A/N: O.M.G...I AM SOOOO SORRY!!! I can't believe how long it took for me to finally write this damn chapter! For all of those who were kept waiting, I am very, very, very sorry. I think this has been the worst case of writer's block I have ever had the misfortune to suffer from. It just...wasn't there. I promise the last chapter and the epilogue will be much faster in coming. I'm not so sure about this chapter, even after I agonized over it for nearly two weeks, so forgive me if it seems OOC, which it probably is. *bangs head against a table* I did my best! For malfoysdaughter, the other half of my soul.

Warning: there is some mildly graphic violence so if anyone is particularly sensitive, well, it gets a bit gross. It's not horrible but I felt I should warn everyone anyway.


Al burst into the library that day in a flurry of frantic desperation, armor clanking along with his sharp movements, an odd, loud contrast of his normal composed self. Ed heard him coming from down the hall and could only gape as he watched his younger brother barrel in through the doors, ignoring the annoyed hiss from one of the librarians. It was obvious the boy was looking for him, which was confirmed a moment later when the younger boy yelped as he spotted the blond and nearly bawled his older brother over in his haste.

"Al, what the hell has gotten into you?" he demanded, not even sure if he should be worried or amused at the picture the large suit of armor made as he flailed about anxiously. But instead of answering, a hard grip wrapped around his wrist and was dragging him from the library.

"I'm sorry, nii-san but something really bad happened and I think Roy is about to do something really stupid and you're the only one who can stop him—" the light tenor was higher than normal, strung tight like a thin string on an instrument and was the real clue to the depth of his distress. Ed let himself be led through the halls, unable to break through his surprise at the sudden outburst and wondering just what could be so terrible it had his laid-back little brother in such a worried mess.

And then the words he was saying penetrated his confusion, striking him like a blow. The case, that case, the one that Ed wanted nothing to do with nor to hear anything about and he was being dragged right into the middle of it. Clearly they had found one of the men responsible and the very thought had his gut twisting so painfully he wondered if he would be sick and his knees nearly locked up so that he would have to be carried to move any further.

"Al…" and his voice was small, filled with fear because there was no way he could face that, not again, not if he wanted to remain sane. His younger brother must have sensed his fear and hesitation, just like he always did, and stopped in his head long rush, reaching out and touching Ed on the side of his face. It was a gesture Al had never once used before, not on him and it caught his swirling thoughts, gently reeling them back in. The glowing space where his eyes should be were soft with compassion.

"I know, nii-san but he's going to kill him. We may be already too late," somewhere in the blonde's mind, he knew that Roy could absolutely not take his revenge in that manner. They had spent some time talking over the past weeks and Ed had been horrified to learn of the things that the Colonel had been forced to do when he fought in Ishval. Things that had led the older man to nearly commit suicide. He could not, would not, let that happen again and he knew that even of it was for Ed, in retribution for what had happened, the dark haired man would still be killing in cold blood. And just like that his sickening, crippling fear was swept away in a wave of determination.

He let Al take his hand again and ran with him to a part of the building he had never had a reason to visit before, the walls bleak and cold. It reminded him of cold justice and bitter retribution. Heart in his throat, he ignored the looks and the enraged shouts for them to be more careful, praying to the god he didn't believe in that he wouldn't be too late.

A door was slammed open and he saw those white gloves, poised and ready to flare with red, glaring fire. Nothing mattered but that he caught the hand they adorned right before the flames roared through the room, not even paying attention to anyone else in the room because he was drowning in black eyes that burned with a vengeance so bright it nearly burned him right to his soul. When Roy snarled at him, barely even recognizing the blond in his fury, why, why, Ed allowed himself to be touched by that fire and felt it purge all the fear and doubt and darkness from his mind.

"Because the man I love would not want this,"

Finding the Blood Rose Alchemist had actually been an accidental turn of luck.

