New Season! Sei Alchemist– Part 1

The soldier sat at her desk. Her dried-blood-red hair touched the tops of her ears, and had a slight shaggy look to it. Her storm blue eyes had grey-black bags under them. She wore the blue uniform of the military. Her jacket over the back of her chair, she wore a white T-shirt under it. Beside her chair, a two-year old toddler sat playing with ABC blocks.

The toddler had dark brown hair, green eyes, and a slight quirk to his mouth. His name was Satori (enlightenment)Ryokou(journey). He was the result of a love for her family and a need to protect her father. She had been raped, and the result sat on the floor next to her.

She had meant to put him up for adoption, and even before that she had wanted to kill him. But seeing the look of innocence in those eyes when she had held him in her arms at the hospital, she couldn't do it. He was hers. She had come to love him.

"Ryo," she said to her son. "Be a good boy for mommy and not make so much noise, okay?"

"Hai(yes)," Ryo agreed.

She sighed. Raising a kid in the military was hard. She hadn't had a mission in a year, but desk work was no walk in the park.

Mustang walked up to her desk and laid down a folder.

"Take a break, Satori," he ordered. "You look wiped."

"Can't, Ryo has to be watched at all times." She took a box lunch from a drawer and began eating.

"I'll watch him. You need rest, Lieutenant Colonel. I order you, as your commanding officer, to go take the rest of the afternoon off."

"Heh," Satori sighed again. "All right, Major General Mustang. But only in the common room. And only for an hour."

"Just get some sleep!" Mustang ushered her out of the office. "Go!"

"Yes, sir," Satori shuffled off down the hall.

She woke up– by her pocket watch– a half hour after falling into a restless sleep on the couch in the common room. A soldier stood above her in the uniform of the military. She had never seen him before, but she recognized him by his green eyes.

"Hello, Envy." She didn't get up.

"How is Ryokou?" Envy asked, sitting on the back of the couch.

"He still won't find out about any of this," Satori said firmly. "Not any of my past, or who his father is."

"I've learned to not push the issue," Envy held a hand up in defense. "How are you? You look tired."

"You care?" Satori laughed. "That's good for a chuckle or two."

"I'm quite serious," Envy let his hand brush a hair from her brow. "We must have our test subjects in mint condition. If you get too tired, that could pose a problem to our research."

"Yet another section to add to your charts." Satori got up, sitting with her head in a hand. "Why am I talking to you? It's been six months since any of you talked to me. There must be something you want."

Envy smiled. She hated that smile.

"Edward is coming home," he said.

"Really?" Satori pretended not to care. "Back from that non-alchemic world? Aren't you there too?"

"A part of me," Envy shrugged. "I was able to convince a civilian alchemist to help me strap a piece of my soul to a body of one of the military's dogs for a short while each month to check in on you."

"How touching," Satori got off the couch and stretched. "When is he getting back?"

"Winry and Scieszka are going to tap into the secretary's phone," Envy said. "Then Winry will get a briefcase with automail to repair Edward's limbs, and then his plane will come through the portal created between their world and ours."

"So?" Satori said. "He's a big boy. By default he is older than I am. You want me to go to him, don't you?"

"No," Envy said. His eyes snapped from green, to brown, to green. "I am fading back to the other world. Just know he will be back, sweet slave."

He walked around the couch, sweeping her into his arms. He kissed her then. She clung to him. It wasn't that she liked their kisses. She hated the bastard. But she had developed a subconscious need for them. She had become someone she didn't like at all.

"I knew you'd warm to me," Envy parted them.

"Don't count your chickens," Satori wiped her mouth.

He kissed her once more, then the man whome he had inhabited for a short while slumped into her arms, out cold. She lay him on the couch, and went to relieve Mustang of her child.

"He was an angel," Mustang smiled as she approached. "Just sat playing with his toys! How'd you get him to be so good? Hughes– he couldn't get Elicia to do that even if he had tried."

"I didn't do anything, he just knows." Satori came around the desk, giving Mustang's shoulder a reassuring pat. "And don't worry: Gracia's doing okay. I'm sorry you lost such a good friend."

"No need to pity an old man," Mustang got up. "Oh, and a mission arrived for you while you were asleep. Something about going to see a woman named Lyra, from what I could make out at a glance." He scratched his head as he walked away. "I've heard that name before..."

She looked down at the file. Opening it, she read through it with the speed of a highly trained specialist. Lyra. So she was being watched. Looks like the bastard hadn't been lying. Someone higher up was taking action.

"Honey, go over to Armstrong's office, okay?" she said to Ryokou. "Mommy has some business to do."

"Hai," Ryo picked up his three blocks and toddled off down the hall.

She waited until Armstrong received him, and gave her a thumbs up. She smiled her thanks and set off in the opposite direction.

