The continuation! I was initially going to keep this as part of a larger chapter, but I figured that I had kept you waiting long enough. ^_^ This one is mostly dialouge, but please bear with me! Here you go. Enjoy, and Review!
EDIT: Thanks to PipsqueakMidget for pointing out the mistakes! My beta is unable to help me right now, so I really appreciate it!
~0x0~
"Hello, Colonel."
Roy's remaining eye shot open, but he was still blind for a couple seconds. He lay completely still, not daring to move, not even taking a breath. After moment, his vision cleared and he concluded that he was safe and sound in his own bedroom. Slowly, he rose, propping himself up on his elbows.
'A dream. Had to have been a dream.'
But the drip-dripping of rainwater off his roof and the fact that his head had a sizable knot on it told him otherwise. Roy tilted his head back and let his eyelid slip closed. He took deep even breaths.
One breath, two.
'Yes. I was hallucinating due to stress. No reason to freak out, I just need more rest.'
Three, four.
'I was silly to have overreacted like that. Hell, I don't even remember dragging myself to bed…perhaps I should invest in sleeping pills and a day at the spa to relax.'
Five, six, se-
"Awake now?"
Once again, the General's eye flew open at a speed faster than his brain could follow. He flailed around, nearly falling off the bed in the process.
"Hey, be careful. You already have a bruise from your earlier tumble. Don't make it worse." Said a disembodied voice in smooth tones.
"Wha…" Roy panicked, looking for the source of the sound, needing to see it with his own eyes, needing to confirm what should have been impossible.
"I'm right here."
The dark haired man squinted in the direction he thought the voice was coming from. Of course, it was still very dark, so it was hard to tell, but he was fairly sure there wasn't anything over there.
As if summoned by his thoughts, a figure melted out of the darkness, just visible in the low light of the moonbeams pouring in through the window.
Roy blinked, once, twice, three times, making sure that the new arrival wasn't just his imagination.
Edward Elric stood before him.
He looked different. Despite his still slight stature he had grown. His hair had turned a shade darker, and hung from the back of his head in a ponytail. He had exchanged a red coat and leather pants for brown slacks and a button down shirt. He was pale. Very, very pale.
His eyes had…changed. They were the same amber-gold that Roy remembered, but there was something else in them. Something foreign and ethereal.
"F-Fullmetal?"
"Ha. I haven't heard that name in years. Wishing I was still under your command, Colonel?"
"I'm a General," Roy said, distracted. His mind wouldn't stop tripping over itself. "What…Where have you been?"
"Nowhere. Everywhere. Depends on your point of view."
"That's…not helpful. How the hell did you find my house? Moreover, how did you get in?"
Roy unsteadily clambered to his feet. He shakily walked towards the blonde, questions spinning in his brain.
'He's back. He's really back. I knew he would return someday. So why do I feel as if something is out of place?'
Edward just looked on, pinning Roy with his lion-like gaze.
Roy swallowed and stopped shuffling across the floor.
"You have a lot of explaining to do."
~0x0~
Once again, Roy was in his kitchen brewing coffee. Such a mundane action, so normal, so bland.
How could a single person make something so boring so extraordinary?
Roy was hyper aware of the figure sitting motionless at his breakfast table. He tried to make himself look busy, as if his every movement was not him gravitating around his former charge. He glanced at the clock.
3:36.
Damn. Much too early to be able to fully process life-altering visitations from a dead man.
"How do you like your coffee?" the taller alchemist asked, once the silence had become unbearable.
"I…can't drink coffee anymore. Makes me sick." Edward replied.
"Oh…well…I have other things. What would you like?"
"Nothing, thank you." The blond said curtly.
"Alright. In that case, would you care to tell me where the hell you've been the past four years?"
"No. First, you will answer a question of my own."
Roy cocked his head to show that he was listening.
"Is Alphonse in his own body again? Is he alright?"
'Ah. He wouldn't know, would he?'
"Yes, Edward. He's fine. Alphonse is in Liore right now." Roy noticed that he visibly relaxed in response to his statement. No surprise. His brother's well being had always weighed heavily on the mind of the young lad.
"Liore…so that is why I couldn't find him…wait, why is he there?"
"I do believe that is more than one question. Now, what about my query?"
"Colonel, I-"
"It's General now, Elric. And you had best answer this one truthfully and completely. I searched high and low for you for well over a year, and the only rewards my dedication brought were an empty casket and having to watch yet another brazen kid risk his neck chasing a legend. You owe me a damn good explanation for all this."
Once again, Edward leveled the dark haired man with his unreadable gaze. Now that Roy had coffee and had gathered his wits about him, he managed to not flinch.
Finally, the blond leaned back in his chair.
"Alright. Ask me whatever you wish and I will answer to the best of my ability."
