Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction ❯ Rain ❯ Rain Part Four ( Chapter 4 )

 

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Rain: Part Four

 

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A Full Metal Alchemist fanfic by L.A. Mason.

Standard disclaimer applies: No copyright infringement intended. No profit being made or sought.

 

This installment is once again un-beta-ed. Any errors in logic, continuity, or grammar are entirely mine.

 

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With Mustang upstairs busy depleting the house's hot-water supply, Edward had the luxury of throwing himself down full length on the sagging parlor couch and staring moodily at the flickering fire on the hearth. He really hadn't intended to spring his plan on the older man like that, but the ex-officer had seemed so down, that he hadn't been able to resist. Frowning, he turned that last thought around in his brain: yes, ever since he'd turned up on the man's doorstep, the Flame Alchemist had been fumbling and unsure of himself…. depressed, even. Especially after Armstrong's death. What had happened to the egotistical bastard that had made Ed and Al's lives hell on more than one occasion?

 

Wait… Had that person ever even existed?

 

Absently, Ed laced his dissimilar fingers together to make a rest for the back of his head, hardly noticing the contrast in textures any more. He had a tendency to think of his own life as having epochs, with the first great divide being Before Human Transmutation, and After. Then came Through the Gate, and most recently, Returning from the Gate. Was the Colonel's life also broken into segments in the same fashion? As an alchemist, Edward prided himself on having excellent observational skills, but there was a world of difference between a laboratory reaction, and what went on inside of people. He'd done pretty well on the missions he'd been given during his stint as the military's errand boy, but he harbored no delusions that that qualified him as an expert.

 

And, taking the Colonel again as an example, there was definitely something… broken… inside the man, and Edward was at a loss as to what it might be, and how to fix it. A smashed radio, sure, he could turn it back into one that was brand new. And the same went for everything from vases, to pick-axes, to entire buildings. But the one thing that he had learned was that humans weren't like things, and that went for their minds, as well as for their souls.

 

After that close call with the gun - an event that even at a month's remove had the power to make Edward's insides squirm uneasily - he'd made a concerted effort to notice more of what went on behind Mustang's irritating collection of masks. And what he saw, disturbed him.

 

There was no way that he would own up to it, but after the first couple of nights, it wasn't the fear of a repeat suicide attempt that made the younger man put up with the back-breakingly uncomfortable single bed. It was the nightmares. Neither he, nor the Colonel, mentioned them in the light of day, but nearly every night Ed would awaken to find his bedmate twitching and whimpering in the throes of some dream or other. Mustang would hold himself rigidly still, as if afraid to attract some demonic regard, and he hardly ever spoke during the episodes. But what little he did allow to escape was all about fire, and smoke, and blood… Always blood.

 

Career-wise, Ed knew that his old commander had served as a human weapon during the first Ishvarian conflict. It had earned him more than one field promotion, while also destroying his killing instinct; the way the man had choked during his duel with Edward was proof of that. Not that Mustang was a coward. Far from it. Against a legitimate foe, the Colonel was lethal. It was just that he lacked the ability to ever again blindly follow orders against the innocent. The details of precisely what had happened in Ishvar were not among the rumors that his younger subordinate had been able to tease out with any degree of certainty.

 

But one thing he was sure of: Mustang - Roy - had at least considered the Forbidden, because he had recognized the evidence of human transmutation for what it was. Roy knew.

 

And that meant that whatever Hell lay in his past had to be very, very bad indeed.

 

The obvious solution was to keep the man too busy to brood about that past. Edward recognized a kindred spirit in the sense that both of them were kind of short on goals just at the moment, and that had led him to consider the ambitions that had driven Mustang in the past. Putting a stop to the senseless killings struck the steel alchemist as worthy, the more so now that he was aware of the source of the energy that fuelled transmutations. The question was, just what it would take to make a difference, to combat the wars that continued to plague Amestior? The rule of the military had been broken, and Ed wasn't stupid enough to want to return to that, thank you very much. If you had soldiers, that meant that you had battles for soldiers to fight in, and he'd more than had his fill of serving the military even as a largely free-lance operative, let alone as their dog.

 

No, these days, power lay with the men in the suits, with the politicians. If he and his Colonel were going to accomplish anything of worth, it would mean pulling off a different kind of coup.

 

Hn, `his Colonel….' Right. If the man had heard that, he'd have been giving Ed his walking papers and showing him the door so fast that it would make the blond's head swim. Snickering quietly, his eyes drifted shut of their own volition.

 

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Those proprietary thoughts came back to bite him in the ass with a vengeance two days later.

