Chapter Fourteen
It took the agents and local police department most of the day to finish working the crime scene and taking statements. It also took a rather incredible amount of bullshitting on the part of the FBI and alchemists – enough that even Edward, with his history of "creatively" reporting on his missions, was impressed – to convince the local police that Harding had booby-trapped the area with explosives and other traps, and that one of them must have included some sort of accelerant that Harding had gotten on himself. That combined with a stray spark from a bullet or a bit of flying metal must've set him alight. They even went so far as to caution the police officers and crime scene techs to watch out for any traps that may still be set.
Mustang stayed right by Ed's side, silently supporting the exhausted, wounded teen throughout the hours while the agents went to work. The teen's gloves had been destroyed in the fight, so Mustang loaned him his, although not before giving him a stern warning and extracting a promise that he would be extra careful with them and would return them as soon as they were back in the hotel or once Ed could get a replacement pair.
Ed had grumbled and rolled his eyes in an exaggerated fashion but accepted the gloves. "Did you hit your head or something? You're starting to act like you care and it's creeping me out."
"Brat," Mustang replied, ruffling the teen's sweaty golden hair and ignoring the snarl he received in response as Ed flattened his hair back into place. He was glad to see that Edward had at least managed to put his mask back in place. He was still worried about the moment when everything would catch up with him and he realised exactly what had happened, but for the time being he was just happy to see the blond acting like his normal, bratty self.
At one stage, Prentiss brought a paramedic over to where they were leaning against the SUVs. The man had taken one look at Edward – covered in blood, sweat, and grime – and strongly recommended that the teen go to the hospital.
"No," Ed said simply, crossing his arms over his chest stubbornly and glaring at the medic. "I don't need a hospital. I need a shower and some sleep, and that's all."
"Then at least let me look over your injuries and disinfect and bind them up," the paramedic insisted. "You're covered in blood and you've got so much filth on you, you're risking infection if you don't get them covered."
Edward shook his head. "No. I'll be fine. I know how to clean and dress my own wounds." He ignored the man's further protests, even when he looked to Mustang for some support or for the older alchemist to overrule Edward and directed his attention to the activity near Harding's body.
Mustang shook his head no and shrugged, and the paramedic sighed in defeat and left the two alchemists alone, with Prentiss trailing behind him after casting a concerned glance at Edward. It wasn't as if the agents could have missed the way Edward had thrown up his stomach contents earlier, and no doubt they didn't believe his bravado. However, it was also clear that the teen wasn't willing to talk about it, and Mustang was most likely the best one to handle it, since he was Edward's commanding officers and spent the most time with the younger alchemist.
Doctor Reid came over to them several hours into the cleanup, after assisting with the questioning of a few civilians who'd heard the fight and come to check it out (thankfully after it was over and all signs of alchemy had been cleaned up by Mustang) and asked if they'd like to go back to the hotel and get some food and sleep.
"Yes!" Edward exclaimed. "Let's go now."
"I agree," Mustang said. "We used a lot of energy and I could use some sleep as well."
Reid nodded and chuckled. "Okay, just wait a few more minutes while I see how many from the team we can spare."
It turned out that everyone except for Hotch and Rossi accepted the invite for food and sleep and they commandeered both cars with JJ promising to come back to pick Hotch and Rossi up when they were finished with the scene. Reid, Morgan, and Prentiss ended up taking one car back, while Mustang and Edward found themselves riding with JJ. Mustang seized the opportunity to grab the front passenger seat while Ed was shunted to the back. Edward was honestly too tired to give a shit and the back seat was starting to look more and more like an ideal place for a nap once they started moving.
Al had always said that he was impressed at how it seemed that Ed could sleep anywhere at any time, no matter how uncomfortable it might be, and right now he was fighting that urge. As much as he desperately needed the sleep after expending so much energy, he was not going to fall asleep until he was safely behind the door of the hotel room. He was not going to have JJ or any of the other agents witness him in the middle of a nightmare.
The car ride back to the hotel was mostly silent, broken only by a few quiet questions from JJ about what they'd like to eat. Both alchemists indicated that they didn't have a preference and would eat just about anything to replenish the energy they had expended. So instead, JJ had followed up with more probing questions about what foods they liked, didn't like, or if they had any known food allergies that she would need to avoid. Armed with the knowledge that if milk (unless in cheese form), capsicum, or peas made an appearance in any of their food, the agents would have two severely displeased alchemists on their hands, she dropped them off at the hotel and gathered orders from the other agents. As she pulled away in search of a restaurant that could prepare enough food to feed an army and to fill Garcia in, the rest of the group headed into the hotel.
