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"Shit—!"
The exclamation startled Achilles out of his stupor, head swiveling towards where Greed was currently setting up the tents.
Ed had gone with Darius and Henkel, the three working together to either hunt down something more substantial than rabbits or find a town. They were… in the middle of nowhere, so Achilles doubted they'd find the latter, but Darius and Henkel loved to go on about their animal instincts. Who knows, maybe they had found something after all.
That left him and Greed to set things up at camp, and Achilles was currently working away at setting up a campfire. Ed would have just transmuted a divot and thrown the firewood in, but Achilles liked the careful minutia of collecting stones and wood, orgaizing them, and ensuring things were some level of orderly. He did still add a divot with alchemy, but it was, admittedly, the least interesting part of the whole process.
Greed's exclamation from where he'd been working had Achilles whirling towards him, setting the wood he'd collected down with haste. "What's wrong?" he asked as he jogged over.
"It's nothing, just this fucking—! How the hell does the kid manage this shit?" Greed growled, his back to Achilles as he struggled with the poles and canvas. Achilles blinked. It hadn't occurred to him before that Greed wouldn't know how to do any of this, but… he supposed he didn't have a lot of previous experience to work off of when it came to camping.
"You have it off-balance," he pointed out, gesturing at the way Greed had propped the pole up. "And — did you get the corners already?"
"The hell're you talking about?" Greed grumbled. Achilles moved over to the opposite side of the tent. Greed must have been struggling with it the entire time he'd been off looking at sticks and rocks. He felt slightly bad that he'd gotten assigned the task that he found most calming compared to setting up tents, so it was only fair he helped where he could.
Achilles took the pole at the opposite side of the tent, considering where Greed was struggling.
"Set up the poles first," Achilles said, tugging slightly at the cover for the tent. "It's easier to pitch a tent if you have the poles in place. I don't think we have stakes, so we just have to hope it doesn't get too windy…"
"Well if you're such a genius at pitching a tent, why don't I leave you to do camp setup? How kind of you to offer," Greed said cheerfully, popping up opposite of Achilles and walking off. Achilles stared after him. He wasn't exactly surprised at the turn out, but it was still… a little frustrating.
"You could at least hold a pole in place to help," he sighed, but continued working on the tent anyway. He was going to let himself get lost in the minutia of the task, but he watched as Greed took a single leap into the air and the light of transmutation as Greed's ultimate shield turned to claws, hauling himself onto a branch and laying out leisurely. Achilles stared a moment longer before returning to the tent. These still had to get pitched, even as his curiosity was piqued.
He'd heard Ed's explanation of Greed's shield when he went after the brothers on Izumi's orders, but seeing it again had rekindled his curiosity. He knew that Greed's shield was carbon, reorganizing the makeup in order to become more solid. Others would say it was like metal, but he couldn't help but wonder if Greed's shield was more like a diamond compound — using the cubic system to make itself harder.
"No, that would only explain a lack of scratching, that'd mean it's still rather brittle…" Achilles muttered to himself as he worked. "Maybe lonsdaleite? But then it'd still be somewhat transluscent, and the shield looks more like graphite than diamond…"
"What the hell are you muttering about down there?" Greed grumbled. Achilles looked up to find a single red eye peeking down at him. "For someone who's usually quiet, you're pretty noisy right now."
"Sorry. Didn't mean to interrupt you napping." Achilles shifted a little, feeling his face heat up. He hadn't realized he was thinking out loud.
"Doesn't answer my question, Golden boy," Greed huffed back, brow quirking at him. "Heard you say something about my shield. Lookin' for weaknesses already?"
Greed grinned, but the question only inspired Achilles to explain himself to avoid being misunderstood.
"No, actually — I'm trying to figure out what the carbon structure your shield takes is most similar to." Achilles finished pitching the tent, moving on to the second one, glad to have something to do with his hands while he explained. "It isn't really diamond-like, since diamonds have high hardness, but they're still surprisingly brittle. It's not like graphite — that's what's in pencils, and I don't think that kind of fragility would work for any kind of shield. I'm currently wondering if it's maybe something like lonsdaleite?"
Greed stared at him. Achilles was too caught up in his mental hypothesizing to really care, brows knit together. "Is it even crystallization, though? It's almost like high-carbon steel, but the carbon percentage in those is closer to 1%… no, it has to be crystallization, that doesn't make sense."
