A Beach Trip With Elrics, part 1/6
Title: A Beach Trip With Elrics, part 1/6
Rating: PG
Genre: AU, crack, fluff
Pairing: Hei + Ed
Length: 1561 words (+ 1 picture)
Author: kalikamaxwell
Artist: ketita
Summary: Edward is sent in search of a mad alchemist and encounters the mad alchemist's fishy victims.
Note: Entirely ketita's fault. The original picture was posted here.
There were many things Edward hated. Drowning was one of them. Oh, he hadn't drowned yet, but he had the suspicion it was close at hand. He'd learned to swim in a lake, not in an ocean, and he'd never been trained to swim through a storm big enough to sink a ship, which he was currently trying to do anyway.
His muscles ached with the strain but the moment he stopped fighting was the moment he would disappear under the surface and sink to the bottom, just like the ship had done mere minutes ago. Or what he thought were minutes. There was no time in a storm of this magnitude, only water and air and trying to keep above the first to breathe the second.
He knew the official map: there was no known land nearby. But there might be an island. He'd been sent to find this island without knowing whether there was anything interesting on it and, at the time, hadn't really cared whether he found it or not.
Right now, he cared very much.
He was breathing more water than air now, his movements growing erratic. No island, only water, water, and more bloody water. His body gave up before his mind: he told it to move but it wouldn't, turned to lead. Like lead, it sank.
He looked upward all the while. The air was up there. He needed that air. He needed--
"Waah!"
There are many ways to wake up after nearly drowning. Edward chose screaming out and falling off whatever he'd been on and into cold, salty water.
"Waah!" he repeated, flailing.
Brain cells began to function, informing him of several things all at once: the thing he'd fallen off was a rock, he'd fallen into the ocean and he hadn't in fact had a nightmare. The boat had really sunk, and he was really alone in the middle of the ocean.
But he wasn't quite dead yet, and that was a little strange. He climbed back onto the tiny rock that must have saved his life and coughed out water.
Then he choked on some of said water, realizing he wasn't alone. A blonde young man about his age was watching him from the water with a puzzled expression. Edward thought the puzzlement should belong to him: he was a perfectly normal human, nothing to puzzle anyone, while this other guy... Edward had never met a guy with a fish tail before.
"Oh great," he groaned. "Lack of oxygen damaged my brain. I've gone insane."
Edward settled on the rock, pulling his legs up to keep his feet out of the water. He tried to pretend there wasn't a fish person in the water (it was probably a hallucination) and surveyed his surroundings. He was unsurprised and rather depressed to find out there was water, water, and some more water. The sea was calm now and there was no trace of the ship or of any survivors. The ship's crew had been quite small and he hadn’t been able to befriend them because he did not speak Cretan and they spoke very little Amestrian, but he regretted that his mission had caused their death. If Colonel Stupid hadn't sent him off to find some forgotten island off the coast of Creta where some crazy alchemist may or may not have been deported fifty years ago, this wouldn't have happened!
He sighed and dropped his head in his hands. It was sunny and warm, which was pleasant, but the same warmth was making him thirsty. He could have transmuted the salt out of seawater, but he didn’t have anywhere to put some water to transmute it and he couldn’t transmute the whole sea. At this rate, he was due for an even more unpleasant death than drowning.
Hands touched his leg. He looked down and found fish-guy patting him comfortingly and making strange sounds that seemed more likely to have come from a dolphin than a half-human. The touch seemed quite real...
Scientific curiosity kicked into gear. Was this guy for real? He paid closer attention: yes, the upper half of the creature's body was perfectly human, and the bottom half was a long, green tail with fins at the end. The transition was flawless, from pale skin to green scales.
Details of the mission file came back to his mind. He'd been sent after a man named Sanders Miles, who had been exiled to some remote island for performing forbidden acts of alchemy on humans...
"You have got to be kidding me," he said. "You're a functional water chimera? Who the hell would mix people and fish?" Unwelcome memories came to mind. If there had been an alchemist sick and mad enough to experiment on his wife and his daughter, there could certainly be a sick bastard alchemist to try to mix people and fish. A sick bastard alchemist who visibly hadn't been alone on his island, wherever it was.
Edward forced his thoughts away from Nina’s fate with some difficulties, instead directing his mind to recover memories from the previous night’s storm and his almost drowning. Yes, he did seem to remember someone pulling him away just before he passed out. He hadn’t randomly found this rock then: he’d been brought to it. This chimera meant him well.
Hope swelled in Edward’s mind. “Hey, um, you. I really appreciate you saving me and all, but how about taking me back to land? Any land?” The chimera looked up at him with wide blue eyes, still caressing his legs with his hands. “Um, why are you looking at me that way? Do you even understand what I’m saying?” He assumed that a chimera created by a man from Amestris would understand his language but he couldn’t be sure how smart this chimera was: some human chimeras were people with a little extra while others had no more intelligence than animals.
His stomach chose this moment to growl. The sound seemed to startle the chimera, who pushed away and disappeared underwater. “No, wait! Come back!”
