Edward did not fall asleep that night. His mind was racing. Roy had seemed so tired that whole day, and it was Ed's fault. He had disrupted this man's life and probably humiliated him in the infirmary because of his stupid phobia of needles. Unvoulantairily, his mind went back to years ago at the orphanage.

He had a really bad day. The flashbacks of all of his past trauma took control over him frequently. He was bedridden, and as usual, his leg was chained to his bed. That was something they did to the kids who had a history of running away. All they actually needed to do was to confiscate his crutch, but apparently, they still felt the need to humiliate him even further. Or, maybe they were just giving him too much credit. The restricted movements triggered his flashbacks. Soon the chain around his ankle lit ablaze and made him unable to get out of their burning house.

At some point, it must have gotten really bad, because an excessive amount of staff threw themselves over him and took the form of huge spitballs of fire in his mind. He felt a stab in his arm, and suddenly, he was trapped. Usually, when the flashbacks would occur, he would be able to snap back by himself at some point whenever it seemed to become too much. Like being jolted awake from a nightmare. But whatever that syringe had been filled with, it did not let him wake up.

When he finally awoke from his pained sleep, he found himself strapped onto his bed. Leather belts tied his head, arm, leg, and torso tightly to the bed. A small crowd of terrified kids had gathered around him. They looked like they were watching a freak show. Ever since he had been terrified of needles.

He had felt so much calmer when Roy had come in the door at the infirmary. He knew he would not let them drug him like they had in Drachma. Also, he kinda knew that their awful medical practitioner, who seemed to like Ed way too much, was far, far away. But if someone was to force him to sleep again, he would not know that. At that point, the reality was whatever transpired inside his fractured mind.

Ed shrugged as the memories of that vile man crept into his head. He did not want to think of him. He had left him behind at the orphanage. He was far, far, farfarfarfar away.

Ed had spent a lot of time in the orphanage's medical wing. Not only because he was not fully healed when he was brought in (not that he would ever be), but also because he was such an easy target for the older boys. He was so weak (is so weak), that anyone could do whatever they wanted with him (and usually did). He had been broken so long ago. Broken so many times. There was no way anyone could pick up the pieces and put them back together. Not even an important and kind military man. Nobody deserved to be stuck with him.

When Ed finally snapped out of his train-of-thoughts, he shuddered. Was he having flashbacks of having flashbacks now too? He crawled out of bed, tryingly putting some weight on his broken leg. He found it easier with the support of the cast. His crutch was placed in the near left corner of the room and was well within his reach. It definitely hurt to put weight on his foot, but he could manage. He needed to leave, and let Mustang get back to the regular life that he had so selfishly disturbed. The voice of the Drachman doctor sung in his ear;

'You ungrateful, disgusting little shit. Stop fucking crying!'

Edward realized that he was, in fact, crying.

Roy threw on his civilian coat and ran out the front door. From the inside, he could hear the phone started ringing again. He had heard it while he was rummaging through the house just a couple of minutes ago.

"Edward?" he yelled and looked around. It had snowed a lot during the night, and his driveway who he had shoveled just the day before was again covered in several inches of snow. Completely erasing any fresh tracks that might have given an indication on how or where the boy could have gone. Roy cursed, and the phone's shrieking was not making his panic lessen. He turned back inside, grabbing the handlebar off the wall

"What?" he growled to whoever was on the other side.

"Sir? Is anything wrong?"

Riza.

"Edward is missing." his voice turning completely flat, as he leaned against the wall, covering his face with his arm.

"Missing? How..." she interrupted herself before he could. "Lieutenant Colonel Hughes and I will be over right away."

Roy uncovered his face.

"Hughes?" he asked in confusion.

"Yes. He is in the office to see you. You had a meeting this morning."

Roy pressed his palm to his face.

"Tell him I'm sorry. I forgot. Things have been a bit crazy this morning."

"You can apologize yourself, sir, when we get there."

"Thank you."

A click as she hung up was heard, and Roy followed her lead.

Where the hell could a boy with two missing and two injured limbs possibly have gone?

Edward's balance was worse than usual because of the roundness of his cast. It was so painful that he could bearly move forward. The frigid wind was tearing at his skin and made his stumps ache furiously. He had hardly moved at all it felt like, and looking back, he could confirm it to be true. The colonel's house was still at eye's sight. He knew they were going to look for him in a couple of hours, and he could not risk them getting to him. Then this whole thing would just start all over, and they would be stuck with him once again. They did not deserve this. They were so kind, and Ed was just going to let them down.

He had only walked about half a mile when his leg gave out from the strain. He collapsed to the ground and grabbed onto his ankle, protected by two pairs of woolen socks, and rocked himself back and forth, breathing through the fit of pain. After a short rest, he had no choice but accepting that there was no getting back to his feet, literally and figuratively speaking. But he was not going to let himself be found. They might be worried about him for a couple of days, but then realize it was for the best and be glad he was gone. This was for the best.

To the best of his abilities, he grabbed the crutch and started to crawl his way through the snowbound streets.

