Never Not So

He knew he was in a hospital bed before he even opened his eyes. The smell was unmistakable (disinfectant, and what he sort of assumed was the scent of souls being trampled by painfully white walls) and the bed was too stiff to be anything other than something hooked up to a million tubes and wires.

So, hospital. And if he hadn't had the smell and rock-like mattress to tip him off, he probably would have reached the same conclusion due to the fact that everything everywhere hurt.

"Ack," he said, without opening his eyes. Because he wasn't one hundred percent sure that wouldn't eject themselves screaming from his skull if he tried. "What the hell. Was there a bear? Please tell me there was a bear."

"Seriously, Fullmetal? You fight a lot of woodland creatures in your free time?"

Oh, look. Now his eardrums were hurting too. How magical.

"Noooo," he moaned. "Why are you here? If you're here to wring your hands at my bedside, I have to tell you two things. One: that makes me uncomfortable as your subordinate, and not just because one little slip of your hands could light my face on fire. Two: If you're actually here instead of muffling manly tears into Hawkeye's shoulder like I know you do all the other times I end up hurt, I must be actually about to die or something. And I really don't want you to be the last thing I see. So. Go away now."

"You're so much more fun to be around when you're not talking," Mustang said pleasantly.

Edward growled a little, and then stopped because his throat felt like sandpaper. Cautiously, he squinted open one eye, and when it didn't immediately immolate his socket, he blinked himself back into awareness.

"What happened?" he asked, glancing down at his own sheet-covered frame. Already, he could feel the heavy tug of plaster, and that never boded well.

"You broke your human arm," Mustang said. "And gave yourself a concussion. Which is impressive, because I didn't think anything could actually dent that thick skull of yours. Also, you're bruised pretty much everywhere, and there was some talk of internal bleeding. Which may be why it probably feels like somebody took a pogo stick to your insides."

"You're so poetic, so lyrical," Ed sneered, even as he secretly admitted that it was a fairly accurate metaphor. "I see now why women risk so many diseases just to be close to you. Also, both of my arms are human arms. You ass."

"Charming. Also, before you ask, your brother is out in the hallway with Hawkeye, talking to the doctors."

Ed, who would never admit that he'd been about to ask now that Mustang had called him on it, nodded.

"And they left you to babysit me?" he asked. "Great. Still doesn't explain why you're at the hospital in the first place."

He turned his head, now that he was reasonably sure that he could muster up a decent sneer. Only to discover that Mustang wasn't standing at his bedside, wringing his hands and weeping manly tears.

He was in the bed. The bed next to Edward's.

What?

"Bastard, if you're trying to seduce the nursing staff by throwing yourself all over the bed, I will actually kill you."

"Oh, sure. This gaping hole in my shoulder, all wrapped in bandages? It's the seduction tool of legends."

Edward sat up so fast that several areas of his body screamed obscenities in unison. But once the pretty little stars and sailor language cleared out from around his head, he was able to take in Mustang's prone form. He was pretty well covered by his blankets, but Ed could see the absolute lack of color in his face, the deep purple bags under his eyes, and the thick packing of bandages wrapped underneath his thin hospital shirt.

"You," he started. "What…?" But then several images flashed in front of his eyes at once.

"Seriously, why are you here?"

"I know you, Edward. Your brother is across town running errands with Hawkeye. The rest of the team is out drilling the new recruits for the Fuhrer. And this is the first clue you've picked up in a while. If someone doesn't tag along to watch your back, you'll frolic your way into your very own death scene."

"Bastard. I don't frolic. And I'm not looking out for you, okay? This is important, and I can't waste time taking care of your geriatric ass."

"I never thought you would."

The old, broken down church on the outskirts of Central had looked abandoned. Should have been abandoned; the painted windows had been smashed and the trinkets taken ages ago. All Ed was looking for was the library; few thieves thought to take the books as well.

Of course, that wasn't what they'd found inside.

Mustang's eyes were blank. Expressionless. Totally calm as he watched the rage creep its way across Edward's face.

"You are so stupid and I am going to-" Edward started to hiss, but the opening door drowned out the rest of his obviously winning death threat.

"Brother!" Alphonse said, easing his large metal frame through the door. "You're awake!"

