Return to the Underworld

Chapter 10

"Ed, someone wants you on the phone."

Edward huffed as he put down his pen, closing his notebook so the pen could act as a lumpy bookmark. He stood up, brushed out the creases of his shirt with his hands, and ran downstairs. Charice was waiting for him in the living room, holding out her mobile phone to him. She raised a brow as he entered.

"Who wants me?" Ed asked as he took the phone out of her hands. She shook her head, shrugged her shoulders and walked off, muttering that he should get his own mobile and to not constantly use hers. He ignored her comment and put the mobile to his ear. "Hello? Edward Elric speaking."

"Good afternoon Edward," a woman on the other side said, her voice smooth and low. "This is Tulisa; we've met over a month ago when I handed over the invitation to meet my partner, Church. We have another meeting for you."

"What kind of meeting?" Edward paced around the living room uneasily.

"I'll deliver the details tomorrow. Pack a travel bag for three days. You can bring a friend if you wish." And then she hung up, leaving Edward listening to Charice's annoying dial tones. He sighed, running his hand down his face in frustration.

"Charice?" he called, waving around the phone in the air. "Do you have any large satchels?"

- - -

Charice was sprawled over a set of seats, leaving Edward squished at the very end. Her breathing was long and deep, indicating her sleep. Edward looked ahead of him, staring at a tall blonde woman as she organised some documents in a folder. The train jerked slightly, making the cabin walls rattle as the train rounded a bend in the English countryside.

"How long is it until we arrive?" Ed asked irritably, nudging Charice's elbow off his lap. She stirred, her face scrunching into a scowl momentarily before relaxing into a lazy smile.

Tulisa looked up from her paperwork; a strand of hair fell over her face. "Fifteen minutes. It's best if you wake your friend up."

Edward sighed as he rolled his eyes. Charice was content in her current state, and he knew that as soon as she is awoken from it she would be in a foul mood. Shrugging, he grabbed her shoulder and shook her awake. She made a startled noise, which reminded Ed of a noise a sheep would make, and held out her arms in an awkward manner.

"Jeez," she groaned as she finally recovered her bearings. "These seats are naff..."

"Slept comfortably?" Ed smirked as he watched her arch her back, making a few joints pop and click. She snorted a laugh.

"About as comfortable as being stabbed, if you ask me," she scoffed. Tulisa gave her a small smile before placing her files in her bag. Charice was eyeing that bag ever since she first saw it. It was black, with platinum studs and it bore a metal logo that indicated it was Vivienne Westwood. Tulisa had good style to go with her good looks.

"Have you ever been to London before, Edward?" Tulisa asked as she flicked the blonde strand of hair away. Ed shook his head. Charice nodded hers enthusiastically, not caring if the question wasn't directed towards her.

"I have, to the O2," Charice said with pride. "Best. Concert. Ever."

Tulisa gave Charice a patronising smile before paying her attention back to Ed. "How familiar are you with this world's ancient histories?"

"Not very."

"Then I suggest that you visit the British Museum," she drawled as she stood up. "You can also visit the Natural History Museum and the Science Museum. But first we have to go and meet Church."

- - -

Once again Charice has found herself bored out of her brains. The meeting with Church was boring, and she found Church's wandering eye incredibly disturbing. She often wondered if he was conscious of it moving, or if it moved based on his thoughts. If Church was intrigued the eye would swivel side to side. If he was confused the eye would jitter. If Church laughed then the eye would go into a full spasm attack. However, the meeting was over, and Charice was still bored as she whined to Edward repeatedly.

"Ed..." she groaned. "This museum is so friggin boring. Can we go to Harrods? I saw this really nice bracelet in there, and it's so pretty."

Edward ignored her as he took down some notes, inspecting an ancient Egyptian mural. He smirked occasionally, and the knowledge that seemed to flood him was more the welcoming. Charice, however, was not as enthusiastic as Ed.

"We can go later," he sighed. "When I'm done."

She sighed melodramatically, as if her presence inside a museum was a crime. He felt smug as he decided to write down his notes slower than usual, taking up more time inside the gallery. Charice felt like her brain was on fire. Ed glanced over to her, deciding to relieve her of boredom instead of encouraging it.

