FMA Big Bang 3

[xeviscerax]

Chapter Three

It wasn’t the pain that woke him; pain was just what he was, now. He breathed it, slept it, could feel it around and inside him every moment of every day. It wasn’t the cold, either; he couldn’t feel cold any more than he could not feel pain.

It was the light. There was just so much of it, it smothered him, flowed behind his eyelids and scorched itself into his brain. It was heavy, a bright cocoon blanket of the exact opposite of what he’d known for so long. It was an alien touch and he couldn’t simply ignore it. There was no getting away from it. And it seemed to make the pain worse without the pain actually being worse. He tried to writhe away from it, hide from the all-consuming invasion of it. The longer he felt it on his skin, the more he panicked. His breathing picked up, calling up a phantom ache in his throat, sandpaper striking a match down to his lungs.

“Easy now,” a voice called out from the light. “Just take it easy, you’re safe now, there’s no one to hurt you here.”

A woman’s voice. He didn’t know who she was, why she was talking to him in such a tender voice, why her cool, gentle hands were pressing him down to the soft mattress at his back. It had been so long since he’d heard a woman’s voice he almost didn’t believe the words she said. There was always someone trying to hurt him. He was never safe. They just gave him enough time to catch his breath and maybe heal up a little before they came back for him.

He tried to tell the woman to get her hands off of him and the strange tickling against the roof of his mouth startled him into sudden stillness. He moved his tongue behind his teeth and felt that strange tickle again, couldn’t think of what it could be.

“There now, shhhh.” The woman’s voice again, hand patting against his hair, one still holding his flesh shoulder down in case he began his struggles again. “See, no one’s going to hurt you here. Can you open your eye for me, Edward? I know you’re awake, can you look at me?”

Could he? He didn’t want to. There was too much light, it hurt even through his eyelids, he could feel the sting of it in his sinuses. But maybe...

There, a sliver of white between wary lids. He saw a glimpse of a chair leg and the corner of a cabinet before the light forced his eye closed again. The woman made encouraging sounds at him and patted his shoulder, like he’d done so much more than crack his eye open for a fraction of a second. To be honest, it hadn’t actually been so bad. He could maybe... try again...

It took a few minutes, his brain was so used to nothing but darkness that it wanted to cringe away from the light, but eventually, he was able to flutter his eyes open.

Except...

Something wasn’t right. It took him a few moments to realize what it was, but when he did...

“No! Edward, no! Calm down! Shhhh! Shhh...,” the woman beside him put both hands back on his shoulders to keep him from falling to the floor in his panicked flailing.

There was no problem keeping his eye open now, it was wide-staring rolling in its socket and yet actually seeing very little. The fire was back down his throat again, and fuck that weird tickle in his mouth but he needed to talk, he needed to scream-

My eye, my eye you sick fucks what the fuck did you take my eye for-?

What actually came out of his mouth was much less eloquent but no less horrified. In his unthinking panic, he tried to reach up with his one remaining hand, touch the evidence, assure his brain that it wasn’t just remembering an old nightmare but that his eye was really gone-

The pain that erupted both in his hand and the side of his head was almost enough to make him vomit. It stopped his struggling long enough for the woman to push him back down to the bed, and now she was yelling something at someone else. Edward couldn’t understand her through the pain and nausea and the black-red strobing light where his other eye should be.

“Edward, calm down, you’re going to hurt yourself.” That voice was calm now, trying to sooth him, but now it just made him angry. Hurt himself? He was already hurt! What did it matter anymore? He made a token attempt at shrugging her hands off, but, as gentle as they were, they were much stronger than he was. “That’s it, just calm down. Edward, you’re safe, I promise. Just take it easy, we won’t hurt you.”

Shut up, shut up! I don’t care, just stop talking-

“He’s awake already?” A new voice, gruff, male. Edward twisted his face away from it, curling his body into itself as much as he could. How many were there? In the dark he didn’t care how many there were, but the light shone on every part of him, he couldn’t hide, they couldn’t help but see and that just made him panic more. Burning breaths down his throat and a horrid, thumping pulse in his head, matched moments later by the bandaged, splinted mess of his hand. “Edward.”