"Hey, Al," Edward said, shooting one last poisonous glare in the Colonel's direction before easing himself back onto the bed. "Yeah, I'm up. I'm fine."

"No!" the younger Elric disagreed cheerfully. "You're not fine; you're an idiot and once you're well again, I'm probably going to punch you in the face!"

"Bwuh," Edward said blankly, and refused to turn his head even a little bit, because he just knew that bastard was smirking over the similar theme of Elric violence.

"Brother, why didn't you wait for me?" Alphonse continued, less cheerfully murderous now, and just murderous instead. "I know you would have gone alone if the Colonel hadn't caught you leaving."

Ed squirmed in his hospital bed (and quickly decided that sheepish gestures were also on the list of things that caused his body to consider mutiny).

"I just wanted to check it out, Al," he said. "Before we lost any more time. It's not a big deal."

"Gonna have to disagree with you there, Boss," Havoc said, stepping into the room and up to Al's side. "That hospital bed you're lying on sort of throws a wrench in your argument."

"It was just an abandoned church!" Ed protested. "I didn't know it was going to be dangerous or anything."

Alphonse's giant hands curled into fists, and Ed took momentary comfort in the fact that his baby brother probably wouldn't try to hit him until the cast came off.

Probably.

"Of course it was dangerous," Al said. "You were there. It could have been a harmless building full of fluffy kittens before you showed up. It still would have tried to kill you when you got there, Brother. Because that is just how things happen when you are around."

"Point," Havoc and Mustang said.

"Look, Al. I'm sorry, okay?" he said it quickly, because even though he could always say the words to his baby brother (who deserved apologies from him until his tongue shriveled up and fell out of his mouth) the bastard was still present and Ed was on a personal mission to never say it to him, ever. "Next time, I'll wait for you. We'll go together. Although, the only place I want us to go right now is somewhere with a bed. Can we head back to the dorms?"

"What?" Al said, a little softer now that Ed had admitted his wrongs. "Brother, you can't go anywhere. You're hurt. You're bruised inside. They need to keep you here for a couple of days to make sure it doesn't turn into something worse."

"Aw, come on Al. You know how much I hate hospitals. I promise I'll sleep and stuff if you take me out of here."

Havoc leaned over and tapped his nose. Ed briefly considered biting him.

"It's really cute how you think we'll actually believe that, Boss," he said. "We all know you. The second you've gotten a little sleep and some food, you'll be crunched up in the library. Or out exploring that abandoned church again."

"No I…won't?"

"Brother. Wrong punctuation."

Ed folded his arms (carefully, because one was metal and one was covered in a heavy white cast…judging from the look on Havoc's face, he looked pretty hilarious) and sulked.

"I'm guessing I have to stay as well?" Mustang asked from the other bed.

"You've got a hole in your shoulder, Colonel," Havoc answered. "They missed all your important bits, but yeah. It warrants you a little Hospital Vacation."

Mustang sighed. Edward flinched. He could feel Alphonse staring at him (with non-existent eyes…his brother was talented) and so he turned his face away.

"Fine," Mustang said. "Please have the hospital staff make up a private room."

"Nope," Havoc said, and the unholy glee saturating that one word brought Edward's face back from the perusal of the wall.

"What d'you mean, nope?" Ed repeated. "I have to stay a few days. Bastard has to stay a few days. We can't share, in any meaning of the word, so hurry up and wheel him out of here before I hit him with my cast."

Al curled his giant fingers around Ed's plastered wrist, as if to prevent any cast-hitting.

"I'm sorry, Brother," he said. "But the hospital's all full. They don't have any open rooms, not even for high ranking military officers. And because they brought you and the Colonel in together, you get to share a room."

" 'Get to'," Ed breathed, voice gone soft with horror. "Al. Alphonse. Why are you making it sound like this is a reward? Do you want me to cry?"

"I have so much money riding on this," Havoc said, practically spinning in his excitement. "Fuery's riding on you guys working out your differences and emerging from this hospital all respectful and stuff."

"Fuery is going to get murdered someday," Mustang said, eyes squeezed shut against what appeared to be great emotional pain. "By something fluffy and warm. Shot in the chest by a puppy with a sob story, that's what's going to happen."

