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mikkenekoSo, some of you may remember Temperance. Or not; it's been a while (one year and eight months, more or less) since I worked on it. I also never really pimped it widely because I knew how terrible I am at finishing multiparters and I don't like to pimp what I can't finish. But I'm determined to finish it now. Here's the next step.
Temperance
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Language, drug use and abuse, violence
Pairings: None
Spoilers: None
Previous chapters:
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Al took two steps forward and reached out to grab Ed, but halted himself before he made contact. "Brother?" he called. Ed didn't raise his head, so Alphonse went to his knees with a clatter instead, bringing his head level with Ed's. "Brother! Can you hear me?"
Very slowly, Ed turned his head and focused on Al. He was close enough to see his pupils contract as he took in the sight before him, and then he blinked. "Hey, Al," Ed said in a dreamy tone. "You're back."
Now that he was closer, Al could see that Ed was not so composed as he appeared; beads of sweat stood out on his forehead and neck, and his hair and collar were rumpled and disheveled. Al turned to glare up at Doring. "What did you do to him?!"
"Don't throw a tantrum, young man," Doring said in a superior tone, looking down his nose at him, "your brother is fine. Just fine. Better than he's ever been, I'll wager; ask him yourself, in an hour or two, and see what he tells you."
"An hour or two?" Alphonse was outraged. "You --" Alphonse came to his feet, ready to wring Doring's scrawny neck.
Edward followed Alphonse's movement, over and up, and swayed a bit too far; losing his balance, he started to fall off the chair. With a bored, practiced movement, Doring reached out and grabbed his shoulder, pushing him back upright. "You! You gave him more of that drug, didn't you?" Alphonse demanded.
"You needn't sound like I did anything wrong. He asked me for it. Very nearly begged me, I might say." Doring smirked widely as he announced this. His hand stayed on Ed's shoulder, tightening possessively.
Al shoved back on his anger with some difficulty. "What do you want?" he said, wishing he didn't sound so helpless.
Doring glanced down, and his hand left Edward's shoulder to play with his braid, instead. Edward barely reacted. "For whatever reason, you seem to be immune to my drug," he said casually. "Either that or you have remarkable self-restraint. Sooner or later, you will have to eat, but in the meantime you are causing me quite a lot of trouble, and disruption to my orderly town.
"However, as you can see, your... brother is not immune to my lovely drug. Never forget that he depends on me for it. You may not know, but he volunteered to be responsible for your actions, as a condition of letting you out of jail. This was before your little breakout stunt, mind you. I'm sure that from now on you will be more circumspect in your behavior; I would hate to have to punish a good assistant for your little... indiscretions."
His hand, slightly grimy and callused, turned the braid over and dragged his fingers through the hair. Al entertained brief visions of breaking that hand off, but he shook with the need to control himself, after that threat Doring had just delivered. "I didn't ask for him to take responsibility for me," he managed at last. "As you can see, I can take care of myself just fine on my own." As you know perfectly well, Brother, you idiot! he castigated silently, feeling more than a little anger behind the hurt. You didn't have to do that!
"Whether you asked him to or not, he has," Doring said indifferently. "Because I am a forgiving man, I'll overlook the trouble you caused this time, but me more careful in the future. Now, Linus will take you to your quarters. I, ah," again that greasy smirk, "expect your brother will need some help in getting there."
Alphonse found himself torn between annoyance at being dismissed like an unruly kid, and the desire to get his brother out of there as quickly as possible. The door opened behind him, and he half-turned -- careful not to put his back to either Doring or the new presence -- to see the reedy, black-clad man who had guided them into the mansion the first time.
"Brother, let's go," he whispered, and Ed only turned his head in a short arc in response.
"Hmm?" he said, sounding distracted, and Al nearly sighed with frustration. How much of that drug had Doring given his brother, anyway? Nothing like this had happened the first time he had taken a dose, coming from the inn to confront Doring. At least Ed wasn't going into another fit, so Al decided to count his blessings.
"Brother, get up," he said, putting a hand under Ed's arm and nudging. Under his prompting, Ed slowly climbed off the stool and stood swaying for a moment, before deciding that the floor was also comfortable and sliding downwards. "Argh!"
Doring was watching. So was that little rat of a butler, and Ed was going to kill him when he came back to himself and remembered this, but Al had no choice. He couldn't possibly bend down far enough to support Ed with a shoulder under his arm and a hand around his waist, not unless he wanted to walk nearly double. And it was clear that Ed wasn't going anywhere on his two legs. There was nothing to be done but to pick him up entirely and carry him, under the smirking looks of the alchemist, out the door in what was unquestionably a full retreat.
The butler led them to a room in the servant's quarters, and Alphonse was pretty sure there was supposed to be a message in that. He rather thought Doring had some expectations of National Alchemists that didn't really fit his brother, but he felt too worn out to care. He knew it was a silly feeling -- he didn't need sleep, and this body didn't get fatigued -- but he felt it all the same. He didn't want to do anything for the next few hours -- not fight with guards, or work on escape routes out of the city, or try and set up a radio to contact the military. He didn't want to do anything but curl up as small as he could in a room with his brother and rest.
Edward seemed to have fallen into a half-doze on the way back to the room. It was hard to tell, in this state, and Al settled his brother on the narrow bed, watching him anxiously. This blank, almost unnatural calmness was the farthest thing he could think of from the screaming hysterics of the other night, and yet... it was the same drug. Who knew where the threshhold lay between dose and overdose?
Doring, probably, but Al wasn’t about to trust that.
He looked back at Ed, slumped bonelessly on the bed, hair falling in his face, and suddenly felt sickness rising in a heart he didn’t have. This wasn’t fair. It just wasn’t fair, because Ed deserved to be happy -- he deserved to be at peace. Al wanted that for his brother, but not like this. Not like this, made helpless and vulnerable against his will at the hands of some greedy swindler. Nobody but himself should see Ed like this, peaceful and open, defenses down; nobody but somebody who cared.
He sat down on the edge of the bed, and put his chin in his hands. Ed stirred, eyes opening to reveal a crack of gold. “Hey, Al,” he said, still in that strange, calm tone.
“Yes, Brother?” Al stirred himself to look over at his brother. “Is there something you need?”
“You’re back,” Ed said. And after a minute, “You okay?”
“I’m fine.” And now irritation made a reappearance. “You didn’t have to do that, Brother. It was a stupid thing to do.”
“What was?” Ed appeared to be struggling to stay awake.
“Telling Doring you were responsible for me, of course!” Al snapped. “I can take of myself perfectly well, you know. I don’t need you acting like you’re in charge of me!”
“I know that,” Ed said, beginning to grin. “You’re strong.”
Al stuttered to a stop. “Then -- why did you?” he asked, at a loss.
“Needed you here,” Ed started to push himself up on one elbow, then gave up and slid back down. “Helping me. Figure it out.”
“Figure what out, Brother?” Al began to feel hopeful again.
Ed didn’t answer for a long moment, blinking slowly. “Talking,” he said, “is slow. Not so slow... to think.”
“I understand,” Al said immediately. “Brother, it’ll wear off in a few hours. You can tell me everything then.”
“Tell you now,” he said. He tried to push himself up again, and managed to brace himself against the headboard this time. “Saw plant. Raw form. Leaves... not roots. Distillation process... it was...” he seemed to be struggling for the words. “Five steps... Jupiter on, Al, it was...”
“Boiling to get the essences out,” Al said, and nodded to show he understood, “and then redrying that to a crystallized form. That makes sense. Then what?”
“Had an array,” Ed said, leaning back against the headboard to stare at the ceiling. “Didn’t... see. Too early. Doring...”
“Keeps all the secrets to himself,” Alphonse said. “That figures. Brother, do you think he’ll ever let you see it? He’d be a fool to give you that much control.”
“Don’t know,” Ed said, and a small frown marred the blissful expression on his face. “Behave,” he added at a moment.
It took Alphonse a moment to figure Ed meant himself, not Al. “We’re relying on your good behavior? Oh, we’re doomed,” he snorted, relieved all the same. And now feeling more than a little foolish. While he’d been out throwing tantrums in the city streets, Ed had been working on a plan. He really ought to have known. Edward wasn’t the type to just give in to blackmail, or threats; but he could and would play along with any situation it he thought he could elicit more information by doing so. Information, as they both knew, was power. The more Edward could ferret out, the closer they came to reaching their goal.
But there were other kinds of power, too, Alphonse realized; more than just physical, or alchemical, or mental. They had all of those they needed, and to spare, but what resistance could you put up against a force that pressured you from inside?
“What are you going to do now, Brother?” Alphonse asked, turning back to his brother. “Are you just going to keep doing what he says?”
Edward, staring up at the ceiling, didn’t answer. Alphonse waited, and after a while, he looked away. Whether it was because of the drug, or if Edward just didn’t have an answer to give, pressing him for an answer would change nothing.
