Alphonse didn't know what to think. He couldn't do anything about what was happening. All he could do was listen to Colonel Mustang's explanation and watch as the soldiers carried his brother away. He stood there for what must have been ten minutes, then stumbled back into the house. He didn't bother to shut the door behind himself.
He sank heavily into a wooden chair in the kitchen, staring up at the ceiling with a blank face. Inside, his thoughts were jumbled. His brother couldn't be Fullmetal—that just wasn't possible. Ed was his brother. He would never steal anything! But . . . Edward never told him or Winry what his mysterious job was. He pulled in heaps of money from whatever it was, and he was gone on a job every time Fullmetal struck. But he simply couldn't be the same notorious thief that everyone in the military was pulling their hair out over . . . could he?
It was another hour before he stumbled to his feet and dragged himself to the Rockbell residence.
On the porch, he hesitated before knocking. The door was opened by Granny Pinako.
"Alphonse? What's wrong?"
Al gulped. "Granny . . . I need to tell you and Winry something."
Pinako frowned, but didn't question him. She opened the door wider. "Wait in the living room. I'll fetch Winry."
Alphonse nodded and stepped into the house. Once he had reached the living room, he plopped onto a stuffed armchair with a sigh. How was he going to tell them? Something like this was simple to explain, but somehow it seemed so hard.
Winry came down a minute later in her usual garb, Pinako close behind her, and they both took a seat on the sofa opposite him.
"What's this all about, Al?" Winry asked. "And where's Ed?"
Al shifted uncomfortably. He thought he'd gotten up the courage to say this, but the words seemed stuck in his throat.
"Where's Ed?" Winry demanded again, worry beginning to creep into her voice.
"He got taken away by some people from the military!" Alphonse blurted out.
Winry looked shocked, and Granny's expression said something along the lines of, "I thought something like this might happen, but I was really hoping it would't".
Alphonse began to explain before either of them had the chance say something. By he'd time he'd finished, Winry had gone very pale. Then she turned red.
"THAT IDIOT!" she yelled. "WHY DID HE START STEALING IN THE FIRST PLACE? DOES HE HAVE A DEATH WISH? IF HE REALLY IS FULLMETAL, HE COULD BE EXECUTED!"
Al winced and covered his ears. "Don't yell, Winry. I'm mad too." He really was. He couldn't believe that his brother had done this—he didn't think Ed was the sort of person who stole things, but it explained his job, and a guilty man didn't run. He was sure of that. "But I don't think we can do anything about it. If he's Fullmetal, the same one that has been escaping the military and annoying them to no end, they probably aren't going to be fair on the trial—they might try to just send him straight jail."
"Yeah . . . I guess you're right. . . ."
They all fell silent. Pinako left to go make tea, and Winry pulled a wrench out of her pocket. Alphonse supposed she was imagining hitting Ed over the head with it until he caught hold of his senses.
When Granny returned with the tea, the silence was tentatively broken by Winry's trembling voice. "So, what do we do now?"
Pinako spoke up. "Al's right. We can't do anything about it. For now, we should continue with our everyday lives."
Al glanced up from where he'd been twiddling his thumbs. "'For now'?"
Granny nodded grimly. "Edward's neighbors, us included, might be called to Central to testify in court."
Alphonse's eyes widened. "I can't betray brother like that!"
Winry placed a hand on his arm. "Calm down, Al. We have to be strong—for Ed's sake."
Al took a deep breath. "Yeah. I guess you're right."
'-'
Ed groaned; his head was aching terribly, and whatever surface he was lying on was rather hard and lumpy. A hard surface. . . ? Where was he? What happened? He was . . . he had been . . .
The events from earlier came rushing back to him, and Ed sat up with a gasp. He looked around frantically, not really taking anything in, but managed to calm himself down a moment later.
He was sitting on a cot close to the bars of a dull gray cell.
A military holding cell. That meant it wasn't a dream.
