THE OUTSIDER
by Iland Girl
"For those without 'purpose'."
A Fullmetal Alchemist Fanfiction
I don't own anybody but Erin, Auntie, and Brayden... for now...
Chapter 9
"The Way Home"
"There is a kind of magicness about going far away and then coming back all changed."
― Kate Douglas Wiggin, New Chronicles of Rebecca
(Erin)
When I pictured Resembool, I had to go off of what Edward and Alphonse had told me.
I pictured a very dull, flat place with people spread out really far, the gene pool being limited, and it being a clusterfuck for rednecks.
That was Ed's view on it.
Then I pictured Eden, the perfect picturesque landscape with flowers blooming everywhere and adorable children running around while grandparents watched them.
That was Al's views.
What I got was a smash of both... I guess...
It was... rural. Nice and quiet, not too much going on, but nothing overly plain either. As we walked I looked out to over the rolling hills, smelling the remaining scents of morning dew. I missed the smell, it was always there when I walked to school. Fond memories of the park, the alcove I huddled into, surfaced.
I glanced up at Al, who was being carried by Armstrong, and he glanced down at me. I smiled at him, and I got the feeling that if he could, Al would be smiling back.
As I walked, I had to stop suddenly or risk tripping over a toppled Edward. I blinked in surprise when I saw a wrench embedded into his face. Looking up at the house in front of us, I was surprised to see a girl standing on the top deck.
"You! Not a single letter in years and now you suddenly come back?! What have you guys been up to?!" The girl shouted, gripping the guardrail as though trying to strangle it. Edward was quick to recover, making me think this was normal.
"What the Hell?! First second you see me and you try to kill me?! Thanks for nothing!" He shouted.
"Ed!" Al scolded, making me look up at him. "Winry was just worried!"
I looked back to Ed, then the girl, then back to Al.
"Um, did I miss something?"
"I'm so sorry about earlier! It must have startled you!" Winry said with a smile. I offered a shaky one back as she held out her hand. "I'm Winry Rockbell, and you are...?"
"Erin Lallier," I said, smiling while clasping her hand. "You must be the mechanic I've heard about."
"Oh? And I suppose you've heard of me too?"
I looked over as a third person walked in the living room. A smile broke across my face again.
"You're their Aunt Pinako, correct? Al told me a lot about you two." I said, seeing her give a wise old smile.
"Well at least these two boys haven't forgotten about us." Pinako said, Ed piping up from his seat on the couch.
"Hey c'mon! Cut us some slack! We've been working nonstop for years! Of course we were too busy to visit!"
Winry glared at him, making him quiet down. A small chuckle escaped my lips, I'd never seen Ed so tamed before. He gave me a look, just daring me to voice my thoughts. Instead, I looked away and acted innocent. The blonde girl walked over to Edward then, glaring at the place his metal appendage should be.
"I can't believe you broke that arm! It was a masterpiece of mine!" Winry growled out, glancing over to Al. "And Al's all banged up too. Have you two been getting into trouble?"
Ed and Al tensed, both shaking their heads.
"It's not like that!" Al insisted, but then Winry got a sharp look in her eye. Suddenly those orbs were upon me.
"Is that true?" Winry asked me, my eyes widened for a second, then I smiled. Such worry, you'd think they were family.
"Well," I began, closing my eyes and shrugging dramatically. "I've got to say, keeping these boys out of trouble is probably more dangerous than letting them charge in. As you can see, Ed and Al don't listen to me very well, so I had to teach them a lesson."
When I glanced at her, her eyes had widened to the size of dinner plates. I clutched my stomach I was laughing so hard.
"I'm kidding! No these boys were just over doing it, nothing dangerous! I swear!" I said, smiling. A feeling in my gut told me Winry was a really close friend to the brothers, and that's why they didn't want her to worry. It was sweet of them, but as much as I wanted to tell Winry, it wasn't my place.
Winry grumbled something under her breath, but before I or Armstrong (who had been quiet like a ticking time bomb) could comment further, Pinako tapped my shoulder lightly. I turned and looked down at her.
"Well if that's the case, we'll need to get working right away." She said, making me raise a brow for a second.