"You've lost me, Golden boy."
Achilles looked up as he finished the second tent, Greed's face twisted with his brows knit together and looking down at him with both eyes now, propped up on his forearms on the branch. Achilles rubbed the back of his neck as he moved on, tugging slightly at the hairs at his neckline.
"Sorry — I just really enjoy crystallization and gemstones," he explained, continuing his task. "Your shield is an interesting puzzle. I understand it's carbon-based, so I could deactivate it reasonably, but the active setup of those atoms is uncertain to me." He gasped, then, looking up at Greed again. "Maybe you can change the organization if you tried hard enough, too — but that still means understanding what your shield is…"
Achilles's brows knit together as his gaze returned to the tent he was working to pitch, considering his options. Was Greed even able to reorganize the carbon himself, or was it just instinct? It didn't sound like he knew what his shield was made of either, and it wasn't like he was capable of alchemy, either due to being a homunculus or simply because he'd never learned how. Achilles's mouth quirked to the side as he finished the third tent.
The soft thump of Greed's feet hitting the ground closeby had his gaze turning up to him, watching the other boy grab the pole opposite to Achilles as he began to pitch that side. "So what you're saying is I might be able to make my shield stronger?" he asked, brow raised in Achilles's direction.
"It's mostly a hypothesis," Achilles answered, working at the canvas in order to position it correctly over the poles. "I don't know if you can cognisantly reorganize the structure of atoms on your body when you make your shield, and there's a real possibility that it could render you incapable of movement even if it does work — but it's possible."
Greed was silent for a long moment, the pair completing the tent without much fanfare. As Achilles stood up to go back to the fire pit, Greed stopped him with a hand on his shoulder, shoving him slightly so he could look Achilles in the face. Achilles blinked, finding Greed with a wide grin.
"Show me."
"Where the hell is our firepit?"
Ed's voice grabbed both Achilles's and Greed's attentions. Greed's brows were furrowed in irritation, his mouth downturned in clear dissatisfaction. Achilles, meanwhile, looked startled at Ed's approach, his brows nearly reaching his hairline. Edward was about to go on a tangent when he realized what Achilles and Greed were sitting in front of.
Inbetween the pair, scribbled into the dirt was… a lot of chemistry. Achilles, he assumed, had drawn the structure of carbon and then had added the structure of multiple different possible forms of carbon crystallization nearby. The one for graphene was circled, and arrows pointed at the different possible atomic setups for things like graphite, diamond, lonsdaleite… It was an impressive show of alchemical understanding when it came to crystallization and the forms of it, but it didn't explain what the hell they were doing.
"Sorry, uh, Edward —" Achilles spoke up, standing from his place beside Greed. "I can set it up, I got sidetracked. I was thinking about Greed's shield, and, uh —"
"Save it, you don't have to explain yourself to me, sheesh. You don't have to treat me like I'm your CO." Ed rolled his eyes. Achilles was always so concerned about upsetting or disappointing people. He couldn't figure out what was such a big deal about it, but he hadn't bothered to ask because it didn't matter so far. "Just get it done. What's happening here, anyway?"
"Golden boy here thought I might be able to improve my ultimate shield," Greed answered, giving Ed a shark grin. "Figured if we could get my shield as strong as diamond, there's no chance of Wrath cutting through it so easily."
"I already said diamond is brittle, it's not the ideal setup of atoms to prevent penetration or injury!" Achilles called from where he had begun proper setup for the fire pit. From the way Greed rolled his eyes, Ed figured they'd talked about this at least twice before.
Ed crouched down, inspecting Achilles's scrawled notes. There was a lot of consideration here — the amount of carbon in the body, the way it might affect the bodily systems in place (and how Greed crossed those concerns out with a note of "doesn't matter" beside it. Yes it does), and different potential drawbacks of changing Greed's shield from graphene to different materials.
He'd known Achilles's alchemical proficiency was in crystal, but he hadn't realized just how in-depth Achilles's knowledge was. If he had this level of comprehension of crystalline structures, Ed couldn't help but wonder what was keeping him from just using metal instead of jade in his weapons more frequently.
"Well it's a cool idea, but I don't think it's gonna work," Edward said finally, pushing himself up to standing with his hands on his thighs, letting out a short grunt. "Your shield's never changed before. I don't figure you can start changing it now."