For several desperate minutes, Edward scanned the water around his rock. The chimera had to come back!
And he did, reappearing with a great splash and---a squid. Which he handed over to Edward with a dolphin-like chirp.
“Thanks but no thanks. I’m not that hungry.”
A crestfallen look appeared on the chimera’s face. Edward felt bad for about two seconds, right before the squid tried to attack his face.
“Waah!”
The chimera had to rescue him from the damn thing, prying it off and throwing it away. He no longer looked sad, only amused.
“Stop laughing at me,” Edward said. He looked around at the empty sea and sighed. “So what about that land? I really, really need to get to land or I’ll die. I can’t live in the sea, you know.”
The chimera nodded and looked downward. Edward followed his gaze just in time to see another blond head emerge from the sea. This time it was a female, complete with very, very female breasts. Very naked female breasts.
Edward hid his eyes as a blood gathered in his face. “You could wear clothes!” His own logic politely disagreed: salty water would certainly destroy any clothing these chimeras might like to wear and shells wouldn’t be very comfortable.
He was then very rudely dragged into the sea by four hands.
“Waah!” he said once again.
Both holding one of his arms, the chimeras swam away, keeping their heads-and his-above water. The male one was making a stream of sounds but the female only answered once and on a cranky tone that even Edward understood. The male chimera was quiet after that, but did offer him a smile.
The ride went on for some time. There was something growing on the horizon, something that turned out to be an island. They eventually reached it. Edward calculated it had taken roughly an hour and a half to get there. He gratefully crawled on the warm sand and lay there, rubbing his arms where the chimeras had held him tightly. Land! He was saved. Here he would find drinkable water, and food that he wouldn’t have to eat alive.
There was a chirp from nearby. Edward opened his eyes and found the male chimera had crawled on the sand beside him. He was lying on his stomach, his tail moving up and down in what might have been an unconscious swimming motion.
“Thanks,” Edward said. “I guess you do understand. But the vocal cords don’t let you speak my language, huh?”
Chirp.
“I’ll take that as a yes. Name’s Edward, by the way.”
There was a moment of pause, the chimera’s throat moving. Then he said, with some difficulty, “’fons.”
“Okay. Nice to meet you, Fons. Now I need to find some water…”
Edward pulled himself up and started walking up the beach and toward the trees. If there was vegetation, there was water somewhere. The sand was a little too hot on his bare feet but he supposed he’d have to get used to it: the only clothing he still had were his pants, and he didn’t know how long he would be stranded here. Oh, Colonel Stupid would certainly make Creta send help, Edward just wasn’t sure how long it would take. Stupid politics.
Rating: PG
Genre: AU, crack, fluff
Pairing: Hei + Ed
Length: 1561 words (+ 1 picture)
Author: kalikamaxwell
Artist: ketita
Summary: Edward is sent in search of a mad alchemist and encounters the mad alchemist's fishy victims.
Note: Entirely ketita's fault. The original picture was posted here.
There were many things Edward hated. Drowning was one of them. Oh, he hadn't drowned yet, but he had the suspicion it was close at hand. He'd learned to swim in a lake, not in an ocean, and he'd never been trained to swim through a storm big enough to sink a ship, which he was currently trying to do anyway.
His muscles ached with the strain but the moment he stopped fighting was the moment he would disappear under the surface and sink to the bottom, just like the ship had done mere minutes ago. Or what he thought were minutes. There was no time in a storm of this magnitude, only water and air and trying to keep above the first to breathe the second.
He knew the official map: there was no known land nearby. But there might be an island. He'd been sent to find this island without knowing whether there was anything interesting on it and, at the time, hadn't really cared whether he found it or not.
Right now, he cared very much.
He was breathing more water than air now, his movements growing erratic. No island, only water, water, and more bloody water. His body gave up before his mind: he told it to move but it wouldn't, turned to lead. Like lead, it sank.
He looked upward all the while. The air was up there. He needed that air. He needed--
"Waah!"
There are many ways to wake up after nearly drowning. Edward chose screaming out and falling off whatever he'd been on and into cold, salty water.
"Waah!" he repeated, flailing.
Brain cells began to function, informing him of several things all at once: the thing he'd fallen off was a rock, he'd fallen into the ocean and he hadn't in fact had a nightmare. The boat had really sunk, and he was really alone in the middle of the ocean.
But he wasn't quite dead yet, and that was a little strange. He climbed back onto the tiny rock that must have saved his life and coughed out water.
Then he choked on some of said water, realizing he wasn't alone. A blonde young man about his age was watching him from the water with a puzzled expression. Edward thought the puzzlement should belong to him: he was a perfectly normal human, nothing to puzzle anyone, while this other guy... Edward had never met a guy with a fish tail before.
"Oh great," he groaned. "Lack of oxygen damaged my brain. I've gone insane."
