For as much as Al loved Xing, and really he did, one of the things he had to admit to hating about being here the most what having to receive most news from his brother and sister-in-law by mail. Even if it was a handwritten note that he could stare at and even slightly smell Rushvalley on it, he couldn't help but feel it was impersonal. He couldn't laugh and hug them or roll his eyes at them or even exasperatedly walk out of the room when they started making eyes at each other.
Or when they were expecting another child nine months after their first one was born.
Had the news been delivered to him in person, he would have gaped at the two of them and asked them how that even happened, to which Winry probably would have blushed and Ed would have grinned. He hadn't even been in Xing a week and they were already telling him she was pregnant, which meant that she had to have pregnant while he was there with them. Well she had been acting off color and sick, but he thought that was an effect of having delivered a baby… not being pregnant with another one.
He couldn't point this out to them in person though. The best he could do was hurry down to the Empress's room, letter in hand. He wanted to tell both her and Rikui, but Mei first. He knew where she was right now, but she was more likely to be in a different place sooner than Rikui. And of the two Chang women, she was the one that actually knew Ed and would probably laugh harder at it.
He went through the standard search and wait while the guards asked Mei if he could come in, and then he was admitted. He was surprised upon entering to find both of said Chang women sitting there stiffly. Neither one of them was looking at the other, instead staring off in different directions as if they couldn't stand the sight of the other.
The smile faded off his face.
"Is everything alright?"
"Everything is fine, Ambassador," Mei said in a clipped manner, moving her untouched teacup father away from her. "What did you need?"
"I…" His reasons for coming in seemed to have left his mind. Rikui glared at Mei as she spoke, then fixed her dark eyes firmly on him. She had a length of cloth tied in her hair like a headband, only it was long enough to fall over either shoulder.
"Letter. There was a letter from Ed. I though you would want to know what was in it. Both of you, actually," he said, gesturing with the hand with the letter in it at her.
"And what did he say?" Mei asked, her voice sounding like it was defrosting a bit. There was still a hard edge to it though.
"Um, is this a bad time? I can come back later…"
"No, everything is fine," Rikui said in a sarcastic tone, shooting another glare at Mei, to which she responded in kind. She dropped the tone when she turned back to Al though. "I do want to know what he had to say though. What is it?"
"Oh well…" Al managed to summon a small smile to his face. "Well… Winry's pregnant."
Both of them stopped and frowned. "But… she just had Benny."
"I know. She's already pregnant again. And she's already far enough along that they're starting to see it, which means she must have gotten pregnant right after Benny was born."
"Excited, were they?" Rikiu asked, raising an eyebrow. Al turned a bit pink, but grinned.
"I'm going to be an Uncle again. Already."
"That will be difficult for them, won't it? Especially for Winry. Especially with Benny still so young."
"You'll have to go back," Rikui said in response to Mei's comment. "Help them out. Maybe you could finally show me your home, Al."
"I don't think that would be a good idea," Mei said sharply, causing Rikui to turn around sharply and glare again. "Your father made it very clear to me when he sent you here—"
"That I'm an adult and I don't need to be told what to do? Especially by my second cousin who's younger than me?"
"I am the Empress!"
"Exactly my problem! You're so caught up in your own self-importance you don't even stop to realize that you're killing this country. All of you fat politicians are! What do you think the riots are about?!"
"Rikui!"
"I know exactly why father sent me here, he sent me here hoping that your importance might beat me into submission, but I see what you really are!"
"And what's that?"
"A…" she faltered, words seeming to fail her. Then something flickered in her eyes. "You're a failure, that's what you are! You're a pathetic excuse for a ruler, a little puppet and Xing deserves better! You're going to ruin us all, just like everyone else. You got the throne because you stole a Philosopher's Stone from Amestris, not because you have any qualifications to be spoken of! You couldn't even get a Philosopher's Stone on your own! And— And the very first thing you do is get us involved in a war that kills millions of us! And then when we're about to win, you give into international pressure and surrender! Now we have more debt than we know what to do with and it's all YOUR FAULT!"
Al watched, open mouthed in horror at the scene before him. Mei was sitting frozen in her seat, white as a sheet as Rikui, who had shot to her feet, screamed.
There was an echoing silence that followed her outburst.
Rikui stood there, breathing heavily, then she spun around on her heel and stormed out of the room.
Al stared after her, but the guards seemed likewise shocked because they let her out of the room. It seemed no one had ever had quite an outburst like that before. The closest Al could ever remember to anything like that was when Mei had said almost the same things about herself.
"Empress…"
He turned to look at her and then immediately dropped the letter in his hand, rushing to her side and putting a hand on her shoulder.
"Mei, it's alright."
She looked like she was hyperventilating. "Mei, Mei!"
"She's right, she's completely right—"
"Leave," he ordered, turning to the guards who stood in the doorway. For once they didn't try to protest, instead just hurried out. Then he pulled her into a tight hug and she held onto him, still breathing rapidly and rambling about how she was entirely correct.
"Mei, she is not right, you're fine, you're not pathetic, you're not a failure. Remember everything good that you've been doing? How many people you've been helping? You are not weak!"
"Just keep breathing," he muttered, rubbing her back. "You are not a failure, you are not weak."
"Al—"
"Mei Chang, you are strong, and beautiful, and independent, and a good, kind, caring ruler! You are not going to let something she said because she was angry upset you like this."
