Destruction was such a beautiful phenomena in this world. It did away with paradise, it crawled inside the mind. The body was a victim of life and death. There were so many things that one could do to this material world, but what was a soul? The state of mind that humans called emotions, what were they really? Born with the need to survive, to gain it all, these creatures swarmed over one another faster and faster.
Edward was not human by biological means. He was only human for what lurked beneath the surface. The human consciousness was the only to rank thoughts, emotions, and actions from good to bad, yet they were the only animal that killed simply to kill. Pleasure in death, rejoice at the sight of violence, the want to kill. This is what made humans to monsters, or so they all thought. Edward was a monster for having committed every possible sin. The blood that flowed through his veins, the powers that had been bestowed on him; that appeared to make him inhuman.
But these were things that were part of humanity. None of the creatures could escape any of it. It is what made them human after all. These feelings could be felt by no one else.
By that definition, Edward was the most human of all.
He had savored every drop of blood. He'd exploded with delight when Roy kissed him. Bliss flowed right through him. He couldn't bring himself to rid of the guilt though, the guilt of allowing Roy to fall in love with him. Tonight Edward had almost killed someone. Roy would've been deeply disappointed if he knew.
At the moment, what he hadn't prepared for was Al.
"Edward... what the hell is going on!"
Edward scrambled to escape from underneath Roy who rushed to the front of the bed defensively. How much had Alphonse seen?
"Brother get away from him!" the armor yelled.
How could his little brother understand? No, he couldn't possibly understand. No way in hell was Edward going to tell his brother that he had fallen in love with another man- an older man.
A soldier.
"You dirty bastard! He's half your age! How could you do this? You're-"
"Disgusting."
"Honey, just let him be already. Even he's had a long day."
"No, Trisha. This boy is disgusting. Look at the filth he takes in from all these men."
"Brother, what are you doing, get off that bed! Get away from this-"
"Get out of here, Alphonse," demanded Edward.
"What? Am I suppose to leave you here with him?"
"I said get out."
"No I'm not leaving. Don't you see, the Colonel is taking advantage of you like all those other soldiers back home-"
"Shut...up..."
"He's exactly like them!"
"SHUT UP!"
Every item aboard a piece of furniture slammed into the suit of armor. Books fluttered, their pages tearing from their binding. Candles littered the floor, the gooey wax hardening. An entire lamp slammed into the armor knocking him over. The door shut with an invisible quivering force. Edward couldn't inhale another breath until he heard the sound of footsteps retreating down the hallway outside.
"He's exactly like them."
Roy was no where near those sex crazed rats. Being a soldier didn't mean he was the same. He wasn't like them. No one could ever compare to Roy. Edward wasn't a dog, not even if the military called him so.
He was not Roy's dog either.
Even if Edward had spent the majority of his life shackled like one. Spit on like one. Expected to rot like one.
"Now I understand what your brother was asking."
"What-what are you talking about?"
"The first night he was here he was asking me if you were happy. Happy with the military. More specifically, he wanted to know if you were happy with me."
Had Alphonse already guessed that something existed between Edward and the Colonel? Edward had always been suprised that no one blinked an eye when he had moved in with his superior. Then again, no one knew what had happened. How did Roy feel now, knowing that Ed had been- had been taken advantage of?
He was afraid to be laughed at after the things he survived. This detail didn't fit in with his pride. But it fit with every other detail of the pain that had came wave after wave throughout his life.
Roy returned to the bed, taking a seat alongside Edward with caution. "Your brother is looking out for you. That's all. Anyway, I can only expect to be called a pervert for obvious reasons," Roy said with a sign. "It was rude of you to throw everything around like that," he continued teasingly. "Go apologize for being a reckless." He leaned in for a gently kiss to Edward's forehead. Finally Roy added, "My answers can wait."
The Elric sat there for a few moments. How-Did Roy dismiss everything he had heard?
"Neither of us can help our past, and I won't think any less of you for yours."
