FMA Fanfic: Unconditional – Thirteen
Unconditional – Thirteen.
by arcanewinter. R 5740 Roy*Hughes. Fullmetal Alchemist. AT, pan-series spoilers.
Forging a tenuous bond, Greed and Hughes enter the fringes of human society.
These characters do not belong to me. I do not profit from this. [...]
Greed stood in front of the door bearing the address Hughes had given him. It was the door to a tiny residence, apparently vacated through some means Greed couldn’t guess, but it was in good condition. It looked like any human might live here, might do human things here.
He’d been standing there for several minutes now, trying to bring himself to ring the doorbell, or knock, or whatever he was supposed to do. It felt ridiculous having to submit to the rules of house entry, but at the same time, there was no need to break in, and this was Hughes’ house, after all, so he shouldn’t just walk in anyway.
He already felt like an idiot for agreeing to join him here, but he thought maybe the house wouldn’t look so . . . kept-up.
And it might have been the middle of the night, but there were houses around it, too, and Greed was just standing there.
“This is stupid,” he muttered, turning and fairly stomping back toward the street. He was going to have to rethink this, or at the very least, wait sourly for Hughes to find him. Whatever the case, he was certainly not going to–
“Greed?”
Well, that worked too.
Greed turned to see Hughes standing in the doorway. Again, he looked pleased, as though he hadn’t expected Greed back. “You made it.”
“Yeah.” Greed paused, still standing awkwardly on the front walk. Should he go in? Or should he wait for an invitation? “I don’t think I was followed.”
“Good.” Hughes stepped to the side. As though recognizing Greed’s hesitation, he nodded his head toward the space inside.
Fine. Greed shoved his hands in his pockets and followed the walk back to the door, glancing at Hughes before he stepped over the threshold.
“How long were you out there, anyway?”
“Just got here,” Greed mumbled.
“Glad to hear it,” Hughes answered. He shut the door behind them, and Greed tried to stay calm. It even smelled like someone’s home, not like the dust and dank he was accustomed to.
“I’m surprised you didn’t bring anything.”
Greed turned to look at him. Hughes was trying for light humor.
It wasn’t like Greed hadn’t thought about bringing a few things, just to kick it off right, but the thought of returning to his first and last permanent residence with Envy made Greed a little less eager to be reunited with his possessions.
There had only been one he really cared about, anyway.
“This is your place,” he answered. “Not mine.” He shrugged.
Hughes paused, glancing over the room with its sparse furnishings: a desk, a chair, a couch, the light of a few lanterns to pool in the gloom.
“It’s yours, too. I meant what I said: whatever this is with us, I need it.” His eyes returned to Greed’s. “Will you stay?”
That look.
That subtle desperation for company, for reassurance, for devotion and acceptance.
His envy. He still felt it.
Did he even realize it? Did he even hear that particular sin forging his plea; would he see it measuring his gaze if he looked?
“Yeah,” Greed answered. What else was he going to do? “Yeah, I’ll stay.”
The relief on Hughes’ face was a familiar sort. But rather than hurting Greed further, it was almost a comfort. Hughes would never be entirely free of Envy. That body would never be human.
Greed sauntered to the couch and flopped onto his back on its worn cushions. He didn’t belong here, he could feel that he didn’t, but maybe he could force it. He’d act like he owned the place, even if, for once, he didn’t feel it.
“I could sleep for about a week,” he muttered. He only realized now as his eyes closed how deeply exhausted he was. He’d hadn’t rested for almost three days.
“Whatever you need,” Hughes acquiesced. “I’ll be here.”
“Just keep an eye out,” Greed mumbled, already drifting off. “We’re still in danger.”
“Get some sleep. I know.”
Greed wondered if he really did know, but it was too late not to trust him.
* * * * *
Comatose was a good state for Greed. Beyond just needing the rest, he could always extend his unconsciousness if he woke up and didn’t feel ready to deal with his predicament just yet.
