Classes start up again on a Monday that leaves the world outside of Hogwarts covered in blankets of snow.
Inside the castle walls, all of the students excitedly report how they spent their holidays and groan about the workload they're anticipating for this half of the school year. Students in their fifth and sixth years stress about their upcoming O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s, but Fred and George are relatively unconcerned; Ed thinks they've got big things written in their futures regardless of their academic success, so he doesn't waste his time nagging telling them to study, since the twins are going well out of their way to avoid it.
Ed goes through his monotonous daily schedule, barely paying any attention to his own classes as he's already well-prepared for assignments and exams for the rest of the year.
McGonagall is still keeping a rightfully suspicious eye on him and low-key torturing him with his own sloppy handwriting during their Wednesday detentions, but the rest of the professors (aside from Snape who tries very hard to find fault with Ed's potions) hardly find issue with his work. (The Ravenclaws, even those not in his year, hate his guts and Ed absolutely lives to spite people – he thinks the Ravenclaws need to collectively pull the sticks out of their asses.)
Of course, Lupin still badgers him with questions on Friday's and is constantly done with Ed's shit (especially now that Ed no longer pretends to be what he clearly isn't), but that's no surprise. They only have a few detentions left, not that the werewolf has managed to wrestle any useful information from Ed, who turns his brain off for that one hour each Friday. His half-brained responses to Lupin's probing ("I'm Ed, I'm fifteen, and I never fucking learned how to read") should warrant further detentions, but Ed is of the opinion that the man is ready to be rid of him as soon as possible. It's reached the point where Lupin once spent half an hour with his forehead pressed to the chalkboard, taking deep breaths and mumbling to himself. Ed's not entirely sure, but he has a feeling most of what had been said were threats to his person.
Snape somehow manages to become more of a dick than usual, getting snappish over nothing and terrorizing students to the point that Neville almost cries one class and Ed is one ugly sneer away from alchemizing Snape's hair into a grease-fire (or at least, attempt to – he's 63% certain he can pull it off, but he's not Mustang, so there's an unavoidable margin of error).
And on top of all the trivial inconveniences of being a student, he still hasn't found Black, which is the real kicker. His thorough search of Hogsmeade during the holidays didn't yield any results and now he's back to constantly being watched by students and professors alike, so there's no easy way to slip out of the castle without notice and it's difficult to avoid attention on the weekends, when the majority of the student body also escapes the confines of the school.
He does ask the twins once more about the map, but they had given it to Harry shortly before the winter holidays, leaving Ed with no means of catching Black even if he does choose to attempt another break-in.
Where does that leave Ed?
Fucked, that's where.
Ed bemoans the lack of progress that's been made, never one to be sitting pretty. He hasn't really accomplished anything in his time here and he's starting to understand why Truth thought it'd take him years possibly to finish what they started.
Some things do change, and what a surprise it is.
Malfoy, while still unbearable and stuck-up in the way teenagers so often are, does start paying better attention during "the great oaf's class" and is successful in avoiding any future attempts on his life via enraged mythical beast. (Buckbeak lives happily and freely under Hagrid's care and Hagrid doesn't attempt another class with the hippogriff at all.) In fact, Malfoy is a bit strange once he returns from the holidays. His posse is still composed of horrible bullies who look ready to hex a person for "daring to breathe the same air", but Malfoy himself doesn't go out of his way to instigate fights or verbal assaults (towards Harry in particular). While he may sneer or scowl or grimace at the prospect of tolerating a non-Slytherin's presence, he holds his tongue far better than he ever had before. Maybe he's growing up. Or maybe he's afraid Ed will make good on his promise and punch him again. Or maybe, he's beginning to understand that just because his reputation suggests he's unbearable, doesn't mean he has to live up to it.
Blaise also starts spending more time by Malfoy's side once classes start up again. Not to say he hadn't been hanging around him before, but now, Blaise actually bothers to make conversation and pay attention to the other boy, which he hadn't really ever done before, had he?
That's what it seems like to Ed, who discreetly notices all the ways in which Malfoy and Blaise seem to be diverging from their original patterns of behavior. He's probably only so focused on it because Blaise has been spending more and more time seeking Ed out, talking to him like they haven't spent the majority of their acquaintance bitching at each other, and sometimes with an irritable and paranoid Malfoy in tow (only when there's no one else around to spot them).
The one thing Ed can say for certain is that Blaise is different now, like he'd suspected during that shared moment in the empty classroom over the holidays. There's less of a show of his "affections" in front of others and Ed gets the sense that for once, he is able to get an accurate picture of who Blaise really is. That bizarre Slytherin affectation fades away over time and although there are some things Ed can tell Blaise avoids talking about to preemptively end an argument, Ed mostly just gets the impression that Blaise is truly trying to befriend him for some reason or other.
In his effort to do that, Blaise starts to "intrude" on time Ed spends with other people, albeit briefly and awkwardly before fleeing with what dignity he has left.
It's not like Ed's friends don't know one another or get along. The twins regularly crash mealtimes at the Ravenclaw table and they're already well acquainted with Neville to begin with. On the other hand, Neville and Luna are in the process of getting to know each other better, which is catalyzed by the times when one of them is with Ed and then the other happens to find and join them. There's only been one or two instances where Ed's friends have come together as a group and nothing had been particularly out of the ordinary during those times, even if Ed remains the reason they had come together at all.
But when Ed is with any combination of his friends and Blaise happens upon them, the reactions have been mixed.
Fred and George don't like it at all and don't bother to hide their distaste.
Neville is uncomfortable around Blaise and they blatantly ignore one another and only address Ed, not out of rudeness, but for lack of things to say.
And Luna, being the best, as she usually is, does her best to accommodate Blaise, but often leaves him confused and mildly worried about her sanity, although he's smart enough to keep those thoughts to himself.
Ed doesn't even know where to begin, because Blaise and Malfoy (and the rest of the Slytherins) do suck at times, but everyone acts like being a Slytherin is the equivalent of being a Death Eater, when Ed knows for a fact that there are a few half-blood and Muggle-born students in said House – he's counted – and on top of that, there are plenty of Slytherins who don't go out of their way to snub people based on ancestry. And it's not like they get to pick what House they end up in to begin with: that dumb-fuck Hat chooses for them.
