Edward was learning how to fly.
It wasn't going well.
"Flap, you bastard, FLAP." The fierce cry in the small grassy clearing area of the avian battle-cruiser had surprisingly come from a rather petit woman. Her black hair was braided into a series of ropes that looped about her head and were tied with what looked like an elastic band. Her eyes were black, and her skin, like that of the majority of avians was a pale milky cream and baby-smooth. Alphonse watched on, as Izumi Curtis scolded the prince for the third time in five minutes.
"In case you haven't realised," replied the prince with exaggerated patience, red wings bristling behind him with simple instinct, "I'm TRYING."
After Edward's recuperation from having his wings grow in, he had immediately been presented in an intricate and delicate ceremony to the populace of the cruiser. Those in the other ships scattered about mars' orbit had watched via satellite relay as a rather disgruntled looking prince had been crowned, while looking like he really didn't want to be there in the slightest. Less than a day later, Alphonse had found Edward and his own adopted mother, Izumi, swearing at each other in a full-blown argument over all the reasons why Edward didn't want to learn to fly.
Izumi had won. She had a way with words that not even Roy Mustang could match. And a powerful right-hook. The lessons had started and now, three days later, Edward knew how to fold his wings perfectly.
A resounding crack echoed through the clearing, emanating from the small woman hitting Edward over the head with enough force to give a long term injury. Al winced empathically. He had been on the receiving end of that blow more than once.
"What the FUCK was that for?" The prince demanded angrily, and received a further hit over the head. Edward staggered.
'Watch your fucking language." Replied Izumi, with the tone of being unaware of anything ironic. "Now flap your fucking wings."
Edward glared and mumbled something that Alphonse couldn't make out, seated as he was in one of the high tree branches at the edge of the clearing. However, it seemed to annoy Edward's new teacher as once again her hand found its mark on the back of his head.
"Then do as I say, Edward, not as I do." Said Izumi firmly. "I thought a bright boy like you would have been able to figure that out." Her tone spoke of no nonsense, and wisely, Edward chose not to dispute it.
Alphonse knew that Izumi was a force to be reckoned with. Strong, fast and deadly, with seemingly no special abilities of her own, there was no one more knowledgeable on, or better at teaching the individual talents possessed by the upper houses. While more handsome than beautiful, she had an air that commanded the respect of even the strongest man, most of whom she could beat in an instant with simple physical prowess. Her pale blue wings were built for speed, elongated and fine, and they seemed slightly odd for her stocky frame and darker features.
She had taken Al in after his mother died in childbirth. Apparently she'd lost a child of her own only turns before.
Edward growled at the woman unfeelingly. Al could tell that the prince had already developed a great deal of respect for her in the short time that she had been teaching him. Indeed, it was because of her that his wings no longer dragged foolishly along the ground behind him, but folded neatly at his sides. Also, he had mastered a small amount of the concealment and illusion that was such a specialty to the Elric house.
Alphonse remembered once asking Izumi why he had been able to preform illusionary techniques when he wasn't an Elric. While smiling brightly at him, Izumi had informed him that not every Elric in fact remained an Elric, there were many people who married into other houses, intermarriage and strange abilities in other houses were becoming more and more commonplace. Alphonse had a sleeping ability from an earlier generation.
But here, seeing a true Elric, one who was royal born learning in days what took Alphonse weeks to learn taught him a new respect for the true descendants of the Elric house.
"Stop thinking about flapping and just DO it." Izumi demanded, in a tone of frustration, and inadvertently breaking Al out of his thoughts.
"What. The. Hell. Does. That. Mean?" Edward bit out angrily, quite obviously thinking that Izumi was doing everything in her power to annoy him.
The woman sighed and cast her eyes towards the ceiling of the ship for a moment, whispering in the original avian dialect "Grant me patience." Before turning back to Edward and reverting to a language that the prince would understand. "Do you think about moving your arms or legs when you want to move them?" Her tone was one of addressing the mentally disabled or very young.
"I guess not." Mumbled Edward, obviously unsure of whether he should be insulted or sheepish.
"Then don't think, you idiot boy! Just flap!"
Edward glared icicles at her, his body language basically screaming 'if it were that easy...!' However, the prince, not to be beaten by the woman, closed his eyes and tried.
Once again, he received a fist over the head. "You're still thinking." Izumi informed him with authority.
