Author's Note: This first chapter is sad, but I promise the ones to follow won't be. Expect motherly figures and brotherliness in general. I cried while writing this. I think I was thinking into it too much. Hmm. Reviews appreciated! Thanks for reading. :)
The second night after Trisha Elric passed away was the most terrible Edward could remember having, and it had clearly stood as the worst ever since. It was by this point, amidst the confusion and the funeral arrangements, that it had finally begun to set in on him and his brother that Mother wasn't going to come back. The first night hadn't been as terrible. There has still been shock then. They had become slightly accustomed to their mother not being around because of her ailment. But they had had hope. It was the second night that was painful. It was then, without a doubt, it really felt like Mother had gone somewhere far off and unreachable. Somewhere where her smile couldn't be seen, and where her soft hands couldn't heal their wounds. She was beyond their reach.
And it was after the shock had begun to wear away that the pain started.
It hit Alphonse like a storm. He could hardly do a thing. He just cried long and hard. The sobs never tired and the weeping pleas didn't stop. Ed felt helpless to watch him like that. It appeared that Al felt like if he cried long and hard enough, Mother would come home to them and dry his tears again. But she didn't. Ed had never been good with words of comfort. It was his mother, too, after all. What could he say to make it better? This was his wound to cope with as much as it was Al's. Winry, however, provided at least a little consolation. She had lost both her parents in one day, several years prior. She held him for a long time without a word. Edward had just assumed there was nothing left to do but let him cry himself out. Besides, how could he be any kind of guiding light if he was every bit as lost?
Ed spent that second day wandering the open hills, hands stuck deep in his pockets, head stuck deeper in thought. He didn't cry much. At the most hopeless points of thought, a tear or two would fall, but not much more than that. He didn't want to see his brother grieve like this anymore, or hear the adults talk in sad hushed voices like they had just prior to his mother's death. There had to be some kind of a way around this. It couldn't just be the end. And he was determined to find a way around this blockade.
Then came the horrible night. It was marked forever in his memory as one of the worst nights of his life, followed extremely closely by the night they lost their bodies, which, at that point, had been yet to come.
What made it distinctly horrible at first was the quiet. Night had never, ever been this quiet. Alphonse wasn't even crying by then. Ed thought maybe his assumption about 'crying himself out' had been right, and he just had nothing left to cry with. After Ed had wandered the hills, still lacking any means of a plan, he had returned to the Rockbell's, where Pinako had kindly offered to have them stay for dinner. Now, they had returned to their own home. Their quiet home. Their empty home. Their seemingly lifeless and motherless place. It was like punishment. When nightfall had come, blanketing the sleepy countryside in darkness, they had gone up to bed without a word, for what was left to say?
Both kept their places at opposite sides of the same room, but neither moved from the moment they'd gone to bed. It was a funny feeling, rigid with quiet. Neither spoke, nor moved a muscle, almost in fear it would make a sound. There was a strange expectation in the air. Every night, for as long as they could remember, and until she had taken ill, Mother had come upstairs to kiss them goodnight once they were in bed. They were mutually aware by now that they were both waiting for her to come, even thought they knew she wouldn't. It felt like a long time before finally something happened. Ed sighed, and the tension melted away. It was almost as if to say, she won't come this time.
Much to Edward's chagrin, Alphonse started to cry again. He almost regretted having sighed in the first place. He lay quietly, listening to nothing but his brother's near-silent sobbing. Without looking, he knew the scene. Al would be sitting up, crying into his pajama sleeve, no doubt… After awhile, he couldn't take it anymore. Ed got up, crept over to his brother's bedside and softly slid an arm around his trembling shoulders. Tearful eyes, red from crying, looked up at him. "…Ed?"
He didn't say a word, and hugged his little brother to his chest with one arm. Al gave in and leaned into his shoulder. His tears became completely silent again. "She's not coming back, is she..?" he asked, his voice faraway and sad. Edward wasn't going to answer that. They stayed this way for awhile. It was peculiar… as though regardless of how far away Mother seemed now, she seemed just a little closer while he was holding his brother.
"I want you boys to look out for each other," said Trisha in his memories.
Ed held Al a little closer. He could feel it undeniably now. There was a little bit of warmth inside the coldness his heart had become over the past few days. Warmth that was Mother. That warmth gave him hope. A tear fell down one cheek, but he pretended not to notice. Mother's funeral was to be in the morning, but even now, something was being put together in his mind, for he had just recalled a book he had once read… one that might make it so his little brother wouldn't need to cry anymore.
Mother would come home.
It was quarter after eleven when Alphonse fell asleep. His tears had dried for now, and Ed felt by looking at him that he would probably make it through the night okay. But Ed didn't want to sleep. He wanted to confirm his thoughts first. He went quietly to search for Father's books, and he found the one he wanted. It was an old thick leather volume with a chapter index in Roman numerals, and the reading of that index was what added to the blow of one of the worst nights he would come to remember.
Chapter XIII: Human Transmutation.