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batsutousaiTitle: Our Sinner's Redemption Extras
Fandom: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood
Author: Batsutousai
Rating: Teen
Chapter Summary: This is from chapter four of Come What May, when Roy gets the package from Chris, via Ed and his baker friend.
A/N: This is a series of side-stories for my Our Sinner's Redemption series. It's going to be a bit of seeing scenes from the perspective of someone other than Ed and a few smut scenes between Ed and someone other than Roy. You should read the chapter in the series that each one's attached to before reading the side-story, but the side-stories aren't necessary for enjoyment or understanding of the series itself. So, you know, if the summary of one of them makes you feel uncomfortable, feel free to skip it. :)
He never thought he'd say it, but Roy actually missed Fullmetal's presence during his Sunday phone calls. He'd actually been rather glad, the first couple of times, when the boy had made a quick escape, but then he'd kept coming, would sometimes stay and act like he cared – actually cared, wasn't just asking in an attempt to torment Roy about it later – about what was going on in Ishval. Roy had found himself getting used to him, to the easy conversations that, a year ago, he'd never have believed possible.
And then, his parting shot, that he was remaining in the military? Roy...didn't really know what to do with that. Honestly, the last thing he'd have expected of Fullmetal was for him to stay with the military. And command training?
Fullmetal had grown up a lot in his months on the run, hadn't he?
Roy shook himself as he parked the automobile he'd taken up to Resembool that day, then stepped out. He needed to stop thinking about the boy every Sunday. As hard as it was to enter Resembool without thinking about its most widely-known resident. (Assuming Fullmetal even counted as a resident, any more; Roy hadn't seen it himself, but he'd heard about the burnt husk that had once been the Elrics' home.)
He huffed at himself and shoved his hands into the pockets of his desert coat. A little too heavy for this time of year, honestly, but he preferred the anonymity it granted him, covering his rank and honours. He supposed he could just take off his uniform jacket – could almost hear Fullmetal pointing that out, probably while rolling his eyes, and absolutely with a 'bastard' tacked on to the end – but then he ended up feeling almost... Naked was the wrong word. Normal, maybe? Disguised, like he was trying to fit in with the villagers, hiding the fact that he was very much not one of them.
(Maes was probably laughing at him; he'd always said Roy was too much of a city-boy to be able to pretend otherwise.)
He was just passing the shop where Fullmetal had always got his bribes – unnecessary, but appreciated, and Roy had honestly considered stopping a few times himself, just for the sake of familiarity – when he heard a voice call, "General Mustang!"
He frowned, admittedly disturbed at losing that sense of anonymity – he really should have known it was just an illusion, given how incapable Fullmetal had always been about keeping his tiny mouth shut – and turned to find the woman minding the bakery shop waving to him. Hardly the first time she'd stopped him – Fullmetal had, twice, had her pass on doughnuts as an apology for his usual bad manners – but it was the first time she'd used his name, and the first time she'd called out to him without Fullmetal being around. Unless he'd given up continuing his military service after all? (Roy wouldn't blame him, and hardly expected doughnuts as some form of apology, or whatever this was.)
Forcing back a sigh, Roy put on the most charming smile he could manage on short notice and started over to the shop. "Can I help you?" he asked.
The woman held out a bag, bigger than the ones Fullmetal usually brought filled with doughnuts. "Gift for you," she said, before winking.
Admittedly a little bemused, Roy accepted the bag, unfolded the top, and glanced inside. Brown paper met his eyes, with an array drawn on the top, and it took him a moment, tripping over the fact that there was an array in a bakery bag, but then something in his head – in that corner that held the information he'd received in that other place, and kept finding excuses to not look at too closely – shifted.
The array resolved itself not, improbably, as some advanced transmutation, but as a message: 'Brigadier General Bastard just doesn't roll off the tongue right'.
Fullmetal had sent this, clearly, but Roy couldn't even begin to guess why the boy had sent him anything, let alone what it might be, that it couldn't go through the normal post.
That last, actually, kind of scared him, a bit. Fullmetal was not subtle, and he didn't do things in secret. Ever.
Or, he hadn't. Until he'd spent months hiding from the military with that Xingan prince – who had been possessed by one of the homunculi? Roy still wasn't quite clear on what had happened there – and those two chimeras, managing to avoid even Madame Christmas' long reach. Roy had vague memories of vacillating between fear and anger, at the time, but it had all resolved itself into relief when he found the boy in those tunnels under the city, alive and quite clearly well.
