Author's Note: I suppose this deserves some explanation. In my mind, there are two types of crossovers: the type where characters from one universe literally cross over through magic or science or what-have-you (in FMA's case, it's typically something to do with the Gate) into another and interact with characters there, and the type which is a sort of AU where characters from one universe are made to have been in another all along.
This is one of the latter, as that's almost always the way I imagine crossovers, and is set in the FMA-verse. This means that you need absolutely no prior knowledge of Leviathan or its characters, since you can basically treat their AU'd selves as OCs of a sort. It also means that if you've only read Leviathan, then you're not going to get an awful lot out of this. However, the series are rather similar: both set in 1914, both steampunk of a sort, both with fifteen-year-old protagonists, both with soldiers, and both with AUs formed from fantastical science (for FMA, matter-manipulating alchemy, and for Leviathan, genetic engineering and legged vehicles).
As you can see, they're obviously very crossable-overable! :D Well, actually, they are pretty darn close to each other, and I love them both to death, so here we are. 'Round about the middle of the manga (this fic is manga/Brotherhood-verse, by the way), I had a sudden revelation: Ed and Deryn, as very empowered characters and possibly my favorite protagonists of all time, would make a simply fabulous 1) friendship pairing and 2) just regular pairing! :D
Don't get me wrong, I love Dalek and EdWin and wouldn't wish anything besides happily-ever-afters on either. But this idea was just insane yet plausible enough to be intriguing, and I still maintain that it's about a thousand times more likely than some of the ships floating around out there.
So here we are: the complete Edryn story, told in drabble-y, song-named thingies. (Try not to judge my extremely mainstream song choices, although I can't help but recommend all of them.) It starts somewhere during Chapter 19 of the manga (Episode 12 of Brotherhood), where the Elrics are leaving Rush Valley for the first time, and goes for quite a ways through the plot. (For Leviathan, it can be assumed that the characters are in a FMA-AU'd version of post-Goliath events.) It is character-based, however, so some of the plot points may be skimmed over/mentioned only in passing for the sake of length/relevance to Edryn.
A note to those of you who have read my Leviathan stuff before: you know by now that I'm not the type of person to curse gratuitously, but this is Ed we're talking about. He narrates most of these drabbles, and for those of you who are unaware, he curses as much as Deryn does, except normally and not with words Scott made up. Be warned. Deryn, of course, is just as charmingly fake-Scottish as ever...
DISCLAIMER: Not that this thing should be any longer than it already is, but I gotta say it: I'm not Scott Westerfeld or Arakawa Hiromu, and I don't own any of this. The songs and lyrics are all copyright the artists in parentheses.
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i. crashed
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and I crashed into you
and I went up in flames
(Daughtry)
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Edward Elric has met a lot of people for someone who's—almost—sixteen. It's an occupational hazard of working for the military, albeit one of the more pleasant ones. He'd much prefer an endless parade of lieutenants and warrant officers and majors and whatever the hell else the military has to offer—he's never been a stickler for protocol; if they aren't going to call him "Major", then why should he bother with their pointless formalities?—to being blown to bloody bits.
In all those meetings, though, he's never actually run into someone. Happened across them by chance, sure, but not literally—he's always thought it was a stupid expression, actually, one of the asinine things that old ladies said: "Oh, I've just run into my old friend at the store!" (Yeah, sure. If you actually ran into anything substantial, you'd probably break every bone in your rickety old body.)
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He finds himself reconsidering this rather abruptly one day in East City, when he—quite by accident—slams smack into someone. More accurately, his face slams smack into someone—someone's shoulderblades, which are unfortunately rather bony. He manages to stop the rest of himself in time.
Rubbing his nose, he retreats in annoyance, mumbling something that will probably stand for an apology—he's late, again, and Colonel Bastard has developed a habit of exponentially increasing his snide remarks for every minute of his "important time" (hah! He spends it all talking on the telephone with girls and avoiding doing paperwork, Ed knows,) that Ed takes up.
