Disclaimer: I do not own Fullmetal Alchemist.

Safety First

It was just another one of those usual maintenance checks that he had come for. Even though he was only there for such a short time, he really enjoyed those little visits he had to the Rockbell's. Winry enjoyed it just as much as he did, if not more. After all, she had missed him for so long. The only way she could ever communicate with him was through weekly letters. And even then, since Ed traveled so much, some would become 'return-to-sender'.

Even though they had that; a letter is not nearly as satisfying as actually seeing the person. So when he finally walked through that rickety gate, he instantly felt a sense of belonging. At times he had forgotten it, blinded by his own determination of not turning back, but this was his home.

He made his way to the front door, followed by the hollow sound of Al's metallic footsteps clanking noisily against the stones behind him. Before he could even get up the last step, he could hear hurried footsteps approaching the other side of the door. His eyes watched as the doorknob turned and was flung open by Winry, who was huffing and puffing from the speed of her run to it. She must've been upstairs in her room to know he was there already without him knocking. He climbed the last step, waiting for her to catch her breath. The pace and intensity of her breaths gradually decreased until she was breathing at a normal speed again.

"Hi Ed," she squeaked, obviously excited that he was there. He chuckled to himself, amused by how eager she had been when it came to greeting him alone. "Back for your maintenance check?" She grinned.

It was then he noticed that sparkle to her eyes. It was that familiar sparkle that usually only came to them when mechanisms of any sort were involved. She really hadn't changed; she was still the same machine freak he knew so well. She never reallyhad seemed to change over the years; she would simply work as hard as she could on her beloved automail in the time that he was gone, and on his when he was actually there. And then she would always occasionally attempt to knock some sense into his head whenever needed with her trusty wrench.

He never knew why she was so devoted to her automail, or why she would obsess over any little machine. She was never like that when they were growing up together as kids. It was only after he had tried to resurrect his mother. Perhaps he would ask her why one day.

He nodded, sending her a toothy smile. "Yeah." She ushered them in, stepping inside to make room for the two of them to get through the doorway.

He strode in, feeling more at home with every passing second. Within a few moments, Den had come over to the door, pawing at Ed's leg with her front-left metal one. He put his suitcase down on the ground, bending his knees so he was at eye-level with Den before reaching out his hand towards her and patting her gently on the head.

"Hey Den," he murmured to the dog. She raised her head slightly, as if telling him her greetings.

He stood up properly again, hearing Den's feeble protests as he stopped petting her, and looked to Winry.

"Where's Auntie?" He queried, curious that she hadn't shown herself.

"I think that her old age is getting to her." Winry murmured in reply. "She's been really tired all the time, and she's slowed down quite a bit. So she's sleeping upstairs at the moment."

"Ah," he nodded in confirmation. He couldn't really picture Pinako like that; even for an old lady she was pretty energetic. They always had those little joking fights with one another; the name calling for instance. He sighed, knowing that another thing had dropped out of his life while he had been gone. Even if he didn't particularly enjoy those spats with her, they were a part of his routine when he was here, and they would be missed.

"Come on," Winry urged, pulling him by the arm.

He allowed himself to be lead to her workbench, his eyes drifting over her growing mountain of tools and spare parts. His amber orbs rested upon what seemed to be the newest tool of her trade on the bench. It was a new wrench. It was nothing like he remembered her old one to be like; but that's what happens when you get a new one. This one was slick and had no dents in it, not even a single scratch. The light reflected brightly off of it, giving it that new glow to it. It was larger than her old one, and the handle was easier to grasp and wouldn't fall out of her hands as easily. Her old one had dents in it from where it had collided with his head, and chips out of it from where she had hit Alphonse. It was worn with scratches, age, and overuse. Of course she would've gotten a new one after all of that. Too many things had changed in the time he was gone. It seemed like Al, Winry, and himself were the only things that hadn't.

He worked his way over to the chair, stripping himself down to his boxers from being so used to his normal routine when he was here before sitting down. He glanced at this automail arm. The shine had gone from it, and instead was replaced by an outer layer of caked dirt which had trails in it from rain and wear. From what he could tell, his leg was in the same state. But of course, he wasn't an automail expert, so he could never know what was going on in Winry's head.

She pulled a bundle of string and a piece of paper out of her workbench drawer. Tracing along a line starting with the name 'Edward Elric',she followed along it until she got to the length she had last recorded his real leg and arm was. Winry then unraveled a bunch of the string, careful to measure it, before cutting it and walking over to where Ed was seated. She already couldn't wait to begin her inspection.

"You haven't been taking care of it, Ed." She stated with that familiar tone of annoyance in her voice. He knew he hadn't been; when did he have the time?

She took the string and measured his limbs, checking to see if they had grown or not over the time he had been absent. After carefully scrutinizing them, she looked up at Ed and smirked.

