Rusted Dawn, Pt. 11
Title: Rusted Dawn
Pairing: Roy/Ed
Rating: NC-17 overall
Summary: It's too close; he's crumbling, and he can't stop the slide into this disaster.
A/N: Good grief, it's been forever, hasn't it? But my horrible move and this chapter are finally complete, and don't I just feel like cheering! Very long one, too, even longer than the last one, so that's part of the reason it took so long to complete. And as always, I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to evil_whimsey for being a superlative beta, my constant cheerleader, and a paragon of patience as I whined and cried and bitched about the writing process. But I'll shut up now; I'm sure you're more interested in reading than listening to my blather. Sorry about the wait- I hope it won't be so long before the next one's ready!
previous chapters
Edward breathes deeply, his sleeping body curled against the Colonel's side, one loose fist tucked beside his open mouth. The hoarse gasping subsided some time ago, drifting into exhaustion and the smooth, slow rhythm of slumber. Mustang holds him close, sometimes awake and sometimes dozing, weariness and relief blending to a strangely energized somnolence that keeps him just on the verge of rest but never tipping completely into it. His side twinges from lying with the weight of automail and densely muscled flesh pinning his arm, but he's reluctant to move. Not when moving risks waking the young man cradled against his chest, finally resting quietly.
Fullmetal has known so little peace in his time. And yet throughout his trials he has remained strong, and Mustang has depended on that strength, and its constancy. He has relied on the purity of Ed's soul, untouched by the filth and evil of the world, lit by the same idealism that once burned in Mustang's own heart.
Despite all the terrible things Fullmetal has done and seen, he had endured. And unlike Roy Mustang, he had seemed unbreakable.
But here, gathered in his arms is the evidence that Edward is just as human as he. Just as capable of slipping, and being hurt, and though Mustang had caught him last night, their quiet hiatus won't last. It was pain that left him vulnerable last night, but the Colonel has no illusions; Fullmetal's stubborn self-reliance will reemerge, and once the shock clears he will pull away. Mustang is sure of this, and yet he is surprised at how the inevitability pinches his heart tight in his chest.
When did I become so needy, he wonders. I used to be as independent as Edward, as contemptuous of anyone who would attach themselves to me. Where did that go?
Vanished, fled. Escaped through a decade-old door flung wide by accident. Leaving behind a frightened, pale thing that didn't know how much it craved the touch of one who understood.
When he lies with Edward, the desert is so far away.
But Mustang shies away from those thoughts, too close to the ones he wants to avoid. Clings to the lithe body next to him, as though he could pull this transient moment into permanence by the force of his grip. With his face buried in warm, silken hair, inhaling Edward's scent until it envelopes him, he can imagine, for a little longer, that this may yet last.
But it can't, won't. In his arms, Edward shifts just slightly, awakening. Thick lashes beat before parting to reveal gold eyes still dulled by sleep. Slow, lazy blinks, and then the young man stiffens as he realizes where he is, and the Colonel reluctantly loosens his hold, allowing Edward to wriggle from his grasp. Automail rasping, Fullmetal props himself up on his elbows, bright gaze dimmed with suspicion and embarrassment. The aura of grief still hangs about him, muted now, and the cracks that had been so evident earlier are sealing before Mustang's eyes.
“How are you feeling?” Mustang asks, voice pitched low, and his fingers twitch with the suppressed desire to brush away the matted tumble of hair that covers half of Edward's face and fit his palm to the curve of a warm cheek. But Fullmetal draws his head back, skittish, as though he's read something of the Colonel's thoughts from his expression.
“I'm fine,” he replies, the lie obvious, and Mustang sees that although the fractures may be hidden, they still reach deep. He has to ignore the way his soul resonates in sympathy with Edward's pain. He understands that silent suffering all too well.
“All right then,” he agrees quietly.
An awkward silence builds in the bedroom, as Fullmetal studies the ceiling and Mustang watches him from the corner of his eye. There are many things they still need to address, he thinks, and he's considering how to broach the topics when Edward suddenly lurches forward with a curse on his lips. Throwing the sheets back, the battered alchemist flings himself from the bed, nearly toppling to the floor in the process, and begins snatching articles of clothing and dragging them on at breakneck speed.
Mustang jerks upright, mouth opening to speak, but before anything can come out Edward turns to him, his eyes filled with the panicked glaze of a trapped animal. “I have to go,” he pants, pulling hard as his trousers snag on an uncooperative metal joint. “I have to leave, Al-”
“Where is Alphonse?” Mustang interjects, the name striking him with sudden guilt. Why didn't I ask sooner? Though of course Edward would never have come to him this way if his brother was missing, or endangered. “Fullmetal?”
“Hotel,” Edward gasps. “I left him there, waiting for me. I didn't think I'd be gone so long, he'll be worried...”
The confirmation comes as a relief, and Mustang lets out a long sigh. “You have no idea how relieved the office will be. Everyone was so worried about both of you. After Alphonse disappeared- Edward- wait, stop,” he calls, as Edward yanks his shirt from under the bed. “You can't leave like this.”
Translucent eyelids and lurid bruises, automail still making its high-pitched protests. The couple hours of sleep he took at the Colonel's side have refreshed him, but Edward still looks haunted and fragile. Even the angry glare he shoots at the Colonel is more desperate than intimidating.
“I can do whatever the fuck I want,” he snaps. “Al's waiting for me.”
“Be reasonable,” Mustang tells him. “I have a phone. Call the hotel, let him know you're safe. I'll drive you there in the morning myself.”
If anything, the offer seems to frighten Fullmetal. “I can't stay!” he growls, nervous as a stray dog worried that a kick will come with the proffered hand. Shaking his shirt right-side out, he pulls it on with undue haste, ball bearings in his arm screaming like wheels on gravel, shrilling out a strident complaint. He looks ready to flee without shoes or coat, all defensive teeth and flurry of excuses.
“Fullmetal,” Mustang insists. “Don't go.”
One boot pulled on, and Edward peers warily at him through the shield of his hair. He doesn't move to escape, nor does he remove the boot. He simply watches Mustang closely, his breath coming in heaves; the Colonel can see the quick heat building in his face and realizes that for once, Edward doesn't know what he wants. Or rather, is pulled by two opposite desires.
“Equivalent exchange,” he breathes, daring to hope. “I've never asked before. Stay, tonight.”
Edward says nothing, his gaze dropping to the floor as he considers the request, and Mustang prays that he's not misread that moment's hesitation. But when has Edward ever paused when it concerned Alphonse? If it's only his imagination, if that moment of indecision wasn't real, nothing will keep Fullmetal from his brother. But if he's right...
You want this too. Please, want this too.
...if he's right, then he's given Edward the excuse he needs to stay.
It is only when the bright head dips, submitting, that Mustang relaxes. Sliding from the bed, the Colonel rummages in his dresser until he finds a loose pair of pyjama pants to pull on. When he turns around, Edward is still sitting in the same crumpled position on the floor, one boot on, automail foot bare and gleaming. Tamping down the immediate swell of protective tenderness that rises, he grasps at the most innocuous courtesy he can offer the young man to defuse the tension filling the room. “Would you care for some coffee?”
Edward mulls it over, finally giving an offhand shrug without turning. “Sure,” he mumbles, as though being offered coffee at two in the morning, half-dressed on his commanding officer's bedroom floor, were the most mundane of occurrences.
“I'll bring it up.” Mustang tells him, remembering the painful limp in the young man's gait; a sure indication of more automail damage. Gesturing to the telephone at his bedside he adds, “Feel free to call Alphonse while you wait.”
That elicits a reaction; Edward's head lifts, focusing on the phone. “Yeah,” he says, a hitch in his voice. “I don't want him to worry about me.”
Giving Fullmetal privacy to call his brother, Mustang retreats downstairs, wincing as his bare feet slap across cold tiles, the chill in the air raising gooseflesh on his arms. The darkness of the kitchen looms before him and he fumbles for a light, feeling for just a moment the echo of the interminable days of Edward's absence in the midnight silence. But the glow from the lamp overhead dispels the momentary emptiness; he pauses in the doorway, breathing slowly and absorbing the reality of Fullmetal's return once again.
Moving carefully across the room, he pulls the percolator out and fills it with water, measures out grounds and dumps them in the basket. Setting it on the stove to heat, he retrieves two mugs from the cabinet, while trying to not to listen to Edward's voice floating down through the silence as he argues with the hotel night clerk. “Yes, for fuck's sake, he's awake! And yes, it's important! Just go knock on the goddamn door already!”