A large, warm hand held the unbandaged side of his face. He couldn’t help but flinch. The hand turned his face back towards the light, implacable and unrelenting as a machine, and Ed was forced to squint his eyes against the brightness. He wouldn’t open his eye; didn’t want to see this new face at all. Just another one, telling him it was alright now, he wouldn’t be hurt. They had no idea...

Fingers were prying his eyelids apart, more light than there had ever been in the world was shone directly into the pupil. Struggling did no good, his body moved, but that hand held his head in perfect stillness. He couldn’t look away, the light was everywhere-

Then gone. A little click and the world went dark again. Voices over his head, talking about dosages and blood loss and the woman apologizing and telling the gruff voice she didn’t want him to overdose. It all went through his head, never making any connection to anything to do with him. Edward just lay, blinking stunned up at the ceiling. Breathing hurt in a way that his body would actually acknowledge as pain. His throat was as raw as the meat hung in Teacher’s shop window, dripping blood down his throat. He swallowed, and oh hell, that hurt worse. He craved water, but even the thought of swallowing that much made his stomach twist.

“-the hell is going on that this is what we have coming in here now, under Bradley I wouldn’t be surprised but-”

“Doctor! He’s right there!”

“-and military in my waiting room, looks like a fucking-”

“Doctor!” Hissed now, frantic and scandalized “I will adjust his dosage, Doctor, I will take care of everything. Please.”

There was a huff, a shuffling of feet and the sound of a door clicking shut followed by such quiet Ed thought maybe they’d both left. A sigh and light footsteps told him otherwise, as the woman (must be a nurse to talk back to a doctor like that) did something with the I.V. attached to his arm. He still didn’t want to open his eye (eye, eye, singular, he only would ever have the one, now) to the room, still too bright, too clean, too normal for him to feel comfortable seeing it.

“I’m sorry about Dr. Peirce, Edward,” the woman said, gently, as if to speak to him like a normal person might somehow damage him more. Ed squeezed his eye tighter and felt the pull of stitches across his face. “He’s really a very good doctor, but he used to be military and... well, sometimes he treats us like we were, too. I know he can be gruff, but there’s none better.”

He didn’t care, he didn’t care, he just wished she would stop using that tone of voice with him, it made him feel...

As broken and pathetic as he really was, actually. A heavy sigh fell from him before he could think to stifle it, and of course, it drew her attention. Of course.

“Edward? I know you’re in pain, I’ve given you something for it, you should start feeling better any moment now. Do you need anything? I can get you something to drink, the doctor said I shouldn’t give you too much, your throat is... But a few sips would be alright.”

He was so focused on her babbling that the feel of her hand pushing the hair back from his face startled him into opening his eyes (eye) and he got his first actual look at the woman he only knew by voice. He guessed she was pretty, she wasn’t ugly, Ed was never a very good judge of that kind of thing, people were just people whatever they looked like. She had light brown hair, almost blonde, a few shades lighter than his mother’s, but much shorter, skimming the edge of her jaw. The hat she wore just made her look ridiculous, what was the point of them and he’d never really known what it was that made them stay on, there must be pins or something, and oh... she was smiling at him now, he must be staring. And yeah, now that he was looking and now that she was smiling, he guessed she really was kind of pretty, and yeah, okay, maybe he did sometimes notice things like that, but really what did it matter?

It took him a moment to realize that he was probably really very high right now. He must be high, why else would he be letting some random woman pet him like a cat and give him that amused look like she knew exactly how high he was? He didn’t say anything, he couldn’t really, just gave a slow blink and hoped that communicated that, yes, actually, a little water wouldn’t go amiss, and by the way, do you have a boyfriend?

Yes, he was definitely high.

Waiting rooms were good for something, at least. The blinding, boiling rage had reduced to a slow simmer; still just as strong, but a controlled burn that he could actually use, bend to his will. Roy Mustang angry was a force to be reckoned with, and he was going to remind everyone who seemed to have forgotten that. He’d burned a homunculus to nothing but a puddle, without his gloves. He didn’t think it would take much to put the fear back into them at the mention of the Flame Alchemist.