He’d elected for that option quite a few times in the past few days, always careful to peer out at the room without giving himself away. Most of those times, if Hughes was in the room, he was reading or playing some kind of cards at the desk.
But once or twice, he’d woken secretly to find Hughes watching him with an odd expression on his face. And there was no way in hell Greed was getting up to face that.
This time, though, the room was empty when Greed woke up, and it continued to be empty as he slowly opened his eyes all the way and sat up for the first time in probably a few days.
But this wasn’t the only room in the house, and he could sense that he wasn’t completely alone.
It seemed like sometime in the afternoon. Exploration was easy, and the first door opened to a small kitchen, also empty.
There was only one other room worth checking, and as Greed entered it he subconsciously stepped a little quieter. It was a bedroom, and Hughes lay asleep in its bed.
He paused.
So that was the reason. With his eyes closed, with his glasses gone, Envy looked more himself. And Greed would have looked like Roy. That’s what Hughes had seen.
Greed was good at being silent. He moved closer without any disturbance in Hughes, but his steps were hardly voluntary. He was drawn closer by all those things he couldn’t help feeling. How close could he get before Hughes would wake? Could he touch him?
But the glint of the necklace on the bedside table saved him from falling any further into the illusion.
Greed took it, lifting it to the bit of sunlight that made it past the torn curtains. It was pretty, something Greed might steal if he found it somewhere, but what was it? Greed realized only now that Roy didn’t know its importance, either.
He turned and sat gracelessly on an empty space on the bed. As intended, Hughes woke with a start–and he was almost defiantly Hughes, the glasses forming almost immediately.
“Greed? What is it? What’s the matter?”
“Nothing.” He shrugged. “I’m awake.”
Hughes stared at him for a blank moment, as though there must be something more. Greed half-expected to be chastised, but then he laughed quietly, rubbing his face like a human would to wake up. “I see that.” He was so good-natured. Hard to believe how caustic he could get when provoked.
“So what is this?” Greed asked, holding out the necklace. His voice no longer revealed his bitterness over having found it in the first place. Maybe he no longer felt it. Maybe he’d given up wishing it hadn’t happened.
Hughes reached for it as he sat up, taking it thoughtfully. He glanced at Greed as though to gauge his intent, a second-guess, then returned his gaze to the tiny, glittering pendant. It looked like a diamond, modest but brilliant, delicately suspended by finely crafted gold.
Greed looked from it to Hughes’ face.
“It was a gift,” Hughes murmured. “I gave it to her on our fifth anniversary–of our first date, not our marriage. Even when we were married, I couldn’t forget that day.” He drew a slow breath and released it, his expression bitter-sweet. “We were going to start a tradition. She’d give it to our daughter, and she to her daughter, and on like that, starting with us, starting with her.”
Because humans only lived a little while, Greed pondered. Handing something down one to another would mean something.
“I shouldn’t have it,” he went on, his voice much less smooth. “It’s Elycia’s. I just don’t want to give it up–I don’t want to let go of it.”
His fist tightened around the chain with his words. He meant them to his core. And though Greed sometimes felt that way about his things, he knew this was a little different.
“But she’s probably miserable thinking she’s lost it,” he reasoned, his voice softer again as his hand relaxed. “I need to put it back. Some night, I will, I’ll put it back.”
Back where it was found. Back at the house on the desk, back where Greed had first seen Hughes, where Greed had heard his wife still alive upstairs. Where Greed had said nothing.
“Why don’t you give it to her?”
The words were out of his mouth before he could think better of them. Hughes looked shocked.
But Greed was on to something. This was stupid, after all: they were hanging around in Central of all places, thumbing their noses at a military force that wanted nothing better than to see them burn for something they didn’t (entirely) do. It wasn’t this house that Hughes wanted–he could get that anywhere. He just didn’t want to be too far away. And if he was going to be tethered to her like this, if they were going to put themselves in danger for this proximity, then Hughes should do something with it. He should make it worth the risk.
“I’ll go with you.”
