We build castles with our fears

and sleep in them like

kings and queens.

-C. Poindexter

Winry Rockbell had never been considered timid by those who knew her. Her childhood was one long montage of splashing in mud puddles, scraped-up knees, and school yard scuffles with the neighborhood boys who would tell her to 'go play with dolls'.

Doing what the other girls did just wasn't who she was. She tinkered, always breaking things apart to put them back together. She was a fixer, and that love of reassembly would manifest itself as she matured, shaping her into the healer she would become. All her life, Winry had never been faced with a problem she couldn't solve.

Until Frank Archer entered her life.

Archer was the first time she'd ever felt truly hopeless, and due to lack of experience Winry had no way of knowing how to pull herself out of the situation until she wound up screaming for help to a 911 dispatcher as she bled out on Frank's apartment floor. That particular memory was her mind's choice to replay over and over as she made her way to the docks, pulling her jacket around her tighter to shield from the cold air. The silence felt too calm, it's serenity only doubling her heart rate as she looked around anxiously, waiting for Frank to make his move. She only prayed she'd be able to get what she came for.

The darkness offered no sound besides that of the water splashing up against the wooden beams and concrete slabs below; no souls to be found around her to witness if she be thrown to the frigid depths —the blackness of the water matching that of the night sky. It wasn't long before her phone vibrated in her pocket.

[You must know Elric isn't here. And yet you still came.]

Winry looked around, searching the darkness for a figure and trying to quell the uneasiness that came with vulnerability.

[Don't look around. Stay where you are. I want to look at you.]

Winry typed back with shaking fingers. [[I need to see you. I've been waiting for you Frank.]]

The pause in the darkness was long, her heart thundering as she waited and prayed he'd take the bait.

[I'm sorry it took me so long. I had to get him away from you. I had to make it look good.]

[[Why are we texting? Can't we talk? I miss you.]] She said. Archer was never an idiot, but he was guilty in the past of letting his emotions take over. Winry's best hope was to exploit his feelings as badly as he'd exploited hers.

[I can't speak to you yet, but soon all this will be over. I know the DA, he hates automail and the way people weaponize it. The marks on Bostic's neck should be perfect. Elric's trial will be the fastest anyone's ever seen.]

Alarm bells rang in Winry's head.

'How would Archer know about any of this?' She thought. She'd easily gotten enough evidence to take some of the heat off Edward, and at the risk of being reckless, she pushed further hoping for something even more incriminating.

[[I knew it was you who sent me the letter, that's why I came. I need to know something Frank.]]

Winry's anxiety continued to rise. Breaths came shallow and quick, a cold sweat breaking on her skin. She willed herself to stay where she was just a little longer, and she continued to type.

[[Why did you hurt me? Was it the drugs?]]

Nausea swept through her as she waited for a reply. This would infuriate him, but the fury would make him crack —as it always had in the past— and she prayed this would make him slip up and reveal more.

A deafening crash shattered the silence and sent her jumping out of her skin as she spun to find the source. A shed not 50 feet away sported a newly-splintered hole in it's side from where a metal kayak had been pitched through the aging wooden walls and smashed to dock's surface before skidding to a stop.

Fear took over, and Winry ran.

The cell Edward sat in was cold and dimly lit, but it smelled of bleach which provided some comfort knowing it was at least clean.

"Yea the blood was scrubbed out of it the day before you came in." Braeda shrugged from his seat outside the cell. "Some asshole shanked some other asshole."

"I thought this was a holding cell. Where'd a shank come from?"

"Fuck if I know. But don't worry they're not gonna let anyone in there with you, especially since everyone thinks you're violent."

Ed rolled his eyes.

"You know I'm not."

Their eyes connected for a moment. "Ed I know you didn't do this, and in his gut Mustang knows it too. We're trying our best to find proof."

Almost on que, the door near where Braeda sat opened and a fearsome woman of 6 feet marched in and glared at Edward.

"Fullmetal! When the hell were you planning on telling me this involves Winry Rockbell?"

Olivier Armstrong was known in police circles as "the 3 B's": Brilliant, Beautiful, Brawn. It wouldn't be hard to add "Bad-ass" to the list. Anyone unfamiliar with her would almost dismiss her at the sight of flowing blonde hair and glossy pink lips, but that's where the femininity ended and her permanent scowl and relentless bark took over. Mustang had been promoted to her position as Commander when she'd retired from the Army and entered the Police force. She had been integral in pulling Mustang and his chosen soldiers to the 503rd precinct so she could always have a familiar team beneath her.

Wide golden eyes met a blue very different from the aquamarine that engaged his thoughts most of the time.

"Wait, you know Winry?"

"Of course I do. I worked her case three years ago." Armstrong replied, softening only slightly. Edward stood to better meet her eye line.

"Why didn't Mustang mention that to…well, anyone?" He asked, looking from Armstrong to Braeda and back again.

"He may not have known." She said. "He wasn't at this precinct at the time and Rockbell's file has been missing. She was here today, Ed."

"What?! When?!"

Ignoring his question, Olivier produced a key from a crowded ring and unlocked the cell, sliding the door open for Edward to step out.

"A warrant is out for Archer's arrest; he set you up and Winry got him to admit it more or less."

Ed's heart dropped, suddenly desperate to find Winry. "…Can-can I go?"

Armstrong gestured to the door and Ed was gone, leaving Braeda and Olivier to exchange heavy expressions.

"Archer filleted that woman and left her to die," She said to Braeda. "and she went back into that hell to prove Ed's innocence."

