Chapter Text
They had been tying on clothing for hours now. Kain and Hawkeye were up on deck but Mustang had been “overseeing” the “acquisition” of their new wardrobe.
Though to ed is looked suspiciously like the guy was ogling them as they were undressing.
Havoc should probably have gotten the car to where ever he was going to drive it to now. Ed wondered if the pick up car would have more space for all the bullshit clothing they were apparently getting.
On the up side though, he did managed to let em have the cool ass black leather pants. He was going to look badass in that! He was sure. Al favored pastels more of course. And they both got some light blue colored jeans. But why they both needed several pairs of cotton pants in a tan color... Must be another culture thing.
Ed was just getting off the gimbal platform when the ship did a mighty swing to the side. Tumbling Ed right in to the lap of the pervy colonel who had been watching them all afternoon. That was followed by a huge explosion sound.
“The hell!”
“Stay here! Both of you!”
And Ed was quickly moved to the side as Mustang went out the door to the upper deck. That door had only closed for a second when the other door, the one leading further in to the ship opened. A panicked guy came out.
“We're taking on water, abandon ship!”
“Oh no, my wares. This stuff isn't insured outside the shop!”
Ed looked at Al, they both nodded at each other. A lil hole in the ship wasn't going to be that much trouble if they had enough materials to work with.
Ed headed for the door the panicked crewman had come from, while Al grabbed the man and shook him to calm down enough to get more information.
Passing through the door, it quickly became clear it wasn't just a little hole. Having taken off his boots earlier for all the clothing fitting, Ed now very quickly noticed the water coming in to the ship, as it soaked his socks easily.
After walking a bit more, grumbling about his socks. Ed found the hole. Fortunately, it was right at the waterline, meaning it wasn't a huge gushing geyser of water. Unfortunately, the hole was huge and every wave was poring more water inside, thus lowering the ship and adding more water. On top of that everything was soaking wet. So no chalk would hold directly on the outer-hull of the ship.
“Fuck!”
“Brother, did you find the... Oh dear, that is a big hole!”
“Yea, got any permanent marker on you bro?”
“That wouldn't work, to much water, it wouldn't be able to dry.”
“Ideas...”
“we could try carving the array, but that might take to long.”
“Fuck, fuck, FUCK! I am NOT, gonna be defeated my a measly lil hole!”
Ed slammed his fist in to his palm and a spark in his brain light up. What if... It would be a gamble, no idea if it would work. It would be difficult too, he'd have to hold the whole array in his mind while doing it. Fortunately he was only relocating materials, not doing any transformations. Those arrays are twice as complicated.
“I'm gonna try something Al, I need you to be perfectly still and keep anybody else away too.”
Then Ed walked up to the sode of the hole. Closed his eyes. Placed the palms of his hands against each other in a rough imitation of a circle. And concentrated on pulling up the energy he'd normally pull up when placing his hands on a circle. His hands were on the circle, they were part of the circle. And in Ed's mind the array took shape, glowing lines he drew in his mind as if he was drawing them on the ship wall. When Ed finished the array, he held it for a moment, making sure he kept its shape clear in his mind. Then transferred all of it from his hands to the ships hull.
A huge bright flash of alchemical energy sparked up from Ed's hands and then to the ship. Then the hole started changing, the inward warped metal started to band back in to place, then one that was done, the rest of the metal seemed to flow over the left over seams. Healing as if it was a wound on skin.
To Ed, who watched it happen. It felt like ages for it to finish. In reality, it took less than a minute between when Ed closed his eyes and the hull was completely closed. The ship still had an ankle deep layer of water. But it wasn't going to be sinking.
“Brother! How did you DO that!”
“Later, right now we have other problems. Like what caused that hole and will it happen again!”
“You're right of course. But you are going to explain that later brother.”
“Sure, sure. Come on!”
Ed rushed back the way they had come, only slightly slowed down by the soaked socks and bottom edge of the pants he was wearing.
When they reached the room with all the clothing again. Kain was there, with what appeared to be some type of radio. Not a conventional one, more like what you'd get if you stripped one down to its bare components.
Kain looked up as Alphonse closed the door behind him.
“Oh, they're here still. I repeat, Black and White are still secure. It looks like they were in the other room......Oh I'll ask them. Hopefully we'll reach E4..... No, no new orders from King. He and Queen are on deck in case of another attack. I'll inform you if new information is available. This is Pawn, signing off.”
Kain took a deep breath and moved the headphones on his ears to his neck.
“What were you doing in there. Didn't Colonel Mustang tell you to stay here?”
“We fixed the boat.”
“You.. Oh that is wonderful, now we surely will reach port. I'll go inform the Colonel. But you have to stay below deck. We have reason to believe snipers are waiting to shoot you if you go up.”
“Oh, but won't they shoot you instead? Please don't risk you life for us!”
Al looked worriedly at Kain. Ed mean while sat down, pulling off the soaked socks.
“Oh don't worry. Besides that it would be an honor to risk my life for royalty. I'm not going to go all the way up on the deck. Just going to poke my head out and yell at the Lieutenant. She can forward the news to the Colonel.”
Kain then took off the earphones and went to the door. Al following, ready to pull the young sergeant back inside if needed.
Ed meanwhile had put on some dry socks and his boots again.
It didn't take long for Kain to yell the news. And not long after there was a marked feeling of speed. Whoever was steering the ship had clearly decided they needed to get out of there.
After Kain had informed the people on deck, he returned to his radio. Al right next to him.