"You're still as short as ever, Ed." As much as she cared for the boy, she couldn't help but indulge herself in teasing him every once in awhile about his height. After all, when people are as short-tempered as he was, they can be a very fun target to make fun of.

She watched as he slowly breathed in, preparing for another one of his rant-like retorts.

"Who's so short he can't even reach the sun's rays!" He bellowed, shaking his fist and squirming about. She had gotten used to his outbursts, but she never got tired of hearing them. After all, it was seldom she heard from him at all.

"Brother…" Al sighed from the sidelines, watching what the usual maintenance check would consist of. He should've been used to this by now.

She grabbed one of her special cleaning cloths from her workbench and turned back to Ed, starting to clean the automail. She really was passionate about it; and talented to match. The both of them were pros at what they did.

Winry with her automail, and Edward with his alchemy.

He watched her work at his automail, paying attention to her as her finely trained eyes saw and cleaned every detail of it, down to the last screws and bolts. Once she had finished, she sat up properly to admire her handiwork.

"And that," she concluded. "Is how a well taken care of piece of automail looks." He looked at the job she had done on his automail, and saw how dramatically cleaner his muddied automail had looked. It was gleaming in the light just as brightly as if it were only equipped to him yesterday instead of 4 years ago.

"Are you going to stay overnight, Ed?" She asked, putting away all her tools. He nodded in response.

"Yeah. It doesn't hurt every once in awhile. After all, it's been so long since we last had the chance to relax." He pulled his clothes back on, save for his coat, and dusted himself off.

His clothes had been stained with blood, and were torn from fights he had been in over the years. His gloves were yellowed instead of the pure white they once were, and his boots were scuffed and muddied. He looked like a mess when he really looked at himself. But at least, after all that, he was still alive. That was all that really mattered.

"How's your journey been going?" He snapped back to reality, turning around to meet with Winry's worried face. "Not too dangerous for you?"

"No, it's fine! And it's not that dangerous. Even my automail wasn't broken this time! We're getting closer to our goal now. That's the important thing." He stated simply. She watched his expression carefully as he stated that. She could clearly see the determination behind his eyes, and the slight smirk that tugged at his lips. The very same expression that had come into being right after Roy had first come in and given him a reason to get out of bed and recover. A goal to go after. Something he could achieve instead of sitting around in a bed all day with no hopes of regaining anything. She hated the fact that the military had once again taken away the two most important people in her life, but she was also happy that they had something they could chase after again. It brought those amber orbs of Ed's back to life. He wouldn't react to anything. He wouldn't smile. When he finally reacted to something and made such an important and dangerous decision, she didn't know whether to be worried or thrilled. But then it occurred to her that she should be the one to cheer them on from the sidelines, to make sure they didn't stray from their goal. They wouldn't take her along anyways. After all, they had always told her it would be too dangerous to do so. She both resented and appreciated that at the same time.

"If you say so…" She murmured, still a bit suspicious for as to whether he was telling the truth or not.

Pinako never made her appearance that night; she had rested in her room the whole time. Ed never saw or heard even the slightest sign that she was awake.

Winry had set up Ed's room for him on the first floor, and Al had insisted on just staying in the living room with Den, as he didn't need to sleep, nor disturb his brother.

Late that night Winry awoke to the fierce sound of thunder rolling throughout the hills of Rizenbul. Little droplets of rain would occasionally get through the roof in parts of her room, and the immense noise the storm made had made it impossible for her to simply sleep through it. She opened her eyes to see Den sitting at the far end of her bed, barking at the thunder noisily.

"Ugh, silly dog…" She murmured resentfully, blaming her waking up more on Den than the rain. She sat up in bed, finding it pointless to try and fall back asleep. She ran her fingers through her hair, pulling out the knots and tangles she had made in it while she tossed and turned in her sleep. She looked around her room and watched as the lightning illuminated it, casting her own shadow to the far wall of the room. Her scattered tools shone brightly in the additional light the storm brought, revealing where she had misplaced things weeks before. Screws and bolts caught between floor boards, her beloved wrench at the foot of her bed… Everything.

Den resumed her barking, and then jumped off the bed and ran out her door and down the stairs, barking all the while.

'Darn it, she'll wake up Ed!' Winry thought to herself in realization. She got out of bed groggily and tugged on lower rim of her night-shirt, noting how it still went down the tops of her knees. She started walking to the stairwell slowly at first, then as she began to fully wake up and see things around her properly, her speed picked up and she was down there just in time to see Den run into Ed's room.

She hung her head and sighed. 'Geeze, did you have to go in that room of all places?' She reluctantly made her way to Ed's room, holding her breath out of fear of waking him up. She walked into the doorway and whispered through her hands. "Den! Come here!"

The dog didn't listen; instead, she in fact jumped onto the boy's bed. "I hate you." She retorted to Den's actions. She turned her head towards her best friend, watching as he shot up and cursed at being woken up.
"Um…" He stiffened, surprised to see that Winry was in the room. He turned towards her with a curious look on his face. "Sorry… Den ran down here and I tried to stop her… but…" She started, moving her foot in circles on the ground, obviously embarrassed that she had woken him up despite her intentions of preventing that. He sighed, pushing his hair out of his face.