 

Okay, first off, if Ed had really been sincere about his vow to do a better job of figuring out people, he might actually have observed that Mustang was up to no good. In self defense, though, the younger man sourly claimed that the Colonel was a pro, and it would be a bit much to expect anyone - even somebody with Ed's background and qualifications - to catch an expert who didn't want to get caught. But it had still been a shock when Roy had responded to the sounds of numerous heavy boots as his front porch with a casual, “Stay put. It's just a delivery man with a couple things I ordered,” as he went out and closed the parlor door behind him. Flummoxed, Ed hadn't gotten so much as a word out before it was too late.

 

`Couple of things,' my ass! he growled inwardly. There were at least four sets of feet tromping around in the narrow hall and up the stairs to the second floor. It wasn't difficult, after more than two months, to pick out the Colonel's less ponderous tread from among them; even in peace time, the man was light on his feet. Those other feet though, had to belong to the big van pulled up out front at the end of the cottage's walk. The gap that Ed dared to open between the drapes wasn't big enough to let him make out the company's name, and that only increased his determination to make the army officer pay for whatever the Hell it was that he was up to.

 

At last, after what seemed like forever, the strange feet marched out, and the truck pulled away from the curb with a snort and the rumble of a big diesel engine. Ed was waiting, quivering with annoyance, just inside the big pocket door when Roy slid it open, and he shoved past the taller man with an annoyed scowl. Mustang, the bastard, just snickered, and Ed's “All right, asshole, what did you do?” came out with more venom than he'd intended.

 

Smirking, the Colonel bowed, and extended one hand, pointing the way to the stairs. “After you.” Ed glared, but stomped up the steps anyway.

 

There were only two rooms, plus the bath, on the second floor, thanks to the slope of the house's roof. With the hall off-centered, the marginally larger had become Roy's bedroom, and the smaller served as an all-purpose box room, only half-filled with the limited clutter of a military life where frequent reassignments had discouraged the acquisition of too much stuff. The door to the larger bedroom stood ajar, and for the first time that Edward could remember, a bar of watery sunlight spilled out through the gap into the corridor. Shooting a suspicious glance at the now openly grinning officer, the blond alchemist pushed the door the rest of the way open, and stopped dead in his tracks, jaw dropping soundlessly. Behind him, Mustang coughed in an attempt to stifle a laugh.

 

A bed… A freaking huge bed, with a tastefully carved headboard of cherry wood, and it dominated the room. Ed choked, sputtering something incoherent that sparked a full-out guffaw from the man leaning against the corridor wall. But when the smaller alchemist whirled, intending to shout `What the Hell --?!' the words died in his throat.

 

There was an uncomfortable uncertainty to the man's black stare, even though his mouth was curled up in a generous grin at Ed's expense, and the reply was tentative. “I couldn't help noticing that things were a bit cramped. I thought it might be more comfortable if we got a bigger bed. If you'd rather not, I had the delivery men set up the old one in the smaller bedroom, across the hall…”

 

`If we got a bigger bed…' Oh, crap… He said `we.' Ed coughed. “Er… no, I guess that won't be necessary. The other room, I mean. Ah, we…” Helplessly, he waved both hands at new bed. Now that the shock was wearing off a bit, he noticed that there was not one, but two matching dressers shoved haphazardly against the wall, and a number of smaller boxes and parcels in heap in between. Edward frowned. A superior, smug bastard was annoying, but familiar and comprehensible. A melancholy Colonel, on the other hand, was a cause for worry.

 

Just what had he gotten himself into?

 

While he stood there dithering like an idiot, Mustang shook himself and slipped in. A good-sized bundle wrapped in paper and tied up with twine landed on the bare mattress. Another, even larger, followed, and Roy remarked over his shoulder, “I ordered sheets and extra bedding while I was at it, if you want to give me a hand.”

 

“Huh?” Edward blinked stupidly, causing another half smile to twitch up the corners of ex-officer's mouth. With exaggerated care, Mustang said, “Give me a hand making the bed, Full Metal.”

 

“Oh.” Now he felt like a real idiot. Sheets. Of course they wouldn't be sleeping in a bed with no sheets.

 

But then why was his throat going dry, even as his human palm began to sweat? Somehow, sticking with Roy night after night had been easier when it was less convenient, if that made any sense. Which it didn't. Now that a temporary arrangement was at risk of becoming permanent, he found that he didn't quite know what to make of it. Good God, had he somehow given the Colonel the wrong idea?

 

Was he taking advantage of a man who had become rudderless and adrift, to move in and control the other's life?

 

Ed wasn't stupid, or at least he hoped he wasn't, even if he'd been thinking lately that he might not be quite as brilliant as everyone, his father included, expected. Living in Mustang's house had gotten… comfortable. As if it really were his home. They could talk, or not, and it made no difference. Neither of them was likely to get seriously offended if the other was in a contrary mood. But lately, he'd a couple of times found Roy looking at him with an oddly wistful smile, kind of like the way Mother had once looked at Ed and Al. All fond, and full of reminiscence of the good sort, tinged with an awareness that her boys were growing up and that nothing lasts forever. As a result, he'd been steeling himself against the inevitable day when the Colonel would return from one of his infrequent trips into the outside world to tell him that the hunt for the missing Full Metal Alchemist was over, and that it was time for him to be on his way.

