Chapter Text
The heat of the midafternoon sun beat down on the backs of two traveling boys that were headed to the bustling Central City. The taller of the two kept pace with his shorter companion, his feet clunking loudly against the pavement because of the heavy armor he wore, keeping a hold of his older brother’s suitcase over his shoulder. The somewhat shorter male was groaning in frustration as he irritably scratched his golden locks with one hand as the other remained in his red coat.
“Ugh, I hate having no luck with the philosophers stone,” growled Edward as his shoulders slump. The fact that their last mission bore no fruit from their efforts to find the legendary rock did not help the eldest Elric brother’s mood nor his exhaustion from the annoying trip.
“Well, we did know this was gonna be a hard road, right brother?” Alphonse attempted to comfort his brother, gently patting Ed’s back in attempts to soothe him.
“Yeah, but it would be nice if our leads were true,” Ed complains loudly in annoyance, huffing heavily as they turn down an alley as a shortcut to the command center. The blonde male stepped around several boxes in the small space, not noticing a young woman curled up between a couple stacks.
The hiding figure thought she remained invisible to the wandering boys due to Ed’s lack of reaction, but to her dismay, Al was far more observant than Ed. The younger Elric boy stopped in his tracks and looked down at the huddled girl with curiosity and mild alarm.
The girl had her face hidden by the hood of her cloak, but the fabric of said cloak was in shambles and close to falling apart. Because of this, Alphonse got a decent look at her thin arm and legs that were within sight, her clothes filthy and torn in many places, looking like a raggedy dress mixed with a hospital gown. Internally frowning to himself, Al sets down Ed’s suitcase next to him and squats down in front of the girl.
“Hey, are you ok? Do you need help?” the young boy inquires worriedly. The girl jumps when he got a little close to him from kneeling down to her level, scooting further back into her hiding spot between the stack of boxes.
“Al? What’s wrong? Don’t tell me you found another cat........” Ed groans out in annoyance as he looks over his shoulder at his brother.
“Not quite a cat, brother. We might have another Ling situation,” Al says gently before looking back at the girl who seemed to be trying to melt into the boxes to hide away from him. “Hey, it’s ok. We won’t hurt you, no reason to be scared.”
“Another Ling situation?” Ed questions in confusion as he wanders over to Al’s side, looking down at the trembling girl. Frowning at the sight of her, Ed joins his brother in the low position on the ground and tries to get a better look at her. This seems to send the girl into a panic now that she doesn't have an easy way to escape and scrambles as far back from them both, trying to hide something under her cloak.
His face scrunching up at the odd movements and the sound of metal clinking, Ed carefully reaches out and moves the cloak back and notices an automail arm. The girl panics at how close Ed was and tries to pull away but the alchemist catches her automail arm gently in his hand.
“Hey, calm down. I just wanna take a look. I promise, I’m not gonna hurt you,” Ed reassures while he guides the arm out of hiding. Now that it wasn’t hidden under the cloak, Edward notices it was a very rough design, as if it were rushed and not given lots of care or thought on the user's needs. He notices that she attempted to hide the fact it was automail by clumsily wrapping it with bandages, but pieces of metal were shining through the cloth. Frowning at the condition of the automail, he glances up at her.
“Hey, do you have any family? Is there someone we can call to get you help?” Alphonse asked worriedly, trying to help ease her worries by showing as much kindness with his words and actions as he pulls out one of Ed’s spare jackets and offers it to her. The girl looks at the two worriedly, hesitant to say anything. After an internal debate in her mind, she allows her hood to fall off her head.
Both the boys were surprised to see she had long black hair that was tangled and matted to her head, grease and dirt mixed into her locks of hair. Her facial structure is very familiar to their eyes, but they can’t pin the similarities. And so were her eyes, they were a deep black, almost onyx like. For whatever reason, Ed grew slightly irritated with the familiar look she had but decides not to display his displeasure, because he can’t pin the source of the irritation. But it didn’t help his impatience when she decided not to answer their question directly.
“P-please, don’t. They’ll find me...............I’m here to find my brother and I can’t get caught,” the fearful girl whimpers out, starting to retract her hand away from Ed’s hold and trying to return to her small ball to become hidden again.
“What do you mean ‘they’ll find you’? Who will? Is someone after you?” Ed presses impatiently, keeping a firm hold on her arm as he drags her out of her hiding spot to keep her from retracting. This causes the girl to grow terrified and more insistent of getting free of his hold.
“Th-The people who took me.......” She explains in a frightened manner at Ed’s sudden insistence and the fact she was no longer hidden. She frantically tries to remove the grip Ed had on her arm to free herself.
“Please don’t panic. We just want to help you. Can you tell us your name? We can help you find your brother,” Alphonse quickly tries to reassure her, taking her hand that was trying to remove Ed’s into his own, rubbing soothing circles over it gently.
Before she even had a moment to consider his request, there were sudden sounds of feet racing towards the alley from the street and a gruff looking man in a suit seemed to appear at the end of the alley. He scans around the small space and spots the girl, looking relieved and slightly panicked as he looks over his shoulder. “She’s over here guys!!”
