A/N: I only want to say that I know that I do some grammar mistakes. It's only natural. But I do want to improve, thus I'd like to filter my chapters through a Beta Reader! If anyone is willing to help me with my little story, drop a PM if you like, please. :) On another note, this whole scene turned out longer than I expected, so I left some things out of this chapter and I will add them to the next one.


:xx-CHAPTER VIII-xx:

[ supreme defense ]

'The building is now sealed.'

"I can definitely see that," Ed commented. There was a feeling of anxiety which pressed down his shoulders, his fingers twitching once or twice, in lack of control. He narrowed his eyes, letting them roam the surroundings, in a hopeful attempt to get his eyes to focus on something, anything, in that darkness. He heard a footstep.

"Al, you're still here, right?"

"Yeah," Al replied lowly. He sounded as if he was too afraid to speak any louder, because something might shatter. "What are we going to do now?"

"Hmm," Ed took a hand up and placed it underneath his chin. In the darkness, he began to distinguish the shape of the door, which stopped swinging in lack of air currents. "We might want to get out of here before the Defense Department bursts in. Or before we die because there's no oxygen."

Al sighed, "Why did we even come here in the first place?"

Ed smirked, "Because I wanted to kick that guy's ass."

"Oh, yes. Of course."

And then, Ed started processing his location. He had absolutely no idea where this Mail Service room was located, compared to that round hallway with the judging rooms. He didn't know how close or far the culprit was or how they could get to the main entrance.

"This is hopeless," Ed breathed out, pressing his palm over his forehead, "We can only wander around and see what we bump in."

"Right," Al cut himself off abruptly, his voice ringing with eagerness, "Hey, Brother, I need to show you something awesome."

Ed cocked an eyebrow, puckering his lips, "Something awesome? What is it?"

"It's something I've learned in Xing."

And Ed twitched. Oh, it was too obvious. It was Alchemy related. Couldn't Al be a little more careful on his choice of words? Alchemy was 'awesome' by itself, so when he came with something like that… No, Ed wasn't upset that he'd lost his alchemic abilities, not at all. It wasn't like he'd spent the following months, after the events with Father, reading about every book in Amestris that could help him.

He lost his track of thoughts when a ray of blue lightning flashed across the wall where the billboard was hung on, lighting up for a brief moment. And then, in simultaneity, torches popped up from place to place on the walls. The thing was, they weren't torches lit with fire, they had lightbulbs instead.

Now Ed managed to see Al clearly as he was smiling with pride.

"Yeah, yeah," Ed snorted and turned around, fuming when he heard Al's chuckles in the background, "You are too cool to be true. Actually, can't you just unseal the doors and windows?"

"I've tried that before, it doesn't work."

Ed glanced from the corners of his eyes at the window covered by an iron barrier, "They are Alchemy protected, huh."

And then he heard a shot, followed by a crash.

"What was that?" Ed jumped.

"There's no one supposed to be in here."

Ed's eyebrows furrowed in a frown, his focus being on his listening. "No one but us, the criminal and his hostages…" Ed murmured and exchanged intuitive gazes with Al. Ed heard, and so did Al, that as he was about to be judged, the criminal had somehow managed to unarm his escorts and took one or more hostages afterwards. The problem was they didn't know the room.

Ed watched as Al bit his lip, with frustration. He knew that they both thought that they needed to help the people held hostages, but it could be dangerous in more than one way, and also help was on its way.

"Al," Ed sighed."

"We have to get out."

"Yeah, I know."

"Let's go look for an exit."

"And if we interrupt the 'trial' by accident… too bad."

Ed started with slow steps, taken swiftly on his toes. He stretched out his fingers and pressed them against the door. It was silent, too very silent, and it gave him that childhood feeling. He felt like when he was little, afraid to open the door of his closet, afraid that something might pop out of its darkness and hurt him.

After some time of wandering about, Ed and Al managed to find their way into the round hallway where they had been taken before the trial. Ed created a mental map of the Capitol so far: there was the main entrance and a long, straight hallway stretched from it. At the end of that hallway, stood the other hallway- round, with ten doors filling it in.

He felt his entire body tremble when a crash made the ground tremble underneath his feet. It was his instinct that pulled Ed out of the way, making him avoid the pieces that had hit the wall, after they'd exploded out of the ground.

"Al!" the other joined his side quickly, Ed having to put a hand on the wall to keep him from falling over.

Next to the door he had been in front of, there was a thin cloud of dust which resulted from the shattered floor. And he distinguished a figure underneath that layer of dust- average height, black clothes and a black mask to cover the face… judging by stature, it seemed like a male.

"What are you doing here?" the voice definitely belonged to a male.

"I'd ask you the same thing, man," Ed wiped a smirk on his face, his brow twitching lightly, "You jump down and end up destroying the floor? Whoa."