"Al," Ed said, and grabbed desperately at his brother's hand with his uninjured arm. "I promise. I swear. If you get me out of this, I'll do everything you say. I'll take naps. I'll eat soup. I'll drink milk, Alphonse. Just don't leave me here with him."

Alphonse laughed, and patted at his brother's hand.

"Don't worry, Brother. Who knows? Maybe you and the Colonel really can get to know each other a little better."

In the middle of the room, Havoc started laughing hard enough to do a little internal bruising of his own, and Mustang looked like he was seriously contemplating knocking himself unconscious with the bedpan.

…

Day One

"Fullmetal. I'm telling you this in all seriousness. I respect you as an alchemist…occasionally. And as a soldier…almost never. But you should know that if you try to take my pudding cup one more time, I will have Hawkeye shoot you in the face."

"….Seriously, Bastard? That's your moral line? Murder is justified in the face of stolen snacks?"

"Chocolate pudding is not a snack, Edward. It's a serious business."

"You are a terrible person."

"Insult me all you want. Just stay away from my pudding cup."

….

Edward woke to the taste of his own blood in his mouth, and the feel of his heart trying to pump its way out of his chest. Breath tearing, lungs screaming, he shot upwards in his bed, and immediately let out a half-scream of pain and surprise as the state of his body shrieked its way back inside his nightmare-crowded brain.

Dimly, he was aware of the rustling in the bed beside him. But he was too busy trying to regulate his breathing in a way that didn't make his bruised lungs ache inside his chest to notice, or care. He dropped his sweaty forehead into the palm of his automail hand, only to hiss and jerk back as the concussion on his head made its presence known.

He almost screamed again, when the lights flipped on. He wasn't back from the nightmare place yet, the visions in his head were too real, the adrenaline in his blood too raw. He crowded back against his mattress, automail hand curling into a tight fist, teeth bared at the nurse that rushed to his bedside.

"Mr. Elric," she said, hands fluttering gently as she checked his cast, his bandages. "I heard a noise. What is it? Are you in pain?"

Ed struggled to absorb her words, to uncurl his fist, to understand her as something non-threatening. But it was hard, so hard, with so much screaming still ringing inside his skull.

"Mr. Elric?" she repeated, and glanced toward the door. To get a doctor, Ed realized numbly. Because she thought he was in pain, going into shock. Broken and weaker than he already was.

"He's fine," another voice said, and Ed gasped at the familiarity of it. "It's my fault. I was giving him a hard time. He got a little riled up."

"Oh," the nurse said, turning towards the other bed, and it was obvious that she didn't believe the bastard. The doubt weighed down her voice like rocks in water. "Well. I suppose, if you say so, Colonel."

"Yes. Thank you for coming to check."

"Can I get you anything while I'm here?"

"I think my water pitcher is empty, and I'm feeling a little dry. If it's not too much trouble?"

"Of course."

As she left, Edward curled his uninjured fingers in the sheets, and breathed. After a while, he laid back down on his side. No big deal. It happened sometimes, especially when he was sleeping in an unfamiliar bed (which really sucked, because so many of the beds were unfamiliar nowadays).

The nurse came back after a bit, and Edward fell asleep to the sound of Mustang's voice, thanking her for the service.

….

Day Two

"Bored. So, so bored."

"I'm not here to entertain you, Fullmetal."

"Don't I know it. You couldn't keep my attention if you tried."

"Trust me. All the times you dozed off during debriefings? Got that message across quite effectively."

Ed tapped his automail fingers against the metal rail of his bed, filling the air with a soft pinging sound, and wondered if it was possible to actually expire from inactivity.

"I'm going to make a sheet-rope and fling myself out the window," he decided.

"Ah, yes," Mustang said. "A valid cure for medically induced boredom: breaking your remaining limbs and thereby lengthening your hospital stay."

"Keep that logic crap on your side of the room, okay, Bastard?"

"Ask them for a book, Fullmetal," Mustang said, and then went back to silently communing with his own inner Bastardry, or whatever the hell he was doing over there.

After a while, he did.

They brought him a coloring book, and crayons.

Mustang laughed so hard, and struggled so valiantly to keep it silent, that he almost suffocated.

It started as revenge. Ed tore one of the coloring book pages out of the book (scowling at it as he did so) and folded it into a fairly basic paper airplane, which he then launched at the Colonel's bed.