"Yeah, we're coming to that conclusion too." Achilles was organizing the stones on the ground into a careful circle, the firewood already placed. "Turns out, even with understanding of the atomic makeup of his shield, Greed can't really change it."
"I can focus it to different parts of my body, but nothing like getting it to do something like what you did to me," Greed grunted, arms crossed over his chest as he continued to consider the notes Achilles had taken. "Turns out, even though we're powered by a philosopher's stone, we can't do anything even close to alchemy."
It wasn't too surprising when Ed thought about it. Father had made the homunculi to be pawns, to do his bidding as he worked beneath Central. Having his pawns rival, or even be close to his power… that would inspire more rebellion. Keeping them in line was important. It just so happened Greed was particularly hard-headed.
"An interesting thought experiment, though!" Achilles said, his tone chipper even with the disappointment Greed showed. "It makes me wonder what the other homunculi's capabilities were, and if they focus on that utilization of matter the same way?"
"They don't," Ed and Greed said simultaneously. Edward swiftly took over the explanation, not trusting Greed to describe it properly. He was a smarmy bastard, he'd make things out to be either more or less impressive than they were.
"You've seen Envy's whole deal, they're a shapeshifter. They condense their body down tightly into a flesh suit and can take on the appearance of just about any living organism." Ed crossed his arms as he continued to think. "Gluttony's a failed portal, and Lust could extend her fingers and slash through just about anything."
"The ultimate stomach and the ultimate spear," Greed supplied, and Edward continued.
"Then there's Sloth, who's apparently ridiculously strong."
"The ultimate muscle," Greed added, and then smirked. "Or, if you want, the ultimate meathead. And then there's Wrath," Greed's voice went dark at the mention of Bradley, and Ed raised a brow at him. "His ultimate eye can see just about any weakness you've got, and he can exploit it."
Achilles snickered at something — probably one of the others in his head commenting on something, but Ed had no idea what. Then, he looked over at Greed and Ed, his eyes going between them. "Think he'd exploit emotional weakness?"
"Probably," Greed confirmed, and Ed crossed his arms.
"He has already. Remember how he used Winry as a bargaining chip?"
Achilles nodded, pulling his knees to his chest where he sat with one arm, looking down at the firepit he'd made. "He used Isaiah and Zelda as blackmail, too."
There was a length of silence. Then, "Hey, where's Henkel and Darius?"
Ed let out a deep sigh. "We found a town. They got on my ass for trying to go in, said they'd handle buying food and whatever. I'm so tired of this!"
Greed gave him a look. "I told you, you're gonna have to work in the shadows if you're working under me."
"Yeah, I was ready for the shadows, not the goddamn forest," Ed griped, settling down and laying out on his back. "How long until the goddamn Promised Day, anyway?"
"We've only been traveling for maybe a week, kid, give me a break." Greed rolled his eyes, and Edward almost gave in to the urge to punch him.
"Eight days, actually," Achilles ammended. There was the sound of transmutation, and Achilles held a piece of goldlike material in hand. Greed raised a brow at him, but Edward recognized the metal immediately.
"Why are you using pyrite when you could just get a regular flint and steel?"
"It's more fun this way," Achilles answered simply, as if that's what mattered here. Looking at the setup he'd made more carefully, Edward let out a deep sigh.
"And what's with the firepit being set up like that? Come on, we're supposed to be hiding out here! If we leave evidence like this, we'll be tracked down in no time." He stared Achilles down, and the other boy didn't look him in the eye — he never did — and instead looked down into the firewood as he struck the pyrite against another stone to make sparks.
"I'm going to dismantle it in the morning," Achilles responded, more quietly than Ed was expecting. He almost sounded defensive, which wasn't something Ed was used to. Achilles was usually quick to follow orders or just follow someone else's lead. The guy arguing in favor of doing something his own way was practically unheard of. "I just like to organize things like this. It's relaxing."
"Yeah, 'cause being on the run like this is supposed to be relaxing," Ed snarked, rolling his eyes. "Fine, as long as it's gone, I don't care."
"I wasn't asking for your approval," Achilles muttered, and Greed whistled.
"Woah, is that some heat coming from Golden boy for once? Color me impressed, kid! You've finally got him pissed off!" Greed's voice was really starting to grate on Ed's nerves, and he sat up straight, baring his teeth at him in irritation.