It's not like Ed doesn't understand where the reputation originates from. He's been studying Riddle's rise to power and ideology like he's been possessed and he knows more than enough to begrudge Riddle for his enduring negative impression. Granted, Ed doesn't like the majority of the Slytherins he's interacted with (it's that cursed Slytherin insincerity, he's sure of it), but he also knows that this is probably how they were raised and they don't know how to be any other way, because the students from the other Houses are only willing to see them as Dark wizards in the making. If no one is willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, Ed can understand why they'd turn to one another for support and ultimately end up fostering certain animosity within their insulated community.
There's a vicious cycle – and it always seems to come back to cycles and circles for Ed – of upbringing and exclusion that's been breeding resentment and hatred since Riddle first weaponized blood status.
And if Ed has been put here to deal with Riddle anyhow, he may as well get to work toppling his support system. What better way to ensure the demise of a murderous psychopath?
He already has a head start with Blaise and Malfoy, but it's about time he knocks some sense into the other students. The main problem is that the Slytherins have made themselves as unlikeable as their reputation implies, a self-fulfilling prophecy, making it near impossible for Ed to think of actually sound plans for creating a sense of unity across Houses.
Maybe that's asking too much.
A recognition that they are all products of their environments, then.
He'll have to start small, so naturally, he starts with Luna."What do you think of Blaise?" Ed asks her one morning. She's currently trying to decide on what type of marmalade she'd like on her toast.
"He's got a royal nose. Do you suppose he's descended from elven kings? I believe he could be, he has the right features for it."
Ed snorts at the image of Blaise with a crown – it suits him all too well. "I meant more like as a person, what do you think of him?"
"He's in spring," Luna replies knowingly, "and I find it wonderful."
In other words, she thinks he's changing too, Ed translates to himself. Luna continues on her original position that Blaise may or may not be of fae-blood and she frets as she tries to recount if she's ever explicitly introduced herself by name.
"They steal those, you know."
"What about Malfoy?"
She's not quite as fast to respond this time. "I think you'd find it difficult to sway him from the path he's been on his whole life. But if anyone were capable of such a task, it'd have to be you, Fullmetal."
The conversation stops at that point, because Ed opens his mouth to refute her claim and she presses a hand over his mouth and shakes her head.
"It's you or no one. I can just tell."
He doesn't argue with her about it.
* * * * *
Ed tries again with Neville, who is a little less sure of Blaise than Luna, but not willing to dismiss him outright.
"He's not out for blood the way some of them are," Neville explains when Ed broaches the subject with him, "but we don't exactly have much in common. And," he adds quietly, "I can't say I'm a fan of Malfoy or anyone who affiliates themselves with him."
"Do you think Malfoy might have had a chance to become less dickish if he'd ended up in another House?"
"The Malfoys have always been in –"
"I don't care about the Malfoy's, Neville. I'm talking about Malfoy." A pause. "Draco. Whatever. You know what I mean."
Neville thinks about it intensely, tries to work through the implications of Ed's hypothetical question. "You mean like if he had been sorted into, say, Gryffindor?"
"Yeah. Or Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw. Just somewhere else."
"I can't even imagine what he'd be like if he were in any other House."
They're both silent for a while before Ed decides to push forward.
"I can."
"What do you think then?"
Neville is watching him with a casual nonchalance that he wouldn't have been able to fake at the beginning of the year.
"I think he'd finally have a chance to learn what an actual asshole he is." Ed rubs his face tiredly. "Then maybe he'd eventually learn how to stop being one."
"You're thinking about all of them, aren't you." It's not a question, it's a testament to how well Neville understands the way Ed communicates.
"I am," Ed admits. "I'm… concerned."
"About the Slytherins?"
"Not exactly. More like, concerned for the future."
"Can you elaborate?"
Ed thinks about his objectives in this reality and his impartial perspective on inescapable bloodshed. Should there actually be a war, losing a fourth of the next generation of wizards to Riddle could prove disastrous.
"If he comes back," Ed says eventually, carefully choosing his words, "it's better if he has less resources to depend on."
(He momentarily feels as if he's said something that reveals more of him than he'd like.)
Neville doesn't bat an eye, but the trembling of his extremities gives him away. "I see," he says, a slight quaver in his voice.
They don't talk about it moving forward, but Ed can tell that Neville has committed what he said to memory.
* * * * *
Ed runs into the most resistance from the twins, but he can't say he isn't expecting it. Fred is outraged that Ed even questions whether Slytherins are evil or not, while George just looks disappointed that Ed wants to have a debate about it in the first place.
"They're, it's, and they're, I mean, you can't see…? So pretentious, and like, there's, I don't even, I can't, there's You-Know-Who!" Fred rants incoherently as Ed tries not to grimace.
"Most of their families have ties with You-Know-Who, Ed. They grow up believing certain things and they aren't ever going to change in that regard," George translates helpfully.
"But don't you ever think if you were raised to be a bigoted fucker, you'd like someone to tell you that you're an asshole?"
"Well, yeah, of course I would, but we're talking about Slytherins here!" Fred yells.
"And they're notoriously allergic to self-reflection," George says.
"It's not fucking helping that you're all acting like they've already handed their souls over to Ri-, 'You-Know-Who'," Ed retorts, barely correcting himself on the use of Riddle's given name. The bizarre taboo on the moniker "Voldemort" is something Ed normally wouldn't accommodate, but the name itself is so utterly tasteless that Ed only ever refers to the man as "Riddle" or as "You-Know-Who" to avoid strange questions.
Fred's eyes are huge and round. "Mate, their souls were given up the minute they were born into those families."
"Trust us on this, Ed. They know exactly what they're doing."
"They're supporters, not victims."
"And they believe it, you know."
"My point exactly – thank you, George – they buy into that blood supremacy stuff!"
"And they might not be saying it as explicitly right now, when there's a certain amount of political correctness related to the subject, but if the chance to segregate wizarding society were to make itself known, they'd take it without hesitating."
