The Golden Sun: Chapter Ten: Endurance

AN: The continuous love this fic really warms my heart! At his core, Hohenheim isn't a bad man, he's a very sad and tragic man (with a very different past), but he had so many fears about being a father that it led to him being inadequate. He loves his sons…he just doesn't know how to be fatherly in any capacity. Worry not, all shall be explained about him eventually.

There weren't any updates for a little while because I needed to figure out the direction this fic is going and I rewrote this chapter eight times *sobs* now I know: this is going so AU that barely any canon is remaining. Hohenheim's past is a bit different and more closely tied to Father, Xerxes is hugely important, and a lot of stuff is going down in Xing, that's probably all I can say about it right now.


Roy didn't usually have to worry about the Elrics, which was equal parts amusing as it was sad. Now at thirteen and fourteen they were making waves and it seemed like every other week Ed and Al were stomping into his office, Ed delivering a half-assed report, Al greeting all his subordinates.

Things hadn't really changed since that day more than a year ago when Ed had clung to Roy had sobbed into his chest, he was still as volatile as ever, always prone to shouting, but he cooled down faster and he smiled a bit more. He smiled when Hawkeye patted his head and then had Al lean down so she could do the same to him (Roy still remembered Ed saying he didn't like the other soldiers touching his hair, but he never seemed to mind Roy's men, that warmed his chest), laughed when Breda and Havoc pulled him into an argument, and sniggered when Fuery quailed under Hawkeye's eye while tripping Falman in an effort to get him to loosen up.

("Do you and Lieutenant Hawkeye ever argue?" Al asked him once.

"Not often," Roy considered.

"Why not?"

"She gets the kids in the divorce," Roy lamented and Al had burst into tittering giggles, even though Roy still wasn't sure if he was talking about his men or Ed and Al.)

Roy had once caught Ed slip up when he was reading a book in the cafeteria and someone asked him where his dad was and Ed had responded "probably in his office" followed five seconds later by "WHAT THE FUCK!"

("Do you miss sleeping?" Roy asked Al.

"Every night," Al said. "Do you miss sleeping through the night?"

Roy hated how old he sounded when he spoke, old beyond his years, Al deserved to be a kid for as long as possible. "Sometimes," he heaved a heavy sigh, "but I've given up the right to wish for that anymore.")

Things were good, now, better. Some days Ed came back into the office with a black eye, or his arm in a sling, or a bandage around his head, but hardly ever without a wild grin that was unapologetic. One day he came in annoyed and with his coat ripped "Another ninja tried to kill me," he complained like it was at most an inconvenience for him, rather unlike the last time, when he'd almost died.

(There were days where Ed looked at his brother with so much misery and self-loathing that Roy didn't know how he could bear it.)

There was still a healing scratch on Ed's cheek as he slumped into the couch in Roy's office, his head tilted slightly as if listening for something, or giving off the air of not listening to Roy, which was always a possibility.

"I've got another mission for you," Roy said and Ed groaned loudly.

"C'mon, Colonel Bastard," Ed complained, sinking even lower into the couch, his legs straightening and his chin hitting his chest. "You've been giving us mission after mission, when are Al and I gonna have any time to do our research?"

Roy could understand his frustration. Listening to Al list the things that he missed about his real body -being able to sleep, being able to eat, being able to feel the warmth of the sun- tugged at his heartstrings, but it must've been far worse for Ed. But Ed was right, they had been doing mission after mission after mission lately. And they were missions from above Roy, so he couldn't exactly refuse them for Ed.

"Sorry, kid, orders from above."

Ed's scowl was more like a pout. "What is it?"

"A lot of children in East City and a few in the other cities have gone missing in the past few months, we think there's a large child trafficking ring located in the city," Roy explained, extending a thick file to Ed who scowled even further and didn't bother getting up so his brother heaved a heavy sigh, standing himself to grasp it. At least one of them was mature. "We have a lot of individual information on them, but we haven't been able to catch them yet."

"So…you want me to find them and kick their asses?"

Roy sighed. Ah, Ed, he was so eloquent about committing violence.

