Prologue: Welcome Home

(POV)

It was a cold rainy, lonely night once again in the home of the Rockbell's. As I looked around my room, I sighed. Scattered parts for automail and tools covered the floor. And all I could do was stare at them. Even now I find it hard to believe I had been living here all on my own for 2 years now. Since the accident and Grandma passing away so suddenly, I hardly notice how alone I am.

Looking down at my left leg, I sigh once again. The clinking of my full automail leg and thigh sometimes keeps me awake during the night. I still remember everything that day as it happened. The motorcycle I had invented for myself had malfunctioned, I had lost control, and unfortunately, I had been test driving it near the rocky hillside of town.

Big mistake.

After suffering three broken ribs, a shattered right arm and leg, a broken collarbone, and having my left leg being mutilated to the point of no possible repair, the doctor's saw only one possible way for me to ever walk again. And that was to have my leg amputated and have automail installed.

Lifting the metal up slightly into the light, I feel the tears prickling the backs of my eyes. Grandma had been devastated to hear that the installment was to be put in right at the thigh joint to my pelvis. And since none of my nerves had healed properly at the time, the installment took a lot longer than most. Even longer than Ed's.

Even after my installment, I still couldn't walk for a good eight months. My right leg was still healing and I was bedridden for even longer due to stress and depression.

While I was in the hospital healing, I managed to at least make one friend there. His name was Jason Talbot, and he shared a room with me for the first five months I was in there. Like me, he had been in an accident, but he had lost so much more than me. Both of his arms and his legs had been severed and destroyed during a joyride with his friends. Even though he now had automail like me, he still wished everyday he had not gotten in that car.

His friends had all survived, and joined the military like they had all planned on doing. Even though Jason for the most part was made out of more metal than flesh now, he had told me before he left for his training that no matter what, he would make it. I just hope his dream came true.

Every now and then I get a letter from him, telling me about how his training is going and whatnot. I laugh at the end of it though, because he always calls me his little sister. I think of him as a big brother now, and I miss him like crazy. But I know one day, he'll come home and see me. Even if it is only to have his automail checked out.

I was angry most of the time while I had been in the hospital. Mainly because of my very failed escape from this town. I had wanted to go and see Edward and Alphonse over the summer that year, but I had really had no money for a train ticket, and I was having many other issues.

So, after my failed attempt, even more bad things started happening. Grandma passed away due to a heart attack in her sleep, and this man known as Alex G. Wilcox started to harass me. Saying that he wanted my land and me.

Even though I knew he was a dangerous man, I defied him everytime. Taking the beatings and abuse just so he knew he could never truly have me. Mainly because my heart had always belonged to someone else.

Its actually been five years now since I've heard from either of them, and I've missed them both so much. Edward had sent me a note a few years back saying he was coming to visit with Al, but they had both never come. In a pathetic way, I was thankful. I didn't want either of them to see me like this. But in other ways, I was angry and hurt all the same.

They've never come to see me since then.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

'Who could that be?' I wondered. It must have been at least four in the morning. Looking out down to the front door from my window, I froze.

Long dark golden hair was sticking to his face and back. The red coat I remembered so well hung in rags against the hard body I had forced metal parts into for years upon years, and then it was the voice that snapped me into reality. And it also made me very afraid.

"Winry?!" he screamed. "Winry?! Aunt Pinako open up! It's me!"

Before even thinking it through, I ran to my door. But before I made my way for the stairs, I looked down at my leg. I couldn't let him see me like this. And I had a funny feeling that it really wouldn't go over well with him, since I knew how much he really did detest automail. Even his own I knew he hated most of the time. And in the back of my mind, I felt the siren go off saying simply to me 'He'll leave you if he knows.'

So, quickly grabbing a pair of loose fitting jeans and socks, I ran down the stairs to the banging door. I stood there for a while, maybe because at first I had no idea if I was dreaming or not. But then I thought back to the past five lonely years of my life. And I felt angry all over again.

"Winry?! God damnit will somebody open the fucking door already?!"

"Give me a reason why?" I said, feeling the old rage of why he hadn't been here swelling inside me.

