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The Elric brothers lose their mother young. They're left with their father, who ultimately signs over custody to Pinako Rockbell, the official automail outfitter for the newly-minted Jaeger program. They learn their maths and English in a military base, schooled with the other Jaeger Program children.
A Kaiju attack steals away the older brother's arm and leg when he's nine - mostly due to his insistence that he go back for his brother. The younger Elric emerges unharmed, but Edward loses an arm and a leg for his heroism. He is outfitted with automail eight months later by personal request. The superiors nearly deny the operation, but the head of enrollment takes one look at the boy and lets the request go through.
Both he and his Drift partner, Riza Hawkeye, refuse to comment on the order.
The subject is forgotten until the boy is accepted into the pilot program at the controversial age of seventeen.
His brother is accepted later, and the two test positive for drift compatibility. Officially, it still holds the title as the strongest compatibility on record. Their training begins, and the two are hailed as child prodigies.
They are sent out into the field for the first time at the tender ages of seventeen and eighteen, and public apprehension is swept away at their success.
They are given the Mark-3 100311, who they name the Fullmetal Sentinel. The Jaeger itself, designed with grey titanium and red accents, is the heaviest Jaeger in the bay. They pilot it through 25 Kaiju attacks within the first year, as the War Clock loses hours and the Jaeger program loses money.
They are the youngest members in Jaeger Program history, one of the four teams sent out during the Push, and the only people to have ever tangled with a Category Five. The elder, Edward Elric, age nineteen, is the only surviving human to have ever witnessed the Breach's other side, and the youngest receiver of the Badge of Honor.
.:.:.
Year 22
The Final Push.
.:.:.
Ed has few memories of his life before, but his mother's face is clear as glass.
Trisha Elric had green eyes. Ed wishes for green every time he looks in the mirror, just so he could have something that reminded him of her. He eventually stopped wishing. He's stuck with his father's eyes, his father's hair, his father's face. He accepts that.
But he's going to die tonight, and he wishes for green.
The softer lines of his brother's features are etched with a hard look of determination. For some reason, that doesn't sit well with him. Alphonse was always the kinder one; he shouldn't be wearing such a sharp expression. The lights of the Jaeger interior dim as the intercom blares out voices, and Alphonse moves to respond.
"Drift initiation starting in three."
The speaker button clicks back, and those three seconds are the longest of Ed's life.
The Drift snaps, viper-fast and just as painful, and he's nine. His mother is dead and his older brother is hard-faced at the funeral, and tears mark cold trails down his face. The memory flickers by and Ed lets it go. It's not his. He's eleven now and himself, and he watches his father's back as he walks away.
The scene changes again. The pain is agonizing, but the recovery is worse. Automail gleams in his frontal lobe, and in his head he reaches up to touch the docking port, expecting the pain but still not prepared for it. That memory is gone too, and it's replaced with their first time on the field, all water and exposed nerves. The Kaiju's teeth are huge, and Ed watches as the Jaeger -- he and Alphonse's Jaeger -- shoves its hand through the monster's neck, ripping out masses of dripping blue.
A recent memory of Winry comes next - she's crying across from him, hair spilling over her shoulders. This memory hurts -- he can't make this better, he never knows how to make it better -- and Ed's chest aches as he snaps back into the present.
"Strong as ever, Elrics." Olivier's voice is steely but proud, and Ed doesn't blink as he feels the Jaeger jostle.
The ride to the destination is short, but it's longer in the cockpit. Alphonse is nervous, he can feel it over the Drift and in the air, but neither of them speaks. There's no need for words in the Drift. The impact of landing sends needles into his feet, and he takes a deep breath as Olivier's voice comes over in swift English. "Category four, nickname: Amestrian."
The anticipation floods his lungs, mingled with the chemical smell of the cockpit, and the across tang of fear. It's always the same, a weight in the center of his chest. Shaking off the dread never got easier, but after their fifth deployment, it did become normal.
Winry's voice comes in over the intercom next, and Ed's head snaps up. "Stay alive, okay you two?"
He takes it to heart, pressing the intercom button as he breathes out the steadiest voice he can muster. "Yeah, we will."
Ling and Lan Fan's Jaeger is still as death in the water, and Ed spots them on the top of the huge machine, two pinpricks against a backdrop of black. The Kaiju lurking around them is slow to turn, and the Fullmetal Sentinel knocks it away as everything melts into blues, blacks, and adrenaline.
.:.:.
Alphonse's pod goes up with a hiss of the emergency deploy, and Ed's heart is tattooing beats against his ribcage. It's selfish in a backwards way, to act like his brother's life is more valuable than his, to martyr himself like this, but Ed doesn't think about that. Winry's voice is ringing in his ears as he scrambles for the mainframe's nuclear reactor chamber, yanking up the lid with shaking hands.
Stay alive.
He rigs the countdown to start, the bright, red numbers searing themselves into his memory, and he pushes himself to his feet.
Stay alive.
He's done; the Jaeger is set to explode and he's finished what needs to be done. All that's left is him.