Roy huffed a brief sigh. He hated playing 20 questions. It always felt like interrogating a prisoner or something. (And he had certainly had some experience with that.) But, if that was how Edward wanted it…
"How long have you been back?"
"About three months."
"Three months? Why the hell didn't you come find me sooner?"
"I was busy."
"Busy with what?"
"Pass."
That brought Roy up short. "What?"
"Pass." Edward repeated. "I am not going to answer that one yet. Next."
Roy shook his head and decided to let it go for now. He began firing off more questions.
"Where were you?"
"Germany."
"Where?"
"Germany. And a few other places."
The taller alchemist just looked at him until Edward decided to expand upon that.
"Germany is a country. It lies on the other side of the Gate."
"The Gate? You were inside the Gate?"
"No. On the other side of it. The Gate acts a sort of a barrier between this world and that one. The two sides mirror each other, with some differences on either side. Parallel worlds, you might say."
"…You know, I would say that sounds crazy, but coming from you, I'm apt to believe it. How did you get there?"
"When I preformed the transmutation to bring Al's body back, I was thrown to the other side of the gate and trapped there."
"And that's why you sound ridiculous?"
"Hmm?"
"Your voice. Being stuck in another country for so long has given you a bit of an accent."
"Oh." Edward looked a little abashed, as if someone had uncovered a dirty little secret. Roy smirked slightly, and continued in what should have been the normal sequence of questions to ask.
"How did you get back?" He asked, taking another sip of his now luke-warm coffee.
After about a minute of silence, Roy walked towards the room's other occupant and stopped beside his chair.
"Edward?"
"Pass."
"You can't do that! What about answering to the best of your ability?"
"That is the best of my ability."
"Surely no-"
"Mustang." Golden eyes bored into him, somehow holding sincerity and secrets at the same time. "That is one question I am not prepared to answer. There are some things better left unsaid."
And once again, Roy felt that coming from Edward, some things were very believable.
~0x0~
Roy felt uncomfortable in his own home. The air had somehow changed, like something was a little off, but he couldn't quite place it.
Every time he asked Edward a question, the younger man would refuse to answer.
After about an hour of the blond refusing to eat or answer any more questions, Roy got fed up and decided to try and shock him into giving up some information. He gave into desperation and flung out a fact that he would normally never admit:
"I had a dream about you, you know."
The man still sitting at his kitchen table started and looked at him with wide eyes. They both knew that General Roy Mustang was not the type of person to just give out information like that.
"At least, I am fairly certain it was about you. I couldn't see your face, just your eyes." Roy glanced over, looking for signs that Edward may have wanted to talk about it. All he saw was shock and confusion, and he figured that was a good enough handhold to start scaling the mystery that was Edward Elric.
"I've been having them recently…I know I must sound foolish, admitting that I was dreaming about someone like you, but they weren't normal dreams. It was more like…a nightmare." Roy carefully studied the other man out of the corner of his eye and saw a hint of a reaction at the word 'nightmare'.
"They always stayed fairly vague, and dark, but I am positive that I saw your eyes in both of my dreams, because I don't know anyone else with your eye color. And there was always fear involved."
It seemed as if the room got colder with every word he spoke, but Roy chalked it up to an overactive imagination and continued. Ed did seem to be responding to his tale, slowly becoming more and more disgruntled.
"There were strange noises and something like pain, if you can believe that someone could feel pain from a dream. And a smile. Both times, the dream ended with a smile…a smile with fangs."
And then came a reaction he didn't expect. Edward stiffened and jolted backwards as if he'd been burned, leaning away from the taller man, eyes wide as saucers.
'What? What was that in response to? Smile? No….I said that twice before he got startled. Must have been the word fangs then…but why would-'
"Th-That's…" Edward stammered, interrupting Roy's train of thought.
"What? What did I say?" The General asked.
"That's…unusual." Was the quiet response.
"Ed-"
"I should be going." The blonde stood up swiftly and began to briskly walk out of the kitchen.
"Ed, wait! Where are you going?"
"To Liore." Was the only answer.
"The trains aren't running at this time of day."
"I'll walk." Edward had stopped and was now standing in the doorway, his back towards the other man.
"Walk? That would take weeks. Come on, Fullmetal. Don't be unreasonable. Stay here tonight. Or, I guess I should say today. We can call Alphonse at a later hour."
He seemed to hesitate at that, and Roy jumped on the opportunity to throw more logic at him in the hopes of making him stay.
"Think about it. A dead man can't just start walking the streets. You'll cause an uproar. I don't know what you have been doing the past three months, but it is pretty apparent that no one knows you are back. A field trip to Liore is hardly the way to make that particular announcement."
"I don't want any announcements. I just want to see my brother." Said the sullen blonde.