The place was very simple; Edward could just clap his hands and break out. . . . But he couldn't.
His automail arm was missing, and his left hand was bound with coarse cloth that didn't allow him to carve transmutation circles, but gave him freedom to curl it into a fist.
He had to get out, run away where they wouldn't find him. But the cell had no windows to climb through.
Panic began to bubble up inside him again, and he was just considering attempting to break out without alchemy when footsteps alerted him to the approach of what was probably a guard. Said guard cast him only a passing glance before continuing on his way, then did a double-take and looked at him again.
"Oh, you're awake." The soldier spoke in a monotone, but there was underlying anger accompanied by smugness. "I have a bone to pick with you—then again, I doubt there's anyone in the military who doesn't." He stepped closer to the bars, blue eyes steely with anger. "You know how many nights I've had to stay at HQ, working all night, away from my wife and kid?" He reached through the bars and before Ed could escape, grabbed him by the front of his shirt and pulled the alchemist up to eye level. "You're sure as hell going to pay for that."
Edward bared his teeth. "You know I could sue you for assaulting me."
The officer sneered. "With that stolen money of yours? I don't think so." He pulled Ed forward, banging his forehead against the bars, then sent him sprawling on the cot again. Edward was left in a daze, and by the time he had managed to sit up again the guard was gone.
He sat there for about half an hour, during which time he noticed another guard across the hall glaring at him. The Xingese prisoner he was guarding also stared, but his gaze was just curious. The prisoner eventually seemed to realize that Ed was uncomfortable being stared at and distracted the officer by trying to convince him that he was seventeen. The guard didn't believe him, hence the "trying".
Ed would have found the argument amusing, had he not been in the place where he least wanted to be.
He spent a little while considering various escape plans that he knew wouldn't work before a voice interrupted his thoughts.
"Hey!"
Edward looked up from where he was examining his one hand. Outside of his cell stood a tall man with black hair and glasses. The corners of his eyes were wrinkled slightly, indicating that he smiled a lot, but his expression didn't have a lick of humor in it.
"I'm Lieutenant Colonel Maes Hughes from investigations. You're coming with me." The man gestured for the guard from earlier to unlock the cell. When the door had opened, the he stepped in.
Edward stubbornly remained seated.
The man sighed and grabbed him by the arm. His grip was firm, but not harsh as the guard's had been, and he pulled Ed along down the hall gently. From this, Ed got the impression that Hughes felt sorry for him.
They walked in silence—an uncomfortable silence. Edward didn't break it, and Hughes didn't seem to want to talk to him.
When they had reached the bottom floor, Hughes took a moment to talk to the young man standing at the front desk about his "removing the prisoner from the premises". Ed was then dragged (he refused to walk on willingly) outside, where a car was waiting with yet another officer sitting in the driver's seat. He was made to sit in the back and his hand was cuffed to the seat in front of him, where Hughes sat.
The car ride was also spent in silence. Edward got the feeling that the driver was new to the military, because he didn't glare at him. The Lieutenant Colonel didn't seem angry at him either—his glances were more pitying than anything. He opened his mouth as if to speak sometimes, then closed it again.
When they reached Central HQ, Ed didn't pretend to be amazed at the size of it—he'd been through Central City several times on odd jobs (that is, stealing), and had even taken from the place itself a few times when something of notable worth was kept there. They had fetched quite a hefty price on the black market.
The car stopped and Hughes stepped out. He was greeted by three more officers, one of whom opened the door and, after uncuffing him, pulled Ed out. When Edward started paying attention to the people around him, it took all his dignity to keep his jaw from clattering to the ground.
While the officer who had his hand wrapped around Ed's upper arm looked normal, with chin length blond hair, and the woman soldier as well, with short black hair, the mountain of a man talking to Hughes was a sight to behold.
He was about as tall as the suit of armor in Ed's basement, and was obviously about as muscled as a dedicated bodybuilder. Aside from a little loop of blond hair dangling over his forehead, he seemed to be bald.
