"What," Roy Mustang sighed. "Is this?" He would like to say that this was a typical Monday morning for him, but of course it wouldn't be. It was only nine in the morning and he could already feel a headache coming.

The Fullmetal Alchemist stood in front of his desk, looking embarrased of all things, and if Roy was going to guess, he'd say that Alphonse was also not in the best of moods.

"Well, what does it look like?" Ed snapped.

"You tell me, Fullmetal." Roy retorted. He honestly had no idea what the horror in front of him could be described as.

"They're the homunculi, Sir." Al said.

"I can see that. Why are they... like that?" He asked, trailing off as he stared at the scene in front of him.

Ed and Al looked uncomfortable as what could only be described as baby homunculi clambered over Al's armour and pulled on Ed's hair.

"Well," Roy hid his smirk behind his glove. "One could say that it's your own fault for having your hair so long."

"Shut up, Bastard!" Ed yelled. Envy, who had been swinging on Ed's braid happily repeated the new word.

"Bastard, Bastard, Bastard!" He chriped happily, probably enjoying the look of rage that was now on the Colonel's face. Now it was Ed's turn to try not to laugh.

"Alright," Roy's eyebrow twitched. He could barely keep his anger out of his voice. "How did this happen?"

Ed scratched the back of his head sheepishly. "Well..."


"Hah," Envy laughed as he literally came out of no where. "Did you miss me?"

"Envy?" Ed asked. "Wait, where did you come from?"

"Eh, that doesn't matter." The homunculous shrugged. "Pipsqueak, I can't kill you but-"

"WHO ARE YOU CALLING SO SMALL THAT YOU DON'T NEED TO FIGHT HIM 'CAUSE YOU CAN TREAD ON HIM?!"

"Brother," Al said, "Don't get mad, he's doing it on purpose."

"Yeah, I know." Ed spat. "No excuse. I'll kill him."

"Will you really now?" Lust stepped out of the shadows, standing beside Envy.

"Lust?" Envy asked. "Why are you here? I can handle the runt and the tin man by myself."

"Tin man?" Al whispered, hurt.

"You're needed back at HQ." Lust told him.

"Lust... I'm hungry, can I eat the big guy?" Gluttony whined, also coming out of the shadows

"Three of them?" Ed screamed. "We have to deal with all three of them?"

"Brother, this doesn't look good." Al said, sounding worried.

"Yeah, we might be in trouble." Ed grunted, looking at the three arguing homunculi.

"Might be? You'll have to fight all three of us!" Envy crowed, somehow having heard him.

"We can't kill them." Lust reminded Envy sharply.

"Yeah, yeah." He grumbled. "Fact remains, we still get to fight. I really don't like the short one, he's annoying!"

"WHO ARE YOU CALLING SHORT?"

"YOU, MIDGET!"

"Really, Envy?"

"Brother, please calm down."

Unfortunately, neither Ed nor Envy paid any attention to Lust and Alphonse.

"Lust..." Gluttony complained. "When can I eat them?"

"You can't." Lust snapped. "They're human sacrifices."

"Aww."

Suddenly, a bright light filled the room, making human, armour and homuculous alike cry out. When it finally faded, Ed looked around, trying to pinpoint what caused it or what had changed. The first thing Ed noticed was that Al was alright, so the tugging on his trousers was a suprise to him.

"WHAT THE HELL?" He wailed, completely freaking out when he saw a baby Envy clinging to his leg.

"Brother? Are you okay?" Al called, still disorientated from the light.

"No, this is unnatural." Ed screamed.

"Huh, brother, what is this?"

"The homonculi..." Ed's dramatic pause was completely ruined as Envy started climbing up his leg, "have turned into babies."

(Flashback over)


"That's all well and good," Roy was barely keeping his temper in check, "but why have you brought them here?"

"Well." Ed was smirking now. "What is it that you're always telling me? Oh yeah, 'Fullmetal, you sometimes need to bring evidence with your reports. It is simply unacceptable.'"