Roy cleared his throat, recalling his manners – Chris had been quite firm in ensuring he knew to always pay his informants, even for something as simple as a post drop – and quietly asked, "What do I owe you?"
The woman laughed and shook her head. "Ed sent money," she admitted, before putting on a crafty expression. "However, if you wanted to buy something else..."
Roy coughed, gave himself a moment to consider saying no – he didn't need the treat, and he always felt a little bad about accepting those doughnuts Fullmetal bought, even though he knew those soldiers who took a weekend trip up to East City hardly regretted their civilian fare – before giving in and requesting, "A doughnut, I think."
"You think?" she teased, her smile more warm than mocking, and Roy couldn't quite stop a slightly helpless shrug.
He ended up with two doughnuts, and he couldn't quite drum up sufficient regret for the purchase.
He made his way down the way to the train station and, instead of going straight to the phone to ring the Hugheses, he settled on the bench and pulled out the package from Fullmetal. It was encased in unusually stiff paper – he assumed alchemy was involved, given who it was from – which tore with only a little more difficulty than normal paper. Inside were two of his older alchemy journals, the same ones he'd mentioned that he wished he'd packed to Chris, in one of the rare messages he'd chanced. He'd expected to pick them up when he went to Central for Elicia's birthday, yet...
How had Fullmetal got his hands on them? Through Chris, clearly, but how had she even found him? And why? Just because his aunt knew he trusted Fullmetal – as much as he trusted any of his team – didn't mean she would go hunting him down to sneak Roy a package. For that matter, the last time he'd even mentioned Fullmetal to her, was when he told her to end the surveillance on him, since Roy hardly needed to keep tabs on the boy when he was done in the military. (He wasn't, but Roy hadn't known that, then, and he was hardly in the position to keep tabs on Fullmetal right now, anyway.)
He picked the wrapping back up and gave it a careful look over, checking to see if there were any other messages, but it was just the two journals and Fullmetal's little note.
Well then. He'd have to go by Madame Christmas while he was up in Central after all, if only so he could corner his aunt and demand an explanation. And see about restarting that surveillance on Fullmetal? Maybe? There was still the issue of how Roy would get updates, but he couldn't see Fullmetal being able to sit still for long in Ishval – assuming Roy could trust his temperament down there in the first place (he had his doubts) – and it seemed he'd come away from his exile with some truly worrisome new tricks.
Roy sighed and shook himself as he slipped the journals into the inner pocket of his jacket and stood; there was no use worrying about any of this for the moment. He had a month and a half before he would be able to tackle the issue with his aunt, and another month and a half after that before any surveillance would be necessary. Longer, if Fullmetal ended up actually coming down to Ishval for a while. (Roy was beginning to think that might be a good idea, if only so he could judge, in person, exactly how much the boy had matured, and hopefully pick out any new bad habits before they became a public relations nightmare.)
For the moment, however, he rang the Hugheses and, after trading the normal greetings with Gracia, said, "Could you please pass on to Fullmetal that calling me Brigadier General Mustang is sufficient?"
Gracia was silent for a moment, before slowly agreeing, "O...kay. I'll do that. Is there a reason?"
"Just responding to one of his jokes."
Gracia let out a cough that suggested she was resisting the urge to laugh. "Let me get Elicia for you, then. Unless there were any other 'jokes' you wanted me to respond to on your behalf?"
"Not today," Roy offered.
She snorted at him, then passed the phone over, and Roy was left with Elicia's endless glee, which did a great deal in the way of distracting him from wondering about Fullmetal and how he'd react to the return message, despite him and Alphonse being at the centre of nearly all of Elicia's newest stories. If anything, her stories were actually a relief; they promised that, despite whatever had happened during those months that Roy knew nothing about and his father's sacrifice – Roy didn't believe, for one moment, that Fullmetal was as unaffected by that as he'd tried to pretend – his youngest subordinate hadn't changed that much. Was still ignoring rules – like the one about not using weather alchemy inside Central City limits without the proper permissions from the Führer – and blowing up at the briefest mention of his height.
Those were the simple truths of Edward Elric, and as long as they remained true, Roy knew the boy was just fine.
Come What May Chapters:
01 || 02 || 03 || 04 || 05 || 06 || 07 || 08 || 09 || 10
11 || 12 || 13 || 14 || 15 || 16 || 17 || 18 || 19 || 20
Extras:
Ch 10 (Darius - NSFW) || Ch 16 (Ed - NSFW) || Ch 17 (Roy)
We All Need Saving Chapters:
Unposted
Dancing With the Devil Chapters:
Unposted
.
