I don't know why, but every time I type the phrase "come on" an extra letter E appears. Dangit, spellcheck, you're supposed to help me hide the fact that I'm an idiot, not accentuate it!

Air ventilators in the early 20th century were mechanisms designed to encompass the patient's entire body (plastic was a relatively new invention, and so intubation had yet to become a practiced procedure). For the purposes of this story, it is assomed that the air ventilator is designed similarly to the modern equipment, and is powered by electricity generated by alchemy arrays engraved upon its structure(a person may merely activate these arrays to use the machine).

Whether or not this is an accurate description of this condition is for the interpreter. There is very little recorded research of this disease occuring in patients around Edward's age, as most of them occur in remote areas where little contact is available. Much of this is based on the exaggerated effects among older victims. Symptoms of tetanus vary from person to person, as it attacks the nervous system, and each person's system is unique. Age and past health issues also contribute to how the body reacts.

Therefore, I apologize if there is anything anyone might find unrealistic concerning the experience of tetanus.

"Aaaph!"

"What is it, sir?"

"He just stuck his fingers in my mouth!"

The bitter taste of iron was stinging the tip of Roy's tongue. He nearly stumbled as Edward's heavy metal arm fell away from his face and out into empty air. Fullmetal whined loudly, and Hawkeye quickly took the steel wrist and guided the stray limb back to its owner.

Reaching the top of the staircase, Roy led the way to the guest room, where Riza pulled the sheets back on the bed, and Mustang rolled Ed onto the mattress from the hammock of his arms and now thoroughly wet coat. He studied the garment, disconcerted-not by the cost to have it restored at the cleaner's, but at the fact that it had to be restored. If Edward continued to sweat like this, the kid would shrivel up like raisin by morning. Or drown in his own perspiration. Both mental images were too bizarre for words.

Riza gently pulled the blankets up to Ed's shoulders. While at the hospital, he had been stripped down to his boxers and undershirt. Little reason to redress him had been seen; at the rate that Ed was perspiring, any heavy clothing would prove uncomfortable. Riza took the opportunity to take a closer look at Ed's right shoulder. It looked normal for the most part, but if one were to inspect the line of transition from skin to steel, one would notice the edge of the port seemed trimmed with a rosy glow. Hawkeye touched the port lightly with the tips of her fingers. She expected the metal to be warm, but instinct told her that this warmth was not a healthy one. Roy waited until Riza had withdrawn her hand before speaking.

"How bad is it?"

"I can't really tell. But his shoulder's hot to the touch."

Mustang sighed in an almost resigned way.

"I'll take care of it when he wakes up. Better let him sleep for now. Let's go help Maes get the ventilator up the stairs."

XXX

"Brother… Oh, Broootheeer…"

"Nng."

"Guess what I've got, Brother."

"Go 'way."

"It's your favorite."

Something poked Edward's cheek. It felt sharp, but not pointed, and Ed growled. He hated being woken up, for any reason at all. Except for food. Food was something to be woken up for. His lips were prodded and Ed spluttered out of reflex.

"Al, what're you doin'?!"

"Giving you a present."

"S'a stupid presen', stickin' in m'mouth..."

"It's not stupid, that's where it's supposed to go."

"Wha'?"

"Open your eyes. I promise you'll like it."

Ed huffed in irritation but did as he was told.

At first the world was nothing but spilled watercolors. After a good deal of blinking, his vision finally cleared enough that he could see Al leaning over him, holding a glass. In the next moment, Edward realized three things:

First, that it must have been the straw floating in the glass his brother had been poking him with.

Secondly, the contents of the glass was sunset red.

Third, that he was lying in pool of wet linens and his own sweat.

This last revelation he found particularly unpleasant.

His immediate solution was, naturally, to sit up push the drenched sheets away from his body. As soon as he told his body to move, Edward came fully awake.

Ed's back and arm throbbed as he lifted himself to a sitting position. He tried to hide the awful pain he knew was showing in his eyes by ducking his head. He heard Alphonse shift and then felt a leather gauntlet push itself into his back beneath his shoulder blades and help him complete the motion.

"Al, I can do it on my own."