Edward wanted to relive that phrase one more time, enough times for a peaceful flame to consume him, letting him lay without a single sound, without a fear.
Alphonse got the best of him, or else Edward would've slapped his damn Colonel then and there. He wasn't sure how to take Roy's actions. Despite the battle with Greed and Alphonse's appearance, Roy still has faith in him. He didn't understand why. Edward had kept his identity a secret for so long. Surely Roy wasn't that much of an idiot to not realize that Edward knew something about the homunculi or that his abilities in witchcraft and alchemy were beyond what they appeared to be. Being put under Iscariot's jurisdiction must've made the idiot question something. To make matters worse, Edward was going to have to explain that he was a ghoul. Then there was that matter of the chimeras, the military experiments, and the possibility that the Fuhrer was a homonculus like Greed. Then there were the other two homunculus he met tonight.
Edward remembered the way he had been knocked out. In the black void of his mind he had drifted for a while, thinking over what would've been if the homuculus wouldn't have shown up before Ed had taken a bite of the drunk teen. No ones ever seen his inner ghoul, much less his kagugne, without dying. When he had woken up from the nothingness the hole in his leg had already healed. His eye hand't cooperated.
One thing at a time, damn it.
Edward knew that Roy wanted to do everything to protect those close to him. But that still didn't explain why he was tolerating all of this despite the trouble he could get himself in. Roy had brought literal hell in Ishval by conducting mass genocide with the alchemy that was suppose to help society. A subordinate protects their subordinate, and so on. That should be possible for puny humans like us. Edward remembered that phrase from long ago when Roy told tales of horrors. These ideals were indeed naive. They could be the same ideals that kept Roy watching Edward's back though. Edward must be the newest of the Colonel's responsibilities, one that the older man had willingly chosen to take on. The mysteries that kept on resolving weren't compromising that will. Such tenacity had caught Ed's attention.
Is this what it is to act out of love?
He was about to run after his brother but at the bedroom door he stopped. Edward faced the human that he had dared to love and said, "Thank you."
Alphonse couldn't believe what he'd witnessed. The past crawled up on him and it made him choke. Not having a body didn't mean that his mind could not take on the scaring lacerations.
It was true, his older brother had been raped. He'd been abused. The monstrosity that humanity was manifested itself on Edward's suffering. Alphonse could barely mask his hate for the military. He was cynical around them, the soldiers who seemed to be everywhere. Deep inside he tried rejecting the fact that it had happened more than once.
"Al."
Alphonse wasn't sure how to confront his brother. He feared to find that the same nightmare had been repeating itself in this house as well.
"I'm sorry for snapping at you. I know what you saw looked wrong, but let me explain. Please."
The suit of armor continued to sit in front of the fireplace.
"This isn't like back then. The Colonel has done nothing but protect me. He's kept everything a secret. He's allowed me to searh for a way to get our bodies back-"
Al whipped around. "And to repay him, he uses your body! Is that what is it?! In exchange for all of this-"
"Alphonse." The tenderness of Edward's voice broke through Alphonse's rage. The armor was dumbfounded by the tone. His brother sounded... so content with himself.
"The love between me and the Colonel is sincere," brother continued as he shoved his hands in his pant pockets. A pink blush brightened up his cheeks. "He's never taken advantage of me, not that way. I willingly chose to be with him. And I like it."
The red lights in Alphonse helmet must've been pretty wide because Edward playfully sneered, "What?"
Oh, Brother. "Nothing," he laughed back.
"Ahhh, I'm going to punch in your helm if you keep giving me that look."
The younger brother allowed himself a good-hearted laugh. He was so relieved and surprised by Ed's behavior. For once he acted his age, a teenage boy trying to find a girlfriend. Er, boyfriend in this case.
"Brother, how old is the Colonel?"
Reluctantly, Ed mumbled, "Twenty-nine."
