Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction ❯ By Sightless Lightning ❯ Part I - Risenbourg ( Chapter 1 )
[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]
The sun had gone down when Edward came outside to check on his brother, and only an indigo glow lingered behind the trees and hills. Alphonse liked sunsets, or so Edward believed; it was impossible to know for sure, but he thought he could see a light of pleasure in his brother's eyes when he was brought outside near dusk. If Edward stayed to watch the sunset with him, though, Alphonse would grow restless, fidget, and perhaps get up out of his chair and stumble.
It had therefore become a nightly ritual: Edward would take Alphonse outside as the sun was beginning to set, sit him in the porch rocking chair and then go back inside. He kept an eye on his brother from the window, but had to take care that Alphonse didn't see him watching.
Once the sun was down, however, it was safe to go outside again. Alphonse wouldn't throw a fit then.
"Here you go," said Edward. He'd popped some corn over the fire, the same way their mother used to when it was cold, and he put the bowl in Alphonse's lap. This required a bit of rearranging of the blanket he'd put over his brother to keep him warm, as autumn was coming and the evening air was starting to acquire a nip. "I don't think I burned very much of it. Heh. I tried to pick out all the burned ones."
There was no answer, but Edward hadn't expected one. Gray-green eyes slipped down to gaze at the bowl of corn, and slowly Alphonse lifted a hand to eat some. It was painful, watching him miss what he was after over and over as he misjudged his aim, but Alphonse got annoyed if Edward tried to help him. And honestly, it was probably better for him to relearn his coordination on his own.
"That letter today was from Mustang," said Edward. He sat down on the porch step, because the only chair was the one Alphonse was sitting in. "He says he's given me another month of leave, so there's no hurry to get back." Groping backward with his left hand, he touched his brother's leg above the ankle. Alphonse made no reply, and Edward didn't mention that these free gifts from Mustang would only last just so long. Eventually, he'd be wanted back in Central, and he had absolutely no idea what he would do if Alphonse weren't better by then.
The house mainly faced the south, and the long track that originated at the door wound off between the hills toward Risenbourg. Winry would be coming by tomorrow, because she always showed up on Wednesdays; she was pretty much the only person other than the mailman who ever came walking up that road. If the other residents had heard that the Elrics had taken up residence here, in what had always been called "the army house" since before Edward could remember, none of them had bothered to come see for themselves.
That was fine with Edward. He didn't want company. It was difficult enough when Winry showed up to drop off groceries and visit for a few hours, and he always hid in the house when the mailman came by.
"It's going to be a hard winter," he said. "Winry says that the wooly worms are all black this year, although I haven't seen any, black or brown or what. It'll really suck to get snowed in out here. I should ask Winry if she can get some firewood for us." He wasn't sure if he'd actually do that. He would probably get recalled long before the snows hit.
The dark glow of the horizon darkened further, slipping steadily away and unveiling the stars. Somewhere nearby, a cricket began to chirp; it would die soon, as the weather turned colder. Edward thought it sounded very lonely. "When we get back to Central, I'll buy you one of those pennywhistles you wanted. Remember how you said I should get one for you, and I told you not to be an idiot, you didn't have any use for a whistle? You were right. I should have gotten one, because you could play it now if I hadn't been so selfish. When we go back, though, I promise I'll buy you one." He grinned hopefully up at Alphonse, but his brother didn't even look at him. The taller boy was still mechanically eating, hand into bowl, then hand to mouth, and sometimes he missed his mouth and dropped the small white puffs onto the porch. He stared off into the distance, rocking a little, and if there was any expression on his face it wasn't visible in the darkness.
Edward went silent then. Maybe two months earlier, there would have been fireflies coming out about now, emerging from the line of trees that concealed the nearby creek. Alphonse had liked the fireflies, and had spent the evenings chasing them around the yard, stumbling and falling a lot, but happy nevertheless. Edward hadn't liked it when his brother caught one, and smeared it into bitter-smelling, phosphorescent goo all over his hands, but he liked to see Alphonse smile. The fireflies were all dead now, though, and Alphonse gave no indication that he wanted to get up from his chair.
