Horse of Whispers and Wood
Title: Horse of Whispers and Wood
Fandom: Fullmetal Alchemist
Characters/Pairings: Ed/Al/Alfons
Word Count: 6,073
Rating: NC-17
Author's Notes: Post!COS AU. Some dodgy theorizing about the Gate/portal/human transmutation. Written for fmabigbang's Reverse Big Bang challenge. I'll update links once everything goes live. The current masterpost for the challenge is here.
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Some days, he can't believe how lucky he is. It feels like a fluke, like a gift horse, like it can't possibly be real. One thing he's learned, though: If it seems too good to be true, it probably is; and yet this is his life now, this is his reality.
He has them both.
None of them have any clear ideas about the how's and the why's, and Ed's still afraid to delve too deeply, to look too hard into the mouth of whatever this is. (He knows that it's foolish, knows that knowledge should only ease that pit of apprehension in his gut; but he also knows that knowledge isn't free, that it costs something, that sometimes knowing can be worse).
(Another thing he's learned, over the years).
Ed's not quite sure what to do with them. During his first years in Europe, his years with Alfons, he'd noted all of the ways in which Alfons reminded him of his brother, all of the things Alfons did that echoed Al's own mannerisms. But there were a lot of things that were different, too, a lot of ways in which Alfons was his own person-there were whole stretches of time when Ed could almost forget that there were any parallels at all. And while they're inherently similar, both familiar to him on a practically molecular level, he's still not sure how they'll get along.
Years pass, and Ed is still afraid that everything they've built is going to come crashing down around them because it's good, too good to be true. Alfons and his brother get on immediately-better than he and Alfons ever did, if he's honest with himself. And sure, there's a war coming-they're all certain of that-and they're tight on money and Alfons still isn't perfectly healthy and he and Al don't have alchemy or their home-life is still shit like life tends to be-but they've made something here, something that makes them whole, and happy.
Despite all of that, though, it's not until the first time he walks in on the two of them, Al pinning Alfons to the wall, face buried in the curve of Alfons' neck, that those persistent, niggling doubts about the three of them truly dissipate.
He leans against the doorframe, eyebrows raised, watching and waiting for one of them to notice him.
"Hi, Brother," Al says almost immediately, shameless, without looking up. Ed isn't in the least bit surprised.
"Ed!" Alfons' eyes snap open, and he makes an abortive attempt to both push Alphonse off of him and to shrink in on himself, to make himself smaller, but Al just pushes against his body with more force, keeping him where he is.
"We'll be done in a moment," Al tells him, finally craning his neck around to actually look at Ed, who waves his hand as if to say, "Take your time."
Al flashes him a quick smirk before turning his attention back to Alfons.
Ed goes to the kitchen to make them all food.
Things change after that, but not by much. If anything, Ed thinks that this is what they should have been from the start.
And there are some things that stay the same. Al and Alfons had always preferred to sleep near each other, if they could (although neither could really explain why) and more often than not, morning would find them in the same bed, tangled together, breathing in unison.
Ed makes a note as this particular habit starts to spread into what should be waking hours. But more and more frequently, Ed comes across them sound asleep, curled together in various places around their flat, at odd times throughout the day. After a while, he learns to let them be, knows that they're disoriented and sluggish if woken up. They're never asleep for long, anyway, and it doesn't affect their ability to sleep at night, so Ed doesn't see any immediate harm in it.
He has only assumptions and half-assed theories about how the two of them are even possible; he doesn't know how Al dragged Alfons' soul back from the Gate, or if there will be any long-term ramifications because of it, if changes will manifest slowly or come all at once down the line.
So he watches them sleep with anxiety itching at his skin, a tingle of apprehension in his veins: He gets a glass of water for Alfons, throws a blanket over Al's slender shoulders, and doesn't look more closely at it than he has to.
Too good to be true, a voice whispers in the back of his mind, unbidden.
"It's strange," Al says into the silence late one night, when Alfons has left them to their research with a fond smile and a quiet "Goodnight," he and Ed huddled around their kitchen table, eyes strained from reading. "That he's here."
Ed raises his eyebrows in question, must give Al a strange look, because suddenly Al is tripping over himself to explain, to make Ed understand.
"Not in a bad way!" he clarifies. "I love that he's here; I wouldn't want anything else. It's just. Strange." He pauses, thinking. "Because he's me, you know? My...counterpart." Al says the word like it's awkward on his tongue, and maybe it is-maybe this is something that a person should never have to deal with, or face. Maybe all the years in the world wouldn't help him adjust. Maybe it's something that just isn't meant to happen.
(Parallel universes are, after all, perhaps parallel for a reason).
But the Elrics have never been good at leaving the laws of physics well enough alone, and if this is their penance-a feeling of not-quite-belonging to either yourself or your surroundings-Ed thinks that maybe it's the best place they've ever been. Because maybe it's not supposed to happen and maybe they're breaking some law or other, but this just seems different rather than wrong, and that is something that Ed can very much live with.
"I don't think they're ever actually supposed to meet," Al says thoughtfully, like he's reading Ed's thoughts. "A person and their counterpart. I mean, Dad, and you..." He trails off, not sure if he should broach the topic, not sure if he even can.
"We never met them the way you and Alfons have, yeah," Ed finishes the thought for him, leaving a hell of a lot left unsaid, but Ed knows that Al understands. "They're meant to replace each other, almost. They can't exist independently in the same world."
Al smiles at him, a little ruefully.
"Well," Ed amends, "they shouldn't be able to."
But at his words, Al's smile vanishes. He averts his eyes, gazing intently at the wall just over Ed's shoulder, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth.
Tension suddenly hums in the air between them, but Ed waits, knowing that something has been bothering Al-and not just Al, but Alfons, too. Ed doesn't know if they've talked to each other about it, but he has a feeling that Al wants to talk to him first. He dips his head, intersecting Al's gaze, forcing Al to look up at him, encouraging him to speak.
"I don't think we do," is all Al says; Ed keeps his face neutrally blank. "Exist independently, that is," Al clarifies, completely unnecessarily.
"What do you mean?" Ed asks him gently, because he's been wondering about this for a while, wonders now how long Al has known, or suspected. Probably longer than he's given him credit for, Ed thinks, and now he suddenly needs to know Al thoughts, needs to know if their theories match up.
"Well, we brought him back, for one," Al begins.
"You brought him back," Ed amends.
Alphonse doesn't immediately deny it, but seems to be lost in thought again. When he speaks, his voice is soft, uncertain, but prompt in a way that confirms Ed's suspicions of just how long he's been thinking about this. "You didn't see the Gate," he says, and Ed nods in agreement: That was one conclusion they reached right after it happened, when Al came to in Ed's arms, surrounded by the rubble of Haushofer's mansion, fear deep in his eyes like he'd lost something, like he shouldn't have been alive, or whole. It was a look Ed had recognized because he'd felt it before himself, on a stormy night in a basement in Resembool.
"You didn't see it," Al repeats, breaking Ed's reverie, "so I was responsible for bringing Alfons back; I think we know that for sure. But I don't know, Brother," he huffs, frustrated. "I don't think I could have done it alone. I don't think it would have worked without you there."
