Disclaimer: I do NOT own Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood in any way

It was summer when Ed and All finally returned to Resembool. Al was still extremely underweight and Ed's automail leg was the wrong height. Because of his growth spurt in the hospital he knew that he need a new one. How he hated wearing the spare-it was always at a wrong height and left him with an odd looking limp. Not that he wasn't limping now with his uneven leg (because he definitely was). But the spare still felt weird. Not to mention the fact that he had to use a spare during the time that his new leg was being made. Getting new leg, unfortunately, would mean having to strip down so that Winry could work on it.

Ed just thanked Truth that he wouldn't have to take off his shirt since his arm had been restored. Sure he'd had to take his shirt off in front of Winry before, so it was nothing new in that respect (other than his still sort of undecided feelings). He just didn't want her or Al to see the scar that he had gotten from his incident back in Briggs. He had yet to tell anyone of that little misadventure.

So now Ed sat in his boxers and a T-shirt as Winry removed his old auto mail leg and situated the spare onto his port.

"Now take off your shirt," Winry said as she finished attaching the spare. Ed balked for a moment before regaining his composure.

"W-why?" He asked, mentally cursing for his stutter. Winry regarded at the golden eyed male with an odd look before answering.

"I need to check and make sure that the auto mail that was still embedded into your shoulder was properly removed," she said matter-of-factly. She reached for the hem of his shirt but he snatched at her hand and scooted away slightly. This caused the blonde to furrow her brows in confusion and slight frustration.

"Ed, what is the matter? It's nothing I haven't seen before," she said, wiggling her hand free of his grasp. He nodded slightly, as if realizing what he had been doing for the first time and slowly removed his shirt by pulling the back collar over his head like a hood, so that most of his front was still covered by the shirt. He also discreetly turned so that the scarred side would be partially hidden from view.

Thankfully Winry didn't catch sight of the large white... thing on his abdomen. She quietly checked over his shoulder front and back, lightly rubbing her fingers over the rough splotchy skin that marred his shoulder. Other than being slightly thin, his shoulder was fine and free of any remaining metal pieces.

"Alright, you're fine," she said as she got up and headed for the door. Ed let out a breath he had not realized he had been holding and pulled his shirt back on. As he did so, Winry chose that moment to turn back around. "Oh, and Ed..." She stopped as she caught a glimpse of what looked suspiciously like a scar. Rushing back over to him she ordered him to take off his shirt.

"Huh? But Winry, I just..."

"Now!" she yelled. The underlying desperation in her voice made him swallow any rebuttal he had. He sat with silent guilt swimming in his eyes as he looked away, "Ed... What was that I saw just now?"

"I don't know what you are talking about," he mumbled very unconvincingly.

"The hell you don't!" she exclaimed. "Now take off the damn shirt!"

Ed shut his eyes as if in pain as he reached for the hem of his shirt and drew it up above his head. He heard a sharp gasp about halfway through the motion and knew she had seen it.

Winry stared in horror at the sight before her. The scar was large, covering almost the entire lower left side of his torso. Its edges were rough and jagged, much like the scar from his auto mail surgery. Ed had anticipated her ask what happened, but her real reaction was not what he expected.

"Al! Get in here!" she shouted towards the door.

"Oi! Winry! Al doesn't need to know this!" he said, moving to get up but was stopped by the look of hurt on her face.

"You haven't even told Al yet?" she said, her voice quiet and full of betrayal.

"What is it Winry?" Al asked poking his head in the door. He froze when he caught sight of his older brother. Said man's shirt was off making the large rough scar on his abdomen painfully obvious.

"Nii-san..." Al whispered, thinking the question both he and Winry wanted to ask.

"You are hiding things from us again, Ed!" Winry shouted, pointing an accusing finger at the older brother as her other hand inched towards the wrench in her tool box.

"I was not hiding it!" he returned indignantly. "You guys weren't even there when it happened and then the Promised Day came almost right after and it just... kinda'... Slipped my mind," he said, his voice fading towards the end of his explanation.

"When weren't we there!? Or at least when was Al not there for the length of time it took for you to get that injured and then heal!?" Winry nearly exploded.

"When we escaped Briggs," Al breathed in realization, "we left you alone and you got hurt."

"Wa... No you didn't le..." Ed said, seeing a very teary future if he did not quell the emotions soon. He looked over to Winry, hoping to see she had not come to the same realization that Al had. He was wrong. Tears hung at the corners of her eyes as she realized what he had gone through alone because of her stupid plan.

"H-how?" she asked tentatively. Ed closed his eyes as if reliving the pain that had been inflicted.

"You don't want to know," he mumbled quietly.

