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Fullmetal departed for the East a driven, disturbingly extraordinary sixteen-year-old, focused on his goals to the point of tunnel vision. He returned five months later a driven, disturbingly extraordinary seventeen-year-old who knew precisely what sex was and how to get it.
Or so Roy kept hearing. He didn't entirely credit the rumors -- anyone who wasn't Al generally had to bash Ed over the head with a very large brick to get so much as the time from him -- but he was resigned if it turned out to be true. Which would be easy enough to determine. Who was Ed most likely to exercise his newly discovered charms upon, after all?
And so he awaited Fullmetal's report with unaccustomed interest; an Edward Elric seduction promised to be entertaining, at the very least. Perhaps the scene would become a bit unpleasant, and Roy had to admit he didn't have much practice with this saying no business, but Fullmetal must be shown with no doubt that he couldn't attempt to influence his commanding officer that way. Or any way. The balance of power between them teetered alarmingly sometimes, despite all of Roy's precautions, and the only saving grace seemed to be that Fullmetal hadn't actually noticed. Yet.
Edward arrived for his report with the usual racket – the door went bang, his report went plop onto the middle of Roy's desk, carefully orchestrated file by piles system be damned, and Fullmetal himself went thump down onto the sofa.
"There you go," he said, flinging one arm across his face and settling back. "I hope you enjoy it, because I certainly didn't."
That's not what I hear. Roy bit his tongue and collected the report. He flipped quickly through, confirming details, and then started in at the beginning to read more carefully. Fullmetal's reports were always worth close scrutiny, and not just for the colors he turned when Roy corrected his spelling.
"And what was so terrible about your trip, do tell," Roy murmured.
"Giant elephant," Ed said succinctly. "Page eight," he added, as Roy looked up at him.
Roy lifted an eyebrow, flipped the pages and read, then lifted the other eyebrow. "What's that children's story about the elephant and the mouse?" he asked thoughtfully.
Ed sucked in a huge breath. "Who're you calling smaller than a mouse's –"
"I do find myself wondering, however," Roy said, cutting across the brewing rant. "Your report is rather vague on the disposition of this elephant."
Ed deflated, looking shifty. "Must've misplaced it," he said.
"Ah yes. Easy to lose, being so difficult to spot in a crowd."
"I can't keep track of everything," Ed snapped defensively. "Is it my fault the big stupid lummox wandered off?" Roy waited, hands steepling on top of the report. "Bet he's all right, though," Ed said after a brief silence. "Bet he found his way to a circus or something. What?" he added off Roy's look. "They were dead dull, just a bunch of trained horses and one lion. And what would you have done with it?"
"Ah," said Roy. "This does shed new light on the four trips to the circus itemized in your expenses."
"Would you rather I'd brought it back with me?" Ed asked archly.
Roy started to answer, briefly pondered a vision of Edward and his brother riding an elephant through the streets of Central, and reached up to rub absently at his temples. "You have a remarkably cavalier attitude towards the state's property, however acquired," he said. "I suggest you take more care in future – the state does not appreciate having its possessions squandered." He eyed the raw scrapes visible at Ed's cuffs, the splash of bruise shadowing his cheek, still mottled and green after over three weeks of travel. He let the silence hang, then stretch until Edward twitched, eyes narrowing suspiciously. Then he smiled, uncapped his pen, and returned to the report.
He went through several pages, needling his subordinate with a series of pointed questions and gleefully commenting on Edward's peculiar approach to grammar in the margins. And between exchanges he looked up over the edge of the report, studied the boneless sprawl of young man on his couch, analyzed the cant of hips and artless splay of legs. Edward had always lain like that, insouciant to his very sinew. But was Roy imagining a touch of new awareness in the way he let his knees fall open? Perhaps . . .
"What?" Ed asked abruptly.
"Beg pardon?"
"What're you looking at?" Ed sounded cranky, and Roy jerked his eyes up with a start of curiosity. Ed blinked back at him, the picture of uncomprehending hostility.
. . . Perhaps not.
"Nothing at all," Roy said smoothly. "Just wondering if you've grown, or if it's just your hair is a bit puffy. Well then," he added briskly, snapping the report shut as outrage propelled Ed up into a sitting position. "Thank you, Fullmetal, for your diligent investigation. Please report to Lieutenant Hawkeye for an assignment to the barracks. You'll be staying in Central until I can find another use for you." He paused a beat, letting that dangle, then sighed in quiet relief as Ed let the opening sail right by. "And also report to the Quartermaster," Roy added suddenly, looking down at the feet propped up on his couch. "Your boots are a disgrace to your rank. Dismissed."
Definitely a relief, he thought, as Fullmetal took a few parting shots and stomped out. Even if it did mean his sources of information had been so woefully mistaken. Somehow, that seemed much easier to cope with than Edward Elric on the prowl.
Roy's satisfaction lasted for an entire six hours, until he heard that Ed had gone straight from his office to the Quartermaster – an infamously tight-fisted bastard of a Major – and come away with boots, a new wardrobe to go along with them, and a date for the Green Lion on Saturday night.
Roy absorbed this information, confirmed it with two more sources, and spent the rest of the week with an intense feeling of impending doom.
*
Roy was most definitely above arranging his weekend to dine at the Green Lion, even for the sake of towering curiosity. He did, however, decide it was about time to go refill his order for specialty alchemist's gloves with the Quartermaster on Monday. He'd been putting it off for months, after all.
"Good morning, Colonel," Major Banes greeted as he entered. "More gloves, is it?"
"Yes, Major," Roy said, coming to lean on the counter, the best to loom. It was really the only way to extract anything from the miserly bastard, as not rank nor pleading nor threadbare need seemed able to do it.
"Sure thing," Banes said brightly, and turned to retrieve a requisition form. "We just got a new shipment last week. It's the same silk blend you chaps like."
"Thank you," Roy said, thinking of the last time he'd requested new gloves and the twenty-minute rant it had provoked on the exorbitant cost, and why can't you alchemists use the same dress gloves as the rest of us?
Hmm. Maybe that was why Fullmetal liked him?
"Here you are," Banes said, exchanging Roy's completed form for a box of pristine white gloves, just awaiting the application of the array.
"Thank you," Roy said, not moving.
Banes smiled inquiringly. "Something else I can help you with, Colonel?" he asked.
"Yes there is, Major," Roy said. "It has come to my attention that you've taken an interest in the Fullmetal Alchemist."
Banes's smile didn't shrivel up the way Roy had been expecting; instead, he all but beamed. "Yes?" he asked.
"Fullmetal is my subordinate," Roy said. "And a valuable member of my staff."
"I'm sure he is," Banes agreed warmly. "He's very talented."
Roy clenched his teeth so hard he heard a back molar creak. "That he is," he agreed through a fixed smile. "And as such, I take any threat to him personally. And that includes a threat to his . . ." he sucked a deliberate breath between his teeth, "reputation. Do you understand me, Major?"
Banes smile faltered at last. "Well of course, Colonel," he said.
"Excellent," Roy said, and straightened to go, satisfied in a job well done.
"But you might want to tell him that," Banes said to his back.
Roy turned slowly. "Beg pardon?"
"Well we had dinner together at the Green Lion on Saturday," Banes said. "And then, uh, brunch at Café Xing on Sunday."
"I'm aware," Roy said frostily.
"And dessert last night in the southern district. This charming little sidewalk café, you know, with outdoor tables right along the promenade. The point being," he concluded hastily, correctly reading the look on Roy's face, "that none of these, uh, excursions were my idea."
"I see," Roy said. His jaw was beginning to ache. Banes looked back at him, guileless and bizarrely, maddeningly cheerful. "Your shirt is buttoned wrong," Roy said at last, and left.