---------------------------
As long as he could think of it like a new research project, it was okay. The work Doring gave to him was easy stuff -- elementary, really. Basic chemistry. It was just a matter of taking the raw plants and breaking them apart, cooking them, adding the right combination of salt, and making sure to decant the water, then waiting for it to settle. It was hot, stinking work, and unimaginably tedious. Which was no doubt why Doring had wanted to foist the job off on someone else.
The real trick of the process was the part Doring kept to himself; the array in the next room where he carted off the finished results of Ed's part of the process and came out with the Rapture. The frustrating part was that it only took Doring five minutes of transmutation, for every half hour of Ed's work; that left Doring far too much time to strut around the lab and annoy Ed. At least some of the time, Doring occupied himself further distilling the drug; different forms for different uses, just as Ed had guessed.
In its purest form, Ed observed, it was a cloudy white liquid; Doring might or might not do other things to it, to change it into other forms. He recognized the fine brown powder that the innkeeper had used to drug their food the first night, as well as a heavy gray cake that seemed to use up the majority of what Doring produced. For the workers in the town, Ed guessed; most of what they got was watered down, diluted, and Ed wasn't any too trusting of its reliability. The pure stuff, it seemed, was saved only for Doring's inner circle, his personal guards and lieutenants.
And, now, Ed.
A shiver ran up Ed's spine, and he squashed it firmly and tried to focus. This work was mind-numbingly tedious, but he'd ground through worse in school. The decanter he was working on right now was approaching the critical boiling point, and he had to pay attention to it or the whole batch would be ruined. Think of it as a new research project, he told himself. Look past the mechanics, observe the reactions, and try to figure out what this stuff is, and how it works. Knowledge is power...
At another time Ed might have been thinking of ways to sabotage the process; now, damn it, he wanted it to go right. Not that he was afraid of Doring! The man hadn't done anything, at least not yet. But his smug attitude -- whenever he found even the slightest excuse to put down Ed's competence as an Alchemist, blaming his age, or his breeding -- was plenty enough to make Ed's vision cloud over with red. And he had to rein it in. There were people who would suffer if Ed lost his temper and destroyed the lab.
Another shiver escaped his control, and his trembling sleeve nearly brushed against the open, half-visible flame of the burner. He scowled at his traitorous arm, and tugged it back out of range. Not yet, damn it.
"Having trouble, my dear boy?"
That condescending, oily voice slithered over Ed's skin like a chemical spill, and he flinched defensively before he could stop himself. A nasty chuckle followed, dashing Ed's hopes that he'd managed to conceal it from Doring's view; the man watched him like a hawk for any sign of weakness, anyway. He turned on the lab bench, and jumped slightly to find Doring right behind him.
"I'm fine," he growled, and edged a few inches away, regaining his personal space. He tried to focus on his work, for the moment, anyway. Just a few more minutes...
Doring took another step, looming over Ed until he could practically feel the heat radiating off the man. Oh yeah, and smell him. Doring was none too clean. Ed gritted his teeth, and tried for civility.
"Can you not hover over me like that?" Ed said, casting a wary eye over his shoulder. "I'm trying to concentrate... Master Doring."
He reached to turn the flame down; it would slow things down, but he needed the extra time to gather his wits. His hand was shaking again, completely in defiance of his will; he had to brace his wrist against the edge of the table to keep it steady. A movement caught the corner of his eyes; before he could pull it back, a grimy, thin-fingered hand had closed about his wrist, and pulled it upwards.
"Hey!" His protests went completely ignored. Doring harbored surprising strength for such a reedy man -- unless Ed's senses were playing tricks on him, and it wasn't the weakness in his arm. Instinct wanted to drive an automail fist into the man's face for such a liberty, to knock him to the floor and stomp on him for good measure, but he took a deep breath and controlled himself.
Doring tugged his arm upwards, pulling Ed half around on the bench to face him. Ed glared up at him, wishing the bench were just a little bit taller. "Let go."
Doring ignored him, of course. "Your arm is shaking." Thin, cold fingers gripped his wrist, and pushed up the sleeve of his arm, wrapping around the skin beneath. Ed felt a shiver go down his arm that had nothing to do with the weakness. "How long has it been since your last hit?" He smiled coldly down at Ed.
Ed tugged on his wrist, angling to at least get him to let go of his sleeve. "You should know," he said sullenly. "You were the one who gave it to me."
It still burned in his memory, flushing his face all the way up to the ears with humiliation. When he agreed to work for Doring, the other alchemist allowed him his dose, but only conditionally; he didn't either didn't trust or simply wouldn't allow Ed give it to himself. It had taken three guards, the first time, to keep Ed from knocking Doring's head off when he administered it. Now, Doring didn't need the guards; however unwillingly, Ed co-operated.
It was still shocking to Ed, and a little sickening. No one was usually allowed that close to him -- only a few trusted people were even allowed to see Ed with his shirt off. To let any person handle him -- make changes to his body, over any objection he might have -- the only one he'd ever allowed that right was Winry. He knew Winry, and trusted her to act with his best interests in mind. He didn't know Doring, and he sure as hell didn't trust him, but he didn't have a choice in the matter. The only thing worse than submitting to Doring was the way the man gloated when he did, and Ed seethed silently under his stolid, sulky expression.
"I need to finish this," was all he said aloud, yanking his wrist out of Doring's grasp and leaning as far away as the workbench would permit. "Leave me alone unless you want this whole batch to be ruined."
Several expressions flickered over Doring's face, faster than Ed could decipher them; his mouth twitched, then pulled down, then smoothed into a casual mask. "You're such a diligent worker," he murmured at last, placing one hand on the table and leaning over to study the boiling mass. "If you keep up at this rate, there won't be anything left for you to do, and I'll have to send you away early."
Ed let his brows raise. "Ask me why I'd mind this," he sniped.
Doring chuckled, shaking his head. "No reason at all, dear boy," he said, and Ed narrowed his eyes warningly at the use of the name. Doring continued, "I'm only concerned for your state, that is all.
"If you leave the lab this early, I'll have to make sure your next dose is large enough to carry you all through the evening and night, or you'll suffer for it before morning. And that would leave you in no condition to walk. Or else," he added, seeing the flinch Ed couldn't hide, "I'll have to come to the room you and your brother share to give you your next dose... tonight."
Ed's hands gripped the edge of the workbench tightly, as he lowered his head, hoping his bangs would conceal his expression. It was hard to say which option appealed to him less. He leaned over to turn off the flame of the burner without answering, and sat waiting for the boil to stop, hands clenched tightly on his knees.
Doring looked down on him for a few moments, before seeming to make up his mind. "Oh, well," he said, with an exaggerated sigh. "You've been such a good worker, perhaps you've earned a little special treatment. I can give you a normal dose now, and then your next dose to take with you; treat yourself when it wears off, tonight."
Ed's head came up with a start, surprise coursing through him at Doring's words. He struggled to conceal the excitement he felt at the announcement, and failed; exultation flashed briefly over his face, before he managed to lock it back behind an impassive expression. "Really?" he said, stomping hard on his voice to keep it steady. This is it! his inner voice whispered. A pure sample to study, and the privacy to do it in, this is the break at last...
Fortunately, Doring misread the cause of his excitement. "Of course," he said, radiating smugness, "but do try to remember, Mr. Alchemist, don't let your... baser urges run away with you. Indulge them too early, and you'll suffer for it later. Heh, heh, heh..."
Irritating bastard. Ed ignored it. "Thank you, Master Doring," he said, as abjectly he could manage; it was expected. Inside, he was still crowing, but with his head bowed and his hands on his knees, he thought he looked properly grateful and submissive.
Submissive and grateful. Yeah, that was the key. Give me a little time with this shit alone, Doring, he said silently, and you'll see just how grateful I am.
---------------------------
"We're still missing something," Ed said at last, raising his head from where he'd been resting it against his flesh hand. "This doesn't all add up, Al. We're still missing one of the pieces."
"But we have all of the important things," Al protested, his voice conveying the same frustration as Ed's, if not the same tiredness. "We have the raw plant that I helped gather, we have the distilled form that you brought from the lab, and now we have the final product as well. We have each of the steps along the way. And we know the process between two of the steps. It should be a simple matter of identifying the missing link between the secondary and final forms."
"Well, it's not simple," Ed snapped; after hours of slow and frustrated progress, his temper was wearing thin. He was cramped, and tired, he had a pounding headache, and he was, as he fiercely told himself, only hungry. "Or maybe it's too simple, and we're making it too complicated. I don't know. But the fact is that the numbers aren't all adding up, something is missing!"
He punched his hand onto the countertop in frustration, adding to the small collection of dents that was already growing there, and scowled around at the mess surrounding them.
Their room, already tiny and cramped by most standards, had been rendered unlivable by their attempt to fit as much of a working laboratory as possible into a space not much bigger than a supply closet. The small bed, shoved against one wall, was piled up with books, leaving not quite enough room to sit on. The other two walls had been converted into a workbench, transmuted out of the walls and floor, and laden down with their improvised equipment.