Now, Greed’s mouth was getting out of hand. But he couldn’t take it back. Hughes’ eyes, cautious and frightened, told him that much.
“You would do that?”
“Yeah.” Greed looked away, focusing on his knees and brushing the dust from his clothes like the idea didn’t frighten him, too, just by the sheer awkwardness. He didn’t belong here. He wouldn’t belong there. “We’ll drop by together, and we’ll sit her down and explain what happened, and there will be proof, with pictures and with everything you know, and she’ll accept it. She’ll get over it.”
Hughes’ face nearly brightened, but his doubt overtook it swiftly. “I don’t know–it’s too much to ask of her.”
But Hughes wanted to believe. He wanted the support. Greed could see it.
Greed shifted, just a little closer, to elbow him in the ribs. “At least you don’t look like me, right?” He grinned purposefully.
That got a smile out of him, though it faded conspicuously as Hughes studied his face. He shook his head as though to change its course of thought, clearing his throat. “But you know,” he murmured seriously, “that the more you validate me, that I am who I say I am . . .”
His words trailed off, and after a moment he lifted his eyes to Greed’s again.
Greed met them a little too long before he broke away, looking to the floor. “I don’t know anything anymore.”
He could feel Hughes watching him, but Greed couldn’t look up again. His attention was consumed by a single speck on the floor.
After a long minute, Hughes bumped him on the shoulder with his fist.
“You’re a good friend, Greed.”
Greed appraised him sidelong, jarred from his focus. Finally, he shrugged, ever casual, and stood to leave the room.
“We all have our bad days.”
* * * * *
The week that followed was a series of false starts. Hughes obviously wanted this more than anything else Greed could think of, but almost equal to that was his dread of rejection. And there were other concerns. If she didn’t accept him then the ordeal could traumatize her–maybe even if she did accept him. And in the back of Greed’s mind, he wondered if she might actually betray them to the military or whoever else might be looking for them.
But for Hughes’ sake, he had to believe that Elycia Hughes would be the same sort of person as Riza Hawkeye, whom he considered to be trustworthy. Or maybe she was the only one.
“All right,” Hughes announced at the door, same as the past six nights. “Let’s go.”
“You’re sure this time?” Greed smirked lightly as he approached him, folding his arms as he’d done the past five nights.
But there was something a little different in Hughes’ expression tonight. “You know what I’m afraid of. But anything could happen to her. She’s not . . . like us. And I can’t repeat what happened with Gracia. I can’t put it off. It’s tonight.”
Well, he hadn’t given that speech before. Greed nodded. “Tonight, then. Let’s go.”
Hughes was still for a moment, his hand over his pocket, where he’d tucked the necklace away. But after a moment, he stepped forward, and Greed followed him out, unfolding his sunglasses.
* * *
Travel was slow. Everything was slow for humans and their ilk, but they eventually arrived at the front walk. It was dark, but not late. And unlike the last time he was here, the lights were on. She was awake. Or at least, someone was.
“Didn’t sell it, huh?” Greed murmured.
Hughes shook his head dully, eyes never leaving the door at the end of the walk. His mouth was dry as he answered. “No. We left it to her; she decided to keep it.”
Greed let him stand a moment before beginning to prod. This was as far as they’d ever got. “She’s gonna be asleep if you wait too long.”
“Just give me a minute,” he answered. He was breathing a little faster, but for the most part he was calm. He might actually do it.
He checked his pocket again before he drew a slower breath. “All right. It’s tonight.”
He strode evenly, deliberately, to the door, and while Greed was still wondering if he’d stop and turn back, Hughes pressed the bell, and Greed heard it sound inside. Hughes was resolute.
Cursing lightly, Greed hurried to the side of the door, out of sight. He was moral support, not a feature. Hughes was just an arm’s reach away, easily retrieved if necessary.
But he wasn’t running. As he waited, as Greed listened to the footsteps inside, and her call that she would be right there, Greed could see the tension in him as he all but planted himself on the welcome mat. He was determined to ride it out, come what may.
Greed was impressed.
