@arrowsbane well i guess we’re going to just have to keep being inspired by each other. i read her amazing post HERE, which was in turn inspired by my post HERE and you don’t need to read any of these to read this, but can i just say –
holy shit. havoc/ed. what a brilliant fucking paring that i’ve never even thought of before. holy shit, it’s perfect.
so – to set the scene. trans female ed. trans ed who performed human transmutation not to bring anyone back to life (both her parents are alive, but gone, trisha was not content to be left behind this go around) but instead to give her the body she always desired. and she succeeds. she and al are still trained by izumi curtis, and this gives ed her driving passion, her goal in life – to be a housewife.
so she and al go about her adventures, dragging winry along more often than not, but they stay away from central and they always come home. and ed’s about to turn twenty, and pinako is talking to her old friend ellie, and ellie is moaning about her unmarried grandson, her grandson who refuses to inherit the general store and won’t settle down and is off in the military, of all things. he’s a bright, handsome boy, elle says, he just has his head in the wrong place.
and pinako taps her pipe and goes – you know i’ve been raising three kids right, my granddaughter and my neighbor’s kids, a boy and a girl. and ellie is surprised, she thought both elric children were boys, but she dismisses the thought easily. she remembers ed as a tomboy, of course, and with that name who can blame her. but no one’s first thought is unprecendented human transmutation when presented with someone’s who’s a different gender than the one she remembers.
ellie is like oh, is winry looking to settle down? but pinako scoffs, says she’s a career gal through and through. but her other girl, eden – she has a wandering spirit, but she’s a good girl, a lovely country bred woman who’s looking to be a housewife (ellie’s idea of housewife and ed’s idea of a housewife vary wildly, but pinako’s not about to bring that up). so pinako sends a message to her children, and ellie sends one to her grandson: she’s sending a young woman to central from their hometown. she’s single, and looking to settle down, and the granddaughter of an old family friend.
so jean havoc gets this letter, completely and utterly horrified. the whole team makes fun of him. but grandmother eleanor rules the family with an iron fist, and havoc better come up with a damn good reason not to marry this girl. he’d not interested in a country mouse for a wife. before he can think of one, eden has already agreed and is on a train to central. she convinces al to stay behind, just for a couple of weeks, because she doesn’t want him scaring this jean havoc off.
ed is gorgeous, and a genius, and an absolute terror. she’s dated a lot of men, slept with just as many, and hasn’t found a single one worth her time. she doubts she’ll be interested in a boy from their little rural town, but pinako knows her and she trusts the old woman’s judgement. if she thinks jean havoc is someone who could make her happy, eden is more than willing to give it a shot.
so havoc has to leave early from work to meet his amost-maybe-fiance at the train. obviously, the team minus hawkeye follows him. they’re dying to know.
a country girl. they were expecting a country girl, someone wide eyed, unpolished, a little out of her depth. instead they get eden elric, a girl who’s been to cities and knows how to dress for it. they get eden elric, black boots and black leather pants and a black shirt with a dramatic red coat flaring out behind her. eden elric, golden eyes and golden hair and in the setting afternoon sun just golden. she smiles when she sees him and jean’s mouth goes dry and his heart goes zing! and havoc is going to send his grandmother some really nice flowers. “you must be jean,” she says, voice low and smoky, eyes crinkling at the corners. “you look like your father.”
“i, you,” he fumbles, holding out his hand to shake and stepping forward to take her bag at the same time. “hi.”
“hi,” she repeats, and he’s screwed, she’s already laughing at him and it hasn’t even been five minutes. “did you know you’re being followed?”
he sighs and doesn’t look behind him. “those would be my coworkers and my superior office.”
“delightful,” she says, dry and completely unimpressed, and she’s from resembool, his job and his rank is worse than useless with her, it’s a detriment. none of that crowd like the military. his mother hadn’t talked to him for over a year after he enlisted. “that won’t do. we’ll have to ditch them.”
“how?” he asks, and she grins, sharp. he takes her to his car and she shoves him in the passenger seat and climbs in the driving one, breaking about a thousand laws as she careens down crowded city streets. jean’s horrified for about thirty seconds, then he’s egging her on and cheering, directing her down roads whenever she hesitates and laughing the whole time.
they make it to where he was supposed to drop her off, beaming. “usually men throw up when they drive with me,” she says, beaming.
“nah, that wasn’t scary, it was fun,” he says, and he’s already kissed this relationship goodbye before it’s started. she’s beautiful and brave and exudes the same type of easy confidence the colonel does, and that’s not something he’ll ever be able to match. she’s no country mouse. she’s a supernova, and he’s stardust.
eden smiles at him, and says, “would you like to meet me for lunch, jean?”
havoc peers up at the building, and it’s central university. he wouldn’t have expected a country girl / wanna be housewife to be pursuing a degree, but clearly he should toss every preconceived notion he had about eden out the window, because none of them are going to be right.
