Everlasting
By LadysWords

Previously on Everlasting:

Apparently trying to get Ironwing and Stormswift to become friends was a bad idea.

He watched amused as the Ironwing began to steadily eat all the ferrets that they had brought for the two hippogriffs after a whole day of coaxing the two hippogriffs to become friends. Stormswift picked up one leg of the last ferret as if to declare 'that's mine', before Ironwing could eat it. However, Ironwing had other plans as he too eyed it.

Edward chuckled, distracted by the rest of the herd.

Before Stormswift could react, Ironwing leaned his head towards the ferret and bit it. But before losing the ferret entirely Stormswift took a bite at it as well. Now the two hippogriffs began to play tug of war with the dead creature.

"Think we can get Ironwing and Stormswift to play nice?"

At the moment the hippogriffs were acting like two bratty human boys fighting over a toy…well, if that toy were a dead animal.

"Highly doubtful, Lupin, those two can't get along, Stormswift has been mimicking Ironwing the whole time, and after all stupid is as stupid does."

At that Stormswift looked at him with piercing hateful eyes, as if he understood at his new owner had just said and began to approach him dangerously.

Lupin snorted with laughter as Edward steadily walked backwards from suddenly approaching danger. "Nice Hippogriff."

Chapter 21: Time

"Time has been transformed, and we have changed; it has advanced and set us in motion; it has unveiled its face, inspiring us with bewilderment and exhilaration."

-Khalil Gibran

Time, Edward decided, was something he had so much of that he often felt unsettled by the vast quantity that was given to him by his father, Hohenheim. It was unsettling because he had no idea what to do with the free time half of the time.

He and his father had embarked on a journey to liberate his trapped soul from this body, this world. For many years he and his father traveled throughout the foreign world trying to seek a way to return to their own. But time after time events interrupted their journey, and prolonged their stay. Though at this particular moment, time had decided to ebb away slowly during his classes, and Edward felt the need to do something about it, like hitting his head and demanding to know why this particular class was going so damned slow today.

"No." Edward once again informed his pupil that defiantly stood his ground after being rebuked for half an hour, or what Ed had felt had been over an hour.

"But-"

"No, means no."

"But, why not?"

"Because for the last damned time, I said no."

"Couldn't we just-"

"Fred or George, I don't really care which Weasley you are, for the final time, no. If you don't mind, I would like to continue this lecture, so whatever you and your brother were conspiring to do in the middle of my class can be conducted later outside of my class, and not during the interval of my lecture. So no, Mr. Weasley, you will have to wait to do whatever it is you wanted to do later." Edward said while he gritted his teeth at the red head. The said Weasley twin looked sullen at the answer but ultimately sat back down in his seat at the front of the classroom.

"Now, as I was saying before Mr. Weasley interrupted, the difference between alchemists and magical folk is mostly philosophical. Magical people tend to disrespect the flow of the world. For example: the Time Turner; a device that reverses the flow of time for a short period. It allows the user to be freely transported back in time. In short, magical people have created a way to be completely separate from reality and yet intimately connected to it. However, alchemists don't disrupt the follow of time. They allow nature to flow as it should."

'Most of the time,' Edward added to himself, as he talked through his lecture in a fifth year class.

Abruptly a Slytherin boy's hand rose. He nodded to the young boy with short black hair and onyx eyes to speak. "Sounds like Alchemists are inferior to us magical people."

Edward narrowed his eyes and remembered who the kid was, 'Nathan Deyer, I believe.'

"Mr. Deyer, if that is true then what would happen if your wand was to suddenly become unavailable? What then would a wizard do if he is unable perform magic and also unable to apparate?"

At that the student fell silent and sat back down. As Deyer sat Ed felt himself grinning. Edward cleared his throat and began again, "While some say that magic is superior and alchemy inferior, they are indeed right most of the time."

"Alchemy and magic are like oil and water. You cannot mix the two ideas or powers. In short, the power difference between the two depends on the situation, and which might be a better option. While it is true that with magic you're capable of doing of many different things with a few simple words, something similar is true with alchemy. It's correct to assume the subject is not as vast as magic but it does have its perks…"

His lecture was cut short as he glanced at the time, 'Looks like this lecture will be saved for next time.'

"Right, since we're out of time tonight's homework will be to write two parchments about today's topic." Edward sighed in relief as he concluded his final lecture of the day.

OoO

'Time, huh?' Edward couldn't help but think as he sat down in his chair as he graded papers at the end of the day. It reminded him that he was running out of time.

"Dad," Edward said nervously, the word dad felt like some foreign word that he didn't know the meaning of.

"Yes?"

"If you say I don't belong here, then where do I belong?"

"In a place called Amestris, on the other side of the gate."

"Amestris?" Edward questioned his father; if saying the word dad had felt strange, this one felt ever stranger. He had never heard of this 'Amestris' before. It was as if it was a made up world that did not exist, and his father was telling him nonsense.

"Your soul is trapped in a body that does not age, and I believe that time is flowing differently than we think."

"What?"

"I think that if your Philosopher's Stone runs out in this world, then your time on the other side will run out as well."

"I'm really am here on borrowed time then?"

He watched his father nod, "Try not to die as much as you can, while we try to figure a way back, since we don't know how long it will take us."

"Try not to die?" Edward repeated his father words.

"Both the muggle and magical communities are about to commence a massive war, Edward. It'll be a shame if we both die just because we got caught in the cross fire."

Edward nodded in understanding, "Where will we go first?"

Edward saw his father think for a while before he informed him, "Durmstrang in Norway, I have an old friend there and he just might help us out."

OoO

If it wasn't his pupils that drove him mad it was the paperwork, Edward decided at end of the week.

The amount of paperwork a professor had to do here was horrendous. Edward felt his head shake. If only he hadn't listened to his former teacher at Durmstrang.

"You're Edward Elric, aren't you?" Edward blinked to see Professor Hoffman peer curiously at him. He was surrounded by half of the library's textbooks.

Slowly Ed felt himself nod, "Did you need something of me Professor?"

Edward saw him wave his hand dismissively at his question.

"No, it's just hard to believe a student is actually reading as much as you are."

Edward blinked in surprise as he clutched his book and bit his lip.

"I'm not like most." Edward muttered to himself.

"Your father has spoken much about you, but he failed to mention your habits."

"I see." Edward said while he closed his eyes.

"I see that he was delayed coming here to Durmstrang."

Edward nodded."We were separated on the way, and since I didn't know what else to do, I enrolled here."

"You did not need to enroll for my help, Edward."

Edward looked up in surprise and replied dumbly, "What?"

"You could have just sent me an owl."

"Oh."

"Besides I hardly think that you need to waste your time here, from the work I and the other members of the staff have seen, you're a genius. I feel like you would become a great professor, considering the fact you can sometimes outsmart some of the other professors.

"I really should not have followed the man's words." Edward mumbled to himself as he went through the stacks of papers the students had handed to him. This was going to take ages even if he had all the time of the world.

Author notes: I apologize for the lack of updates but, if you haven't read my profile then, you should know that beginning of next week I have finals until the first week of June. Please vote on the poll, thanks.

Edited by Kanathia

TBC