"The only reason they haven't been public about it now is that they don't have You-Know-Who here to pave the way!"Ed rubs his temples, feeling the beginnings of a migraine. "Are you telling me that you don't think there's any possible way to change their minds, no chance at redemption whatsoever, when they've constantly been treated as villains, even those who've never even met You-Know-Who and just happened to be born into those families or sorted into Slytherin? That they're definitely evil bastards even though they've never been told to shape the fuck up and be better or have any idea on how they can even start approaching that?"
The twins look properly chastised. Ed's not a sympathizer in any case, but he is more than willing to play devil's advocate if it will force people to see where the potential to fuck shit up is and fix it, fast.
"I am the literal poster child of fucking up and I've been fucking up my entire life, but I've been lucky enough to have people by my side who could keep me in check and tell me when I straight-up suck and when I need to do better."
George elbows Fred slightly and the two of them exchange glances. Ed never talks about his life outside of Hogwarts or anything that could faintly be considered personal.
"And I'm guessing you guys have had similar people in your lives to help shape you into the people you are now. But Blaise? Malfoy? The entirety of Slytherin? They're fucking ostracized by the rest of the school and most of them grew up with families who have those poisonous fucked-up ideals because they grew up in that same shitty situation and none of them ever learn or realize that maybe, just maybe, the things they were taught to be the truth aren't so true after all."
He glares at them.
"I'm not saying you need to go on a campaign to befriend every Slytherin out there and teach them right and wrong, in fact, plenty of them fucking suck regardless of their stance on blood, but I think you need to realize that it's not just them. From where I'm standing, as an outsider, a transfer I mean, I think there are plenty of kids from other Houses who suck just as much as the worst of the Slytherins, some of them even more than that. And I'm saying there's a chance that underneath all that stuck-up bullshit, you're going to find out one day that the Slytherins aren't strangers, they're people. Just. Like. You." He clenches a fist. "And you know what? It'll probably be one day too late."
Ed doesn't change any of their minds right away – he knows that's incredibly unlikely, just as it would be for Malfoy or Blaise to make a 180 in their beliefs and actions – but he did tell them what he thinks about Riddle and his followers and the Slytherins.
He likes his friends and has started to care for them deeply, but he thinks they have room to grow, too.
Hopefully, they'll come around soon.
* * * * *
He normally doesn't sleep well anyway, but Ed starts to have even more nightmares, accompanied by unbearable pain in his automail ports, which he suspects is a direct result of being idle in brain and body. The nightmares are the same: images of Amestris, of home, of Al, waking up to find Ed gone, contrary to Truth's promises. Or of Nina somehow knowing what Ed's doing and asking what is taking so long, crying, the sounds distorted when made with a dog's vocal chords.
It becomes bad enough that his friends begin picking up on it and commenting.
"You look like shit," Fred says to him, unhelpfully.
"Thanks," Ed answers, out of his mind.
"Something wrong?" George asks, shaking his head a little at Fred.
"Can't sleep."
"We already knew that," Fred says, again unhelpfully. George pinches him on the arm this time and Fred yelps.
"Any reason why?"
Ed snorts. There are so many reasons he's incapable of falling asleep and staying asleep, but none of them are reasons he can easily share with anyone. He probably wouldn't even say anything to Al, if he were here and had been the one to ask. Some things Ed has to bear alone.
"Nope," he lies, "absolutely no idea."
He continues this way for another four days before Professor Sprout pulls him aside after herbology. Neville shoots him a worried look before continuing to his next class.
"Professor?" He hasn't done anything wrong, he's sure of it. He tries really hard not to inconvenience nicer professors like Pomona Sprout, who has a friendly, warm energy that Ed thinks perfectly suits someone who likes plants and cares about them.
"Edward, how are you doing?"
"I'm fine, ma'am," he answers immediately, perfectly cordial.
She clucks her tongue sternly, looking very much like a concerned grandmother. "Quite frankly, my dear, you look terrible. I've had dying plants that looks healthier than you do at the moment!"
He rubs his eyes and blinks rapidly to soothe his dry eyes. "I'm just a bit tired, Professor. It's nothing to worry about."
"I'm your Head of House, I'm sure you already know, and it's my job to worry."
Sprout gives him a once-over and upon deciding the most reticent Hufflepuff she's ever had under her care will likely abhor discussing his current state of mind or whatever he's struggling with, she reaches out and holds one of his hands between both of hers.
Ed freezes, unsure of what is happening.
"Edward, I hope if you've been having a hard time lately, you'll find someone to talk to. You're, of course, always welcome to knock on my door, but anyone will do. It isn't good for one's health to bear the weight alone."
"Uh, I –"
"Just keep it in mind, alright, dear? You have friends here who care about you and professors who are here for the sole purpose of helping you. Hogwarts can be a home if you give it a chance." The last part is said while scanning his face for any reaction, but Ed doesn't know what to say or how to feel about that sentiment.
"I'm not sure I'm allowed a home here," he blurts out. He curses himself the instant he realizes what he's said aloud.
"Oh, Edward," Sprout says, not with pity, but with surprise, "everyone should have a home, whether that is a place or a person or a thing."
I do have a home, he wants to say. My home doesn't exist here.
"It's somewhere else," he says instead.
She smiles, warm like sunshine and baked bread. "Perhaps you're taking me too literally, dear. I am not saying you must relinquish your home to find one here. But I think you'll agree that you're preventing yourself from developing roots, because you're worried about what that means for what you call home right now."
Al, in his seven-foot-tall glory and echoing pre-pubescent voice. Winry with her handkerchief and heavy-handed smacks on the head with her favorite wrench. Granny and her horrible smoking habit and unsolicited but much needed wisdom.
"You can have more than one home, Edward."
Neville with his budding confidence and big grins and kind heart. Loony and her interesting perspective on life and her all-seeing eyes. George with his tendency to fret and at the same time, make sarcastic quips. Fred with his promise to cause chaos wherever he goes. Blaise and his attempts to change.
"But if you want to call this place yours, you'll need to be open to it." She squeezes his hand. "Do you think you might give Hogwarts a chance?"
"I'll try," he answers, head ducked, avoiding her gaze.Good boy," she says brightly, before letting him go.
He walks off in a daze, both from lack of sleep and with the out-of-the-blue perceptiveness with which Sprout had picked up on his troubles.
