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The early morning train ride out of the city was perhaps the tensest one that Ed had ever taken in his life.
He and Al sat awkwardly and perfectly silent across from each other in their private compartment, Ed unable to help fidgeting in his seat while his brother was still as a statue. Ed had been running on next to no sleep already as it was, but sitting there in the lulling motion of the train hadn't been enough to even try to tempt his eyes shut. He couldn't dare let it.
So instead, he simply sat there across from his brother, and waited. First occupied by listening to all the hustle and bustle around him; other passengers finding their seats, the training starting up under and around them, and then, when the train had started, staring as Central City passed by outside their window in a thick, dead silence.
He never dared let himself move. Not once did he let himself do anything more than breath twitchily through gritted teeth, each one shallow and nervous in his chest, and try to keep his eyes glued on pretty much anything but the figure he knew lay in terrible, terrified hiding, right inside his brother's chest.
Al, he could see, didn't move either. Not even an inch. In fact, Ed was pretty sure he was all but frozen in a fear all to his own, so scared of jostling the precious burden inside him that he braced himself with every tiny jolt of the train and looked so apologetic whenever he couldn't Ed was half-surprised he didn't say how sorry he was out loud.
Ed couldn't even blame him for it.
He gritted his teeth harder, fists shaking in his lap and the tension crawling just under his skin knotting his stomach, too, as he was held helpless but to just sit there and watch the city stroll by. They passed through the busy borders without incident, but even as they reached the sloping farmlands around the city, Ed still held himself motionless and silent.
They still weren't far enough yet.
It still wasn't enough.
The minutes ticked on by, so slowly Ed felt like he was going to scream. It was too still. Too quiet. How could it possibly be so damn quiet? The colonel had been panting, all but whimpering near constantly, but ever since they'd set out for the station this morning he wasn't sure he'd heard so much as a whisper from him. It had been nearly an hour, now... so long, and with such silence, it made Ed's own trepidation rise within him.
He almost would've preferred hearing those pained sounds all over again.
At least he'd be hearing something.
The train started to roll around the first bend, a slow, gentle curve that bent them from east to south, a track that they both knew very well. It was the same path, in fact, that they took all the time, the one that brought them back from Central to Risembool. A train that any other time would've had them both smiling and hugely relieved to be on at all, because as much Ed denied it to everyone else, Risembool was still home and Winry was still their best friend...
Well, as much as he'd really love to, Ed didn't feel any relief associated with this ride now.
He gritted his teeth again, glaring hard back out the window, and tried once again to just ignore the anxious, taut nerves trembling in his stomach and be as calm as he could.
He knew his brother physically could not experience anything that Ed, in his flesh and blood body, was right now. That Al was of course scared and nervous and guiltridden as all hell, and Ed would never say he was jealous or that Al was better off, because he knew how much his brother would give up to just feel something. But right now- right now, from the nausea tightening his stomach into unbearable knots, the tension that crawled under his very skin like a nest of bugs had broken inside him, the way the back of his neck felt hot and his ports ached and he just couldn't make himself sit still-
Fuck, Ed was pretty sure he was freaking out enough for the both of them right now.
"...Brother?" Al ventured at last, voice small and hesitant into the constant noise of the train. "Brother, can we...?"
Ed shook his head wordlessly, not allowing himself to say a single word. They'd discussed it before. They couldn't risk it on this train. They could've been followed and if they had, if at any point a soldier came looking-
They could not find the colonel curled up in plain sight in their compartment.
That was also the reason that he didn't say as such aloud to his brother. If their compartment had been bugged somehow, if there was anyone listening in...
Or, at least, that was the reason he told himself.
Ed knew a decent part of it was because if he spoked aloud, he didn't know if he'd be able to keep his voice steady. He knew Al would hear the weakness and how much he wanted to give in- and damn it, at least one of them had to be strong here.
Fuck, he didn't want the colonel to hear him having to say they still couldn't let him out.
Al turned miserably away at his silent shake of his head, soulful, longing eyes redirected back out the window as he wrapped his arms around himself, cradling his empty chest cavity like it was a precious treasure or an infant. If Ed listened hard enough, he could've sworn he could hear heavy breathing from behind his arms, but against the noise of the train around them and his own heart pounding in his ears, he wasn't so sure he wasn't imagining it entirely.
And still, they sat there together in silence, and they waited.
The train ride was four hours long in good weather, a time that they usually passed reading or napping or just talking. This ride, Ed passed by glancing at his pocket watch with nearly every minute, sweating as the time ticked by at a snail's pace and waiting- waiting- for the moment to come.
No one ever came to look into their compartment. If Ed hadn't spent so long being read into military operations and knowing just how slick they could be when they wanted to be, he would've taken a bit more relief from that than he did.
And then, at last, the minute hand on his watch ticked to bring them into two and a half hours into the ride, and Ed knew this had gone on for long enough.
He nodded once to his equally nervous brother, bringing his hands together to crack his knuckles, then stood. His brother stood with him, moving as gingerly as a ballet dancer or trapeze artist to press his own hands together, then bring the to the ceiling.
The hole that opened up with barely even a crackle of alchemy was neat and clean, the ceiling splitting apart to make just enough room for Al to be able to fit through. But the noise of the train got that much louder, metallic cranks and creaking bursting in his ears and now joined by the hot rush of wind overhead, a clamor that stampeded straight through the second Ed opened his mouth and tossed his words to be muffled and swept up by the wind. With a growl that he couldn't even hear himself, Ed snapped his mouth shut to give his brother a thumb's up instead.
It took a little more maneuvering from there for Al to help him squirm his way up through the new opening, luggage in his arms and the sun and wind buffeting him in the face in a splitsecond. It burned in his eyes and swept his hair about to whip in his face, blinding his eyesight into a nest of windswept hair and Ed cursed and spat, blocking the gale with his suitcase held up like a shield, but it was nothing. This was nothing- it had to be, if he wanted to help Mustang. He'd been in tighter spots before and he knew he'd be in tighter spots in the future, and he'd get through his one just fine.