The someone is apparently not willing to stand for this, however, and flings out an arm that is, as it happens, the exact height of Ed's windpipe. He stumbles back, choking, and looks up—why is everyone so damn tall?—for the first time at his assailant.
Who is, indeed, depressingly tall, and sports short blond hair—a shade or two paler than Ed's, more, in this light, a silver than a gold—and a bulky leather coat. His frame, under it, looks skinny to the point of frailty, but the boots planted firmly on the asphalt of the side street are those of someone more than willing to kick various sturdy objects. He looks concerned for a moment, then realizes Ed isn't mortally wounded—his thin features (handsome, but why is Ed noticing this?) morph into an expression of more-than-slight annoyance.
"Excuse me?" he snaps, in a higher voice than his height would indicate, and Ed revises his age estimate down a few years—this boy can't be older than him or Al. "Just rush off and leave me, that's right, without even apologizing!" An accent that Ed can't quite place lilts in his voice.
He's about to snarl up into the other boy's face and hurry along—the bastard should be glad Ed didn't just curse at him and leave in the first place—but Al's warning "Brother—" from behind him stops him dead in his tracks.
"Sorry," he grinds out, not bothering to smooth his scowl; Alphonse's sigh from behind him causes him to tack on, hastily, "for running into you. I—wasn't—looking where I was going."
"Obviously." The other boy scowls back and folds his arms, but the expression lasts only a second until it melts into something more—playful. He sketches a bow. "May I have the honor of knowing whose head has left a bloody bruise on my back?"
"Edward," Ed says, not exactly sure why he's bothering—something in those blue eyes, maybe—and, gesturing behind himself, adds, "and Alphonse Elric."
The boy's eyes widen briefly—his mouth twitches—and suddenly he is laughing hard, bent almost double.
Ed doesn't know how to deal with this suddenly crazy stranger. Neither does Al, apparently, because he comes up next to his brother and says, tentatively, "Um... are you... all right?"
The boy swipes at his streaming eyes with the back of his hand and manages, "Aye... it's just... you're the Fullmetal Alchemist?" He points at Ed with a slightly shaking hand.
"Yes..." Ed isn't sure if he should be flattered that a total stranger recognized him by his name alone, or if he should punch said stranger for laughing at him.
"But you're so—" he gasps, laughing again, and makes a hand gesture at chest level.
Ed needs no more provocation; he has the boy by the collar before he can get that damn word out. "Who are you calling—!" He's grabbed with his automail hand, however, rather harder than he meant to, and the coat's only buttoned button rips right off. The coat slides off the boy's shoulders.
A truly excellent punch slams into Ed's jaw, and an indignant "Oi!" sounds in his ears, but he's too busy staring at what the coat has uncovered to more that halfway notice either. Regaining his presence of mind, he manages to let go of what remains of the collar and back up several steps.
"You're a—" he starts, then swallows.
"I'm a what?" A blond eyebrow arches.
"You're a girl?"
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It comes out rather harsher than he intended, more accusatory than anything, and suddenly her pale eyebrows are crumpled down and her jaw is set in a way that's familiar, somehow—
"Of course I am, you sodding idiot, what did you think? It's not like I'm barking disguised as a boy!" she explodes, and although her voice is several octaves higher than his own, Ed suddenly recognizes the way he sounds when someone's got him pissed. He takes another generous step back.
"Ah—no—p-please forgive us, miss. It's just—with your hair—and that coat—I d-don't think we were sure." Al's voice is apprehensive and timid—he's used to stepping lightly around people with hair-trigger tempers—and he sounds about six.
The girl blinks at him, apparently reconciling the voice with the seven-foot-tall suit of armor, momentarily forgetting to be angry. "I'm not mad at you," she says, her voice considerably softer. Then it skyrockets in pitch and volume again. "I'm mad at him!" She jabs an accusing finger at Ed. "He insulted me!"
