If anybody's wondering, the guy from the last chapter panicked and chose to kill Ed to silence him before he could say anything about the people involved. He would then have shot himself, believing that he died for a good cause.

At least that's what he was planning…

Go Roy!

And now for the world's most awkward interrogation, complete with cameras, a protective Roy and a drugged Edward…

Enjoy!

Chapter twenty-three

"Ed, how are you?" Roy asked, still afraid that Ed had been hurt. "Are you in pain?"

"No." The kid sounded tired. "Just … heavy? … Slow … brain'sall."

"Do you think you're going to fall asleep?"

"No."

"Okay, Ed. Listen, you're safe now. Just leave the rest to me."

Roy suddenly heard the click of a gun and turned his head around sharply. A frightened worker was obviously trying to play hero. "P-please, General! St-step away from the b-boy!" The man had tears running down his cheeks and Roy realised that he had just killed a man in cold blood right before these people. He had killed one of their colleagues and was hugging the child he was supposed to have tortured to death.

This didn't really look good. Even if he killed the man to save Ed, these people had believed for over a week now that Roy was a torturer and a kidnapper. They wouldn't exactly be persuaded by Roy burning a man to death to save Ed's life.

"I-I'll sh-shoot you!" The man was trembling. Roy could see a few scared people moving slowly towards the doors. He hoped Greg would be able to persuade them to stay because they really didn't need their plans to be messed up even further.

"Believe me, I'm not a torturer! I would never hurt Ed!" Roy said, holding him closer. "I was framed by someone in the military and they were the same ones that ordered him dead." He was quickly scanning the room for anyone else looking to kill Ed. He had to avoid hurting any of them if at all possible. He needed to build trust to get this article published, especially now that Edward was hardly able to speak.

"And where is Alphonse Elric?" another journalist asked. The crowd seemed to be split between people who were sure he'd kill them, and people who were willing to kill for a good story.

"Al is safe."

"Where have you been hiding the boys?"

"I haven't been hiding them. We've been in hiding until we could expose this military group without them going after Ed and Al!" Roy was getting anxious and angry. These people were still trying to make him out to be some kind of criminal.

"Why would you hug your subordinate?" another person asked. "How exactly is your relationship to Edward Elric?" They sounded suspicious, making Roy feel a shiver going down his spine with what the question implied.

"Just what the hell do you think of me?! I'm not some damn pedophile!" Roy shouted.

"So the feelings are mutual?" the person prompted, making Roy's blood boil. Ed was still half his age and Roy was straight. Besides, it made some very disturbing pictures form in his mind that he'd never ever want to imagine again.

"No … way … in … hell," Ed growled weakly.

"I told you to release him!" the man with the gun said, possibly gaining some nerve from the thoughts of Roy doing something like that to Ed. "I will shoot you!"

"Tell'm … Dad," Ed said, obviously getting scared that Roy would get shot otherwise. As well as being too drugged to actually think clearly.

Silence.

"Did he call him "Dad?""

"He did!"

"He's their father?"

"Biologically?"

"Do you people believe me now?" Roy asked exasperatedly. "They're trying to frame me because of my work in Ishbal. There's a big military organisation who are killing and torturing officers and Ishbalans in order to keep the Ishbalans away from their holy land! Now get that gun away from me and let me lay my drugged son down on a couch!" Roy was thoroughly pissed off that it was that moment his body decided to have a coughing attack.

Roy's mind was caught up in two things: coughing and trying to not aim it at Ed.

At least until someone suddenly offered him a cup of water.

Roy accepted the cup and drank it down in one gulp. He looked around. People were getting to their feet, the gun lay forgotten on the floor and most of them were instead looking at the charred corpse on the floor, many of them crying.

Roy put Ed carefully down on the floor and clapped his hands in order to transmute a kind of wooden box around the body in order to at least cover it up as they worked. He then swiftly lifted Ed up into his arms, his head resting against Roy's chest.

A large group of workers were still just staring at him, but at least they didn't accuse him of any unspeakable crimes anymore. Instead, there was just a lot of cameras flashing as he stood there with Ed in his arms.