“This is pawn calling bishop, pawn to bishop over..... The board has been mended, we're on our way to E4 post haste. Repeat, board has been mended. Black and White decided to fix it for us. We're on our way again...... Is Knight in position?... Yes, we should be able to reach E4 if no other counter moves are made. Pawn out.”
Ed snorted at all the chess metaphors. Clearly whoever had come up with them was a big fan of the game. Ed wasn't. Chess relies on the idea that each piece can only move in a certain way. Real life however people will do all kinds of things you don't expect. Also there was the matter of chess being two dimensional. There was no up in the game. Hell the barely was a back in the game either. The game probably was good for TEACHING strategy. But not for complicated battle strategies in real life. Else pawns would have the ability to desert, or run back in fear.
Of course Ed knew why he was pondering chess metaphors. He was avoiding thinking on what he'd done earlier. Circle-less alchemy, Array-less alchemy. They were both names for what he just did. Though in Ed's opinion. Best description would be internalized-array alchemy. He was still using a circle, still drawing an array. He had just done it all in his mind. And the array had been beautiful, more like actual art than any paper drawing he'd ever made.
Of course it wasn't anywhere near what Mustang had shown. He'd just snapped his fingers. Was that it? Had Mustang drawn his array in his mind that tiny? Pretty impressive if he had. Of course the bastard would probably never tell him.
Ed wished he had his alchemy book, maybe with this new knowledge he'd understand some things in it more. Or at least be able to pretend he was busy. Al had already been staring at him for several minutes. Obviously waiting for Ed to start explaining. But Ed wasn't sure he was ready just yet.
It had been a hunch, an idea, a random brain-fart. He still wasn't sure how he made the leap in logic. It almost felt destined. As if it was something that had been waiting for him. But that made no scientific sense. Which brought him back to the start. How had he come up with this, if he couldn't explain it to him self. How could he make his brother understand.
The stare-of came to an end between Al and Ed when Colonel Mustang entered the room from top-deck. It accompanied with the distinct feeling of a reducing of speed.
“We have, as far as we can determine, lost our attackers. At least for now.”
Mustang straitened him self and ran his gloved fingers through his hair.
“We'll be docking at an unofficial dock in just a few minutes. At which point we'll relocate to a new vehicle for the next part of the trip. Hopefully this will be a better disguise than our current one.”
“Where are we going then. Aren't we going back?”
“No, if they managed to set an ambush for us. Its safe to say there is a leak somewhere in the line of information. And we still need to acquire two sets of pawn-promotions for you two. For which we need to get close to the border with Xerxes. There lives an Alchemist-forger there that can create travel papers for you. Papers you need to be able to get in to the city proper. Your official papers would not be suitable because I'm sure our opponent has ears in the border-guard. Any mention of your real names would surely draw more attacks. No, you'll be going in under the names Edris Catalina and Alfis Catalina. Civilian cousins of Second Lieutenant Rebecca Catalina. She's not a part of this unit, but she's a friend of Lieutenant Hawkeye. Official lines should be just murky enough to not tip of our opponent. Hopefully.”
“What about him?”
Ed pointed at the tailor who had been boxing up his wares since Ed and Al returned with news of the fixed hull.
“He will be working on your attire for the journey. And once done, will be taking a nice well earned vacation to Riviere. I'm told the fountains there are particularly inspiring to the color-conscious.”
“Right, because after this. He'll be wanting to see more water.”
“Do you suggest I'd send him to Wellesley instead?”
“Are you mad? Of course not. That place is a perpetual war-zone.”
“Indeed, and while they could use an update uniform for their forces there. It would not be much of a reward. Also... I do believe we have docked.”
Hawkeye came in then. While Ed grumbled about bastards always needing to have the last word.
“Sir, all appears clear for disembarking. We are ready on your orders sir.”
“Excellent Lieutenant, then lets not waste any more time. Lets go.”
“Um, sir. What about Kain, is he joining us?”
“No, Sergeant Kain will be escorting the good tailor back to his shop along with his wares. Don't worry prince Alphonse. He will be fine. And we'll be in contact by radio if anything does happen.”
“Alright, goodbye Sergeant Kain. Perhaps we'll see each-other again some time in the future.”
Kain smiles. “Count on it your highness. Safe travels!”
And with that, they all followed Lieutenant Hawkeye out the door and to the ship-deck. From which a long gangplank was perched to the shore. It looked a little bit unstable to Ed. But they moved over it to the shore easy enough. Hawkeye looking in all directions to look for potential enemies.
But the only thing to see was the river's curve, the grass covered dike on each side of the river. The road and the farmers-truck with stack of bales of hay in the back. Havoc leaning to the side, dressed in dirty farmer gear with a piece of straw in his mouth instead of a cigarette.
Ed looked at Al.
“What was that all about back there?”
“Its called being polite brother.”
“Riiight...”
“Whatever. You still haven't told me how you fixed the ship!”
“Later, when we don't have people listening in on our private conversations.”
“You better not forget brother. I want to be able to do that too!”
“I know, just, later ok!”
Ed then stepped up next to Mustang.
“How is THAT, going to work better than the ship.”
“You'll see, now let me show you inside.”
Inside turned out to be the inside of the bales of hay. Which turned out to be only a few inches thick, covering an iron room with two benches. One on each side. It was cramped, dark and hot. With only air coming in from a few air hole in the floor of all places.
This was defiantly not going to be fun. But in they went. It wasn't until the door was closed and thus properly camouflaged with hay again. That Mustang opened a slat in the wall between the room they were in and the truck-cabin. This let in a tiny bit of light, just enough to be able to see.
No sooner was the slat open or the truck was started and they were on their way to their next order of business. Ed hoped it wouldn't be a long trip.