Fullmetal sounds so close to his usual, cantankerous self that the Colonel nearly smiles, and were it not for the breakdown he'd witnessed earlier, he could almost believe that the only damage Edward has incurred from the mission is physical. His humor fades, however, as he recalls the pale, trembling man who'd met him in his den, the splayed, small figure on his floor. So much pain. He hasn't managed to spare the young man anything.
But he's alive, Mustang reminds himself. He sets out the sugar bowl and fumbles in a drawer for a spoon, the familiar motions soothing even as they jar against the unusual circumstances. Making coffee in the middle of the night to drink with a man returned from the dead, the silhouette cast in grief against his heart for weeks ... the spoon drops to the floor in a tinny clatter, and his hand shakes as he retrieves it.
After fearing the worst, believing the worst, for so long, just hearing that raspy voice upstairs (now speaking quietly; Al must have been put on the phone) is enough to fill his stomach with an aching, peculiar lightness. He had nearly been reconciled to its loss; devastated and bereft. But he should have remembered that, for the Elrics, miracles are commonplace.
Perhaps he can get used to miracles.
I need to let Breda know, he realizes. He would want to know, right away, about Edward and Al's return. And Hawkeye of course, and the rest of the office staff. He will have to see if he can reach Havoc and Armstrong before they board the train back; the good news can only improve the long journey back. Calling off the word of Fullmetal's death- never before has he been excited at the prospect of additional paperwork...
The thought abruptly sobers him. Of course the officers close to Edward will be overjoyed at his reappearance, but the Colonel's superiors will very likely take an altogether different view. Their first assumptions will be dereliction of duty, desertion, not simple relief that Amestris' most brilliant alchemist has survived a terrible ordeal. One follows orders, or does not, and few mitigating circumstances are accepted. From them, punishment would await Fullmetal, not healing.
Well. It's not as though he hasn't covered for Edward many times already. Focusing on the problem before him, Mustang settles into a chair at the table, concentrating on making plans for damage control while Fullmetal's voice mumbles in the back of his consciousness.
It's much later when an uneven, halting tread and a mechanical whine rouses him from his thoughts, and Mustang lifts his head in surprise, suddenly aware that the percolator is at a rattling boil behind him, while Edward watches him with a cautious, guarded stare. Caught off guard, he blinks and rises, pulling out a chair for his companion. “You didn't need to bother coming down,” he says. “I told you I'd bring it up.”
Edward growls at his approach. “I'm not hurt. I don't need to stay in bed, like some invalid.”
“I wasn't suggesting anything of the sort.” He tries to keep the concern from his eyes and voice, but can't quite control the corners of his mouth. “Don't you ever just rest?”
The young man gives an irritable snort, easing himself into the offered chair. “Don't have time for that.”
Mustang removes the coffee from the stove, hoping that, despite his lack of attention, the brew will still be palatable. “It's worth making time for,” he remarks, filling the mugs on the counter. Setting one down in front of the other man, his mouth twists wryly, and he nods at the beverage. “Hope it's okay.”
Flesh hand wrapped loose around the mug, Edward's head tips forward to catch the steam and aroma from the coffee full in the face as it rises. His eyes close as he inhales, and the smile that slowly curves his mouth looks almost genuine. “Thanks,” he murmurs.
For a few minutes they sit quietly, sipping at the coffee- a little strong, but bracing. The silence between them isn't quite companionable, but it's comfortable, and gradually Edward relaxes, although the keenness of his gaze is still clouded with sorrow and guilt. Mustang can't help but wonder how long it will take to cleanse it from his eyes.
“Gotta get train tickets tomorrow,” Edward says abruptly, flexing his arm in a squeal of servos. “This thing's about shot, and I might as well get the beating over with. Winry's really gonna kill me this time.” He shifts in his chair, casting a speculative glance up the stairs. “I should've had Al go pick up some tickets, that way we could leave on the early train...”
“Fullmetal.” The young man flicks a look back at him, frowning a little at the serious tone the Colonel forces himself to use. “You're going to have to remain in Central for a while.”
Edward opens his mouth to protest, an angry line forming between his brows and the Colonel holds up one hand to forestall him. “Listen,” he says sharply. “Call your mechanic in the morning, have her come to Central for the repairs. I'll have Hawkeye give you the forms so you can expense it to our budget, but Edward- there will have to be an accounting of your disappearance.”
Emotion has bled from the young man's face; what confronts the Colonel now is a countenance of ice, implacable and cold. Mustang frowns, hand dropping into an imploring gesture. “This isn't what I'd prefer,” he explains, “but regardless of why you disappeared, there are a number of higher ups who would love nothing more than to seize any excuse to discipline you. I'm sure you know that many think I give you far too long a leash.”
“Fuck them,” Edward spits. “What the hell do they know?” But Mustang can see thoughts moving behind the mirror of his eyes, and the worry growing there.
He takes another sip of his coffee. “For what it's worth, I quite agree. However, they have the authority to follow through on that desire. At least, so long as we give them what they need to pursue it.”
Fullmetal leans back in his chair, the impassivity cracking to show the anger simmering beneath. “You always talk in damn riddles,” he complains. “Just say it straight out, why don't you?”
Mustang sighs. “At the moment, Fullmetal, you are officially dead- lost in the line of duty. When you reappear at Headquarters, unharmed-” he makes a quelling gesture as Edward winds up to rant about his broken automail, “-there will be questions. Why you abandoned the mission, why you didn't report to me sooner. We have to head off those questions before they arise.”
“You want to get our lies straight,” Edward snorts, his voice caustic. “Very nice, Colonel.”
Mustang shakes his head. “No lies, Edward. But we shall be selective about what truths we tell. It's an important distinction.” He levels a direct stare at Fullmetal. “But I'm going to need you to tell me what happened first.”
Edward goes very still, his expression unreadable, and Mustang aches for the necessity of forcing him to relive recent events. Very gently, he says, “I wish I could spare you this right now. Even if I could, there would still have to be a formal debriefing. At least if we do this here, it will be more private than it would at the office.”
The young man glances around at the kitchen, assessing his surroundings. Weighing the modest comforts of the house, Mustang thinks, against the memory of the rigid functionality of the base. Turning back to him, Edward gives a curt nod, shadows darkening his eyes.
“Fine,” he replies, but the defiance in his voice is thin, transparent. “Let's get this over with.”
~*~*~
Fullmetal sits back in his chair, head cocked to the side, eyes slightly unfocused and directed somewhere to Mustang's left as he begins speaking. He almost sounds bored, his words coming without emphasis or emotion, but the Colonel isn't deceived. Dissociation is the easiest way for a soldier to deal with painful reports, and no one who has seen a war could possibly mistake it.
Edward hurries through how he arrived on the mountain and blended in with the cultists. Though as he listens, Mustang begins to realize that, in point of fact, Edward had been incorrect about the mass of people who had banded together in the caves. They weren't truly a cult. There were no defining religious convictions among them other than a belief in the Resurrectionist's miraculous abilities, nor any real organization to the group at all. The Resurrectionist's dubious charisma held the people together; his mesmerizing sermons, and the hope he engendered that their loved ones may be returned.
There was little Fullmetal could learn in the camp. Only the most devoted were allowed into the deepest caves where the Resurrectionist performed his miracles, and although everyone descended from time to time to listen to rambling sermons in one of the larger caverns, quasi-religious rhetoric doesn't go far toward answering the question of precisely what was occurring there.
Edward just snorts when the Colonel inquires as to what was preached. “It was nonsense, half of it, and the rest was just warped from basic alchemical theory. Shit that no one with any sense would believe, if they weren't already desperate.”
Desperate seems like an apt description of those gathered at the caves, Mustang concludes. Impoverished and displaced, the Resurrectionist's followers were grasping for any solace they could find. The camp offered them something to focus their hopes on, and a steady stream of assurances that their lot in life could be improved even in the face of death. An appealing illusion, he thinks, understanding the desire to be deceived. Even without living the struggle that encompassed their existence, there are still lies he wishes he could afford to believe.
Life there was difficult, despite the group's occasional forays into the town below. The rocky ground was hard and far from arable, and Mustang knows that the logistical difficulties of feeding and tending to large numbers of people in inhospitable land are troublesome even with supply lines and equipment. Instead they were forced to forage, and snare what little game they could find, and Edward speaks grimly of finding scant resources there.
“Kids, Mustang,” he growls, anger showing through his impassive mask. “Crying at night because they're hungry, and their parents brought them there to starve for a fraud and a lie.”
