A/N: Okay, I know this is my first FMA fic and I want it to be really good, but because I have so limited time to even find to write in, I completely forgot where I even wanted to take this story, so I'm just writing as I go and hope things turn up fine, heh. Anyways, I'm glad I have a couple readers though, that makes me happy, so yay, I'll continue…!

Edward stood waiting patiently behind the doctor as he spoke with the reception nurse on the other side of the check out desk, he had already given her the payment for the bill thus far, and luckily enough for him he had just barely over enough. She opened a file folder and wrote some things down on the paper, then nodded with a smile back up at the doctor to signal their completion. But then she glanced behind him and noticed Ed with a tense expression on his face as he gripped the shirt on his chest tightly with his hand. The nurse sighed with a small frown, she opened a drawer and pulled something out.

"Here." She extended it towards him.

"Huh?" Ed snapped out of the painful trance.

The nurse was smiling up at him, "Take this." She placed the bottle in his hand. "I can see that you are still in a lot of pain, this medicine will help the heartburn from your upset stomach." Ed opened his hand and looked at it as she continued to smile sympathetically up at him. "I used it when I had food poisoning, heh, it felt like it was tearing and smooshing my insides." She giggled a bit. "It worked wonders, I was better in less than a week. Just make sure you take something with it, or you'll feel really sick alright?"

Ed looked at it and smiled back gratefully, "Yeah. Thank you miss, I really appreciate it." He placed it in his pocket. Of course he wasn't poisoned, but it still might come in handy, and plus it was the thought that counts. He turned back to the doctor and shook his hand, "Well thanks anyway."

"I'm sorry Ed." The doctor looked at the sullen boy, he may have been young…. and short, shh… but he really did act mature and was a lot smarter than many people older than himself. "You know, Ed, you may not have the money for medical procedures, but that doesn't include education on the subject."

"I'm sorry?" Ed raised an eyebrow, not following.

"What you may be suffering from could be one of different things, I don't have the time to help somebody with no money, but that doesn't mean you can't help yourself." The doctor smiled. "I would like to grant you access to the medical wing in the district library."

"You what?" Ed's eyes went wide.

"You seem like a smart young man, so what do you say?"

Ed blinked, "But, is it authorized?"

"I think I just gave it." The doctor continue to smile.

Ed smiled back slightly, "I see, thank you."

"It's the least I could do, since I can't be of any more help myself."

"Don't worry about it, see ya." Ed gave a salute and left the hospital. As he walked down the street, his stomach began to churn and he placed a hand on it. "Come on, I'm outta that hell hole now, you should be happy." He smirked and then looked at the bottle in his hand, reading the label. "Well, it says to take with food, so maybe a little snack will make you happy." His stomach gurgled. "Hey shut up!" Just then Ed froze in his tracks and gasped, "Al…!" He whirled around. "Alphonse!" He looked around. "Where is he, where did he go? I could've sworn he was right behind me, gah!" He pulled on his hair and continued on. "Man, somebody should really invent some kinda portable device to keep you in contact with people wherever they are…." He sighed and dug his hands into his pockets. "Maybe I'll see him back home." He pulled out what little money he had left. "Maybe I have enough left to at least get a small soup…"

After eating a light bowl of chicken broth from a corner bistro, Ed went home in hopes of finding his brother. "Al?" He called as he opened the door only to find a dark empty apartment. "Hmm…" He closed the door slowly and looked around. "It's not that late, maybe he's out busy…" He turned a light on by the table and wrote a note. "I'll tell him where I'm at, that way he won't worry and if something comes up he'll know where to find me." He set it down on the counter in the kitchen and then turned the light off, closed the door and left.