Now that he was thinking more clearly, Roy was beginning to question certain things, not the least of which was why the hell Abrams had been there in the first place. The raid was under Mustang’s command, no one over the rank of Colonel should have even been involved, in the grand scheme of things, routing a splinter cell of some of Bradley’s old hangers-on and retrieving a captured alchemist should have been a trifling thing to be noted, signed off on and filed with the rest of the paperwork. It didn’t add up.

Hawkeye shifted in the uncomfortable plastic seat she’d been occupying when he and Havoc had arrived still bloody and disheveled and pissed off. Roy remembered then that she’d been there for a good hour and a half before they had, and hadn’t said much of anything to either of them other than to tell them no, she hadn’t heard anything on Fullmetal’s condition and that perhaps they would like to clean up, the restroom was just down the hall, sir. He and Havoc had gone to clean off the blood and grime and the sick stench of horror from their hands and try to clean it from their minds with stale, burnt coffee from the waiting room station. Jean’s hair was wet, he’d had to rinse the blood out of it the best he could in the washroom sink. Under the harsh fluorescent lights, he looked tired and sickly with dark circles like bruises beneath his eyes the only color to his face. Roy guessed he probably didn’t look much better, but couldn’t be sure, he’d avoided looking at his reflection too much in the mirror.

Roy’s coffee had gone cold in his hand. He hardly noticed, too focused on Edward just down the hall possibly not doing so very well and maybe even possibly dying, and here Roy sat useless as anyone ever felt sitting in a waiting room. It had been too long since any of them had spoken for it to be anything but awkward when he broke the silence, but something else had just occurred to him and it needed outing.

“As soon as we learn about Fullmetal’s condition,” he began, voice an ungraceful croak of too much rage and not enough breath, “someone will need to notify Alphonse.”

He felt both of his lieutenants tense at his words. Jean tugged the front of his hair with a grimace, and after a moment Riza let out a sigh of a breath she must have been holding. He didn’t blame them, he wasn’t looking forward to having to tell Edward’s newly-flesh brother what they’d found tonight. The boy had been distraught - no, to be perfectly accurate, he’d been hysterical - when Ed had first gone missing. Roy could still remember his high, panicked voice choking down the telephone line asking him all sorts of questions to which there simply were no answers.

He’d been on a routine stake-out keeping tabs on someone Roy suspected of conspiring with the splinter cell of Bradleyists. He’d called in at his appointed check-in time with nothing to report, and when Breda had arrived at the old, worn-down apartment to relieve him, he’d been gone. It was clear he hadn’t gone quietly; broken furniture was scattered everywhere, there was a long gouge up the wall - probably from Ed’s transmuted automail blade - and bloodstains on the kitchen linoleum. No footprints of the abductors, no clues whatsoever that anyone but Ed and Breda had ever been in the apartment at all. No fingerprints, either, which was odd but not entirely unfeasible.

Of course Roy and his team had been worried, but it wasn’t until he’d been missing for over a week with no sign that they began to get frantic. After all, Ed had been in situations like this more times than they could remember, and he’d always turned up a little battered, a little bruised and a lot pissed off, but he’d always turned up. It was Roy’s suggestion that they not tell Al at the beginning, it would only cause him unnecessary worry and yet another distraction Roy really didn’t need. Not only did he now have to find his missing alchemist, but he still had to monitor the movements of the targets and hand in all of the paperwork that entailed so the brass would stay off his back. They weren’t too happy with his stubborn insistence that there were still those out there who were loyal to the Bradley Regime and would do whatever was necessary to get things back the way they had been.

Finally, after three weeks, Roy had been forced to call Alphonse and tell him the truth. No, Ed wasn’t busy with work, no he hadn’t met someone and gotten distracted, Ed was missing in action and Roy didn’t have the slightest idea where he was, though he had a very good idea who might have taken him. That was the only thing that kept Al from trekking all the way from Risembool to look for Ed himself. Roy knew something, and that was a start; he would find his brother, Roy was like a terrier, if he knew even one little fact, he would worry it and gnaw at it until the rest revealed itself, even if he had to get his hands dirty and dig. He would find his brother.