Because he has been worried about how involved he's become, when he'd originally promised himself to remain detached and objective for the sake of his assignment. But it's already been five months and he is not only not getting things done as quickly as he'd like, but also tackling larger sociocultural issues he hadn't intended to deal with.
And he has friends here.
Even more paralyzing is the innocent thought that he has a life here.
It had occurred to him randomly one day as he had made plans to catch up with Neville that he's integrating into a world he doesn't belong in. A world he's already sworn to give up from the moment he stepped into it.
It unsettles him.
If he starts to think of Hogwarts as home, what would Al think? What would the Rockbells? Or even Mustang and the rest of his unit?
He doesn't sleep that night, tossing and turning as he lies in bed.
* * * * *
His last detention with Lupin happens towards the end of January and neither party could be more excited to get rid of the other. Ed, in particular, is looking forward to the days where he can stop avoiding Lupin's attempts to trip him up into admitting anything about himself.
"Edward," Lupin says, exhausted. "It seems we've reached the end of our time together and you've managed to evade every single question I've asked you."
"Yeah," Ed answers, not listening.
The full moon is on Sunday, Ed thinks as he takes in Lupin's disheveled appearance. He'd reread many of the books and papers regarding lycanthropy after he'd realized that Lupin is a werewolf and he is pissed off by the stigma in wizarding society. Worse is the fact that Snape clearly knew about the entire situation, had to have known how students would react if they'd found out, and had meddled with Lupin's lessons hoping someone would recognize his condition.
Lupin is going through the motions half-heartedly, asking questions he already knows Ed isn't planning on answering at all.
"I understand you aren't fond of personal questions, but I mean no harm, Edward."
It slips out because Ed is short-tempered and is running on three hours of sleep over the last two days and he's been ruminating on Snape's off-putting behavior and the less-addressed prejudice-of-sorts against Slytherins he's now trying to fight against and the human potential to be better or worse with the right influences and how he's been here for months and nothing is getting done the way he'd normally be doing things because everything has to be subtle and that's entirely at odds with his personality and –
"Aren't you fucking tired of this bullshit?"
Lupin is taken aback. "I'm sorry?"
"Tired, aren't you tired of all of this bullshit."
"I'm afraid you'll have to explain a bit more than that, Edward."
"You've been hounding me since the first detention and I already told you then that I wasn't going to answer anything, but you wouldn't leave it alone."
"I wouldn't call it 'hounding' per se –"
"I'm not in league with Sirius Black, I'm not a fucking Death Eater, and I'm not here to mess with Harry Potter in any way, so you can stop bothering me with these thinly-veiled attempts to figure me out."
"What are –"
Ed doesn't want to deal with the one-sided interrogation any longer, so he deflects. "You should get some rest, sir, you have a long weekend ahead of you." He shifts back into his faked politeness and watches Lupin's pale countenance somehow turn whiter. It might have been an asshole way to say it, but Ed doesn't have it in him to care at the moment.
"How, I, I don't, I don't know what you mean," Lupin says unconvincingly. He struggles to disguise his surprise (and his panic).
"If you want my opinion, you should probably hex Snape whenever you get a chance. He's the one who assigned that particular topic in October and I think it's pretty clear what his intentions with that were."
They're both avoiding saying it aloud, but they both know what topic it is.
"You've known. Since October?" Lupins replies weakly.
"Well, yeah, since around then."
"Why haven't you said anything?" None of his students had acted any differently since the start of term, so Lupin is inclined to believe Ed hadn't mentioned this… little detail. Ed himself had never acted any different in that time either.
"It's not their business to know." Ed shrugs."I think you'll find most wizards would disagree."
"And I figured if anyone is as tired of wizards and their habit of sticking their noses where they don't belong and judging people for things outside of their control as I am, it'd be you."
"You speak as if you aren't one," the werewolf says softly. "A wizard."
"Different upbringing," Ed answers. It's technically not a lie. "Haven't had to deal with this as much prior to this whole Hogwarts adventure."
"Why are you telling me this now?"
"Like I said," Ed says, face obscured by his hair, "I'm fucking tired."
Lupin doesn't know what to say. Ed looks ready to pass out, now that he's had a chance to properly look at him.
"Are you alright?"
Ed laughs sharply. "The full moon is in two days and you're asking me if I'm alright?"
Lupin winces slightly.
"Someone has to," he says. "You look like death warmed over."
How accurate.
"I'm fine," Ed says instead. When Lupin levels a disbelieving look his way, he corrects himself. "I'll be fine."
"You're certain?"
"I am."
There's a tangible awkwardness, where Lupin hasn't ever had to deal with students finding about his lycanthropy and doesn't exactly know what to say or do, particularly with a student as strange and deviant as Ed.
"Alright then. I suppose we can end here."
Ed grabs his belongings and is quick to leave, but Lupin stops him just before he reaches the door.
"And Ed?"
"Yeah?"
Lupin looks directly into his eyes. "Thank you."
Ed assumes he's referring to his discretion on the whole werewolf ordeal. "It's not a problem." He leaves.
Once the door shuts, Lupin feels as if he breathes for the first time since Ed had revealed what he knew. He'd been afraid that this time would come, when his condition would be found out and he'd be forced to leave one of the best jobs he's had since finishing school. But he'd been stunned by the casual manner in which Ed talked about it and the knowing way he'd talked about wizards and their prejudices.
Ed had been wrong when he thought Lupin's motivations for thanking him involved his silence. He had thanked him not for his discretion, but for his distinct lack of fear or pity or hatred.
He thanked Ed for making him feel like a human and not a monster.
Lupin hadn't ever dreamed that this odd, foreign boy could prove to be radical and disruptive to the status quo in a positive way, but he thinks that given the right opportunity, Ed could truly become a force to be reckoned with.
* * * * *
Two weeks of insomnia and narrowly avoiding insulting and infuriating the people around him, Luna finally decides she's had enough and he needs to talk, whether he likes it or not.
"Fullmetal," she says, her voice grave and her eyes upset. "What's on your mind?"
He hadn't stopped having those same nightmares of his family and his friends claiming he'd abandoned them, which are only made worse by Sprout's well-intentioned but incredibly stress-inducing advice on homes and how they come to be.
