READ THIS FIRST
A/N: Edward and Alphonse have gotten their normal bodies back a few months ago. Ed is 15, Al is 14. Edward is of normal height. (Up to Roy's shoulders.) Ed and Roy are kinda friends. Well, they're nicer to each other. Barely, though.
Dress Up
Chapter 1
Hughes bursts through the office door and practically skips into the room, humming some unknown tune with a huge smile on his face.
"Hey, Hughes, you seem awfully happy. Something happening today?" asks Havoc, eyebrow arched and a cigarette in his mouth. Hayate prances over to Hughes and barks up at him for attention. Hughes complies and bends down to pet his head and scratch behind his ears.
"No, nothing particularly special's going on. But how could I not be happy when I spend everyday with something as absolutely adorable as my precious little princess?" With this said, he reaches into his pocket and whips out at least 7 pictures, holding them in his hand as if they're playing cards. Havoc sweatdrops and very slowly backs away into a far corner of the room, with Breda, Farman and Fury close behind. The only one stupid enough, uh, I mean, kind enough to stick around is Hawkeye, who pauses in her work to glance up at Hughes. She doesn't mind Hughes talking about his daughter, but paperwork is much more important than what sundress Alicia was wearing, or what she did when she was wearing Mommy's high-heeled shoes, or how she sang along to the Barney song on TV. She was trying very calmly and patiently to tell this to Hughes, but soon realized that he was to far off in his 'Alicia Land' to notice. He was saved from being shot at numerous times, however, when Ed and his little brother, Al, walk through the door
Hughes finally notices where he is and sees a very irritated looking Hawkeye with a gun aimed at his head. He chuckles nervously and puts the pictures back into his coat pocket. Havoc, Farman, Breda and Fury step back out of the 'safety corner' to look at their saviors for that round of 'daughter obsessed Hughes' picture show'.
"Hello Edward, Alphonse. Come to give the Colonel your report?" Hawkeye asks, tucking her gun safely back into its holster. Speak of the devil; Roy walks in at that moment, coming to investigate what had caused all the commotion in the once infuriatingly silent office, which is thanks to Hawkeye and her ever-faithful companion, Mr. Gun.
"Naw, Al and I don't have anything to do, so we decided to come here to see if anything exciting was goin' on. Looks like we came just in time to save Hughes from being used as target practice…not that you need any, of course." Ed hastily adds with a grin toward Hawkeye when he sees her give him dirty looks. Pfft, like Hawkeye would need target practice.
"Sorry to disappoint ya, but nothing's happening here. Farman, Breda, Fury and myself just finished up our paperwork and were planning on headin' out to lunch in the cafeteria, if ya wanna join us."
"Ah, we'd love to, but Al and I just ate." He looks over at Hawkeye to see if she had any suggestions to quench their boredom.
She shakes her head. "Sorry, but I can't help you guys find something to do right now. I've still got papers to work on."
Ed looks at the ground in frustration, racking his brain for something, anything. He didn't want to shop; he had just done that for 6 hours straight last week when Winry visited. He didn't want to go to the library and read. As much as he loved to, he didn't have anything to look up, so it would be pointless. Al and him had just come back from a mission the day before so he knew there wasn't one waiting for them. There was just NOTHING to do!
He looked up when he heard a 'give me attention' cough. Roy was standing in the doorway to his office with his infamous smirk on his face.
"I've got an idea. But I won't tell you unless you do me a favor." He said in a singsong voice, advancing a few steps toward them.
Ed narrowed his eyes and scowled, sending Roy his best 'you're a jackass' glare. Roy wasn't fazed, however, and continued to walk forward, stopping only when he was a few feet away from Ed and Al.
"What can we do for you, sir?" Al asks in his sweetest voice, hoping to make up for his brother's rudeness.
Roy's smirk widens and he chuckles softly. Al, seeing Ed tense and clench his fists, automatically places a hand on Ed's shoulder, just in case he decided to lunge at Roy.
Roy opens his mouth to speak, but is cut off by Hawkeye who sighs loudly, showing that she's annoyed by something. Roy looks over at her with his eyebrows raised, wondering what was troubling her. Riza smiles at him and, without a word, points into his office. Roy turns and peeks into his office to find out what she means. Finding nothing, he turns back around to face her and gives her a quizzical look. Riza rolls her eyes in exasperation and says in a stern tone, "Paperwork, sir. You still have paperwork to do."
This time everyone leans over to look into Roy's office. Sure enough, there are two huge mounds of paper sitting hazardously atop his desk.