"You know," he started. Charice twisted round to face him. "Alchemy in my world started out as an experiment in the kitchen. A woman was trying to concoct a mixture for her child to cure him of his headache. Her child didn't like the mixture, so she placed the leftover glass on top of her husband's work paper. Her husband was a philosopher and mathematician, and he passed his time by drawing geometrical shapes. The glass was directly on top of one of his geometrical shapes. In frustration of her child's distress, she rested both of her hands on the table, and through her emotional outburst she activated the circle."

Charice was silent, and she listened intently to Edward's words, drowning out the background noise of other visitors and tourists.

"Through these extraordinary coincidental chains of events, alchemy was discovered." He finished. He looked down at his notes, flicking through the pages aimlessly. "Alchemy was discovered around two thousand years ago, and up until today our culture has been influenced heavily by it."

He looked up behind him, staring at the large stone statue of Ramses the second's torso. Charice folded her arms, smiling at the thought. "Shame," she laughed. "We have physics here. Alchemy sounds so much more amazing."

Ed held up a finger, pointing at the Egyptian Pharaoh statue. "True," he said. "But here, the concept of alchemy was thought up an extra two thousand years before ours. Yet, physics is in abundance. So, what has happened to alchemy here?"

She shrugged. "Yeah, but, alchemy wasn't actually discovered, like you have," she muttered. "It's more or less a religion rather than an actual science."

"Nope," he challenged. His face twisted into a determined sneer. "Remember those crop circles we had a look at? I recognised some of the symbols that were used in this very museum. Those circles were no doubt influenced by the past. That could only mean that your ancient people must have successfully dabbled with alchemy."

Charice grimaced at the memory of that night, and how she managed to catch a cold from being soaked in the rain. "So why are those ancient symbols used in those crop circles?" she questioned, confusion taking over. "Because crop circles are pretty modern stuff..."

"That could only mean one thing," his grin widened. "The knowledge has been kept or passed down, four thousand years, until now. Why keep and pass down useless knowledge?"

Charice, now grasping the concept, grinned along with Ed. "Sheesh," she exclaimed. "How can something be passed down for so long down the time line?"

"Easy," he said, snapping his notebook shut. "Religion. Alchemy is disguised in the forms of religion in this world. And you know how people can easily cling onto religion; it's a perfect way to hide knowledge and pass it down at the same time."

"So, what," she mused. "You gonna be a Bible basher and decode Jesus, or something? Because you have to respect that religion has heavily shaped our culture here, too. People are still entitled to their opinion and belief, so I think we should keep this concept quiet."

"I'm agnostic," he said dryly. "But this is pretty good news. Why translate new transmutation circles by myself, when I can just pull out the translations that have already been made for me by your ancient ancestors?"

He chuckled as he walked to the next expedition, and Charice followed. Maybe the museum wasn't so bad after all.

- - -

Charice and Edward were given separate hotel rooms, paid for by Tulisa and Church. Charice would wait in her hotel room, watching cheesy hotel television until Edward would come back from his meetings with Church. The rest of the day would be spent exploring the rest of the museums. On the last day of their three day trip they decided to pay a visit to the Natural History Museum before they went on the train to go home.

"Look at the size of that!" Charice pointed up at a life size replica model of a blue whale. "It's massive!"

Edward only crossed his arms, smiling at Charice's reactions instead of the actual exhibition. "You get excited over a whale, but not the dinosaur in the entrance?" he laughed.

"Yeah, but dinosaurs don't exist anymore," she waved him off in a playful manner. "Whales are still alive. That fossil in the lobby is just a big fat spine with legs."

He laughed at her way of thinking. Personally he found the dinosaur skeleton much more interesting than the whale. Charice decided to lead the way instead of Ed, browsing through the exhibits casually without the need for stopping too long. She told him that the world is more beautiful if it still has its mysteries, and exposing too much of it would lose her admiration of the Earths secrecy. Edward had never thought of that before, but his heart and soul was too committed to knowledge for him to stop now.

Charice took a leaflet from one of the public maps, and she hunched over it as she stood next to Ed. She pointed at an area of the map, where a diagram of a blue whale was.

"We're here," she said, indicating to the whale. "But you're not really interested with animals and stuff." She folded the leaflet back up. Charice then grabbed Ed's wrist as she led him through the hallways, dodging past people and tourists. She then pointed ahead, letting go.