That was months ago. And Roy’s hands were definitely dirty, and not just with Edward’s blood. He wasn’t proud of the tactics he’d employed to get the information on Ed’s captors; in fact he was little better than the people who’d taken him. It was only by bribing a sentry into abandoning his post outside the interrogation room that he’d escaped a military tribunal for assaulting a suspect, but he’d learned what he’d needed to know in less than five minutes, he dared anyone to question him on his methods when this was what they’d been doing to Fullmetal for months.

After that, it was only a matter of detective work and a few off-the-record scouting missions. The abandoned hospital in Old Central was such a cliché Roy hadn’t even entertained it as a possibility at first, but then, terrorists were never very original. Once he’d been sure of the who’s, when’s and where’s, he’d pounced. They never knew what hit them.

And the whole time, from the day he went missing until this very moment sitting in possibly the world’s most uncomfortable waiting room chair, Roy had been dreading actually finding Ed. The looking, he could do. The planning and strategizing and late nights with one ear to the ground and the other glued to the telephone, sending feelers out into the dark of the city, crossing off suspects and circling new ones, all of that he was familiar with. He was good at the looking. It was the finding he couldn’t seem to deal with. He couldn’t decide if that made him a terrible human being, or just human. No one wants to find someone they care about, are responsible for, who trusts you with their lives in a bloody, broken heap with pieces missing.

The coffee was threatening to come back up. Roy swallowed the nausea down, sat back with arms crossed over his chest and glared hard at the toes of his boots. Time to focus on the positive: They found Edward. He was still alive (he hoped). The culprits were in custody. Edward would probably be discharged following his ordeal and need never be put in a situation more dangerous than stubbing his toe, if Roy had any say in it. The worst was over.

You are delusional. Sunshine and flowers the rest of his days, right? Maybe in a perfect world.

So engrossed in arguing with himself and glaring holes through the top of his boot, Roy didn’t even notice the sound of footsteps marching their way until Hawkeye murmured, “Sir, I believe the doctor is coming.”

He didn’t remember telling his body to stand, barely felt it took any effort, as if he were full of helium, a child’s balloon let go. The man approaching them was tall, nearly as tall as Havoc, but older, salt-and-pepper hair cropped close, almost military. His eyes were hard, disdainful things tucked behind pockets of flesh that told of long hours in the sun more than too much smiling. If he was shaken by what he’d seen of Edward’s condition, he didn’t show it.

“I take it you’re his C.O.,” the man said, forgoing any pleasantries to get right to the point. At Roy’s nod, he said simply, “Dr. Peirce.”

“Colonel Roy Mustang.”

“Right, well Colonel, I’m going to be perfectly honest with you. I don’t much care for the miliary being in my hospital, but I took my oaths when I became a field doctor and I meant them, so I can’t throw you out on your asses. We have a very serious situation on our hands and I’m sure you can appreciate the gravity, but I’m going to say this now so we’re all clear. That kid in there - and you can’t tell me he’s anything but a snot-nosed brat, I know who the Fullmetal Alchemist is, I read the papers - is my patient, first and always, and I will not have the military sticking their noses in. If I tell you something is for his own good, it very damn well is and to hell with your god damn protocol. I will not have uniforms stalking my ward and barking orders left and right, this is a hospital, not military headquarters, and if I hear so much as one complaint from any of my staff -”

“Doctor,” Mustang interrupted, holding up a hand to forestall any more of the man’s angry ranting, “first, let me tell you how much I appreciate you looking after Major Elric. I know this is not something anyone likes to see, and I’m grateful you take your duties seriously. As for the military, I can guarantee you, no one under my orders would ever think to undermine Edward’s treatment or recovery. You have my word, Doctor, no one wants to see Edward recover more than my team and I.”

The doctor scowled, digesting this, then nodded. “Fair enough. The next few weeks will be hard enough without all of that mess.”

“Indeed,” Roy agreed. “What can you tell us about his condition?” How much of him is left?