The air turned cooler, and a little breeze sprang up; although Edward had provided his brother with a blanket, he himself wore only his pants and a thin black shirt. "Let's go inside," he said.
It took several tries to get Alphonse to understand that he needed to stand up, but once he was upright it was easy enough to guide him inside the house. The half-empty bowl of corn was left on the porch for the morning birds.
As sometimes happened, Alphonse looked around the rooms as if he'd never seen them before, a light of interest coming to his eyes as he stopped to examine the staircase, a chair, half an apple left over from lunch and turning brown on a plate on the table. Edward let him do whatever he wanted, and, when Alphonse was finished with each object, herded him closer to the library. They got there eventually, and Edward put his brother into the armchair next to the fire. He tucked a blanket around Alphonse's knees too, but it was kicked off a moment later.
"Too warm? Okay." He folded the blanket and put it over the back of the chair instead. It was encouraging when Alphonse showed a preference for something, so he offered his brother a smile. Only a vague stare was returned. "Want something else to eat? There's still some oranges left."
He went and got one out of the kitchen and peeled and sectioned it, and offered a piece of Alphonse. It was accepted after a thoughtful moment, and Edward was pleased when Alphonse started to nibble on it. He set the rest of the sectioned orange on a plate next to the armchair, and made sure Alphonse's gaze had fixed on it before he moved away again.
There weren't very many books in the library; the shelves had been almost completely empty when Edward and Alphonse had arrived. Edward had had a couple of alchemy books with him, but he hadn't touched them since setting them on a shelf. Winry had brought a couple from her own house, but the one he took down now was one of the few that had been left by the house's prior occupants. It was a book of faerie tales, and Edward had no idea what kind of person had purchased it, brought it to this house, and then left it behind when they moved out. The property was owned by the military, but it was hard to imagine any military person with a need to hide out near Risenbourg having a desire for a book like this.
Turning on a lamp and settling into his own chair, farther from the fire, Edward opened the oversized book on his lap. Metal fingers slithered over the pages. "What do you want to hear?" he asked. He'd read them all to Alphonse before, but his brother seemed to like some of them even if he read them over and over again. "The Unicorn's Nephew? Or how about The Donkey in the Snow Queen's Palace? You like that one, don't you?"
A quick glance at Alphonse showed no interest at all in stories; he was instead picking with all the gravity of a scholar at a section of orange. Juice had smeared over his fingers. He looked like a small child, and Edward wondered what he was thinking. If anything.
He had to pause a moment before he could trust his voice to speak again, and he took his time paging through the book to the right spot. The illustration at the beginning of the story was a fanciful sketch of a small donkey standing at the end of a grand blue hall, or ballroom maybe. "You like this one," he said again, and started to read. "Once upon a time, a certain man was taking his vegetables into town to sell. He loaded up his wagon with them, vegetables of all types - carrots and onions and potatoes and all kinds of vegetables - and hitched his donkey to the wagon to pull it, and they set off toward the village. But as they were passing down a hillside into a valley, it began to snow ..."
When Edward got to the part where the donkey was learning to dance in the Snow Queen's court, he glanced up toward Alphonse and found his brother dozing a bit in the chair. Closing the book, he set it aside and went over to move him. It was fully dark now, and the only light came from the fireplace and the lamp behind Edward's head.
"Come on," he said, shaking Alphonse by the shoulder. Gray eyes opened, looking even more unfocused than usual, but then they caught up on Edward. And then Alphonse smiled, and for an instant all was right with the world. Edward smiled back and said, "That's it. Come on, let's go to bed." While Alphonse was deciding whether or not he actually wanted to stand up, Edward banked the fire and turned out the lamp.