Edward settled on the rock, pulling his legs up to keep his feet out of the water. He tried to pretend there wasn't a fish person in the water (it was probably a hallucination) and surveyed his surroundings. He was unsurprised and rather depressed to find out there was water, water, and some more water. The sea was calm now and there was no trace of the ship or of any survivors. The ship's crew had been quite small and he hadn’t been able to befriend them because he did not speak Cretan and they spoke very little Amestrian, but he regretted that his mission had caused their death. If Colonel Stupid hadn't sent him off to find some forgotten island off the coast of Creta where some crazy alchemist may or may not have been deported fifty years ago, this wouldn't have happened!
He sighed and dropped his head in his hands. It was sunny and warm, which was pleasant, but the same warmth was making him thirsty. He could have transmuted the salt out of seawater, but he didn’t have anywhere to put some water to transmute it and he couldn’t transmute the whole sea. At this rate, he was due for an even more unpleasant death than drowning.
Hands touched his leg. He looked down and found fish-guy patting him comfortingly and making strange sounds that seemed more likely to have come from a dolphin than a half-human. The touch seemed quite real...
Scientific curiosity kicked into gear. Was this guy for real? He paid closer attention: yes, the upper half of the creature's body was perfectly human, and the bottom half was a long, green tail with fins at the end. The transition was flawless, from pale skin to green scales.
Details of the mission file came back to his mind. He'd been sent after a man named Sanders Miles, who had been exiled to some remote island for performing forbidden acts of alchemy on humans...
"You have got to be kidding me," he said. "You're a functional water chimera? Who the hell would mix people and fish?" Unwelcome memories came to mind. If there had been an alchemist sick and mad enough to experiment on his wife and his daughter, there could certainly be a sick bastard alchemist to try to mix people and fish. A sick bastard alchemist who visibly hadn't been alone on his island, wherever it was.
Edward forced his thoughts away from Nina’s fate with some difficulties, instead directing his mind to recover memories from the previous night’s storm and his almost drowning. Yes, he did seem to remember someone pulling him away just before he passed out. He hadn’t randomly found this rock then: he’d been brought to it. This chimera meant him well.
Hope swelled in Edward’s mind. “Hey, um, you. I really appreciate you saving me and all, but how about taking me back to land? Any land?” The chimera looked up at him with wide blue eyes, still caressing his legs with his hands. “Um, why are you looking at me that way? Do you even understand what I’m saying?” He assumed that a chimera created by a man from Amestris would understand his language but he couldn’t be sure how smart this chimera was: some human chimeras were people with a little extra while others had no more intelligence than animals.
His stomach chose this moment to growl. The sound seemed to startle the chimera, who pushed away and disappeared underwater. “No, wait! Come back!”
For several desperate minutes, Edward scanned the water around his rock. The chimera had to come back!
And he did, reappearing with a great splash and---a squid. Which he handed over to Edward with a dolphin-like chirp.
“Thanks but no thanks. I’m not that hungry.”
A crestfallen look appeared on the chimera’s face. Edward felt bad for about two seconds, right before the squid tried to attack his face.
“Waah!”
The chimera had to rescue him from the damn thing, prying it off and throwing it away. He no longer looked sad, only amused.
“Stop laughing at me,” Edward said. He looked around at the empty sea and sighed. “So what about that land? I really, really need to get to land or I’ll die. I can’t live in the sea, you know.”
The chimera nodded and looked downward. Edward followed his gaze just in time to see another blond head emerge from the sea. This time it was a female, complete with very, very female breasts. Very naked female breasts.
Edward hid his eyes as a blood gathered in his face. “You could wear clothes!” His own logic politely disagreed: salty water would certainly destroy any clothing these chimeras might like to wear and shells wouldn’t be very comfortable.
He was then very rudely dragged into the sea by four hands.
“Waah!” he said once again.
Both holding one of his arms, the chimeras swam away, keeping their heads-and his-above water. The male one was making a stream of sounds but the female only answered once and on a cranky tone that even Edward understood. The male chimera was quiet after that, but did offer him a smile.
The ride went on for some time. There was something growing on the horizon, something that turned out to be an island. They eventually reached it. Edward calculated it had taken roughly an hour and a half to get there. He gratefully crawled on the warm sand and lay there, rubbing his arms where the chimeras had held him tightly. Land! He was saved. Here he would find drinkable water, and food that he wouldn’t have to eat alive.
There was a chirp from nearby. Edward opened his eyes and found the male chimera had crawled on the sand beside him. He was lying on his stomach, his tail moving up and down in what might have been an unconscious swimming motion.
“Thanks,” Edward said. “I guess you do understand. But the vocal cords don’t let you speak my language, huh?”
Chirp.
“I’ll take that as a yes. Name’s Edward, by the way.”
There was a moment of pause, the chimera’s throat moving. Then he said, with some difficulty, “’fons.”
“Okay. Nice to meet you, Fons. Now I need to find some water…”
Edward pulled himself up and started walking up the beach and toward the trees. If there was vegetation, there was water somewhere. The sand was a little too hot on his bare feet but he supposed he’d have to get used to it: the only clothing he still had were his pants, and he didn’t know how long he would be stranded here. Oh, Colonel Stupid would certainly make Creta send help, Edward just wasn’t sure how long it would take. Stupid politics.