Roy wasn't sure whether to be offended by the expression the boy wore when saying what he did, or the horrible impression of his voice. He did not sound like a five year old on sugar.

"Bringing evidence with your reports... When did I ever say that?" Roy muttered.

"Just now, Sir!" Havoc called from where he had decided to wait outside. Roy wondered if Hawkeye would notice him casually dumping all of his paperwork on his subordinate's desk. She probably would.

"Well, this is the perfect time to finish them off." He tried. Yes, it would be low to kill them when they were like this... But... Who was he kidding? He wasn't sure he would be able to do it. Not again.

"We can't, anyway." Ed said dully. "Their regeneration abilities have tripled."

"How do you know?" He was more than curious now. Especially if Fullmetal's expression was anything to go by.

"Lust managed to get a papercut. It healed before we noticed it happened, but that didn't stop her from screaming." Ed muttered sourly, glaring holes in the floor.

"I see." He smirked. He had a plan. "Well, looks like we'll have to babysit them, then. By we, I mean you. Have fun." He then proceeded to pretend that he couldn't see the brothers over his paperwork.

"Sir, it would be irresponsible for you to leave two young boys caring for three infants." Riza Hawkeye said sternly, stepping into his office, with another stack of paperwork.

"What?" He asked, not believing that this was happening to him.

"You'll take care of one, I'll take the other, and the Elric brothers will care for the one currently clinging to Edward's leg." She nodded, picking up Lust and leaving. Just like that, he was stuck caring for Gluttony.


Al had excused himself as fast as humanly possible the second they were out of the Colonel's office. Ed couldn't really blame him, considering Envy was starting to sing in his childlike voice. It was incredibly loud and the song was very rude.

"Uh, Envy, shut up." He said quickly, trying to ignore the dirty looks he was getting from passing officers.

"Why?" He questioned with huge eyes full of childlike innocence.

"Because what you were just singing was very rude." He hissed, eye twitching.

"What's rude?" Envy asked sweetly.

Ed cringed at how out of character the homunculous was. "Something not to be repeated in public." He said, for lack of a better explanation and too lazy to come up with one.

"What's public?" After everything, Envy was proving that he could still be evil. All the questions were slowly driving Ed insane. By now they had left the HQ and were aimlessly wondering around the town.

"In front of people. Like me." Ed said quickly.

"People... Am I a person?" That question made Ed turn sharply and look at the homunculous. The child looked so innocent and young that Ed couldn't quite bear to crush his hopes. He could practically hear the older Envy laughing at him as he replied.

"Yes." He managed to say.

"Yay!" The child cheered. Just then, the clock in the town chimed to announce that it was now, indeed twelve o'clock. Just then, Ed remembered something very important about twelve o'clock. Something that would earn him a wrench to the head.

"Oh crap! I'm supposed to meet Winry at the train station." He yelped, running, making a startled Envy clinging to his hair. Sadly, the child soon got over his shock and realised the wonderful new word in his vocabulary.

"Crap! Crap! Crap! Crap!" He chanted gleefully, making Ed swear even more.


Winry had been searching the crowds for several minutes by the time she managed to spot Ed. He looked suspiciously out of breath, but waved to her cheerily none the less. She smiled and rushed over, slipping the wrench back into her pocket. He was here, so he clearly hadn't forgotten.

"Hey Ed!" She chirped.

"Hi. What's wrong? Why are you happy." He joked.

"No reason." She decided to ignore his comment about her being happy. She was always happy, she must've hit him with the wrench too hard last time. Suddenly, she noticed movement by his legs.

A small child was hiding behind him. They had spikey hair that was such a dark green that it seemed black. Then he was wearing a short top and what looked like a skirt. It was weird, really weird. Why did Ed have a child with him?

"Ed?" She asked, tone turning dangerous. She was pleased to see him go pale. Maybe he had seen her reach for her wrench after all.