"Twenty-nine! Wha-that's-he's-"
"You're making me feel old, Alphonse Elric." The Colonel was descending down the spiraling stairs and into the library. He wore an apologetic smile on his face. Alphonse studied him closely. Although the young Elric wasn't as good as reading people's energy like his older brother was, he came to a solid conclusion fairly quickly. It was so easy for Al to believe in the kindness of others, whether he knew them or not.
"Our relationship may not have the best first impression but I asure you that I'm not in it to harm your brother. I honestly do love him. Please don't let gender or age be the only thing that you judge us on."
"Does anyone else know about this? I mean, Edward does live with you," wondered Al.
At this question, the Colonel wrapped an arm around his brother's shoulders. "We've been careful to keep it a secret due to the consequences. We would both definitely loose our positions as state alchemist and be faced with punishment from the church for adultery," explained the Colonel. Edward looked so small beside him. He also looked safe.
Edward lightly put a hand on the arm wrapped around him. "I'm sorry you had to find out like this, Al."
"No, brother. It's alright. I can't possibly deny you this." And that was the truth. When Alphonse had a body of flesh and bone he'd barely gotten the opportunity to hug his brother. No one ever embraced Edward that way but him. Now he had someone else to receive affection from, affection from someone his brother truly wanted to be with. Alphonse couldn't help the anxiety he felt. All his life he'd accepted things so easily. None of those things had ever been like this though.
Alphonse had been away from home a lot. His parents had sent him on "vacations" frequently when they were the most distressed. Little Al had asked why big brother could not come with him.
"You're going on vacation to get away from him, not to go with him."
Mom and Dad spoke to him gently. Although Dad was gone regularly he had never raised his voice at Al. For the majority of his childhood, Mom was an angel. He thought she was the most beautiful person in the world and nothing could replace her kindness. One night at a time, Alphonse became lonely and distant from Edward. He didn't like that his brother slept all by himself in the basement. Wasn't that basement cold? And how come whenever Dad went down there he'd come back angry?
As a toddler, Alphonse couldn't build up the courage to approach Edward. Back then he didn't even know his name. His parents never talked about the golden boy that lived with them. The bright pile of hair poked out from wherever Ed was hiding. He'd sit very still. Al would run away whenever the gold did move. That was when he was really little though. Eventually Edward would disappear more frequently to the basement. Memories were hazy.
When Al was a little older, at school the teacher had once asked if he had siblings. During recess Alphonse would always draw pictures of his family. He had decided that the golden boy was part of his family even if they didn't talk too much. He would always draw Ed by himself in the corner because that's where he always was.
"I have one brother."
"Why do you draw him right there? Families love each other. No one needs to be alone," the teacher advised. "What's his name?"
"I don't know."
Teacher didn't look happy. "Does he go to school somewhere else?"
"He stays at home in the basement."
After that, Alphonse's parents home schooled him.
Having Mom and Dad teach him wasn't so bad. Mom would always smile whenever he got something right. She said he was extremely intelligent and would make her very proud. It wasn't long before he was already learning alchemy from Dad. He was a little more stern but tolerable. Alchemy meant being part of something more important. Alphonse was quite honest with himself, the teachings of the church and God didn't exactly make sense to him. Alchemy... it explained the flow of life in the entire world.
Those fragments in time must've been an insult to his brother's hell.
Dad was gone again and probably won't be back in a week. Alphonse was probably five years old. He'd rarely see the golden boy in the kitchen when he ate breakfast anymore. Even when he did eat with him he didn't make a sound. The boy was never kneeling beside him with Mom when they prayed. Mom said he had to do that by himself if God were to ever grant him any mercy. Al didn't really understand why; he'd say, "OK."
Today was different. Mom had opened the basement door. The golden boy moved a lot more than usual. Here and there he walked, stretching his skinny limbs. He was looking through Dad's books too. Alphonse didn't think he could read since the boy didn't go to school. Nevertheless, the boy flipped through the pages. His eyes were a beautiful color, even if they weren't gray like Mom's and his eyes did dart away from the sunlight.
