AN: OMG I HAVE OVER TWO HUNDRED REVIEWS! –bounces—THANKS!

As thanks for all of your support, I will make a short story about Roy, before the curse n.n. I really hope you enjoy it!

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--SPECIAL GIFT FROM ME TO MY REVIEWERS FOR GIVING ME OVER 200 REVIEWS! XD I THANK ALL OF YOU FOR SUPPORTING THIS FIC AND I HOPE YOU WILL CONTINUE READING UNTIL THE END! LOVE YOU!—

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Roy Mustang woke up groaning and rubbing his head. Now, what had he been doing last night again? Ah yes, drinking.

He glanced over at the lump besides him and removed the sheets, only to discover another woman sharing his bed. What was her name again? She wasn't a beauty—her black hair was rather dull, her nose was crooked and her very pale contrast made her similar to a ghost. She had nice, full and red lips though, which was a plus.

At any rate, Roy had never really cared about the exterior of a woman—as long as she could give him what he wanted, he was fine with it. And what he wanted was pretty easy to give: sex. He didn't care if it was good or bad, as long as he had it. His best friend Hughes had once suggested that he might be addicted to it, but Roy had refused to believe it—he knew the reason why he did it, but he did not feel like explaining it to him.

The truth was that he had nightmares during the night, about the war. Roy didn't quite know how to deal with them, so threw himself at any woman and had sex with anyone he could find. Sex made him tired, which was perfect—if he was too tired, he wouldn't have any nightmares and he wouldn't have to remember. He didn't like commitments or settling down for that matter, so he had a different woman each night. Perhaps if he would find someone who would strike his interest, he could settle down, but he doubted he would ever meet that person.

The woman stirred in her sleep as Roy tried to remember what had happened. She threw herself at him, begging him to take her. It didn't happen often to him, but it did happen sometimes, only this woman seemed to be more desperate. She had said that she had loved him for a long time now, which was a bit concerning for Roy now that he was sober.

They had apparently made a big mess last night: clothes were spread all over the floor, his blue uniform lay scattered and several things were knocked off their regular places when they had stumbled in and tried to find the bed as they were undressing each other.

She woke up. Roy swallowed.

"Good morning, love," she said, smiling lightly. It seemed as if Roy's stomach had tied itself in a knot as she looked at him with love. How could she love him? She didn't even know him… unless she was a stalker or something. He tried to smile back, but it turned out to be nothing more than a grimace as she reached up and cupped his cheek with her hand.

Roy had to end this immediately.

"I should be going," he said, grabbing her wrist and pulling the hand off his cheek. The woman blinked at him, apparently confused. "I had a nice time," he said as he gathered his clothes from the floor.

"You had a nice time?" she asked him, her voice croaking. Roy nodded mutely.

She started to chuckle.

"You had a nice time?" she repeated, chuckling some more at Roy's second nod. "I see, you do not wish to see me again, do you?" A pause and then a shake of his head.

"I am sorry if I gave you the wrong idea," he said truthfully—and he did mean it. But he had never declared his love to her, nor to any other woman he had slept with. And he did that very often. Her eyes narrowed immediately and the light chuckle stopped.

"I don't like being toyed with, Roy," she said. Roy was in the middle putting on his pants.

"I did not toy with you, I never said anything about love," he pointed out to her.

"Sex usually is an act of love," she shot back at him.

"Not necessarily. If you really do love me and you really do know me, you would know that I have sex almost every night with a different woman," he said coldly. Really, he should get out of there! All of his alarms were on, especially when he saw that look in her eyes. This was not going as planned.

"You should've known better," she hissed dangerously. "When I told you I loved you, you should've rejected me right then and there instead of leading me on." Roy shrugged.

"You took your own conclusions, I never said anything about loving you eternally." The woman's eyes narrowed.

"I guess I have no choice but to punish you then, Roy Mustang," she said.

"M'am, I am a Colonel in the military. Please do not make such threats or I will be forced to arrest you," he replied coolly, putting on his blue military jacket, stuffing his silver pocket watch in his pocket and heading towards the door.

In a flash, the woman was in front of it. Roy blinked.

"Not so fast," she said, holding her hand on the doorknob. "Roy Mustang, a man without a heart it seems. Are you capable of love, you think?" Roy had no time to reply. "I've never loved a man before and you cast my heart aside as if it is nothing. You won't get away with that so easily," Roy raised an eyebrow sceptically, refusing to let the fear he felt in his gut take over. Something wasn't right here. "I've decided on your punishment, I believe. I will make sure that you will never be able to break a woman's heart again. You will spend the rest of eternity serving men and only men, that is the rule of this curse. The curse will not be lifted by any other man or woman—only you can. But it will be impossible for a man like you." She chuckled mercilessly, before a light came from the purple pendant she wore around her neck.

