Chapter Text
Rooming with Mustang was the best thing to happen to Ed in the past few weeks. He didn’t want to admit it. Didn’t want to admit that he was a weak child who craved some adult presence in his life. To protect him. To be the one to shoulder all the burden. Such a thing was so antithetical to how had had lived since Mom died.
Ed was the one that needed to take care of Al. Ed was the one who needed to shoulder all the burdens of the world. Ed was the one who couldn’t be weak because if he was weak, then who would protect Al?
And he had thought he had done a relatively good job at being strong . No matter what life threw at him, no matter how many times he was kicked when he was down, he got back up. He dusted himself off. And he continued on with his head held high.
But something about this experience changed him.
Trekking through the woods with Havoc in charge, even though Havoc didn’t outrank him and wasn’t an alchemist made him realize just how small he was in the world. That no matter how much alchemy knowledge he shoved in his head, no matter how much he studied, no matter how many fights he won, there was always someone who knew more than him.
And he did understand that on a logical level. After all, he had sought out Teacher to help him understand more about alchemy, hadn’t he?
But this felt different.
This was different.
Havoc wasn’t there to teach him the ways of the world. Havoc was there to keep him alive and moving. Ed wasn’t sure if he had ever had that before.
And that was only the tip of the iceberg.
There was also his reaction to rooming with Mustang. He had never given much thought to the place Mustang held in his life. He figured that if he did think about it too much, it’d force him to confront some long-buried part of himself. A part that died the day Dad left .
Or, at least, the part he thought died the day Dad left.
He didn’t need anyone to take care of him. He didn’t need anyone to chase away the nightmares or the monsters. Or so he thought.
Because being with Mustang made him feel safe.
God, how he hated that.
He was Edward Elric!
He wasn’t supposed to need anyone to feel safe.
And yet, here he was. Unable to sleep unless he knew Mustang and his stupid smug face were in the room with him. He’d never let the man know, of course. He had a reputation to remain. And, if Mustang ever found out what Ed was thinking then he’d never let Ed live it down.
However, if Ed allowed himself to think on the issue for more than thirty seconds, he found that he understood why Mustang would tease him endlessly for his perceived weakness.
He had never given it much thought, Mustang’s position in the military; his position in Ed’s life. But the two of them were more similar than he originally imagined. They both had these walls up around them because letting them down would mean showing their weaknesses. And if they showed their weaknesses then people could take advantage of them. They could hurt them. They had hurt them. Both of them.
Ed’s hand went to the brand on his chest. It still ached. It probably always would. The thick, gnarled scar tissue would be stiffer than his skin. Knotted and rough.
“What’s wrong?” Mustang asked. The tone was sharp and eyes narrowed.
Ed dropped his hand. “Nothing. Just thinking.” He answered.
He wasn’t sure what he was supposed to say now. What he was supposed to do. If he broke down and let Mustang know how much he needed him, then Mustang would either be forced to act like Ed was a nuisance, or else risk opening up and potentially painting a bigger target on their backs.
And make no mistake, Mustang’s apparent, uncaring feelings towards Ed were just that. An act. A carefully constructed façade that gave him the freedom to move how he needed to move to reach his goals. Ed saw that now. He recognized that.
The thought made his heart clench. Even though both he and Mustang cared about each other, they couldn’t be open about it. Not without risking everything. That was just his luck. To finally have someone he trusted to watch his back and not leave like Dad did only to choose the one guy in the world with his own demons ready to take them both out.
Mustang’s eyes narrowed further. “You haven’t made a move in nearly a minute.”
Ed looked down at the chessboard balancing between them. He had bugged Mustang until he agreed to teach Ed how to play. Mostly because Ed was bored sitting in a hospital with nothing to do for hours on end. The doctors wouldn’t let him do Alchemy or anything! They were afraid he’d keel over and die, he guessed.
“Cause you’re a shitty teacher,” Ed shot back. He resigned himself to his fate. He was fine with Mustang pretending to hate him and vice versa. So long as he knew the truth. So long as he knew that the barbs and insults thrown his way were an act. He could live with that.
He didn’t want to. But he could.
Mustang tilted his head to the side. He glanced down at the board and then back at Ed. “You know—”
“You gonna make a move old man? Or are you going senile?”
Mustang’s eye twitched. “I’ll have you know I am the youngest colonel ever—”
“Just because you’re the youngest doesn’t mean you’re young.”
“If I’m so old, shouldn’t you be respecting your elders?”
There. That was more like it. The back and forth. The jabs. That’s what they should be showing the world.
Ed opened his mouth to argue some more. To give him another jab to show that nothing had changed between them. Only, when he tried, he found that he didn’t want to. He didn’t want to pretend, even knowing it was for the best. Instead, he turned his attention back to the board and moved a knight. The move itself opened him up to all sorts of attacks from Mustang’s side. He didn’t care. He wanted the game to be over and done with. He was tired of playing anyway.
