I just realized that this was sitting on my hard drive, but I had never uploaded it to here.
Warnings: general movie spoilers, mentioned past Hei/Ed, and lots of fluffy happiness (only without any fluff or happiness).
Last Wish
At first, Al wondered if something had happened to his vision, to make everything monochrome. He blinked and rubbed at his eyes, but soon realized there was nothing wrong with him – it was the location that was strange. This place at the other end of the Gate looked remarkably like a city in Amestris would, except for the severe lack of color, giving everything a pallid feel.
The fact that he seemed to be standing across the street from a graveyard did nothing to cheer him up.
How could his brother, who was one of the most alive and vibrant people he knew, ever have survived in this awful place?
Al looked around, fighting despair. For some reason, he had expected the Gate to take him straight to Edward, but obviously this was not the case. He had to find Ed quickly; his time was limited, and he didn't want to risk being stranded. Yet Ed could be anywhere in this strange world. Where was he supposed to start looking?
A man was walking towards the graveyard now, and Al decided to try and talk to him. If the people here could understand him, maybe he could find out where he was, and how to go about tracking Ed down.
Slightly cheered by having a decisive plan of action, Al hurried after the stranger.
-
Alfons looked around idly at the sound of someone behind him, and what he saw nearly made his heart stop.
For a moment he was sure that it was Edward, then he realized with something akin to agony that it couldn't possibly be him. The hair was darker, and the eyes not nearly so sharp, but the features were heartbreakingly similar.
And when the young man opened his mouth and asked him in hesitant English where he was, even the odd accent was the same.
Alfons knew it was silly of him to even consider it, but he had to ask- "Do you know somebody called Edward Elric?"
The young man stared at him for a moment in shock, then grabbed his arm. "You know him? You know where I can find him?"
It was him. Alfons knew, without a doubt, that this had to be Edward's younger brother. The brother he had been incessantly compared to, the brother that Edward had loved more than anything.
The brother that, in the end, he might have convinced Edward didn't exist.
Alfons found himself unable to meet those earnest gray eyes, and turned away. "I'll show you where he is." He was proud that his voice wavered only a little.
-
He led the way into the graveyard, Alphonse following him in growing disbelief.
"Are you sure we're going the right way?"
Alfons couldn't answer, and the younger man grew more agitated as they strode past rows and rows of dull stone graves.
"This can't be right…" Al grabbed the German's elbow and forced him to turn around, glaring up at him. "You have got to be kidding me!"
Alfons flinched and looked away, silently pointing at a grave. Snarling under his breath, Al let go of him abruptly and ran towards the grave.
It couldn't be true. Al refused to believe the words on that ugly piece of stone. Edward couldn't be dead. He couldn't have survived everything the world had thrown at him, even the passage through the Gate, only to die in this horribly dreary place.
"How did this happen?" Al shouted towards the taller man. "How can he be dead?"
-
"I used to be sick," Alfons said. "I had a lung disease-"
Alphonse Elric was fuming, clearly not understanding how this had anything to do with Edward.
"It's relevant, I promise. I used to live with Edward. He was studying rockets, trying to find a way home. All he wanted was to get back to you." Alfons couldn't conceal the bitterness in those words. "But it was very difficult. After a while, he started wondering if he would ever succeed." Alfons spoke quickly, the story painfully dry. "Meanwhile, the sickness was killing me." There was no way to summarize neatly what had happened between him and Edward; any words would fall short of the truth. So he just told the bare bones of the story. It was all he could manage.
"One night he came in, and said he had found a cure for me. He said that even if the 'gate' wouldn't let him go home, it would always be willing to take. Then he- he did something. Next thing I knew, he was on the floor, and he couldn't breathe-" A sob choked off the words, and Alfons couldn't stop the memories from returning; Edward clinging to his shirt, every attempt at breathing bringing up a mouthful of blood. Edward's eyes full of tears of pain, his body convulsing, yet he had still tried to smile at Alfons, teeth streaked with red, before he had lost consciousness.
And Alfons remembered when he took the first deep breath in years, and nothing hurt, his body felt better than ever – and he screamed until his throat was raw.
Violent shaking snapped him out of the memories, and Alphonse was looking up at him in undiluted anger.
"He died for you? My brother is dead because of you? Why the hell would he do that?"
"I loved him," the German choked on the words, his eyes beginning to fill with tears. Had he ever truly loved Edward? Alphonse's hands on his shoulders were painfully tight, and he found himself remembering, for some reason, Edward saying that Alphonse was the only person who could always beat him in a fight.
"I don't care," Alphonse said coldly. "Why would he love you back, enough to sacrifice himself for you?"
"He always said I look like you," Alfons snapped, remembering the jealousy with pain.
"Like me?" Alphonse stared at him in shock. "We look nothing alike!"
At that, Alfons finally broke away, and hid his face in his hands. Because it was true, the resemblance between them was only passing, even if they did have practically the same name. Edward looked far more like Alphonse than he did.
And all his cruelty, his accusations that Edward never truly cared for him but only saw him as the doppelganger of his precious brother, all that was wasted on what?
The resemblance had to be something in Edward's mind, born of loneliness, and he had played on it, preyed on Edward's emotions.
The love he professed to have for Edward, what was it worth? How could that petty, pitiful emotion ever compare to a life willingly cut short for his sake?
In the end, Edward had loved him enough to die for him, not for Alphonse. And he had died with a smile, because Edward could conceive of nothing greater than dying in order to give life to someone he loved.
-
That was it. Al stood dully, staring at the grave. This was where Ed's story finally came to an end. Now he let himself cry, because there was no reason not to.
"We promised," he whispered. "We promised we would be together." Why had Edward done it? Al was his brother, and Ed was all the family he had. How could Edward choose to die for somebody else?
Feeling utterly betrayed, Al turned his back on the grave.
"Where are you going?" the man asked suddenly, and Al realized dimly he still didn't know his name.
"Back," Al answered distantly. "There's no point in staying around."
"Aren't you going to…take his body home, or something?"
"He's dead," Al snapped furiously. "Do you honestly think he cares?" If this world was what Edward had chosen, he might as well just stay here!
"Edward may not care," the man said sadly, "but you will. You'll find yourself thinking of him, buried here all by himself, where nobody knows him, and you'll wish you had brought him back."
"I…" Al hated to admit it, but it was true; the thought of Edward buried here made him shudder.
"It's not fair!" Al burst out. "It just isn't…"
"I can help you dig him up, if you want," the man suggested uncomfortably. The unpleasant side of Al noticed the man was still crying. Wasn't the fact that he had known Edward in a way that Al never would enough for him?
Al shook his head silently, and bit his lip. "I can't…if we dig him up, I don't want to see…" He couldn't bear the thought of Ed decaying, even if it was the natural way of things.
"There's a coffin; we'll keep it closed."
-
It was practically night, and there was no one to see them. Alfons led Al to a shed nearby, and a few minutes of rummaging yielded them a pair of shovels. At first they worked in a frosty silence, but soon they started talking quietly; Al told about the brother he had known and Alfons about his lover.
Finally they reached the coffin, and Al cleared away the dirt. He would activate the array for re-opening the Gate from right here.
A moment before he left, Al looked up once again at the man, who was looking sadly down at him. Briefly, Al felt a sense of kinship with him, and a strange rush of affection.
"Thank you," he said suddenly. "For being there for him. I'm glad he wasn't alone."
The man scrubbed at his eyes again and tried to smile, but failed.
"Before I go…what's your name?" Al asked quietly.
"It's Alfons."