InsaneJournal

The Pen is Mightier! (penismightier) wrote in chaotic_library, @ 2007-11-01 13:35:00

[Elricest; NC-17] Lie With Me, Brother, Lie For Me
Character/Series: Edward Elric; Alphonse Elric; Others; Fullmetal Alchemist
Rating: NC-17
Notes: Written for Edward month at fma_fuh_q Redux. The side characters that make appearances are also not mine, but it's not necessary to know who I ripped off where they come from to enjoy the story. (Although if you get it, email me plz, so we can talk about spoilers. :D) Set post-movie, so read at your own risk if you haven't seen the movie or read the spoilers.
Music: La Bel Age by Pat Benatar
Title: Lie With Me, Brother, Lie For Me
Author: yuuo
Word Count: 4423
Summary: Nebraska had to be the most goddamn miserable state on the Earth, right after Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas.




"There comes a time when you should see things clear,
Free from my innocence, there is no circumstance too severe.
There is a time, temptation's on the run.
Dreamer, you've had your way,
Soldier, you've had your day in the sun.
There comes a time when you must find your way.
Beggar has made his bed wrapped in a silhoutte
Of gold and gray.""
-"Le Bel Age"; Pat Benatar

Somewhere between York and McCool Junction, NE, USA
June 14, 1933 A.D.

Nebraska had to be the most goddamn miserable state on the Earth, right after Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas. The four seemed to compete for the title of "Hell On Earth", those states that stretched northward from the border of Mexico right smack in the middle of America.

So of course, that's exactly where Edward Elric and his younger brother were currently stuck.

Edward swatted absently at an unidentifiable bug that buzzed around his head noisily as he watched the rousties at work, watched his brother working with them and arguing with a couple over the mechanics of the ferris wheel's old and dust-clogged engine.

Winry would be proud of him.

"Look, Elric, I ain't disagreeing," the rousties' manager snapped, pausing his steps to turn to Al, "I'm just sayin' we ain't got the money to clean that damn thing up proper and in case you haven't noticed, we ain't exactly got an abundance of water in these parts, unless you reckon you can go without for a week or two and use your share."

"I know that, but unless it's cleaned soon, Jonesy, that thing's gonna break down and it's gonna be at the wrong time, and it's gonna get someone killed!" Al argued, following after Jones as the man limped away, his gait stiff-legged from the brace on his left leg.

Jones stopped and gave Al a dirty look, and Edward raised an eyebrow, watching the exchange with interest. After a moment, Jones sighed, pointing his wrench at Al. "Fine. You go con Samson outta the dough and resources to get what we need to clean it with. I'm through with it."

Part of Edward was tempted to go see if he could help, but he knew Al was the better mechanic of the two of them, picking up Winry's duties in helping keep up the automail. Al could easily handle Jones and Samson both, Edward wasn't terribly concerned.

Giving a token attempt to brush some of the dust off his pants, Edward stood up and turned to head inside the rickety boxcar that had been turned into his trailer. It was miserably hot and humid and the wind was just as hot and humid when it was blowing at twenty miles a damn hour as when it wasn't.

"Your brother sure has a tendency to drive Jonsey crazy, don't he?"

Edward paused and looked down at the three-foot midget that ran the carnival. Samson motioned with one hand, the other resting on his cane. "I tell ya, ain't seen anyone able to put a bee in his pants like that except Sofie. That a family trait?"

If only he knew.

Fighting back a smirk, Edward glanced back towards his brother who was still arguing with Jones, then down at Samson. "Something like that," he replied in German, the language more a habit for him to speak than his own native language by now.

Samson looked up at him from under the brown fedora he wore, then over at Al and Jones, then shook his head. "Hell. Kid, go let your brother know that you and I are goin' into town."

His hand dropped off the door handle quickly as he blinked, turning to face Samson. "Why me?"

"Because, kid," Samson told him, flashing him a grin that said there were more reasons than he was about to say, "this town here's a German settlement, and I need someone who can speak the language better 'an me in case some folk can't speak English. I'd have your brother do it, but Jonsey would be a man down then, and you seem to just be collectin' dust at the moment."

Edward bit back an argument. He had been about to go back in to studying the information he'd managed to steal out of Lodz's trailer- there's honor among carnies and thieves, but not among magicians at odds- but like hell he'd tell Samson that.

Besides, he wanted to see what the sneaky little bastard was up to.