Mustang doesn't bother asking why he didn't contact Breda as planned. In his mind's eye he can already see Edward scouring the mountain to try and find something to feed the children, as though he could somehow singlehandedly alleviate the suffering brought on them. The part of him that is already putting the right spin on the tale, redacting and composing the report he will write for Edward notes; daily duties made military contact impossible. Constant scrutiny by cult members meant that absence would arouse suspicion, and jeopardize the mission.
There's a pause in the monologue, as Edward's face reverts momentarily to the haunted expression that had met Mustang only hours earlier. But it's gone in the same instant, and he says, offhanded and hollow, “Benny was the one who found the family on the mountain.”
Mustang leans forward, silently urging Fullmetal to continue. The significance of the incident is clear in the young man's stiff posture, the tremble in one hand as he reaches for his mug, but he doesn't dare encourage Edward to say more. He simply waits, watching as Fullmetal works through the obvious tumult in his mind until the alchemist once again finds his equilibrium.
Staring past the kitchen, miles away, Edward hunches in on himself. “Benny saw them while I was checking snares, and by the time I finished he was taking them to the caves. They had a...” He stops, shakes his head. “They were looking for a miracle. Fuck, you'd have thought it was a goddamn celebration when those people saw the family bringing their boy's corpse to be raised. Singing, praying... They sent people down into the deep caves with the dead boy, and the rest of us were taken to the big caverns where the sermons were held for a vigil.”
Fullmetal's face is white; he looks ill, his impassivity beginning to fray. “They picked Benny,” he breathes, and at the Colonel's confused frown adds, “The really devoted ones, the people who spent the most time down in the caves with that bastard alchemist. Said he was blessed, for finding the family. Said he was gonna be an acolyte.” His hands abandon the mug, curling into fists on the table before him.
Mustang tilts his head slightly, brow furrowed. “Acolytes?” he repeats quietly. “I thought there wasn't any hierarchy to the group.”
“It's not like that.” Gaze riveted to the table, flesh fist still white-knuckle tight. “Not like there's any rank attached. The acolytes were supposedly something like apprentices to that... to him. Once they were chosen, they'd go into the caves, and never come out again. Everyone said they were learning the mysteries, becoming enlightened- all the usual bullshit that just means no one knows what they're up to. But they wanted to take Benny...”
The light is bleeding from Edward's eyes, and Mustang has to restrain himself from reaching out to lay a reassuring hand on his arm. He fears that a single touch could shatter the young man, or cause him to erupt unpredictably. Across the table, Fullmetal's lips curl in a silent snarl, his words coming out serrated and filled with self-loathing.
“He was scared to death. He didn't want to go, he wanted to run away, but I...” a hard swallow,” I thought this was the opportunity I'd been waiting for to get close to that fucker. And so I promised him- I promised him, Mustang- that I'd keep him safe. Told him I'd be close by, and that we'd see what was happening down there, and then we'd go. I'd take him with me, and we'd walk off the mountain together.”
He gives a harsh croak that's not quite a sob. “And he agreed. He was scared, but he trusted me when I told him it would be okay, so he agreed.”
“Edward...” Mustang hadn't intended to speak, but the utter wretchedness rolling off of the other man is overpowering; the name leaves his lips in a short gasp and he would've taken Fullmetal's hand in his had Edward not suddenly pulled back, arms clasped around himself as he huddles in the chair.
“He was just a kid.” Barely more than a whisper. “Reminded me a little of Al, and I... fuck, I was the closest thing he'd had to a real family. He wasn't much older than Al was when we... when...” He squeezes his eyes shut, breathing heavily.
Watching Edward relive the events as he tells them is terrible. Mustang wants to tell him to stop, to wrap his arms around those small, trembling shoulders and pull him into the safety of his arms. Seeing the distress caused by the memories, both recent and old, brings out too many similar emotions in himself. Old regrets and grief, but he presses his own traumas down, focusing on the dilemma before him. He believes in Edward's strength, his ability to survive such weights on his soul, and so he makes himself wait for the young alchemist to gather himself once more.
“I followed them,” Edward finally says, voice uneven. “Benny, and two men who took him down. There wasn't much light, and I couldn't get too close or they'd have seen me. And after a while, I started feeling funny. It was like, the longer we walked, the harder it was to think. Kept stumbling over nothing, seeing shit in the shadows... only thing I could concentrate on was keeping them from noticing I was there, and hoping I could find my way out again later.” He hesitates, clearly recalling the confusion and anxiety from that evening, and silence settles into the room like an uninvited guest dominating the conversation.
After several minutes Edward still shows no sign of resuming the story, and the Colonel is reluctantly about to prompt him when the other man's eyes open, unfocused and staring. “I saw the array,” he says, breaking the hush. “Benny's escorts left, and I followed him and the fraud into another, bigger cavern. It was where he did his work- his lab, if you can call it that. The array... Damn thing was drawn so sloppy I'm surprised it did anything at all. And I could barely think, everything was fuzzy and confusing by then, but even like that I knew the moment I saw it. It could never have brought back the dead. Wrong, everything was wrong... Wrong symbols, wrong lines...”
The Colonel remembers his conversations with Major Armstrong, the descriptions of the revenants; breathing, eating, moving where directed, all with the same eerie, vacant expressions. “Then how did the Resurrectionist...”
The response the question elicits is unexpected; Edward's eyes kindle with a blaze of sheer fury. Anger sears through the miasma of sorrow enveloping him, and he snarls, “Samuel Cradshaw.”
Mustang blinks, surprised. “Excuse me?”
A muscle in Edward's jaw twitches. “Cradshaw. The cult leader. His name was Samuel Cradshaw, and he was a liar, and never brought anyone back from the dead. He doesn't deserve that title, I don't even want to hear it. It's not fucking true.”
The sudden vehemence stuns the Colonel for a moment. But he recovers quickly, nodding in acquiescence. “Cradshaw,” he agrees. “But were you aware of the people we recovered, who were supposedly raised? Havoc and Major Armstrong are bringing them back to Central.”
“So you haven't seen them yet.” Edward's gives him a stare filled with disgust- not at him, Mustang realizes, but directed at the revenants themselves.
“No,” he replies carefully. “I haven't. But Major Armstrong has sent very detailed reports, and there doesn't seem to be any doubt that they are alive.”
Edward looks furious. “Alive. They're alive the same way grass is alive. An insect has more life than they do.”
Something cold seems to slither between his ribs at the words. Sitting up straighter, brows stitching together, Mustang says, “But they're alive. Surely that's remarkable, even if the means..”
“The means?” Edward spits, appalled. “You still don't get it, do you? Fuck, Mustang, it wasn't human transmutation! I told you, it can't be done, and that array wasn't designed right for it anyway. What that... that fucking prick of an alchemist did was create chimeras! He combined live people with corpses. Pulled the life force of one into the other, to reanimate dead things!”
Mustang can feel the blood draining from his face. “That's monstrous.”
Edward nods slowly. “And he put Benny in the circle with the body,” he whispers.
The Colonel's stomach lurches at the image and he controls it with an effort, although bile burns in the back of his throat. He shouldn't say anything, should let Fullmetal continue reporting events at his own pace, but the words spill out on their own. “You didn't let that happen to him.”
“No,” Edward answers in the same hushed voice. “Brain felt like it was full of sand, I could barely stand straight, but there was no way in hell I was going to let that fucker turn Benny into one of those... things. I had to... tried...” He stops, hands lifting to cover his mouth, harsh breaths gasping out around his fingers.
For a moment, Mustang fears that Fullmetal will shatter under the weight of his grief once more, and his own chest swells tight with suppressed emotion. This is too much, he thinks, miserable and angry with himself for dragging the young man through this again. “Edward, stop,” he says roughly, “That's enough, you don't have to-”
The metal hand drops away from his face with a squeal, and Edward stares at him with reddened, serious eyes. “I do,” he answers, words coming in a stop-start stutter. “I h-have to, I owe him that.” He draws a deep breath, automail grasping the edge of the table for support and sways just a bit in his seat.
That strength. How can you bear to be so strong?
Scrubbing at his face with his flesh hand, Fullmetal opens his mouth, closes it, sets his jaw and starts again. “W-When he put Benny in there, I didn't think, just rushed out. Told him to stop, step back and yelled at Benny to get out of the circle. Cradshaw just stared at me like he didn't even know if I was real, but he looked like the only person there who wasn't scared. He... he wasn't anything. I'm pretty sure he was insane. Fuck, you'd have to be insane to do those things...
“And Benny still wasn't moving. Dunno if he was too scared, but I could look at Cradshaw and see that he wasn't going to stop, and Benny was still in the array, and I just ran for him, but Cradshaw was closer...”
