Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction ❯ Descent ❯ Jealousy ( Chapter 2 )

Descent

 

 

 

Chapter Two:

 

 

Jealousy

 

 

 

“A month of leave?”

 

Ed nodded curtly when Colonel Mustang repeated his request. The frown that was already prominent on his face deepened when the black haired man raised an eyebrow and flatly repeated, “You want a month of leave?”

 

Ed exhaled in sharp irritation. “What the hell are you? A fucking parrot?”

 

Mouth quirking into a small smile of amusement, Mustang leaned back in his chair and quietly studied the short alchemist over the tips of steepled fingers for a few minutes before saying, “Not exactly the words an inferior officer uses with a superior officer when asking a favor; especially when he's been lounging around doing nothing for the past few months.”

 

“Fuck you.” Ed retorted sharply, then muttered, “I wouldn't exactly call being in the hospital lounging…” He was not in a good mood and had no desire to banter with the conceited man sitting behind the sleek mahogany desk.

 

The first couple of days after waking had been pretty good for Ed, despite the pain and the disappointment of still needing automail. It was great to have Al whole and in the flesh again. To see him smile; see him laugh. It was fun to see all of his brother small body language quirks. They brought nostalgic feelings to Ed, remembering how Al used to do the same things as a child. It was amusing to see how Al enjoyed every meal, every smell, and every touch.

 

They'd spent a lot of time together, while he was forced to stay in bed, playing games and talking of what they would do once Ed was released from the hospital.

 

Winry was there too.

 

It seemed to Ed that she was almost always there and at first it was alright. She was a friend and of course it was great to see her, when she wasn't nagging at him… However, as the days dragged on Ed longed to have more one on one time with his brother. There were just some things he didn't want to talk about with Winry there, but he couldn't seem to get her to go away and Al was no help in that either.

 

Ed was noticing, and becoming more and more irritated by it, that Al seemed to act … differently… around Winry… seemed to pay more attention to her than him. Not that he was jealous… he wasn't… it was just…

 

“Fullmetal?”

 

Ed looked up at the colonel and felt frustrated at having let his mind wonder.

 

“No more obstinacies.”

 

“Shut up. You're not my father.” Ed grumbled.

 

“You're right. I'm not. If I was, I would put you over my knee and give you a well deserved spanking.”

 

Ed glared at his commanding officer for a second before letting his face split into an evil grin. “I didn't know you were into kinky stuff like that…” He let his sentence trail off and enjoyed the look Mustang gave him. There wasn't much of an outward show, but Ed saw the signs of surprise, a pause in the man's body language, a small flicker in the eyes… a faint redness in the colonel's cheeks…?

 

That made Ed wonder if he had hit on something…

 

Mustang dropped his hands from the steepled position, leaned forward, put his hands on his desk and opened his mouth to speak when the door opened. Both alchemists looked toward it and saw Lieutenant Hawkeye walk through the door with a stack of papers.

 

Ed returned his gaze to Mustang, and saw no hint of a blush on the man's cheeks.

 

Perhaps I imagined it. Ed thought.

 

“Sir. I was asked to drop these off to you.” She said briskly, crossing the office to the desk. The black haired man looked decidedly unhappy about the fresh load of work being delivered to him. Hawkeye placed the papers neatly in the middle of Mustang's desk, turned around and headed back toward the door. Without stopping, the blonde woman said, “It's good to see you're feeling better Edward.” And with that, she was gone.

 

Ed kept his eyes on the door for a moment, then turned his attention back to the man behind the desk when he heard, “You're right Fullmetal. I'm not your father. I'm your commanding officer, and I am commanding you to refrain from using obstinacies in my presence.”

 

Yeah right. Ed thought. Like that's going to happen.

 

“What are you going to do? Kick me out of the military?” He asked snidely. He had a pretty good idea that Mustang knew Ed had every intention of leaving the military after he used up all his vacation leave. If he didn't use it, he'd lose it and there was no way in hell he was going to let that go to waste. It was like throwing away free money.

 

Mustang put a hand to his forehead and sighed. “Fullmetal.” The colonel began, then stopped for a moment before going on. “Have you given any thought to your future? You have your brother's body back. Now what? Neither of you formally finished any schooling. Here you have a job and some seniority as a State Alchemist. You're a talented alchemist. If you really put your mind to it, you could easily climb the ranks.” A pause, then, “I could help make it happen.”

 

Ed snorted. “I'm not interested in the military. The only reason I joined was to help Al… and myself if I could… I don't care about being a high ranking officer and no way do I have any interest in being one of your cronies. Al and I have alchemy and we have each other. That's all that matters!” Ed stopped and realized he had been yelling. His breathing was rough and ragged.