---

When the two of them had first joined the carnival, Al as a hired hand and Edward as a showcase- whatever put food on the table, times were too hard for dignity to take a front seat to providing food and shelter for his brother- Edward had noticed right away that Samson seemed to see everything despite his rather low vantage point.

Al had calmly said it was a 'short person thing'.

Edward had attempted to kick his ass for it.

He'd promptly lost for his attempt.

Still, sometimes the midget tended to make Edward a bit nervous. The brothers had their share of secrets to hide, and generally, nobody pried, at least amongst the other freaks, but it still made Edward uncomfortable to think that maybe Samson had figured out some things on his own anyway.

Granted, in a place with a mother-daughter cooch dance show pimped off by the man of the family, nobody in the showcasers would bat an eyelash at the brothers. That didn't put Edward much at ease, though.

"Turn here," Samson told him, breaking the silence as he directed Ed off the main road onto Fourth Avenue. "There's a gas station at the end of the block, might have what your brother needs to fix the ol' wheel."

Edward glanced down at him as he turned the corner and into the gas station's lot. "You overheard that?"

The look Samson gave him made him feel almost stupid for asking. Of course he had. "Hard not to, with how loud those two get when they're arguin'. And you can cut the act, kid, I know you can speak English."

The first words he nearly said in English were of the more creatively obscene variety at that. He stayed silent instead as he put the truck into park, and turned off the ignition. "How long have you known?" he asked quietly, switching languages.

"'Bout a month after you guys showed up," Samson replied, opening his door and sliding down out of the truck. "Now come on, let's find out where we can get those parts."

Edward wondered what else Samson had figured out.

"Tell me, my good man," Samson said loudly to attract the serviceman's attention as he strode into the store, "where could a body go to find some good parts for an engine of an unusual build?"

The serviceman looked around, his gaze finally settling on Edward before Edward pointed downward at Samson in front of him. God, it was good to not be in Samson's position for a change. Now he understood why Al always had to struggle to keep from laughing when they were younger.

"How unusual?" the serviceman asked, wiping grease and oil off his hands with a rag.

"For a ferris wheel."

The service man stopped, looking between the midget and Edward who seemed to be playing an apparently silent man who didn't think anything of wearing thick gloves and a sports jacket in the nasty Nebraska summer's humidity. "Y'all with that carnival in town?"

"That we are," Samson said proudly, tipping his head back in the direction they'd come. "Just down the road towards McCool a bit."

The man didn't answer right away, just nodded his head slowly. After a moment, he shrugged, apparently deciding against whatever he'd been debating. "There's a place just down Lincoln street here, on the corner at Tenth. Man named Carl owns it. He doesn't speak much English, but his kid does."

"Great!" Samson's cane thumped in triumph against the floor. "Between the boy and Edward here, we'll be able to communicate just fine, I think." He looked at Edward as he turned towards the door. "Come on, let's get those parts."

"Y'all part'a the freaks?" the man finally asked, as Edward somehow suspected he would. Edward glanced back, not entirely successful in biting back a dirty glare.

"Naw, I run the place," Samson said without missing a beat. "And Edward here... well, you'll just have to come to the show." With a grin and a tip of his hat, Samson had walked out the door. Edward didn't waste time catching up with him.

Nothing was said as the two climbed up in the truck and Edward kept his lips tightly pursed together as he got the truck turned around and back onto the main street, turning down towards Tenth.

Samson was first to speak. "It still bothers you, don't it, kid?"

"I'm used to it."

That earned him a derisive chuckle. "That don't mean it don't bother you." Edward merely shrugged in response, stopping at an intersection to let a family cross the street before continuing. "That why you don't speak English?"

Finally, Edward spared the much shorter man a glance. "People don't ask questions when they think you can't answer."

For some reason, that seemed to amuse Samson even more. "Kid, you're reminding me of Ben. Stop that. I don't need two of ya givin' me headaches."

It was Edward's turn to laugh as he finally turned into the parking lot of the service station. "No. Ben reminds me of me when I was younger."

Samson stared at him, then shook his head. "Christ, you mean to tell me you used to be worse?"

"You woulda hated my guts, Samson," Edward told him as he put the truck into park again and climbed out.

"I think I already do!" The truck door slammed shut and Samson practically jogged to keep up with Edward. "But I tell you what. You're a money-maker, and I like that. And it makes folks feel a bit better having your brother and them guns around after what happened in Babylon."

It was on the tip of Edward's tongue to ask what had happened, but he suddenly had the feeling he didn't want to know.

"And better than that," Samson continued and Edward held open the door for him, "you drive Lodz crazy."