But the look of terror on his face was worsening, and as the knob turned, so did Hughes. It was an involuntary reaction. He didn’t move a muscle, but another likeness consumed him like it had been thrown over him, to hide him at the last second.
The door opened, and the light fell on him, but her “May I help you?” was spoken to a stranger: a stranger who had no words, whose own ability had escaped his control and kept him safe and hidden, where he didn’t want to be.
Well. Somebody had to do something.
She gasped when Greed appeared, sudden as a thief, but he kept his focus on Hughes to avoid intimidating her–for now. He took his arm and dragged him inside, closing the door behind him. Her initial shock kept her from resisting them, but now, of course, she was ordering them out. And though of average size for a woman, her authority was very convincing.
But Greed didn’t have time for that right now. It would work itself out, eventually.
He took Hughes’ shoulders and shook him until he found his eyes, whose expression was all he recognized.
“Show her.”
Hughes was panicking, though silently, and rock-still. “Not like this,” he finally pushed out, his jaw barely willing to allow the movement.
“Yes, exactly like this. There will never be a better time. Show her!”
“I can’t!”
“I said GET OUT.”
Greed turned with the intention of snapping at her to give them a minute, but a minute was apparently too much to ask for. She had taken out a gun, and she held it like she was used to it.
Hughes took a half-step toward her. “Elycia, put that down!”
“I don’t think so!”
But even in the midst of her retort, she saw it. His sudden concern over his daughter handling such a weapon was apparently the push he needed. Greed saw Hughes’ reemergence out of the corner of his eye, and she saw it fully.
But she was no fool. She snapped up her aim again, her shock passing swiftly. “What are you!?”
Hughes grimaced, yet he held still for her to see him, to pass judgment on him. But he had no words for himself. He looked to Greed, pleading mutely.
“He’s your father,” Greed answered, his eyes only moving to the girl in the following silence.
“My father is dead.”
“He look dead to you?”
“It doesn’t matter what he looks like!”
At that, Hughes finally found his voice. “Look, honey–”
“Start over.”
“Elycia, just put the gun down, and I’ll explain everything!”
“I’ll put it down when you get the hell out of my house!”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” muttered Greed, reaching for the gun. He’d intended to take it from her before she could even react, but her reflexes surprised him. She backed up a step so unexpectedly that he lost his balance, and she used his temporary vulnerability to bring the butt of the gun down hard against the back of his neck.
Her force was commendable. It would have easily brought down a human of his size, but the strike of the steel against his Shield was nothing more than an ugly sound. Slowly, he lifted his head to glower at her from beneath his brow, the glasses knocked off with the collision.
“You should listen to your father,” he muttered, plucking the gun from her hands, her joints painfully jarred from the unexpected resistance.
Hughes had made some mild, quiet protest, sweeping forward to take up her hands, examining them with a father’s concern.
She was bewildered. While Hughes looked over her hands, she studied his face, clearly recognizing something there that had nothing to do with malice or deceit or trickery. This was Hughes at his truest. And now that it was obvious that their visit was nothing she was prepared to resist, she was taking a moment to wonder.
“But how?” she asked faintly. Like Hughes, she wanted to believe. She wanted her doubts to be crushed. It was the same expression Greed had read on Hughes’ face.
Hughes lifted his eyes now, her hands still so carefully held in his.
His lips parted, and tensed, but he said nothing. The longer he met her gaze the closer he was getting to outright weeping.
“This is alchemy at its finest,” Greed muttered. “A human back from the dead.”
“A homunculus.”
But it was she who said it, not Hughes.
“You know what that is?” Hughes asked gravely.
She pulled her hands out of his. “I know my father was investigating them at the time of his murder.”
She shifted her weight, a foot sliding back while her torso remained still. She was preparing to run, through the back of the house, probably, and she knew surprise was her best bet.
Of course, Hughes’ eyes were on hers alone. Greed was the only one paying attention.
“I was,” Hughes answered slowly. “And they didn’t want me to share what I found.”
