Where the Heart Resides
The Germany of 1925 was vastly different than the war-torn country he had arrived in seven years ago. The economy was finally beginning to recover, thanks to the newly-elected government. And thanks to their newly acquired government sponsorship, he and Al had made more progress in a year than they had in the past three. Edward sighed, remembering the days (and nights) of pouring over physics texts in their hole of an apartment, trying desperately to catch up to Alphonse, who was studying physics at Munich's University. He remembered the two of them, huddled under a blanket together (just like kids, Alphonse had said) because they had no heat, talking of someday when their rocket was built… someday was quickly approaching.
Now, secure in their theories and plans, actual construction was under way. Edward's knowledge of mechanics had previously been purely theoretical, but now there was the practical to confront. They had, optimistically, promised their sponsors that the rocket would be competed and ready for testing in less than one year. Now he and Alphonse worked day and night to get it built, in a lab by the Munich airfields provided by the government.
Alphonse seemed to think that once they launched their rocket (providing the launch was successful, that is) his country would finally gain the respect it deserved. Al was doing it for his country, Ed was doing it to get home.
But after ten years, sometimes it seemed that he had to force himself to remember his home, even if it was just one thing every day. When he woke up in the mornings he always knew where he was. It was very rare, now, that he felt for a split second that he was sleeping in his old home in Rizembool, or in the spare bedroom at Winry's with his brother in the bed next to him. He almost never had those dreams where he was going about a normal day, in Central, reporting to that annoying Colonel, and suddenly thought, huh, that was a weird dream I had last night, I was in some place called Germany. Good thing it wasn't real.
Even the voices and faces he loved began to blur in his memory, becoming less defined over time. Winry's eyes were blue, he knew, but exactly what shade of blue were they again? And Al, oh, even if he could still hear his voice clearly in his mind, his voice wouldn't sound like that now. Al would be a grown man, like he was, not the child Edward remembered. It was all too often, Ed thought, that the word "home" now conjured up images of cooking dinner with Alphonse Heiderich in their always-messy kitchen or sitting on the floor with his friend, leaning back to back, each engrossed in a book.
He jumped when he felt the hand on his shoulder. "Ed, hello, you there?" Al was asking, teasing him.
"Huh?"
"C'mon, it's late, lets finish up and get home," Al said with a smile, rubbing this thumb over the dirt smeared across Ed's forehead.
"Yeah, okay, just let me-"
Although they both heard it, neither of them could place the whistling noise before everything went white, then red, and finally black.