She entered a ruined building. A brick clump crashed on her right, but she didn't flinch. She saw a person bent over in one corner. As she approached, the figure straightened, holding a bundle of weeds.

"Weeds not suit you, Lyra?" Satori stopped a few feet behind the other woman. "Or should I say Dante? Which do you feel better suited to?"

"Dante is fine," Dante replied. "Lyra died when I took her body. Unfortunately, I will need a new one soon, I am crumbling to bits."

"How did you get out of Gluttony?"

"You just have to know the right doors to check."

They were silent. Dante bent down and laid out the weeds in a crescent shape between them.

"I hear you were reborn?" Dante inquired, laying out each individual weed now.

"That is not your concern," Satori answered curtly. "Why am I here?"

"This and that." Dante smiled at her handiwork.

Satori waited for a proper answer.

"I need you to plant an alchemic rope on young Elric for me."

"Which one?"

"Edward. He will choose to go back to the other world to close his side of the portal. I need a trail to be left between the worlds so I can go through and find a new body, then live a life without alchemy."

"You won't give it up just like that," Satori laughed.

"The lengths one goes to live are drastic," Dante looked her in the eye, standing up. "I am willing to give up alchemy once I acquire a new body and get to the other side. I don't want to hurt anyone anymore, Satori-sama," here she curtsied, "I would be forever in your debt if you did this last favor for me."

Satori looked down at the curtsied figure of a once powerful alchemist. She taught Izumi Curtis, Ed and Al's teacher, she probably taught many other before that. She was old and tired, and needed help to find a good ending to a long life.

"All right," Satori agreed. "But on one condition."

"Anything!" Dante stood up, smiling. A sincere smile that struck Satori with surprise.

"Take me and my child with you."

"You and a child?" Dante asked, aghast. "With whome did you have the child?"

"Envy, if you must know," she was getting cross. "Do we have a deal?"

Dante looked Satori over.

"You will not double-cross me?" She asked.

"No, you have my word as a State."

"Then it is agreed."

They shook hands.

Satori held Ryokou's hand as they walked the grounds to their apartment. She had changed the guest room into Ryo's bedroom when he was born, and it changed quite often.

She unlocked the door and ushered them both inside. Putting her briefcase on the table, and laying her jacket across the seat of a chair, she rolled up her sleeves and went to cook dinner.

"What do you want tonight, Ryo?" she looked down at Ryo, clad in a small apron.

"Okanomijyaki(pan-fry cake w/ veggies, meat, and egg)," he replied.

"I wish you would get out of this phase," Satori told him, getting out the ingredients. "Really, Ryo, you can understand English, why not speak it?"

He just gave her a blank look. She sighed. He could be so stubborn in his moods. First it was the "mine" phase at the age of one– God, that had been awful– and now this.

She finished preparing the dish, and let it simmer for a moment.

"What to drink?" she pondered to herself. "No sake(alcoholic beverage)...what do you think, Ryo?"

"Ryokucha(green tea)!" he clapped his hands excitedly.

"Green tea it is." She put on the kettle.

Going back into the dining room, she looked through her briefcase. Nothing in there that couldn't be done after dinner. She stopped to look at the picture of her, Rikuno, Ed, and Al she had attached with a paper clip to the top flap. Sighing again, she closed the flap and went to take dinner off the stove.

Serving it, she poured the tea. She balanced the food on a tray she then balanced on her head. She picked up the tea in each hand– pot in one, cups in another. She walked to the table and carefully set it all down. Ryo sat down, waiting for his mom.

She sat down.

"Tamasii(soul),domo agrigato (thank you very much)."

"Youkoso(welcome)," Satori replied, bowing her head.

They sat down and began to eat.

Over the next few days, Satori worked hard to finish everything that might tie her to the world she inhabited. She had many second thoughts about what she and Dante were going to do. Knowing Dante, the woman had no regrets at what she was about to do. But Satori thought of all she would leave behind. Unless she was able to find a way to create a portal or telephone between the two worlds, she was as good as a normal person.

She thought several times of telling Mustang, or Armstrong. But in the end she shunned the idea. They would only try to talk her out of it, and in the end she realized it was indeed the right course to take. She would start a new life, with Ryokou, and settle down with a normal job. No more dog of the military, no more pawn of non-humans.

She smiled to herself as she put aside the last of her paperwork for that day. Looking at the pile of paperwork for the next day did not dampen her spirits.

She got up and stretched. In two years she had gone from second-youngest state alchemist to deskman with a kid in tow. What had become of her? Without the homunculi making a fuss, and only a few wars that needed attending to, she was just another hired hand.

When would they act? When exactly would Ed get here? There questions swum around behind her closed lids as she leaned back in her chair.

"Satori!" Mustang sounded annoyed as she came slowly back to reality.