"Nothing," he says defensively. It's almost rude, how blunt he's being, but it's been getting harder and harder for him to hold back, to play the part he knows he has to, and he's started to lash out thoughtlessly. It's like everything has been building and he's bursting at the seams.
He's unsure. He's worried. He's afraid.
"I'd prefer you didn't lie to me," Luna says.
"I'm just tired."
"Why? The Feinfeys get you?"
"No," Ed answers. "I don't think that's it."
She persists, despite his reluctance to discuss the matter. "You're distressed."
He refuses to confirm it.
"Am I allowed to know why?"
Fuck, she always knows.
He still doesn't say anything out loud.
"You know," she says softly, "my mother died when I was younger, a bit before I started Hogwarts."
"I didn't know," he says.
"She was an incredible witch. She quite liked experimenting with new spells and I'd seen her create a lot of unbelievable things in the time I had with her."
The only person who knows he's "orphaned" is Neville, but Ed doesn't put it past Luna to know that information in her unnaturally intuitive way.
"It's hard to lose people. It's even harder to lose people you love." She turns to face him. "Who did you lose?"
Coming from any other person, Ed would be offended at the frank question. Instead, he just says it plainly: "Everyone."
She's momentarily surprised by his answer, but then her face settles into understanding. "And it's bothering you that your life is continuing without them."
"Yeah," Ed says. "That's exactly the problem."
It's more complicated than that, he thinks, because my life is continuing with them for now, but I need to get back as soon as I can.
"When my mother died, everyone told me that grieving is a five step process that ends after acceptance. But even once you've accepted it, it's not like you can forget." She stares into space. "You never forget the people who make you feel like you're home."
Ed hasn't stopped thinking about Sprout's suggestion that he open up and give Hogwarts a chance. "Why does accepting it feel like I'm betraying them?"
Why does living a life while I'm stuck here anyway make me feel guilty?"We want the best for the people we love and care about. Living without them makes it feel like we are neglecting their memory or the space they occupied in our lives. But you know what? The people you love, love you back, and they know -" she turns to stare at him "- that you remember them. That you love them and that you care, even when they're not here. Especially you, being more stubborn than any other creature known to man."
She pats his arm. "Whenever you'd like to talk about it, I'll be there once you're ready."
Ed watches her walk away after providing him with the affirmation he needed to get over himself.
He did say Luna is the best: this just proves it.
* * * * *
Time passes and Ed hasn't made much progress on his main priorities, but he's no longer conflicted by the idea that he'll be in this reality for longer than he'd initially planned to be and that he isn't a horrible person for trying to make the best of an awful situation. He's accepted that he won't be seeing Al or anyone else any time soon, but as Luna had rightfully reminded him, he's never going to forget what he came here to do or forget the promises he's made to them first.
In regards to his current plans, he's at least managed to impress upon his more reluctant friends during this time that perhaps, a change in mindset is in order. Neville had been quite contemplative on the whole issue and Fred and George had been more serious about further discussions on the issue than they'd ever been about anything else.
Blaise is… trying. He slips up now and then and Malfoy is even worse, casually referring to people as "mudbloods" until Ed cheerfully explains why that pisses him off and what he's willing to do to help Malfoy remember to hold his tongue in the future. Malfoy starts to phase certain words out of his vocabulary directly after said conversation. (Everyone thinks Malfoy is a bit off recently, but they've never seen him around Ed as the Slytherin is still very careful about protecting his reputation.)
The bigger issue about this ongoing side project is that Ed isn't exactly one for socializing, and while it's great his friends have come around on some of the problematic things on "their" side of the current state of wizarding affairs, he knows it'll only really be affective if he's capable of manipulating the rest of Hogwarts creating widespread change. He's not sure how to go about doing that when he literally cannot tolerate the majority of students and their constant rumors and their penchant for fearmongering.
They still think he's some tattooed delinquent who'd been to Muggle jail or whatever else they've been saying about him these days.
He has too many irons in the fire. What started off as a somewhat sketchy deal to get rid of Riddle and recover three objects has deviated into pretending he's a student and untangling the complicated mess and history behind the fire Riddle is fueling and chasing after leads like Sirius Black who may or may not prove useful and thinking of ways to ensure no one has to die for everything to settle down. All of this he has to do behind the scenes, instead of crashing into it like the cannon ball he's earned a reputation for being.
He'd have never believed there'd come a day he misses being the Fullmetal Alchemist, but such is life.
And so it goes, until Ed catches Sirius Black in mid-February.
Or he thinks the dog is Sirius Black.
It might not be Sirius Black.
But it is a dog.
And it's a black dog, just like in his memory.
And it is the first dog he's come across since he started testing this theory out.
It's wet and miserable out when Ed makes his way to Hogsmeade, as he does every weekend he's allowed. No matter how awful the weather is, Ed can be found outside of the castle on both Saturday's and Sunday's, which he claims to his friends is a direct result of his lack of reading material and they accept as the truth, because they all know too well how insane Ed gets over research.
He's about an hour into searching when he stumbles across that ginger cat with a squashed face from before running an errand.
"Running an errand" because it has a carefully folded piece of parchment paper clasped in its mouth as it trots off, its every action brimming with almost human intention.
The sight of it is so bizarre and bemusing that Ed trails after it, the cat none the wiser about its new shadow, and the pair wanders deep into the surrounding forest before the cat ultimately stops, drops its prize, and lets out a horrific meow.
"What the fuck," Ed says under his breath as he watches the cat… waiting for something. For someone?
His patience and stealth are rewarded by the approach of a large, black dog.
In stark contrast to the healthy and clean appearance of its accomplice, the dog has ratty, matted fur and looks a touch too thin to really be intimidating, despite its size. The dog and the cat seem to have a silent, animal-only conversation, where the cat cocks its head to the side and taps the scrap of parchment, before wiping its face with its paw. The dog, in turn, ducks its head, as if to show gratitude, and picks up the offered gift between its teeth. The dog whines briefly and the cat blinks, once, twice, and then leaves with a disgruntled meow.
Well, it is a big black dog…
Ed can't say for certain if the dog shows any human intelligence the way McGonagall does when she's a cat – if anything, the cat seems to be the more intelligent of the pair – but he's desperate enough at this point to risk looking insane; the worst that could happen is that he'll embarrass himself in front of the dog.