Alphonse once found him behind the couch drawing some alchemic symbols on the floor.
"Does Dad ever teach you alchemy?" Al asked.
The golden boy had gone still. His eyes studied Alphonse, then looked beyond him. Alphonse turned around to find Mom standing at the living room entrance.
"Do you wana play with me?"
"..."
"What's your name?"
This time Alphonse could hear Mom stop breathing.
"You're my brother, right? Brothers play together. Lets play!"
After a little while Mom said, "Edward Elric. That's his name."
And so, for the first time in his life, Alphonse played with Edward. They ran around the house, chasing one another, throwing paper balls. When Al sat down to rest he couldn't believe how much energy his big brother had. Ed's laugh was funny to Alphonse, especially when he laughed really hard. It would echo so loudly and all the things around him would vibrate. Edward didn't really talk yet. All he did was laugh, a sound so strange in this house. Mom still kept watching them. She looked happy and sad at the same time so Al would go and hug her every once in a while. All she did was whisper prayers to herself.
It was like that for a really long time. While Dad wasn't home Edward would come upstairs to spend time with Alphonse.
"Are they nice to you?"
Those were the first words that he'd ever heard from Edward.
"Mom and Dad?"
"Yeah."
"They're always nice. Are they mean to you?"
"They never wanted me."
Alphonse never responded to that. Ed seemed angry now. His hands were made into tight fists. He was mumbling something under his breath.
"Huh? Are you saying some-"
There was a sharp crack. Alphonse looked around for what had broken. A picture frame had been knocked down from its place on the wall.
"What was that?" Mom asked as she rushed in. She looked so scared.
"The picture fell from the wall, Mom."
She knelled down to clean up the pieces of glass but there was a pounding on the floor.
. .
The floor where the picture frame had fallen on moved as if something was pounding into it from underneath. The pounding became harder and louder, the wood splintering. The frame and shattered glass bounced from the powerful pounding. Mom ran towards Alphonse and cradled him to her chest. Al was terrified now.
"Edward, please stop that. Please," his Mom begged.
How could Edward be doing that? He was standing over there...
The house went still. Suddenly his brother screamed and screamed, the rage of some writhing animal, until he finally started running, running to find an exit, running to the front door which somehow opened by itself, running to the outside.
Days and nights passed. Edward still wasn't back home. Alphonse wondered if his brother should return. Mom was really upset. She'd probably just put him in the basement again but Alphonse worried for him. He'd never seen his brother go anywhere outside the house before.
When Edward finally did come back, he was dragged through the mud and stones by Dad.
"My god! Hohemheim, I'm so sorry. He just ran away-he-he," Mom desperately stuttered. "Please forgive me!"
"Silence yourself woman! Help me get this thing downstairs!" he roared.
Thing wasn't what you called a son, right? Alphonse asked himself. Together Mom and Dad dragged Edward's body down to the basement. His head smacked down on every step. The tiny body wouldn't move. Alphonse whimpered at the sight, tears streaming down his cheeks. Why were they hurting brother? Dad dragged Ed by the foot as if too disgusted to touch him any further. Brother's body was drenched in blood. Why was there so much blood!?
The basement was tiny compared to any other room in the house. It was pitch black until Mom turned on some candles that she set on the floor. Her hand shook insanely when she lit them, tears also coating her beautiful face. Dad kept yelling at her, and she was so scared.
Edward finally awoke from his slumber. Dad had already tied one of his arms onto the bed but he flailed like there was nothing more important in the world. His screams were heartbreaking to Al. He'd never heard such pain ever in his life. He cringed violently when Dad swing his fist across brother's face. That did nothing to quiet Edward though. The boy hissed and trashed.
Why am I just standing here, Alphonse thought to himself.
"Trisha, get over here!" Dad ordered.