This is something that Ed isn't expecting. They've both been doing what research they could about how they were able to close the portal, how they were able to transmute just that one time on this side of the Gate. The material leaves something to be desired, of course, so they've both since more or less chalked it up to the energy flowing through the portal, some lingering power of Mustang's alchemy flowing through the breach. But why one of them couldn't have done it alone, besides the sheer strength of the transmutation, Ed doesn't know.
"What do you mean, Al?" Ed asks him for the second time, voice low and serious. He studies his brother's face, doesn't like the shadow that seems to cross it at Ed's words.
"I did a lot of research while you were gone," Al says, pained, which, okay-it's not like they haven't talked about what exactly Al was doing during those years, but with Alfons still in their lives, with their still being in Europe, they've done a lot more talking about how Ed spent those years. And there's something, something about how Al gets whenever Ed asks him about it-short, evasive, almost guilty-that makes Ed think that Al doesn't want to tell him, that maybe he shouldn't want to know. What seems like this sudden revelation of Al's is surprising, to say the least.
"I knew you weren't dead," he continues, and Ed doesn't need him to clarify when. "I felt you at the Gate, could still feel you when I woke up, but it faded. I guess that was when you passed through, when you came out on the other side. On this side," he corrects himself, "but I could still feel you, even then."
"Our souls are connected," Ed says, nodding. "It makes sense that you'd be able to sense it."
Al nods back at him: It's hardly the strangest thing that's happened to them. "Teacher told me everything she knew, and we reconstructed a lot of the research that we must have done searching for the Stone. There wasn't much. I spent a lot of time looking through Dad's notes, but fuck, Ed," Al says, shaking his head, "I don't know what code he used and I was never able to break it completely. He probably could have told me a lot, but I just couldn't understand it."
Ed notes the hardness in his brother's voice, the intensity, and thinks that for his genius, Alphonse should be so much more than he is: For more years than he should have been, a kid in body but not in mind; a will so strong contained to vessels that were never quite his own; a brain capable of so much but still not enough to satisfy him. Ed loves Al in that moment with a ferocity bordering on psychosis, a possessiveness so strong it nearly takes his breath away.
"I went to see Roy-" Al's voice cuts into Ed's thoughts, and at this Ed's head snaps back up to look at him, because for all of the things Al had never mentioned, this was perhaps the biggest, "but he wasn't really that helpful, to be honest. My own mistake," Al admits with more grace than he did with his inability to decipher Hohenheim's code. "I needed rank to get into the Central branches, but I'd forgotten that he'd rescinded his own. Riza took care of me, though," he finishes, eliciting an ungainly snort from Ed.
Al smiles back at him, privately, because of course Riza took care of everything; and Ed aches for Mustang, suddenly, just a little bit.
"I spent a year or so in Central," he continues, "and I-"
But here Al cuts himself off abruptly, looking pained, like he doesn't know if he can continue.
"What, Al?" Ed prompts him, concerned, scooting his chair closer to take Al's hand in his, squeezing his fingers encouragingly. Al doesn't shake off Ed's grip, even squeezes back, but the grimace, if anything, intensifies.
"I ended up researching myself more than anything else," he admits quickly, suddenly. "It wasn't that I wasn't trying to find you, Ed, I was, I just-I got sidetracked."
And then his words flow with a quiet sort of intensity, a brimming eagerness that makes Ed think that he's been wanting to discuss this for a while. He isn't sure how it makes him feel.
"I'd known since pretty much the beginning that I could bind my soul to inanimate objects, even if it didn't make sense: It should've technically been human transmutation, as far as Teacher and I could figure, but I never saw the Gate, so apparently it isn't. I guess you actually have to be dead. Doesn't matter. Point is, I could do it.
"From what I could work out, my soul is...loose, somehow. Something to do with its time in the Gate, maybe, or just with how many vessels it's had. Because of that, well, my alchemy wasn't-wasn't stable, you could say.
"I was more powerful, everyone who'd seen me transmute before said so, but it came and went as my soul spliced and rejoined itself. I got used to it, built up a tolerance for the fatigue, but I was never able to do more than a few transmutations at a time."
Ed thinks he sees where this is going, knows they're getting close to it, now. But Al's ability to transmute his soul is, Ed believes, unique; he needs to be sure.
"How does this relate to the portal?" Ed asks. "Why wouldn't it have worked without me there?"
"Neither of us had a Stone, Brother," Al begins. "Best we've got is that we channeled the energy from Mustang's transmutation for our own-for you to close the portal, and for me to get Alfons' soul." He acknowledges Ed's nod with a single tilt of his head. "But a soul transmutation that big, with no alchemy of my own to speak of? I was exhausted, Ed. There's no way I could have done anything with the portal on top of that."
That doesn't seem right, Ed thinks. That can't be it. "But, Al-"
"That's not everything," Al cuts him off. "I had a Stone when I brought you back under Central; you bargained your limbs and my memories to bring me back. But what did I lose this time, Ed? What did I bargain with?"
And all at once, the fear in Al's eyes when he woke makes a hell of a lot more sense to Ed. Al had known the price of what he'd done, had expected to have paid it one way or another.
"When I saw that you had closed the portal, that Alfons was alive and I still had my body, it didn't make sense. The Gate should have taken something."
"You said that you didn't think you and Alfons existed separately," Ed says, and there's a hint of what might be fear in his voice. "Are you saying you split your soul? That Alfons is just a permanent vessel of the transmutations you did with the armor? Because that's not-"
"No," Al says, confidently. "It's not the same. Alfons has his own personality, his own will, nothing like the armor I used to transmute. It's partially because we're counterparts, partially because of the circumstances of the portal. My guess is that the Gate didn't realize what I was taking-that in the confusion of the portal tying to the Gate and alchemic energy flowing where it wasn't meant to, I was able to transmute Alfons' soul like I was just transmuting my own. Alfons was in the Gate but he wasn't dead, just like you weren't dead when I used the Stone. His and my souls are bound to each other's. Not exactly the same way ours are, but similar. And that bond didn't break-"
"Because the portal was open when he died," Ed says, the pieces falling into place in his head.
"Yes," Al confirms, business-like. "And when it came back, his soul recognized its body and went back to it, reanimating it; but even that wasn't human transmutation because the soul is, as far as the Gate is concerned, mine. Or, well, we share it. But if the portal had stayed open, if you hadn't been there to close it, I don't think both of us would be here. The energy flow would have done something to one of us. The Gate would have demanded something eventually. Counterparts-"
"-can't exist in the same world," Ed finishes, tying together the last threads of Al's words.
Al nods, shrugs, because it's all on the table now; and he may look as overwhelmed as Ed feels, but it's clear to him that Al is relieved to have said all of this. There's still a lingering worry written into the line of brow, though, the slight downturn of his mouth. There's still guilt in his eyes, even if he doesn't seem as aware of it at the moment as he normally does.
"What did you do, after?" Ed suddenly asks, wanting to wipe that look from his brother's face forever. Al looks up at him in confusion. "You said you spent a year in Central," Ed explains. "What did you do after that?"