*
By Wednesday, Fullmetal had moved on to a dark-haired graduate student from Central University. He was studying classic literature and he had a cat, which was about as much as Roy could gather by the time Edward abandoned ship and took up with a technician over at the government alchemical research labs. After that it was back to the military for a Captain over in Internal Security, and then, an unexpected departure, a pretty young florist shop girl with big blue eyes and a sweet smile. Edward seemed to toy briefly with the whole idea of women; he worked rapidly through the blonde florist, went on to a redheaded student, and then tried his hand at a brunette nurse. Roy had the impression of someone ticking options off a list, for the sake of thoroughness in data collection. Then it was back to men, and the Ivory Alchemist walked around for three days with the dopey exhaustion of a man getting thoroughly laid at every opportunity.
"About time," Hughes said succinctly, lifting his glass in a toast to Edward's bright head bent in serious conversation with his newest escort – a starving artist type, apparently.
"I suppose," Roy said. "But don't you think it's a bit . . ."
"Yes?"
"Unseemly," Roy said firmly.
Hughes blinked. "Granted no one seems to have explained discretion to him, but a reputation like his affords many eccentricities, you know. The people's alchemist is permitted a certain leeway."
"The people's alchemist is a trollop," Roy retorted.
This made Hughes laugh until his glasses fogged up, one finger waggling at Roy in impotent hilarity. And even after he'd stopped he wouldn't explain why. He only grinned at Roy the way he did when he knew something very extra special top secret, and sniggered behind his hand.
He was right though, Roy thought morosely an hour later. Hughes had gone home to his family, leaving Roy alone at the table, and somehow Fullmetal had managed to make himself scarce without Roy noticing. With his new paramour, naturally. But it was true, as far as it went – it didn't seem to particularly matter what Edward did or who he did it with or how publicly he did it. Roy had heard only a few ugly whispers, and he'd been listening. The general feeling seemed to be bemused tolerance, seasoned with a healthy dose of envy and pity for those Edward chose so briefly to favor. He was the Fullmetal Alchemist, after all, possessed of both enormous power and strange, startling beauty. Always a beguiling combination, and doubly so now that the second attribute seemed to have come to Ed's attention.
It was bizarre. It was maddening. It was – it was all going to end in tears, Roy just knew it.
*
"Your suit, Sir," Hawkeye said, stepping around the door to hang a garment bag behind it. "For the banquet tonight," she added pointedly.
Roy paused, caught in the act of shrugging into his everyday jacket. "I'll dress at home, thank you, Lieutenant," he said smoothly. "Please call a car -- no need to inconvenience you this evening." He studiously collected a stack of reports from his desk and started to sweep out. It would have worked better if Hawkeye had gotten out of the way.
"No, Sir," she said, as Roy was forced to pull up short in front of her.
"Excuse me, Lieutenant??" He tried a forbidding frown on the off chance it might actually work this time.
"You're going to the Fuhrer's banquet tonight," Hawkeye said.
"I believe we just covered this," Roy said with annoyance.
"No Sir. I just covered this -- you are on your way out to follow Edward Elric around on his date tonight."
"Fullmetal has a date?" Roy asked.
"Yes," Hawkeye said flatly. "You don't like him, as it happens. And while your intentions are --" she sucked in a breath "-- laudable, I'm sure, you are neglecting your other duties."
Roy's hands curled reflexively, a hot, unexpected rage pulsing behind his eyes. He wouldn't allow -- this was utterly ridiculous -- she had no business --
"Thank you for your input, Lieutenant," he said through a fixed smile. "Insightful, as always -- and quite correct. Excuse me a moment." He stepped around her and stuck his head out the door for a quick survey. "Fallman," he snapped. "Havoc."
They appeared with pleasing alacrity.
"Have I got a job for you," Roy said, grinning at them. Hawkeye looked momentarily as if she'd like to bang her head repeatedly into the wall. Or possibly Roy's head.
"A job, Sir?" Havoc asked uncertainly.
"A very important job," Roy said. "And I trust you will have an easier time keeping track of someone else's love life than you do your own . . ."
*
The sense of vindication he felt a week later when Fallman came into his office, grim-faced, and closed the door behind him was short-lived.
"A report, Sir," Fallman said.
Roy listened to the story in silence, hands locked together on his desk. Fallman recited the facts in characteristically clipped, precise sentences, and when he was done he stopped and waited.
"Where is Fullmetal right now?" Roy asked.
"In the dormitory."
"And General Veres?"
"His office. Packing."
Roy nodded. "And his wife?"
"On a train to the South," Fallman said. "To her sister's, I believe."
Roy nodded again, patted the jacket pocket where his new gloves lay, and stood. "Thank you, Lieutenant," he said calmly. "Dismissed."
"Sir," Fallman said, saluted smartly, and about-faced. He didn't so much as blink when Roy strode past him before he'd even made it back to his desk.
Roy hesitated briefly in the hall, weighing, and then turned decisively left, deeper into the building. He kept his stride measured, his chin up, ears open. Fallman had been quick -- the gossip mills seemed to be rehashing last week's tepid leftovers, unaware of the juicy grist to come. Roy gave it half an hour, at most. He spared a thought to hope Edward would have the sense not to show his face before Roy could get to him, but under the circumstances expecting Ed to be sensible was probably asking a lot.
Of course it would happen this way -- was there ever any doubt? Edward had stumbled upon a new gift, and he'd gripped the heady power so hard, so fast, because he was Edward and he could and he never seemed to know where a limit was until he'd broken himself bloody on it.
General Veres's door was closed. Roy knocked sharply, didn't wait for acknowledgement before walking in.
"Ah," the General said, glancing briefly up from where he crouched over a half-filled box. "I thought you might put in an appearance."
"I heard you were leaving us," Roy said, coming to a halt in front of the messily stacked desk and clasping his hands behind his back.
"Transferring," Veres said shortly. "Abruptly. Voluntarily, so to speak. As you well know."
"A wise decision," Roy murmured.
"I guess," Veres said, sitting back on his heels and looking as if that aspect hadn't actually occurred to him. "I've been more focused on the necessity."
"Oh?"
He shrugged one deprecating shoulder. "My wife packed up her things and told me never to darken her door again," he said. "I've known Eliza for twelve years -- she meant it when she said she'd break a candlestick over my head before ever speaking to me again. I can't stay in the house where she was -- I can't stay in this city where he is . . ." His face shivered for the first time out of blankness and into misery. Roy watched, feeling like a gawker at a bad car accident. "Anyway," Veres said, dropping his eyes to the contents of his box again. "You might as well say what you came to say. Though I've got to tell you, Mustang, I think you have it backwards, running around after Edward's lovers like this. Warn us not to hurt him, ha -- like warning a mouse off a snake."
A flush of righteous anger lit in Roy's chest. Here, at last, this was something he could do. "You dare blame Fullmetal for your disgrace?" he asked, moderating his voice with an automatic effort. "May I remind you, Sir, that the Fullmetal Alchemist is seventeen years old, and a junior officer. He may legally be an adult in these matters -- he may live as an adult in almost every way -- but it cannot be forgotten that--"
"Oh fuck off, that's rich coming from you," Veres said with sudden anger. "I wasn't blaming him, you flaming hypocrite. Might as well shout at a pile of gold for making you want it. That's the hell of it, you know," he added, lapsing back into moroseness. "It doesn't matter what you say to me now -- it wouldn't have mattered if you'd warned me off a week ago." He looked up at Roy, bleakly. "I would have done it anyway," he said. "I'd do it again right now, even knowing . . . That was the best six days of my life. He's . . ." He trailed off, shook his head. "I could really just hate him for this," he said. "Only, no, I really can't."
