Chapter 9:

The sun was setting as Alphonse Elric stood before the library where just a short while before his brother had stomped his way into. He could hear shouts and curses from inside that where clearly his brothers. The replies to his shouts where too faint for him to hear but he was sure that the librarian was terrified of Edward in that moment. Time ticked by like this until his brother exited the library to stand beside him with three books under his arm.

"Come on, let's go." He stated before turning away and heading towards Emily's home.

"Wait, you said that you would bring those to Mustang!" he exclaimed as he followed Edward down the hard packed pavement that made up the street.

"The hell with Mustang, He doesn't seem to care what happens to her! He's too into that red headed twerp that for all we know ran away from his crazy teacher." Edward kicked a lamp post as he passed it and clenched his fists to try to control his anger.

"He does care! He thinks they are connected somehow." Al had started off in a shout but it soon died away to a soft murmur. Edward shrugged and turned to face her house, which they had come upon so suddenly that it made Al's mind spin. He regained her thoughts as he watched his brothers red coat slip into the house quickly. He followed the short blonde silently, hanging his head a bit just to get through the door.

The house looked just about the same as it had the night he had busted through the front door, his near dead brother over one shoulder. He looked at the slightly darker stain that was located at the middle of her couch, his blood. Then at the large gashes in the floor, from multiple time of him shifting over the wooden boards with his metal feet. Her small dwelling had been marked by their presence, but he knew himself that the night that she had spent at their home had left no such evidence. She even took the trash out for them the next day, taking the takeout box away with it from her dinner. That was when he realized just how easily she had slipped in and out of their lives despite them marking hers forever.

"Brother?" he called out as he pulled himself from his own thoughts.

"I'm in here." Edward's voice was distant, emanating from her bedroom at the far end of the hall. He followed it and saw him standing before her unused bed and holding a fourth book in his free hand. He turned his bright golden eye on his metal brother causing Alphonse to visibly shiver at the sight of the hatred glowing from its depths.

"They've been here." He stated as he held up the open book, which held a piece of paper tapped to a page near the middle. The paper held a picture of Emily, bound and blindfolded while hunching forward apparently passed out in her forced kneeling position. Below the image was a set of words that made his blood run cold when he had found it on her bedside table:

If you want to see her you will come. Be seeing you Pipsqueak.

"Envy?" Al asked as he moved closer to study the image. It was dark around her but he could see clearly that the ground below her was made of concrete.

"That bastard has to have her." Edward ripped the paper from the book and looked around for evidence of the Humunculi being there. The window on the opposite side of her room from the door was still slightly open, and a scuff mark was left by a boot on the floor nearby it. He ran to it and placed his gloved hand at the edge of the muddy print, "They knew we were coming." He said under his breath, "They may have been following us all day. Could of even saw us coming from the library and ran ahead of us."

"Do you think we can pick up their trail?" Alphonse asked as he bent to study the print.

"I think it's their intention for me to follow it." He stated as he looked carefully at the picture once again, she did not look injured but that did not mean they hadn't hurt her since it was taken. He stood and headed out of her room mumbling "I'm coming alright." under his breath before shutting the door and closing his brother inside.

Emily had to of fallen to sleep at some point because the throbbing of her head caused her to come to her senses. She was lying against Jericho's shoulder and could feel the soft breathing that meant he was asleep as well. Someone patched him up at least, even if the job was even worse than the one she had done on Edward.

"You're up huh." She turned to lock her silver eye with his swollen blue one.

"I thought you were asleep." She stated matter of factly.

"Nah, they stuck you with a needle though, I think that's what made you pass out long enough for someone to take your picture. It was weird." He said as his forehead rubbed against the side of her own.

"What are you doing?" she asked in a quiet voice as a bright pink flush took over her cheeks.

"Calming you down like you did me when we were kids, I'm not really good at it." He smiled sadly and sat up a bit to look around while supporting her with his shoulder.

"What are you doing?" she whispered as he reached towards his back pocket with the tips of his fingers. He shot her a quick look that said 'be quiet' and pulled the fabric of his jeans so that a small shiny object fell from the pocket. A split second after this he had the thing in his hand and was working it up between his fingers towards the ropes.

"Shh, my mom's ring, it's got a diamond on it and they say that diamonds will cut through anything." She wanted to giggle at the farfetched idea that her friend was attempting to work out. He was sliding the diamond against the tightly bound ropes quickly but the smooth top of the ring wasn't cutting anything any time soon.

"Someone's coming." She whispered causing him to hide the ring between his palms. Two more bodies were thrown beside him and then chained up to where they faced sort of away from her. She strained to see who they were but could not turn her head far enough to see. She winced as the pain rocked through her arms once again due to the strain she put on her bindings.

"They're out cold. I don't recognize them." Jericho stated without looking at her. She nodded to herself, glad that he did not say that there was a state alchemist among them. They had not got ahold of Edward or Roy. She shifted to rest her back against the one of her friend and sighed her discomfort.

"What are they planning?" she asked no one in particular.

"Actually, I know what they want to use us for." His voice had a shy undertone as he answered her rhetorical question.

"You do?"

"Yeah, they're pretty open about it actually, apparently their bodies that they are using are running out and they need seven 'eggs' to use as new bodies." He stated in a low whisper so as to not wake the other two.

