Hey, guys, I'm back. Note that 'tis a filler chapter. We are approaching the plot, but I like my story being well-paced, so yes, expect this story to have one or two filler chapters with little to no action.

I am sorry for the long wait, but I had to draft this twice before being able to declare without shame that this is not a complete piece of crap. I'd rather let you wait than giving you something you'll call "shit".

Ah, and on another note, I have received two reviews who kindly pointed out that Edward's hometown is not "Resenpool" but "Resembool" or "Risembool". I thank you guys, but for the sake of continuation, I shall have to settle with what I have typed.

Unrest in Resenpool

Edward's strides were rapid as they carried their owner through the building, followed closely by clanking footsteps that belonged to Alphonse Elric.

"Brother, what's the rush?" Al asked curiously as he finally matched his brother. Although short, Edward was nowhere near slow.

"Possible human transmutation in Resenpool," Edward explained, his voice held none of the usual frustration, rage or annoyance after a council with Colonel Mustang. He was serious this time, Al noticed. And human transmutation in Resenpool caught his attention as well. Automatically, the brothers were reminded of their transmutation, done in the same town.

As they walked, Edward filled Alphonse in about the mission and the files. When they got outside, Ed suddenly chuckled, although it held little humor, all the while pulling his thick coat tighter around himself. "Well, Colonel Bastard finally sent us on a mission that makes sense, huh?" he said dryly.

To be honest, Alphonse had no idea what "makes sense" is by Edward's standard. As far as he knew, Ed had always complained when a mission was issued from Colonel Mustang regardless. It seems to him that if it was Mustang who issued the order, it was already not on the "makes sense" list in Ed's mind.

Such was Edward's sacred hatred toward the colonel.

"Where did the sightings happen?" Al pressed on. Between his long strides and Ed's rapid pacing, they were approaching their dormitory quicker than a bike could've ridden.

Edward flipped open the file Mustang gave him and read through it. Then his eyes widened. "Hey, it's our old house!" he exclaimed. "Or what's the remains of it, anyway. Apparently, the townspeople saw a dark light coming off of it several days ago." He bit his lip. Dammit, why do so many things have to repeat themselves?

"Looks like we're missing creative people these days," Edward muttered to himself, handing the file to Alphonse, not feeling like reading it aloud. The dormitory was already in sight.

Edward was trapped in a state of confusion; he was curious and worried about this transmutation at Resenpool, his hometown, where he had so many memories there, and where he had made his biggest mistake (which had been repeated by some other daft fool). But all the same, he rather dreaded it. Edward still remembered perfectly well what the result of a human transmutation would be. He shivered at the thought that he would have to check it, and it was a complete possibility that he would find the exact pile of revulsion he and Alphonse had made back then.

Now Edward suddenly felt angry at Mustang for sending him on the stupid mission. Didn't he know Edward had bad memories about that night? But no, the bastard just had to send Edward on this mission, for the sake of whom, huh? Oh, that's right. Because somebody wanted to move up a seat and become Fuhreh to issue mini-skirts as part of the uniforms.

With those thoughts, it was no surprise Edward all but kicked the door down when they reached their dormitory.

"Brother!" Alphonse scowled, exasperated, setting the folder down to pick up the door, drew a transmutation circle and used it to fix the door. "Do you have to do that? First the clock and now this!" he chided Ed, who had already walked steadily to his room to pack up.

"Sorry," Edward yelled back, making Alphonse release the same sigh he'd given this morning.

By the time Alphonse was done with the door, Edward had already pushed past him in a flurry of red and gold, heading out of the door with a worn-out suitcase in his hand. As he did, Alphonse couldn't help but noticed how Edward seemed to hang back at the door a little bit, and then threw a wistful look back at their dormitory like he would miss it. Yep, the very same one he'd complained about being too cold and damp and all that.

Something was making Edward reluctant to go on this mission, despite all his enthusiasm at the beginning.

But then Edward shook himself and went outside, calling over his shoulder, "C'mon, Al!"

"Um, right," Alphonse said, getting outside again, and unlike his brother, showed some mercy to the door when closing it. When he turned again, by some miracles, Edward was already down the road.

"Brother, wait!" Alphonse shouted, but Ed was already out of sight. Sighing again, Alphonse ran to catch up with his brother. Always on a hurry, always eager to move out, always eager to throw himself into danger. That's Edward Elric for you.

At least one of the two brothers was one with a practical brain.