Roy shifted, suddenly awkward. This wasn't what he'd thought; he'd expected to find himself in the bitter wreckage of a marriage destroyed for the sake of passing lust. But Veres wasn't a thoughtless letch -- he was in love. Of all the ridiculous . . . Had it been like this for all of them? With the exception of Major Banes, Roy had steered clear of Fullmetal's conquests until now; had Ed done this to all of them? Drawn them in with that vast, strange magnetism, then left them stranded and aching when he was through? Would they all still thank him for the privilege?
Roy cleared his throat. "What do you mean, me of all people?" he asked.
Veres blinked up at him for a long moment, then laughed. It was like being laughed at by Hughes, only infinitely less fun. "Oh, that's fantastic," Veres said, grinning mirthlessly. "Tell you what, Mustang, you let me know when you figure it out. And God help you when you do, because nothing else will." He chortled and turned back to his boxes. "If that's everything, I have a lot of packing to do. So unless you want to help . . ."
"I'll leave you to it," Roy said to his back. He felt off-balance and, consequently, angry. But that was all the more reason to turn around and walk out without another word.
He turned his steps towards the barracks. No sense putting off the even more unpleasant interview, and who knew what Fullmetal might take it into his head to do in the meantime.
It was nothing short of inexcusable distraction, Roy realized a few minutes later, that he'd failed to take account of the obvious problem.
"Good morning, Colonel," Al said, managing somehow to loom politely down at him. "Lovely day, isn't it?"
"It is," Roy agreed equably, wondering if Al could feel the warmth of the sun. Probably not. "I'd like to see Major Elric, please."
Al coughed diffidently, not moving. "Well, see, the thing is, I'm not actually military, so . . ." he said apologetically.
"Ah," Roy said. "I see." He eyed the enormous suit of armor standing sentry outside Ed's door and came to the rapid conclusion that nothing up to and including fire alchemy would budge him. Damn, damn, and damn. "I just want to know how he is," he said, trying for appropriate concern.
Al peeked warily over his shoulder at the closed door. "Brother is . . . upset," he said.
Roy's imagination began instantly producing scenarios. No telling what this new -- more mature? -- Fullmetal might do in times of crisis. Roy rapidly contemplated an epic drinking binge, an alchemical rampage, a good old comfort orgy. Or, he thought suddenly, packing. Ed couldn't possibly intend to follow the good General, could he? A shock of alarm jolted down Roy's spine.
"Alphonse, please tell me what he's doing," he said evenly.
"He's reading, mostly," Al said.
"Reading," Roy repeated on a slow exhale.
"That's right," Al agreed. "And eating a lot of cheese . . ."
"Cheese?"
"And drawing arrays. I keep telling him not to eat when he's covered in chalk, but . . ."
"I see," Roy said, untruthfully.
"Which means he'll be all right," Al said, in the tones of someone drawing a logical conclusion from available data. "Though he still won't tell me what exactly happened," he added with sudden sulkiness.
"Er --" Roy floundered, finding himself in very murky waters. Was there actually a way to put this delicately? "What do you think of your brother's recent activities, Alphonse?"
"Oh, I'm very glad," Al said firmly. He checked over his shoulder again, but the door remained safely closed. "Brother thinks he isn't allowed to do anything I can't do," Al said more quietly. "I told him that was stupid, because it's not like he can stop eating. Or breathing. So I told him he'd just have to have fun for both of us," he finished practically. "I'll get a chance too, someday."
Roy wondered what it was like to come into an awareness of human sexuality without the thundering static of biology clamoring at you. Apparently, this was what happened. It was simultaneously creepy and rather sweet.
And Ed certainly did seem to be dating for two. . . . which also explained his eating habits, come to think of it.
"Only now he's upset," Al said mournfully. "Colonel, I don't suppose you could tell me --"
"Ah, I think that should be up to your brother," Roy said, taking a hasty half-step back. "But please tell him that he's expected back at the National Laboratories to continue his research assignment on Monday. Best not hide out, all things considered."
"Sure, Colonel," Al said, nodding gravely.
"And tell him --" Roy hesitated, a bit at a loss. And it wasn't as if Ed needed any advice from him right now. Ed knew how to mine wisdom from disaster; it was what he did best. "Tell him to keep his head up," Roy said, and escaped.
*
Roy was swept up in train with one of the Fuhrer's surprise inspection tours, and so it wasn't until he returned to Central the following Thursday that he discovered Fullmetal had actually done as told.
"Been a bit hair-raising, let me tell you," Hughes said, fiddling compulsively with Roy's longest paperclip chain. "It's all right, really, but that's only because Liza Veres left town. At the moment it's a titillating, but officially ignorable rumor."
"Good," Roy said crisply. He liberated the paperclips from Hughes and spun them glittering around his fingers. "So you've seen him?" he asked casually.
"Not much. I invited the two of them for dinner, but he said he had to work late. But the lab's the best place for him right now -- you know that lot."
Roy nodded distractedly. Alchemical scientists wouldn't give a damn who Edward was sleeping with, as long as the arrays kept coming. "But you spoke to him?"
"Sure," Hughes said, then blinked confusedly at Roy's scowl. "He seemed like Ed," he said with a shrug. "I asked him if he wanted to talk about anything and he said no and made me eat some cheese."
"Cheese?"
"You're allowed to talk to him yourself, you know," Hughes said.
"I've been out of the city," Roy said, and wondered why he was feeling suddenly so defensive.
*
Fullmetal continued to go about his business with decorum. Or, well, without any inappropriate sexual liaisons, anyway. Roy brooded watchfully, putting off his restless subordinates with uncommunicative grunts. Edward was simply regrouping. He wasn't put off romance any more than a failed attempt at human transmutation had put him off alchemy.
No, he would pick up roughly where he'd left off, Roy was sure. He would likely go carefully at first, be wary and cautious. The only question was whether he'd acquired the sort of judgment that meant he could be left to his own devices. Roy doubted it, and he began to wonder for the first time if he wouldn't need to find a more permanent solution; covert surveillance and necessary interference wouldn't protect Ed forever.
And then the circus came to Central.
"Come on, you know you wanna," Hughes wheedled, dangling the tickets in front of Roy's nose.
Roy squinted at them, cross-eyed. "I can honestly say that I really don't," he said.
"They have an elephant," Hughes sing-songed. "Don't you want to see my little girl's face?"
"I'm sure I will anyway," Roy said dryly.
"Ed's going," Hughes said, delivering the non sequitur in the same coaxing tones.
"All the more reason to absent myself," Roy said. "I've had my fill of Fullmetal's peculiar brand of histrionics for a lifetime, thank you. Give my apologies to your wife and daughter."
Hughes retracted the tickets with a huff. "You're getting grumpier by the day, you know," he said with genuine irritation. "I'd ask what was wrong, but there's no point belaboring the obvious."
Roy blinked after him, puzzled. What obvious?
He spent the evening alone at the office, working steadily in a way he could only manage when there was no one else around. Fullmetal, presumptuous as always, was eating up far more of his staff's energies than Roy had quite realized.
He forewent a driver and took the long walk home at a stroll as the moon rose full over Central's rain-dewed streets. They were just teetering on the brink of summer, and it promised to be a blazing one. Fullmetal's automail would become dangerously hot to the touch through the worst of it -- Roy had the scorch marks on his office sofa cushions to prove it.
He slept better that night than he had in several months, and he was smiling when he came back into the office the next morning. It lasted only through his first cup of coffee and perusal of the newspaper, then died a precipitous death when he lifted the top report from his desk.