It started innocently enough, when one of the young Majors on the military's police force went into one of the seedier shops downtown whose owner had been caught selling narcotics several years ago out the back of his store. It was merely a routine checkup, to make sure he was following the stipulations of his parole. Luckily, the Major had been working with Roy's team on the investigation and knew enough that it was Wells who walked through the shop's door moments after he himself did. Such a stupid, simple coincidence and just like that, the man that had sold Ed and his younger brother off to pay his debts had been neatly arrested.

And what a sad, pitiful image of a person he made, too. If the Colonel wasn't already so inclined to hate the man, he might have acknowledged the tiny flash of cold pity before it was squashed under the towering force of his fury.

It was Hughes that had interrupted him in a meeting, his eyes glittering like hard ice behind his thin glasses, lips pressed into a sharp line. While the meeting itself wasn't terribly important, the man still knew better than to pull him away. And Roy might have been annoyed as he stepped from the room if he hadn't caught the expression on his friend's face. Triumph and anger and a twisted kind of relief shone on the planes of the handsome face, giving him pause.

"What's happened?" he had asked, curious because the last time he had seen that look, they had just found out the war they had been fighting in Ishval had been announced over. The Lt. Colonel allowed a smile but there was no joy or humor in it and it made Roy glad he never had a reason to get on this man's bad side.

"We've found him," the deep voice was as hard as the green of his eyes but the dark haired Colonel didn't need to ask who it was the man was speaking of. The truth of it struck him immediately and hard, stoking the ever burning flames within his chest so that they licked at the edges of his vision and prickled in his lungs as he breathed. Not another word was needed before he was striding down the through the halls, retribution clinging greedily to his boot heels.

He wasn't sure what he had been expecting to find when he first saw the Blood Rose Alchemist but surely the old, broken husk of a man that he was staring at wasn't it. The lined face showed nothing and the faded, jade eyes captured beneath heavy, grey brows were completely dead. Whatever life had dwelt within this person had faded a long time ago. He sat chained to the harsh metal chair, unmoving, his white head bowed as if in defeat. Those eyes just stared at the blank surface of the table in front of him, hiding the sins that Roy was going to forcefully extract from him. And by the looks of the other people occupying the room with him, staring out the dark observation glass at the single man in the next room, he doubted there would be a single protest should he allow his anger to break free like he dearly wished he could. After all, this person, this sorry excuse for a human being, had hurt one of their own. It didn't matter if most of the people working this case didn't know Ed and his brother. The fact remained that Ed is a State Alchemist that had been sold off and then tortured and raped for more than two weeks. Everyone here wanted to see justice done.

There were no thoughts cluttering his mind as he stepped into the next room, emotions tightly tied down under the weight of the knowledge that this was it. With this, he could finish what had been started months ago and might be able to give Ed his closure that the boy truly needed. He didn't care about the why or what Wells had been thinking when he went to a gang to aid him with his money troubles. All he cared about was this man had sold the young man Roy was in love with to pay off his debts and now he was going to destroy him.

The man didn't even flinch when the door slammed closed and four officers of varying ranks entered the room, their faces dark and forbidding. Hughes was there as was Riza, both of them refusing to be left out of this. Silently, he was grateful for their support. The fourth was a Lt. by the name of Jerry Singer who was also the captain of the police task force within Central's headquarters. He was a big man, with a perpetual frown and piercing, icy blue eyes that were intimidating even to his co-workers. At any rate, the Colonel was glad to have him on his side. In fact, when the Lt. was given the details of the case, he had looked the dark haired man in the eye and said without hesitation that Roy was permitted to have free reign of his men and facilities.