Ed gapes at her. "Insulted you? You bi—" Her expression is positively murderous, however, so he backpedals hastily. He's not afraid of muscular, adult men out to kill him, no—but he's been hit with a wrench enough times to know to respect the rages of teenage girls. "Uh, well, your hair... and the coat..." he says lamely, aware that it isn't much of an excuse. He's met women with hair that short before—and, besides, he's looking at what the coat hid right now—well, trying not to, dammit, but he's having a hard time of it—and he can't really imagine that it must've been doing a very good job. "I suppose I just wasn't paying attention," he adds, softer, which is true. Well, truer
He's guessed right in using the softer tone. The anger goes right out of her face, replaced by something like amusement, and she laughs once. "This is what you get for wearing Alek's massive coats, you daftie," she says, presumably to herself, then sticks her hand out at Ed. "Apology, such as it is, accepted. Deryn Sharp... the Wind Alchemist... at your service."
For the second time in as many minutes, Ed is shocked right of his wits. He nearly gapes again, but manages to take her hand and ask, "You're a... State Alchemist? But you're not... in uniform..." Her clothes are neat and plain—loose black pants tucked into the tall boots and a white, long-sleeved collared shirt, the sleeves cuffed all the way down but several buttons undone—but indeed not military issues.
Deryn—the name suits her, even if it sounds suspiciously boyish to Ed—lifts an amused eyebrow. "Aye. But neither are you," she points out, then withdraws a silver watch that's intimately familiar to Ed—one just like it rests in his own pocket, after all. "Go on. Check my credentials."
Ed takes it in a daze, flipping it over. Deryn has turned to greet Al, so he has a few seconds to examine it in peace—and he can't deny that the design on the front is entirely genuine. On the back is indeed etched "Wind Alchemist."
Suddenly she's beside him, plucking it out of his hand and grinning cheekily. "Aye, I'm not winding you up, I really am an alchemist."
"Winding you up"? Where is she from? "You had better be, to make that claim," Ed says, smirking a bit, pulling back—tactical retreat, troops!—to cover his amazement. He'd thought he was the youngest State Alchemist by far—but it's looking like Deryn may be close.
She just snorts and rolls her eyes, but then shuffles her feet and looks down. "But anyway—er. I... um... might've been due to report to Eastern Command bloody ten minutes ago, and I might be just a wee bit lost. Sodding East City conductors," she adds under her breath in disgust. "So... since I assume you know the way...?"
"Of course we do," says Al graciously. He's always been the kinder of the two brothers; Ed often wonders at the contrast between his terrifying exterior and the boy who can't bear not to coddle stray cats—but that's the point, isn't it? If he was in his real body—like he will be, one day, when Ed fulfills his promise—his face would be just as sweet as his temper. He scowls at the thought. Al cuts him a look, misinterpreting, then continues, "In fact, we're going there as well. And we're just as late as you are. Care to join us?"
Her smile is directed entirely at him, without a shade of uncertainty, an oddity—people find it hard to treat such an imposing appearance as the boy inside deserves, sometimes. "Aye, I think I would! Thanks loads."
"You weren't that lost," Ed feels obliged to add. "This is a shortcut, actually."
But he's largely ignored as Deryn falls into step with Al, leaving no space for him on the narrow side street. He lengthens his stride—damn tall people!—and does his best to keep up.
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By the time they've reached headquarters, Deryn and Al have run through all the standard pleasantries, but Ed hasn't learned anything more about her, besides the fact that she's fifteen and therefore almost exactly his age. Al keeps trying to rope him into the conversation, which Ed foils mainly by ducking his head and grunting. He ran into this girl, yes, and she's a State Alchemist, but that doesn't mean he has to be nice to her—or let her learn anything more about him.
Deryn looks around with curiosity but no surprise as they enter headquarters—she's responding to the bustle of uniformed staff as if she's seen it all before, which Ed guesses she probably has. She's taking her time moving, though, so he asks, "Who are you reporting to?" in a not unkind tone.