"Looks like we're going to take up the whole newspaper tomorrow, kid," Roy commented to Ed.

"Crap."

Roy smiled, earning even more camera flashes. "Okay, everyone, we'll give you complete dibs on the story as long as you all stay here and don't say a word to anyone else. And then we'll tell you everything." Roy tried taking control of the situation. A few people were still looking scared, but others had stars in their eyes at the thought of having dibs on this. Especially a short, middle-aged, brown-suited man with a large brown moustache covering his mouth. He was grinning widely as he strode forwards.

"Hello, General! I am the editor, Thomas Smith. It sounds like we have a very fine deal here, then, but I suggest we do the interview upstairs because of the … body."

Roy sighed, wanting these people to understand something important. "I know that man was your coworker, but he was going to shoot Ed, and if he wanted to do that, then he was probably fine with Ed being tortured too. Those people delivered to me what I thought was Ed's head, the eyes gouged out and the teeth pulled out one by one. That man was fine with being a part of an organisation that would do something like that to a kid while he was alive. If you'd rather have him alive than Ed, then that's your problem, not mine."

The workers seemed horrified. Roy knew for a fact that the eyes and teeth being removed had never reached the newspapers before, and a lot of people had gone from crying to looking sick and many were scowling at the wooden box covering the body.

The editor then pointed Roy towards the staircase and the whole group, a total of about twenty people, went up the stairs to a kind of conference room. There they all sat down and Roy ended up with Ed sitting on his lap, looking a bit dazed. Roy seriously hoped that the drug would stop working soon. Seeing Ed being so helpless and struggling to keep his mind working, was a very sad and frightening thing to see.

"Okay, everyone, ask one question each, choose your own focus and then you can merge your articles together later," the editor announced to the room at large.

"How did this happen?" A woman said at the far corner, a notebook and pen in front of her.

"We were attacked by the organisation in the middle of the night as we were walking through Ishbal. They set fire to our tent and they knocked me unconscious. Ed was however brought to a cave where Major General Carl Freeman decided that he'd tell him in detail the ways he was going to be tortured. Ed was then drugged and he woke up with partial memory loss from the incident, while a fake head was lying on the floor in front of him. They had cut off his hair in order to make the fake head as realistic as possible. They then delivered it to me in a box. I woke up back in my own house thinking that it had all been a nightmare just to find that box at the bottom of my staircase." Roy knew that he would be sharing a lot of feelings he would rather keep close to his chest, but right now he had a whole country to win back, which meant that every gruesome detail was key. They wanted to know how he felt as a parent. He really couldn't see how he'd avoid it, not anymore. So if he was going to win everybody's heart, then he would tell them at least a bit. He didn't want to relive it, though. He never wanted to do that.

"And how did that make you feel?" the next journalist asked predictably.

"How do you think? I found my kid's head inside a cardboard box, his eyes some bloody pits and his lips sunken in because of the missing teeth. And they even left me a note telling me they'd do the same to Alphonse and my other subordinates if I ever told anyone about this."

"Are you their biological father?"

"Of course not. I am only fourteen years older than Edward."

"So when did your fatherly instincts begin?"

God, this is like talking to Hughes. He must be laughing at me from beyond the grave right now.

Ed was turning furiously red.

"About half a year ago I saw how our relationship was changing, and with the events this Spring, I decided that I should let it be known before it was too late."

Shit. I just said that to the newspapers. Ed and Al are going to need bodyguards after this.

Roy knew he had to be blushing himself by now, but there was no going back. Ed was making a constant sound somewhere between humming and a drill where he sat.

"But Colonel Elric was in fact alive and well? How long before you found out?"

"Not until the day after the funeral."

"How was it like to believe him to be dead for a whole week while looking after his brother?"

"Devastating."

Roy could see a few tears in some of the many faces listening with rapt attention while scribbling intensely.

"Could you elaborate?"

Roy sighed, not even able to look at them anymore. This was hell. He may need to regain the Amestrians's trust, but this was one hell of a price to pay for it.

Ed hummed even louder as Roy began speaking.