"And you will. When we get a hold of him, I'm sure it won't be too hard to convince him to take the first available train back. Then it will only be a couple days until he gets here."
"A couple days? I can't-"
"Yes you can. Patience and a clear head are what you need right now, all right? It will go by fast, I promise. In the mean time, I can catch you up on everything that has happened while you were gone."
When the other finally nodded, Roy breathed a silent sigh of relief. He hadn't said it out loud, but he wouldn't have let Ed leave, even if he had insisted. The man was too afraid of him disappearing again and not coming back.
~0x0~
"Al's in the military now?"
"Yes. He wanted to join so he could find you."
"Idiot, I told him that only one of us had to-"
Edward stopped mid-sentence and stiffened slightly, as if he had heard something.
"Edward?"
"I…need to rest." The blonde said slowly.
Roy raised his eyebrow and glanced over at the window, seeing that dawn would be coming soon.
"Oh. Of course. Sorry to keep you up for half the night. You can use the guest bedroom."
Roy stood and motioned for the other to follow him out of the room. He led his guest upstairs to the spare bedroom. For a moment they both stood awkwardly, shifting from side to side. Then both started to say something at the same time.
"Well, I-"
"I guess-"
Both stopped short and blinked into the awkward silence that had fallen until Roy cleared his throat.
"Well. Good night. Or morning, I guess. Feel free to sleep in."
"Thanks."
When the shorter man shut the door, the General lingered a moment longer, not entirely sure why he felt so uneasy.
'It's just nerves. Things are a bit awkward between us. I suppose that is to be expected.'
He listened and heard nothing from the other side of the door, then scolded himself for eavesdropping. The dark haired man trudged down the hall and entered his own room, collapsing onto his bed immediately.
The final thoughts that flitted through his mind before he fell to a restless slumber were of how happy Alphonse would be when he learned that his beloved big brother had finally come home.
~0x0~
"So, you have returned."
Roy furiously shook his head, loathe to be back in this horrid dream world where he had no control.
The disembodied voice chuckled in the dark. "Poor little man, unable to keep himself from coming back to this place. Tell me, what brings you here?"
Roy wanted to ask why the evil creature suddenly wanted to have a conversation, but he couldn't seem to locate his vocal chords.
However, it seemed to have understood without the use of words, because it answered his question without prompting.
"Ah, I am not such a beast. I can be cordial when the occasion calls for it. You seem to be frequenting my dominion as of late, so we may as well behave like adults, eh?"
Roy wondered why this had taken such an altered course from the usual horror.
"Hmm. An interesting question…normally, I only get a visit from someone once, and then they are scared off, or unable to return. But you have come to me three times now. Quite curious, really. That rarely happens. I'm not entirely sure if it is bravery or foolishness on your part, though. Had I known that you would be returning, perhaps our first encounter would have been different…oh well. It's interesting, having you here. I don't feel the need to kill you because of that."
Kill? There was no dream that could kill someone.
"Dream? You think this is a dream? Interesting…Had I known that my little experiment would turn out such intriguing results, I would have done it long ago…" mused the rasping voice.
What the hell was this, the dark haired alchemist wondered. This whole thing was bizarre, even for a dream. Where was the phantom monster with fangs and golden eyes? Roy was confused and disoriented, and was quite honestly fed up with this nightmare crap. He wanted to just get it over with, so he could wake up.
"Alright, listen. Firstly, you were the one that came to me. Not my fault that you can't seem to control your subconscious enough to make it stay in one place. Secondly, I don't deal in nightmares and phantoms. I am The Truth. Everything you view in my presence is purely factual."
The truth about what?
"The Truth of all Truth, dear little man. Think in capital letters. And I can't tell you what The Truth is without receiving something in return. That goes beyond mere conversation, after all."
This was nonsense. Roy didn't know what was going on, or what this dream was even about.
"…I'll tell you what. I like foolish men like you. You amuse me. And, technically, you have given up a lot of restful sleep to be here, so I will give you a clue before I see you off. Honestly, I said it before, but humans often need things to be spelled out. So, let me say it again. Everything I show you is purely factual."
Then the smile was back. This time it seemed to stretch wider than ever, as if on the brink of laughter. The fangs seemed elongated, protruding past unseen lips, glistening in the gloom.
"I am looking forward to seeing how this plays out. It should prove to be most entertaining. Be sure to play your part to the fullest, so you won't disappoint. Until we meet again, little man..."
A golden flash caught Roy's eye, and once again he saw twin amber pools, filled with emotion and something entirely foreign to him.
As the excruciating pain suddenly burned his nerve endings, as the scent of blood hit his nostrils, Roy was certain of one thing.
He had seen those eyes on Edward's face.
~0x0~
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