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Prompt: Ed is doing something and it takes Roy a while to figure it out.
Warning: PARENTAL or BROTHERLY….FLUFF….prolly OOC…. "screw it I'm writing what I want to write"...WE HAVE PLOT….Just kidding. Still NO PLOT.
Read on. Good luck.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
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Edward Elric followed Colonel Mustang on their way back to the office. He had been forced into going with the man to run an errand. Sure the errand was a case, and sure the case was alchemy related, and yes he was a subject matter expert of a sort, but still. His skills should have been directed elsewhere. Somewhere more important, like doing research, not trying to put together clues so they could catch some convenience store thief. It's not like he had been hurting anyone.
He hopped up on a small wall to his right and flung his arms out so he could balance.
This had been such a waste of time. Of course, he had been an integral part of catching the culprit this afternoon, but he shouldn't have had to help, if you asked him. It took him like five minutes to figure out the man's method for breaking in. He'd been using the sewer system and some underground tunnels from one hundred years prior when there was a lot of black market dealing in Central. Well, more than there was now. And from there, the guy had simply used an array to manipulate the ground above him, kinda like what he did when he created mud walls. Then he'd simply just fix the damage he'd done to the store's floor and walk out the front door with girly magazines with girls in them or something. The colonel hadn't let him look. Probably cause he liked the girly magazines.
He snickered to himself and hopped off the small wall, which had unfortunately come to an end. He looked at the sidewalk and lengthened his strides. He looked at how the sidewalk was broken into segments about three strides long. Well, three strides long for him. He watched the colonel's feet ahead of him. The man took about two steps per block. Ed smiled to himself accepting his own challenge. I bet I can take only two steps per block. He hopped over the crack of the current block and stretched his other leg as far forward as he could. It was close, but he just made it into the next block. He had to jump a little farther each time, but he finally landed on one of the cracks. "Dang it," he muttered to himself.
Mustang perked back over his shoulder. "What was that, Fullmetal?"
"Nothing," Ed said innocently.
Mustang slowly lifted one of his eyebrows, "Right. Well, keep up then. You're falling behind."
Ed childishly mimicked the man behind his back, then hurried to catch up.
His gaze once again fell to the man's feet. Smiling, he had a new idea. He got as close as he could without touching the colonel and stepped in time with him, reaching his legs as far as he could to shadow the man. He was glad the man wasn't taking his full stride, otherwise there was no way this would have worked. He continued this way for a distance, having to double up on his steps every so often to stay close, but this was way more successful than the two steps per block challenge.
And then Mustang stopped and Ed's face rammed unexpectedly into the man's back. "Ow!" He hopped back and rubbed his nose.
"What the-?"
"Hey!" Ed shouted indignantly. "What the heck?! Why'd you stop?"
Roy frowned in confusion. "Oh, I'm sorry, Fullmetal," he apologized sarcastically. "I wasn't really in the mood to get run over today." He pointed at a car passing by in front of them. "Why were you following so close, anyway?"
Ed looked away with a blush. "You said to keep up."
"Keep up a little farther away." Mustang squeezed the bridge of his nose. "Actually, no. Walk in front of me, so I can watch you. You're making me anxious."
Ed shrugged and didn't skip ahead of him-except he actually really did-hopping across the street and leaping from one white line of the crosswalk to the next.
Mustang raised both eyebrows, frozen on the street corner. What…? Was that? He rubbed his temples and shook his head, chalking it up to his long day toting Fullmetal around with him.
Before their little field trip, this case had been a disaster for two weeks. For two weeks, his men hadn't been able to figure out how Stephen Phipps had been infiltrating numerous corner stores by seemingly walking through the front door. None of his men were alchemists. Their perp was. That hadn't crossed his mind as a possibility until he read over a recent report and saw the young man's hobbies. It was then that he thought he might have to get involved. And since Edward had been in town, he figured he might as well make the boy suffer with him. He regretted that poorly thought out decision the entire day.
"Do I have to go….This is a waste of time….I'm hungry…..These guys are stupid….When can I go to the library….Why do I have to be here for this…..This stuff is so simple, even Winry could figure it out….This guy was just stealing magazines….Why won't you let me see them….I bet you read them too, don't you….Can we go home noooooow?"
The damn brat did not shut up. He'd developed his migraine early on, and it had only recently started to subside on their strangely quiet walk home. He was not taking this kid on any other cases. Ever.
He looked a few meters ahead of him. Edward was walking with an awkward gait. Was he hurt? He was sure nothing happened today that could have harmed Fullmetal, but just in case, Mustang quickly marched ahead to catch up only to find that Fullmetal was likely not hurt at all.
The sidewalk near the gates was made of brick. It was like a parquet wood floor, laid out like a checkerboard with every other square of bricks laid out horizontally then vertically then horizontally again, etc. Edward was deliberately stepping only on the vertically facing squares, matching the direction he was headed. So, no, the boy wasn't hurt. Thankfully. He was just…..well he didn't really know what he was doing. The kid was being weird.
Roy was perplexed by the odd behavior for a moment and then it clicked. A disbelieving smile spread across his face. He was playing. This was not the Fullmetal Alchemist, military brat. This was just Ed, the boy, and he was playing. What he was playing, Roy had no clue, but he seemed to be enjoying himself. And he was quiet. He had been for a while. He must have been playing the entire walk back.
Ahh, okay. Well, this was new. And for Roy, very unexpected. It shouldn't have been though.
Edward was twelve after all. And twelve was still a child and children played sometimes. A lot sometimes. Seeing Edward having a good time was nice, and it gave Roy an oddly fuzzy, and twittery feeling inside, making him want to join in on the fun.
