Without Ed

story by Tohru Daihikashousha

Note: There may or may not be yaoi this time. For those of you who STILL don't know what yaoi is, although I'm assuming that you have read the first two updates, and therefore DO know, yaoi is the explicit version of boyxboy, aka gay sex. If you don't like it, I stand by my decision that you should go to will be extremely fluffy shonen-ai, however.

Another Note: STILL NO REVIEWS!!! takes out ueber super muffin machine gun and fires muffins at the masses REVIEW!!!!!!

Chapter Four: Discoveries (continued)

Suddenly, Envy stood up and ran out the door. A few stray tears followed, sparkling in the light. Roy couldn't help but feel bad for the poor homunculus, as strange as that seemed. He was obviously in a lot of pain, and Roy knew how it felt.

Envy didn't know where he was going, he wasn't even sure why he had run. He should have just finished it right there, should have killed Roy while he had the chance. He shouldn't have even talked to that woman that the two sleezes that kidnapped him had called Hawkeye. He shouldn't have cried.

Surprisingly, she had been understanding. She had realized that he needed to talk, and she had talked. More than that, she had listened. She had let him rant, and rave about how now that Ed was gone he felt alone, he had noone to pester, no reason to continue fighting. She had understood when he said that he felt something for the boy, comforted him when he was jealous of Ed's feelings for Roy.

That had come as a surprise for Risa. Ed liked Roy? That had to be impossible, yet here was a homunculus who had access to Ed's thoughts saying that he missed Roy, and definitely felt something for him. There was that, and the fact that Ed had told her to say hello to Roy, not Mustang, Roy for her.

But she wasn't going to tell Roy. No, Roy needed to get over Ed, he needed to learn that wanting to fuck his subordinates was not a good thing to do. Although she was his sister, she was a general first.

She was getting good information from Envy, and had even enjoyed talking to him. She had always been one of the psychiatrist types, she had always enjoyed listening to peoples problems, and telling them how to fix them. She was coming along well with Envy, but then Roy woke up.

"Why were you talking to him?" asked Roy, "What were you talking about? Why was he crying"
Risa sighed.
"Would you like it if I told a random friend that you don't know about you missing Ed"
"WHAT? You didn't tell him, did you"
"Exactly"
Now Roy was confused. "What"
"Envy wouldn't like it if I told you, to him a random friend of mine, about him missing Ed"
"What"
Oops. She hadn't meant to say that. It had just slipped out.
Roy started laughing.
"He.. he, he misses Ed?" he wheezed. "Oh, that's a good one Hawkeye." he laughed to himself, but stopped when he realized his sister wasn't laughing.
"He misses Ed?" he asked, completely serious now.
"He figured out that if he changes into Ed, he can reach him where he is now. He can take over Ed's body, and in return, Ed can take over his body." said Risa, ignoring Roy's question. "And by the way, you missed him, Ed was here. He told me to say 'hi' to you for him. So, 'Hi"
Roy's face went to stone. "Risa, this isn't funny anymore. You know how much it hurts me to talk about him, and you go flaunting it in my face, pretending there's a way to talk to him, and saying that you did talk to him, and he said to say hi to me! Everyone knows that even if there was a way for him to talk to us, he would have said something more to the effect of 'i hate the Colonel.'" Roy started to cry, as he hadn't since the first day of Ed's death. "He could never like me, let alone love me as I loved him." Tears streamed down the Colonel's face, and he broke down and sobbed at his desk.

Just then, Fuery and Armstrong walked in with a sobbing homunculus. They dropped Envy and stared at Roy.
Fuery rubbed his eyes.
"I think we need to get some coffee. I'm definitely not awake yet"
Armstrong nodded, and they left in a daze.

Envy had been running out the exit of the headquarters when they caught him. He wasn't sure why, but he had shifted into Ed. Ed had taken over, but for some reason, he couldn't stop sobbing. Envy's residual feelings were linked with his.

However, the two alchemists that had caught him knew that Envy could shift, and kept holding him. Envy was in no mood to take back over, and Ed couldn't stop sobbing, so it was a bedraggled looking Edward Elric that the guards dropped on the floor of Colonel Roy Mustang's office.

Risa stared at Ed, and then looked back to her brother, but her brother didn't seem to notice that his love interest was sitting on his office floor.
Eventually, he stopped crying, and looked up, wiping his eyes. For some reason, Risa was talking in her motherly voice.
And then he heard a voice that nearly made his heart stop.