He took a step forward. Ed pulled a step back, his fingers gathering into fists at his sides.

"Hmm, I've seen you two brats before," the stranger commented.

"Brother…!" Al gasped and Ed blinked, "I've seen him before! He was part of that group of thieves."

"The gang that Cedric is part of?" Ed inquired, keeping a close eye on the one dressed in black, who was kicking pebbles around against walls.

"There's no doubt then," he said and skewed his head abruptly, in a manner that made him look as his head was just about to fall off, "You are those two foreign alchemists."

"Can't a person travel the world without being chased by death wishes?" Ed huffed with a jerking movement of his head, his blond locks swaying over his forehead for a moment.

"Did I say I had a death wish for you?" the other retorted, spreading his arms open.

Ed opened his mouth -

"I didn't say otherwise either."

There was a sound resembling a howl coming from his direction. And for a second, as he leaped backwards, Ed could catch a glimpse of what looked like the shine of claws stretching at the tips of his fingers. And then he headed towards him, in a flash.

He was fast. Very fast.

The only way Ed could avoid the claws that lunged at him was to fall down on his back, on a pile of rubble. When that didn't seem to stop the attacker, he resorted to raising his prosthetic leg, which clashed against the claws with an iron-on-iron screeching noise. The impact nearly pulled Ed's leg up at a 90 degrees level. Instead of retreating, the attacker simply added more force into his hand and put more pressure in pushing against his auto-mail.

"Agh, damn it…!" Ed hissed through his teeth as he slowly began to slide against the ground. The auto-mail was making strange noises and he started fearing that it would crumble under the applied force.

He was fortunately saved by a wall which Al had created underneath the man's feet, whom was forced to jump backwards in order to avoid it. Taking the opportunity, Ed jumped back to his feet and winced. He couldn't stand very well on his auto-mail.

"Brother! Are you okay?" Al quickly joined his side. Ed didn't give a clear response, he simply swung his head to a side and narrowed his eyes. The man was just standing still on the pile of rubble.

"Who are you?" Ed spat out furiously, "You don't seem like just an ordinary leader of a theft gang!"

"You are, oh, so right, about that one," he responded in a low voice, towards the end breaking in a fit of controlled, but maniacal sounding snickers. "The funny thing is that I know who you are… The Elric brothers, hm?"

Ed's lips pressed in a tight line and turned towards Al, exasperated. "Am I wearing my 'I am Edward Elric' T-shirt nowadays?" he grumbled helplessly.

Suddenly, Al nudged his elbow and Ed jumped. His eyes met the stranger, who took an offensive stance again. More precisely, he focused on the claws… his hands were dark colored, seeming as if they were wearing a layer of dark shaded iron.

"But that…!" Ed gasped.

"It looks familiar, right?" Al mused, narrowing his eyes.

That was impossible. True, there weren't exactly big chances to see someone able to do such a thing every day, on every corner. Ed noticed that he bent down, about to lung towards them again.

He had to take a chance.

"Greed!" Ed breathed out and the other stopped abruptly. A moment of silence followed and Ed started feeling rather tense… And then the man did it again- he tilted his head suddenly. It started with a few chuckles and then it escaladed into a loud, uncontrollable laughter which left both Ed and Al wide eyed and puzzled.

"…Did I say something hilarious?" Ed muttered with annoyance.

"Indeed, indeed," he snorted and took his hand up, stretching out his clawed fingers, "I've even managed this- to have people tremble with fear because of my name."

Ed flinched. He looked at Al, who looked back at him.

"So it is you," Ed sighed out, "Greed."

"But, how?" Al didn't hold back his confusion, "You're dead –"

"Dead?!" Greed hissed, "I'm right here. I'm alive."

Ed stretched out a hand, patting Al's shoulder. "He definitely died," he murmured, "But we now they can be resurrected. The problem is, who or what exactly brought him back to life?"

"Did you kill those teenagers at the bonfire?" Ed suddenly asked. Greed nodded firmly, without letting out any words.

"Are you alone?" Al asked calmly and Greed let out a questioning 'hmm', "Are there other homunculi?"

"Homunculi?" Greed flashed a quick laughter, "I don't know what you're talking about. And even if I did, visit time is over."

And then, rapidly, Greed turned around, crossing his arms before him right when a rain of bullets started to shoot towards his direction. With a cringe, Ed grabbed Al by his sleeve and pulled him out of the round hallway, sliding behind a wall. As much as he wanted to avoid the military, the moment he sat down against the wall, he was approached by some officers, very rough and rushed in their speaking.

"Who are you?!"

"We are part of the victims," Ed replied poisonously, "Instead of wasting time on us, you might want to get to," he pointed his thumb towards the hallway, "that guy over there."

