The Times of Trial

CHAPTER 1

Paperwork and Bullets

The hallways of the Midtown Military base were completely empty. People were away on holidays or visiting family, even the dormitories that normally stood crammed with young soldiers was frightening silent. John Low was one of the last few people on the base for the weekend, and he was completely swamped with work, most of which was filing, or cleaning up his office. He carried a box of old cold case files and walked down the vacant corridors to the storage room. It was large and dusty, probably hasn't been sifted through in ages, but John wasn't going to start now, he had too many things to do. As he walked, his shiny black boots made clapping noises on the tile floors and echoed throughout the hallway, they sort of felt out of place in the silent, white building. As he pulled out a key to open the locked storage door, a cry broke through the tranquil hallway.

"Colonel John!" a voice screamed out to him. It was so sudden that it made him drop the keys and box of files to the floor, scattering papers everywhere. John moaned in exhaustion and annoyance and turned to glare at the person.

"What's it this time Lieutenant Parkinson?" he groaned as the girl bent down with him to pick up the spilt paper work. Several files were spilt out over the floor mixing contents and scattering any hope of an early leave that day.

"Did you get the fuher's letter about the recruitment promotion?"

"No. I might have been able to find it if I searched through the jungle of an office I have," he said flopped down on the floor next to her. His hands started to massage his temples in frustration. Parkinson gave a soft chuckle at him, which made him even more annoyed.

"Maybe if you did your paper work when it actually was supposed to be done, or actually filed anything for once, you might not be in this mess."

"What did the paper say," he mumbled trying to get back on topic. His day didn't need any more reminders of how slow he was when it came to paperwork.

"The Feuher wants you to be at the station tonight at 5:00 for the recruitment table. It is supposed to promote awareness for jobs in the military to the citizens in the city." Parkinson stuffed the lasted of the unsorted files back into the box and dropped it on the Colonel's lap. He let out a groan as the dead weight dropped on him.

"I thought Sergent Gordon was supposed to do that today," he looked up at her throwing daggers, but she simply threw some back at him.

"Sergent Gordon is sick. He caught the flu yesterday and is taking bed rest."

"How about Major Tonks?"

"Overtime."

"Officer Charleson?"

"Grandmother died."

"Chaplin Petters?"

"Night Service speech with the Veteran Society. You are the only one open for the job tonight along with Major Bolden." The Colonel let out another groan and got to his feet shoving the box under his arm.

"What about you?" He asked suspiciously. She pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration.

"If you read the schedule that I gave you, you would know that I have Basic Training with the newest Recruits. It was a job that you of all people, assigned me specifically," She let out her own exhausted sigh that nearly knocked John over as he was trying to stand. When he finally managed to get himself vertical, he gave the Lieutenant a halfhearted salute.

"You are dismissed Lieutenant Parkinson," he sighed nearly dropping his work for the next four hours. As Lieutenant Parkinson made her way to the training fields, John gathered his things and sulked back to his office. Boxes and stacks of paperwork covered the walls and the floor of his office. It looked more like a maze than a workspace. He wished he could blow up his office to smithereens along with all the paperwork inside of it, but he had to refrain. John made his way over to his desk and clumsily shoved all of the other papers onto the floor along with the rest. The box was set down with a thud on the wooden surface, dust flew everywhere.

"Well, you really got your work cut out for you tonight, Colonel," He huffed to himself and started to pick his way through the vanilla folders.

The cold case files, as John Low recalled, were organized by class, type, number of suspects, and data. This was all simple enough for him to handle, for all of the vanilla folders were clearly labled and organized. However, all of the contents spilt out and were all mixed together. John had to sift and match every paper to every case individually. This was going to take a while.

As he was picking through the piles, something crashed through his window and whizzed over his head. The Colonel jumped into the air from the start and turned around, knocking the half organized box back to the ground. A bullet whole was spider webbing itself through the glass of his window. He carefully opened it and glared out at the training fields where he saw the Lieutenant yelling at the new recruits in their P.E. uniforms. One held his gun awkwardly and shirked away from the Lieutenant's shouts.