"Because I'm wet and it's freezing out here!" he yelled through the door to me.

"Not good enough. Why the hell are you here? Oh, lemme guess, you need your automail tuned up, right?" I said sarcastically to him. "It's been five years Ed. Five whole years since I've heard from either of you. Now tell me what it is that your doing here or I'm going back upstairs."

When there was no retaliation, I paused. Something wasn't right.

"Ed?"

"Please," I heard him say softly through the door. Almost too soft for me to hear due to the heavy rain. "Please let me in Winry."

I knew something was off just by his tone, so I opened the door and looked at him. My breath caught in my chest the moment I saw those golden eyes I loved so much.

He looked a little taller than when I had last seen him. Maybe even to the point where he was taller than me, and his automail was far too small for him now. His face looked like it had aged slightly. As if he had gone through something very stressful only a little while ago. His hair hung loosely in the classic ponytail I had gotten him to start wearing since we were children, and it must have reached to about his lower back by now just from judging the length. But it was his eyes that scared me the most in that instant. Even though he was soaking wet from the rain, he seemed to be almost crying.

He looked at me in that instant and smiled sadly. As if there was something about me he almost wanted to cry over. I looked at him the only way I could think of at the moment.

Pissed off.

"Hi Winry," he said quietly to me. "So, how have you-"

Without any warning, I slapped him hard across the face. His eyes widened in shock for only a moment as he looked back at me. I had tears in my eyes as he finally glared at me in his normal way. But it had felt good to hurt him even a little. Just for how much he had truly hurt me.

"What the hell was that for?"

"Look asshole, I'm still pissed at your little puny ass for never coming to see me," I hissed in his face as I saw the fire rise in his eyes. "I really needed you guys here and you both never showed, so thanks for nothing."

"Wh-what did you call me?"

"You heard me you little shit. Now, what the hell are you doing here?" as I looked around him, waiting to see Al standing in the rain in the armored suit his soul had been bound to, I was surprised to see no one there. "And where's Al?"

Even though I could clearly see flames in his eyes, they quickly died into nothingness the moment my last question left my lips. Looking at him now, I was scared.

There were tears in his eyes.

Edward never cried. Not ever.

Something was wrong.

"E-Edward?" I said, feeling as though something was crumbling within my soul looking at his golden eyes.

He didn't look at me for a moment. And as the seconds rolled by, I started to become scared. Where was Alphonse? Even though I knew I was acting somewhat harsh towards him, I had a feeling in this tiny moment that I should be showing some kind of compassion. But when he did finally look at me, and speak, I could feel the guilt washing over me in waves.

"Al's gone," he said barely in a whisper to me. "The Homunculi killed him two years ago after we had both been captured by them… they let me go after I watched him die."

As Ed's body fell into mine, almost as if he had lost control over it, I caught him in my arms. He was shaking from all the strain of telling me those two small sentences. And letting go of all my own rage I had been holding for over five years, I pulled him closer to me.

Even though it shouldn't have been passing my mind in the moment, I realized how much he had really grown in height, and, that's when it really hit me how long he had been suffering.

Edward must have been so lost within himself, that he had forgotten to even take care of his own body. His balance was way off, due to him having grown about six or seven inches, his arm was too small and appeared to be almost broken due to so much wear and tear. But, I knew it was his heart, that had suffered the most damage.

And it was the one thing I could never fix.

Then, even as I looked at the open door behind him, I found myself crying softly for Al. I couldn't believe he was gone, and so heartless was his death.

So, pulling away slightly from Edward, I looked into his eyes, and found something very odd on his face. A slight smile. Almost as if the reason for him to feel so sad was slowly fading away. I took this the only way I had ever known how to with him.

I changed the subject.

"Well, welcome home Ed," I said rubbing my eyes with the back of my hand as I pulled him into the automail shop. "I need to put some natural prosthetics on you until I can order you some new parts. When are you going back to Central?" I asked as I roughly sat him down in my normal way, knowing full well he would try and act like his old self, even if it was for my sake alone.

