JJ is almost falling asleep at Ed's bedside when the terrible red glow of his tattoo finally fades and he groans, twisting on the bed.

"You're finally awake," she says, relieved. "Derek, go get Al," she tells him. He had dozed off an hour or so ago. He jolts awake, sees Ed waking up.

He jolts awake, sees Ed waking up, and says "On it." He doesn't ask anything else, knowing where Al probably is by now without saying anything else.

Ed buries his head in his pillow and groans, reminding JJ of her boys when they don't want to wake up. After making another unhappy-to-be-awake sound, he turns to face JJ and cracks an eye open. Despite how long he's been sleeping, he still looks exhausted and his eyes are red-rimmed. "How long have I been out?" he asks.

JJ looks at her watch reflexively. "Probably about sixteen hours," she says. She hears feet thudding down the hall, and Al bursts into the room, Derek close behind him. He makes a beeline to Ed, grabbing his flesh arm and checking the wrist, sighing in relief when he sees the tattoo is finally no longer glowing.

"Sixteen hours?" Ed asks. "Really?" He waits until Al releases his wrist to try to sit up. He lumbers up like he's still half asleep and his limbs are heavy. She wonders if that's part of the sleep or if there's some holdover from whatever he's doing with Mustang.

"Yes, really," Al says, his voice and face reflecting the same concern that JJ feels. "I originally suggested letting you sleep as long as you needed when we saw the tattoo was glowing. Was the General sleeping that whole time too?"

For a long moment, Ed just looks down at his wrist. After watching it glow that sickly red for so long, it feels almost unreal that it's not glowing anymore, almost looks wrong. Except JJ knows that's wrong, knows that humans are not supposed to glow, but the tattoo is still that red that seems too red, that seems other and it makes her skin crawl a little bit.

"Yeah, he was," he says. He looks distracted still, like he isn't quite with them.

"Is he okay?" Al asks.

There's another hesitation before Ed shakes his head. "I don't know. I think so. I'd know if he were in any real danger, I'm pretty sure. But he had a fight with Kimblee, and he was hurt."

"Kimblee?" Al asks, his voice rising in that very particular tone people get when they're surprised by things and not in a good way. "And how hurt is hurt?"

Ed shrugs. "Something with his eye, he thinks. It bugged him enough to carry over to the dream." He rubs his eyes, and though he might be waking up, he didn't really look any more awake.

"What did you talk about for sixteen hours?" JJ asks, careful to make it a curious question rather than a demanding one.

Running a hand through his hair, Ed meets her eyes squarely. Staring into those supernatural eyes is not any less unnerving several days in than it was the first time she saw them. "We were talking about how to get everyone home." His gaze releases her to move over to Derek as well.

"You know how to get us home?" JJ asks, almost gasping with desperation. She can't help but notice that Al is watching his brother as if he doesn't approve, which makes her wonder what they've been talking about.

Ed rubs his metal hand over the tattoo on his wrist again, then sighs. "Soulbonds," he says, grim and unyielding.

"No," Al says automatically.

"It's the only way!"

"No, it's the fastest way," Al contradicts. "You already know how to do the soulbond—"

"On myself, yeah—"

Al actually raises his voice to speak over Ed. "—So you're just looking for the fastest way to get the General back."

Glaring at his brother as if he feels like Al has betrayed him, Ed says, "It's not just about getting Roy home. It's about getting JJ and Morgan home too. JJ's got two boys. How long do you think their mother should be missing."

JJ does not need to be told that Ed just hit with an extremely low blow, because Al flinches, and then his expression firms. The look he sets on Ed makes Ed flinch back as well.

"Sorry," Ed says unprompted, and JJ doesn't actually know the last time he actually voluntarily apologized quite like that. "I might have been sleeping for the past sixteen hours, but I feel like I'm at the end of a three-day binge. Not an excuse, I know," he says, raising a hand to forestall Al. "Just… an explanation. It is true though."

Crossing his arms, still looking disappointed, Al stares at Ed for a long moment before he asks, "What else?"

