Disclaimer: Not mine.

Chapter 3 - Home

Edward woke abruptly, and launched himself at the nearest wall he saw, putting his back to it and twitching his arm in preparation to defend himself. The twitch activated a mechanism he'd installed when his Alchemy began truly failing, and a blade slid out from under the forearm plate to extend past his fist and along the side of his arm. The quick movements made his vision start to grey and blur, so Ed focused on breathing, and listening for any kind of threat while he couldn't see.

When his vision cleared, and he could make sense of what he saw, Ed leaned back and slid down the wall.

"What the hell?" He choked out. His gaze darted over the room, noting every familiar and unfamiliar detail.

It couldn't be real. This had to be another one of those dreams. He'd been thinking of home, after all. If he fell asleep on that chair, it would make sense that he dreamed of home, right? He couldn't possibly be in the room he and Al had used to share at the Rockbell automail shop. He pinched himself, and flinched at the sharp pain.

If it was a dream, that should have woken him up. And Al should be there, but the corner that had held the other boy's bed was conspicuously different, the bed replaced with a large bookshelf.

"I'm... not dreaming?"

He stumbled to his feet, retracted his blade with another twitch of his shoulder, and headed for the door. Someone had to be here. Al, Winry, Aunty Pinako.

The doorknob twisted under his hand and the door opened. Face to face with a concerned looking Winry, Ed could only blink dumbly at what had to be a dream come true.

"You're finally awake!" She exclaimed, a bright smile coming onto her face. She'd clearly been tending to him, because she had a tray with two bowls and some cloth on it in her hands.

"Winry?" He couldn't wrap his mind around seeing Winry standing there. Despite the pinch he'd given himself, he just had to be dreaming. It wasn't possible that he was home. Maybe he should think of some other way to test if he was awake?

He wavered on his feet, his mind momentarily losing control of his extremities, and he shook himself out of his shock in time to catch himself on the door frame.

"Maybe you should sit back down, Ed. You don't look too steady." She gave him a stern look, admonishing him for getting up before he was stronger, and pushed him lightly back towards the bed.

He went without argument, face still showing shock. "I'm home."

The look softened. "Yeah, Ed, you're home. Now sit down and rest, so you can get better and I can yell at you for being stupid again." She directed him back to the bed, putting the tray in her arms down beside him.

"What do you mean, again?" Ed asked, indignance breaking him out of his shock. "I haven't even been here for three years. I can't have done anything stupid here."

"You didn't have to be here to do something stupid. I don't know what you've been doing to your automail, but whatever you've been up to, it's in terrible shape. There's no way you've been taking proper care of yourself. We had to wait for you to wake up so we could make sure we could remove it without causing permanent damage. Grandma and I have already started working on replacement parts for you, though, so you'll be feeling better in no time. You're just lucky we've got a spare model that will fit you with just a few modifications. We had to take new measurements, since you've finally grown a little."

"I'm not short! I've grown three whole inches."

The smile on Winry's face grew just a little when he responded just the way he always used to, and she threw her arms around him. "Oh Ed, we missed you so much. It's hard to believe you're back. But I could just kill Alphonse for how he did it."

"What? Is Al okay?" If Al wasn't okay...

"He's fine. He brought you back without telling anyone what he was planning, though, Ed. He just went off one morning, and when we heard there was a commotion and some lights up at your old place, I thought the worst. I thought it was happening all over again, but he looks like he'll be fine once he sleeps it off."

Ed breathed a sigh of relief. "I'm glad he's alright. I'll have to kick his ass later though, for not telling anyone anything. That was dangerous."

"You're one to talk. How many times have we patched you up, Edward?"

"I'll have you know I can take care of myself!"

Their bickering was interrupted by a gravelly voice. "Still as argumentative as ever, Edward. I'm glad to see that other world hasn't changed you too much."

Edward and Winry made faces at each other, but quit arguing.

"You know me, Aunt Pinako, I'm as stubborn as you are." Ed grinned at the old woman.

"Stubborn as a mule, more like. Now, let me look at your arm."

Ed refrained from making a comment about her calling herself a mule, and sat quietly while she poked his shoulder, automail fingers twitching every time his nerves panged.

Pikano was finally satisfied, and stood back from him. "It looks like it can be removed with no damage. You're lucky. In this kind of shape, it could have been very painful, or done permanent damage."

"Hah, it's plenty painful. Keeps twinging at me." He waved his hand in the air, evoking another twinge.

"Hush, that's nothing. Let's take it off for now, though. I need to look at the socket. It may need adjusting."

Ed winced at the idea of a socket adjustment, and then bit his lip at the removal of the arm. He cautioned Winry to be careful with it.

"I had to make a few modifications while I was on that side, so it's a bit dangerous. I didn't like playing with it, I'm not the best mechanic, but I didn't have too much choice."

He took the arm back, and triggered the mechanism that loosed the blade. "Took me forever to get it right without jamming something up."

"But why not just use Alchemy, Ed?" Winry asked. While she'd never liked the idea of him fighting, she had taken comfort from the idea that he was never truly unarmed, as long as he had his automail and his Alchemy.

"Alchemy barely works in that world. For a little while, I could do small things, like my armblade. Then it got to the point where I couldn't turn ice into water without a massive array, and a putting a lot more into it than I usually do. Half killed myself to make anything work." He could remember the three days he'd spent on his bathroom floor, past the point of exhaustion after trying and failing at Alchemy.

"That's horrible." Winry couldn't imagine how it had to have been for Ed, he was so reliant on his Alchemy.

"Yeah. It was. And now I'm back." Unspoken was his relief at having Alchemy accessible to him again.

Pinako stepped back from Ed, holding his automail leg. "Yes, you're back. And you clearly need rest just as much as you always have. We'll get you something to eat and you can take a nap. By the time you wake up we'll have substitute automail for you. I will need to make some adjustments to the sockets, but they're relatively minor."

"Works for me. How long was I out, anyway?"

"We found you and Al yesterday morning."

A quick glance out the window told Ed it was late afternoon now. He rubbed his face. "And I'm still this tired? Yeah, I think I'll sleep some more, after I eat. If Al wakes up, though, wake me up. I want to see him." There was a raw look in Ed's eyes that said he was barely keeping himself from hopping down the hall on one leg to find his brother.

"No problem, Ed. I'll be right back with a big dinner for you." Winry practically skipped out the door.

"Thanks."

He leaned back on the bed and stared at the ceiling. He was really home.