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Once the cab pulled to a stop Greed stepped from the passenger side, sunglasses glinting in the sun as he looked up at the magnificent golden palace before him. If there was anything he’d missed about Xing, it was that extravagance. The people had good taste. And like, wealth. It felt good to be back in his element, abundance transcending culture shock.
Hearing a crash behind him, he turned to see that one of the attendants had opened the door to the backseat without realizing that it too was full of luggage.
“Hey, careful with those!”
He waved off the immediate apologies as not their fault. Ling should know by now to send a car with more trunk space.
“Where is his highness anyway?” he asked the nearest attendant.
“The emperor will greet his guest inside.”
Greed headed in without further prompting, not needing some kind of escort into his own home.
He didn’t live here anymore, the courts much too stuffy for a wandering soul(s) type such as himself. But it was the place he knew best, at least in this life. It’d been over a year since his last visit, and he was actually pretty glad to slow down a bit and break from the traveling circus that was his chimera crew.
“Guess who’s back!” he called out with a shove against the doors to the empty throne room. Only Ling and a pair of advisors lingered at the head of the table.
“Greed!” Ling perked up at the sight of him.
“Right answer.” Greed removed his sunglasses with a sharp grin.
The advisors were seasoned, and knew to take their leave before Ling could even shoo them. They passed Greed on their way out, muttering some familiar Xingese phrases under their breath. He lazily flipped them off before turning back just in time to catch himself as another body collided with his, Ling’s arms wrapping around his neck.
He laughed a bit as he returned the hug, squeezing tight. The Xingese weren’t the most outwardly affectionate but he and Ling had never known personal space, even after being separated. “Hey, kid.” He and Ling looked about the same age now, but the nickname remained as familiar as the embrace.
“It’s good to see you,” Ling said into his neck.
“There should have been a parade.”
Ling pulled back with a smirk. “Palace officials are annoyed enough by you without being forced to organize some kind of festival in your honor.”
“What? The people love me!” At Ling’s skeptical squint, he added, “Well, they’d learn to love me if you threw me a parade.”
“Not even a dictator would force such an opinion on his own subjects.”
Greed huffed rather than dignify that with a response. “Where’s your woman?”
“Lan Fan is with Fu.”
Ah, Fu Two. The catalyst for this visit. The young prince, named after the old bodyguard.
Ling’s smile widened into the big sunny kind that was usually a cover for his true shrewd nature, but this time it was genuine. “Are you ready to meet him?”
In contrast to the sunniness of Ling, all of Greed’s smiles had a razor sharp edge to them. “Hell yeah.”
He didn’t know if he was excited or what. He guessed he was curious more than anything. Homunculi are born adults. They also lack the ability to have children of their own. This meeting would be quite unprecedented, therefore he tried not to make a big deal out of it.
They actually encountered Lan Fan in the hallway leading to Fu’s room. Not once in the past decade had Greed ever managed to sneak up on her, so there was no surprise on her face when he turned the corner.
“Hey toots,” he greeted while Emperor moved towards Empress. Ling placed his hands on Lan Fan’s shoulders and a kiss on her hairline, murmuring something.
Lan Fan smiled at Greed over her husband’s shoulder, reserved but undeniably affectionate. “Hello Greed.”
“Are you reeeady?” A high pitched voice drew Greed’s gaze to the door behind the couple, which Mei had cracked open just enough to poke her round face through.
No greeting. No preamble. She must have sensed him through the door, and been eager to introduce Fu.
The pipsqueak’s excitement was a bit contagious. Even though Greed rolled his eyes, he hadn’t stopped smiling since encountering Ling. “Yes, yes, what’s with all the suspense? Show me the damn brat already.”
Greed had never spent much time around babies. He’d seen them in passing obviously, and knew the general facts, but information about them was never relevant to his life.
So he was uniquely unprepared when Mei, in a twirl of robes as she spun, brought him face to face with Xing’s newest prince.
Fu.
The first thing that struck Greed was that he was very, very , small.
It sounded dumb in retrospect, but frankly this wasn’t what Greed had been expecting.
He knew babies had to start out small, to fit in the belly or whatever, but it had been months .