It was early noon by the time he got to the library, the doctor had already called the receptionist and she granted him access to the medical index at the smaller end of the library. Ed scrolled up and down, fingering the books, pulling out only what he thought would be necessary, then took them to one of the desks for study. He turned on the overhead light and smirked to himself as he cracked open the first book, "Wow, this really takes me back to our Alchemy studies…" He looked up, getting some flashbacks of Al and himself as smaller children when they were first beginning their training. "Makes me nostalgic, and… and it kinda makes me want to go back home…" He shook his head and focused. "Gotta get started on work here…" He turned to the first page and began to read.

As the time went by and the sun moved across the sky, Ed retained the valuable knowledge on the subject he was reading and continued to learn. Finally he stretched and decided to take a break, he stood up, cracked his knuckles and stretched his arms behind his head. "I should move around for a bit, maybe take a bathroom break." He walked around and looked around the building, it reminded him of the library at the university where he and Alphonse met and began work on the rocket project. Just then he froze and clenched his stomach, "Whoa man…!" He raced to the bathroom and luckily nobody else was in there. When he finished he washed up in the sink and splashed his face. "Dang, food was a bad idea." He began to cough harshly, he cupped his stomach and wiped his mouth when he was finished. "The medicine really isn't helping, it was a nice thought but I wasn't really poisoned by anything, it could just be making it worse since it wasn't for me to begin with." He dug into his pocket and pulled out the label again, he paused as he looked at it in his hand, but he was in fact looking past it onto his hand. "What…?" He put the bottle down and looked closely at his hand. "Is that, blood…?" He began to grown nervous as he stared at it, he started coughing again harder this time, not covering his mouth, and he keeled at the waist, and finally when the spell ended he opened his eyes and froze, he began to feel the sweat roll down on his skin as he saw more. "Blood…! What, why?" He turned on the sink and took one of the small cups, took a drink and threw it out. He began to pant, "What is going on here?" He propped his hands on the counter and leaned in closer to the mirror, he opened up his mouth and laid his tongue down flat so he could see down his throat. He gasped, shocked to find more of the same substance dotting it. "But, but how…" He began to shake then he froze. "Wait a sec…!" He raced out of the bathroom and rushed back to his stack of books, flipping through them. "I just read something… and if this isn't the lethal lung ailment Alphonse had, then it can only point to one thing…!" And just as Ed finished his statement he turned to the exact page in the medical dictionary. He froze staring pale and shaking at the page. "Then…!"

Just then Al was seen hurrying through the library, the receptionist saw the resemblance between Ed and himself so she directed him towards the medical wing, "Brother!" He stopped when he saw Ed standing over the books, his head down, bangs covering his face. Al slowly began to walk over, "Brother…?"

"Alphonse…." Ed's voice was dry and quiet as it shook to escape.

"What are you doing here, what's wrong?"

"Al, I…" Ed finally brought himself to look up at his younger brother's worried face, his own covered in sweat from his broken nerves, he moved his hands to cover the pages on the open book. He swallowed hard, desperate for something to drink, and not wanting to tell him what he discovered just yet, "Hey, what are you doing here?"

"I was worried about you, I didn't find you at home but I saw your note, and, are you alright?"

Ed caught his breath, "Yeah, I'll be okay." He forced a tired smile.

Al noticed the piles of open books scattered on the table, "What are you doing?" He began to walk over.

"Oh, eh…" He began to shut them all feverishly. "Nothing, just studying on some topics."

"Like what, your body?" Al spoke seriously.

"Uh…" Ed didn't know how to answer as he finished stacking the books.

"Brother, please, I want to help you. We may not be able to pay the doctor to help us, but we do have each other! And our help to one another is free of charge."

Ed stared in shock at Al, but then smiled, "Thanks Al."

Al sat down, "You're welcome." He took one of the books. "Wow, all this medical research… it must take you back to our Alchemy books."

Ed laughed a bit, "Yeah actually I got the same vibe, ha!" He sat back down. "Al…"

"Yeah?"

"How do you know, I mean, what are you going to be looking for?"