Alphonse had trouble negotiating the stairs, and took them very slowly. He didn't really need help walking anymore, but Edward remained close by in case he tripped on a step, or got distracted by something, which happened all too often. Tonight, though, they got upstairs without event.
Going downstairs in the morning could be an adventure.
The orange had gotten all over Alphonse, and Edward wet down a towel and wiped his brother's mouth and hands before telling him to get undressed. Alphonse didn't need help with this anymore, either, and he threw his clothes forcefully across the room when he got each garment off.
Once he was down to his underwear, he sat on the edge of the bed and looked expectantly up at Edward, edged in the soft light of the lamp.
Something twisted in Edward's belly, and he wasn't entirely sure what emotion produced it.
It had certainly seemed like a good idea when he'd caught Alphonse masturbating about a month after the transmutation. Ineptly. After the fact, Edward wasn't too surprised, but at the time it had shocked the hell out of him to find out that his little brother was in some way sexual. It had seemed cruel to leave him like that, though, crying with frustration because he was aroused but not coordinated enough to jack himself off, so Edward had done it for him. And the next time Alphonse rubbed up against him with an erection, Edward had done it for him again, and a precedent was set. Over the months they'd spent here, Edward had masturbated his brother dozens of times. It was probable that Alphonse could have taken care of himself now, but he never tried.
And by all that was unholy, Edward was learning to like it.
It was one thing to touch his brother simply because Alphonse couldn't do it himself. It was quite another to push his brother onto his back on the bed, and kiss him, and nuzzle his neck, the way he did now. Or to take a nipple into his mouth to tease as his hand slipped over Alphonse's clothed erection. The object was no longer to get Alphonse some relief as quickly as possible; these days, Edward did things because he wanted Alphonse to enjoy it.
It was the least he could do.
He could taste the orange when he kissed Alphonse again, and something else. Something that was always there, but which he'd never been able to identify. It had disturbed him the first time he'd given in to the temptation to kiss, but now he associated the strange flavor with sex, and he gasped a little with sudden arousal. The sound was echoed by Alphonse, writhing now under the gentle strokes of Edward's hand. Fingers buried in his hair, tangled in the braid.
"Oh," moaned Alphonse, and Edward's heart contracted, although this was not the first time he'd heard Alphonse's voice at times like this. There were never any words, but Edward couldn't help encouraging him.
"Yeah," he whispered, nipping his brother's ear. "Speak to me, Al." He rested his weight on his automail shoulder and slid his hand between fabric and skin to lightly caress his brother's cock.
"Ahhh," said Alphonse, eyes closed. His hips thrust upward into Edward's hand, his erection hot and full, and moist at the tip.
"Speak to me," murmured Edward again, his tongue dipping into Alphonse's ear between the words and his hand moving. "Al, I'll love you no matter what you say. Anything."
There were to be no words tonight, though. Edward gave up his entreaties soon enough, and simply browsed his brother's body with his lips. Alphonse's skin was so soft in places, so easy to touch, even when that skin dampened a little with sweat. The way he twitched and squirmed was incredibly arousing, and when he ran his hands over Edward's back it felt like forgiveness.
Presently, Alphonse raised his chin, mouth open as his back arched, and Edward stroked a little faster. He licked his brother's neck, rubbing himself against all that passion as Alphonse hesitated, tense enough to snap, and then groaned in pleasure. Edward couldn't help moaning as well, being that close as Alphonse came.
Alphonse relaxed and caught his breath while Edward licked his hand clean, and then he wanted to kiss. So Edward kissed him, tasted the orange again, and wanted to die.
Edward and guilt were old friends. He didn't let it get in his way for long.
When Alphonse started to seem drowsy, Edward tucked him into bed, and then retreated to the bathroom to deal with his own erection. As wrong as it was to enjoy the taste of his brother's moans, it would be even more wrong to masturbate in front of him. He was thinking of his brother's body, though, as he jacked off. And by the time he was finished, he was crying, and he couldn't have picked just one reason why.