"Oh," Al says, like it's not the question he was expecting. "Wandered around Amestris, mostly, looking for leads, anything that could've helped me figure out where you were. After I'd basically dealt with the soul thing, I-"
He cuts himself off again, smiles ruefully, like he doesn't know how else to say what he has to say next. "I remembered why I was there in the first place," he admits, finally, and not even a fool could mistake his tone for merely sheepish; it is embarrassed, ashamed, and Ed's stomach roils. "I left pretty much the next morning. I knew there wasn't anything else in the libraries. I needed to get out there and talk to the people we knew, the people who knew us. I'd wasted too much time already," he finishes weakly, not meeting Ed's eyes.
"Hey," Ed says sternly, pulling on Al's hand, forcing Al to look at him. "Listen to me, Al. You didn't do anything wrong. Okay? I'm pretty sure bringing me back was impossible, but you damn near did it on your own, anyway. You accomplished so much in those years, more than anyone else could have dreamed of doing."
Al looks up at him at this, the tiniest glimmer of hope in his eyes. "You didn't let me down, or anything like that, all right? You were spectacular," he finishes, voice low, touching a finger light to Al's chin, turning up Al's face to look him in the eyes.
Al leans forward almost unconsciously, bringing their foreheads together, his eyes closed, breathing Ed's air. "I'm sorry," he can't help himself saying despite Ed's reassurances, because for all he did, it still wasn't good enough.
"Don't be," Ed replies sternly, like he knows what Al's thinking. "Don't be," he repeats, as he leans in and presses his lips to his brother's, feather-light and fleeting. "Don't be," he says again, pleading this time, and Al reaches out to grasp the back of Ed's neck, to pull him closer, press their lips together.
Ed responds immediately, both of them suddenly desperate, needing to be closer. Al doesn't break their kiss as he pushes back from the table, fumbling towards Ed to straddle him on his chair. Ed wraps his arms around Al's back, hauling him in at the same time, hands trailing down his body to rest in the curve of his sides, to settle just above his hips.
The kiss gets messy, sloppy, and soon Al's mouth is moving over Ed's jaw, trailing down his throat as Ed pants and leans his head back, exposing his neck to his brother. His fingers scrabble at the hem of Al's shirt, needing skin, needing to feel the warmth of Al on top of him, all over him-and even years later, he's still not used to this, still not over the sheer disbelief that Al is alive, and whole, and here.
He digs his nails into Al's skin when Al sucks at the strained tendons in his neck, biting briefly before running his tongue over the gouges left behind by his teeth, marking him. Ed eventually needs his mouth again, needs to be kissing him, and slowly they regain their finesse, calm their intensity as the kiss drags on-as they reassure each other that they're here, that they're not going anywhere, that they forgive each other for everything.
Ed makes lazy circles on Al's back, his hands hitching up Al's shirt, and Al trails his fingertips down the lines of Ed's face, over the curve of his jaw.
"I love you," Al says against Ed's lips when they finally break the kiss, not ready to move away from each other quite yet.
"So fucking much," Ed replies, brushing their noses together before finally, finally breaking apart with one last peck to Al's bruised lips.
"We should get to bed," Al declares, unfolding slowly from Ed's lap, unsteady on his feet for a moment. "Alfons is probably wondering what's keeping us."
"Please," Ed dismisses, taking Al's proffered hand and standing, silently pleased that he's still got half an inch on his brother. "Kid sleeps like the dead. We could fuck on the mattress right next to him and he still probably wouldn't wake up."
"Didn't we do that once?" Al throws over his shoulder airily, clearly joking, and Ed smirks at him.
"I'm serious, we probably could."
"That wouldn't be very nice, Brother," Al points out, in what would be a sensible manner, Ed thinks, if not for his huge hypocrisy.
"Right!" Ed hisses. "Like I don't walk in on the two of you all of the time."
"Ah," Al tuts, "but you could join us, yet you never do," he trails off innocently, like he doesn't know exactly why Ed doesn't, like he doesn't know that Ed loves to watch them, to note the ways they compare, contrast, fall into each other like they really are the same person, or just two halves of a whole.
"So I still think it wouldn't be very nice," Al concludes, eyes twinkling, and Ed can only shake his head.
"Smartass," Ed tells him.
Al takes a bow.
Apparently things were to good to be true, because it's not two months later when Al and Alfons both come home on the same day with different animals in their hands.
"Is that a cat," Ed deadpans at Al, when he barges into their flat with an orange ball of fur in his hands and a much-too excited expression on his face.
"Yes! I found it on the way home from the library. It started following me, and it didn't have a collar-"
"So you brought it home," Ed says, already resigned to his cat-filled fate. He's actually very surprised this hadn't happened sooner.
"Isn't it cute?" Al asks rhetorically, stroking its noise with the tip of a finger as it purrs contentedly in Al's arms.
"You're gonna have to ask Alfons if we can keep it, you know," Ed reminds him, since his brother already seems lost to reason, giggling as the cat licks his finger.
"Don't worry about it, Brother," Al assures him. "He'll love it."
Alfons does not, however, love it.
Alphonse gathers the cat in his arms when they hear Alfons struggling with door, ready to present the cat to him when he comes in. Things go in an unexpected direction, however, when Alfons pushes the door open with his back, turning around only to have a small, exceptionally fluffy dog in his arms.
Everything freezes for a moment, the door still wide open behind Alfons, Ed looking on from a safe distance in the kitchen. Not even the animals react, seemingly affected by the surprise of their respective new masters.
Ed's gaze flicks from Al to Alfons, completely bemused. How, he thinks to himself. How did this become my life?
"What is that?" Al asks, breaking the stalemate, now stroking his cat possessively.
"Dog," Alfons replies, in what he probably meant to be a stern manner, but he couldn't keep the sweet tone out of his voice when he looked down at it in his arms, even if when he glances back up a second later, he's leveling a glare at Alphonse.
"Well, you can't keep it," Al says imperiously, almost unconsciously glancing around for Ed, catching his eye, as if expecting corroboration.
"Oh, hell no," Ed says, when Alfons turns his glare to him instead, following Al's eyes. "I am not getting involved. Figure this out on your own." He wants absolutely nothing to do with this.
"Maybe we can keep them both," Alfons says generously, after another long moment, even though he sounds skeptical.
Al doesn't reply.
The cat, as it turns out, is vicious. It stalks the dog around their apartment, hissing and clawing at it whenever it walks by. Alphonse, for his part, coos over the sadistic animal and makes (in Ed's opinion) ridiculous baby noises at it while it laps up the milk Al gives it; and Ed swears the thing smirks at everyone in the room when Al cradles it to his chest, muttering about how precious it is.
It doesn't go on for long. Alfons corners Ed in the kitchen one day, when Alphonse is out picking up food at the market.
"You need to get rid of it," he tells Ed in a hushed whisper, as if the cat may overhear them. "Poor Wernher is going to die of fright before the end of the year at this rate."
"Maybe that's Al's plan," Ed tells him, and can't help the slight turn up of his lips, the quirk of a smile at the memory of Al with that fucking cat.
Alfons sees it, though, and looks downright betrayed. "Oh," he says coldly. "I see."
"No, Alfons, that's not..." but he's almost laughing now, and that doesn't help matters in the slightest.
Alfons turns on his heel and marches back into the living room, Wernher jumping up around his knees as he goes.
"Christ," Ed swears, with feeling.
Alphonse has a habit of dropping by the university on most days, occasionally bringing both Alfons and his brother a fresh cup of coffee or some food, or a book from the library he knows that they need.