"And by 'eggs' you mean us." She stated softly. He nodded and shrugged.

"Something about our alchemy not being fully awaken yet." He added without looking at her. She rested her head against the back of his neck and looked into the darkness above them. His head fell back to rest against her own as his fingertips brushed along the back of her knuckles. She jumped away from him at that point, a fresh blush on her cheeks.

"Uh, uh, uh, I don't think that's a good idea." She practically cried out the words as she hid her face from him. It took a long moment but she finally heard his soft apology in the darkness.

"I didn't mean to make you feel that way, I just, I don't know." He murmured after a long awkward silence.

"It's okay, I just don't want to think about that right now, not in this situation." She tilted her head to indicate the room around them. She felt him shift and turned to see him leaning forward with his back to her.

"I'm pretty stupid huh?" he stated rather than asked. She felt herself give a small smile, and had the urge to pat his shoulder to let him know it was okay. It was just so frustrating, being tied up and bound to the floor as if she were some sort of common criminal.

"Lookie here, halfway through hmm." She winced away from the foul breath that struck her nose, "Pride will be very well, proud, to see our little collection. Envys face came into view as she peeked her eyes open ever so slightly, "Nice to see you again little girl." She grimaced at his feminine face and gritted her teeth against his foul breath.

"I've never seen you before." She stated as she turned away from him.

"Oh yes you have." He smiled then, a sharp toothed smile that was far too broad for his face. It brought back memories of the night her parents where ripped to shreds in front of her eyes. She backed away and cried out in fear as she realized what he was.

"You! You where there that night! It was you!" she accused with boiling hatred in her veins.

The trail had gone dead just outside of Central City at a three way fork in the road. He spent hours out there studying the road for any sign of the homunculus who could have done this but any evidence was neatly covered by layers upon layers of tire tracks. He growled to himself as he paced back and forth in front of the sign. East or West, which way would those bastards take her? His fingers itched to wrap around Envys neck and squeeze until the homunculus' body stopped twitching. Alphonse was walking in a large circle in the grassy area nearby the sign that pointed towards their hometown. He would start at the sign and walk around to the wooded area nearby, then back to the sign. The repetitive motion was driving Edward to the point of insanity every time the large metal man walked past him.

"Can you stop that!" he shouted finally and growled low to himself as he sat back against the sign. His gloved fingers found his hair and pulled at it as he grew even more frustrated. Alphonse sat down next to him and scratched at the dirt with his gloves that made up his own fingers.

"Brother do you think that maybe it was a false lead?" He asked as he watched the small alchemist struggle with his own anger.

"Those bastards," Ed grumbled as he looked around, "they couldn't have just disappeared."

"They didn't." The brothers turned in unison to see Roy Mustang and Riza Hawkeye standing nearby them in front of Riza's car. Ed shot up onto his feet at the sight of them. His golden eyes blazed with mixed emotions at the image of the dark haired officer standing before him.

"Now Fullmetal, you could at least be happy to see us, we are on the same team here." Roy held up his hands as if to show the brothers that he was not a threat.

"Two more alchemical students have gone missing from in the town." Riza stated stiffly, "There is an obvious connection between them now. You said yourself that the young Ms. Hagraven wanted to learn alchemy."

"Yeah." Edward rubbed his upper arm as he spoke without really looking at any of them.

"So our observation was correct. They aren't taking fully realized alchemists, only those studying under well-known ones." Roy tapped his finger against his chin as he spoke.

"That can't be true though because she just asked me to teach her last week! I never answered her and no one knew about it but us. Plus they tried to get her the day she got to Central." Ed exclaimed, only lowering his voice when he realized he had said too much.

"They tried to capture her when she came to Central?" Hawkeye repeated him with something close to shock on her well-kept professional face.

"We uh, found her when she was running away from them." It was Alphonse, seeming to tremble as he spoke the words carefully.

"Why didn't you tell us?" Roy was not as professional as his subordinate as he snatched Edward off of his feet.

"Sir, I don't think that is important right now. We are looking in all the wrong places. If she wasn't a known alchemical student then why would they go after her?" Hawkeye shot Alphonse a quick glance, almost as if she were asking for his input.

"Her parents were well known Alchemical doctors." He stated after a moment of thought, "Maybe they thought she had trained under them."

"It's a possibility." Roy rubbed his chin as he paced back and forth in front of the car. His bots kicked up dust which flew through the air before settling again over a metallic looking surface. The gleam f it from the setting sun behind him caught Ed's eye and caused him to tilt his head and squint to see it better. Its outline was circular in the dirt and dust and it was hidden partially due to the front tire of the car.

"What is that?" he asked no one in particular as he bent down to inspect it. Wiping away the dirt and dust that covered it revealed a circular hatch with a handle built into a deep indent to the side of it. He could feel his brother's presence as he joined Ed near the thing on the ground.

"That's certainly not a man hole." Roy stated from his standing position nearby, "Riza!"

"Yes Sir!" she automatically slipped into a tight salute that would make any official in the military proud.

"Go get Armstrong and Hughes. Tell them to meet us here. It would not hurt to find Havoc as well." He ordered without looking up from the boy's discovery.

"Yes Sir." She slipped inside her car and expertly drove away, leaving them to clear away the section that the wheel had been hiding.

(End of Chapter 9)