"Yes, sir?" she asked.

"Where is your report on your last assignment??"

"I didn't know it had been deemed an assignment, sir," Satori blinked.

"Well get on it, I want it on my desk before you clock out!"

"Yes, sir."

He left, leaving her with her humming computer and a pile of papers.

"What to write?" She wondered. "It's not like I can openly state what happened out there."

She made a decision, typed out her report in one and a half pages, printed it, and left it on Mustang's desk later that afternoon.

She was drinking coffee in the break room when they barged in.

"What is this??" Mustang threw her report down on the table.

"It appears to be my report, sir." She took another nonchalant sip of her coffee.

"It's crap!" he corrected. "No one could just sit in a coffee shop and talk about old times! The Fuhrer would never send someone on a mission to do that!"

"Either he did, or it wasn't a real mission."

This made Mustang pause.

"Rikuno Nishi!" he bellowed.

"You called, sir?" Rikuno entered the lounge, hands in pockets.

"What do you make of this?" he handed her the report.

"Appears to be a report, sir."

"Is it a mission report?"

"It is labeled as such, sir."

"But all it is is about talking and old times! Does that sound like a mission to you?"

"Neither did killing a brother sir, but that wasclassified as a mission."

Mustang thought a moment, then nodded.

"Yes, I remember. Seiji was quite upset."

Rikuno and Satori exchanged looks.

"May I continue my break now, sir?" Satori asked, calmly.

"When do you normally go home, Lt. Colonel?"

"Around two thirty, why?"

"I would like to speak with you in my office before you head off."

"Yes, sir."

Envy sat on Bradley's desk, grinning.

"Do you think she's guessed yet?" he smirked.

"I don't think so," Pride said from the window.

"The whole story of Ed coming back, and me being on the other side of the Gate!" Envy laughed. "She should know better!"

"Her hopes are high, and she has no reason to doubt now." Pride pointed out. "She has a child now, and her mind is preoccupied. Having not seen Edward for some time has caused her to believe he is no longer in this world. She would assume he is on the other side of the portal."

"What do you think she'll do when she realizes Edward is really just over by East HQ?"

"We'll set things up before that time comes."

She had left Ryokou with Armstrong again. She couldn't bear showing him to her parents, and telling them how he came to be hers, and how they had become grandparents. It would break their hearts.

She stood on the platform of the Central train station. She was going to go see her parents on their Alpine home. It had once been her home too, but she had left it at fourteen and never really looked back.

Well, almost.

She had killed her brother, Jiyuu, when he tried to kill her, and her uncle Uagane too. Her uncle Tsuba had been lucky to die in the battle field, a true samurai defending his country.

The train pulled into the station. She got on it.

"What brings you to our door?" he mother asked.

"I have come to tell you something."

"Then, speak!" he father laughed. "What is it?"

"I..." she bit her lip. Maybe she should have brought Ryokou after all. "...had a child."

Her father nearly spit out his tea, and her mother simply sat there, mouth agape.

"Pardon?"Otou coughed.

"His name is Ryokou. He is now your grandson. I am sorry I did not tell you sooner." She bowed a formal samurai bow.

Otou stared at her. Standing there in his casual Japanese robe, he looked like a warlord about to punish a disciple.

"I cannot be angry with you, Seiji," he sighed, sitting at the table with them. "It is only right you and Ed–"

"It's not his! I mean: Ryo is not his child!"

"Who's is he then, besides yours?" Onaaasked.

Satori merely looked ay her father.

"He didn't!" Otouexclaimed. "That cretin! He got you pregnant?!"

"I am afraid so, father. Ryo is a bastard. It is nothing if not my own fault."

"It is no fault of yours," Onaasaid, hugging her daughter. "It is only his. Envy should not have done such a thing to you."

Satori looked at her father again.

"I told her everything," Otouexplained.

Satori nodded. "So neither of you are mad at me? I am sorry I have not told you sooner, but..."

"It is all right, Yabusame," Onaareassured. "It is not your fault, and I am sure the child does not have any of his father's...tendencies."

"I have raised him better than that!" Satori said. "He is my son! He may look like Envy, but he doesn't know about any of it. I won't tell him."

"What if he gets older, and more curious?" her father asked. "Even then, doesn't he have a right to know? Is it not his birthright?"

This caused Satori pause. She had not thought of that. That by not speaking of the issue around Ryokou, that she would prevent any unwanted questions. That she would never have to tell him anything.

"I never thought of that."

"He will deserve to know someday."

"But until then I will keep him sheltered; when he finds out, I do not want him to hate me."

"He will dislike you for a time, just as you disliked us for keeping your brother a secret from you– but the world will be kind to you, and things will get better."

"I hope you are right."

Oh, she dearly did.