Who:Ed and Lina What:Training starts again~ When:Recently! Where:Some random open area. Warnings:Sass, but otherwise none STATUS:FINISHED
Ed was bored, he probably should be glad to be bored-but bored none the less. He was hanging around the magic guild wondering what the hell the point was. He’d created a place to hang a hammock in one of the corners, there was literally nothing to do. There were only so many times he felt like going over the same damn code from the same book that he couldn’t seem to figure out no matter how many angles he looked at it. There were only so many experiments he felt like running by himself before it even lost it’s thrill.
So he lounged. He lounged in the hammock with one foot dangling out of it like there wasn’t a care in the world. For him there basically wasn’t. He had a pair of earbuds in his ears and swung his foot along to it.
The lab was a bit messy, but it was a lab. It wasn’t meant to be a place to live so he didn’t care much. He’d fix it up eventually.
Messy was an understatement, but she’d let it slide. Now that the oven was unoccupied and her body healed from, uh, the effects of natural childbirth (not a fun ride, by the way) she was getting back in the grind of things - coming back into her more offensive techniques of magic, for one thing, and back to the grind of government work and research. Another routinely thing to get back into was Edward’s mentoring. Which was more about keeping those hands-on practical skills sharp, and not to mention it was also a scheduled thing that kept him occupied.
And out of trouble. Mostly.
“Hey, lazy,” came her greet, plucking an earbud from his ear. Her fiery hair was pulled into a tight, high ponytail atop her head, and she was dressed comfortably in stretchy yoga-ware. “What’cha listening to?”
Ed had practically fallen asleep by the time Lina got there, nobody was around so why not? It was summer and he wasn’t taking extra courses in school for once, so he’d slacked off in most areas of life. There wasn’t even a single incident he’d gotten wrapped up in over it, which he thought was strange-but maybe a break was a good thing. He could hear himself think. It was an odd thing.
An eye peered open to glare at the one who dared to remove his earbud like that but quickly changed to an expression of surprise. “Oi.” It was a strange mix of steampunk, storytelling and rap by the sounds of it. “Something called Professor Elemental.” He sat up a little more and peered around half expecting a spawn attachment. “Haven’t seen you out here in awhile.” He said with a hint of curiosity in tone. “Sup?”
“Interrupting your snooze,” she smirked, her eyes cast down at him with amusement. “I’m no longer a vessel of life that has to tiptoe and watch her step over uneven cracks in the ground, so I figured it’d be a good time as ever to get back into things?”
Their routine was good exercise, and missed - they seemed to battle with their alchemy and sorcery in the paths the dreams took them, and how else were they going to keep their moves top-notch? Lina poked at his ribs. “Unless you’ve turned into a slob and are afraid I’m going to cream your face into the ground.”
Ed peered up at her tiredly. Routine wasn’t a thing he’d had that summer, not even a little. He wasn’t entirely sure how he felt about it, but maybe getting back was good though his body was reluctant to move. He made a face and actually bothered to put his feet on the floor finally. “Rude. I need my sleep you know. “ Just maybe not twelve hours of it. “If you’re sure?”
He looked her over critically to see if she really was ready for this sort of thing. Her comment gained an incredulous look. “Pfft yeah right. I can take you.” He stood finally, but looked around his lab with a bit of dismay. “Here?”
“I don’t even know the concept of sleep anymore,” Lina sighed, a little envious. That final stretch of pregnancy involved the bun in the oven doing all sorts of cartwheels in the womb and keeping her up, or making her pee on a constant basis - now it was the sleepless nights due to the never ending task of diaper changes and feedings. Then work during the day, but the sorceress figured it was just best to keep busy. Might as well forget that sleep was a luxury so she wouldn’t whine about missing it too much. “But it doesn’t have to be here, this place is a pigsty anyway. We can drive out somewhere isolated. The fresh air might wake you up?”
There was a craving to cut loose, expel that magical built up that needed a habitual unleashing - she preferred an open area that went on for miles. Less things to break and replace. “I’ll even toss in a trip to a drive-thru on the way back. Maybe for some icecream?”