Mustang sighed and did not immediately take out Ed’s queen.
“You’re a tough kid, you know that?” he said softly.
Ed looked up. “What?”
“You’re tough. You know how to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and keep moving.”
Ed didn’t want to respond to that. He certainly didn’t feel tough . Especially since Havoc had been the one doing most of the picking up, dusting off, and moving forward. Sometimes downright dragging Ed to their next checkpoint.
“Part of being tough is knowing when to lean on other people,” Mustang said as if reading Ed’s mind. “Havoc’s a good leader. He knows his shit and he knows how to keep people alive. You were right to lean on him during this.”
“I would have been more helpful if I didn’t need to lean on him so much,” Ed grumbled. He moved a pawn forward to capture Mustang’s bishop. Another stupid move that left his king open.
Mustang captured the pawn instead. “Maybe. But you did what you needed to do to get to Central.”
“Didn’t matter much in the end. Fuery had already gotten ahold of the radio. And Havoc was running around killing a bunch of people.”
“A team effort then . Besides, you were infinitely more helpful than I was.”
“You crushed Hakkert pretty well if I remember correctly.” Why wasn’t Mustang capturing his king ? Why wasn’t he ending this game? Why was he playing along with this charade? Purposefully keeping Ed in the game when he could have ended it in one move?
“Still, that was only after everyone on my team got captured because of a mistake I made.”
Ed moved another pawn forward. Somehow, he managed to capture Mustang’s castle.
“You blew up a bunch of them at the train station too.”
“That I did.”
Ed advanced forward once more. “What’s all this about? Why are you telling me all of this?”
“Because I fear I did not prepare you enough for the life of a military dog. The backstabbing. The distrust. The people who are looking for any excuse to cut you down to serve their own purposes.”
“Like you?” Ed asked before he could stop himself. He wasn’t sure if he wanted Mustang to answer truthfully or not.
“Yes, like me.”
He swallowed and pushed his pawn, his one lowly pawn that Mustang had yet to make a move on even though he could have. Ed took a Knight.
“But that’s why I’ve handpicked my team,” Mustang continued. “I trust Havoc, Hawkeye, Fuery, Breda, and Falman more than I probably should, especially given my goals. But it is necessary. And what sort of life would that be if I had no allies around me? A lonely one.”
Practically all of Mustang’s pieces were now surrounding the King , but he kept moving to take other pieces of Ed’s. He wanted to yell at him and tell him to just finish it already.
“Okay, so you’re telling me that I can trust Havoc and Hawkeye and all of them too?”
“Partially. But remember, Elric, I hand-picked you too. You may have not been planned, and I may not have a job for you in mind, but you’re still one of mine. And that’s not a weakness.”
Ed watched as Mustang took his last pawn on the board and took Ed’s pawn. The one he had been solely moving about the board since his revelation.
“Checkmate,” Mustang said. “Better luck next time, kid.”
Ed glared down at the board. “You’ve had that planned from the beginning.”
Mustang smiled. “Maybe. Or maybe not. What matters is that I know my team’s strengths and weaknesses. And I knew how to minimize the weaknesses while protecting the strengths.”
Ed felt like there was a metaphor somewhere in there. He hated metaphors. Maybe he should ask Mustang to recite it to him in alchemy terms. Then he’d be able to understand and piece things together.
“Brother!”
Ed and Mustang looked to the door to see Al, Winry, and Granny Pinako practically bursting through the door. Well, Al and Winry were bursting through the door. Granny Pinako was shuffling along behind them. Seemingly in no rush to get into the room.
“Al! Winry!” Ed said, smiling so hard his cheeks hurt. “You guys finally got here.”
“Trains have been down for almost a week now,” Granny said, shuffling to the closest chair and sitting on it. “No thanks to you.”
Ed’s smile dropped. “Hey now, that wasn’t my fault!”
Al bundled him up into a hug, pulling him off of Mustang’s bed and knocking over the chess board in the process . “Oh, we’ve been so worried about you. First, you disappeared and then Lieutenant Colonel Hughes was calling. No one would tell us anything.”
Mustang sat back with a small smile on his face, watching the scene unfold in front of him.
“Yeah, you jerk. Do you know how rude it is to just disappear like that?” Winry cried, brandishing a wrench at him.
“It wasn’t my fault! I was walking all the way to Central. Do you know how long that takes?” Ed shouted back.
“And look at what you did to my automail! All that work down the drain.”
“Your automail? What about me?” Ed cried as Al finally set him back down on the bed.
“Oh, Colonel, you’re hurt as well. Are you okay?” He asked, rushing over to fuss with him next.
“I’m fine, Alphonse. Thank you for asking.”
“Brother hasn’t been bothering you, right?”
