A/N: Hey, you guys are gonna love this…. what long blonde haired, short standing state Alchemist do you think I will be dressing up as on Tuesday for Halloween…? Give you three chances to try…. oh, what, did you say Ed? Yeah, that's right… and yes I AM a girl… lol, anywho, I figured if I do bit by bit typing in small amount chapters I can upload them more often, so I hope it'll still be good and I can take it one of many ways... and more readers, YAY!!! Oh also I did a quick pic of how I see Ed and Al, and since time has supposed to have gone by since we last saw them I made them look a little different, and I gave them just plain old clothes because I didn't want to get too much into German fashion history, lol. Well anywho, enjoy…!

"Mmm hmm mm mmnmm…" Ed was humming while rolling his eyes a bit nonchalant. Al's eyes however were focused, staring strait on target. Finally Ed cleared his throat, "MMHMMN!"

"Huh?" Al snapped out of the daze and drew back slowly after being within only inches away from Ed's own face, his eyes leering forward at him.

Ed closed his mouth after his brother stopped poking and prodding around inside, "Are you quite done in there now….!?" He tapped on his chest to clear things out. "Gees."

"Oh, sorry." Al looked away, having lost the track of his thoughts. "I guess I just got lost in thought."

"Oh yeah?" Ed scoffed slightly at the remark. "Thinking about what, my wisdom teeth!?"

"Brother…"

"Ugh, look, are we done now?"

"Yes." Al sighed. "I just wanted to make sure I have all the analysis complete, all the observations and all of your symptoms and pains logged, that way we can do our research better and maybe find if there's a better way than modern medicine to cure you, I mean I'm sure there's another way, there always is."

"This is why I hate doctors…" Ed hissed quietly to himself through his teeth, ignoring Al's rant of hope. He stood up and cracked the joins in his arms. "My throat's all dry now, I'm getting a drink okay."

"Oh. Right, sorry." Al said absentmindedly as he wrote. He began to think again. "Brother…"

Ed had gone to the bathroom to get a drink and rinse off his face, after he turned off the faucet he dried off with the towel and looked in the mirror with a smirk, "Well, hey there handsome." He stuck out his tongue to make a silly face and then laughed slightly, then he stopped and sighed as he began to think himself, staring at the mirror lost off in space and time. "Al…" He closed his eyes as he flashed back to an old memory. "I remember, and I know why you're doing this…" He could still hear the screaming…

Back when Ed and Al were still both small and Trisha was still alive, Al had become terribly sick to his stomach. They were young and neither understood what was going on, but frankly Ed didn't really care, all he knew was that his brother was crying out loud in pain and needed help, and all He was doing was being kept outside the room, looking around the cracked open door to see his mom and a doctor she called standing talking over the bed. The doctor didn't look to happy and of course their mom was very sad and afraid. Ed hated seeing his mom and brother this way and it angered him. The next thing Ed knew, the stranger had picked Al up and was leaving with him, his mom agreed, but he could see the fear and sorrow in her eyes.

"Mom, why is he taking him away, what's going on!?" Ed demanded in his small voice.

"He's taking him to a hospital to help try and save him, I can't do it here."

Ed's eyes shook with misunderstanding as he gasped quietly, "Is he going to die…?"

His mother looked down at him, slightly biting her lip, "No I think he'll be alright honey, but, he's in a lot of pain. He's got what they call appendicitis, he might need an operation."

"An operation…?" Ed's question came with wide eyes, his frown quickly turned angry. "I don't care what it's called, all I know is that he's sick and needs my help!" Ed's anger made him upset and his eyes started to water.

"Oh, my little man…" His mother bent down and hugged him.

"Mom…" Ed choked.

"You're such a good big brother." She said quietly to him beneath the tears. Ed sniffed and put his crying eyes against her shoulder, and as they cried, Ed made a promise to himself that he would always keep, a promise, for Al.

Ed opened his eyes, finding himself in the bathroom staring at the serious face that looked back at him in the mirror, "I made a promise to you Al, and I promise you I will keep it…"

Al was still lost in his own thoughts as he felt the scar from where he'd had his apendix removed as a small boy, "I can remember a time when I felt so cold and hollow inside, where I missed the such things on my old warm body like these scars. But still yet that metal body protected me from wounds that would create such scars, and you traveled in the flesh, risking it all. Have you already forgotten about it all, brother? I haven't, it wasn't that long ago, but how could you forget, the pain that you were in…?"

Al went back to a flashback of his own, this one was much more recent, it was back when they were looking for the stone and shortly after they lost Marco. There was a terrible storm, they were out in the middle of nowhere and it took them a while to find shelter, but they soon came across a small town. It was late and by that time Ed was freezing, Al was fine for being in a suit of armor after all, but Ed has passed out as soon as they found an inn with a nice warm room. Al put him to bed and sat next to him on a chair, the rain pelting against the window in the darkness of the night outside. The only other sound than that was that of Ed's coughing, it was harsh and terrible sounding from deep in his lungs as he tried hard to get the air to breathe in his feverish sleep. He was running a terribly high fever and Al was very worried. The doctor in town was gone on vacation but the inn keeper said it looked like it was a rough case of ammonia.

"Al…" Ed wheezed in his semi conscious state.

"Yes brother, what is it…?" Al leaned in.

"Al I'm scared…" Those three words caused Al to freeze up. "Please, don' t let me die…"

"Brother…" Al's eyes shook with fear.

"I, I'm sorry Al…" Ed said between gritted teeth as he continued to struggle to breathe, he broke down into a harsh coughing fit as Al could continue to do nothing but sit there, once the spell finished Ed gripped his neck in pain.

"All I could do was watch as you fight alone, though I was there by your side I could do nothing to help you, no matter how much I wanted to, wanted to help you, help you to get well and continue to live in this world alive with me." Al was thinking to himself back in the present. "We lost mom, I never knew dad, and I wasn't about ready to loose you…"

Ed was thinking as he was walking back into the living room from the bathroom, "I promised you I would fight alongside you no matter what, with anything…"

"I hated to see you in such pain, being so helpless to do anything for you…"

"So that's why I decided…"

Ed and Al both looked up once they sensed they were in the same room together, and they solely finished their similar thought, "I would give anything and everything in equivalency just to be there, to stay there by your side, to help you, to save you from the pain, and help you get through. To be there to carry your weight if you ever had to call it quits, because my life is yours, and your life is mine. We are brothers, we are one, and without the other, there is no equivalency to alchemy, and there is no equivalency in our hearts. And I will keep this promise, a promise maybe I cannot explain, but you and I both know…"

Al looked over at Ed, "Because I love you brother…"

Ed stared over at Al determined, "So help me God, Al…"