0o0o0o0o0

The brothers were in luck. There was an express train leaving for Resenpool right then. With a few peculiar looks and a "Mamma, what's that big scary robot?" from a five-year-old girl (which made the younger Elric rather hurt), they settled down.

"Don't worry, Al," Edward said, glancing at the girl who produced the statement above a distasteful look. The girl burst out bawling at his glare, and the mother led her away, all the while shooting a look over her shoulder. "She wouldn't say that if she knew who you are." Ed snorted. "They always only cared about what's outside."

Al didn't comment. In fact, he said nothing. He only stared out of the window and inclined his head slightly to show that he was listening. He knew he was attracting looks everywhere he went, and after four years, he was used to it.

But Alphonse couldn't get used to people, especially children, being scared of him.

Getting no respond from his brother, Edward finally sighed and muttered something under his breath. Then he, too, glanced out the window as the train started rolling, his eyes cloudy with thoughts, suspicions and dreads.

It'll be nightfall before we reach Resenpool, Edward thought, closing his eyes to rest them. I'll ask Granny if she or the neighbors had seen anything to add to this supposed transmutation…Winry's in Rush Valley now…God, I missed her…she's cute when she wasn't holding a wrench and trying to bust my head open with it…I wonder if I can talk Granny into making me some stew…His thoughts derailed completely from its original track as time went on.

In precisely ten minutes, he had passed out.

0o0o0o0o0

Nightmares were, by no mean, strangers to Edward. He had seen too much in his sixteen years of life, and the knowledge of what he had done and had seen always came back to haunt him when he was most vulnerable, when not even his alchemy and brilliance can save him: in his sleep.

This time, it was no different.

Once again, he found himself in his father's old room, where he and Al had performed the transmutation. And there was the transmutation circle he had come to fear but had also come to remember too well.

And in the middle –

Dream-Edward took a step back. The middle was shadowed, but he knew all too well what was there, and he thought seeing it once was enough for a lifetime, thank you very much.

"Edward," a voice, gentle and kind and loving and oh so familiar it hurts. "Edward, come here! What do you fear? Why do you fear?" The voice came from the center of the transmutation circle.

"No!" Despite himself, Edward screamed. "NO! You're DEAD!" To himself, he shouted silently, Wake up, you stupid moron! Wake up before it appears!

"Yes, I am," the familiar voice replied calmly. It was lowering in pitch. What came out next was the hoarse whisper of something that was too close to dying to say any more than it had, "but you tried to bring me back, you stupid boy! And look what you have made me! Look at what you have made your brother!"

Edward reared back. "NO!" he yelled. The shadows lifted, and once again he saw the pile of flesh that was supposed to be his mother.

"Brother!" a far-off voice called. "Brother!" it repeated again, this time more urgently.

Like a sinking victim of a shipwreck who didn't know how to swim, Ed clung to the voice with all his strength like it was a lifesaver. It was getting clearer. Oh, god, how thankful is he to get away from that thing. From that time.

Edward's eyes flew open, and he found himself staring into two seemingly concerned pinpoints of red light, surrounded by a familiar steel helmet. It took him awhile yet to realize he was actually shaking, and Alphonse's hands were clasped firmly around his upper arms.

"Al…I…I…" he stammered, much to his own embarrassment. Then he closed his eyes, took a deep breath and regrouped. The pressure on his arms were released as Alphonse let go of him and sat back on the bench opposite of his brother, worry scorching his soul already. What kind of brother would not when their sibling suddenly started screaming like Hell was coming up here itself to get them?

"It's just a little nightmare, that's all," Ed finally managed.

Little nightmares don't make you scream like the roof of the world's dropping on you, Alphonse wanted to argue, but before he could, the speaker on the train announced loudly and rudely,

"We are approaching our final stop! Please pack up your belongings! We will arrive at Resenpool in ten minutes!"

By now, the brothers were among the only three people on the train. There was one other passenger in the same car with them; a short man, only a bit higher than Edward himself, dressed in a high-collared trench coat that all but hid his entire face. A hat hid the rest of it.

"Resenpool in ten minutes?" Edward glanced outside. It was dark. Oh, so he had slept through the entire trip. The nightmare didn't seem to last more than a few minutes, at most.

Look at what you have made your brother! The faint voice of the dying thing suddenly flashed back in Edward's mind. The boy winced bodily, but if Alphonse had seen it, he said nothing.

