When it's Time
Disclaimer: Characters and setting are the property of Hiromu Arakawa. I'm just borrowing them for a bit of non-profit angst.
Normally Havok and Farman were two of the less superstitious members of the company. This time it wasn't helping. Sneaking into the head quarter's basement with a coffin to retrieve a body in the dead of night was the sort of thing to get anyone jumping at shadows.
The Colonel said it was time. Edward was physically healthy, there was some chance that this might help him mentally and so they were going to take Alphonse home to bury him.
The reason for the late night retrieval was because officially the coroner's office had lost Al's body. Hawkeye had meticulously drawn up the paperwork that showed they had delivered a body to the coroner and if it wasn't there now it was clearly because the coroner's office was filled with incompetents. To add verisimilitude Colonel Mustang had paid the coroners several visits to harangue them for their carelessness and their lack of progress in recovering the body. His visit provided the added benefit of keeping everyone in the office so off balance that they hadn't even begun to arrange an organized search for the missing body.
In truth they'd smuggled the emptyarmor that was the closest thing to a body Al had into the base while Colonel Mustang and Lieutenant Colonel Hughes staged a very loud, very public blow-out about the six days it had taken Intelligence to pin-point the Elric brothers. Unfortunately the subject was a sensitive one and both men had said more than a few things that they shouldn't have, even thought their fight was just a diversionary tactic. It had taken them three days to apologize and start talking to one another again.
After that they'd waited for Edward to be ready. And waited. Now they were going to force the issue. Al deserved better than to be forgotten in a storage room and Ed needed something to jolt him back to reality.
Havok spared one last nervous look into the shadows then grasped Al under the armpits. Farman took the boy's knees. They traded a nod then; together, they lifted in preparation to transfer Al's body to the coffin. The armored form fell apart in their hands. The pieces clattered loudly to the floor.
The two men leapt into opposite corners and all but climbed the walls.
After several minutes Havok collected himself and began gingerly transferring Al's parts to the coffin and reassembling him. Farman quickly followed suit.