Alphonse couldn't take it any longer. It didn't matter how hard he pressed his hands against his ears. The muffled sounds came through. They were still deafening. His eyes wouldn't close. Wide open they forced him to look at the carnage that his family was capable of. Mom didn't look so beautiful in the guilt and fear that made her cry. Dad wasn't a father at all, but an instrument of suffering. Edward wasn't the quiet golden boy anymore. He was fiery red, and he was hurt. The might he held at this very moment made him powerful and dangerous.
It was like this almost every night for what could've been the rest of their lives.
Alphonse was never allowed to go downstairs. Not ever again. But he still did despite the agony.
"I'm sorry. You don't deserve to be here."
Edward blankly stared at him, wiggling his chains a bit. The skin around the wrist was raw.
"Here, eat this. Mom and Dad don't know I'm down here with you or that I took the extra food." Spoon after spoon, swallow after swallow. "How do you move stuff around without touching it? It's not part of any alchemy I've ever read about," Alphonse asked. This was genuine curiosity, not anything meant to offend his older brother. "Dad keeps saying it's black magic, the Devil and all this other nonsense."
"Nothing special really. You don't believe what they say about me then?"
"Why would I when I see what they do to you. This isn't fair. Where's the equivalent exchange. You don't get anything in return."
"Well, that rule isn't necessarily true you know."
"Of course it is. You have to sacrifice something in order to gain something else. That's the main rule of alchemy and the world."
"With something as materialistic as stone yeah. I don't think this is on the same scale. Anyways, it doesn't matter if you're here, right? At the end of everyday I do get something. I get to talk to you. Now give me some more food. I'm starving."
That's how the days were.
Another time, Alphonse asked why brother was always covered in red when Dad brought him back home.
"Outsiders give me trouble all the time. They're like Mom and Dad, real violent and nasty. I just have to put up one hell of a fight to stay alive," answered Edward. Alphonse wasn't entirely sure what he meant but he didn't ask again. He especially willed himself not to ask when Dad dug six feet deep holes in the backyard and buried the dead.
"When the Devil's is at your heels it's a miracle to make it out alive," his Dad used to say. His breathing became more labored with every shovel of dirt. "It's even more of a miracle if he were to die himself."
He wished he didn't have to lay in bed as Dad beat his brother over and over and over and over... Parents were suppose to protect their children and in return a child would respect and love them. This was nothing like Mom has taught him. Why would God allow for his brother to suffer? The cycle was cruel. The cycle was relentless. It somehow became a routine. Brother would always manage to run away, and Dad always found him. Mom would clean up the bloody mess, on hands and knees wiping the floor from something that couldn't be erased. She would cry. Cry some more, cry some less. After a couple of years, she wouldn't at all. She'd sometimes try calming down her husband with soothing voices but nothing dispelled his rage.
For a couple of years, Alphonse did nothing except watch. His understanding of the situation never changed either. Even after his brother was raped by those soldiers. Even after the entire town had set themselves out to hunt down his brother. Even after he was sure his parents were delirious as they dedicated their body and soul to the invisible being they called out to as God. No matter how many times the cycle repeated, Alphonse did nothing. He was a shadow in the background of an insane world. All the things he knew as a child he threw away. Strange things always occurred in this home. He stopped trying to question it. He'd become the microscopic flare of compassion for Edward.
Edward wasn't happy about going back to the hospital especially in the middle of the night after some embarrassment. The ride there had finally allowed for his mind to recollect.
He felt like an idiot for retreating into himself while Roy had tried tending to his wounds -which he didn't find. Getting stripped to his boxers by Alphonse hadn't been nice either. Edward never liked being treated like an incapacitated vegetable. Only after Mustang had finished bathing him did the boy realize how undignified and silly he felt. He wasn't going to keep up the distressed princess act.
That didn't change the fact that he had been terrified when he was at Roy's doorstep and his eye was still pulsing. He knew he couldn't stay on the street unless he desired to be tempted to eat the next passerby. Or run into more unreasonable humunculi.