"I'm sure you can, Brother."

Ed was about to reply with a sharp Then stop touching me! Then it occurred to him that if Al did so, his back muscles, which were already angered by the task of lifting him, would have to continue to work to keep him upright, and although it would take little effort, it would add up until the soreness became too much for Ed to bear, or the muscles would simply give out and he would fall onto the bed unceremoniously, and probably wouldn't be able to get up again. So he relaxed and let Alphonse support his weight, and pointedly ignoring the situation. Al, however, wasn't making that very easy.

As soon he was sure his brother was comfortable, he once again poked Edward's lips with the straw.

"Ow! Al-"

"Shut up and drink."

Hearing the word "drink" made Ed realize how incredibly thirsty he was.

He bit down on the straw without further protest. To his satisfaction, the drink was, as he'd hoped, punch, and within the next half minute the glass was half empty. It didn't once reach his mind that his brother was both holding him up and holding the glass for him.

"Whoa! Brother, slow down! You could-"

Edward's epiglottis failed to lift as he paused in his swallowing to take a breath. He made a stricken, gargling sound, turning away from the glass and gulped at the air like a fish. Alphonse stiffened, wondering what he ought to do, when Ed gagged, choking on nothing as his throat convulsed savagely. And then his esophagus turned limp and he sucked in air. Al watched, frightened, as Ed panted and gasped.

"Brother… Are you okay?"

Ed's throat was still limp. It felt heavy in his neck. He nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

"Do you… do you want to drink some more?"

He thought before he answered. He was still terribly thirsty.

"Yeah… okay…"

Good. If he could talk, he reasoned, he should be able to swallow.

"Not so fast this time, okay Brother?"

"Yeah. Sure."

Edward would drink one mouthful of punch, then take a few cautious breaths, and the repeat the process. Inevitably, the glass became empty, and Ed stared at it forlornly, wishing he could fill it back up with his eyes.

"Don't worry, Brother. We have more." Al's voice held a hint of amusement as he placed the glass on the bedside table.

The acceptance of the furniture brought Edward to properly take in his surroundings. He did not recognize them.

"Where are we?"

"At the colonel's house."

"At the… colonel's house!?"

He glanced around the room in an almost horrified way, then shot his gaze downward and stared at the bed beneath him.

"I've been sleeping in… the colonel's bed!?"

"And sweating in it, too."

At this Ed gave the sheets a second glance, and a slow, maniacal smile spread across his face.

"I have… I hope it stains." He pictured a frustrated colonel vainly scrubbing linens, the air stinging of bleach and turning the man's eyes red. He giggled savagely.

Alphonse wisely decided to say nothing.

XXX

"…So the colonel got you up the stairs and put you here, and you've been sleeping ever since."

Edward swallowed the last drops of his third helping of punch as he contemplated the day's events, as described by his brother. Much of the garbled collections of sensual data he remembered was beginning to make sense. Although there was one thing he had trouble understanding.

"You punched someone?"

"Yes, I did." Al's voice was heavy with shame.

"You punched someone because you thought they were hurting me?"

"Yes."

They were speaking of Alphonse's reaction upon arriving at Eastern Command. He had found his brother shouting and writhing as a stranger loomed over his right shoulder, and Al had panicked. The medic who had been trying to inspect Ed's port was now sporting a face of two colors-one of a healthy complexion, the other an ugly soup of reds, blues, and blacks. Ed found this fact quite touching.

"That's awesome, Al!"

"No, it's not! I could have really hurt them!"

"Yeah, but they would've hurt me if you hadn't."

"They didn't mean to!"

"That's beside the point."

"No, it isn't! What if-"

"Judging by all the high-pitched yelling, I'd say you're awake, Fullmetal."

The brothers had been so engrossed in their conversation that neither had noticed the colonel opening the door to the guest room. He stood in the threshold, expression calculating and unreadable, as it often was.

"Hello, Colonel Mustang. Brother and I want to thank you for letting us stay here."

"No, we don't. And I my voice is not high-pitched!"

"Brother! Be polite. If it wasn't for the colonel you'd still be in the hospital, and probably drugged stupid, too."

