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winryofresembool · 4 years

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Fic: A Birthday to Remember

A/N: Happiest of birthdays to @mcgonnagle!! :3 ♥ When I started writing this fic, I was not imagining it to become 3k+ words, but somehow that just happened :’D But I still hope you are going to enjoy it! I sure enjoy myself some parental Edwin and I hope you do too :D

Summary: Edwin daughter Emma’s 10th birthday (sorry, I have no idea how to summarize this mess otherwise :*D)

words: 3400+ (woops)

genre: floof, I guess some hurt/comfort

warnings: Ed’s language

...

”Emma?”

”Yeah, dad?” the eldest daughter of the Rockbell-Elric family lifted her gaze from her book. Her father, Edward, was standing next to her, staring at her with a weird expression.

“Is there something you’d like for a birthday gift, Bean?” he asked.

“Sure. That the twins would go away and I could hear my thoughts so I can read.” She gave her dad a pointed look. She had made it clear many times the twins annoyed her, and Ed sighed.

“Listen, Emma. We know that the constant crying is getting into your nerves. Heck, it’s getting into all our nerves. But they are just babies, Truth knows you were just as loud when you were of their age.”

“You’re not helping, dad.” Emma rolled her eyes but decided to change the topic. Slowly, she said: “If you really want to know what I want though, it’s someone to play with. Alan… is always tinkering something in the workshop when he’s home, and Elena likes playing with her pretty dolls. I want to go out and explore and there’s no one I can do that with.”

“You’re not having friends at school?” Ed asked worriedly. He could still remember what it felt like when he only had Al to rely on.

With brutal honestly Emma answered: “They’re all stupid, they don’t understand when I rant about my favorite books and they call me know-it-all behind my back just because I know the answers to teachers’ questions better than they do. So no, I don’t want to be their friend.”

“I’m… I’m sorry,” Ed grunted, not sure what else to say. He wished he had Winry to help him with this talk. “You know… sometimes we misinterpret things a lot. And we judge other people too fast. Do you know how I got to know the Emperor of Xing? He was in Amestris illegally, without anything to eat or drink, so he bought some with my money when we had just met. A shitty thing to do, right? But I learned to know him better and found out he was actually very serious about his country, and he seemed less bratty after that. Not to mention, he and Greed actually turned out to be pretty valuable on the Promised Day. But my point is, sometimes we find friends in very unexpected situations if we just keep eyes open. I’m sure you will too.”

“Uh, thanks dad. I hope you’re right,” Emma said awkwardly, focusing her eyes on her book.

“I know I am. And Emma,” Ed added after a brief silence.

“Yeah?”

“Your old man may be an annoying guy a lot of the time…And I know the twins have taken a lot of our time lately… But whenever you need to talk, know that I am always here. And I do want to know how you’re doing. And so do your mum and your siblings.”

“Oh… Yeah, I’ll try to remember that.” Emma nodded. She wouldn’t admit it, but she had needed to hear that.

“Good,” Ed said and turned to leave.

“Dad?” Emma said hesitantly when Ed was almost out of the room.

“Mmmh?”

“Can I… get a hug?”

Ed was caught a bit off guard, but he was happy about Emma’s question nevertheless. “Sure thing, Bean,” he said and returned back to her.

“Don’t call me that,” Emma mumbled against his shirt, but was still happy to wrap her arms around him.

“You’ll always be my Bean.”

“Ugh, why do you have to ruin the moment like that?” Emma growled, although not very seriously.

“Because that’s my job, right? To annoy my kids. Anyway, I should probably get going because I just got an idea,” Ed said mysteriously.

“Oh?”

“You’ll see eventually!” He shouted from the door and left a very confused Emma behind.

…

“Winry, did you say you had seen Major Hawkeye recently?” Ed asked his wife only a few minutes after his talk with his eldest daughter.

“Yeah, Riza and I had a cup of coffee together when I was in Central to meet up with a client last week,” Winry admitted.

“Right. Did she mention anything about the puppies? I heard from the Gen… I mean Mustang that some of them have already been claimed…”

“Why do you ask?” Winry asked with surprise. “I thought you were against taking one when we visited them the last time.”

“Yeah but… sometimes opinions change.”

“They don’t usually change when it comes to you,” Winry eyed her husband suspiciously. “What caused this?”

“Well… It’s Emma. Remember how much she loved that black puppy? She… she just told me she wanted someone to play with, but she doesn’t like her classmates. And I can’t just magically change people’s attitudes, so… what’s a more loyal friend than a dog? And we haven’t had one since Den… Maybe it would be about time…”

“I guess we could consider that,” Winry agreed. “But she has to take the main responsibility herself because you know we don’t have a lot of extra time in our hands.”

“True. But if given the chance, I think she’d be more than happy to accept that challenge.” Ed grinned at his wife.

…

“Hello Edward, what brings you here?”

True to his old habit, Ed hadn’t called Riza Hawkeye, now ranked a Major, before arriving to her doorstop. Riza didn’t seem too perplexed by this fact though; she brushed it off and instead wanted to know what the reason for his sudden arrival.

“It’s my daughter. She wants… well, I was thinking that this might be the right moment for a new dog, after all. Despite what I may have said during our last visit.” Ed shrugged.

“Oh! Well, you were in a luck because one of the people who had planned to adopt one of our puppies just canceled the other day. Apparently their kid has allergies. So, we do have one left!”

“Which one is it?” Ed asked, hoping it would be the one that Emma had bonded with earlier.

“Come see yourself,” Riza invited Ed inside.

“General Ba… Mustang, why are you here?”

Ed found his ex-superior in Riza’s living room watching the puppies intently, a mildly amused expression on his face.

“I just had to drop some work things to the Major…” Roy answered casually while leaning against the puppy fence.

“I almost believe you,” Ed rolled his eyes and stepped closer to look at the puppies. “One would think you have gotten soft and want to get a puppy of your own.”

“Tell me, Fullmetal, how many puppies do you have at home, though? I have lost my count,” Roy claimed.

“They are human children, Mustang, and there are 6 of them, have been almost a year now.” Ed glared at him.

“Don’t mind him, Ed, he’s just… doing what he usually does,” Riza said, a tiny, mischievous smile on her face. “The other day he asked me weirdly specific questions about them, so he does actually remember their names and even birthdays.”

Ed wanted to throw Roy another snarky comment, but when he saw that the older man was looking at him with a serious expression now, he decided to change the topic. “The thing is… Emma really needs some company. Winry and I… can’t really offer her what she needs, even though we are trying our best, and her siblings, besides Alan of course, are still too young to understand her mindset. I know a pet can’t talk to her back, but it can at least give her some distraction and company when she feels the family isn’t enough.”

“That does sound like a good idea,” Riza nodded. “Hayate and the ones after him have been a very big help to me as well.”

“If I remember correctly, the one Emma seemed to bond with the most was the black one with a tiny white dot in his neck. Is he free still?” Ed asked, trying to spot that one among the puppies.

“I’m afraid he has been claimed…” Riza said apologetically. But then a smile spread on her face. “But I remember that the person who claimed him seemed to like another one too and he was debating between them for a long while… I could pull a couple of strings and see what I can do!”

…

15 minutes later, Riza had managed to call the person who wanted the dog Emma had fallen in love with. At first, he was reluctant to switch it to another puppy, but when he heard it was for a 10-year-old girl, he eventually softened and gave in. Ed promised to compensate for it somehow, even saying that he’d fix roofs or anything if needed but the man laughed it off and said that the husband of Winry Rockbell didn’t owe him anything. It turned out Winry had helped the man’s wife with her prosthetic limb a few years prior and they both were still very thankful for her help. Ed thanked his wife in his mind and sighed of relief when the phone call ended.

“Emma will be so happy!”

“I’m sure she will. I wish I could be there to see her face,” Riza said.

“Oh but you can,” Ed told her enthusiastically. “After all this trouble, the least I can do for you is to invite you to her party. I’m sure she’d be happy to see you too” Then he casted a dark look at Roy. “I suppose you can come too. If you really insist.”

“You know I wouldn’t miss it for the world.” Roy smiled smugly.

“Right,” Ed snorted. “Anyway, remember, no one is allowed to know about this! I want it to be a surprise.”

“Don’t worry, Fullmetal, the secret will go to the grave with us.” Roy said wryly and got another poisonous glare from Ed.

…

Emma wasn’t in her best mood when she woke up in her birthday morning. The twins, who slept in the room right below hers, had been screaming a lot the previous night (she had heard her dad suspecting they were ill, but Emma was positive they had done it just to ruin her night), which naturally meant also Emma had slept badly. She had tried to read for a moment but her flashlight had run out of batteries and she didn’t have candles in her room either, afraid of turning on the big light because her parents may notice and ask her why she was awake at that hour. So, it was no wonder that when she marched into the kitchen for breakfast, she was far from the “sunshine” as her dad described her when he greeted her.

“Happy birthday to my sunshine! Big 10 today, huh? How does that feel?”

“Would feel better if I wasn’t tired as hell,” she gave her dad a pointed look, letting him know nonverbally that she had been awake because of the twins.

“I’ll let that language slip this one time because it’s your birthday. But don’t let me hear that again,” Ed warned, cocking his eyebrow.

“Whatever,” Emma snorted, knowing full well Ed had probably been worse than her with his language when he had been 10. She buttered a bread and then started looking around, asking: “Why isn’t there a cake on the table? I thought it’s a tradition…”

“Bean, we’ll get it later this afternoon, we’ve been so b…”

“Busy, yeah, I know,” Emma said, disappointment clear from his voice. “I feel like that’s what you always say these days when you need some excuse…”

Ed glanced at his other kids who gave each other vary looks and decided this was not the place for this discussion. She told Emma to follow him into the living room, and she did, arms folded over her chest.

“Listen, Emma. I can understand why you are bummed, but the twins simply need more attention right now because they can’t help themselves, unlike you do. I’m pretty sure they’ve been crying a lot is because they have an ear infection or something like that bothering them. And your mum didn’t want to take that new patient, but she had to, because her pride wouldn’t let her say no. She wanted to keep this as a surprise, but she already told me that once she was done with the automail and got the payment for it, she’d take you to Central for a trip. So please, don’t imply that we don’t care because we do. I hope that today we can show how much.”

“Are you… saying… that you have actually planned something for me?” Emma wasn’t sure how to react, but her face reflected both genuine surprise and relief.

“Of course we have! Why would you even think otherwise? Have we ever forgotten your birthday?” Ed asked.

“No… of course you haven’t…” Emma said regretfully. “Sorry. I guess… I just wasn’t expecting anything because you have had your hands full…”

“Well, I promise that something you’ll like will happen today but I can’t say anything else because it would ruin the surprise.”

“Okay. Then you don’t have to. But where’s mum?” Emma realized suddenly. “She’s always the first one at the breakfast table.”

“She… Uh… I think she may have run out of some automail parts and went to buy them,” Ed lied quickly, but from his face it became quite obvious it wasn’t true. In reality, she had gone to buy some necessities for the dog.

“Dad, you are a bad liar. But don’t worry, you don’t have to tell me.”

Ed swiped his forehead in relief. “Good, because I’m pretty sure your mum would have killed me if I had slipped something…”

Emma seemed already happier when she said: “It’s rare to see you so mysterious, dad, I really can’t help but wonder what you’re hiding! But guess I’ll see soon enough, right?”

Ed ruffled his daughter’s hair a bit. “Of course you will, Bean. Now, let’s go back to the others, your porridge is getting cold.”

“Daaad, do I have to eat porridge on my birthday?”

“Of course you do! Otherwise you won’t grow big and strong like me!”

Emma couldn’t help but snort at his dad’s silliness, but she elbowed him on his side softly, letting him know they were good now.

…

In the afternoon Ed and Winry kept staring from the window nervously. Riza was supposed to bring the dog any moment now, but the problem was keeping Emma out of the way so they could bring him in without her noticing. Thankfully Alan knew about his parents’ plot, so he took Emma out for ice cream before his dad started showing signs of exploding from keeping the secret.

Finally Riza brought the puppy and she, Ed and Winry took him in the livingroom where Emma’s gift pile (including a lot of dog necessities) was waiting. Ed had built the puppy a wooden box with cushions inside to make it comfortable, and that’s where he was planning to put him when Emma got home.

Soon Winry had finished decorating the cake Al and Mei had brought for them, the younger kids were hanging out quietly upstairs, even the twins sleeping, and Alan and Emma would probably be arriving soon. Riza, Roy (who had not wanted to miss a chance to tease Ed for being a doting father), Al, Mei and their kids were already waiting for the birthday girl, and the rest of the guests would visit later that evening.

While they were waiting, the puppy was acting a bit restlessly, as if it was sensing something interesting was going on. Riza tried her best to keep it occupied by clinging her keys. It seemed to have developed a weird interest on them; when Emma had first met the puppies, she had showed this same puppy her keys to her diary and the puppy had kept following her since then.

Finally, Ed saw some movement on their yard and told Riza to set the dog to the spot he had planned for him. For a moment that plan seemed to work. The puppy sniffed his surroundings and tried to mouth the pillow in the box a bit before laying on it. But when he heard the door going, he didn’t want to stay in the box anymore. Unfortunately, Ed had underestimated the puppy’s jumping skills and when he turned away for a moment, he was already out, running mindlessly towards the hall. On his way there, he managed to push a broom Ed had left leaning against the dining table, hitting the juice jug on it, which fell over and spilled the contents on the tablecloth, floor and Ed’s clothes. Emma and Alan could hear their dad’s cursing from the livingroom before their attention moved to the black little storm approaching them.

“What… is this?” Emma asked with wide eyes when the puppy stopped right in front of her, jumping against her legs excitedly. She stared at it for a moment, her eyes suddenly flashing with recognition. Then she took out the door keys she had had in her pocket and made a ‘clink’ sound with them. The dog immediately reacted.

“Oh my… Truth! It’s him!” She exclaimed and crouched down to pet him. Finally, she turned her head to address her parents: “Mum? Dad? What does this mean? Is he… Is he…” Her voice was starting to break.

“He’s all yours, sweetie!” Winry said softly.

Emma was silent for a moment. She looked between the dog that was now licking her hand, and her parents, and suddenly she jumped up and squealed louder than Ed and Winry had probably ever heard. Then she almost tackled her parents as she pulled them into a hug and shed a few tears against Ed’s shirt.

“I wished… I wished… but I never thought you actually would…”

“For you we’d go through the portal of Truth again, Bean,” Ed was the first to speak.

“Emma, sweetie,” Winry added. “I wish you had told us earlier how you felt. I’m so sorry for not seeing it until your dad told me about your discussion. If you want to, we can try to switch schools after the summer break so you can meet new kids. And we are going to do our best to give you the attention you need. But for now, will you take care of this puppy? I have a feeling he likes you already.”

“Of course I will,” she mumbled emotionally, wiping the corners of her eyes quickly.

“Remember, he’s a lot of responsibility,” Winry said as she was stroking her daughter’s hair. “We are expecting you to help with the feeding, training and walking because we can’t do it alone. You can do that, right?”

“Of course, mum!” Emma said without even thinking about it.

“So,” Riza stepped in, “How are you going to name this boy?”

Emma looked at the puppy for a moment, and without hesitation she noted: “Key!”

…

A couple of weeks later, Emma took Key to a local park. They had been doing surprisingly well considering the puppy had only recently been separated from his family: Key already seemed to enjoy sleeping in Emma’s bed, did pretty well with the potty training and even knew how to sit already. That’s why they were allowed to go out on their own without the watching eyes of Emma’s parents. The two of them were simply enjoying their time together, Key sniffing everything he found from the ground and Emma being happy when someone stopped to compliment the puppy.

Just when they were about to leave, Emma noticed a little girl by the road staring at them. She was probably a little younger than her, her curly hair kept under a big sun hat, but even that couldn’t quite hide the fact that she had a lot of freckles on her face. She stopped there only for a moment, giving them a tiny wave when she saw Emma noticing. However, that moment ended fast when the girl’s mother came out of the shop she was standing in front of, and urged the girl to continue walking in what seemed a pretty cold fashion to Emma. The two girls continued to their own ways, but little did they know that one day the fate would reunite them and create the most beautiful form of bonds between them. Meanwhile, Emma just scratched behind Key’s ears and smiled at him, her face expressing that she had just met a friend.

#edwin #edxwin #i mean this is not a shippy fic but #edward elric #winry rockbell #fullmetal alchemist #my fics #edwin babies

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schrijverr · 4 years

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Professor Elric?

After The Promised Day Edward is sent on a miliary mission to Hogwarts where he will teach Alchemy to his students. He is told not to interfere with their business, but he has a hard time not getting involved with this weird Voldy prick.

On AO3.

