’t seem too bad for wear as he peeked in the door, and there didn’t seem to be any upheaval going on.

When he tiptoed dramatically over to the other door and opened it, he saw that Hawkeye was, again, doing her work in the inner office, her files spread all over the coffee table, her gun lying at the ready on a pile of papers. She’d be leaving after lunch to try to catch some sleep, before serving her turn with Breda in the house tonight.

( A possible suspect at last? )

(See Chapter 8)

(See Chapter 5, Part 1)

And suddenly, deep, deep inside the building, a loud rumbling started that grew louder and louder, beginning to shake the ground beneath their feet. Then Maes knew with sick certainty that the wooden barrels had begun to burn through and give way, their contents quickly vaporizing in the heat, and beginning to ignite in the flames.

Oh Gracia, he thought, grief and regret stabbing through him.

( What Roy did about it )

(See Chapter 6)

(See Chapter 3)


Maes rapped lightly on the front door, and then after a couple of moments without any answer, pressed the doorbell. He heard it ringing loudly inside Roy’s front hall, and at last an answer came.

“It’s open, Maes!” the man’s voice came hollowly through the door. “Just come in – I’m kind of occupied!”

Maes turned the knob and found that the door was indeed unlocked. (He’d have to speak sternly to his friend about that; couldn’t have him leaving himself too vulnerable with some pyro wandering the streets with possible vengeance on his mind.) Stepping into the front hall – and, incidentally, locking the door behind him – he briefly allowed his eyes to adjust to the dimmer inside light, and then walked further in. It was much warmer in here than in the cooler morning air outside. The sun had only just risen a few minutes ago.

( Roy Mustang under stress )

(See chapter 5 part 1)

(See Chapter 2, part 1)

“The thing is, Roy,” he said in answer to his friend’s quiet remark, “we really have to know if it was possible for anyone else to get hold of Riza’s father’s research. You have to tell me that nothing – nothing – escaped that burning in the fireplace. Are the two of you absolutely certain that there was no trace of this alchemy left, outside of that house?”

He expected an immediate, certain confirmation. But instead, Roy and Riza exchanged an uneasy glance. He pounced on it immediately.

“There is something, isn’t there? What is it you haven’t told me?” After another uncomfortable silence, he pressed the point. “Come on, you two, this could be important. I have to know.”

( Maes develops some theories )

(Go to Chapter 3)

Chapter 1


Maes paced a small path, back and forth, working off his agitation as he stared at the blackened, smoking wreck of the warehouse. The engineers – yet again – were testing the remaining frame of the building, to make sure it was safe. He could tell that most of the roof was gone, since he could peerk through several of the windows along the sixth (the top) floor, and see stars through the haze that still hung in the air after the fire had been put out. None of the Investigations people were ever allowed into these buildings before these tests were done, no matter how urgently they needed to find clues about what had started the blaze. There had been a close call in the very first burned building, five months ago, when a precarious wall collapsed onto the spot were two investigators had been standing about ten seconds earlier, and that was the end of just sauntering in to start peeking around.

Maes had made that decision himself, and of course he knew it had been the right choice. But that didn’t prevent him from chomping at the bit, wishing he could just get in there and start looking. Who knew what clues might be glowing in there, gradually fading and disintegrating under the influence of the water, to leave them clueless (in so many ways) once again?

He’d thought – everyone had thought – that the arsonist had finally stopped, when there had been that two-month silence after his string of seven burned buildings in the prior two months. But that hope had been dashed tonight, when Maes had been awakened by the shrill ringing of the phone in the darkness, and informed that another empty warehouse near the edge of the city was ablaze.

This made eight in total. And he had no doubt that whoever had started this fire tonight was the same person who had instigated the previous seven. Which meant, he admitted gloomily to himself, that it probably didn’t matter how quickly they got inside to look around. There had been no useful clues whatsoever, the first seven times, and it was very probably that there would be none tonight either.

He made himself stop pacing, and cast a glance at his companion, who had remained utterly still and silent at his side, through all the hustle and bustle of the cleanup and the tests.

( Disturbing undercurrents )