Edward's face drained of color and he said nothing.

"You seem to be enjoying my punch; I've seen Alphonse make more than one trip to the kitchen for refills."

"It's not yours, it's mine. You got it for me, remember?" By the time Ed realized what he'd said, the words were already out of his mouth.

Mustang smirked. He loved it whenever someone fell for his traps.

"So you admit it! In that case, I think a 'thank you, Colonel Mustang' is in order."

"No way in hell!"

"Brother!"

"I don't owe him anything-"Edward ceased speaking abruptly and his flesh hand rose to his face, hiding it. Roy's arrogant radiance vanished and he hurried to the boy's side."

"Fullmetal? What's wrong?"

"Brother?" Al leaned closer to Ed, trying to earn a response of any kind.

"Go 'way."

"But, Brother-"

"I said, go!"

Mustang noticed that Edward's words were coming out slurred and he quickly figured why.

"His facial muscles are acting up."

"Is there any way we can make them stop?"

"You could go away."

"Not immediately. We could try giving him the sedatives-"

"No!"

"…Apparently, we are not giving him the sedatives. The only thing we can do is wait it out."

"You don't have to wait out anything." Edward's statement was acidic, especially so since it was true.

There was an awkward silence.

"Well, if you have to deal with it, I'll deal with it with you."

Roy fought the impulse to smile at Alphonse's ridiculously loyal words.

The sound of a door opening, followed by many footsteps, caught all three attentions.

"What in the-"

"Roy! We're here! And guess who's with me?!"

"Is that… Hughes?" Ed looked from Roy to Al and back again, not sure who the question should be directed at. Al was the one who answered.

"Yep. He and Mrs. Hughes brought you dinner. It was awfully nice of them, wasn't it?"

A familiar gleam sparked in Edward's eyes. He and Al realized at that moment that Ed hadn't eaten all day.

Uh oh.

XXX

"Ed, my boy! You're finally awake! Last time I saw you, you and Roy were snug-"

"You brought me food?!"

Hughes was a bit taking aback by Edward's presumptuous greeting.

"I'm sorry, Lieutenant." Al was trying quite hard not to laugh. Maes was standing with his hand in the air in some kind of extravagant salute. He had barged across the threshold like that, clearly with a hello-get-well-soon speech he had been working on for the past hour, and Ed's appetite had ruined it. "He hasn't really had anything to eat all day."

"Where's the food?"

Ed looked Hughes up and down, and even tried leaning to the side to check behind him. When his searches proved fruitless, he returned his eyes to Maes, countenance gloomy with betrayal.

"Al said you had food."

"It's downstairs in the kitchen." Maes lowered his hand and smiled at Edward the way one might when watching a kitten explore a new toy.

Ed immediately made to leap off the bed and make his way to the lower level. He was stopped by a giant blue arm.

"Al, what-"

"Mrs. Hughes will bring you something, Brother."

"She doesn't have to. I can walk just fine."

"She's only trying to be nice."

"I said, I'm fine-"

"Your brother's right, Ed." Edward glared at Hughes. The man wore a strange expression; scrutinizing, yet in a nervously expectant way. Ed's eyes narrowed. There was something Maes wasn't telling him.

XXX

Dinner was quite an event.

Mrs. Hughes brought Ed plate after plate of casserole. Al offered every single time she did this to cut the food for him. Every single time Al did this, Ed would snap that, no, he could cut his own food, and besides, it was a casserole, and therefore was a dish made without knives in mind. He would then hungrily began to swallow as much casserole as he possibly could per mouthful. Eventually, he would choke, and Al would panic, and Ed would be too busy trying to get his diaphragm to let go of his lungs to tell him to shut up.

"You don't have to eat all of it, Brother."

"But I want to eat all of it."

He was panting for breath.

"Well, too bad."

Ed looked up tiredly as Roy and Hawkeye appeared at the threshold.

"You have to save some for us, Fullmetal."

"No, I don't."

"Yes, you do. I'm your superior officer, and I am ordering you to save some of that casserole for the lieutenant and me."

"I'm off duty and where have you been?"

"Entertaining the baby. Hughes and his wife have taken over for now."