"Parkinson!" John yelled down at her. His partner immediately went into a salute followed by the rest of the soldiers on the field. "Watch your recruits! Keep their aim away from the buildings! That's the second time this month!"

"Yes sir!" She shouted back at him. "It won't happen again!"

"And you," John shouted out at the young man who was obviously the culprit of the stray bullet. "I advise you to keep your safety on while you handle your firearm, otherwise you should think strongly about taking a desk job!" Before the recruit could answer the colonel shut the broken window. 'It's time to get these windows bullet proofed.' He thought to himself, but that was paperwork for another day.

As he turned back to his box of scattered papers, he noticed a couple pictures poking out of the pile of work. He carefully picked them up along with the rest of the files and set them on the table. One of the pictures was of two young girls, looking about nine or ten years old, with dark brown hair and grey eyes. 'Probably siblings,' he thought to himself. Though the two girls looked completely innocent and normal, John caught a certain look in their eyes from the photograph. It was a look that only veterans from the Dunlasian war wore. Dull, worn, and frightened. As he liked to say all the time, a person's past can only be truly described through their eyes. These girls obviously weren't normal for their age.

As the Colonel pondered over the pictures, a knock rattled his office snapping out of his cloud. "Come in," he said sternly as he placed the photographs off to the side of his desk. The door swung open swiftly and attacked a pile of files, sending them cascading to the ground. The colonel let out a small breath of suppressed anger as he watched two more hours add themselves onto his work day. The man in the doorway walked carefully over to the colonel and saluted. "At ease Major Bolden," he mumbled sitting back down in his chair and picking up a few more papers.

"Colonel, it is nearly time to be departing for the train station. We should be departing shortly," he said calmly. John looked up at the statue of a soldier. The major's mass nearly touched the ceiling and could easily be confused as a brick wall. His curly red hair acted like a beacon, or a warning.

"Bolden, it can't nearly be time for that yet, and if it was, I think that I would be able to make it down to the train station by myself," he said back to him, failing to mask his overly tired voice.

"Sir, it is quarter till five, and Lieutenant Rosy Parkinson informed me that your vehicle is currently in the garage for repairs. So if you please, we should be departing." The Colonel glanced around his desk trying to find his clock. He saw a suspicious lump underneath a pile of files that was giving off the faint tick tock. John let out a small moan.

"Time flies so fast when you don't want it to," he mumbled as he stood up from his office chair. The Colonel grabbed his military coat and his white gloves and put them on. He glanced out his window at the training field where his coworker ran through an obstacle course with the recruits. Knee deep in mud, she still had time to keep him on schedule. "So, Lieutennant Parkinson has got my back again," he sighed deeply. John made the mistake of looking at the Major, whose eyes started to sparkle with emotion. John gave a huff and walked past the towering soldier. Bolden got so tearful about everything emotional. Just as the Colonel stepped out of the office, the Major tackled him into the hallway in a firm hug.

"Oh John!" he screamed as tears started to run down his face. "I saw the bullet hole in your window! I hope everything is alright. Just think of what would have happened if that damned stray piece of led would have hit you! It must have been so frightening for you! You could have been killed!" Tears fell down onto the suffocating Colonel. John started to claw at the major's grasp.

"The only thing that is killing me is you, Bolden. Get off me!" John gasped. Obeying his commanding officer, Major Bolden stood down. If it wasn't for rank, he would have continued his emotional breakdown until the Colonel's kidneys were bruised. Bolden wiped the tears out of his eyes and started to straighten his curly red hair.

"Sorry Colonel," he apologized. John waved him off.

"It's fine," he mumbled as he started to head down the hallway. He was not looking forward to his evening at the station with Major Bolden.

Sorry for this update, I just misplaced a name. AS I would like to point out these characters are not supposed to directly link to the manga. That is why I changed the names and some of their appearances. Though their role and characters might be like one from the manga, I wanted to throw twists in characters and plot. This is all to avoid flames. This fanfiction is supposed to be based on the ideas of FMA not the exact plot line.