"I want you to find them and gather intel, try to keep your head down just a little, won't you, Fullmetal?"

Ed bristled before huffing and twisting his head away from Roy so he wouldn't have to look at him.

"I'll look after him, sir," Al promised, seeming almost cheerful.

Ed made a grunting noise in the back of his throat, pulling himself off the couch before he ended up on the floor. "Yeah, yeah, keep my head down."

"You're easily the most expensive endeavor the military has ever taken on," Roy called over to him as he traipsed out the way he'd come in.

"Love ya too, Colonel Bastard!" Ed fired off behind him and Roy buried his face into his hands and wondered what on earth he'd done to deserve this.

"Don't worry, sir," Al informed him in the same cheerful manner, "I'll make sure Ed doesn't destroy too many buildings."

"Thanks, Al," was muffled behind Roy's hands, before saying to Hawkeye when they'd both gone, "These boys are going to kill me, Lieutenant."

"Don't worry, sir, I'll avenge your death."

That didn't really help.


The atmosphere in Xing always seemed so tense, like a powder keg waiting to explode. In the past year the Jin, Mao, Pan, Shen, and even the Yun heiress had either had a convenient accident or been outright assassinated, but it was getting harder to tell, the assassins were ever crafty. Now there were only nineteen sons and twelve daughters remaining.

Ling had dodged three more assassination attempts since the attempted garroting that had left him with a thin but obvious scar across his throat. His voice remained the same for the most part, but if he tried to lower it too much it became a bit gruff and prone to breaking. So far there'd only been one attempted kidnapping, which was surprising.

Not because it happened but why it happened. Usually when heirs were kidnapped it was to ransom their rich parents, but Ling's mother was long dead and the Emperor never cared that his children lived or died, his children had been assassinated left and right for years, he would never give in to ransom demands.

But clans would.

Clan heirs were the literal lifeblood of the respective clans. Each clan that had lost an heir over the past few years had immediately lost all their political standing. If your clan heir ended up as the Emperor, the power of the clan, the wealth of the clan, the social standing of the clan went through the roof. That was why Lifen Yun's death was such a big deal. She was the heiress of one of the most influential and powerful clans, like the Yao clan, and after her death, they were scrambling, they needed to attain power somehow.

The Yao clan had been of higher standing than the Yun clan to start with, so them attacking was expected and planned for.

Ling and Lanfan looked enough alike that someone unfamiliar with both of them would make the careless mistake of not being able to tell the difference between the two. Ling hadn't quite hit his growth spurt yet so they were practically the same height. Lanfan could tie her hair lower, shift her bangs across her face, bind her breasts and dress in the cheongsam he wore under the yellow jacket with the Yao clan's symbol on the back, and no one would be any the wiser. She could very well be Ling Yao.

Unfortunately, and unsurprisingly, Ling wasn't a fan of the plan, but they weren't expecting him to be. Bodyguards acted as protective measures, they were there to keep their charges safe. He and Lanfan might be friends, might've grown up together, but she was also there to keep him safe and alive, that was her job, that was her duty.

And, as expected, they struck.

Lanfan could've evaded it entirely, but that wasn't the point. The point was to get caught, the point was to make them think they'd succeeded.

So Lanfan collapsed to the ground, the world going black around her.


Roy had set the Elrics loose and had almost been expecting to hear something about them blowing up a building by 'accident' or men ending up in the hospital complaining of a golden-haired demon and a menacing suit of armor (hah!), and those were generally very frequent with them. But this time it was surprisingly quiet. Honestly, Roy hadn't been expecting it. He didn't know if he was more impressed or proud when Ed finally delivered a week after being assigned the mission.

It was a massive operation and with all the sectors of the military and the police collaborating, they'd managed to take it down, based off Ed's intel. Roy was mostly surprised that he'd managed to limit the amount of ass-kicking.

The Fuhrer himself had come to congratulate Roy on his subordinate's actions, smiling in that fatherly way that he did and telling him that Ed was up for consideration for the next rank up from Major, which was Lieutenant Colonel -the rank Hughes had only just recently attained. That itself was so startling, because Ed was only fourteen, and he definitely wouldn't be happy about moving up in the ranks, even if it added to his pay. The military was a temporary stopover for him until he figured out a way to get Al's body back.