The shape-shifting homunculus had been the ugliest reminder of what it meant to be a ghoul. That's what he had settled on calling it. Ever since he had become a dog of the military Edward had suppressed his kagugne. His eye sometimes slipped his control but never in front of an audience. When he was alone he felt that the fact that he was a ghoul was no biggie. That's how he thought about it. In his head he told himself, "A ghoul is a creature who feeds off the flesh of human beings. We're only a little bit dangerous because of our ability to regenerate and our kagunes, a bundle of cells that act as a weapon. It's not any different from the human beings that kill each other with their own weapons." He wasn't really a monster inside his own head.
To the rest of the world he was.
But he didn't mind, he guessed. He knew that he wasn't wrong because what can be wrong in this cruel twisted world? And he knew he thought about this with a lunatic smile, protecting the small part of him that could ever afford to be sympathetic. Agh! He didn't mean to associate with the concept of small.
"You owe me an explanation, you know."
Roy offered a joking smirk, probably remembering the first time he ever said those words to his subordinate. At least Ed remembered.
The older man definitely drove as smoothly as he smirked. With unbelievable gentleness he'd managed to guide the older Elric brother into his car after their confrontation with Al. Edward had whined that he didn't have to go back to the hospital, that the nurses wouldn't miss him, but Roy had insisted that he couldn't get them in more trouble. If anything the nurses were lovely. Just when the words made him feel like a burden, the Flame Alchemist peeked him on the cheek with a warm kiss. For the rest of the time until now the golden haired boy blushed quietly in the passenger seat.
He didn't want to give an explanation. That's something that everyone seemed to request from him nowadays. Edward much preferred the quietness that had rolled down on him and Roy as he had scrubbed the boy's bloodied body in the bathtub. It was a quietness that spoke volumes of trust. Underneath Edward's panic over his ghoul eye being exposed, he was very much aware of his naked body, of Roy's shy motions when washing him. Roy studied him with an awe that didn't overlap with horrifying amazement. It was an awe over...over something. That awe intensified when Roy wiped at Ed's face. Had he not been intimidated by his inhuman eye?
That was one more thing that made being a ghoul more bearable. The way in which Roy still kissed him on his bed despite almost having his throat torn out by Edward's teeth. That had been enough to dispel the hungry eye away.
There had been a million other times that Edward hadn't been rewarded with affection. Instead he had been punished for showing that eye.
"Give yourself a good look in the mirror boy."
A fist struck him across the face.
"Don't snarl your teeth at me dog."
A hand gripped his hair.
"They shouldn't call you a dog, am I right? Parasite might be better."
"I promise to tell you once I'm out of that dreary hospital, Colonel," Ed muttered. He honestly wished that for once in his life he could live in one place, in one paradise. Maybe that way his sanity wouldn't waver constantly from being thrown into chaos by the spinning wiccan and alchemic energy inside him, and the physical pain that surpassed the boundaries of human suffering. His thoughts acted the same, focused on his past rather than his present, the ups and downs of Edward Elric.
Right now his thoughts were infested by his vacation with Iscariot.
He could never really shake off the feeling of being shackled. He had been shackled in the basement of his parents house a a child. He was shackled again by new hands in a white room that managed to turn purely black when the lights went off. When his abusers came the lights were always on. When they were done bothering for the day they would turn them off every night- at least what Edward assumed was night- and left him to wonder what a wounded animal looked like.
To say he was bothered was an understatement. He only put it that way to again protect his fragile mind. That was exactly why Edward never made an effort to remember the faces of those that had visited the white room, tortured him day after day in the chair he was bound to. In his memory Edward only saw hands, faint silhouettes, and his own blood.
In his personal hell he thought often of Roy Mustang. No matter how low he'd been beaten, the thought of the Colonel put a smile on his face.
Even if Ed didn't expect to ever see him again.
A couple of times he wondered if Roy had consented to any of this, that he had been the one to sign some document and give Iscariot permission to violate him.
Then Edward remembered the way in which Roy had shook with rage when they had escorted him away from Central headquarters. Away from their newly found love.