Why would people have kids if it meant giving stuff up like sleep again? Ed didn’t get it, but then again his own family life had been a mess, so he wasn’t anxious to even think about kids any time soon. Plus, sixteen and all. It wasn’t a thought he wanted to think about. “Jeeze, everyone I know is a zombie.” He made a face, between Lina and Neal it seemed like it anyway. The two people he was closest to. He hadn’t been to Neal’s as much as he had been to Lina’s. Even at Lina’s he still had yet to hold her spawn on his own, he was afraid of breaking kids. He broke doorknobs on a regular basis. Gentle wasn’t his strong suit.
“Even when I win?” Ever confident. That was how Ed got out of many scrapes. He’d never lost his confidence even if the odds were against him.
“It’s called adulthood,” was Lina’s counter to his zombie comment - it was mostly true anyway. Long gone were the days of excess drinking and doobie smoking, sleeping all day and causing mayhem throughout the night. Now it was filled with mostly a routine, which had its ups and downs. It brought stability but boy, did she miss the spontaneity. “Enjoy these years while they last, punk, but you’ll get ice cream even if I make you eat the dirt beforehand. Don’t start screaming child abuse on me, alright?”
Her hand went to playfully ruffle that hair of his. “Now come on, up and at it! I’ve had maybe four hours of solid sleep this past week - you have no excuse in my book. You can look at all the new pictures and videos I took of Amelia while we’re on the way, sound good?”
Because everyone needed to see the cute blob of flesh she pushed out of her twat. Look, she birthed a human, she was going to show off the fruit of her literal labor whenever.
Ed made a face and tried to hit that hand away as he always did. “Oi oi.” Her and Neal with the hair rufflings. He looked over at her crossly for a moment as he straightened out the mess of hair she created. He had an image to maintain you know. “Yay?” his was awfully close to sounding like he was walking alongside with Maes Hughes all the sudden. “Jeeze, everyone’s got a spawn.” He motioned for her to lead the way and followed not too far behind. “Whatever you got I can handle. I’m not that fragile.” He smirked, it even appeared that he had toned out a bit over summer in spite of his ‘summer of ultimate lazy’.
“You can try old lady, you can try.” He teased with a shit eating grin as he gave her a shove at her comment about eating dirt. “But I think it’s you that had better be hungry for dirt cakes.”
Har, har. Lina returned that shove - because, you know, what was that alchemical law? Equivalent exchange? “See, there you go, acting your age. All obnoxious and pretentious,” she snorted, adjusting the strap of her bag over her shoulder, and leading him out into the open. Her car was nearby, and it had an empty baby carseat with other random paraphernalia on the floor of the car. Try caring for a baby neatly.
Doors unlocked, she swung the bag into the backseat and slid in. The driver’s seat was, of course, already adjusted to her height - high as can be and close to the steering wheel was possible. “By the way, is your Halloween booked yet? Pete and I are getting hitched, you should come.”
“Damn me, I know I know. I’m terrible.” He mused as he climbed out and didn’t bother taking anything with him. Ed was just that cocky, he didn’t need shit all to win aside from his own two hands. At least so he thought.
“Eh, just my birthday but I doubt we’re doing much. Halloween wedding eh, scary.” He remarked, giving her a shit eating grin in return. Ed was likely to always downplay his birthday, last year he’d nearly forgotten if not for Al. When they were kids birthdays weren’t really a thing, he wasn’t accustomed to them. The first one he’d had was with his aunt and Neal and such.
Fudge. His birthday was in October, wasn’t it? Lina’s nose scrunched. “Still means you’ll get a kickass gift, and cake. It’s costume optional, the wedding - outdoors, food trucks.” It’d be a fairly casual event, but she still had plans to still make it feel like a wedding - she was working on centerpieces with Romany and Luna. Plus, chair ribbons, and favors. “I’d want you there, of course. I’m sure Zee’s going to bring Raven. Or you can bring her as a plus one?”
