Title: Comes Back Somehow

author: ursweetheartles

warnings: shonen-ai and m/m themes, definite AU diverging from cannon at set point. Spoilers for that thing with Hughes we're not supposed to talk about

a/n: updating and writing is tough now, with school on again, so bear with me. Unbeta'd so any constructive feedback would be nice, looking for a beta at the moment, mine seems to have decided she likes it in Romania shrug

Disclaimer: i wrote Hirouma Arakawa a nice letter asking her if she'd like to trade FMA for some nice fudgy brownies. i have not heard back but i am hopefull...

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.. Part 1: the nature of my crime ..

Roy Mustang woke up in a room he didn't recognize but the sterile white that surrounded him and the heavy smell of antiseptic with a sour undertone, faintly like decay, told him he was in some sort of hospital. It took some time to register that there was someone else in the room, a head slumped down on the bed beside him, a golden braid that seemed achingly familiar, even if the face was turned away. How had he gotten here, he struggled to recall but his mind was blurry, there were snapshots of memory, Maes' face, only wrong, chalk trembling in his hand, someone holding him, crying. he tried but he couldn't put them together, and the more he tried the more they slipped away, crumbled under the pressure, until he was left with only a blur once more. The form beside him shifted, arms stretching, head lifting, eyes screwed shut, face gaping in a yawn.

"Fullmetal?" His voice cracked from disuse, the boy's eyes sprung open then, mouth hanging limp in shock.

"Mustang, you're awake! You'd been out for quite a while there, the nurses were getting worried." The boy blushed slightly, and Roy still look dazed, confused. Now he was trying to figure out why Edward of all people would be here in the hospital room.

"w-why, wh-what ..." He was having trouble making complete sentences then, the words and concepts were floating around in his head, he knew what he wanted to ask, what he meant to ask, but it didn't quite come out.

"You don't remember, do you?" Edward sighed and looked away, his hand resting lightly on Roy's arm.

"Tell me Fullmetal, why am I here?" The boy smiled distantly, but shook his head.

"Its better that you forget, that you let it slip away." Roy tried to grab the boy, and barely succeeded, though his grip was loose and pained.

"Tell me Fullmetal" His voice was as commanding as he could make it, but Edward only stared resolutely out the window, then he softened, pleading, "Fullmetal ... Edward, please..." His eyes showed the depth of confusion and hurt he felt, but Ed still shook his head lightly, standing up to leave.

"You need your rest, bastard. Maybe when you get out of the hospital, maybe when they figure out what's wrong, and they make you better."

And with that the boy left, quietly and quickly. Roy stared at the ceiling for a while before the nurse came in, fawning over him until she tired of it, then leaving him alone with his thoughts once more.

X

It took two weeks and three days for Mustang to be well enough to get out of the hospital, and in that time every one of his subordinates and friends came to visit him, including Alphonse Elric, who came several times and always brought him something, a book or a magazine, a deck of cards, anything that might stave off the boredom and horror of having to stay in that hospital room alone for most of the day. None of them, however, had any idea of what had happened to put him in there. the closest he got was from Hawkeye, who had said that she had gotten a distraught phone call from Edward that night, that Mustang had been hurt and that he needed help. She had rushed over immediately and had almost fainted from all the blood, both of them had been covered in it.

Edward had dragged him upstairs and out the front door, they had been waiting patiently on the front porch when she had rolled up, but Edward wouldn't explain what had happened, he had just kept sobbing, something about mistakes and apologies, about stopping something and losing something, and oh gods, Roys hurt so bad, he needs help you have to help him, I can't do this by myself I just can't. And that had been it, they had gotten to the hospital and stabilized his condition, and he had stayed asleep for three days, none of which had Edward left the man's side, he just stayed there constantly, waiting for Roy to wake up.

So the logical first thing Roy had done, after going home to shower and change clothes, was to find, and confront Edward. He needed to know how he'd ended up there, what he'd done. He'd figured that much out now, he'd done something that night, he'd done it alone, and he'd feared it and wanted it at the same time, it was something he felt strongly for, he could remember the clots of searing emotion simmering around the shards of the memories of that night. He knew Edward knew what it was, he had one clear memory after all of that, one moment he could feel in isolation from the others, without the blurry quality of all the others, and the emotions were different some how, it was different.

He remembered Edward sitting there, cradling his head and crying into his shoulder, the tears were hot and salty, the small body racked with sobs pressed against him. He remembered words chocked out around the cries, Why, oh gods why, don't die on me, you cant die on me not now. that was stupid, so stupid.

And now he needed to hear from Edward what had happened, what it was he had done to do so much damage to himself, to make Edward cry like that. It was the only time he had ever seen Edward cry. It must have been bad, for Edward to cry over him, Ed never seemed to feel anything warmer than a fragile trust from the boy, like he was distancing himself on purpose.

He knocked on the boy's dorm room door, hoping that by dropping by unannounced that Edward would have less chance to ignore or avoid him. Roy couldn't let that happen, the boy had to answer him, he had to. Ed opened it and then almost slammed it right back shut again, he would have made it, to, if not for Roy's shoe in the way. He couldn't let the boy escape.

"Edward, I need to talk to you, very seriously. Is your brother in at the moment?" Ed sighed and stepped back, already resigned to dealing with the colonel, something he didn't want to do now.

"No" he said, eyes glued to the back of the couch.

"Good, I need to know what happened that night. What was it that I did that made me that way." he paused, and then added, in a quieter tone, "why were you crying over me?"

X

Roy walked swiftly in the dark, mulling over what the blonde boy had told him inside of his mind, the magnitude of what he had done settling over him. I recognized the circle you drew Edward had said, refusing to meet the man's eyes, it was so much like the one we had, way back then, only it was better, more elaborate, thought out farther than ours had been. It was obvious that you'd been preparing for a long time, studying hard. You did it better than we did, I would assume, but I didn't see the form, only you. By the time I got there whatever you brought back had already disappeared. Who knew, maybe it was made well enough to move on its own then, before any interference. All I knew was there was blood, there was so much blood. The boy was on the verge of tears once more, it was clear from the desperate wobble in his voice, I thought it had killed you, you weren't moving at all then, you were barely conscious. I remembered you tried to say something but it came out too weak. There was nothing more I could do, I panicked.

The boy's words floated in his head, who was it that he had brought back that night, if he had indeed brought back anyone at all. He didn't really doubt his capacity to try that method, even if he did know that it was going to fail, he had come so close before. The only thing between him and actually breaking that cardinal rule of alchemy had been Maes. Oh gods, Maes! That must really be it, it must have been him. It made sense to Roy in hindsight, Maes had too much to live for to be let die, but he knew that was not the real reason for trying. If he was telling the truth he would have to say they were dubious reasons indeed.

He couldn't live the same way without the man, without Maes standing beside or behind him pushing, pushing him upwards, towards some goal they had both swore he would reach one day. Or Maes behind him, just pushing, pushing into him, sweat slicked skin sliding. Yes, it had been an ultimately selfish decision, and one he knew would have nothing but bad consequences. He knew that, but he also hoped that maybe it would work. It had been a plan of desperation, a decision made not with his conscious mind but with that whole he felt in his gut whenever he thought about Maes' smile, or his rough hands and sharp knives, whenever he really realized that he would never hear his voice again, or feel that hot wet mouth cling desperately to his skin. Even now, Roy felt tears welling up behind his eyes. But he blinked them back. Roy Mustang did not cry.