Roy strode forward and walked close to Ed. Then he gave him a tiny push to the side, and Edward missed his mark.
"Hey!" Edward glowered at him after recovering. He didn't look upset so much as he was just caught off guard.
Mustang smirked. "What?" He asked innocently, shrugging his shoulders.
"You did that on purpose!"
"I don't know what you're talking about, Fullmetal."
To Roy's amusement, Ed gave him a playful shove back. He didn't budge of course, since he wasn't about to let the boy win after everything he'd gone through today. And as a result, Edward continued to try and shove or trip him. Grunting from the exertion and huffing when each successive attempt was unsuccessful.
After he successfully avoided being tripped for the fifth time, Ed resorted to a different tactic and attached himself securely around Roy's waist. The younger male dug his heels into the ground and Mustang was forced to drag the dead weight forward a few feet.
When Ed didn't relinquish his grip, Roy stopped walking. "Alright, that's enough of that," he announced. He turned around and pried the boy from him. Then quickly grabbed Ed's arm, stooped over, and drug the smaller human across his shoulders and into a fireman's carry.
"Aaah!" Ed shouted in surprise. "Hey! Put me down!"
Roy knew Ed couldn't get down until he let him get down, and he wasn't about to just let him down so soon after capturing him. If he set the riled up boy down now, he could very easily go back to whatever plans he'd been carrying out trying to take out his shins. This was easier. And safer too.
"No, I don't think I will. You can just stay right where you are and just think about what you did to get into this position," he mock scolded.
"But I didn't do anything!" Ed shouted in protest, flailing in such a way that wouldn't harm his holder. "You were the one who started it!"
"That's debatable. Now quiet down like a good little puppy."
"I'm not little!" Ed fumed. "And I am definitely not a puppy, you bastard! Let me down!"
"Hmmm. No. I think I already made it pretty clear, I'm not putting you down, Fullmetal," he said adamantly.
"But-oof!" Roy readjusted and bounced Ed up higher, causing his shoulder to ram into the boy's abdomen. "Oww...fine." Ed gave up and dropped his head onto Mustang's shoulder, not because he wanted to but because there was simply no other place to let it rest comfortably.
"Don't worry, I'll put you down before we get back to the office," he said. "Probably. I do have a reputation to keep after all."
Ed scoffed. "Like you're the one in the compromising position here. Jerk." Roy felt the words more than heard them since they were spoken into his jacket.
"Oh, please. Stop being dramatic. Nobody would even think twice. Trust me," he assured.
"Last time I trusted you, I ended up on train with a psychopath," Ed recalled wistfully.
"And then you were able to take the State Alchemist Exam," Roy pointed out. His eyes darted over his shoulder. "Do you trust me?" He asked, genuinely curious.
"I don't know yet," he admitted with a sigh. "I mean, I think I do, but sometimes...it's hard for me to really trust anyone."
"I see," Roy acknowledged. Then he hummed. "Well, what if I do this?" He faked dropping the youth by leaning back.
Ed scrambled for anything that would prevent him from cracking his head open on the bricks down below and held on with a death grip. "No!"
Roy stood back up and made sure to get a good hold on the boy's arm and automail leg before repeating the process. "How about now? Do you trust me now?"
"No!" Ed yelled, though he sounded amused, like he was trying not to laugh.
Roy stood back up again. "You do know I'm not actually going to drop you, right?"
"Weeeeell…" Ed joked.
"Ed?" He said in warning as he made to lean back a third time.
Ed tightened his holds. "Yes, yes. Okay. I know you won't," he relented. He sighed. "I guess I do trust you."
"Good. I'm glad." Mustang smiled.
"But you're still a bastard, bastard."
"I'd worry if I wasn't." They reached the main building so Mustang bent down to one side. "I'm letting you down now, but you have to walk like a normal person."
"I was walking like a normal person," Ed said defensively when he slid off and back to solid ground and fixed his jacket.
"Walking only on the bricks facing the direction you're walking is not normal, Fullmetal." Roy said, opening the door for both of them.
"I couldn't help it!" Ed felt a blush creep up his neck. "I was bored, okay? Cause someone made me go help with the stupidest case that ever existed."
"Yes, well, if it's any consolation, Fullmetal, that won't be happening again anytime soon." They climbed the stairs to the third floor and settled into their normal routine.
"Good. I wasn't gonna go again anyway."
"Like you have a choice. That's real cute, kid. I'd stop talking now, if I were you. I could change my mind."
"You won't," Ed practically dared him.
Mustang didn't grace him with a response and instead just shrugged and entered the office.
"Wait...you won't," Ed stated, now unsure. "Right?"
Again no response. Mustang entered his personal office and locked the door behind him, leaving the boy to sweat.
"Colonel?" Ed blanched.
Inside, Roy smirked to himself and muttered. "Never again."
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A/N: I have absolutely no explanation for this other than I was walking on a curb and got a weird look from an old Korean lady (Before you ask, yes she was Korean. I live in Korea for the moment), so I was like...I guess I won't have fun over here lady. And I hopped off. I decided if I wasn't allowed to have fun, the I'd make Edward have fun, and Roy would have to witness and possibly join in.
Also, just so we all know how important saving any kind of work is, I'm going to give you a scenario. You're writing and your computer crashes or your application closes and you didn't save at all recently, so you lose half your work and have to rewrite the entire ending of your story over again. Does that sound fun? If not, SAVE ALL THE TIME. Be paranoid! That is the end of my advice.
Loved it? Hated it? Meh? I agree. Elle, oh Elle.
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