The thing about pain, Is it won't last forever,
And it kills you right now, But with time it gets better,
The thing about scars, Is they all start to fade,
Until nothing is left, Of the cuts that were made,
The thing about today, Is there's always tomorrow,
And if you can't find your smile, I have one you can borrow,
The thing about help, Is beside you it stands,
But it won't know it's needed, Unless you reach out your hand,
The thing about love, Is you can't feel it's touch,
Until you let someone know, That this world is too much.
-e.h.
The rest of the night was spent in Central and bled into dawn. Mustang and his team had taken the intruder, a man I had learned was actually an active duty member of the military and someone who worked alongside Roy. His name was Frank Archer, and Mustang had never felt that he was fully trustworthy. He had made it known more that once that he craved power; something that didn't sit well with Brigadier General Mustang since it meant Archer would be gunning for his job. But Roy always knew the importance of keeping an enemy close, and Frank Archer was now being kept somewhere in Central, soon to be interrogated.
I had been sent along with my doctors to the lab so they could draw blood and run various tests, and my hands never seemed to stop their shaking. Edward refused to leave my side. He chose some colorful phrases for the doctor that dared to suggest he should wait outside the lab while they took a blood sample. His anger simmered under a collected exterior, but was quickly rising to to a boil when I was dismissed from the lab and we were shown back to Mustang's office.
The glass walls of Roy's office where newly fogged at the click of a remote, sheilding him from any onlookers with the use of a technology allowing large panes of glass to alternate between transparent and opaque. He called for Ed to come in alone.
"She's not staying out here."
"Winry will be fine, this is Central." Roy reminded him.
"She was attacked by a soldier from Central." Ed retorted.
"While one of Central's most qualified was supposed to be keeping her safe. Leave her with Hawkeye and get in here now."
Elric's eyes darkened and he looked back at me for a moment, silently asking if I'd be alright. I gave him a slight nod and settled myself into a chair outside Mustang's office as Ed entered and closed the glass door behind him. Several minutes ticked by, during which Riza was kind enough to get me a cup of tea and sit with me. Voices from inside the office began to rise, slowly becoming louder as one fought to overcome the others.
I began to recongnize not only the voices of Roy and Ed, but also of Warrant Officer Vato Falman, 2nd Lieutenant Jean Havoc, 2nd Lieutenant Hymans Breda, Lieutenant Colonal Maes Hughes, and Master Sergant Cain Feury. The detail of their words were muffled, but inflection in their voices made the emotion unmistakeable. Havoc, Feury, and Hughes's voices rang in steady rhythm. They were known to be calm, analyzing, and often times the first to offer possible solutions to problems. Breda was the guy who had everyone's back, the strong supporter who would latch onto a cause once he found one he could stand behind. The optimisim in his voice carried through the thick glass. It had been argued before that Vato Falman was too emotional for the military, a trait that brought on his grey hair early, but his passion for human decency was something to be treasured and Roy kept him around as a reminder of that. His heart always on his sleeve, Falman's shakiness seemed to reverb from behind the walls signaling his clear discomfort with whatever they were discussing. Mustang's distinction powered through the commotion with the unmistakable authority of someone giving orders, and when it seemed the dust had settled, a new rage shattered through the room.
"That's bullshit and you know it! You can't expect me to just sit by!" My heart lept into my throat and I exchanged a look of alarm with Riza. I had never heard Ed so angry, and from the look on her face I guessed she hadn't either. Muffled voices responded, no doubt in effort to reason with him.
"Not a fucking chance!" Ed shouted back. Mustang's door was yanked open and Edward stomped out, seething and clenching his fists at his side. I watched nervously as he steeled himself, and called back to the men who were all now emerging from behind the glass walls. "I'll take care of everything. I've got control, we'll be fine."
"Do you, Fullmetal?" Roy challenged. His hardened black eyes seemed to bore into Ed's back. "You need to keep it together, Ed. We can't afford to get sloppy. You can't lose focus EVER. I'll send in a replacement if that's what it takes." Edward's eyes went wide and he turned to face Roy as he sighed.
"Maybe you're right. Maybe someone else should be protecting Winry."
"NO!" I yelped. Every head in the room snapped to my direction, and I shrank back in embarrassment. "Um, no. Please, what happened wasn't Ed's fault. I'm okay, really. I... I don't want to start all over again, living with a new stranger. Please don't make me."
Mustang's eyes danced back and forth between Ed and myself, and my skin began to crawl under his assessing gaze. It was easy to see why this man made people nervous.