There was a brief discussion about whether they'd be eating in their own rooms or together in the meeting room Ed had discovered. Morgan was the one who had made the decision in the end. He pointed out that Ed looked dead on his feet and that Mustang didn't look much better, and since they didn't know how long JJ would be, they might as well head to their rooms, clean up, and get some sleep until she came back.
After being assured that someone would get them when food arrived, the two alchemists disappeared into their room. Almost immediately, Ed was in the shower. Mustang scrounged around their room and found a small first aid kit in their little kitchenette. Within minutes, Edward exited the bathroom wearing only his boxers and carrying the rest of his clothes and a small first aid kit he'd found in the bathroom. Mustang seized the opportunity to really give him a proper once over, noting every injury he found.
"I'm going for a shower. Don't go to sleep yet. I'll help you treat your wounds," Mustang ordered firmly as he headed for the bathroom. He saw Edward roll his eyes in response but ignored the disrespectful gesture as he had so many other such gestures from the younger alchemist over the last few years. Quickly undressing and hopping into the shower, Mustang scrubbed himself clean and did his own wound inventory. He'd suffered several cuts and grazes, a multitude of bruises, and a sprained wrist from when Edward had tackled him to the ground, but only one of the cuts seemed like it'd need stitches. The rest of his minor injuries could be left alone to heal. It was just too bad that his sprained wrist wasn't his dominant hand – once they got back to Amestris, he wouldn't be able to use his injury to avoid his paperwork.
Finished with his shower, he walked out dressed the same as Edward. Edward didn't even flinch at the sight when Mustang walked out of the bathroom. He had apparently spread his towel out on the bed after using it to dry off his automail and had the first aid kit opened next to him and was currently cleaning and binding one of the many cuts he'd received in the fight.
"Put your clothes over there with mine," Ed said, not even looking up as he pointed to his bundle of filthy clothes. "I'll clean and mend them after we get some sleep." Mustang did as he had been directed and made himself comfortable on the bed next to the blond. Edward didn't protest when Mustang lifted his left arm and took the alcohol-covered swab from him and continued to disinfect the wounds. Mustang noted that only a couple of the cuts Ed had sustained on his upper half would need stitches.
He tossed the swab in the trash bin, prepared a new one and moved on to the old scar above Edward's right eye that had been reopened in the fight. He knelt in front of Ed for this one, using one hand to keep Ed's bangs out of his eyes while he gently cleaned the gash. He saw the faintest wince of pain from the teen at the sting of the alcohol, but otherwise showed no signs of discomfort. While the wound had bled heavily during the fight, it wouldn't require stitching, just some gauze and a bandage to protect it until it closed again.
With a third swab in hand, Mustang moved on to Ed's legs. The upper part of his left leg above his automail port, hadn't sustained any injuries aside from some minor bruising, but he had a particularly nasty gash on his right calf. He looked up at Edward. "This one's going to hurt like a bitch to clean. I'm going to have to get in there properly to clean it."
Edward shrugged. "I've had worse. Just do it." So, Mustang did as he asked. Ed flinched when Mustang started, but the older alchemist simply held his leg still and continued with his work.
"Did you notice if either of the first aid kits had any supplies for stitches?" Mustang asked as he finished up with the gash. Once it had been cleaned out and he'd gotten a proper look at it, Mustang realised that it wasn't as deep as he'd originally thought. It definitely needed stitches, but he'd been worried that he would end up having to drag the blond to a hospital to get it dealt with. Thankfully, he got to avoid the hassle of knocking the kid out and then having to deal with the angry aftermath.
"No, they didn't. What kind of med kit doesn't have crap for stitches?" Ed grouched with a glare at the kits.
"Clearly they weren't prepared for you and your knack for getting seriously injured," Mustang replied smoothly as he rummaged through the kit looking for things he could use.
"Oh shut it, Mustang. Are you nearly done?" Ed snapped at him.
Mustang made a small sound of victory when he came up with a trauma pad and some more bandages. "Nearly; I just have to wrap your leg up and you'll be alright until we get back to Amestris to get that leg and arm stitched up," he said as he proceeded to wrap the wound up. Once he was finished, he cleaned up the empty wrappings and used disinfectant swabs and tossed them. He looked up at Edward. "How's your automail port?"