And yet Fu still fit so easily into the arms of the already vertically challenged pipsqueak princess, like he’d been born yesterday or something.
Greed was taken aback with a familiar emotion he’d never really taken the time to define, more closely examining the thing that was supposedly the same species as the runt he’d watched punch a false god in the face.
Fu was chubby, and practically bald but for a wisp of black hair. His limbs looked absolutely useless, like he wouldn’t even be able to crawl, let alone walk. And his eyes were wide like he was overwhelmed by the sight of his own nursery. He looked kind of stupid.
Ling was still beaming, presumably so proud of himself for making such an unimpressive little blob.
Greed guessed he could understand that, the thought coming with an odd pang of jealousy. Nothing his sterile ass could ever create would ever be so his as Fu was Ling’s.
“Greed, this is Fu,” Mei introduced like he didn’t already know. “And Fu, this is your Uncle Greed!”
Uncle Greed.
Should he... say hi? It couldn’t understand him, could it? Mei was talking to it. He suddenly felt cornered by his lack of knowledge. Without realizing it, his expression fell into a contemplative pout.
“Do you want to hold him?” Lan Fan asked seriously.
Memories of carbon tipped claws slicing through flesh and metal alike jumped to the forefront of his mind unwarranted. The stark contrast to Fu’s softness had him glancing down at his hands, half expecting to find grey talons dripping blood. At the sight of his still very human looking hands, he calmed a bit.
He found himself nodding, the curiosity returning. Stepping forward, Lan Fan arranged his arms with a firmness reminiscent of when she’d trained him as a guard years earlier. Before he knew it Fu was placed in the hammock she’d created, lightly pressing against his chest.
The familiar feeling returned full force. His mind started to cloud with images of Wrath’s swords cutting through henchmen and soldiers like it was nothing, but those were memories he was practiced in pushing away. He forced himself to focus on the task at hand.
Don’t drop Fu or he might break.
God, was that really all it took?
He was trying so hard to hold still that he shook a little. Big black eyes reflected back his admittedly nervous expression.
“He’s not gonna bite you, he doesn’t even have teeth.” Greed dared tear his gaze away from the baby in his arms. Mei was smiling, Lan Fan intent. Ling was the one who spoke, and he looked like a smug son of a bitch.
That expression pushed Greed to at least fake some confidence. “Maybe he takes a bit too much after his predecessor then,” he quipped, relaxing.
“I think he really likes you,” said Mei. Greed would have to take her word for it since Fu wasn’t even smiling. But he was still gazing at Greed dumbly, and he wasn’t crying. If he was anything like his mother maybe that neutrality counted for something.
“Lan Fan and I are going to get dressed for our night on the town,” Ling announced, leaving aunt and uncle to their own devices.
Mei took Fu back and settled in the cushions serving as a sitting area. Being passed back and forth seemed to be the only activity Fu was good for, and Greed found himself disappointed and bored. He collapsed next to the pair with his legs sprawled.
“Stick your finger out to him,” Mei advised, looking like she had a special surprise in store.
Greed did as she asked and Fu took notice, wrapping his tubby fingers around the digit with surprising strength.
Greed gave a genuine smile. “Grabby, aren’t you? I like that.”
This was much more comfortable, though the drastic difference in the size of their hands was still a bit weird.
By the time Mei finished telling him an amusing story about a newborn thief stealing a midwife’s wedding ring, the Yao royals had returned. Though Lan Fan was never dressed to the nines for functionality’s sake, both spouses had demoted their outfits enough to pass for normies, and Ling’s hair hung freely down his back for a change.
“Seems news of your return was enough to coax Al out of his library,” Ling told Greed.
Lan Fan retrieved her son and brought him over for Ling to kiss him on the head before disappearing to the crib area. Greed watched with slight interest.
When had his terrifying warrior friends become such softies?
He got up to leave, and Mei joined him, causing something to dawn on him.
“We’re leaving him here?” Greed blurted before he could stop himself.
Assassinations weren’t as much of a concern now, but he suddenly found himself wondering how baby Ling had survived long enough to grow into the strong young man he knew today. It wouldn’t take an expert assassin to take out such a helpless little thing.
“He has guards posted. It’s not like we can watch him all the time,” said Ling.
