Broken

Roy stood at the picture window and swept his steady gaze over the thick blanket of snow that had settled over his neighborhood. Some might have called the view peaceful, but he found it suffocating. He closed his eyes and tried to steel himself against the coming storm.

The sound of Riza's bare feet on the thick carpet echoed in his head as she approached. "We're going to bed."

"Alright." He wanted to turn. To smile and kiss her goodnight. But his limbs were as cold and stiff as those of the tree in the front yard. Even if he had pushed it out of his heart…even if he could shut down his mind…his body could still feel it coming. Riza's footsteps retreated upstairs and after a few moments, the absence of sound roared in his brain as his ears strained to pick up the first sign.

There was no mistaking the plaintive squeak of the hinge on the back gate. To Roy, the sound seemed to reverberate through the whole house and set the tension in his body on fire. Light flooded from the kitchen and reflected in the window in front of him, chasing away his view of the frigid night. He ran his right hand through his hair and turned to face the intruder.

A messy blonde head had just emerged from a cabinet and was heading toward the freezer. On flesh hand grasped the handle and one metal hand braced the thin body against the counter.

"Edward."

Startled, wide, golden eyes met Roy's dark ones, and Roy's stomach dropped. The young man's eyes had dulled, sunken into a pale, gaunt face. The older man mentally kicked himself for seeing the drastic change for the first time.

"There is no alcohol in the house."

Edward pushed himself away from the refrigerator and whirled to face Roy. The instantaneous anger immediately melted away and left a pathetically lost expression. "Please?"

Roy ignored the urge to walk away and avoid the situation altogether. However, he still could not yet bring himself to leave the safety of the doorway. "We talked about this last time. I got rid of it."

"Why?" Ed's tone was half pleading and half accusing.

At that moment, the cry of a newborn baby rang out. Roy heard Riza leave their bed and forced himself to stay and watch was Ed absorbed the noise and understanding washed over his face.

"The baby…?"

"Three days ago." Roy wondered briefly if the lump in his throat would ever stop rising when he thought of the child.

"Can I…can I see…"

"Not tonight."

The young man opened his mouth, but did not argue, instead dropping into the nearest chair. He placed folded hands on the table and his forehand on his hands.

Roy took a step into the room. "Edward."

"I understand."

"Do you?"

"Yes!" Edward slammed his fists on the table. "Dammit, Mustang, I know!" He pulled his hands from the table as though it'd burned him and dropped his voice to a whisper. "I know I'm a fucking mess."

Mustang stepped closer, assessing the situation and trying to formulate a plan. He heard the blonde mumbled through the hands now covering his face once more and made the decision to occupy the chair across the small table. Remembering Riza's lecture on body language, he consciously unfolded his arms and sat forward.

Edward looked up at the older man from under his bangs as though daring him to try and care. He was surprised to find the earnest expression in the dark eyes staring him down and an unexpected surge of emotion rose in his chest. The pressure from the inside ground against the pressure of the heavy, breathtaking silence and he could almost feel the thin shell of his body ripping apart.

The balance had begun to tip, Roy could see the signs. "Edward, speak." The tenderness in his voice surprised him.

Closing his eyes, Edward imagined each molecule in his body giving up and letting go of the next, being sucked into either the vacuum of the world around him, or that of the massive hole inside of him. If this went on long enough, eventually there would be nothing left of him.

"Fullmetal!" Mustang inwardly cringed at his own sharp bark. "Look at me." It had been months since he had pulled rank on the young man, not that rank mattered anymore.

It was enough, however, to pull Edward out of his reverie. His eyes shot open to stair blankly at Roy for several long moments. Suddenly, his whole body slumped as though surrendering. "Fucking hurts tonight."

Roy softened his tone once more, knowing all to well the cruel cycle of memory and pain. "We both know it would." Just like the old nightmares came with the rain, these new nightmares came with the snow. "It would be better to talk than to drink." He wanted to laugh bitterly at the hypocrisy of his own words, but managed to keep his composure.

"That's nice, coming from you."

Mustang cringed and sat back in his chair. "What do you want from me?"

"I want you to let me fix this." Edward straightened. 'Let me try to…"

"No." Roy's tone left no room for argument. He could not let the alchemist carry out his desperate plans. It was inexplicable why Edward only thought of these plans on nights like this one, or why he actually listened when Roy told him no. The old Edward would have scorned Mustang's advice and done what he wanted to. He didn't know whether to be grateful or sad that that had changed. But people did not come back from the dead, and both alchemists knew that for a fact.

Edward could have been reading the man's thoughts. "He might not be dead. He…"

"He's gone, Edward." It was hard to watch such a short sentence completely crush the Fullmetal Alchemist. Looking back, however, Mustang could see the blonde boy sitting on the steps to headquarters, crying for the loss of a little girl. He remembered the distress clouding those golden eyes at the news of Hughes' death. As he watched the same boy—now a young man—crumple into a mess of despair at his kitchen table, his heart broke. When he spoke, he couldn't manage more than a whisper. "I'm sorry."

With his head buried in his arms, Edward's voice came muffled by his coat sleeves. "It's so…empty; I'm so…lonely now."

Roy perked up. Edward had veered off the beaten path of this conversation and expressed a feeling other than pain or rage. They might be getting somewhere. Loneliness could be remedied. "You should go back to Risembool for a while."

Ed peeked over his arms at Roy as though the suggestion was offensive. "I can't."

"Why not?"

"I can't face them after what happened."

Roy had tried to pry Edward away from his guilt. As far as he knew, the guilt was going to be there forever. "They're your family. They love you."

Ed dropped his head back down and didn't reply.

"They care about you, Edward." Roy thought back on all the phone calls from Winry he'd fielded in the last several months.

"Oh do they?" The young man violently pushed himself away from the table. "If everyone cares so much, why am I alone?"

Roy couldn't control the saddened surge of anger. "It's not our fault you push us away." As soon as the words left his mouth, he wished he could take them back.

Edward stood, his eyes blazing. "You know what? You're right. Everything is my fucking fault!" He spun on his heel in a flurry of red and black and slammed the door on his way out.

Immediately, Riza appeared out of the darkness of the living room.

"I'm sorry we woke the baby." Roy couldn't meet his wife's gaze.

The apology, however, did not appease her. "Go after him."

"I don't…"

"Don't lie to me; you know exactly where he's gone."

Roy finally looked up at her, apprehension clouding his dark eyes.

"Edward needs you. You will go after him."

Taking a deep breath, Roy stood and tried to prepare himself both physically and mentally to venture out into the suffocating night.