Chapter One
Disclaimer: I do not own Fullmetal Alchemist.
Author's Note: I recently realized how much I love the FMA movie, Conqueror of Shamballa, after having known that movie for over a year. The idea came to me in a rather funny way, in school – like all of my other fanfictions. I am writing a paper on the genius Marie Curie, and realized that I knew more about radioactive substances than I thought. The more research I did on her, the more I found that scientists had compared her work to that of alchemists hundreds of years before her. As a Fullmetal fangirl, it was needless to say it interested me immediately. My development continued rather smoothly, and now you have the first chapter :D
Another quick note, this fanfic will mostly have its own plotline since it branches off the end of the movie. There will be several aspects of the manga/Brotherhood as the plot further developes. And yet again, I am writing with several OCs. Let's face it, my original characters are the only things that have me dedicate myself to finishing a story.
There was something terribly wrong; Sara sensed it in her bones. She lay frozen in her bed, the comforter tucked tightly over her shoulders, listening intently to what was going on in the floor below her. Nothing, she heard nothing.
Kerstin should be downstairs, rattling pans in the kitchen or polishing the creaky floorboards roughly. Sara half-expected the woman she shared the manor with to suddenly create a clatter, she was waiting to be startled by some loud noise. When no sounds arose, she bit her lip fiercely. The eerie silence was worrying her. Sara sighed, a sharp pain shot through her chest; that was a sign that the disease was spreading to her internal organs now. She hated thinking that she was in such a large house alone, alone in the dark. Kerstin always kept the lights on in the house, even if that meant keeping several candles lit in the windows. Sara felt like a child again, fearing the dark and wishing her guardian would be there to look after her.
She gazed around the room. Moonlit shadows were cast over the room from the window beside her bed. On the nightstand beside her sat a glass of water – a supposed temporary cure for her nausea – and the note Kerstin had left for her telling her that she had left for the city in search of medicine for her and would be back by midnight. That was one of the disadvantages in living in their father's countryside manor, it took so long to get into town and back again for even the littlest things. Not that Sara's condition was little; she had been suffering immensely for days. The red blotches had begun appearing across her skin at the beginning of the week, it took no time at all for her to realize that she was dying. She had quarantined herself to her bedroom, insisting that no one come in to see her. The patches turned into itchy burn-like blisters quickly afterwards with a skyrocketing fever and headache. She was highly contagious, and she was not going to risk anyone else dying around her.
Fear stiffened her tattered body as the sound of a screeching door echoed through the nearly empty halls of the house. When it reached her ears, it sounded like nails on a chalk board or the scream of a child. Sara wanted to investigate the sound, but knew better than to risk passing out on the way down the staircase or, worse, contaminating the entire household. Knowing it was not her half-sister entering the manor, she instead yanked the sheets over her head to hide.
Sets of footsteps shuffled into the foyer, rather loudly. Whoever it was did not seem to care if there was anyone inside or not. Sara figured they thought the house was abandoned or currently empty at the least, she had quickly learned upon her arrival to Germany that no one lived in the country manors anymore. That being said, why would several people come into a house that was supposedly empty? In the back of her mind, the part that had not been consumed by the utter horror of the break-in, Sara was cursing Kerstin for not locking the door on her way out of the house.
"Brother, it isn't empty," a small male's voice protested. "There are people living here. What if they come home…?"
"I say getting caught is better than freezing to death in that wind," a man responded sharply. Sara could tell he was much older than the first voice, and therefore a much more dangerous threat to her. The younger boy sounded like he could not stand the thought of hurting a fly, let alone a weak and bed-ridden woman. She clenched her fists, digging her nails into her palms nervously. The blisters on the back of her hands tore open and her skin began stinging terribly. She fought against herself to keep from crying out in pain. "And with a place this big, no one – if anyone at all – will notice us sleeping in one of the extra rooms. We can slip out before sunrise and make it to Munich before noon."
Strangely, that gave Sara a small glimmer of hope. They did not mean to take anything from her father's house as far as she was concerned and they were certainly not there to hurt her. She knew that there were people looking after her, especially after what she had discovered. But her knowledge would disappear off of the face of the earth with her when she passed away, a result of dedication to her research. When their footsteps began to advance up the staircase, her comfort slipped away from her.
Maybe they would not find her; she was rooming at the very end of the hallway, after all. And if they did, maybe they would be too scared of her to even think of staying in the house. She could warn them that she was contagious. She could tell them she was dying and everything in the house was contaminated. That way, they would just leave without harming her or taking anything.
It was growing more difficult to breathe. Sara did not know whether it was because of her disease or that the blankets over her face were filtering less and less oxygen with each breath she sucked in. She was not going to risk sticking her head out for fresh air, especially not when the men's footsteps were trudging down her hallway, closer to her door with every step.
