Archive of Our Own

I.

Every morning, when Alfons wakes, he hopes against hope that this will turn out to be some kind of existentialist nightmare and not his life.

Every morning, when Alfons wakes, the air’s a little colder.

But he’s trying with all his might to stay positive—trying not to succumb to the fluttering wings of panic where they stir inside his chest. He’s trying to believe that this could all be for the better. He’s trying to pretend it’s a grand adventure, like a fantasy, or a fairy tale. As long as he leaves a trail behind him, he’ll crest some narrative arc, and he can follow the breadcrumbs back home. Munich is out there, waiting—Munich, Earth, his sunsets, his skylines, rockets, Ed.

He’ll find them. He’ll find a way. He’ll be fine.

And honestly, he could do much worse for company. The perpetually-aggravated General Mustang must have had at least one sympathetic bone in his body after all: it’s so difficult to be miserable with Major Armstrong around. The man is a towering emotional outburst waiting to happen, and his sheer, unstoppable passion for existence is inspiring almost as often as it’s overwhelming. Underneath the melodrama, too, Alfons thinks that Armstrong only acts so spectacularly overstated because he cares too much, and this is the only way he knows of to let it out.

Alfons can relate to that.

So when Major Armstrong offers him a suitcase full of sweaters that are much too big—proclaiming that he’ll “find the Northern climes quite bracing!”, and that the “food will be so hearty, and the toil so righteous, you’ll grow into them sooner than you think!”, and that the whole experience will “put some hair on your chest; you’ll see, young Alfons!”—Alfons doesn’t pause to point out his observation, from several occasions upon which Major Armstrong tore his clothes off and traumatized everyone in the general vicinity, that the man himself doesn’t have any hair sprouting in a manly manner from his pectorals.

He just accepts the first real gift in a brand-new world with all the enthusiastic gratitude that he can muster, and he tries to be worthy of the kindness.

Armstrong nearly bowls him over with a clap to the shoulder when Alfons swims his way into the smallest of the sweaters, and Alfons dares to wonder if perhaps his luck has changed.

II.

His soul went numb when he saw Ed.

No.  Not Ed.  Not the Ed who knew him; not the Ed he knows.  Not any Ed he understands—a stranger.

First the shock, then the pain, then the shutdown: it’s self-preservation, isn’t it?  And he survived.  Whatever else can be said about him, however weak he’s been, he has made it this far, and still he hasn’t crumbled.

And the world, this world, keeps turning. The sun keeps arcing steadily across the sky. Gravity and mathematics hold just as true, and when there’s nothing else, he can bury himself in that for reassurance. The numbers won’t ever abandon him, and the laws won’t let him down.

He froze to the core trying not to feel anything—and perhaps that was better; perhaps it usually is. It’s safer, certainly. But he’s slipped into a routine here, in the echoing hallways and strange hollows of the looming snow-hushed wall. He’s stumbled on a life, or something close to it. A schedule, at least; an occupation. He is occupied.

But now that he’s settled, his guard is coming down, and the pins and needles have begun.

Strange, like everything here—as the fort gets colder, he thaws.

“You’re shivering,” Dee says.

Alfons likes Dee. He liked her from the start, in a distant, almost vicarious kind of way, like he was watching her clever eyes and genuine compassion through the thick pane of a window. He likes most of the other young engineers, but Dee the most.

“It is all right,” he says.

“It is not,” Dee says. “Come on, I brought it all just for this.” She jogs the box of scarves and gloves and knitted hats that she’s holding in both arms. “The heater breaks right about this time every year; I knew it’d happen eventually.”

She smiles—shyly? Alfons is still fumbling with other people’s emotions; his have long been too muddled to make sense, roaring too loud and looming too large to comprehend.

She’s holding a powder blue scarf out towards him, and she looks so hopeful… “I figured this one would bring out your eyes.”

And then she looks delighted when he wraps it around his neck and lets the rest dangle against his chest (like a noose rope, like a dead limb, like a—), so he must have made the right choice.

“Thank you,” he says. “It is very… chilly.”

He smiles for her, because he likes her, and she’s trying to be kind.