Edward rotated his right arm carefully, listening to the sound of the metal and feeling how the nerves reacted to the movement and weight of the arm. "I'm not sure. It feels about how I would expect it to feel if it was jammed between stone and brick due to a hard impact. Truth is protecting it, so it's still functioning, but I'll probably need Winry to take a look when we get home and make sure that the connections between the nerves and the port itself aren't damaged."
Mustang gave him a concerned look. "Is that a possibility?"
Edward lifted and rotated his arm again. "I don't think so. Even with Truth protecting it, I think there'd be more pain if the connections themselves were damaged. It's hard to tell since the metal itself doesn't transmit pain. The pain is coming from where the metal is attached to my skin and muscles, so I think it's just going to be a deep bruise, maybe a strain around the port itself."
Mustang nodded. "Okay." He rose from his kneeling position in front of Edward and moved over towards his own bed with the second first aid kit. While he was doing that, Ed inspected his handiwork. He had to admit – if only to himself, since Mustang didn't need his ego inflated any further – that he'd done a decent job of patching up the wounds. He glanced over at his commanding officer. He could tell from the way the man was holding his arm that his wrist was damaged. Sighing, the blond stood and limped over to the other bed before sitting heavily next to him and taking the swab from Mustang's hand.
"What are you doing?" Mustang asked, startled by the action.
"What does it look like? Helping you," Ed replied as he set to work. He may not have had any formal medical training, but he'd hurt and patched himself up enough times to know the basics. He reached towards the largest cut he could see, on Mustang's left bicep.
"You should be resting. I can manage by myself," Mustang argued as he reached to take the swab back.
"You've got a busted wrist, some pretty deep bruising and a small cut on your shoulder, and a large gash on your back. There's no way you can clean it out properly, even if that was your only injury," Ed pointed out as he moved his hand to dodge Mustang's grab.
Mustang froze. "I do?" He hadn't noticed he'd injured his back when he was in the bathroom, but now that Ed had mentioned it, his shoulder blades were throbbing.
"See? You obviously need help if you didn't even notice it." Mustang had to agree with that, so he let Edward clean him up. He was a bit worried by the fact that Ed seemed to be far too much at ease with what he was doing. Ed finished cleaning his shoulder wound and put a small piece of gauze over it before taping it down securely.
"I guess it's an unfounded hope that you learned to do this simply because you've read a medical book?" Mustang asked.
Ed let out a small huff of amusement. "Of course I read medical textbooks. But there's nothing like a bit of real-world practice to make sure you know what you're doing," Ed replied as he finished up with the cut on Mustang's back. Thankfully, even though it was long, it was shallow and wouldn't even need wrapping up. "You can turn back around now. Give me your wrist."
Mustang held out his injured wrist. "Do I even want to know?" Mustang asked as Ed gently prodded his wrist and hand to judge the severity of the injury.
"Let's just say that my medical history contains barely half of my injuries. It's just a bad sprain by the way. So you'll need to ice it and rest it for a few days. Luckily, it's not your writing hand, so you'll be able to get back to all that wonderful paperwork once we get home." Ed grinned as he started wrapping Mustang's wrist up.
"Don't remind me," Mustang groaned. The thought of nearly a week's worth of backlogged paperwork and a very pissed off Lieutenant Hawkeye was not appealing.
Ed didn't even bother to hide his smile as he finished what he was doing and cleaned up. Just the thought of seeing Mustang trying to avoid or placate Lieutenant Hawkeye was something he was looking forward to seeing. It was the little things that brought him so much pleasure these days.
Mustang stood and moved to the fridge to check for any ice packs or ice he could wrap up. Thankfully, he found an ice pack and placed it over his wrist as he headed back for the bed. He had thought he'd see the blond curled up and sound asleep but was surprised to see him drawing on himself. Glancing at it, he recognised the absorbing array just as Ed finished drawing it.
Edward looked up and saw Mustang standing next to him, looking down at the array. He motioned for the Colonel to hold out his arm. "Activate it before you go to sleep. That way we can speed up our intake of energy while we rest," he said as he traced the array onto Mustang's arm. Mustang nodded at the idea. "Done. Get some sleep, Mustang. You look like shit," Edward said with a small wave of his hand.
