The stolen cigarette falls clean out of my mouth.

There, on my doorstep, is a giant suit of armour that sounds like it's twelve, holding another boy who can't be more than a year older than me. And he's bleeding out something fierce. The cigarette sizzles and goes out as it rolls over a drop of blood.

All the bleach in the world would never make that come out.


Being a herbalist has its perks. Being a herbalist who also knows basic alchemy just makes my work a lot easier.

My parents had sent me off to the west, in a small village called Folton. They aren't doctors, not exactly. They're apothecaries who just happen to treat people with minor wounds and illnesses. Once I was old enough to understand what they did, they taught me a little bit. Hey got sent off to Reole to help deal with casualties there. Well, no; they went there of their own accord once hey found out what was going on.

They didn't trust the military to take care of the people there.

With them gone, that left me alone, and I'm not nearly old or good enough at what I do to take care of a shop (and pseudo-practice) by myself. So they sent me off to live Charles Moore, a doctor by trade and a decent alchemist who just happened to be a decent family friend. Honestly, he's a glorified babysitter; he doesn't explicitly teach me anything, but in the few months I've been with him, I've managed to pick up a fair amount of medical knowledge. Mostly from stealing his books in the middle of the night and reading by the light of the smallest candle I could find.

But dealing with someone who has such extensive injuries, and probably way too much internal bleeding? That is something I absolutely am not prepared to deal with.

"Please miss, you have no help him," the giant suit of armour pleads. I swallow thickly and try to steel myself. This isn't any time to lose my cool and panic.

Deep breaths. I can do this. I can try.

"Come in. Give me a second."

I runinside and leave the door open. Run to the right where Moore's desk is, pileeverything together as neatly as possible and drop it on one of the chairs in front of the desk.

"Alphonse, right?," I ask the armour, and though he seems shocked, nods. I walk over to a cupboard and pull out a sheet... two sheets, and spread them over the desk. The blood would probably soak through in no time, but it's definitely more sanitary.

"Lay him down here. What happened to him?" Gloves! Gloves. I need gloves. The desk drawers should have some.

"I-I'm not sure," Alphonse begins. The way he fidgets reminds me of when I watched my parents deal with someone whose arm was rotting off their body. "There was an explosion and I think maybe something went through his shoulder! Is the doctor around?"

I wash my hands in the sink, up to my elbows, slip on the gloves, pull my hair back and cover my face with a mask.

"Nope. Just me. Get the jar labelled Goldenseal from the cupboard over here, please. And the mortar and pestle on the shelf next to it."

With the pair of scissors in one of the drawers, I cut up the shirt from the collar down to the left bicep. And swear loudly.

Alphonse hands me the jar of powder and the mortar and pestle, but I don't have time to thank him. "I need the honey that's in the kitchen through that door. Don't worry about making a mess to look for it."

The armour disappears through the doorway. I can't remember for the life of me where the chalk is and I didn't see a marker in the drawers I looked through. Steadying my breathing is getting harder.

And now Fullmetal seems to be regaining consciousness. Shit.

"Try to stay calm," I call out to him, walking over to a small filing cabinet. Locked. Great. "I'm going to give you some pretty strong painkillers, so just bear with it for a bit."

Moore probably won't mind if I transmute the spare cane he keeps, right? I still need something to draw a circle with.

"I found the honey!," Alphonse exclaims, just in time.

"Great, perfect, now I just..."

My eyes stop on the elder Elric brother writhing on the desk. Stupid; his blood should do just fine. I hand the mortar and pestle to the younger brother.

"Put as much of the powder as you can in there and just enough honey to make a paste. Try to get as much in the wound on his shoulder as you can," I instruct, rushing to the desk and covering all the finger of my hands with as much blood as I can. It's not glamorous.

Alphonse thankfully doesn't stop once to ask me what I'm doing. I manage to paint a circle on the floor under the cane to transmute at least the tip of it into a flat point. I just hope the metal is strong enough.