“How do I know you weren’t part of that? How can I tell you’re not lying?”
“I can prove it to you–I can tell you things! Things only you and I would know.” He had taken a short step closer in his urgency, but she smoothly kept her distance.
It was only now that Greed saw a glimpse of emotion in her. She glared at him as though in reprimand. “I was four years old when my father was murdered by your kind. How much, exactly, do you think I remember?”
She may as well have shot him with the gun Greed still held.
His entire frame lost its strength, its reason for standing, breathing, walking. “You don’t remember me?”
He drew his breath slowly in her silence, but his eyes were already wet. “Tell me you remember something!”
“I remember losing him.” She blinked, her face nearly mirroring Hughes’, but she was stronger. She only recognized him in photographs; unlike him, there was no emotional connection to ravage and weaken her.
At least she was smart enough to protect herself first, Greed thought. But it was clearly killing Hughes.
He had lifted his hand to reach out for her, but brought it instead to his mouth to cover it. He was obviously in need of her, yet he knew she would recoil again. His other arm held him around his middle.
Greed would almost have done that for him. From the looks of it, it had never occurred to Hughes that he would have left no mark on his daughter’s memory, that he might not have lived long enough to make any lasting impression on her life. He may as well never have existed.
Why would she risk her safety to trust someone she didn’t remember?
Hughes pulled himself together enough to draw the necklace from his pocket. He held it out to her, letting her take it without touching him.
“You took this?”
He shook his head shortly, lacking any sort of conviction. He was backing away, giving up. “I didn’t know what I was doing at the time. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything.”
Greed glanced between them, helpless, though not certain he should care one way or another. But his primary concern was Hughes, and Hughes not going off the deep end. Leaving the gun on a table, he followed him, faithfully, as Hughes turned for the door, somehow getting himself to it.
“Get me home,” Hughes whispered shortly, blindly feeling for the knob.
Greed began to reach for him.
“You have my father’s voice,” she said, stopping them both.
They turned back. She stood defiant still, but her tone suggested otherwise.
“I only know that because of the last thing he said to me. It’s the only thing I remember.” She held the chain of the necklace tightly, her knuckles white where her fist rested against her stomach.
“What did he say to me that night?”
Greed looked from her to Hughes. His expression was still one of ruin, but he was steadier, his eyes focusing more sharply on her.
“I told you I had work to do.”
Her breath escaped her, as though she’d been holding it. Her hesitation, and the way she glanced around her, told Greed that she knew it was not wise to believe, that her very desire to believe was a weapon against her, but still she finally paced forward, and Hughes finally moved to meet her.
She said nothing, but her eyes searched his face and her mouth lost its rigid line. She finally leaned into him, and his arms took her in. He held her differently than what Greed was accustomed to. It was all protection and steadiness and concern for wellbeing. Things had gone right, finally, or so he guessed.
“I’m gonna go eat your food,” Greed muttered. He couldn’t be sure that either of them heard him, but he felt he should say it anyway. He wouldn’t want to be rude, now.
He passed them and headed for the kitchen.
* * *
The more he overheard of their conversation, the more he ate, sitting on her countertop amidst a plundering of her refrigerator.
He’d realized two steps into the kitchen that supporting this little venture had all but guaranteed he wouldn’t see Envy again for a long, long time–at least not until the daughter had gone, but with the way humans worked, there was bound to be yet another descendant to keep Hughes interested, then another, and another.
Humans begetting humans . . . the whole thing made Greed squeamish. Not to mention the fact that Hughes looked the same age as his daughter: how was that supposed to reinforce their relationship for Greed? They barely even resembled each other past the analytical quality of their eyes.
He stuffed the rest of a sandwich into his mouth and pulled the cork out of a bottle of wine, soon guzzling down about half of it. At the moment, Hughes was delicately avoiding any mention of Envy by name in his summary of the past thirty years, but maybe that was just as well. Maybe it was better not to hear talk of Envy at all if those words would be only hateful. Greed needed to protect his memory if no one else would.
You loved him.