Rows of small glass dishes, material borrowed from the window, held chemical baths and various sizes of samples, all precisely labeled (Al had insisted, despite Ed's protest that there were only the two of them working on it and it wasn't like he was going to forget which was which!) The litmus strips, the centrifuge, and the chromograph all competed for space off to the side; the majority of the space was reserved for their crowning effort, the microscope. It had taken him and Al two days to get the lenses transmuted and situated right, and they'd better hope nothing hit the window, because the glass that was left in it was as brittle as thin ice by now. Everywhere there was paper; notes, charts, microscope drawings, all devoted to one single subject, and for all the data they'd amassed from this monster, they were no closer to cracking its secrets.
"Let's start from the beginning again, Brother," Al said reasonably, picking up one of the sheets of paper. "We deconstructed the plant down to hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, calcium..."
"All in about the right proportions you'd expect to find in a plant," Ed took over the monologue, "with only a few trace elements extra. Looks just like any other weed."
"But then in the distillation process you take out most of the plant structure, and it looks like you take out most of the traces as well," Al said, reaching over to pick up one of the sample dishes filled with a small amount of wet brown paste. "And you're left with mostly phosphorus, hydrogen, and carbon. We know that much."
"I was hoping the trick would be in the trace metals," Ed groaned. "I get metals. I hate biochemistry. It's all three hundred billion variations on how you put hydrogen and carbon together to do stupid shit."
"That's life," Al said, with the vocal equivalent of a philosophical shrug; he didn't dare move his bulk too much in these cramped confines. "Okay, so we know the process that far. We also know that just eating the raw plant or the distillation doesn't really do anything to anyone, because people have tried. So the activating potential has to be in the final step. We know the before and we know the after. What's different?"
"That's what I don't get, Al!" Al winced slightly as the table added another dent to its collection. "You can break it down into the elements and it's the same, it's just the same as before. The elemental composition hasn't changed. Nothing's changed!"
"You said yourself, it's all in the arrangement of the elements," Al reminded him, and Ed bared his teeth at having his own words thrown back at him. "Alchemy is about understanding the composition of something, deconstructing it, and reconstructing it in a new arrangement, isn't it?"
Ed growled wordlessly. Al ignored him. "In theory, he could be taking the elements, breaking them down completely, and making a whole new hydrocarbon arrangement out of them." Armored shoulders sagged a little as he lifted his hands in defeat. "It could be anything, Brother."
There was no reply, and he across the table to see Ed's face turned down, both hands pressed tightly against his chin as he struggled to concentrate. "No," he said finally, in a tone of no uncertainty. "That's one thing I'm sure of, Al, is that Doring's not good enough to do something that complicated. If that was all he needed he could use any plants, he wouldn't need these ones specially. No, whatever he's doing, it's got to be something easy, something a second-rater can do without breaking a sweat. Something simple.... so simple..." He moved his hands to press his knuckles against his temples, grinding slightly. "Why can't I see it..."
"He may be a third rate alchemist, but he's also a doctor," Alphonse reminded him, carefully standing up and turning around in the cramped space. "He has to know a lot about medicines that we don't."
"Drugs, you mean," Ed snapped.
Al shrugged a little, creaking. "They can be the same thing a lot of the time," he said, and began sorting through a pile of books. "But the point is, we don't know what he did, because we don't know enough about how medicine works. We need to research if we're going to be able to understand what to do."
Ed groaned, leaning forward and pressing his hands against the back of his neck, leaning his elbows on the table. "This is getting us nowhere, Al."
"The answer's got to be in here somewhere, Brother," Al said patiently. "These are all the books on medicine that the library still had. We were lucky to be able to sneak these out of the library. I hope nobody notices they're gone."
"Nobody had been in that library for months," Ed sneered, slouching down further in his seat. "It was falling apart. Obviously the great and powerful Master Alchemist doesn't think books are important enough to take care of."
Alphonse sighed, a hollow, rattling noise of worn patience. "But if he did go looking for books, these would be the ones he'd probably want to find." He piled a stack of a dozen heavy hardback volumes into his arms, and turned carefully back to the table again. "The sooner we solve it, the less chance there is of us getting caught."
"I know," Ed grumbled, tense and edgy. "I know, okay. You don't have to remind me all the time. Just give me a damn book."
"Okay, I will," Al said. His voice carried a hint of the mild, pacifying tone one uses when they're working very hard at being patient with someone having a temper tantrum. It grated on Ed's nerves, but he knew he'd earned it. "Do you want the Bombast, or the Aurellius?"
"Forget the Aurellius, the guy's a fucking quack. Half these authors are total fakes." Ed glared at the stack of textbooks, as if accusing them of failing to pony up an answer right away. "I don't know. I don't care. Just give me something new."
Silently, Al handed him a book from the bottom of the stack. Ed nearly snatched it out of his hands, metal fingers digging into the edge of the binding until he was in danger of overturning his own usual careful book habits. "Some of these books might as well deserve to be left to rot," he said under his breath, to justify his behaviors.
Al, wisely, chose not to reply, instead reaching and creaking around the tiny room, securing the equipment back in its makeshift hiding places. Nobody had come to see the Elric brothers in their room yet since they had been left there, but they couldn't count on that forever. They had to be ready to hide the evidence of their work at a moment's notice, so as not to raise any suspicions. Ed kept one ear out for the sound of footsteps in the hall, just in case.
It was so hard to concentrate, though. Ed felt found up and tense, his skin stretched tight, every little sound and discomfort amplified. It was all he could do not to snap at his brother not to loom over him so much. He knew Al couldn't help it, that there simply just wasn't enough room in this tiny space for both of them and all their books, but knowing that did nothing to soothe his growing agitation.
Every few minutes Ed shifted position in the uncomfortable chair, trying to find some ease for his tense and aching muscles. The small creaks and clinks Al made when he moved assaulted Ed's ears like a hammer blow. How was he supposed to hear if someone was coming, over all that damn racket? How was he supposed to hear anyone coming, over the roaring of his own pulse in his ears?
How was he supposed to concentrate when every strand of hair falling on his skin pressed sharp, vivid lines against his skull? He realized that he'd been staring at the third page of the introduction chapter for long minutes, eyes unable to process what he was seeing. He grabbed his bangs with his metal hand, wincing as he yanked slightly, and tried to force himself to focus on the words in front of him.
Pharmacodynamic Evaluation of Factors Associated with the Development of Bacterial Resistance in Acutely Ill Patients, he read, and stopped, nearly stupid, at the end of the line. He could not seem to force his rattled mind to make sense of the words.
The black lines seemed to crawl on the page, and he lifted his eyes from the paper, blinking to try and relieve the effects of the pounding headache. Resistance. He couldn't seem to force his befuddled mind to get past the concept. Resistance was the way living organisms dealt with poisons, by adapting their systems to be less responsive to the toxins. To overcome resistance, you had to increase the dose. This was very important somehow, he could feel it, behind the haze that seemed to settle over his thoughts. To overcome resistance, you had to...
He just needed to be able to concentrate, that was all. He just had to get rid of this headache, get rid of these distractions, and then he could think straight again.
"Forget this, Al," he declared abruptly, flipping the book closed and pushing it across the desk. "We're not getting anywhere. We might as well give up for the night, pick up again tomorrow."
There was a squeaking sound as Al looked across the table at him, surprise written in every dent and polish of his armor. "But, Brother," Al said, confused. "We've hardly gotten anything done. We haven't looked at half these books yet; maybe they'll teach us something new we can --"
"Forget it!" Ed repeated forcefully, slamming his hands into the table and pushing himself to his feet. "These books are worthless, and we're just wasting time here. We can pick up again tomorrow, when we're more fresh, and get somewhere then."
"Tomorrow?" Al sounded completely bewildered now. "But, then we'll have wasted a whole day! We don't have all that much time, Brother!"
"I know that! But this mucking around isn't solving anything!" Ed scowled. Al was right, he knew he was. He was making excuses. Why was he making excuses? He pushed the thought to the back of his mind, and poured all his frustration, all his tension into the best steamroller glare he could manage. Al had to do what he said because he was the big brother here, and that was final. "Don't argue with me, Al. We're stopping."
Al was staring at him, and Ed began to fidget, looking restlessly around the little room. "Besides, you already put everything away," he said, somewhat lamely. Where had Al put it, anyway? He had better have put it somewhere safe, after all the blood Ed had sweated in the lab that afternoon to get it --
"What's this really about, Brother?" Al asked quietly.
"Nothing! Fine! If you want to keep working, you go right ahead!" Fuming, he began tearing at the compartments in the little room, pulling out the equipment again, and slamming it down on the table. What in hell had Al done with it? "But I'm taking a break! I'm not a machine, you know. I can't keep going on indefinitely with no rest and food, unlike some people!"
Behind him, Al made a muffled noise, like a stifled gasp, that only served to fuel Edward's frenzied searchings. What was he saying? He didn't even know any more, he couldn't think, he needed to think, he needed -- "Where the fuck did you put the sample, Al!" he burst out. "Where's the fucking drug?"
Damn Al's packing skills, anyway! Everything was stacked on top of everything else in the small space. In a sudden surge of anger, he yanked out the box of litmus graphs and threw it aside. There was a tinkle of breaking glass from somewhere on the floor, but he hardly registered it.