"Shut up! I'm not trying to piss anyone off!"
Greed let out a real laugh. "Leave it to you to fuck up and annoy the most lax guy in the room!"
This time, Ed didn't resist punching Greed. It was only by circumstance that it was with his left hand and not his right, even though Ed very much wanted to wipe that smirk off the other guy's face.
"I'm not annoyed," Achilles said as Greed struck back at Edward half-heartedly, but oh, like Ed was going to let that shit go. "I'm just tired of people saying my way is the wrong way, that's all."
Edward was grabbing Greed by the scruff of his shirt by now, Greed's ultimate shield pulled all the way up to his throat as he pushed against Ed's face with one hand, claws digging in, but not enough to break skin as they growled at each other. Achilles's words snapped him out of it, though, and Ed frowned.
"What are you talking about?"
"I mean, just —" Achilles sighed, setting down the pyrite as the fire took to the firewood. Clapping, Achilles created a jade poker from the ground behind him. "Everyone asks me why I do things certain ways. I can't count how many times I've been asked why I use jadeite and nephrite rather than metal. Why I focus on crystalline structures rather than really helping by extracting the metallic compounds from them, since that's "more useful"."
Edward watched as Achilles pulled the jade poker onto his lap, thumb running along the length of it somewhat. He'd mentally asked the same question once or twice, honestly. It was hard not to wonder when metal was such a useful resource, especially in alchemy; its melting point was over 1500 degrees celsius, it was resilient and tough, and it had all sorts of practical uses. Jade was good, but in a contest between it and metal, well. It'd be close, but Ed would rather bet on the metal than the jade.
Still, it did put how Achilles did things into perspective. He'd followed orders down to the letter during his time traveling with Ed and Al, so much so that he sometimes got on Mustang's nerves for not doing, well, more. Hell, Achilles's moral compass got on Ed's nerves more times than he could count, and they both refused to kill anyone! Somehow, Achilles managed to have an even more convoluted and specific moral code that left him refusing to fight unless he absolutely had to defend himself or his people.
It was, admittedly, pretty frustrating. Achilles never gave pushback when told to do something, but… yeah. He could see why Achilles would have been told to do things differently, or better, or more conveniently.
"Well why not do it the easier way?" Greed spoke up. Some time during Ed's pondering, he'd strode over to Achilles beside the campfire, brow raised at the other.
"Because I like doing it this way," Achilles answered softly. "Alchemy is an amazing science. You can do all sorts of things with it — you can bend the elements of the world to your will, reshape the very earth in your image. But…"
Achilles reached out, his hand going into the fire, and Edward felt a spike of panic. He was already taking long strides forward before he remembered that both of Achilles's hands were made of automail.
"…I like to look at how the world is already shaped, too." He looked up at the sky, the darkening horizon a watercolor portrait of pinks and blues and oranges, the first smatterings of stars beginning to glow against the darkest edges. "I learned a long time ago it doesn't shape itself around you. You have to be the one to carve out your place in it."
Edward watched Achilles's gaze lower back to the firepit, his fingers drifting over the rocks he'd organized around it, pressing maybe more harshly than necessary. "I don't want my place to only be defined by my alchemy."
Edward remembered how it felt when he couldn't do alchemy, back when he first met Father. It was terrifying, having that part of himself torn away against his will — how the world refused to shape itself to him for many long minutes, leaving him, Alphonse, and Achilles at a total disadvantage against the homunculi. He remembered running — and he remembered how Achilles had frozen.
At the time, he'd thought Achilles was just afraid. Ling had just been taken over by Greed, his alchemy was taken away, and he was stuck between listening to Edward — the person he'd been ordered to assist — and Father, the true leader of the country. It didn't help that King Bradley was a homunculus, too; he'd nearly buckled under his gaze as Ed tried to give up his state certification. He remembered Mustang's incredulous look when Achilles hadn't even spoken, simply nodding or shaking his head in response to the man.
Achilles had been rendered entirely helpless all over again, and Edward knew what that was like better than anyone.
"That's why you make those little figures, then?" Ed asked, and Achilles perked up. "I see you make the crystals, but you never shape them down to the figure with alchemy. You carve them yourself." Ed gave a small laugh. "I just thought your understanding of atomic structures was lacking. What an asshole thing to think, right?"
