The Worth of a Soul
A single lamp burned in the consuming darkness, joined by the flickering light from the fireplace. A boy sat at the worn table, a stack of parchment before him and a pot of ink at his elbow. He flipped a thin black pen between two fingers, thoughts whirring through his head, fragments, memories, a truth that bothered his mind but didn't want to be said aloud.
Remembrances of pain seeped into his nerves and took root. Physical agony that now tugged at where his nerves connected to automail limbs. Thorns of guilt that encircled his heart. A single night that ran through his mind on repeat, interrupting itself, skipping ahead, lingering on the moments he most wanted to forget. Not forget—stop from happening at all.
But that very night had taught him that above all other wishes, correcting the past was most impossible. He closed his eyes briefly, breath tight in his chest, fingers tight around the pen. Then he stirred the object into the ink pot and set it to the top sheet of parchment, where it bled out the thoughts he could no longer keep bottled.
Equivalent exchange.
The first time I heard the term, Al read it aloud from one of the dusty books buried in our father's bookshelf. When he explained it, it was simple to understand, and simple to apply. In order to receive something, you must sacrifice something of equal value. I performed my first transmutation that afternoon, applying the law, sacrificing wood from the floor for the wood to make a small toy. My grin would have probably made an evil genius proud.
I loved the logic in equivalent exchange. It made Alchemy understandable, easy even. I saw all of life laid out in this one simple law.
So when Mom died, I trusted in it once again. I didn't let myself give up. I promised to myself and to Al that we would transmute Mom, that we would bring her back. And I set about learning what made a human like I was learning what made a wooden toy.
Water, 35 liters; carbon, 20 kilograms; ammonia, 4 liters; lime, 1.5 kilograms; phosphorus, 800 grams; salt, 250 grams; saltpeter, 100 grams; sulfur, 80 grams; fluorine, 7.5 grams; iron, 5 grams; silicon, 3 grams. The material make-up of one adult human. Al and I learned and gathered all the elements for the body. Through logic, I reasoned out what to sacrifice for the soul. Mom's soul was who she was; it was her true life. Life could be expressed through blood—something that pulsed and flowed. With it, you were alive. Without it, you were dead. I still have a small scar on my finger from the cut I made for the sacrifice of blood.
We chose the biggest room in the house for our work, because it was the only place where we could draw the transmutation circle big enough to fit every detail. It had only one window, and warm sunlight spilled through the glass, across one countertop, and straight onto our circle, highlighting the small tub of materials we had placed proudly in the center.
I'd had a heartbeat of pain in my finger from the cut, but I barely noticed it. Al and I grinned at each other like idiots. True idiots, because we never guessed what hell we were about to unleash. All we knew was that every moment of slaving work had finally paid off. We had finally reached our destination. We would finally have our mother back. I could already see her smile and feel the warmth of her arms encircle me. Her voice echoed in my mind, bright and praising. My eyes soaked in the light at the center of the transmutation circle, without ever thinking about the shadows lurking at the edges.
Al and I both nodded at the same moment and dropped to our knees. My heart thundered in my chest and I know my whole body shook as I pressed my hands to the circle. I never doubted that it would work. I never fathomed it might go wrong.
Blue light erupted from the dusty chalk lines, overpowering the sunshine. Energy crackled and danced around the circle like lightning, and I leaned forward, aching to see that familiar figure rise from the center of the circle and smile at me, longing to hear her say my name once again.
But shadows flared at the edges of the light, small at first, then leaping to life with reaching arms that strangled the lightning. I heard Al say something was wrong just as a crack split down the center of the circle, shooting open to reveal a giant eye. My brain rebelled, unable to absorb the sight. Where was Mom? I could hear her! I could already hear her calling my name. Where was she?
Someone did call my name, the familiar voice a shriek of terror. I jerked my head to Al, my insides lurching at the sight of his missing hand, at the shadows twisted around his bare arm and reaching for still more of him with groping black fingers. I screamed his name, and then just screamed as agony tore through my leg, bringing me crashing to the ground. I twisted and could see the shadows gnawing their way up me as well, a gaping void already ripped in the space where my calf should have been.
Al screamed my name again. I tried to jerk away from the shadows, tried to reach for him. My eyes widened in horror as the shadows tore him apart before me. He screamed my name over and over, his hand extended for me even as the shadows shattered his arms, his chest, his face. Tears scorched my eyes and a ragged shriek tore from my throat. My hand reached him and closed over his fingers just as they disappeared—
And then there was silence. White.