Havoc came when bellowed for and stood at sloppy attention, fingers of one hand hooked through his belt.
"Yep," he said succinctly. "Twins. Acrobats, wouldn't you just know it."
Roy massaged the bridge of his nose. "You're telling me that Fullmetal took both -- no, wait, never mind." He pushed the report away on a sigh.
"Won't be a problem, though," Havoc said. "They all seemed quite friendly, and no wedding rings. I checked," he added conscientiously. "And the Boss did too. Well, actually, he seemed to already know them." He took in Roy's expression. "And the circus is only here for three nights, anyway," he added brightly, then paused. "Only thing, though -- I think the Boss is on to me, Colonel."
Roy's lips twisted. "I imagine he is, yes," he said dryly.
"I was subtle, really I was," Havoc said, straightening under some sensed insult. "I was careful. I was sneaky. I was stealthy."
"To the very best of your abilities, I'm sure," Roy said soothingly. "No worries, Lieutenant, this won't be a problem."
"If you say so, Sir," Havoc said dubiously. "Only, ask me, the Boss knows who I answer to -- it's only a matter of time before he comes howling in here for your head."
"Precisely," said Roy, smiling. "Thank you, Lieutenant. Dismissed."
Havoc stumped out, visibly puzzled, and Roy sat back with a sigh. This was why he was in charge and he had men like Havoc running around to do his bidding. And, he reflected with some satisfaction, men like Fullmetal to react with predictable pyrotechnics when prodded correctly. Edward would come storming in here, right enough, in full outraged sail. At which point Roy could offer some cogent, pithy observations on his recent behavior, introduce him to a dose of reality, and send him on his way. There was nothing quite like manipulating your opponent into losing his cool to give you the upper hand.
*
The circus departed on schedule, taking its elephant and famous twin acrobats with it. Roy waited with baited breath, but Fullmetal did not appear the following morning. Or the morning after that. And the morning after that, neither did Havoc.
"This is beyond the pale, even for him," Hawkeye said, frowning severely at the clock.
"I'm aware," Roy said stiffly. It was quarter after eleven. Even at his hung-over worst, Havoc had always managed to drag himself in by 10:30.
"He was doing some surveillance for you last night, yes?" Hawkeye asked with palpable disapproval.
"Call his apartment again," Roy said. "We'll give him another hour, and then alert the constabulary."
Havoc arrived forty-eight minutes later with a thump and a curse. Roy had bolted to his office door at the first hint of a disturbance, so he got a clear, unmistakable look. Havoc stumbled in with hair rumpled and eyes half-shut. He looked like he hadn't gotten a wink of sleep. His jacket was unbuttoned, his collar askew, and on his throat was one of the most impressive love bites Roy had ever seen.
Havoc made it to his desk chair with single-minded determination and landed in it with a thump. Only then did he seem to become aware of the silence in the office. He looked up, blinked around at them, then turned pleading eyes to Hawkeye. "Okay," he said plaintively, "now I need a cigarette."
And in the depths of Roy's psyche, some tensile thread of sanity gave way with a series of alarming pings, like the over-taxed cable of a bridge.
"You --" he said hoarsely.
Havoc slewed back around to look at him -- to check for gloves, Roy dimly realized. "Er, Colonel . . ." he began.
"You --" Roy took a halting step, then jerked to a stop. Havoc scooted back in his chair, going boggle-eyed.
"Me?" he squeaked.
Roy sucked in a huge breath. "This --" he said, "this is the very end. This -- I'll --" and he broke for the door, dodging neatly around Hawkeye and making it ten feet down the corridor before her protest reached him.
Roy ignored it, took the first right, and left the door guards in a tizzy as he blazed out. He had only three blocks to cover, and he went in a daze, ducking in and out of traffic where necessary. He had the presence of mind to flash identification at the desk Sergeant before taking off into the labs. He hadn't been here in months, but he knew exactly where he was going.
Fullmetal had his own lab, for reasons too numerous and obvious to name. Roy slammed the door behind him and had the satisfaction of seeing Edward jump, bright head popping up as he twisted around on his lab stool.
"Oh," he said with the predictable scowl. "Typical -- just as soon as I'm getting somewhere you come to send me to the middle of nowhere again. What, did Hawkeye demote you to message boy?"
Roy stalked over and slammed his hands down on the lab table, one on either side of Ed. "I have been patient," he said. "I have been indulgent beyond all imagining with you."
Ed's eyebrows flew up. "Since when?"
"Don't talk," Roy snapped. Ed's eyebrows rose even higher but, shockingly, he stayed quiet. Which wayward obedience provoked Roy right past the point of coherent speech. "You!" He snarled.
"Me?" Edward asked, nowhere near a squeak.
"What do you think you were doing with Lieutenant Havoc?" Roy shouted.
Ed rolled his eyes, not missing a beat. "I gave him back," he said snottily. "Not a -- only a few marks on him. I promise he won't be late next time, if that's what's crawled up your nose."
"Next --" the lab table creaked alarmingly under Roy's hands. "Insolent, ill-mannered, unbearable brat --"
"Jealous?" Ed asked lightly. And beneath the flick of that new, adult power so casually used, Roy flamed. He saw the shock mirrored in Ed's eyes, couldn't breathe for an endless sprint of seconds as the heat ignited in his face and some fundamental notions of self did an emergency reshuffle. Oh . . . shit.
Ed's head dropped to one side, lips parting. "Huh," he said. Then, after a long moment in which Roy scrabbled for an appropriate thing to say from a plethora of deeply inappropriate options, he smiled. "Well, why the hell not?" he said whimsically, and climbed Roy like a tree.
Roy yelped. It was protest, really it was, though Ed's smirk said he thought otherwise as he slung his weight up and wrapped his legs around Roy's waist. Roy caught him automatically, two sweet, dizzying handfuls of forbidden territory.
"Major –" he began forbiddingly.
"Ha," Edward said, grinding up against him with a dirty little shimmy. "You're gonna have to have a much bigger dick than I think you do if you want me to call you sir."
And that was just fucking it. Ed's eyes popped gratifyingly wide when his back hit the lab table. But he snatched and rolled, quick as a cat, and Roy crashed down on the messy stacks of notes. They grappled across the lab bench. Ed was slick like an eel, Roy had never really had the need to develop his hand-to-hand skills, and it wasn't until he seized Ed's trailing braid and yanked his head back that he felt something like control returning.
Well, at least until Ed grinned up at him, all teeth, and said, "Shoulda guessed you'd like it like this. Does the military only promote kinky bastards, or is it part of the officer training?"
"My kinks – theoretical kinks – are neither here nor –" Roy began.
"Blah blah blah," Ed cut in. "Can we skip the part where you pretend you don't want to fuck me and get to the part where you take your clothes off?"
"We will do no such thing -- I will do no such thing –"
"Clothes on works, too," Ed said, and grabbed Roy by the balls. There was another tussle, necessarily abbreviated on Roy's part – Ed had a grip like a piranha.
Then the fight changed to something else. Or maybe it didn't change it all, and it was just that Roy had finally caught up. All he knew was that they were kissing, and Ed was wriggling under him, thighs parting for Roy to press up hard between them. And they were going for it just like that, rolling and shoving and grinding at each other. Roy bit Ed's lip and Ed made a low, needy noise that Roy knew, he just knew Ed would make in bed. In bed proper, with all his clothes off and plenty of time for someone to do him right, like he so clearly needed. For Roy to do him like he desperately wanted to.
He grabbed Ed by the thigh, spread him wider and pressed him flat to the table, then pushed up tight between his legs and ground them together.
"Like that?" he demanded roughly. "This what you wanted?"