Edward scowled darkly and Alphonse bit back the giggle that threatened to betray him.
Then, suddenly, as if on a cue to prove Izumi right, Red wings swept up and outwards, before rushing forwards with a great displacement of air. "Hey! Look! I did it! I did it! I flapped!" Edward shouted, suddenly sounding youthful and energetic. Half surprised and half elated, he turned to Izumi, expecting praise.
"Good." The woman said. "Now do it again."
Edward's scowl returned.
"Well done, Edward." Said Izumi as they sat in the mess hall for dinner that night. It was rare praise for the woman. "With luck, you'll have mastered flight by the end of the week."
Edward couldn't quite fight back the smug glow he felt at that announcement and therefore, didn't try. He grinned at her, before digging in wholeheartedly to the food in front of him. The woman laughed almost fondly, and Al repressed a small smile. Edward rolled his eyes. "Comedians." He paused to mutter at them.
At this Al laughed outright and even Seig, Izumi's burly and rarely spoken husband gave an appreciative guffaw. "You must admit though, Ed,' said Alphonse cheekily, "You're hardly royal material with your dismal eating habits." He took a slender bite of his own dinner. Edward rolled his eyes and kicked him lightly under the table. He had taken to eating with this family, due to the easy acceptance he received, it was convenient, and he had discovered that Izumi, who prepared all her own food, was actually a very good cook.
"Don't eat so fast, Edward." Admonished Izumi. "You'll get indigestion." Edward smiled at her with a mischievous gleam in his eyes and swallowed the large portion of vegetable in his mouth. Izumi shook her head wryly.
"Hey," Asked Edward after awhile. "I have a question."
The table turned their attentions to him.
"Why is it that I instantly trust everyone on this ship, even though by all rights I shouldn't? Is it just another one of the strange powers, or have I finally lost it?"
Al gave a small snort, and Izumi shot him a warning glance. Alphonse ignored it with the grace of a teenager. "It's because you're an Avian, Prince." He said. "Though really, you're still learning to be one, and learning very slowly." He grinned, and was hit over the head with Izumi's well placed wing. "Oww! Teaaaacher..."
"Alphonse Curtis, be serious." She snapped at him. She turned to Edward who was trying to school his features out of a smile. "It is simply because you, Edward, like every other avian here value honesty above every other value. And as you have seen that in this society, you are inclined to instantly trust. However, it's curious that you don't trust the one person on this ship incapable of lying."
Edward's brows crinkled into a small frown. "Who's that?"
Izumi sighed. "Roy Mustang, Edward. Who else?"
Edward tried to inhale in the wrong direction. After a few minutes of choking, he demanded, "What?"
"Mustangs, as a... 'punishment' I guess you could say, for reading minds, are unable to lie to...Edward?"
For Edward had stood up, and was hastily wiping his face down with a napkin. He had just remembered something Mustang had told him in their first ever meeting. "Excuse me." He said in a choked voice.
"Are you alright, Ed?" Alphonse asked, laying a hand on Edward's arm. The avian in question shot him a startled look, just like one a caged animal would give.
"Fine, just fine." He replied, the gaze of the whole table fixed upon him. "I'll be right back."
Mustang can't lie, huh? I'll see about that.
"Mustang."
The man seated at the oaken desk looked up patiently as Edward Elric appeared in the door of his office. The avian was bristling with anger, seemingly aimed at Roy.
"Princess, if you are here to remind me that Dinner is being served in the mess hall," Roy replied, turning back to the paperwork he was pursuing, pushing his reading glasses back up to the bridge of his nose, "I am already aware of the fact." Mustang didn't have to wear the glasses, except to read encoded information basically illegible without them.
"Is it true you can't lie?" Asked Princess. Mustang quirked a sardonic brow.
"Quite." He replied in an airy tone, unconcerned as to where Edward had received this information. He was quickly figuring out the direction this would take, and wondering which one of his frequent hints had lead Princess to the realisation he was now making. The one underlying the anger in those feminine features. He smirked at his own thoughts. "However," He said, "There are a great many truths in this world, Edward, and it is a simple matter of choosing the right one for the right situation. Therefore, while physically unable to lie, I can tell an untruth."