Greed slouched against the cupboards, his arms folded over the wine bottle. Why had he been such a pushover when Hughes had first shown up? Why had he consented in the first place to call him by the name he wanted? Was Greed losing his edge? Had his agreement with Envy damaged his ability to put himself first over everything else? If he had just refused him, maybe Envy would have resurfaced. But it was too late now. Hughes had too much to stick around for.
It wasn’t that Greed didn’t like Hughes. But he wasn’t Envy.
The rhythm of the conversation outside had changed. She was going to get a drink of water.
And that meant–
Greed continued to sulk as the girl appeared in the kitchen doorway, the door swinging shut behind her. Her gait wavered when she saw him, as though she’d forgotten he was still in the house, but she recovered quickly. She had avoided the untrustworthy military, she had explained to Hughes, but she’d followed in her father’s footsteps as an investigator, and Greed could believe it. With the country in its current state, she’d need to keep pace with the worst of them.
She took a glass and filled it from the sink he sat next to. He watched her drink from it, but as she set down the glass again she seemed unsatisfied.
He held out the wine to her.
Her eyes moved first to it, then to him before she took it. “Thanks,” she said, before drinking it straight from the bottle as he had done.
Greed shifted where he sat. “It’s yours.”
She laughed shortly, abruptly lowering the bottle. “I suppose it is,” she answered, lifting it to take another swig, this one uninterrupted.
Greed didn’t know what he was supposed to say to her, but saying nothing didn’t bother him. Arms again folded, he studied the floor. She’d go back to Hughes in a second. Maybe she’d leave the wine. Even if she didn’t, she probably had something else somewhere.
“You look familiar,” she said, instead, and Greed tensed. “I’ve seen you in pictures.”
But she hadn’t said anything that wasn’t true, regardless of what she was probably thinking, and Greed calmed himself.
“We’re all made from humans,” he mumbled. “He’s just a freak.”
She paused.
“Who are you, then?”
He flashed a grin. Could he say it without grinning? “I’m Greed.”
“I would have thought ‘Gluttony.’”
He laughed quietly. “My appetite isn’t limited to food,” he replied, his gaze leveling on hers. His grin had morphed into something more sly, but it faltered as his insinuation suddenly became very awkward.
He had fully resumed his sulking just in time for Hughes to appear in the doorway. His eyes settled on Greed, pointedly, before his expression softened, his focus moving to Elycia. His tone was reserved. “Would it be all right if I went upstairs? Just to . . . see.”
“Of course,” she answered, and Greed noticed her face was perceptibly brighter, her eyes happier, even in their deep sympathy. “I don’t think much has changed at all.”
Hughes nodded as he dropped his gaze. He tapped the latch his hand rested on as he stepped back again. “I’ll be back, then.”
And as soon as the door had swung shut behind him, her expression sagged again. She looked after him, eyes on the door, as she brought the bottle’s mouth to hers once more.
Shouldn’t she be a little happier than this? The man she must have mourned her entire life had been returned to her, after all. Unless–
“You don’t believe him?” Greed asked.
Her mouth twitched in a sort of torn smile. “I do believe him. That’s the problem.”
Greed glanced to the side as though he might find some clue there, but there was nothing to help him, and his attention returned to her.
She noticed his expectation. Her fingers toyed with the neck of the bottle before she lifted one hand to smooth her straight hair back from her forehead to the tie that held it. Hughes had at least passed that gesture on to her, if such a thing were possible. “Toward the end,” she explained, “Mom was . . . smiling. She was happy because she was going to be with Papa again.”
Greed frowned. Can’t be in two places at once.
She drew her breath slowly, passing it in and out until it was steady. She handed the wine back to Greed, who took it.
“Finish it,” she offered, bravely cheerful as she left the kitchen.
He watched the door as it shut behind her, and listened to her footsteps as she took the stairs to join her father.
Alone again, Greed soon followed her suggestion, swigging down the last of the wine with more of a purpose this time.