"W-what else?"

She happens to know from first-hand experience that Ed is an excellent liar, but apparently his brother is his kryptonite because every bit of guile and poker face she's used to are completely absent while Ed practically flails. Under other circumstances, it'd be funny.

"What else," Al repeats, implacable, "are you not telling us? You didn't spend sixteen hours talking to the General about that alone."

This time Ed mirrors Al's body language and crosses his own arms. "And who says we weren't…" he trails, flushing a little. "You know."

"While under normal circumstances, I wouldn't doubt that you and the General would take advantage of supernaturally enhanced libidos—"

"Al!" Ed exclaims, scandalized.

Al continues as if Ed hadn't said anything. "—these aren't normal circumstances, and I don't believe you."

Putting his head in his hands, Ed groans. "How can you even say that with a straight face?"

An eyebrow rises, unimpressed. "Brother, I'm married. I know about sex—"

"You're my cute baby brother, and you know nothing about sex, and you never will."

Al rolls his eyes, but a grin seems to tug at his mouth in spite of himself. "I've also gotten to know the General's sisters pretty well in your absences. It was quite… educational."

"Why would Mustang's sisters be educational?" Derek asks, sounding confused.

Ed's shoulders slump further, and even with his face covered, he looks like he wants to hide even without seeing his face. He mumbles something JJ is sure she must have heard wrong.

"Did you just say brothel?" she asks, trying to figure out what else she might have heard.

Making a sound of frustration, Ed lifts his head out of his hands and says, "Roy grew up in a brothel," as if it pains him. "His 'sisters—'" He makes air quotes. "—are the girls—women—that work with his aunt."

JJ stares, trying to process this new information.

"Are you saying your… partner," Derek manages somehow to make the word sound neutral, "was also a sex worker?" She's impressed—somehow none of that question came out judgmental, more like someone who just isn't sure they heard correctly, which is something she emphatically relates to at the moment.

"No," Ed says, sighing again. "At least, if Roy ever worked, he never mentioned it to me, but considering I know his aunt and his sisters, I don't see any reason he'd lie if he did. Can we please not do the 'he's a predator preying on you' deal again?"

She and Derek exchange a glance because the fact that Ed's already questionable partner has that kind of history really does raise even more questions, but Mustang isn't here, and they've probably already beat this horse to death and then some.

Even so, she can see Derek nearly chomping at the bit to ask, but really, Ed is going to do absolutely anything he feels necessary to protect Mustang. Alienating him over this, over a decision he made a long time ago and is bullheadedly determined to stick with, is just a recipe for disaster. "So that aren't you telling us about this? Other than we need to soulbond?" JJ asks, redirecting the conversation. She knows that Derek wants to ask, and she knows that he means well, but they've got bigger problems than two adults in a relationship they're emphatic is consensual.

Ed glances around the room, then says, "Close the door."

Derek shoots her another look before he does so. "Okay," he says, planting himself in front of it like he's guarding it. The action seems to put Ed a little more at ease.

"It's not just sending JJ and Morgan home, and getting Roy back here," he says carefully. He braces himself as if for a blow as he meets Al's eyes. "Hughes is alive."

JJ looks at Derek, wondering why the name Hughes sounds familiar as Al goes almost white.

"Al?" she asks, alarmed by how pale he looks.

Al leans on the end of the bed. "That's impossible," he says, low and very certain.

"Not for Truth it's not," Ed points out gently.

Shaking his head as if he can't hear this, Al says, "No, it's not."

"Roy's convinced it's really him," Ed says. "He swears it's not a homunculus, that there's no sign of an ouroboros on him. He remembers everything up until he died." This time Ed shakes his head like he can barely believe it. "It's him."

Dragging a hand over his face in a motion that makes Al seem about a decade older than he actually is, he braces himself and says, "That makes for a better trade." It isn't a happy tone, but it is a serious one.

"Trade?" JJ asks.

