A/N: Hello everyone! First off I have not abandoned A Painless Lesson. But with the beginning of term, I've been super busy. I'm working on chapter 11, but it may take a while; I have it maybe a third written right now. So I figured, instead of not updating, I could put up this story that's been resting on my computer about the Elrics after the Promised Day. It's short (it's multi-chaptered but the individual segments are brief), relatively plotless, and nearly complete. So I think it'll serve as a good buffer until I'm done with chapter 11. It's so close to being complete that I will probably just post the other chapters even if I can put up a chapter of A Painless Lesson on time. Thank you for reading and hopefully I'll have chapter 11 up soon!

1915

Ed couldn't believe it. He was home. Al was home...really home, as himself, he could touch things and eat Winry's pie and feel Den when he played with him. He laughed softly, punching with both fists, and seeing flesh blur past twice instead of flesh and metal sent him into more fits of uncontrollable laughter. Jogging, he thought of everyone who helped him get to this point, who he needed to thank…of the Colonel and the Lieutenant, Mr. Gori and Mr. Heinkel…He suddenly stopped jogging, his pace slowing until he was standing in the middle of the road. Not everyone had gotten out of helping them alive. Hughes murdered as a warning…Nina murdered for no reason at all…Foo who never got to see Lin become emperor...

Oh man, Lin and Lanfan. He hadn't had much chance to talk to either after the Bearded Bastard was taken down. Lin had said he wanted to leave fast because they were illegals and didn't want to get caught. Ed and Al hadn't had time to tell them how sorry they were about Foo or Lanfan's arm, the arm she couldn't get back any more than her grandfather. He continued slowly down the familiar dirt path. He hadn't noticed that he had almost reached Winry's house. Now thoroughly depressed, he pushed open the front door.

"Hey, hey! Long time no see!" a familiar cheerful voice called.

"Ah! What the…!? Lin!?" Ed started. Sure enough his Xingese friend was standing right in front of him, eyes-as always-closed, grinning broadly and poised on the ledge of a window facing the front door. Recovering, Ed ran up to him.

"Lin you crazy bastard, what are you doing here!" he exclaimed happily, pounding his friend's fist.

"Oh, diplomatic business and whatnot. I've got a lot of that to do now I'm emperor. Thought I'd surprise you and Al. I'm sorry we couldn't talk more after…well…" Lin's face hardened and Ed knew he had meant "after Foo died". But Lin snapped out of his brooding to conclude "Well, thought we'd drop by!"

"We? Wait, of course, that means…"

"Hey, Runt."

"Lanfan!"

A masked figure had emerged from under the window and climbed through where Lin had just been. She removed the mask, revealing her much less intimidating face and grinned. Ed scowled.

"Hey that's not fair! I'm taller than you now, you can't...oh whatever." He grumbled. His reverie hadn't exactly put him in a fighting mood. "How's that arm holding up? Fully recovered yet?" He asked. She grinned wider.

"Don't patronize me! I've gotten completely used to it!"

Soon Winry came in demanding to know who was in her house, Pinako right behind her.

"Oh Ed, it's you. Oh! Lin! Lanfan! You're back?"

"What, more riffraff in my hou- wait, aren't you that young fellow who was here with Ed before?" Pinako squinted at Lin through her small glasses.

"No ma'am, that wasn't me, but I was there."

"What?"

But further explanation was drowned out by a high pitched squeal from Winry. She had noticed Lanfan's arm.

"Wow, Ed was right! Oh, man his description didn't even come close." She grabbed the automail arm abruptly, making Lanfan gasp in surprise and blush.

"This is genius...whoever made this was able to gut it enough to fit a blade but keep it durable...oh your so lucky..."

"Winry! Cut it out!" Ed hissed warningly. Winry blushed, and dropped the arm, mumbling an apology.

"That's alright." Lanfan assured her generously, raising both arms palm out infront of her as a sign she took no offense.

"May I take a look at it later? It's so superbly crafted and weaponized automail is so cool..." Winry asked.

"Sure." Lanfan assented shyly. "Perhaps you could give me some pointers on maintaining it? I'm afraid I'm not very good at keeping it clean and such..."

"Of course!"

Seeing as how Lin and Lanfan were friends of Ed and Al's she insisted they stay for dinner. They banded together to find Al, who had been making repairs for people in the village. Ed, Winry, and Pinako had been concerned with him overexerting himself with his body still so weak, but he said he needed to keep moving to build his muscle up again. So, he did as much work as he felt up to as often as he could. When they found him, he was delighted to see Lin and Lanfan and asked after Mei which earned him no end of grief from Winry. After much catching up, Ed and Lin, with nothing pressing that needed to be done for a change, took a stroll down Resembool's main drive.

"It doesn't feel real we're not being almost murdered by homunculi, huh?" Lin broke in calmly, almost sadly. It was one of the many times Ed was violently reminded of how mature Lin was, even though he was younger than himself.

"No, but I hope it stays this way." he answered smiling wryly. Lin grinned.

"Well it's too bad. I could use a shot at Bradley. Greed did most of the work."

Ed felt he'd never understand the idiot prince. But suddenly, Lin's grinned disappeared and his face hardened like it had when he mentioned the Promised Day.

"Oh I'm joking. I mean, c'mon, Ed. Our whole time in this country searching for immortality was hell. You should have seen Lanfan's family when we got back, Ed. They were torn apart."

Ed could understand families being torn apart.

"When her brother Shu saw her arm, he looked like he wanted to kill me. Or just break down crying. Or like he couldn't make up his mind which he wanted to do."

Ed was reminded vividly of his own family's reaction to he and Al's broken bodies. How Winry had cried for days and refused to leave either's side. How Granny had raged at the Colonel for merely suggesting they perform alchemy ever again.

