The Flight of Icarus

by Grave Destroyer of Souls

He has no idea who he is aside from his first name, he doesn't know how he can shape matter just by putting his hands together, and not even the School can explain his metal limbs. It's only natural that Ed would tag along with Max's flock in hopes that a trip to New York would solve their mysteries. Begins to substantially deviate from The Angel Experiment starting in chapter 8.

1. Prologue: The Sea of Blood

Flight of Icarus
Prologue: The Sea of Blood

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Viewpoint: Unnamed School resident; dream/flashback.

I'm standing in a sea of blood that's up to my knees while I put the finishing touches on an intricate design of blood on a huge stone slab. It's a circle with many runes scribbled on the outside.

Bringing God down to Earth… I ponder what I'm about to do; transmuting oneself is no easy task. My eyes wander to several stone tablets piled on the stone slab. From the assumption that they were all one piece at one time, they depicted a beast of some kind about to swallow the sun.

A dagger of pain hitting my broken left arm reminds me what I have to do.

"It's finished," I say. "If I transmute myself, you two jump in, and we use the Philosopher's stone-" I glance at a huge fiend lurking in the shadows. "-to pay the toll, we should emerge from the same place where we were taken. In other words-"

"Gluttony's stomach," says a boy around my age, to the opposite side of the fiend. Ling's right, but he's not done. "What do those stone tablets symbolize, Ed?"

I glance at the tablets. "The two intertwined dragons were upside-down; that symbolizes throwing God to Earth."

"Throwing God to Earth? That's a high concept for mere humans to think of," says Ling.

"Well, the tablet also depicts a lion about to swallow the Sun. That symbolizes the Philosopher's Stone. This should allow me to transmute myself, using Envy's Stone as a toll."

Envy- the fiend- lumbers over to the stone slab. "Then stop talking roundabout, Fullmetal. This-" He opens up his mouth, showing a pulsing red stone connected to indistinct white shapes. "-is what you really want. Isn't it? Get us out of here-" He sucks down the red stone. "-and I'll tell you about Cselkcess."

I sigh, and force my left arm towards my right. My fingers bend and stiffen as I hold back the pain.

When my hands meet, I let the power flow from within me into the circle.

The lightning and howling wind come, but there's something else- something wrong. I feel a dark presence under my feet.

"Envy! Ling! Jump in!" I yell. They follow my order without hesitation- I'm the alchemist who's getting them out, after all. The feeling swells and I fill with dread. Something's definitely happening. The ground underneath me flashes, and my legs start to be deconstructed. But this time, it's painful. Envy isn't faring much better, and Ling is almost gone.

What happens next comes in a furious wave. We're deposited in front of the Gate; Truth sneers and waves us through, taking a handful of souls from Envy, and the brain attack comes. My brain is crammed with knowledge- secrets of life and some things I already know, rapidly being shoved into my head. Through the onslaught of knowledge, I glimpse Envy, being transformed back to his human form. Ling is yelling in pain. We slowly are separated as the pain in my head builds. I scream and I'm catapulted into a strange portal.

I emerge, but the next three seconds flash by. I'm thrown through a lab and smack my head into a cage. The world darkens, and the last thing I see is a winged girl of about ten inside the cage peering down on me with a curious expression.