"Well, I don't know exactly. But really neither do you, right?" He flipped through some of the pages. "But what I do know is that no matter what it takes, in the end, I will be there with you, because we've always been there for each other, we've always been honest and open with each other."

"Yeah, I guess so…"

"So what was it brother, what was it that you were going to tell me?"

"Huh?" Ed looked up, snapped out of the somewhat tranquil daze.

"Earlier, when I came in, you had a look on your face, like you had something on your mind, something big and important that you wanted to tell me. What was it?"

"What was it…?" Ed didn't really know how to answer that. "It was nothing, I was just worried about you, and, I felt so relieved when I saw you that…"

"Brother…"

"What?"

"Tell me the truth!" Al stood up, Ed drew back and looked away. "Brother, you know what's wrong with you, don't you. You're a smart guy, I know, you've been here studying these books for hours before I showed up, you and the doctor talked, so tell me, tell me what it is brother, what it is that's wrong with you!"

"Al, I…" Ed gripped his throat, suddenly feeling so thirsty. "What I have, might not be able to be cured, unless we're lucky enough to have the money."

"You mean for a transplant?"

"Or for the other option of surgery."

"Surgery? I don't get it."

"The transplant is like starting over with a new organ, surgery would, well I guess take out the bad and leave in the good. But did you know what was wrong with them in the first place?"

"Well no, not exactly. And I'm not sure the doctor knew either."

"Well granted to that, he didn't because we didn't have the money for those tests, and from exams and observations and talking he drew some ideas."

"But in your reading, you found the answer?"

"To that question yes, but to solve that solution we don't have the money for surgery if the case where no transplant were found to save me."

"Then just tell me brother, tell me what it is we can do."

"I don't know…"

"Brother… what's wrong with you?"

"Al I…. I…I just don't know how to say it." Ed's voice became quieter as he spoke on.

"Then just tell me honestly, no matter what it is Ed, I'll be there for you just like you'd be there for me, and I'll help you, and I'll take care of you."

"But if we can't save my life, and it was all done in vain… because Al, I…"

"Brother, just tell me!"

"I have cancer…"

…………………..

The library remained open until late so even once the lights turned on and the moon hung in the sky. Ed remained quiet, sitting I his chair and not even touching the books. Once he'd broken the news to Al, however, he began to skim through them furiously in order to find some kind of answer or loophole even.

"The symptoms do all point to it…" Al spoke as he jotted down notes he was keeping from different books. "But how do we know which internal organ has been effected?"

"Who knows and who cares, point blank remains the same, and that's that I'm gonna die."

"Brother!" Al slammed his hands down on the tabletop. "I refuse to let you give up and talk like that! There was a shortcut with Alchemy so there must be with modern medicine in this world too." Al went back to reading. Ed coughed a few times and patted his chest. "You have to take care of yourself now brother. Even if you think there is no point."

Ed glanced somewhat carelessly over at Al. He watched Al work in the lamplight and blinked, he realized and he knew deep down inside that if their roles were reversed and he was the one fighting to save his little brother's life, he'd be doing the same thing. He sighed and closed his eyes, lowering his head as he understood, and yet still though, with the pain he was suffering in his body, he just felt like he wanted to give up. Finally closing time arrived, the receptionist however allowed the brothers to check out some of the materials until the end of the week. Ed paid her with what little money he'd had left and they left, taking the books home. Once they arrived, they set them on the table but rather than heading right back to work, Ed just went into the living room and flopped down on the sofa, his back facing Al. Al turned and watched, he started to move forward in order to go over to him.

"Don't Al." Ed's voice stopped him from even taking one step. "I'm going to sleep."

Al sighed, "Okay brother. You do whatever you want, and I'll do the same."

Al turned and went back into the kitchen where they'd put the books on the table. He sat down and went back to working where they'd left off. Ed looked over his shoulder at the dimly lit room, he turned back and sighed, then he closed his eyes and went to sleep, only after letting the painful stabbing spell end from attacking his gut once again.