Hell, Mustang had sent him onto a train, with zero warning or preparation whatsoever, then a twelve year old child without the slightest bit of military training, to catch terrorists as a fucking test before he'd ever stepped foot into his bastard office.
So yeah, he was pretty sure he could handle this.
Al joined him up on top of the train in a flash, hauling himself up with his powerful gloves and a series of noisy clanks but underneath the wind and the engine, even those barely got through. Nobody could've heard them, not even if Al was stomping around right on top of their compartment. Sighing in relief again, the sound stolen away by the wind whipping about them, Ed knelt back down, clutching at the train with his metal hand as tight as he could and squinting through windswept hair to find the the forest blurring by just on the border of the tracks.
It was stupid, risky, and crazy. In fact, Ed could already just picture the look on Mustang's face, if he'd done this on a normal mission then had to recount it to him in his office once all the action was done. It'd be the blindsided and agape one, the one with a blank stare and slightly open mouth that said I do not get paid enough for this, and at some point in the meeting, he'd be guaranteed to lecture him that just because you look five, doesn't mean you have to act like it.
It was, quite simply, probably a terrible fucking idea all the way around, but Ed didn't want to risk not thinking it necessary only to find out he was wrong.
Once Al had clambered safely up to join him, moving awkwardly all the while, Ed leaned back around to close the hole, leaving as little sign of their escape as possible. If they really were being followed, someone who knew what to look for would be able to find out what they'd done, but unless they were psychic, they'd never be able to tell just where in the train's path they'd made a break for it.
They'd be safe.
Just as long as they could make a safe landing, anyway.
"All right, Colonel!" Al shouted, his young voice edging just a hint over the roar of the wind whipping about them, then crouched for Ed to clamber his way into his arms and clutch at him as tightly as he could. "We're going to jump now! Try to sit still, okay? You'll be out soon!"
If Mustang made a noise at all in response, it was not audible over the sounds around them so loud it had made Al have to shout.
Just like he had in the train, whatever noises he was making were so quiet not even Ed could hear them.
Ed swallowed uncomfortably again. The knot in his stomach pulled just a little bit tighter, and when he looked back up at his brother, he could see he was just as unsettled as he was.
This was going to get way worse before it got better.
Al clutched him tighter to his chest and crouched himself, clearly preparing to jump. Ed took one look at the at the rushing ground below, squeezed his eyes shut, and held on for dear life.
Cushioned (however uncomfortably) in his brother's arms, the bone-grating thump when Al landed was so deep he felt it vibrate down to his spine. He bruised against his brother's arms, teeth chattering together in his skull, and goddammit, ow, ow, OW! His head spun and pierced straight through with a solid ache, his stomach lurched with the violence of it, stammered scream warped into a strangled gasp by the lack of air- but beneath all of that was a sudden, instant, head-swimming silence, and a jolting stillness.
The noise and motion of the train was gone.
And that meant that they'd made it.
In possibly the most painful jump of his life, but still.
Ouch.
"Brother! Ed, are you-"
"-all good," he coughed, then groaned, squeezing Al's glove with two trembling hands, then groaned again. Goddammit, OW. Mustang's right, maybe, I'm gonna get myself killed one day... "I'm- I'm o-okay-" he ground out, "I'm good, I promise," then moaned through his still spinning head.
That really sucked.
He blinked past the stars blooming in his vision, groping out with a blind, numb hand to find Al's and worm his way back down to solid ground. It took him a few painful steps to steady himself, still dizzy and lurching even within his brother's arms, but he found his balance as fast as he could and the instant he'd grasped it, shook the help off as fast as he could.
Because whether he was okay or not, the focus was here was not meant to be on him.
His stomach knotted again, and a dangerous unease started to gather in his throat.
If the jump had been that hard on him, then...
Taking a deep breath, Ed met his brother's eyes. He gulped no matter how hard he tried not to, and could tell very fucking easily that Al felt just as badly as he did. And he hated to see his brother like that, so taking as deep a breath as he could, even if it came out shaking and unsteady as all hell, he focused back down on Al's chest plate, and took a step forward.
"...Colonel?" he called weakly. "Hey, we're... safe now. Okay? ...Colonel?"
There was still nothing.
Just like in the train, the colonel really could've just gone off and died in there, and neither one of them would even know.
Damn it-
"Colonel!"
He and Al moved together, his brother tugging at one strap while Ed threw himself at the other, fighting to get his chest cavity open as soon as possible. Damn it, Mustang had promised he'd be okay, he had promised, if he'd fucking lied- "Bastard, I swear-"
Together they finally got Al's chest plate open, wrenching it back to reveal the inner cavity- and the figure waiting within- to the outside air.
And oh, fuck.
The colonel was curled just as they'd seen him hours before, when he and Al had worked to hide him while hiding themselves in a dark, smelly alley. He was settled limp and awkward like a forgotten, stiff doll, slumped in a bundle of sheets stripped from their dorm room that had been packed inside the cavity to try and cushion him as much as possible. Sheets that were stained in more than one place now with a distinctive red-brown smear but still clutched around him like an oversized blanket.
And just like he'd been in the lab, just like'd been in the sewers underneath Central, just like he'd been this entire terrible time- he still covered his face with one shaking, too pale hand.
Still alive, at least.
Ed just wasn't sure if there was anything else positive about his condition.
The colonel fumbled about, groaning aloud like a stiff old man as he shifted, one hand still hiding his face and the other clutching at the sheets. He mumbled something, Ed couldn't hear what, and stiffened badly when they tried to help him out, and were left helpless but to simply watch as he stumbled, first out of his furled little ball, and then, outside of Al's chest to stagger into the sunlight.
Ed held his breath, and watched.
The colonel limped forwards once, an unsteady, bare-foot step over the loudly crunching leaves and shifting grass. It leaned and tilted, listing to the side like a crumbling tower, but the whole of him was still shrouded in a loose fall of stained sheets and whether it was the shock of the fall, or-
Or...