"Its fine, Winry. The thunder would've woken me up sometime soon anyway."

"Ed…"

"What?"

"Are you really going to leave tomorrow?" She asked sadly.

"… Yes. We are. I know you don't like when we leave, but…" He trailed off.

"But what?" She shot, fuming. He paused for a moment, taken aback.

"But we have to. I promised myself that. I need to get Al's body back."

"Could you at least come home a bit more often? We all miss you! I miss you!"

"Winry…" He took a deep breath, and then continued. "I told you. I can't. We've been searching for four years, and we're starting to get somewhere! We can't stop now!" She fumbled for a response, but only found the same words she always did on the tip of her tongue.

"Why can't you take me with you!" She stomped angrily, watching as her tears of frustration hit the floor. There was a silence that hung thick in the air for a moment, before Ed started to speak again.

"Because it's too dangerous, Winry. We don't want you getting hurt. That's why we leave you behind."

He was basically telling her that same annoying phrase that adults would usually spout when you were younger to prevent you from doing what you wanted. 'Safety first,' they would say. After all these years of being left behind, she had loathed that saying.

"Don't you understand I'd rather be in danger than being safe yet alone?" She shouted, finally getting the words off her chest she had carried for so long. She took a deep breath, attempting to calm down. She could hear Ed stuttering, before beginning again with total confidence in his statements.

"Winry, I know you hate being left behind. We hate leaving you behind too, since you're so close to us. But just being associated with us can get you in trouble, let alone coming with us! Everyone who gets close to us just ends up getting killed! Hughes, Nina, Marco… everyone! We don't want the same thing to happen to you!" What he said obviously struck a cord; she started to tremble and clenched her teeth, biting back words. She sat down next to him, and looked him in the eye.

He watched her movements, how she grabbed his hands tightly in her own, how she continued to shake and whimper because of tears, how she continued to smile even though what he had said made her so upset.

"I appreciate what you're doing for me, but it gets a little bit lonesome. Just… come back home a little more often. Tell me what's happening to you in letters instead of cutting corners. I worry about you and Al a lot. So please don't just leave me in the dark like you usually would."

"Winry-"

"It's not that much to ask, Ed. Just try, okay?" After a moment, and somewhat reluctantly, he nodded.

"Fine. We'll try, alright?" Her whole face instantly lit up, and she wiped her tears away. She pulled him into a hug, smiling ecstatically.

"Thank you, Ed!" She responded warmly, feeling incredibly giddy at having won her latest battle with him, and at getting to see him more often because of it. He sighed, and allowed himself to rest his head on her shoulder. "Thank you!" She cried, happily. There were no other words that she could think of at the moment, just a simple 'thank you'. It wasn't nearly enough to express how happy she felt at the instant; having Ed promise her as much as he could at that point in time, but that was all she could do.

During the whole morning, despite the fact that Winry knew they were leaving, she was incredibly happy with what she had convinced Ed to agree to last night. She loved the idea that she would see them more and that she wouldn't be entirely left out of their lives anymore. Well, if anything, she was there with them in spirit. She was the one that had to cheer them on and make sure that they don't turn back on their dreams no matter what obstacle there was in their way. She was there for them for everything; for the good and the bad. For the times when they were weak and needed someone to be there for them, and for the times where they had no one else to turn to. She would be there for them.

That was her equivalent exchange with them.

Before they had a chance to leave out the door, Winry made her way over to Ed and gave him a quick peck on the cheek; resulting in their faces both turning the color of his coat.

"That's in return for what you promised me. I'll be waiting, alright?" He smiled weakly in return, nodding.

"Yeah." He headed out the door with Al following closely behind. Just as they walked back out the gate, he turned back on his heel and began to wave. "Bye, Winry! We'll be back soon!" He smirked. She waved back just as enthusiastically as she had run to the door the previous day; her hand almost blurring as she did so.

"Bye Winry!" Al shouted in turn; his armor clanking as he waved.

"Come back soon!" She called; half laughing as she did so.

They turned again, and continued on the long journey ahead of them.

Winry watched until they were out of the distance, still smiling even though she knew she was alone. She was the one who was meant to be left behind; it was her place. And she knew they'd always come back for her to see her when she was needed. And that was good enough for her.

"Brother, what was all that about?" Al asked slyly.

"W-what're you talking about Al? Nothing happened!" Ed replied uncomfortably. Al sighed knowingly.

He should've been used to this by now…

AN:

Hey! Yeah, I actually bothered to upload something of mine XD Don't you just love me:3 ... I'm such a sap for romance in mangas and animes. I swear. XD;

I worked hard on this, so please R&R!

Reminder: THIS IS A ONE-SHOT.

-Rei