Roy didn't want to be the one to bring it up to Ed, given that he would probably respond very explosively.

However, he wasn't expecting a very worried Al to wander into his office and ask him if he'd seen Ed recently.

It was like an echo of the time when Ed had been kidnapped by Barry the Chopper.

"When was the last time you saw him?" Roy asked.

"He said he was going to look into the last truck that left East City from the child traffickers," Al explained, "he thought it was heading across the Eastern Desert to restart the operation in Xing instead."

It wasn't a bad thought. The reason Amestris could've easily demolished the trafficking ring was because they had an organized force -there might be things Roy didn't like about the military, mostly Ishval related, but he couldn't deny that the organization of the military made them more effective- and, as far as Roy knew, Xing didn't have the same. It would be a very big problem for Xing if a trafficking ring set up there.

Ed liked to claim that he only cared about one thing, Al, but Roy knew that wasn't right. He'd watched him speak gently, softly with a small Ishvalan child that had been recovered with the rest of the children. He cared more than he liked to admit, and that was so like him, to go off on his own and try to stop the bad guys on his own.

But sometimes Ed needed some backup, even if he didn't want it, even if he was too fast for them to keep up to, even if it was dangerous.

"We'll find him," Roy promised, leaning up on the tips of his toes in an attempt to pat the top of Al's helmet, an action that both boys reacted positively to. "I mean, how far into the Eastern Desert could he get before snapping at them and concussing them?"

Al couldn't help but laugh.


It took two weeks to cross the Eastern Desert on foot, but it took significantly less when you were on a horse, or in a cart that was attached to a horse, then it took about a week. Lanfan wasn't even sure how far into that week she was, just that she was sure it had been going on a while.

She'd been stuck in the arm several times with a sedative, so it had to have been several days at least. The last one was starting to wear off, so she grabbing as much awareness as she could.

The cart she'd been thrown in was covered, which was probably how they'd managed to get out of Xing so easily. No one really checked covered carts that rolled behind horses, so often carrying crafts to trade. There was a crate or two of Xingese embroidered silk in the back with her, that seemed to be mostly for show.

Her eyes flicked down to her wrists as they twinged, cramped after days in the position. It was a good thing they'd put her in rope instead of chains, they were noisy and rattled far more, making escape a bit louder. Even Ling would've been able to get out of the rope, but most people didn't know that Ling had been trained by Fu, most people didn't know that he was incredibly proficient with his dao, most people didn't know that he could sense chi as well as anyone who could read the flow of the Dragon's Pulse. Ling wasn't some weak-willed prince, though there were certainly those type amongst the Emperor's children, but the assumption was very helpful.

Lanfan lay very still, listening intently and feeling the flow of chi around her.

There were the two men in the front, then there was three approaching from the other direction, and one of the chi she sensed…she didn't know quite how to describe it other than warm, like the sun. It was very strange.

She drew her hands close to her chest, one finger digging between the buttons of the cheongsam to brush against her chest bindings, digging past it to the small kunai she had hidden there before the kidnapping.

Lanfan had to still suddenly, just when she'd barely managed to grasp the kunai, her eyes sliding shut when one of her captors looked back to her before complaining to his fellow about their job and how bad it would be if the people approaching caught them with 'the Yao brat'.

She bristled at the derogatory tone in which that was said, her temper flaring up. Ling didn't deserve that. She pulled the kunai completely out and the ropes that bound her fell to the ground as she stood, the blade still clutched in her hand.

They only realized what was happening a moment too late.

There was a flash of blood and a struggle -Lanfan was sure that she'd felt something painful snap in her arm- and a moment later the horses came to a halt just as the truck -why on earth anyone thought taking an Amestrian vehicle into the Eastern Desert was a good idea, Lanfan would never know- came to a screeching stop in front of the cart, skidding and ultimately rolling a few too many times.