Mustang snorted but did as he was told. He got himself under his blankets and watched Ed do the same, albeit a bit more cautiously thanks to his wounds. Both alchemists got settled and activated their arrays, immediately feeling the effects.
Mustang was nearly asleep when he heard Ed call his name.
"Hey, Mustang?"
"Yes, Ed?"
"Thanks for helping me."
"Anytime, kiddo. Thanks for helping me."
"Anytime, old man."
"I'M NOT OLD!" The last thing Mustang heard before he fell asleep was Ed's laughter, and he had to admit, there were worse sounds to fall asleep to.
Ed had hoped that his exhaustion would lead to a dreamless sleep, only to be confronted with something he hated more than his nightmares: a white world and a black gate.
"Hello, young alchemist," the static figure grinned at him.
"Hello, Truth," Edward sighed. "What do you want this time?"
"Why Edward, what could I possibly want with you except to congratulate you on a job well done?" Truth asked, almost sounding affronted.
"It we've finished the job, are you here to bring me and Mustang back?" Edward asked, more than a little suspicious about why he was here and Mustang wasn't, if Truth was about to bring them back to Amestris since their task was done.
"Not quite. You see, I can't bring you back unless you activate the human transmutation circle and come here yourselves." Truth grinned.
A trickle of suspicion tickled the back of Ed's mind. "Will there be a price to pay if we do that?" Edward asked, almost completely certain what the answer to that question would be, considering his prior experiences with Truth and the Gate.
"Of course! You don't expect to pass through me twice without payment?" Truth asked.
"Of course you'd make us pay for the return trip. Why isn't that included as part of the deal? We succeeded in our mission so why isn't that payment enough?" Ed demanded angrily.
"Our first deal was that you would owe me a favour in exchange for your brother back, body and soul. I called in that favour when Harding managed to sneak past me. This time our deal was that you and Mustang would stop Harding and that I would give you information pertaining to that world and keep your automail and alchemy functional. A free return trip was not discussed and therefore isn't part of the deal. You need to pay a toll to get back to Amestris," Truth explained, as though it was obvious.
Edward stared at his most hated nemesis. "You're serious?" was all he managed to gasp out as he felt Truth's words sink into his brain. "You're seriously making us pay to get home?"
"Of course! Equivalent exchange, young alchemist! You completed your task, thus your payment for your brother's return has been finalized. I don't owe you any favours, after all. I'm sending you back now. It seems the lovely Agent Jareau is knocking at your door. See you soon, Edward Elric." Truth's evil grin was the last thing he saw before his eyes snapped open and he woke, gasping for breath.
"Edward! Are you okay?" Mustang was hovering next to him as he fought to calm his breathing down. He could vaguely hear knocking in the background. Finally, he managed to get his breathing under control as he sat up.
"I'm fine. Go and get the door before they break it down. I'll tell you about it later." He got carefully out of bed and grabbed their dirty clothes, ignoring Mustang staring at him. As he clapped his hands to perform his cleaning array, Mustang moved towards the door to answer it. He could hear murmured voices and a minute later the door shut and Mustang was back beside Edward.
"It was Agent Jareau. Food is here and we're all gathering in that meeting room in five minutes. What happened? Another nightmare?"
Obviously, Mustang wasn't going to be easily dissuaded. Ed handed him his clean and mended clothing, which Mustang accepted with a nod, but didn't make a move to put on, waiting patiently for Ed to talk. With a sigh, Ed clapped again and performed the same cleaning and mending array on his own clothes.
"It wasn't a nightmare. Truth paid me a visit," Ed said in a flat voice as he started to dress himself, being mindful of his injuries. Mustang started following his lead, although he kept his onyx eyes on Edward.
"What did it want?" Mustang queried, knowing it wasn't going to be good news, judging by Edward's tone and expression.
"It decided to tell us we did a good job in stopping Harding, and to inform me that we aren't going back to Amestris unless we pay a toll," Edward informed him.
Mustang froze, halfway through buttoning up his dress shirt. "Are you serious? It's making us pay for passage back?"
Edward winced at the disbelieving and disgusted tone in his commander's voice. "Yeah. Apparently, passage back wasn't part of our deal. I'm sorry, Mustang." Edward hung his head.
"Why are you apologising? It's that bastard's fault!" Mustang asked, gripping Ed carefully by his shoulders so as to not exacerbate the teen's injuries. Edward looked up at the touch.
