run, i'm a natural disaster
43- Too Easy
When you've fought the homunculi, more ordinary occasions for fighting- such as people trying to assassinate the Emperor and his personal guard- become much less climatic. A swing there, Ed's knife there, Greed's claws, and the two chimera ripping people apart, with Lan Fan simply throwing knives at a safe distance. Due to demands by advisors, Ling and Lan Fan decided to marry, and Lan Fan is pregnant and therefore less agile in her role of the Emperor's personal assassin. Pregnancy has not made her any more sentimental, and she is still perfectly willing to cut down anyone in Ling's way. Or even if they're not in Ling's way. Ed suspects she's getting tired of the advisor's demands she stay behind and under protection.
Ed spits on the ground by one's unconscious body. One of Ling's servants- if she's got it right his name is Yinseng but she may be horribly wrong, it wouldn't be the first time- picks it up and places it on the rear end of the carriage. She looks questioningly at Ling- why do they even need the bodies? Is there going to be a public execution? It's strange. Last year, she wouldn't have been so blasé about death at all. She sometimes wishes she didn't have to be.
"We need their information", Lan Fan says. The mechanical tone of her voice hasn't worn away over time, and never vanishes unless she is really really drunk in the Emperor's private sitting room. Maybe they could get Winry to replace her with a full automation. Ed's sure no-one would notice.
"Torturing?" Heinkel asks. He seems quite disinterested, but his hands are twitching like he doesn't really agree with the idea. Heinkel's own ideas for an ideal death, as he confided one day, is one that is quick and relatively painless. It's probably why he likes guns so much.
"No, we would never", Ling says. "We'll water board them. So much neater."
"Isn't waterboarding counted as torture?" Ed asks, curiously.
"Nope." Ling is cheerful, but his eyes are shadowed. "Torture physically damages the victims. Waterboarding only simulates drowning- there's no chance of death at all. It's distressing, all right, but it's not torture."
Greed and Darius are stomping over, carrying their own victims. "That was really boring", Greed moans. "When I deign to fight, I expect, no, wait; I demand a decent opponent. Even Ed at twelve was a better fighting."
"I was fourteen, you tosser", Ed snarls.
"When you're over four-hundred, you can bitch to me about ages" Greed says with a smile full of teeth.
[When Ed does indeed reach four hundred, she bitches Greed out for a week about ages and their importance.]
A.N: lol age gap what age gap
Yinseng is in reference to Ying Yang from the Expendables film series