And All Manner Of Things Shall Be Well
Disclaimer: I don't own FMA, I just like to play around in it's world and annoy the characters for awhile.
After-beta: ShiniLuv
It is unwise to consume revenge hot - Ishbalian proverb
Chapter Three - In which we skip back a few months. Beware of flying wrenches!
On a beautiful summer's day in Risembool, Alphonse Elric sat at a small table in the backyard of the Rockbell house, doing what he'd come to love best: using his alchemical skills to help animals. Even during the years his soul was trapped in that suit of armor, Al had had a knack with animals from little on.
Dogs came wagging their tails, cats rubbed against his legs, even birds came and perched on his head when he whistled. Sometimes, they had "accidents" on his head too (which an annoyed Ed pointed out was most unsanitary), so he was glad to be back in his physical body, and the birds settled for perching on his index finger.
His "patient" that day was a feral tabby kitten with an eye infection; it sat quietly in his lap, perfectly trusting in this human not to hurt it. With his left hand, Al gently tipped the kitten's head back, then he used the thumb and index finger of that hand to hold it's left eye open.
In his right hand was an eye dropper filled with a yellowish liquid; knowing kittens don't like to sit still for long, Al quickly brought it over and administered two drops of medicine.
"Good kitty", he crooned, and rubbed it's ears. Already purring, the kitten actually raised the volume of it's 'motor'. This was the third dose he'd given the kitten, and the infection was nearly gone. Since tthe signing of the Amestris/New Britain trade pact, Al had been in contact with a professor at the Highgate School of Veterinary Medicine in New Britain; he gave Al advice on the ingredients, and Al finished the medicine using alchemy.
Idly, Al wondered if he would be allowed to take the kitten along when he left for New Britain to begin his studies at the college; he knew Pinako wasn't a fan of cats because the feral cats in the neighborhood had a tendency to use her flower garden as a litter box. Alchemy was rare in New Britain and the new flow of ideas between that country and Amestris had sparked great interest in 'complimentary medicine' - using traditional Hippocratic healing, along with alchemy to cure maladies, and heal wounds.
Al's thoughts were interrupted with a crash - a tremendous one which sounded inside the yellow house behind him. It was immediately followed by an angry, incoherent yell - brother's voice. The yell was answered by a high - pitched female scream - Winry's.
Not good.
The kitten's tiny body tensed up, it first growled, then spat, and Al released it before he got scratched. It had bolted up a nearby tree by the time another tremendous crash sounded and the back door banged open. Out the door and down the porch steps hurtled a black and yellow streak - Edward Elric had pissed Winry Rockbell off again - which is why he was running hard, ducking to avoid a flying wrench.
"Broth - ?" Al began
Shut up and run!" roared Edward.
When Winry was angry, it was best to stay out of her throwing range. Capping the eye dropper, Al leapt out of his chair and pelted after his older brother.
"Don't forget to duck!" Ed yelled. Al did so, and a good thing he did too, as a wrench skimmed right over his head, damn near putting a new part in his hair.
Edward zigged and zagged; avoiding all but the last thrown wrench: at the last minute, he zagged when he should have zigged and the wrench bounced hard off the back of his head. The jolt caused him to lose his balance and plow face first through a small pond of storm water at the end of the yard.
But he was up on his feet almost instantly, and the brothers scrambled together up a steep bank to the road. Both plopped down, gasping, and looked back at the pretty blond woman raging in the doorway.
"I'M AT WAR WITH ALL MEN - AND THE ELRIC BROTHERS ARE ENEMY NUMBER ONE!" screamed Winry Rockbell.
Al was stunned. "What ever have I done to you?!" he shouted back.
"You're the brother of Edward Elric!" bellowed Winry, "That's a good enough reason!"
He looked over at Ed, who was spitting mud and bits of grass out of his mouth, his golden eyes looking like beacons in his mud covered face.
"Brother, what did you do to her?"
Edward snapped, "Hell, I don't know, she just started yelling and then she beaned me with a wrench." He kept on, "I swear Al - that woman is crazy. All women are crazy, l - I'd advise you to steer clear of the lot of them."
His little brother chuckled: Ed's hate-love-hate relationship with Winry was a running joke in Risembool. Most of the villagers felt it meant they were made for each other - but Ed was useless at courting - any attempts to make 'nice' on his part tended to end badly. An argument invariably ensured, with yelling, and wrench throwing close behind.
Clapping his hands together, Al lightly set his fingers on the mud, dirty water and vegetation clinging his brother. A bright flash, a crackle of alchemical energy later, Ed and his clothes were clean and dry again.
"Thanks, Al, that was my last clean shirt"
"No problem, brother"
Cautiously circling around to the main road, Ed hoisted himself onto the low stone wall which bordered one side. It made Al realize how much taller he'd grown. Four years ago, he would have to jump up for a handhold, then climb the rest of the way.
Al sat down next to him, and for a time, neither said anything, both lost in their own thoughts. This road held so many memories for both of them. When younger, both raced down it on the way to the river to fish, or go swimming; back and forth on this road on the way to school; they left their home for the last time on this road; and followed it on visits to the Rockbell's.
And, and - and...
Their mother's funeral cortege - plus those of Winry's parents - and so many local war dead - had taken this road on the way to the cemetery for their final rest. Now it was the turn of Al's eyes to mist over.
He felt the pull of generations of people who lived in the valley; their mother had been a Crawford - her ancestors had first settled her over 1,000 years ago. On mother's side at least, Ed and Al's roots ran deep in Risembool. Al slyly brought his hand up to surreptitiously brush away a tear.
"Al?"
