Yay! I finally finiished this chapter... I kept having to re-write it from one point cause I kept messing up... but it's done lol. As always, I'll appreciate any reviews, and I hopeeveryone likes this chapter!

FMA and the characters in it do not belong to me...

"Ed," a voice called his name out softly, "Ed, are you awake?"

"He's asleep, you idiot!" another voice screamed, at least as loud as you could yell while whispering. "Don't wake the poor boy up!"

"I'm not the one who'll wake him!" the first voice fought back.

"Shhh! You're both waking him up!" someone else whispered.

Slowly, Ed's eyes began to open. In every corner of the squeaky-clean and germ filled hospital room there were hordes of people staring down on him intently. This was all so uncomfortable.

"Uh, hello," Ed said quietly, hoping a few people would stop staring. But it was no use. All eyes were still glued on Ed.

"Ed, are you okay?" someone asked. Ed turned his face towards the voice, not surprised to see his brother Al.

"I- I'm..." Ed struggled to think of something to finish that sentence. in pain. dead. weak. All of those words could describe how he felt right now. But Ed decided to say something much less morbid. Maybe everyone would stop gawking at him if he acted like nothing was wrong.

"I'm fine, I guess" he muttered. Not entirely feeling bad that he had lied to everyone. Just to help the lie along, he flashed a small, crooked smile towards Al. "I'm just... fine."

The fact was, Ed was just the opposite of fine. He was in so much pain, both physically and mentally. He could feel his mind involuntarily playing back what had happened.

"Fine," Ed whispered again, this time to himself, as if he was trying to convince himself that he was really fine.

But the truth was, only one person in the room noticed that Ed really wasn't okay. Most of the people smiled at Ed and cleared out of the room once they heard he was "fine", leaving just two people to confort Ed.

Roy sighed. He was the only one who could see the pain hidden deep within Ed's eyes. Not even Al, literally connected to his brother by blood, noticed that something was wrong.

"Ed, you're sure that you're okay? You're perfectly fine?" Roy asked, leaning in closer with each word he spoke.

"Y-yes," Ed whispered nervously, averting his eyes across the room. Of course he wasn't okay, but like he was really going to tell Mustang that.

"Well then..." Roy leaned back away from Ed. There was a long, uncomfortable silence between the three.

"You know Ed, a little girl found you a few days ago." Roy said, breaking the silence. "She began running and screaming down the streets when she saw you." He stopped for a second and let a soft chuckle pass his lips. "Let's just say she woke up every person within a few miles of where she saw you." Mustang had meant it as a joke, but Ed didn't laugh.

"Oh." That was it. Just oh.

"Yeah." Al said, continueing the story. "You were brought to the hospital almost immediately after that. I had accidently fallen asleep after you'd left, so.. I never noticed you were gone." Big surprise.

"I see." Another meaningless word used just to fill in the empty spaces in their conversation.

The rest of the story was simply about the condition he was found in and what the doctors did to Ed. Lost blood this, fatal wounds that, bruises all over, blah blah blah. None of it seemed to affect Ed. In fact, he hardly seemed to be listening at all.

"Yeah, but that was just about four days ago," Al replied, a slight crack in his voice. "You've been asleep for four days straight, basically due to loss of blood and shock over what happened."

Ed took in a sharp breath and seemed to fight over control of his body. "yeah..."

Mustang, noticing the tension that had just been shadowed over the room decided Ed probably needed a little quiet. But Al seemed to be talking more the more uneasy and tense the conversation got. Mustang drew in a breath and prepared for the worst.

"Al, I wouldn't mind if you wanted to leave a bit," Mustang said sweetly, "I'll stay with Ed here."

Al seemed concerned, suspicious, and grateful all at the same time. But he couldn't leave his own brother's side when he was recovering.

"I-I can't leave Ed," Al replied, leaning over to touch Ed's shoulder. Ed flinched back in pain and fear, taking in yet another quick breath which sent Al standing straight up as fast as his metal legs could carry him.

"Brother! I'm sorry!" Al yelled as his wildly waved his arms in front of his face and his knees clanked together.

Ed, feeling a bit clostrophobic and wanting to be left alone a bit, decided that he wanted at least one of them to go away. It would be near impossible to get them both to leave, and he didn't have the energy to fight with them just to get some peace and quiet.

"Well, one of you should leave. It's not as if being here with me is helping anyone else out." Ed chose his words carefully, afraid that he would say something wrong and make a big mess out of this whole thing.

"My proposition stands", Roy said quickly after Ed finished speaking.

"Brother, is that okay with you?" Al asked. Ed strained to pull an exaggerate, crooked smile onto his face and nodded. As long as he didn't hear anyone's constant talking in the background, he was fine with it.

"Okay then, I'll leave you with Ed." Al seemed anxious to leave. "Goodbye, brother," he said before rushing from the room.

"Bye," Ed called back as the door closed, laying down on top of the pillows below him.

Then Mustang, turning towards Ed, asked what had really happened to him four nights ago. He knew that he probably shouldn't have bring it up so soon, but he was just so curious.

"N-nothing happened!" Ed yelled, caught off-guard by the question. "Please, be quiet now, I need to rest."

Roy seemed quite taken back by the forcefulness in Ed's voice, but complied with the request. All night Roy promised to stay by Ed's side. And as Ed slowly lost consciousness, he fell into a fitful sleep filled with nightmares of what had happened.

"Ed!" a voice called out, "Ed!" came the voice again before an evil cackle could be heard. "It's time for you to come and play!" Slowly the men that had raped Ed came into view, each walking, limping, crawling forward with grotesque features and crippled arms and legs that all grabbed at Ed's body.

Darkness shrouded everything around him. The only thing he could see were the men as they slowly drew closer around Ed, trapping him once again in the circle of their own filthy bodies.

Ed tried to scream, but his throat seemed to close up with fear. He put his hands together, a bright light glowing from between his palms, and threw raw balls of power at the figures all around him. Smoke rose up from everywhere as he continued trying to fight back with alchemy, but nothing seemed to harm the men.

The men's laughter grew wild and stronger from within the smoke as hands reached out to grasp Ed's arms and legs and anything else within their grasp. All Ed could hear was the hollow echos of the voices calling Ed's name, laughing, saying that Ed couldn't beat them; he was weak, and his own screams, filling his head, still unable to pass through his throat.

I really hurt my wrist.. guess I've been on my computer too long at a time. heh... Anyways, it's still kinda short.. I guess I'm just not capable of writing long chapters.. Anyways, I'll try to get the next chapter up soon!