"Right, I'm going to do those right now, but I was wondering if Ed and Al would like to help me out." Roy turns to look at them hopefully.
Al tilts his head to the side and furrows his brows together in confusion. Ed, at first, has the same expression as his sibling, but then it slowly turns into anger. "What?" Ed hisses out through bared teeth, his fists still clenched and glaring as hard as ever.
"I said, I was wondering if you…"
"I heard what you said, I just can't believe you have the audacity to ask us if we would do your work for you. I mean, it's not our fault you're too lazy to do it yourself. And besides, why would Al and I want to do your work for you? What do we get out of it?" Ed says all of this quickly, flailing his arms around and jabbing his fingers at certain points to emphasize things. Now he stands with his arms crossed over his chest and is tapping his foot and the shiny wood floor, making loud thudding noises.
Roy is calm through all of this, watching Ed throw his tantrum with amusement. He waits a few seconds before speaking, making sure that Ed wasn't going to say anything else. "First off, I didn't say I wanted you to do my work for me, I simply asked if you would help me with it. Secondly, you said the two of you had nothing to do, so I figured that that would give you something to do. And lastly, I really need to finish those papers by today and there is now way I'm going to finish them before this evening by myself and I want to go home on time at least once this month. So, Fullmetal, what do you say?"
Ed puts his hands on his hips and looks at the ground, clearly thinking. After a few moments, he looks up and nods. "Alright, if it gives me something to do, then fine. But I'm not doing the majority. We'll split it as evenly as possible between the three of us."
"Um, actually brother, I'm not going to help. I'm still kinda tired from our mission, so I think I'm just gonna hang out in here with Hawkeye and Hughes." Al looks over to Hawkeye to see if his plan is alright, and she nods in agreement.
"Oh, okay." Ed turns and proceeds to Roy's office with Roy right beside him.
"I bet you can't finish all of it in 30 minutes." Says a voice out of nowhere.
Everyone jumps at the suddenness of the voice and looks at Hughes, who is facing Ed and Roy smirking.
"Huh?" both Roy and Ed say, staring at Hughes in puzzlement.
"I said, I bet you can't finish all of it in 30 minutes. Doing paperwork is boring, so I thought that I'd liven it up a bit by giving you guys a time limit. 30 minutes, think you can do it? I bet not."
Roy and Ed look at each other, and then look back at Hughes and grin. "Alright, we accept your challenge. You think that we can't finish it in 30 minutes, and we think we can." Roy sticks his hand out to shake and complete the bet. Ed follows suite, his grin widening.
"I knew you guys couldn't turn down a challenge. But before we shake on it, we have to come up with consequences for loosing. If I loose, I have to do whatever you guys want, and seeing as there's two of you, I'd have to do two things. But if you guys loose, you have to do whatever I want. Deal?" Hughes puts his hand out.
"Deal." Roy says, shaking Hughes' hand.
"Deal." Ed says, shaking Hughes' hand.
"Deal." Hughes says, shaking both of their hands. "Alright then, to the office!" Hughes points his finger at the door and begins marching toward it.
"Hm, this could be very interesting. Wanna go watch?" Havoc asks, looking around at the others. They all look at each other, then shrug and walk into Roy's office. They all find a place to sit while Hughes, Roy and Ed cautiously divide the stacks into about even piles and set them on the floor next to the desk. Then Ed sits at one side of the desk while Roy sits at the other.
"Wait a minute. Colonel, how can Ed do your paperwork? He's not a Colonel." Asks Breda, looking over at Roy skeptically.
"Well, these papers don't have to have my signature or anything like that. They just need a check to show that they've been through here and looked at, or a summary of something that happened. But these are all at least a week old, so Ed hadn't left on his mission yet. He should know enough about them to jot down a few sentences."
Breda nods his head in understanding and moves his attention to Hughes, who is standing in front of them with a wristwatch in his hand. "Everybody ready?" he asks them, and they all nod their heads. "Are the contestants ready?" he asks, turning to face Roy and Ed. They nod, pick up a piece of paper from their stack and ready their pen.
"Then on your marks, get set, GO!"
A/N: Wow, I'm surprised. I thought that that would take me forever. It only took me a few hours. So, what do ya think? Good, bad…silence…uh, cough ok. Anyway, if you like it and want me to keep updating, then please review. But if I don't get any reviews, then I'll just get rid of it. Keep in mind that this is my first fanfic ever and the story came to me out of nowhere one morning while getting ready for school, so that's why it might not be good. But thanks to all of you who read it and even more thanks to those who review. Jaa ne!