Wedge it into the edge between the drawer and cabinet to force it open. The lock gives with a sound I can't worry about. And there they are; the syringes and whatever the hell it is he doctor usually uses for anaesthetic. Neat little glass vials.

I turn back to Alphonse; though he's actually slathering as much of the poultice as he's made onto and into the jagged wound, Edward's mouth stays resolutely shut. I can see he muscles in his jaw working and hear his teeth grinding.

"...take his belt off."

"Take... what?!" If he had a face of flesh and bone, I'm sure it would've been ten different shades of red and embarrassed.

"Take it off, loop it once or twice, and make him bit down on it."

Alphonse hesitates for a second before following through wordlessly.

"Alright, Edward?" Twitch of a brow in recognition. Thank goodness; sucks for him, but consciousness is good. "This is going to suck, and then it won't. Tap out a beat on the desk for as long as you can."

When I turn around with a half-full syringe—maybe a little less than what Moore uses, but whatever, it's a teenager, it should be fine—one bright, golden eye is glaring at me, teeth digging into the leather of his belt. It's enough to freeze me to the spot for a few seconds.

I'm a god damn teenager too. What am I doing?

"The goldseal poultice is to try to staunch the bleeding," I explain slowly, and make my steps slow and deliberate. Consciously telegraphing movement is harder in practice than it is in theory. "That's what your brother is covering your shoulder with. The honey should prevent infection. This is..." My hesitation makes both the brothers stare at me a little too intently. God dammit, talk about a time to forget words. "This is enough to put you to sleep for two or three hours. Long enough for me to work without your having to feel anything. Keep tapping that beat."

The alchemist flinches with nearly his entire body when I first try to grab his arm. Remind him to relax again, and feel for the most noticeable vein in the crook of his elbow. Someone must be watching over me; for some reason his veins are especially prominent and easy to find.

"Keep tapping," I remind him, quietly, and quietly slip in the needle.

Only one whine makes it past the belt and out of his mouth. I count the seconds out loud. It doesn't make more than thirty before the tapping stops. This is when I allow myself to fall to my knees.

I wave off Alphonse's concerned calls. My reassurances come with a complete lack of conviction. I look at the door, hoping the doctor would burst through it and yell about the blood on his porch.

He doesn't.

My legs shake too much when I finally get up. I try not to look at my hands when I take off the gloves.

"I'm making tea. The poultice needs to set a bit to properly stop the bleeding," I explain quietly, inexplicably out of breath. "I'll be back in a few minutes."

The routine of tea-making barely offers hardly any rest. The damage to Edward's shoulder is honestly disgusting. Something was pulled out of there that had been decently lodged; from the dust and gravel and dirt in and around the wound, you can only hope it was actual rubble. I can handle that kind of infection decently. Something from tainted metal, on the other hand...

I don't want to think about it.

I let the tea steep longer than it needs to. Walk back into the lobby-turned-office and grab a sheet of paper from a stack I was going through earlier. Moore... might not mind a recent patient visit summary going missing. I could always just parrot it off to him; Mrs Braun always has the same complaints and the same results every time. Doesn't matter if one of the summaries disappears. There're dozens more.

Walking back into the small kitchen, I take the tea bag out of the cup, smush it between my finger a bit, and use one of the corners to paint a circle onto the paper. Not my finest work—the lines are fat and my hands shake so much that some of the straighter lines don't look too good—but it should work just fine. I've drawn worse alchemy circles and still had it work just as well.

"What the fuck," is what I say when I leave the kitchen, steaming mug in one hand and tea-painted paper in the other. "What the actual blooming fuck," I mutter again, dropping the piece of paper on top of the stack still resting neatly on a chair. "I'm sixteen and too young for this shit."

That's as much panic and acknowledgement as I allow myself. If Alphonse passes a comment on my age or language, I don't hear it. I find one of the suture kits and a lighter and get to sterilizing the curved needle. It doesn't take long before I burn myself, and promptly stab myself trying to catch a falling needle.