Ed grinned up at him, flushed and enragingly smug. "It'll do," he said, and dug fingertip bruises into Roy's back right through his uniform.
"I could stop," Roy said, and pulled Ed's hair again until his head was at the angle he wanted.
"No," Ed said, when Roy released his mouth a long moment later. "No, you really can't."
"Brat," Roy breathed, and ground their cocks together until Ed came, shaking and crying out into Roy's mouth. And Roy just kept rutting against him, listening to the tiny wounded sounds Ed was making. He looked into Ed's eyes and thought about fucking him until he came, and then just carrying on until he was good and ready to be done. Ed grinned like he'd heard that loud and clear, and Roy came, wracked, eyes wide and staring into Ed's.
They lay together for a long minute while Ed made contented cat noises and Roy tried to collect his breath and his common sense. He was just about to start in with the damage control when Ed gave him a shove with the metal hand and rolled out from under him.
"Thanks, bastard," he said casually, dropping off the lab bench to his feet with thoughtless grace. "I needed that. Now get off my notes, will you? I'm on a deadline here."
Roy sat up, frankly disbelieving. He had just been dismissed like a hired doxy. Edward Elric had just tossed him on the discard pile, trial period expired, in the company of who only knew how many others.
Roy had, at certain junctures in his life, experienced a sort of temporary state of possessed madness that would cause him to do things like, just as an example, charge unarmed into an oncoming hoard of enraged Ishbalan guerillas. Until now, all these occasions had been on the battlefield.
"I hope your deadline isn't too pressing," he said silkily. "As I'll be taking you to dinner tonight at eight o'clock." He rose, did his best to straighten his uniform. No hope for it, the trousers were a loss. He glanced back up, braced for a fight.
But Ed simply waved a hand over his shoulder. "Sure, dinner, whatever," he said, and reached for his pen.
"Eight o'clock," Roy repeated grimly.
"You still here?" Ed asked his notes.
Roy inhaled carefully through his nose, considered his current strategic position, and decided a retreat and refortification was in order.
He closed Ed's lab door very gently behind him, wondering just how much noise they'd been making. Then he strode off up the hall, trying very hard to think the thoughts of a man who hadn't just messed his uniform like a teenager.
He hesitated on the street, then hailed a taxi and provided his home address. And while he sat in the back through the busy late morning traffic, and while he dashed in for a quick shower and a change into identical clean trousers, and while he hurried back to work and negotiated Hawkeye's interrogation about his whereabouts, Roy seethed. He also planned.
He sat at his desk, folders dutifully open and pen in hand, and heard nothing but Ed's voice. Thanks, Bastard, like Roy had just offered him coffee. Roy was dimly aware that he had taken blatant mockery – he had taken blatant mockery from Ed -- better than this. Better than being judged in a matter of seconds and found just another of Ed's men. Entertaining for a while, but quickly disposable. And then as quickly replaceable. And that was unacceptable.
It was not about ego, though that did smart. No, this was a matter of no less importance than the very foundation of military hierarchy. Roy was not, and he could never be, just another man to Ed. He clung to his authority over the brat by his fingertips some days as it was; letting Ed treat him like another casual fling would obliterate whatever there actually was of command respect. And for reasons too numerous to name, that could not be allowed to happen.
Which made his course clear. He was going to date Edward Elric. Show him once and for all that Colonel Mustang was not to be taken lightly – that Colonel Mustang was not to be taken at bloody all. True, he could put a stop to the whole thing now, but sometimes it was important to beat someone at their own game. And this was clearly one of those times. He was going to beat Ed at this game, no doubt about it. Ed might be catching up by leaps and bounds, but Roy still had years of experience on him. He knew how to seduce someone, how to reel them in so fast and so close they couldn't remember how to breathe. And he also knew a lot about dropping someone like a hot brick, and it was far past time Ed was taught such a lesson.
So he made reservations, the kind that specified a quiet corner table. And he went home to change again after work, opting for dark civilian trousers and a blue shirt. And, on a mad whim, he bought flowers from a corner stall.
They hadn't discussed any of the niceties of who was picking up whom where, but Roy's first guess was dead accurate. Ed, the twisted little workaholic, was still at the labs, though the rest of the building was largely deserted.
"Good evening," Roy said in his plummiest tones, knocking lightly on the doorjamb.
"You again?" Ed said, looking around squintily.
"I've come to take you on our date," Roy said patiently. Ed looked completely blank. "The date," Roy repeated. "That you agreed to this afternoon. You do recall – dinner?"
"Oh, food!" Ed said, sliding promptly off his stool. "Why didn't you just say so."
"These are for you," Roy said, extending the flowers.
Ed stopped in the act of shrugging on his coat. "What for?" he asked, then tentatively accepted them.
"Uh," Roy said, finding that he didn't actually have an answer to that. "For, ah, our date. As a mark of my . . ." he dangled at the end of the sentence, alarmed.
"Your . . .?" Ed asked, bright eyed and interested.
"Affection," Roy said through his teeth.
"Funny way to do it, with the sawed off reproductive organs of helpless plants," Ed said. "But, you know, thanks."
He turned away, sought about for a minute, then deposited the flowers in a handy beaker marked HAZARDOUS! HANDLE WITH CARE. "Right," he said, tugging his braid out of his collar. "Food?"
"I thought we'd walk," Roy said, stepping back to let him pass. "It's just a block from here."
Ed was uncharacteristically quiet as they walked; Roy found it completely unnecessary to shorten his stride for him.
"In here," he said, touching Ed's elbow – the flesh one – and guiding him through a narrow alley and then out into a lamp lit courtyard, secreted inside a block of tall buildings. The maitre d' seated them quickly, and Roy suddenly found himself staring across an expanse of snowy tablecloth at Edward Elric. In candlelight, with a string quartet playing quietly. And for the first time in their entire acquaintance, Roy found himself without anything to say to Ed. Usually that wasn't his problem – quite the opposite, in fact.
"Ah," Roy said, clearing his throat. "So tell me what exactly you've been working on at the labs?"
Ed lowered the menu he had just pounced on. "I knew it!" he said. "What's the point of me writing out reports if you don't fucking read them?"
"Your last progress report was a limerick," Roy said tartly. "Not terribly informative."
Ed rattled the menu hostilely. "Like to see you find a rhyme for isotope," he said.
"My apologies," Roy said gravely. "It was an exquisite composition. The scansion was inspired."
Ed hmph'ed and returned to the menu, over which he was gloating quite a lot. Roy left him to it, applying himself to the wine list
"Red or white?" he asked.
"Neither," Ed said. "I don't drink."
"Oh?" Roy asked, secretly relieved as it had occurred to him only belatedly that he was about to purchase alcohol for a seventeen-year-old. The hypocrisy of that – of all of this – churned briefly in his gut.
Ed snorted. "Why anyone'd want to purposely zap their reflexes and alchemical accuracy and then wander helplessly around the city, I don't know," he said.
"Fair point," Roy said, setting the wine list aside and thinking that yes, all right, it was possible to see him as something more than a boy.
"It's about reattaching things," Ed said after a brief pause, still speaking to the menu.
"I beg your pardon?"
Ed shot him a quick, annoyed glance. "My research. It's about the mind-body connection. I think if this goes how I want, it could be useful for coma patients, maybe some people with certain mental disorders."
And severed souls. "Tell me about it?" Roy asked.