It was only after that that Ed noticed they were all officers of the Defense Department, dressed in black uniforms. Apparently the officers realized the truth behind his words, because they let them be and focused on Greed. Ed wasn't sure what was exactly going on behind them, because his eardrums were being assaulted by rains of gunshots.

"We should go," Al suggested. Ed was reluctant. The fact that Greed happened to be inside of the Capitol, exactly in Karma City, Aerugo, intrigued him. But more intriguing was how exactly was he brought back to life? Not anyone could simply create a Homunculus.

But it was dangerous, so he ended up nodding. Carefully, he stood up, only to be pushed back down by someone.

"Stay down," it was the voice of an elderly man.

"Wha-?" Ed, in his confusion, wanted to protest, but once he met the man's sharp, violet eyes, he decided it was best to sink in against the wall and… well, wait.

His eyes were still fixed on his figure. And then Ed's jaw dropped when the man clapped his hands. After a vortex of bright yellow light, he took out a sword from his scythe and hurtled its tip against the ground. Astonished, Ed watched as blocks of wood emerged from the floor, straight into the hallway. Crashing noises echoed in the Capitol.

"Al! That's Alchemy!" Ed exclaimed, his voice ringing with enthusiasm. He didn't expect to find State Alchemists in a country where Alchemy was so underrated.

Some officers approached the man, dressed in black and gold, with sharp violet eyes and a mix of grey and dark locks in his hair. "General Avagart," they greeted, "You are being requested to put in practice the capture plan."

Avagart frowned, "Not yet."

A howl was heard and it genuinely sent some shivers down Ed's spine. It sounded almost beastly. Avagart's expression froze and, furiously, he slammed the tip of his sword into the floor.

"He shredded the wood blocks to pieces…" the man grumbled darkly.

"You can't touch him," Ed suddenly said. He felt obliged to warn those people, "He has a defensive shield."

"What is this nonsense?" Avagart sputtered.

"General!" an officer rushed over, "The suspect is gone."

"Gone?!" Avagart howled, "How could you let him escape?!"

Ed rose up to his feet slowly. The fighting sounds were gone. It was replaced by the commotion of some confused people who were squirming around in circles, lost. As she spun around on his toes, Ed hoped that he could get away safely, without having to suffer some questions.

"You, boys!" Avagart's voice called out and Ed stopped abruptly, his head turning around slowly. He was expecting to be sent in trials again for interfering with the state's business and whatnot. Instead, all that Avagart did was to say, "Get out."

Ed and Al submitted and, as they made their way towards the nearest exit, they realized that the building had been unsealed. Much to their bad lack, they had chosen the main entrance. The moment Ed opened the doors, he could see that oceans of people were gathered around curiously, locked behind the gates which circled the Capitol. It was a big commotion, which Intern Officers tried to sustain. Even different journalist had gathered in the masses.

"You," Ed jumped when a female voice basically breathed in his ear, "Go down and preferably take the back gate."

Ed swung his head around and blinked, his eyes meeting the figure of an average height girl, with long light blond hair and violet eyes. It seemed like eyes of that color were a typical trait for Aerugians.

"Yeah, I…" Ed arched an eyebrow. Was she part of the military? She seemed a bit too young for that, "Don't we need to give some explanations or something?"

She waved a hand and raised her eyebrows, "Not unless you insist."

Ed nodded briefly, jerking his head as he glanced at Al. He turned around on his toes and climbed down the stairs, turning left and away from the masses of curious people. They were walking along the streets of Karma in silence; Ed was deep in thought, his hands slipped in his pockets.

Al cleared his throat, "So, Greed…"

Ed sighed. "It's clear now," he murmured, "It wasn't that guy who killed those people."

"Why would Greed do such a thing?"

"This is the last thing I'm thinking about, honestly."

Al analyzed the surroundings for a few moments before speaking again, "Why are we going at Café D'Ulmo?"

"Because I have some questions," Ed stopped and turned towards Al. Ed's eyes had a flicker of fire inside of them, they were glistening. "You think that the fact you can make some lightbulbs glow is cool? I've learned something cooler."

Al parted his lips, hesitant in asking any further questions. He shook his head slowly.

"Al," Ed put a lot of accent on his words, "I've learned about another way to create Homunculi- through Human Transmutation."


A/N: Thank you again for all the reviews and support I have received so far! They really keep me going. I hope I'm not letting you down with the story.

Don't forget to review/follow/favorite, please? Oh, yes!

Ed: *Sighs and pouts. Rips his shirt off sexily and hugs TaylorRiley17.* Thanks for the review on Chapter 7...

Me: Oh, actually... Thanks to everyone!

Ed: Wait, what?

Me: ... *Pushes everyone in a group hug with shirtless 19-year-old!Ed.*