"It's a short trip," Edward remarked easily, switching back to German as they walked into the store.

Samson started to reply, but whatever he might've said was cut off as a child abruptly ran into him, sending both of them sprawling. Edward hurried to help Samson to his feet as Samson sputtered a few curses. "Mother Mary and Joseph, kid, watch where you're goin'!"

The boy started stammering apologies in a frantic mess of German and English and skittered behind a man that hurried over at the clamor. The man immediately began to scold the boy, then turned to Samson and Edward and tried to apologize in stilted English.

"It's all right," Edward assured him in German and the man visibly relaxed. "Are you Carl? You own this place?"

"I am," he answered with a sigh and gave the boy a sharp look. "Donald, what have I told you about running around the store? Go back to the office, stay in there." Carl looked back at them. "I'm very sorry for him. Boys are a handful. What can I do for you gentlemen?"

"We need parts for an engine," Edward replied after he'd paused to translate for Samson and get an answer back.

"What kind of engine?"

"A ferris wheel."

Carl's eyebrows shot up, and he tapped his chin. "Ferris wheel, huh? Well, I'm pretty sure I can help you out, but it won't be cheap..."

Edward translated, glancing between Samson and Carl. It was... fascinating and frightening all at once to watch two salesmen prepare to haggle with each other. He almost wanted to leave the translating to Carl's son, but the boy had already disappeared.

"You know," Samson said, eyeing his cane and pointedly not quite looking up at Carl, "I bet your boy would love to get to see a carnival."

After Edward had translated, Carl rubbed at the back of his neck thoughtfully. "I bet he would. Dunno when he'd ever get a chance to go again, of course, and you know boys, they wanna just go back."

By the time to the two were done, Carl had free passes for him and his son for the whole time the carnival was in town, with unlimited ferris wheel rides for the boy, and Samson had gotten the parts they needed, which were worth at least three times as much as what was getting charged.

Edward decided to never ever try to negotiate a different cut of profits with Samson.

---

"Hey, Jonsey!"

Jones looked up from his work at the carousel, squinting his eyes against the sun at Samson and Edward as they approached, Edward dragging a couple crates behind him. "Yeah, Boss?"

Samson motioned to the ferris wheel with his cane. "Where'd Elric get to?"

Jones didn't answer right away, rocking back on his heel and adjusting his balance on his outstretched bad leg. He looked between Samson and the crates Edward pushed up next o the shorter man, then back to Samson. "Jesus, Samson, don't tell me you actually went into town and bought that shit."

Samson and Edward both just grinned at him, waiting for him to send for Al. After a moment, Jones rubbed his forehead, laughing in disbelief. "Christ. Oswald!" One of the other rousties looked up from carrying some planks in the direction of the three-in-one. "Go get Elric, wouldja? He's helpin' out Stumpy and the girls."

Edward bit back a growl as Oswald ran off. "Again?" he muttered.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Samson look up at him with a smirk. "Hardly can blame the boy. Free show from the girls dancin' while he puts up the stage? I'm surprised nobody's tried to beat him to the job yet."

Oh, of course, can't blame him at all. Why wouldn't he want to go watch the cooch dancers? Edward forced a smirk. "They have. Nobody can beat him if he doesn't want them to."

If Samson was picking up on Edward's jealousy, he wasn't showing it. He laughed. "We know, we've seen you two get into your brawls. Hell, the rousties don't even bet any more, they know who's gonna win."

Edward snorted as he sat down and leaned against the crates. "I'm gonna beat him, someday."

"Sure ya will, kid," Samson said as he pulled himself up onto a crate and settled on it. "And when you do, I'll let you keep the full take for a week."

Closing his eyes with an indignant huff, Edward reached back and swatted lazily at his boss, waiting patiently until he heard the sound of Al's voice arguing with Oswald. The boy argued with all the rousties over anything, it seemed. Edward was going to have to talk to him about picking up the elder brother's bad habits.

"Quit sounding like me, Al," Edward called to him, waving at him from his place on the ground. He heard Al's voice abruptly stop, and he opened his eyes, watching his brother approach. "You know it's my job to argue over everything."

"Yes, and you can't argue with anyone but Samson and I, so I figure I gotta pick up the slack," Al snapped back, not bothering to switch from English. "I was almost done with that stage, you know."

"Sorry, kid," Samson said, hopping down off the crate. "You'll just have to watch the show tonight. We got something here you might like."

