Upon opening his weary, tired eyes one morning, the first thing that Edward Elric sees is a peculiar device sitting on his desk. When he walks over to the desk to inspect it, he finds a note attached to the top of the device.

In smooth, blood-red letters, the note reads:

Hello, sleepyhead. Maybe you should stop leaving the window open when you're in bed.

This machine right here happens to be called a laptop. I took the liberty of logging you in, but the laptop's asleep, just as you are. Press the button that says 'on'- I've seen your library, and I'll assume you're smart enough to know how to read- and take a look at what I've left up for you. You're going to enjoy this.

Sweet dreams, Elric.

If you can ever sleep peacefully again after seeing all of this.

Edward reads the note several times. He's still convinced, at least in part, that he's asleep, and that this whole thing is just a bizarre dream. That is, he's convinced of this until his metal leg collides with one of the legs of his chair, sending him hurdling into the hardwood floor of his bedroom.

He supposes there's a reason that this surface is called hardwood. The pain that jolts through his body lets him know that all of this real.

Who could have left this here? Ed thinks to himself for a moment. Winry's asleep in her own bedroom right now, judging by the soft snores he hears from down the hall. Anyway, she wouldn't dare climb in through Edward's bedroom window. One night, Ed had locked himself out of the house and had to climb in through her window, and she'd whacked him with the wrench so many times that Ed almost had needed more automail.

Who else could have done this?

Of course. It has to have been Al.

Al had recently returned from Xing, where he'd been studying alkahestry with Mai Chang and Ling. The three of them, plus Lan Fan, had come back to Amestris a few days ago on business. Al had opted to stay with Ed and Winry instead of in a hotel, wanting to get in some 'quality bonding time' with his brother and his now-fiancé Winry before the quartet went back across the desert to Xing in a few weeks.

This laptop, or whatever the hell it was, must be some Xingese trinket that Al decided to try and prank me with. But the joke's on him, because I figured it out! Oh well, I might as well have a good laugh with him about this over breakfast, and then we can all forget about this.

Ed smirks as he walks downstairs, silently praising himself for being so clever as to figure out the weird game his younger brother was trying to play.

He finds Al (who was now looking significantly healthier than he had the day he'd gotten his body back, to Edward's great relief) sleeping on the couch, one thumb in his mouth and a smile on his face. Ed cannot stop himself from chuckling at this baby-like behavior.

"Al," he whispers. But, because he's Edward Elric and he couldn't be quiet even if someone were to put him on mute, it comes out as almost a yell. Al jumps up in shock, his warm brown eyes widening.

"Brother, why would you wake me up?" Al asks pitifully, trying to rub the sleep from his face. "You know I haven't readjusted to Amestrian time yet."

Ed might feel guilty ordinarily, but he just laughs as he replies, "You're probably just tired because of the prank you tried to pull on me last night. It was a pretty good attempt- you genuinely scared me for a couple of minutes, until I figured out what game you were playing."

"I wasn't playing any game. What are you talking about, Ed? Is this because I beat you at chess again yesterday at dinner?"

"I TOTALLY LET YOU TAKE MY KING!" Ed shouts defensively. "AND MUSTANG'S THE ONLY NERD AROUND HERE WHO CARES ABOUT CHESS."

As Edward trains (in vain) to defend his own honor, he comes to the realization that Al doesn't know any more about this strange 'laptop' than he does.

Unfortunately for the two brothers, it's at this moment that a wrench soars through the air, boomerang-style, and hits the both of them in the head before it flies back Winry's hands. Ed's pretty sure that a wrench acting as a boomerang completely defies gravity as he knows it, but he doesn't point it out.

"What are you two doing down here, making so much noise this early?" Winry snaps, but she's mostly glaring at her bedhead-sporting future husband as she does so. Al knows better than to interrupt her beauty sleep. "What game are we talking about? I'm sorry about the chess, Edward, sweetheart. Just let it go."

"THIS HAS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH CHESS, WINRY. It has absolutely EVERYTHING to do with this note that some creep left for me while I was asleep, along with this weird electronic thing. Here, both of you guys read the note and tell me what you think about it."

So, after Al and Winry read the note together, their brows furrowing with confusion, they glance at Ed blankly.