 

Of course we have each other... I'm not jealous... I'm not... Things will be different when we get to Rizembool... He thought.

 

Ed didn't know how long Mustang stared at him, considering, but it was a long, uncomfortable amount of time. Finally, he spoke; his voice was low and serious. “Grow up Fullmetal. Unless they changed the legal adult age to something higher than sixteen () without me knowing, you are no longer a child. At seventeen you're an adult. You need to act like one. I'm going to grant your request, but I want you to think about what it means to be an adult while you're gone.” Mustang finished speaking and the two solders sat looking at one another.

 

A flat gaze from Mustang.

 

A glare from Ed.

 

The air in the office was heavy and the silence seemed to punctuate the tension. Finally, Mustang took his eyes from Ed and began scribbling on a piece of paper. When he finished, the Colonel stood, picked up the paper and walked to the couch where Ed was sitting.

 

Ed stood quickly and made a grab for the written permission. Mustang moved it out of his reach and said, “I expect to see you back here in four weeks.”

 

Ed rolled his eyes. “Why? It's not like I have to submit my resignation papers in person.”

 

“That's true, but I would like you to do that anyway.”

 

Ed made no reply and made another grab for the paper. Again, the taller man moved it out of Ed's reach. He glared at the Colonel, then growled, “Fine! Whatever! Four weeks! Just give me the damn paper!”

 

With the golden eyed teen's agreement, Mustang relinquished the document without a word. Ed scanned over the paper to make sure everything was in order, and grunted when he saw that it was. When he looked up, his commanding officer had moved away from him and was half sitting on his desk watching Ed with an unreadable look.

 

Ed bowed slightly (), giving the Colonel the minimal amount of respect required, stalked to the door, opened it, but stopped when Mustang spoke.

 

“Oh, and Fullmetal, while you're at it, try to grow a bit taller while your gone too.”

 

Ed felt the anger that he had been holding inside escalate into full fury. Stepping across the threshold, he grabbed the doorknob with his automail hand and pulled the door shut so aggressively that the doorknob broke away from the heavy wooden door. The sound of something breaking in the office met his ears a second later.

 

Glaring, Ed dropped the brass knob on the floor and made his way down the hallway.

 

;-;-;-;-;-;-;

 

Roy Mustang kept his eyes on the door long after his blond subordinate's belligerent exit. Shards of glass from a frame that had been hanging on the wall lay scattered across the floor near the door. The photo had been unlucky enough to hit the filing cabinet on its way down to the soft carpet below.

 

He sighed and looked at the stack of papers near his hand on the desk. Although unhappy about the new pile of work, he was truly grateful to Hawkeye for coming into the room when she did. If he didn't know better, he'd think she had bugged his office and listened in until it was the opportune time to interrupt. He chuckled to himself at the absurdness of the notion, then frowned.

 

Spanking indeed! He thought.

 

The impertinent little punk was generally rude and usually had no manners to speak of, but this was the first time he had ever heard crudity from the short alchemist, even if it was only implied. Roy shook his head. He didn't really see how spanking was that kinky, but he supposed it would seem so to a boy with no experience. Truthfully, he really wasn't into spanking anyway. That never really did much for him, but he was sure he could…

 

He stopped that train of thought with an effort. He was a military officer. Elric was his subordinate. Then there was the age difference… Seventeen was just too young for him, Roy told himself. And, of course, he didn't know if the blond alchemist would even consider a relationship with another male… let alone him…

 

Roy sighed and ran his fingers through his fine black hair. There were very few people who knew of his preference, and he tried to keep it that way by dating as many women as he could get his hands on.

 

Maes Hughes had known, before he'd died. Of course he had. They had grown up together. Hell, they had experimented together as boys. But then, Maes had decided it wasn't for him. He liked the ladies too much. Thankfully, they had remained the best of friends.

 

Roy let his lips curve into a small smile for a moment as he thought about all the times Maes had taunted him; always telling him to get a wife. Everyone seemed to think the joke made reference to the dark eyed alchemist being a playboy among the ladies, but he knew better. So did Maes.

 

The smile slipped from his face. Maes you bastard... You son of a bitch, how dare you die on me like that?

 

He missed his childhood friend, his best friend. Maes always seemed to know just what was going on with Roy Mustang. Maes had even known of his… what? fascination? … preoccupation?... obsession? … whatever you wanted to call it, with Edward Elric.

 

Once Maes had caught him staring at Fullmetal and had murmured, “Do you know what the prison time is for statutory rape….?”

 

At the time, Roy had glared at Maes in irritation and disbelief. Roy didn't need the warning. He wasn't stupid. He had his career to think about, and plus what did Maes think he was? Some sort of perverted pedophile? He wasn't about to prey on some naïve twelve year old no matter how much he was fascinated by him.