Ships: Edwin and Romoine mentioned

Warnings: mentions of canonn deaths

Chapter 10 out of 10

~~~~~~ ~~~~~

He found them talking to a bunch of adults with Death Eater unconscious and tied down around them. He was then quickly introduced to the Order by an excited Hermione, who then told him enthusiastically about how she saved Sirius’ life using Alchemy. The man in question thanked him for teaching Hermione so that he could live to see another day.

Edward waved it away and told them about what happened outside while they were still fighting the Death Eaters here. He got some perplexed looks when he told them he’d shot Voldemort in the face. They looked like they didn’t believe him so he showed them the gun and said: “You can go look at the body, but you’ll be swarmed by media there, so do it at your own risk.”

“The media? And you left Harry there?” Sirius said outraged, it was nice to know the man cared so much about his godson.

“No, Dumbledore took him back to Hogwarts, I think.” Edward replied, “And we should go back to Hogwarts too, you guys have a lot of explaining to do. What were you thinking? Sneaking off to the Ministry like that, you guys are lucky I gave Harry my phone number and he had the mind to use it or this could have had a whole other ending, for example your dead bodies lying on the ground.”

He looked at the students, who all shuffled in their place uncomfortably. When he was certain they had understood how careless they had been, he crossed his arms and said: “You are lucky I don’t do house-point, because you would have lost a lot otherwise. Now show me how you got here.”

Dejectedly the kids showed him to an exit where a few black bony horses with wings were waiting. Edward looked at them in wonder and asked: “What are those?”

A girl with light blond hair dreamily said: “They’re Thestrals, you can only see them once you’ve seen death.”

“Great.” Edward said under his breath.

“Who did you see?” the girl asked.

He could feel the looks of the others and he sighed: “Who haven’t I seen?”

He’d gotten a far away look in his eye as he thought of everyone who had died. He remembered all of their faces with life, fighting spirit then looking at nothing, no fire in their eyes. It just was unfair that after all his sins he was still alive, but mom wasn’t. How could it be that there would be no one to see Elicia grow older. Why did Selim get to grow up again, while Nina never could? How could it be that he was breathing, but Fu wasn’t. Why should he live and Martel die or Greed or the rest of the crew. How was it fair that Captain Buccaneer died for Amestris while defending something else than his Fort Briggs? Why was everything so unfair in death?

He took a deep breath and shook it off. The girl was still looking at him with unblinking eyes, he smiled at her and said: “You helped today, you made sure you never have to see a battle field or a city in ruins. Remember that.”

If she hadn’t expected that, she didn’t show. She just gave Edward a mysterious smile and said: “The Thestrals like you, don’t sit near their wings too much.”

Then she climbed on one and waited for the others to join her.

Hermione got of the Thestral with the rest. All were making their way over to Madam Pomfrey in the hospital wing, all but Mister Elric. She lagged behind then turned around to go over to him. He raised one of his brows at her and she began: “Mister Elric, I-”

Mister Elric cut her off: “Hermione, after that you can call me Ed, it’s short for Edward. We’re not that far apart.”

“Okay, Ed.” it felt kind of strange on her mouth, but it fit him better than Mister Elric, “I wanted to ask what you’re going to do now. Will you come back next year?”

Ed shook his head: “No, sorry, this year was good for me. I needed a break from helping rebuilding Central and Ishval, but I’ve healed a bit and there are mistakes I need to fix at home. I’m not made for the easy life.”

“Oh.” it was the only thing she could say.

“Don’t be sad. You still have to take my very hard exam and after that, well, you can write me if you want, I think I would like to know what great things you do.” he said with a genuine smile, “Besides, you still need to tell me how I can donate to S.P.E.W.”

She smiled back and said: “I will, don’t worry. Can I ask you something else?”

“I would be concerned if you didn’t ask questions.” Ed laughed.

Hermione rolled her eyes, but still asked: “Did you mean it? What you said to Luna, I mean. Were you serious?”

“Yeah, I did. Kids shouldn’t fight a war, they shouldn’t have to fear for their safety and worry about the future of the world, you fought a battle today, but you didn’t fight a war and that’s what matters. You never know how it’s gonna go, but you know you prevented the worst. Anyway, I’m just rambling, talking wisdom like I’m Teacher or something.” he shuddered.

Hermione giggled and said: “You like to act dumb, but you’re pretty wise.”

Ed smirked and said: “I am dumb, ask anyone I know and they tell you and I hope you’re not as dumb as me, because I’m still waiting to ask out a girl I’ve known for years, cause I’m so scared. Be smart, Hermione.”

He looked over her shoulder than back at her and gave her a meaningful look. She turned around and saw Ron on his own, still waiting on her, she whirled around and mouthed: “Really.”

“Be smart, Hermione.” he repeated with a grin, then he turned around and walked away, he waved with his right hand and she could see his automail where his glove had been ripped. He called over his shoulder: “Do well on my exam.”

Ring, Ring, Ring

“Ugh, yeah, hello this is General Mustang, the Flame Alchemist, speaking. Who is calling a government line?” Roy answered the phone.

From the other side a cheery voice he knew all to well came: “Bad news, I got involved. Good news, there’s no wizard war to worry about anymore!”

“What did you do now, Fullmetal!” Roy roared into the line.

“Sheesh, nothing much bastard, but expect a bill about the Ministry of Magic interior, although Hogwarts might have to cover it.” Roy could basically hear the air of dismissal in that statement.

He pinched the bridge of his nose as he imagined the stacks of paperwork that would follow his youngest subordinate out of England. Fullmetal didn’t seem to care, because he cheerily said: “I’ll be back tomorrow to give you a full report. See you then!”

“Don’t you hang up on me.” Roy yelled, “You explain yourself, now.”

“Nah, I think I’ll do that tomorrow, I want to see your face while I tell you.” the smug little shit said, he went on asking: “Hey, are we sending anyone as a replacement for me? If so who?”

Roy decided it wasn’t worth the fight, so he said: “We were thinking of sending Armstrong over, if they’ll have us after your stunt.”

“Don’t worry so much, of course they will.” he could visualize Fullmetal waving his concerns away, “But, Armstrong you say? Those poor little bastards.”

An evil glint got into Roys eyes as he said: “Yeah, little, like you.”

As expected Fullmetal exploded: “WHO ARE YOU CALLING SO LITTLE THE BUGS WON’T EVEN NOTICE IF THEY-”

Beeeeeep.

“Bye, Fullmetal.” Roy said to the cut of line.

He smirked to himself, but that smirk was quickly wiped away by Hawkeye, who told him she was kind enough to bring him the new paper work, since it seemed he had time to insult Elric, so he must be done with his last stack.

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konekoryuugamine · 5 years

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Chaos Critic’s Top 10 Disliked Anime

Oh man I am going to get SO much flack for this one . . . I know, I know" so many anime are out there, and so many are like this, and yadda yadda - Look, I wanna do this, I wanna help people steer clear of these shows, and if someone likes these shows, more power to ya, but I don't like them, this is only opinion, and I prefer that no one calls me a liar or a jerk for saying something about an anime that is all speculation and varied per person. Anyways, I don't own these animes, and please read and enjoy, no flames, thanks a bunch. Let me say this now: not all anime rock. I have been an avid anime watcher since I was in the 5th grade, and when I realized anime were released every year, in the hundreds, I was flipping over in cartwheels. Vampires, dragons, wizards, ninjas, rock and roll - all of those in my favorite animation style that is pretty much SO flipping awesome in so many ways - made me so happy. I ended up binging anime on Toonami, (still do), and joined several anime sites to get the latest anime dishes and series that I could muster up enough free time to watch. My parents grew concerned about me watching so much of it to the point where I would have been addicted, but then I ended up telling them it was where my heart laid, and they accepted, it with somewhat unwilling protectiveness. After all these years of watching anime and reading manga, I ended up developing tastes that ranged from very horroreqsue anime with suspense and mystery to ridiculous comedy with great puns on words. 'Bakemonogatari', everyone.

However, with these tastes and genres came some of the weird and strangest animes I have ever seen, and am currently watching. Does this mean I think all 'weird' anime are bad? Heck no - 'Bobobo-Bobobobo', "Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt" and "FLCL" are some of my favorites, although I consider Bobobo a guilty pleasure. I did run into some strange and bad anime, however, and it made me wonder whether or not getting into anime at all was a good or bad idea. It even made me think that these were the animes that gave other great ones bad wraps - hence the stereotype of Japanese anime always being about ten-year-old girls and tentacles. No idea why, honestly. The more I do think about it, however, I do feel there are some pretty bad anime out there on the internet, and if you ask any anime fan, they will list some anime that are bad, their favorites, and even one they watch when they choose to. Many a conversation I had often resulted in me talking about the ones I liked more than the ones I hated, to my relief. But otherwise, I feel these anime I'm about to list carry their ideas a bit too far, go too far with anime as a format, or are just overhyped and bad as heck . . . just because an anime is weird, strange, badly dubbed or whatever else does not mean I have to hate it. I have my reasons. So, without fault, here's my top ten anime I dislike more than others. Keep in mind that these are the anime I dislike for certain reasons, and if someone out there does like these, and calls me out for hating them, then I accept it. Just because I hate something doesn't mean you can make me like it.

And here they are. NUMBER 10: " Lil' Pri" I thought this series would be cute to watch for a while, and I decided to watch a few episodes. I ended up binging the whole series and started thinking too much about it. Then I realized it wasn't really that good. Ringo Yukimori, a young girl who enjoys Snow White's stories, literally bumps into two other girls at a concert for a super famous singer named Wish. The other girls, Leila Takashiro and Natsuki Sasahara, also enjoy the stories of Princess Kaguya and Cinderella. The suddenly then run into three adorable talking animals, Sei, Dai and Ryoku, (a bird, a squirrel and a dragon), who are looking for their princesses in the human world. The main idea behind this series is that the three girls turn into older versions of themselves with the embedded spirits of Snow White, Cinderella, and Princess Kaguya to help bring human happiness, "happiness tones", to Fairyland and save it. Humans' happiness and believe in the fairytales has dwindled, decreasing the happiness tones. So, the girls agree to help retrieve those, and along the way, they figure out Wish is the Queen's 'long-lost' son, who can turn into a rabbit . . . Yeah see where I'm going here? The anime is, for all intents and purposes, as straightforward as a magical girl series can get. There are no hidden meanings to Ringo, Leila or Natsuki, and their names pretty much are dead giveaways to what stories they enjoy most. Prince Chris, a.k.a. Wish, is immediately given focus at the beginning of the series, and there are no real surprises until the last few episodes of the series when the girls give up their magic, hint-hint, and leave Fairyland after retrieving all the happiness tones. Let me tell you, that can get kind of boring . . . The main problem I have with this series overall is how bland it is and how it seems to take ideas from several other little girls' magical shows, such as Ojamajo Do-re-mi or Pretty Cure. The concepts of having normal girls become heroes to save other lands, rescue royalty and adapt to their situation are something I've heard before and seen more excellently done, in other shows. The fact the girls also become idols onstage is an interesting quirk, but it reminds me too much of the Witchlings' maid outfit changes from the fourth season of Ojamajo.

It doesn’t help the CGI in the anime comes off as awkward, leaving the concert scenes clunky and hard to watch. Their movements are stiff, and their voices are not exactly the best. They do get better in vocals as the series progresses, but everything else stays the same. When I also state how bland the series is, I'm also referring to Ringo, Leila, and Natsuki, reluctantly. The audience is told and can understand the heroines well enough to the point where we wish they had more depth. They all love Wish, they love fairytales, Ringo loves apples and has seven brothers, Leila is half Italian, Natsuki loves sports - we get it. The problem is that they have no other depth than being cardboard cutouts of anime heroines. We are never given any character conflicts, they never have issues that expand over the series, they never really get the kind of development other series like Sailor Moon receive for magical girl heroines. I know I may get flack for mentioning that, but I have seen development of Usagi Tsukino in both the manga and the new anime adaption of the series. The girls don't really receive any development here, aside from the minor mentioning of growing up and accepting happiness as it comes rather than forcing it on others. The reason this one ranks so low on my list is because I do still enjoy the cuter designs of the characters, and give it points for trying to come up with a good driving plot that does bring to mind the idea of growing up and being happy. It’s a cookie cutter style idol show but it has heart to it. It tries to overstep its bounds, but never gets the chance to. At the same time, I also think Show By Rock!! and Zombieland Saga did the “idol concept with a twist” take much better, what with one being a Sanrio based product that combines an isekai with an idol show, and an idol show about zombie girls that satirizes the entire idol industry. NUMBER 9: " Full Metal Alchemist" I am going to get SO much flack for this one . . . Before someone eats my liver, let me say I love the series as a whole, but compared to Brotherhood, this series has become something that both baffles me and makes me confused. The series revolves around Edward and Alphonse Elric, who try to bring their mother back from the dead using the practice of alchemy. Strictly taboo, and stricken with grief, they decide to bring her back and return to their happiness. However, something goes horribly wrong and Alphonse's body is taken as compensation for their mother, who doesn't truly return. Ed sacrifices his arm and leg to save his brother and bring him back in a suit of armor. After the incident, in the anime, Ed decides to join the military of Risembool and hunt down the Philosopher's Stone, which is implied heavily to be something that can work real miracles. I enjoyed watching the series, and I empathized with both Edward and Alphonse. They lost everything, tried to get it back, and lost more in return. Their tackling of the philosophy of equivalent exchange and getting something for nothing is truly moving, and the deep symbolization of The Philosopher's Stone being hope and realization is something that I know I will never see duplication of. Then . . . I saw the ending episodes of the first series. And I got mad. I expected an epic climax, much like what happened in "Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood". I wanted Ed to get his limbs back, Al to get his body back, Ed to marry Winrey, Hoenheim to die and accept his flaws, for the Philosopher stone to dissolve, and for Scar to repent himself . . . Instead, we got something that felt rushed, confusing and strange to me. Something that throws the entire series out of whack because of it. The leader of the Homunculi, who had been chasing Ed and Al all over the place until they reached Liore again, were being led by Dante. The old lady who taught Izumi, their teacher. The old lady who was killed by Greed in episode 33. Who had an assistant who had that strange alchemic tablet. Dante, as it turns out, was a lover of Hoenheim, much to everyone's shock, and when Hoenheim and she gave up their souls for the stone, they created something that they could use to swap their bodies and minds, intelligence included, into other beings, sort of like the plot of "Quantum Leap" without the randomness and depth. She was jilted because Hoenheim left her, (reasonably succumbing to his guilt over killing so many people to make the stone), and she decided to make and use the Homunculi to chase down HIS sons and make a new stone. In other words, she ended up wanting to make another stone, and her real motives for why are never explained, although her anger over Hoenheim leaving her for another woman, then using HIS KIDS to make a new stone, is petty in terms of evil levels. She toyed with the Elrics, taunted them throughout the series, and ended up controlling things to make a new Philosopher's stone. That part, however, is hard for me to buy. Dante being the villain behind everything, including the making of the second Philosopher's stone, and bringing back Rose for no other reason than to use her as a 'figurehead' then possess her, is hard for me to take in. This would mean she'd have to have tabs on the Elrics at all times, be involved in the Risembool military, use more than one person at one point or another, display that she knew about the war and probably was the one who started it in the first place. There were no indications to me that Dante was the villain all along through the series, as the Homunculi were given more screen time than her, her assistant and later body double Lyra was shown twice and was bland as other minor characters, and things don't connect well for me to buy it logically. If she was the one behind everything, and she was supposed to have been fake-killed by Greed, then when did she successfully possess Lyra? How long has she kept tabs on the Elrics? Was she involved somehow in Trisha's illness, that kickstarted the entire flipping hunt for the Philosopher's Stone? If she was also involved, why drag Rose into the battle to just tick off Edward? And furthermore, if Hoenheim knew if she was behind everything, and knew he'd be killed otherwise, then why didn't he just come right out and explain everything to the brothers when they first got involved with the Homunculi? Was he just afraid of dying? Of killing others?

The more confusing thing is how this ending was created. Anime depends on the manga in most cases to flesh out the story. If the manga is over several volumes, like One Piece or Bleach, episodes will be released and designated in arcs and storylines. If the manga is ahead of the anime, then the writing process for the episodes can be ad-libbed thanks to the story that’s already present.

When the manga halts or goes on hiatus, the anime must do something to fill in the extra space while the mangaka continues their work. Hence “filler arcs”. Like the extra few filler arcs in Bleach that involve the new captain or the Bounts, or the filler arcs in Naruto that everyone wishes didn’t exist. They exist to not only extend the anime’s lifespan but to try and flesh out the worlds of these series to make them feel more alive.

In this case, this was a filler ending for the Full Metal Alchemist anime series. The manga had gone on hiatus and they had nothing to conclude the show with, so they had to deal with what they had. I wanted to like it, but after looking at everything, I just find that nothing fits. Either way, the ending of the original anime just befuddled me with an antagonist who was barely connected to the story to me, and the threads that bound her fingers to her puppets were about as thin as fishing line to me. . . . Not to mention I'm still wondering how the anime connected itself to the 'parallel-world' of 'Germany' and how Edward was stuck there through the movie "Conqueror of Shamballa", but that movie did try to tie up the original anime series with a bow.