Were humans really reunited after death? It would only seem fair, given that they died to begin with. But he didn’t remember anything after Roy’s demise. There had been nothing in the interim–nothing he knew about, anyway.
Or maybe the whole idea was philosophical. And Greed was no philosopher.
Having eaten almost everything of interest, Greed pushed himself from the counter and stretched. This was all very exhausting, despite the fact that it had very little to do with him. After all, they were upstairs, indulging in the tragedy of it all, and by this point he was very unnecessary.
Still, as Greed exited into the empty living room, he knew he had been needed in the beginning, and that was somewhat validating. This wouldn’t have happened without him. And as it seemed to have gone well, in the end, Greed felt good about it, despite how counterproductive it was to him and his goals. There was a name for that kind of behavior, but Greed wouldn’t insult himself by using it.
On the coffee table was an open album of photographs. If Greed had to guess, he’d say it was a scrapbook Gracia had put together of Elycia, but he wasn’t about to get any closer to it than the couch, where he slumped. Hughes might be done with him for the evening, or perhaps for some time to come, but Greed wouldn’t leave without him. They were both better off together. Even if they hadn’t seen or heard news of any further moves against them lately, they couldn’t let down their guard. They couldn’t be reckless.
But Greed didn’t see the harm in sleeping.
Flopping to his side, he stretched out across the cushions, and though still listening for outside activity, fell asleep.
* * *
He was dully aware of their descent down the stairs, but not fully conscious. They were speaking to each other, their tone amicable and calm even if he didn’t care to make out the words.
He felt a light clap on his shoulder as the light from overhead dimmed in Hughes’ shadow. “Let’s go, buddy.”
Greed’s answer was little more than a slur. He quickly forgot what he’d meant to say. He was tired.
He felt Hughes pulling him to sit up, but Hughes was fighting that battle for him. Did it matter where he slept? Wasn’t she family?
In the end, he felt Hughes sit on the edge of the cushions, his hands gathering Greed’s legs around him as he tipped Greed onto his back and stood with him.
“All right, we’re off.”
“You’ll be all right to walk back?” She sounded curiously concerned.
“He’s light.”
I’m not light, you idiot, you’re just a homunculus.
But his inner grouse didn’t make it to the surface. He was little more than dead weight as Hughes made his goodbyes. He called her ‘honey;’ she called him ‘papa,’ and though she paused, she seemed to mean it. Hughes moved forward to hug her, one-armed on account of his cargo, and while she was close, she added a “Good night, Greed.”
He grunted. It was only polite.
Finally, they were out, and the chill air felt good. He hadn’t realized how stuffy the house had been, but it was probably normal, what with the unbroken windows, the lamps, and however the thing was heated.
“How’d it go?” Greed murmured after a few minutes. The fresh air was starting to wake him up a little, though Hughes’ steady gait was counteracting its effect.
“Really well,” Hughes answered. Greed could feel his voice through his back. “As well as I could have hoped for, anyway. I just wish–Well. I won’t bother you with it.”
Greed felt him squeeze his leg where he held it. ‘No hard feelings.’
“Tell me,” he mumbled.
Hughes walked a handful of paces in silence. “I just wish she remembered me.”
“She did a little.”
“The worst part, though.” Another few, measured paces, and he drew a deep breath, lifting Greed slightly before he released it again. “For four years she was the center of my life, but for her . . .”
“You can start now.”
“Yeah.” Hughes squeezed his leg again, just behind the knee. “I’ll just have to.”
He said nothing further, but he seemed calm. The conversation drawing to its close, Greed grew restful again, concentrating on nothing more than Hughes’ breathing and the rhythmic motion of his walk.
And there was something else that eventually pervaded his thoughts, his face tucked so close to Hughes’ neck.
He smelled like Envy.
His arms tightened against Hughes’ chest where they dangled, his hands briefly smoothing over a torso he knew well enough to have memorized.
It was a good thing he was so close to dozing off again. His arms relaxed once more, but he didn’t bother to draw his mouth away from Hughes’ skin.