So Ed did, which got them through most of dinner, even though Ed also seemed to be eating for three. Beneath all the jibes, they both knew that Ed was twice the alchemist Roy was – Roy had admitted, very privately some time ago, that Ed was twice the alchemist that anyone was. And so once Roy could let himself stop poking at that fact like a child with a snake and a long stick, it actually went quite well, with a minimum of eye rolling and personal slander. Even up to the point where Ed stole a strip of steak off Roy's plate to use in a weird pictorial demonstration on the tablecloth. Roy had trouble grasping the metaphor, and he suspected Ed had mostly done it to be annoying. If so, it was strangely unsuccessful.
They lingered over coffee, the liquid variety for Roy and both liquid and ice cream for Ed. Roy stomped down the urge to inquire about Ed's notorious caffeine consumption. He'd heard Al fussing at Ed about it – 'it's a wonder you sleep at all, brother' – but Roy suspected it was one of those things Ed greeted with grumbling tolerance from his brother, while the rest of the world would get violent dismemberment for their trouble.
"And your brother is enjoying your laboratory time?" Roy asked, as Ed wound down an admittedly hilarious story of the first and only budget meeting the lab supervisor had made him attend.
"Oh sure," Ed said casually. "Though mostly he's running errands these days."
"Ah yes," Roy said dryly. "I remember now. Running about the city, spending far beyond your research allowance on first editions." He could have bitten his tongue the moment he said it – was this a date or a debriefing?
But Ed only snorted at him. "The first edition has the original notes," he said. "How else'm I supposed to find them?"
"Of course," Roy said. "It's not at all that you're assembling a personal alchemical library at the military's expense."
Ed grinned, unrepentant. "That too," he said cheerfully. "You gonna tell my commanding officer on me?"
"Worse," Roy said. "I'm going to tell Hawkeye."
Ed shifted. Shiftily.
"Ah yes, I think the check, please," Roy said, grinning as he raised a hand to the waiter.
"I can—" Ed began, as the bill was rapidly presented.
"No," Roy said, touching the thin skin over his bony wrist, where his sleeve had ridden up. "My treat."
"Oh right," Ed said, sitting back. "The dominant male asserts his financial control over the courtship ritual as a prelude to sexual overtures. What?" He scowled at Roy's choking incredulity. "I dated this girl, from the university, she's trying to get a whole new department started on this stuff."
Ah yes, the tall redhead, one of Ed's few feminine aberrations over the past month. She'd lasted pretty long, too, a respectable four and a half days.
"Sexual overtures?" Roy asked silkily.
Ed shrugged, elaborately casual. "Well, we've established you do have a vague idea what you're doing," he said.
Roy laid down the proper amount of money – goodness, Ed could eat -- and pushed the bill to the edge of the table. "What I'm doing?" he said. "What I'm doing, Edward, is taking you to dinner. And then what I'm doing is asking your permission to walk you home. And then what I'm doing is stopping you under the willow tree just around the north side of the barracks, in between the street lights, you know the one? Ha, yes, of course you do. And then what I'm doing is brushing your hair out of your eyes, and maybe putting my hand on your waist. And then what I'm doing, if you'll let me, is kissing you good night." He smiled into Ed's widened eyes. "Slowly. Thoroughly."
Ed took a breath, straightening up. "Not bad," he said, grinning judiciously. "Nice talking, anyway. You gonna actually manage to put your mouth where your mouth is?"
"I don't know," Roy said. "May I walk you home?"
It wasn't until Roy was strolling home through Central's darkened streets an hour later that he remembered that a tease cut both ways. Ed had let himself be kissed, all right, and several other things besides, but there was only so much the studiously oblivious sentry rounds could ignore. At the time Roy had silently gloated over Ed's swollen mouth, the sounds of needy disappointment he'd made when Roy had pulled back, untangled Ed's legs from around his waist, set him back on his feet. Now he couldn't help wondering if he was going to manage to sleep a wink tonight.
*
The thing about a tease, though, was that it worked. Particularly if you were Roy Mustang. It worked even when you'd already had someone, quick and dirty over their lab table. Ed wanted more, Roy knew it like he always knew these things, by the way Ed's pupils dilated as he stared at Roy's mouth the next afternoon. Day one, rousing success. Quite literally.
"I was hoping to take you to lunch," Roy said from the door of Ed's lab, momentarily put off by the sight of Al across the table.
Ed actually looked tempted, then he wrenched his eyes away. "Can't," he said shortly. "Some of us actually work during the day."
"And some of us have unavoidable evening obligations," Roy said. "At the Fuhrer's cocktail party, for example. So some of us thought it might be nice to have a late lunch."
"Huh," said Ed. He didn't turn around, but looked to Al. Roy did too, wondering just how far Al's cheerful tolerance would stretch. He'd seemed judiciously accepting of Ed's previous dalliances, but would that extend to Colonel Roy Mustang, dog of the military?
"I'll keep an eye on the experiment," Al said imperturbably. "Go on, brother, you'd have to stop to eat eventually anyway."
"Well . . ." Ed said, and slid off his stool. "Don't forget to keep the alchemeter ready."
"I've got it," Al said, and Roy stepped forward to take Ed's arm and begin towing him out backwards.
"And record the temperature changes for me!" Ed called as Roy closed the door.
Roy took him for sandwiches three blocks north, and eventually Ed even stopped gazing anxiously toward the roof of the labs, like a fussy mother bird. Roy applied himself to being just irritating enough to hold Ed's attention. He asked a series of increasingly dumb questions and let Ed gape in astonished affront and tell him at great eloquence and volume what an idiot he was. At least until Ed caught on and halted, mid-tirade.
"Stop smiling," he said, biting viciously into his sandwich.
"But I'm enjoying myself," Roy protested. Like all the best lies, it was absolutely true.
"And don't patronize me," Ed said, genuinely annoyed.
"Oh." Roy set his sandwich down. "My apologies."
Ed eyed him narrowly over the rim of his glass. "We always talk about alchemy," he said, and it was the most neutral delivery Roy had ever heard from him, which left him with no cues.
"Well, it's what you do," he said cautiously.
"You don't," Ed said tartly. "You do paperwork. Or pretend to, anyway."
"That's a much less scintillating topic of conversation, I assure you," Roy said. "But I'll have you know that what I do is coordinate military operations."
"Politics," Ed said, disgusted. "With guns."
"Well," Roy said, unable to actually contradict him. "Right now I'm trying to parcel out five available open commands for small posts in the east to a pool of eleven eligible men."
"You could try doing it by merit," Ed said blithely. He was spectacularly politically tone deaf, and Roy was almost, almost sure that it was genuine. Upon reflection over the past year, he'd come to realize that Ed was either staggeringly naive and mouthy to the point of idiocy, or he had a reductionist but fundamentally liberal sociopolitical agenda and he was mouthy to the point of idiocy.
"I'll take it under advisement," Roy said. "Now, are you doing anything tomorrow night?"
"Dunno," Ed said, making the remainder of his sandwich disappear like magic. "Am I?" His cocked eyebrow said impress me.
"I was thinking I could cook you dinner," Roy said, and bam, he had him.
"You cook?" Ed asked, visibly awed.
"I've picked up a few tricks here and there," Roy said, bemused to finally discover something he did that Ed gave the faintest damn about.
"This I gotta eat. Er, see." Ed grinned toothily. "Your place?"
"Seven o'clock." Roy stood when Ed did, and there was an awkward second at parting when they hovered a foot apart, looking a bit narrowly at each other. Roy let his eyes drop to Ed's mouth; Ed retaliated by licking his lips, then sucking one distractedly between his teeth. They stepped back simultaneously.
"See you then, bastard," Ed said, and bounced off up the sidewalk, braid swinging.
*
He was ten minutes late. It was an improvement over his usual half hour tardiness, and Roy wondered if he might not get Ed to show up on time to debriefings if he served lunch.
