"Granny, why didn't he scream?"

That was the question that Winry Rockbell, age eleven, asked timidly as she watched her childhood friend sleeping feverishly upon the surgery table. Edward Elric's face was flushed and disturbed, the image only made worse by the lack of half of his limbs.

Pinako looked upon her granddaughter with a face of weariness.

"Because he had someone to protect," she answered simply, placing her pipe between her teeth. Winry peered down at her grandmother with confusion. She would probably not understand this reason until years later, when she saw the same boy she had fallen for give up nearly everything to save his brother.

She would understand why he didn't scream when his raw nerves were attached to the automail port after he returned home, a triumphant smile on his face as he trailed behind his younger, flesh-covered brother.

Because everyone else that came for metal prosthetics didn't have the motivation to get their limbs back.

Those tired, crippled men that returned from wars and asked for automail were only doing it because they felt useless without them. They only wanted limbs for themselves, so they could become stronger, richer, more famous. People who lost their limbs in accidents only wanted replacements so they could pretend as if the accident never happened, so they wouldn't feel mournful over their loss.

But Edward Elric was different.

He wanted the prosthetics not for himself, but for his brother. He had someone to live for, someone that he needed to protect. The men and women who got automail screamed because they didn't feel a need to hide their weakness from anybody. Edward felt as if showing weakness would be the same as admitting that he couldn't restore his brother's body. He had a real, desperate reason to get these limbs, even if the pain was the worst anybody could feel. He had faced the Truth, and he had lived to tell - or not tell - about it. He was a big brother, dammit, and he had a reason to go through all this torture!

But, looking at him when he was a young boy, lying on that table with his face scrunched up in pain, Winry couldn't help but wonder why he didn't let everybody know about just how much pain he was in.

Now, looking fondly on as her husband played with two young, giggling children, she smiled.

"Winry, why didn't he scream?" Pinako asked quietly behind her, the smallest of grins upon her lips. Winry glanced at her for a moment, slightly confused, before remembering her asking the same exact question years before. She looked back out into the yard.

The object of their conversation suddenly looked over, as if he knew they were talking about him. Grinning widely, Edward waved, his four-year-old daughter squealing happily as she clung to his arm.

"Because he had someone to protect," Winry whispered, her voice barely reaching her grandmother.