"Brother," the younger boy whispered cautiously, warningly. "I still don't feel right about being in here… What if this is someone's bedroom? That would just be weird."
"Would you rather sleep in the cellar, Al?" the older man demanded fiercely. The boy whimpered. Under the comforter, Sara shuttered, hoping they would turn away from the closed door separating them. "I didn't think so. It will only be for a few hours and we can sleep in shifts if you want to, that way we can get out if anyone threatens to come up here."
Her heart stopped abruptly as her bedroom door swung inward on its hinges. Light from the hallway poured in, illuminating a path directly to the bed against the back wall. The thin comforter covering Sara's body did little to hide her on the bed.
"There's someone in there!" the younger one, Al, hissed through his teeth. "Brother, let's leave!"
Heavy footsteps stomped across the room. The covers were drawn back from Sara's face, releasing her burned skin to the crisp air. The muscles in her face suddenly went numb. She was staring up at the harsh face of a man. Blonde bangs fell over his cat-like yellow eyes and his jaw was firm as he glared down at her. He was studying her skin for the longest time before he moved away from her. He was clearly not scared; maybe he was one of the men after her. Sara felt unbelievably terrified. She could not move. She could hardly breathe. She was a statue staring up at the face of a strange man, who was most likely going to torture her for details of her research. Her death was going to arrive so much faster than she had expected.
"Al," the yellow-eyed man murmured, dropping his head and turning towards his brother. "We can't leave. We have to help her." He looked over his shoulder at Sara, who remained in the fetal position with her arms wrapped around her in fear. "I'm sorry about this. We didn't mean to bother you." The way his gaze softened showed that he had more of a soft spot for women than he had originally led on. "I can help you, though. I know what's on your skin."
Sara rolled over onto her shoulder, facing the door. The yellow-eyed man took a step back, keeping his gaze locked on her. She was able to get a good look at him, dressed in a shabby brown overcoat and hair tied in a ponytail at the back of his head. The younger was just like him; same outfit, same hairstyle only darker toned hair, same strange eyes. She mumbled something inaudible; even she did not know what she meant to say.
"What's your name?" the older brother asked curiously, kneeling beside her bed.
"Je ne parle pas allemande," she rasped sorely, trying to convince him that she did not speak German. Sara was lying directly to his face, but she did not want help from him. He broke into her house, which was especially a reason that she did not want him to be around her. She also knew that, if she lived, she would be killed anyway for the information she had discovered. Those German scientists – the Thule Society or the Nazis or whoever they said they were working for – would be all over her as soon as they realized she survived.
"It's French, Brother, let me ask her," Al insisted, stepping forward. He joined his brother, kneeling beside her bed as if it made him seem better. He did appear nicer, though, his face was not as harsh as his brother's and he was obviously years younger than his sibling. "Quel est votre nom?"
Sara shook her head subtly in protest, trying to insist she was not going to tell them anything. She was scared to death, they should know that. Fear itself was living in her icy blue eyes.
"S'il vous plait?" he persisted politely.
She drew in a death breath. "Saraphine Amsel," she replied hoarsely.
"Amsel?" the older yellow-eyed man echoed. "As in, Sven Amsel? The chemist lecturing at Munich University?"
The invalid woman nodded. "That's my father," said Sara.
"I thought you didn't understand German," Al whispered accusingly. Both Sara and his brother ignored the comment.
"Do you know how you contracted this burns all over your skin?" the older asked, leaning forward as if that was going to bring the answer out of her more easily. There was not possible way that she did not know; she could not have just woken up one day with this type of blisters. Saraphina nodded. "How?"
"I studied the work of Madame Curie in my home country," she sputtered, ending her sentence in a violent fit of coughing. "I repeated several of her experiments and had direct access to the notebooks she used during her original study. The radioactive substances wore off of the pages and onto my skin. That's how I got infected."
"When did this happen?" he continued.
"I noticed the burns about a week ago," Sara answered.
"A last question," the man promised. "Are you the girl that they are searching for? The one who fled France several weeks ago after studying at the University of Paris?"
"Are you part of the organization searching for the girl?" she returned swiftly, her voice wearing out. She sounded as if she had been swallowing nails.
"No," the brothers answered in unison.
Sara nodded slowly. Confidence was slowly washing back into her body. She felt she was safe enough that they were not going to hurt her, safe enough that she could give them the truthful answer. "Yes."
"Do you realize what this means, Al?" the older brother asked.
"No…" the boy muttered.
"It means that we can go home. She knows how to open the Gate without alchemy."
I hope that you, readers, don't mind I am going to use the worst FMA clichés here. Sara has a sister, it is non-canon, so on and so forth. I doubt this will be a pairing story though, so you will have to bear with that. EdxAiame and AlxAya are the only acceptable Elric brother pairings anyway…
Tell me what you think of it! Comments are absolutely loved!