“yes,” he says, because eden will make an effort with him for a while, he knows, since she’s here on the insistence of both their grandmothers. but she’ll grow tired of him eventually, like they all do, and jean intends to spend as much time with her as she can before that happens.
except it doesn’t happen. she’s kind and smart, so unbelievable smart, and dry and biting. she snores when she sleeps and get snappy when he interrupts her reading, refuses to drink milk and hates brushing her hair, so more often than not it’s up in a truly awful ponytail. he likes these things about her best, because her little imperfections, her temper and her skittering attention, the messy way she eats, all make her human. she’s flawed, and each new one havoc finds delights him, because the fact that she leaves crumbs on the counter brings her just a little closer to his level.
they keep going out. the brother shows up, and gives him one overly-firm handshake, then takes his lead from eden. she’s happy with him, so alphonse is happy with him, but he imagines the easy friendship he shares with the other man would disintegrate the second eden indicates she’s moved on from him. eden talks about her classes and the kids in them, which ones are good students and which ones aren’t, and havoc keeps meaning to ask what exactly she’s studying but it keeps slipping his mind. he listens to her talk about it for hours, but it’s all science mumbo jumbo and honestly goes in one ear and out the other. he just likes listening to her talk when she’s excited.
she follows him home about a month in, and the sex is so amazingly mind numbingly good it almost doesn’t seem real.
she comes to office one day to meet him for lunch, a first because she hates his office and his work and the impasse they’ve managed to maintain about his career is that they just don’t talk about it much. but she shows up, pretty pale pink dress and softly curled hair, looking close to the delicate country girl they all expected her to be. havoc is running late, and when he shows up it’s to eden sitting on hawkeye’s desk and laughing with the woman. it’s a terrifying experience. he didn’t know hawkeye could laugh.
but she’s around more after that, befriends hawkeye, and jean finds out that eden met catherine armstrong on campus and they’re fast friends, she spends a lot of time at the Armstrong mansion. and havoc is sure that’s it, that eden will meet strong, rich alex and their relationship will go out in flames. but it doesn’t happen, eden keeps asking to see him and he keeps saying yes.
it’s been almost a year when eleanor barks down the line, “are you going to marry this girl or not, jean?”
“i don’t know if that’s something she’s interested in,” he says, because he’s not the marrying sort, but for eden? he would be willing. he’d be a husband if it meant having eden as a wife.
his grandmother scoffs down the line, “she’s a smart girl, jean. if she’s still seeing you, she’s interested in it. she didn’t move to central to date you. the girl wants to be a housewife.”
and jean hems and haws, but the thing is he does love eden. and maybe, just maybe, eden loves him. so he goes to hawkeye for help, and she goes, “oh thank god, finally.” havoc is offended for all of two seconds before realizing that means eden’s been waiting for him to propose. yes.
he’s walking down the street with her after a movie, holding up his jacket over both of them as some sort of minimal protection from the rain. there’s a ring burning a hole in his pocket, but thanks to the torrential downpour this is not the romantic evening he intended. they see roy, and are confused for about to seconds until they see serial killer scar going to attack him. havoc yells at eden to run, and she does – right at the serial killer.
but then she does something he’s never seen her do, she claps her hand together and blue energy cracks in the air, and – she’s an alchemist?
he really should have had that conversation about what she’s studying at university.
she good, incredible good, and he knew she worked out, but he didn’t know she was combat trained. she launches a relentless alchemica/physical attack against scar that has him running away with his tail between his legs. ed’s helping roy up when jean runs up and grabs her by shoulders to shout, “you’re an alchemist!”
“what,” she blinks, “of course I am? i talk about it all the time! i know i teach the advanced theoretical alchemy seminar, but my knowledge isn’t theoretical. what kind of professor would i be if I didn’t’ test my own theories before teaching them?”
“teach,” he says faintly, “professor. right.” he’s such an idiot, eden isn’t attending central university, she’s teaching there.
she gives him an odd look, and okay, his girlfriend is way more awesome and too good for him than he previously thought, but that doesn’t change anything.
“will you marry me?” he asks. they’re sweat, rain, and blood soaked. roy has horrible gash on his side, and he thinks eden might have a broken arm. he had a speech planned, but he can’t remember it right now. “you do still want to be a housewife, right?” he knows better now, that eden will never be the traditional housewife. but he can give her a home and his name, and, oh god, kids, when she wants them. he’ll give her everything within his power to give her, if only she’ll take it.
“finally,” eden and roy say at the same time, and havoc doesn’t have the time to get flustered before she’s kissing him.
and they all lived happily ever after
