"Stop that, Edo-kun," Colonel Roy Mustang said without looking up from his desk. Ed tapped his boots on the short table in front of him a couple more times, just to be annoying.
"Why did you call me here, Mustang?" Ed asked, keeping his eyes closed.
"Just to talk, Edo-kun."
"So talk. I don't have all day. Al is expecting me back sometime soon."
"That's... actually what I wanted to talk to you about." Roy put down his pen and folded his arms on the desk, looking straight at the blond sitting on his couch. Ed opened one of his eyes and warily eyed the colonel. "What is your relationship with Al?"
"He's my brother. You know that," Ed said sharply, with a mutter of "idiot" under his breath.
"So do you love him?"
"He's my brother. Of course I love him." Ed shifted to lie down across the couch, propping his head on his arms to look at the colonel.
"That's not what I'm asking and you know it, Edward."
Ed turned his head so he was staring at the low table, although it was doubtful he was seeing anything at all. "He's my brother," he repeated as if that was an answer. And maybe it was.
"...Actually, he's the brother you're risking your life to save, the one you're willing to become a dog of the military to help, and the one you quite literately gave your right arm for." Roy looked at Ed like he could will the boy to give him some straight answers.
"...Incest is wrong and illegal," Ed stated dully.
"But love is not. Or do you not love your brother?" Roy propped his head on his fist, content to wait as long as it took.
"Shut up, Mustang." But Ed's voice lacked the hard, angry quality it should have had. Instead, he sounded a bit depressed. This was his most closely guarded secret and somehow the colonel had found out. He had thought he was doing a good job of hiding it. "You don't know anything."
"Would you like to know what I think, Edo-kun?"
"Not really, but you're probably gonna tell me anyway, aren't you?" Ed lifted up his right had, staring at the glove covering his automail thoughtfully.
"You and Al are special, in more ways than you or anyone else know. You're both as different from other kids your age as it is possible to be. So maybe a 'different' kind of love is just what you need." Roy really did care for the two boys, even if he didn't show it often. He also wanted them to be happy.
Ed looked up at the colonel considering. Roy offered him a small smile. "You both have suffered so much and I say you should do whatever makes you happy regardless of what others say."
"...You really think so?" Ed asked, for once sounding like the shy, somewhat insecure teenager that he should have been.
"If anyone deserves a bit of happiness, it's you and Al." Roy replied, picking up his pen and pulling another form across the desk. "That is all, you're dismissed." He waved his hand absently, eyes skimming the paper in front of him.
"Thanks, colonel." Ed stood up and grabbed his jacket. "It's nice to know you're good for something at least," he said playfully, offering a lazy salute as he left the office.
"...little brat..." Roy muttered as the door shut. But there was a faint smile on his face. It was good to see that spark of life back in Ed's eyes.
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"Al, I'm home!" Ed called as he entered the small apartment the two shared. He took off his jacket and carefully hung it up on the hooks by the door. Suddenly, a strange thought struck him. "I should get a jacket made for Al." And he would, too. Because they were going to find the Philosopher's Stone and he was going to restore his little brother! As he toed off his boots, Ed idly wondered whether Al would look better in blue or green.
"Ah," Al's armored head poked out of the kitchen doorway. "Welcome back, nii-san. What did the Colonel want?"
"What's cooking?" Ed asked as he joined Al in the kitchen. "Smells good." Ed jumped up onto the counter beside the stove, looking down at what Al was making. It looked good too. "The usual, to annoy the hell outta me."
"It's chicken soup," Al replied to Ed's previous question. "Kaa-san used to make us this when we were sick," he said with a hint of sadness in his voice.
"I remember that," Ed smiled, chasing away the darkness of their memories. Better to remember the happy times than the sad times that followed. "You came to lay in my bed because you were lonely. Then Kaa-san brought us some soup and read us a story."
"Yeah..." Al smiled, insomuch as he could and went back to cooking, allowing a comfortable silence to fall over the kitchen.
"I'm gonna go rest for a bit, okay?" Ed jumped down from the counter.
"All right. I'll call you when it's ready."
"Thanks, Al." Ed wandered out of the kitchen and into their bedroom. Since Al didn't really sleep, it seemed a little silly to give him a bedroom. So he simply rested in Ed's room during the night.
In reality, Ed didn't need to rest, but he did need some time to think. He lay down on his bed, hands behind his head and staring unseeingly at the ceiling. He remembered more about that day than what he had told Al.
He remembered his little brother climbing into his bed and staying with him when he was sick, which was how Al had gotten the sickness in the first place. He remembered that Al's touch on his forehead had been so warm, which was odd because he had been burning up. He remembered sleeping curled around Al as both their fevers escalated.
He remembered the story his mother had read them about love and marriage and happily ever afters. Most importantly, he remember the fleeting, possibly fever induced thought that if he was ever to marry anyone, he wanted it to be Al. He remembered how warm and content and peaceful that thought had made him.
Maybe it wasn't as impossible as he had first thought. Mustang was right, they deserved a little bit of happiness. And honestly, who was to say whether their love was right or wrong. Maybe when he restored Al, they'd move away. To a new, better place where they could live in peace. That is, if such a place even existed.
Ed chuckled, rolling over as an unexpected sleepiness took him. To him, it didn't matter where they went of what they did after this whole Philosopher's Stone deal was done. As long as he was with Al, nothing else mattered.