Edward closes his eyes for a moment, his face creased with terrible pain. “I wasn't going to make it in time,” he says. “And my head was swimming, I fell and... there wasn't any other way that I could see. I-I... I had to...” Deep breath. “I transmuted the floor. Or tried to.”
He hangs his head. “It didn't work.”
The clock in the hallway chimes the half-hour, a deep, somber toll and Mustang starts at the sound but Edward doesn't move. Gold hair falling lank about his face, hiding his expression, voice harsh as sandpaper over skin. “I fucked up the transmutation. I did something wrong in my head, or... I don't know. Doesn't matter. Instead of pulling the floor up into a wall, I brought the whole damn ceiling down around them.
“And I tried... I don't know what I was thinking, fucking couldn't think... but I tried to pull it back apart. Maybe I hoped I'd fucked up when I brought the rocks down, I don't know... but the sparks from the alchemy... the whole cave just lit... exploded. Threw me all the way out where I'd first seen Cradshaw, or at least I think that's where I landed. Don't know how I wasn't killed outright by the explosion. Hell,” he laughs, strained and humorless, “I don't know how I lived at all. Don't even know how I got out of there. Certainly don't remember doing it. My automail was fucked, my head was stuffed with cotton... next thing I know, I'm hanging onto this big tree, puking my guts out.”
Heart racing, and Fullmetal's quiet distress is contagious; he feels as though he's drowning in this misery. And as frightened as he'd been for weeks, realizing precisely how close Edward had come to perishing as well. I can't let this happen again, he thinks, the thud of his pulse making him feel almost ill. But the inexorable specter of duty sneers, promising you will.
For now- focus. Edward sits before him, awash in memory and bound by so much wretchedness that it surprises the Colonel when the other man moves, leaning back, head tilting upward. He looks exhausted; battered, beaten, and Mustang aches to see him proud and defiant once more.
“I don't know how long I was out there,” Fullmetal says to the ceiling. “A couple nights, I think, but I'm not sure. Felt like someone had been kicking me in the head with military boots, and I was half out of my mind and sick. Light hurt my eyes, and when I closed them everything spun...” He pulls his arms around himself at the memory. “And it was cold. I remember being cold, all the time.”
“When Alphonse disappeared from the caves,” the Colonel ventures, “was it because he found you?”
A ghost of a smile haunts the young man's lips. “Yeah. He wanted to take me back to town right away, but I was so sick, really fucked up.”
The smile drifts away, replaced once again by sadness. “Really fucked up,” he repeats. “Couldn't stop thinking about what I'd done. That I'd killed. Benny... All the people I've met who deserved to die, and I kill him. Some poor kid who just wanted a family.” He knuckles one eye roughly before adding in a soft voice, “He was looking at me, you know. When the roof came down. Just looking at me. Trusting me.”
“You kept him from suffering,” Mustang tells him. “Even though he didn't survive, what Cradshaw had planned for him was far worse. You didn't let that happen to him, Edward.”
“I could've done better. I could've done things right, could've-”
“Gas,” the Colonel says gently. “The lower caves were full of it. Exposure can cause confusion, disorientation. It happened to some of the men clearing out the debris, after. You had no way of knowing. You're not accountable for that.”
Edward is quiet for a while, brow furrowed as he thinks. But he finally shakes his head, sighing.
“Doesn't matter,” he states. “Still my fault.”
Mustang would argue the point, but heavy eyes roll his direction, pinning him beneath their sorrowful weight. Old, soldier's eyes, so out of place in a face still flush with youth. Mustang is mesmerized, unable to turn his head away as Edward asks, oddly gentle, “Have you ever...” Pauses, uncertain, the question hanging..
“Have I ever what?”
A half shrug. “You know. Fucked up. Like I did.”
The teeth of his nightmares drag across the tender places in his mind, and his soul flinches. Mustang drops his gaze to his lap. “Yes. I have.”
He can hear Fullmetal shifting in his chair. “What happened?”
He doesn't want to discuss this. It is his sin, his own demon, his past. But he knows this logic does not work in Edward's mind. To the young alchemist, equivalence must be met; he knows Fullmetal's most terrible mistakes, so Edward is entitled to his. And yet it's been so long since anyone knew the worst of him; the thought of laying himself bare is terrifying.
And Edward waits, watching him with patient, young-old eyes, and there is no choice, after all.
“Ishval,” he sighs, and it is his turn to look away. “It was... you have no idea how bad it was there. No open battles, just guerrilla warfare. House to house, street to street, ambushes you prayed to walk out of.” He closes his eyes, feels the heat of the sun battering down on his neck, the whip of wind and sand. “There were... You have to understand, they were fighting for their lives, and I couldn't blame them for that. They were being exterminated, no matter how the military liked to couch it. And they only wanted to live... “
The memory of the flames is still too strong. He can still see the bodies so clearly, smell the blood and scent of death. Suffocating with fear, and he finds himself struggling to breathe even in the clear air of his kitchen.
“I killed a lot of people there, Fullmetal,” he says in a monotone, the words coming hard. “Men fighting for their homes, zealots fighting for their god. Children. I killed children there. Some of them carried guns, and others... “ He chokes, but forces himself to keep talking. “When you're young and scared and have been attacked too many times to count, a stick can look like a gun. A doll can. And I... I burned them all.”
The wound in his heart is oozing blood like dark, sticky tears; never healed, only waiting to spring fresh poisons into his soul. It hurts more than he could have imagined, more than it did when it was new, and Mustang wants to lock it away once more, let it fester in darkness where he doesn't have to see. I don't want anyone to know. I want this to die with me.
His mouth twisting with bitterness, Mustang says, “I'm not proud of my actions. The people I was ordered to kill- most of them weren't even combatants. So you see, Edward, your error doesn't even come close to mine. One innocent, caught in the crossfire as it were, next to all the lives I took-”
“How many?”
Edward's question catches him off-guard, and Mustang looks up. “I don't know,” he answers quietly. “They didn't tell us the official count. I was too young, it never occurred to me to ask. And I don't think I want to know. It's too high, too terrible to contemplate. I don't think I could bear knowing.” He pauses, more upset than he can afford to show. “I don't like talking about this.”
Please don't make me remember.
But Fullmetal holds him in his gaze, frowning as he asks, “Don't you owe it to them to remember? They were human too, with their own lives. You took that away from them; you don't get to forget it.”
“It's not so easy. If I were to dwell upon what I've done... I don't think I could face myself. And for my sins, I'm going to change the military, to keep anything like that from ever happening again. Even if what I've done is...”
“Unforgivable?”
“...Yes.”
Silence surrounds them once more; Edward considering, while the Colonel hunches over in his chair as though trying to hide from his admission. The quiet no longer feels so comfortable; it's too raw, and filled with the shades of the dead, and the truths that hang between them point with laughing clarity at their flaws. And Mustang wishes with every breath for the simple solace of Edward's touch, and wonders when the tables turned so completely.
Automail whines as Edward pushes his mug away. “We're a fucked up pair, Mustang.”
The Colonel wants to laugh, but it's just not funny at all. “Yes, we certainly are.” He glances up at the young man slumping over the table, golden eyes inhabited with devastation, and sighs. “You're exhausted. We should both get some sleep.”
Fullmetal says nothing, but he rises along with the Colonel and they make their careful way up the stairs, the young man growling only slightly at the assistance he's offered. At their backs, the clock chimes four and when Mustang turns back from closing the door Edward is already climbing stiffly onto the mattress. The leather pants are in a bunch on the floor, and he steps over them as he lies down at Edward's side.
The ragged course his emotions have run is taking its toll; the Colonel's eyelids are heavy and burning, but his arms are empty without Edward's warmth filling them and sleep seems a distant destination. I wish..., he thinks, but before he can complete the thought Fullmetal is bumping up against him, fitting himself into the contours of Mustang's body. Edward's chin nudges hard against his shoulder, and his arms close instinctively around the smaller man. Mustang sighs, one hand trailing gently up Edward's arm and feels that tenuous sense of peace returning.
Grumbling in his throat as though severely put out by Mustang's neediness, Edward allows him to touch his cheek, his hair, but doesn't quite relax beneath his hand. “Just for tonight,” he says, quiet and rough. “And only 'cause we've already done this once. It's the same as it's always been, though. Doesn't mean a damn thing.”
“Of course not,” Mustang agrees, but his bones shiver beneath the lie. Edward sinks back into him, breath trembling against his chest, and the truth shudders against his skin. But he can let Fullmetal have his illusion of deceit, if it helps to restore his strength and will once more. He would sacrifice all of his pride, to give him that.
next chapter
Pairing: Roy/Ed
Rating: NC-17 overall
Summary: It's too close; he's crumbling, and he can't stop the slide into this disaster.