He looked over at Ed, who was smiling at him. Al blushed and ducked his head, and he tried to sniff back the tears, but some escaped to roll down his cheeks. Ed handed him a handkerchief, and Al dabbed quickly, then he sat there with it crushed in his hand.
"Brother, I - "
"Thinking about mother too?"
'How did you - ?"
"She crosses my thoughts almost every day, at least once a week."
"Me too, brother, me too."
"We will never forget her Al, never." Ed sighed. "She was our rock, our strength, our shield. She helped us feel safe and secure, even when it seemed the whole country was going to hell in a handbasket."
"Helena Handbasket?"
Ed flopped his metal hand in an offhanded gesture. "It was a term I heard during my time in the machine world. They are big on slang terms over there, sometimes it was difficult to understand them."
Al had nothing to add at first, so he just nodded.
"Brother, we haven't visited her grave for a while, I think it's time we went into the village and got some fresh flowers for her. I think she would like that."
Now it was Ed's turn to nod in agreement. "You were always the voice of reason Al. Maybe Winry will have cooled down by the time we get back."
As one, they jumped down from the wall and headed in the direction of Risembool village. Ed's metal arm was draped over Al's shoulder as they talked about mundane things such Al's fear that he would forget to take his identity papers along, or whether he would get seasick in the Jersey channel, could he handle more formal schooling than he was used to, were cats allowed in student housing, or how he would cope with homesickness.
Down in the village, they were recognized and greeted by virtually everyone. During theirchildhood, should Ed or Al misbehave on one end of the valley, they could be certain their mother had heard about it before he got home - as sweet and loving as Tricia Elric was - she wasn't afraid to mete out punishment when they behaved badly.
Parents pointed them out to their children - look kids! - it's the Fullmetal Alchemist, and his brother, the Soul Alchemist. It was very rare for a village the size of Risembool to produce even one State Alchemist, so two was a huge honor. The Elric brothers didn't know it, but the entire village was very proud of them - especially of Ed's feats of insubordination. He may be a 'dog of the military', yet he wasn't very obedient.
After a quick visit to the flower seller, they headed back up the road, to the village cemetery high on a green hill. Drawing close to their destination, both fell silent, lost in personal memories again. The cemetery was quiet and peaceful, studded with trees from which occasional birdsong could be heard. But the only sound now was the drowsy humming of bees attracted by flowering bushes which marked family plots. In sight of Tricia Elric's grave, both stopped dead in their tracks.
Someone was kneeling in front of her grave and digging up the ground! Stealthily laying aside their rose bouquets, both Ed and Al lifted up their hands, palms facing, ready to clap them together.
A moment before they acted, the intruder looked back, then swiftly stood up. It was Winry!
"Winry!" exclaimed Al, "how did you know we would come here?"
One side of Ed's mouth quirked up, it didn't take a rocket scientist (did he really just think that? Another machine world term) to figure out where they would go. Winry smiled and stepped aside to give them an unobstructed view of the grave. They saw a small round bush, covered with glossy dark green foliage, with tiny white roses scattered amongst the leaves. A gentle breeze struck up, and a faint tinkling sound was heard coming from the bush.
Al exclaimed again, this time with delight. "Oh, Winry! A wind rose bush!"
Winry blushed and ducked her head. "A customer short on cash traded three of these bushes for repair work I did on his arm; I only needed two for my parent's graves, so I decided to plant the other in front of Tricia's."
"It's beautiful, Winry, that was very thoughtful of you."
"I know it would have been best to ask you two first, but wind roses are tricky, they don't like to be out of the ground for too long."
Ed's throat tightened, he had a sudden, strong urge to go up and hug the stuffing out of Winry; but suspicious she had a wrench hidden somewhere on her person, he hung back. Al had no such hesitation, and he hugged without fear.
Winry knew what Ed was afraid of - so she decided to mess with his head a bit by flashing him an evil grin over Al's shoulder - and she got the satisfaction of seeing him flinch.
"I hope it grows here O.K."
"As long as the hole is filled with water and some rose food before planting, Al, it actually is quite hardy. I think the story of it being finicky is an urban legend, designed to boost it's mystique - and the price." Wind rose bushes were incredibly expensive - the equivalent of a months' pay for a State Alchemist.
Ed picked up the rose bouquet he'd brought and ruefully said, "I guess these can't hold a candle to that."
"Nonsense, Ed; you have red roses, and Al brought blue. They'll go very well with these white ones."
Touche, Winry, touche. (yet another machine world term, what was with him today?)
Admiring the effect later, Ed had to admit WInry was right.
The sun was going down as the trio walked back to the Rockbell house; the brothers close enough to Winry between them she would be unable to swing any wrenches. Ed carried her water bucket, and Al her gardening tools - a sudden flashback came up in Ed's mind - walking to school along this road, he and his best friend Asimov Hodgeson used to fight over who would carry Winry's books.
What ever had happened to him? Oh yeah, he'd been killed on the Northern Front, fighting against the Drachmeans, his body laying somewhere in the Briggs Mountains. Poor Asimov, who would never touch the soil of Risembool again.
There were too many bad memories in Risembool: the valley looked idyllic, but the endless decades of war had deeply scarred it's people. So many maimed veterans, so many families with father, mother, son, daughter, uncle, aunt, brother, & sister - shaped holes in their hearts.
Wait a minute. Why was he thinking like this? He, Edward Elric had nothing to kick about. Sure both their parents were dead, the family home a pile of ashes; reduced to a handful of photographs, but he was home again. Al restored both physically and mentally, Scar and all the homunculi (he hoped) were dead, and peace - such a rare commodity - was in the air.
What were a few wrench induced contusions compared to that?
End Chapter Three.