There are many ways he can deal with the potential threat of an unregistered Animagus that is also an escaped convict, including turning him over to official authorities and waiting for confirmation that this dog is indeed Sirius Black. But there would certainly be paperwork and testimonies and other aspects of bureaucracy that will raise a lot of questions about Ed that he's never going to answer and that will also inevitably drag on as the authorities try to actually do something for once.
Ed's never been very patient.
He stuns the dog as it turns to makes its leave, parchment still firmly clenched between sharp teeth. It collapses instantly, and Ed is left standing in the middle of the forest with a stunned dog, possibly a murderous madman, and a piece of parchment that has a bunch of literal nonsense scrawled down. He pockets the list for later inspection and stares down at the unconscious animal at his feet.
There's only one place Ed can think of where he could hide a dog (person?) long-term.
He casts a Disillusionment charm on the unconscious animal and then levitates it, heading in the direction of the Shrieking Shack.
* * * * *
The Shrieking Shack is something of a Hogwarts (and Hogsmeade) ghost story, rumor being that it's one of the most haunted buildings in the country and that most of the villagers reported hearing the sound of screams at some point in the last twenty years.
(Ed is confident that he is scarier than any ghost, ghoul, or other imaginary creature lurking in the abandoned building.)
He enters the ramshackle building without any problem, setting the still unconscious dog down on the dusty wooden floorboards of what must have been a living room long ago.
Based on what Ed has seen of McGonagall's transmutations and on things Ed himself has read, it's possible that the dog, if it really is Sirius Black, has a wand on his human form and Ed doesn't want to know his chances against a wizard who likely won't fight fair. (He's confident he'll win, but the problem is he's absolutely positive he'll need alchemy to do so. What would the point of a trump card be if he were to reveal it so early on?)
"Incarcerous."The dog's limbs are tied together by thick coils of rope that fall from the tip of Ed's wand.
"Rennervate."
The dog blinks awake and growls when it lays eyes on Ed.
"Rise and shine, asshole," he says.
It barks.
"Right, forgot."
He twists his wand and prods the dog with the tip, none too gently. He murmurs the string of Latin intended to return Black to his human form – assuming, of course, this dog actually is Black.
The pitiful creature lying before him shakes, from its head to the tip of its tail; the dog convulses and its fur stands on end in waves as the dog bursts out of its own skin, as if it were too big for its own body.
Ed claps a hand over his mouth, the familiar taste of bile skirting the back of his throat as he watches the fur recede and turn into a mop of dirty curls on the head of a scrawny, grey-skinned man dressed in rags. The tail disappears and the paws elongate into bony fingers. The man's hands and feet are still bound tightly with rope, and now, his gaunt face turns to face Ed's.
As if the transformation weren't enough to send him over the edge, Sirius Black's hollow eyes look exactly like the ones on his mother's reanimated corpse.
Ed is down on all fours in an instant, retching on the dusty floorboards. The sound of Truth's non-existent laughter rings in his ears.
"Didn't think I smelled that bad," Black croaks.
Ed looks over at the escaped convict, who has pushed himself up into a sitting position, watching him with wary eyes.
"You definitely need a shower," Ed responds, wiping his mouth with the back of his glove and getting up. "But I'm guessing no one was willing to shelter a wanted man."
Black's right eye twitches. "And here I was hoping you were just some little kid getting off on torturing animals."
"Who's little?" Ed snarls, grasping the front of Black's rags, but stops himself from completely losing his temper.
Not the time, Fullmetal.
He keeps a firm grip on Black as he begins going through his pockets, looking for a wand.
"Hey," Black says hoarsely, struggling feebly against his restraints, "don't –"
"Shut up." Ed continues searching. "Where's your wand?"
"What wand?" Black laughs darkly. "Haven't had one in twelve years."
Ed isn't one to take a criminal at his word, but he also doesn't find anything on Black's person that can even remotely be considered a weapon. If anything, all Ed learns is how unhealthily thin the man really is. He lets go of his robes and Black slumps back against the wall.
"You're way too fucking young to be pulling shit like this," Black says.
"Shit like what?" Ed glares at him.
"Shit like tracking down a wanted criminal on your own, kid. A wanted murderer."
Ed forces himself to ignore the liberal use of the word "kid" and laughs, the sound bordering on cruel. (He wishes he didn't have it in him to be cold-blooded, but there are things he left behind in his childhood home to be burned to ashes for a reason.)
"You think I'm afraid?" Ed asks, twirling his own wand with deft fingers. Even without it, he is better prepared for a fight than Black seems to think him capable of.
"You should be afraid," Black corrects him. The haunted look returns to Black's face, made worse by the combination of deep bruises underneath his eyes and his prominent cheekbones. Ed is compelled to step back unsteadily. Not out of fear, never out of fear, but because he's familiar with the man's expression.
He used to see it quite often, after all.
Reflected back to him in the bathroom mirror of the Rockbell house, when he was eleven years old.
He steels himself, shaking the threat (or is it a warning?) from his thoughts as he approaches Black.
"I have questions," Ed says, showing all of his teeth as he crouches in front of the man, "and lucky for me, you have all the answers."
Black's eyes dart from Ed's face to his wand, which is pressed lightly against the man's jugular. "I don't have answers."
"No point in lying, Black. I know you're a Death Eater and I know you're looking for Potter."
The convict shudders, before writhing against the ropes wrapped tightly around him. "You don't fucking know anything," he snarls, the abrupt change in demeanor startling Ed, although he manages to hold his ground.
"What don't I know? You got Potter's parents murdered and now you're back to off him. Why else would you be breaking into schools –"
"You think I want to be breaking into Hogwarts and running from dementors just to get a god-damn glimpse of my godson!" Black roars this time, struggling furiously against his bonds. "You think I want to live letting the people I love think that I would ever fucking betray James and Lily?"
"Godson?" Ed repeats dumbly. The word echoes in his ears.
Black stills for a moment, as if it's only very suddenly occurred to him what he had said moments prior, breathing heavily against the strain of the ropes. He allows his head to drop when he's calmed down. "Godson," he confirms quietly.
Ed swallows thickly. This is not the picture that every other member of wizarding society had painted for him, this development was not mentioned at all.
