Chapter 9
The Stone of Death
"The Elric brothers have locked themselves in there for almost three weeks, Major Blanche," Maria Ross responded to Renee when Renee came in to check on her partner. For three weeks she had a side mission of tracking down a deluded alchemist near Briggs with Major Armstrong. She met the general of the fort, Olivier Armstrong. She was, by far, the scariest woman Renee has ever met. Renee kept her distance most of the time until Major General Armstrong demanded to have tea with her one night.
"So, the biggest dog of the military is sleeping around with a royal blood? That sickens me to the core," Olivier said to Renee as they watched the blizzard outside pound on the fort.
"You get used to the complaining after a while," Renee replied before she took a sip of her tea.
"Is it true that you two met beforehand? Before the war?"
"He trained me to become the alchemist I am today," Renee cooed.
"Your alchemy out here would do a great amount of damage wouldn't it?" Olivier asked Renee.
"Most likely. I have a tendency of producing better quality ice attacks during blizzards but the military is starting to train alchemists to use weapons besides alchemy so I've been trained to use a bow."
"Any luck?"
"Hell, my alchemy is more deadly with a bow," Renee responded and Olivier smiled before they discussed the case file.
Renee kept her bow in a case hidden in her room under the bed in case of robbers while Roy actually bought a gun to keep in the nightstand. Renee wouldn't touch it. Roy hardly looked at it unless he wanted to clean it while he listened to his nightly stories on the radio. Today however she had it crossed over her body connected to her arrow bag behind her.
"Do you know what they're researching?" Maria asked her as they stood in front of the door where the Elrics caved themselves into.
"Something extremely dangerous," Renee replied before knocking. Al answered the door quickly and pulled in Renee before shutting it. The room was covered in darkness except for the few candles lit on the wooden table.
"Edward?" Renee asked when she saw him quiver behind the table.
"We did it… three weeks of pure torture and we finally pulled it off," Edward whispered and he slammed his hands on the table.
"You deciphered his research?" Renee asked and breathed in. The recipe for creating the Red Stone… Edward finally unlocked the doctor's research notes.
"Human sacrifice. That's the main ingredient. We have to kill human beings in order to create the stone," Edward shouted.
Mustang sat with Hughes at the local coffee shop eating sandwiches and drinking a beer. Hughes was celebrating Eliza's first day of school and discussing each and every single moment that happened between waking up and meeting Roy at central command. Roy was getting tired of Hughes' stupid day and looked out the window to see the new jewelry shop was having a sale. Hughes looked over to see Mustang staring at the jewelry shop across the street and crossed his arms.
"Doesn't Renee hate jewelry?" Hughes asked him.
"She only has her tiara and her mother's locket left," Mustang replied.
"It's too early for a ring," Hughes responded and Mustang glared at him. "What about pearls?"
"No… I think I should get her something with a sapphire on it. Sapphires are her favorite jewels. I don't know, I never really given her anything nice. She's such a strange girl that it's hard to find something she'll like."
Hughes grabbed Mustang's arm and dragged him across the street to the jewelry store and waved over a jeweler.
"This man here is looking for something pretty to get Princess Renee," Hughes said. The jewelers face lit up and he smiled at Mustang.
"Colonel Mustang… you must be a very lucky man to have Princess Renee in your life. I know just the piece for you," He responded and pulled out a ring with a waterfall design that had both sapphires and diamonds sprinkled over the silver ring and waterfall. "It makes the ring look frozen yes? I had this designed for any royal fans that know about Renee's special talent."
"It's breathtaking," Hughes replied and Mustang blushed. It was simply star stuck and Renee would certainly cry over it when he would give it to her.
"How much?" Mustang asked. "I'm taking it."
"We need to find a place where the stone could be created," Renee said when Edward finished his soup that Major Armstrong brought them.
"Where? Do you honestly think the military would conduct experiments like this in central?" Major Armstrong asked them.
"Yes. It's a perfect place! I need a map of all the laboratories in central," Edward replied and Major Armstrong pulled out a small map from his jacket.
"Not many are left open around this area since the end of the war but 10, 12, 3 and 7 are open," Armstrong explained.
"It can't be them… it has to be one of the closed ones," Renee replied and Edward pointed at Laboratory 5.
"It's right next to a prison. It has to be this one," Ed said. He was right, it was right next to a prison.
"We should go tonight and have a look around!" Al shouted.
"No way! You boys are under our protection and we will not have you wandering around a closed down laboratory!" Maria screamed at them. "You're under lockdown from this point on, understood?"
"You can't tell us what to do! Don't you understand how important this is? It means the military is hiding secrets about the stone and we need answers!" Ed shouted back. "Look… Al and I can't use a stone to return to our original bodies anymore because of the secret ingredient but that doesn't mean we won't stop researching more on the stone. The military is hiding something and we're going to find out what it is!"
"Ed she's right," Renee replied and Edward turned to glare at her. "We should look tomorrow morning when there is more light out." Renee got up and pulled on her jacket. She followed Maria and Armstrong out the door leaving Ed and Al locked in their room.
"They're going to escape you know," Armstrong replied.
"I know… I just have someone to inform about this before making my way over to the lab," Renee replied.
Roy received the call from Renee and rushed over to the library where he bought her dinner and sat and listened to the details that Renee discovered from Ed and Al.
"They all gave us stones during the war, we had no clue what it was made of but hardly cared," Mustang replied. She ended the topic by glaring at him. He pulled out the ring box and slide it across the table to her. "I never got you a good enough gift so I think this makes up my extremely poor gift decisions to you." She looked at him confused and opened the box. Her jaw dropped and she felt tears swimming into her eyes before she pulled out the ring and placed it on her left hand ring finger.
"Why?" Renee asked him.
"Eh, I've been a pretty crappy boyfriend lately and decided to take a swing," Mustang asked.
"Funny, I know you're asking for sex as a thank you present later," Renee replied and Mustang smirked at her.
"Always the smart one. You know me so well."
"Anyway, before sex we should follow the brothers to lab 5 shouldn't we?" Renee whispered and winked at him. Roy checked his pocket watch.
"We got some time," He replied and followed Renee to the lab.