Riza's car parked in the driveway and Roy could see Riza, Hughes, and Havoc stepping out of the car. While waiting, he had been looking around his backyard and the small shed behind the house.

"Havoc wanted to come along too," Riza explained.

"Anything to get out of work", Roy mumbled, cynically.

"Hey, I worry about the little guy too!" Jean Havoc protested, lighting his cigarette.

"It's good to see you old friend!" Maes Hughes exclaimed and forcefully hugged Roy. "I only wish it was under different circumstances."

"Yeah, me too," Roy muttered, his mouth being muffled by the unwanted embrace.

"Now, what is this I hear about you adopting an orphan?" Maes asked in his usual chipper voice, smirking at his old friend.

"I have not adopted an orphan," Roy grimaced. "We met him on the train, he had nowhere else to go."

"That's not really the whole story." Havoc said, looking to the side.

Roy gave him an angry glare.

"The colonel arrested a crippled kid, told him that his father was dead, and proceeded to let him leave on his own, resulting in the kid breaking his leg," Havoc flatpanned.

"That's not entirely..." Mustang intervened, while Hughes looked at him, gaping.

"How could you be so heartless?" Hughes countered.

"I'm not! I just didn't realize I was supposed to adopt every stray animal that came crashing into me in the street."

"You knocked him to the ground..." Havoc replied.

"Mustang!" Hughes exclaimed.

"Havoc!" Mustang crossed his arms.

"Guys!" Riza intervened. "Should we not waste any more time? How long has Edward been gone?"

Roy rubbed his face as if it would help him remember anything of importance.

"I don't know. He probably left during the night. When I went to bed at midnight, he was still in his bed."

"Well, there is no time to lose. He's not in good health, and it's cold outside."

"What does he look like?" Maes asked.

"He has long blonde hair... 16 years of age..."

"Looks like 12." Havoc cut in.

"Short," Roy opposed. "Missing an arm and a leg, and what's left is bandaged, hobbling around with a crutch... Kind of hard to miss."

Hughes scratched his head and looked to Riza for any sort of confirmation.

"Pretty much," she said flatly. Roy took the command.

"Okay. First Lt. Hawkeye and Sec. Lt. Havoc, you two should take the car and drive around the neighborhood. Lt. Colonel Hughes and I will look on foot."

"Sir." The two lieutenants saluted their superior and got to work. Roy started to walk at a fast pace down his driveway, and Hughes ran to catch up.

"Come on Roy, what's with the formalities?"

Roy did not answer. He always had a tendency to grow irritable and lash out whenever he was worried. Luckily, Maes was not the one to take those sorts of things to heart. There was probably no one in the word that could see through Roy's severe exterior as easily as that man could, not even Riza.

"I'm still looking forward to hearing the whole story," Maes said, with a teasing smile on his face.

"You will," Roy simply said. "But right now we have to concentrate on finding the boy. If he's been outside all night, this might be a matter of life and death."

Ed was feeling very tired. His body was numb from crawling in the snow and he did not feel well. He had crawled further than he had been able to walk, but he still had hardly left the suburban neighborhood. His eyelids were partially frozen shut by the frost on his eyelashes and tugged every time he blinked. When he finally had stopped to rest, his bandaged hand had frozen and stuck to the metal crutch. He accidentally ripped his bandages off while trying to free it. He looked at his wounded hand. Cotton balls had been put between his fingers, separating them, and keeping all the blisters and sores from rubbing against each other. Now it looked like the fluids from the exuding wounds had made the cotton balls germinate* into his hand. It looked gross, and Ed felt a hint of nausea.

Now he was huddled up against a tall wooden fence and watched as the sun rose over a mountain in the distance. What was behind the fence he had no idea. If he had noticed, he certainly did not remember. All he knew was that it was the closest thing he had found to keep him just a little sheltered from the wind, as well as out of sight from the main road. The snowing had finally eased, and in front of him was a large field that led into the woods. He could try to get there, but he had no idea what kind of wildlife there was in Central. In Drachma he would be a bear's supper in an instant. Maybe that would be for the best. That way, at least he would be to some use.

No, this was fine. He was so tired. If he closed his eyes for a couple of seconds, the weariness might fade, and he might be able to go a little further after all. He closed his eyes. Just 15 seconds.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5... This felt good.

6, 7...

6, 7, 8... Wait, how far had he counted?

7, 8, 9, 10... Yes, this was helping

11, 12...

13, 13, 14...

He didn't even feel cold anymore.

15.

Thank you for reading! I know everything is moving along quite slowly right now. The story will develop a lot in the next chapter! We're coming close to the end! Thank you for putting up with me! I did originally state that I was gonna update before Monday, but I do have plans (shockingly enough, as I am completely failing at adulthood) this weekend. I do want this next chapter to be good and tie up some loose ends. Making some progression! My ADHD has a tendency to aboslutley blossom while writing, making . hard. There are soooo many undiscovered paths to look into, and I tend to feel like exploring them all. The story of my life.

Aaaanyways... Enough of my existential anxiety.

Stay awesome, and please leave a review!