Ed greets him today with a quick kiss and an emphatic "Thanks" when Al hands him a hot mug of black coffee. He goes to grab the delicious-smelling brown paper bag in Al's other hand, only to get smacked across his knuckles for his trouble.
"Hey! What was that for, Al?" he asks, indignant.
Al walks back to the front of Ed's desk, paper bag safely out of Ed's reach, and perches himself on the edge of it, ignoring the selection of chairs in Ed's office. "It's not for you," Al tells him simply.
Ed narrows his eyes. "Is it for Alfons?" he asks, with a warning tone in his voice that Al, of course, completely disregards.
"Yes, it is." And with that, he hops off the desk and makes his way to the door.
"He's not going to let you keep it!" Ed shouts after him, even though Al is already gone.
Alfons prefers to work in the lecture hall, and Al gets halfway down to him before he looks up. He smiles when he sees Al approaching, pats the chair next to him in invitation.
"Hi," Alfons says belatedly, when Al places a kiss to his temple before taking the proffered chair.
"I brought you something," Al tells him, offering him the bag.
"Oh, thank God," Alfons says. "I'm starving."
Al sits with him while he eats, chatting about Al's research and Alfons' latest designs, anecdotes about students and library patrons.
"Well, I should head back," Al says after almost an hour has passed. "And let you get back to work."
"Hmm," Alfons agrees. He leans in to give Al a soft kiss on the lips. "Thank you for the food."
"Of course," Al says, following Alfons' lips for another quick kiss.
"You still can't keep the cat," Alfons says.
Al leaves without another word.
Ed get home first one day and walks into their flat to find Rebis perched on their counter, glowing eyes fixed menacingly on the ball of grey fur currently sleeping right below him.
The cat turns his lamplight eyes on Ed when he comes in, and Ed takes in the scene with a frown.
"Behave, you," he tells Rebis sternly, glaring when the cat just cocks his head like he understands but refuses to listen.
He wouldn't dare admit it to either Alfons or his brother, but he's become strangely fond of both animals: The way Wernher greets him when he comes home and rests his head on Ed's knee when Ed's sat at the kitchen table; the way Rebis curls against his back at night and lounges on their sofa during the day, filling up the empty spaces, making their flat a little more of a home.
"I mean it," he adds for emphasis, pointing a finger at Rebis.
Rebis meows in a stubborn sort of way, but hops off the counter all the same.
"You still," Al huffs out between labored breaths, "have to get rid....of the dog. Fuck, Al," he finishes to the ceiling, head thrown back and fingers wound tight in both the sheets and in Alfons' hair.
Alfons just takes him deeper, hollowing his cheeks, taking shallow breaths through his nose.
"Al, fuck, I'm-" is all the warning Alfons gets before Al's coming down the back of his throat.
(One thing that Alfons loves-absolutely adores-about the Elrics is how alike they are, when you get them separately. They may play off one another when they're together, complete each other, temper and encourage each other, but when they're apart? They're exactly the same: It's just that you don't get them apart very often, so very few people know this. But Edward is actually cooler, much more collected, when he doesn't have Alphonse to react to; Alphonse, for his part, is sloppy, more rebellious, more crude, when he doesn't have Ed to look after).
(This is nowhere more obvious than when Alfons manages to get them in bed alone; and whenever they're done, he calculates the differences, adds up the little Elric idiosyncrasies that you only ever see when you're only getting half of the picture; and it's times like those when Alfons can't help but smile and shake his head because they are such brothers, and he loves them both more than he ever would have imagined).
Hence Alfons notes the unusual profanity, the painful and careless tightening of Al's grip in his hair, and can't help but smile around Al's cock. This, of course, only results in him losing focus and choking, Al's come sliding down his chin in slow rivulets. He pulls off when Al finishes, his body sinking back into the sheets, boneless.
"Fucking look at you," Al says to him, as Alfons wipes his chin with the back of his hand, licking it a moment later. "Get," he bites out, "up here. Now."
Alfons obeys him immediately, crawling up Al's body until he can collapse on top of him, chest to chest. He's still hard, distractingly so, and he ruts against Al's hip in mindless little movements while Al tips his face up to kiss him.
Al spreads his legs at the same time, lets Alfons settle between them, and he pushes up into Alfons' thrusts, causing Alfons to break the kiss with a muttered "Fuck" to his cheek.
"C'mon, Al," Alphonse whispers, breath hot on the shell of Alfons' ear. "C'mon," he says more forcefully, offset with a particularly brutal twist of his hips, and he feels Alfons's muscles contract under his hands, between his legs, and Alfons' come is a wet, hot mess between their bodies.
"Shit," is all Al says when Alfons rolls off of him, scooping up one of their discarded shirts to wipe them down with. They're both already half-asleep, always more drowsy when they're together anyway, and when Alfons blinks awake not twenty minutes later, Al still asleep beside him, Rebis stares back at him from his perch on Alfons' chest.
Ed comes into their bedroom to find Alfons and his brother tucked haphazardly under the sheets, the air smelling like sex.
Alfons gives him a lazy wave, gesturing him over. Ed goes gladly, stripping off his vest and belt and squeezing in next to him, tucking himself under Alfons' arm.
"Al still asleep?" Ed asks, even though it's fairly obvious by the way he's motionless, completely dead to the world. He doesn't know what it means that he's sleeping longer than Alfons, if it means anything at all.
"Yes," Alfons answers him, and they both look over at him, watch him sleep for a long moment, all soft smiles and gentle eyes.
Ed leans in to give Alfons a quick kiss. "I'm gonna shower before dinner. You wanna join?" he asks, not suggestively, this time-just curious.
"No," Alfons answers softly. "I'll stay here until he wakes," he adds, nodding his head towards Alphonse.
Ed may not fully understand the bond between the two of them, what caused it or what it's doing to them, but he loves them for it all the same, is unspeakably happy that they have each other, no matter what may come of it.
"Okay," Ed smiles, leaning back down for another kiss.
It is then, of course, that Rebis pokes his head out from under the sheets, from where he'd been quite contentedly curled up between Al and Alfons' bodies, meowing loudly.
Alfons reaches out to scratch behind his ears without thinking, and looks up to find Ed staring at him, eyebrows raised incredulously.
"What?" Alfons asks airily. "He's sort of cute."
Not two weeks later, Ed finds Alphonse rewarding Wernher with table scraps, saying things like "Sit!" and "Good boy."
"What?" Al asks, when Ed clears his throat dramatically, announcing both his presence and his skepticism. "I'm training him," Al explains unnecessarily. "He's actually sort of cute, isn't he?"
The flat isn't big enough for the five of them; it was never even really big enough for the three of them. Rebis takes up too much space in their bed and Wernher sleeps in the most inconvenient places; they're both too loud for the three of them to get any work done at home and they're always underfoot, getting tripped on, not to mention shedding all over the furniture.
Al still favors the cat and Alfons still pays more attention to the dog, but they work, the five of them. They find a rhythm, fall into a routine, and weave around each other with an easy sort of grace.
And it's not perfect-far from it, really-because Alfons still wakes up coughing and Al still sleeps like the dead and the news gets less and less hopeful by the day and there is still nothing there when Ed claps; but he considers himself lucky all the same, because he has this, their little flat and their animals and each other to come home to, and there are days now when he doesn't worry that it's all too good to be true.
