Not in chronological order, but the boys' ages will be listed at the top of every chapter.

Yuery (Harry Potter) Elric 16 months. Edward Elric 15. Ling 15

Babysitting

Edward is stuck recovering with his son, two chimeras, and his possessed friend. Greed gains a quick lesson in childcare.

Takes place in Journey Ends

Early Morning

Ed was bored. He was bored and agitated. He was bored and agitated and a little jealous. He would never admit to that last one, but he was. Greeling and Darius and Heinkel had order him to bed to heal three days ago, and completely taken over childcare. He was 'generously' allowed to have his son sleep next to him at night, but that was it. Every meal, every diaper change, every chase had been done by the other three men.

Ed knew it was silly to complain even to himself that someone was helping him when he was injured. He knew he needed to heal so that he'd be ready for Promised Day. He knew they never took his child out of his sight. Still, he missed his son. He had spent nearly every day of his son's life taking care of him! Mostly by himself. His baby was already getting big a lot faster than he would like, and now he had been sidelined for part of it.

"You're pouting so loud they can hear you in Central you know." Greeling said casually as he held Yuery and gently rocked him back to sleep. Ed had hoped he would be able to put Yuery back to bed when he started stirring around, after all it had to be around four or five in the morning. He had forgotten that Greeling doesn't sleep.

Before Ed could do more than roll over Greeling was there, lifting his son from the bed and taking him across the room to change him and give him a bottle of milk. Ed scoffed now. "I am perfectly capable of holding my child while he falls back to sleep."

"Perhaps. However, you have already proven that you can and will hide how poorly you are feeling, therefore we agree that this is for the best." Greeling said, as the baby started falling back to sleep.

"Yeah, that's another thing. You don't get to claim two votes just because you're possessing my friend. One body, one vote." Ed said as he sat up.

"Nice try kid. Even with that 'rule' you were outvoted three to one. Just lie down and focus on healing." Greeling scoffed before reaching out and gently shoving Ed back onto his pillows as if he was an unruly toddler. At least the chimera hadn't seen that.

"I agree with Greed kid. We want you healed and lugging around twenty pounds of dead weight isn't going to help." Darius said from his bunk.

"Yeah, well to bad for us all that my arm alone weighs twice that." Ed grumbled as he struggled back up and started to swing his legs off the bed.

"Keep that up and we'll be forced to remove the arm and leg to remove the added weight." Greeling said without looking up.

"You can't just take them! You don't even know how to remove them." Ed said, but he laid back down.

"I do." Darius said. "I worked with a mechanic for awhile to make ends meet. He taught me how to use the emergency release."

"…There's an emergency release?" Ed asked.

"If your mechanic was any good at all, yes. It's not a great idea in that you have to wait at least a week before reinstalling to gives your nerves a chance to settle."

"I can't believe I'm being blackmailed here." Ed said, as Greeling eased the baby back onto the bed and Ed wrapped an arm around him. "He's my son dammit."

"We just want what's best for you both Edward." Heinkel said from his own bunk and Ed huffed. They where more overbearing than his Dad.

Ed was still grumbling to himself even as he fell asleep. The other three all rolled their eyes but made sure to be quiet so the boys could sleep.

Early Afternoon

Greeling had gotten tired of listening to Ed complain that everyone was 'hold him wrong' whatever that was supposed to mean, so he took the baby outside to walk around the clearing for a while. It was really such a bother, taking care of these children. How was this going to make him rule the world anyway? 'So, let me out, I'll take care of Yuery for a while, and you won't have to deal with him.' Ling said inside their head.

"No, not happening. Nice try kid, but Yuery's mine." Greed said. Like he was going to just hand over this kid to anyone. He'd give him back to Ed. Maybe. Eventually. But he wasn't sharing with anyone else if he could help it.

This kid was awesome. Greed knew, and Ling agreed, that he was obviously using magic. To keep this under their hat, he needed to keep the baby happy and the kid from throwing a fit over the need to heal. Honestly, you would think the boy would know better than to push his body to far given the number of scars he was sporting.

Before the annoying little prince could weigh in again, Yuery squealed and started squirming as he pointed at a fluffy rabbit ahead of them in the path. "It's not happening kid. If I lost, you even for a moment there is no way I'd be able to keep your father in bed."

Yuery pouted but settled back into his arms, the rabbit having hopped off into the underbrush when he spoke. Greed then took the baby to the center of the small yard created by the cleared trees around the cabin. He let the kid loose, unconcerned about his speed, confident that he could catch the toddler well before he got himself into trouble.

'Play with him, don't just watch him wander around. He'll be easier to handle if you wear him out a bit.' Ling supplied as Greed watched the baby wander around the yard babbling to himself and picking up sticks.

"What do you know about taking care of kids? You're a prince." Greed scoffed.

'Apparently more than you do. I've been watching Ed and Mustang take care of this boy for months. I watched the mothers and caregivers of my clan care for the children all my life. You can't just ignore them; you need to play with him.'

"How do you even play with someone so small?"

'Let me out, I'll show you how.' Ling said and Greed could feel his eyeroll. It wasn't Greed's fault that this was his first time dealing with a tiny human. It's not like there was a ton of mothers busting down the doors of his club to find a babysitter.

With a sigh, he released control to Ling, who immediately drooped to the ground and called Yuery over to himself. Yuery wandered over, and Ling snatched him up tossing him lightly in the air to make him laugh before tickling him. He ignored the feeling of Greed watching carefully, so that next time he could take care of the kid himself. Ling released the baby, who ran off giggling, only to return as soon as Ling called out to him to repeat the game.

Greed allowed Ling to play with the baby for roughly half an hour before taking control. He played another two rounds of the game Ling had invented before scooping the kid up one final time to take him inside. It was starting to grow colder and windy, and the last thing they needed was a sick baby.

Early Evening

Graciously, Greeling, Darius, and Heinkel had allowed Edward out of bed to sit with them for dinner. Greeling had even given him 'permission' to hold Yuery in his lap and feed him. Edward wanted to yell at them over how they were treating him, but he feared they would go through with the threat of tying him to the bed to make him behave.

Yuery was sitting in his lap, happily babbling Ed was able to catch enough of what the boy said to know he was talking about playing in the yard this afternoon. Ed was nodding along with exclamations of "Really" and "No way" as he fed bits of food to his excited child.

"He's going to need a bath tomorrow." Edward commented. "If one of you would fill up the washtub, I can take care of it after breakfast."

"No, no. It's fine, I'll bathe him. You shouldn't strain your stomach like that." Greeling said.

Greed had no idea why both Edward and Ling were laughing so hard at the idea. The kid was tiny, how hard could bathing him be?

Mid-Morning

Hard. It turned out bathing one tiny toddler could be very, very hard. The baby clearly had a strong aversion to water, something no one had felt the need to tell him even after the laughter had died last night. Ed suggested, from his place on the bed, that singing would help. Ling suggested, from inside his head, to offer the kid a washcloth to play with. Heinkel left the cabin altogether to gather wood, the traitor. Darius stood on hand holding a towel.

Greed managed to wash the squirming, screaming child in under five minutes before passing him off to Darius. Yuery then clung to the chimera tightly while glaring at Greed and muttering to himself. Greed grumbled as he hefted the tub and carried it out to dump in the yard. When he returned the child was dried and dressed but still pressed against Darius and glaring distrustfully and Greed.

"Yeah, he's always like this. He HATES baths. That's why I said I would take care of it. He'll be over it in about ten or twenty minutes." ED said from the bed, still laughing a bit at Greed's expense. Greed decided right then and there that the next bath was going to be one of his minions because he was not going through that again.