Ed swallowed tightly again. Another wave of paranoid fear swept through him and, his heart shuddering painfully in his chest, he squinted through the ache in his head to analyze the colonel as best as he could.
He was standing still now, back to them and trembling like a leaf. But the shape, at least, was humanoid. He still had two arms and two legs, and still walked like one, too, even if reeling like a drink, and even with his bowed face covered he could still see that mess of familiar dark hair.
He didn't look any different at all.
If he really was a chimera, he didn't look like it from here.
Then, with another deep, ragged gasp, the colonel took one more step forward. He trembled and nearly slipped, wheezing, then tried again.
And with that, tumbled down to the forest floor like a tower of blocks pushed over by an unruly child.
"Mustang! You-" Ed shot forward with a burst of panic, catching his left side at the same time as Al moved for his right. The man- or whatever he was- stiffened again, trying to pull away, but this time Ed wasn't about to stand there and wring his hands about as his superior just fucking faceplanted. "Come on, Mustang... Al, over there-"
His brother nodded wordlessly, taking pretty much all of Mustang's weight because as much as Ed tried, the man really was too... not small... for Ed to carry any of it. Ed helplessly scrabbled on beside him instead, propping him up as much as he could while clearing the way the few steps towards the nearby river.
Once again, Mustang hit the ground so heavily it was as if he never wanted to stand again, sagging onto his knees half in the water without even caring as he got splashed. He tried and failed to shrug Al off him, panting high-pitched and pained into his hand, and for a moment Ed was frightened he was about to be sick.
"...That," Mustang groaned at last. "T-that..."
Ed exchanged another worried look with Al, his stomach twisting. It sounded like he could barely talk at all,l. "That what? ...Come on, Colonel, that what?"
"Talk to us, sir..."
But Mustang only shook his head briefly, saying nothing; by the sound of it, barely managing to stay upright at all. He took in another great, heaving breath, fumbling on his legs with both hands still occupied, trying to find support against anywhere else but them.
"That was the worst jump I have ever taken, in my life." He coughed weakly into his hand, the words coming out muffled and strangled, but sincere. "Never- and I repeat, never- do that to me again."
Then, he keeled over to dunk his upper half, facefirst and all, straight into the icy river.
Ed started again, stomach lurching with disbelief. He even started to reach forward, once again trying to catch him, support him, something- but it was agonizingly evident Mustang did not need their help.
Slowly, a weak smile filtered back across his face instead, and he sank helplessly back to sit with his brother on the riverbank, and wait.
No matter what was going on with the bastard's body right now, it was clear that his mind, at least, was still intact.
Bastard mind and all.
Mustang stayed sagged in the river for several moments, hands plunged underneath as well. His face also continued to be hidden, everything up to his shoulders still wrapped in the filthy sheets while his black hair swirled upwards in the current, obscuring everything about his face that he was trying so hard to keep hidden. Ed couldn't help but lean a little, squinting, trying to glimpse just a hint of something, but sitting like that, he really just looked like a normal person.
A normal person wearing a bedsheet and washing his face in the river, but a normal person all the same.
...A normal person with...
...pointed ears?
Ed's eyes widened.
Holy shit...
Is that... are those actually...?
In a dripping deluge of ice cold water, Mustang emerged from the river again, soaking wet and sodden, breathing in deep again but before Ed could even try to get a second look he had firmly turned his back, rubbing at his face with his arms in a pretty shabby job at toweling off, and even worse at than that was how brazenly he was refusing to even face them. Ed slumped again, scowling silently at the wet sheeted back that was all he could see of the colonel. Damn it, they could not pull this off if the bastard was going to be fighting them like this. If he was going to refuse to so much as fucking look at them.
"Mustang-"
Al caught him by the shoulder, quiet but stern and inescapable, holding him back from moving for the bastard to drag him around himself. Ed glared at him, trying to tug back forwards, but Al shook his head again and in his soulfire eyes, he could see very clearly that there was no room for argument.
Something stubborn yet tinged with defeat unfolded in his chest, bringing his arms to cross but his shoulders to sag. Because, as was really to be expected- his brother was right.
They had more important things to worry about now than yelling at Mustang for being stupid.
Al let go of him after a few moments, sitting back himself for them to form an awkward sort of triangle, them uncomfortable on the forest floor while Mustang continued to slouch with his trembling back to them, shrouded in blankets and wet hair. An awkward silence settled between them, broken only by Mustang's heavy, unsteady breaths, and Ed's own heart, pounding in his ears.
This was bad. This was really, really bad.
"...So," Al ventured at last, high-pitched and almost squeaky through the discomfort of it. "We should be safe here, at least for now. Dublith is about ten miles from here, but the only thing between us and them is farmland. And... sir, you- you said..."
"Kiel," Mustang coughed. The word came out gravely and weak, and once again, it took nearly everything Ed had not to yank him around to face them. "I h-have a... a friend in Kiel. He can help me. We have... I have to get t-there."
Ed rolled his eyes, because that fuckery didn't even deserve a response, but biting his tongue wasn't exactly his speciality, so he grabbed for his suitcase instead just to occupy his hands to stop himself from yelling at him for it. "Right. That Marcoh dude." He dug through the clothes and all the money he had and the dry packages of food to grab for the map, flattening it out even as he shot a suspicious glance to the colonel's back. He was still talking weird, too. Ed wasn't sure what the fuck was going on with his vision, because it was evident he could see something, now, but his words were still coming out oddly muffled and just a little slurred- and he wasn't even covering his mouth anymore.
Something was wrong with his mouth.
Just like something was wrong with his eyes, and something was wrong with his ears... and there was probably something really, really wrong with the pretty much all of him he was still hiding under the blanket.
Ed hesitated again. His eyes narrowed, lingering on the ears hidden back under his hair, then to the back of his neck, searching over for him for even the slightest sign of something that wasn't the way it should be.
Whatever the military had done, the colonel couldn't hide it forever.