Ed wasn't like any other date Roy had cooked for. He hopped up to sit on the counter next to the stove, for one thing, scuffing up Roy's cabinetry with absently tapping boots. And he was all wide-eyed attention as Roy chopped and sautéed and stirred, which was really quite exhilarating, all things considered.
"I would have thought you, of all people, would know how to cook," Roy said, grabbing the pepper grinder Ed was tossing from hand to hand.
"I can do that," Ed said, watching him take out the fish steaks. "Done it on sticks over a fire. S'great."
Roy shuddered. "But can you assemble a zesty herb rub?"
"Cooking's weird," Ed said, sailing past his culinary inadequacies. "It's not like alchemy at all." This, predictably, seemed to offend him.
"I suppose not," Roy said, and wondered if Ed had ever thought about the difference between mastering an art and a science. Alchemy was a tool to him, and food mere fuel. He was still vastly passionate about both, but Roy was sometimes frustrated by Ed's universal pragmatism. Surely even Ed could enjoy something just for the sake of enjoying it. Aside from promiscuous sexual liaisons, anyway.
"So I'm bringing food to alchemy," Ed said brightly. Roy lifted an eyebrow, popped his glove on, flipped the fish into the air, and snapped. The steaks landed in the pan, seared pink as the brief fireworks quenched in the bubbling sauce. "That's going to kill you one day, you know," Ed said unexpectedly.
Roy had been hoping for the usual response to that trick, which was a lot of ooing and ahing. That had been very silly of him. "What is?" he asked.
Ed reached over and tapped his glove. "Depending on that," he said casually. "One day you're not going to have it, and you'll just be a Mustang-shaped smear." The prospect didn't seem to bother him too much.
"Which is why I will always have it," Roy said crisply. "And I'll have you know I'm not completely helpless, anyway."
"Sure," said Ed, who by all accounts fought like a cornered feral cat, with added explosions.
"Worried about my safety?" Roy asked.
"Naw." Ed leaned back on his hands, rolled his head until his neck popped. "Only, it'd be a shame if you up and kicked it just when I was finding a use for you."
"Wait," Roy said. "Am I useful for cooking you dinner, or . . ."
"I'll let you know when I've gathered the required data," Ed said, and stole a sizzling onion right off the pan with his metal fingers.
They ate at the little table in the kitchen instead of the enormous teak monstrosity out in the dining room. Ed went quiet and appreciative as he plowed through two-and-a-half servings, and Roy weighed an assortment of smugly suggestive comments.
He shouldn't have bothered. Ed made the last morsel of crusty bread disappear, eyed his empty plate for a speculative moment, then turned his yellow eyes on Roy.
Roy looked back, caught. This was the moment where he would reach across the table, touch the back of his date's hand, let his eyes go soft and wanting. He'd lower his voice – everyone leaned in to hear, automatically, and they'd be up close over the table. And he'd say something suggestive, though not obscene, and he'd smile, and there would be a yes or there would be a no. Well. There would be a yes.
Roy hesitated. It wasn't that he was doing this under false pretences – that'd never bothered him before, after all. But this was Ed, who was young and not entirely sane, and who might actually have more baggage than Roy did. Going to bed with Ed would be like juggling hot coals for fun. Which, come to think of it, Roy had done on a dare once.
"Right," Ed said, and jumped to his feet. "If we waited on you, we'd be here until morning. Where's your bed?"
"Uh," Roy said, giddily. "Right this way."
Ed followed him upstairs, then ducked under his arm as Roy pushed open the bedroom door and reached for the lamp. He looked around, turning once in a tight circle. Roy waited, oddly nervous.
But Ed just shrugged, grinned, and started stripping. Roy stepped close, caught his hands at his belt. "Allow me," he said gallantly.
"Oh right," Ed said, rolling his eyes. "You think you're a sultan in the sack, or something." He flung out his arms. "Impress me, then."
Roy huffed, and kissed him. He undressed Ed slowly, taking his time over each button and buckle. Ed was all bones and muscle and surprisingly soft skin, except for his work-roughened flesh hand and the cool, smooth steel of the other. He let Roy undress him down to skin, and stood naked and unself-conscious on his toes for another kiss. Roy wanted to take the time to unplait his hair, to see how long it was, loose. But Ed was already plucking at his shirt buttons and sneaking curious fingers into his waistband, impatient wretch. Ed was smug and heavy-lidded, and the quiet was kind of unnerving.
So Roy bent quickly and caught him around the waist. He swung Ed right off his feet, kissed him breathless, and tossed him lightly onto the bed. Ed bounced once, then rolled up onto his knees in one easy motion.
"Ha," he said, "right, I forgot, you like a little manhandling, don't you?"
"I do n--you forgot?" Roy demanded, stung.
"I'm busy," Ed said. "Are you gonna keep your clothes on all night?"
Roy stripped rapidly, annoyed and turned on and a little confused over how things had come to this. Ed watched, unblinking, confident like an apex predator. Roy thrilled to the weight of that attention, focused entirely on him for perhaps the first time. And he knew, suddenly, that this was how Ed did it, this was how he entangled so many people without pretty words or subtle flirting or any manners at all, actually. It was just this, being the center of Ed's intense little universe for a few minutes. And of course it meant more to Roy than it had to any of Ed's other lovers, because only Roy could know all the terrible things he was displacing there.
This was the dumbest thing he had ever done.
Roy pounced, and Ed shrieked, letting himself be caught before he grappled, hands everywhere. They wrestled; much more satisfying on the wide expanse of Roy's bed than over that narrow, hard table. They pulled up short at the far edge, rolled back, kissed until Roy tasted a faint trace of blood.
"Where's--?" Ed demanded, breaking off.
"Here," Roy said, stretching for the bottle and shoving it at him. They were on exactly the same page, wordlessly, unwilling to wait a second longer and unashamed about it.
Ed pushed him flat, knelt on his thighs, and stared hungrily at Roy's cock while he fucked himself open on his metal fingers. Roy leaned sideways to watch, dry-mouthed. He wanted Ed to touch him with those fingers, to wrap them cool and hard around his dick. He wanted to leave a bite mark around one of Ed's hard little nipples. He wanted to slide his cock into that insolent fucking mouth and then see if Ed would let him come on his face. Ed would, Roy just knew it. But mostly, Roy wanted—
"Yeah," Ed said, spreading his legs over Roy's and slowly fucking himself down onto his cock with wicked little shimmies. "Yeah, just like that." He bit his lip and slid all the way down, hands splayed on Roy's stomach for balance.
"Of course you're a talker," Roy said breathlessly.
Ed's eyes popped open wide, then narrowed in on Roy. He inhaled the way he did right before shouting very loudly; it shifted his weight forward, and Roy gasped with him. The tirade died, unshouted, and a slow grin took its place. "I," Ed said deliberately. "Am going to make you stop smirking." And he started to fuck himself on Roy's cock, letting gravity do most of the work. Roy let him for a long, wonderful minute, then he found his moment and he pushed up hard, off-rhythm, making Ed yelp and catch his balance. And Roy was ready – he caught Ed round the waist and tried to roll him over.
Ed pinned him flat again so fast, Roy nearly had whiplash. Really, this was ridiculous, Ed weighed about as much as a sack of kittens. But he was fast and strong and all right, pretty experienced.
"Did I say you could do that?" Ed demanded, annoyed.
"Oh right," Roy said, a bit muffled with Ed's forearm across his face. "Very sorry. I'll be good."
