Work Text:
“Hey, I’m with you, okay? Always.”
“I….” Everything Ed could see was blue, but he didn’t mind. He found himself caught up in Roy’s embrace, and his boyfriend’s uniform dominated his vision. His head was pounding. Something didn’t feel right, but he couldn’t tell what was wrong. Roy’s uniform was wet. “Yeah. O- okay.” Everything was floating just out of reach, and he couldn’t tell whether or not he was actually talking.
“Ed. Can you tell me what happened?” Roy propped him up against a wall, and Ed noticed that Roy was kneeling. Why would he be kneeling? The ground was wet. Roy hated cleaning his uniform. Something else was wrong with his shirt, too, there were red stains on the front where Ed’s head had been resting a minute ago.
Consciousness was slow in coming back to Ed. Something was still wrong. Roy looked like he had been crying, but when their eyes met he smiled reassuringly. The world swam for a second and Roy’s hands were on Ed’s shoulders to steady him as he sat against the wall. Did something hurt? Yes. There was definitely pain. As soon as Ed realized that something was hurting that’s all he could think about. “I…”
He looked down. One leg was fine, but the other…it took Ed a minute to understand where his other leg was: pieces of metal were scattered all over the concrete. It looked like Roy had swept some aside to find a place to kneel. What hurt? His head. But something else, too. Ed noticed that one arm wouldn’t move. Automail? No, he had two good human arms now. He looked at the left one, and found the problem. It was twisted at a grotesque angle. Blackness crept back into his vision.
Roy was saying his name. At first Ed heard Roy from a long way away, but his voice got closer and closer and so did the throbbing in his skull and the terror of not having both legs and the sharp pain in his arm. “ED? Ed.” Roy was so annoying. Why did he have to keep saying Ed’s name like that? “Edward.” Fine. Ed opened his eyes. This time, he was the one wearing Roy’s uniform. It was draped over his shoulders like a blanket. He couldn’t see his arm anymore, but that was a good thing.
Though Ed had only a vague idea of what had happened, knew he was relieved that Roy was there. But it was raining, didn’t that mean Roy shouldn’t have come? He couldn’t use flame alchemy in the rain. There was a gun on the ground and Roy’s holster was empty.
A siren wailed in the distance, drawing closer until Ed thought the sound of it would make his head split open. Then he was being lifted up, and then he was lying down in the back of an ambulance and he could hear a conversation going on outside:
“Sir, you can’t get in-”
“Whose jacket do you think this is?” There was a pause, possibly while the EMT looked down at Roy’s uniform coat, which Ed had been wearing, and realized Roy’s rank.
“My apologies, sir.” Then Roy was next to Ed again and he felt safe.