And that was the last thing Roy saw for thirty years.

END EXTRA CHAPTER! -

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On to the real one! n.n

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Chapter 13

"Hi everyone," Edward held up a hand in greeting as he looked over the entire group. Alphonse and Winry beamed at him and Edward was glad that his little brother didn't tackle him this time—in public was just too embarrassing. Next to them stood Russell, who looked rather nice with black slacks, a white button-up shirt and a brown jacket, looked a bit reluctant to be there and had his hands in his pockets.

"Everyone, this is Jean Havoc," Edward said finally, gesturing at the blonde man besides him and Roy. Said man held up his hand and muttered a nervous 'yo', before his eyes rested on Russell. He grinned nervously and immediately put out his cigarette at the look of disgust on Russel's face. Winry and Alphonse politely introduced themselves to Jean and Russell did this again reluctantly.

Edward loved the guy, but he could sometimes be a total prick.

"What are you grinning about?" he asked Alphonse, who kept on grinning.

"You'll hear later this evening," he said.

"Shall we go inside?" Winry suggested nervously, looking at the slightly irritated Russell and her eyes flicking back to Alphonse, who kept on grinning. She seemed happy, but a bit nervous all the same. Everybody nodded in agreement eagerly, desperate to lighten the mood a bit. Roy just found this whole event to be rather amusing—at least it wouldn't be a boring dinner.

"Ed, I need to speak to you for a moment," Russell said, wiggling his eyebrows. Edward sighed and nodded, motioning everybody to go ahead. Jean seemed to be a bit reluctant about leaving Russell, but also went ahead. "You didn't tell me he was a smoker!" he hissed. Edward blinked innocently.

"Didn't I?"

Russell smacked him.

"Ouch! That hurts," the vertically challenged blonde whined, clutching his head. "Anyway, it doesn't matter if he smokes, right? I mean, not when you or Fletcher are around! And he really his nice Russ, give him a chance," Edward pleaded.

"It does matter since Fletcher's last attack was because someone had been smoking around him," he looked at the puppy-dog eyes Edward was giving him. "… Fine, but I won't like it," he muttered angrily, stomping off inside. Edward grinned to himself—he knew Russell was just acting this way because Edward had been right about Jean. Russell liked him, definitely, he was just afraid to admit it. His pride wouldn't allow it.

Dinner went quite well (AN: I know you were all expecting some kind of disaster, but I honestly couldn't think of anything xD And quite frankly, it wasn't in my plans either o.o But I tried!), save for some few minor incidents—like Jean spilling wine over Russell, or Jean accidentally elbowing him when he was telling a story that made it necessary for him to make wild gestures with his hands. But he got a lot of laughs from Russell nonetheless and Edward was glad that Russell really was having a good time after all—his instincts never failed.

Roy didn't behave himself though. Not that he expected him to, since it was still Roy, the exhibitionist.

During the entire dinner, Roy's hand kept wandering to Edward's thigh, squeezing and rubbing it. Edward would stop him when the hand would come too close to a more… private… area, though occasionally Roy succeed. All in all, they both left pretty aroused at the end of the evening.

They also couldn't get rid of Alphonse, who kept asking them questions about their relationship, nor could they get away from Winry, who kept on squealing in glee whenever Roy would peck Edward on the cheek or when it was the other way around.

She told them she loved boy's love, which really wasn't a surprise to Edward. She had been ever since high school and had even tried to get Alphonse into kissing Edward full on the lips, tongue included.

Alphonse had been willing to do it (but Edward did NOT want to get into that).

Anyway, back to what Alphonse had been asking—let's take a little peek at part of their conversation, shall we?

"So, Nii-san, I noticed you walked a little funny just now," Alphonse said, folding his hands and resting his chin on them. Winry nodded in agreement.

"Yes Ed, care to explain? We're awfully worried about you, did you fall down the stairs or something?" she asked sweetly. "Or did something get shoved up—"

"Winry!" Edward yelled automatically, quickly throwing his hands over her mouth. Her sentence was instantly muffled, thank God. Alphonse chuckled.