A few minutes later, the plane came sailing back, re-folded into a much fancier model. It bopped Edward right in the mouth. He stared at it for a minute, his lips curling into what Alphonse called his 'Crazy-making-explosions-will-happen' smile, before ripping another page out of the coloring book.

By the time Hawkeye walked in, carrying a stack of paperwork for the Colonel to peruse, alchemically enabled paper airplanes were rocketing from Edward's bed to the Colonel's, who proceeded to blow them up with a simple snap of his fingers (he'd sweet-talked his alchemy gloves out of the nurses within one hour of his hospital vacation…Ed suspected he slept with them under his pillow). Ed was cackling, golden eyes bright and giddy, looking all the world like a typical fifteen year old boy. Mustang wasn't laughing, but the smirk curling his lips reeked of adolescent arrogance.

Hawkeye almost hesitated to put a stop to it. She briefly considered easing back out of the room. They were laughing and smiling, after all, and no one was bleeding yet. But Edward's planes were getting more and more ambitious and aggressive, and the Colonel's flames were getting bigger every time the younger alchemist let out a whoop of glee. And Hawkeye was well acquainted with the consequences of letting two bored geniuses play with their powers for too long (it had taken days to convince the secretaries to come back to their desks, and had only been ultimately accomplished by Hawkeye swearing up and down that the Colonel would never aid his subordinates in practical jokes ever again).

So she stepped forward and said, "Sir," in her blandest, blankest voice.

Both alchemists flinched, and the paper airplanes went crashing to the floor.

"Lieutenant," Mustang said, with what he probably thought was a charming smile. Hawkeye ignored it, and paid attention to the mild panic in his eyes instead.

Edward decided that abandoning the field altogether was the better option, and burrowed under his covers for a really heroic attempt at feigning sleep.

"I see you've recovered enough to utilize your free time, Colonel," Hawkeye said, calmly dragging the visitor's chair up to his bedside.

"Um."

"Allow me to fill it with more productive means."

She dropped a stack of papers on the sheets, and Mustang sighed, already reaching forward (carefully, so as not to pull his bandages) for a pen.

And if she let him nod off after signing only a small amount, it was only because she hated seeing those dark eyes so exhausted, that clever mouth tight with pain he'd never admit to, those straight shoulders slumped.

And maybe just a little bit because he'd looked so young, for a change, blasting Edward's paper airplanes out of the sky.

….

The second night, Edward woke just as violently, but with a different kind of terror beating inside his blood. He hadn't dreamed of monsters this time, or his mother's face. He'd dreamed of recent and real-life horror instead.

He hadn't been expecting the crumbling church to still be occupied. And they'd trained themselves to be quiet, so quiet and still, that Ed never knew they were there for sure, nothing beyond the faint burning of 'wrong' inside his brain, until he'd felt the hard crunch of a metal pipe meeting his good arm.

To his dying day, he'd deny the sound that came out of his mouth as he felt his bones snap. Especially because the Bastard Colonel was present, and because he was already furious with himself, even as he crumpled forward, for allowing them to take him by surprise.

"Fullmetal!" he heard, and then the Colonel was there, kneeling on the stones in front of him. "What is it?"

"Someone's here," he said through gritted teeth, because the pain was curling at the edges of his vision, sickly green and orange. "Broke my arm, I think. You should go, get help."

"Wow, you're stupid when you're injured," Mustang snapped, and Ed rocked back a little on his knees, because that looked an awful lot like fury in the Colonel's eyes. "Just a lot dumber than normal, even. Can you stand?"

It wasn't easy, or pleasant. Ed was used to all kinds of hurts, but broken things were a bit more foreign, because two of his limbs were metal, and he tended to throw those first in a fight. By the time Mustang got Ed on his feet, his braid was damp with sweat, and his jaw ached from clenching back cries and curse words.

"I'm going to kick your ass," Mustang hissed, as he helped Ed hobble down the hall, dark eyes scanning the shadows furiously, one hand kept free with fingers at the ready. "Because you're stupid. And short. But mostly stupid. A tiny, stupid person who walks into church traps and breaks his limbs."

"Asshole," Ed gasped, because every step on the uneven stones jarred his arm, and so his bantering skills weren't quite up to par.