Of course, this leads me to say why I dislike it so much: because Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood exists. It’s an amendment to the series that aims to follow every detail of the manga. We see more progressive action and character development from start to finish, and we see an expansive world that was never given to us in the original anime. Fans of the show were rewarded with Ed and Al getting what they wished for, intense and awesome animation, and a marriage proposal that is adorable no matter which way you put it.

However, I will say the first 10 to 13 episodes of the original anime are far better introductory episodes than the first few episodes of Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood. We see the Elrics grow and reach their respective early goals quick, and we actually get to know Alexander and Nina before Shou Tucker fucks things up. We also get deeper motivation for Ed’s reasons to become a State Alchemist.

If I did have to recommend this series to people who’d never seen it, I’d say go watch the first 10 episodes of the first FMA series, then watch Brotherhood in its entirety. Get the context and emotional development first, then come back in for what else is in store. And now I'm gonna put on this football helmet while I wait for the hate mail. NUMBER 8: " Ghost Hound" This one is a special case of bad to me. There was a point where I got hooked on the anime "Serial Experiments Lain" and I got into the idea that many anime were deeper than they seemed. Lain was a dimensional protagonist who I felt much in common with, and developed a sense of what I wanted to know about ESP. I decided to get into shows involving the subject, and later developed a taste in supernatural shows and law dramas. Or anything that often touted lighter themes of horror. I found this anime on accident one day when I was looking up scary anime. And after finding out it was done by Production I.G. and Shirow Masamune, I was ecstatic. I was disappointed when I watched it. The entire story revolves around a boy named Taro, who was kidnapped with his younger sister Mizuka on September 22nd, 1996. His sister died, but he survived the horrific situation. Since then, he's been seeing a therapist and has horrible PTSD-induced nightmares involving the situation. He also develops the ability to astral project himself into The Unseen World, which is the space between the living and the dead, and he uses his ability to better himself and his friends Makoto and Masayuki, who have also suffered similar traumatic childhood situations. They are led on this journey by their psychologist, who has his own agenda on the matter, but wants to help solve the supernatural insanity in the boys’ lives due to his own interactions with The Unseen World. On its own, this idea is rather interesting, and you feel it can be done well over the course of 13 episodes, with an added OVA of how the entire conflict is resolved with death being a part of life, how having a power means it comes with greater responsibility and how everyone has issues they must come to terms with. And in the case of Masamune’s anime, delve deeper into the human understanding and structure of the conscious and unconscious mind. However, the anime takes a rather . . . interesting, turn in its story. And when I say interesting, I mean something that may or may not work, depending on who you ask. When the boys get together and go after the one who kidnapped Taro and his sister, they come across Miyako Komagusu, who has spiritual powers thanks to her miko line. She chooses to help them and Taro soon becomes fixated on Miyako due to her appearance, which is eerily similar to his sister.

Soon, the whole kidnapping element is thrown out the window, same with the title of the anime being only Makoto's astral-projection form, and comes in with a religious sect underneath Makoto's family and the fact his grandmother tries to make Miyako the new head after her father is hospitalized. And it's later revealed that the Ogami Religious Cult has ties to an underground group of illegal drugs, medical enhancements, MUTANTS, and child kidnappings . . . At this point, I was saying "why?" On the one hand, it's a dark turn for an anime that started out with ESP, traumatic incidents, and they do save Miyako from the group of psychos. Whether or not the group remained standing was unclear to me, and the more I thought about how deep this went, the further I ended up in mental spirals of how logic had to be invoked. On the other hand, it's a mish-mash of every cliche involving some evil mastermind group I can think of: the bad guy actually did this to such and such, who became the main guy's best friend, and now they want the girl who the main character has a connection with, and they all have supernatural powers, and they get others who betrayed the bad guys to help them. This overlay of genres, and the fact the ESP is forgotten at about halfway through the anime for my liking, (along with there not even being MUCH of the supposed 'ghost hound'), there is also a stunning issue I had with the design of the characters not fitting the backgrounds. Whereas the designs were simple, the backgrounds were overly lush, too detailed, too mesmerizing. Not like in "Over the Garden Wall", but still. All in all, 'Ghost Hound' is a mixed bag to me. It does provide some good food for thought and an interesting storyline, but the second half ruins the story and eliminates the ESP the story was embedded into. NUMBER 7: " School Days" I am aware this will be on others' hate lists, but hear me out . . . yeah, it's that bad in the anime form. "School Days" is based on a visual novel game of the same name by Overflow, and has quickly garnered a reputation. The series involves this character, Makoto, as he makes his way into high school and develops a crush on adorable and shy Kotonoha. At the same time, depending on which way the player goes, he'll also fall for his best friend, his best friend's cousin, the other girls IN his class - well, you get where I'm going with this. But before I get to the anime, let me explain a bit more about the game itself. It incorporated motion and sound into the visual touch, making it look like you were playing an interactive anime, which wasn't that bad of an idea. There were also numerous cut scenes, (including graphic content might I add), that depicted the characters, and something that made the series very popular online: the death scenes. What made this game unique from others is that it included graphic and detailed executions of main characters in several gorey fashions, along with some of the worst bad ends that can ever be imagined when it comes to one main character screwing over someone else. One death scene in particular involved Kotonoha committing suicide from a tall building in front of Makoto and Sekai, and you can HEAR THE CRUNK AND BUBBLE OF HER BODY AS SHE HITS THE PAVEMENT. THAT ALONE TELLS YOU WHAT IS AT STAKE IN THIS GAME IF YOU SCREW UP. But, because of how varied the main character's answers can get, and how many cut scenes are available at the time of the first go-around, someone will have to play the game multiple times before a Good ending is unlocked, like the super-rare harem-esque relationship between Makoto, Satonaka and Kotonoha. (Apparently, it's impossible to get because of how many things you can say, but I digress). Now, to explain how the game became an anime . . . and I really don't want to . . . The anime adapts the storyline of the game, following Makoto in high school, and he tries to get Kotonoha to fall for him, and Sekai tries to help him, then she falls for him. In short, it's a typical anime that depicts a three-way love triangle. Until about the fourth or fifth episode. After he gets Kotonoha as a girlfriend, he dates Sekai, with the knowledge of everyone, and LIES about breaking up with Kotonoha, AND HAS SEX WITH SEKAI, for the purpose of making things better with Kotonoha. He then goes around and sleeps with OTHER GIRLS IN HIS CLASS and AVOIDS KOTONOHA to keep up this whole thing. That is called "sleeping around" and "being a jerk". The reasons why people list this anime on their worst list is mostly because of the annoying voices, or because of the stilted and bland colors in the background, but to me and numerous others, it's because of Makoto Ito being a two-timing jerk who also has sex with numerous girls while still having one intimate girlfriend. No, what also cements it for me, are the last three episodes: Sekai announces she's pregnant to the class, Makoto is reasonably cut off from his friends, Kotonoha, who had been RAPED, is devastated, and Makoto blames Sekai for ruining his life when he was JUST as much at fault in the first place. He goes out with Kotonoha, and right as he gets home, Sekai, reasonably ticked off, stabs him brutally with a butcher knife, and Kotonoha kills her and affirms she was lying about her pregnancy, then takes Makoto's head and sails off. This was about the only way I could have expected this entire mess to conclude. Someone had to die, Makoto had to be given his karmic payback for sleeping with so many women, and for cheating and leaving Kotonoha to be raped and blaming Sekai for everything when he had his own faults, and Kotonoha had to take revenge or grow a backbone because of how everything bad happened to her for some reason. In other words, the conclusion is more satisfying to me than the show itself, and that actually saved it a few places on my list. Watching it from start to finish is terrible, and the way you know about Makoto's sleeping around makes you want to slap some sense into him. Or stab him with a knife, but I digress. NUMBER 6: " Bludgeoning Angel Dokuro-Chan" AND now we get to something that's both bad and comedic. And for once I'm not talking about Spongebob. "Bludgeoning Angel Dokuro-Chan" is an anime that combines hentai and comedy, and as for the brand of humor, it relies on what is known as the continuous running gag. To understand what I mean, let me give you a few examples of continuous anime running gags: Team Rocket blasting off in every episode of "Pokemon" and doing some kind of farfetched scheme to capture Pikachu, how Joey Wheeler is also denoted as being immature or a punk, and as of more recent anime I've seen, how Tsukune is subjected to being fought over by Moka and the other girls. The reason I'm bringing this up is that these are the gags I've seen being used in shows that quickly got stale . . . and were still being used as the show went along. 'Pokemon' is still the biggest offender of this since Pokemon Co. got a hold of the dubbing and anime creations in both Japan and America. The gag of Team Rocket blasting off is okay for a season or so, but seeing them just get pounded again and again makes me feel sorry for them, and makes me want to slap them and say "Stop blowing yourselves up all the time!", thinking they'd learn. But hey, I can dream can't I? The issue with that is the issue with this anime completely. "Bokotatsu-Tenshi Dokuro-Chan", or "Bludgeoning Angel Dokuro-Chan" is an anime that focuses on a boy named Sakura Kusanabe, who is a normal boy going to school and having a crush on his classmate. Apparently, 20 years into the future, he invents a machine that prevents the aging process on women after the age of 13, making them . . . physically younger. They literally call this in the anime a "pedophile's dream world". So, God, in the future, sends an angel, Dokuro, to go and assassinate him so he can't make this crazy machine . . . if you are laughing right now, I was too. The plot is ridiculous, as par for how it's supposed to be a comedy, but the manner of ridiculous ends there and it becomes more mindbogglingly annoying with each passing episode. Dokuro, when she gets to Sakura, decides to live with him and convince him to not build the machine, and in the process, does so with her rambunctious energy, super-human strength, her annoying voice, and often times, KILLS HIM WITH HER KANABO CLUB CALLED EXCALIBOLT. That is the gist of the entire show. He tries to impress a girl, he 'insults' the over-sensitive Dokuro, she kills him, she brings him back to life. He tries to make some friends, she gets offended, she kills him, she brings him back to life. And so on and so forth. For about thirteen episodes. I ended up watching the series with my younger sister when I was about 15, and I couldn't help but laugh ad how dumb it was. And because I knew I couldn't change the videos because of my younger sister saying "Show me more, show me more! I wanna see him die again!" . . . I felt a part of my soul die. (I also learned never to show my sister that kind of anime again . . . until she watched "Attack on Titan"). so, Anyways! The entire anime, dub or sub, is annoying, high pitched, and the characters are all flat as boards. Dokuro's entire character is her crush on Sakura and the fact she wants to help him while never learning she accidentally causes his deaths. Sakura is a perverted young boy who is trying to get by, and ends up falling for Dokuro in a stereotypical fashion. There's also other angel characters, such as one who uses a . . . cattle prod, and she has ram horns . . . and one who is a . . . transvestite punk goblin? To be honest, I never bothered to remember their names because I forgot about them after another two episodes. Same with Dokuro's sister. The only reason I remember her was because the show made her look hot for a 7-year-old, and she used a wet towel as a weapon. And everyone in the school thought she was hot. . . . I'm gonna stop on this one now before I get angry again and say that this anime isn't very good, but it does do a good job in setting up something that is both hilarious in context and causing some of the better memes in AMV Hell 3. NUMBER 5: " Sonic X" From contrived and humorous to awkward and strange. I first watched this show, much like others, on the Fox Box, (among other anime that were terribly dubbed by 4Kids). It was . . . strange, to see a talking hedgehog with blue quills run about with a two-tailed yellow kitsune, and on Earth no less. I had to change the channel every few seconds or so because I felt so strange watching them. I ended up feeling the same thing when I was watching 'Sonic Underground'. I know now that the feeling was 'awkwardness'. The story follows Sonic and his friends from the planet Mobius as they get transported to Earth because of some unintended calculations from Sonic screwing with Dr. Eggman's machine. Because they don't how it happened, and they don't know how to go back, they have to adjust on Earth, and they do just that. In the process, Sonic befriends a human, Chris, whose father is a scientist. And the wacky adventures are supposed to continue from there . . . I'll go ahead and say this now: combining humans in a world of anthropomorphic animals has to either be done well or not at all. I'm cool with anthropomorphism being talking animals, like Bubbie from 'Flapjack', or like Fred the horse or Beatrice from 'Over the Garden Wall'. I also don't mind if they have only the humanistic approach, and cannot talk, like the animals from 'Wicked'. But if it's full anthropomorphism, like Looney Tunes or Tom and Jerry, then it has to make sense as to why they are there and how they can fit in with the environment. It comes down to three basic things: environment, history and art style. If the environment is okay, and the history of there being anthropomorphism is established, and the art style is in turn okay, then it is okay in the long run. This is why I enjoy "The Looney Tunes Show". The environment is more modern and bent to match reality, the history of the characters is established early on and build on episode by episode, (and there's the references that add to it with Looney Tunes jokes from previous shorts from the 60's), and there are confirmed humans in the show who don't notice the anthropomorphism, and the art style blends it all together in a clean swipe of hilarity and animation brilliance. This is also why I enjoy the movie "Cats Don't Dance": it takes anthropomorphism of animals and turns it into a metaphor for racism in 1940's Hollywood. It combined a relative environment of a historical timepiece, added the necessary elements of anthropomorphism with its own rich metamorphic history and the art style made all of it look like it was a classic cartoon. If the environment works, and the history is laid down, and the art style manages to work it together, then anthropomorphism in shows is alright and well done in my book. But, (and I do have to be honest when I say this), if even one of these is never touched on, or brought too much into focus, then questions will be raised and things can be turned awkward. This is what I feel happened when I watched 'Sonic X'. The environment was Earth and all humans, with no mentions of Sonic being real before, and then out of the blue Sonic and his friends fall to Earth, "like Magic". The art style made it harder for me to watch because of how cartoonish Sonic and his friends looked compared to the humans and Eggman. It also could have been because every line looked SO SMOOTH, and there were no detailed areas or specifics, but I could have been wrong. To me, this series started off awkward, and continued to get more awkward with the introduction of Shadow, Eggman's schemes and the later part of season one. The conclusion of season one was, and I'll say it lightly, okay. Chris saying goodbye to Sonic and his friends at the expense of never seeing them again was heartfelt, and he did act reasonably when it came to seeing them leave. (Although the CGI could have been better for their transition back). THEN . . . season two happened . . . then season two happened . . . Just like how I feel with "Sword Art Online", I feel season two of 'Sonic X' is weaker than the first. Chris coming back because he longed for Sonic all these years and building a machine to send him to Mobius, and he happens to turn into a kid again because of the time differences on planets? Sure, I'll buy that, albeit it sounds like Sonic 06 to me. And Cosmo being the key of life for an evil overlord, and later performs a sacrifice of herself to save everyone and Tails is left in the Friend Zone? Cliche, painful to watch, predictable and overall weaker than the previous season. I don't want to spend too much on this season either because the plot and Chris made it weaker than when we witnessed Sonic and his friends adapting to Earth and humanity. Introducing an annoying character again and adding a character who becomes the key for hope is something I feel has been done better before. I hate feeling this way because I watch "Sonic Boom" now, but I feel that one is better than this . . . I hate to feel that way, but I do. NUMBER 4: " Eiken" Stop me if you've heard this before: a new male student to a school, desperate to make friends, ends up tripping and falling, literally, for a busty babe who is perfect. Then he has to do something insane, meet her friends, and tries to hook up with her only to be shut down as lucky, a pervert or a complete loser. If you answered me with "That's the opening plotline for Rosario+Vampire", then you're close. I also would have accepted "Stop talking, that sounds like every hentai anime out there", but fair enough. This is also, word for word, the opening scenes of the OVA series "Eiken". THIS one is BAD. Originally an 18 volume manga series, "Eiken" involves a boy named Densuke Mifune, who transfers to Zashono Academy at the start of a new year. He accidentally gropes one of the school's most attractive girls, Chiharu Shinonome, and gets drafted into the Eiken Club, which is run by her friend, the lively and flirtatious Kirika Misono. He is then subjugated to being tortured by the club members while he tries to get Chiharu to like him. . . . there is a catch to this one aside from being stereotypically harem/hentai anime. "Eiken" has become infamous in the anime community for having female characters possess pronounced, er . . . "tracts of land". Yeah, I said it. The entire manga and two-episode OVA series follow hentai taken to ridiculous extremes, involving large boobs. I don't know how the joke came about, or how people come to know about this, (probably in the same manner that people know about Boku no Pico), but dang it, I hate that I know about this one. The only reason this isn't my number one pick is that I found other clips on AMV Hell about it, and decided to check it out. Now, I bet you're wondering: why would a straight-laced, highly intelligent young woman like myself watch a two-episode OVA involving girls with 'humorously' large breasts and a perverted boy who day-dreams of bondaging his crush in measuring tape? I'll let Alucard get channeled here for that reason. Ally? (Alucard: Fuck you, that's how.) Thanks, ya fuck-mothering vampire. Aside from hitting all the earmarks of cliche and hentai moments in the book, the OVA adds to it by adding as much fanservice as physically and mentally possible, such as the bananas, the table dresses, the bondage day-dreams, etc. If someone wanted to make a hentai porn, those already exist. This is trying too hard to be something like porn without being it. And kind of doing it poorly. The games of the academy also are involved in some kind of rigging, which is contrived and makes no sense whatsoever, and Chiharu is involved with the bad guy, who is also cliche and makes no sense, and the entire resolution is easily predictable. It's dull, and only served to make me angry when I watched the OVA to see what the frick it was about. I really do regret it. I cannot stress how much hatred and pity I have for those who read this and actually enjoy it. If you do, more power to you; but just remember something. THEY GAVE A 10-YEAR OLD BOOBS THE SIZE OF BASKETBALLS. NUMBER 3: " Black Butler II" Before ANYONE says anything, YES I consider the second season of "Black Butler" to be another anime entirely. Makes separating the two much easier. For the record, nothing is wrong with "Black Butler". The series is wonderful, the pacing is perfect, the storylines between the manga and the show differ greatly, but either way the conclusions are perfect, the artstyle and metaphoric coloring is syched, the voicing acting is awesome - shall I go on? So, when I finish the first season and see the second one, I decide to watch it. I really, really, REALLY wish I hadn't. The first season was, in all definitions of the words, "a work of art". The second season too it, and decimated every last loose end that was tied up in the first season finale. Why am I being so hard on this series? For a couple of reasons. First of all, the plot. The second series picks up with a new young blond gentleman, Alois Trancy, who has recently been found by his family after a kidnapping incident. Because of his trauma, he's become a bit of a jerk and often harms others. At his side is a handsome and elegant butler, Claude, who looks eerily closer to Sebastian than I can stand. They take the mansion over, and Alois goes about his merry way to be happy, albeit in the worst of ways, by torturing his female maid Hannah and the triplet servants. If this is starting to sound like a warped Ciel Phantomhive to you, then you are feeling the exact same thing I felt when I first watched it. Of course, the first episode delves right into these two firsthand, how Alois is a bit of a prick, (the fact he wears booty shorts), and how he is not above hurting others to get what he wants.