A/N: Good grief, it's been forever, hasn't it? But my horrible move and this chapter are finally complete, and don't I just feel like cheering! Very long one, too, even longer than the last one, so that's part of the reason it took so long to complete. And as always, I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to evil_whimsey for being a superlative beta, my constant cheerleader, and a paragon of patience as I whined and cried and bitched about the writing process. But I'll shut up now; I'm sure you're more interested in reading than listening to my blather. Sorry about the wait- I hope it won't be so long before the next one's ready!
previous chapters
Edward breathes deeply, his sleeping body curled against the Colonel's side, one loose fist tucked beside his open mouth. The hoarse gasping subsided some time ago, drifting into exhaustion and the smooth, slow rhythm of slumber. Mustang holds him close, sometimes awake and sometimes dozing, weariness and relief blending to a strangely energized somnolence that keeps him just on the verge of rest but never tipping completely into it. His side twinges from lying with the weight of automail and densely muscled flesh pinning his arm, but he's reluctant to move. Not when moving risks waking the young man cradled against his chest, finally resting quietly.
Fullmetal has known so little peace in his time. And yet throughout his trials he has remained strong, and Mustang has depended on that strength, and its constancy. He has relied on the purity of Ed's soul, untouched by the filth and evil of the world, lit by the same idealism that once burned in Mustang's own heart.
Despite all the terrible things Fullmetal has done and seen, he had endured. And unlike Roy Mustang, he had seemed unbreakable.
But here, gathered in his arms is the evidence that Edward is just as human as he. Just as capable of slipping, and being hurt, and though Mustang had caught him last night, their quiet hiatus won't last. It was pain that left him vulnerable last night, but the Colonel has no illusions; Fullmetal's stubborn self-reliance will reemerge, and once the shock clears he will pull away. Mustang is sure of this, and yet he is surprised at how the inevitability pinches his heart tight in his chest.
When did I become so needy, he wonders. I used to be as independent as Edward, as contemptuous of anyone who would attach themselves to me. Where did that go?
Vanished, fled. Escaped through a decade-old door flung wide by accident. Leaving behind a frightened, pale thing that didn't know how much it craved the touch of one who understood.
When he lies with Edward, the desert is so far away.
But Mustang shies away from those thoughts, too close to the ones he wants to avoid. Clings to the lithe body next to him, as though he could pull this transient moment into permanence by the force of his grip. With his face buried in warm, silken hair, inhaling Edward's scent until it envelopes him, he can imagine, for a little longer, that this may yet last.
But it can't, won't. In his arms, Edward shifts just slightly, awakening. Thick lashes beat before parting to reveal gold eyes still dulled by sleep. Slow, lazy blinks, and then the young man stiffens as he realizes where he is, and the Colonel reluctantly loosens his hold, allowing Edward to wriggle from his grasp. Automail rasping, Fullmetal props himself up on his elbows, bright gaze dimmed with suspicion and embarrassment. The aura of grief still hangs about him, muted now, and the cracks that had been so evident earlier are sealing before Mustang's eyes.
“How are you feeling?” Mustang asks, voice pitched low, and his fingers twitch with the suppressed desire to brush away the matted tumble of hair that covers half of Edward's face and fit his palm to the curve of a warm cheek. But Fullmetal draws his head back, skittish, as though he's read something of the Colonel's thoughts from his expression.
“I'm fine,” he replies, the lie obvious, and Mustang sees that although the fractures may be hidden, they still reach deep. He has to ignore the way his soul resonates in sympathy with Edward's pain. He understands that silent suffering all too well.
“All right then,” he agrees quietly.
An awkward silence builds in the bedroom, as Fullmetal studies the ceiling and Mustang watches him from the corner of his eye. There are many things they still need to address, he thinks, and he's considering how to broach the topics when Edward suddenly lurches forward with a curse on his lips. Throwing the sheets back, the battered alchemist flings himself from the bed, nearly toppling to the floor in the process, and begins snatching articles of clothing and dragging them on at breakneck speed.
Mustang jerks upright, mouth opening to speak, but before anything can come out Edward turns to him, his eyes filled with the panicked glaze of a trapped animal. “I have to go,” he pants, pulling hard as his trousers snag on an uncooperative metal joint. “I have to leave, Al-”
“Where is Alphonse?” Mustang interjects, the name striking him with sudden guilt. Why didn't I ask sooner? Though of course Edward would never have come to him this way if his brother was missing, or endangered. “Fullmetal?”
“Hotel,” Edward gasps. “I left him there, waiting for me. I didn't think I'd be gone so long, he'll be worried...”
The confirmation comes as a relief, and Mustang lets out a long sigh. “You have no idea how relieved the office will be. Everyone was so worried about both of you. After Alphonse disappeared- Edward- wait, stop,” he calls, as Edward yanks his shirt from under the bed. “You can't leave like this.”
Translucent eyelids and lurid bruises, automail still making its high-pitched protests. The couple hours of sleep he took at the Colonel's side have refreshed him, but Edward still looks haunted and fragile. Even the angry glare he shoots at the Colonel is more desperate than intimidating.
“I can do whatever the fuck I want,” he snaps. “Al's waiting for me.”
“Be reasonable,” Mustang tells him. “I have a phone. Call the hotel, let him know you're safe. I'll drive you there in the morning myself.”
If anything, the offer seems to frighten Fullmetal. “I can't stay!” he growls, nervous as a stray dog worried that a kick will come with the proffered hand. Shaking his shirt right-side out, he pulls it on with undue haste, ball bearings in his arm screaming like wheels on gravel, shrilling out a strident complaint. He looks ready to flee without shoes or coat, all defensive teeth and flurry of excuses.
“Fullmetal,” Mustang insists. “Don't go.”
One boot pulled on, and Edward peers warily at him through the shield of his hair. He doesn't move to escape, nor does he remove the boot. He simply watches Mustang closely, his breath coming in heaves; the Colonel can see the quick heat building in his face and realizes that for once, Edward doesn't know what he wants. Or rather, is pulled by two opposite desires.
“Equivalent exchange,” he breathes, daring to hope. “I've never asked before. Stay, tonight.”
Edward says nothing, his gaze dropping to the floor as he considers the request, and Mustang prays that he's not misread that moment's hesitation. But when has Edward ever paused when it concerned Alphonse? If it's only his imagination, if that moment of indecision wasn't real, nothing will keep Fullmetal from his brother. But if he's right...
You want this too. Please, want this too.
...if he's right, then he's given Edward the excuse he needs to stay.
It is only when the bright head dips, submitting, that Mustang relaxes. Sliding from the bed, the Colonel rummages in his dresser until he finds a loose pair of pyjama pants to pull on. When he turns around, Edward is still sitting in the same crumpled position on the floor, one boot on, automail foot bare and gleaming. Tamping down the immediate swell of protective tenderness that rises, he grasps at the most innocuous courtesy he can offer the young man to defuse the tension filling the room. “Would you care for some coffee?”
Edward mulls it over, finally giving an offhand shrug without turning. “Sure,” he mumbles, as though being offered coffee at two in the morning, half-dressed on his commanding officer's bedroom floor, were the most mundane of occurrences.
“I'll bring it up.” Mustang tells him, remembering the painful limp in the young man's gait; a sure indication of more automail damage. Gesturing to the telephone at his bedside he adds, “Feel free to call Alphonse while you wait.”
That elicits a reaction; Edward's head lifts, focusing on the phone. “Yeah,” he says, a hitch in his voice. “I don't want him to worry about me.”
Giving Fullmetal privacy to call his brother, Mustang retreats downstairs, wincing as his bare feet slap across cold tiles, the chill in the air raising gooseflesh on his arms. The darkness of the kitchen looms before him and he fumbles for a light, feeling for just a moment the echo of the interminable days of Edward's absence in the midnight silence. But the glow from the lamp overhead dispels the momentary emptiness; he pauses in the doorway, breathing slowly and absorbing the reality of Fullmetal's return once again.
Moving carefully across the room, he pulls the percolator out and fills it with water, measures out grounds and dumps them in the basket. Setting it on the stove to heat, he retrieves two mugs from the cabinet, while trying to not to listen to Edward's voice floating down through the silence as he argues with the hotel night clerk. “Yes, for fuck's sake, he's awake! And yes, it's important! Just go knock on the goddamn door already!”
