A/N: I've decided to upload all my fics into a single account. eye of the beholder until let the walls break down were originally only uploaded to my AO3 account, callingthequits. Then I went back to my roots and thought, "Hey, why not post it on Fanfiction too?" so here I am.

Title comes from Take A Walk by Passion Pit.

He's alone.

Granny and Winry don't really like doing that, but it's really annoying having them fuss over him and Ed can't help it - he's glad they're gone. At least he knows they're sleeping. Besides, he isn't an idiot; he gets it, why they shouldn't leave him, especially since it's only been a few days since he got his automail. He still hurt and everything, and they were worried about him - and he can understand that! He's rushing into things, breaking limits, being reckless. He's taking risks and it's -

Well.

It's not the worst thing he could be doing. And maybe it's not the best either, but if he had another deck to deal his cards with, he'd have laid them out on the table by now. It's not a nice feeling to know that, it's not even a bad feeling either, but it feels pretty stupid and he'd like to get rid of it, thanks. But honestly, what else could he have done? He can't even do alchemy without both of his arms, otherwise he would've had his leg back already. And Al would have a body again, and if they were both really good maybe they could have their mom back.

(It'd also be pretty nice to have both of his parents too, but it's not like he even likes the other one. He can go fuck off, but he already did that and Ed hates him.)

Besides, that Must - what? Mustache? Must-something, whatever, that military guy - he opened this door that Ed didn't even know was there. He always assumed that the greatest alchemists went solo, rogue, having epiphanies in battle. Well, Teacher did, and she had to be one of the best, but he probably should've realized it sooner that it wasn't the only way to be great. He could take a different road. He could live a different life, with guns and generals and order - which is a stupid life, honestly, it's almost as stupid as the one he's living now.

Metal creaks beside him, and Al's voice - which echoes now, he used to think it was scary but now that he's realized that he can scare other people with it, it's almost awesome - says, "Brother?"

And after all this time, Ed still isn't used to seeing a huge piece of armor instead of his brother. Which is dumb, since now that Al's soul is in the armor, the armor is Al, which means that Ed's brother is armor, and - he lives a weird life. A weird, tragic life. He hates his life, honestly, and lately he's been hating himself, but he's trying to push it away. He sighs, because what the hell else can he do when he can't even stand, and he says, "Yeah?"

"Don't worry, okay?" Al says, and Ed can hear his grin from wherever his real body is. "We'll get your limbs back. So just deal with it for a little longer, please?"

He is literally the only ray of sunshine in his life at the moment. "Don't expect," he pauses for a moment to catch a breath, because he's accidentally moved his shoulder and it's not even pain he's feeling anymore, it's just the awkwardness in having a metal arm and having your nervous system connect to wires that would in turn connect to everything else in his automail for it to act as the arm he's always had. And Al waits, because Ed's sure that he knows what it's like, for something that is not your body react almost exactly like your body but is not actually your body at all, and the wrongness will hit every time you move because it simply isn't right.

But his life is surreal so all Ed does, Ed takes a deep breath and says, "Don't expect me to wait for you."

And Al laughs, and if it was Granny he'd curse at her, if it was Winry he'd snap at her, if it was someone else they would be bruised and bloody, but since this is Al, Ed just smiles at him.

"I would never," and isn't it freaky that Al sounds happy? It's a stretch to say that he is, but he's hopeful at the very least, light and bursting with it and - Ed wishes he was Al. He wishes he was the nice one, the sensible one, the optimistic one out of the two of them. He wishes he was as cheerful, as kind, as good as his brother was. And even though Al's the closest thing to a saint, it doesn't mean he actually is, and even if Al hates him it doesn't mean that Ed will hate him too, right? And he can - pretend. For a while. Before it eats him up on the inside.

Completely, at least.

Coward.

Ed shakes his head a bit.

No I'm not, shut your fucking face.

"If you leave me," Ed threatens, "I'd just go back and beat you."

"Which would never happen," Al says, "because I always win our fights."

Ed huffs, because what the hell else can he do when he can't throw his pillow at his brother, and Al laughs again. It's hard to be mad at a person when their laugh sounds like the sun decided to shine a little brighter, but he can try. And it's easier than before, because it's so different despite the fact that it sounds so alike, because of the echo and the armor and the fact that it's a bit deeper than normal and-

Al ruffles his hair and leaves the room.

Ed doesn't even know how to respond to that.

This is his life. He has a metal arm and a metal leg and armor for a brother and he's aiming to be part of the military at twelve years old. He doesn't know if his father is alive and he doesn't care, he definitely knows that his mother is dead and he cares a lot, and also he has a part of his hair that sticks up like a little golden antenna. He ate an ant once. It was really sour. Milk isn't, but he hates it anyway. He is living with his childhood friend and relies on said childhood friend for, well, practically everything. A military guy shouted at him once, and it changed his life.

It's not an ideal one. It's waiting and hurting and lying in this stupid bed because he can't do shit. It's having an old lady with the stupidest hair and a girl with the stupidest face fuss over him. It's having a suit of armor tuck him in every night. It's waking up every day and feeling useless because he can't stand without bleeding all over the floor. It's not the best life - it's horrible and almost disgraceful and it's kind of tearing him up inside.

But having Granny talk to him while she makes the adjustments on his automail, having Winry smile at him every time she sees him, having Al alive and maybe not breathing, but with him all the same - that. All of that. All of this. It's not - it will never be - the best life. Not for him.

Then again, it's not like it's the worst life. So he can live with it, with this, for a while. He can - sometime, maybe, definitely in a long time - go back to this. Or something. It wouldn't be the best, maybe, but it would be good, at the very least. It would, it has to be. It has that whole homey atmosphere that's all comforting and -

What is he talking about. This is a place where the dog has an automail leg. It'd be pretty great to come home to this.