Note: Ed/Winry is now my OTP of OTPs- no surprise there, honestly.

Title: Legacy's Name.

Genre: Family/Angst

Description: Six year old Nina Elric wants to know who her daddy named her for. Ed doesn't think he should tell her.

Further Notes: So basically, Ed and Winry naming their first daughter "Nina" is a headcanon that you can pry from my cold, dead hands.

Dedication: To the amazing Meritt who was acting beta reader and who really knows how to give me that right amount of praise and healthy criticism. Thank you, Findekano!

"Daddy?" A tiny hand tugs roughly on his sleeve and Ed nearly chokes on his coffee. He manages to set the mug safely back on the tabletop without spilling any of the sloshing liquid, before turning to his daughter.

"Geez, kiddo…" He coughs, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "Where'd you come from?" A little absently, his mind still on perusing the report he's been given to look over, he runs a hand through his daughter's hair.

"Who am I named after?"

Ed stills.

A memory of a little, bright-eyed girl stirs in the back of his mind, perky pigtails flying behind her as she bounces along with a big, white dog.

Big brother. Let's play.

The old pain slams into his chest like a brick, knocking the wind out of him.

"What?" he breathes when it feels like he can again.

It's not the right answer and Nina, misunderstanding her father's reaction, tilts her head impatiently. A gap-toothed grin firmly fixed in place, she gives her father's sleeve another tug.

"You're not listening, Daddy!"

"Sorry, sweetie." He takes a breath. "You want to know who you're named after?"

She nods.

"Nicholas said his daddy named him after his daddy," is all the explanation she gives.

Involuntarily, Ed's eyes flicker in the direction of the door. The sound of children's laughter drifts in through the open window. Caleb and the neighbor's son are still outside.

He should call them in, he thinks distantly. Winry's making dinner (her chicken- the smell of it alone is enough to set his stomach growling and mouth watering) and they promised the Dustins that they would feed Nicholas before they sent him home.

"You're still not listening!"

"Okay." Ed pushes the paper away and sets his daughter on his lap. She giggles, thrilled to have his full attention, and Ed beams. "I'm listening now." He swallows past the lump in his throat. "You want to know who you're named after?"

She leans forward, nodding eagerly, and Ed forces himself to grin. After all, isn't telling your child the story of their namesake supposed to be a happy occasion?

He could lie- tell her the name is nothing special, just a name they picked that they liked, like Caleb's. Or that they named her for her pretty eyes.*

That last one has a particular appeal, though it would only encourage her child's vanity.**

(She does, however, have very pretty eyes. She gets it from her mother.)

Still, something in his heart rebels violently against the idea. It's not just that he doesn't want to have to lie to his daughter, but it's about not letting Nina Tucker be forgotten.

His Nina should know that she was named after a little girl with bright eyes and an even brighter smile and an infectious laugh.

That she is everything Nina Tucker was and more.

He swallows painfully.

"She was… a little girl my brother and I met." He holds Nina a little closer on his lap. "She was like a little sister to us."

Nina starts fiddling with something in her lap and Ed runs one tight braid through his hand.

"Did she die?"

The point-blank question catches him off guard, nearly knocking the wind out of him.

She's tilted her head back to look at him, blue eyes wide and innocent.

His dear, sweet, little daughter, still so innocent when it comes to death, to the cruelty some people are capable of inflicting upon others.

Upon their own children.

Ed prays it stays that way for a very long time.

He nods. A lump has settled into his throat.

"Yes," he whispers, the hand that isn't holding his daughter steady on his lap clenching, "she did."

He shuts his eyes, lost in his own dark thoughts for the moment. Before he can muster the willpower to draw himself out of them, Nina is standing.

"I'm sorry, Daddy," she says with all the sincere tenderness that only a six year old can possess and plants a soft kiss on his cheek.

Then she's hopping off his lap and running for the door, blonde hair flying behind her, tossing a, "Love you, Daddy," over her shoulder.

Ed brings a hand to his cheek.

"Love you too," he says softly.

Winry finds him sitting outside on the porch, watching the children play.

"Hey." She sits beside him.

"Hey," he answers, without taking his eyes away from the children. His voice is distant.

"Is something wrong?" Concerned, she rests a hand on his knee.

Ed takes a deep breath. "Do you think we were wrong?" He finally meets her eyes. "Naming her what we did?"

Winry sucks in a breath, eyes widening fractionally. "Nina…"

Ed had wanted the name so badly when Nina was born and Winry had known, without either of them saying anything, what it had meant to him.

It was several months after their engagement that Ed first told her about the little girl, Nina Tucker. She still remembers the sick horror that had stuck in her throat when he described the scene in Shou Tucker's laboratory.

She'd held him as he cried and she tried to understand the pain that he had carried for all these years without letting her in.

But it didn't matter- and she straightens her spine a little rigidly as she recalls that same resolve she'd felt back then- she knew now and she wasn't going to let him shoulder that hell alone.

"That darkness following our little girl around…" he says dully, fingers weaving together. He lowers his voice.

"Don't say that!" Winry snaps before he can continue.

Ed turns to her with wide eyes and she sucks in a breath.

"Don't say that," she says, calmer now. "That's not… that's not what she's named for."

Ed swallows, eyes focused straight ahead on the laughing figures of the children, and she rests her hand on his shoulder. His muscles feel tense beneath her hand and she begins to rub, her hand moving in slow, soothing circles. She works her way down to his elbow, hoping that her own anxiety doesn't bleed into the touch.

"You wanted to remember Nina's light, didn't you?" she asks. When no answer is immediately forthcoming, she opens her mouth to press on, but then Ed shifts beside her.

"Yes," he answers quietly.

She grasps his hand with her own and holds on. His broad fingers are just as calloused as her own.

"So remember the light."

Note: Kind of based a lot of Nina's mannerisms off of my own six year old sister and watching her interact with my dad.

*Nina means "pretty eyes" in Hindi.

** "child's vanity..." I'm not actually sure if this is a term, but, hey, little girls are vain sometimes (got two little sisters), so it's a term now.