Username: 
Password:    
Remember Me

Search by :  Username E-mail Region Interest AOL IM ICQ Number Yahoo! ID MSN Username Jabber

maes hughes (maes) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2015-10-01 07:06:00

Who: Maes Hughes and Edward Elric
When: Backdated to sometime before the Shattered Sight Plot
Where: Close to a coffee house
What: Maes has gone to run a few errands, though he needs some coffee first but runs into Edward before he makes it there.
Rating/Warnings: Low/Moody teen ftw, some language
Status: Closed/Completed GDoc



Humming happily, Maes parked his car, although it was a good piece away from where he'd actually intended to go. What did he expect on a Saturday? For parking spaces to be abundant? That was a ridiculous train of thought. Besides, Maes didn't mind walking, it was good for him considering he sat behind a desk most of the time.

Whistling now, Maes got out and hit the lock button on his keyring before pocketing his keys. Pushing his glasses up his nose, Maes stepped up onto the sidewalk, and dodged a couple of people as he moved down toward the coffee shop. He was in the mood for a simple cup of black coffee, along with a pastry as a sugary treat since he was out running errands this morning. He'd just about made it to the coffee shop when he spotted a familiar looking face.

He'd seen a photo of the boys before, Riza's nephews, although he'd yet to meet either one of them yet. He wondered for a moment if he should say anything, although that thought was quickly dismissed as he walked up to Edward, stopping close to him. "Yo," he lifted a hand, a bright smile on his face. "I'm Maes Hughes, a friend of your Aunt Riza's. You're Edward, correct?" He dropped his hand down, shoving it back into the pocket of his pants.

Ed might not have been able to drink alcohol to forget recent events, but he could drink coffee. He had one in a gloved hand just outside the coffee shop and was trying to down the sludge when a very familiar voice caused him to pale. “Major Hughes?” He said out of habit before he realized he’d even said such a thing really “I-Yeah, I am. I mean, Hughes.” He stumbled over his words a bit at first, he hadn’t been expecting that name of all names to sneak up on him.

A pair of wide golden eyes watched him like he was in shock. Hughes didn’t call him Fullmetal, that ought to have been his first indicator of how likely he was to confuse the man with his stumble, but he wasn’t really thinking about it.

Maes's brows furrowed slightly as he called him Major, and he looked at Edward curiously. He wasn't sure what that was all about, but he brushed it off for now with a wide smile. "Good to finally meet you in person!" That was the pure and simple truth of the matter, of course, Maes was generally a happy fellow.

"And actually I'm a step up from Major now, Lieutenant Colonel now. I was promoted before moving here." Maybe Riza had mentioned something about his past military experience to the boys? Who knew, all Maes knew was that there appeared to be something in Ed's eyes, or maybe he was just being paranoid. "So, how are you doing, Edward?"

It was almost eerie talking to Hughes after everything the dreams had brought him. Very few things change about the people from the dreams, only the reality they existed in. Ed couldn’t help but to stare for a moment.

“What are you doing here?” Dumb question, the answer was pretty obvious. It was a public coffee shop after all, but it was like words and brain weren’t connecting for a moment.

Cocking his head to the side, Maes looked very confused before a smile broke out across his face. "I'm here to get coffee of course!" He laughed, his smile lighting up his entire face, of course, there were other reasons that he could be asking that question.

Maes stopped laughing, "Unless that is not the real question you're asking. I'm working at Camp Pendleton, and have been for a little while." Although he'd been transferred from one place to another to gather information on the Network. Maes couldn't mention that as it was classified. His look faded into one of concern. "Is everything alright?"

Edward quirked an eyebrow as he looked up at the taller man and gave a slightly embarrassed huff. “Obviously.” He even added a folding of his arms to complete his childish annoyance. Even his personality was the same. How could any one human be that cheerful?

“I recognize you, and it’s weird..is all.” He tried to play it cool, but that ship had probably sailed by now. “Have you been to Alchemy Flower shop?” Maybe he’d buy that one. Camp Pendleton though, go figure. Ed stifled a smile at that.

Chuckling, Maes nodded. "I'm a regular over at your Aunt's shop." He really was. Maes was there quite frequently. "I go there, and buy flowers for my wife and daughter all the time. Well, at least once every two weeks, sometimes more. It just depends." He lifted a shoulder, smiling softly over at Edward.

He thought for a moment, he wasn't sure if Riza had any photos of him or not, and he wasn't entirely certain he'd seen Edward at the flower shop. It was probably the latter to be honest. Maes was focused while he was at the shop, so it was possible that he'd missed seeing him there so he put it off on being that.

“Thought so.” He raised an eyebrow at that though. “You really buy that many flowers?” Was that a thing everybody did, or was that just a Hughes thing? The blonde’s attention was distracted by the cooling of his coffee and he simply threw it out. “This stuff tastes like sludge.” He said out loud, only to earn himself a dirty look from one of the waitresses passing by. He was not a coffee drinker. Usually when he visited Raven’s shop it was for something sweeter, but most sweet drinks lacked the necessary caffeine. He sighed at that.

“Wait, how do you know me?” He hadn’t introduced himself as far as he was aware. This meeting was weird, simply put.