Ed glances over at the shouting man for a moment but then turns back to the girl as the look of sheer panic and dread washes over her features quickly, becoming more insistent on pulling away. Frowning slightly at the reaction, it doesn’t take Edward long to figure out the situation at all. With a heavy sigh, Ed finally releases her hand and stands.
“Alphonse, you know what to do..........” Ed says tiredly as he stands up, turning towards the men that began filling the alley way quickly.
“Right! Be careful brother,” Alphonse requests as he scoops the terrified girl in his arms while he wraps her in Ed’s jacket gently. The terrified female squeaks in surprise and whimpers in mild pain before quickly clinging to him while Al turns the way they came and immediately races away from Ed and the group of men.
“Wh-What’re you doing?!” the girl asks in surprise and shock, looking around her as Al ran a different route to get as far from the pursuers as possible.
“Taking you somewhere safe!” Al quickly explains as he navigates the maze of different alley ways and side streets, heading towards Central Command. As he ran, Alphonse glanced down at her periodically and noticed her wince and whimper as he moved, frowning more to himself as he came to the conclusion that she was in severe pain from wounds that weren’t open to be seen.
-----Back to Ed----
The eldest Elric brother stood in the path of the pursuers, noting that it was only four men in the group that was looking for the terrified girl. He hums in mild annoyance as he stretches his body and blocks their path.
“Out of the way, half pint! That girl is ours!!” the leader growls in annoyance, stepping quickly to chase after Al while he tries to shove his way past Ed. But the blonde male immediately snarls in irritation and catches the man’s arm before he could pull away.
“WHO ARE YOU CALLING A SMALL LITTLE MAGGOT YOU CAN’T SEE UNDER A MICROSCOPE!!??” Ed shrieks angrily before immediately throwing the man back towards his group. The men groan in pain from the strike and try to collect themselves but Ed had clapped his hands together and slapped the ground, making a hand form that sends the leader flying off to the far side of town.
The irritated boy then races towards the other three men and starts practicing his sparring techniques on them, working two of them over especially hard when they made similar comments about his height. Within minutes, all three of the remaining men were left in crumpled heaps on the ground. With an annoyed huff, Ed makes some rope and ties up the two unconscious men he worked over harder than the other. Then he glanced over and noticed that the last man was trying to crawl away. Snickering in amusement at the attempt to flee, Ed catches his shoulder, causing him to tense up while he looks back at Ed, who gives him an evil smile.
“Where do you think you’re going? The fun’s just beginning~” Ed says lightly with a dark look in his eye before he quickly ties up the last man and tosses the rope over his shoulder and begins to drag him towards the Command Center. The man thrashed and squirmed in a panic, trying to get free while Ed started to call back to him smugly. “I have a lot of questions for you my friend, you best be cooperative~”
“I-I can’t tell you a-anything........” the man quickly says, looking up at Ed with a pale face that had fear and panic etched on every line.
“Well isn’t that a shame. Because I’m sure the government won’t have a problem with sentencing you to a good 30 years in prison for kidnapping,” Ed laughs maniacally as he continues his steady dragging before thinking out loud. “Too bad I can’t lower the sentence because you were cooperative and gave me info. I wonder if they still have hard labor as a form of punishment for the new prisoners. If only you knew something, it would help your case a lot. If you do know something, it's in your best interest to be honest.”
The man glances up at Ed weakly before sighing heavily as he caves, murmuring quietly, “.........we took her when she was young because she had high potential to be a great alchemist.........and also having a good body chemistry to become an experiment to see if becoming a chimera was possible........”
Ed pauses his stride, frowning deeply at the information. He quickly turns on the man and grips his collar, bringing them close to each other until their noses nearly touch as he whispers with malice practically dripping from his tongue, “Last question, whose family did you take her from?”
The man lets out a shaky breath before whispering weakly, “Mustang.........the Mustang family.........”
At the mention of his superiors name, Ed’s eyes narrowed dangerously as he whispers darkly, “Sorry, I lied. I’ve got another question.” Gripping the man’s collar with both hands, Ed steadily lifts the man from the ground before suddenly slamming him against the wall, his feet dangling a few inches from the ground as Ed stares the man straight in the eyes. “Did you do anything to her? The man in front of me, did you do ANYTHING to her?”
“N-not me.........she was taken to a lab........I think they turned her into some kind of chimer. She’s the only one who stayed human and has stayed human that I know of............But that’s all I know!” the man quickly explains, swallowing thickly at the sudden fierceness that Ed was displaying. Fullmetal nods before dropping him to the ground, kneeling down and quickly unties him smoothly.
“You’re free to go on the condition I never see your face again and you go on to an honest living,” the blonde boy growls softly then suddenly grabs him by the collar and gives him a deadly glare. “Now beat it.”
Ed shoves the man into the dirt as he nods vigorously and scrambles to his feet, immediately fleeing out of the city. Ed sighs at all the new information and rubs his hand through his hair. He returns to the alleyway, grabs his suitcase and starts for Central Command, figuring that’s where Al went.