"Edward come on, stay with us! Don't you dare let go!"
It was taking all of Roy's strength to keep Edward from falling to his death, while fighting some rouge runaways who had been raping young woman in a mining warehouse; Edward had been tripped and fell into a broken lift shaft. Roy had just managed to catch his arm before he fell. But the kid was heavy due to the automail.
"Ed, you're too heavy, you have to find a foot hole and push up!" But Ed couldn't find a foot hole; the whole shaft had been lined with steel creating a smooth flawless surface.
"There are no foot holes, forgod sake Mustang, there no sense in both of us falling!" Ed's eyes widened as Roy's body lurched forward under Ed's weight. But he caught himself.
"Ed I'm not going to let you fall! Even if I have to sit here holding you up until back up comes!"
Roy's arm was in so much pain, being dragged down by two full limbs of automail, plus Ed himself and gravity. Just don't think about it, Roy kept saying to himself. There was no way he was gonna just let the kid go.
"Colonel!" Finally Falman, Breda, Furey and Hawkeye came running into the warehouse.
"Help me pull Fullmetal up!" All 5 of them grabbed hold of Ed's hands and dragged him up.
"Bloody hell Ed, you aren't half heavy" Breda joked
"Ah shut up" said Ed waving them off and yelping as Hawkeye smacked himself and Roy round the head.
"And don't you two ever run off without back up again!"
"Yes Ma'am" they both said.
They all walked out laughing apart from Ed, he knew they had only been joking, but for some reason, the words about his weight hit a nerve. He could have killed both himself and Colonel.
A week later Roy walked up to Ed in the canteen, the kid was sat at a table reading a book with no food in front of him.
"No lunch today squirt" Ed slammed his book down.
"WHO YOU CALLING SO SMALL AN ANT COULD EAT HIM FOR LUNCH AND STILL NEED SECONDS!"
Roy blinked and then smirked
"I didn't say anything like that. Just thought I'd let you know that they caught the guys from that warehouse. Idiots went back to it after we left".
Ed let out sigh "some people are just born idiots. You would know a lot about that"
Roy raised an eyebrow "I don't think so, you may be the youngest ever state alchemist Fullmetal but you still work under me".
Ed puffed and then went back to his reading.
"So, you're seriously not eating lunch?" he raised his eyes over his book
"Me and Al are going out later" Ed said quietly
"Oh right, and you have such a small body that you can handle more than one meal a day"
"IM WARNING YOU BASTARD!"
Roy laughed again and walked away sighing and saying something about getting back to his pile of paper work that was so big it was 10 times the size of Ed. Ed himself let that one slip since if that was true it was gonna make the bastard very unhappy anyway. Hehehe.
But Ed's smile faltered once Roy was out of the room, he hated lying, for some reason especially to Roy. He and Al weren't going out tonight. The truth was from the time he got home the day of the warehouse incident, he hadn't eaten a thing. So far Al hadn't noticed and he had always managed to lie his way out of close calls. It had been hard at first, but the memory of almost getting Mustang killed because his stupid body was too heavy gave him the will to keep going.
3 months later
"Fullmetal, were going out for lunch, I'm sure we could squeeze you in the car seeing as your so short and all"
Ed raised his eyes from his paperwork and glared, but he didn't react "No thanks Colonel Bastard"
"Come on Ed, we don't want you eating Cafeteria food while were eating something decent" Riza intervened; Ed smiled but shook his head.
"Thanks Riza, but I'm fine, I'm not really that hungry" Roy frowned Ed had been coming up with these excuses for a while now. And he hadn't seen him eat in ages. Walking over too him he grabbed his wrist.
"You're coming Fullmetal that's an order" He dragged him out the door.
"Let me go! You can't force me to go! Let go Mustang, Mustang, Roy!"
Riza was about to tell Roy to calm down but then she saw his face, something was wrong.
Roy forced Ed into the car and he tried to make a break for it.
"Havoc, hold him!" Havoc looked confused but obeyed grabbing Ed by the arms and holding him in his seat, but the more the young man struggled the wider Havoc's eyes went. A few weeks ago Ed's arms had been small but muscular, now they were just bone.
Once they were at the restaurant the struggle began again, the lady who was meant to show them to their seats looked alarmed.
"Don't worry, he's always like this" Roy smiled at her with his most winning smile and she instantly forgot about the fighting young blonde Roy was dragging by the hair.
"Sit down and stop acting like a child!"
"I'll stop when you let go of my god damn hair bastard!" Roy let go and Ed sat, rubbing his head from where Roy had been pulling his braid.
"Can I take your orders?" Everyone ordered and when it came to Ed, he was about to say "I'm not hungry" when Roy intervened.
"He'll have the chicken salad as well" Ed glared at him.
When the food came the air became a bit lighter, but Mustang and Havoc kept their eyes on Ed, he nibbled at the food and moved it around his plate a lot, but he ate very little.
Eventually it was time to leave everyone stood up but Roy raised a hand.
"You all go on ahead; Fullmetal and I are going to stay here for a bit"
"Why!" said Ed, he wanted to get out of here, the smell of food made him feel sick these days.
"Because you're going to eat all of you food. I mean it Edward Elric, either you eat or I tell everyone" Ed's eyes widened, how could he know? Was he that obvious? No of course not, and even if he did he wouldn't show them not in with this many people watching.
Riza cocked her head slightly to the side, putting two and two together. She had noticed that Ed was starting to look slightly gaunt and his cloths baggier that they were normally, but she had thought it was just stress, but the more she thought about it now, the more she could see all the signs.
"I'm not hungry Mustang and you can't force food down my throat!" Mustang gave him a deathly glare.
"Watch me" Riza bustled everyone out, knowing that the two alchemists needed time alone, before she left she gave Roy a "don't you dare hurt him" look.
Once they left Ed turned his head away
"You know, I rang Alphonse when I went out an hour ago. Asked him about you, thought it was a bit sus pious that you were going out so often when Al can't even eat food. Do you know what though; he doesn't know anything about it. He says you've been saying that you've been staying late at work and eating there!" silence
"What's going on Ed?" Roy was trying to calm things down now, knowing that getting angry with Ed very rarely gets the desired response.
"It's nothing" said Ed standing up and going to walk out the door. Roy quickly put the bill on his tab and followed, grabbing Edward and dragging him to the side of the restaurant; it was getting dark earlier these days so the blackness was hiding them from passers-by.
Once again Ed tried to make a break for it but Roy caught him round his stomach, or lack of it. Roy could feel every single one of Ed's ribs and he wasn't even holding him hard.
Slamming him against the building Roy's black eyes glared in to Ed's golden ones.
"This is going to stop now Fullmetal. Every day you're going to come with me and eat a whole plate of food for lunch and then every night I'm going to make sure Al calls me and tells me whether you ate anything when you go home. Understand!"
A/N: ok I wrote this a while ago now when I first started my case study project, such as the previous story on PLS. I write this much and I'm stuck. So if you want me to continue this please leave a review, because I need some motivation. And if you have any ideas on how I could continue then idea would be very welcome.
Until then. Karin x