"I didn't think about the return trip and now we have to pay Truth knows what to get home! You shouldn't have even been here. It was a deal between Truth and me; you had nothing to do with it and now you have to pay for it!" If asked, Edward would blame his exhaustion and the events of the past few days on the fact that his eyes were starting to fill with tears.
Mustang noticed and felt his heart ache at the sight. "Listen to me, Ed. None of this is your fault." Ed opened his mouth to argue, but Mustang cut him off. "No, listen. Truth offered to send me back before we got sent here, remember?" A slow nod answered him. "I chose to come with you. While you're very talented and defying the odds, your chances of surviving this mission were apparently increased by me being here. So I decided that I would come with you and make sure you got back to your brother in one piece. I do not regret my decision and I will pay my toll to pass through the Gate if that's what I need to do to make sure you get back to Al. In no way is any of this your fault. If you want to blame something, blame me for agreeing to come or blame Truth for being an asshole, okay?"
A small, slightly watery chuckle escaped Ed as Mustang finished. "Okay," he said as he rubbed his eyes with the heel of his hand.
"Good. Now, more importantly, did you manage to transmute yourself a pair of gloves, or do you need to continue borrowing mine?" Mustang asked as he removed his hands from Ed's shoulders and noticed the lack of gloves on him.
Ed picked up the ignition gloves from the table the clothes had been on and handed them back to Mustang. "I'm good; I transmuted a pair for myself while you were talking to Agent Jareau," he said as he pulled the freshly transmuted pair of gloves on, with Mustang mimicking his actions.
"Excellent. Now, let's go get something to eat and then come back up here and get some more sleep before we figure out what we're going to do about Truth," Mustang declared as he ushered Edward out the door and down towards food.
Ed laughed as his antics but went along willingly. Very little could upset the blond enough to put him off food, and Truth wasn't one of them. Ed led the way down, and subsequently was the first through the door into the meeting room. That also meant he was the first to be tackled by a perky blonde launching herself at him. He winced in pain as the bear hug put pressure on his cracked ribs, but the blonde was gone as quickly as she came.
She hadn't gone far, however, and soon Mustang was captured in her embrace. Garcia finally calmed down enough to notice that her new friends were injured and immediately started apologising for causing them pain. Morgan soon intervened and led Garcia away from them so they could find a place to sit at the table, which contained a number of different kinds of food.
The variety of aromas was enough to make both alchemists salivate. They barely noticed that Hotch and Rossi were also present. However, they sat down politely at the table and waited patiently for everyone else to be seated. Edward was ready to just launch himself at the food and start shoveling it in his mouth at top speed, but he restrained himself. Of course, the fact that Mustang had one hand gripping his flesh arm to hold him back also helped.
Soon enough everyone was helping themselves to food. The two alchemists had next to no idea what they were eating, although they did recognise the pizza. Some of the food tasted like Cretan food and some tasted similar to Xingese food, but they were more focused on actually eating than worrying about what they were eating.
Twenty minutes and several empty food containers in front of them later, Edward and Mustang had finally eaten their fill, much to the amusement of the agents, all of whom had finished eating long before the alchemists were sated. There was some idle chatter among everyone, mostly in the form of the agents and alchemists answering questions about the battle for Garcia. Once the perky blonde analyst had run out of questions, Hotch spoke up.
"I understand that you joined forces with us solely because he was one of your people, but I wanted to thank both of you for your assistance in putting a stop to Harding's killing spree. After witnessing the fight between the three of you, I have to admit that we'd have been hard-pressed to go up against him without you. So thank you."
"It was our duty to stop him but we couldn't have done it without your help. Not only would we have been struggling to understand your country, but we more than likely wouldn't have caught up to him until he'd killed even more people. Without your assistance and acceptance of us, we wouldn't have stopped him so quickly. There's no need to thank us," Mustang replied while Ed just managed to stop himself from rolling his eyes at how diplomatic they were being.
"Yeah, like Mustang said: we'd have been fucked finding our way around this place by ourselves, so no need to thank us. We also kind of killed your mics and the other techy things you gave us during the fight, so you definitely don't have to thank us. Also, I killed that tracking device you hid in my jacket pocket," Ed said as he raised his eyebrow at Hotch and handed over the destroyed device.
Hotch took it with a small chuckle. "So you found it, huh?"
Ed laughed at Mustang's surprised face. "Yeah, good try. But next time, slip it into my right-hand pocket. Probably wouldn't have found it as quickly with the hand I can't feel," Ed told him helpfully.