"It's, uh... Hard to explain." He said quickly.

"Oh please." She scoffed. "You used that excuse last time."

Ed gulped. "Can I explain later?"

Winry paused to think. She did need to book into a hotel. He could explain once she did it.

"So you decided to look after them?" Winry asked. She had calmed down a lot after hearing his story. "That's kind of sweet."

"Yeah, well... It was either that or let them roam free." Ed, for some reason, wasn't looking at her. Winry was about to ask why, but she was interrupted by Envy.

"Hi!" He smiled at her.

"Aww, hi." She smiled back.

"Do you like Ed?" Envy asked, sounding innocent, but a certain alchemist knew better.

"What?" She asked still smiling.

"Do you like Ed?" He repeated, while Ed was getting ready to kill something. Winry didn't notice.

"Yeah, he's my childhood friend. An idiot, but yeah." She shrugged. Envy's evil smirk just looked cute... Well, until he decided to speak again...

"You like Ed... Kiss!"


Roy sighed. He had tried to get his paperwork done, but the child sitting on his desk wasn't making anything easier. Seriously, he was drooling all over the desk. Roy was going to need another box of tissues if he wanted to keep his desk clean.

"I'm hungry." Gluttony whined.

"There's no food here." Roy muttered, trying to focus. Hawkeye would shoot him again if he didn't get this done. Plus, he really didn't get along well with children. "You'll have to wait for another ten minutes."

He turned back to the sheet he was working on, mentally groaning. At least this one was nearly done... Wait, where was it? Roy panicked. He hadn't imagined that entire sheet had he? No, that couldn't be it.

There was a loud chewing sound, that made Roy look up slowly. Gluttony was eating a sheet. He was... eating the paperwork!

"You know, it probably isn't good for you to eat that." Roy said, still in shock.

"But it tastes so good!" Gluttony managed between gulps.

"Well," Roy began, a plan forming in the back of his mind, "there's plenty of it if you really like it."

"You're the best!" Gluttony cheered, and started grabbing all the papers he could. Roy smirked. What paperwork?


Riza Hawkeye found the whole 'looking after random children' thing to be no problem. The reason for this was probably that Lust really liked Black Hayaye. She was perfectly happy to play with the dog and let Riza do her paperwork.

Then again, they did talk a little bit. Mostly about simple things like the weather. Riza finished her paper work and turned to smile at Lust. "We should probably go and see how the Colonel is doing."

"Okay." Lust said cheerfully.

They entered the office, to see Mustang smirking and Gluttony laughing.

"Hello Lust!" Gluttony said happily. Riza raised an eyebrow at the empty desk.

"With all due respect Sir, there is no way you completed all that paperwork." She said, reaching for her gun.

"W-what? Of couse I did. It'd be here if I hadn't done it." He smiled winningly. Well, he thought so... Riza, not so much.

"Sir, where did you put the paperwork?" She asked calmly.

"No where! How was Lust?" He asked, desperately changing the subject.

"She behaved well. I wonder how the Elric brothers are doing?" She replied.

"Who knows? They'd better not turn up with even more of these things tomorrow." Poor Roy had no idea what was coming...


Ling, Lan Fan and Fu had been walking around Centeral, trying to pinpoint the odd presence they felt. A man in a military uniform wearing an eyepatch had been following them, and they had barely avoided him the last time by ducking behind someone in a suit of armour who was picking up stay cats.

Ling rounded a corner only to come face to face with the man. Lan Fan let out a cry of alarm and rushed forwards, but didn't get very far. Suddenly, there was a bright flash of light... The man with the eyepatch was now a child with an eyepatch.

"Lan Fan, did he just turn into a child?" Ling asked flatly, pointing at the kid, who was now crawling towards the swords that had fallen to the ground.

"It appears so, my lord." She said,

"Then," Ling grinned, "he might be immortal!"