At last, Ed learned forward, giving up on actually grabbing him to make him look but raising his voice nonetheless, because he just couldn't help himself. "Listen, I know you said this guy is a doctor, but Kiel isn't exactly a skip and a hop away. But Dublith is pretty much right next to us, and there are doctors there- and pretty much no one there likes the military anyway, you'll be able to hide out while we figure out what's going on-"
"No."
"No- no what? Come on, Colonel-"
"Sir, Ed really does have a point... please, listen to us." Al moved forward next, genuinely pleading in a way Ed could not, but the alchemist just sat with his back still turned and his face still completely hidden. "At least for a little while! You're not well, you're not in any shape to travel that far right now-"
"I said no."
"-or is it because Marcoh's an alchemist? Colonel, our teacher's in Dublith! She's really, really good, between the four of us I'm sure we could-"
"Alphonse," the man rasped. "Edward."
Just that. Just their names, two low, guttural, strangled croaks that sounded as if his throat had been filled with ground glass, and his mouth with blood.
It was still enough, to stop Al in his tracks.
It was still enough to make Ed's stomach drop.
By the sound of his voice alone, Ed really wasn't sure how much longer they were going to last out here.
But the colonel still drew himself up to his full height, or, at least, as close to it as he could get, leaning precariously against a nearby tree. He clutched the sheets tighter around, tugging them close, but in the process of pulling them against his chest they slipped just a little down his back- just enough to reveal a hint of skin on his neck.
A hint of dark blue, scaly snake's skin.
Ed blanched.
"Allow me to make this perfectly clear," Mustang growled. Not a mutter but an actual, genuine, animal growl that Ed could hear came straight from the throat, muffled or not, distorted or not. "Neither of you are equipped to deal with this situation."
"That's not fair! You won't even give us a chance to h-"
Mustang snorted like an angry bull, back coiling and hands slamming to the ground with a hot breath of- smoke.
That was not air. That was fucking smoke and sparks that he had exhaled, and that was bright flickering sparks there, now, orange and red scattered against the leaves and his hands, embers that glowed in the shadows and smoke that curled overhead.
Curled straight from him.
But...
He doesn't have his gloves with him...
Ed's heart skipped a beat. An almost immediate sense of utterly lost, stricken panic tightened his throat shut, and when he drew closer to his brother on instinct alone, he could feel the exact same emanating from him. The colonel had just-
Just fucking breathed fire.
What?
"...Colonel-"
"Unless you wish for me to end up like Nina Tucker," he spat, "you will shut your mouth, Fullmetal, and you will do as you're told, or I will find someone who will."
Ed's stomach knotted again, reluctance and hesitation gluing in his throat like ash. For a heartbeat, he couldn't speak at all.
His hand fisted in his lap, metal fist over his flesh and blood one, and his teeth gritted together so hard it hurt. Stupid bastard. Stupid smug, arrogant, rude, asshole, fucking bastard-
And, before Ed's very eyes, that stupid, smug, arrogant, rude, asshole, fucking bastard was now listing to the side, head sagging forwards and shoulders trembling through the sheets, and before he knew it, Al had just barely made it forwards in time to catch him as he dropped forwards in a dead faint.
His hot flush of anger snuffed out like a light, and in its place was a gut-wrenching knot of guilt and nauseated worry, instead.
Oh.
"He's okay!" Al called after a moment, crouching just behind him to hold him upright. The colonel had crumbled against him entirely, headfirst into his arm and slumped to fold in on himself nearly double and held up only by Al, his obviously terrified brother cradling his shoulders like they were made of glass. "He's okay, Ed, he just passed out..."
Ed rolled his eyes past the tightness in his throat, forcing off as calm an air that he could manage. "Yeah, because okay people pass out all the time," he grumbled, and it came out bitter, stifling his own sense of worry still turning his hand clammy but he knew his brother wasn't even close to fooled.
None of them were, because it was pretty damn obvious, no matter what the bastard said, he was not okay.
He stayed crouching back in the dirt, painfully aware that his help would only slow things down and watched instead, Al settling the colonel the rest of the way down with an agonizing sense of slowness. Carefully, gently, he got Mustang down, dropped to his stomach to lie limp and shivering in the crunching leaves, protected only be a mess of wrapped blankets that somehow made him look even more vulnerable than he would've looked without. After a few seconds of plainly uncomfortable deliberation, his brother then turned his wet, dark head as well, just a little so he wasn't eating dirt, then pulled the sheets over to half obscure it from their view.
Once again, it was Ed's turn to scowl. "Al."
"He doesn't want us to see it, Brother."
"Well, he's gonna have to get over it, isn't he?" Still frowning, Ed crawled forwards on his hands and knees, pulling up to Mustang's side to reach for the sheets. Al didn't try to stop him, but that was merely because his brother knew him well enough to know he didn't have to- because Ed reached for the sheet, and found himself faltering before his fingers had even closed around it.
Al was right. Mustang, very obviously, didn't want them to see.
And no matter how much the bastard could rub at him the wrong way, this...
He... really wasn't human anymore, was he? He could not longer just blow it off as his eyes not quite working or his voice not coming out quite right because he was sick or hurt. His eyes hadn't worked before, and his mouth wasn't working properly now, because he'd become sort of creature, deformed or not, where they didn't.
Something that wasn't human.
And as much as it killed him to admit it, finding out more about just what that something was wouldn't be enough for Ed to help. Mustang had said it himself.
They hadn't known enough to help Nina, and they didn't know enough to help him.
Ed's fists clenched again, and he sank helplessly back down on the ground without another word.
Al made an uncertain noise after a few moments, giving the colonel another hesitant once over before pulling his hands back to himself with an air of caution. "I think he's right, Ed. We don't really know enough to help ourselves here, but he seems to at least think he knows someone who does. That's better than us."
"Yeah, but who is he? I don't think I've ever even heard of a Marcoh, Al, and we read everything about chimeras that we could find! How does Mustang know this random specialist who's simultaneously so amazing and so secret no one's ever even heard of him?!"