Lanfan pulled the bodies out of the front of the cart, tossing them onto the ground, looking over to the rolled truck, quacking with the sounds of a beating from within. She stared as an unconscious man was thrown from within, shortly followed by a second, before a third stomped out, swearing loudly.

Lanfan stared some more, surprise dawning across her face, because it was a boy about her age, skin bronzed as if blessed by the sun, with long blond hair tumbling out of its braid and eyes like gold, and on the side of his throat was the Xingese symbol for sun, the exact size and shape of the one on Ling's chest.

It probably wasn't polite to stare, but Lanfan couldn't help herself in this moment.

This was the soulmate of the young lord and she'd just witnessed him literally kick his way out of a crashed truck. There was a gash on his thigh and another on his arm and it was probably likely that in a few hours his face was going to be incredibly bruised.

His eyes fixed on hers and they both sized each other. Lanfan took note of the collapsed but still breathing bodies at his feet, he took into account the corpses at her side. Both of them nodded approvingly.

"You from Xing?" he asked in flawless Xingese and Lanfan reeled in her shock.

"Kidnapped," she offered helpfully and his expression soured before he clapped his hands together and pressed them into the sand.

Lanfan's jaw unhinged as she watched the sand crackle with electricity next to his hands before forming into rope that easily tied up the two unconscious men. Amestrian Alchemy wasn't the same as Xingese Alkahestry, Lanfan knew that, sure, they were pretty similar, but they were still rather different. But, Lanfan knew enough to know that alchemy and alkahestry couldn't be performed without an array, yet he'd done so.

"Amestris is only a few hours that way," the boy said, jerking his thumb in the direction he'd come in. "You can probably call home from there and let them know you're all right…I think Xing is several days ride away."

Lanfan grimaced, twisting to look behind her into the distance where she knew her country lied beyond how far she could see. She almost wanted to stubbornly turnaround and head back in the direction she had come, but then her stomach had rumbled.

She felt like Ling, always starving for some food but Lanfan wasn't sure how much food she'd managed to eat in the past week, it was kind of a blur.

"What's your name?" she asked instead, switching to Amestrian.

"Edward Elric," he said, finally putting a name to the face of Ling Yao's soulmate.

"Lanfan," she return, wincing and looking down at her arm and he seemed to finally take notice of his own injuries.

In a short matter of minutes, Lanfan's arm was splinted and looped into a makeshift sling while Edward's cuts were bandaged tightly.

He looked over to the crashed truck that he'd probably played more than a hand in causing with a grimace. "Don't suppose you'd give me a ride back to East City to drop these assclowns in jail, would you?"

His words startled a laugh out of Lanfan and then she found herself quite unable to stop.

"No," she finally managed to force out, "not at all."


They'd been traveling together a little over an hour, Edward –"Ed," he'd told her with another scowl, "no one calls me Edward unless they're annoyed with me, usually"– had told her a few things about himself. He was a State Alchemist in Amestris known by the title of Fullmetal Alchemist, he'd joined the Amestrian Military when he was twelve for his brother but he never explained that further, two of his limbs were automail prosthetics -which explained why the heat was affecting him so much that he appeared almost feverish, slapping a water-soaked rag over his shoulder and his thigh in an attempt to make the metal sear less into his skin-, the only reason he'd been in the desert was because he was chasing down some child traffickers that were hoping to set up shop in Xing, and someone he called 'Colonel Bastard' was going to kill him when he got back.

Lanfan almost asked if that was his father but thought better of it. Ed hadn't mentioned anything about his parents, only his brother, and they'd barely known each other an hour, it wasn't really right of her to pry.

Lanfan had told him that she was the bodyguard to the Yao Clan's heir, that they'd been expecting someone to kidnap him to leverage the clan's power so she'd played his part and been captured instead.

"Xing sounds tough," Ed said to that, straightening his fingers on the reins, keeping the horses going straight. "I mean, one of your assassins almost killed me when I was twelve, but people really kidnap people to leverage their clans?"

Lanfan started slightly at the mention of an assassin almost killing him. That sounded like the day Ling's soulmark had almost completely faded before regaining its color.