Ed chose to speak at last. "So, who's the big guy?"
Hughes opened his mouth to respond, but wasn't given the chance.
"I?" The man's voice boomed, his mustache twitched with every word, and he seemed to grow even larger. "I AM ALEX LOUIS ARMSTRONG!" With this great bellow, he proceeded to rip of the top of his military uniform, showing that he did indeed have bulging muscles.
The blond man still holding onto Ed seemed to wilt; the woman twitched, and Hughes face-palmed. Ed gaped in horror; one, because who wouldn't be horrified at this? And two, he had stolen from the Armstrong household before.
"AND YOU MUST BE FULLMETAL—"
Ed shrank back.
"—THE ONE WHO STOLE A PRICELESS FAMILY HEIRLOOM THAT HAS BEEN PASSED DOWN THE ARMSTRONG LINE FOR GENERATIONS!" The man loomed over Edward, and in that moment he seemed even more intimidating than before.
Hughes cleared his throat before Armstrong could go on. "Now's not the time, Major."
He pulled back. "Of course, sir."
Once Armstrong had re-clothed his torso, they set off up the steps to the gate. Edward was still being dragged by the arm. The officer clutching him wasn't quite as gentle as Hughes had been, but he was eventually passed back to the Lieutenant Colonel, and he could hear the lower-ranked officers whispering behind them about, "That poor kid, he can't be older than seventeen," and, "I heard he has a younger brother who didn't even know he was stealing." "What? No way!" He was starting to get fed up with their gossip when they stopped at the gates and the officers fell silent so as not to be heard by the guards standing at either end of the doors.
Once through, they continued up the cobbled path and into Headquarters, still without speaking a word. The lack of communication between the members of their diverse little group was starting to get to Ed, and he felt tension steadily growing inside him. It was like he was a timebomb, waiting until a set moment to blow up. And the time was ticking away.
Just when Edward thought he was about to explode, they stopped in front of a pair of double doors on the third floor. Beyond those, Ed was met by the sight of more officers sitting at desks and dutifully filling out paperwork. More were rushing about with files tucked under their arms and shouting orders to others. Ed supposed that seeing as the military had been on his case for a year, his capture must be causing quite a stir.
A mousy young woman with large glasses rushed by them holding a stack of books. She stumbled to stop when one almost fell off the top of her pile, then froze and turned around to stare at Ed. A moment later, another officer crashed into her, and she fell to the floor with a shriek, drawing the attention of everyone else in the room.
It didn't take them long to notice Edward standing there.
'-'
It was pandemonium. Many officers saluted to Hughes and Armstrong with cries of, "Sir!" while several others tried to get closer to Ed. Eventually, they managed to break through the crowd to the other side of the room and through another door. They all sighed in relief once the door had been closed, except for Armstrong, who had plowed through without a problem. Then the Lieutenant Colonel poked his head back out the door.
"Sheska, get in here! And bring Fullmetal's file!"
The mousy girl from before stumbled in a minute later, and Ed was made to take a seat at the table dominating the middle of the room. After instructing Sheska to note down the interrogation and ordering the other three officers to leave the room and calm down everyone in the office, Hughes sat on the other side of the table.
Sheska poised her pen over a blank page in what Edward supposed was his file, and Hughes leveled his gaze at him. "State your name and line of work."
Heya! Okay, in case anyone didn't notice or forgot, Ed's seventeen in this. Yeah. Because I wanted him to be seventeen. XD
Thank you for all the fifteen follows, nine favorites, and five reviews! I'm glad that so many people responded well to this. :) Also, if anyone is interested, I posted this weird crack-ish one-shot called Fountain Pen in which Ed tries to buy a new pen from a stationary shop and everything dissolves into chaos. So yeah, if you want to read that, please do!
Feel free to point out any mistakes in my writing or anything that sounds weird.
-Quiet Leaf