DW post here. Comment there? |
Fandom: Fullmetal Alchemist
Characters/Pairings: Ed/Al/Alfons
Word Count: 6,073
Rating: NC-17
Author's Notes: Post!COS AU. Some dodgy theorizing about the Gate/portal/human transmutation. Written for fmabigbang's Reverse Big Bang challenge. I'll update links once everything goes live. The current masterpost for the challenge is here.
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Some days, he can't believe how lucky he is. It feels like a fluke, like a gift horse, like it can't possibly be real. One thing he's learned, though: If it seems too good to be true, it probably is; and yet this is his life now, this is his reality.
He has them both.
None of them have any clear ideas about the how's and the why's, and Ed's still afraid to delve too deeply, to look too hard into the mouth of whatever this is. (He knows that it's foolish, knows that knowledge should only ease that pit of apprehension in his gut; but he also knows that knowledge isn't free, that it costs something, that sometimes knowing can be worse).
(Another thing he's learned, over the years).
Ed's not quite sure what to do with them. During his first years in Europe, his years with Alfons, he'd noted all of the ways in which Alfons reminded him of his brother, all of the things Alfons did that echoed Al's own mannerisms. But there were a lot of things that were different, too, a lot of ways in which Alfons was his own person-there were whole stretches of time when Ed could almost forget that there were any parallels at all. And while they're inherently similar, both familiar to him on a practically molecular level, he's still not sure how they'll get along.
Years pass, and Ed is still afraid that everything they've built is going to come crashing down around them because it's good, too good to be true. Alfons and his brother get on immediately-better than he and Alfons ever did, if he's honest with himself. And sure, there's a war coming-they're all certain of that-and they're tight on money and Alfons still isn't perfectly healthy and he and Al don't have alchemy or their home-life is still shit like life tends to be-but they've made something here, something that makes them whole, and happy.
Despite all of that, though, it's not until the first time he walks in on the two of them, Al pinning Alfons to the wall, face buried in the curve of Alfons' neck, that those persistent, niggling doubts about the three of them truly dissipate.
He leans against the doorframe, eyebrows raised, watching and waiting for one of them to notice him.
"Hi, Brother," Al says almost immediately, shameless, without looking up. Ed isn't in the least bit surprised.
"Ed!" Alfons' eyes snap open, and he makes an abortive attempt to both push Alphonse off of him and to shrink in on himself, to make himself smaller, but Al just pushes against his body with more force, keeping him where he is.
"We'll be done in a moment," Al tells him, finally craning his neck around to actually look at Ed, who waves his hand as if to say, "Take your time."
Al flashes him a quick smirk before turning his attention back to Alfons.
Ed goes to the kitchen to make them all food.
Things change after that, but not by much. If anything, Ed thinks that this is what they should have been from the start.
And there are some things that stay the same. Al and Alfons had always preferred to sleep near each other, if they could (although neither could really explain why) and more often than not, morning would find them in the same bed, tangled together, breathing in unison.
Ed makes a note as this particular habit starts to spread into what should be waking hours. But more and more frequently, Ed comes across them sound asleep, curled together in various places around their flat, at odd times throughout the day. After a while, he learns to let them be, knows that they're disoriented and sluggish if woken up. They're never asleep for long, anyway, and it doesn't affect their ability to sleep at night, so Ed doesn't see any immediate harm in it.
He has only assumptions and half-assed theories about how the two of them are even possible; he doesn't know how Al dragged Alfons' soul back from the Gate, or if there will be any long-term ramifications because of it, if changes will manifest slowly or come all at once down the line.
So he watches them sleep with anxiety itching at his skin, a tingle of apprehension in his veins: He gets a glass of water for Alfons, throws a blanket over Al's slender shoulders, and doesn't look more closely at it than he has to.
Too good to be true, a voice whispers in the back of his mind, unbidden.
"It's strange," Al says into the silence late one night, when Alfons has left them to their research with a fond smile and a quiet "Goodnight," he and Ed huddled around their kitchen table, eyes strained from reading. "That he's here."
Ed raises his eyebrows in question, must give Al a strange look, because suddenly Al is tripping over himself to explain, to make Ed understand.
"Not in a bad way!" he clarifies. "I love that he's here; I wouldn't want anything else. It's just. Strange." He pauses, thinking. "Because he's me, you know? My...counterpart." Al says the word like it's awkward on his tongue, and maybe it is-maybe this is something that a person should never have to deal with, or face. Maybe all the years in the world wouldn't help him adjust. Maybe it's something that just isn't meant to happen.
(Parallel universes are, after all, perhaps parallel for a reason).
But the Elrics have never been good at leaving the laws of physics well enough alone, and if this is their penance-a feeling of not-quite-belonging to either yourself or your surroundings-Ed thinks that maybe it's the best place they've ever been. Because maybe it's not supposed to happen and maybe they're breaking some law or other, but this just seems different rather than wrong, and that is something that Ed can very much live with.
"I don't think they're ever actually supposed to meet," Al says thoughtfully, like he's reading Ed's thoughts. "A person and their counterpart. I mean, Dad, and you..." He trails off, not sure if he should broach the topic, not sure if he even can.
"We never met them the way you and Alfons have, yeah," Ed finishes the thought for him, leaving a hell of a lot left unsaid, but Ed knows that Al understands. "They're meant to replace each other, almost. They can't exist independently in the same world."
Al smiles at him, a little ruefully.
"Well," Ed amends, "they shouldn't be able to."
But at his words, Al's smile vanishes. He averts his eyes, gazing intently at the wall just over Ed's shoulder, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth.
Tension suddenly hums in the air between them, but Ed waits, knowing that something has been bothering Al-and not just Al, but Alfons, too. Ed doesn't know if they've talked to each other about it, but he has a feeling that Al wants to talk to him first. He dips his head, intersecting Al's gaze, forcing Al to look up at him, encouraging him to speak.
"I don't think we do," is all Al says; Ed keeps his face neutrally blank. "Exist independently, that is," Al clarifies, completely unnecessarily.
"What do you mean?" Ed asks him gently, because he's been wondering about this for a while, wonders now how long Al has known, or suspected. Probably longer than he's given him credit for, Ed thinks, and now he suddenly needs to know Al thoughts, needs to know if their theories match up.
"Well, we brought him back, for one," Al begins.
"You brought him back," Ed amends.
Alphonse doesn't immediately deny it, but seems to be lost in thought again. When he speaks, his voice is soft, uncertain, but prompt in a way that confirms Ed's suspicions of just how long he's been thinking about this. "You didn't see the Gate," he says, and Ed nods in agreement: That was one conclusion they reached right after it happened, when Al came to in Ed's arms, surrounded by the rubble of Haushofer's mansion, fear deep in his eyes like he'd lost something, like he shouldn't have been alive, or whole. It was a look Ed had recognized because he'd felt it before himself, on a stormy night in a basement in Resembool.
"You didn't see it," Al repeats, breaking Ed's reverie, "so I was responsible for bringing Alfons back; I think we know that for sure. But I don't know, Brother," he huffs, frustrated. "I don't think I could have done it alone. I don't think it would have worked without you there."
