"You were barely in the hospital for maybe five days, and you try to run around outside and play with a bunch of kids?" Roy said in a stern voice directed towards Duo who was in bed against his will.

"And you two," Roy diverted his gaze on Edward and Alphonse, "you two permitted him to do that? What were you thinking?"

Al and Ed looked ashamed (Ed not as much), but Duo looked angry at Roy for making him come back to the hospital room.

"I don't see why your patients can't have a little fun." Duo rolled his eyes and crossed his arms across his chest.

"You are injured, how many people much stress how important it is for you to rest and heal?"

Duo didn't retort and the Elric brothers showed no signs of disagreement on the fact of what they did was wrong, so Roy left the room to try and get control of his anger.

The three of them were quiet for a while, but brightened when Hughes' head poked in. He had a pleasant smile on his face that always had a fatherly charm to it.

"What's up boys?" He put a reassuring hand on Ed's shoulder and Ed smiled at him.

Alphonse also looked up from the spot he had taken an interest in observing for the past few minutes, and also had a happy look to the way he moved.

"Don't worry about Roy. He doesn't seem to get that young men such as yourselves need to run off some energy once in a while.

"Still... we shouldn't have been so careless to take off without telling anyone." Ed looked worried that Hughes would be mad; even though he knew Hughes never got mad at him for something so trivial.

Hughes patted him on the shoulder and then turned to face Duo. He walked over to Duo with some caution; as if expecting him to attack. Duo doubted Edward or Al would notice such carefully minimized body language, but he had been trained to be able to read any movement by someone considered a potential threat.

"Listen, I'm sorry Roy also got after you for getting that out of your system, but I must agree with him on the fact that you were injured and shouldn't have been acting so recklessly. For all you know, it could've made your leg worse than it already had been."

Duo raised a skeptical eyebrow before turning to look out the window. The sun was hidden and it looked as if more rain was going to come that evening.

"I'm already done healing. I know for a fact that everything is already done growing back with maybe a small exception to some of my tissue."

"You still shouldn't take such a dangerous risk like that. It'll only take one small mistake to have you end up back here and staying for months instead of a few weeks."

Al glanced at his brother and was surprised that Edward looked worried.

"Lieutenant Colonel, I went ahead and let him do whatever he wanted to do. It is also partially my fault."

Hughes smiled at Ed and then turned towards the door, "You boys take care now, and next time I'll have brand new pictures."

Edward knew Hughes couldn't resist adding the last bit on as a kind of threat, but also just another sign of how much he loved his daughter.

It made Ed wonder for a second what if he and Duo ever adopted a child? Would he be as proud as Hughes was of his little girl?

Then, Ed caught himself thinking of Duo again, and how he was now longing to be able to kiss Duo. It felt strange for Edward to finally know what it was like to fall in love. He kept pushing the thought away whenever it occurred with a desperate hope that he could forget all about loving Duo.

At the time, Edward didn't seem to realize just how much Duo was starting to like him back.

After Roy had cooled down, he had given the three another long lecture on how they should behave from now on, and the finally left to Duo's great relief.

"He really does like to hear himself talk, don't you think?" Duo asked as he took a bite of his bread.

"He's right though..." Al bent over a showing that he was still upset with himself for throwing caution to the wind.

"You have to live life to its fullest if you want to die without regrets!" Duo suddenly exclaimed as he saw Edward begin to get a look of shame on his face.

"What would be the point of existing if we couldn't have fun once in a while? I'm sure some people like to be work-aholics, but I'm not one of them." Duo grinned as he saw Ed's smile a bit.

"What do you think will happen to Duo once he heals?" Al asked just as lightening flashed across he sky.

Duo took a quick look out the window when he heard rain begin to pummel against the window.

"I never really thought about it..." Edward realized that he had honestly not thought of what would happen when he was no longer needed to assist Duo.

"I'm sure they'll interrogate me, and once they realize I'm no enemy, they might let me go." Duo sighed as more lightening cracked with the booming unison of thunder.

Ed tried to picture the military just letting Duo walk out from there without any problems whatsoever, but couldn't seem to picture it happening as he wished it would. Instead of a happy image of where Duo would walk out unharmed; Ed imagined that he would most likely be harassed by the military for a long time until they knew exactly where Duo was from and what he had to do with that giant "ball of light" he appeared from.

"Somehow," Edward said with a look of regret, "I don't think it'll happen."