Chapter Text
When Boyle finally stowed away the last manila folder in his desk’s hanging file, the sun had already dipped below the mountaintops on the horizon. Night hadn’t fallen yet, but the day was over and the world seemed caught in peaceful limbo.
Edward closed the office door with a soft click and let his shoulders sag. Every bone in his body felt twice as heavy as it should be, anchoring his feet to the ground, making every step a physically demanding undertaking. They’d spent the entirety of the day glued to uncomfortable chairs, throwing back and forth ideas and hypothesises, but none of them had brought them closer to solving the case. With the evidence they’d gathered so far, pinpointing a suspect was virtually impossible.
Boyle, having seen similar cases in droves before, inferred that the culprit was male. Edward, like every person with eyes and common sense would have guessed, concluded that their man was an alchemist. While those assumptions did narrow down their pool of suspects considerably, it did not point them in a specific direction. They didn’t have a motive, they didn’t have a solid criminal profile.
Edward shuffled along the hallway, eyes trained on the ground so no one came up with the glorious idea of striking up a conversation with him. He might just bite whoever tried anyway. He was too exhausted to even think about speaking.
“Fullmetal.”
If there had been any doubt left at all, this dispelled it: Fate had it out for him, and Edward didn’t even believe in fate.
Mustang stood in the doorway of his office, arms crossed, looking as if he’d been waiting for Edward to come by. Knowing the bastard, he probably had waited, having figured out that Edward needed to pass his office on his way back to the dorms. “Have a minute?”
A rejection sat on the tip of Edward’s tongue, but the blank stare Mustang levelled him with made him swallow it.
Edward nodded and approached him, trying to get some pep into his step. Sadly, fooling that man was an endeavour doomed to failure.
“You look like death warmed over,” Mustang said bluntly.
“Gee, thanks.”
A firm but gentle hand pressed against his shoulder. Edward gasped in surprise. “Hey, are you okay?” There was a command hidden in there somewhere, but Edward’s mind was too scrambled to pick it apart.
“I– uh–” He looked up at Mustang, blinking tiredly. Shit, his eyes burned and the only thing he wanted to do was close them and drown in the darkness they provided. “I just didn’t sleep much last night. I feel all wrong.” Hearing himself say it, he winced at how childish it sounded. But it was the truth – well, a part of it. He did feel wrong, off-kilter, but the lack of sleep was a symptom, not the cause.
Mustang removed the hand and laid it against his upper back instead, pushing him forward into his office. “Come on, we’ll talk inside. I want you sitting down, lest you fall over and break your nose.”
Inside, the familiar smell of leather, smoke, gun powder and ashes draped over him like a warm blanket. Those smells shouldn’t have been as comforting as they were, but they reminded him of boring reports, slow rainy days in the office and jokes shared with Havoc and Breda. They also reminded him that the people who belonged in here – trained soldiers, a deadly sharpshooter, the flame alchemist – had his back.
As the door fell shut behind them, Edward felt the tension slide off completely, like a slippery silk cloth against bare skin. It left him teetering to one side and he had to grip the backrest of the couch for support.
“Have you eaten?”
“Uh, I had breakfast?”
“My god, do you want to faint?”
“Right now? Yeah, kind of.” Edward bit his lip. He hadn’t meant to say that out loud.
Mustang’s face did a funny thing, then he approached him, gripped his upper arms and guided him around the couch, pushing him into the soft leather with such force Edward’s vision swam and he had to blink several times to regain his bearings. “Wha–”
“Sit.”
“Well, you could have just told me, instead of manhandling me like a ragdoll!”
“Please, you were two seconds from collapsing.”
Edward couldn’t deny the relief the soft cushions brought him, so he kept his mouth shut, deciding to choose his battles wisely. “So, what did you want?”
“First, I want you to eat this.” Mustang tossed him a nut bar, one of those military things that could probably survive a nuclear fallout. Lots of protein, lots of fat, lots of calories. Edward tore the packaging open, suddenly cognizant of the emptiness in his stomach. The bar would do little to alleviate it, but it was better than nothing. He bit into it. As the sweetness spread on his tongue, he sighed and leaned back into the couch, chewing with deliberation, savouring every grain.
“Thanks,” he said between bites.
“Yeah, yeah.” Mustang pulled out the chair behind his desk and sank into it. “I actually wanted to talk to you about Colonel Boyle. I promised you I would look into it.”
Edward stopped chewing. He swallowed. “And?”
“All things considered, I don’t think you need to be worried. Boyle makes a habit of working with different people from all branches. You’re not the first soldier he requested a team-up with. I honestly think your reputation as a genius alchemist has made the rounds far enough to give him ample reason to consult you.” Mustang leaned his head to the side in consideration. “I also genuinely have no idea how he would have even gotten wind of your background. The only people who know are people I trust with my life. Boyle has no way of knowing what you did.”
“Well, that’s one weight lifted off my shoulders,” Edward said. It sounded logical. No member of the team would ever rat out Edward and Alphonse, that he was sure of. And unless Boyle had a secret, elaborate information network reaching even the far away corners of Resembool, there was no need to worry.
“So now, do me a favour and take some weight off my shoulders,” Mustang said.
Edward pushed the last piece of the nut bar past his lips and licked his fingers. “And how would I do that?” he mumbled with a full mouth.
“I will work here,” Mustang began, an edge to his voice, “and you will catch some shut-eye on that couch.”
“But–”
“That is an order, Fullmetal. I will call Alphonse if you don’t follow it.”