This is something that Ed isn't expecting. They've both been doing what research they could about how they were able to close the portal, how they were able to transmute just that one time on this side of the Gate. The material leaves something to be desired, of course, so they've both since more or less chalked it up to the energy flowing through the portal, some lingering power of Mustang's alchemy flowing through the breach. But why one of them couldn't have done it alone, besides the sheer strength of the transmutation, Ed doesn't know.
"What do you mean, Al?" Ed asks him for the second time, voice low and serious. He studies his brother's face, doesn't like the shadow that seems to cross it at Ed's words.
"I did a lot of research while you were gone," Al says, pained, which, okay-it's not like they haven't talked about what exactly Al was doing during those years, but with Alfons still in their lives, with their still being in Europe, they've done a lot more talking about how Ed spent those years. And there's something, something about how Al gets whenever Ed asks him about it-short, evasive, almost guilty-that makes Ed think that Al doesn't want to tell him, that maybe he shouldn't want to know. What seems like this sudden revelation of Al's is surprising, to say the least.
"I knew you weren't dead," he continues, and Ed doesn't need him to clarify when. "I felt you at the Gate, could still feel you when I woke up, but it faded. I guess that was when you passed through, when you came out on the other side. On this side," he corrects himself, "but I could still feel you, even then."
"Our souls are connected," Ed says, nodding. "It makes sense that you'd be able to sense it."
Al nods back at him: It's hardly the strangest thing that's happened to them. "Teacher told me everything she knew, and we reconstructed a lot of the research that we must have done searching for the Stone. There wasn't much. I spent a lot of time looking through Dad's notes, but fuck, Ed," Al says, shaking his head, "I don't know what code he used and I was never able to break it completely. He probably could have told me a lot, but I just couldn't understand it."
Ed notes the hardness in his brother's voice, the intensity, and thinks that for his genius, Alphonse should be so much more than he is: For more years than he should have been, a kid in body but not in mind; a will so strong contained to vessels that were never quite his own; a brain capable of so much but still not enough to satisfy him. Ed loves Al in that moment with a ferocity bordering on psychosis, a possessiveness so strong it nearly takes his breath away.
"I went to see Roy-" Al's voice cuts into Ed's thoughts, and at this Ed's head snaps back up to look at him, because for all of the things Al had never mentioned, this was perhaps the biggest, "but he wasn't really that helpful, to be honest. My own mistake," Al admits with more grace than he did with his inability to decipher Hohenheim's code. "I needed rank to get into the Central branches, but I'd forgotten that he'd rescinded his own. Riza took care of me, though," he finishes, eliciting an ungainly snort from Ed.
Al smiles back at him, privately, because of course Riza took care of everything; and Ed aches for Mustang, suddenly, just a little bit.
"I spent a year or so in Central," he continues, "and I-"
But here Al cuts himself off abruptly, looking pained, like he doesn't know if he can continue.
"What, Al?" Ed prompts him, concerned, scooting his chair closer to take Al's hand in his, squeezing his fingers encouragingly. Al doesn't shake off Ed's grip, even squeezes back, but the grimace, if anything, intensifies.
"I ended up researching myself more than anything else," he admits quickly, suddenly. "It wasn't that I wasn't trying to find you, Ed, I was, I just-I got sidetracked."
And then his words flow with a quiet sort of intensity, a brimming eagerness that makes Ed think that he's been wanting to discuss this for a while. He isn't sure how it makes him feel.
"I'd known since pretty much the beginning that I could bind my soul to inanimate objects, even if it didn't make sense: It should've technically been human transmutation, as far as Teacher and I could figure, but I never saw the Gate, so apparently it isn't. I guess you actually have to be dead. Doesn't matter. Point is, I could do it.
"From what I could work out, my soul is...loose, somehow. Something to do with its time in the Gate, maybe, or just with how many vessels it's had. Because of that, well, my alchemy wasn't-wasn't stable, you could say.
"I was more powerful, everyone who'd seen me transmute before said so, but it came and went as my soul spliced and rejoined itself. I got used to it, built up a tolerance for the fatigue, but I was never able to do more than a few transmutations at a time."
Ed thinks he sees where this is going, knows they're getting close to it, now. But Al's ability to transmute his soul is, Ed believes, unique; he needs to be sure.
"How does this relate to the portal?" Ed asks. "Why wouldn't it have worked without me there?"
"Neither of us had a Stone, Brother," Al begins. "Best we've got is that we channeled the energy from Mustang's transmutation for our own-for you to close the portal, and for me to get Alfons' soul." He acknowledges Ed's nod with a single tilt of his head. "But a soul transmutation that big, with no alchemy of my own to speak of? I was exhausted, Ed. There's no way I could have done anything with the portal on top of that."
That doesn't seem right, Ed thinks. That can't be it. "But, Al-"
"That's not everything," Al cuts him off. "I had a Stone when I brought you back under Central; you bargained your limbs and my memories to bring me back. But what did I lose this time, Ed? What did I bargain with?"
And all at once, the fear in Al's eyes when he woke makes a hell of a lot more sense to Ed. Al had known the price of what he'd done, had expected to have paid it one way or another.
"When I saw that you had closed the portal, that Alfons was alive and I still had my body, it didn't make sense. The Gate should have taken something."
"You said that you didn't think you and Alfons existed separately," Ed says, and there's a hint of what might be fear in his voice. "Are you saying you split your soul? That Alfons is just a permanent vessel of the transmutations you did with the armor? Because that's not-"
"No," Al says, confidently. "It's not the same. Alfons has his own personality, his own will, nothing like the armor I used to transmute. It's partially because we're counterparts, partially because of the circumstances of the portal. My guess is that the Gate didn't realize what I was taking-that in the confusion of the portal tying to the Gate and alchemic energy flowing where it wasn't meant to, I was able to transmute Alfons' soul like I was just transmuting my own. Alfons was in the Gate but he wasn't dead, just like you weren't dead when I used the Stone. His and my souls are bound to each other's. Not exactly the same way ours are, but similar. And that bond didn't break-"
"Because the portal was open when he died," Ed says, the pieces falling into place in his head.
"Yes," Al confirms, business-like. "And when it came back, his soul recognized its body and went back to it, reanimating it; but even that wasn't human transmutation because the soul is, as far as the Gate is concerned, mine. Or, well, we share it. But if the portal had stayed open, if you hadn't been there to close it, I don't think both of us would be here. The energy flow would have done something to one of us. The Gate would have demanded something eventually. Counterparts-"
"-can't exist in the same world," Ed finishes, tying together the last threads of Al's words.
Al nods, shrugs, because it's all on the table now; and he may look as overwhelmed as Ed feels, but it's clear to him that Al is relieved to have said all of this. There's still a lingering worry written into the line of brow, though, the slight downturn of his mouth. There's still guilt in his eyes, even if he doesn't seem as aware of it at the moment as he normally does.
"What did you do, after?" Ed suddenly asks, wanting to wipe that look from his brother's face forever. Al looks up at him in confusion. "You said you spent a year in Central," Ed explains. "What did you do after that?"
"Oh," Al says, like it's not the question he was expecting. "Wandered around Amestris, mostly, looking for leads, anything that could've helped me figure out where you were. After I'd basically dealt with the soul thing, I-"
He cuts himself off again, smiles ruefully, like he doesn't know how else to say what he has to say next. "I remembered why I was there in the first place," he admits, finally, and not even a fool could mistake his tone for merely sheepish; it is embarrassed, ashamed, and Ed's stomach roils. "I left pretty much the next morning. I knew there wasn't anything else in the libraries. I needed to get out there and talk to the people we knew, the people who knew us. I'd wasted too much time already," he finishes weakly, not meeting Ed's eyes.