“He needs to sleep most of the day anyway. You actually came at the perfect time to meet him.” Lan Fan surprised Greed by agreeing. She followed the siblings to the door so easily, like she wasn’t the most overprotective person he had ever met.
Greed foolishly lingered for a moment, and Ling turned back to him with an innocent look belied by more smugness. “Lan Fan screened his guard. Do you not trust her judgment?”
Greed glared at him to avoid the cool threat of Lan Fan’s piqued expression.
“I’m just letting the royalty go ahead of me.” He slapped at the hair hanging over Ling’s shoulder. “Ladies first, and all that.”
They were down the hall by the time Ling addressed him again, quietly. “It would be more dangerous for him out there anyways.”
Something about Ling’s x-ray vision into how he was feeling made Greed keep his mouth shut.
During Greed’s first two hundred years he never left Amestris. A century in Central and a century in the south. For all his talk about demanding the finer things, being born beneath a landlocked, warring nation didn’t inspire an imagination of traveling to far off exotic locales.
In his second life Ling’s gushing about Xing expanded his horizons and had him looking forward to seeing everything the world had to offer. Once he ruled every corner, he would see it too. Even though the whole world domination thing didn’t pan out, he’d still spent most of the last few years traveling through Xing and beyond.
But he knew the space around the palace best, obviously, so this was different from exploring new cities. Even if the rest of his party intended to draw as little attention as possible, Greed enjoyed walking the streets like he owned them- because he did. Somewhere in the capital was a road named Avaricious Street, unless his pissant had repealed it in his absence. Ling claims to have spoiled him far too much in their early days together, but Greed had to disagree. There was plenty more he could milk out of his near sacrifice. Make the action as selfish as possible retroactively. He had a reputation to uphold, after all.
Despite the intention for this to be a simple social stroll, Greed managed to snag a few shiny new possessions at the market before anyone complained.
The crux of the night was spent at dinner, over a spread that put even Ling’s appetite to shame. It was a pretty nice place, and they rented their own private room, the restaurant staff falling over themselves once they realized who they were serving.
The group of five officially began to play catchup. Greed even got in a few good stories about him and his gang before the conversation inevitably turned around to the little bundle of joy they had left behind.
“I don’t know if I’ve ever seen you so spooked. And by a baby .” Greed really missed the days when Ling was just one of the many souls in his body, and had to play nice with him.
“He’s just...not what I expected.”
All of Al’s laughs sounded like giggles, even his snorts. “What did you expect?”
If not for the threat of more laughing and ridicule, Greed might have given a serious answer. Instead he pointed his chopsticks at Ling and said “After twelve years of dealing with this whiny brat I expected a lot more crying from his progeny.”
That managed to get a laugh from both Al and Mei. Lan Fan even smirked behind her cup, despite his insult of ‘the young lord’.
Ling took the taunt in stride, the bastard. “Oh he’s a very well behaved baby. I’m sure his namesake would attest he takes after Lan Fan that way. In fact-”
Al interrupted, looking a bit exasperated. “You’re telling this story again?”
“Yes I’m telling it again. I have a new audience and Uncle Greed here has three months of milestones to be caught up on.”
Again, Fu didn’t seem capable of much that was worthy of bragging about, but the pride of claiming a valuable possession was something Greed could easily recognize.
So he actually sat and listened with minimal teasing.
And ignored the familiar feeling beginning to grow in his chest and toil in his gut.
On the way back to the palace Greed idly wondered about Edward’s family back in Amestris. The other Elric brat had two brats of his own by now, but Greed hadn’t met them. He had nothing to gain from traveling out to a farm in the middle of nowhere.
But it did remind him he knew a fellow uncle who might be able to give some insight.
“Psst. Tinman.” He’d fallen to the back of the group in a small attempt at privacy. Hands in his pockets, eyes to the sky, he tried to seem as casually curious as possible. “Since you’re such a world class bookworm, I was wondering if your library had anything on human babies.”
Despite his giggles at dinner, the smile Al threw him was one much more favorable than what he could ever hope for from Ling or even Lan Fan. “I’ll help you find something.”