"Kind of, yeah," Achilles answered, and Ed sputtered.
"Wh — hey, you're not, you —"
Greed let out a loud cackle, and Edward shot him a glare, his face feeling warm as Greed grinned down at the two of them. "You're the one who asked, kid! Don't get mad at him for being honest, that's all he does."
"I know that!" Ed snapped back. "Don't make me punch you again!"
"Ooh, I'm so scared. The big, scary Fullmetal Alchemist is after me."
"Okay, now you're asking for it, you bastard!" Ed launched himself at Greed all over again, the guy sidestepping with another loud laugh.
"So much for peace and quiet," Henkel muttered as he stepped through the treeline, a bag slung under his arm, Darius trailing behind him.
"See, I told you they'd be fighting when we got back."
"Yeah, but at least the camp's set up." Henkel looked over the tents, and then his eyes caught on the fireplace, where Achilles was still sitting as he watched Ed and Greed squabble.
"Well done on the fireplace, kid," Henkel said as he walked over, taking a seat beside Achilles. Darius followed soon after, taking things from Henkel and piling their bags over by their tents.
"Yeah, way nicer than Fullmetal's," grunted Darius, and Ed whirled around on them, anger already seething.
"SHUT UP! You should be grateful I've kept us from getting caught all this time!" He yelled. "Someone will track us with this!"
"It's just a fire pit," Darius argued, glancing at Henkel. "If they could find us with just one, we'd be found by now."
"Yeah, and you've got alchemy anyway. You can just deconstruct it later, can't you?" Henkel asked.
"You know, they've got a point, kid. It's not gonna stick here forever, so what's with the rod up your ass?" Greed snickered as Ed threw another wild punch, leaning his head over to the right to avoid the strike.
"SHUT UP! It's the principle of the thing!"
"What, the principle that you can't relax for five seconds? Even Golden boy's chilled out more than you."
"No he hasn't!" Ed threw his hands in the air, unable to contain his irritation, his mouth going before he could think better of it. "You're just shit at reading how freaked the hell out he is!"
"Guys, I'm right here," Achilles said tiredly, running a hand over his face.
"Don't mind them, they're repressed," Henkel sighed.
"Yeah, that's teens for you," Darius agreed, nodding.
"My animal instincts tell me it's puberty," Henkel added.
Achilles's brows knit together. "I'm only a little older than them, guys. And I'm still a teenager."
"Yeah, but you're an adult. Those idiots aren't." Darius crossed his arms, and Ed found himself beginning to march over to kick the gorilla's ass. "Plus, you're more mature than those two combined."
"Shut the hell up, I'm plenty mature! You're just trying to piss me off on purpose!" Ed snarled, whapping Darius on the head with his metal arm — or, at least, he tried to. The strike was intercepted by an automail arm, and he found Achilles standing in his way.
"No, I think you're still pretty childish," Achilles responded, using his left arm to shove Ed away so he could reposition himself. Ed was too angry to predict the hip-check, and he went tumbling backwards with a surprised noise, finding himself on his ass. Staring, bewildered, up at Achilles, he tried to read the other's face as Achilles stared down at him. "Hitting someone for saying they don't like something is fairly childish behavior."
"Yikesss," Greed hissed behind him, only making Ed's irritation flare further. "How'd you manage to piss off Hades?"
"Who the fuck?" Ed looked back at Greed, and Achilles (Hades?) gave a sigh.
"What did you find to eat?"
As… Achades (Hadelles? Achdes? Chades? Chad) turned back to Henkel and Darius, Greed's footsteps got closer until he was crouching, leaning over Ed's supine form.
"You've just gotta let 'em call you a kid, they won't let up on it," Greed said, offering Ed a hand to get up. "They say that even though my previous incarnation was, what, over 200 years old?"
Ed glared at Greed for a long moment before he let out a sigh, taking Greed's hand and using it to get to his feet. "Yeah, but you're not that Greed, are you?"
"No, I guess not." Greed crossed his arms, brows furrowing in consideration. "Guess by their standards I'm only a few months old, but I've got the Prince's memories and some of my old memories up here, so that's gotta count for something."
"Counts for being still a kid, apparently," Ed grumbled, and Greed laughed.
"Yeah, apparently."