"...I know, Brother."
Ed sank back down with another huff, his glare transferring back to Mustang's still back while his brother remained silent by his side, withdrawn and with downcast eyes. Ed could sympathize with him pretty easily, by this point.
They had no idea what was going on, and Mustang did not seem open to helping them figure it out.
Al made a clearing-his-throat sort of noise after another minute had passed in a thick silence broken only by the colonel's slow, raspy breathing. "If we're going to do this, then we need to do it now." He rose to his feet, dusting some of the leaves and dirt off his feet and gesturing for Ed to stay down in the same motion. "I'm going to get to Dublith and find Teacher, explain what I can. You stay here with the colonel."
"That's- me? Alone? Al, are you sure?" Ed's stomach twisted again at the very thought of it, every inch of him wanting to pull away, because that was simply a big, fat no. No, sir. Sneak into and around Dublith on a stealth mission, hiding from the military, getting help from Izumi? Absolutely. Sign him right the fuck up, because that was right up his alley.
Setting bedside with his unconscious superior and finding it thrust on him to somehow take care of him, letting his brother handle everything else, and wait helplessly for him to come back?
Yeah, that really was not his speed.
But Al was already turned towards the edge of the small clearing, leaving him sitting back alone with Mustang on the rough ground. "You could keep out of sight easier, but almost no one but Teacher's family knows what I look like here. Even if I get spotted and the military follows us this far, no one will be able to tell them I was here- and you know we can't leave Mustang alone." He dusted a few more of the leaves off himself, still wary and guarded and quiet, but under the facade Ed could see just how unsettled he really was, and that was enough for him to bite his tongue and keep silent.
Al was right.
Again.
And if he actually wanted to help Mustang like he'd promised Hughes that he would, then he was going to have to bite his tongue and sit here with him to do it.
Ed nodded once to his brother again. He swallowed hard, trying to silence the anxiety and unease still clenching around his heart, then made crawl forwards to sit down against the nearest tree next to Mustang's side.
He smiled up at Al then, a wordless promise that he understood, and more than that, that it was all going to be okay. Mustang wasn't in shape to take charge here, so Ed was going to step up, and that meant not letting his brother worry about him more than could be helped. "Go on," he assured. "I'll be here with Mustang."
Just... hurry back.
Please.
His brother hesitated only a moment longer, bright eyes still searching between him and Mustang with a heavy glow of reluctance. It was obvious that he didn't want to leave either one of them alone, any more than Ed wanted to be the one to stay. It was eve more obvious that he felt just as badly as Ed did about this whole entire thing.
But they both know that there wasn't time to spare.
And that was how Ed was left to sit alone in that sunny clearing, squinting through the trees to watch as his brother made his way towards Dublith as fast as he could- and trying as hard as he could not to look at the sick probable chimera, curled up in the grass beside him.
Ed swallowed hard again. He curled just a little tighter around himself, hands locking together around his knees as he sank deeper back against the tree, gaze searching desperately anywhere else besides the shining pink elephant right smack dab in the middle of the clearing.
Even when every low, cracked wheeze of a breath from the trembling form beside him snapped his gaze right back to it.
He shivered a second time. His skin continued to crawl, something sick and miserable curling in his stomach, and no matter how hard he tried, he just couldn't get himself to look away.
Hidden underneath the oversized huddle of of bedsheets, spilled awkwardly across the ground on his stomach and head still lolling uselessly to the side, Mustang looked... small, somehow. Which kind of made Ed want to smile, only to find it wiped away in a heartbeat, something chilling gnawing at his insides in its place.
No matter what the bastard said, Mustang really wasn't all that tall. Half his team towered over him, for fuck's sake, and Al could probably crush him like a soda can- but no matter his physical height he still had an authoritative sort of air about him, a commanding aura that he brought into every room he found and could've let him rule it even if he was only two inches tall. Ed hated it, but when Mustang was up and speaking, really speaking, not snarking his way through a fucking short joke... it was like his height had vanished, and everyone else in the room had shrunk to be looking up to him and his aura of dominant, ubiquitous authority. The aura that was as much a part of him as gravity; as natural as breathing.
The aura that wasn't there now.
The self-assuredness that defined Roy Bastard Mustang, that irritated Ed to high heaven and drove him mad whenever he opened his mouth, the thing that made the bastard, the bastard, was not there now.
Because the same military they'd both given their lives to had taken it from him.
Ed shook his head vigorously to himself, sucking in a shaking breath to wrench himself back on track, because if he started thinking about that he knew he wasn't going to stop. His heart and mind racing together in a sweaty, nervous tandem all over again, he crawled for the colonel instead, focusing down on him as much as he could.
Come on, Ed... you can do this...
Hold yourself together, damn it... he NEEDS you. Come on, Ed, don't be a fucking kid...
Ed took another breath as deep as he could manage, fighting to banish away any such stupid, waste of time, utterly unhelpful thoughts, fingertips brushing together as he searched over the colonel. A warm flush started to rise in his cheeks, half embarrassment, half another wave of hard, unyielding guilt. They hadn't exactly had any clothes that could fit him, nor had they wanted to risk drawing attention to themselves by raiding his apartment, so all he really had was the oversized lab coat they'd found him in, and the sheets from their dorm. Neither were all that effective... or clean, he considered unhappily, gaze lingering on the dust, the dirt, the rusty blood stains that could only have come from Mustang.
Ed frowned again. His hands drew closer together on instinct alone, a warm alchemy starting to crackle between his palms without pause. Then, because he was Edward Elric, and dithering around doubting himself was not what he did, he clapped his hands straight together, then went to work.
It wasn't anything he hadn't done before. His coat got torn or worse on half the missions he went on, and having a fighting style that involved turning his own arm into a giant knife really wasn't the best for the state of his clothes in general; he and Al had gotten good at working with cloth a long time ago. It still wasn't easy, with his subject flat on his stomach and Ed too wary of touching him to even risk the slightest brush of a fingertip. It wasn't easy at all, when his material was not an already perfectly-sized, neat set of clothes but a flimsy and filthy, pathetic sheet, and he knew one slip up could reveal far more about Mustang before him than either of them wanted to see- or that Mustang might ever forgive.