"Winry we have to wonder if this arrangment may not be working. We sent Edward to protect you and find who's been threatening you, and it took Frank Archer attacking you for us to actually get any solid leads. Its not like us to take so long bringing down an enemy." He said, casting his repremanding glare at Edward. "We need to wrap this up. I better not hear of another incident like this, Fullmetal. You were sent to do a job and tonight you've done it poorly. But you may be able to redeem yourself by interrogating Archer for me. Normally I'd do it myself, but I fractured a bone in my hand interrogating the last scumbag I was forced to deal with so I won't have much influence over Archer. I know he won't give me information easily."
Ed's icy glare intensified as he flexed his metal fingers threateningly.
"He'll answer to me."
It was mid day when we finally returned to my apartment. Ed had been as quiet as he was when we first met, clearly trenched in thought. My heart sank when we walked in and he immediatly retired to the guest room without a word and shut the door. I was reading on the floor in front of the fire when he emerged hours later. Ambers cut through the darkness and the fire's soft illumination revealed the tiredness etched into him. He crossed the room to the kitchen and pulled an ice pack from the freezer, handing it to me as he sat next to me on the plush rug.
"That bruise is swelling up." He said as I held to ice to my face. "We're lucky he didn't break a bone."
"Are you mad at me?" I interrupted. He blinked in surprise at my question.
"What gives you that idea?"
"You're doing it again. You're being grouchy and secretive. You do that when you're angry at me."
"I'm angry at myself!" He barked. "Look at you. You're black and blue because of me. Every night I'm supposed to check the locks on the door and windows. But last night I forgot. Archer was watching us. He was waiting for me to slip up because he knew I would."
"Its my fault too. I could have checked the fire escape window in my room but I didn't. Its just as much my fault and now Mustang is angry with both of us."
"No, he's pissed at me."
"I know you probably want out of here." I said, my voice tightening with emotion. "Mustang gave you the opportunity to leave and let someone replace you, and I messed it up because I'm afraid. I shouldn't have been so selfish. Why should you waste your life being stuck here with me? You have every right to be mad at me. I understand if you want to go."
He took me by the shoulders and forced me to look at him.
"I'm angry at Archer for reasons that go far beyond what he did to you. Reasons that I can't explain to you. I beat him bloody earlier and I'm still not satisfied. I'm furious at Mustang for allowing me to stay here. I'm angry because I'm afraid of what will happen."
"I don't understand." His grip on me tightened.
"I always know exactly what to do. Exactly how to handle any situation I face. But now I'm torn between leaving and staying. Rationality says that I should go, because I've gotten sloppy from too much time spent out of the field. I'm becoming too relaxed here, and I'm making mistakes and taking unnessesary risks that could cost you your life. That isn't fair to you."
He relaxed his grip on me. "But now there's something else here. I thought it was the same feeling I had when guarding Nina, and that was unnerving enough, but this is different."
I stared back at him and tried to calm my racing heart as he locked his eyes on mine.
"I care about you Winry. I care about you more than I should and that's really dangerous, for you physically and for me psychologically. I can't make the same mistakes I did with Nina. I got comfortable, I got emotional, and then I left and she was killed."
"What are you saying?"
"I'm saying that I'm not going anywhere. I'm worried if I do you'll wind up dead, so you're stuck with me until I catch this guy and kill him. Mustang can send whoever the hell he wants here to gaurd you, I'm not leaving. But I need you to stop."
"Stop what?" I asked.
"Stop being you."
"Stop being me? Is this you trying to make me feel better? I was sexually assaulted last night, you know." He raked his hand through his hair and let out an exhasperated growl.
"I need you to stop...trying to get close to me. Stop caring about me. Stop doing things that make me care about you." It was like someone was squeezing my brain.
"Wait," I said. "I'm confused, you're not making any sense right now. You say you're mad at anyone but me, and that you shouldn't stay here, but that I'm stuck with you, yet you're telling me to go away? Last night was both our faults, but I know you won't let it happen again. Everything is fine."
"Stop acting like everything is fine." He shot back. "You were nearly raped. Don't be so casual about it." I blanched at his frankness, and his shoulders sagged seemingly from the exhaustion of dealing with me. I set down the ice pack and twisted the hem of my slouchy sweater nervously, my hands resting in my lap as I looked away from him. He really had a way of making me feel like a child. I was about to collect my book and head to bed when the deep rasp of his voice stopped me.
"You don't know what it did to me." His face was raw with anger, fear, anxiety, I couldn't decide and I watched him speculativly as he gazed into the flames. "I heard you scream, and it made me remember things I wish I could forget. Then seeing him crawling over you, with that sick smirk of his-" His sentence choked off and he grimaced before continuing. "I can't believe how much shit you put up with. The kind of life you're forcing yourself to have to save a world of people that don't even know you exist. I mean fuck, Archer works on the team in charge of keeping some of the military's top assignments a secret, including you." His expression only became more pained, and for a moment it felt as if I wasn't in the room anymore. I was a fly on the wall, watching the walls of this carefully guarded fortress start to crumble from the onslaught. "He was supposed to be on our side. Sure he wants Mustang's job, lots of people do. But Feury and Hughes said he always prioritized your well-being. Why would he do this now? Why would anyone torment you like this?"