"Okay, back the fuck up. What happened twelve years ago?"
At first, Black refuses to state his version of the truth to a complete stranger, especially such an odd teenager who somehow had known who he was in his Animagus form. But when Ed insists he might as well, otherwise Ed might just report him to the Ministry of Magic and let it slip that Black also happens to turn into a dog, the man reluctantly shares a story about four school friends that ends with betrayal, murder, and scapegoating, while Ed sits stone-faced, his back against the opposite wall.
When all's said and done, Black looks nostalgic and pained. They sit across from one another, both deep in thought.
Ed considers Black's motives and entertains the possibility that the man hadn't completely spun some yarn to fool Ed. There isn't any evidence Black can provide as proof of his story, unless he somehow manages to get in contact with the last living member of the four friends. Black hadn't mentioned any names or defining characteristics and Hogwarts didn't have any public records of past students.
Maybe a professor might know?
There are several professors who come to mind, who would have been old enough to remember when Black had been a student, but all of them are probably highly suspicious of Ed so it's unlikely they'll be willing to provide him with any answers. If he were to start asking questions about Black now, Ed can imagine he'd wind up in Dumbledore's office faster than Mustang can burn a man down to nothing.
There is one other professor who might be able to help Ed out.
Remus Lupin looks to be approximately the same age Sirius Black is currently, and according to books on wizarding education, there really aren't many choices for where a child could attend school. The majority of wizards in this country and the surrounding area attend Hogwarts, meaning it's likely Lupin and Black had been at school around the same time.
Ed scowls as he tries to think of the best way to confirm Black's story. "How can I verify what you're saying is true?"
The maybe-falsely-accused convict lets out a bark of laughter. "Kid, do you think it's that easy? I'd have given an arm and a leg years ago to tell people the truth and have them believe me."
Ed's metal limbs lock in place at the most unsettling combination of words he's had the displeasure of hearing; it startles a hiss of pain from him and he grabs his right shoulder, kneading the scarred skin around his port in an effort to self-soothe. It barely works; his arm joints loosen slightly, but remain rigid and uncomfortable against his actual flesh. Ed curses.
"You'd what?" His voice trembles and he swears again internally at how visibly affected he is.
"Give an arm and a leg," Black repeats, glancing at Ed curiously. "It's an expression. Means you want something badly."
Ed lets out a shaky breath. What kind of sick joke is this?
"...not your first language?"
"How can I possibly trust you?" Ed shuffles away his depressive thoughts for later when he's alone (and he's certain they'll make an appearance in his nightmares) and doesn't deign Black's prying question with a response. "You said even your remaining friend believes it's you who sold Potter's parents out to Riddle."
Black's eyebrow raises at the use of Voldemort's given name, but Ed is so absorbed with his own thoughts that he doesn't notice.
"I can prove that I wasn't responsible for the twelve deaths that niThat gets Ed's attention. "How?"
"All that was left of that rat bastard was a finger. A finger. And they thought it was enough proof that I was the one who murdered him and the other eleven who died," Black says. He laughs without restraint, but the sight of him, mouth open and curling at the corners is anything but happy. It's bleak. "But the real reason they didn't find the rest of him is that he's still alive and in hiding."
"How the fuck could he be in hiding without anyone finding out?"
Black's eyes glitter beneath the curtain of limp hair. "How the fuck did I escape and hide from the authorities without anyone finding out?"
There's only three seconds of confused silence before Ed realizes what Black is saying.
"He's an unregistered Animagus."
"You're quick, kid, I'll give you that much. Three guesses as to what animal," Black says, the most alive he's been their entire interaction.
"A rat," Ed says, the gears in his brain spinning so fast he can practically hear them.
Black smiles, his teeth bared in a wide grin that splits his face into a weird patchwork of emotions. Ed, in turn, rubs his left hand over his face and through his hair, the stress of the situation beginning to get to him.
"Were all four of you unregistered?"
"Not all of us," Black answers, almost absent-minded in the way he stares off into the distance. "But most of us."
"Where's the Rat Bastard now?"
Black blinks rapidly a few times as he pulls himself back into the conversation. "At Hogwarts," he says, "and once I find him, he's dead."
There's a finality in Black's voice that destroys any possibility of keeping him out of jail in the future.
"Shit. Fucking shit, why can't anything be easy?" Ed mutters.
He had caught Black in search of information on Riddle (and to teach him a lesson about trying to murder a child), but now he's pulled himself into a mess of personal vendettas and secret identities and Harry fucking Potter, which is the last thing he really needs when he's trying his best to lay low. (Although his notoriety at Hogwarts is anything but.)
And he still doesn't have the necessary information to go in search of Riddle's Horcruxes.
Ed returns his attention to Black when he feels the skin on the back of his neck prickle. The man is staring at him with an annoying intensity.
"What?" he snaps.
"I don't get it. I keep thinking about it and there's no way you could have known that the dog was me, unless…" Black trails off. His voice is subdued, sad even, as he continues. "Unless he told you."
He?
Ed resists his urge to strangle the man. "You're going to have to be a little less cryptic. Who's he?"
"R-, Moony." A pause. "Moony," Black says a second time, sure of himself. "The bloke who's still alive."
"Moony," Ed repeats, letting the stupid nickname roll off his tongue. A number of variables in his equations have been filled out with that revelation alone. "What the fuck."
"What?" Black is the one to snap this time.
"What. The. Absolute. Fuck."
"What!"
Ed points a finger at Black. "You must be Padfoot –"
"So he did tell you –"
"– and James Potter must be Prongs, because with the literal nicknames being used, I'm assuming the rat is Wormtail. Wait, what kind of animal was Potter then? More importantly, what kind of animal was Moony?"
Black slams the back of his head repeatedly against the wall. "I can't believe he fucking told everything to some random kid –"
"Moony didn't tell me shit. I don't even know who Moony is."
Black blinks languidly, the emptiness in his eyes filling with what any other person might call hope. "You don't? Then how do you know about the –"
"The Marauders Map," Ed cuts him off. "I've seen it."
"That's still around? Who has it?"
Ed might be willing to admit there is a pretty good chance Black is not the murderer and betrayer he's believed to be, but he'd be the dumbest soldier alive to name targets to a potentially crazed killer.