The book made the feeling worse. Meeting Fu earlier that day and listening to Ling muse about Fu lifting his head had begun to paint a picture, but now Greed knew just how much longer the child would be helpless for. It was honestly ridiculous. When Greed was six months old he discovered the meaning of life , though to be fair he had some foggy 200 years of memories to assist. Fu wouldn’t even be able to talk at the same age.
He didn’t want to admit it, but he was afraid of a baby. A baby . The least threatening person he had ever encountered.
But that was why he was scared, wasn’t it?
It was the same angry twist of his insides as when he saw a moronic soldier charging towards the certain death of Wrath’s blade. The cold shock of the Promised Day when he realized Ling’s body would fail them if he didn’t do something.
That same, old but familiar...fear.
All homunculi thought humans weak, and Greed was no exception.
The difference between him and his late family was that he saw this opinion as an excuse to protect humans, not condemn them.
It was this familiar urge to protect that carried him back to Fu’s room at God-knows-what hour. Not that it mattered to Greed. Homunculi didn’t really get tired. Fu’s human guards on the other hand...
They were humans. Mere, weak humans. They would get tired. Maybe even fall asleep on the job.
Greed couldn’t dredge up the energy to lie to himself. There was no use in acting tough if it was going to continue to bother him like this.
“Let me through.”
The guard posted at Fu’s door seemed about to object, and he raised a hand.
“I’m still a royal guard, and he’s mine anyway.” At the odd look he received he remembered not everyone spoke Greed the Avaricious. “My...nephew, or whatever.”
Let in with silent disapproval, he crept in quietly so as to not disturb the sleeping child, but that proved futile. Fu’s eyes were open.
The two of them stared at each other for a moment, and Greed found himself wondering if Fu could perfectly make him out in the low lamplight even without the sharp eyes of a homunculus. His gaze looked less dumb and more...seeing. Like he was taking in everything about Greed’s features. Like with a little understanding and practice he’d be able to see through his uncle just as well as his father did.
Greed ignored the slight tightening in his chest.
Fu looked even smaller than he had that afternoon.
“Hey Fu Two.” He decided to offer the greeting he was too self conscious to give earlier.
Fu, predictably, didn’t respond. According to the book it would be months before Ling could even expect a ‘da-da’.
Greed sighed. He sat down on a cushion beside the crib, continuing to watch Fu between the bars. He continued to whisper while the kid was awake, anything that came to mind.
“You know if it wasn’t for me, I don’t think your pops ever would have made a move on Lan Fan, so I guess you have me to thank for your existence. I’ll let you make it up to me later.”
“You’re very sweet Greed.” Greed jumped at the voice, one hand already carbon before he realized it was just Ling. Upon seeing his friend’s grin he settled back down indignantly, facing Fu again.
“Shut up.”
Ling plopped beside him cross legged, leaning his head onto his shoulder tiredly.
“He’s mine.” Greed stated in explanation. Like the claim in any way refuted Ling’s statement about him being sweet.
“And you take care of what’s yours.”
“Damn straight.”
“You know he’s more mine than yours,” Ling said, his territorialism a reminder of how alike the two friends were.
Greed smirked. “But you’re also mine, so he’s still mine by association.”
Ling hummed, shifting closer. “Circular.”
“I’ll admit I wasn’t immediately sold, but you look to be raising a fine possession here.”
There was a moment of silence before Ling said anything, the sleepiness in his tone replaced with conviction.
“I’m going to be the first great emperor who’s also a great father.”
Greed didn’t even need to respond to let Ling know he understood. They sat together in the kind of silence that made them feel like one mind again, watching Fu drift back to sleep.
“It’s weird, he’s kind of like you, but then not.”
“God forbid he turns out anything like you.”
“Don’t make me move back to the palace just to spite you. I’ll show Fu Two what it really takes to own this place. I’ll be his Amestrian tutor, and I’ll only teach him the important words. None of that polished formal shit you forced on me when I was learning Xingese.” He leaned closer to the crib, lips nearly puckered between the bars as he whispered, “Say ‘fuck’, Fu.”
Ling turned his face into Greed’s shoulder before flopping back with groan, chuckling through it all. “Ugh, without Lan Fan here we’d create a monster.”
“Not all monsters are bad.”
Ling was yawning. “True, some of them are very loving uncles.”