"Really Nii-san, you don't have to be embarrassed about you finally having a good lay," he said. Edward just grumbled something that really sounded like 'betraying bastard of a brother' but wisely kept his mouth shut. He didn't really want to cause a scene in the middle of a restaurant after all.

However, there was one announcement that shocked him. A lot.

"Everyone, I have an announcement to make," he grabbed Winry by the hand and pulled her up, before his arm rested around her waist. "I'm very glad to announce that me and my lovely, beautiful—and slightly violent—wife is pregnant!"

"From you?" Roy asked dryly. Alphonse chuckled.

"Surprisingly, yes," he said in a serious tone and promptly got smacked by Winry. They were lucky she didn't have her wrench. Edward was still gaping.

"S—She's pregnant?" he finally exclaimed, flailing his arms. "Oh my God, I'm gonna be an uncle!" He grinned happily, before jumping at his little brother and tackling him. Alphonse fell to the floor, laughing at the older Elric all the way.

Winry squealed in glee.

"So that's why you've been grinning all evening!" Edward finally said loudly, finally sitting back down next to Roy, who was affectionately smiling at him. Edward didn't notice this, but there was also a hint of bitterness in there—Roy honestly did wish he could stay with them forever. They felt like family. Russell and Jean both congratulated them, shaking their hands. Jean said he would've offered them some wine, if Russell hadn't forbidden him to buy it again.

That made Russell roll his eyes in amusement.

"Yeah, we just found out this afternoon," Alphonse grinned.

All in all, it had been a very successful evening.

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After three hours of torture, Edward and Roy finally went home. Alphonse and Winry walked with them for a short while, since their apartments were rather close by. Jean had asked if Russell would like to go to his apartment for some wine (he promised not to spill it again) and, to Edward's surprise, Russell had actually accepted.

Edward then realised that there was a hidden matchmaker inside of him. Which was weird, considering his love life hadn't been exactly that wonderful (until now).

He sighed as they entered the apartment, putting his keys on their regular spot and taking off his coat. He was followed by Roy, who immediately slipped his arms around Edward's waist and started kissing his neck affectionately. Edward moaned, glad that he had not forced Roy to do things he didn't want to do when they had first met—if he had, he wouldn't have felt this much pleasure now.

Because being touched by someone else, was much more wonderful when that person cared for you.

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They spent the rest of the week in Edward's apartment, only coming out of there if the food had been eaten or if they wanted to rent movies.

They didn't mind at all, because they enjoyed each other's company and they wanted to spend as much time together as possible, because they only had two weeks left. Time was ticking for them—soon they would have to say goodbye and Edward wanted to spend every waking minute of that time with Roy.

He didn't know why he was acting like a lovesick girl—even with Russell he had never been so sappy, but Roy was different. He was in love with him, he loved him and Edward couldn't imagine living in his apartment without him. It wouldn't be right, it would be empty.

And Edward could do nothing about it—he couldn't help him.

The thought of Roy having to spend his life in that watch made him sick and the thought of Roy having to serve other men, having to get raped by other men disgusted him. It made him want to vomit and it made him want to protect Roy all the more. Roy did not deserve this—no matter how many people he murdered in that war, or how many hearts he had broken. Roy was a good man, despite his arrogance, pervertedness (Edward does realise that it's not a real word, but he doesn't care!) and his annoying quirks.

Why couldn't that stupid witch have given him a time-limit? Like 'when you serve your thirtieth master, you'll be free again', or something like that. Stupid, stupid sadistic witch.

If she had been alive, Edward would've killed her. No doubt about it. Or bitch-slapped her.

But Edward felt so helpless, he felt so helpless knowing that Roy needed to go eventually. It wasn't possible for him to stay—after all, even after six-hundred years he still didn't know how to break the curse, how could he know now? If only the witch had given more hints than that vague 'only you can break the curse'.

If only she would've just told him.

If only he had another hint…

Edward fumbled with the watch. It was midnight and Roy was sleeping soundly besides him, exhausted from their previous activities. The blonde sighed, looking at it, before he suddenly remembered something.

Maybe…

He quickly clicked on the little button, which opened the silver watch. Inside, it ticked softly, but it wasn't the clock Edward was looking at—it was the date that was carved in it.

"Sixth of October, 1729," Edward muttered softly. Was it a clue or not?

"It's the date the witch cursed me," Roy murmured. Edward blinked, realising Roy was staring at him with sleepy eyes. Roy scooted closer to Edward, taking the watch from him and putting it on the nightstand, before he wrapped his arms around the blonde, who sighed in content. "Just go to sleep."

And Edward did.