Mustang could feel Edward's scowl, even as he chose to ignore it, focusing instead on the coded information in front of him. The short man habiting his doorway scowled harder. "The trick," Mustang continued, feigning obliviousness to the audible grinding Edward was making with his teeth. "Is to ask the right questions of one so that the truth and answer you desire, you can obtain." The avian inflated slightly with rage. Roy looked up briefly to flash a smirk at the prince, knowing it would infuriate him further. He once again slid his gasses up his nose, making a mental note to get them adjusted some time soon.
Edward glared at him, stalking forward and placing his hands on the edge of the desk menacingly. Mustang was completely unrelenting in his ignorance of the prince's behaviour, instead choosing to place one file to the side and pick up another. "Fine." The young man said, poison dripping off his words. "What is Alphonse's real last name?"
Roy allowed himself a small, true smile, wiping it off his face before Edward had a chance to see. He sat back in his chair, folding his glasses and placing them on the desk. Edward's wings were flexing in anger, and he looked like a thundercloud. Roy gave a small snort. "Curtis." He announced.
Edward visibly deflated before him, his eyes flashing through confusion, betrayal, sadness, failure, before he finally realised what Mustang had just told him and they became hopeful once more. Roy deliberately kept his face smooth, and resisted to tap into that thought trail Edward was pursuing. "Ask the right question, huh?" Princess said.
Against his will, the avian with black wings felt his eyebrow rise patiently.
Edward fixed him with a glare. "Captain Roy Mustang." He said in the most condescending tone he could muster. "What then, was Alphonse Curtis's house of birth?"
Mustang allowed his lips to quirk upwards in a smirk, pinning Edward deliberately with a look that would have melted the heart of any woman. "Well, then, Princess." He mimicked. "Isn't that just the right question."
.
A/n: -singsong- Mustang is a baaaaastard. Mustang is a Baaaaastard.
But I love him anyways.
Due to the fact that that chapter HAD to end there, and that the other scene I wanted in the chapter just wouldn't agree with me(I scrapped it. It was meant to be a coronation ceremony thing.), I thought I'd give you a preview of one of the scenes next chapter. So, here goes.
"Do you think," Mustang snapped, eyes ablaze with a fury that Edward had never seen before, "That I want to be unable to lie? Do you think that this dance of manipulation is fun, Edward Elric, Highness, whatever the hell you want to be called? I have to be on my toes, finding truths to dance with, manipulate those apes down there on that planet with. It would be easier to lie and get it over and done with."
Edward backed away slightly, recoiling in a tiny amount of fear. "...No, but..."
The captain growled, his obsidian eyes glittering. "You can only get one thing with sacrificing another, Princess. You gained a place where you belonged by sacrificing a family. Do you even think about the rabbits anymore, as busy as you are with your duties? Have you thought about that Winry girl you were so convinced set you up ever since you arrived on this ship?"
"I..." Edward gasped, cowering.
"No, you haven't. You think you can just burn your bridges behind you, don't you, forget what has happened to date with your life. It's because I couldn't forget that you are even here Edward. Because I didn't give up on what everyone else thought was a fable. You're an incredibly selfish person, Highness." Mustang gasped, seeming to come to his senses once more. "Leave. I have a battle to plan."
Released, Edward fled.
A/n: I hope you'll look forward to it! (Though I'll probably have edited it before then)
Leave a review for a hungry authoress?
EDIT!
I thought I might as well answer a couple of questions while I'm here.
Q: Is this a slash fic?
A: YES. It is. It will be RoEd, HOWEVER only a small little bit, right at the very end.
Q: Can you update faster?
A: I try as hard as I can to get updates out as fast as possible. However, I am a student with a job currently on the line, and I'm working my bum off to keep that, also, I have many pressures put on me due to school. (Though I do sometimes give up my study periods, for my goal is to have the next chapter out within a month at the latest.)
Q: how long will this fic be?
A: Oh... So far the plan says 25 chapters. There are three definitive parts to this fic, and NEXT chapter is the end of part one.
Q: Sequel?
A: I haven't even finished the fic yet! But yes. Sequel. It is already planned as well.
Q; Homunculus?
A: Sequel.
Q: Was that fruit name really just future spelt backwards or was it just me?
A: It was Future spelt backwards, yes. Well done. There are also many other little interesting things in this fic to look out for, tidbits I've thrown in here and there. As a Lit student, I know the value of in-fic symbols and have tried to put a couple in.
Q: What happens next?
A: You'll just have to wait and see.