"That's scary, brother. Maybe we should call General Mustang and see if he heard about a breaking-and-entering last night," Al says.

"Or maybe we should do what the note says," Winry adds, flipping the laptop open and following the directions on the note. "The page is loading… Oh my gosh, that's hilarious!"

Winry is now doubled-over with laughter. She manages to point to the now-loaded screen before she bursts into another chuckling fit. Al and Ed both rush over to the laptop and take in what's on the screen.

A blue bar at the top of the screen reads 'Fanfiction- unleash your imagination'. In the upper right-hand corner, some nickname or codeword or something says 'one_you_in_all_universes'. Apparently, that's the codename for the person whose account they're viewing. Ed struggles to use the bizarre little… navigation thing (a label reading 'mouse' is attached to it; Ed's not sure if that's the name of the device, or if it's actually just a convoluted short joke) to close out of the page, but hitting 'x' doesn't change anything.

"Brother," Al gasps next to him, "read the page."

So the brothers read as Winry finally stops laughing, trying to regain her composure.

"What the fuck?" Ed bursts out. "The description on this thing here says 'Edward Elric and his younger brother Alphonse find themselves in high school, where they must band together to avoid the girls that want to make out with our popular male duo. Modern day, Highschool!Au, AlxEd.'"

"Let's read part of it," Al suggests. But the brothers don't get more than a paragraph into it before they find themselves clammering to the bathrooms to wash the taste of vomit out of their mouths.

"I can't believe the author of that abomination had us MAKE OUT WITH EACH OTHER IN THE FIRST DAMN SCENE," Ed rubs soap over his tongue, regretting the words as soon as they leave his mouth.

"I believe the author referred to it as… Elricest?" Al shudders. "That's a clever portmanteau, I guess. Well, we might as well click through the rest of those things, see what else is there."

With Winry, they read more of those Truth-forsaken things (fanfictions, they seem to be called). Among the ten they look over, 4 of them involve new, made-up alchemists that seem to have no idea how alchemy actually works; one of them is another Elricest (they skip reading that one, of course); another 2 or so are alternate endings to something or another ("But Ed," Al had inquired confusedly, "how can the story be over when we're still living it?"); and then the next two involve some female version of Ed (nicknamed Fem!Ed).

Upon seeing female Ed at play, Ed curses the heavens and shouts, "WHY DOES EVERYONE THINK THAT A MAN WITH LONG, FABULOUSLY BRAIDED LOCKS MUST WANT TO BE FEMALE? I LIKE LOOKING GOOD, DAMMIT!"

Al has to pull Ed and Winry away from the laptop, as they're both trying to brutally maim the poor machine.

The tenth result, though, is by far the worst. Ed's normally golden-tan skin turns several shades more pale as he reads the description.

In a voice filled with horror, Edward whispers, "You don't mean… me and Roy… dating? What kind of sadist wants me to date that bastard?"

"A lot of people, apparently." Al nods as he continues. "The next two results involve your anniversary with Roy and your father-son relationship, respectively."

"ED! YOU WERE CHEATING ON ME WITH ROY? A WRENCH ISN'T GOING TO BE ENOUGH FOR THIS!" Winry yells, even more loudly than Ed has ever yelled before.

"YOU THINK I WOULD ACTUALLY DATE COLONEL- I MEAN, GENERAL- BASTARD? I HAVE SOME DIGNITY, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!

"But I know someone who doesn't have that same level of dignity." A dark look passes across Ed's features, and then a wicked smirk dances on his lips. "We're going to Central HQ right now, you guys. Winry, take your whole toolbox with you."

~FMAB~

"Edward Elric!" A man behind the front desk calls in surprise. "I thought we'd never see you here again, seeing how you said that you couldn't do alchemy anymore and you wanted to go do some independent research..." Ed's golden glare makes the man shut up, and he stammers the next bit. "Um, well, w-who do you want to m-m-meet with? Please, don't kill me, I have a wife and children!"

"I don't even know who you are," Ed says flatly. "Is Mustang in his office?"

"He may be in a meeting, but… if it convinces you to so generously spare my life, then I'll send you up right now."