Fullmetal sounds so close to his usual, cantankerous self that the Colonel nearly smiles, and were it not for the breakdown he'd witnessed earlier, he could almost believe that the only damage Edward has incurred from the mission is physical. His humor fades, however, as he recalls the pale, trembling man who'd met him in his den, the splayed, small figure on his floor. So much pain. He hasn't managed to spare the young man anything.
But he's alive, Mustang reminds himself. He sets out the sugar bowl and fumbles in a drawer for a spoon, the familiar motions soothing even as they jar against the unusual circumstances. Making coffee in the middle of the night to drink with a man returned from the dead, the silhouette cast in grief against his heart for weeks ... the spoon drops to the floor in a tinny clatter, and his hand shakes as he retrieves it.
After fearing the worst, believing the worst, for so long, just hearing that raspy voice upstairs (now speaking quietly; Al must have been put on the phone) is enough to fill his stomach with an aching, peculiar lightness. He had nearly been reconciled to its loss; devastated and bereft. But he should have remembered that, for the Elrics, miracles are commonplace.
Perhaps he can get used to miracles.
I need to let Breda know, he realizes. He would want to know, right away, about Edward and Al's return. And Hawkeye of course, and the rest of the office staff. He will have to see if he can reach Havoc and Armstrong before they board the train back; the good news can only improve the long journey back. Calling off the word of Fullmetal's death- never before has he been excited at the prospect of additional paperwork...
The thought abruptly sobers him. Of course the officers close to Edward will be overjoyed at his reappearance, but the Colonel's superiors will very likely take an altogether different view. Their first assumptions will be dereliction of duty, desertion, not simple relief that Amestris' most brilliant alchemist has survived a terrible ordeal. One follows orders, or does not, and few mitigating circumstances are accepted. From them, punishment would await Fullmetal, not healing.
Well. It's not as though he hasn't covered for Edward many times already. Focusing on the problem before him, Mustang settles into a chair at the table, concentrating on making plans for damage control while Fullmetal's voice mumbles in the back of his consciousness.
It's much later when an uneven, halting tread and a mechanical whine rouses him from his thoughts, and Mustang lifts his head in surprise, suddenly aware that the percolator is at a rattling boil behind him, while Edward watches him with a cautious, guarded stare. Caught off guard, he blinks and rises, pulling out a chair for his companion. “You didn't need to bother coming down,” he says. “I told you I'd bring it up.”
Edward growls at his approach. “I'm not hurt. I don't need to stay in bed, like some invalid.”
“I wasn't suggesting anything of the sort.” He tries to keep the concern from his eyes and voice, but can't quite control the corners of his mouth. “Don't you ever just rest?”
The young man gives an irritable snort, easing himself into the offered chair. “Don't have time for that.”
Mustang removes the coffee from the stove, hoping that, despite his lack of attention, the brew will still be palatable. “It's worth making time for,” he remarks, filling the mugs on the counter. Setting one down in front of the other man, his mouth twists wryly, and he nods at the beverage. “Hope it's okay.”
Flesh hand wrapped loose around the mug, Edward's head tips forward to catch the steam and aroma from the coffee full in the face as it rises. His eyes close as he inhales, and the smile that slowly curves his mouth looks almost genuine. “Thanks,” he murmurs.
For a few minutes they sit quietly, sipping at the coffee- a little strong, but bracing. The silence between them isn't quite companionable, but it's comfortable, and gradually Edward relaxes, although the keenness of his gaze is still clouded with sorrow and guilt. Mustang can't help but wonder how long it will take to cleanse it from his eyes.
“Gotta get train tickets tomorrow,” Edward says abruptly, flexing his arm in a squeal of servos. “This thing's about shot, and I might as well get the beating over with. Winry's really gonna kill me this time.” He shifts in his chair, casting a speculative glance up the stairs. “I should've had Al go pick up some tickets, that way we could leave on the early train...”
“Fullmetal.” The young man flicks a look back at him, frowning a little at the serious tone the Colonel forces himself to use. “You're going to have to remain in Central for a while.”
Edward opens his mouth to protest, an angry line forming between his brows and the Colonel holds up one hand to forestall him. “Listen,” he says sharply. “Call your mechanic in the morning, have her come to Central for the repairs. I'll have Hawkeye give you the forms so you can expense it to our budget, but Edward- there will have to be an accounting of your disappearance.”
Emotion has bled from the young man's face; what confronts the Colonel now is a countenance of ice, implacable and cold. Mustang frowns, hand dropping into an imploring gesture. “This isn't what I'd prefer,” he explains, “but regardless of why you disappeared, there are a number of higher ups who would love nothing more than to seize any excuse to discipline you. I'm sure you know that many think I give you far too long a leash.”
“Fuck them,” Edward spits. “What the hell do they know?” But Mustang can see thoughts moving behind the mirror of his eyes, and the worry growing there.
He takes another sip of his coffee. “For what it's worth, I quite agree. However, they have the authority to follow through on that desire. At least, so long as we give them what they need to pursue it.”
Fullmetal leans back in his chair, the impassivity cracking to show the anger simmering beneath. “You always talk in damn riddles,” he complains. “Just say it straight out, why don't you?”
Mustang sighs. “At the moment, Fullmetal, you are officially dead- lost in the line of duty. When you reappear at Headquarters, unharmed-” he makes a quelling gesture as Edward winds up to rant about his broken automail, “-there will be questions. Why you abandoned the mission, why you didn't report to me sooner. We have to head off those questions before they arise.”
“You want to get our lies straight,” Edward snorts, his voice caustic. “Very nice, Colonel.”
Mustang shakes his head. “No lies, Edward. But we shall be selective about what truths we tell. It's an important distinction.” He levels a direct stare at Fullmetal. “But I'm going to need you to tell me what happened first.”
Edward goes very still, his expression unreadable, and Mustang aches for the necessity of forcing him to relive recent events. Very gently, he says, “I wish I could spare you this right now. Even if I could, there would still have to be a formal debriefing. At least if we do this here, it will be more private than it would at the office.”
The young man glances around at the kitchen, assessing his surroundings. Weighing the modest comforts of the house, Mustang thinks, against the memory of the rigid functionality of the base. Turning back to him, Edward gives a curt nod, shadows darkening his eyes.
“Fine,” he replies, but the defiance in his voice is thin, transparent. “Let's get this over with.”
~*~*~
Fullmetal sits back in his chair, head cocked to the side, eyes slightly unfocused and directed somewhere to Mustang's left as he begins speaking. He almost sounds bored, his words coming without emphasis or emotion, but the Colonel isn't deceived. Dissociation is the easiest way for a soldier to deal with painful reports, and no one who has seen a war could possibly mistake it.
Edward hurries through how he arrived on the mountain and blended in with the cultists. Though as he listens, Mustang begins to realize that, in point of fact, Edward had been incorrect about the mass of people who had banded together in the caves. They weren't truly a cult. There were no defining religious convictions among them other than a belief in the Resurrectionist's miraculous abilities, nor any real organization to the group at all. The Resurrectionist's dubious charisma held the people together; his mesmerizing sermons, and the hope he engendered that their loved ones may be returned.
There was little Fullmetal could learn in the camp. Only the most devoted were allowed into the deepest caves where the Resurrectionist performed his miracles, and although everyone descended from time to time to listen to rambling sermons in one of the larger caverns, quasi-religious rhetoric doesn't go far toward answering the question of precisely what was occurring there.
Edward just snorts when the Colonel inquires as to what was preached. “It was nonsense, half of it, and the rest was just warped from basic alchemical theory. Shit that no one with any sense would believe, if they weren't already desperate.”
Desperate seems like an apt description of those gathered at the caves, Mustang concludes. Impoverished and displaced, the Resurrectionist's followers were grasping for any solace they could find. The camp offered them something to focus their hopes on, and a steady stream of assurances that their lot in life could be improved even in the face of death. An appealing illusion, he thinks, understanding the desire to be deceived. Even without living the struggle that encompassed their existence, there are still lies he wishes he could afford to believe.
Life there was difficult, despite the group's occasional forays into the town below. The rocky ground was hard and far from arable, and Mustang knows that the logistical difficulties of feeding and tending to large numbers of people in inhospitable land are troublesome even with supply lines and equipment. Instead they were forced to forage, and snare what little game they could find, and Edward speaks grimly of finding scant resources there.
“Kids, Mustang,” he growls, anger showing through his impassive mask. “Crying at night because they're hungry, and their parents brought them there to starve for a fraud and a lie.”
