NOTE THAT YOU MUST READ BEFORE READING THIS FANFIC: This is an Alternate Universe fic. Conquerers of Shamballa happened, but the brothers found their way back. Mmmkay? Mmmkay.
Tales of the Neo Alchemists
Prologue
Somewhere in the deep country...
Thunder, rain, a darkened castle deep within a thick forest far beyond the borders of Central, and nowhere near close to Liore.In the castle a madman stood in a laboratory. His grey, grizzled features were drawn up in a maniacal smile as he recited chants of an ancient, long forgotten art. A dead art, dead in the days of Alchemy, dead in the days of no Alchemy. Tonight, he was to reach his victory, and then his true test would begin. This would be a reawakening for the world. His world. He would make it his world. Four pairs of violet eyes watched in the darkness as their master did his work.
Several months later, Central, Early 1970s
"Does that hurt Tanya?" asked a kind voice as Tanya Hamall sat in a doctor's office. The young Ishbal girl shook her head.
"No, it doesn't. I think they're fine now." she replied cheerfully. It was true, she was completely void of pain.
"You've really got to stop playing in that old warehouse. You don't know how stable those catwalks are, you might walk away with more than three broken ribs next time." the doctor chastized. Tanya sighed.
"Oh, come on Alph...Dr.Elric! You can't tell me you didn't have any sense of adventure when you were my age." Tanya protested. She had thankfully caught herself before she'd called her doctor by his fist name. Dr. Elric chuckled.
"Well, you know how it is." he said with the sort of shrewd amusement that came from nostalgia. Tanya was sixteen, Al had lost all sense of adventure by then. "You run along now."
Tanya nodded, and like that she was out of Al's hair.Al sighed as the young woman left. Adventure. Those had been the days. It had been quite an adventure getting home too. Al and Ed had attempted to close the gate after over two years of researching, but as it turned out, to close the gate, all that had come through had to be put in their rightful place. The two had returned home. Unfortunately, their reunion with all of their old friends was short lived. About a month after their return Ed had been brutally murdered in his sleep by an Ishbal man who considered himself to be following in Scar's footsteps. He'd drugged Ed while he slept, then stabbed him in fifty-two different places, the coriner had said. Al had been heartbroken.
As a result, Al had given up Alchemy.
But he wasn't alone, as it turned out. After Colonel Mustang had destroyed the gate, and the people saw how much damage Alchemy could really cause, it became slightly disdained, then taboo, then it died. Al hadn't missed it. He went to school, got his doctrine, and never bothered with the art again.
Little did he know, he'd soon need it.
Uldirk Faustino was an artist, or at least he considered himself to be one. He was a fantastical artist of the forgotten art of Alchemy, and many others. He could create, he could destroy, and the world would come to fear him. He was a god among men. No, he wasn't a god, he was God. He was God because he could create life. And that life would usher in a new world. But in order for a new one to begin, an old one had to end. For that, he needed helpers. So he made them.
The thought of the Seven Deadly Sins was tempting, but he considered them too excess. He needed a smaller number. He needed an apocalypse, and four horsemen to usher it in.
So he made them.