Al smiles nervously at the man behind the desk, who proceeds to burst into tears. In a few moments, the Elrics and Winry are standing outside of Mustang's office. They can hear some slightly muffled voices discussing something… Al thinks it's probably some national security matter of the utmost importance, but from what Ed can hear, it's a waste of time.

"Um, General Mustang?" A female voice (Ed knows that voice) inquires. "According to this survey, your recent surge of facial hair has led to a rapid drop in your approval rating, particularly with the female population. We highly advise you to shave it, for the good of this nation."

"What? MY MUSTACHE IS TRENDY AND FABULOUS, AND SO IT STAYS. Besides, Risa doesn't seem to have a problem with it."

"She doesn't seem to," the female voice explains impatiently, "but I assure you that her guns have been much more… well-loaded recently."

"How do you know that? Can your psychic powers really tell that much?"

"It doesn't take a psychic to make that assumption. I've been in her office enough lately to know that she's ordered a lot of boxes of ammunition, most of which are now half-empty."

Of course- the female voice is that of Anastasia Owens, the Truthseeker Alchemist. Ed's not sure whether or not he should really consider her a friend, but they've collaborated a lot together in the past. Ana had actually seemed pretty sad to see him leave the military after the Promised Day.

In the room, Roy sighs. "Very well. Armstrong, arrange an appointment with my barber for tomorrow. Next matter of business: who's catering lunch?"

"Actually, sir," that lazy front-desk worker finally breaks into the discussion, "this meeting will have to be finished up at a later time. The Elric brothers, and the future Mrs. Edward Elric, are here to see you about something urgent."

"Very well," Roy sighs. "The meeting is adjourned. You may all leave."

As people finish filing out (thank Truth that Armstrong doesn't see them, or they'd be crushed by hugs; Ed doesn't exactly want to be touched by anyone after reading what he'd read), our trio enters the room, coming face-to-face with Mustang, Hawkeye, and Ana.

"How was Xing, Alphonse?" Hawkeye politely asks the younger Elric. But before he can reply, Ed starts to fire words at the Flame Alchemist.

"Bastard, why did you climb through my open bedroom window and leave this disgusting piece of technology on my desk last night? WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT TO ME? I've been through enough because of you, Mustang!"

"Nice to see you as well, Fullmetal," Roy says flatly. "Contrary to your belief, I have no desire to be in your bedroom."

Ed laughs, but it's not a real laugh. It's a laugh that's overflowing with hostility.

"Judging by everything you wrote on here, you'd love to be in bed with me!" Ed thrusts the laptop at Mustang. Mustang and the two women standing behind him begin to read the fanfiction. Mustang and Hawkeye look appropriately disgusted, but Ana just laughs and mutters something about fangirls, whatever those are.

"Lieutenant, I believe this may be an act of war," Mustang says stiffly. "We should notify the Fuhrer at once."

"Oh, there's more than that. Much more," Ed says bitterly.

Ana seems to actually understand how to use the laptop, so she navigates around the fanfiction site. Hawkeye and Mustang skim through the contents as she does so, and after a few minutes, Mustang's outright laughing and Hawkeye's suppressing a smile.

"You should come read this next one, Fullmetal," Mustang remarks. "It involves you and a certain Homunculi."

Ed stares at the screen in horror. "You mean, that genderless shapeshifting palm tree? How would that even WORK?"

"HEY!" A raspy, indignant voice. Suddenly, one of the chairs in the meeting room shifts into the form of an androgynous young teenager who wears skintight clothing and an annoyed expression.

"Are you saying that I'd be bad in bed, Mr. Edward Elric? I'll have you know that Lust said I was an excellent partner, and she's Lust!"

"…That's awkward," Ana says. Ed finds himself agreeing. "Anyways, Envy, I thought Mustang killed you. To properly quote the whole death-scene, he 'incinerated you to a pile of ashes'."

Envy scratches his head, looking perplexed himself. "You're right. How am I alive right now? And why would I have shifted into a CHAIR? That would be remarkably uncomfortable!"

Then, just as suddenly as Envy had appeared, several very crucial pieces of cloth disappear from his body. Everyone is now sporting nothing except for several black censor-bars so that this fiction can maintain a T rating. Judging by the spot where Envy's bars are and are not, Envy is formally a 'he'.

