Chapter 25ish

Ed nearly inhales what appears to be a sticky brownish mess of some sort of goop, which he knows most back home would have thought, at first glance, as belonging buried in a hole somewhere rather than presented as a meal. He avoids Sakura's astonished gaze as he places the empty bowl aside, and sweeps another from her hands. He pours the contents of this dish into his mouth, nearly without taking a breath and startles when the door swings open.
A quick and dirty equation shines in his head, and he leans his back more solidly against the wall as he touches his fingers of his right to the fingers of his left about the round shape he clutches in his hands. The composition of the ground beneath him is easy enough to calculate, as are the bowls, and he shifts his weight slightly. Even as the bare metal of his left scrapes against the tile and echoes into the hall, he is ready. He feels the hum of the earth singing within his bones.
He swallows what he can, (what he can't he crams into his cheeks), and glares up past the plain white rim. For good measure, as he chews, he narrows his eyes. Towering above him, just past the door itself, is the woman called the Hokage. She smiles down, a false friendly toothy thing, just as his left cheek is freed of a mass of sticky stuff.
"Natto agrees with him, I see." She chuckles, and looks over the arrangement of bowls he has placed around him. He sees her intelligent brown eyes narrow and for a moment, he wonders if she recognizes the pattern of the defensive array they form.
"Yes, it was, uh, the only thing that didn't have chakra enhancers in it." Sakura says from the wall by the bed. The Hokage nods and gazes down at him once more, familiar face unreadable. The look on her face reminds him so of the sneak thief Clara. Brown orbs full of intelligence, tricks, mysteries, and broken promises, and more. His heart hammers in his chest now as it did then on that roof in Aquroya, and he nearly triggers his array. He tells himself it's not so that he may flee instead of facing the sheer embarrassment of his own hormones.
"Kakashi. Why is he on the floor?".
Ed swallows down the clumps stuffed into his right cheek as he lowers the empty bowl from his face.
"Ah…" Kakashi begins, his single visible eye blinking rapidly as if the man had awoken from a light doze. Ed suspects it's mostly an act. Mostly.
"My choice." Ed says, and carefully places the bowl in the center of his arrangement as he climbs to his feet. He levels his gaze at the Hokage, then glances over to Kakashi before he steps away from the door. His metal foot clinks on the tile as he turns, and he takes care to never face away from any of the nins in the room.
"And, uh.. did you examine.."
"That. Has yet to be accomplished." Kakashi says vaguely, and turns a page of his tiny book.
Ed folds his arms as his metal heel bangs noisily against a wall, and lowers his head to allow his bangs to curtain his eyes. He watches for a rolled parchment of any sort, and seeing none, settles his back against the surface behind him as he considers several equations flittering about his consciousness. He hears more sandal leather squeak and some weight shift some grit at the doorway, but his view of the bodies they belong to is blocked by the door.
The Hokage's gaze sweeps over him as a frown creases her faint brows.
"I see. Sakura, come with me please?"
He watches the door slowly close. The silence that follows fills the room. In time Kakashi clears his throat, and Ed turns his head just as the man makes a show of closing his little book.
"So. You really like natto I take it."
Ed snorts, and looks at the hinges of his false toes.
"No." Ed replies. "Is nasty. Better than no food. You?"
Ed looks to the door, then slides his eyes towards the silently watching, slouching man.
"Is…Question for question. Equal good, yes?"
"Excuse me?" Kakashi's single eye squints. Ed lets out a breath and turns away as he shrugs.
"Thought not."
"What are you..um. Would you explain what you mean?" Ed looks back.
"Equal good. No. Not right. Bad word. Equal… Equal.. trade! That it. Equal trade."
"Equal trade..?"
"Is of I am. I look and look, but books no word of it." Ed grumbles, and kicks out his metal toes at an imaginary rock. "You nin word simple. I no nin."
"I know that. Sakura filled me in." Kakashi says. "What.. what exactly are you then?" Ed narrows his eyes, and tilts his head.
"Answer question first.."
"Ah, equal trade is it?"
Ed nods a single slow nod.
"No, then. I have no particular fondness for natto."
"Ah." Ed grins. It is not quite his best and brightest fake one, but he thinks he manages nicely. "Alchemist." Ed says proudly in Amestrian, and adds in gibberish. "Think close word in you talk be "scientist", or "craftsman"."
"Craftsman, is it?" Kakashi says, "That reminds me."