And still, a few minutes later, Ed was left to sit back, folding his arms, and observe his handiwork.
Most of the fluff had been severed, lying now in an abandoned heap off to the side that it'd be easy enough to transmute into a flimsy pillow later. The rest of it he'd managed to seal into a loose sort of dress, since anything more complicated would've meant moving Mustang around and given how badly the man seemed to want to keep hidden-
Ed may've been curious, but Al was right. Forcing a look when he was unconscious and couldn't stop it didn't feel right and he couldn't bring himself to do it.
Which was what had led to the last, and most important, comfort he had tried to give the colonel: a hood.
It was sloppy and oversized, like pretty much everything else; too thin because it had been stretched from fabric not meant to be stretched, pulled haphazardly over his head in a way that made him look even more like a corpse than before. It fit in perfectly with the whole rest of the ensemble to look like a fucking mess.
And it hid those pointed ears and whatever else that wasn't right about his face from view.
Ed shivered again, an anxious and tight ball coalescing down in his stomach until it hurt to breathe. He stared on at the prone form again, hands worthless and ineffectual in his lap, and abruptly felt so selfish and guilty he couldn't stand it.
Without a word, he crawled back over to his tree, and, curling up back around himself against the trunk, he shifted around to continue watching for Al in silence.
It was nearing sunset, the orange glare too bright through the trees and sky, the shadows stretching, and the air around them cooling, when the colonel woke again.
It was sudden and swift in the long-lasting silence of the woods, a rough intake of breath that made his heart skip a beat like he'd just been shocked, even as the colonel himself jolted on the ground. The noise jerked his head up out of his arms, fizzing a shock of awareness through his head just in time to see Mustang stiffen again, a limp figure half in shadow that kicked, coiled, and whined like a struck dog.
Ed tensed at the noise, unsure of just what was going on now, and found himself frozen against his tree to watch and wait in silence.
When Mustang's next jolt had him curling, legs pulling up to his chest to bury another whine, a whine that did not quiet but grew louder and louder to end in another smokey, spark-laced snort that nearly set the grass on fire, he knew he couldn't afford to do nothing but wait in silence.
He couldn't bear to do it, either.
"Mustang," he called hoarsely, voice trembling. Clearing his throat, Ed started to venture closer, reaching out to try and brush his fingers against his back. "Hey, Mustang, it's-"
And he screamed.
It wasn't a bastard-yell, loud and brash and just a little bit hilarious as he hung up on Hughes or shouted at Havoc to get back to his office or against Ed whenever he'd gotten the better of him. It wasn't a Mustang-yell, a shouted order in a mission that brokered no room for disagreement or argument. It wasn't even a normal, human scream. It was thin and high-pitched and still muffled, somehow, distorted like he'd howled it into a pillow-
But it was a scream of agony all the same, and it all but made Ed's heart stop.
"Mustang- Colonel, stop it! You have to be quiet- Colonel!" His hands yanked back as if they'd just been scalded, fluttering uselessly over his back as he leaned over him, desperately wanting to help but no idea how to try. "Shhhh! Mustang-"
The alchemist jerked and gasped again, shaking his hooded head against the ground like a distraught child. It was terrifying and wrong, seeing a man so in control of himself and assured and confident just crumpled down into this... Ed couldn't grasp it, could barely even believe it was real. Not from the Mustang he knew. Not- fuck, he looked so wounded and- and frail, holy shit this was wrong, Mustang wasn't supposed to look like that- god, this was actually terrifying-
But finally, the spasm passed, shudders easing out of his shoulders for the man to at last lay still and quiet. A limp, panting shell on the cold ground, radiating nothing less than sheer, unadulterated exhaustion, a poisonous aura that was somehow even harder to see than before. He was sweating again, trembling with fever and the force of heaving, muffled gasps- he was so sick, so weak- Ed's stomach lurched for what felt like the millionth time and he pulled away, part of him wanting to be sick himself. Because he'd wanted to take the man down a peg or two for a personal victory, but this was not that... he had never, ever, in a million years, wanted or even fathomed of this.
He'd never even thought it possible that Mustang could look like this, and he knew, sitting there right here, right now, that he didn't like it.
"Full... Fullmetal," he gasped finally. A low, hideous croak, so weak it barely even sounded like him at all. "...Please. Don't touch me there."
"What?" Ed inched a little closer as carefully as he could, not daring to risk jostling him even a millimeter this time, hands still hovering uselessly over his back in a desperate desire to fix him even though he could not be fixed. Don't touch... "I- I did that?! I hurt you?!"
Mustang shook his head once, a vigorous ruffle of the hood that was all he could see in the dying light and there was an angry snort again, this time more smoke than anything else. "Not your fault," he struggled out, then shivered again, one hard jerk from head to toe visible even through the loose borderline sack he was hidden in. "J-just- don't touch me there again."
Regret tightened in his throat again, apology no matter what the bastard said to try and assuage his guilt, he knew he'd caused it. A cautious glance at his back didn't reveal anything all that illuminating, but something told Ed he really did not want to see what his back looked like underneath the sheet.
He didn't think he wanted to see what any of him looked like underneath the sheet.
But...
He shivered again, regret darkening into another prickle of unease, and his eyes rested down on Mustang's back.
He'd barely even touched him. Certainly not enough to hurt him if his back had been okay, but Ed had been hurt plenty of times, and he knew that the light touch he'd used on the colonel wouldn't have been enough to provoke that kind of pain out of a normal injury.
He had barely touched him, and just that light brush of fingertips against already covered skin had still been enough to launch him over the edge- and nearly irrecoverably, at that.
Something anxious settled in his throat, and Ed swallowed hard again.