Something I don't remember Ciel ever wanting to do or exhibit. So, in episode one, a strange man with a large suitcase comes to the door and Alois lets him in. The man is later revealed to be Sebastian Michaelis, who was searching for something. In the suitcase is Ciel Phantomhive's soulless body, and Sebastian leaves the mansion with a tea box, holding a familiar blue ring. Alois is ticked, Claude is pissed and Ciel comes back from the dead. The reason for this is pretty much left obvious for the viewers through flashbacks: in the first series finale, Sebastian was about to take Ciel's soul, when a contrived demon spider, Claude, swiped his delectable soul away from the raven demon. Sebastian, reasonably ticked off, went after him and gave him his soul back, but now Ciel's memories of the previous season are gone, he has lost his revenge sought, and doesn't remember how he helped to save London. There's a reason I hate this anime. Claude stealing Ciel's soul and him having amnesia are just more contrivances that serve nothing more than to force the plot of there being another demon-master team for Sebastian and Ciel to go up against. Rather than build up to something in the previous season, everything in this one is left readily explained, and it just hurts to see how everything goes swiftly to dog poop. The second reason, the behavior of Claude and Alois Trancy. I've seen several worst anime character lists over the web, and Alois Trancy often dominates because of his smarmy attitude, his devastating contrasts to Ciel and how he harms others and begs to be saved by Claude at every instant notion of danger.

And, I can see why. Alois was, without a doubt, raised in a hellish environment, and all he had to look forward to was his 'brother', who is actually a saving grace for the anime and the blond. However, the severe deaths and mass village murders that took place because of his brother's pact with Hannah the Demon just wrecked everything for him. If the writers wanted to make Alois more relatable, like Ciel, then more emotional touching could have been done. Instead, Alois is often shown not regretting his actions, causing trouble and damage at every beck and call, and like in one episode, begs for help from Claude. I can tell he's supposed to be a contrast to Ciel, but it's too far. Especially when you count in how he also has three servants and Claude. As for Claude, he's not off the hook either. His mannerisms are more unique than Sebastian, but aside from that, he's the same dandy as Sebastian. All he does differently is be more cold-hearted and go back on his bargain made with Sebastian in the second episode. And to explain that in further detail, he and Sebastian ended up making a blood pact using roses and their own blood to see who would get Ciel Phantomhive's soul: a who would win kind of scenario with a yaoi prize going to the winner. Claude was the one who suggested it, and he was the jerk who broke it. Sebastian even pointed this OUT, and still, Claude wanted Ciel's soul. Not . . . to mention when Ciel and Alois' souls combined, he acted a bit . . . creepy around Ciel. (Dude kisses his leg . . . pedophilia there.) Three, the introduction of Hannah and her role in the story. Hannah is literally the Deus-ex-machina in this story, and I will not lie when I say I genuinely believe it. The maid, Hannah, later in the episodes, is revealed to be a demoness, (whom Sebastian never noticed before, even when Clyde used her as a sword sheath), and was never brought into full use as a demoness and user of magic until the final three episodes. She is given a very cliche and bland personality at first, which gives way to how she was putting on a facade to get close to Alois, because she felt what his brother felt when he made the pact with her. As much as I feel Hannah is a saving grace of the anime, I have to ding some points off because of how she exposites her role in Alois' past to him, in Ciel's body no less, and ends up performing a final act, that should not be possible, until she dies with Clyde and Alois. She could have been a better part of the story if she was given more of a stronger personality when Alois was being cruel, without going too sappy. Not much else about her makes me want to hate her as much as hug her. She does has a reason to be near Alois, she does care about him unlike Clyde, and does win him over in the end. But in all cases, she was a little bit of a good thing in a large bad thing. And as for the fourth reason, the flipping ending of the second series. Oh . . . MY GOD . . . Here's what happens as a recap, and stay with me here.

Ciel and Alois' souls are combined so he can be used by Claude as a last-ditch effort to win over Sebastian, and Sebastian gets reasonably ticked. Claude acts creepy, Ciel and Alois fight over Ciel's body and a maze is conjured that is fixed by Alois to let Claude win and take Ciel's soul away. Sebastian and Claude fight in the maze, Grell is there for no reason, Hannah is trying to talk to Alois who is in control, and Ciel's will takes over and changes the maze again. Alois finds out Claude lied and did want Ciel's soul, and Alois is ticked. The butlers complete the maze, and see Hannah over a passed out Ciel/Alois, and now with a new mark on him. The butlers are then escorted by Hannah to a demonic isle where they fight, and Alois' final contract with Hannah is revealed: he decided if Ciel's soul was so valuable, then he didn't want anyone to have or love it. So he wished that Ciel was a demon. Ciel Phantomhive becomes a demon, and his last command to Sebastian before this happened was to follow his order and help him. . . . The slap mark on my forehead is red. Alois, being jealous of Ciel, wished him into a demonic being, and now Sebastian, who ended up with a happy ending in the first series, is now stuck with Ciel for all eternity. And as a bonus punishment, Ciel is immortal and has to retreat with Sebastian to the demon world and never return. I was so angry when I watched this episode that I threw my phone across the room in a rage. Thank god for the Otterbox, or else it surely would have broken. There are several problems I have here with this ending, one of the most obvious being how Hannah could get Alois to get another contract in when he was already in one with Clyde, and how Ciel's body could handle THREE contract pressures at once and not feel any kind of soul degeneration, or something by then. But no, the largest problem is how and why the writers turned Ciel into a demon. The point of 'Black Butler" was to become associated with the concept of revenge and learn that it is not often what others are searching for. It's to be accepted that people will do bad things, and often get away with it. It doesn't mean taking revenge is the best option. While it is fulfilling, oftentimes it's not. Here, the concept of revenge is taken to the extreme with Alois turning Ciel into a demon because he was jealous. There's nothing in the lines of retribution here, aside from the fact he sacrificed his life to save Ciel's and Sebastian's. All that he did he did for petty jealousy. Ciel never did anything wrong in this series, so it was as if Alois was the torturer and Ciel was the poor dude strung along on the wall. The revenge within this series was also manipulated and forced between Ciel and Alois, compared to how Ciel had to sleuth out who to kill in the first series. Forced elements are never good. They always end badly. And this series is just proof of it. Having Hannah use her power to turn Ciel into a demon is also a stretch, as it is never implied she could do something like that before. I blame it more on the writers going "This is a good idea' and inserting it into the anime for kicks. . . . or to create a 'hint-hint-yaoi-hint-hint' product to establish a new fanbase. BUT, that just about sums up this one: contrived, bad characters, and ruining the first season of what made it good. And now I will put on a helmet . . . because the second one is going to make SO many people angry at me . . . NUMBER 2: " Sword Art Online" I can feel the fury from much hate-mail coming my direction, but let me explain my piece before someone goes all out and eats my liver. I like sci-fi tech stories in anime. .Hack//Sign is one of my favorite anime, and it still stays as one of the better examples of video games in anime, next to "No Game No Life" and "Log Horizon". It takes gaming into another level and gives you a video game world you want to participate in, and characters you want to root for. Yet this anime is where I draw the line when it comes to intense immersion. Aside from the stunning artwork and the stellar designs of the characters and worlds, I don't know much else I can commend about this anime, aside from the fact that it was also a fanfiction that became a thing. (Remind you of anything?) Now, back to what I was saying. SAO follows a boy, Kazuto Kirigata, or as he goes in the game(s) "Kirito". In the first arc of the anime and stories, he gets stuck in a game called "Sword Art Online", along with about a thousand other players. The mastermind behind it, one of the creators of the game, got them stuck there, and to leave, the players have to reach level 100 of the entire game and defeat him. And they can’t be forcefully removed from the game system due to it being hooked to their nervous system. Sure, it's a good idea, and sure I thought it was okay, but a part of me instantly disliked this idea because the same instance occurred in '.Hack//Sign', except the main character was the only one stuck in the game, it was psychological aspects with less action and the main character was a male avatar with a female body in the real world. I just thought it was a rip-off of the series, and when I decided to watch the rest . . . I had to nope out. About two to three episodes into the series, the players of SAO start to think the beta-testers for the game are beating everyone else easily because they know the mechanics and grinding points. So they try to force beta-testers to help them get information about the game and everything that entails it. And of course, no good comes from it because someone has to be the sacrificial lamb. This also spawns the term “beaters”, beta-testers who are ‘cheating’ in the game because of their foreknowledge.

Kirito then gets the idea that since he was a beta-tester for the game, and knows the details of the game and knows everyone hates his ass now, he can beat the game himself. So, he gives a shortwinded diatribe about being “The Guy” and goes it alone. This is given the fact he also seems to have no motivational aspects for this, nor does he TRY to reach out to other members of the SAO player communities that are stuck in the game, but the other players treat him and other beta-testers of the game as jackwagons. Beta-testers of games are beta-testers for a reason; they OK a game and game-play for little to no money, or much, and most of the time are good gamers. And the nicest people. I should know; I know a dude who beta-tested Destiny. Here, they're treated like jack-wagons, and Kirito just enforces the whole idea by acting like a jackwagon and walking away from other players to continue the game because why not. Aside from that, Kirito's personality is one of disinterest and expressionless pity. He wants to get out, but he continues alone until he meets Asuna, who for all intents and purposes, is the BEST character in Part I. Their relationship is easily one of the better things in this anime, albeit ham-fisted and later turned to sludge in the second and third parts, but still. Seeing them happy was a GOOD thing midway through this anime of darkness. It did give Kirito and Asuna something to fight for, but it never really fleshed either of them out for me. Skewer me later, I have a LOT more to point out. AS the show progresses, the plot becomes more and more linear, it never forks, Asuna is later RAPED IN THE SECOND PART, IN GRAPHIC DETAIL, and Kirito's flat sister comes into play as well. My disinterest in the characters and hatred of the second villain of the anime was enough to make me switch to something else. I'll be finishing this anime up for a full in-depth analysis later, but for now, I'll go ahead and say my piece here and leave it at that. I know people like this anime, and it makes me happy to see they like something collectively. I may not like it, like how I may not like One Piece as much as I used to, but for people to come together about an anime is okay. It's just I don't like this anime, and I don't mind others liking it. The pacing of the story measures out for almost an eternity, Kirito's ambitions and goals and behaviors are never really justified, the second part's villain made NO flipping sense, Asuna was degraded as a character and as an archetype, Kirito is in desperate need of development, reasons are needed for how they can be so OP in many parts, and I want some more answers on how his sister came into the picture. And . . . for the love of god . . . I want a redo on this anime's second half. . . . and I think most people do as well. . . . I don't think I can continue this part until I can get the FINAL and WORST anime I have ever seen out of my system. And believe me when I say . . . it's BAD. NUMBER 1: " Pupa" This anime. This . . . anime . . . I found this anime after scrolling around on Crunchyroll for something to watch in the Summer of 2014. I was interested in the genre and cover of the anime and decided to give it a try. . . . I want to erase it from my brain. Utsutsu Hasegawa and his little sister, Yume, are exposed to a rare and monstrous virus called 'Pupa'. Yume becomes a vicious man-eating monster, while Utsutsu gains regenerative powers. They are then approached, almost as if by magic, by a researcher who wants to contain Yume and Utsutsu and use them as guinea pigs for research. Utsutsu allows it, saying he'll do anything for his sister, and decides to become his sister's food source so she can assume a normal life. While the concept is golden and has the potential for deeper symbolic meaning, like how it used the teddy bears as the shattering of Yume's humanity and innocence, and how Utsutsu's relationship with his sister was put to the ultimate test, it becomes . . . hard to watch. In more ways than one.

The anime episodes are 4 minutes long each, leaving the entire series at a binge-able time of 1 hour. There’s not much to do with that much time, and it can’t be a fast-paced comedy like Hetalia. It’s a horror series. Horror series need to work quickly but have context and depth, or else the deeper meaning is lost. Since this is also animation, it means the drawings and backgrounds need to be visually appealing or eyecatching so the viewer can keep watching without problem.

Artistically speaking, the characters are well designed, but in animation terms, their movements are as bad as an early Studio Deen production.

And that’s where the praise ends.

There is an episode of the anime, each being five minutes long, of Yume just eating her brother, and saying "Utsutsu" over, and over, AND OVER again . . . If you get the idea of where I am going with this, then you know exactly WHY I do not like this anime. The concept itself is the driving force for the anime, and after that, NOTHING HAPPENS. Yume is kidnapped and experimented on, like Utsutsu, but he saves her and still decides to be her food source. She feeds on him, they love each other, they live normal lives, yadda yadda. Nothing. Conventional. Or concrete. Happens. Characters are introduced, but they come and go and are never touched on again unless the plot calls for them to make an appearance. Utsutsu and Yume's mother is cold and sees Yume as a monster, which may or may not be her delusions given how she was also abused by the kids' father, who is ALSO never developed outside of being a wife-beater, and both are who I consider to be the worst parents of all time. Yume and Utsutsu, for all purposes of the anime, are the most developed and touched on characters. But, they never do much outside of adapting to their own hellish nightmare. Never do they ask Maria the scientist for a cure, never do they try to escape or move along with their lives. They just get stuck in their nightmare, forever to be mad. I hate it when animes like this come around. It introduces an interesting scenario, only to forget plot and context in favor of showing more and more grotesque imagery and disturbing content. I know it's rated M, but in all honesty, the incest insinuations and the fact that no one helps these kids out of this problem is enough to make me mad. I will say it has beautiful designs.

I will say it had an interesting idea. I will not say it's a good anime. And, now you know why. Well, there you have it. Those are the top ten anime I personally dislike, and in a few cases, hate to the core. But, just because I hate these anime doesn't mean that others can't enjoy them. That's the power of the internet and personal opinion. Now . . . I'm gonna go back to writing MLP reviews . . . I've been getting rusty, and I feel like I'm gonna get so much flack for these . . .

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worseandworser · 5 years

Text

What doesn’t kill you

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2

This is a weird mix of ABO, chimera!Ed, and the werewolf!Ed, I guess.

Ship: RoyEd

Summary: “You were on a mission,” Ed turns to Alphonse, who carries on with the explanation, “There was this alchemist messing with chimeras, Brigadier general Mustang sent you there to check, and apparently you got caught up in a transmutation.”