Kakashi straightens and Ed's grin vanishes. He immediately ducks down, spreading his fingers just over his elbows, watching warily as the man slowly rises to his feet.
"Stay there." Ed growls out. Blue colored discharge flashes as the tiled floor warps up into a low wall between the bed and himself. The dishes he placed on the floor crash down on the lip of the thing, and he adjusts the equation to incorporate the trace amounts of iron and glass to form several wicked spikes pointed Kakashi's way.
"Hey ..easy." Kakashi says and lifts his hands to pat the air. He begins moving around the bed with the exaggerated care that one would use with a frightened wild animal. "I am here to examine those marks that are on you, and I can only do so up close."
"I fine. Just, stay there." Ed shifts the active equation further, allowing several stone hands to take shape from the walls. Kakashi stops, and fiddles a bit with his face mask as stone fingers form near his head. Ed grimaces as a particularly large and wildly snapping discharge launches into the air, forcing him to unfold his arms and place on hand on the wall behind him. The direct contact with the medium allows for him to smooth out the flow of energy, and he folds the unexpected excess back into the earth.
He sees Kakashi rubbing his chin, looking his way with two eyes now: one angry red iris nestles in a scarred socket; its partner, a more sedate deep brown.
"Let me ask you something Ed-kun."
"Not let you touch me." Ed says, and allows the active equation to shift stone fingers like they were living muscles.
"No I suppose not. But that wasn't my question. Could you tell me just how you did that?"
Ed narrows his eyes at the man.
The door bangs open, and Ed darts his gaze away. The fraction of a second it takes him to shift the equations he knows is far too long, and instead he whirls down and away to the safety of his low wall as much shouting fills the room. He's crawling at the far edge by the time he hears only Kakashi shouting for whoever it is to get the hell out.
He's behind the man, and very near the bed, when Kakashi begins looking over the wall and tentatively calling out his name. In that vantage point, he sees a pack of nins crowding the doorway, and ducks down before they look his way.
"Fuk." He whispers, and wracks his brain for options. At the moment, the only viable one is to create his own exit—preferrably through the nearest wall. He brings his palms closer together to do just that.
He hears a deep resonating sound just before a shadow drops over him, and has a heartbeat to look up before a white furry mass blocks out much of the world.
"Woof!"
oooo
When he arrives, the air is thick, yet nothing like what he knows killing intent is like. From long practice, he knows better than to let his eyes drift, so he keeps them locked on the agitated, pacing blond.
As he slumps his way forward, Shikamaru knows without looking who it is that is noisily chewing. He hears the dry crinkle of an ever-present potato chip bag and that is all he needs to locate the fellow sitting unseen, likely cross-legged on the tile floor around the corner. Automatically, Shika shuffles along with his hands deep in his pockets and, at a certain point, he turns and settles his back against the wall. A heartbeat later, he lets out a breath, and, like a deflating balloon, slides down to the floor as well. He lazily crosses his legs in a similar manner as he hunkers down beside his rather, uh, rather big boned, teammate and best friend, Choji.
Shika doesn't feel the weight of Choji's gaze, and his friend doesn't shift his massive form to acknowledge his presence. He doesn't have to. He knows Choji, and his friend would wisely choose not to shift his eyes his way in a delicate situation such as this. Instead, he would be observing the blond's behavior like a true nin.
He hears Choji swallow down his nervousness in the silence.
The pacing blond's name is Ino. She is, well, a woman, and women have ever been a great bother. In his experience, they are ever unpredictable-- volatile-- especially when someone they deeply care for is seriously hurt.
He knows she is a trained mednin, but she is far too personally involved with a particular patient. She would be highly likely to make many deadly medical mistakes due to her current emotional-- maelstrom. It was a highly logical, professional decision to remove her from this duty, and, considering the patient in question just happens to be Ino's father, Shika considers the policy a wise one.
He knows Ino would not agree at very high volumes, which would only serve to distract the other mednins.
He holds his silence as he watches the troublesome slim body pace the hall, carefully observing every twitch of muscle with trained ease. The tenseness of her shoulders alone tells him much of her current mood. Her high ponytail swishes with each harried turn, but, for now, she merely worries her lower lip with her teeth as her blue eyes constantly dart towards a certain closed doors nearby. There is no mystery why her face is twisted up with a noxious mixture of frustration and worry.