"Nii-san, please..." Al said, looking at Ed desperately. The older boy let out a long suffering sigh as he began his story;

A giant gaping hole sat above him and several large pieces of rubble lay around him. There was minor bit of clearance amongst the wreckage where Ed had fallen. He was somewhat surprised that he was not buried like the two chimeras that lay a few meters away. He tried to get up from his position on the ground, but heard a sick squelching sound followed by another. He looked down where he had heard the sound come from and saw a jagged price of rebar sticking through him. Shock replaced his earlier confusion as he stared at the large misshapen metal that had torn straight through him. Collapsing onto his side from his already slightly elevated position, he breathed heavily around the blood at the back of his throat. Ed was vaguely aware of when he clapped his hands and broke the rebar that stuck out of his back and of when he clapped again to release the two chimeras from under the rubble.

Ed halted in his story as he wondered whether or not he should tell them about the fact that he healed himself with alchemy.

"Then I had the two chimeras that I saved help me and I spent the next few months healing up at some retired doctor's house 'cause Kimblee was looking for me," he finished, deciding to not tell them.

Al and Winry had somber looks on their faces at the end of his tale.

"You had to deal with that all on your own?" Winry said quietly. Ed tried to wave it off, but then Al had a look on his face that said something didn't add up. Ed cursed mentally when he saw that look.

"But Nii-san, if it was a retired doctor I doubt he would have had the means to heal you of rebar impaling you. Even professional doctors have a hard time fixing impalement, especially if it was by something that large." Al leaned closer from his position across from his brother and stared at the scar. Ed had a slightly uncomfortable look on his face, the kind that meant you were trying to get out of something, "And your scar," Al continued, "it looks almost as if it's been..." Shock was suddenly written over Al's face as he realized that his guess was the truth. "Nii-san, don't tell me you used alchemy to heal yourself!"

"Okay I won't," Ed said with a tight voice, an uncomfortable expression still rested on his face

"NII-SAN!" Al exclaimed in exasperation and worry.

"What does that mean?" Winry asked in concern.

"He doesn't know how to use it properly! Without a philosophers stone he couldn't have performed medical alchemy properly." Both blondes looked at their scarred friend/ brother in concern of what he had done.

"Yeah well I kinda... had to... usemyselfasaphilosphers'stone," he said, not looking either of them in the eye.

"What?" they asked in unison.

"I used myself like you would a philosophers' stone, okay!" Ed shouted, crossing his arms across his chest.

"What does that mean?" Winry asked, but by the way that the two brothers were acting she guessed that it couldn't be good.

"He took a few years off of his life span to close the wound," Al stated simply, guilt set on his face.

"Ed..." was all Winry could say as she stared at him.

"Would you stop acting like I am already dying!" Ed shouted at the sulking pair. "If I hadn't done that then I wouldn't be here now. Don't you think that that is the important part?"

"But...still, you shouldn't have had to go through that on your own!" Winry shouted back, standing up above the seated blonde.

"Are you kidding!?" Ed exclaimed, standing himself to look Winry in the eye and found that he actually had to look down. "I was relieved that you two weren't there! You could have been injured worse than I was, or killed! I would never forgive myself if either of you were killed..." He trailed off at the end of his rant and sat back down onto the couch roughly.

"Nii-san, don't you think that we would be able to forgive ourselves if you has died then?" Al said softly to his brother.

"Why do you think I did it?" Ed asked incredulously. "The reason that I did something that reckless in the first place was because I needed to warn you about Kimblee! Although it turns out that you didn't really need me to warn you anyway," he mumbled the last part to himself.

"Nii-san..." Al said in slight awe of his older brother.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to die yet. I still have some time," he said with a grin. Al stared for a moment before smiling himself. Ed looked over to Winry who still stood there with tears clouding the corners of her eyes. She met his golden gaze with an intense blue one. They held eye contact for a moment before Winry smiled and wiped the tears from her eyes, relaxing and smiling back.

Al, noticing the actions between the two, got up and turned to leave. Just as he was at the door he turned back around and said "Nii-san... You might want to put your shirt back on," then quickly exited the room. Ed would have made some sort of comment but his younger brother had already left the room. Quickly, he unfurled his shirt from where it had been held in his hand and pulled it over his head.

"Stupid Al..." Ed muttered to himself. "Of course I was going to put my shirt back on. I'm not Armstrong."

As soon as he had pulled on his shirt he felt a pair of thin but strong arms wrap around his middle. He looked down to see Winry burying her face into his chest.

"Winr..."

"Stupid..." she said in to his chest, "don't talk about dying. You still have plenty of time. You aren't allowed to leave yet. You still have a life here with Al and Granny...and me." Winry lifted her head and looked into the older Elric's eyes. Ed stared down at his childhood friend in shock before his gaze softened. He finally returned the hug and wrapped his arms around her small frame. The male blonde smiled into her hair as he said,

"Yeah... I have plenty of time here."

Nii-san- older brother/big brother

Oi!- Hey!

So hey viewers! I hope you like this little thing that I put together. I finally have a person to edit for me so there are hopefully less edit issues than my previous posts. But please review so that I can know how to fix any future post that I have. Thanks!