Chapter Five: Seedlings (you don't have to get it. just go with it. please w

Al awoke sticky and sore, under scratchy covers at a whorehouse. He had never felt better in his life. He had his pain, he had something to take his mind off his brother, and he had had an awesome night. It couldn't get any better. He rolled over to look across the edge of the bed.
Morning light was shining through a dirty window, and a warm form moaned and nestled farther into his side. "Arrgh.. its too bright!" Noe whined, trying to shield his eyes from the sun with Al's back. Al's back was nice, and warm, and muscular.. and.
Al had spent the night, and people were going to wonder where he was.
Suddenly he sat up straight. Now it was Al's time to grumble.
"Al! You're still here! We fell asleep!" exclaimed Noe, prodding Al in the side. "We overslept! I have to get to work"
"You're already at work, stupid." muttered Al, pulling Noe back down beside him, and curled up around the older boy's waist, looping his leg over Noe's.
"No, no, no! You don't understand, I need to make money! If I don't make money, I'm going to have to go back. Back on the street. Come on, Al. Get off me. I have to go to work. Anyway, you should leave. This isn't a place for someone as young as you, anyway. Go on, leave me to my work." In the beginning, he almost laughed out loud, they sounded like they had been lovers for years. As he started getting more serious, however, Noe almost thought he was going to cry. He knew he was right, he knew that it was no place for someone as young as Al, but he didn't want to know.
Al rolled off him, and got out of bed, going to put his pants on. Noe had never felt as attatched to someone. He didn't want Al to leave, he enjoyed the uke. That was it, he just didn't want to be raped by some guy who wanted to be dominant. That was all. Just the boy's role. He didn't actually feel anything for the boy.
He looked back to where Al was dressing, but the boy wasn't dressing. He was fishing in his pants pocket for his wallet. Taking out a one hundred dollar bill, he handed it to Noe.
"Is that enough to cover last night?" Noe stared at it in shock. He had never seen a one hundred dollar bill before.
"This- This is far too much! You only owe me about Ten dollars!" He tried to hand the money back, but Al wouldn't take it.
"So this buys me about ten days, right? I'd like to get to know you. Everyone else I went to either wouldn't accept me because I was too young, or accepted me only to turn me out because I was gay, or because I wanted pain. You actually did what I wanted. You've helped me to get over him a little. Just enough. I can start to live my life again without him, and I'd like to get to know you"
Any happiness that Noe might have felt at the statement dissapated. He was just wanted as a bounce back fuck. He wasn't actually wanted, not at all. He had to work quickly to hide his dissappointment, and instead put on his sexy, moneymaking mask.
"So, then. What would you like me to do?" he asked, his voice dripping with honey.
Al seemed to understand what was wrong immediately.
"Oh, no. You're not.. that's not what I meant exactly. You see, for the past couple of years or so, I've been in love with my older brother. He just never noticed me. A while ago- a while ago.." he had to stop to keep from bursting into tears. "A while ago he died."

Noe wasn't appalled as Al had expected.
His face went from a sexy dissappointed mask of a whore to that of an understanding, caring friend.
"Oh, Al, I'm so sorry. Let me be your Whore so that you can just Forget!" he spat out.
Al jerked back. "I- I"
"Just use me! Of course I don't actually mean anything to you, I'm just someone you can BUY to USE whenever you want! Stupid rich prick, I don't want your money"
He was about to throw the one hundred dollar bill, the first one he had ever seen, back at the boy, when Al's arms wrapped tight around him.

"W- What"
"Silly, I don't want to use you! I actually want to get to know you!" Al's old self started to shine through, and he tugged on the man's arm. "Come on! Lets go get something to eat!"

Noe had never had someone take him out to eat before, certainly noone took a whore out to eat with them.
"I.. but I don't have any clothes"
Al looked surprised.
"I know you don't.. I was going to buy something for you! Unless you don't want to.. I just thought maybe you would want a break from being a.. a.. a whore.." He choked out the word.
"Oh, so now I'm a pity case, am I?" Noe snapped, pretending to be angry. He ruined the effect however, by bursting out laughing. He grabbed the pants from Al's hand and threw them to the floor, sweeping up the naked teen in a tight hug.
He surprised himself when he felt tears streaming down his face.
"Thank you so much. You have no idea how much this means to me." Al looked up, and smiled, wiping away Noe's tears with his thumb. Noe's face lit up in a blush.
"I love that about you. You need to blush, and laugh more often. It makes you even more beautiful, Noe." Noe just stared at the boy that had called him beautiful. Nobody ever called him beautiful.
He leaned in, and drew Alphonse into a deep, yet innocent, kiss. When he pulled away, he looked Al straight in the eyes.
"Thank you."

A little bit later, Al stood in the lobby of the brothel, waiting for Noe to finish talking to his friend.
"Cole.. I don't get it, man. I think- I think I really like this kid. Cole, I don't know what to do. I'm falling for him, Cole, and I don't know what to do."

-
The entire time I was writing this, My left wrist was aching, and it was getting harder and harder to move my fingers without them hurting. Dear God, I can't afford to get Carpal Tunnel!
I'm sorry for the lack of updates on anything, I've been on a two week vacation to Paris and Ireland ((w00tw00t for the homeland!!)), so I've decided to update this, update with two chapters of Royalty, and maybe I'll get around to posting a new story I'm writing called Chronos and Tertos. (which is a misleading title, as it is mostly about Tertos and Tsubarin..) I may also end up posting my new short, Subway.
Thanks for reading this and sticking with it, even though I am such an unreliable hippocrite. bows domo domo domo!!

About the dollar bills. I don't think I've seen anyone use ANY money in the entire Full Metal Alchemist series. So I just used the money with which I'm most comfortable, good old american dollars.
And another thing, I know he's a cheap whore. Just go with it.