"You were tracking us?" Mustang demanded, starting to rise from his chair, his gloved hands pressed against the surface of the table.
Ed put a hand on his arm. "Chill, Mustang. Like you wouldn't have done the same thing. They were just taking precautions," he pointed out logically, making Mustang deflate a little bit.
"Wait, how did you know that was a tracking device? From everything that you've told us, it doesn't sound like your technology is as advanced as ours," Morgan said.
Ed laughed. "The books that I read the other night at the hotel. Some of them were true crime stories, and I recognised it by the description in the books."
"Well, now that that's been dealt with, there is something else I'd like to discuss with you. I think you'll be very interested," Hotch said once Mustang had sat back down. Edward raised a curious eyebrow and Hotch took the hint. "Rossi and I were helping the local PD sweep the store where Harding was hiding for anymore 'booby traps' when we found something that you might want to take back home with you."
He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a white handkerchief that had been folded in half. Unwrapping it, he held it out to reveal two small red stones.
"No fucking way," Ed could only say as he realised what he was looking at. Mustang's jaw was hanging open and he looked as shocked as Ed felt. "He had more Stones?!"
"It would appear so. We found them in his hideout, tucked away in a small hole in the wall. Honestly, if we hadn't heard you describe them, we wouldn't have paid much attention to them. Since they're of your world and pose a danger to ours, Rossi and I decided to give them back to you to deal with as you see fit," Hotch explained as he handed them to Edward, who took them cautiously, like he was being handed an unstable bomb.
"Ed, you realise what this means, right?" Mustang asked as soon as he got over his shock.
"Yeah. It means we got fucking lucky that Harding couldn't get back to his hideout and get these," Ed said as he felt the slight hum of power going through him, thanks to the Stone.
"No, well, yes…but not just that. We have our payment for Truth." Ed whipped his head around to look at Mustang with surprise, golden eyes wide. "We can use these to buy our way back."
Ed grinned as Mustang's words sunk in.
"What do you mean, 'buy our way back'?" Reid asked, snapping the alchemists' attention back to their forgotten audience. Both alchemists exchanged a look before apparently coming to a silent agreement.
"I had a visit from Truth," Ed said. "I'm pretty sure I explained about who it is when we first arrived, right?" The agents all nodded. "Well, it came to let me know that while we have completed our mission, we are going to have to pay our way back, since a return trip was apparently not included in the deal we made. We were going to go back to the room and discuss what to do, but now that we have these, we can exchange them for our trip back."
"You have to pay? Like, money?" Garcia asked.
Ed chuckled darkly. "Not quite. You pay whatever Truth deems a fair price in exchange for what you want. The first time I ever went through the Gate, it cost me my leg. The second time, my arm."
The agents all stared at him in shock at that admission. Ed didn't fail to notice the way their eyes flickered over to his right arm, and he kept himself from gripping it through sheer force of will, uncomfortable with the amount of attention he was getting.
"You went through it a second time? Voluntarily? Even though you'd already lost your leg?" Morgan asked disbelievingly.
"The first time, I didn't understand what I'd done or the price I paid. The second time, I didn't know what price I was going to pay, but I had to go back through. It was the only way to save my brother," Ed said curtly. Feeling the tension in the air, JJ changed the topic.
"So when are you going to head back?" she asked, a little sad at the prospect of saying goodbye to the alchemists so soon. She was really enjoying having them around.
"Now that we've got the Stones, we can head back at any time," Ed said. "The sooner, the better. I've got a little brother in the hospital to get back to, and Mustang's got some paperwork to start catching up on," he added with a smirk.
"Maybe we can stay here a few more days?" Mustang suggested half-heartedly.
Ed wasn't the only one to laugh. "That just means even more paperwork and a very pissed off Lieutenant Hawkeye when she finds out that you hid out here for a few more days to avoid your paperwork."
Mustang sighed, but accepted defeat.
Edward stood and stretched cautiously. "Do you know what the array looks like, or do you want me to draw it?"
"Draw it out. I only remember the one you drew and I'm not confident I remember it one hundred percent," Mustang said after much deliberation. Edward nodded and complied, digging out the piece of chalk from his jacket pocket and kneeling on the wooden floor. With careful, deliberate strokes, he drew the one transmutation circle that he knew he would never forget, no matter how old and mature he got.