But when he looked at me, I almost couldn't look away. There was something in his eyes I really couldn't read, and then, after sighing, he said something to me that made my eyes bulge.

"I'm not going back until they need me. Roy gave me the next six to eight months off," he said removing his shirt as he pulled the light switch with his normal right arm.

Even though his old automail looked like crap, I couldn't help but almost drool over the eight pack on his stomach and the other many muscles he now had.

When my hormones finally decided to cool down to some degree, and I realized he was actually blushing, I started unscrewing the first set of old bolts holding the old arm in place. When I looked at him, I decided I should at least ask why he was on such a long leave.

"How come so long?" I said pulling the arm out of it's holding and bringing a plastic replacement to the hole, pushing it in lightly so he wouldn't feel it in his nerves.

"Well," he said sighing. " After…, After what happened to Alphonse, I started to basically go insane from the torment of everything in my life. Riza was the first to notice it. But I refused to stop believing that there was a way to bring Al back. So, after trying to perform the same thing we had done for our mother, and getting caught, Roy put me on suspension until as he put it 'I'm well again.' But I couldn't stand staying in Central for that long… So, I came back home."

After a long silence between us, he finally spoke to me again after I had managed to put the replacement leg in.

"So? Where's Aunt Pinako?" he said looking around.

After standing up and turning away from him, I pulled on the fabric hiding my leg, and I felt the need to scream.

"She- she died," I said, feeling the tears already pulling at the backs of my eyes. " Two years ago in her sleep."

Without any warning, I felt the cool plastic and warm flesh wrap around me, holding me in a tight hug from behind. Looking at his face, I could see he was beginning to understand my coldness towards him somewhat better now.

"I'm so sorry. I should have been here... Me and Al both should have been here for you," he said hanging his head low.

He only stood there for a moment, and now that he was actually wearing a prosthetic that fit on his leg, I noticed I did in fact have to look slightly up at him. The top of my head was at about his perfect lips. The one's I never thought I would be this close t ever.

Pulling away from him, I grabbed his hand and smiled at the blush forming on his cheeks.

"Come on, we can talk in the morning," I said softly to him as we made our way up the stairs into my room. Which now held two beds instead of one. I hadn't had the heart to throw Grams bed away, but I had needed her room for storage. So, when I had finally been strong enough to move, I'd pulled the bed up into my room.

As Edward looked around, he smiled at all of the old tools and gave me a look at the parts of automail on the floor. Brushing off the stress, because I didn't want him to feel any worse than he already did, I climbed into my bed and pointed to the bathroom.

"I still have some of your old clothes in the bathroom bureau, and there's also a hair dryer in there if you feel like using it," I said pulling the covers over my body, pealing the socks off underneath the covers.

He didn't say anything as he walked into the bathroom ad shut the door. I sighed when I finally heard the hair dryer being turned on and the sound of his wet clothes being thrown in the hamper.

Looking out at the rain streaking down my window, I wanted to cry. What was with that smile on his face? Why other than to have his automail replaced had he come back here? And the one question pulling at the back of my mind that hurt the most was this. Would he be angry at me for keeping my secret for a while? At least until I felt safe with him once more?

Feeling the cold metal of my auto mailed toes against my normal flesh, I couldn't hold back my tears any longer. Rolling over to the wall and covering my face with a pillow, I wept openly into the soft fabric.

That is until I felt those arms come around me once more.

"Why are you crying?" he asked getting very close to the side of my face.

My voice at the moment was lost to me, so, shaking my head, I refused to look into his eyes. But my tears just wouldn't stop.

As far as I knew, he had stayed with me the entire night. Most likely because even Edward didn't want to be alone anymore. But as I fell asleep, I smiled.

Because at least, he had come back to me. And it wasn't in a dream for the first time in a long time.

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Well, it's not much, but it will get better as it goes on.

I know I mainly write other fics, but this one I actually wrote out a long time ago, and it's been bugging me to be shown ever since.

So, lemme know what you think, and I PROMISE, you won't be disappointed in what I have coming up next.

Toodles,

Me

: P