Everything blurs, and suddenly he's nineteen and he's not ready to die yet.
:.:
He doesn't wake up until after he's been transported to the Shatterdome, and all of Alphonse's reassurances can't keep Winry from shoving away half the medical staff to get to him.
She doesn't cry until he wakes up, and he makes a weak grab for her white coat as the crowd buzzes around them.
Winry dips to lay her forehead against his, her German clumsy through her tears, the words are sweet in his mouth as he says them back.
Somewhere in the crowd, someone snaps a picture, and he reminds himself to wring their neck.
.:.:.
The picture is worth more trouble than it's worth.
As Ed is forced into a suit and tie for an interview on nighttime television, he already knows what questions are going to be asked, and what picture is going to be broadcasted on the air. Not the one of he and Alphonse in their gear, not the one of them fresh out of graduation and in front of their Jaeger, not even the one of them in the victory parade.
All of those are pushed aside for the now-viral photo of him and Winry, his hand clenched in her coat and his sweaty forehead pressed against hers.
The interviewer is a well-manicured woman in heels, and he blesses his growth spurt as he looks at her. The first few interviews he ever had were embarrassing, usually ending with him grinding his teeth at the "World's Shortest Hero" jokes. The live audience is frothing as he walks in and shakes the woman's hand, and the grilling begins the moment she clears her throat.
The first half of the show's questions are easy; the staples about the Drift, his Jaeger, his brother. Ed expects them and answers them easily; they're just rehearsal questions. The next few are about the Push, and Ed shifts uncomfortably as he answers them. The panic and desperation of the event still fresh in his head, and recalling it felt like pulling stitches.
When the first mention of Winry comes up, Ed sees a picture of her come up on the screen, her blonde hair done up in her usual ponytail and her wrench gleaming in the light of the fluorescents. It's an idle mention of his automail and the engineer who built it, and he waves the metal hand, displaying the stainless steel and wriggling his fingers for the audience at the woman's request.
"Amazing craftsmanship." The woman says with false amazement, and Ed sets his hand on his lap. "What were the metals she used?" She asks, making sure to keep Winry in the conversation, and Ed tips his head.
"It's all stainless steel and wires in there, but I don't really take it apart to look at the casings she uses for the nerves." It's meant in seriousness, but the woman laughs and Ed forces himself to crack a smile for the cameras.
She shifts and curls her lips into a red lipstick smile, and Ed knows what's coming before the picture changes. He doesn't have to look to know which one it is, and the audience quiets at the display of the image. "So, speaking of Miss Winry, how are things?"
"We're fine," Ed starts, and decides that the public won't take that as an answer. "She and Alphonse are my best friends."
The woman leans forward. "Then what's the story behind this photo? There certainly is a lot of emotion there."
Ed tenses up, the lights suddenly making him feel nauseous. "We were both pretty glad to be alive. She saw Al come up but not me, and then I wasn't waking up-" He pauses and shrugs, making sure to keep the nod of his shoulders nonchalant. "She was worried. We've known each other since we were kids."
"Ah, a childhood relationship." The woman is doing a good job of not looking disappointed by his answer, and the crowd's volume bubbles up with little shouts of "You were so close in the photo!" and "What were you saying to each other?"
The interviewer snatches up the second question, and picks right back up on the Winry topic. "That's a good question, what were you two saying?"
"It was in German." Ed blurts out. "We were just... saying how glad we were to see one another."
The live audience boos at that answer and the interviewer laughs genially. "Either way, we're out of time, but thank you so much for being here tonight." She stands to shake his hand, and Ed felt relief crash into his lungs the second he exits the set. He takes the gift basket from the producers on his way out, not stopping to talk to anyone.
He leaves it in the backseat for the chauffeur when he leaves, waving off the insistence that he take it. He hates The Nightly Truth and pears anyway.
Winry gives him a hug before bed, her face in his chest and her fingers clasped in his t-shirt. When she finally pulls away to go, she leaves his head cloudy with the smell of her vanilla shampoo.
.:.:.
The remaining Jaegers are taken apart that weekend, a team coming in from Hong Kong to scavenge the materials and machinery. Ed watches them for an hour from the viewing dock, his badge of honor beside him on the floor. Winry joins him later, her feet swinging off the viewing dock as she props her arms up on the lower railing. She offers to get him lunch, but he takes her hand instead, uninterested in anything else.
They sit for a long time, watching the disassembly with a strange sense of finality. After a while, she moves to embrace him, and Ed numbly folds her in his arms, fingers tangling in her hair. He doesn't feel the need to cry but it happens anyway, his head coming to rest on the curve of her shoulder as his breath hitches. She presses her lips to his temple and they sit, quietly, as Fullmetal Sentinel comes down around them.
.:.:.
When he lifts his head her shoulder, she pushes his bangs from his forehead to get a better look at his face.
"I love you." she says, and Ed closes his eyes, voice breathless and soft.
"I love you too."
She leans to kiss him, and there's nothing left to say.