Once he was finished and had scrutinised every line and symbol, he straightened and stood. He looked seriously at the agents. "As soon as we're gone, get a stick or a rag and break the outer circle to make sure that it's safe, and then destroy this whole array," Edward asked Hotch, who nodded solemnly. "Thanks again for everything, especially the food," Ed said, gaining a small chuckle from the agents. Garcia and JJ both gave him and Mustang hugs while everyone else settled for a slap on the back or handshakes as a goodbye.
"It was fantastic meeting you both and I almost hope we get to meet you again," Reid said, grinning at Ed."
"Ditto, Doc," Ed grinned back before he and Mustang waved one final time. Taking a deep breath, he and Mustang stepped into the center of the array. He knelt down again and pressed both hands to the array, activating it. A huge flash of blue light erupted from the chalked lines, and after a moment turned a deep, vibrant purple and then a large grey eye suddenly opened beneath their feet, followed by a ring of black, grasping hands rising from the ground, making the agents jump in surprise and step back several paces.
In the next moment, the two alchemists were gone, the eye closed and the hands vanished into the ground, leaving only a chalked circle on the wooden floor. There was nearly a full minute of silence before Hotch approached the array with the same level of caution he would have shown an armed bomb. He dropped his handkerchief on the ground and, in the same way he'd seen Ed destroy the array in the alley outside the hotel, he used the toe of his shoe to drag the handkerchief across the outer circle, breaking it and smudging several of the symbols inside the circle at the same time.
JJ sighed as she left to go and request some cleaning supplies from the front desk clerk so they could fulfill their final promise to the alchemists.
Mustang and Ed stood in a familiar void of pure white, facing Truth, with the Gate looming behind them.
"Welcome back, alchemists."
"We're here to go home," Edward didn't even bother with pretending to be polite.
"Oh? And what do you plan to pay with?" Truth grinned evilly.
"These," Edward said, extending his hand to reveal the two Stones. "One for each of us."
Truth's grin grew wider, if that was even possible. "Oooh, a very handsome payment indeed," it cooed as it reached out to take the Stones from Edward. It spent a moment inspecting them, before turning its attention back to Ed and Mustang. "Very well. I accept your payment. You're free to go home."
The Gate's doors opened wide and familiar black hands grabbed them to drag them back through. The last glimpse they had of Truth was of it grinning at them, waving goodbye at them before they blacked out.
When they came to, it was to find themselves lying on a pristine white tile floor to the sound of two panicked voices calling their names.
"Chief! Boss!"
"Colonel! Brother!"
Mustang and Ed both slowly sat up and took in their surroundings. They were back in Amestris, and more specifically in Al's room at Central Hospital. They met each other's eyes and grinned. It had worked, they were both home and in one piece. Ed felt a hand on his left shoulder and looked up to see Havoc standing over him. He accepted the older man's hand and allowed himself to be pulled to his feet, while Mustang helped himself up using the frame of Al's bed.
Almost as soon as he was on his feet, Ed was yanked out of Havoc's grip and down onto Al's bed, where he was subjected to a hug stronger than Garcia's.
"Where have you two been?!" Al half-shouted through desperate sobs. "You've been missing for five days! I've been worried sick!" Ed soothingly rubbed Al's back as the younger blond sobbed into his left shoulder.
It took a little while for him to calm down, time that Mustang used to claim Edward's usual chair by Al's bed while Havoc summoned Lieutenant Hawkeye and the rest of his relieved and terrified team. He swallowed a little nervously when he saw the combination of relief and rage on Hawkeye's face.
"So? Are you going to tell us what was so important that you disappeared without telling anyone, only to come back injured?" Hawkeye demanded.
Edward and Mustang exchanged a glance and matching grins before Edward looked at Hawkeye and the rest of the team. "It's a long story, so you'd better make yourselves comfortable."
A/N - And here is the final chapter for you guys! Now you can read the entire revised story! A massive thank you to the lovely PhoenixQueen for all of her hard work in revising this story for me. She's also going to work on AMA2 for me and she's helping me with my new story. There's also a chance that once the new story is written, she might help me with Spirit and I'll start writing new chapters sooner than I thought! Now that this story has been completely revised, I would love to hear what you guys think to it!
*Added A/N* if you notice any timeline discrepancies please let me know what chapter and where it was you spotted it so I can fix it! Many thanks! FullmetalBitch xx