"Elicia's here?" Roy sighed at the excited note in Al's voice.

"Yes, she is. Maes thought Fullmetal would be magically cured by his daughter's… babiness, but I told him she had to stay downstairs."

"Why? Afraid I'd bite her or something?"

"Brother!"

"Yes." Roy surprised both brothers with his sarcastic answer. "I told him all about your vicious fangs and your insatiable lust for the blood of children-ow!"

Hawkeye had stamped down on his toes, which were already purple from the times she had assaulted them with her heel at the hospital.

"We didn't want Elicia to tire you out."

It was the truth. Perhaps a bit watered down on severity, but the truth nonetheless.

Edward scoffed.

"Tired? I'm not tired. I've been sleeping all day!" His eyelids drooped as he spoke.

They widened soon afterward.

His stomach, roiling with the meal-meals-he'd eaten, had been contentedly performing its nature until a moment ago. It felt as if something had become jammed, some gear of his innards had broken loose and fallen into the mechanism, ceasing its progression.

"Brother? Brother, are you okay?"

"'M fine."

He then contradicted his own words as his midriff clenched so violently, he was forced to curl into himself. Roy stampeded out of the room, screaming as if he'd found a corpse buried in his closet.

"Maes! MAES, WE NEED YOU!"

Hawkeye's reaction was Mustang's antithesis.

She dived to the side of the bed and placed a firm hand on Edward's back.

"Ed? Look at me. What's wrong?"

Ed hadn't planned on saying anything. Even if he had, he wouldn't have managed. His abdominals tightened even further. Edward gritted his teeth. He could feel the miniscule rips that were forming in the muscles; each one was a small beacon of fire below his rib cage.

Footsteps scrabbled across the floor.

"How bad is it?"

"Is he breathing?"

"Roy!"

Hawkeye's gaze snapped to Mustang and bore into him with the intensity of markswoman, and Roy's heart braced itself instinctively for the bullet that would surely ruin it. His instincts were true. When the projectile arrived, it tore open scars that only he and Riza knew existed.

"Talk to him, Roy. Tell him what to do."

Hughes and Al both looked at Hawkeye in bewilderment, and then at Roy, awaiting an explanation. Roy looked at nothing. His eyes were glazed and his jaw was rigid, his face the color of bleached bone. Those who knew him referred to the countenance as the "Ishval face." Many read it as a warning, a sign that the Flame Alchemist was no longer there, and was prone to lashing out at his personal ghosts that did not burn, and charring the living that did.

Hughes saw it as a calling to his duty as Mustang's friend and as a fellow survivor of the fighting. He clamped his hand on Roy's shoulder; not tight enough to hurt, but strong enough break through whatever visions were ruling his mind. And there had been only one person throughout the sources of the visions that had ever done so.

Roy slowly turned his head and faced Maes. He did not see him at first, but after sifting through the layer of dreams, he found the contours, and focused to the best of his ability until the imagined world receded to the back the edges of his sight.

Edward moaned.

It was a short sound, quickly cut off and stifled. But Roy heard it, and he heard the pain and fear it held.

Talk to him, Roy.

He stepped towards the bed. Hughes's hand fell from his shoulder as he walked from underneath it.

Tell him what to do.

Ed was trembling with exertion he was unwillingly spending. He was trapped hunched over himself, his left arm strangling his torso and his right clutching the elbow, as if making to pull the limb away from himself, but balking out of uncertainty.

Focus on me, Roy.

"Focus on me, Ed."

His hand caressed the boy's arched, spiny back. He could feel the sudden twitches and jerks as the muscles tore, but if anything, the damage only made the tissue pull tighter.

"Think about breathing. Don't move anything. Just relax. Focus on me, and think about breathing."

Keep breathing, Roy.

"And if you can't breathe… just focus on me."

One minute passed.

Two minutes.

Three.

And for each one, he repeated the mantra, his sense of touch affixed upon the feeling of Ed's constricted lungs valiantly snatching any air that found its way down his throat.

On the death of the fourth minute, Fullmetal collapsed.

No one spoke.

No one moved.

Then Edward moaned, and Roy was lightheaded with thankfulness.