"Mr. Wells," now Roy's strong voice broke through the tension in the room like a battering wave against sand, demanding both respect and attention, "You have been brought here on charges of kidnapping, assault of a military officer, misuse of alchemy and aiding in the crimes of a known gang. To name a few," there was a sneer in his voice but instead of it being smug, it came out quiet, knowing, dangerous. Normally he didn't like interrogation; it made him feel like a fraud, like he was some nefarious drone trying to dig into the mind of some petty criminal that barely understood the consequences of their actions. But this…this he would relish. He wanted to sink his fangs into the graying skin and shake his head until the bent neck snapped. It sat on the back of his tongue like heavy sludge but it tasted good too, addicting. When the jade eyes barely even shifted in acknowledgement of his words, he almost grinned. Oh, yes, he would break this man because he had broken Roy's lovely, golden Edward, "Now that you have no doubts as to why you are here. I would like very much to know why you had a State Alchemist kidnapped, along with his younger brother and then had them held in a warehouse nigh on three weeks before they were found," there was a flicker of recognition on the wizened face but no remorse and no pity. Wells then turned his head as if he couldn't bear to answer.

"We have enough on you that we can incarcerate you with barely a trial," Lt. Singer's voice was a dark rumbling of sound, like thunder, a deeper counterpoint to Roy's crackling velvety tones. Yet where his voice had been pure malice, threatening and promising pain, the other man was clam, confident fact, "You will be thrown in jail and forgotten about until you rot away into ash. I promise, no one will remember your name or that you even existed at all," the old man chained to the chair trembled slightly, as if the prospect of disappearing was a nightmare that kept him from sleeping at night, fear flickering are the edges of his gaze. Only the fear looked mad, like a struggling animal might, fighting even though it knew it was going to die.

"Then," the rough voice cracked and Wells licked his lips before trying again, "Then why is it I am here?" he still didn't look at any of them but had tipped his wild head up so that he was staring at himself in the reflective glass of the window. It was Hughes that sat in the chair across from the older man, forcing the green eyes down again. The Lt. Colonel's face was as hard as Roy had ever seen it, completely lacking in sympathy.

"You will tell us, by the time we are done here, who it was that you sold the two young boys off to; their names, their connections and anything else relevant that you can remember. Keep in mind, no sympathy will be shown to you. Should you tell us, no leniency will be added to your sentence. However, if you don't tell us what we want to know…well…" Roy nearly shivered at the cold smile that curled over his friend's lips then; nearly because he was getting a twisted kind of pleasure watching the way the Lt. Colonel's words caused the lined features to pale, "my friend here is very fond of fire," and a little thrill went through him when Maes indicated Roy.

Wells was staring at them now, back and forth between the two dark haired men, looking every bit the cornered menial beast. It was then Roy realized that while the man might not have been afraid of being put in jail for the rest of his natural life, he knew that if he gave them the information they wanted, he would not live out the week. Even locked away in a military facility, he would not be able to escape the long reach of an enraged mafia boss, which would be sure to happen should he talk. There was a moment Roy thought they would have to lean on him more when the man started to shake, rocking in his bindings so that the metal links rattled against the chair. He was shaking his head, over and over as if something was buffeting at him.

"No…no, no one ever understood…" at first Roy had to strain to hear him, wondering if the older man was about to have a mental breakdown, "You all turned me away…I was brilliant; what I did…what I could do with my alchemy…and you…they…he turned me away! Couldn't even appreciate it for what it was! I should have been acknowledged as the best! And they would have, until that little brat stepped in my way!" he was raging now, eyes so wide, there was a ring of white all around the wild green irises, crooked teeth bared in a snarl, "Why him!? Don't you know he broke the biggest taboo of all! Oh, yes, I know all about that! But they let him stay and turned me away!" There was more, so much more on that vein and he could see it all crowding the man's mouth as it tried to spill forth in a messy, hateful admission of guilt. But upon listening to it, to the ramblings of this mad being frothing before him in his chair, Roy felt the banking of his own fury hit its peak, blasting forth in a surge of nearly harmless alchemy that sent the metal chair skidding back from the table until Wells slammed into the opposite wall. He had, even through the red haze that had descended over his vision, been careful to use less oxygen so that the air snapped hard enough for such an explosion while not actually burning anything.