Quiet stretched between them then, an uneasy silence that felt like neither of them knew how to break it. Mustang still curled on his stomach, panting into the dirt and clearly not very inclined to change it. Ed would've helped him move somewhere more comfortable, or at least to wash his face off again, if he hadn't been so afraid to touch him again after what had happened last time. His hands still wrung miserably together, itching to clap, itching to move, itching to fix, but with Mustang still collapsed and in some obvious measure of pain-
There just wasn't anything he could do.
"Al's in Dublith," he blurted out finally. He just needed to say something. "I think he's waiting until it gets dark to come back with help. It shouldn't be long now."
Mustang nodded several times again, but his only audible reply was another series of wet gasps into the silence. Ed pressed his lips together and swallowed hard, trying not to give into yet another wave of fear.
He was going to be fine. Just because he was this sick now didn't mean it was too late for him to fix it.
It didn't mean he was going to let him down.
It didn't mean this was going to become another Nina.
"...Mustang?" he asked again. The name came out just a bit choked and worried past the lump in his throat, so Ed swallowed it and tried again, because the last thing Mustang needed to hear was him freaking out over here. "You should drink something. Or at least try to." He tried to phrase it as little like a question as possible, not wanting to leave much room for debate- because it was true. No matter what the military had tried to do to him, no matter how bad he felt, water was pretty much the only thing that was all but guaranteed to help, even if just a little.
When the colonel did not respond, Ed tried again, drawing just a little closer to his head and reaching for a canteen from their luggage. "Come on, bastard, just a little." He didn't ask about eating anything. If he was right, and something was wrong with Mustang's mouth... well, that wasn't a road he wanted to go down until absolutely necessary. But water was easy, right? Even if his mouth was hurt or his teeth were messed up or whatever, he could surely still manage a few sips of water.
"All... all right," the colonel coughed, finally, slow and pained but the words were there, and Ed couldn't have been more relieved. He sounded guarded and wary, like part of him really didn't think it was worth trying, but Ed figured he also knew that arguing would get him nowhere, and he was at least willing to try.
He could work with that.
That was something.
Mustang still was not making any move to sit up, barely working his head up underneath an arm with a delicate, agonizing slowness, wincing with every move, making those muffled, gritted teeth whines whenever anything tugged the wrong way. For fuck's sake, all he was doing was pulling up an arm to rest his head on it, but by the noises it was making it sounded like every inch was raking him over red-hot coals.
This was bad. It was really, really bad. He could barely move. He couldn't sit up, wouldn't look at Ed, and had reacted so badly to being touched it was like Ed had punched him in the stomach.
He wasn't sure he was going to last to this Marcoh at all.
But starting that argument again was pointless. Ed's points for it hadn't changed, and moreover, Mustang really didn't seem like he had the strength for it. So instead of forcing that point again, Ed steeled himself, gritting his teeth down so tight it made his jaw hurt, and moved just close enough to his superior's head to offer the water.
Even from this close, with the hood and Mustang's position and the dim lighting, he could see very little except for the shrouded hand that waved ineffectually towards the bottle several times, brushing against it with vague incoordination and the weakness of a child. He thumped it several times, the limb trembling in the air, and never once managed to get close to grasping it.
This time, when there was a tiny whine, it was one of frustration and humiliation instead of pain.
Somehow, this one was even harder to hear than the ones before it.
Ed kept himself silent again, biting his lip until it nearly bled as he pulled the bottle back himself, unscrewing the top. Mustang made another small noise and Ed glared straight back. "Listen, if you want to be a baby about this it's gonna make it that much harder on us both. We're not gonna ever get to this Marcoh guy if you don't let us help you so just suck it up already so we can get it over with."
Mustang tensed a little again, just the smallest tightening in his shoulders and another low noise, a gentle prick of obvious shame. For a heartbeat, he was quiet, and in that moment Ed worried he just might've pushed too far.
Then, the colonel snorted again, a low growl emanating from his throat that was more animal than human, and without another word of a protest leaned forward, and allowed Ed to help him drink.
It was awkward and uncomfortable and terrible all around. With the colonel barely lifting his head a few inches off the ground and Ed still hovering uncomfortably over him, afraid to even touch him after what had happened before, he was pretty sure he got more of the water on Mustang than in him, and be the coughing and weak spluttering Ed worried most of the little water he got in him ended up right back out again.
But when the bottle had run empty in his hand, and Mustang's head had sagged back straight down with a heavy, exhausted thump, Ed knew he didn't have it in him to make him try again.
They were going to have plenty of time to give it another go on the journey to Kiel. For now, he just couldn't make him do it.
Didn't want to see his superior like that again.
Or... former superior.
Because- and it finally hit Ed then, for the first time the full, solid weight of the blow settled down over his shoulders as he stared at the stretched out form beside him on the ground, and finally conceptualized that no matter what else happened from here on out, Mustang was no longer a colonel. Mustang was no longer an officer at all. Even absolute best case scenario, where Mustang was fine and the military didn't find them at all, when Ed walked back into the office, Mustang wouldn't be there.
The smug, slick bastard who had nagged him, bugged him, irritated him, and no matter how it chafed to admit it, protected him and Al since day one- was the reason that he'd made it to Central and fought this far at all- and he wasn't his superior anymore. He never would be in that office again.
For a moment, it felt like the world had just shifted under his feet, like everything solid and familiar had tilted and become different and so disorienting it was blinding, and in that moment, it was too overwhelming to even think.
Ed swallowed hard again into the silence, forcing his hand and heart to steady. "There," he grunted, withdrawing his hand back, and went so far as to fake a pathetic little smile even if he was the only one to see it as he sat back against his tree. "Wasn't so hard, was it?"
The bottle was empty, he saw, glancing unhappily back down to it. How much of it had ended up anywhere besides the ground or Mustang's face was debatable, but... he had to have at least managed something.
Mustang grunted something back, low and inaudible even as he sagged heavier back towards the ground. He took in another few breaths, if they could even be called that, deep and guttural and aching, then at last just shifted to bury his face into his arm.