The brothers turn and look at them, but Al speaks. "Brother thinks that he can use a soulbond between you two and your loved ones, and—I assume—his own bond with the General and then link General Hughes and Gracia, and use those bonds to pull everyone through." He looks back at Ed. "Did I get that about right?"

"Yeah," Ed says, sounding relieved. "I know how risky it is, but that's why Roy and I spent so much time together. We had to alter the soulbonds to make them unique enough to find their mates but also make them be, you know, soulbonds."

Al doesn't look any more pleased, but he clearly is considering it seriously. "That makes sense," he says slowly, almost grudgingly. "But how do you open the gateway? What's the price of both linking everyone and exchanging them?"

"The transmutation that pulled us here not only opened the gate here and resurrected General Hughes, it also made a red stone," Ed says.

JJ is really getting tired of them using words that she swears she understands but feeling like she's listening to a foreign language. From the expression on Al's face, whatever a red stone is, it isn't good.

"What's a red stone?" Derek asks.

"A false Philosopher's Stone," Ed says. "It's made from the souls of people."

Glancing between them, seeing how grave and unhappy they both look, JJ does not feel excited by whatever this is. "So… more soul alchemy?" she asks, the red calling to mind the glowing of Ed's tattoo.

"In a way," Ed says, though he still sounds grim.

"So the General can use the stone on his side," Al says in the kind of voice that says he's thinking aloud. "But what will you use?"

Ed doesn't answer and doesn't look at him.

Al's eyes sharpen on him. "Brother." It's somewhat a relief that that particular warning tone seems universal.

Ed closes his eyes, shoulders slumping. "My Gate, again."

"Absolutely not," Al says.

When Ed looks up this time, his eyes are defiant. "It's not your call to make."

"You can't give up your alchemy again," Al says. "Who even knows if Truth will let you!"

"What other option do we have?" Ed demands, then, before giving Al a real chance to answer, he continues, "I gave it up once, I can give it up again. I don't need my alchemy, Al. I need to be here, to be home, to see Eden grow up, to see Xerxes rebuilt. But most of all, I need Roy."

Pain so visceral, JJ wonders if he's actually injured passes over Al's face. "But your alchemy…"

"You were worth it," Ed says, his eyes almost ablaze with his certainty.

"And you think the General is worth it too," Al says softly, almost regretfully. It's the first time she's seen any indication that Al might have reservations about their relationship.

Ed doesn't say anything in response to that, but he doesn't really need to. Every line of his body says it is, says that any price is worth paying. The determination she sees in Ed's eyes is borderline fanatical, and it sends a chill through her.

"Would that be enough?" Derek asks, breaking the tension a bit. "To move four people between worlds?"

"It was enough to get Al's body back," Ed says. "The cost of that transmutation was a lot higher."

Al presses his lips together, his eyes looking oddly misty before he nods. "You look like shit," is what he says though, stepping forward to push Ed back. "Get some real rest. We can talk about this when you wake up."

Ed goes, but he seems distressed. "It was my fuckup. It's my price to pay, Al."

"Just… let me think about it, for a bit."

He starts to walk toward the door but before Derek can step out of the way, Ed says, "Al?" Al looks back at him, but doesn't say anything. "It gets JJ home to her kids, Morgan home to his partner, Roy back to me, and Hughes back to Gracia and Elicia. You can't tell me that wouldn't be worth it."

Al's jaw gets very tight, and when he speaks, his voice is breathy, like he's having to force it out. "Let me think about it." He doesn't say anything to Derek, but Derek moves out of the way and lets him leave. He looks at JJ as if she somehow can make more sense of all of this than he can, but she just gives him a helpless look, so he turns his attention toward Ed instead.

"You should get some real sleep, like Al said," Derek says. "We can talk about what a soulbond means in the morning."

Ed doesn't look happy, but he doesn't argue. He must truly be exhausted because he drops off in minutes. They've spent most of the day stressed and waiting for him to wake up, and now that he's okay, the stress crash is coming hard and fast, so they crawl into their own beds.

Despite her own exhaustion, it takes JJ a long time to fall asleep.