"Enough," he hissed, rounding the table, the air snapping nervously around his head. All of this, all of what had happened to Ed, all the shame, the agony and all because one old man had gone soft in the head. And he wasn't sorry because all he cared about was that he had been turned away, "You will not speak of that boy. You will speak of nothing but to answer the questions that are put before you," He reached down and grabbed a handful of Well's jacket, pulling him up so that he was closer to the blazing heat of Roy's gaze, completely unaware that in his anger, he had lifted the chair clean off the floor, "And when you are done, I'm going to turn every last inch of your skin into ash so that you will live in agony for the rest of your life and every time you breathe, you will taste nothing but smoke," there was real fear in those eyes now as the older man finally understood that the threat within the room was so much worse than anything that could happen to him at the hands of a gang.

"Roy…" his name was a soft warning but his ignored it as he let the chair fall back to the floor, drawing on more and more of his anger as Wells stared up at him in terror. The thin lips worked furiously but he had no patience left in him and before he knew it, his hand was in the wild mane, jerking the head back and he was nearly nose to nose with the older man.

"You will talk," he hissed and snapped with his free hand, pulling back when the older alchemist jerked and screamed with pain. The skin on the man's right leg had been seared away, the stench of burned flesh and singed cloth filling the room. Once it might have made him gag but not now. Now he breathed it in because here there would be retribution and if he had to rip, maim, tear, destroy, then he would do it, all the while keeping the memory of Ed's nightmares and flinches and tears wrapped firmly around the forefront of his mind.

He could hear, vaguely, as if the voices were coming from far away, someone begging him to stop while someone else dashed from the room, panic and fear as thick in the air as the stench of cooked meat. But all he cared about was the way the older man was sobbing and babbling, spilling secrets and confessions of every little sin between screams for mercy. Except he would find no mercy and when the flow of his words paused, another part of his body would burst into controlled flames. Roy could feel himself sinking deeper and deeper into his role, darkness yawning beneath his feet as he tumbled down into it, allowing himself to be swallowed.

And then Ed was there, standing before him, eyes wide but lacking judgment, pulling him back like the sun draws the day from the dregs of night.

"Stop, Roy," his beautiful, husky voice was like honey, beginning to soothe the ragged edges of his rage, "Please, that's enough," but he remembered how those stunning eyes would still sometimes darken in self loathing and pain and he clung to his fury, wanting to end it, to give him the revenge that he deserved.

"Why? Why?" that smile, it speared his heart, shining like a ray of hope through the veil that had fallen before his eyes and for the first time since he had allowed his anger to burst forth like a snarling blaze, he understood what he had done.

"Because the man I love would not want this,"

**

The house was completely silent as he huddled on the window seat in the small nook, knees drawn to his chest as if that could keep away the vulnerability that had come with the surging guilt and sickening shame. Over and over he played what had happened in that room in his mind and he wanted to sink through the ground, wishing it could swallow up the unforgivable atrocity of his actions. He knew that he had been so mad he couldn't even think straight; more angry than he had ever been in his life and, more than anything else, it scared him, down to his very core. And if it hadn't been for Ed stepping in when he did, he was positive he would have completely lost himself to that darkness.

When he had gotten the chance to step back and really look at what he had done, a crushing sense of self-loathing overtook him. Today he had broken a promise to himself that had lasted for nearly ten years that he would never again senselessly hurt someone with the power that he possessed at his fingertips. Wells wasn't dead but he would never be the same, with burns on nearly half of his body, some of them bone deep. Roy would have killed him, too, given the chance.