 

But simultaneously, Ed had settled into a routine. Sharing the housework. Sharing his thoughts on research as his insatiable mind refused to stay quiet. Cajoling the amused and resigned officer into ordering books that had either been newly published in the returning prosperity of post-military rule, or that the younger blond had simply never had the luxury to explore because they had been too far removed from the focus of his single-minded quest.

 

They'd been living together as though they really were partners. Were friends. And suddenly, Ed needed to know if it was real, or if he'd trapped the tormented former officer into being a surrogate for Al, just because he himself couldn't stand to be alone.

 

Mustang had unwrapped the bundles and gotten busy shaking out crisp white sheets while the extra set of hands just stood there and stared, lost in confusion. But he paused attentively enough when Ed cleared his throat. “Um… Colonel?” No, too formal, and besides, as the exasperated man had pointed out repeatedly, no longer accurate. Flustered, Ed tried again with “Mustang?” and ended up tacking a belated “Sir.” onto the end of that. Finally, desperate, he nearly shouted “Roy!” when the cool dark eye turned to the ceiling in an expression of patient suffering.

 

“Yes, Full Metal? Is there something you want to say?” The lazy drawl that never failed to send Ed's blood pressure rocketing was enough to break the younger man out of his state of conflicted indecision and send him stalking over to grab the Flame Alchemist by his shirt front and give him a hard shake.

 

“Will you just, for once, be serious!” Furious, he glared up at the mocking face, and was surprised to see a glimpse of real temper in a momentary tightening of the lips and a narrowing of the already intense, remaining eye, only to have it be quickly tamped down and concealed behind a faint, superior smile.

 

“I wasn't aware that I wasn't being `serious,' Elric.” Smooth, suave, every bit the dilettante that Ed remembered, while a subtle shift of the shoulders within the shirt he had hold of, and a minute change in balance said that yes, Mustang was in deadly earnest, but that he would never admit it. Ed had to wonder when he had suddenly gotten proficient in `Roy-speak.'

 

Not that it mattered, because it meant that finally he might get an answer that he could make sense out of. He opened his mouth, intending to ask about Al, and whether the annoying man felt that he was being pressured, but what came out was the question's mirror image: “Are you just using me because you're lonely, or is this what you really want? I- I need to know.”

 

“ `Using you?' ” the Colonel echoed. A haunted, stripped down look passed over his face, barely there, then gone. Ed watched as a rapid succession of answers were taken down, examined, and then returned to the shelf. Whatever was going on under that untidy mop of silky straight black hair, it was something that Mustang didn't want to discuss. Which of course meant that the other alchemist was determined to ferret it out, just like the way they had always battled things out in the old days. But there was nothing entertaining about how the fight dimmed in the one black eye, or how the other man suddenly seemed to age. Edward let his hands drop from the crumpled white cotton, allowing his captive to take a step back away.

 

“I…” Wearily, Roy made a vague motion, taking in the new furniture and the rest of the jumble. “I don't know, Full Metal. Maybe it was an attempt to manipulate you, to play the game. I have no idea any more. But I would like you to stay. If you're willing.”

 

There was an uncomfortable sense that the Colonel had just answered a completely different question from the one that Ed had asked. And one that didn't seem to have any bearing on the `game,' either. It was one thing to get all hostile and defensive about the way that the old Mustang had maneuvered events down paths that he felt they should take, but it was another thing altogether to hurt the man. And it was looking like he had. Ed could forgive his traitorous mouth for accusing the officer of continuing with bad habits, when he had intended to ask if he were the one at fault - given the bastard's track record, it wasn't that outrageous an assumption - but it was no excuse to cross the line into the personal.

 

Awkwardly, Ed rubbed at the back of his neck with his flesh and blood hand. Well, if honesty seemed to be the rule of the new turn their conversation had taken, the least he could do would be to reciprocate. Equal trade, and all that. “Ah… I… Oh, Hell. Yes, thank you. I'll stay. Somebody's got to keep you from making an ass out of yourself. And if Lieutenant Hawkeye isn't here, I guess it's up to me.”

 

Roy's head jerked up at the back-handed, surly acquiescence. One elegant brow tented into a sharply skeptical `vee,' barely visible under the shaggy growth of his bangs. His voice was nearly normal as he drawled, “I see. That's certainly big-hearted of you.”

 

The glare Ed shot back was nearly enough to strip paint. “Yeah. It is. And don't you forget it, either, asshole.”

 

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To be continued