"Brother!" Hands were on him, suddenly, seizing him and turning him around. "Brother, you can't, you know that. We need that sample to do research on. You said you couldn't take it, we couldn't waste it. You said we needed every bit we had!"
"Forget what I said!" Ed snarled, struggling against his brother's hold until he managed to connect with a clang, and push them apart. "I didn't know what the hell I was talking about, and neither do you. We're wasting it with all this useless mucking about for nothing!"
"But we need --"
"Yes, we need it! I need it! What the fuck do you know about it, Al? You don't get hungry, you don't get thirsty! You don't know how this feels, you don't know how anything feels. You're a fucking empty suit of armor, Al, you don't know what need even means any more. So don't tell me what we need!"
There was a moment of frozen silence. Ed found himself breathing hard, as though he'd just run a mile or come out of a fight. Al was absolutely still.
Then, after a moment, the younger brother reached up and pried open a section of the armor, pulling a small envelope out from between two of the plates. "I thought I should keep it somewhere safe," Al said in a quiet, calm voice. "In case we got caught, they'd have a harder time taking it away from us."
He carefully laid the envelope flat on the workbench. Ed stared at it, unable to move his eyes away, unable to think beyond that small distance. "If we're taking a break," Al went on, "then I think I'm going to go out for a little bit. Nobody seems to be watching me, anyway."
Before Ed could gather himself enough to respond, Al left. Walked out the door and closed it behind him, with a quiet click that somehow felt all the more final than if he'd slammed it.
Trembling legs carried him the few steps to the workbench, where he snatched up the envelope in shaking hands, and peeled it open. There it was; a plain white powder, as simple and harmless-looking as sand.
The craving roared to the forefront of his mind, but with the sudden spike of need, came the recognition of just how much it had been driving him. The irrational anger which had driven him faded into the background, to be replaced by a sudden rush of guilt and loathing. Oh, fuck, Al. Why had he said that? He knew better, he knew he knew better than to do that -- to throw Al's condition into his face like that. Al might not have skin, might not have bones to ache and flesh to burn but he was still human and he could still feel, could still feel pain on a level far beyond what Ed could feel, far beyond Ed's stupid petty aches and pains.
In a surge of anger, he crushed the envelope in his flesh hand, feeling the grainy substance grate against the paper. Damn the drug, damn Doring, and damn this whole town for doing this, for dragging him down to their level with him! He felt the sudden urge to throw the damned stuff away, to flush it down the nearest drain, to destroy it for making him act this way towards his brother.
As strong as the impulse was, though, came an equally urgent nausea at the thought of letting the precious substance go; at facing hours more of the stomach-churning headaches and shakes, the incessant craving. Throwing the drug away wouldn't help anything; it would only make these feelings worse, make him worse, not better.
He sighed, and slowly opened his hand. He couldn't blame this on the drug, he knew. This was his own weakness, that had caused his own fuckups, and there was only one way to deal with that.
First things first.
---------------------------
There was no river in Elliotsburg, which struck down Ed's first few ideas for finding Al. He knew his brother, though; Al liked open spaces and nature when he was feeling sad. Sometimes during the night Al would go out just to look up at the stars; and feel the wind, he said, although they both knew he couldn't feel it. Ed knew better than to deny it, though -- or at least, he usually knew better. Damn, damn, damn.
There was a stairway at the end of the wing, a small unobtrusive workers' stair that led down to the boiler room in the basement; Ed took the opposite stair, leading upwards. His suspicions were confirmed a few minutes later, as the stairs kept climbing all the way onto the building's roof.
Up above, there wasn't much light; there were no electric or gas lights up here, and not much light came up from the occupied rooms below. Most of what light there was came from the dim glow of the town itself, further down the hill, and the gibbous moon above.
Al was sitting on the edge of the roof, hands clasped in his lap, boots dangling into empty space. Ed had to fight the urge to tell him to get back from the edge before he fell; Al wasn't likely to lose his balance, and even if he did it wouldn't hurt him, any more than making an awful racket.
Ed came halfway across the roof, but stopped before he approached the edge. He didn't feel all that sure of his own balance, just at the moment. When Al didn't turn around immediately, Ed shifted his weight and cleared his throat. "So, uh," he managed to say, then stopped.
Al turned his head to look at Ed, or at least enough that Ed could see his eyes. "Are you feeling better?" he asked, still in that small voice.
"Yeah," Ed said automatically, then paused. He sighed; he really sucked at apologies. "Look, Al... about before, I was..."
"Right," Al interrupted him.
That threw Ed off. "Huh?" he said after a minute.
"You were right," Al said softly, and turned back to look over the edge of the roof again. His voice was hard to hear. "I'm not the one who has that... poison in my body. I don't feel hunger or thirst. I can't feel pain, so I don't understand what you're going through right now. I shouldn't have tried to tell you what not to do."
"That's not -- that wasn't what I was going to say!"
Al didn't answer.
Screw caution, Ed decided, and he walked forward to sit down next to Al on the edge. The world swayed a little bit as he approached the empty space below him; he had to put one hand on Al's shoulder to steady himself, but then he was firmly seated and could look out over the empty space.
"Look, Al," he said softly, without looking at his brother. "All that means is that you're the only one who's got his head on straight in this whole mess. You've got to stay clearheaded, because nobody else in this crazy town is. I don't think you can even trust me right now. This drug is screwing with my head, Al, making me crazy, but that's no excuse for what I said or did. Right or wrong, I should never have said it, there's no excuse for saying it."
"Brother, it's all --"
"It's not all right," Ed interrupted. "But that's not what matters what now. Al, I've got to rely on you if we're going to get out of this alive."
He held out his arm, still avoiding looking at his brother. After a moment, hesitantly, Al put out his own hand under Ed's. Ed closed hand opened, dropping the crumpled envelope into Al's hand. There was another quiet gasp.
"This is..."
"I trust you, Al," Ed said softly. "Because right now, I can't trust myself."
There was silence. Ed squeezed his eyes shut, shaking, and tried not to think too hard about what Al was holding it. The few square milligrams of powder that would ease the shakes, satisfy the hunger, quell the pain... Walking up to the roof with it held in his hand, relinquishing hold of it into someone else's hands, was even harder than he'd thought it would be. But it was out of his hands, now, and there was nothing he could do to call it back.
"Brother," Al said, and his voice was almost back to normal. Ed opened his eyes, in time to see Al lean forward -- nearly toppling into empty space -- and stand up, clattering, on the edge of the roof. "Let's go back down."
"Huh?" Al held out his hand, and without thinking Ed took it, glad for the steadying influence while his head was still spinning. Something rustled against his automail, and when Al let go of his hand, he found himself holding the envelope again. "Al..."
"And when we get back to the room," Al said, still softly but with an underlying firmness, "you do what you need to. I don't like to see you suffer, Brother."
Ed's heart leaped in his throat. "But, Al..." he protested halfheartedly. "We need... for experiments..."
Al shook his head. "We won't crack the secret tonight," he said, clearly and definitely. "We just don't know enough yet. We'll spend tonight reading the books, once you feel well enough for it, and working on the other forms of the plant. By tomorrow we'll come up with new tests to do, and when you get another sample tomorrow, we'll start over then."
They left the roof, went back to their tiny cramped workroom and cell, and this time Al went ahead of him.
~tbc
Temperance
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Language, drug use and abuse, violence
Pairings: None
Spoilers: None
Previous chapters:
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Al took two steps forward and reached out to grab Ed, but halted himself before he made contact. "Brother?" he called. Ed didn't raise his head, so Alphonse went to his knees with a clatter instead, bringing his head level with Ed's. "Brother! Can you hear me?"
Very slowly, Ed turned his head and focused on Al. He was close enough to see his pupils contract as he took in the sight before him, and then he blinked. "Hey, Al," Ed said in a dreamy tone. "You're back."
Now that he was closer, Al could see that Ed was not so composed as he appeared; beads of sweat stood out on his forehead and neck, and his hair and collar were rumpled and disheveled. Al turned to glare up at Doring. "What did you do to him?!"
"Don't throw a tantrum, young man," Doring said in a superior tone, looking down his nose at him, "your brother is fine. Just fine. Better than he's ever been, I'll wager; ask him yourself, in an hour or two, and see what he tells you."
"An hour or two?" Alphonse was outraged. "You --" Alphonse came to his feet, ready to wring Doring's scrawny neck.
Edward followed Alphonse's movement, over and up, and swayed a bit too far; losing his balance, he started to fall off the chair. With a bored, practiced movement, Doring reached out and grabbed his shoulder, pushing him back upright. "You! You gave him more of that drug, didn't you?" Alphonse demanded.
"You needn't sound like I did anything wrong. He asked me for it. Very nearly begged me, I might say." Doring smirked widely as he announced this. His hand stayed on Ed's shoulder, tightening possessively.
Al shoved back on his anger with some difficulty. "What do you want?" he said, wishing he didn't sound so helpless.