Winry sat on the mattress on her floor at home with a carton of fried rice and the tv acting as low background noise. Attention focused on her macbook, her eyes scanned as she scrolled through the Craigslist ads for sublets; she would need to move again just to be safe, and would probably have to open another credit card to pay for it. Her heart only jumped for a moment when a loud buzzing sounded from the intercom. She sat rooted for a moment, afraid to answer for fear that it could be Archer, but curiosity shuffled her forward to press the button and ask who it was. Time flew too quickly for her mind to process; her hand moving of its own accord before she opened her apartment door and waited, listening to the sound of boots bounding up the stairs and down the hall. And then he was there, sweeping her up and asking her if she was insane. She didn't remember the door shutting behind him, she didn't feel the blanket fall from her shoulders, —Winry only felt the warmth of his body and smell of his skin as her arms went around him. She only felt the sheer elation of knowing her risk was worth it and that Edward was free.

1 a.m. rolled around and awake they remained, on the floor together —just them, the fried rice, and old black & white films on TCM. There seemed to be millions of questions —many unvoiced due to the sheer disbelief of their situation, but Edward had gotten the basics from Winry and sat in awe of her. He'd barely been jailed for four days, yet being away from her in such a way had felt like a lifetime. Being apart of their own volition, while difficult and frustrating, was far easier than the knowledge that they could have been unwillingly separated forever, wether it be by the legal system or by Archer's devastating final blow. While Edward had never been a religious man, he found himself silently thanking some unknown higher power for the crazy woman who could've feared him enough to let him rot for crime he didn't commit, yet didn't. His fingers never left the intertwinement of hers, the feel of her skin being something he didn't know how much he'd truly missed until he was threatened with never feeling it again.

"What happens now?" She asked, the fingers of one hand gently tracing the smokey tattooed lines from his wrist to his knuckles and back, her other palm gently weighted by his. She was equally uneasy to break the connection.

"I spoke to Roy, they're looking for Archer. They're contacting Apple to ask if they can help by tracking Archer. Mustang says the texts he sent you show he was using an iPhone."

"He'll have gotten rid of it by now," She said. "Knowing him, he probably pitched his phone into the river. I pissed him off hoping to make him slip up and give more information, but he threw a steel boat through the broad side of a wooden shed."

Edward pulled his hand from hers, the emptiness from sudden lack of contact earning Winry's focus to his fearful eyes.

"He could have thrown you through a wall. You could have gone into the river like Bostic did. How could you be so fucking reckless?!"

Winry sat agape before stubborn will took over. "Is this you thanking me for saving you?"

"This is me freaking out at the thought of losing you!"

The admission sat heavy between them, hanging only for a moment before her hands were in his hair, his palms sliding up her back, their mouths fighting for dominance before she pulled back only for a moment to breathe,

"You didn't lose me. I'm right here."

Edward silently vowed to never let Winry out of his sight again, because the tether around his heart that pulled at the very thought of her had dragged him kicking and screaming, down the depths of an abyss he swore to never drown in again. Not since Noah. Not since Nina.

But he was helpless against Winry, a sea-siren if he'd ever known one, for every pass of her tongue over his reduced his thoughts to static. The feel of her body beneath his as he pressed her into the mattress fanned a flame in his heart that for years had barely been so much as a simmering ember. She'd conquered the fear of her scars, of her story, and when the Devil came knocking she answered. She broke off with a breathy sigh, looking up at him with a sweet serenity in her gaze he hadn't seen from her before. Despite his palpable fear Winry seemed unfazed, and thats when it hit him —she trusted him completely, because she felt safe with him.

"Stay with me?" She pleaded softly.

That heavy anchor that chained around his heart finally hit the ocean floor.

He never stood a chance.

He'd been hasty, he admitted, when he killed Barry. His anger at knowing Winry was with the Artist made his blood boil, and he'd lost his temper. Just like he'd lost his temper with Winry at the pier. She'd always angered him so easily. He'd given away too much information, and instead of taking more time to toy with his prey he would be forced to strike quickly. He decided to put what he'd gathered to good use, and once a new cell phone was acquired he would contact his last remaining loyalist from precinct 503.

When he'd come back to town, it was only to watch her. To study her actions, to appreciate her from afar, —for he knew she was always his and always would be. She'd be so impressed at what he'd done, at what he'd made of himself. He imagined the pride that would beam from her to see him in his new state. But that all washed away as he noticed how often she went to the small tattoo shop, how her eyes were so different whenever he'd seen her on the street with the Artist. Her body language when she was with him.

Attempting to frame him had not been enough. More was required. Winry would not return to him while such a distraction was still around.

His new plan was perfect. First, she would be marked again. Then, the Artist would die.

A long silver blade slid down the sharpening block, the resounding ring as pleasing as the low light reflecting off of the stainless steel, however he didn't like that particular stainless steel knife.

He was disappointed with how easily her dried blood had faded from it's blade.

A/N: Guys, writing is hard. I enjoy it so much but oh my god it's so damn hard. But we're getting there, there's only a few chapters left and it means the world to me that you've all been so patient with me. My OG fanbase from the Perfect Blood days knows that updating at such a slow pace is normally not what I do. This fic is challenging, and on a good note work has me super slammed (April and May are the busiest months of the year for me) so while I'll never complain about having work it does take time away from my writing. I've figured out that I need to be in near solitude to effectively write, and that's not always easy to find in the middle of New York City.

Thanks again for hanging out, more on the way. I'll try not to be away for a month this time.