"...can I help with that?," a small, tinny voice asks. I consider the giant hollow armour for a second before handing over the lighter and needle.

"I'll leave the fire work to the one who's resistant to fire. Thank you." Alphonse nods stiffly—though I find myself wondering for a second if he's even capable of nodding any other way—and runs the need through the flame for a bit.

I turn to the thread in front of me. I sit down in the only other vacant chair and start unspooling the thread. I'll have to flush out of the wound in a bit, then sew up as many of the larger, torn-open areas as possible, and then...

And then.

"Here you go, miss." Alphonse's voice almost makes me jump clean out of my skin. I nod and accept the needle.

"I'm going to need your help again," I say quietly. We've been speaking in near-hushed times this entire time. It's not like he alchemist is going to wake up just because we're talking. Across the desk, Alphonse seems to be eagerly waiting for his next instruction. "The bleeding's mostly stopped; I need you to get as big a bowl of water as you can carry."

The younger Elric races to the kitchen, and the changing of pots and pans makes me wince. It's loud. Meanwhile, I force myself back into my legs, secure the needle to the sheets covering the desk, and rummage through the cupboards for something that could even remotely resemble a washcloth.

Alphonse comes back with a bowl I'm pretty sure he transmuted (somehow) and with enough water to make my life easier. I hand him a washcloth of his own.

"Is the water warm?," I ask, before chancing dunking my hand and cloth in. Alphonse nods sharply. "Good. Clean out as much of the poultice as you feel comfortable; it won't matter much if there's a little left. I can work with that."

Dunk my hand into the bowl—though maybe it's more accurate to call it a shallow bucket?—and get to cleaning out the wound. Now that the bleeding isn't as horrible, Edward's shoulder doesn't look... too mangled. Definitely not the worst I've ever seen. And he might only need maybe a dozen stitches for the bigger areas. It's going to leave some nasty scars, but...

Considering his metal limbs, I don't think he'll mind much. Or care.

Alphonse stops for a second to look at his brother's knit brow. I take a second to do the same. He's clearly in pain, but... well, I hope he won't remember it. It's the best I can hope for.

Once the shoulder is relatively clear, and I've got a better idea of the damage, I stop Alphonse's hand before he continues.

"It's good enough like this," and my voice starts to shake a little too much. I've gone and out myself in one hell of a situation. I walk around the desk, rummage for another pair of gloves to slip on, grab the threaded needle and swallow down the bile rising in the back of my throat. "This area here, I'm going to need you to try to keep it pinched together."

No question, again; dangerously blind obedience. I would ask it, but the sutures need my full attention. And I've only ever sewn together a cut finger and a cut leg, and one of those was my own. The scar on my leg itches when I think about it.

One stitch; done. Slow, and tedious, and my fingers shake so much the scissors rattle when I cut the thread.

Second stitch; I remember more and more clearly how this is supposed to go.

Third, fourth and fifth stitches; it takes less and less time with every snip of the scissors, and I can almost ignore the fact that I am literally seeing flesh back together.

I almost botch stitch six.

Seven through eleven aren't a problem.

I slump back into the vacant chair with a sigh. It looks... terrible, honestly, and any doctor worth their salt would probably cut off my hands and lecture me while cauterizing the stumps.

"...you're not really...," Alphonse begins, but trails off. I shake my head.

"No, I'm not done, I just. I just need to think for a second."

He waits a beat before asking, "Think about what?"

"How the muscles in your shoulder are supposed to work," is my short reply. I sit up straight in the chair and pluck the tea-painted paper off the chair next to me.

I study it for longer than strictly necessary. No matter how much I look at it and try to convince myself that it's fine, I'll keep feeling like something's missing from it. I know there isn't.

I carefully place the paper over Edward's shoulder. Alphonse's armour clanks loudly as he stands to his full height, looking over his unconscious brother and I.

He yells something at me, but honestly, I can't be bothered. I take off the gloves, let my fingertips touch the edge if the alchemy circle, and let my mind and the power beneath my feet do the rest.