Doring glanced down, and his hand left Edward's shoulder to play with his braid, instead. Edward barely reacted. "For whatever reason, you seem to be immune to my drug," he said casually. "Either that or you have remarkable self-restraint. Sooner or later, you will have to eat, but in the meantime you are causing me quite a lot of trouble, and disruption to my orderly town.
"However, as you can see, your... brother is not immune to my lovely drug. Never forget that he depends on me for it. You may not know, but he volunteered to be responsible for your actions, as a condition of letting you out of jail. This was before your little breakout stunt, mind you. I'm sure that from now on you will be more circumspect in your behavior; I would hate to have to punish a good assistant for your little... indiscretions."
His hand, slightly grimy and callused, turned the braid over and dragged his fingers through the hair. Al entertained brief visions of breaking that hand off, but he shook with the need to control himself, after that threat Doring had just delivered. "I didn't ask for him to take responsibility for me," he managed at last. "As you can see, I can take care of myself just fine on my own." As you know perfectly well, Brother, you idiot! he castigated silently, feeling more than a little anger behind the hurt. You didn't have to do that!
"Whether you asked him to or not, he has," Doring said indifferently. "Because I am a forgiving man, I'll overlook the trouble you caused this time, but me more careful in the future. Now, Linus will take you to your quarters. I, ah," again that greasy smirk, "expect your brother will need some help in getting there."
Alphonse found himself torn between annoyance at being dismissed like an unruly kid, and the desire to get his brother out of there as quickly as possible. The door opened behind him, and he half-turned -- careful not to put his back to either Doring or the new presence -- to see the reedy, black-clad man who had guided them into the mansion the first time.
"Brother, let's go," he whispered, and Ed only turned his head in a short arc in response.
"Hmm?" he said, sounding distracted, and Al nearly sighed with frustration. How much of that drug had Doring given his brother, anyway? Nothing like this had happened the first time he had taken a dose, coming from the inn to confront Doring. At least Ed wasn't going into another fit, so Al decided to count his blessings.
"Brother, get up," he said, putting a hand under Ed's arm and nudging. Under his prompting, Ed slowly climbed off the stool and stood swaying for a moment, before deciding that the floor was also comfortable and sliding downwards. "Argh!"
Doring was watching. So was that little rat of a butler, and Ed was going to kill him when he came back to himself and remembered this, but Al had no choice. He couldn't possibly bend down far enough to support Ed with a shoulder under his arm and a hand around his waist, not unless he wanted to walk nearly double. And it was clear that Ed wasn't going anywhere on his two legs. There was nothing to be done but to pick him up entirely and carry him, under the smirking looks of the alchemist, out the door in what was unquestionably a full retreat.
The butler led them to a room in the servant's quarters, and Alphonse was pretty sure there was supposed to be a message in that. He rather thought Doring had some expectations of National Alchemists that didn't really fit his brother, but he felt too worn out to care. He knew it was a silly feeling -- he didn't need sleep, and this body didn't get fatigued -- but he felt it all the same. He didn't want to do anything for the next few hours -- not fight with guards, or work on escape routes out of the city, or try and set up a radio to contact the military. He didn't want to do anything but curl up as small as he could in a room with his brother and rest.
Edward seemed to have fallen into a half-doze on the way back to the room. It was hard to tell, in this state, and Al settled his brother on the narrow bed, watching him anxiously. This blank, almost unnatural calmness was the farthest thing he could think of from the screaming hysterics of the other night, and yet... it was the same drug. Who knew where the threshhold lay between dose and overdose?
Doring, probably, but Al wasn’t about to trust that.
He looked back at Ed, slumped bonelessly on the bed, hair falling in his face, and suddenly felt sickness rising in a heart he didn’t have. This wasn’t fair. It just wasn’t fair, because Ed deserved to be happy -- he deserved to be at peace. Al wanted that for his brother, but not like this. Not like this, made helpless and vulnerable against his will at the hands of some greedy swindler. Nobody but himself should see Ed like this, peaceful and open, defenses down; nobody but somebody who cared.
He sat down on the edge of the bed, and put his chin in his hands. Ed stirred, eyes opening to reveal a crack of gold. “Hey, Al,” he said, still in that strange, calm tone.
“Yes, Brother?” Al stirred himself to look over at his brother. “Is there something you need?”
“You’re back,” Ed said. And after a minute, “You okay?”
“I’m fine.” And now irritation made a reappearance. “You didn’t have to do that, Brother. It was a stupid thing to do.”
“What was?” Ed appeared to be struggling to stay awake.
“Telling Doring you were responsible for me, of course!” Al snapped. “I can take of myself perfectly well, you know. I don’t need you acting like you’re in charge of me!”
“I know that,” Ed said, beginning to grin. “You’re strong.”
Al stuttered to a stop. “Then -- why did you?” he asked, at a loss.
“Needed you here,” Ed started to push himself up on one elbow, then gave up and slid back down. “Helping me. Figure it out.”
“Figure what out, Brother?” Al began to feel hopeful again.
Ed didn’t answer for a long moment, blinking slowly. “Talking,” he said, “is slow. Not so slow... to think.”
“I understand,” Al said immediately. “Brother, it’ll wear off in a few hours. You can tell me everything then.”
“Tell you now,” he said. He tried to push himself up again, and managed to brace himself against the headboard this time. “Saw plant. Raw form. Leaves... not roots. Distillation process... it was...” he seemed to be struggling for the words. “Five steps... Jupiter on, Al, it was...”
“Boiling to get the essences out,” Al said, and nodded to show he understood, “and then redrying that to a crystallized form. That makes sense. Then what?”
“Had an array,” Ed said, leaning back against the headboard to stare at the ceiling. “Didn’t... see. Too early. Doring...”
“Keeps all the secrets to himself,” Alphonse said. “That figures. Brother, do you think he’ll ever let you see it? He’d be a fool to give you that much control.”
“Don’t know,” Ed said, and a small frown marred the blissful expression on his face. “Behave,” he added at a moment.
It took Alphonse a moment to figure Ed meant himself, not Al. “We’re relying on your good behavior? Oh, we’re doomed,” he snorted, relieved all the same. And now feeling more than a little foolish. While he’d been out throwing tantrums in the city streets, Ed had been working on a plan. He really ought to have known. Edward wasn’t the type to just give in to blackmail, or threats; but he could and would play along with any situation it he thought he could elicit more information by doing so. Information, as they both knew, was power. The more Edward could ferret out, the closer they came to reaching their goal.
But there were other kinds of power, too, Alphonse realized; more than just physical, or alchemical, or mental. They had all of those they needed, and to spare, but what resistance could you put up against a force that pressured you from inside?
“What are you going to do now, Brother?” Alphonse asked, turning back to his brother. “Are you just going to keep doing what he says?”
Edward, staring up at the ceiling, didn’t answer. Alphonse waited, and after a while, he looked away. Whether it was because of the drug, or if Edward just didn’t have an answer to give, pressing him for an answer would change nothing.
---------------------------
As long as he could think of it like a new research project, it was okay. The work Doring gave to him was easy stuff -- elementary, really. Basic chemistry. It was just a matter of taking the raw plants and breaking them apart, cooking them, adding the right combination of salt, and making sure to decant the water, then waiting for it to settle. It was hot, stinking work, and unimaginably tedious. Which was no doubt why Doring had wanted to foist the job off on someone else.
The real trick of the process was the part Doring kept to himself; the array in the next room where he carted off the finished results of Ed's part of the process and came out with the Rapture. The frustrating part was that it only took Doring five minutes of transmutation, for every half hour of Ed's work; that left Doring far too much time to strut around the lab and annoy Ed. At least some of the time, Doring occupied himself further distilling the drug; different forms for different uses, just as Ed had guessed.
In its purest form, Ed observed, it was a cloudy white liquid; Doring might or might not do other things to it, to change it into other forms. He recognized the fine brown powder that the innkeeper had used to drug their food the first night, as well as a heavy gray cake that seemed to use up the majority of what Doring produced. For the workers in the town, Ed guessed; most of what they got was watered down, diluted, and Ed wasn't any too trusting of its reliability. The pure stuff, it seemed, was saved only for Doring's inner circle, his personal guards and lieutenants.
And, now, Ed.
A shiver ran up Ed's spine, and he squashed it firmly and tried to focus. This work was mind-numbingly tedious, but he'd ground through worse in school. The decanter he was working on right now was approaching the critical boiling point, and he had to pay attention to it or the whole batch would be ruined. Think of it as a new research project, he told himself. Look past the mechanics, observe the reactions, and try to figure out what this stuff is, and how it works. Knowledge is power...
At another time Ed might have been thinking of ways to sabotage the process; now, damn it, he wanted it to go right. Not that he was afraid of Doring! The man hadn't done anything, at least not yet. But his smug attitude -- whenever he found even the slightest excuse to put down Ed's competence as an Alchemist, blaming his age, or his breeding -- was plenty enough to make Ed's vision cloud over with red. And he had to rein it in. There were people who would suffer if Ed lost his temper and destroyed the lab.