Oh. That would explain why Edward can’t remember the basement.

Rating: Mature (chances of turning n/s/f/w)

Warnings/tags: AU, Post fmab, Pining, Scenting, Taller!Ed jhagdcfjh, werewold-chimera!Ed

read on ao3

The first two weeks, Edward stays inside voluntarily, which is a surprise. Winry brought with her a provisory prosthetic that makes him ache in disgraceful places, so he refuses to ear it — and hopping around the streets is not exactly comfortable. Alphonse is, as always, the best brother ever and brings him books from the Central’s library. Someone from the team calls him from time to time. Not much else happens.

The rest of the month, however, with a new and fitting automail leg, is a constant struggle to adapt. Not that he’s resigned to his current transmuted form — a few extra centimeters don’t hurt, right? — but outside of his and Al’s flat exist many challenges. The overwhelming mix of scents is one, and his newly found hearing sensibility proves to be another. He can hear Alphonse’s breathing from the other side of the room and car horns make him flinch like a frightened animal.

Of course, there are a few other noteworthy changes. His reflexes are sharper — he’s become a master of picking falling things up before they hit the floor — and acquired a weird taste for undercooked meat. Sleeping is a mystery; either he sleeps too much or stays wide awake for days in a row without much trouble. Even the new height isn’t perfect after all, since he’s still not used to the new balance point and fuck spending money on new clothes.

And his discomfort isn’t taken seriously apparently, because no one lets him see the goddamned array.

It takes Mustang a bit to give Alphonse any information. One morning Hawkeye shows up at their doorstep and drags the younger Elric out. Since then, the two arseholes have been working on the alchemy alone, not even bothering to share any of their research. That obviously angers Ed to no end, that he is being kept in the dark even though he’s the only one who was affected by the transmutation. It’s not really safe for him to be around the General, yes, and he will not get into much details about that, but it’s not justifiable. Alphonse could at least give him an update. Or Mustang could stop being such a controlling freak and just pass the whole thing onto Edward — he could surely work it out way faster.

Instead, they leave Ed to his own devices — which are, basically, trying to not get angry at people for how they smell. He begins to catalogue scents to try to avoid that precisely. He’s mostly looking for a pattern: what he likes and what makes him uncomfortable, those that calm him and those that leave him on the edge of a rage outburst.

Winry’s is a bit like dark chocolate — bitter, but sugary. Edward would never admit to her that he enjoys it very much, or that it brings a protective feeling to his chest as it does. It’s pleasant, not as calming as Alphonse, though it never fails to remind him that, yes, he does have a place to call home.

Hawkeye, the only member of the team he’s seen besides Mustang, smells like apple pie. Shocking, too shocking, so shocking Edward lock himself up in his room to laugh for a good half-an-hour. He expected so many things for her, but the sweet aroma of freshly baked goods was not one of them.

Most of the neighbors have what Ed started calling background scents — like street noise, perhaps; it’s there but not enough for you to care. One day, while collecting the correspondence, he bumps into the lady that lives next door: he sniffs at her, notices the perfume that is inherently hers, and forgets it as soon as he gets home. Background scent. Not that they even meet enough for Ed to remember her name, for god’s sake.

But he must thank her because it’s that fateful encounter that helps him gather the courage to leave the building.

For the first attempt, he begs for Alphonse to accompany him. There’s no way to know how far the heightened olfaction fucked up his already fucked up social behavior, and Al has to help him with that since he refuses to explain him the transmutation. It’s only fair. They go at night — fewer people, less noise, fewer chances of sending Ed spiraling down into an anxiety attack.

And everything goes well.

Edward can barely contain his relief. Yes, he can smell drunkards almost a whole block away and can partially comprehend conversations taking place across the street, but so what? It’s a beautiful, breezy summer night and Ed is not even bothered in the slightest. From time to time, Alphonse frowns at the sky, but Edward brushes it off as the usual worrying.

The following morning Ed feels bold, so he goes alone and only a few hours before lunchtime. There are cars everywhere now and he flinches a couple of times, and by the third block, the scents start mix curiously. He no longer detects each specific smell, but rather a mix of many things, which he probably won’t ever be able to explain to Alphonse. Street scent, perhaps, as if city and inhabitants are an entity in and of itself, — and Ed feels it all at once.

Like a machine or a body, he muses, a bunch of pieces that can’t be separated ‘cause they’ll just stop working.

He goes back home an hour later and by the doorstep he is certain of what they’re having for lunch.

“You shouldn’t go out today.”

Edward glares at the only other person in the room, “And why the fuck you’re—“

“I mean it, Brother,” Alphonse lowers his notebook to properly look at the older Elric, “maybe you should keep it low this week.”

“‘M not tired.”

“I can see that but that doesn’t mean you’re fine,” Al snorts, “it’s pretty clear that you’re not fine.”

Which is true. All Ed has been doing since yesterday is walk around the flat, fidgety and hyperaware. He didn’t sleep a minute, instead going for a long, mindless walks — during one of those he almost attacked a cab driver; the guy was asking for it when he mistook Ed for a woman and catcalled him. He wants to go out again, his whole body is itching for it, he can’t stand being inside anymore, he’s been inside all day already

“I am fine,” he smiles, trying to reassure the other, “I’m great, actually. I feel like I could run a marathon.”

“Thank you for proving my point, it’s almost night, please, don’t leave the apartment.”

And Ed does agree with him, partially. He shouldn’t leave, not when he’s feeling this skittish — who knows what reactions a busier environment could bring. But the prospect of staying in makes him feel like a caged animal, and he can’t have that. So he brushes Al off with a half-assed promise that he’ll be back soon, and exists their home a bit too eagerly.

Lacking a destination, Ed is once again a wandering man. Not that this is a bad thing, no: Edward is more at home when he’s wandering. Be it a short circuit around the block or a trip across the country, his home has always been the path and not the destiny. There’s no better feeling than shoving your hands inside the pants’ pockets and looking for a thing that you don’t really know you need until you bump into it.

He buys an apple from a street vendor and eats in large, fast bites, cleaning his hands on his shirt afterwards. His feet take him far away from the flat, and Edward is a mere spectator who watches as streets pass by and are left behind. At Av. Marston Court, he takes a left, and that’s when the idea of checking a bookshop pops up in his mind. With surer steps, he makes his way to the one on the crossing, which sells used books for a very interesting price — ideal for when Ed plans to stock up reading material.

The place is filled with dusty boxes and dustier shelves, and Edward breathes in the delicious smell of mold and old books. In this specific store it’s stronger, and not because Ed’s newly found olfactory prowess, but rather because it is. Naturally, inherently. He leisurely strolls through the stacks, his eyes falling on covers and titles and author’s names but not searching for anything in particular.

And then his nose picks up—

—that.

It’s not as strong as the first time, but it still makes him freeze up mid-way through reaching for a book. The hairs of his nape stand on end, his back instantly goes straight, and every muscle of his body tighten. He can almost hear the loud thud of his heart, beating heard and fast as if trying carve a way out of Ed’s chest.

Roy, his brain provides uselessly, Roy Roy Roy—

He sniffs, trying to pinpoint the man’s location; in the store, yes, but where. Stumbling through the aisles, he has to refrain from running towards the alluring smell — but he does follow it, like an eager puppy, looking into each corridor aisle hopefully every turn he makes.

As Edward gets used to the scent, the intensity of his reaction decreases significantly. He halts, scolding himself for his behavior; what gives him the right to stalk Mustang like this, especially when his feelings are... platonic? Feeling his face burning, he lowers his head and slumps against a shelf, shame building up and insisting for him to leave as soon as—

“Fullmetal?”

“Not an alchemist anymore...”

Roy is over there, and then right by Ed’s side because of course he would have to get closer. The blue military jacket hangs from his forearm and he is holding a book with a grey paper cover — a novel, probably, and, although Ed has never been one to read fiction, he still wants to ask about it. And he looks good — even if he’s in those clothes Edward always sees — since there’s probably not a single moment in the man’s life he doesn’t.

“Old habits die hard, I suppose.”

”It’s been years now,” he snorts, “I know your old man memory makes it all harder, but it’s time for you to catch up already.”

The raven-haired man opens his mouth, and rapidly closes it again — instead of words, what comes out is laughter. A small huffed sound that Edward takes a moment to admire.

“What’s so funny, Mustang?”

“Nothing, it’s just— I was going to make a joke about your diminutive height, but I’m not entitled to that anymore.”

Ed’s grin is larger than the Drachman border, “Fucking finally.”

They’re eye to eye now. In fact, Edward is even a bit taller, but that might just be the angle — or biased by Ed’s strong desire to one-up Mustang in something. The blond breathes in deeply, letting that overwhelming scent warm him up deliciously; his knees go a bit weak and he blinks at Roy in an attempt to regain his focus.

“Do you feel well enough to go back to work now?” Roy asks, with worry furrowing his brows.

“...”

“It’s been almost four weeks now.”

“I know, and I’m sorry about that, it’s just things have been kinda… complicated.” Ed has no idea if the slow nod Mustang gives him means more days off or simply acknowledgement, so he adds: “but I can go back whenever.”

“Are you sure about that?”

“Yeah, I mean, I’m feeling good and all that.”

Roy bites the corner of his bottom lip, “Yes, but I mean are you sure?”

Oh, Ed shivers, he’s talking about that.

To say Roy knows a thing about that, would be a blatant lie — Ed had been very quick to shout for Mustang to get out that day. Still, the thought doesn’t stop the spike of fear, and neither the annoyance burning its way through his throat. He has to remind himself to stay calm, that Mustang probably thinks Ed just gets uncomfortable with his scent, that Alphonse would never expose him in such way.

Ed sighs, and this time the warmth that comes with inhaling settles in his chest, cocooning itself like a small animal underneath his ribcage.

“It’s alright, I’m getting used to the whole hypersensitivity thing, it doesn’t bother me so much.”

For the smallest second, Ed is sure he sees—

—that flash of disappointment.

Yeah, that’s pretty stupid, isn’t it?

Their following exchanges’ themes orbit around work, as they always do. Mustang tells him about Havoc, who was in charge of all paperwork involving the infamous Major Elric and couldn’t wait for said Major’s return to get rid of it. Edward chimes in when he supposes necessary, which is almost never — and his answers are mostly monosyllabic. As they exit the shop, Roy offers him a ride home in one of the military cars and Ed refuses, leaving the man baffled when he says he’ll walk back home.

He hangs around him until the car arrives, and he tells himself it is to keep Mustang company, but…

No one would really blame him for being selfish just this once, right?

#royed #safe RoyEd #fma #edward elric #Roy Mustang #werewolf ed

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just-absolutely-super · 6 years

Text

Of Dreams and Other Lives

AN: So this is what happens when you cry about FMA 03 Edwin while having some weird fascination with a character having insight into their AU self’s life. (If that makes any sense...)

Anyways, this fic is Winry-centric with a good dose of Edwin fluff, and while it takes place in the canonverse (the manga and FMA:B), I do dwell a little bit into 03′s continuity. So, spoilers I guess for FMA 03 and COS.

Anyways, hope you all enjoy it!

--------------

Summary: They say your dreams are visions of a another life you are living. Winry experiences a heartbreaking one.

Timeline: Post Series

Ship: Edwin with some Resembool Trio Brot3 goodness

FF.NET LINK

--------------

“I guess this is goodbye for good...”

Winry groans as she rouses from her sleep, feeling more tired than she did when she fell asleep that night.

She had a very strange dream. She doesn’t really remember it though. She remembers Edward and Alphonse were in the dream, but as for what they were doing she couldn’t say. Whatever it was, the dream left her feeling extremely tired.

And extremely sad, too…

Winry frowns at that. Why would she be sad? She recalls some dreams she’s had in the past where the boys never came home, but the feeling she had upon waking from those was more nervous rather than sad.

She shrugs. It’s just a dream. She doesn’t remember it anyway, so why bother dwelling on it?

Yawning, Winry rolls out of bed and trudges her way down the stairs and into the kitchen. There, she is met with the sight of her two best friends, the Elric Brothers. Alphonse (who finally managed to get his body back to a healthy state since the Promise Day) has his back to her while he fixes breakfast. His older brother Edward sits at the table, drinking coffee and reading the morning paper. She can’t help but smile at the domestic sight.

Al doesn’t bother sparing her a glance as he cheerfully says to her, “Good morning, Winry! Granny had to make a house call to Mr. Kline. His wife rushed in here saying his legs gave out while he was working in the field. She’ll be back soon, though.”

Winry nods, knowing full well whom her grandmother’s client is. Apparently the old farmer Mr. Kline is just as bad at keeping up with his automail maintenance as Ed is.

Speaking of Ed, the former alchemist glances up from his paper to smile at his mechanic, causing butterflies to flutter in Winry’s stomach. Edward really has grown into a handsome man over the past few years.

“Morning Win—GAAAH!”

Winry jumps at Ed’s outburst. One moment he’s smiling at her and then the next he’s practically jumping out of his chair, staring at her with a panicked look.

“Wh-What’s the matter with you?” Winry asks him.

“Yeah, Brother, why are you—Winry?! What’s the matter?!” Al asks her, moving from his spot at the stove to join his older brother in gawking at her. He too has a look on his face that told Winry he was shocked and worried.

Winry stares dumbfounded at the two boys, “What are you talking about? I’m fine.”

“Bullshit!” Ed spats, pointing an accusing finger at her, “You’ve been crying! What’s wrong?”

Winry blinks in confusion. Crying? She hadn’t been crying. What are they—?

Raising a hand up to her face, Winry touches her cheeks. She feels some moisture. Moving to a mirror that hangs on one of the walls, Winry examines her face. Sure enough there are tear tracks that were just now drying. Her eyes are bloodshot as well, making the blue of her irises stand out.

She had been crying. But for the life of her she doesn’t know why.

She turns back to her two best friends and shrugs, “I guess I was crying. I don’t know why though.”

Edward raises an eyebrow at her and shares a confused look with his brother at the girl’s confession. They turn back to her and examine her face, probably to make sure she isn’t lying to them or anything.

“You’re absolutely sure nothing’s wrong?” Ed asks skeptically.

“Yeah, Winry, if anything is bothering you, you know you can talk to us. We’re always here for you,” Al comforts, giving the girl a small smile.

Winry beams at the boys, “Thank you for your concern, but I really am okay. I had a weird dream last night, and even though I don’t remember it, I do remember being sad in it. I probably subconsciously cried in my sleep.”

She laughs it off, though the fact that she did cry in her sleep left her feeling uneasy. She wishes she knew what that dream was about now. It must’ve been bad if it left her feeling emotionally compromised to the point of tears.

She feels a pair of comforting arms around her. She looks up to see Alphonse. “Well, I’m glad you’re okay. Whatever it was, it was just a dream. They aren’t real.”

Winry smiles at the younger boy and nods, “Yeah, of course. Thanks, Al.”

“You’re welcome!” Al removes himself from her side before shoving Edward towards her, “You’re glad she’s okay too, right Brother?”

Ed glares at the sly look Al is giving him, a bright blush on his cheeks. Coughing awkwardly, Ed faces Winry, his gaze avoiding hers, “Y-Yeah. It’s good you aren’t really sad or anything like that.”

Winry gives the older Elric a small but genuine smile. He is still very awkward when it comes to his feelings for her, but Winry knows he’s trying and really does care about her.

To her surprise, Edward quickly gathers her in his arms. The hug is so tight that her breath gets momentarily knocked out of her. Her cheeks flush as she feels his hot breath in her ear.

“But if you ever get sad again, don’t play that cool act. You come talk to me, okay? Al too. Or Granny. Hell, even Den would be a good option.” He sincerely says. His hold on her loosens enough for the girl to breathe, but thankfully he doesn’t let go. Winry melts into the embrace, wrapping her arms around him to return the hug.

“I will. Don’t worry. Thank you.”

--------------

Winry’s eyes snap open as she gasps out.

She quickly gets out of her bed and turns on the bedside lamp. She’s trembling, tears profusely falling from her eyes as she gasps out heartbroken sobs.

It was that dream again.

She hasn’t had it for months and barely remembers it, but she just knew that’s what it was.

She wasn’t sure what was going on in the dream. It looked like Amestris, but at the same time it didn’t—like she was in a whole different world altogether.

She had been standing in a city, but it wasn’t a city she was familiar with. She remembered Al in the dream, but he didn’t really look like Al. He was younger, and his hair was a darker shade of blonde than what it should be—almost brown. It was longer too, similar to Ed’s. She recalled Roy Mustang being in the dream too, but the details of his role were fuzzy at best.

But she does remember Edward in the dream, almost to a horrifying degree with how clear it was.

He had crashed to the ground in some kind of machine Winry wasn’t familiar with. He was fine, if not a little beat up. She recalled hugging him in the dream, but it wasn’t a hug she would have normally given him.

She had held him tightly, almost as if she hadn’t seen him in a very long time. Like if she let go at that very moment, he’d disappear.

He seemed to be different too. He looked like Edward, sure, but his eyes were different. Still gold in color, but they looked colder and more distant—like he was constantly putting up walls to protect himself. He also still had an automail arm instead of the flesh one he gained back after the Promise Day.

That was another thing that was off: his automail. It was badly broken in the dream. She couldn’t find any humor that dream Ed is also reckless with his limbs because the automail he had didn’t even look like automail; at least, none she is used to handling. Winry had set to work to fix him up. She gave him new and better limbs.

This was where the dream gets fuzzier, but Winry knew what was happening all the same.

Ed had left to fight someone—who, Winry wasn’t sure—and the fight was taking place on an aircraft. Flying machines are something in the early stages of development according to Mr. Garfiel; so she’s surprised to find her subconscious showing her this contraption that shouldn’t even exist yet!

