Title: Heaven
Pairing: Roy/Ed
Rating: PG
Spoilers: For the infamous episode 25. Need I say more?
Warnings: Shounen-ai. Slight angst. Content that doesn't really make much sense...
Word count: 3,470
For: Neo Diji's challenge: Trisha + RoyEd. Hope you like it, Kara!
Disclaimer: FMA isn't mine. I'm Asian, yes, but I'm Chinese, not Japanese. Thus, I can't possibly be Hiromu Arakawa.
Author's Notes: Un-beta'ed. This short story doesn't fit in anywhere with the anime/manga timeline. To understand this fic, just bear in mind that Hughes is dead, and so are the homunculi and Hohenheim. This takes place perhaps a few weeks after Hughes's death.

Heaven

The figure beside him was in a feverish sleep, beads of perspiration gleaming on his forehead, as he tossed and turned and moaned the name of a man who only existed in memories. Memories of moments in time that once seemed insignificant, but were now much treasured.

Edward knew memories. He knew memories and dreams and nightmares like the person next to him did, because he, too, was human. When darkness took over, not even the brightest and most optimistic person could escape the cruel prison of his own mind. At times like these, Edward wasn't just a child. Oh no, he was much more than a child. He was someone who had seen more of the world and learnt more about truth than he would have liked to. He was someone who had felt sorrows and loneliness claw at his heart, attempting to shred it into tiny little pieces and let it scatter away with the wind.

Edward reached out with his automail hand, but then withdrew it after some hesitation and instead used his other hand to awake his lover. He was going to use his artificial limb at first because he was afraid that the man would lash out at him in his unconsciousness, and if he used his flesh hand he might get bruised. Mustang was a strong man, and god knew how powerful he could be when he wasn't in control of his strength. But when Edward thought about it, the older man would be the one to get bruised if he hit the metal hard. And, as much as Edward didn't seem to care for the man on the outside, he would rather let himself get hurt than the person he loved.

And the second reason was -- warmth.

Al's large leather gloves were often the ones who brought Edward to safety at night, but even though Ed was grateful for them, those cool, lifeless 'hands' were nothing compared to his mother's or Roy's, because they lacked human warmth. Edward remembered clearly that relief surging through him at the warm, loving touch of those two people's hands. How could he forget such an amazing thing? It was a better remedy for nightmares than anything else in the world.

So carefully, Edward pressed his flesh palm onto his lover's face. Roy groaned, and, as expected, one of Roy's arms tried to attack the intruder. The boy made no movement to defend himself, and simply flinched when he was struck. It wasn't too painful; he could bear it, after his incidents with some deadly enemies, especially the homunculi.

"Wake up, Roy," the blond whispered, shaking the other man's head gently.

The whimpering stopped, and Edward saw dark obsidian eyes gazing up at him. It hurt him to see the incredible sadness lurking in those inky pupils. He turned away, and lay back down on his own pillow, which felt hard. The comfort of the bed had disappeared the instance those eyes had cast their magic spell.

"Maes..." Roy murmured, over and over again. "Maes..."

Neither of them could fall asleep again that night.

---

When Edward Elric came home from a mission, he dropped his bag at the sight of a familiar array drawn on the wooden floor of the dining room, and a mixture of different things in the middle of it. The dinner table and chairs had been moved away. To where, Edward didn't know. He wasn't particularly interested in that at the moment. All his attention was reserved for the white chalk patterns and the substances piled amongst them. He stopped breathing. He had forgotten how to.

He'd constructed the same thing himself, nearly five years ago. There were a few minor differences here and there, but the purpose of the array was quite clear. It was for human transmutation, the forbidden act of alchemy.

As he stared, entranced, Roy Mustang stumbled into the room through the kitchen door, holding a bottle in his hand. Edward looked at him, a pale, stricken look of horror and shock and betrayal.

"You promised me... you won't..." Edward accused. "You promised!"

"I'm sorry..." Roy muttered in a dull tone, lowering his head. "I had to... Maes..."

"Give me some cloth and water! I'm going to wipe away this array right now, and clear away all the stuff. We can forget this ever happened, and don't you ever dare --" He was cut short, for Roy had lifted his eyes to meet Ed's golden ones once more, and was now speaking angrily.