Another shiver escaped his control, and his trembling sleeve nearly brushed against the open, half-visible flame of the burner. He scowled at his traitorous arm, and tugged it back out of range. Not yet, damn it.
"Having trouble, my dear boy?"
That condescending, oily voice slithered over Ed's skin like a chemical spill, and he flinched defensively before he could stop himself. A nasty chuckle followed, dashing Ed's hopes that he'd managed to conceal it from Doring's view; the man watched him like a hawk for any sign of weakness, anyway. He turned on the lab bench, and jumped slightly to find Doring right behind him.
"I'm fine," he growled, and edged a few inches away, regaining his personal space. He tried to focus on his work, for the moment, anyway. Just a few more minutes...
Doring took another step, looming over Ed until he could practically feel the heat radiating off the man. Oh yeah, and smell him. Doring was none too clean. Ed gritted his teeth, and tried for civility.
"Can you not hover over me like that?" Ed said, casting a wary eye over his shoulder. "I'm trying to concentrate... Master Doring."
He reached to turn the flame down; it would slow things down, but he needed the extra time to gather his wits. His hand was shaking again, completely in defiance of his will; he had to brace his wrist against the edge of the table to keep it steady. A movement caught the corner of his eyes; before he could pull it back, a grimy, thin-fingered hand had closed about his wrist, and pulled it upwards.
"Hey!" His protests went completely ignored. Doring harbored surprising strength for such a reedy man -- unless Ed's senses were playing tricks on him, and it wasn't the weakness in his arm. Instinct wanted to drive an automail fist into the man's face for such a liberty, to knock him to the floor and stomp on him for good measure, but he took a deep breath and controlled himself.
Doring tugged his arm upwards, pulling Ed half around on the bench to face him. Ed glared up at him, wishing the bench were just a little bit taller. "Let go."
Doring ignored him, of course. "Your arm is shaking." Thin, cold fingers gripped his wrist, and pushed up the sleeve of his arm, wrapping around the skin beneath. Ed felt a shiver go down his arm that had nothing to do with the weakness. "How long has it been since your last hit?" He smiled coldly down at Ed.
Ed tugged on his wrist, angling to at least get him to let go of his sleeve. "You should know," he said sullenly. "You were the one who gave it to me."
It still burned in his memory, flushing his face all the way up to the ears with humiliation. When he agreed to work for Doring, the other alchemist allowed him his dose, but only conditionally; he didn't either didn't trust or simply wouldn't allow Ed give it to himself. It had taken three guards, the first time, to keep Ed from knocking Doring's head off when he administered it. Now, Doring didn't need the guards; however unwillingly, Ed co-operated.
It was still shocking to Ed, and a little sickening. No one was usually allowed that close to him -- only a few trusted people were even allowed to see Ed with his shirt off. To let any person handle him -- make changes to his body, over any objection he might have -- the only one he'd ever allowed that right was Winry. He knew Winry, and trusted her to act with his best interests in mind. He didn't know Doring, and he sure as hell didn't trust him, but he didn't have a choice in the matter. The only thing worse than submitting to Doring was the way the man gloated when he did, and Ed seethed silently under his stolid, sulky expression.
"I need to finish this," was all he said aloud, yanking his wrist out of Doring's grasp and leaning as far away as the workbench would permit. "Leave me alone unless you want this whole batch to be ruined."
Several expressions flickered over Doring's face, faster than Ed could decipher them; his mouth twitched, then pulled down, then smoothed into a casual mask. "You're such a diligent worker," he murmured at last, placing one hand on the table and leaning over to study the boiling mass. "If you keep up at this rate, there won't be anything left for you to do, and I'll have to send you away early."
Ed let his brows raise. "Ask me why I'd mind this," he sniped.
Doring chuckled, shaking his head. "No reason at all, dear boy," he said, and Ed narrowed his eyes warningly at the use of the name. Doring continued, "I'm only concerned for your state, that is all.
"If you leave the lab this early, I'll have to make sure your next dose is large enough to carry you all through the evening and night, or you'll suffer for it before morning. And that would leave you in no condition to walk. Or else," he added, seeing the flinch Ed couldn't hide, "I'll have to come to the room you and your brother share to give you your next dose... tonight."
Ed's hands gripped the edge of the workbench tightly, as he lowered his head, hoping his bangs would conceal his expression. It was hard to say which option appealed to him less. He leaned over to turn off the flame of the burner without answering, and sat waiting for the boil to stop, hands clenched tightly on his knees.
Doring looked down on him for a few moments, before seeming to make up his mind. "Oh, well," he said, with an exaggerated sigh. "You've been such a good worker, perhaps you've earned a little special treatment. I can give you a normal dose now, and then your next dose to take with you; treat yourself when it wears off, tonight."
Ed's head came up with a start, surprise coursing through him at Doring's words. He struggled to conceal the excitement he felt at the announcement, and failed; exultation flashed briefly over his face, before he managed to lock it back behind an impassive expression. "Really?" he said, stomping hard on his voice to keep it steady. This is it! his inner voice whispered. A pure sample to study, and the privacy to do it in, this is the break at last...
Fortunately, Doring misread the cause of his excitement. "Of course," he said, radiating smugness, "but do try to remember, Mr. Alchemist, don't let your... baser urges run away with you. Indulge them too early, and you'll suffer for it later. Heh, heh, heh..."
Irritating bastard. Ed ignored it. "Thank you, Master Doring," he said, as abjectly he could manage; it was expected. Inside, he was still crowing, but with his head bowed and his hands on his knees, he thought he looked properly grateful and submissive.
Submissive and grateful. Yeah, that was the key. Give me a little time with this shit alone, Doring, he said silently, and you'll see just how grateful I am.
---------------------------
"We're still missing something," Ed said at last, raising his head from where he'd been resting it against his flesh hand. "This doesn't all add up, Al. We're still missing one of the pieces."
"But we have all of the important things," Al protested, his voice conveying the same frustration as Ed's, if not the same tiredness. "We have the raw plant that I helped gather, we have the distilled form that you brought from the lab, and now we have the final product as well. We have each of the steps along the way. And we know the process between two of the steps. It should be a simple matter of identifying the missing link between the secondary and final forms."
"Well, it's not simple," Ed snapped; after hours of slow and frustrated progress, his temper was wearing thin. He was cramped, and tired, he had a pounding headache, and he was, as he fiercely told himself, only hungry. "Or maybe it's too simple, and we're making it too complicated. I don't know. But the fact is that the numbers aren't all adding up, something is missing!"
He punched his hand onto the countertop in frustration, adding to the small collection of dents that was already growing there, and scowled around at the mess surrounding them.
Their room, already tiny and cramped by most standards, had been rendered unlivable by their attempt to fit as much of a working laboratory as possible into a space not much bigger than a supply closet. The small bed, shoved against one wall, was piled up with books, leaving not quite enough room to sit on. The other two walls had been converted into a workbench, transmuted out of the walls and floor, and laden down with their improvised equipment.
Rows of small glass dishes, material borrowed from the window, held chemical baths and various sizes of samples, all precisely labeled (Al had insisted, despite Ed's protest that there were only the two of them working on it and it wasn't like he was going to forget which was which!) The litmus strips, the centrifuge, and the chromograph all competed for space off to the side; the majority of the space was reserved for their crowning effort, the microscope. It had taken him and Al two days to get the lenses transmuted and situated right, and they'd better hope nothing hit the window, because the glass that was left in it was as brittle as thin ice by now. Everywhere there was paper; notes, charts, microscope drawings, all devoted to one single subject, and for all the data they'd amassed from this monster, they were no closer to cracking its secrets.
"Let's start from the beginning again, Brother," Al said reasonably, picking up one of the sheets of paper. "We deconstructed the plant down to hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, calcium..."
"All in about the right proportions you'd expect to find in a plant," Ed took over the monologue, "with only a few trace elements extra. Looks just like any other weed."
"But then in the distillation process you take out most of the plant structure, and it looks like you take out most of the traces as well," Al said, reaching over to pick up one of the sample dishes filled with a small amount of wet brown paste. "And you're left with mostly phosphorus, hydrogen, and carbon. We know that much."
"I was hoping the trick would be in the trace metals," Ed groaned. "I get metals. I hate biochemistry. It's all three hundred billion variations on how you put hydrogen and carbon together to do stupid shit."
"That's life," Al said, with the vocal equivalent of a philosophical shrug; he didn't dare move his bulk too much in these cramped confines. "Okay, so we know the process that far. We also know that just eating the raw plant or the distillation doesn't really do anything to anyone, because people have tried. So the activating potential has to be in the final step. We know the before and we know the after. What's different?"
"That's what I don't get, Al!" Al winced slightly as the table added another dent to its collection. "You can break it down into the elements and it's the same, it's just the same as before. The elemental composition hasn't changed. Nothing's changed!"
"You said yourself, it's all in the arrangement of the elements," Al reminded him, and Ed bared his teeth at having his own words thrown back at him. "Alchemy is about understanding the composition of something, deconstructing it, and reconstructing it in a new arrangement, isn't it?"