And so for the months Edward suffered, he didn't mind being broken. He didn't mind that his mind was so penetrated by the physical pain that at some point he enjoyed it. He didn't even know when he had started to laugh at his abusers for trying to damn hard to hurt him. Everything they did hurt, but at the same time it didn't.
Hadn't it all felt the same when his parents did it too? Edward was pretty sure that even before that his state of mind of questionable along with the meaning of his life. Hohemheim had attempted to drown him several times. That hadn't worked despite the reality that Edward had been a mere toddler back then. Yep, that should be enough to make anyone want to get rid of him.
He also knew how sadistic he was.
All those times Edward had ran away from home he had hunted. He hand't hesitated to kill. His inner ghoul screamed out in agony from being neglected. In his fervent hunger, Edward had slaughtered and devoured his prey. Some had been men, others women. In some cases, children his own age. Nothing stopped him from the blinding delight of taking a life, from seeing the substance that flowed through all their veins.
He didn't deny that he sometimes hand't killed for his bodily needs, but simply to do it. Hell, he barely knew that his bodily needs weren't normal. He remembered the way Alphonse so casually ate his cereal in the mornings when he was little. Young Edward Elric quickly learned that his little brother wasn't like him.
Maybe people weren't completely wrong about Ed. Maybe he was some devil in disguised, readying to destroy humanity. He sure felt that way. He surely hadn't died when he was suppose to from some deadly wound like anyone else would. No one else he knew had so much wiccan power either. He had a nagging suspicion that his ability to draw energy from within himself and the world wasn't just magic or alchemy. It was something else altogether. He only called it those two things because it seemed rational. None of it explained why he'd been born as a ghoul, or as a creature that simply wouldn't die. It didn't explain how he knew so much about any of those subjects either. It was true, he felt like somewhere deep inside he held the secrets of the world, but what little part of him that made him mortal deprived him from that truth like the rest of humanity.
He wasn't the only one that had that same suspicion. That same person had walked into his white walled hell one day as he was laying on the floor rotting away. He didn't think much of the footsteps he heard at first. Iscariot had so many different members that they never really repeated their visits.
The clicking heels on the floor was the first sign that something had changed. Edward was sure that no one wore even half an inch of heel in Iscariot. They all wore they flat polished shoes like the saints they were. Edward let out a harsh snort at the thought. He noted that the lights were on. Oh how they reminded him of the hospital.
"Is that how you're going to greet me, Edward Elric? With a pig's snort?"
No one had called him by his name in a really, really long time.
His usual chair was gone, so Edward rolled around from whatever space he was on the floor to meet the person who had addressed him. The chains that kept him bound to the ground clicked.
The heavy accent continued. "That's still not good enough you midget. Stand up straight when I'm talking to you."
He barely registered the insult of his height as he shot straight off the ground. Why the hell was he standing up for? To get whipped across the face?
Or maybe it was because he hadn't heard anyone say his name since he got to this god forsaken place.
"Hmm. I don't see what the problem is. I was told you had issues with your appetite. What is it they called you? A ghoul?"
Alright, she was stating the obvious.
"They said I had to use special sedatives from keeping you from going on some feeding frenzy."
Was he really that much of a danger in the eyes of the stupid church? Wait, who the hell was she?
"My concern is your magic, or whatever the hell those morons call it."
What the hell was this woman doing here!? Why was he even hearing this absurd conversation? He already knew why he was here.
Did he?
"Edward Elric, I have full jurisdiction over you from now on until i see fit. Under my eye, you can either prove your self-control and loyalty, or be left again to whatever the rest of Iscariot would like."
Did he have this conversation before?
"Sir Integra Hellsing, but I want you to refer to me as master."
"Yes, master."
"I love you."
Those three words yanked Edward from his consuming memory that threaten to rewind and play over and over and over...
"I love you too."
He finally turned to look into onyx eyes. The car continued its journey to the hospital while to Ed those black eyes fixed him into time.