Edward, meanwhile, was occupied with the landscapes and the finally slowing train. He forced the dream out of his mind for now, instead concentrating on the task at hand. So all he had to do was returning to the very location where he had basically committed suicide, search for something that still terrified him after, what, five years? And confirm if it was real or not.

What a wonderful mission. Mustang always picked out spectacular things for him to do, does he not? The charming man.

Yeah, right. More like a friggin' bastard.

"C'mon, Al," Edward grunted, hoisting up his suitcase and marching toward the door as the train stopped completely, dark thoughts swirling in his mind. The rush to get to Resenpool in the beginning had melted completely, now that he was here. "Let's get this over with as fast as possible."

0o0o0o0o0

"Well, look what we have here," Pinako Rockbell scolded with a smile on her face as she looked at the suit of armor and the short blonde boy standing in her doorway, one could have smiled if he could, the other shaking like a leaf. Although Resenpool lied in the far South, it didn't mean the town didn't know what winter was. Snow was rare, but chilly nights were not uncommon.

"Will you let us in first and then begin your epic lecture, Granny?" Edward moaned. He seemed to have forgotten that Resenpool's December nights were just as cold as Central's and had left his thicker coat behind. Now he had only the familiar attires to wear.

Pinako stood aside for the Elric brothers to file in. As she closed the door, Edward rubbed his left arm thankfully and went to sit by the fireplace, trying to rid himself of the cold that seemed to have followed him inside. Den came with him, barking in a friendly greeting and lying his head on the boy's lap.

When they had settled down, Pinako's smile faltered. She took a breath from her pipe and studied them darkly. "Well, looks like the news of the transmutation traveled all the way to Central pretty quickly," she noted.

Edward turned to her in surprise, but Pinako spoke first, answering the unnamed question, "The whole town's buzzing with it, Ed. I might be old, but I am certainly not deaf, and I do have customers who spent their time trading gossips." She sighed. "And with that grave-robbing business going on, it's easy to make the darker rumors escalate."

Both brothers turned to face her, alarm on Edward's face and in Alphonse's voice, since he couldn't show any facial expression. "Grave-robbing?" they said as once.

Pinako nodded gravely. "There have been talks of strange men dressed like runaway criminals visiting the graveyard with spades, and the next morning, several bodies went missing," she explained.

"Is Mom's grave - ?" Edward nearly spluttered, his eyes wide as he stood to face Pinako, knocking Den out of his lap without a care. Oh, please, no. Not her grave. It was the last they had of her, since they have burned their house down.

Pinako looked at them for a few moments, then sighed and took another wisp from the pipe. "Her grave is robbed…yesterday night," she said at last, very carefully, like she was detesting every syllable leaving her mouth. Either that or she was watching how the Elrics would react. Or both.

There was shocked silence for a moment, then Edward's face flushed red and he started throwing a tantrum with all kinds of swear word that Pinako all but cringed upon hearing them, inwardly if not outwardly. What in heavens have driven a sixteen-year-old teenager to hear those words, much less learn to speak them?

Alphonse, in contradict to his brother, stood stock still, but the gloves that served as his hands clenched and unclenched, like he was dying to grab someone by the throat and squeezed. Hard. Preferably whichever bastard had stolen their mother's body.

"Granny, had they caught the grave robbers yet? Any of them?" Alphonse's voice was calm, but also icy. Edward stopped his swearing to listen, but his face was still the shade of a ripe tomato and as comical as it sounds, steam coming up from his ears weren't that unbelievable.

Pinako walked to the kitchen, Den following her, tailed by Edward and Alphonse, who traded each other a dark look. Well, Edward did, anyway. Alphonse couldn't, but he tried, and his brother understood.

"To answer your question, no, none of the grave robbers have been caught. How they managed to sneak past the tight security placed around the grave-yard since last Monday was truly a wonder," Pinako said at last as they sat around the dinner table, Edward tense and seething, his brother's composure still standing strong, and Pinako folding her hands together in front of her.

"Damn them!" Edward slammed his hand down on the desk, grounding his teeth. "I'm gonna freaking kill them when I get my hands on those sons of –"

"I assume you want to know about the rumors going around here about human transmutation," Pinako cut in sharply before Edward could produce any more swearing. "So I suggest you listen." She took another long wisp from her pipe, then began.

Reviews are highly appreciated, and constructive critisms even more so. Is that kind of OOC? If so, then how am I supposed to fix it? Please be specific.

Thank you for reading.