Maes nodded, "I do actually." It might be extravagant, or silly to some people but Maes wanted his girls to know that that he thought about them. He curiously watched Edward as he threw away the cup of coffee, chuckling softly with a shake of his head. "Some of it is." He didn't really like overly sweet coffee himself, although he did find himself at random coffee shops more often than not for pick me ups.

He canted his head to the side, only to push up his glasses a few moments later. "I've seen a photo of you at your Aunt's flower shop, and we've spoken about you and Alphonse a few times." Maes always asked about the boys when he saw Riza, only because he knew how important family was. He lifted his shoulders into a small shrug, "That's how I knew who you were. At least, I was fairly certain that's who you were, and I just took a chance to come speak with you."

“The milk isn’t helping it any.” He could taste it like a brick to the face. Milk was a deal breaker for Edward when it came to just about everything. “Your taste buds must be dead if any of it is. I weep for them.” He shook his head dramatically with a shrug of his arms and tone dripping in sarcasm

“Oh, right..of course. And ah..she told me about you. Yeah…” Except he’d been on that network thing he was sure of it, Ed squinted at him accusingly and then sighed. “Except that’s a lie and this is going to sound weird, but..I dreamt about you.” Often when the military was involved in fact, and not all of it was the dream stuff of sugar plums and candy..

Laughing, Maes rolled his eyes with a shake of his head. "Some of it is okay, so I suppose my taste buds are quite dead at this point. Either that, or I'm just getting old." Not that Maes thought he was getting old, since he didn't feel old.

A dark brow rose over the edge of his glasses as Ed spoke. Well, that made more sense to him, if he was being entirely honest. "I see." He replied with a small nod of his head, "I haven't had any of these Dreams I hear people talk about yet. I have a feeling that they'll eventually catch up with me." Part of Maes wanted to ask how those dreams turned out for him, but he refrained. There was something nice about not knowing. "So no, it's not weird, but I do have one question." He leaned in a little bit, "Are Gracia and Elicia with me in these dreams of yours?"

To a 15 year old boy most adults were hella old. Though some people claimed ed acted older than his age, he hadn’t felt it until recently. The dreams weighed heavily on him.

Hughes wasn’t freaked out, that was a good sign. But when he leaned in like that Ed backed up slightly but not terribly obviously at least. He was just awkward with adults still. Dreams or no dreams.

"Yeah. They both are actually. Your wife made me a birthday cake." Hughes family had treated him like one of their own, it was nice. Ed and Al only had each other, no real adults in their lives. Hughes filled that void.

Maes moved back away from Ed and nodded. A smile pulled up the corners of his lips as he thought about the simple fact that his family was still with him even in these dreams. "That's good. I'm glad to hear that." His voice was soft, and he gave another small nod of his head. "That sounds like something she'd do. I hope that you enjoyed it."

He just wondered if, or when these dreams would come to him. Perhaps in time he'd find out, although he was content with his life. He didn't really want to add any other complications on top of all of it. "You and Al are more than welcome to come by our home any time you'd like. I'm sure that Elicia would love to meet you two. Or just you, if you'd rather come by yourself. It doesn't matter."

“I’d actually forgotten all about it but she didn’t.” So much had happened that Ed had overlooked it entirely, he had a habit of doing that often. He just didn’t figure his birthday was worth remembering usually, so it got put on a backburner somewhere in his mind. “I don’t even remember telling you when it was there either.” He shrugged, but being military that wasn’t really a hard thing to find out. Still Ed was sort of touched by it, he hadn’t mentioned it. Hughes could have just let it pass by without a second thought but he hadn’t. There was a hint of a sadness to his tone, okay so the dreams sucked-but at least they knew him there.

“Yeah?” Having Hughes around woudl be nice..”Really? But you hardly know us.” He didn’t want to turn down the offer, not really-but it could be awkward, and he didn’t want to do that to someone he liked.

Laughing, Maes shook his head. "Well, apparently someone let the news leak." He couldn't say how they knew about it either, but Maes was good at finding out information. That was why he'd been moved to a different area within Camp Pendleton, and why he'd decided to become an Intelligence Officer in the first place. "I know Gracia never forgets important dates, and I don't either. Typically. Once or twice it might've happened."

It was just part of being human after all.

Nodding, Maes offered Ed a smile, "You're Riza's family, and Riza is a friend. That's all I really need to know." Reaching into his back pocket, Maes pulled out his wallet and then a business card. "That has my direct line at the base, and my cell phone number on it. Use it any time you need to." He handed it off to Ed with a smile, "I've got to get going. I'm going to grab myself a coffee, and then head to the store. I hope the rest of your day treats you well, Ed. And I'm serious about the offer to come over, or call any time you like." Maes didn't see any harm in giving those things to Ed, after all, he thought of him as basically family at this point since he was Riza's family and she was a good friend.

Ed actually smiled at that. So many thing in his life lately had sucked, but this wasn’t one of them. He accepted the card and nodded. He didn’t have business cards to hand out, but at some point Hughes would get a text from him about something or another. “Thank you.” That had gone much better than he could have expected, and honestly Ed needed more of ‘better’ to happen. Lately everything had been so hard, for something to go well was a breath of fresh air.