#fma talk

Briggs soldiers are a tough bunch and Idalia is one of them for sure.

Just look at her:

between how hard they both work towards their shared goal, how unwilling they are to risk failing, and how little they seem to think of themselves as deserving of pleasure, comfort, or love, i do find it hard to imagine that they are actually hiding a sexual relationship. it just seems like an indulgence they would feel unworthy of making, on top of the fact that it’s illegal, difficult to hide, and could complicate their professional relationship.

however. i always come back to two points from the manga:

1) these panels:

after roy’s unit is split up and riza is taken hostage by bradley, he goes to see his aunt about contacting grumman secretly for him. she asks how he’s doing and when he says he is doing poorly and came to the bar to cheer up, madame asks him rather pointedly, “why don’t you go play with elizabeth [to cheer yourself up]?” to which roy informs her that she (riza) has been “taken by another man.” madame obviously catches the true meaning, while his “sisters” seem to miss it, and titter about roy finally being single. the fact that both madame and his sisters are in on this idea of “elizabeth” being roy’s girlfriend makes me very interested in madame’s specific wording of “go play with” her. it establishes that roy and riza in fact do see each other in their personal time, and this is something which madame understands to be a significant enough fixture in roy’s life that her very first suggestion to help him feel better is to go see her. the specific phrasing “play with” is obviously open to either an innocent or salacious interpretation, but considering madame’s line of work, well... ya know.

2) the other thing that i can’t get over is riza’s use of 貴方 (anata) in two very critical places: twice as she holds a gun to roy’s head, and once when they are reunited after roy loses his eyesight.

i’ve talked about this before and i’ve seen another post discuss it, but essentially, 貴方 is a word for “you.” in japanese, pronouns are not typically used because it is generally understood who the subject/object of a sentence is. when clarification is needed, japanese tends to use the person’s name rather than a “you” pronoun, as over-using pronouns comes off rude. 貴方 is a “you” that is typically used when speaking formally to someone whose name is unknown, or spoken informally by a woman to her husband. we actually hear izumi refer to sig as the shortened version (anta) throughout the anime, which more loosely means “dear.” my understanding is that anata/anta are no longer commonplace endearment terms in japan, but are still frequently used in japanese media to imply that the relationship between the speaker and listener is romantic. it is crucial to note that in both instances where riza uses 貴方, she is not using formal japanese despite speaking to a superior. this is the first time we ever hear riza being informal with anyone ranked above her (in general she rarely drops formal speech at all), so it is especially shocking. specifically, her shift to informal speech comes when she pleads with roy after ed and scar show up:

roy: やっとだぞ!!やっと追い詰なおめたんだぞ!!! (”finally!! i’ve finally caught up!!!”) riza: わかっています!!! (”i understand / i know,” formal -masu ending) riza:  でも!!! (”but,” generally this “but” is considered casual) riza: 今の貴方は国のためでも仲間を助けるためでもない!! (”right now you are helping neither your country nor your friends,” informal -nai ending) .... riza: 貴方はそちらに堕ちてはいけない...! (lit., “you must not fall there.” translated as “i cannot allow you to descend to that level” in the anime. it is, once again, the informal -nai ending)

my take on this is that roy refuses to listen to her as his subordinate, so she instead speaks with him as his lover. she is begging; her hand is shaking and her voice is soft and pleading as she speaks to him with such directness, blowing clean through any semblance of polite discretion one would use with someone they’re not close to, and cutting straight to the harsh truth. it is an incredible display of vulnerability and intimacy, and when roy doesn’t relent (although he does reciprocate her informality), she steps back into her polite, subordinate speech. and when she does, it almost seems like she is retreating into the safety of emotional distance from him.

the other spot riza uses 貴方 is when the two are reunited and roy asks her how her injuries are.

riza: また貴方は!!ご自分の心配をなさってください!! (”you are doing it again! please worry about yourself,” using ください “kudasai,” which in this instance is a rather forceful way of saying “please” and is closer to a command than a request, compared to a much more polite  お願いします “onegai shimasu.”)

it’s a little less ~intimate~ here because ください is a completely acceptable way of phrasing this statement even in polite speech, however considering the context and her tone of voice, it is clear she is making a demand rather than simply expressing concern for him, something that is not respectful at all given their professional relationship as superior and subordinate. she is therefore speaking to him as an equal again in this moment.

also that moment in the anime where riza almost touches roy’s face didn’t actually happen in the manga which makes me sad so i pretend that it did

so those are my two major canon reasons why roy and riza might actually be together. it’s clear to me either way that they are in love and essentially devoted to one another romantically, but what’s not clear is whether they act on their feelings or if they forbid themselves from enjoying such things. again, as madame reveals to us, they do in fact spend time together, privately, outside of work. it is left undescribed what exactly they do when they’re together. but riza, in a deeply desperate attempt to pull roy from the precipice, speaks to him with all the intimacy of a lover, something i hesitate to accept without also considering the notion that she resorts to this because she is used to speaking to him this way, when they are together in private.

but

“Stay right by my side, lieutenant” 

The Mustang gang, especially Roy and Riza, have a back motif going on.  “I’m gonna continue to rely on you to watch my back” “I feel like I can trust you to watch my back.” “I’m glad the two of you have got my back” 

HONESTLY roy really picked his team so well. to a man, every single one of them is different from the persona they project. havoc seems like a lumbering idiot who could be easily enticed into spilling secrets, but in fact he is quick-thinking and tight-lipped. his biggest draw may be that he's capable and efficient muscle in the field, but his unique appeal to roy is that he's clever and staunchly loyal.

breda looks like an unassuming lazy lug who cares about food and doing the bare minimum. nobody suspects he's incredibly clever and strategic, capable of working in the shadows and moving people remotely while keeping his involvement discreet.

fuery looks like a shy, gentle little nerd with a weird fixation on technology, but he is in fact a master of covert communications, surprisingly fearless in the field and is always thinking ahead. his preparedness gets the team out of tight situations.

falman honestly. his appeal is that he looks like an average dude who just, works. he's not strong, he's not outspoken. he just seems like a normal, reserved guy. that's his advantage. he's incredibly intelligent, a veritable repertoire for political and historical knowledge. but he's so unassuming that nobody suspects he could play a hand in greater schemes 'cause he's just A Dude. it gives him the freedom to move around without arousing suspicion.

and we know all about riza.

it does!

the answer is that he felt there was no safe way to preserve his research without the risk of it being stolen by someone who would use it for evil. any alchemist seeking his knowledge would be highly unlikely to look further than books. nobody would suspect an unassuming non-alchemist teenaged girl would carry a complex and incredibly dangerous secret tattooed on her body. and as an extra precaution, he encrypted the array itself very heavily.

it was always hawkeye's intention to teach flame alchemy to roy. note that this is not the official VIZ translation but hawkeye says essentially the same thing in the official translation: he wanted to see that roy was ready to learn flame alchemy with his own eyes and it was a pity he would die before he could teach him.

this of course also implies that riza is not to blame for choosing the wrong alchemist to give her secrets to. her father picked roy. riza's mistake was giving it to him at the wrong time, and in that regard she could not possibly have suspected her mistake even if she had been older and wiser than the scared and naive teen she was. neither of them could have known what was coming in ishval. her guilt is misplaced. roy becoming the second flame alchemist was a decision her father made long before he ever set the ink in her flesh. in a way, her own father bound riza to roy years before they ever made the decision themselves. you have to wonder if he did it on purpose, or if he was so lost to madness he didn't realize what he was doing at all.