"You aren't going to let my efforts go to waste!" he shouted. He advanced towards the array. Edward noticed the fear on his face. It usually wasn't easy to read Roy's expressions, so Roy was obviously terrified.

"Stop it, Roy! You're drinking again! You're always out of your mind when you've been drinking. Just take some time to calm down, and rethink this, okay?" Edward pointed at the empty bottle, which was once full of Scotch. Roy always kept plenty of Scotch bottles around his house. It was his favourite type of liquor, and a bottle chased away unwanted thoughts easily, and helped the dark-haired man avoid his problems for several hours.

"No!" Roy shrieked, his rage sweeping away his fear. He clapped his hands together the second he finished his word, and Edward, horrified, couldn't think of anything else to do but step into the array.

"Please, Roy! You'll lose me if you continue!"

The dark-haired alchemist looked at his lover, stunned, but it was too late. His hands were already on the array; it was already activating, emitting a blinding yellow light. Black hands appeared out of nowhere and grabbed Edward's arms. "Roy..." Edward breathed, and Roy wondered briefly if it was a tear he could see trickling down Edward's cheek, before he blacked out.

All Edward could think of was soft, brown hair, a clean white apron, basketfuls of fruits, and a beautiful, motherly smile as the light darkened into an eerie purple, and everything else faded.

---

Two big emerald-green eyes came into sight, and Roy jumped, sitting up straight.

"I see you're awake," a sweet voice said, accompanied by a kind smile. Roy blinked. His head was killing him. It was throbbing like hell, and the world kept slipping out of focus, but he soon managed to gain an account of the speaker's appearance. A woman was looking down at him. A pretty woman, with long, brown hair tied loosely at the end. She was wearing some of Roy's clothes. They were a bit too big for her, and she looked strange in them; she was a woman who would be more suited wearing a dress or skirt. Obsidian eyes snapped up to the hair tie. Was it just his imagination or did it look like Edward's? Most hair ties looked pretty much the same, after all... And she was wearing Roy's clothes. So why wouldn't she be using one of Edward's spare hair ties?

Edward! Everything rushed back to him, and his head felt like it was going to explode.

Panicked, he enquired shakily, "Where's Edward?"

"... Edward?" The woman looked confused. "You know what? I have a son called Edward. And then there's Alphonse as well..."

Roy stared. And stared. Now that he thought about it, he recognized the woman. He knew her. Not personally, though, no, for he had never seen her in his life. Edward had described her countless times to him, and told him many stories about his childhood spent with her and his brother, and he'd heard Hohenheim mention her once or twice a long, long time ago.

"What's so shocking?" Trisha Elric asked.

"You're Edward Elric's mother..." the alchemist said, breathless.

"Yes... You were talking about my Edward?" the brunette gasped. "You know him?"

Roy was surprised by the pang of jealousy in his heart on hearing the word 'my'. Edward was his mother's just as much as he was Roy's, and the man should have known and accepted that fact long ago. All the same, he liked to think that Edward belonged to him only. "Yes, I'm his... superior officer. We're both in the military."

"Where is he right now? I want to see him!" she demanded.

"That's exactly what I wanted to know. But..." He didn't know what to say. Should he tell the truth about the attempted human transmutation? Would she be angry at him because he had made her son disappear? But what else could he say? He wasn't going to tell her that he was involved in a romantic relationship with her son, not just yet. But he didn't feel like lying to the mother of his lover. So he told the story quickly, and nothing more.

Trisha listened quietly. "I'm supposed to be dead. I know that already. I was really bewildered when I arrived at this place. I still am, to be honest. But now that I'm here, the person I want to see most is gone. He's gone because I'm here." There was a deathly silence, and Roy saw the guilt in the mother's green eyes.

"No, he's not gone because you're here. He's gone because of me. Because I didn't listen to him. Even though he's done it before, and I knew that he wasn't successful, so why did I think I would be? It's all my fault, not yours."

"Wait, he's done it before? What do you mean?" Trisha's eyes were wide with surprise. She didn't seem to have any thoughts for the man's sin, but only for her son.

