FMA Fanfic: Unconditional – One
Unconditional – One.
by arcanewinter. PG13 545 Roy*Hughes. Fullmetal Alchemist. AT, pan-series spoilers.
Greed has no memory of what’s come before him; he only knows what he wants.
These characters do not belong to me. I do not profit from this.
She called him Greed.
From the moment he opened his eyes, he knew why. It was all he was and all he felt, and his wanting didn’t stop with the stones in her outstretched hand. It drove him and it pulled him, and in his first weeks as her creation, he obeyed her when it got him something and he rebelled when the world showed him something better. He among them was difficult to control.
She knew his tendencies. She punished and she belittled and she did her best to lash him to her will, but whatever he had always faded in the promise of what he wanted.
But at the heart of it, at the heart of him, was a want that predated everything he knew, a want that seemed to have been born with him, at his side. It held his ear to its mouth and was never quiet, and it was this weakness that she reached for, and this weakness that she twisted.
She dangled the offer in front of him as though he were a dog. One request for his sworn obedience. One wish for his life.
He didn’t want to give in to her. Giving in meant bending to her, answering her summons, serving her fickle will. He would be hers. That was her offer, her equal exchange.
He hissed shortly and turned away, his arms folding across his chest as the skin along his hands hardened and blackened with his mood. He knew his own name was guiding him, curling around his conscience and clouding his reasoning. He knew he didn’t belong to anyone, that he was clever enough to evade her long enough to make escape worth it. It was just that he wanted so damned much.
It was what kept him from using his claws to remove her from his world: she alone was capable of giving him more than he could give himself. There was an ability that separated them, and without it, he was powerless to make manifest his greatest desire.
He began to smile jaggedly, taking his time, greedily claiming the moments for himself. That he’d give in to her he had no doubt. She promised him things and the only thing he had to give in return was something he couldn’t see, something he couldn’t touch. Sure, freedom and dignity were valuable, but there had to be something worth more, something he could feel and hold and possess. He just had to find it.
And it was already there in his mind, something he’d been wanting even before he could breathe, before his heart could beat. It was familiar, familiar to a point that frightened him, comforting in a way that suggested the ashes he’d risen from. He didn’t understand what he wanted, but someone did; this was someone else’s wish.
And he’d never be satisfied without it.
She stood before him, tempting him though her hands were empty, commanding him though her form was weak.
“What is it that you want?” she repeated.
His mind had already begun humming with the answer. He rested the full weight of his contempt on her as he lifted his gaze.
“I want him back.”