"WE ARE LOOKING FOR EDWARD ELRIC, THE FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST! COME OUT OF HIDING!"

Ed rolled her eyes, fat chance. She surveyed her surroundings while she had some cover, her back against a hastily thrown up wall, her assailants about 50 meters away on the other side of it. Close enough she could still hear the clicking of more than a few gun hammers being drawn. Which, shit, her alchemy was fast, but not 'bullet' fast. She leaned over to check on Mustang who was grumbling himself back into consciousness. It was already a crappy morning, General Sunshine was definitely going to make it better.

The day had started out nice enough, Alphonse had headed off early to the university to get some paperwork in order before his classes started next month and grab some books on medical Alkahestry they could read later, so she and Winry wandered out to the market to shop for groceries. A normal Saturday morning since she'd returned to Central. Unfortunately that meant she was becoming predictable and situations like this ended up happening. Before she had a chance to do much more than cover Winry, an explosion had almost buried the both of them in bricks and vegetables. Her next move was to shove her friend into hiding behind a building before running across open ground to the other side of the street. If she was over here, they'd leave Winry alone, plus it had the added benefit of finding out what the hell had happened to Mustang, because right as the explosion went off she'd seen him disappear under a falling building.

Now that she was next to him she could easily see Mustang's leg was trapped under some cement and he was unconscious, fortunately apart from that he seemed physically ok.

"FULLMETAL! YOU HAVE TWO MINUTES!"

Ed yelled over the barrier before the bombers started coming over to investigate, no need for them to find out Mustang was out of the fight. "WHAT DO YOU WANT?"

Personally, she needed time and was going to buy it with questions. Right now she didn't care what they wanted, her focus was on Roy. She clapped and freed Mustang's leg so she could take a look at it.

Broken.

She hissed at him as his eyes blinked their way into focus, "What the fuck are you doing here?!"

He growled back, "Looking for you! You're the one that left me that stupid note!"

"I didn't leave you any fucking note jackass."

Mustang narrowed his eyes at the same time Ed said, "Fuck."

A set up.

"WE WANT YOU AND THE FLAME ALCHEMIST TO COME WITH US. AS A TRADE."

Trade?! Trade what? Better not be 'trade whom'. Alphonse was safe at the university almost an hour away, and Winry was hiding across the street. Ed poked her head over the top of her barrier to verify.

Fuck.

There was a grunt as Mustang started pulling himself up to take a look over the wall, she shifted her attention back to him and shoved him onto his ass again. "Stay the fuck down idiot."

He glared pretty fiercely at her, "I need to SEE where they are Edward, before i can burn them to ashes."

"They've got Winry, you can't blow them up until i get her away from them. Shouldn't be too hard, looks like she did some damage to the guy that got her but we'll have to buy some time until she wakes up." Good job Win.

"We've got your girl FullMetal. Come out with General Mustang and we'll leave her here in exchange for the two of you coming with us."

Shit. How long did Winry need before she regained consciousness?

She yelled back, "This asshole won't trade himself for anyone, he'd sacrifice his own team if he had to! Get another plan!"

Mustang frowned at her and she stuck her tongue out at him.

Their response was too quick and too smug, "Normally i'd agree with you but i have good intel that says Roy Mustang owes Winry Rockbell some parents. I'm willing to bet he won't let her die here."

Ed traded a look with Mustang, their bluff hadn't gotten them anywhere. Ed swore and took matters into her own hands.

"It's still going to have to just be me. You blew up a building and it broke Mustang's leg."

Roy glared at her, "Why the fuck did you tell them that?"

"Shut up asshole, I'm saving your life. The street is too damaged to get a vehicle in here and if you can't walk they'll have to leave you behind."

She could hear the grumbling of an angry argument on the other side of her wall but it was too far away to pick out any words.

"I was wondering why he hadn't been making demands. In any case, we've got you surrounded so you'll have to prove it to one of my men and then come quietly or we'll shoot every civilian we can find."

An enemy head popped over the edge of the wall and disappeared just as quickly, "Sir! Leg's definitely broken. We'll just have to take FullMetal."

"Fine, but get away from there until we can get him cuffed. FullMetal! Come out and walk slowly toward us with your hands up."

Ed made to stand up and then stopped, turning in a crouch to face Mustang. "Don't tell anyone i can do this." She clapped and put her hands on his leg, stitching bone and tissue back together. "It's not a complete heal, you'll have to do some physiotherapy for a while because bone and tissue are still bruised. I got it from Shou Tucker's books; about sewing life."

She wasn't going to tell him what the alchemical trade was, Tucker was giving up parts of his soul but Ed's soul was tied to Al's and she'd trade that for nothing. Instead, she'd modified the alchemy to be more 'one for one'. Plus this was just easier. Her eyes watered as the bone in her leg snapped, it didn't look any different from the outside but inside it was cracked through, mimicking Mustang's.

Roy was watching her closely, too closely. Glaring. He grabbed her coat to force her to meet his eyes. "What. The. Fuck? Did you just break your own leg to heal mine?"

She ignored his question, there wasn't really time for explanations. "It'll take your tendons a couple of minutes before they move the way you want them to but you should be able to stand by the time i need you. Hopefully you'll be ready when i fall."