Roy sighed. He had said something he shouldn't have. But he knew sooner or later, Trisha would have been filling him with questions about her sons' lives, and he would have to answer them one by one anyway, so he was better off telling her the full story now. Leaving out the bit about him and her elder son, of course. So he told the Elric brothers' life story, beginning from after her death. He had heard the tale a thousand times from Edward, and he had played a part of it himself, so he knew it very well.

Trisha never interrupted, and waited till he made it to the very end of the story before she spoke. "I can't believe I missed out so much by being dead," she muttered. "They did all that by themselves. My two boys. My heroes. They must have grown up so much..." Her voice was dripping with sadness. The man looked at her helplessly, not knowing what to do or say. Then suddenly, her eyes lit up, and she asked, "Alphonse is still here, right? He hasn't disappeared. I can see him, then."

"Yes, Alphonse is in Central all right. He's staying at a hotel not far from here." Roy was not ready for Alphonse to receive news of the human transmutation, and his brother's disappearance. Al would certainly kill him if he found out that he had lost the dearest person in the world to both of them. The Flame Alchemist didn't want to die yet.

"Can I please go and see him?" Trisha pleaded with a hopeful smile.

Roy nodded limply. He didn't have the right to decline her wishes, and bring a frown of disappointment onto that pretty face. He owed her the world by taking one of her sons away from her, so the most he could do was let her see her remaining child. Alphonse had to be informed sooner or later, anyway, so Roy thought perhaps it would be better to get it over and done with now.

---

"Alphonse!"

"Mother!"

The reunion was something quite spectacular. A tall suit of armour that towered over its mother, who was hugging it around its waist. The Colonel stood at the doorway, leaning against the wall, feeling out of place. The brunette let go of her son after an eternity, and following that was a lively conversation, two high voices that chirped shrilly with happiness and excitement and love.

Roy watched silently as guilt and shame consumed him. It wasn't long before Alphonse started asking questions. Awkward questions that made Roy shuffle on his feet, play with his buttons, and inspect the swirls of the paint on the ceiling with great interest. When interrogation was over, the boy gave Roy the exact same look as the one that had been Edward's face upon discovering the array. How a suit of armour could display such heartbreaking expressions, Roy had no idea. All he knew was that he wanted more than anything else to run out of the room, and carry on running forever, away from Alphonse, away from Edward's mother, away from what he had done.

"I'm sorry," he said softly, even though he was aware that these words often had no effect in situations like this.

Al just continued giving him the same look as he said firmly, "You have to bring brother back."

---

The dark-haired man stood outside the spare bedroom, where his guest was resting. His right hand was raised in a fist, frozen in a position that was ready to knock on the door. He gazed at his own shadow, long and dark, stretched along the corridor, and thought that if he tried hard enough, he could picture a blond with a feline smile and grinning golden eyes, facing him from the depths of his shadow.

After a while, his hand dropped, and he walked away slowly, in the direction of the staircase. His heart was heavy, as if it was made of lead or stone, but he just couldn't bring himself to tell Trisha Elric what he hadn't told her. It was impossible.

But there was something he could do for her, and he was about to put all his heart and effort into accomplishing that something.

---

The next morning, when the birds were singing and the sun was up, Trisha Elric awoke to find her elder son asleep on the floor beside her bed. As she stared in amazement, her eyes taking in the blond hair that covered part of the peaceful, innocent face in its slumber, something else hit her: if Edward was here, that could mean only one thing -- Colonel Mustang must be gone, for there wasn't anyone else who was an alchemist ready to sacrifice himself to bring back her son for her..

Climbing out of bed, she knelt down to wake the boy. She almost felt sorry to do so; she didn't want to chase the calmness on his face away.

Edward opened his eyes, and they fluttered close almost immediately. A second later, they snapped open again. "Roy..." he said, in a soft whisper that sounded as if he was trying to grasp onto something that was vanishing. And then he was fully awake, golden eyes wide while his mind registered the person in front of him.

"Mum..." He shook his head as he spoke. "I must be still dreaming..."

"You're not dreaming, Edward," his mother assured him. "I'm alive and real."

"My mother died a long time ago," the blond said, staring out blankly into the distance. "I was there when she died."