"And when they found out about Foo… well everyone loved Foo. And Lanfan's father died when we were little so her mother endures losing her father as well as her husband. On top of a crippled daughter." He finished bitterly, anger in his voice at not being able to protect his servants who Ed knew were family to him the way Winry and Granny were to him and Al. Or how Uncle and Auntie Rockbell were to them before they passed away.

Lin paused, looked down, let out a long sigh, and scratched his head just above the bow that kept his hair in a ponytail. "I put them through alot. And I'm just glad they can rest now."

"Lin, I…" Ed began but he didn't know what to say to make up for what getting involved in he and his brother did to the taller boy. He understood feeling guilty... he felt guilty for what had happened to the dead old man and crippled girl, as he did for Brigadier General Hughes.

"Al and I are really sorry about Foo. And…and about Lanfan. The recovery's a bitch, but get past it and you're as good as before with an automail arm. Girl like her will be fine!"

Lin smiled faintly.

"Thanks." He seemed to understand. "And I hope you're right about Lanfan. She still struggles sometimes but she's getting more and more used to the arm."

"She isn't fully recovered yet!?"

"Ed, it hasn't even been a full year."

"But she said she was fine!"

"Lanfan always says she's fine, Ed."

"Oh. Right."

The two boys continued talking and laughing. When the sun began to set, Winry sent Den for them and they obediently returned for dinner and apple pie for dessert.

"Hey where's Lanfan?" Winry asked abruptly when they had finished eating.

Everyone looked around the kitchen to find it sans one black-haired girl.

Al broke the silence.

"I dunno. Uh…maybe she went on a walk to work off the meal?" he offered. Lin snorted.

"Lanfan doesn't take walks for exercise. That's barely a blip on her radar." He stood up. "Lanfan?" he called clearly. No response. He looked close to panic.

"Let's look for her." Ed suggested seeing his friend's distress. After Winry being used as a hostage hung over he and Al's heads, he understood it was a scary thing, not knowing where a loved one was. "Geez, of course she'd choose to disappear after dinner…she's got a stomach about as big as yours, Lin."

Ed was the one who eventually found her. She was kneeling in the small cemetery his mother was buried in. He remembered approaching the place more than half a year ago and seeing his father standing close to where she was now.

"Man, there you are! You about gave Lin a heart attack… It's not like you to leave him without backup." He said.

"I did not leave him unattended. Others guard him in the shadows, undetected, and I only intended to step out for a moment." She replied simply, eyes still on the grave in front of her.

As he approached he saw whose grave she was looking at.

Hoenheim's.

What's she doing here…? "Lanfan are you…praying for my dad?"

"Yes." She answered not breaking her vigil. "When I asked after him Pinako told me he had past. So I pray for his journey in the other world. I understand he knew and loved our country, so I hope he takes no offense in our customs."

"But why were you asking Granny about Ho-Dad?" Ed asked still getting used to the term "dad" to describe him. But he felt he owed the bastard that much at least. Lanfan blushed and stared at the grave for a moment. She did not seem to know how she should answer. Finally:

"Your father did me a great kindness on that so-called Promised Day."

"What do you mean?"

Lanfan stood up, and with a last little reverent bow to Hoenheim's grave, turned to Ed.

"On that…horrible day" Lanfan began and Ed suppressed a pang knowing how real the horror was for her. She had lost her grandfather on that day. "Do you remember how on that day we all went down into that foul lair under Central? And we split up and I went with your father?"

"Oh yeah! Sorry about that. I hope he didn't try anything funny…" Ed replied, remembering what his dad had said about "preferring the company of young women" or some shit when choosing to go with her.

"What…? Oh! No! It wasn't like that!" Lanfan blustered, blushing a little harder than before but looking amused. "That was an excuse. You see, when we were alone he told me to go find His Majesty."

"To find Lin!?"

"Yes. He sent me off to look for him, saying he'd be fine on his own. That's what I wanted to thank him for. I was sorry to learn he had died."

"That was…nice of him." Ed mumbled. "But" he said finally "How come you had to run off like that? "

She looked at the grave again.

"I did…not want His Majesty to know."

"Why?"

She bit her lip and blushed the hardest yet. What had his father said that she wanted to keep from Lin?

"Lanfan!" Lin came running up to them looking more cross with himself for not finding her sooner than with her for disappearing. And as Ed watched the scene of Lanfan blushingly trying to explain where she had been without revealing too much to an irritatingly probing Lin, he felt he understood his friends, and his father, a bit better.

The next day, Lin and Lanfan set out early in the morning for Central (though not so early as to miss breakfast).

"Well, see you later Ed."

"Take care."

"Yeah, later guys…"

"Come again, sometime!" Al called after them as they walked away.

"We definitely will! Whenever we get the chance!" Lin called back over his shoulder.

"Man, why do I get the feeling we haven't seen the last of them?" Ed griped watching them go.

"Oh be quiet, you know you like them." Winry teased. "Hey, Al, maybe next time they visit, they'll bring Mei."

"So what!?" Al asked defensively, glaring sharply, though the effect was not in the least intimidating in his stll somewhat emaciated body.

A few weeks later, a letter with Xingese writing on the envelope arrived at the Rockbell residence. In it was a grainy photo. In the photo Lin faced the camera soberly in his new Imperial robes which he seemed to be growing into. Lanfan was clearly visible behind the large throne he was sitting on, though her face was obscured by her mask. Ed recognized it as the picture that came with the newspaper article announcing Lin being crowned emperor. On the back was scrawled in inexpert Amestrian:

Lanfan and I at my coronation! Pretty cool, right? Oh, and Chang says hello.

As Ed tacked it to the hallway cork board he mused that no, he probably hadn't seen the last of them. He could never manage to shake the idiot prince before…why should that change now?