Those doors have sign above the jamb, announcing the room beyond as "Intensive Care". An eerie green blue glow flickers like candlelight through the tiny glass window nestled in the wood, and indicate that the mednins are currently treating the patient. As in the other times he has been in the hospital, he knows precious little.
Not wishing to agitate Ino any further with bothersome questions, he instead leans his head towards Choji, and whispers.
"Any news?"
Choji shakes his rotund head slightly, choosing to also honor the silence. Shikamaru frowns, and then quickly schools his face into a semblance of unreadable blankness as Ino turns his way. He isn't sure how successful he is, but as her eyes slide off him, he doesn't bother to wonder further. No, Instead, he narrows his eyes as blue colored lightening dances down the hall from beneath a particular door.
He flinches back as ominous rumble fills his ears, sounding quite thunderous, and takes in a startled breath as many sandaled feet pound the previously tranquil tiles about him. His brows nearly meet when in the sudden crowd of bodies, he feels a hand lifting up his biceps. He darts his eyes to the invasive grip as he rises to his feet .
A pair of jagged red fangs frames the savage smile that greets him, and it takes all of a second for him to recognize the nin that sports them: Kiba Inusuka.
"Come on lazy bones!" The wild haired nin growls, and tugs the band at his forehead down with his claw like fingernails. The joint army plate shines like a new thing, for it was just issued that morning. Shika hadn't bothered to put the drag of a thing on-- yet.
Shika stumbles and glances at a blur of white on four legs as Kiba's beastly partner, Akamaru, rushes by, nudging against his legs in his rush to get to the source of the disturbance. A heartbeat later, Kiba lunges gleefully after, nearly scrambling on all fours like a dog.
Shikamaru blinks dumbly at the nin's sheer eagerness. But then, he supposes, that's Kiba.
"What a drag." Shikamaru grumbles, and stumbles again as a meaty hand slaps heavily against his upper back. Choji graces him with a sidelong glance, then crumbles up his empty bag of chips.
"So. That's where...?"
"Yeah." Shika answers. "Looks like it."
Shika watches Choji turn away and lumber after the crowd. He hears a door bang open, and much shouting as he looks around. That's when he notices that his female teammate is no longer pacing.
Ino is just. Gone.
ooooo
Ed slaps his palms together an instant before he has them on the ground, where he quickly finds a sort of precarious balance to swing his false left leg at the huge white mass of fur. He misses, but the wild swing has the desired effect: the beast lunges away from the edge of the bed and ducks its head down to snap and snarl in his general direction. As Ed pushes off the ground and regains his feet, he reaches out at the metal frame of the bed. The discharge flashes as the quick and dirty equation takes effect-- reforming the rail into a stout staff. Ed tests its weight between both hands as he sees the beast watch him with wary brown eyes.
Ed hears voices around him: One or two seem to be "egging" in tone, but Ed isn't sure what exactly is said. Gibberish slips completely from his grasp, for at the moment, he has far more important things on his mind than understanding the stupid language.
The lumbering dog is huge, easily the size a.. a lion, and Ed swallows as he recognizes the familiar, but ultimately doomed beast somehow conjured up from the nightmare in his past. He feels his throat tighten, and barely whispers a weak, "Alexander..." as someone calls out, "Akamaru!"
When a view of Kakashi's back cuts the big dog out of the world, Ed knows he is staring. He also remembers to breathe. He hears the man's commanding tone, likely directed at the others crowded at the door, and takes the opportunity to shuffle his back against the wall.
He feels his arms tremble, and grips the staff tighter as a dark haired boy with a pair of red triangles painted on his cheeks leaps into view. He is thankful he doesn't recognize the face glaring his way, and as the boy snarls a choice phrase at Kakashi, darts his eyes to others. There is a sea of shining head plates, and many angry expressions directed his way.
One girl in particular extends her arms towards him, cupping and entwined her fingers together. Her long blond hair is tied up into a high pony tail, and her watery blue eyes regard him hatefully as tears trace tracks down her cheeks. He swallows his bile, finding her pose strange, but by long habit he braces himself. He knows in his heart he deserves whatever she plans to hit him with, for there is no doubt who she is.
He can never deny her a thing, especially since he is sure he caused her tears in the first place. The metal staff slips from his slack fingers, and he hears the metal ring when it strikes against the tile at his feet.
"Winry."

Sent via a stray supercharged nano particle of unobtainium....