She is a lioness with wings that span twice the length of her body. For all that, she's young as Cherubim go, a few hundred years only, and if she does not show this through her size, she shows it through deference, padding through the halls of Judgment's Spires on silent feet, head lowered to the other angels, wings carefully folded. She's been Corporeal a few times, but just for short missions, when a Cherub was needed for an investigation, or to keep an eye on a suspect -- the usual duties that come with working for Dominic. There are always people to be investigated and tracked, always some angel at risk who must be protected from themselves, for fear of Falling.

But while she is not a stranger to the Corporeal realm, it has never been the place she works, and so she is surprised when the Most Just himself comes to her, his cloak hiding all parts of himself, and murmurs violin tones to tell her that he has a role for her.

"Sir," she says, and follows him to the Tether.

There he gives her a Vessel, and while she holds up her hands in front of her face and practices with them, the Most Just takes on a Vessel himself -- herself now, dressed in severe black with her hair knotted at the back of her neck. The Most Just smiles with thin lips and asks that she check her equipment.

She does, and finds herself in a uniform. Military, then, which is distasteful, and a gun in the small of her back which is more so, but it is for a good cause. She's not sure, yet, what this cause is, but it's one the Most Just is giving to her, and so it must be good.

"Come," the Most Just says, her new female voice pale and toneless, lacking even the faint echo of the violins that usually sound. "This role may last an entire human lifespan, perhaps."

"What am I to do, Most Just?" She pins her hair up as she goes; the Most Just has granted her military skills to go with the role, and she knows that as it's not regulation length, it must be lifted above her shoulders. The Most Just hands her a barette and she fastens it with that.

"There is a Soldier of mine," Dominic says, "who requires a Cherub."

She nods, and follows the Most Just down a long corridor in a new building to a door. Someone has come and gone recently; a small basket is outside the door with cookies in it, and a cheerful note. She reads as far as If you got these, you went out of your apartment and good for you! Let's get together next week, head to a bar, have some fun -- you need to have some fun and stops; it is personal mail and not her concern.

Dominic knocks and waits. It's a long moment before anyone answers, but she can hear footsteps coming forward. The door creaks open and she feels her eyebrows lift.

The man on the other side is in pain, she can see that at once, and it is not a physical thing; he's haunted by something he has seen or done and cannot escape. The Elohite Attunement, which the Most Just had given to her a fair century earlier, shows his features drenched in blood, the far-too-visible signs of his feelings of guilt. Surely he is someone who must be stopped, not protected, she thinks, and looks up to her Archangel.

Dominic's eyes are sad and she reaches out to not-quite-touch the man's face with her fingertips, brushing through his bloody aura. "Roy Mustang, Soldier of Judgment."

The man swallows and lowers his eyes; it's almost a full ten seconds later that he begins to kneel. "Archangel Dominic."

"You do not have to kneel," Dominic tells him, and the man -- Roy Mustang -- stops. "I have brought you a Cherub. She will stay by your side."

Roy looks at her, then back to Dominic. "I -- she doesn't need to do that, Archangel. I don't deserve--"

"You do," Dominic says, and she knows it to be the highest form of Truth, that this man deserves protection and devotion and love from now until the ends of the earth if needs be, because Dominic can only tell the truth. "Her role name is Riza Hawkeye. She ranks as Second Lieutenant."

"Lieutenant," Roy says, and she -- Riza -- suspects she will hear that more often than the name she has been given. Roy's eyes are tired as they meet hers, and she thinks with a hint of pain that he must not have been sleeping recently, for whatever reason he had. "Are you sure you want to do this?"

She offers her new hand for a handshake and he takes it; with the touch comes connection and oh, he is worthy, he is worthy, and haunted and sad and broken and she'll make it right, somehow, she'll stand guard over him from the things that would hurt him, be they outward or inward, enemy or self. "I will protect you," she tells him, chest aching with the sudden love she feels for this man, this soldier. "I will watch over you with my body and my mind and my soul, and keep you safe from dangers that may come from any of those realms."

Dominic is gone; she has vanished, but she is an Archangel and busy and with this work done, more has called her elsewhere; that's fine. Riza has all she needs and he leads her inside, shuts the door.

"I suppose," he says, "I should explain --" He gestures around him, vaguely, as if it takes enough effort that it hurts to do so. "...how things work here?"

"Tell me," she says, "what happened to you, so I know what I must defeat."

She is there when his expression cracks, when his walls break down, and she holds him to her still-unfamiliar form, lets him press his face into her neck and dampen the collar of her starched uniform. She stands between him and the door and holds him carefully, and all is right with the world while she can stand there.

Riza thinks that this is what she was made for, that this was her purpose all along, and finds her throat aching with the need to cry with him. But she cannot, because what he needs now is strength, and that is something she can bring to him.

It's a start, at least.