Mustang and Hawkeye begin to quarrel.

"GENERAL! What's going on here? I mean, I'd expect this of you, but not of the Elrics or Ana!"

"Lieutenant, what kind of a person do you think I am?"

"All of you, shut up," Ana says. "I don't quite know what's happening, but I have some idea of it. I'm quite familiar with the inner workings of the website ."

There's a moment of silence. Suprisingly, Envy's the one who ends it to ask, "Wait… so you're the one who wrote all of those things? Gee, Anastasia, I didn't think you had that in you. I'm impressed."

"I… I mean, I didn't write any of those, and I don't ship ANY of this; my fanfiction name isn't 'one_you_in_all_universes', it's 'Smiles for Miles!'" Upon saying that last bit, Ana claps one hand over her mouth.

"Miles, as in that friendly part-Ishbalan doctor from Briggs?" Winry asks.

Ana looks ashamed. "Everything I write is Miles and Olivier, okay? I mean, Miles is just so incredibly handsome, and with those goggles and those gravity-defying sideburns of his…"

"If it's at all possible, I don't think I want to hear any more of this," Hawkeye says, sparing Ana some further humiliation.

"I apologize. What I was trying to say was that I'm familiar with this site, and I think I follow this author. We can go find the stories this user has published, and if I'm correct, I know the titles of everything this author has posted."

Ed, Al, and Winry exchanges a three-way look. Then Ed says, "I watched you working the… mouse, I think it's called. I think I know how to use it now. Tell me what to do."

They manage to find the page of 'one_you_in_all_universes'. There are five stories listed, each with so many reviews that there's no numerical value for them; instead, there's just an infinity sign.

"There should be four stories up. In order, they're called 'An Unbalanced Equivalency'; 'Homunculus 7.5'; 'Between Fantasy and Reality: Faux-Man's Land'; and 'The Spring of Amestris'."

Al reads the titles to clarify before replying, "Actually, there's five stories up. The most recent one's title is 'Fullfiction Fanservice'."

Anastasia is silent for a moment. She pushes her glasses up her small nose, then blinks.

"That's it! I know EXACTLY what's going on here! The author is actually…"

She never gets to finish her sentence, though. In an instant, she vanishes, the glasses left behind serving as the only indication that she was ever there.

"Now we'll never find out what she was gonna say!" Winry gripes. "If I use my wrench as a boomerang again, maybe it'll drag her back?"

"Forget that," Envy says to her with a wink. "How about the two of us go somewhere, where we can be alone?"

Now, Winry wouldn't agree to that normally. The request strikes her as odd, and she wants to say no, that she loves Ed. That she's giving him her 100%, or her 80%, or whatever. But, for some reason, she winks back and leaves with the shapeshifting Homunculus. The twisted author has guaranteed them a wonderful, romantic evening.

"I think I know what Ana was going to say," Ed says, not noticing (or perhaps not caring) that his fiancée has wandered off with his enemy. "Al, can you take over with the mouse? Click to see the reviews for 'Fullfiction Fanservice'."

Al does as he is told.

"Fullmetal," Roy says. "I think I know where you're going with this. The most recent reviews seem to be at the top. If you'll just excuse the two of us, the last time I felt this way was when Risa got her throat slit and I lost my eyesight. I don't want Risa getting hurt again."

"We can handle this," Ed replies. "Hawkeye, why don't you shave that awful mustache of his while you can?"

Hawkeye looks lovingly at Mustang (wait, WHAT? They're never so openly affectionate!), which gives both Al and Ed the feeling that Roy will be using his soon-to-be-clean-shaven lips soon. And he'll do so with such romantic tenderness that all of his fangirls will burst into tears. Royai slips out of the office.

"Read me the top three reviews, Al," Ed demands.

"Okay… the third from the top says 'OMG, Envy and Winry are like totally my OTP! Faved/followed!' The second from the top says, "Risa better go shave Roy's mustache. He's so much hotter without it, but not as hot as Edward and his fabulously braided hair'. Brother, I shouldn't have read that last part out loud- don't get a swelled head, please. And the first review… the first review says 'ain't that the truth.'"