"Ed what the fuck? When you fall?! What are you talking about?! You can't go anywhere your leg is bro-"

Ed couldn't help it, she kissed him. Maybe she could blame it on her adrenaline running high, if her plan worked and she lived through this. It wasn't a good plan but Alphonse and Mustang were the planners in her life. And bonus, she'd startled him into shutting up and letting go of her jacket so hopefully he got over it fast enough to help out.

She stayed out of his reach as she quickly made herself a crutch from some nearby broken vegetable cart. Calling over the wall, "I'm coming out. Put Winry down!"

They didn't, of course. It would have been stupid of them to do it, but Ed had to try. She even made it a few paces forward before she tripped, earlier than she wanted but oh well, she clapped on the way down landing face first.

Fucking hell the pain was bad. She should have turned her head, maybe smashing her brain instead of her nose would have numbed the pain in her leg. Her focus had been on Winry though, so when her palms hit the stones her alchemy activated and a giant hand grabbed Winry from below and lifted her up and out of the range of bullets. A perfect plan, as long as she didn't have to think about who exactly was still in the line of fire.

Ed heard the 'tink' and felt the vibration of a bullet hitting her automail. Then the hot fiery pain of another one hitting her flesh thigh. Hopefully that wasn't through an artery, where the fuck was her useless backup? Finally hot flames raced over her head toward the bombers. About time, what the hell had he been doing back there? If he'd been two seconds faster she might have avoided being shot.

At least if Mustang was up and moving she could let her guard down. Further down. Had it been up? And speaking of 'up', who was going to get Winry? Because judging by the taste of blood in her mouth it wasn't going to be her.

!-*-*-

Alphonse felt the explosion at the University and instantly knew that his sister was in the middle of it. Explosions followed Ed around like stray dogs following a meat vendor. He took off running toward the growing column of dust and smoke, maybe he could flag down a cab on the way.

Turns out, lots of idiots were willing to drive straight toward an explosion so Al was able to arrive on scene in under a half hour. Bodies were scattered about, most of them moving thank god. Everyone he could see was covered in layers of dust or scorch marks. Alphonse assigned the second description to the bad guys as soon as he saw Mustang. And since he couldn't immediately find Winry or his sister he ran over to the General to get the current situation.

"Sir? Have you seen Ed or Winr-"

He stopped short. There was Ed, partially covered in blood and completely unconscious. Mustang was wrapping up every injury he could find on her, which seemed like a lot.

Mustang kept working as he responded, not looking up, he sounded pretty angry. Probably at Ed. "She's mostly ok, I think. No brain damage. No more than usual anyway. As long as we can get her to the hospital right now and get some blood back in her she'll survive."

When the General tied the last wrap closed and finally looked up at him, Al realised that Roy did not believe a single word he'd just said. Shit.

He dropped to his knees next to his sister, they'd been studying this. In Shou Tucker's library. Ed had insisted it could be done with a few easy adjustments but he'd wanted to find a way to avoid the trade. To combine it with Mei's already healing Alkahestry. He forced his brain to work over time, Mei had shown him what she'd done for Riza. He could do the same here. It wouldn't fix everything but it would hold it back until they could get her to the hospital.

He clapped. Please for the love of Ed, please let this work.

!-*-*-

Ed regained consciousness in a dimly lit hospital room. Night already? Crap.

Extra double crap OW! Ed whined to herself as the pain hit. Everything hurt. Shouldn't she have pain killers? A hand landed lightly on her arm. A hand she was so grateful still existed. Alphonse.

"I rang for more meds as soon as you moved. They should be here soon."

He looked like he was in rough shape, which meant she'd been here more than just a day. Ed groaned.

"Also, Mustang says you kissed him, so good luck dealing with that fallout."

"Fuck. Don't remind me. How's Winry?"

"Mostly ok. Bruises."

Good. That was good.

"She was pretty pissed at you for getting shot. You got one in the lungs, another in your leg, and a third in your automail. I'm not sure which one she's more angry about."

Lungs? And she was alive? She looked her brother over carefully, "You look fine."

He immediately became more animated, "That's because i told you we could do it without trading injuries you absolute moron! If i ever hear about you doing something like that again. Even for someone you're in love with, I'll give Winry a reason to make you more automail."

In love with!? "What the hell Al! Don't say that out loud!"

"Well, more bad news for you, which i'm currently happy to deliver because you're an idiot. Winry was furious with you so she told Mustang everything about you. She ignored her fear of him and basically told him our life story with day to day play back. You're fucked."

Ed's eyes went wide, "Everything everything?"

Al nodded and made a heart shape with his hands.

Fuck.

"I'm not sure all of it was a revelation though, he was calling you 'she' when i arrived onsite, I'm just not sure how long he knew that."

"I figured it out right after she kissed me. That's why it took me so long to get moving."

Oh no. Please no. Ed squeezed her eyes shut. This wasn't happening.

"Oh, sorry. I forgot to say, Roy's here."

She could hear the smirk in her brother's voice as he'd said that. "Thank you Al. I appreciate the update."

He laughed out loud, "No problem. I'm going to go check on Winry, you two have fun."