“Hey! Bothering him? What about him bothering me?” Ed snarked. It was easy like this. Easy to put on a brave face when Al and Winry were there. He was glad. He didn’t have to think so much when they were here. He didn’t have to worry about weaknesses or people stabbing him in the back. Or whether or not people would try to hurt him to get to Mustang and vice versa.
Granny finally decided to step in. “Alright, alright you two. Alphonse, get him onto the other bed so I can look at the ports and determine how much damage you did to them.”
Al nodded and scooped Ed up, depositing him on the bed with a squawk.
“Do you need me to leave?” Mustang asked.
Ed nearly laughed out loud at that. Mustang wasn’t going anywhere for a long time. Not with his body in the state it was in.
“Depends on what Edward wants,” Granny said.
“He can stay,” Ed grumbled. “Mostly because it’d take too long to get a nurse in here to haul your oversized ass out of the room.” He decided to tack that little jab on at the end just in case Winry and Al read too much into that and got worried.
“Why Edward , you wound me,” Mustang sighed dramatically and flopped back on the bed. “After all that I’ve been through and yet you still insult me at every turn.”
“Yeah, well, you deserve it.”
Mustang clutched a hand over his heart. “Betrayed by my own subordinate.”
Granny clicked her tongue at the antics and went back to looking at Ed’s automail. “You’ll have to come back home with us and get this repaired. You really did a number on it.”
Ed looked to Mustang once more. For permission or comfort, he did not know. And he did not want to know.
“That’s fine,” Mustang said. “We all could use a chance to heal after this ordeal anyway. It’ll be nice for you to be back home and not have to worry about the military for a bit.”
Ed nodded. “How long do you think I’ll be out for,” He asked Granny.
“I’ll need to run more tests, but probably two weeks at the least.”
“Two weeks!” Ed cried. “I can’t waste two weeks. I already wasted god-knows how long walking from West City to Central!”
“Brother, it’s fine,” Al said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “You need to heal. You’ve been through a lot.”
Ed wanted to argue that Al had been through a lot too . Was still going through a lot. Every second he was stuck in that armor was a second that he couldn’t eat. Couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t feel the wind on his skin. Couldn’t cry. Couldn’t even laugh. Maybe if Ed hadn’t been so weak if he had dealt with Hakkert sooner, he’d be back on the road sooner and finding the philosopher’s stone. Then Al could have his body back. But no. He was stuck like this, for another two weeks. All because of Ed and his stupid automail.
Mustang said nothing. Just watched him. His expression was carefully blank, but with a slight furrow of his brow that said he was thinking of something.
“If you want to get your bodies back,” Mustang said after a beat, “then you’ll need to be in top shape to do so.”
Ed flinched. He knew that was true. He knew he needed all his strength and four working limbs if he was going to help Al. He didn’t like to hear it, though.
“Pushing yourself past the limits will do nothing but burn you out and cause you to make mistakes. And, with Al as he is, you can’t risk making any more mistakes.”
Ed flinched again. Even Al seemed to deflate at this.
“Well, we’ll get you back on the road as soon as we can,” Winry said brightly, if not a little nervously, trying to bring the mood of the room back up. “And I’ve been working on my designs so it’ll be even better than last time.” She tossed her hair over her shoulder. “I’ll charge you full price for it, of course.”
“Full price?” Ed shouted.
“This is top-quality stuff, Edward! I need to get paid my worth. Or do you not think my automail is worth anything?”
“I didn’t say that!”
“ Well you certainly implied it,” she huffed.
It was then that Havoc stuck his head in the room. “Oh, hey, Al! I thought I heard you. Finally got here, did you? And Ms. Winry, always a pleasure to see you again.”
Winry blushed and giggled as Havoc pushed in Hawkeye.
Hawkeye smiled at Winry. “Good to see you again, Winry. How are you?”
“I should be asking you that. What happened to your hands?” Winry asked.
“Nothing that a little time and physical therapy can’t fix,” Hawkeye replied smoothly.
“Hang on, I’ll go round up the rest of the gang. Unless you mind?” Havoc asked, eyeing Granny skeptically.
Ed waved a hand at him. “No, it’s fine. We’re finished here anyways.”
“Great!” Havoc beamed. “I’ll be right back.”
It didn’t take long for the hospital room to fill once more with people talking and laughing. Even Granny seemed impressed with Havoc. Though, that could just be because he called her ‘ma’am’ and talked about his own grandmother.
Ed thought he understood now what Mustang was saying. Before about how he handpicked people in his life to trust.
Ed also did that, in a way. He trusted Mustang to help him and his brother get their bodies back. And to not give up their secrets. And he trusted Winry and Granny to keep his automail working as efficiently as possible. And he trusted Hawkeye to help them out. And on and on and on. He knew that there were still people in this world that wanted to hurt him. Some with reasons more valid than others. But, so long as he had a team of people behind him he could trust, he knew he’d make it out the other side.