 

Only…

 

Edward Elric wasn't a twelve year old child anymore. He was seventeen. A year past the legal age of adulthood…

 

Roy sighed and asked himself, not for the first time. “What the hell am I thinking?”

 

;-;-;-;-;-;-;

 

Alphonse Elric stared out of the open train window. He loved the feel of the wind blowing on his face. The weather outside was rainy and on the cool side, though not cool enough to be uncomfortable. It was great to be able to feel the air blowing his hair back, even though little rain droplets smacked him in the face. He shut his eyes, relishing every moment of it.

 

“Al shut the window.”

 

Al opened his eyes and looked at his brother sitting on the seat in front of him. Ed had his arms folded across his chest in a way that pulled his long red coat closed tightly around him. Golden eyes stared at him in blatant irritation.

 

Al frowned. It had been close to four weeks since Ed had woken, and since that time his brother's temper had become increasingly worse. Al had begun picturing the blond alchemist with a little black rain cloud over his head to keep himself in good spirits. He hated arguing with Ed, but they seemed to be doing that more often than not.

 

“Why?” Al asked. He really didn't want to shut the window.

 

“Because it's a fucking icicle in here!” A few heads turned and Al's cheeks flushed in embarrassment. Why couldn't Ed be a little more low key?

 

The tall boy let out a frustrated breath of air. It really wasn't that cold, and he wasn't the only person with their window open. Besides he was wearing jeans and a tee shirt while Ed was decked out in his usual long black pants, long sleeved shirt and long red coat. He shouldn't be cold if Al wasn't.

 

“It's really not that cold, Ed.” Winry spoke up. Al's spirits rose a bit at that. He was glad that Winry would take his side, especially when she was wearing less than he was.

 

Ed's eyes turned to slits when he looked at Winry, but he didn't say anything to her. Instead, he looked back at Al. “Just shut the damn window Al.”

 

Al folded his arms across his chest and stared fixedly at his brother. Ed always tried to boss him around... Feeling particularly exasperated with Ed's recent mood swings, Al said stubbornly, “No. I won't!”

 

Ed's eyes flashed with rage. He looked quickly to Winry then back to Al. For a moment the two brothers sat starting at each other, then Ed unfolded his arms and stood up. Al understood what Ed meant to do almost instantly and quickly put his hands on his side of the sliding window pane to keep it from moving when Ed pushed on the other side.

 

The glass moved slightly toward Al. He grunted and pushed harder. As armor, Al had been a lot stronger than he was now, and even though he was taller than Ed in the flesh, Ed was stronger, having the benefit of six years of physical training behind him while Al's body had been in The Gate, and the automail added to that strength.

 

Again the window pane inched toward him.

 

;-;-;-;-;-;-;

 

Winry looked back and forth between her two childhood friends as they fought over the window. It was obvious that Al was losing. He just wasn't strong enough.

 

“Come on guys...” Winry pleaded, but they ignored her.

 

She felt helpless to stop what was happening, but she wanted to help in some way. Biting her lip, she thought for a moment then said loudly, “Al, it is kind of cold in here, would it be alright if we shut the window?”

 

The two boys stopped and looked at her with twin unreadable expressions. Finally, Al pressed his lips together, reached over to Ed's side of the window, pulled the glass pane closed, then sat down without a word.

 

Her gaze went to Ed and she saw him looking from Al to her to Al to her in unmistakable anger. Then without warning, he stormed off.

 

Winry gritted her teeth together. “What is his problem!” She said loudly. It was as if the older of the Elric brothers had developed some sort of permanent male PMS or something. Part of her felt angry at Ed for being so rude and selfish, another part of her felt sad for him and she wanted to go find him; maybe she could say something that would help…

 

After all, Ed and Al were brothers, they sometimes fought, but not like this, and not as often as they had been. They should be laughing with each other, not yelling at one another.

 

Winry looked at Al who was now staring fixedly out the closed window. She sighed and her eyebrows knit together in worry. In the faint reflection of the window Winry could see a tear trickle down Al's cheek.

 

“Thanks for shutting the window…” she said hesitantly.

 

For a moment there was no response, then he said, “If you wanted the window closed you should have just said so before.”

 

“I really didn't care if the window was open or not, but I…” she felt tears well up in her own eyes and turned her head away. “I just didn't want anyone to get hurt…”

 

To this, there was no response.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have no idea what the age for adulthood is in FMA so I've used 16 for my own purposes.

 

Ed bows to Mustang in the series when making to leave Mustang's office after he made is report about Lior in episode 13.

 

 

Thanks to:

MasamuneReforged for being my beta.

 

 

Comments are welcome.