Something had happened because she saw the wing of the aircraft get torn apart. She wasn’t sure how, but she thinks it was with alchemy. Had Ed done that?

Wait, no, Ed doesn’t have his alchemy anymore. He gave it up for Al’s body. How did he…?

“That must be Ed, I know it.”

Winry’s eyes widen as she recalls her own voice echoing inside her head. The image of the aircraft was flying away into some unknown place far out of her reach.

She then remembers Mustang coming up to her in the dream and telling her that not only did Ed leave this world behind, but Alphonse did too, wanting to follow his brother.

They would never be able to come back…

“So, I guess this is goodbye for good.”

Winry gasps, sobs wracking her body. No. No, they can’t be gone forever. Edward can’t be gone forever. It was a dream. It was just a dream!

But it was so real…

It felt so real!

She runs out of her room and opens the door to one of the bedrooms that the Elric Brothers always reside in.

Empty.

‘No… No, it can’t be!’

Winry slides to the floor, her tears falling out of her eyes as she sobs. She’s shaking all over and it’s getting harder and harder to breathe. In the back of her mind, Winry knows she is suffering from a panic attack but she can’t care at the moment.

They are gone.

Edward and Alphonse are gone. They left her and they are never coming back!

“Winry!”

Winry is startled from her thoughts when she sees her grandmother. She has a candle in her hand to help her see in the dark, her face is contorted in worry.

“Winry, honey, what’s the matter? Why are you crying?” she asks as she sets the candle down and holds her granddaughter in her arms. The blonde feels a cold, wet nose nudging her side and the soothing lick of a wet tongue, indicating that Den has bounded over as well.

It takes a while for Winry to calm herself down enough to answer in between her sobs and hiccups, “E…Ed-Edward…! And Al! They….They’re gon-gone!”

Pinako strokes her hair and stares at her granddaughter in confusion, “Of course they’re gone, you silly thing. Don’t you remember? Al went out East to study that healing alchemy stuff. We got a letter from him yesterday. And Edward went to the West to do some studying of his own. They’ve been gone for a little over three months now.”

At her words, Winry finally comes back to reality. That’s right, Ed and Al did leave; but they didn’t leave to some unknown world Winry couldn’t get to. No, they just went to different countries to expand their alchemic knowledge.

They are just days away by train ride!

And they can return at any time!

This knowledge finally calms her down, though she is still shaken.

“I just… It just felt so real, Granny.”

Her grandmother raises an eyebrow at her, silently asking her to elaborate.

“I had a dream. They were there, but then I saw them leave. First it was Ed, and then I found out Al left too. The feelings I felt were so real I just woke up and wanted to see if they were really gone. If they were here then I’d know for sure the dream didn’t happen.”

Pinako nods at the girl and rubs soothing circles on her back.

“How about I make you some tea to calm your nerves. Then you can go back to sleep. Does that sound good?”

Winry nods, “Okay…”

Pinako goes downstairs to start the kettle in the kitchen, but Winry stays behind, still staring into the empty bedroom.

It is okay… The boys are okay…

But why is she still uneasy?

Taking a shaky breath, Winry forces herself to stand and makes her way down the stairs; Den rushing ahead of her once she sees her master is okay. She pauses when she spots the telephone out of the corner of her eye, a notepad next to it. A string of numbers is written and Winry recognizes them.

A few days ago, Ed called her from a house in Creta. He had befriended a professor who was kind enough to allow the young man to stay with him and his family. The man’s youngest son took a liking to Ed and decided to tease him about his affections for his mechanic. This led to the boy finding the phone number for the Rockbell home and calling Winry to get a rise out of the former Fullmetal Alchemist. One thing led to another and the boy gave Winry his house number.

“In case you wanted to talk to your booooooyfriend—” he teased before yelping in surprise.

“GIVE ME THE PHONE YOU LITTLE—” she heard Ed’s enraged scream before the line disconnected.

Winry smiles at the memory and thanks whoever is listening that she was given this phone number.

It’s late, and she’d probably feel bad about it in the morning, but she can’t care right now. She has to call him. She has to hear his voice.

She has to make sure he really is there.

Picking up the receiver, Winry dials the number listed on the notepad.

She waits one…two…three rings and thinks about hanging up. She doesn’t know what time it is over there but if it is as late as it is here, then she wouldn’t be surprised if nobody picks up—

“Hello?” comes an unknown voice, sleep evident in their tone.

It takes Winry a bit to process that someone indeed is answering the phone.

“Uh…ummm, I’m so sorry!” she begins, feeling very embarrassed, “I just…I was calling for Edward Elric. Is he still living there?”

She holds her breath. What is she thinking? Calling at this god-awful hour! And chances are Edward won’t be there. He probably left ages ago! He’s never one to stay still, why would he—

“Who is calling?” asks the voice.

Winry shakes her head of her thoughts, “M-My name is Winry Rockbell, sir. I’m a friend of his from Amestris.”

‘Friend? Really?’ Winry rolls her eyes, ‘Not like I promised him all my life to him or anything. Geez, Winry, get a grip!’

“Hang on. I’ll get him.” The man yawns on the other line and Winry hears the sound of the receiver being put down. She fidgets on the balls of her feet, now very aware of how silly she’s being. She just hopes Edward isn’t angry with her for the disruption.

“Hello?” comes the groggy and irritated voice of Edward Elric, “Winry? Professor Rodriguez said it was you calling. What in the name of Truth are you doing calling in the middle of the friggin’ night?”

Before Winry could explain, she feels her throat close up as more tears well up in her eyes. She can’t help it, hearing his voice had triggered something deep inside her.

He is there. He is there and talking to her. He didn’t leave forever!

“W-Winry?” now Ed’s voice sounds worried, “You there?”

“E-Ed!” Winry chokes out; a new wave of sobs wracking her body.

“Winry?! Winry, what’s wrong? Why are you crying? What’s the matter?” he frantically asks, “Is it Granny? Is she okay? What about Den? Oh god, please tell me it isn’t Al! Winry, please talk to me!”

“It’s fine!” she finally manages to say to him, “Everyone’s fine! I swear. I’m just…I’m just being really stupid right now.”

She hears him let out a sigh of relief before he softly commands, “Tell me what happened.”

So she does. She cries as she tells him of the dream (more like nightmare) where he and Al left her alone forever. It takes a bit of explaining because she keeps having a hard time composing herself, but she eventually finishes the retelling, feeling very emotionally drained.

“Wow. That’s one hell of a dream…” is what Ed finally says.

Winry nods, not caring that he can’t see her right now. “I know. It’s stupid. I’m sorry for waking you and your host.”

“Nah, don’t be. With this time zone stuff it’s not as late here as it is there. I actually wasn’t asleep for that long,” he reassures, but Winry knows he is just saying that to make her feel better.

There’s a brief silence between them, Winry reveling in the sound of Ed’s breathing before he speaks again.

“Tell you what,” he begins, piquing Winry’s curiosity, “my leg is starting to feel a bit off. I guess I’ve been pretty rough on it... How about I come home so you can do some maintenance on it? I’ll try to get on the earliest train I can find tomorrow.”

Winry feels an immense amount of guilt, “No, no! You just got settled, Edward! Don’t come back for my sake! I’ll be fine, I promise! Think of your research.”

She can’t see him but she knows he is rolling his eyes, “All this information isn’t going anywhere. I can always come back. Besides, it’s been three months yet I’ve learned so much already. Aren’t you the one always telling me to take care of my automail?”

Winry deflates, “Ed, you really don’t have to…”

“I know I don’t have to,” he says, “but I want to. I miss you.”

Winry feels her heart melt at his words. “I miss you, too.”

“Good. So I’ll see you in a few days, all right? Try to get some sleep. You can’t be the best automail engineer if you’re keeling over from exhaustion!”

Winry giggles. Somehow Ed always knows what to say to cheer her up. “Okay, I will. Thank you, Ed.”

“Don’t mention it,” he says. There’s a pause and Winry wonders if he had hung up. Then she hears his voice quietly but gently say, “I love you.”

Winry’s smile grows, cheeks pink as she feels more tears come to her eyes. This time they are tears of happiness.

“I love you, too. Be safe, I’ll see you in a few days.”

With that they hang up. Winry goes into the kitchen to find her Granny sitting at the table, Den resting at her feet. Across from her is a freshly made cup of tea just for the blonde.

“How is Edward?” she asks, a knowing look on her face.

Winry blushes, “He’s good. He’s coming home in a couple of days. For maintenance.”

“Right, mainentance,” Pinako chuckles, stirring her own cup of tea. She gives Winry a calculative glance before speaking again.

“You know, there have been old myths and legends that say that your dreams are visions of another life.”

Winry contemplates this piece of information as she sips her tea.

“I never believed it, though,” her grandmother waves off. “It just seems like something to ponder about…”

Winry absently nods, staring at her cup in deep thought.

‘Another life, huh?’

It is a farfetched notion, but as Ed and Al would tell her, “Nothing is impossible.”

“I wonder how she’s doing.” Winry says before she can stop herself.

“Who?”

“The other me. Or dream me, I guess?” Winry replies, not quite sure how to refer to the woman she had embodied in her subconscious, “Her Edward and Alphonse left her. I wonder what she did to recover. Do you even think she did recover?”

She watches as her grandmother mulls over her questions before taking a final sip of her tea and rising from her chair to put it away. Once the task is complete, she walks over to Winry to give her a peck on the crown of her head.

“Of course she’s okay. There’s no doubt in my mind about it.”

Winry gives her a questioning look, “How do you know?”

Pinako smiles at her, “Because, darling, she’s a Rockbell. Rockbell women are strong. You’re strong.”

For the umpteenth time tonight, Winry feels more tears gather in her eyes. Honestly, how many more tears does she have in her?

Wiping away any stray tears that escape her eyes, Winry gives her grandmother a fierce hug. The old woman returns it just as fiercely. When they part, Pinako gives a tired yawn.

“If you excuse me, I’m going back to bed. You should do the same after you finish your tea. You can sleep in this morning. I’ll handle your customers until you wake up.”

“Thank you, Granny. For everything.” Winry says, giving her grandmother a kiss on her cheek.

“You’re welcome.” With that, the old woman leaves Winry alone with her thoughts.

Staring at the remainder of her tea, she continues to mull over her dream. She can’t help herself, it really did feel like she was there and experiencing everything happening. The emotions she felt were certainly real. After all, they had carried on into the waking world.

And despite Pinako’s words, she still worries for her counterpart. Is she really okay?

Winry shakes her head and decides to push it out of her mind. What good is dwelling on something that ultimately doesn’t affect her in the first place?

Finishing her tea, Winry places the cup in the sink and calls for Den to accompany her back to her room. Once there, she curls up under her covers and feels her eyelids droop. She refuses to think about the dream or this “other life” nonsense. Instead, she thinks about Edward and how he would be coming home in a few days.

He is coming home to her.

--------------

In another life, another universe, there is a different version of Winry Rockbell who experiences realistic dreams too.

In these dreams she sees Edward and Alphonse standing in front of her, smiling and laughing.

They aren’t gone. They’re with her.

Alphonse looks different than what she remembers. He looks to be the age he should have been had he not regressed those four years in the Gate. His hair color is also a lighter shade, matching his older brother’s.

She couldn’t hear what the dream Al was saying to her, but after giving her a brotherly side-hug he runs off back to the house—probably to help her Granny fix supper—and leaves her with Edward.

Looking at this Edward, she can tell he is happier and lighter here. Less burdened by the harshness of the world.

He has a flesh arm too, which she thinks is odd, but she can’t say she isn’t happy to see the lack of metal. She can’t see his left leg, though, for his long pants. Is it flesh too?

She hears herself say something to him (but again, she isn’t quite sure what it is), causing him to roll his eyes and childishly pout. She laughs at him, and is glad to see that he joins in laughing with her as well.

It’s then that the dream Edward moves towards her and pulls her into his embrace. He’s warm, and Winry feels safe. She can feel all the tension and worry leave her body.

“I love you, Gearhead.”

She smiles.

“I love you too, Alchemy Freak.”

She then finds herself inquiring, “You’ll always be here, right?”

She feels him nod against her shoulder.

“Of course. You, Al, and me; we’re a team. We’ll always be here for each other. That’s a promise!”

She melts in his embrace. “Promise…”

Winry’s eyes slide open, feeling content and happy. She always did after these particular dreams. That is, until reality kicks in and she’d feel that familiar emptiness again…

The first time she experienced them she felt such a crushing sadness at the fact the dreams were never reality. Edward and Alphonse aren’t here with her. They are having their own adventures in some other dimension she can’t access.

Her grandmother had once told her that dreams show a life another version of you is experiencing, but Winry isn’t so sure. That is such a fantastical concept.

But if it is real… That means there is a life she lives where Ed and Al came home whole and happy. And they never left.

She’s envious of that version’s Winry.

Sighing, Winry stretches and pulls herself out of bed, ready to start a new day.

No use dwelling on things that can’t be helped. What’s done is done. And she has an automail business to attend to.

Before she heads out the door, she spares one last glance to the framed photo of her two best friends. A bittersweet smile spreads across her pretty face.

“I hope the dream me never takes you two for granted.”

#edwin #edward elric #winry rockbell #fma #fmab #fma 03 #ish #kinda combines all canons #my writing #fanfiction

13 notes · View notes

tsaritsa · 7 years

Text

for the serpent has died and i'm leaning by your side (1/6)

this fic can also be found on ff.net and ao3.

NEXT CHAPTER

written for the 2017 fma bigbang! i was lucky to work with @rebbi-sonnenhell on here! it was a pleasure to work with her, and i hope u enjoy what we have produced.

He hates being reduced to the role of civilian – a convalescing civilian, even more. He hates the red tape that surrounds his recovery; hates that Riza still hasn't come out of her coma like the doctors said she would.

The aftermath of the Promised Day isn't pleasant for anybody involved.

There’s a lot of noise in the time immediately after Edward deals the killing blow to the homunculus that nearly became a god.

The eerie silence which he expects from all the old stories of good versus evil is instead enveloped very quickly by cheering and yelling and shrieks of jubilation which clatter around in his head like a rouge bouncy ball. He feels the ground trembling beneath him, and he tenses – before realising it is simply the footfalls of soldiers around him and Hawkeye. He estimates that entire battalions pass the two of them and it makes him laugh a little at how easy it is for him to tell which soldiers come from Fort Briggs, and which come from Central. The Briggs men are softer, quicker in their pacing and barely bely the exertion they must feel – the Central soldiers, on the other hand, are heavy and clumsy in their gait, and have no idea of what fitness is apparently.

He feels Hawkeye shift next to him, resting her weight on her other foot, gripping his side a little tighter than he expects as she does so. Her breathing is laboured, and for the first time since the battle has finished Roy really thinks about how much he has put her through today.

It is too much. He should never have had to ask this much of her – and yet she would broker no deal where her role was less. It was difficult to try and ignore the dark circles under her eyes as they woke early this morning, nor the slight gauntness to her frame as they dressed for the battle that would come. The months she spent under the watchful eye of not just one homunculi, but two – took a toll on her physically in ways he didn’t want to think about.

Mentally was another problem altogether.

“Hawkeye…” he begins, his mouth dry and cracking over her name. He feels her breath hitch, followed by a tensing of her muscles.

“Sir?” she responds quietly. Her voice is jagged and rough and he wonders just how much of a patchwork job the young girl from Xing had done. Her cut had been clean, and he would vehemently argue it was the only blessing to come out of that awful situation – at the time all he could think of was her blood spilling out of her like a grotesque necklace, dripping down the hollow of her throat, but in actuality he should – she should – count themselves lucky that a clean cut was all she got. He’s well-aware of how cruel the homunculi could be.

He would never admit this to her, but he had woken up more times than he could count in a cold sweat, images of her impaled on Bradley’s swords like an animal left to be bled (he had read the reports of what had gone down in Dublith the last time the Elric’s had visited, and his informants based there had not spared him any detail). He imagined her being left on his doorstep, gutted and bloodless like a carcass ready to be cut for consumption, ribs brutally smashed open: there would only be hollow where her heart ought to be and damn him for not doing enough to protect her.

He doesn’t know too much about the physiology of homunculi, only that they fought well and burned better, but it doesn’t take much to assume that all of them were capable of eating humans. He wonders if it would have come to that, and whether Wrath was possible of the empathy to make her death a quick and clean one.

He doesn’t want to think about the kind of pain that she’s in – what she is doing just to remain upright for his sake – he feels like he has been hit by a truck and ran over at least half a dozen times. Both of his hands are aching and cramping and stinging in a way that is far worse than when he had to burn himself; he feels the blood still dripping down his gloved fingers slowly – the warmth of which makes him feel ill. There’s a pain behind his eyes that reminds him of the migraines he used to get when he was a teenager, and he idly wonders why he didn’t suffer a worse fate with Truth. The Elric’s had lost their bodies in extremely violent and distressing ways; it didn’t make sense that he wouldn’t also suffers something similar. He doubts Truth cares how people come to the Gate – like his refusal to perform human transmutation himself meant anything to the weird not-entity that he can still recall (and he’ll be damned if the last thing he remembers seeing is something like that, he would much prefer a view a little closer to home).

“Sir?” Hawkeye asks him again, her voice barely a whisper this time.

“Am I bleeding out of my eye sockets?” The question is so inane and he has to try his best not to crack a smile – he feels the adrenaline lessening now; his heart no longer feels like it is lodged in his throat, and he feels his pulse strongly in his fingers, a steady but painful tha-thump, tha-thump. Tha-thump. The pain is sharpening now in his hands, and he grimaces as he tries to adjust his right hand that is loosely curled into her side. The stiffening in his tendons is a bad sign – he knows enough about first aid to realise that he needs to be seen by at least a nurse soon, but his men are his first priority. His bleeding, while continuous, has slowed – he feels the gummy texture of the haemoglobin stick around the entry and exit wound on his hand as he shifts it from Hawkeye’s waist to her shoulder, his gloves fraying seams catching on her loose hair. It’s a familiar sensation under his fingertips, even through the fabric of his gloves – she was blessed with thin hair, but plenty of it.