"My orders say... someone called Colonel Mustang, the Flame Alchemist," she replies, crossing her arms and moving out of Ed's path. "D'you know him?"
Ed barks a laugh. "Do I know him? All too well, the bastard. He's my commanding officer. Damn manipulative, too," he says, letting his irritation for Mustang show a little more than usual. He just had to call Ed back to HQ on his way to visit Teacher... what was so damn important, anyway?
His comment—or possibly his profanity—earns him a smile and a laugh. "Brilliant! Then we can go in together, I reckon. Lead the way."
Ed does so, and his little brother catches up to him to say, in an undertone, "Brother—do you think that you being called back has anything to do with Deryn?"
"It's possible," he says, and leaves it at that until they reach Mustang's office.
He barges in first—shouting, naturally. "What kind of a trick are you trying to pull, Mustang? Calling me back here for no goddamn reason!" Behind him, he hears Deryn start to laugh quietly, and Al makes an uncertain noise, as if he wants to reprimand his older brother.
The Colonel barely looks up from what he's writing. "Rest assured, Fullmetal, that there is a reason, much as I love to torture you." Riza Hawkeye, who is standing beside his desk on her perennial guard duty, almost cracks a smile. "You would already know this reason if you had shown up on time..." he continues, finally looking up and appearing to notice Deryn for the first time. His expression immediately changes to one of sunny charm. "Why, hello there, young lady! Is there anything I can do for you?" Even his voice is vaguely flirtatious.
Effacing a smile, Deryn steps beside Ed and gives a crisply practiced salute; he has to fight the urge to tell her not to bother. "Major Deryn Sharp, the Wind Alchemist, reporting for duty, sir," she says, her voice level and professional—she's like a goddamn well-trained dog of the military already, Ed thinks gloomily.
If possible, which Ed doubts, Mustang's smile grows. "Ah, Miss Sharp, a pleasure to make your acquaintance," he says, standing and making his way over to shake her hand—a gesture that would be perfectly innocent if not for the other hand he positively drapes on her shoulder. Deryn blushes slightly. "Forgive me. I knew that my new alchemist was arriving today, but not that she would be so young—or so beautiful," he adds slyly, causing the girl's fair skin to darken further.
"Thank you, sir," she says, and to her credit, her voice sounds reasonably composed.
Ed is all too familiar with his superior officer's legendary womanizing tendencies and decides to intervene before the military's anti-fraternization law can be too blatantly broken—or so he tells himself. He doesn't really have a reason; Colonel Bastard always pisses him off, and he's doing it even more today. "Mustang," he interrupts loudly, "I'm here too, you know."
The Flame Alchemist's charming smile is gone in an instant, replaced by a smirk. "Sorry, didn't see you there. You're a bit below my line of sight..."
"Who are you calling so short that you could step right over him?!" Ed screams, up in Mustang's face, honestly glad for the excuse to unleash his temper. The effort of being civil to Deryn has burnt through what little fuse he might have originally possessed—and, besides, this bastard had called him away from Rush Valley just as he was about to visit Teacher. He better have a damn good reason for this.
Behind him, he hears Al's muffled groan. Mustang does not look fazed, however, and merely says, damn infuriating little smirk still in place, "You, Fullmetal." Before Ed can do anything, say anything, the colonel forges onward. "The faster we get this over with, the faster I can get back to work. You're being reassigned.
"I'm what? To where?" This is not a good reason, in any sense of the phrase.
"Well..." Mustang pauses. "Not exactly. You see, Miss Sharp has just been transferred from Central Command to here, and she's on detached duty; she's living with the military. Now, I thought, and General Grumman agreed, that she would do us no good sitting around Headquarters twiddling her thumbs." He turns to Deryn, the smile again in evidence. "You are proficient in combat alchemy, correct?"
"Yes, sir," she says quietly, and Ed suddenly wonders: what the hell does she do? She's the "Wind Alchemist," yes, but he's never heard of anyone who could control wind, of all things. Maybe it's figurative, like his own, and has nothing to do with her ability?