Edward sat up and turned around up onto his knees, grabbing hold of the lid they hadn't bothered to nail shut on the crate and pulled it up for Al to inspect the contents. His brother shot him a questioning look as he crouched down next to him, digging through the hay that'd been stuffed in for padding.

There was a moment of silence as Al stared at a part, then "Brother?"

"Yeah?"

"Are these-?"

"Uh-huh."

Samson's cane tapped the wooden edge of the crate. "I decided Jonsey had listened to you bitchin' enough for one week."

The look on Al's face kinda reminded Edward of Winry's expression in the shops in Rush Valley. Edward wanted to laugh.

"Hate to interrupt," Jones's voice cut off anything Al had started to say. All three looked up at the urgency in his tone. His eyes were wide and he was pointing off somewhere behind the others. "But we got incomin'."

It looked like a solid dark wall, and for a moment, Edward's brain was unable to decipher just what he was looking at, until the roar finally caught up to them, rumbling over the entirety of the carnival like a freight train falling off its tracks.

"Dust storm!" Samson yelled. Somewhere, someone started ringing the alert bell frantically. Jones ran over and grabbed Samson to get him to safety, yelling orders at the other rousties to grab what wasn't bolted down that could get blown away and get into the three-in-one.

Al and Edward struggled to lift the heavy crate of engine parts. Samson would kill them if the new parts got clogged up with dirt and dust already. "Trailer's close this way!" Al shouted, motioning Edward in a direction behind him. Edward nodded, checked his grip on the crate and started shuffling backwards even as the wind picked up, starting to whistle and howl as the wall of dirt drew closer.

Sound was drowned out under the deafening roar as Edward struggled to keep from falling over ass over head, carefully picking his footing up the steps to the trailer. His flesh hand groped around for the handle and yanked the door open and he stumbled back in out of the wind, Al and the rest of the crate right behind him. They dropped the crate and grabbed the door handle, using both their strength to fight it close against the wind.

The door clicked shut just as the storm hit with the force of a brick wall, shaking the glass on the windows and the walls of the trailer. They both stood perfectly still a moment, staring at the windows, wondering if this would be the storm the glass gave. When the protests of the glass ceased worsening and the angry growl steadied out as the first wall of the storm passed over, they relaxed.

"Well." Al looked at his brother. "That was fun."

Edward groaned, running a hand over his face. "At least we're trapped together this time."

Al's eyebrows shot up as Edward kicked off his shoes and crouched down by the bed, digging underneath it. "You mean as opposed to me getting trapped with Stumpy's girls?"

That earned Al a dirty look. "You seem to get that job a lot." Ah, there it was. Edward pulled out a small box from under the bed and began fiddling with the array on the lock.

His brother flopped onto the bed next to him. "You're jealous."

He shot Al a nasty look before he went back to what he was doing. The box popped open with a click. "Am not."

Rational thought suddenly tangled up on itself as Al reached over his shoulder and traced his fingers down his sensitive back. "Yes, you are." Al leaned down and nuzzled him. "And you don't need to be." He flashed Edward a grin. "You just don't have tits to look at is all."

Edward reached up and grabbed his brother's wrists, nudging the box back under the bed with his foot as he turned his head to capture Al's lips sharply. Al yelped against the kiss, against Edward's teeth that scraped along his lower lip roughly and flailed slightly as Edward pushed him over off his side and onto his back.

Al laughed as Edward finally released him for lack of air and settled himself up on the bed a bit better. "Really, that's all it is, Brother. I just like looking at boobs."

Edward snorted, shaking his head as he leaned down and nipped Al's adams apple. "You're hopelessly straight, Al. How the hell'd you wind up with a guy?"

His brother made a noise that Edward would swear was a purr and he smiled, stretching underneath him. "Because the guy happens to be you and you're just special that way."

At once insulted and complimented, Edward wasn't entirely sure how to react, and finally settled for biting Al's neck roughly and then sticking out his tongue at him. "Brat." His little brother merely smiled in response, running his fingers through Edward's hair, brushing it back from his face a bit. Edward's eyes drifted close, his head tilting against the touch. "Think this one will last awhile?" he asked quietly, barely audible over the howling of the storm.

"Hm? Oh." Al lifted his head a bit, glancing towards the window. "Probably." Edward shuddered as Al's tongue ran along the line of his pulse. "It'd better, anyway." The grin on Al's face made Edward's nerves and thoughts collide and tangle up. "I had plans."