Edward gulped. Alphonse would yell at him, shackle him to a bed, make him sleep for two weeks straight and then kill him. Sleeping on Mustang’s couch suddenly sounded very inviting. Wasn’t that what he had wanted yesterday? Edward pursed his lips. “Fine.” Rearranging the throw pillows around him and taking off his shoes, Edward lay down with a huff.
The couch wasn’t as comfortable as his bed. It was a little too hard, a little too narrow – but he felt more comfortable. His muscles relaxed completely and his eyelids grew heavy within seconds.
“Don’t worry,” Mustang said, “I’ll wake you in a few hours.”
Edward wanted to ask if Mustang really had work to do until well into the night, but he decided that he didn’t really care and he didn’t have the energy to ask either. He just grumbled an affirmation under his breath, closed his eyes and let sleep pull him under.
“Fullmetal. Hey.” Edward squeezed his eyes shut. Mustang shook his shoulder lightly. “You should go to your room now. It’s late.”
But Edward didn’t want to go to his room. He didn’t want to open his eyes and he didn’t want to stand, let alone walk. The thought alone made a whine build up in the back of his throat. He didn't let it escape, of course, but it was a near thing. “Leave me alone. M’ tired.” He slurred the words like a drunk, voice barely above a rough whisper. “Y’ said I could sleep.”
“And you did. You slept for five hours, Fullmetal. I want to go home. Come on.” His voice sounded far away and uncomfortably close to his ear at the same time. Edward pressed the side of his head into the pillow.
“Jus’ leave me ‘ere.”
“I can’t do that and you know it.”
“Why?”
The part of the couch where his feet lay tangled dipped and Mustang sighed. Silence stretched for several seconds and Edward almost fell back asleep before Mustang spoke. “What’s wrong with you? You stumble in here half dead and now you don’t want to leave?”
“M’ jus’ tired.”
Mustang didn’t answer. Edward figured he didn’t know whether to believe him or not. Hell, Edward didn’t know whether to believe himself. The only thing he knew was that he fell asleep in here without nightmares, just blissful nothingness, and he didn’t want to go back to his room and wake up gasping for air with his heart jumping out of his chest.
“Fullmetal?”
“Hm?” Damn, he just wanted Mustang to stop talking. Every syllable droned in his ears like a gun shot.
“You know I meant what I said, right? That you can come to me if anything happens.” He paused, longer than what was natural. “Did anything happen?”
That got Edward to ponder. It pulled him from sleep a little further, made his mind turn a little faster.
Technically, everything was alright. He wasn’t hurt, he wasn’t sick. And yet his mind couldn’t stop replaying the photos he’d seen, the corpses he’d seen – and those, those made him feel sick. They haunted his dreams and they haunted him throughout the day. It was like a cloud had settled over him, following him, dipping everything in dull grey.
Sometimes, the photos melted into memories of Winry. Young, blonde and full of life.
Glover was an asshole, but he’d dealt with assholes before. He could deal with him, for sure. And still, being in his presence made something in him cower. Something about Glover made him shut up when he otherwise wouldn’t. Something about him made him feel small. But Glover hadn’t done anything to warrant those feelings.
Right?
“Nothing happened,” he said. The words felt bitter on his tongue. “It’s just…” Edward took a deep breath. “It’s not nice to look at, okay?”
There. He said it. He admitted it. And now Mustang would laugh at him, call him a little kid who couldn’t handle what the world threw at him. (And he would be right.)
“Do you want me to take you off the case?”
That, finally, got Edward to open his eyes. He turned onto his back and looked at Mustang, eyes searching. But Mustang was carefully stonefaced, not a single microexpression out of place. It was notoriously hard to get a read on him, even when Edward wasn’t half-asleep.
“No.” Even Edward heard the hesitancy in his voice. But he didn’t want to stop. No matter how gruesome the things he had to look at turned out to be, no matter how unnerved he felt in Glover’s presence, he needed to get through it. He needed to overcome it. It was a lead, however small, to get Al his body back, and Edward couldn’t give up.
“Okay.” Mustang sounded just as tentative. “But if you change your mind, the offer still stands.”
Edward nodded.
“Will you get up now?”
“Forget it, I’m staying here.”
“Fine, but I need to go home.” Mustang stood from his place on the couch and stretched. His bones cracked audibly. “There’s a spare key in the top drawer of my desk if you need to get out. I’ll lock the door from the outside so no one can get in.”
Edward turned back onto his side and pulled his legs up to his chest, feeling the absence of Mustang’s body heat. “Yeah.”
“I’ll bring breakfast tomorrow, don’t leave until I get here. Is that understood?”
“Yes. And bring some coffee.”
“Will you be okay?”
“Yes.”
Something light and warm fell over his body. Edward flinched before he realized that it was a thin, woollen blanket. “This is Hayate’s. You better not drool on it or the Lieutenant will kill us both. She washes that thing religiously.”
Edward pulled the blanket up to his chin. It did smell surprisingly clean and he snuggled into it. “Mhm.”
Mustang scurried through the office for a while, opening and closing cupboards and drawers, moving things and closing windows. Eventually, the keys jingled as he grabbed them from the desk.
“Good night, Fullmetal.”
“Night.”
Footsteps walked past him. A door opened and closed. And finally, the lock turned.
Edward was alone and silence hung in the air. Just the rustling of his movements could be heard.
For some reason, the room was a lot less welcoming now that Mustang was gone. Still, he’d rather spend the night here than in his own room in his sweat drenched bed.
He closed his eyes.
Yes, this couch was just fine.
And he would get a breakfast free of charge tomorrow.
What more could he have wished for?
Edward slowed his breaths, emptied his mind, and fell back asleep to the sound of a clock ticking.