Mustang doesn't bother asking why he didn't contact Breda as planned. In his mind's eye he can already see Edward scouring the mountain to try and find something to feed the children, as though he could somehow singlehandedly alleviate the suffering brought on them. The part of him that is already putting the right spin on the tale, redacting and composing the report he will write for Edward notes; daily duties made military contact impossible. Constant scrutiny by cult members meant that absence would arouse suspicion, and jeopardize the mission.
There's a pause in the monologue, as Edward's face reverts momentarily to the haunted expression that had met Mustang only hours earlier. But it's gone in the same instant, and he says, offhanded and hollow, “Benny was the one who found the family on the mountain.”
Mustang leans forward, silently urging Fullmetal to continue. The significance of the incident is clear in the young man's stiff posture, the tremble in one hand as he reaches for his mug, but he doesn't dare encourage Edward to say more. He simply waits, watching as Fullmetal works through the obvious tumult in his mind until the alchemist once again finds his equilibrium.
Staring past the kitchen, miles away, Edward hunches in on himself. “Benny saw them while I was checking snares, and by the time I finished he was taking them to the caves. They had a...” He stops, shakes his head. “They were looking for a miracle. Fuck, you'd have thought it was a goddamn celebration when those people saw the family bringing their boy's corpse to be raised. Singing, praying... They sent people down into the deep caves with the dead boy, and the rest of us were taken to the big caverns where the sermons were held for a vigil.”
Fullmetal's face is white; he looks ill, his impassivity beginning to fray. “They picked Benny,” he breathes, and at the Colonel's confused frown adds, “The really devoted ones, the people who spent the most time down in the caves with that bastard alchemist. Said he was blessed, for finding the family. Said he was gonna be an acolyte.” His hands abandon the mug, curling into fists on the table before him.
Mustang tilts his head slightly, brow furrowed. “Acolytes?” he repeats quietly. “I thought there wasn't any hierarchy to the group.”
“It's not like that.” Gaze riveted to the table, flesh fist still white-knuckle tight. “Not like there's any rank attached. The acolytes were supposedly something like apprentices to that... to him. Once they were chosen, they'd go into the caves, and never come out again. Everyone said they were learning the mysteries, becoming enlightened- all the usual bullshit that just means no one knows what they're up to. But they wanted to take Benny...”
The light is bleeding from Edward's eyes, and Mustang has to restrain himself from reaching out to lay a reassuring hand on his arm. He fears that a single touch could shatter the young man, or cause him to erupt unpredictably. Across the table, Fullmetal's lips curl in a silent snarl, his words coming out serrated and filled with self-loathing.
“He was scared to death. He didn't want to go, he wanted to run away, but I...” a hard swallow,” I thought this was the opportunity I'd been waiting for to get close to that fucker. And so I promised him- I promised him, Mustang- that I'd keep him safe. Told him I'd be close by, and that we'd see what was happening down there, and then we'd go. I'd take him with me, and we'd walk off the mountain together.”
He gives a harsh croak that's not quite a sob. “And he agreed. He was scared, but he trusted me when I told him it would be okay, so he agreed.”
“Edward...” Mustang hadn't intended to speak, but the utter wretchedness rolling off of the other man is overpowering; the name leaves his lips in a short gasp and he would've taken Fullmetal's hand in his had Edward not suddenly pulled back, arms clasped around himself as he huddles in the chair.
“He was just a kid.” Barely more than a whisper. “Reminded me a little of Al, and I... fuck, I was the closest thing he'd had to a real family. He wasn't much older than Al was when we... when...” He squeezes his eyes shut, breathing heavily.
Watching Edward relive the events as he tells them is terrible. Mustang wants to tell him to stop, to wrap his arms around those small, trembling shoulders and pull him into the safety of his arms. Seeing the distress caused by the memories, both recent and old, brings out too many similar emotions in himself. Old regrets and grief, but he presses his own traumas down, focusing on the dilemma before him. He believes in Edward's strength, his ability to survive such weights on his soul, and so he makes himself wait for the young alchemist to gather himself once more.
“I followed them,” Edward finally says, voice uneven. “Benny, and two men who took him down. There wasn't much light, and I couldn't get too close or they'd have seen me. And after a while, I started feeling funny. It was like, the longer we walked, the harder it was to think. Kept stumbling over nothing, seeing shit in the shadows... only thing I could concentrate on was keeping them from noticing I was there, and hoping I could find my way out again later.” He hesitates, clearly recalling the confusion and anxiety from that evening, and silence settles into the room like an uninvited guest dominating the conversation.
After several minutes Edward still shows no sign of resuming the story, and the Colonel is reluctantly about to prompt him when the other man's eyes open, unfocused and staring. “I saw the array,” he says, breaking the hush. “Benny's escorts left, and I followed him and the fraud into another, bigger cavern. It was where he did his work- his lab, if you can call it that. The array... Damn thing was drawn so sloppy I'm surprised it did anything at all. And I could barely think, everything was fuzzy and confusing by then, but even like that I knew the moment I saw it. It could never have brought back the dead. Wrong, everything was wrong... Wrong symbols, wrong lines...”
The Colonel remembers his conversations with Major Armstrong, the descriptions of the revenants; breathing, eating, moving where directed, all with the same eerie, vacant expressions. “Then how did the Resurrectionist...”
The response the question elicits is unexpected; Edward's eyes kindle with a blaze of sheer fury. Anger sears through the miasma of sorrow enveloping him, and he snarls, “Samuel Cradshaw.”
Mustang blinks, surprised. “Excuse me?”
A muscle in Edward's jaw twitches. “Cradshaw. The cult leader. His name was Samuel Cradshaw, and he was a liar, and never brought anyone back from the dead. He doesn't deserve that title, I don't even want to hear it. It's not fucking true.”
The sudden vehemence stuns the Colonel for a moment. But he recovers quickly, nodding in acquiescence. “Cradshaw,” he agrees. “But were you aware of the people we recovered, who were supposedly raised? Havoc and Major Armstrong are bringing them back to Central.”
“So you haven't seen them yet.” Edward's gives him a stare filled with disgust- not at him, Mustang realizes, but directed at the revenants themselves.
“No,” he replies carefully. “I haven't. But Major Armstrong has sent very detailed reports, and there doesn't seem to be any doubt that they are alive.”
Edward looks furious. “Alive. They're alive the same way grass is alive. An insect has more life than they do.”
Something cold seems to slither between his ribs at the words. Sitting up straighter, brows stitching together, Mustang says, “But they're alive. Surely that's remarkable, even if the means..”
“The means?” Edward spits, appalled. “You still don't get it, do you? Fuck, Mustang, it wasn't human transmutation! I told you, it can't be done, and that array wasn't designed right for it anyway. What that... that fucking prick of an alchemist did was create chimeras! He combined live people with corpses. Pulled the life force of one into the other, to reanimate dead things!”
Mustang can feel the blood draining from his face. “That's monstrous.”
Edward nods slowly. “And he put Benny in the circle with the body,” he whispers.
The Colonel's stomach lurches at the image and he controls it with an effort, although bile burns in the back of his throat. He shouldn't say anything, should let Fullmetal continue reporting events at his own pace, but the words spill out on their own. “You didn't let that happen to him.”
“No,” Edward answers in the same hushed voice. “Brain felt like it was full of sand, I could barely stand straight, but there was no way in hell I was going to let that fucker turn Benny into one of those... things. I had to... tried...” He stops, hands lifting to cover his mouth, harsh breaths gasping out around his fingers.
For a moment, Mustang fears that Fullmetal will shatter under the weight of his grief once more, and his own chest swells tight with suppressed emotion. This is too much, he thinks, miserable and angry with himself for dragging the young man through this again. “Edward, stop,” he says roughly, “That's enough, you don't have to-”
The metal hand drops away from his face with a squeal, and Edward stares at him with reddened, serious eyes. “I do,” he answers, words coming in a stop-start stutter. “I h-have to, I owe him that.” He draws a deep breath, automail grasping the edge of the table for support and sways just a bit in his seat.
That strength. How can you bear to be so strong?
Scrubbing at his face with his flesh hand, Fullmetal opens his mouth, closes it, sets his jaw and starts again. “W-When he put Benny in there, I didn't think, just rushed out. Told him to stop, step back and yelled at Benny to get out of the circle. Cradshaw just stared at me like he didn't even know if I was real, but he looked like the only person there who wasn't scared. He... he wasn't anything. I'm pretty sure he was insane. Fuck, you'd have to be insane to do those things...
“And Benny still wasn't moving. Dunno if he was too scared, but I could look at Cradshaw and see that he wasn't going to stop, and Benny was still in the array, and I just ran for him, but Cradshaw was closer...”