"Sometimes," she had to shake those thoughts away, realizing that he was waiting for an answer. "A lot of the clan heirs have died in recent year—" Died was putting it mildly, but it was already a heavy topic, adding assassinations on top of it probably wasn't the best course of action at this point. "—so, there's a loss of power that their clans want to regain…the Yao Clan is one of the more powerful clans, so kidnapping the young lord would certainly do that…I love Xing, but it's not as safe a place to be right now."

Ed hummed, intrigued but clearly having nothing else to contribute to the conversation. They settled into a brief silence as he mulled over what he'd learned about the current state of Xing.

"Can I ask you something?" Lanfan asked suddenly and he shrugged his flesh shoulder, the other one starting to ache with his leg port like it did right before rain, becoming agony the longer the rain went on -his phantom pains were a real bitch-, but that was ridiculous, they were in the Eastern Desert, a place that had seen rain in hundreds of years, at least not a lot of rain, not since the fall of Xerxes. "Are golden eyes and hair common in your family?"

Ed blinked his eyes at that. "Uh," he said intelligently, "my brother and I do, well, yeah, I do." His lips drew into a thin line and Lanfan wondered if it had something to do with his brother. "We inherited all our looks from the bastard Hohenheim."

His tone was bitter and full of resentment. Maybe this Hohenheim was his father?

"Why?"

"It's a Xerxian trait, I've seen a few." Lanfan had been younger, but she vividly remembered the eerie golden eyes of a girl passing through Xing. She'd given her a wink when she'd seen Lanfan looking at her with an air of curiosity.

"Xerxians?" Ed was surprised. "As in the people of Xerxes? I didn't think there were any left after Xerxes fell."

Lanfan frowned. "I don't know about how Xerxes fell, but there's definitely a few still around. There's a word for them in Amestrian that doesn't really have a Xingese counterpart…druid? Supposedly a group of them live at the ruins of Xerxes, but no one really finds anything when they go over there."

"Maybe you saw a ghost?" Even offering that suggestion made it clear his doubt to it, given his expression of dubiousness.

Lanfan thought back to the girl, dressed like she was from another century, white robes over blue, the white only covering one arm, the other exposed, a sash winding across a shoulder. She certainly did look like someone in the wrong time, but Lanfan remembered the indents left in the sand.

"I don't think so," she said finally.

Ed bit the corner of his lip, casting his eyes upwards towards the ominous storm clouds brewing overhead. "Al and I were looking into Xerxes, but most of the books we've got are in a language no one can translate…real Xerxians?"

It was almost amusing to watch his expression warp. "As far as I know."

Ed huffed, rubbing at his shoulder port a bit more aggressively. "My mother was Amestrian, that's all I know…my father up and left us when I was five, I'm not sure I want to know his lineage or his past."

Lanfan could appreciate that. "My parents were both killed performing the same job I have now," she confided in him and Ed took one look at her and said "Lanfan, you've got balls of steel."

Lanfan hadn't laughed so hard in a long time, and that laughter turned to delighted surprise when the skies opened up and began to speckle them with rain at first before gradually picking up.

"Well, that's fucking wonderful."

Oh, Ling was going to adore his fiery soulmate.


In the distance, in the remains of a once great Empire, stood a number of figures dressed in similar robes, each bearing either golden or blood red eyes, embracing the rain as it came down on them. Children shrieked in delight, men and women laughed together.

It was a good omen, Grand Cleric Logue Lowe had said and Rajul Din Basira Al-Amin had agreed.

Rain had always been a symbol of good things in Xerxes, of renewal and rebirth, centuries hadn't changed that, and they never would.

Xerxes had been buried, but its people stood tall bathed in Leto's warmth, arm in arm with the children of her sister, Ishvala.


AN: Ishval and Xerxes are going to be huge in this fic guys, we're going super AU and its going to be so much fun for you guys to find out Hohenheim's past and his sons' reactions to it…also Xing is going to be an absolute trip! I'd hoped Ed and Ling would meet this chapter, but don't worry, its coming up very soon!

As always: PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE REVIEW!