"That is the Truth. The author is Truth," Ed says suddenly. "And 'all', and 'one', and 'universe', and... YOU."

From the other side of the room, Ed and Al can see a mocking grin floating in the air. The teeth part, and the mouth moves, and the sinister voice echoes through the room.

"I guess you two Elrics figured it out, didn't you? I'm the one who wrote all those stories, and I'm the one who's writing this one! And you're living it! I can take BOTH of Ed's arms! I can take Al's soul from his body! I can take you two, and Winry, and Envy, and Mustang's whole department, and even my OCs- and I can make you ALL fall in love with each other! It's great!

"Do you have any idea how many reviews this is getting me? If you go to the FMA tag on and sort by the number of reviews, I HAVE THE MOST, AND I'M AT THE TOP. Soon I'll be such a popular author that I could write anything I want, and no matter how crappy it is, ALL THE FANS WILL CONSIDER IT TO BE A CANON LITERARY MASTERPIECE! The Truth of this 'verse will set the truth of every 'verse!"

Al looks as disgusted as Ed feels. Ed sends a glance at his beloved younger brother, who grins back at him and begins clicking around on the laptop while Edward starts to speak.

"You're right, Truth, as always. You can be the best, and you can be the literary God that you think you are. But you overlooked one detail."

The mouth hangs open in shock.

"What could I have overlooked? I've incorporated every trend among the fandom! Hell, I've added OCs that aren't even mine! What did I leave out?"

"You didn't leave anything out, but you left everything on. In the time it's taken you to give your little 'I'm better than you, I win, bow down to me, peasants' speech, Al and I went and deleted all of your stories, changed your account information to something you'll never be able to guess, and blocked from your computer. And, to further cement this victory, Al found the document on Microsoft Word that you saved this story under, and I took the liberty of editing it for you. Now, you've got a MUCH better version of this story, if I say so myself."

But, in the time that Ed and Al foiled Truth's horrible schemes, Truth has disappeared.

"Ed, shall I read what I have down back to you?" Alphonse asks his brother, unable to contain his joy.

"Al, you don't even need to ask," Edward says. "You've always been a remarkable writer, and I'd love to hear it."

Al smiles, pulling Ed into a hug as he reads the BETTER version of this story:

"And so, the Elric brothers managed to restore honesty and balance to Amestris by revealing all the lies that Truth had told. The good won over the bad, as it always should be. Their victory was as simple as pressing a button."

Edward Elric smiles brightly as he turns to Alphonse and tells him, "Hit save as."

Then, he groans. "But before you do that, you better edit your story to add some clothing for us, instead of these censor bars."


So there you go. I incorporated a bunch of fandom trends into something wonderfully weird. (I don't mean to insult any of the fics on here; I've read many works like the ones I've parodied here that I absolutely love!)

By the way, two things

1) The titles of Truth's other 4 fics are references to things within FMA.

An Unbalanced Equivalency- the whole concept of human transmutation; hence, why Truth takes body parts from everyone who gets into his gates.

Homunculus 7.5- Ling as Greed (I always thought that Ling being a homunculus made 7.5 homunculi, in a weird way.)

Between Fantasy and Reality: Faux-Man's Land- that's a reference in two parts. The first part refers to the false Gate in Gluttony's stomach; the second is something of a play on words of the term 'no-man's land', since the Homunculi are artificial humans.

The Spring of Amestris- the Promised Day was either in the spring or the summer, but I can't remember which.

2) So, yeah, Ana (from my multichapter fic, Shards of Reality) makes an appearance here... but this is after the final battle, and SoR is nowhere near that point. My point here is, don't consider anything you read here to be a spoiler of the ending of SoR. I'm not sure which of my potential endings for that fic I'll be going with at this point, but at least two of those potential endings end with Ana going back to her reality. But then, there's also potential endings where she doesn't. It's up in the air.

(But she's totally a secret Miles fangirl. I don't think Miles has a strong enough fanbase; yeah, he's somewhat of a minor character, but he's got some depth to him).

Also, expect an SoR update at or before the end of this week. Chapter 10's mostly finished; I'm kind of just trying to cram a bunch into it right now so I can finish this first plot arc and move to one that's totally of my own creation.