Forcing a bit of dignity and control, Edward snorted, moving his hands to pin his brother's upper arms down as he began to leave a trail of soft kisses over Al's shirt, across his chest and down his abdomen. "I see how it is. Watch them and come to me. Didn't have any tissue on hand?"

Al twisted his arms a bit in Edward's grip, tangling his fingers in Edward's hair. "I always come home to you."

For a second, Edward almost couldn't breathe, feeling something tangling up in his throat and he closed his eyes, swallowing it back down and laughing a bit, shaking his head and ducking, kissing Al's stomach just above the waistband of his pants. "You rotten little sap," he grumbled, pretending that thick congealed feeling in his chest wasn't his heart altering its rhythm to Al's words, to his quiet, subtle commands.

Damn brat. He had all the control in that relationship, and Edward knew it. Nobody else could've ever reduced Edward's mind to sugared mush that easily.

"Just truthful," Al replied, one hand loosening its grip on his hair to pet it back gently. Edward lifted his head to smile at him before releasing Al's arms to slide mismatched fingertips down his brother's torso, to the catches of his pants. The hand still tangled in his hair tightened in anticipation, his hips jerking a bit in reflex.

Working Al's shirt free and pressing his lips against bare flesh, Edward smiled, nipped at Al's stomach and tugged at the zipper of the pants. "Sappy," he said again, determined that to get Al to give up and confess to the fact.

Further arguments were cut off as Edward's flesh hand slipped in between the folds of material, fingers tracing along Al's erection. His brother strangled on a cry, a thin, needy sound that could barely be heard even in the confines of the trailer over the ever-present growling of the storm outside.

Edward smiled, watching his brother's expression, watching the need and want painting itself over his features as Edward's skilled hand teased along heated flesh. Al's breathing hitched, began to quicken and Al managed to choke out Edward's name, voice shaky and trembling.

His brother's cock was warm in his hand, slick from sweat and the precome that Edward and slicked his hand with from the head. He traced along the vein on the underside, fingers dancing over where he knew the nerves were most sensitive, where he knew would make his brother's voice rise in pitch and crack, would make his nerves melt and shatter like glass.

"Br-brother-!" Al gasped, one hand leaving Edward's hair to grip the bed sheets tight enough to make his knuckles turn red. The other hand nudged his head, subtly guiding, or perhaps begging.

Gladly obliging his brother's silent command, he worked Al's cock free from his pants and leaned down, flicking the tip of his tongue against the head. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Al lift his head, saw the wide-eyed expression that accompanied the sudden tenseness. He smiled, tracing his tongue around the head, teasing the foreskin. Al whimpered and whined, breathing growing frantic as his hips arched, inviting and demanding for more contact, for relief.

Edward was never one to deny his little brother. He dragged his tongue along the length before he took Al's cock into his mouth, sucking lightly as his lips and tongue and teeth worked over the skin, teasing and stimulating just the right nerves, just the right sensations. He knew his brother's body as well as he knew his own- better, really- and he knew his brother's reactions, and how to get the ones he wanted most.

He could feel every muscle in Al's body tighten as he went stiff, his eyes rolling back before his head thumped back down against the pillow and he lifted his hips, pressing into Edward's mouth. Edward pulled back a bit, keeping his focus on the sensitive head and foreskin, on the bundle of nerves gathered just under the head.

Al cried out sharply, unmindful of his volume for once as his voice was mostly lost in the noise of the wind, hands clenched so tightly Edward's eyes stung and watered from the pull on his hair. He pulled back just enough for his tongue to flick and rub against the head, and Al went completely still, then began to shudder violently as he came, his voice a thready whine crying Edward's name like a prayer.

That was his brother. Those reactions belonged to him. Were only for him.

Edward wiped his sleeve at the corner of his mouth as he crawled up next to his brother, flopping down on the bed. Al turned and clung to him like a dying man holding onto a life line, shuddering as his body came down from the climax.

Slipping an arm around Al's shoulders, Edward kissed his forehead, then laid his head down on his other arm. Al gave him a sleepy smile, then nuzzled him, making that purring noise again. "I love you, Brother."

"Mm." Edward buried his face against Al's hair. "Sap."

Al reached around him and dragged his nails down Edward's back. Edward's nerves tangled up in response. His brother lifted his head and smiled at him. "I'm not done with you, you know."

That thick, warm feeling in Edward's chest returned, and he smiled, leaning in and kissing his brother softly. "Good. I wasn't done with you, either." His smile warmed and melted into an expression that only his brother ever saw. "I love you too, Al."

Outside, the wind continued howling.