Mustang twinkles at her. "Excellent, young lady, because I have no doubt you'll have plenty of chance to exercise it where you're going." Deryn turns a barely perceptible shade paler, but Mustang doesn't seem to notice, addressing Ed in a considerably more businesslike tone. "I'm placing Miss Sharp with you, Fullmetal. She'll follow you wherever you go and return to Eastern if we need her. Technically, you're the same rank, but, as much as I hate to admit it, you probably have more experience than she does, and she is therefore your responsibility. Don't screw it up."
Ed and Deryn's incredulous "What?"s ring out at exactly the same time in exactly the same shocked tone of voice.
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ii. for the first time
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sit talking up all night
sayin' things we haven't for a while, a while
(The Script)
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Deryn is quiet at first, perhaps a bit uncomfortable, but she grins to herself when she thinks no one is looking, and Edward knows that she's thrilled by this turn of events.
Him, not so much. He has no idea what this girl can do, whether she's a liability or an asset in combat, whether those blue eyes have seen battle and those calloused, thin hands are those of a killer.
He hopes that she hasn't left her heart behind her, in the place which led to her becoming a State Alchemist.
Sometimes he wonders if he hasn't left his heart behind, either.
But they've nothing better to do on the long, long train ride to Dublith, once Ed has decided that he's going to see Teacher, damn it all, and she better not have a problem with it, and so Al asks where she's from.
Her face lights for a moment, transforming her into the girl that had yelled at Ed and made him apologize in the middle of the street, but then she draws her shell around herself again and lets only a single word escape: "Glaschu."
"And where's that?" Al prods gently.
Edward interrupts, from where he's curled staring out the window, "Is that where you got your weird-ass accent?"
Deryn bristles visibly, fingers curling into practiced fists, and says in a tight voice, "Aye. D'you have a problem with it?"
He isn't looking for a fight just yet with his new—subordinate?—and so Ed contents himself with an indolent, "No."
The girl glares for a moment more, then sits back and addresses Al again. "It's in the northeast, near the desert, but we get loads of rain, and snow in the winter. But I didn't come from there. Haven't been back for nearly six months, now."
She deftly turns the conversation to Resembool—"Sheep?" she says slowly when Al asks her if she knows it—and the Elrics hear no more of Glaschu, or wherever else she might have been. Gradually Al seems to open her up, and in a few hours she's talking animatedly about her brother, a second lieutenant and relatively unskilled alchemist at Northern Command, and for a while she tells lively, recycled stories about the apparently obligatory Drachman assaults. Briggs Fortress, which guards the border, is more than a match for them, and by this time they're more weary formalities than anything else. Ed suspects she may be exaggerating a few details, but she makes him laugh once or twice, and it's worth it.
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The cheerful, talkative, bold-as-brass Deryn seems there to stay, and she gradually pulls Edward out of his sulk. Even if she might be damn useless at fighting, she knows how to tell a story, and Al's the most engaged Ed has seen him in weeks.
Inevitably she asks where they came to East City from. Ed and Al exchange glances, as ever wary of telling too much of their story, but eventually Ed admits they came from Rush Valley.
Deryn laughs. "You're winding me up," she says, leaning over to punch his arm—the left one, thankfully. "So did I! We must've been on the same train. Those automail mechanics are mad, aren't they?"
"Yeah," says Ed, grinning despite himself. "One of 'em offered to give me the best deal on a new arm—if I let him chop off the flesh one first." He pulls a face, then grins again, remembering the man whose arm he exploded in an arm-wrestling contest. And then there was Paninya's missile-equipped knee. And the baby delivery. Yes, Rush Valley was rather "mad." "But why...?" He looks at her limbs, hard—her arms aren't metal, certainly...
"Just—dropping off a friend," she says quickly, looking down at her lap.
The way she says "friend" reminds Ed an awful lot of the way he says "Winry"—not that that means anything about him and her, he appends hastily. He hmms. "A friend, huh?"