Ed eased up, scowling. "Yeah, you will," he said. And he went back to riding Roy again, in long hard strokes. His flesh thigh flexed, and the metal moved in eerie silence, intricate motor forces invisible. And Roy got exactly what he wanted – Ed never looked away, eyes tracking over Roy's face again and again, intense and focused. Roy had only to think about trying something – pulling Ed down for a kiss and attempting to roll him again – and Ed would know and the vicious brat would stop moving and just glare at Roy until the idea went right out of his head again.
Ed took what he wanted until he was sweating, hands trembling faintly where he propped himself up, until Roy's cock was screaming and jagged stabs of pleasure were twisting low in his belly. But Ed seemed to know that, too, because he leaned close, threatening. "Don't you dare," he breathed. "Wait."
Roy shuddered straight through, tilted his head back, and babbled out a string of profanities. Ed kept riding him, rhythm becoming frantic. "Okay," he said at last. "Okay, come on, you can touch me now."
Roy snatched for Ed's cock. He twisted his palm roughly over the head, ran a tight stroke down and up and back down. Ed jolted at every touch and came over Roy's fist and stomach, gratifyingly noisy.
Roy surged up, flipped them over, spread Ed's uncoordinated legs and pushed back into him. He was thumping the headboard into the wall, he realized dimly. The long denial was hard to unravel, no matter how his balls ached, and Roy fucked Ed longer than he thought he could, longer than his lungs and his burning thighs could take, with Ed clawing at his back and growling at him, until at last he was there and it was perfect.
After, Roy lay face down in the pillows, partly to hide the goofy grin he couldn't seem to control, and partly because that's just where he'd fallen over. Ed was a contented warmth against his side, making satiated little murmurs.
Until, at least, he bolted straight up and smacked Roy solidly across the back of the head. "Paper, you've got paper?" he demanded.
"Uh," Roy said sluggishly. "Why—"
"I got it," Ed said, and flung himself across Roy to retrieve the blank pad he kept by the phone. He scribbled rapidly; Roy couldn't see, but he somehow knew it was an array.
"Fullmetal," he began, gathering himself to tip Ed off and get up. Just as soon as his muscles stopped being all liquefied. "What in the world are you doing?"
"Had a thought," Ed said. "God, I love orgasms."
He vaulted straight off the bed to his feet, leaving an indelible impression of his bony knee in Roy's back. Ed pounced on his trousers, fumbled something wrapped in paper out of a pocket, and did a quick series of alchemical conversions right there, kneeling naked on the floor. "Hmm!" he said.
"What—" Roy began again, making it all the way up onto an elbow.
"Eat this," Ed said, and popped a sliver of something into his mouth. Roy thought it was chocolate, from the quick glimpse, but the taste melting on his tongue was completely wrong.
"Bleh," Roy said smearily. "That's awful. Fullmetal, are you trying to poison me?"
Ed thumped down to his rear on the floor, dejected. "No," he said, "I'm trying to turn cheese into chocolate."
"You're . . ." Roy said helplessly. "Why?"
"'Cause chocolate's better," Ed said, and Roy thought, why did I ever think you were a pragmatist, and then you have alchemical brainstorms after orgasms?
"Of course," Roy said.
Ed's mood rebounded with particular vigor. "Still!" he said, hopping up. "That was something. Got the look and the texture right. I should go see what I can do with a more refined version of this." He threw on his clothes, making annoyed growling noises when he had to pull his shirt over his head and couldn't stare at his arrays.
"Uh," Roy said, realizing that he was about to be ignominiously abandoned. Nice of Ed, saving Roy the trouble of having to politely kick him out.
"Thanks, bastard," Ed said, like he had before. "Guess you do have some actual uses after all."
Roy sat up. "But surely," he said silkily, "a scientist of your caliber won't base a conclusion on a single data point?"
"Eh?" Ed asked, back in his arrays again.
"Tomorrow," Roy said firmly. "We're having dinner again."
Ed glanced up, disinterested. "Sure, whatever," he said, and wandered out with his boots in one hand and Roy's message pad in the other.
Roy dropped flat. Funny, he had this urge to bury his face in a pillow and scream at the top of his lungs.
*
Roy hummed on his way into the labs. It was after seven, and most sensible alchemists were gone for the night, so there was no one to see him smirking his way to Ed's laboratory, box of chocolates in hand. They were the perfect offering – Ed would either take them as another gesture of romance and be mildly annoyed by them, or he'd take them as a passive aggressive slur upon his extra-curricular alchemical activities and he'd be infuriated. Win-win, really.
So they could argue about that, whichever way Ed jumped, and then they would go to dinner. Their third in six days. Which, counting from that first explosive encounter over Ed's lab bench, meant Roy had captured his attention for two days longer than anyone else on record. Any day now, Roy was going to explain this to Ed in very small words, and be extremely smug to have won a game Ed had never even managed to recognize. Any day now. But until then, chocolates and dinner and –
The lab door was ajar, and quiet voices floated out into the hall.
"—check in the morning," Ed was saying, and Roy stopped against the wall to listen without a qualm.
"The Colonel again?" Al, and there, that was the touch of disapproval Roy had been failing to detect until now.
"Mm-hmm," Ed said, and there was the clink of glassware. "Hand me that—thanks."
"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Al asked.
"Yes," Ed said, and if it had been anyone but Al he would have added something incendiary and fowl. "Yes I think it's a good idea to remove the iron from the blood. You remember what happened when we didn't."
"Not that." There came the peculiar sound of a suit of armor shuffling its feet. "Brother, I meant the Colonel."
"What about him?" Ed asked breezily.
"Well, he's . . ." Al said, and Roy filled in too old, a dog of the military, a bastard, using you, not good enough for you. "He's in love with you," Al said
No, thought Roy, with such perfect, reflexive denial that he knew it was true.
Ed laughed. "No he's not," he said, and Roy could see the dismissive sneer. "Why d'you think I've kept him this long? And don't think I don't know you keep a stack of romance novels back at the dorm – I've seen you when you think I'm sleeping."
Roy didn't hear Al's outraged retort, not with that laugh ringing in his ears. It scalded. And yes, all right, that was deeper, more tender than just his pride.
Roy dropped his chin, studied his boots, and thought furiously. Clearly there was something gone very wrong with your life when you discovered you were in love with the man you were dating, and it was a complete fucking disaster.
Except. All right. Except that he was Roy Mustang, and he knew how to do this. He'd gone off to war once expecting nothing more than a live action tactics simulation, only to find out that no one was playing a game, and the stakes were so high it could drive you mad just thinking about it.
That had changed his life, too. Back then, he'd come home and crawled into a bottle for a few months before deciding that no, he couldn't close his eyes and he couldn't forget, and he was just going to have to play for the same stakes. But Roy was older, maybe a bit wiser, and he didn't have that sort of time right now.
Roy straightened up, and leaned over to check his reflection in the darkened window down the hall. He practiced a smile, and pushed at it until he was satisfied. Then he turned to knock at the door, and pushed it open.
"Good evening," he said.
Ed popped up from the other side of the lab table. He was panting, carefree, with a glass pipette stuck behind one ear. Roy swallowed. These stakes were so high, anyone sane would be halfway to Drachma by now.
"Hello, Colonel," Al said, clanking to his feet behind Ed. Roy didn't know how, but Al managed to look disheveled from whatever tussle they'd been having.
"Alfonse," Roy said, nodding respectfully. So, will you be my ally, if I ask right? He'd need help for the new campaign, that was for sure. "I brought you chocolates," Roy said, extending the box.
"Ooh," Ed said automatically at the sight of food, then pulled up short with a scowl. "What d'you mean—"
Roy, who was not particularly sane, as it turned out, smiled into his outrage. New game. New rules. Playing for Ed this time, as well as against him. Roy had never done this before, and he was still scrambling for strategy. But he would win. He had to.