Ed growled wordlessly. Al ignored him. "In theory, he could be taking the elements, breaking them down completely, and making a whole new hydrocarbon arrangement out of them." Armored shoulders sagged a little as he lifted his hands in defeat. "It could be anything, Brother."
There was no reply, and he across the table to see Ed's face turned down, both hands pressed tightly against his chin as he struggled to concentrate. "No," he said finally, in a tone of no uncertainty. "That's one thing I'm sure of, Al, is that Doring's not good enough to do something that complicated. If that was all he needed he could use any plants, he wouldn't need these ones specially. No, whatever he's doing, it's got to be something easy, something a second-rater can do without breaking a sweat. Something simple.... so simple..." He moved his hands to press his knuckles against his temples, grinding slightly. "Why can't I see it..."
"He may be a third rate alchemist, but he's also a doctor," Alphonse reminded him, carefully standing up and turning around in the cramped space. "He has to know a lot about medicines that we don't."
"Drugs, you mean," Ed snapped.
Al shrugged a little, creaking. "They can be the same thing a lot of the time," he said, and began sorting through a pile of books. "But the point is, we don't know what he did, because we don't know enough about how medicine works. We need to research if we're going to be able to understand what to do."
Ed groaned, leaning forward and pressing his hands against the back of his neck, leaning his elbows on the table. "This is getting us nowhere, Al."
"The answer's got to be in here somewhere, Brother," Al said patiently. "These are all the books on medicine that the library still had. We were lucky to be able to sneak these out of the library. I hope nobody notices they're gone."
"Nobody had been in that library for months," Ed sneered, slouching down further in his seat. "It was falling apart. Obviously the great and powerful Master Alchemist doesn't think books are important enough to take care of."
Alphonse sighed, a hollow, rattling noise of worn patience. "But if he did go looking for books, these would be the ones he'd probably want to find." He piled a stack of a dozen heavy hardback volumes into his arms, and turned carefully back to the table again. "The sooner we solve it, the less chance there is of us getting caught."
"I know," Ed grumbled, tense and edgy. "I know, okay. You don't have to remind me all the time. Just give me a damn book."
"Okay, I will," Al said. His voice carried a hint of the mild, pacifying tone one uses when they're working very hard at being patient with someone having a temper tantrum. It grated on Ed's nerves, but he knew he'd earned it. "Do you want the Bombast, or the Aurellius?"
"Forget the Aurellius, the guy's a fucking quack. Half these authors are total fakes." Ed glared at the stack of textbooks, as if accusing them of failing to pony up an answer right away. "I don't know. I don't care. Just give me something new."
Silently, Al handed him a book from the bottom of the stack. Ed nearly snatched it out of his hands, metal fingers digging into the edge of the binding until he was in danger of overturning his own usual careful book habits. "Some of these books might as well deserve to be left to rot," he said under his breath, to justify his behaviors.
Al, wisely, chose not to reply, instead reaching and creaking around the tiny room, securing the equipment back in its makeshift hiding places. Nobody had come to see the Elric brothers in their room yet since they had been left there, but they couldn't count on that forever. They had to be ready to hide the evidence of their work at a moment's notice, so as not to raise any suspicions. Ed kept one ear out for the sound of footsteps in the hall, just in case.
It was so hard to concentrate, though. Ed felt found up and tense, his skin stretched tight, every little sound and discomfort amplified. It was all he could do not to snap at his brother not to loom over him so much. He knew Al couldn't help it, that there simply just wasn't enough room in this tiny space for both of them and all their books, but knowing that did nothing to soothe his growing agitation.
Every few minutes Ed shifted position in the uncomfortable chair, trying to find some ease for his tense and aching muscles. The small creaks and clinks Al made when he moved assaulted Ed's ears like a hammer blow. How was he supposed to hear if someone was coming, over all that damn racket? How was he supposed to hear anyone coming, over the roaring of his own pulse in his ears?
How was he supposed to concentrate when every strand of hair falling on his skin pressed sharp, vivid lines against his skull? He realized that he'd been staring at the third page of the introduction chapter for long minutes, eyes unable to process what he was seeing. He grabbed his bangs with his metal hand, wincing as he yanked slightly, and tried to force himself to focus on the words in front of him.
Pharmacodynamic Evaluation of Factors Associated with the Development of Bacterial Resistance in Acutely Ill Patients, he read, and stopped, nearly stupid, at the end of the line. He could not seem to force his rattled mind to make sense of the words.
The black lines seemed to crawl on the page, and he lifted his eyes from the paper, blinking to try and relieve the effects of the pounding headache. Resistance. He couldn't seem to force his befuddled mind to get past the concept. Resistance was the way living organisms dealt with poisons, by adapting their systems to be less responsive to the toxins. To overcome resistance, you had to increase the dose. This was very important somehow, he could feel it, behind the haze that seemed to settle over his thoughts. To overcome resistance, you had to...
He just needed to be able to concentrate, that was all. He just had to get rid of this headache, get rid of these distractions, and then he could think straight again.
"Forget this, Al," he declared abruptly, flipping the book closed and pushing it across the desk. "We're not getting anywhere. We might as well give up for the night, pick up again tomorrow."
There was a squeaking sound as Al looked across the table at him, surprise written in every dent and polish of his armor. "But, Brother," Al said, confused. "We've hardly gotten anything done. We haven't looked at half these books yet; maybe they'll teach us something new we can --"
"Forget it!" Ed repeated forcefully, slamming his hands into the table and pushing himself to his feet. "These books are worthless, and we're just wasting time here. We can pick up again tomorrow, when we're more fresh, and get somewhere then."
"Tomorrow?" Al sounded completely bewildered now. "But, then we'll have wasted a whole day! We don't have all that much time, Brother!"
"I know that! But this mucking around isn't solving anything!" Ed scowled. Al was right, he knew he was. He was making excuses. Why was he making excuses? He pushed the thought to the back of his mind, and poured all his frustration, all his tension into the best steamroller glare he could manage. Al had to do what he said because he was the big brother here, and that was final. "Don't argue with me, Al. We're stopping."
Al was staring at him, and Ed began to fidget, looking restlessly around the little room. "Besides, you already put everything away," he said, somewhat lamely. Where had Al put it, anyway? He had better have put it somewhere safe, after all the blood Ed had sweated in the lab that afternoon to get it --
"What's this really about, Brother?" Al asked quietly.
"Nothing! Fine! If you want to keep working, you go right ahead!" Fuming, he began tearing at the compartments in the little room, pulling out the equipment again, and slamming it down on the table. What in hell had Al done with it? "But I'm taking a break! I'm not a machine, you know. I can't keep going on indefinitely with no rest and food, unlike some people!"
Behind him, Al made a muffled noise, like a stifled gasp, that only served to fuel Edward's frenzied searchings. What was he saying? He didn't even know any more, he couldn't think, he needed to think, he needed -- "Where the fuck did you put the sample, Al!" he burst out. "Where's the fucking drug?"
Damn Al's packing skills, anyway! Everything was stacked on top of everything else in the small space. In a sudden surge of anger, he yanked out the box of litmus graphs and threw it aside. There was a tinkle of breaking glass from somewhere on the floor, but he hardly registered it.
"Brother!" Hands were on him, suddenly, seizing him and turning him around. "Brother, you can't, you know that. We need that sample to do research on. You said you couldn't take it, we couldn't waste it. You said we needed every bit we had!"
"Forget what I said!" Ed snarled, struggling against his brother's hold until he managed to connect with a clang, and push them apart. "I didn't know what the hell I was talking about, and neither do you. We're wasting it with all this useless mucking about for nothing!"
"But we need --"
"Yes, we need it! I need it! What the fuck do you know about it, Al? You don't get hungry, you don't get thirsty! You don't know how this feels, you don't know how anything feels. You're a fucking empty suit of armor, Al, you don't know what need even means any more. So don't tell me what we need!"
There was a moment of frozen silence. Ed found himself breathing hard, as though he'd just run a mile or come out of a fight. Al was absolutely still.
Then, after a moment, the younger brother reached up and pried open a section of the armor, pulling a small envelope out from between two of the plates. "I thought I should keep it somewhere safe," Al said in a quiet, calm voice. "In case we got caught, they'd have a harder time taking it away from us."
He carefully laid the envelope flat on the workbench. Ed stared at it, unable to move his eyes away, unable to think beyond that small distance. "If we're taking a break," Al went on, "then I think I'm going to go out for a little bit. Nobody seems to be watching me, anyway."
Before Ed could gather himself enough to respond, Al left. Walked out the door and closed it behind him, with a quiet click that somehow felt all the more final than if he'd slammed it.
Trembling legs carried him the few steps to the workbench, where he snatched up the envelope in shaking hands, and peeled it open. There it was; a plain white powder, as simple and harmless-looking as sand.