His raw, golden eyes swerved over to hold my gaze. "Winry, are you okay?"
I found myself in the all-too-familiar state of being unable to breathe, and in that moment I wasn't sure if I wanted to scream, cry, or kiss him. It had been years since anyone had looked at me with so much sincerity and asked how I was. I could tell his question was completely unrelated to the security of the mission, or his concern for keeping his job. He took my hand in his warm one and ran his thumb over my knuckles. He was worried about me. Tears sprang in my eyes and I couldn't stop my shaking lip.
"No." I whispered. I let out a sob and the tears ran free. "I'm exhausted. I'm so tired of living like this. I'm so sick of smiling all the time and acting like everythings okay. I'm tired of telling myself to grow up and get over being lonely." I looked back at him through the swimming blurriness. "I always feel alone. I have friendly aquaintances, but no one I can really talk to. Everyone assumes that I'm happy doing this but I'm not happy anymore. I'm not satisified being caged here anymore. I don't feel safe the way I once did." His thumb brushed over my knuckles again and thats when it dawned on me. He was holding my hand. His flesh hand was supporting my own and the sensation of his fingers over mine only further pressed my need to feel something new. I drew in a shuddering breath.
"I haven't been okay for a long time. Longer than you've been living here. I'm sad a lot. I'm lonely. I have the most agonizing wanderlust. I get lost in stories and poems that take me to the most vivid faraway places, and I fall in love and build relationships with these fictional characters because theres no one else in my life. Then one day its all over and I look up from the last page of the book and I want to cry because I'm still here!" Edward's face was beyond crestfallen during my monologue, and I sniffed loudly and wiped my nose on my sleeve in a most unladylike way as the tears subsided a bit. "I'm addicted to the written word, but no one ever prepares you for the emptiness you feel when you finish a book. Its even worse when you look around and realize you have no one to talk to about it. No one prepared me to feel like this all the time."
His ashen expression regarded me with untold amounts of concern, and then something flickered in his gaze. As if I could see the deliberation between options happening in his mind.
"How can I help?" He asked. I sat back and leaned my head against the couch with a sigh.
"I don't think there's much you can do at this point. Unless you can help me feel something else right now. My head is pounding; I really just want to feel anything besides what I've been feeling tonight." My mind had the intentions of him coming up with one of his usual quips to make me laugh or roll my eyes, or for him to launch into a story of one of his past missions to distract me. I was not expecting his worried, fearful eyes to close and then open a moment later with newfound determination set in. He stood and pulled me up with him, tugging me behind him as I followed into the guest suite and then the large guest bathroom.
"You're shaking." He regarded, staring down at me.
"I'm cold. Or it could be adrenaline. I've never told any of that to anyone before, its a bit overwhelming." He reached into the stall and turned on the shower, and plumes of steam began to fill the room.
"Get in."
"I'm not getting naked!" I reply shrinking back in horror.
"I didn't say that, I said get in." I eyed him suspiciously. He kicked off his boots and tested the temperature of the water falling from the ceiling-mounted head like rain showers. He stepped into the stall, jeans and tshirt still on, and offered me a hand.
"Now come on." He insisted. I stood outside the stall regarding him with apprehension.
"Winry, you're not alone." He said, "I'm here with you and you can trust me. You wanted to feel something else." I found myself blinking back at him in amasement and my hand fell into his as he pulled me into the stall and under the shower with him. The warmth cascading over me seemed to melt the shaky stiffness from my shoulders and I instantly sagged in exhaustion; the events of the previous 24 hours had finally caught up with me. Ed pulled me to him and my head fell on his chest, and before I knew it I was crying again. He must have felt my body shaking with quiet sobs because he pulled back and looked at me.
"Woah, okay you gotta stop with the tears. It guts me to watch you cry. Seriously, knock it off." I didn't know where the brazeness of my next move came from, the emotion, the adrenaline, who knows. But I stepped to him again closing the distance between us and craned my neck up at him. His hands had found their place, fingers splayed across my back and his eyes danced back and forth between mine.
"Make me." I whispered bravely. "Make me stop crying."
A/N: Thank you all for your patience and devotion to this story. I'm still writing the end and I'm nearly finished. I will be away on vaction for a week and unable to reach my matierial to upload a new chapter until I get back to the city, but rest assured I will be writing while away. I will upload chapter 12 tomorrow night just before I fly out, I wouldn't dream of leaving you hanging for a week when the sparks are about to fly. Thank you all for your inspiring reviews.