Author's Note: This chapter it might get confusing. It will switch to each character and show their fears and haunting memories.
Chapter 9: Déjà vu
-Alphonse-
Al remembered his first encounter with the desert. His fears and worst memories came alive as hallucinations and wondered what the others would soon see. Al ignored the mirages appearing in front of him: Nina and Alexander flashed by again, and Martel exploded into sand.
Alphonse tired from training and the battle, Alphonse fell asleep on his camel's neck. The winds picked up and sand started to be lifted on the ground and soon they had a little sandstorm churning around them.
-Riza-
Riza kept a bandana tied around her mouth and nose to protect her. She reached for her gun when she saw someone standing on the sand dune in front of their caravan until she saw no one noticed anything she thought to herself, must be a trick of light Riza, no need to shoot at sand. When she recognized the woman, she drew her gun and the woman smirked and said, "You are going to try to kill me with bullets again, you humans never learn do you." She laughed as she stepped aside revealing her former grief-stricken self. Riza laughed and said, "Is that supposed to scare me I'm getting married to your killer."
Lust laughed and said, "That wasn't the past, Riza Hawkeye." Lust laughed mirthlessly and disappeared into a small gust of sand. Deep fear started to rise in Riza was the dead homunculus trying to show her the future? Two graves stood at the top of another sand dune where a little girl had placed some flowers and was crying at her parent's grave. Another older black haired boy came up and placed his hand on the little girl's shoulder.
A tear trickled down Riza's cheek as Roy tried to comfort her for the loss of her parents. Riza looked at the ring on her finger glistening from the blazing sun, and thought to herself I chose the right man. She wiped away the tears off her face and smiled to herself, Riza Hawkeye would become Riza Mustang.
-Roy-
Roy rode a camel ahead of Riza and begins to see Ishvalans charred to a crisp burned by his alchemy scattered across the sands. An Ishvalan man ran at him and burst to ash. Explosions of fire rocked each city the Amestris military destroyed. Gunfire could be heard everywhere, and alchemists were forced to eliminate the Ishvalan people.
Roy felt regret and remorse for the torture he had unleashed on the Ishvalan people; they probably thought him a hypocrite for his work on reviving and rebuilding Ishval. "Yo, Mustang," said a familiar voice behind him; Roy turned and saw Maes Hughes. "Did you avenge me Roy, did you," asked Hughes. "Yes, I killed both homunculi and protected Elysia and Gracia," replied Roy. "Now you're Fuhrer I presume, and Riza's your bride-to-be," replied Hughes acknowledging the gold band on his finger, "Please take care of Elysia and Gracia for me."
-Ling-
Ling remembered his last journey through the desert to Amestris where he had passed out from hunger in an alley in Rush Valley where Ed and Al had found him. Greed possessing him then having the immortality sucked out of Ling on the Promised Day.
He saw himself and Lan Fan on a rooftop and Wrath slashing her mask off and cutting off her left arm, she had had to get an automail arm. The sand blew away the mirage and Ling realized it was memorabilia of the past haunting him of the possible danger his fiancé faced.
-Lan Fan-
Lan Fan scanned the horizon and searched for enemies and saw a building and thought it was part of the Xerxes Ruins and realized it was Central HQ she knew that couldn't be right but nobody noticed as they passed. Lan Fan saw Wrath fighting Captain Buccaneer and Old Man Fu. She was busy protecting Greed until Buccaneer and Fu fell and Greed continued on their fight and knocked Wrath over the edge into the moat and a sniper shot him forcing Wrath to plummet a couple hundred feet.
The mirage disappeared carried away to the sky by the wind. The end of their journey came to a close as they dropped their camels off with the Xing Border Guard and proceeded into Amestris. They walked through a bustling train station and boarded a train bound for Central. As they sat in their seats Lan Fan fell asleep on Ling and dreamed of their new life together.