"Hey," Ed says sternly, pulling on Al's hand, forcing Al to look at him. "Listen to me, Al. You didn't do anything wrong. Okay? I'm pretty sure bringing me back was impossible, but you damn near did it on your own, anyway. You accomplished so much in those years, more than anyone else could have dreamed of doing."
Al looks up at him at this, the tiniest glimmer of hope in his eyes. "You didn't let me down, or anything like that, all right? You were spectacular," he finishes, voice low, touching a finger light to Al's chin, turning up Al's face to look him in the eyes.
Al leans forward almost unconsciously, bringing their foreheads together, his eyes closed, breathing Ed's air. "I'm sorry," he can't help himself saying despite Ed's reassurances, because for all he did, it still wasn't good enough.
"Don't be," Ed replies sternly, like he knows what Al's thinking. "Don't be," he repeats, as he leans in and presses his lips to his brother's, feather-light and fleeting. "Don't be," he says again, pleading this time, and Al reaches out to grasp the back of Ed's neck, to pull him closer, press their lips together.
Ed responds immediately, both of them suddenly desperate, needing to be closer. Al doesn't break their kiss as he pushes back from the table, fumbling towards Ed to straddle him on his chair. Ed wraps his arms around Al's back, hauling him in at the same time, hands trailing down his body to rest in the curve of his sides, to settle just above his hips.
The kiss gets messy, sloppy, and soon Al's mouth is moving over Ed's jaw, trailing down his throat as Ed pants and leans his head back, exposing his neck to his brother. His fingers scrabble at the hem of Al's shirt, needing skin, needing to feel the warmth of Al on top of him, all over him-and even years later, he's still not used to this, still not over the sheer disbelief that Al is alive, and whole, and here.
He digs his nails into Al's skin when Al sucks at the strained tendons in his neck, biting briefly before running his tongue over the gouges left behind by his teeth, marking him. Ed eventually needs his mouth again, needs to be kissing him, and slowly they regain their finesse, calm their intensity as the kiss drags on-as they reassure each other that they're here, that they're not going anywhere, that they forgive each other for everything.
Ed makes lazy circles on Al's back, his hands hitching up Al's shirt, and Al trails his fingertips down the lines of Ed's face, over the curve of his jaw.
"I love you," Al says against Ed's lips when they finally break the kiss, not ready to move away from each other quite yet.
"So fucking much," Ed replies, brushing their noses together before finally, finally breaking apart with one last peck to Al's bruised lips.
"We should get to bed," Al declares, unfolding slowly from Ed's lap, unsteady on his feet for a moment. "Alfons is probably wondering what's keeping us."
"Please," Ed dismisses, taking Al's proffered hand and standing, silently pleased that he's still got half an inch on his brother. "Kid sleeps like the dead. We could fuck on the mattress right next to him and he still probably wouldn't wake up."
"Didn't we do that once?" Al throws over his shoulder airily, clearly joking, and Ed smirks at him.
"I'm serious, we probably could."
"That wouldn't be very nice, Brother," Al points out, in what would be a sensible manner, Ed thinks, if not for his huge hypocrisy.
"Right!" Ed hisses. "Like I don't walk in on the two of you all of the time."
"Ah," Al tuts, "but you could join us, yet you never do," he trails off innocently, like he doesn't know exactly why Ed doesn't, like he doesn't know that Ed loves to watch them, to note the ways they compare, contrast, fall into each other like they really are the same person, or just two halves of a whole.
"So I still think it wouldn't be very nice," Al concludes, eyes twinkling, and Ed can only shake his head.
"Smartass," Ed tells him.
Al takes a bow.
Apparently things were to good to be true, because it's not two months later when Al and Alfons both come home on the same day with different animals in their hands.
"Is that a cat," Ed deadpans at Al, when he barges into their flat with an orange ball of fur in his hands and a much-too excited expression on his face.
"Yes! I found it on the way home from the library. It started following me, and it didn't have a collar-"
"So you brought it home," Ed says, already resigned to his cat-filled fate. He's actually very surprised this hadn't happened sooner.
"Isn't it cute?" Al asks rhetorically, stroking its noise with the tip of a finger as it purrs contentedly in Al's arms.
"You're gonna have to ask Alfons if we can keep it, you know," Ed reminds him, since his brother already seems lost to reason, giggling as the cat licks his finger.
"Don't worry about it, Brother," Al assures him. "He'll love it."
Alfons does not, however, love it.
Alphonse gathers the cat in his arms when they hear Alfons struggling with door, ready to present the cat to him when he comes in. Things go in an unexpected direction, however, when Alfons pushes the door open with his back, turning around only to have a small, exceptionally fluffy dog in his arms.
Everything freezes for a moment, the door still wide open behind Alfons, Ed looking on from a safe distance in the kitchen. Not even the animals react, seemingly affected by the surprise of their respective new masters.
Ed's gaze flicks from Al to Alfons, completely bemused. How, he thinks to himself. How did this become my life?
"What is that?" Al asks, breaking the stalemate, now stroking his cat possessively.
"Dog," Alfons replies, in what he probably meant to be a stern manner, but he couldn't keep the sweet tone out of his voice when he looked down at it in his arms, even if when he glances back up a second later, he's leveling a glare at Alphonse.
"Well, you can't keep it," Al says imperiously, almost unconsciously glancing around for Ed, catching his eye, as if expecting corroboration.
"Oh, hell no," Ed says, when Alfons turns his glare to him instead, following Al's eyes. "I am not getting involved. Figure this out on your own." He wants absolutely nothing to do with this.
"Maybe we can keep them both," Alfons says generously, after another long moment, even though he sounds skeptical.
Al doesn't reply.
The cat, as it turns out, is vicious. It stalks the dog around their apartment, hissing and clawing at it whenever it walks by. Alphonse, for his part, coos over the sadistic animal and makes (in Ed's opinion) ridiculous baby noises at it while it laps up the milk Al gives it; and Ed swears the thing smirks at everyone in the room when Al cradles it to his chest, muttering about how precious it is.
It doesn't go on for long. Alfons corners Ed in the kitchen one day, when Alphonse is out picking up food at the market.
"You need to get rid of it," he tells Ed in a hushed whisper, as if the cat may overhear them. "Poor Wernher is going to die of fright before the end of the year at this rate."
"Maybe that's Al's plan," Ed tells him, and can't help the slight turn up of his lips, the quirk of a smile at the memory of Al with that fucking cat.
Alfons sees it, though, and looks downright betrayed. "Oh," he says coldly. "I see."
"No, Alfons, that's not..." but he's almost laughing now, and that doesn't help matters in the slightest.
Alfons turns on his heel and marches back into the living room, Wernher jumping up around his knees as he goes.
"Christ," Ed swears, with feeling.
Alphonse has a habit of dropping by the university on most days, occasionally bringing both Alfons and his brother a fresh cup of coffee or some food, or a book from the library he knows that they need.