"Aye, a friend. Alek," she adds, smiling to herself, and Ed remembers that she said the leather coat—her only apparent possession besides a military-issue kit bag—was his, too.
She avoids further clarification, and Ed and Al don't say much about what they were doing in Rush Valley, either, but as the conversation clatters as comfortably along as the train they're in, she mentions this boy, whoever he is, once or twice again.
And Ed looks at her face, its curves picked out in gold by the light of the sinking sun, and wonders.
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iii. coming home
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let the rain
wash away
all the pain of yesterday
(Diddy - Dirty Money feat. Skylar Grey)
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It's sometime in the middle of the damn night, and Ed should be asleep, getting ready to face the terror of Teacher, but the pains in his leg and arm awaken him.
He sits and rubs his left hand over the shoulder port, hoping that the heat will ease the pain. Who is he kidding, though?—he should know by now that that doesn't have a chance in hell of working.
Outside, of course, the rain is blowing in sheets, clinging with desperate droplet fingertips to the train's window before flying back out into the wind. It's not as bad as the storm back at Dominick's house—it'll blow over by the morning—but still, a damn nuisance to someone who's affected by every change in pressure.
A low laugh startles him. He knows Al is awake, of course, awake and painfully lonely, but he's pretending to sleep for Deryn's benefit—another damn nuisance. And besides, that laugh has none of the thin, metallic, painful-reminder echo of his little brother's.
"You too, aye?" Deryn, of course. He should've known.
Ed squints but can't quite make her out, besides a pale smudge of a face and an even paler glint of hair. "What do you mean?" he snarls, aware that the ache is making him testy but not caring in the slightest. "That I'm awake too? Well, you've made damn sure of it now, bastard."
She makes an impatient noise in her throat. "That's a load of yackum and you know it. No, I mean your automail, daftie. It's aching, aye? So's mine."
Ed's glad she can't see his face; he's sure he's making a supremely stupid face of shock. "But how..." he starts, then swallows, the fear beginning to coil snakelike around his belly. Is she going to blackmail him? Find how how he happened to lose two damn limbs and tell the higher-ups? He pauses and tries again, voice husky, trying to sound appropriately threatening. "How did you know?"
"I shook your hand, aye?" Deryn says, as if it should be obvious. "Gloves can't hide everything. And I know how an automail leg sounds. Besides—rumors. Apparently you're fond of ripping off your shirt to intimidate your enemies." Ed can practically hear the grin in her voice.
He clears his throat, thrown a little off balance. She sounds frank, open—not like she's a damn schemer like Colonel Bastard. And obviously Al thinks she's all right—if this gets out of hand, he can "wake up" at any time and back Ed up, but apparently right now he's judged Ed capable of handling it on his own. He curses his little brother and his plans silently and works up a fitting growl. "All right, I get it. You're a damn smartass. But you've got automail too?"
Deryn's silent for a while—a long while. Briefly Ed fears he might've pushed too far—but if she's prying into his business, he's got the right to do the same to her. "Aye," she says finally. Her voice is a touch higher and sounds—frail, somehow, like it's just barely held together and might shatter at the lightest touch. Of course—anything that'd take a leg would be pretty traumatizing, Ed figures, and he can't expect a fifteen-year-old girl to have just shrugged it off. "Well, we're all bloody geniuses, us alchemists." The words are stronger, now, infused with a growing false bravado that Ed recognizes all too well, as Deryn pulls her armor back around herself. "Bollixed my left leg up right and good two years ago—sodding near burned it off. Pure dead useless, it was. So I got it amputated and replaced with a shiny new one. My brother got me something they use up north—higher carbon content, and it's lighter than regular steel, too. Works all right. I smashed my knee all up a couple of months ago, and the damp's got that off, and of course the port. Can't sleep, is all." Somehow Deryn's managed to make it sound like it's no big deal, that she's used to it—and maybe she is, but her next words slip a bit. "And I just reckoned you might want to... talk."