"But she's right, I'm killing Xing—"
"Absolutely not." She buried her face in his shoulder, still shuddering. "I don't want to hear it."
It still took several more moments for her breathing to cold and her to detangle herself from Al's arms.
"I'm going to go speak with her, alright? She's was just mad and said what she knew would make you unhinge."
Mei nodded, but she didn't stop until Al put his hand under her chin. She looked deeply tired, like she hadn't been sleeping for the past couple of days. He hadn't seen the circles around her eyes look that bad in months.
"Mei… what's wrong? It's not like you to shout at her like that. You're usually better at controlling your temper."
She looked away from him and Al had to fight the urge to turn her chin so that she had to look at him.
"I just haven't been sleeping very well, Al."
"Mei, what's wrong? What did she do?"
She swallowed, then shook her head.
"What?"
"It's stupid."
"You're not stupid."
"I didn't say I was stupid, I said it's stupid." Instead of looking to the side now, she looked down. "She was taking you away from me?"
He blinked.
"What?"
"She was taking you away from me. There. I told you it was stupid."
"What are you talking about? She wasn't taking me away from you…" Her comment forced him to stop and think though. Well he had started spending a lot of time with her and not as much with Mei. And there had been that incident where he had gone to the market with her instead of meeting Mei in the kitchen, but he had apologized profusely over that once he realized hadn't he?
"Mei, I'm sorry… I didn't even realize…"
"I told you, it's stupid. You don't belong to me or anything and I kept trying to tell myself that."
"That's not an excuse for me to ignore you though," he said firmly. "I'm sorry, it won't happen again."
"She's your friend too…"
"Well, yes. Yes she is. But I care about you too, Mei. If you ever feel that way again… please, come talk to me. I want to know."
She nodded.
"Mei… I mean that."
"… I know," she eventually whispered, then threw herself against his chest. "I'm sorry, Alphonse."
"You're perfectly alright." He said firmly. "She was basically hurling your worst fears right in your face, I'm not surprised you reacted like this. I'd be surprised if you didn't react like this. In fact, I think it's very brave of you to not have said something worse to her."
"I was too shocked to."
"Well there are plenty of people who would have done worse. You're a bigger person."
"How did I end up with someone as amazing as you in my life, Al?" she whispered into his shoulder. Al just smiled and rubbed her back comfortingly.
"Because you're an amazing person, Mei."
She smiled, then pulled away. "Thank you."
"Of course."
Al turned around and grabbed the tea cup she hadn't been drinking from earlier and pushed it into her hands. It was still warm, thankfully enough, something that she attached to as she held it.
"Thank you."
He sat there watching her as she drank the tea, eventually pouring himself a cup and then refilling her cup. They sat there for probably twenty minutes, not saying anything until Mei finally cleared her throat.
"So… Ed and Winry are having another baby."
"Yeah. Poor Winry."
"Poor Ed. He's going to have to take care of a baby and a pregnant wife," Mei said in a voice that only wavered slightly. Al smiled.
"Maybe I won't go back to help after all."
"You wouldn't be that mean."
"Well… no. But I think this time I'm not going to come back until the baby's born. I love Winry like a sister, but dealing with her pregnant, well… I'll leave that to Ed. That way he's the only one she can threaten with a wrench and nearly kill."
Mei laughed, taking another sip of tea.
There was a knock on the door. Al glanced at Mei, and she glanced back at him, no clear answer in her eyes.
"Come in," he answered for her.
Both of them were surprised at their visitor.
"… I'm sorry."
He glanced at Mei again, but this time she didn't look back at him. Just stared at Rikui who was standing there with her head bowed.
"I let my temper got the better of me and I said things I didn't mean. A thousand apologies to you, Your Highness."
"You don't have to be so formal, Rikui," Mei eventually said. She was staring down into her tea cup. "I understand."
"You're not killing Xing. If it is dying, it's been happening for a long time. I was just mad. And I went straight to my room and sat there until I realized that. You're trying your hardest to help people."
"Thank you."
The two women stood there, still rather stiff.
"We were just talking about Ed and the baby," Al eventually said, pouring some tea into the cup she had been drinking from before. "What do you think? Should I leave him to suffer with a pregnant Winry, or take pity on him?"
"… Pity," she said eventually after Mei nodded, sitting down and taking the cup. "You wouldn't want to be too harsh on your brother after all."
"Yes, but we're talking about Winry who's prone to knocking people's souls out of them with her wrench on a good day. When she's angry and hormonal?"
"And stressed because of a baby," Mei pointed out.
"And stressed because of a baby," he agreed. "I don't know. And besides, it's their fault anyways, why should I suffer?"
"You're the one that was so excited about being an Uncle," Rikui said, taking a sip.
"That's a good point, Al."
"Yes, but I didn't think I'd be an Uncle twice within a year when I only have one brother!"
This chapter started out fluffy, it did, I swear. And I had every intention of making it fluffy. Then my best friend and I got into a debate/argument bordering on fight and... this happened... Whooooo. Uh... please review! Ever had that happen? You sit down the full intentions to write/draw/create one thing, and then something happens and all of a sudden your subconscious hijacks your brain and you're doing something else? I didn't think "I'm channeling my negative emotions into my writing cause I was just fighting so I'm going to have the characters fight"... I was just writing and all of a sudden they were yelling at each other...