"You can't have the secrets," a voice that wasn't theirs whispered from the dark, and then Mustang was shoving Ed out of the way and following him down, landing on top of him on the cobbled floor.

Ed didn't hear the bang, because he'd both landed on his broken arm and rapped his head against the stones. Sweat burned hot on his skin, which felt cold and empty, grey clouds danced at the edge of his vision, and nausea curled at the back of his tongue.

But he came back to himself, because the warm wetness staining the back of his jacket wasn't his own.

Later, after the rescue, and the hospital, Havoc will tell him without a hint of laughter in his voice that when they found them at the church, Ed was standing protectively over Mustang's unconscious body, covered in the Colonel's blood and staring with blank eyes at the struggling bodies he'd pinned with slowly tightening stone fists.

Back in the present, Ed pressed his automail palm to his eyes, carefully avoiding the bandages wrapped around his head. The room was dark, and quiet, but he knew he wasn't the only one awake.

"I never asked you to take that bullet," he said softly. "I didn't want you to."

"I know that, Edward," came the answer from the other bed, just as soft.

Silence. After a while, Edward eased himself back down, resting his head back against the pillows.

They'll never speak of it again, he knew. Never again acknowledge it under the cover of darkness and dead air, and certainly never bring it up in the light of day.

But still, he fell asleep a little easier, because hearing the Bastard breathe from the bed over, for the moment, seemed to be the remedy to his nightmares.

…

Day Three

"Clothes are amazing. Clothes are wonderful. Do you want me to tell you how good clothes feel, Colonel Bastard, since you can't have any of your own?"

Mustang sighed at the glee in Edward's golden eyes, so happy to be out of bed and back in clothes while Mustang himself remained wrapped in thin pajamas and hospital sheets.

"Gloat all you want, Fullmetal," he said. "The way I see it, they're letting you out early because your wounds are just so…insignificant when compared to mine."

The boy was across the room immediately, moving impressively fast for someone with a broken arm, a concussion, and skin that looked like a black and purple finger painting.

"WHO ARE YOU CALLING SO TINY HE GETS CARTOON BANDAIDS, YOU BASTARD?!"

"Brother," Alphonse sighed, walking into the room to find Edward glaring, and Mustang fighting back a victorious smirk. "The doctor said I could take you back, but only if you promised to rest and relax until your hurts healed."

"I'm healing," Ed insisted, still making ninja hand gestures at Mustang's bed with his good arm. "This is very therapeutic, Al."

"I really, really don't believe you, Brother. Come on. The Colonel needs to rest, and I want to get some food in you before your nap."

"My nap? My nap?!"

"Uh-huh. Oh, and the nurses said you enjoyed the coloring book they gave you, so I picked some up! You can have one to work on after you sleep."

Ed made garbled vowel sounds of revenge and anguish at his brother's back as Al led the way out of the room.

"Enjoy your recovery, Fullmetal," Mustang said, smirk still going strong. "It sounds so…exhilarating. And appropriate."

Edward bared his teeth.

"Whatever, Bastard," he said. "Enjoy your hospital room."

His exit might have been more impressive, had he not been walking like a duck due to bruising and two heavy arms.

Mustang collapsed back against his pillows, letting the first grimace of actual discomfort cross his face now that Edward was out of the room. His shoulder hurt. And the healing skin was itching something horrible.

After a while, the nurse came in with his lunch tray. Mustang sat himself up as best he could, only to quirk an eyebrow at what he saw.

"What'd I do to earn an extra pudding cup?" he said, and flashed a charming smile at the fluttering nurse.

She blushed, and smiled prettily.

"Oh," she said. "Well, nothing, I suppose. It wasn't my idea. The boy you were rooming with gave it to me yesterday, the pudding cup off of his plate. Said that he didn't want it, didn't care much for sweets, but said that he saw that you liked them, and you looked pale enough to eat more sugar anyway." She beamed, arranging the extra chocolate pudding cup on his plate like a prize. "Isn't that sweet? Just the nicest thing?"

Mustang reached out to touch it with gentle fingers, and didn't answer.

But months later, when Riza was digging around in his desk for some lost (read: abandoned) paperwork, she came across a chocolate pudding cup, still sealed and covered with dust, hidden away in the bottom drawer.