Ed greets him today with a quick kiss and an emphatic "Thanks" when Al hands him a hot mug of black coffee. He goes to grab the delicious-smelling brown paper bag in Al's other hand, only to get smacked across his knuckles for his trouble.
"Hey! What was that for, Al?" he asks, indignant.
Al walks back to the front of Ed's desk, paper bag safely out of Ed's reach, and perches himself on the edge of it, ignoring the selection of chairs in Ed's office. "It's not for you," Al tells him simply.
Ed narrows his eyes. "Is it for Alfons?" he asks, with a warning tone in his voice that Al, of course, completely disregards.
"Yes, it is." And with that, he hops off the desk and makes his way to the door.
"He's not going to let you keep it!" Ed shouts after him, even though Al is already gone.
Alfons prefers to work in the lecture hall, and Al gets halfway down to him before he looks up. He smiles when he sees Al approaching, pats the chair next to him in invitation.
"Hi," Alfons says belatedly, when Al places a kiss to his temple before taking the proffered chair.
"I brought you something," Al tells him, offering him the bag.
"Oh, thank God," Alfons says. "I'm starving."
Al sits with him while he eats, chatting about Al's research and Alfons' latest designs, anecdotes about students and library patrons.
"Well, I should head back," Al says after almost an hour has passed. "And let you get back to work."
"Hmm," Alfons agrees. He leans in to give Al a soft kiss on the lips. "Thank you for the food."
"Of course," Al says, following Alfons' lips for another quick kiss.
"You still can't keep the cat," Alfons says.
Al leaves without another word.
Ed get home first one day and walks into their flat to find Rebis perched on their counter, glowing eyes fixed menacingly on the ball of grey fur currently sleeping right below him.
The cat turns his lamplight eyes on Ed when he comes in, and Ed takes in the scene with a frown.
"Behave, you," he tells Rebis sternly, glaring when the cat just cocks his head like he understands but refuses to listen.
He wouldn't dare admit it to either Alfons or his brother, but he's become strangely fond of both animals: The way Wernher greets him when he comes home and rests his head on Ed's knee when Ed's sat at the kitchen table; the way Rebis curls against his back at night and lounges on their sofa during the day, filling up the empty spaces, making their flat a little more of a home.
"I mean it," he adds for emphasis, pointing a finger at Rebis.
Rebis meows in a stubborn sort of way, but hops off the counter all the same.
"You still," Al huffs out between labored breaths, "have to get rid....of the dog. Fuck, Al," he finishes to the ceiling, head thrown back and fingers wound tight in both the sheets and in Alfons' hair.
Alfons just takes him deeper, hollowing his cheeks, taking shallow breaths through his nose.
"Al, fuck, I'm-" is all the warning Alfons gets before Al's coming down the back of his throat.
(One thing that Alfons loves-absolutely adores-about the Elrics is how alike they are, when you get them separately. They may play off one another when they're together, complete each other, temper and encourage each other, but when they're apart? They're exactly the same: It's just that you don't get them apart very often, so very few people know this. But Edward is actually cooler, much more collected, when he doesn't have Alphonse to react to; Alphonse, for his part, is sloppy, more rebellious, more crude, when he doesn't have Ed to look after).
(This is nowhere more obvious than when Alfons manages to get them in bed alone; and whenever they're done, he calculates the differences, adds up the little Elric idiosyncrasies that you only ever see when you're only getting half of the picture; and it's times like those when Alfons can't help but smile and shake his head because they are such brothers, and he loves them both more than he ever would have imagined).
Hence Alfons notes the unusual profanity, the painful and careless tightening of Al's grip in his hair, and can't help but smile around Al's cock. This, of course, only results in him losing focus and choking, Al's come sliding down his chin in slow rivulets. He pulls off when Al finishes, his body sinking back into the sheets, boneless.
"Fucking look at you," Al says to him, as Alfons wipes his chin with the back of his hand, licking it a moment later. "Get," he bites out, "up here. Now."
Alfons obeys him immediately, crawling up Al's body until he can collapse on top of him, chest to chest. He's still hard, distractingly so, and he ruts against Al's hip in mindless little movements while Al tips his face up to kiss him.
Al spreads his legs at the same time, lets Alfons settle between them, and he pushes up into Alfons' thrusts, causing Alfons to break the kiss with a muttered "Fuck" to his cheek.
"C'mon, Al," Alphonse whispers, breath hot on the shell of Alfons' ear. "C'mon," he says more forcefully, offset with a particularly brutal twist of his hips, and he feels Alfons's muscles contract under his hands, between his legs, and Alfons' come is a wet, hot mess between their bodies.
"Shit," is all Al says when Alfons rolls off of him, scooping up one of their discarded shirts to wipe them down with. They're both already half-asleep, always more drowsy when they're together anyway, and when Alfons blinks awake not twenty minutes later, Al still asleep beside him, Rebis stares back at him from his perch on Alfons' chest.
Ed comes into their bedroom to find Alfons and his brother tucked haphazardly under the sheets, the air smelling like sex.
Alfons gives him a lazy wave, gesturing him over. Ed goes gladly, stripping off his vest and belt and squeezing in next to him, tucking himself under Alfons' arm.
"Al still asleep?" Ed asks, even though it's fairly obvious by the way he's motionless, completely dead to the world. He doesn't know what it means that he's sleeping longer than Alfons, if it means anything at all.
"Yes," Alfons answers him, and they both look over at him, watch him sleep for a long moment, all soft smiles and gentle eyes.
Ed leans in to give Alfons a quick kiss. "I'm gonna shower before dinner. You wanna join?" he asks, not suggestively, this time-just curious.
"No," Alfons answers softly. "I'll stay here until he wakes," he adds, nodding his head towards Alphonse.
Ed may not fully understand the bond between the two of them, what caused it or what it's doing to them, but he loves them for it all the same, is unspeakably happy that they have each other, no matter what may come of it.
"Okay," Ed smiles, leaning back down for another kiss.
It is then, of course, that Rebis pokes his head out from under the sheets, from where he'd been quite contentedly curled up between Al and Alfons' bodies, meowing loudly.
Alfons reaches out to scratch behind his ears without thinking, and looks up to find Ed staring at him, eyebrows raised incredulously.
"What?" Alfons asks airily. "He's sort of cute."
Not two weeks later, Ed finds Alphonse rewarding Wernher with table scraps, saying things like "Sit!" and "Good boy."
"What?" Al asks, when Ed clears his throat dramatically, announcing both his presence and his skepticism. "I'm training him," Al explains unnecessarily. "He's actually sort of cute, isn't he?"
The flat isn't big enough for the five of them; it was never even really big enough for the three of them. Rebis takes up too much space in their bed and Wernher sleeps in the most inconvenient places; they're both too loud for the three of them to get any work done at home and they're always underfoot, getting tripped on, not to mention shedding all over the furniture.
Al still favors the cat and Alfons still pays more attention to the dog, but they work, the five of them. They find a rhythm, fall into a routine, and weave around each other with an easy sort of grace.
And it's not perfect-far from it, really-because Alfons still wakes up coughing and Al still sleeps like the dead and the news gets less and less hopeful by the day and there is still nothing there when Ed claps; but he considers himself lucky all the same, because he has this, their little flat and their animals and each other to come home to, and there are days now when he doesn't worry that it's all too good to be true.
DW post here. Comment there? |