But as he moves to tug the sweater sleeves down to warm his hands, he catches sight of Miles—Miles, who is usually so engrossed in personnel reports that only an explosion or a scheduled break can shake him from his reverie. Miles, who has been known not to budge but for breathing for several hours at a stretch. Miles, who seems to have turned dispassionate facial expressions into a competitive sport. Miles—Alfons has met less imperturbable brick walls.

Miles is staring at him, looking shocked, looking wistful, looking… pained.

And then the moment is gone, and the mask is reinstated, and a man disappears back into the Major.

That ought to be the end of it, really—just an oddity; just a fluke. But as Alfons unwinds the scarf again that night, he can’t help it; he can’t help wondering—

“Was there something wrong?” he asks his broad-shouldered shadow as he readies himself for bed. “I am not aware of any—how do you say… cultural… nuance… of accepting clothes from another. Was it wrong?”

Miles is silent for a long moment. Alfons should be angry, shouldn’t he? Doesn’t the bastard owe him a simple answer, after all the interrogations he endured to get here?

He’s still too cold for anger. He feels… tired.

“It wasn’t that,” Miles says. “You can borrow scarves from whomever you like.”

Alfons looks over at him. The major’s hands are folded behind his back. He’s looking at the door.

“I was startled,” Miles says, quietly. “Very suddenly, you reminded me strongly of someone I knew a long time ago. Someone I cared about.”

Alfons can’t think of anything to say to that.

Miles lets the silence rest, and it’s almost comfortable, spreading out between them—like fleece, Alfons thinks; like white fabric rippling.

III.

“It is so cold,” Alfons says, wriggling his way to the edge of the bed.

Miles’s arm stretches out after him, fingertips grazing his back. Miles has not raised his face from the pillow, which is having a significant negative impact on his ability to touch a target. “Then why are you leaving?”

“You and I both know the answer to that,” Alfons says, trying not to betray the fact that he’s shivering violently, and Miles has a point. “We would stay in the bed all day, and then there would be Questions.”

“The dreaded Questions,” Miles mumbles.

“That is easy for you to say,” Alfons says. “You are accustomed to the glare of General Armstrong’s that makes you think she already knows what you have done, and is only contemplating the best way to destroy you.”

“Not true,” Miles says, shifting just enough to peek at Alfons with one amused red eye. “No one gets used to it—you just get better at pretending you’re not scared shitless.” He rolls onto his side, propping his chin up on one hand, and pats the sheets beside him. “Come on,” he says, voice terribly warm and soothing. “Just another minute. It’s so cold.”

“No another minute,” Alfons says, gingerly putting his feet down on the frigid floor. “You will just have to wait until tonight.”

Miles makes a mournful face, and Alfons’s teeth start to chatter, and he realizes that he’s going to lose this rather pleasant battle if he doesn’t take drastic action soon.

Attempting to ignore the way the soles of his feet seem to be going numb, Alfons picks his way across the room and plucks Miles’s coat from the hook on the back of the door. He shoulders it on and holds the collar closed very tightly over his throat.

“This is very—how do you say—cozy,” he says. “This is very cozy.” He nuzzles at the soft fur by his cheek; it is divine. “I am afraid that you may have to pry this from me when again you need it.”

“I suppose I could be convinced to pin you down and take it back,” Miles says—entirely offhandedly, which somehow makes it more arousing. “You should keep it, though. You look better in it than I do.”

“That is ridiculous,” Alfons says. “You look very fine in this coat. Very dignified.” He stands up straight, folds his hands behind his back, and looks down his nose to demonstrate.

Miles laughs softly and then stretches in a rather extravagant way, arms extended over his head, back arching of off the bed. “Dignity,” he says. “Right. Where did I leave that?”

There’s a little flame of want dancing in Alfons’s stomach, twisting, rising, licking at his ribs. He bundles himself a bit deeper into Miles’s coat.

“I am not sure,” he says. “But it can wait another minute, no?”

“Oh, yes,” Miles says, grinning and lifting the blankets as Alfons climbs back up onto the mattress with the long coat trailing. “Yes, it definitely can.”

IV.