Edward closes his eyes for a moment, his face creased with terrible pain. “I wasn't going to make it in time,” he says. “And my head was swimming, I fell and... there wasn't any other way that I could see. I-I... I had to...” Deep breath. “I transmuted the floor. Or tried to.”
He hangs his head. “It didn't work.”
The clock in the hallway chimes the half-hour, a deep, somber toll and Mustang starts at the sound but Edward doesn't move. Gold hair falling lank about his face, hiding his expression, voice harsh as sandpaper over skin. “I fucked up the transmutation. I did something wrong in my head, or... I don't know. Doesn't matter. Instead of pulling the floor up into a wall, I brought the whole damn ceiling down around them.
“And I tried... I don't know what I was thinking, fucking couldn't think... but I tried to pull it back apart. Maybe I hoped I'd fucked up when I brought the rocks down, I don't know... but the sparks from the alchemy... the whole cave just lit... exploded. Threw me all the way out where I'd first seen Cradshaw, or at least I think that's where I landed. Don't know how I wasn't killed outright by the explosion. Hell,” he laughs, strained and humorless, “I don't know how I lived at all. Don't even know how I got out of there. Certainly don't remember doing it. My automail was fucked, my head was stuffed with cotton... next thing I know, I'm hanging onto this big tree, puking my guts out.”
Heart racing, and Fullmetal's quiet distress is contagious; he feels as though he's drowning in this misery. And as frightened as he'd been for weeks, realizing precisely how close Edward had come to perishing as well. I can't let this happen again, he thinks, the thud of his pulse making him feel almost ill. But the inexorable specter of duty sneers, promising you will.
For now- focus. Edward sits before him, awash in memory and bound by so much wretchedness that it surprises the Colonel when the other man moves, leaning back, head tilting upward. He looks exhausted; battered, beaten, and Mustang aches to see him proud and defiant once more.
“I don't know how long I was out there,” Fullmetal says to the ceiling. “A couple nights, I think, but I'm not sure. Felt like someone had been kicking me in the head with military boots, and I was half out of my mind and sick. Light hurt my eyes, and when I closed them everything spun...” He pulls his arms around himself at the memory. “And it was cold. I remember being cold, all the time.”
“When Alphonse disappeared from the caves,” the Colonel ventures, “was it because he found you?”
A ghost of a smile haunts the young man's lips. “Yeah. He wanted to take me back to town right away, but I was so sick, really fucked up.”
The smile drifts away, replaced once again by sadness. “Really fucked up,” he repeats. “Couldn't stop thinking about what I'd done. That I'd killed. Benny... All the people I've met who deserved to die, and I kill him. Some poor kid who just wanted a family.” He knuckles one eye roughly before adding in a soft voice, “He was looking at me, you know. When the roof came down. Just looking at me. Trusting me.”
“You kept him from suffering,” Mustang tells him. “Even though he didn't survive, what Cradshaw had planned for him was far worse. You didn't let that happen to him, Edward.”
“I could've done better. I could've done things right, could've-”
“Gas,” the Colonel says gently. “The lower caves were full of it. Exposure can cause confusion, disorientation. It happened to some of the men clearing out the debris, after. You had no way of knowing. You're not accountable for that.”
Edward is quiet for a while, brow furrowed as he thinks. But he finally shakes his head, sighing.
“Doesn't matter,” he states. “Still my fault.”
Mustang would argue the point, but heavy eyes roll his direction, pinning him beneath their sorrowful weight. Old, soldier's eyes, so out of place in a face still flush with youth. Mustang is mesmerized, unable to turn his head away as Edward asks, oddly gentle, “Have you ever...” Pauses, uncertain, the question hanging..
“Have I ever what?”
A half shrug. “You know. Fucked up. Like I did.”
The teeth of his nightmares drag across the tender places in his mind, and his soul flinches. Mustang drops his gaze to his lap. “Yes. I have.”
He can hear Fullmetal shifting in his chair. “What happened?”
He doesn't want to discuss this. It is his sin, his own demon, his past. But he knows this logic does not work in Edward's mind. To the young alchemist, equivalence must be met; he knows Fullmetal's most terrible mistakes, so Edward is entitled to his. And yet it's been so long since anyone knew the worst of him; the thought of laying himself bare is terrifying.
And Edward waits, watching him with patient, young-old eyes, and there is no choice, after all.
“Ishval,” he sighs, and it is his turn to look away. “It was... you have no idea how bad it was there. No open battles, just guerrilla warfare. House to house, street to street, ambushes you prayed to walk out of.” He closes his eyes, feels the heat of the sun battering down on his neck, the whip of wind and sand. “There were... You have to understand, they were fighting for their lives, and I couldn't blame them for that. They were being exterminated, no matter how the military liked to couch it. And they only wanted to live... “
The memory of the flames is still too strong. He can still see the bodies so clearly, smell the blood and scent of death. Suffocating with fear, and he finds himself struggling to breathe even in the clear air of his kitchen.
“I killed a lot of people there, Fullmetal,” he says in a monotone, the words coming hard. “Men fighting for their homes, zealots fighting for their god. Children. I killed children there. Some of them carried guns, and others... “ He chokes, but forces himself to keep talking. “When you're young and scared and have been attacked too many times to count, a stick can look like a gun. A doll can. And I... I burned them all.”
The wound in his heart is oozing blood like dark, sticky tears; never healed, only waiting to spring fresh poisons into his soul. It hurts more than he could have imagined, more than it did when it was new, and Mustang wants to lock it away once more, let it fester in darkness where he doesn't have to see. I don't want anyone to know. I want this to die with me.
His mouth twisting with bitterness, Mustang says, “I'm not proud of my actions. The people I was ordered to kill- most of them weren't even combatants. So you see, Edward, your error doesn't even come close to mine. One innocent, caught in the crossfire as it were, next to all the lives I took-”
“How many?”
Edward's question catches him off-guard, and Mustang looks up. “I don't know,” he answers quietly. “They didn't tell us the official count. I was too young, it never occurred to me to ask. And I don't think I want to know. It's too high, too terrible to contemplate. I don't think I could bear knowing.” He pauses, more upset than he can afford to show. “I don't like talking about this.”
Please don't make me remember.
But Fullmetal holds him in his gaze, frowning as he asks, “Don't you owe it to them to remember? They were human too, with their own lives. You took that away from them; you don't get to forget it.”
“It's not so easy. If I were to dwell upon what I've done... I don't think I could face myself. And for my sins, I'm going to change the military, to keep anything like that from ever happening again. Even if what I've done is...”
“Unforgivable?”
“...Yes.”
Silence surrounds them once more; Edward considering, while the Colonel hunches over in his chair as though trying to hide from his admission. The quiet no longer feels so comfortable; it's too raw, and filled with the shades of the dead, and the truths that hang between them point with laughing clarity at their flaws. And Mustang wishes with every breath for the simple solace of Edward's touch, and wonders when the tables turned so completely.
Automail whines as Edward pushes his mug away. “We're a fucked up pair, Mustang.”
The Colonel wants to laugh, but it's just not funny at all. “Yes, we certainly are.” He glances up at the young man slumping over the table, golden eyes inhabited with devastation, and sighs. “You're exhausted. We should both get some sleep.”
Fullmetal says nothing, but he rises along with the Colonel and they make their careful way up the stairs, the young man growling only slightly at the assistance he's offered. At their backs, the clock chimes four and when Mustang turns back from closing the door Edward is already climbing stiffly onto the mattress. The leather pants are in a bunch on the floor, and he steps over them as he lies down at Edward's side.
The ragged course his emotions have run is taking its toll; the Colonel's eyelids are heavy and burning, but his arms are empty without Edward's warmth filling them and sleep seems a distant destination. I wish..., he thinks, but before he can complete the thought Fullmetal is bumping up against him, fitting himself into the contours of Mustang's body. Edward's chin nudges hard against his shoulder, and his arms close instinctively around the smaller man. Mustang sighs, one hand trailing gently up Edward's arm and feels that tenuous sense of peace returning.
Grumbling in his throat as though severely put out by Mustang's neediness, Edward allows him to touch his cheek, his hair, but doesn't quite relax beneath his hand. “Just for tonight,” he says, quiet and rough. “And only 'cause we've already done this once. It's the same as it's always been, though. Doesn't mean a damn thing.”
“Of course not,” Mustang agrees, but his bones shiver beneath the lie. Edward sinks back into him, breath trembling against his chest, and the truth shudders against his skin. But he can let Fullmetal have his illusion of deceit, if it helps to restore his strength and will once more. He would sacrifice all of his pride, to give him that.
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