I blinked, looking around at my empty, unfamiliar surroundings. My brain struggled to catch up. I'd just been doing something important, hadn't I? Where was—
A voice caught my attention and I stared in shock at a figure that suddenly appeared before me, seated casually on the ground. The strange figure had the shape of a person, but was completely devoid of features and as white as if it had been sliced directly from the surroundings. Only the churning black cloud around it made it visible.
"Who are you?" I asked uncertainly.
It threw its arms up in obvious delight. "Glad you asked!" A barely visible mouth appeared as it spoke and its voice sounded like a crowd of people in unison, a discordant harmony. "I am called the World. Or perhaps the Universe. Perhaps God. Perhaps Truth. Perhaps One. Perhaps All. And I am you."
A frigid wind breathed down my neck, shooting goose-bumps up my spine. The figure swept an arm wide, then pointed at something behind me. Somehow, I could tell it grinned.
"Welcome," it said, "fool who doesn't know his place."
I slowly turned and found myself staring into a gaping stone doorway. The space inside churned with a black mass that stood in sharp contrast with all the white, and, in its center, a familiar giant eye stared back.
I stumbled backward; any sound I might have made lodged in my throat. Reaching black hands sprang from the darkness and wrapped themselves around me. My voice broke free in a hysterical shout and I wrestled to escape, but the shadows tightened and dragged me toward the eye. I twisted, screaming for help. The figure made no move.
"Relax," it purred. "This is what you desired, is it not? I will show you the truth!"
The shadows jerked me through the doorway and the stone door slammed shut. Images burst into life in the darkness around me, flashing by in an instant while a thousand words about each one flooded my mind. The words seemed to wind themselves around my brain, squeezing themselves in faster than I could absorb, transforming into physical pain that threatened to split my head apart. My voice broke; I kept screaming. I tried to shut my eyes but couldn't. Tears of pain spilled over my cheeks.
The images twisted themselves into a single figure. My heart lurched as my blurred vision made out the familiar outline. I reached out, begging for her, and her hand extended, too. The pain increased and I lost my voice in sobs, but I kept my eyes on her hand. If I could just reach her, she would take the pain away. She always did. I strained to get closer, choking on my own tears. Her hug, her voice, her hand, centimeters away. Millimeters—
The door slammed closed behind me, my hand extended in empty air. My chest heaved. My eyes burned. But the physical pain had vanished.
"How was it?" the voice of a crowd asked.
I turned from the figure to face the door, numb with shock. Truth. All that information had been truth. I pressed my hands against the stone door. It had no texture, only pressure against my icy palms.
"Show it to me again," I whispered. The truth about human transmutation had been behind the door! Shadows of symbols swam before my eyes; my heart floated in a cocktail of understanding and hope. If I could just see a bit more, I could perfect the theory. I could correct my mistakes. "Show it to me again!"
"Impossible," the voice behind me said. "You only paid enough of a toll for what you already saw."
"Toll?" I turned to face the figure again and it smiled. A foot suddenly began to take shape on the figure's left side, extending into a leg that ended at the knee. My heart stopped and I looked down at my own left leg, to see only white.
My wide eyes rose again to find the figure standing right before me, white teeth bared in a leering grin. "Equivalent exchange, right, Alchemist?"
The white vanished, leaving me lying on my stomach on a stone floor of ice. Agony ripped through me and I found myself screaming once more. I twisted and my hands grasped at a leg that was no longer there, replaced instead with a pool of blood. My stomach clenched and I vomited until I was gasping for breath. Tears coursed down my face in a never-ending stream and I begged for help, my gaze shooting wildly over the room. Al's clothes and shoes lay beside me in a heap, only increasing my hysteric pleading.
The blue light died suddenly, leaving a hazy cloud of smoke over the transmutation circle. I clutched at the bloody stump of my leg with one hand, supporting myself on my other arm and crying out for Mom over and over. My blurry vision focused in on the center of the circle, and my tears and voice stopped at the hellish sight.