There seems to be a less-than-rational part of Alfons that is convinced that if he keeps smoothing Miles’s lapels, Miles will never have to walk out the door and disappear into the snow.

“It’s only a six-week campaign,” Miles says softly.

“I know,” Alfons says. Every time he brushes out a wrinkle, a new one crops up nearby.

“I’ll write to you,” Miles says.

“I will write back,” Alfons says.

Miles’s hand lifts to touch Alfons’s elbow. “Every day.”

Alfons swallows. “Every day.”

“Nothing’s going to happen to me,” Miles says.

Alfons flattens his hands on Miles’s chest so that they stop—shaking. Why are they—? “I would… I would rather not begin, with the promises we cannot keep.”

He knows it’s selfish. He knows it’s childish. He knows it’s just six weeks, barely more than forty days, barely even a separation; he knows there will be paper in his hands with Miles’s soul spelt out in ink—that’s more than he’s ever had to look forward to before when he let a person go.

But he doesn’t want to. He doesn’t want to walk the corridors alone, sprawl on an empty bed and curl into the cold sheets, pass the idle hours in silence with only his roiling mind for company. He doesn’t want to lie there nightly, staring into the dark—sit there daily, staring into space—spend hours upon hours torturing himself with unknowable what-ifs until a letter comes. And even then—in the days since Miles’s fingertips touched the paper, ten-thousand things could have happened; there will never be peace in him until he can press his hands to Miles’s skin again, watch him blinking, hear him breathing, feel his heartbeat—

He knows it’s selfish, but he doesn’t care, because he doesn’t want to have to hold himself together while he waits.

“I have something for you,” Miles says.

Alfons looks up from the first brass coat button, expecting a kiss. He wouldn’t turn it down, but he doesn’t know how he’s supposed to make his mouth say the word goodbye when it feels as though his heart’s crumpling like a fistful of tinfoil.

Except that Miles draws a long, narrow strip of coarse linen fabric out of an inside pocket of his coat. It’s rose-colored, with thin white stripes, and he holds it in both hands and looks at it for a long moment before he speaks.

“This was my grandfather’s,” he says. “When it would have been my father’s, the country was too fraught for him to risk displaying it openly. I don’t know if you’ve seen any photographs of the traditional Ishvalan sashes—they’re wider across, and the stripes are black. Those are meant to indicate a closeness to God, and by wrapping one around yourself, you can keep Him close to your heart. These…” He runs the strip through his fingers, slowly. “…are for a closeness to other people. Generally you’re given one at birth by your parents, and the intent is that you save it until you find another person so important that you want to give yourself to them.”

Miles hesitates. He swallows. He runs the pad of his thumb along the nearest hem. Alfons can hear his own breath quickening until he starts to wonder if he’s just imagining it all—

“I’d… like you to have this,” Miles says quietly. “If you want it. You don’t have to—I shouldn’t have saved it until now; I don’t want you to feel like I’m demanding that you make a decision, and it doesn’t… It wouldn’t have to be a commitment if you didn’t—”

“I love you,” Alfons says.

“Oh, thank God,” Miles says faintly. “I thought—maybe—”

Alfons curls a fist into each of Miles’s much-abused lapels and drags him in to kiss him, to really kiss him, hello and goodbye and all the promises he wants to keep, but can’t make; all the things he will offer if he just gets the chance—

And Miles drapes the strip of linen around his neck and tucks it in beneath his collar, and he kisses Alfons’s jaw and his cheekbones and his throat and his ears and murmurs, “Six weeks. That’s all.”

“That is too long,” Alfons says.

“I know,” Miles says.

“There is a possibility,” Alfons says, knitting his hands together behind the back of Miles’s neck, pressing their foreheads together, “that I will go mad from thinking of you. You may not want me, after that.”

“I will,” Miles says. “I always will.”

“Always,” Alfons says, and this moment is slipping through his fingers, but he knows that the moments of absence until Miles returns will stack up into endless concentric walls. “That does not sound like long enough.”

“I know,” Miles says. His arms tighten; his eyes deepen; he smiles, softly. “But we might as well give it a try, don’t you think?”

“Yes,” Alfons says, and the clock is counting down, but there’s still time; there are a few more kisses left…