Ed wonders briefly what to say. If Deryn were wallowing in self-pity, broken and uncertain, he'd tell her what he told Rosé—get up, keep walking, at least you have legs to carry you where you want to go. But that's the thing—she hasn't got both her legs. And she's coping just fine on her own; by the way she was talking earlier, he guesses she might regret telling him this, letting him see her this weak, come morning.
Truthfully, he admires her for it, for the way she's walked strong and steady on with part of her missing. It reminds him of himself and Al, that strength.
Then he reminds himself that she's lost less than half of what he has, and she can't hope to compare to what Al's missing, and he hardens his heart again. She wants people's damn pity? Fine—but she won't get any here. (He conveniently forgets that if he did give her pity, she'd probably shove it right back at him.) So Ed settles for a grunt and a, "Sorry."
He hears the rustle of cloth as she shrugs. "Two years is plenty long enough for me to get over it. It's just a bother, right now... and why pretend?"
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Why pretend indeed. That's all he's been doing for four years now, Ed realizes, pretending that it's all right until he can force it to be so. It's a damn effective strategy—and he doesn't appreciate this girl he barely knows mocking it. "So you don't keep me awake, bastard," he snarls.
Deryn sighs to herself and mutters something about "barking stubborn Clanker—"
"What's that?" Ed interrupts, his annoyance momentarily forgotten in the face of his alchemist's curiosity. He's still getting the hang of her slang, and that's a word he's certainly never heard before.
"Clanker? Someone who has automail," Deryn says with automatic speed, then pauses. He can hear the blush in her voice as she continues, "or works with it. Just an old term from back home."
Ed can tell there's more to know—that word, or the way she used it, has some other connotation for her—but right now he aches too much to ask questions, and he feels himself settling back towards the blurry edge of sleep. He grunts in affirmation and tilts his head back against the seat.
Deryn, apparently, is still feeling damn chatty. "I'm sorry for asking," she says quietly. "I wouldn't want someone asking me that, either—if I were actually awake right now, which I'm not." There's a laugh in her last words, and Ed can't help but smile into the darkness, because that's how he feels. "I just—wanted you to know I knew, aye? My da always said that the more people you give a secret to, the less you have to carry yourself. But that's yackum. Sometimes you've got to carry it yourself. And if you didn't want to tell me—well, I wanted to spare you that choice, is all." Softly, to herself, she adds, "No secrets."
And that's another mystery right there, but Ed's tired now and the pain seems to be fading. "It's all right," he says, because at that moment it is, floating anchorless and insulated in the dark and recognizing the familiar loneliness in her voice, and he swears he can see her smile.
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Writing in present tense is way more fun than it should be :D
A note on spellings: I've seen some crazy variations, thanks of course to various translational interpretations of the original Japanese, but hopefully you know what I mean, and I'll try to be consistent in my choices.
My interpretation of our dear Colonel Mustang is based largely on his reaction to Winry upon first meeting her. I can't help but feel that I didn't quite nail his complexity, but of course, we all know he's just fulfilling his reputation as East City's greatest menace to young women. ;)
"Glaschu" is an ancient Celtic name for Glasgow, naturally, and appropriately AU for my taste.
Deryn's brother Jaspert is, of course, neither a second lieutenant nor a member of the army, but, as Amestris has neither an air force nor a navy and therefore no coxswains, I had to improvise. Deryn herself is afforded the "effective" rank of all State Alchemists, if you were unaware, quite a step up from lowly midshipmen.
Ed is fun to write, obligatory short rages and random angst and all. :D He's also really complex, and this is my first time writing him, so please let me know if he (or any other character) seems unacceptably OOC in any way. Feedback is always, always appreciated, even over compliments.
And that brings me to the final part of this A/N: the part where I beg you to review so I know that you don't hate it and that it isn't so deplorable that I should just give up on it. So review, please! Updates will be biweekly and probably vary wildly in length depending on what I was industrious enough to get done. :P I don't really have a concrete idea of how long this'll end up, but it oughtn't to be too terribly long. :)