“Right to the point, huh?” Peirce looked behind him at the main desk; the reptilian head nurse was watching them intently. Turning back, he nodded his head in the direction of the hallway. “Come to my office, we’ll discuss this there.”

Door closed and the doctor seated behind his desk, he opened a folder and flipped through pages; it was all very professional and infuriating. Roy just wanted to know what was going on with Fullmetal, he could feel his fingers itching to press together. Finally, the doctor sighed and looked him straight in the eye.

“You strike me as a man who doesn’t like going in circles around things, so I’m going to tell you straight. Good news first, though. Your kid looks like he’ll pull through.”

Roy wanted to crumple in relief; behind him, Havoc flopped into a chair, and Hawkeye let her eyes fall closed with a tight little sigh that could almost have become a sob if she’d had any less control. Roy unclenched his jaw and could feel his pulse in his teeth. Peirce took in their obvious relief with an unreadable expression; Roy wondered what he’d thought their reactions would be.

“I can’t tell you how relieved I am to hear that, Doctor,” he said.

“Don’t worry, there’s still the bad news to get through. And I’m sorry to say, Colonel, that it is bad.” He looked down at his papers. “Since you’re his commanding officer, I’m allowed to divulge certain medical information to you, and as long as your two friends keep their mouths shut, I won’t kick them out to say what I need to say. It’s not a pretty piece.”

Roy looked to his lieutenants; Havoc stood straight again and Hawkeye returned his stare with one of her own. They’d come this far, there was no point in keeping anything from them. He nodded to the doctor.

The litany made him dizzy. There was just so much to take in. Roy couldn’t be sure if he heard it all, the sound of blood rushing in his ears drowned out anything else. It seemed Dr. Peirce had decided to be as clinical and straightforward as possible in his briefing of Edward’s condition. It was obvious he was trying to get through it quickly, but the list was rather long and Roy didn’t think he’d be able to stand and listen much longer.

“We’re keeping him sedated for now,” Dr. Peirce was saying when Roy could finally hear him again. “We’ve cleaned and patched him up as well as we can. If you like, I can let one of you in to see him, so long as he isn’t disturbed.” The doctor’s gruff demeanor seemed to have evaporated since their first meeting, and he seemed almost benevolent. Roy wondered what had changed.

“You should look in on him, Colonel,” Riza spoke up. “I’ll go back to Headquarters and get started on my report. I’ll send someone with a fresh uniform for you, sir.”

It was so ingrained in their interactions that Riza basically gave herself her own orders that Roy didn’t even question when she turned on her heel and exited the office, though he didn’t make mention of the curious glistening in her eyes. Jean mumbled something in the same vein and scrambled after Riza, leaving the Colonel standing in front of the doctor’s desk like a child caught out misbehaving.

“Well, I believe you have your orders, Colonel,” Dr. Peirce deadpanned.

The lights were dimmed, soft shadows fell across the still form lying on the bed. Ed's chest rose and fell slowly with his breathing; Roy could feel the guilt thumping in his chest with every soft exhale. Dr. Peirce had told him he'd been sedated, pumped so full of pain killers that he probably wouldn't even recognize him had he been awake. It looked so much like true sleep Roy could almost imagine that the bandages covering him were illusions, what they covered non-existent. A shaky breath fell from him with the realization that this was probably the first time in months that Ed wasn't feeling pain in some way.

His feet didn't want to move from their spot anchoring him to the floor, but he forced them to move, the sound of his boots obscenely loud in the otherwise silent room. The closer he got, the more damaged Ed looked, but he would force himself to endure the sight. After all, it was his fault Ed ended up like this; he'd only been on the assignment in the first place because Mustang himself had insisted. He knew very well this could happen, he'd warned all of his operatives of the risks involved, but there was no excuse for this. He'd put Edward out there, and here was where he'd ended up.