He puts the slightest amount of tension on her hair - not a tug, his head is throbbing and he doesn't imagine how badly she must be feeling, what she isn't letting on to him. The Lieutenant inclines her head ever so slightly – it's an old code of theirs – older than their names; than the well-placed taps of pens on wood; than a lifted eyebrow across an office.

"You shouldn't be speaking," he murmurs, twisting her hair in between his fingers more until he thinks he will not be separated from her. The noises around them are becoming more frequent and loud as every second passes; as every breath passes through his lungs. The air is tinged with gunpowder and smoke. It comes in waves as the wind shifts and Roy is suddenly reminded an awful lot of Ishval. It is the same sounds as after a heavy attack gone successfully; the same atmosphere when the commanders officially declared the end of the war – there is chaos here, but it is tinged with relief, with joy that is barely restrained. He knows there are dead bodies littering the parade grounds here, as there were amongst the sand dunes and rubble.

These soldiers, at least, will be noticed and taken care of with the respect they should not even have to deserve. The Promised Day – whatever the military decides is a fitting name – will immortalise these men and their ranks in stone. There will be parades and minutes of silence as people pay faux penance for sins that they let grow instead of addressing.

A band of Northern soldiers suddenly sprints by, yelling loudly and frantically – their accents a stark contrast to the reserved tones of Central. There is more movement their way now, and eventually Riza stands a little straighter, taking slightly deeper breaths that he can almost feel rattle around in her lungs. “We should move, sir,” she tells him firmly, her voice only wavering a little. “Triage tents are being set up to the north.”

Roy hesitates before he nods, and lets himself be guided by her hands. The cacophony grows louder with every steady, laboured step they make – the familiar screams of makeshift surgery; the frustrated yells for help; the hoarse sobs that are a constant beat in this human symphony. It is too reminiscent of Ishval, and Roy feels ill at the implications of what that means.

He doesn’t need to tell Riza what he is feeling. He knows that she understands, that she too, remembers. Her fingers grip into his coat even tighter as they pass what sounds like a rudimentary operating theatre. They might be walking on polished stone instead of stone carved by sand, but the horrors remain the same and the cruelty of humanity is still laid bare for anybody to see.

He has no idea where they are anymore on the parade grounds. His mind’s eye is hopelessly lost – though he supposes even with eyesight it would still be difficult to recognise the parade grounds now. Riza explains that the middle is torn beyond repair, alchemic or otherwise, and so what’s left of the Central troops and the Briggs battalions find themselves on the perimeters of the land, skirting structural faults that look ready to collapse at a moment’s notice.

They walk in silence for a bit, both intently focused on staying upright amongst the chaos around them. The tang of iron is palpable in the air, and he feels it coat his tongue in a greasy film.

“Hawkeye-” he starts, but she roughly yanks him down suddenly onto what feels like a cot, and he’s still as she lets out a pained sigh, her hand that was so tightly gripping his side loosening. She breathes deeply for a minute, and he can hear how exerted she is. His hand finds her wrist and he strokes over her pulse point, marvelling at how frantically it beats and flutters under his touch. Eventually he feels the tempo lessen and her body begin to relax next to him, leaning into him a little more than what would be considered strictly appropriate. He doesn’t care. She’s warm next to him, and smells faintly of his soap and sweat.

He wonders what will become of the Briggs soldiers, the ones he saw that were soaked with Amestrian blood. General Armstrong would be wise to make a hasty exit from Central if she wanted to keep her men relatively intact. Central soldiers may have been taken by surprise in this attack, hopelessly under-skilled and out-manoeuvred: but vengeance was something that was bred into their bones, into their very beings.

It is cooler here, and all he can hear is the familiar cadences of Amestrian, with the heavy Northern accent thundering out every so often. Northerners were such loud people.

Riza huffs a little and he doesn't stop the smile growing on his face. Against each and every insurmountable obstacle that they faced today, they still made it through – every single one of them, and every single one of his men. Anticipating causalities was a necessary evil of their plan - and it wasn't entirely unlikely that at least one person in his team would get severely injured or worse.

He hadn't been anticipating Riza, however. The entire day had been a flurry of emotional highs and lows and he could still hear her choked-out pleas ringing in his ears to just stop, please don't make me do this, this is not you, this is not who you are this is not –

She truly was his weakness – only she could render him immobile, it was only her now that he could not raise a hand to.

"Thank you for following my orders, Lieutenant," he begins lowly. She shifts a little next to him and it must be killing her that she can't respond but it is killing him more knowing that he is the reason she cannot in the first place. "Without you today..." he sighs and trails off, his gloved thumb rubbing against the bare skin of her neck carefully.

"I fear today might have turned out very differently if not for you. Thank you." His tone is soft, barely carrying over the cacophony surrounding them - soldiers are passing the two of them more frequently where they sit, near what he can only assume is the main triage camp being frantically set up. He knows it is not coincidence that she has moved them both to be near it – not for her sake, of course, but for his. Her ridiculous and at times maddening ability to put him above everything else (including herself) never fails to amuse him as much as it annoys him.

She shifts against him again and the hand resting on his back curls into his side, and he feels the indent of her fingernails, even through the heavy cloth of his coat. He doesn’t stop the small smile he can feel growing on his face, but instead lifts his head up. He can feel the sun on his skin, despite the cool spring breeze that moves through the parade grounds every so often. In spite of the pain that is slowly ebbing from his hands and eyes to the rest of his body, he feels lighter than he has in months.

It wasn’t like his plans (which were always very well-laid, thank you very much) normally went awry, but it was honestly refreshing to realise he wouldn’t need to worry about almost anything for a while now. He wouldn’t need to worry for his life – for her life. He could spend just a little bit of time remembering that he had helped defeat the greatest evil to befall his country in living memory and almost everyone had come out the other side relatively intact.

“Thank you for not dying,” she responds after a while, her voice barely above a whisper now. She shifts a little closer to him, her leg warm against his own. They’re quiet for a while, Riza rubbing his back in a soothing motion, sometimes stopping to trace messages instead. Roy doesn’t care what people must be thinking, at this blatant expression of familiarity that most certainly goes beyond the safe boundaries of a superior officer and his subordinate. He realises that she’s rested her head on his shoulder, and her breathing has slowed, no longer stiff and rattle-like. Her hand still traces letters lightly on the small of his back but they are lazy now, no longer urgent.

Home, he realises after another while, focusing on the languid strokes and the barest pressure of her nails as she begins the word again. Her m’s are beyond recognition, but the kiss she presses into the shoulder her head rests on speaks far more than her bruised and bloody fingers.

His hand shifts from where it had been resting on the edge of her shoulder back to the fragile and mottled skin of her neck, careful not to agitate her wound with the roughness of his ignition gloves as he splays them against the space where her shoulder meets her neck. His thumb slips under the thin fabric of her turtleneck, rubbing firmly against the bone at the top of her spine. It juts out a little more than what he was expecting – and though she’s allowed to relax her posture now, for crying out loud, it certainly points to an underlying concern that she’s not in the healthiest of conditions.

She needs the rest. They all do.

#fmabb17 #fma fanfiction #royai #roy mustang #riza hawkeye #fullmetal alchemist #fma #my fanfic

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refined-cynicism · 7 years

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@georgiagates17 thanks for the tag :-)

Rules: Tag 20 blogs you’d like to get to know better

Nicknames: People usually call me Tea (short for Teodora). Some of my friends call me Teodor, which Is a male variant of my name (it’s weird, I know)

Zodiac sign: Virgo (although I don’t care about astrology or whatsoever)

Height: 5′7′’

Last thing you googled: George Orwell, I just finished 1984 so i wanted to read through his biography again and find his other books

Song stuck in your head: none at the moment, surprisingly

Favourite band: Karnivool, because who doesn’t love progressive metal?

Last movie you watched: Split, it’s kinda sick but interesting

What are you wearing right now: Iron Maiden t-shirt older than time and pyjamas

Why did you choose your URL: Yoichi is one of my favs so

Do you have any other blogs: no

What did your last relationship teach you: been single since i can remember

Religious or spiritual: not sure

Favourite colour: black and/or red

Average hours of sleep: 4 to 7

Lucky number: I don’t have one

Favourite characters: Anime characters? Or fictional characters overall? There are just too many. My favourite anime female is forever Olivier Armstrong. Also I love Edward Elric. Currently I am fond of Mahiro Fuwa (Zetsuen no Tempest). If we are talking books, then there are many more (Kelsier from Mistborn series, Locke Lamora and so on)

How many blankets do you sleep with: one or two, depends on the season

Dream job: I’m kinda lost, but I’m considering being a psychiatrist and/or a wrriter

I tag @mveturius , @thetruthofyourdespair , @princesahinatahyuga , @druggeddraccus , @sadara-for-hokage , @sharinghoe (u said 6, right?)

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kovulein · 7 years

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Answers

Thanks to a lovely person I have to answer everything xP

1. Maren 2. Kovu, Manu, Panda 3. Sagittarius 4. Games on my mobile 5. Harry Potter 6. Ghosts 7. J. K. Rowling 8. HR3 9. Chocolate 10. Nicü 11. Too many 12. Do you like Anime? 13. Dude 14. A friend, Yes 15. Killer. I don’t know the artists name because it was the backround music of an AMV 16. Sherlock 17. Ninjas 18. Zootopia 19. I don’t have one particular 20. Super Smash Brothers Brawl 21. Loosing people I love and getting seriously ill 22. I… am nice 23. I’m really weird sometimes 24. Both 25. Eddie Redmayne 26. Spring 27. Nope, not right now 28. Some of my friends 29. Lennart 30. Brown 31. Naturally brown. At the moment I’m blond 32. My parents and friends 33. Same as 32 34. Same as 33 and 32 35. Some events which are coming up! 36. Haikyuu 37. Kim Possible 38. My best friend 39. Yes, sadly >.<

40. Anything! 41. Anesthesia 42. Depends. Mostly behind but I’m also fine with being in the front 43. Cosplay 44. Tokyo Diaries 45. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 46. I was able to play piano, guitar and clarinet 47. Panda, penguins and snow leopards 48. kawaii-animelife, ladywithtea, thekittenkait, ceejles, an-otaku-to-remember 49. Shapshifting 50. Watching stuff or talking to friends 51. Nope 52. On weekends xD 53. My friends 54. Off 55. Not at the moment 56. Killer 57. Juice 58. That is so long ago. Have to be ages… 59. Mostly not 60. Cats 61. Gosh, I think to EpicRapBattleofHistory 62. I was a pescatarian for a long time 63. Vet 64. Yes 65. Haikyuu 66. The future 67. Yes 69. Being honest, funny and kind-hearted 70. No ._. 71. Being a good singer 72. Traviling the world, giving a part of it to my parents and friends and spending a part 73. Yes 74. Home 75. Japan, Sweden or staying in Düsseldorf 76. Cats 77. A picture of Edward Elric sleeping 78. That depends! But I guess I’m more of an night owl than an early bird 79. Sunset 80. Yes 82. Headphones 83. Yes 84. Operation 85. Don’t have one 87. Quicksilver 88. Arrogance, ignorance and intolerance 89. Real book 90. Swimming 91. Being an adult 92. English, History and Economics 93. A older brother 94. Eye shadows 95. 1,53 m 96. I’m not the best in it but also not really horrible 97. Same as 96 100. I think more girls 101. Has nothing to do with gendre. Depends on the personality 102. Frankfort 103. Pan 107. Watching some horrible movies and liking those 108. DerHaider 110. Nope 111. Block! Hexa 112. Good 113. Russian, American, British 114. Tokyo 116. Nope 117. Nope 118. Nope 119. Nope 120. Not really xD I would like to be one 121. Gluten 122. Yes 123 Nope 124. Nope 125. The Beatles 126. A Fanfiction 127. Mhm… don’t know really but I don’t think so 128. Yes 129. Beach 130. Treat everyone the way you want to be treated 131. Nope. Don’t want to be one 132. Ravenclaw 133. Yes 134. Depends 135. No. I hate it 136. Nope 137. Yes 138. Yes 139. Finding the owner 140. I believe they are able to change in some ways 141. Yes 142. Not really 143. Nope 144. Yes 145. I really have no idea xD Sorry! 146. Yes 147. Had one 148. Nishinoya Yuu 149. Yes 150. Moving out of my parent's house 151. Yes I do 152. Glasses 153. VW Polo 154. Yes 156. I hugged someone out of the blue who I really liked. It was kind of awkward. He was totally confused 157. Christmas 158. Nope 159. Brains 160. Black! YES I KNOW IT’S NOT A COLOR! 161. Yes 162. Anything 163. Sometimes being able to make others happy 164. Sure! 165. Not really 166. Pandas, penguins and snow leopards 167. Yes 168. Yes 169. 24 right now 170. “There’s no such thing as a painless lesson. They just don’t exist. Sacrifices are necessary. You can’t gain anything without losing something first although if you can endure that pain and walk from it, you’ll find that you are now have a heart strong enough to overcome any obstacle. Yeah, a heart made fullmetal.” 171. Naaaah nope 172. Sometimes yes 173. Yes and no 174. There are a lot >.<

180. Not really 181. Stealing 182. A lot 183. Panda 184. A good friend 185. Singing 186. A lot xD 187. Getting my A-levels 188. Love 189. Love 190. I would be too scared to do. One little mistake and everything is distroyed. 191. My friends 192. The place I feel most comfortable with 193. Anime and friends 194. Goodbye Fuckers! 195. No! 196. Anastasia 197. Spinach 198. Vampires 199. Live in the city 200. Wizwards 202. Putting the needs of this person before your own 203. No 204. Yes 205. NO! It’s horrible 206. Sweet 207. Working in a restaurant 208. Manga and figures 209. Me wearing jeans 212. No 213. In a funny way yes but I try not to insult anyone 214. Ron Stoppable 215. Not to have any xD 216. Edward Elric (husbando!)

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winryofresembool · 6 years

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EdWin one-shot: Future is full of possibilities

Summary: Ed is feeling down and Winry tries to make him feel better.

Here’s the fic I promised! It takes place maybe a year-ish after the boys’ return to Resembool after the Promised Day. Sorry about all the possible typos, it’s 1 AM here so everything is possible. *prays that someone is still up to read this*

Words: 1738

Warnings: both Ed and Winry like swearing xD

“Ed?” Winry was observing her almost-boyfriend (‘almost’, because there was the problem that even though everyone seemed to be aware of Edward Elric’s feelings towards her, he himself had never admitted it aloud) who was sitting on the living room couch alone, looking at everything and nothing in particular.

“Hmm?” the young man let Winry know he was listening.

“You are being awfully quiet today,” she simply stated, although the statement held an unspoken question in it. She wanted to know why he was acting like that.

“What, can’t a guy just think quietly sometimes?” he challenged, although his voice was lacking the usual sharpness.

“Of course a guy can, but you can’t,” the girl sassed back, getting frustrated at Edward’s unwillingness to cooperate with her.

“Oh, great, here we go again,” Ed growled. “Can we not do this this time? I’m kinda tired.”

“Fine,” Winry huffed. “This must be the first time ever Edward Elric has skipped an opportunity for a verbal fight. Something’s up.”

The blonde girl raised her eyebrow expectantly, but when he still didn’t explain himself, she sighed. “Ed, please. Didn’t we promise that there won’t be any more secrets between us when you returned?”

“There’s a lot you can’t understand,” he said, the tone of his voice making it clear he was done talking this topic.

“Excuse me? The only thing I know is that there’s no way I can’t understand you if you don’t even try to explain yourself!” she almost yelled the last words. She also realized she was a lot closer to Ed than she had been a few moments earlier. So close that she could feel his breathing on his face when he said:

“Winry. Don’t.”

With those words he rose from his seat and exited the room, and a bit later Winry could hear the slam of the bedroom door even from downstairs.

A tiny sob came out of Winry. It wasn’t because she was upset about arguing with Ed, no; she had gotten used to doing that with him when she had been four years old. No, it was because something was so clearly bothering him, and he was refusing her help. What could have happened that had made him so upset? Winry didn’t remember anything particular happening that day… except that Al had gotten a letter from Xing, and he hadn’t showed it to Ed, nor told him what the letter was about. That was something Ed should accept, because no matter how much the brothers had been through together, Al wasn’t obliged to share everything with him. He was 16 now, and it was perfectly normal that he started to make his own plans, ones that didn’t involve Edward. Even though Al hadn’t told Winry about the letter either, she had a strong suspicion that the said letter had something to do with his plans for the future. She wouldn’t push the younger brother, though, because she knew he would tell them when the time was right. Right now, Al was at the post office, supposedly sending an answer to the letter he received.

Meanwhile, she had to deal with Ed.

At first Winry just wanted to leave the sulking boy alone, because she knew that when he was acting like this - like a moron - he might honestly get angry at her if she tried to intervene, and she didn’t want that. But after about half an hour of not being able to concentrate on anything (not even automails), she gave up and marched up the stairs.

“Edward, I won’t let you do this! You! Asshole! Open the door!” she yelled once she was behind his door, secretly thankful that her granny wasn’t home, because she would be up for a scolding (despite her age) if the older woman caught her granddaughter yelling obscenities at her best friend.

The door opened faster than she expected, and… was that a smirk on Ed’s face? There she was, worrying like crazy about him, and that bastard was laughing at her… Oh, where was her trusty wrench when she needed it the most?

While she was trying to find one from one of her pockets, she was too busy to notice that the boy was, once again, really close to her. There was only an inch between their noses when she looked up and Ed opened his mouth to ask:

“Did you just call me an asshole?”

“What if I did?”

“Then I’d say I probably deserved it.” he continued with a teasing tone. He had a weird fire in his eyes, one that made Winry feel butterflies in her stomach for who knows what reason.