"They have it because they're always up to no good," he answers vaguely.
Black gives him a long-suffering look and Ed's reminded of Lupin for a moment. "Who's being cryptic now?"
"Hey, I can give them weird ass nicknames like you did to the people you talked about, but it's not really going to make a difference, is it?"
"Who even are you, kid?"
Ed is now staring at Black like he's an idiot, because he is an idiot. "You're asking that now?"
"In my defense, I didn't think I'd be telling my 'sob' story to a brat like you. So, I repeat. Who the fuck are you?"
Crossing his arms, Ed decides to go the "less is more" route. "No one you need to worry about."
"That's extremely worrying, you realize?"
"That's the idea."
Black collapses against the floor, limbs still tangled up in rope, and groans loudly.
* * * * *
Ed and Sirius, since he refused to be called Black and Ed refused to use what he considered a dumb nickname (like Padfoot), end up having to call a truce, because Ed isn't completely sold on Sirius' innocence and he needs more time to confirm his narrative and in the meantime, he can't leave Sirius "unleashed", so to say.
The man takes to calling Ed all variations of "kid" and "shorty" and other infuriating names poking fun of his stature in hopes he'll be able to annoy a name out of Ed. It almost works too, but Ed can almost hear Mustang's haughty voice making fun of him for giving up important information so easily and decides he'll keep his mouth shut even if he ends up killing Sirius for the incessant jabs.
The stilted but necessary conversation that follows the initial interrogation and misunderstanding is quite informative, albeit not about anything Ed had wanted to know about originally.
Talking to the troubled man about things other than his vendetta against the Rat Bastard, Ed can imagine what Sirius might have been like had he not been wrongly accused and incarcerated for such a long time. There's a sarcastic humor underneath all that hurt, as well as the hint of an ego worn down by years of imprisonment. In the right mood, Sirius has an almost manic energy and won't stop talking. (Ed suspects the non-stop chatter is a symptom of having been without human contact for too long.) He's a bit quicker to smile or let out a snort of unbidden laughter now than in their first few minutes of acquaintance, but beyond the short-lived bursts of happiness, Sirius is very clearly weighed down by a burden he'll never be able to set down or forget.
Ed gets the feeling that Sirius might be the only wizard he knows who can understand the special brand of agony that Ed has endured in his admittedly short lifetime.
Because one of the first things Sirius talks about when they reluctantly call the truce in the first place is Azkaban (what it was like there, how he survived, how he escaped – the dirty details essentially), mostly because Ed is curious and Sirius is willing.
"When it's dark, I think sometimes that I'm stuck there again, and I hear the screaming and the crying as if I'm still there and I feel that there's this tangible madness in the air."
Ed listens to Sirius' tormented words intently.
The man sucks in a deep breath. "I used to think it was probably the leftover happiness. Like a scar. I don't think that's how dementors work, but sometimes I imagined that when they were ripping the will to live out of other people, something gets left behind, something lingers in the air, like the stench of a body that's been dead too long." He closes his eyes. "That's what the madness was."
Inhale for four seconds. Exhale for eight.
"Is." He corrects himself. "It's still here."
Ed knows the feeling. Different from the darkness experienced in Azkaban, but a darkness all the same. Ed's madness thrives in the sound of cruel laughter that's never there and disembodied grins that are too big and too full of teeth. It haunts his nightmares in the form of chalk circles and black sludge with beady round eyes and limbs that aren't attached to a body the way they should be.
Ed's madness is being here at the threat to a little girl's life.
Sirius claims he got lucky being unregistered, because it meant he could find a certain degree of comfort as a dog, a luxury he absolutely wouldn't be afforded as a human.
"Dementors can't suck the happiness out of you when you're less than human," he says, his expression blank.
Wanting to distract Sirius from (rightfully) wallowing in the complicated layers of trauma built up over the last dozen years, Ed starts to ask questions about what his current plans are.
That's how Ed and Sirius devolve into squabbling like actual school children, both of them forgetting themselves in the heat of the moment.
It's strange to see the ways in which Sirius is immature and naïve, because his life had been put on pause when he was incarcerated at such a young age. Just like Ed's failed human transmutation forced him to grow up too fast in some regards and not enough in others, Ed notices the ways in which Sirius is simultaneously an adult and a child: he's wary and skeptical and careful, but in the same breath, will be irresponsible and foolish the way people in their early twenties learn to grow out of through "real world experiences". He's caught somewhere between child and adult, with his physical appearance belying his mental age.
Exactly like Ed.
(He's a kindred spirit, Luna would probably say.)
The bickering largely occurs because Ed is at a loss for how to convince the living, breathing human adult in front of him that the best course of action is to NOT continue breaking and entering until he finds the Rat Bastard and to NOT kill the Rat Bastard for framing him and betraying Lily and James Potter.
"That's the worst plan anyone on the face of this earth could have come up with. Have you ever heard of a thing called strategy?"
"Kid, I don't fucking need strategy! Lady Justice is on my side!"
"Lady Justice isn't going to save your hide when Dumbledore and every other fucking adult wizard at Hogwarts, with a wand, might I fucking add, find your dumb ass wandering around looking for the son of the man they think you got killed!"
"I won't need saving, my plan is flawless!"
"Correction, your plan is FLAWED and you're an idiotic bastard if you think I'm going to turn you loose to get yourself killed. Dementors, remember? They're everywhere and everyone is on edge, because you already tried this stupid shit and you were already seen, so literally everyone is on the lookout for you."
Silence.
"I still stand by it."
Muttering under his breath, Ed slaps a hand over his face and drags it down. "Fucking dumb bastard with his stupid flair for the dramatic."
"What did you just call me?!"
"I didn't say anything."
"You just said something in a different language!"
"Your plan fucking sucks!"
"It does not!"
"I can't even begin to explain how fucking idiotic you sound right now. How old are you? Five?"
Sirius splutters angrily. "You're one to fucking talk, shorty!"
"I'll fucking murder you, shut the fuck up! I AM NOT SHORT."
"Ha! You're shorter than any goblin I've ever –"
Sirius doesn't get to finish his sentence, because Ed knocks the man over with a well-placed boot on his face.