The craving roared to the forefront of his mind, but with the sudden spike of need, came the recognition of just how much it had been driving him. The irrational anger which had driven him faded into the background, to be replaced by a sudden rush of guilt and loathing. Oh, fuck, Al. Why had he said that? He knew better, he knew he knew better than to do that -- to throw Al's condition into his face like that. Al might not have skin, might not have bones to ache and flesh to burn but he was still human and he could still feel, could still feel pain on a level far beyond what Ed could feel, far beyond Ed's stupid petty aches and pains.
In a surge of anger, he crushed the envelope in his flesh hand, feeling the grainy substance grate against the paper. Damn the drug, damn Doring, and damn this whole town for doing this, for dragging him down to their level with him! He felt the sudden urge to throw the damned stuff away, to flush it down the nearest drain, to destroy it for making him act this way towards his brother.
As strong as the impulse was, though, came an equally urgent nausea at the thought of letting the precious substance go; at facing hours more of the stomach-churning headaches and shakes, the incessant craving. Throwing the drug away wouldn't help anything; it would only make these feelings worse, make him worse, not better.
He sighed, and slowly opened his hand. He couldn't blame this on the drug, he knew. This was his own weakness, that had caused his own fuckups, and there was only one way to deal with that.
First things first.
---------------------------
There was no river in Elliotsburg, which struck down Ed's first few ideas for finding Al. He knew his brother, though; Al liked open spaces and nature when he was feeling sad. Sometimes during the night Al would go out just to look up at the stars; and feel the wind, he said, although they both knew he couldn't feel it. Ed knew better than to deny it, though -- or at least, he usually knew better. Damn, damn, damn.
There was a stairway at the end of the wing, a small unobtrusive workers' stair that led down to the boiler room in the basement; Ed took the opposite stair, leading upwards. His suspicions were confirmed a few minutes later, as the stairs kept climbing all the way onto the building's roof.
Up above, there wasn't much light; there were no electric or gas lights up here, and not much light came up from the occupied rooms below. Most of what light there was came from the dim glow of the town itself, further down the hill, and the gibbous moon above.
Al was sitting on the edge of the roof, hands clasped in his lap, boots dangling into empty space. Ed had to fight the urge to tell him to get back from the edge before he fell; Al wasn't likely to lose his balance, and even if he did it wouldn't hurt him, any more than making an awful racket.
Ed came halfway across the roof, but stopped before he approached the edge. He didn't feel all that sure of his own balance, just at the moment. When Al didn't turn around immediately, Ed shifted his weight and cleared his throat. "So, uh," he managed to say, then stopped.
Al turned his head to look at Ed, or at least enough that Ed could see his eyes. "Are you feeling better?" he asked, still in that small voice.
"Yeah," Ed said automatically, then paused. He sighed; he really sucked at apologies. "Look, Al... about before, I was..."
"Right," Al interrupted him.
That threw Ed off. "Huh?" he said after a minute.
"You were right," Al said softly, and turned back to look over the edge of the roof again. His voice was hard to hear. "I'm not the one who has that... poison in my body. I don't feel hunger or thirst. I can't feel pain, so I don't understand what you're going through right now. I shouldn't have tried to tell you what not to do."
"That's not -- that wasn't what I was going to say!"
Al didn't answer.
Screw caution, Ed decided, and he walked forward to sit down next to Al on the edge. The world swayed a little bit as he approached the empty space below him; he had to put one hand on Al's shoulder to steady himself, but then he was firmly seated and could look out over the empty space.
"Look, Al," he said softly, without looking at his brother. "All that means is that you're the only one who's got his head on straight in this whole mess. You've got to stay clearheaded, because nobody else in this crazy town is. I don't think you can even trust me right now. This drug is screwing with my head, Al, making me crazy, but that's no excuse for what I said or did. Right or wrong, I should never have said it, there's no excuse for saying it."
"Brother, it's all --"
"It's not all right," Ed interrupted. "But that's not what matters what now. Al, I've got to rely on you if we're going to get out of this alive."
He held out his arm, still avoiding looking at his brother. After a moment, hesitantly, Al put out his own hand under Ed's. Ed closed hand opened, dropping the crumpled envelope into Al's hand. There was another quiet gasp.
"This is..."
"I trust you, Al," Ed said softly. "Because right now, I can't trust myself."
There was silence. Ed squeezed his eyes shut, shaking, and tried not to think too hard about what Al was holding it. The few square milligrams of powder that would ease the shakes, satisfy the hunger, quell the pain... Walking up to the roof with it held in his hand, relinquishing hold of it into someone else's hands, was even harder than he'd thought it would be. But it was out of his hands, now, and there was nothing he could do to call it back.
"Brother," Al said, and his voice was almost back to normal. Ed opened his eyes, in time to see Al lean forward -- nearly toppling into empty space -- and stand up, clattering, on the edge of the roof. "Let's go back down."
"Huh?" Al held out his hand, and without thinking Ed took it, glad for the steadying influence while his head was still spinning. Something rustled against his automail, and when Al let go of his hand, he found himself holding the envelope again. "Al..."
"And when we get back to the room," Al said, still softly but with an underlying firmness, "you do what you need to. I don't like to see you suffer, Brother."
Ed's heart leaped in his throat. "But, Al..." he protested halfheartedly. "We need... for experiments..."
Al shook his head. "We won't crack the secret tonight," he said, clearly and definitely. "We just don't know enough yet. We'll spend tonight reading the books, once you feel well enough for it, and working on the other forms of the plant. By tomorrow we'll come up with new tests to do, and when you get another sample tomorrow, we'll start over then."
They left the roof, went back to their tiny cramped workroom and cell, and this time Al went ahead of him.
~tbc
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 03:41 am (UTC)Will leave real reply on it after reading...
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Date: 2006-05-05 04:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-06 02:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 03:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 06:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 07:56 am (UTC)Oh, I love this story, it's just teeming with plot. I love the details of the alchemy that you have tied in here, and Ed and Al's interaction. It's fantastic. And I agree with Al on Doring -- I wanna punch him, too.
I'm glad you continued it! Great job with this chapter.
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Date: 2006-05-05 04:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 08:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 04:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 01:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-06 02:42 am (UTC)Yay!
Date: 2006-04-14 01:56 pm (UTC)Fabulous jeopardies in this story, and I love how Ed and Al have managed to transmute a complete lab from available materials. They refuse to become victims--which is perfectly in line with their canon characterizations. I'm really enjoying this story and am looking forward to future chapters.
Re: Yay!
Date: 2006-05-05 04:48 pm (UTC)And heck, no! The Elric Brothers never give up without a fight! :)
no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 02:05 pm (UTC)Kalika may also have some brain damage that makes her speak in third person.
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Date: 2006-05-05 04:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 05:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 07:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 04:48 pm (UTC)In this chapter, nothing!no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 04:39 pm (UTC)... I thought you finished this chapter a LONG time ago. o_O*
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Date: 2006-05-05 04:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 05:02 pm (UTC)It is pure wonderful delicous plot. It's thrilling and scary with just the right amount of humor and angst.
I really feel for Al and Ed -- and I worry about how far they are going to get with their whole laboratory set up before someone discovers it and figures out what their plans are.
Anyway I hope you don't wait as long to get the next chapter out.
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Date: 2006-05-05 04:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 04:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 05:30 pm (UTC)*clings to*
This plot is such love ;_; And the ending was a pleasant surprise :O Al giving it BACK to him...whoa.
God, I'm incoherent O.o
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Date: 2006-05-05 04:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 08:27 pm (UTC)I was glad to see side effects of anger and irritation when Ed wants his drug. ♥ Poor Al - poor Ed, too. Ed's having issues and I always feel bad for Al when that happens. I love this characterization, this interaction - it's Ed&Al doing what they do best - be brothers. XD;;
Can't wait to see more (but I guess I'll have to)--
~~Vikki
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Date: 2006-05-05 04:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 08:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 04:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-14 09:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 04:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-16 12:30 am (UTC)~comesoutoflurking~
Just wanted to tell you that you're amazing. ^__^;; And I'm really happy that you updated this one. I've been waiting for you to do so since I found you on Scimitar Smile last summer and started er...for lack of a better word...stalking you. >_> I wish I could comment on everything you write, because you're simply incredible. Just know that I closely follow all your work, but I'm kinda shy when it comes to posting things...and reviewing...because I always feel like an idiot. :D I think I might have left a review for you on FF.net in a moment of confidence...
But anyway...~couragecouragecourage~ Just wanted to say you rock.
OHOH! And I didn't forget what happened! I jumped right into this chapter. >_> And then I went back and reread the first four anyway. ^o^;
no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 04:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-17 08:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 04:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-19 05:17 am (UTC)I think that I'm glad that I haven't happened to come by it before, because I don't know if I could have dealt with such a long gap between chapters with much grace! I'm very glad that you are continuing it, and am just dying to find out what happens next!
(And to find out if my theory about the powder is correct. It probably isn't, but still...)
no subject
Date: 2006-05-05 04:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-19 11:02 pm (UTC)Plus, the more I think about what I was thinking... the less sense it makes.
*shrugs*
please update
Date: 2006-05-16 03:40 pm (UTC)