Vato Falman

Falman is marked by his characteristically narrowed eyes, a look his family appears to share, since the two children pictured with him in his ending photograph carry the same feature. He wears the standard Amestrian military uniform, and by the finale his insignia reflects a promotion to captain.

Mustang handpicked him for a memory so precise it can reproduce the smallest detail of any place, event, or person, effectively a walking recording device that leaves behind no paper trail. Honest and industrious, Falman is also rigidly formal, answering even casual questions with long, encyclopedic replies that leave his comrades wishing he would loosen up. Since his strength lies in intellect rather than fieldwork, he blunders like a novice under combat pressure, yet he takes hard news, such as unwanted transfers, with quiet dignity.

The 2003 anime keeps him light, a source of comic relief backing up Havoc, Breda, and Fuery, first turning up during the Bald hostage crisis aboard Hakuro's train, and there Mustang trusts him less than the rest of the unit. The manga hands him a far larger part. He is summoned to grill Barry the Chopper and verify the killer's identity from memory, then stuck babysitting Barry in a safe house, a stretch broken up by the plot to rescue Maria Ross and a violent clash with Barry's reanimated body. After Bradley disbands Mustang's team, Falman is shuffled to North City and then Fort Briggs, earning a promotion to second lieutenant even as his duties shrink to knocking icicles off pipes. At Briggs he helps subdue the homunculus Sloth and, crucially, supplies Edward with the record of historical bloodshed that exposes the nationwide transmutation circle carved around Amestris. As the Promised Day nears he becomes a link in Mustang's communication chain, guides Briggs troops through Central Command using his memory of the building, and stands his ground at the main gate when King Bradley arrives, apologizing to Mustang while raising his weapon in defiance. He falls to Father's countrywide transmutation but is brought back by Hohenheim's safeguard, and the finale shows him promoted to captain and pictured with two children who share his narrow eyes.