"Thank you," the colonel said, again after a long stretch of silence. It was a stumbling rasp again, barely more than a whisper- but still, those two soft, thick words were more than enough to freeze Ed right in his tracks.
Thank you. A real, genuine thank you. From the colonel.
"F-for... for the hood," he clarified a few moments later, soft again. Then, that said on the cusp of another hacked wheeze, he curled back in on himself and withdrew away, clutched into a wounded, hurt ball as protectively as he could.
Ed's throat tightened again, and at first, he couldn't even come close to responding at all. Mustang stayed there in a collapsed, pathetic ball, small and wheezing and desperately fragile, which was messed up because he was Mustang. He wasn't supposed to be any of those things.
He wasn't supposed to be so weak he couldn't drink on his own.
He really, really wasn't supposed to give him a quiet, sincere thank you.
Something turned in his stomach, sick and scared, and his voice went so lost in it that when he first opened his mouth to speak, nothing even came out.
"...How's everything else?" he managed finally, half because he needed to know, half because he was desperate for any change of subject he could find. Maybe it was selfish, but he was too strained and confused and- and scared to care. "You- you said you couldn't... see. Before. Is that...?"
But, to his intense relief, the colonel shook his head in the negative, barely a twitch in the low light but it was still there. "N-no," he murmured, again through another shiver. "I can't... I'm not blind. It's- it was just the flashing lights, I couldn't- my eyes..." Mustang trailed off with another frustrated sigh, shaking his head into the ground a second time. "It's nothing. Marcoh can fix it."
Ed bit back a protest of his own, narrowing his eyes at him. This miracle-worker Marcoh, again. Mustang was sure putting a hell of a lot of trust in him, and on one hand, he sure seemed like their best bet for getting help, right now, but on the other... well, the more he sounded like too good to be true, the less Ed found himself trusting him.
Saying as such to Mustang now, though, when he seemed to be clinging onto that desperate hope like a final lifeline, and, oh yeah, the colonel still wouldn't even tell them what was going on, really didn't feel all that productive.
"And your mouth?"
The colonel stiffened again, a gentle jerk against the ground. For a moment, there was nothing. Just more shivering, more panting, more sweating, more wheezing. But Ed waited, even as difficult as it was to watch and bear, letting the silence demand an answer for him.
"It's..." Mustang coughed, then shook his head, flinching away just a little bit more. "It's nothing."
"Nothing."
"Nothing," he whispered again. The word came out muffled still, and Ed's impatience flared, because fucking obviously there was something wrong with it, but one more crunchy footstep over the leaves closer and Mustang had flinched away again.
Flinched away like he'd just been struck in the face- and Ed had been the one to do it.
Ed shivered again, suddenly cold inside and out, and once again found himself powerless to say anything.
As badly as he wanted to treat this like the Mustang he knew, it was becoming increasingly apparent that he couldn't. Not because the man was so weak he'd crumble like glass at a single harsh word- but because this wasn't the Mustang he knew.
As terrified as it made Ed to realize that, it wasn't that Mustang, and sitting here now, with the colonel shivering, crumpled on a cold, dirty ground, and still whining with muffled agony, wasn't the time to go on a fishing expedition to find it.
It took another few miserable moments for a silence to lapse again, Mustang only settling when the interrogation was clearly done. But while it was obvious that silence was just what the colonel needed, it was the exact opposite of what Ed needed. Which was again stupid and selfish, because this wasn't fucking about him, but he'd never sat in helpless silence with Mustang before. The closest he'd ever come was the colonel making him redo his report right there in his office, because stick-figure depictions and chicken-scratch curse words were apparently inappropriate, or something, but that just- that wasn't this! That-
There was a difference between working with the colonel, and sitting next to him to watch, care for, and protect him like this.
Because until today, Ed had never seen him be so painfully, agonizingly, vulnerably human.
Which was just a little too much to bear, because the curled figure beside him probably wasn't all that human anymore.
Ed fidgeted, desperately uncomfortable again. His legs tucked further underneath himself, and his stomach knotted, and at another low, choking whimper, he knew he could not take this anymore.
He started to push himself towards his feet, glaring obstinately towards the darkening edge of the trees and really, just, anywhere other than the colonel that he could get. "Stay put," he muttered, dusting himself off. "I'm going to-"
"Fullmetal?"
He gritted his teeth, a frustrated whine of his own just barely staying muffled in his throat as he tensed and stiffened and all but cursed right on the spot. No, no- he was supposed to slip away to keep watch for Al, he was supposed to not have to see or hear Mustang be this anymore- wasn't supposed to hear that struggling voice, too weak, too cracked, too broken to be the bastard colonel's- damn it, you conniving, manipulative, you-
"What?"
"W-why are you... y-you... here?"
Ed tensed again.
Mustang stayed limp on the ground, although Ed was starting to worry he wasn't too weak to move, he was just too afraid of the pain it would bring to try. He hadn't turned to look after Ed's attempted departure, back still to him and hood still snugly nestled over his head, and for a moment, Ed had to wonder if he'd realized he was even trying to run tail like a coward at all.
With a great, heavy huff, Ed sunk back down to the ground again, folding his arms to glower to the ground. "You think you're in any shape to not keel over and die out here on your own?" he challenged back, only still managing a scowl because it remained on Mustang's back.
"...No. That's..." A small, disturbingly young sigh came out, too small for any measure of comfort. "...you can't take this back, Ed. If the military- if t-they find this out- for you and your brother, Ed. It's over for both of you, not just you. I'm... you don't understand. I'm not worth this. And not just- Maes, he has a wife, a child-" His voice cracked again, a dangerous waver through his voice that seemed even more dangerously close to an all-too-human sob."You're throwing everything-"
"Mustang?"
The colonel- chimera- whatever he was- fell worryingly silent. He twitched, trembling still, and for a heartbeat, was so still and paralyzed it was terrifying.
"...y-yes?" he rasped at last.
"Shut the fuck up," Ed said, and refocused his attention straight back on the edge of the forest to wait for his brother.