Thankfully, no one looked at him with horror or disgust. They knew going in there that Wells was about as insane as they get and he had little doubt that they might have let him do as he would except that he had nearly lost himself in the process. Wells had been taken away but his screams still lingered in Roy's mind like poison, blackening his soul. He had let Ed take his hand, the gold gaze gentle and understanding and lead him from the building, disgust and horror roiling in his gut until he was sure he would be sick with it. To his credit, he lasted until they were outside and then he was grateful for Ed's warm hands smoothing back his hair as he vomited on the grass. The only thing that kept him from spiraling into the pits of depression were the words the young blond had spoken to him that brought him back to himself after his rage nearly hollowed out his insides…because the man I love would not want this…the man I love…

Ed didn't ask what had happened and he let Roy go off when they got back to his house. He couldn't bear to look at the boy, couldn't face his own stupid mistake under the heavy weight of the gold gaze. How could he stand up to something so pure when he himself was so unworthy of such attention? Just what was it that the blond saw in him? He was capable of doing such disgusting, horrible things; he could never amount to enough so that he might be worthy of such attentions from the boy. Yet in his selfishness, he couldn't turn the boy away. His heart was hopelessly entwined with that of the younger alchemist and he could never again be free of it. Not that he wanted that but he was starting to wonder if perhaps Ed deserved something better.

"You're thinking too much," Ed's voice yanked him back to reality before he could defeat himself even more and he glanced away from the mockingly cheerful sunset to watch the boy walk into the room. The orange light caught at the secret depths of his wide gaze and pulled gold strands from his blond hair, making Roy's heart ache at such beauty. Surely he was too tainted to truly deserve something such as this but even the thought of losing the boy now was like a physical blow. He had to look away because he was afraid the blond would see the tears that stung his eyes.

They didn't speak for long moments, the younger alchemist standing right behind him so that he could almost hear his steady heartbeat until he gave up and pressed his face into his knees. A warm, slender hand slipped into his hair and he shuddered with the wave of emotion that broke over him.

"Please, Roy. Don't shut me out. Not now," the longing in the husky voice tugged at him and he unconsciously relaxed under the gentle fingers carding through his ebony hair.

"How can you…even look at me?" he finally mumbled, words muffled by the material of his pants, "How are you touching me without cringing away? What I did…I…I didn't…" a surprisingly strong grip on the back of his neck stilled his words and he was forced to look up, his own dark eyes finding those of the boy that he loved.

"I can because you're still you. I know why you did what you did and maybe I don't want revenge but I know that the anger that made you do what you did was for me. Not so impressed with the consequences but then, neither are you," Roy swallowed as those fingers slowly stroked over his skin, the calm, gentle words washing over him like an absolution, easing the self loathing that burned in his chest just enough that he was sure he could breathe without pain. Ed smiled down at him, the warmth of the sun in his eyes and the older man was sure that he could withstand anything as long as he had this boy at his side. Slowly, he reached out and drew the younger man to him, wrapping his arms around the narrow hips and resting his forehead against Ed's flat belly. He would never forgive himself for such a hateful loss in his control, as strong as his hatred for Wells might be, but there was more to him than that. He just need to remember that.

Two hands eased into his hair now, fingers rolling against his scalp and Ed hummed softly, the sound suspiciously like a purr. The heat of the dying sunlight outside wrapped around them like an embrace and despite his somewhat awkward position, he was sure he could have stayed like that forever, basking in the glory of the blonde's acceptance and love.

But then…

"Roy…" it was a gentle whisper, like the ocean licking gently at the shore but he heard it anyway, tightening his hold on the boy and breathing in his exciting, intoxicating scent.

"Yeah?" one of those glorious hands slipped under his jaw, forcing him to draw back a bit so he could look up into Ed's face. The boy was smiling, a gentle curving of his full lips but he detected something else there, a nervous kind of anticipation burning behind the soft reassurance. As he held the boy close to him, he felt a tremor take him over, matching the excitement burning on his face. When the blond spoke again, he took Roy's breath away.

"Take me to bed, Roy," he whispered, gaze free of any fear or pain, free of shadows and full of only hot, blazing desire, "Make me completely yours,"

All Roy could do was swallow dryly and nod…

...To be continued

*gasp* I left you hanging right before a lemon! I'm so evil...*runs from smut-starved fangirls*