The left side of Edward's face was swaddled in bandages (... excised his left eye) and a dark bruise colored his jaw just below his right ear (...possible mandibular fracture). A clear plastic oxygen mask covered most of what the bandages didn't (... he stopped breathing and we had to scramble to get him started again). His collarbones were far too prominent (... malnutrition, borderline starvation, dehydration), and Roy could see even more bandages disappearing beneath the loose collar of his light blue hospital gown (... various burns, possibly from a hand-held welding torch). His left hand was bound in a cast, with a wicked-looking contraption piercing his flesh at each knuckle (... we thought we might have to amputate), the tips of his fingers were covered in gauze (... fingernails forcibly removed). His hand lay at his side, palm up. To Roy, it looked like an accusation, as if he were asking why he'd let this happen to him. The I.V. line disappeared into the crook of his elbow; the only part of him left seemingly uninjured, and they'd had to puncture him there to help save his life. If that wasn't the very definition of irony...



Suddenly, Roy's legs didn't want to support the rest of him anymore. He reached out blindly and pulled the nearest chair to him. The legs scraped noisily across the floor. Edward didn't even twitch. Roy flopped into the chair, as if the bones in his legs had simply dissolved into nothing. Ed continued to breathe, and now that he was closer, Roy could hear the painful wheezing of his ruined throat.

Roy's hands were shaking; he didn't notice until he tried covering his eyes to block out the sight of the broken thing lying in front of him. He was suddenly glad that Riza and Jean had made him come in here alone. He hadn't wanted to face this by himself, but he didn't think he'd be able to keep himself together in front of anyone right now.

With a few deep breaths pulled from between his palms, Roy felt himself calm, unwilling to admit even to himself that he'd been fighting tears he hadn't shed since Maes Hughes' funeral. Ed wasn't dead, he wasn't and he wouldn't be, the doctor had assured him Ed would pull through. So there was no reason to cry, he was just tired, overworked, over-stressed and under-caffeinated. This hospital had shitty coffee, really, he should find whoever was in charge and complain.

Ed breathed on. The clock on the other side of the room ticked. Someone down the corridor cleared their throat. Roy put his head in his hands and leaned his elbows on his knees.

Why was he here? Any other Colonel would have gone home, possibly had a drink or two and then gone to bed and let everything sort itself out. Edward was found, he was alive, he was being well-taken care of by a doctor who would shout down a General if he thought it would do Ed any good. What was he doing here, tearing himself up over one kid who - he had no illusions over this - couldn't even stand to be in the same room with him?

But then, he knew the answer to that. The Roy Mustang Guilt Complex was just as well-developed as the Edward Elric version. He'd let Ed down, he'd let his brother down, hell, he'd even go so far as to say he'd let himself down. He took pride in his ability to keep his people safe, and safe had not been where Ed had been found.

The scene in the abandoned hospital flashed in his mind's eye, unbidden and horribly vivid. So much blood, how could a person lose that much blood and still be alive...?

He could feel his gorge rising and sat up quickly, blinked up at the ceiling with a grimace and swallowed back the nausea. Another thing to keep him awake at night, like he needed more of those. He looked back at Ed, still breathing, still and peaceful like Roy knew he wasn't. He suddenly wondered if Ed was dreaming and felt sick all over again with guilt. What the hell was he complaining about nightmares for? Ed was the one who'd had to endure everything, he'd only been there for the aftermath.

And he’d tried to kill himself. Roy couldn’t believe it when the doctor told him, thought he must have been mistaken, it was a seizure, that was all, an accident.

(“No, Colonel. Believe me, it was quite deliberate.”)

What kind of hell had Ed known to warrant that last resort? After everything he’d been through, for him to give up like that, to facilitate his own death...

Without thinking, Roy reached out to the bed, his hand hovering over Ed's arm. For a moment, he wondered if the touch would wake him, and then he wondered if there was any spot on Ed that it wouldn't hurt to touch. In the end, the touch never landed; Roy dropped his hand to the bed, nearly brushing the skin of Ed's arm, close enough to feel his heat, and nothing else.

"I'm so sorry, Edward," he whispered to the still form. He rested his head on his crooked elbow and blinked up at Ed's face, hoping for any sign he'd heard.

When the nurse on night duty arrived to change Ed's bandages, she was greeted by the sight of the Colonel slumped over the side of her patient's bed, snoring softly. She would tell the other nurses in the break room later, it was the cutest thing she'd ever seen a grown man do.