Chapter 1

"Daddy… Daddy, look!" the young girl exclaimed as she sat in the back seat of her father's car. She'd been using up paper after paper, drawing intricate circles she'd seen her father drawing earlier that same day.

The man driving the car chuckled, but did not turn around to study his daughter's drawings. "Sorry honey, but I'm a little busy at the moment. I'll take a look when we get to the hospital". He remained silent for a moment after that, then he released a sigh. "Six years old, and she's already book smart and on her way to becoming an alchemist" he said distantly, as if he was talking to himself. The girl raised her eyebrows.

"Well of course!" she shouted to him, her big blue eyes growing even wider with a newfound excitement, "I'm going to be an alchemist too! Just like you and mom!" Her father replied with another chuckle.

Everything had been filled with excitement for the young girl lately. Her mother and father were teaching her alchemy, well, slightly, she'd learned at least five of the basic transmutation circles in just a few hours, and now she and her father were on their way to visit her mother in the hospital. But they weren't visiting just her mother, they were also visiting someone else, someone the girl had yet to meet.

"Daddy…" the girl called to her father again, "What did you and Mommy say my new brother's name is going to be?". She was just so curious about him. Would he have blue eyes and jet-black hair like her and her father? Or would he have blonde hair like their mother?

"Calm down Anna" he turned the steering wheel to the left, "You've asked me that question at least a hundred times today already, and I've answered you every single time". Anna's father sighed again, then slightly released his grip on the steering wheel to let it center out after the turn. "His name is Anon… Why have you asked so many times?".

"Dunno" Anna said defensively, "I just like hearing it!". A moment of silence passed, and she wondered why her father hadn't responded to her. "Daddy…?" she called to him, "… Daddy!?" Then suddenly, she heard a terrifying gasp escape her father as one of his hands let go of the steering wheel and harshly gripped at his chest.

Anna began crying, sobbing, screaming out at her father, and screaming out of fear now that there was no control over the car. And out of the corner of her eye, only for an instant, she saw the glaring headlights of another car, then everything went black.

"NO!" the blood curdling scream could be heard throughout the entire house as I shot up into a sitting position. I breathed heavily and wiped beads of sweat from my forehead while looking around the small bedroom. A sigh of relief made its way through my lips. I wasn't in a car anymore. I was safe and sound in my bed, in my house, in the village of Recherche.

I pulled my legs close to me and hid my face I my knees. I needed to calm down. Why did that nightmare always reoccur over and over again? Why can't my past just leave me alone? I mean… Its not like I want to forget my father, I just want to forget what happened.

After untangling myself from the sweat-drenched sheets and pulling off sleep wear that was in no better condition, I paced over to the wardrobe in the far corner of my room. I pulled the doors open, grabbed the first plain and tasteless sundress of many that I saw and threw it on. I couldn't say that I was a girly-girl, I just thought dresses were faster and easier to manage.

The house was very… quiet. It was always quiet when I woke up. On most days my mother would head out to work at whatever job she hadn't already been fired from, and my brother would be out playing with his friends. And I, the seventeen-year-old girl with no friends, no social life, and nothing to do, would usually just spend the day cleaning the house and running errands. I was also in charge of taking care of my brother Anon, since my mother doesn't have the time or sanity to do so.

My mother is a touchy subject. After my father's death, she wasn't the same Isabelle Spencer I'd spent the first four years of my life with. Her condition had gotten worse as the years went on, and now it's just what's expected. There are times where she'll come home from work and just sit at the kitchen table for hours with the same emotionless expression on her face. Afterwards she'll usually wander into her bedroom and break down. Throwing memories of my father across the room, he old clothes, pictures of them together, sometimes even books holding finding from his alchemy research. Alchemy is the one thing my family never touched upon again after the accident. I never wanted to give up learning alchemy, but my mother wouldn't teach me because it hurt her too much. No one in the small village we had moved to was able to use or understand alchemy at all. It was partly due to the fact that half the population of Recherche was Ishvallan. Recherche was a in the most South-Eastern part of Amestris, right on the border of Ishvall.

I could try as hard as I wanted to forget what had happened, but nothing would ever work. My mother's tantrums left memories. My brother's questions about a father he never had the chance to meet or to love left memories. The jagged scar that runs from my underneath my right collar bone to the top of my shoulder left memories. Everything left memories. Even after all these years… I-

"ANNA! HELP!"

I jerked my head towards the direction of the plea. "What the…" I thought out loud on realization, "That's Anon!". I threw a white cotton sweater on and slipped on my sandals then bolted out the front door. I scanned the area until I spotted my eleven-year-old brother running towards our house. I ran towards him, wondering what could have possibly gone wrong.

"Anon, what in the world is wrong?" I asked. "You look like you're about to burst into tears!". He really did seem like he was about to cry. His blue eyes were rimmed with tears that were threatening to run down his face. I moved one of his raven locks out of his face when I noticed the destroyed toy in his hands. "What? That thing almost looks as if it's been-"

"Blown up?" a deep, raspy voice finished my sentence and made me jump in surprise. I looked up to see the speaker, a tall man in an Amestrian military uniform. He looked to be in his early to mid-twenties. He had black hair which he kept tied back, with a few flyaway strands hanging in front of his face. He didn't look lanky, but at the same time he didn't look hulking either. One thing was for sure though, he was definitely suspicious.

Anon was just as surprised as I was. He tugged on my sleeve and pointed an accusing finger at the man. "Him!" he practically squealed, "He's the one who made my toy explode!". I had no idea how that was physically possible. Did this guy have explosives on him or something? "He.. He just.." Anon continued, glaring at the man who didn't appear to be affected at all. In fact, he was smirking! How dare he! "He just clapped his hands together and made it explode!". My eyes widened at the sheer impossibility of imagining how he could do that. It didn't matter though, there were more important matters to deal with.

"Alright mister" I narrowed my eyes at the man and tried to make myself sound at least somewhat intimidating, "What do you think gives you the right to mess with my little brother!?"

"Hey, it's not really my fault" he defended and shot another on of those maniacal smirks at me again, "I can make things explode. I like to make things explode. So I do make things explode. Your little brother's toy car just happened to be in my path". What the hell was this guy's problem!?

"Oh yeah?" I shot back at him, a hint of sarcasm in my voice, "What a lovely way to represent what you call a military!". As if the Amestrian military wasn't bad enough! "Who the hell are you anyway!?".

His smirk widened then turned into a frightening grin. "Oh? Well if you must know…". He gave off such an arrogant and cruel feeling. The kind of feeling that made me want to drop kick him all the way back to that hell-hole Central City. "The Name's Kimblee" he said, his smile growing wider by the second.

"Solf J. Kimblee".