"W-what the heck, Charice?" Ed complained as he rubbed his wrists, but Charice shushed him as she looked up. "Where is this?"

She strode across the hallway. Statues of majestic characters posed on each side of the room, and at the far side was an escalator, which led up to a model of the Earth.

"This is the Red Zone," she explained. "You seem to like rocks, and minerals, and volcanoes and stuff. I saw some of the books you borrowed from the library. This Zone is also about rocks and minerals, and other geeky stuff, like how the Earth was created."

Edwards jaw dropped. "They found that out?"

She nodded. "Yeah, ages ago, but that's old news now," she walked off. "But it's the pictures from Mars that I'm interested in. I wanna see if there are cute little aliens in the shot!"

He was still rooted to the spot. "Mars?" he blurted. "What kind of people are you?"

- - -

This time it was Edward who was sprawled across the train seats. Tulisa wasn't with them, so Charice had no-one to talk to on the ride back home. She felt him shift against her, muttering something incoherently under his breath. She bent over a little, trying to catch a glimpse of his face.

"Edward?" she whispered. "You awake?"

He was silent, bar his deep breathing, and he was sleeping on the seats at an odd angle. He barely fit in the seat space next to Charice, and his leg hung off the other side awkwardly. Charice took out her phone, giggling to herself as she took a picture of the sleeping lump next to her.

"I'm so putting that on facebook," she smirked as she uploaded the picture online. Once done she placed the phone back in her pocket, and sighed contently. A while later she sighed in frustration, mainly at how bored she was.

She glanced sideways, looking at Ed, and then stared out of the window as she watched sheep and cows go by. She wondered if Edward also had sheep and cows in his world. Maybe they do, but perhaps they were different from the ones here. Maybe they were bright pink, and instead of bleating or mooing, they chirped and honked like a bicycle horn.

Or maybe they didn't. Maybe the horns of a bull acted as a radio transmitter, and whenever they opened their mouths the top ten charts play. Did they even have a top ten music chart? She remembered Ed telling her that there are people from his world identical here, like a parallel universe. There could be another version of Lady Gaga or Britney Spears at his world. But she also remembered that the librarian Roy in this world was a military superior in his. Maybe Britney Spears wasn't a singer in his world. Perhaps she's something else, like a farmer, or a cross dresser. Hell, she could even be a dinner lady.

Charice laughed at the thought, but it died down when she thought of something else. It must be awful for Ed to see alternate versions of friends he had known, and he had to put up with the fact that they weren't his real friends, they just looked like them. Charice looked down at Ed, remembering the time he froze up when he met her history teacher, Mr. Hopkins. Ed must have recognised him too, and judging by his reaction Ed must have been really close to him.

Ed shifted again, his brows knitting together uncomfortably. Charice rolled her eyes.

"For goodness sake, Ed," she sighed. "What is up with you and sleeping like a homeless person?"

She took her bag off her lap and placed it between her ankles, looping a strap round her foot so it wouldn't get stolen. She slid her arms underneath his shoulders and hoisted him up, so his head would rest on her lap. He had more space to spread out now, with an additional head rest. He sighed, muttering something else, but it was too quiet for Charice to catch.

She smiled slightly as she slid her arms back out, lightly brushing her hand against his coat to tug it higher up his shoulder. As she was about to return her hand so she could cross her arms she felt something hold it. Charice looked down, surprised that Ed had a light hold of her hand. She checked to see if he was awake by poking his forehead with her other hand, but he was still asleep.

"Man," she giggled. "You must have a teddy back home if you need to sleep like that..."

But Charice kept her hand there, for him to hold onto. At least until the train journey was over.

- - -

Oh... didn't get any reviews for the last chapter :( *sniff* I'm sad...

But anyway, added a fluffy ending.

The fic is nearly halfway done! This might be the only fan fic saga that I have ever completed! But I'm still debating about the ending... ah well. Guess you're gonna have to find out :D

Hmm... I still think Charice still has those Mary Sue tendencies. I'm trying to loosen her up a little, but she still seems a bit "OMG LIEK MERR!!!" and Ed seems a bit out of character... I dunno, he doesn't seem serious enough, it's like he's on vacation and he's lacking that urgency for finding a way to get to his brother.

Merrr...

Reviews give me happiness and encourage me to write fastarrr! :D