“You bet you did,” she answered, although she had already forgotten why she had been so angry. The truth was, her face was feeling hot and her heart was racing too fast too, as she was expecting his next move.

Ed took one more step closer, and lifted Winry’s chin with one of his hands, so she was staring right at him, leaned his head forward, touching her nose with his, his other hand burying itself in her hair… and then…

The front door opened. Ed let out a quiet curse, realizing what had almost happened, but pulled his friend into his room before Pinako could spot them standing like that in the hallway.

“Uh, Ed? What the hell was that?” Winry managed to say through panting once they were inside the boys’ room.

Ed let go of Winry’s arm and stuttered: “I don’t kn.. it’s just… ugh, you’re just so hot when you’re angry.”

“I… WHAT? What did you just say?”

“You heard it,” he mumbled, his confidence sucked by the arrival of Granny Pinako.

“You can’t just first shut me out like you did earlier and then… almost kiss me! Seriously, Ed, what is your problem?”

“Honestly? I don’t even know myself,” he admitted, and sank down on his bed. There was that miserable expression again, and Winry started thinking she had been too harsh on him. If Ed wasn’t able to tell… then she should try to be supportive instead of sounding so forceful.

She sat down next to him, nudging him with her shoulder a little bit.

“Hey… is this about Al?”

“What about him?” Ed raised his eyebrow, surprised by how well this girl knew him.

“I think your mood changed after he received that letter he didn’t want to talk about…” It was more of a question than a statement, and she looked at him expectantly.

“Maybe…”

“Hey, it’s OK, I promise. I won’t judge. I just want to know, because I want to help you.”

Winry wasn’t really expecting Ed to answer, but suddenly he blurted out: “It’s that… he already has plans! He knows what he wants to do once he’s recovered enough to travel and study and work. He even has that bean girl waiting for him in Xing. And he’s only 16!”

“But isn’t that…” Winry tried to comment but Ed spoke again.

“Then also… I’ve been looking after him ever since our mum died… It feels so weird that he doesn’t need me anymore.”

“Uh, not to be rude, but… which part of this can I not understand?” she asked, referring to their earlier conversation.

“You’ve always been independent… You too know what you want to do with your life. How would you know what it feels to be left with… nothing? I don’t have my alchemy, Al will have his own life without me in it, and… there’s only one thing I know I want to do in the future. The rest? I have no fucking idea.”

“You’re right that I haven’t experienced the exact same things you have, but what makes you think you’d be alone? Al will always be your brother no matter where he is. And then… you have granny. And Den. And all those friends you made while traveling? And then there’s… me.” The blush returned on her face when she said the last part.

A heavy silence fell between the two of them, and they simply kept looking at each other for a while. Ed inched his right hand forward slowly, and finally it found Winry’s hand. She took it, and rubbed it against her cheek for a little while.

“Have I told you… how happy I am that you got this back? You know… you were able to return Al back into his own body… and got your arm back… even though no one else has ever done anything like that.” Ed looked at her in confusion, not seeing her point, so she continued: “What I’m trying to say is that if you can do that, you can do a lot of awesome things in the future… even if you don’t know what exactly that is yet.”

Ed was now as red as Winry was, but his eyes looked soft when he said: “Thank you, Win.”

“No problem,” she gave him a little smile. “Hey, can I ask you what was that one plan you already have?”

“No,” he shook his head, “but… I’m gonna show you.”

“Oh?”

“It’s this.”

He let go of her hand and moved one of his behind her neck, stroking it slowly. Winry felt chills in her spine at the touch. Then the thumb of his other hand traced her jaw, and she let out a soft hum. Finally, he touched her lips with his fingers briefly, but before she knew it, he moved forward and replaced the fingers with his lips. It was brief, but soft, a kiss that left you wishing more, but just when Ed got the courage to slip his tongue out to deepen the kiss, the couple were interrupted by steps on the stairs, and the bedroom door opened only moments after.

“Al?” Ed turned his head to see the intruder.

“It’s about time, brother! I thought you’d never do it!” he exclaimed, and Ed didn’t have to ask what he meant. Oh, he knew.

“And who are you to talk? How’s the bean girl doing?” was his response.

“On the other hand… Winry, I think you could do better,” Al shook his head before started laughing uncontrollably, until Ed rose from the bed taking a pillow with him. Not before slipping one more quick kiss on Winry’s lips, though.

“I’ll be back!” he promised. “After I’ve killed my brother, that is!”

#plsss let me know what you think #edwin #edward elric #winry rockbell #my fics #fma #fullmetal alchemist

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hermanwatts · 5 years

Text

Swords & Dark Magic

Swords & Dark Magic (Eos/Harper Collins, 2010). Edited by Jonathan Strahan and Lou Anders.

This was a book that I read over eight years ago and came across a review while looking for an old file. This was a sword-and-sorcery fiction anthology of original fiction from a mainstream publisher. I really enjoyed Andrew Offutt’s Swords Against Darkness and Page & Reinhardt’s Heroic Fantasy back in the day and was hoping this would be the start of a new era.

The first warning sign was the cover. The cover painting for the trade paperback edition is just horrible. I have seen small press books that looked way better. The second warning was “The New Sword and Sorcery” phrase under the title. Whenever something is called “new,” watch out.

The introduction is entitled “Check Your Dark Lord at the Door,” which will infuriate some Tolkien fans. The editors think that sword-and-sorcery is smaller scale than high fantasy. I could argue against that citing Hour of the Dragon as an example. There is a very fast mini-history of the sub-genre where Karl Edward Wagner is not mentioned while Andre Norton and Marion Zimmer Bradley are.

“Steven Erikson” has written humongous doorstop fantasy novels that I have not read. I don’t like never ending series and I generally don’t like novels that go over the 100,000 word mark. This is the first Erickson that I have read. “Goats of Glory” has a small group of soldiers wandering into a village off the beaten track. Glenn Cook’s “Black Company” series has had its influence and impact. I would describe Cook and also this Erikson story as “military fantasy” more than “sword and sorcery.” Just like if you read enough science fiction, you can subtly differentiate between space opera and military science fiction, military fantasy has split off and become a separate animal from sword and sorcery. I would present that we now have a new sub-genre that could be called “military fantasy” that is unique and different enough from sword and sorcery to warrant its own designation. Some of Erikson’s soldiers are women. I have a problem with this. Destroy our modern world and women are going to be back to what they did before the industrial revolution. “Erikson” is supposedly has a background in archaeology and anthropology, but he presents very up to date correct gender attitudes. Characters have names such as Snotty, Dullbreath, and Swillman. Here is some typical Erikson prose: “The place stank of pig shit and the flies buzzed thick as black smoke.”

The soldiers are lured to spend the night in an abandoned fortress. Turns out, the fortress is infested with demons. A great idea but–less would have been more. The characters wipe out hundreds of demons in the fighting. The horror effect is markedly diminished. I think a more suspenseful story could have been written.

Glen Cook has been a very influential writer for about the past 25 years. It all started with the story “Raker” in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (August 1982), where he introduced the Black Company. Cook expanded “Raker” into The Black Company, the story of a motley group of mercenaries amidst a huge sorcerous war in a fantasy world. It is no coincidence that Cook served in a Marine Recon unit. Perhaps we should call this “jarhead fantasy.” Cook’s prose for this series is very stripped down with little in the way of adjectives being used. He reminds me of the way that “Paul Cain” attempted to take the hard-boiled crime story to sparse extreme in the mid-1930s. The Black Company books are rather dialogue driven for my tastes.

“Tides Elba” is an episode wherein the Black Company has to track down a descendent of the Dominator who about to mate with another of his descendents. The resulting child would have been a vessel into which the Dominator could project his soul. The story is disturbing with the revelation at the end while getting there is a chore.

Cook is in many ways the godfather for many of the authors for this anthology.

The inclusion of Gene Wolfe does raise the level of attention for this book. Wolfe is considered a writer’s writer. Wolfe never jumped to my A list. I read his Book of the New Sun years back and my response was I had read this before by Clark Ashton Smith and Jack Vance. I did like Wolfe’s story in Cross Plains Universe though. “Bloodsport” is in the first person. The story starts out relating the participation in something called The Game, which is sort of like real-life chess with people. After one game, the town is attacked by “Hunas” who are described just like the historical Huns. Valorius, the narrating knight, and a female pawn escape, and organize a band of fugitives into a small resistance force. That section ends abruptly, Valorius and Lurn the pawn travel to the mountains where the Game originated. An enchanted mountain meadow is found where Lurn is armed and crowned as a queen. Valorius then kills her in a fight and that is how the story ends.

James Enge is a relative newcomer. He got his start with a series in Black Gate magazine about Morlock Ambrosius the Maker. Enge has said Roger Zelazny and Jack Vance were big influences I also see Michael Moorcock in the mix. There is a spear with a demon trapped within it. Enge’s prose on one hand attempts the urbanity of Fritz Leiber or Jack Vance but juxtaposed is anachronistic sounding dialogue such as “You killed my bartender!” The character shows a Jack Vance influence, the plot coupons are from Michael Moorcock. There is a certain vibe of older sword and sorcery to give a sense of déjà vu all over again.

C. J. Cherryh’s “A Wizard in Wiscezan” uses the same world that she used for “A Thief in Korianth” way back in 1981 for Flashing Swords #5. Cherryh is an old pro going back 35 years with D.A.W. Books. She has produced a competent if not overly engrossing tale of infiltration into the keep and assassination of a usurper and his wizard by means of an illusionist.

“A Rich Full Week” by K. J. Parker is written in first person and is a good case of what I think is so wrong with fantasy of the past 20 years. The story is dialogue driven. With a few minor changes, the story could be set in suburbia. The dialogue is mostly inane, takes up space, and does little to propel the story. Read some Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler if you are going to write a first person story with mostly dialogue.

Garth Nix is an Australian writer of young adult novels whom I am unfamiliar with. “A Suitable Present For a Sorcerous Puppet” is a story that has an interesting idea if not high octane in execution. It is clever with a recuperating knight accidentally coming across an ancient curse.

To put things in context, a book containing a Michael Moorcock story in 2010 would be like having a new C. L. Moore Jirel story in 1982. Moorcock’s “Red Pearls” is the keystone story or rather novella for this book. Moorcock brings nothing particularly new in this Elric story but then again, there has been little really new about Elric since the original ten stories in Science Fantasy 1961-1964. There is more multi-dimensional hokum but I have to say this is one of the better Elric stories of the past 20+ years.

I can remember about six years ago, John Pelan of Midnight House Press telling me of some horror writers who wanted to write sword and sorcery. I remember Tim Lebbon’s name from that conversation. Lebbon has been writing some novels with a fantasy setting. “The Deification of Dal Bamore” is in the same world as Echo City Falls (2010). To set the tone, here is some Lebbon prose:

“Bamore is hanging upside down from the ceiling. He is streaked with blood and feces. Beneath him, there is a large bowl collecting all fluids that leak from him.”

There is torture and then a prolonged street fight while on the way for a crucifixion. Something I have noted, Echo City is not described at all. I have no idea what it looks like as there was no description given.

Robert Silverberg has written some of my favorite space opera and adventure science fiction. He is on the fictionmags yahoo group and I like the guy. He has a story “Dark Times At the Midnight Market” set on his planet of Majipoor. It is a “cute” story that elicits a chuckle. The story is nothing major, but competently done and in contrast in tone to most of the other stories in this book.

Sooner or later, a serial killer sword and sorcery story was bound to happen. Greg Keyes’ “The Undefiled” has Fool Wolf possessed by a spirit or godlet who makes him do very bad things. The same idea in Robert Bloch’s classic “Enoch.” Keyes’ has a habit of not explaining things very well in portions of the story. He also jumps a scene before it is finished using innuendo for the reader to fill in. The problem is the innuendo is rather nebulous.

I have been reading Michael Shea since Nifft the Lean came out in the early 80s. He is one of those writers that you must concentrate in order to get everything. You will miss something if you don’t. “Hew the Tintmaster” is starts out in the world of Nifft. Bront the Inexorable teams up with Hew the Tintmaster (i.e. house painter) on a quest for a wizard who is paying handsomely. They are sent to Jack Vance’s Dying Earth and then meet Cugel the Clever. Remember that Shea got his start with A Quest for Simbalis featuring Cugel. In some ways, Bront and Hew are the most conventional sword and sorcery characters up to now in this book. They are also the most heroic in their own way.

I was waiting for a Harry Potter sword and sorcery story to happen and Scott Lynch’s “In the Stacks” is that story. If you like Harry Potter, you will like this story. Set in a library with a wizard pupil who decides to go mega maniacal.

Tanith Lee has been in Swords Against Darkness, Heroic Fantasy, and the paperback Weird Tales. A friend of mine thinks of her as closest thing to a modern Clark Ashton Smith. “Two Lions, A Witch, And the War-Robe” is typical Tanith Lee. The story is very fantastic as is often typical with Lee. This story would not be out of place in one of her old collections such as The Gorgon.

Caitlin R. Kiernan is another horror writer now moving into sword and sorcery. “The Sea Troll’s Daughter” is probably the worst story in this anthology. The story begins after the action is over. The dialogue is top-notch:

“Why, you ungrateful, two-faced gaggle of sheep-fuckers.”

A sword woman amazon kills a sea-troll terrorizing the town. The story starts with her after the fight. The narrative is about drinking and lesbian seduction of a bar-maid.

Bill Willingham’s “Thieves of Daring” reads as sort of homage to Fritz Leiber. It is an entertaining enough vignette. He keeps up the suspense and the reader interested. I hope Willingham keeps it up and writes longer works of fiction.

Joe Abercrombie has been getting a fair amount of press. I have known people who like him, know others who don’t like his fiction at all. This is my first introduction. “The Fool Jobs” has a sort of Dirty Dozen meets Deliverance with swords plot. The characters are all unlikable, which is probably the point. The writing is matter of fact with a little description to paint a depressing landscape. Get Abercrombie a thesaurus as “fucking” seems to be every tenth word he uses.

“Cause it’s my fucking job to fucking tell you to the fucking thing is why, Yon fucking Cumber,” or “Use your cock as a spoon.”

Somebody has a potty mouth. I will say that Abercrombie can write an action scene. I just can’t say reading him is the most pleasurable experience.

So there you have it, the first sword and sorcery anthology in a while. The last anthology I can think of is Swords Against the Millennium from the turn of the century.

First impression– disappointment. My own name for the book is Swords and Excrement. If this is the new sword and sorcery, I want no part of it. I can remember reading Page & Reinhardt’s Heroic Fantasy and the enjoyment and entertainment I got during a rather bad time in my life. I actually dreaded reading this book each night before too long. I couldn’t wait to be done.

The editors have no background in sword and sorcery that I know of. Lou Anders seems to have the most background in Star Trek and Star Wars books and magazines. Jonathan Strahan has edited (new) space opera anthologies. They might have ideas brought in from other sub-genres.

You can divide the book into three categories– the D.A.W. Fantasy Reader (Shea, Cherryh, Lee, and Moorcock), uninteresting writing (Nix) and the scatological.

If you are going to write sword and sorcery, you must engage in landscaping. Landscaping is a term used in conjunction to Zane Gray’s description of the West. The author must do some background painting with words. Sword and sorcery is not a modern day thriller with swords. One of my gripes with Glenn Cook’s Black Company series is the utter lack of any detail. There are too many stories where you have no idea of regarding the architecture, clothing or costumes, weapons etc. Describe the kind of swords used for example. You don’t have to do an info dump, but some detail goes a long way. My own opinion is dialogue driven stories don’t work in sword and sorcery. This isn’t a T.V. show.

The better sword and sorcery writers who came out of the 1970s got their start in the small press. They started out writing short stories, then novelettes. A few then made the jump to mass market paperbacks that were generally 80,000 words long. Now it is backwards, the writers of the past ten to twenty years start out writing 700 page novels for seemingly never ending series. They have no concept of economy. You can stretch out a novel with lots of dialogue. In a 15,000 word story, you have to move it along and talking is not the way to do it.

Readers in the past have been attracted to the glitter, pageantry, and Technicolor of sword and sorcery. Replacing it with mud, feces, and urine is not a good business plan for growing the genre. I was telling John C. Hocking (Conan and the Emerald Lotus) about this anthology. He thinks that maybe our lives are so easy now that getting covered in excrement is about as horrible as some writers can imagine. As one friend of mine said, just because someone takes a dump does not mean it has to be shown. There was not one conventional heroic story in this book.

If you are going to write about a barbarian serial killer, have the gonadal fortitude to channel a little Brett Easton Ellis and show a serial killer in action.

Horror writers– sword and sorcery is not horror. Changing the scene from cars to horses and from guns to swords does not make for automatically a good sword and sorcery story. The gothic element is key in classic sword and sorcery over horror. There is a difference.

When I wrote this review in 2012, there was unease out there with by friends of mine. The increasing scatological obsession was one issue. Nihilism and lack of heroism is another. Literary moral relativism and realism creeping in from the mainstream as a source of contamination. At the time, I was not sure if these were separate issues or all facets of the same thing. I now see it as all part of a cultural change that has accelerated the past ten or so years. I bought Swords & Dark Magic at the local Barnes & Noble store and then felt burned when a few months later it was offered at Edward R. Hamilton online for about 1/6 of the original price. Now I wait.

Swords & Dark Magic published first on https://sixchexus.weebly.com/

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