Don’t think she forgot about that thing the two of them had. Not a chance. But as the conversation went on, the car sped towards a remote location - civilization disappeared behind them, and ahead of them were more winding roads and the view of nature.
Gods, she really needed to start creating her own arena of mayhem - a place where things were meant to be broken.
Ed waved a dismissive hand at the idea that anyone needed to go out of their way for him Honestly he didn’t even mean to say anything. Lips curved into a smirk. “You had me at food trucks.” He reassured her teasingly. For someone born in October he really didn’t get into the spirit of Halloween that much. “Isn’t that my job to bring Raven to these things?” He asked with an awkward shrug, he really didn’t know how this girlfriend thing was supposed to work beyond asking her to be his. He’d kissed her a grand total of maybe once since then, neither of them were good at the title and traditions thing it seemed..
Ed looked around at this empty space and made a face. “Oi, maybe I should have brought a bag of tricks.” There wasn’t much there for him to be creative with as far as ass kicking went. There were some boulders, he could work with those in a pinch, but beyond that for attack purposes who the hell knew. “You ready or what? Jeeze you got slow in all your domestication.” He taunted, obviously trying to rile her up and make things a little more interesting.. Ed tended to think quicker when the odds were stacked against him.
It didn’t have the stretch of land Death Valley had by any means - but it also wasn’t in the middle of a fucking desert at the ass end of summer, and there wasn’t any buildings in close proximity or any innocent civilians that’d get in the crossfire. Lina was contemplating some kind of training ground, where things were meant to be broken - targets and obstacles to test the range and effects of certain spells - but at the moment it was jotted down on her lengthy ‘to do’ list.
Lina tightened her ponytail once they stepped out of the car and surveyed the space around them. It was as if their brain waves were on the same frequency; she contemplated on adding some things to work with, and after some incoherent mutterings, her fingers passed through the air. Her palm faced down towards the earth and beneath them trembled parts of the ground as dirt and stone rose, piling up together and melting into one another to take a smooth but bulky humanoid form.
“Vu Vraimer,” she finished and right there was a very tall stone golem. It was faceless, and subject to the commands of the caster. “I can shift the ground and make things uneven if we want a more difficult area to work with, but I figured we can use this fella here for our purposes.”
It was a more harmless thing to summon. If by herself, she would summon a couple lesser demons and shadow beasts as practice (those spells had been recently perfected and up for more experimentation), but those had the potential of running wild if she wasn’t careful. Best not to put him in that situation just in case.
Ed watched the golem rise and let out a low whistle. “Flashy, but I got some tricks too.” He grinned as he looked over it’s construction, it was made up of various elements all of which he could list in his head. Rocks weren’t just rock you see, they were iron, Oxygen, silicon, and Aluminum. There were so many things he could think of, but first make this a little more challenging. His hands clapped together and pressed down into the dirt as he knelt. A bit of wind picked up and cut through the air as Earth was a bit of a fighty element. You didn’t just shift one you shifted many, and shift the wrong one and things got tricky.
Much of the ground they stood on fell away, save for two platforms, one big enough for him and the other big enough for Lina and her rock monster. There were a few random raised pillars of dirt to jump on but they were far between. He’d done this without even breaking a sweat this time, clearly he’d been practicing at least a little though he tried to blow it off as nothing. “Lets rock and roll. See what I did there?” He gave her a shit eating grin as one more flash of blue light caused a pillar to grow vertically from behind him directly and rapidly at Lina’s rock monster aiming to knock it off it’s platform.
Sniff. Lina was so, so proud of her milk-hating shorty - he’d come far from when they put their brains together to form a more humane Philosopher’s Stone for a certain crazy’s containment. “Your alchemy’s going along so well, and so much better than your puns.” Yes, she did see what you did there, Ed, way to be a total nerd. His manipulation of the ground made a challenging ‘arena’ of sorts; it’d keep them alert and on their toes.
It was good to stretch those muscles though - all in the physical, magical, and alchemical sense. That was going to be one damn good well-earned post-drive thru noms.