His words sent a shiver through Trisha's body. She remembered dying. That made her feel stranger than ever to be alive again. She was about to tell Edward what happened and explain why she was there, but the blond scrambled up abruptly, pushed past her, and ran out of the door, leaving it ajar. She was taken back, and only recovered a few moments later to follow her son. He had apparently gone downstairs, so she hurried down the steps, and found him in the dining room, standing over the huge circle with the many different shapes inside it that didn't make any sense to Trisha at all. She knew that it was an array drawn for alchemy purposes, but that was all she knew.

She could guess, though, that it was specifically used for human transmutations, from what the Colonel had informed her.

"Roy's gone..." she heard her son mutter to himself. "Roy's gone."

"Use me," she suggested suddenly, surprising even herself. "Use me as an equivalent exchange for him."

The boy spun round, gaping at her. "But you're my mum! I've only just seen you. I can't lose you again, not so soon."

"So you believe that I'm your mother, at last. Not dead, but alive," Trisha said.

"Roy brought you back," Edward stated, and his mother nodded to that. "He brought me back as well. But he didn't get Maes."

Trisha recognized the name 'Maes' as that of the Colonel's best friend. "And now you're going to bring the Colonel back."

"I said! I can't use you, you're my mum!" the blond cried, throwing himself onto his mother and starting to sob. "I missed you so much, mum. I tried to bring you back, but I couldn't. I'm not going to let you go back to that horrible place."

Trisha wrapped her arms around her weeping son, comforting him. "You love him, though," she pointed out quietly.

There were several heartbeats of silence, and then there came a muffled reply, "Did he tell you?"

"He didn't, but it's easy to see that you two are in love with each other," his mother answered, smiling down at her son's embarrassment. "I'm completely supportive of your relationship. So, please, Edward, let me be the willing price for him. You need him more than you need me."

"You don't know that," Edward argued. "I love you as much as I love him, but only in different ways."

"Ah, but you need him more. You've done without me for years. You can certainly keep on doing so. When I'm gone, forget this ever happened. Think of me as dead, like before, and you'll cope."

"No! I can't do that!"

"Yes, you can. You can lose me again, but you can't lose him. You know that. You just won't admit it. I want you to be happy, Edward, as happy as possible. So I'll do anything to grant you that happiness. I'll die for you. I'm not afraid of death because I've already experienced it. And death isn't that bad, because you get to spend your time in heaven."

"Is there really a heaven? I thought there is just the Gate."

"No, there isn't really a heaven, Edward, and there is just the Gate. But when you're with people you love, it's closer to heaven than you'll ever get."

"Hohenheim..." the blond whispered.

"Yes, him," his mother paused for a while here. "Do you still call him that? He's your father, Edward. Don't hate him so much."

"I don't understand how you can love him."

"There are some things in this world which you can never understand. Now come, Edward, and send me back to him. And then, you will have your own heaven back." Trisha walked bravely into the middle of the transmutation circle, and planted herself there. Her son looked at his own hands with doubt and anxiety. But he knew that nothing would persuade his mother to step out of the array now that she was in it. So he clapped them together, fell on his knees, and slammed them down.

"Goodbye, Edward. Say goodbye to Alphonse for me too..."

Tears streamed down Edward's face as his mother melted into the light.

---

"Promise me you won't ever do it again," Edward said, his lips trembling as he buried his head in Roy's chest. "Don't even think about it. Please."

"I promise," his lover vowed, bowing his head and running his fingers through golden hair. "And I mean it this time. I absolutely swear I do."

"We're lucky we didn't lose anything." The blond looked up at him, the barest wisp of a smile on his face. He put his hands on Roy's shoulders and pushed him down to meet his height, and he pressed his lips onto Roy's, and in an instant, everything was all right.

He thought he saw a glimmering figure standing where the middle of the array should have been. But the chalk marks had been wiped away, and there was nothing to show they had once been scratched onto those wooden floorboards. The dining table and chairs were moved back to their original places (they were foldable ones, and had been easily tucked away in the storeroom). And amongst those normal things, there was his mother, a mere floating spirit, standing out in a place which she didn't belong in. She was smiling. Smiling at the two lovers with a beautiful, happy smile. Hohenheim shone briefly beside her, smiling too, and then they were both gone.

His mother was right. To be with the person you love is heaven enough.

The End