A twisted, skeletal figure lay on its back on the circle, its head tilted back with glowing red eyes trained on me. Black slime dripped from the clearly visible shape of bones and a gaping black mouth heaved breaths in and out. A crooked, rotting arm reached toward me, falling to the ground after just a moment. Jutting angles marked the figure—a body that had been cracked apart at each joint. Dark blood seeped from under it in rivers which followed the carefully etched lines of my masterpiece transmutation circle. The light faded from its eyes and the mouth stilled in mid breath.
My stomach lurched in dry heaves and I shoved myself back as best I could. It couldn't be. It couldn't be. It couldn't be. I reached out bloody fingers for Al's clothes; they were still empty. I slammed my hand into the ground instead, leaving a streak of crimson. Mom was gone. Al was gone. I was alone. Alone in a pool of blood.
Another flash of pain brought me down on my side, but for the first time, I didn't scream. Cold air sliced through my already ragged throat as I gasped in horrified breaths. The world wavered and tilted around me. Mom was . . . Al was . . .
I jerked my head up at a single lucid realization. Al wasn't gone. Al was at the door—the figure at the door that had taken my leg had taken my brother. Mom was a wraith outside my grasp, but Al was still within reach.
A broken cry of rage clawed its way through my gasps and I gripped Al's white shirt. I wrapped it around the stump of my leg as best I could, shoving aside the pain that once again flooded my eyes with tears. It was all my fault. The figure had taken Al. I wouldn't let it keep him. I dragged myself to one side of the room and slammed an elbow into a suit of armor that always stood sentinel at the wall. It toppled to the ground with a crash, the helmet rolling off.
The overwhelming pieces of truth that had twisted themselves into my mind surfaced. Blood couldn't equal a soul, but it could represent one. And blood had iron. Iron that could bind Al's soul to the metal of the armor.
I wasn't wrong. I couldn't be. I dragged my bloodstained finger over the inside collar of the armor in a crude transmutation circle that I could barely make out through my tears. And I shouted over and over at the figure I couldn't see.
"Give him back!" Take my leg, my arm, my heart. "Give him back!" You can have all of me. "Give him back!" He's all I have left. "Give him back!"
I forced myself into an unsteady sitting position and slammed my hands together, the space between them erupting into the light of a transmutation.
"What a fool," the voice of a crowd whispered in my ear. Shadows reared up from my transmutation and twisted themselves around my right arm, shattering it up to the shoulder. My throat and stomach constricted and I collapsed to the ground, gasping for air, my remaining hand clutched around my shoulder. Blackness spread like a stain through my sight. I fought it, trying to say Al's name, straining to see him. I thought I saw the armor move. His voice called for me, then called again. Rough hands curled around my back. Al. I wasn't wrong.
Reassured, I finally relaxed, allowing the darkness to erase the pain. Had I found the true price of a human soul? An arm? Or was I fading into death, and the price of a soul was life itself?
My head fell to the side as the muscles in my neck gave out and the last of my vision caught on the edge of the failed human transmutation circle before my senses faded completely.
Equivalent exchange—in order to receive something, you must sacrifice something of equal value. I've run the law through my head countless times in the last years. Could we have brought Mom back if I had given my arm that day? My life?
Eventually, I realized what my mistake was. I found a line in a book that read, "The whole is greater than the sum of its parts." One plus one isn't always two, because when you combine things, they can become better, stronger, greater. As an alchemist, as a human, I should have known that. Mom may have been made of elements and blood in theory, but everything combined in a certain way, she became more. They could never be an equivalent exchange for her. Even combined with the price of my brother and my leg, it still didn't even out.
I don't need the door to show me truth—I found it on my own. Human transmutation will never work, because the people in our lives are of completely unique value. They can never have an equal price.
But a body, an arm, and a leg can. Al and I can't fix everything we did in the past, but we can get our bodies back and move on.
Mom would want that.
Ed Elric stared down at the blotchy writing in his hands, the fragments of thought that became lucid at being recorded. His white gloves, curled around the edges of the parchment, bore ink stains that turned red in his vision with the memories of that night. No, they couldn't fix everything. It was a harsh lesson.
He extinguished the lamp and started for the guest bed, pausing only to toss the smudged pages into the fire. The orange flames crackled and twisted around the new fuel, gnawing it apart as easily as the shadows had consumed Al's body. In their wake, they left only ashes, and Ed added them in his mind to the ashes of his childhood home.
The past was gone—nothing would change that. The important thing was to cherish the people around him, because understanding that life truly was unique and could never be returned made it all the more worth living.