"I don't mean to rush or anything, but we've gotta report back soon. Could you have my arm done in a week?" Ed asked, but Pinako chuckled.
"Don't insult me Ed, we'll have it done in three days." She then turned back to me, holding out a piece of paper. "Since Ed and Al are both out of commission, would you mind running to the market to get these things for dinner?"
I took the list, a grin spreading across my face.
"Sure!"
There wasn't much to the market, it was like the local farmer's market back home in Willowneck. The list Pinako gave me wasn't very long, but the amount of money Ed gave me to buy it all was incredibly large. I could only judge this by the prices vs amount of 'cens' I had in my hands. Wow, currency was a lot simpler here than home. No damn pennies! That's a win if I do say so for myself!
I had almost all the veggies and bread and meat from the market. My arms were almost full as I began to leave, but then my eyes came across somethign I never expected to see.
One stand wasn't selling any perishable goods. Instead they were selling trinkets of sorts. One trinket in particular caught my eye. A locket of sorts, the clasp welded shut. It was silver with small vines carved into it. The chain it sat on was thing and frail, looking like it's been welded together at one piece. The chain itself was very long, long enough that you could fit it over your head without unclasping it.
Slowly, I placed a few bags down to look at it closely. A very pretty looking locket, but that wasn't why I was so interested.
It looked like my Mother's.
I could remember it from the pictures. Of Father and Mother. When Bray and I were small, she would wear it all the time. Then, after she died, I never saw it again. It vanished into thin air.
Slowly, I picked it up, examining it. My heart dropped to my stomach when I read the back.
I.F x A.L
Isobel Fowler and Anatol Lallier.
The names of my parents.
I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from whimpering. Clutching the locket, I remembered the last time I had seen it, clutched between Mother and Father's hands. The chain was wrapped around them, as though tying them together.
Father begged for her to stay...
"Excuse me Miss," I glanced up at the elderly woman who stood behind the counter. "Would you like to buy this locket?"
A pang of frustration surrounded me when I realized I couldn't. This was Ed's money, it wasn't my own. I placed the locket back on the counter, frowning slightly.
"I'm sorry, but this is my friends money, I can't use it." I said while trying to reorganize my bags. The shopkeeper was quiet for a moment, but then she spoke.
"A lot of people have asked me where I found this trinket," She said, smiling a bit as she looked down to the locket. "I had nursed a man back to health when he was traveling. He came by, looking ill and weary. He left the next day after I gave him food and shelter. Left a thank you note and a huge pile of money. But I found this lying on the ground. Never did get to give it back to him."
I stared at her for a moment, a sick feeling rising in my gut.
"The man... his name wouldn't happen to be... Anatol...Lallier... would it?" I asked, hesitant to know the answer. She looked at me, slightly surprised.
"How did you know?"
...
...What?
My Father... he'd... been here?
That didn't make any sense! How could he be here? He was... I remembered him vividly being...
Dead.
Father was dead.
Or was he like me?
Trap in this world, with no escape?
"He was... my Father." I said, looking at the ground. The woman surprised me by coming around the counter. She smiled before raising the pendant over my head and letting it rest around my neck. My eyes widened then, I looked into her brown eyes.
"I knew I saw something. You have the same eyes, y'know. Always looking at something others can't see. A fierce but passive nature is in those eyes." She said, closing her eyes. "I suppose giving this to you would be the right thing to do, right?"
I was about to reply that, no, she didn't have to. Then I paused, looking down at the locket. For the first time, I didn't want to share. I didn't want to give this up. So I looked at her with a fierce gaze before smiling.
"Thank you."
"So... this is how you make automail?"
Winry looked up at me as I stared at her, working so hard on Ed's new arm. She smiled at me, beckoning me to walk all the way into the room. Ed and Al were sitting on the couches still, Armstrong nowhere to be seen. After I had put the groceries in their respective places, I had meandered in to see what the others were up to.
I walked up to Winry, she picked up a different arm and held it out for me to see.
"This is the complete model." She said. I stared at the shine of it, noticing it was a lot bigger than Ed's arm. It would be too long for the boy. My orbs wandered up to hers.
"May I?" I asked, Winry smiled before nodding. I took the arm, absolutely fascinated by it. Tinkering around, I flipped it around, studying how it moved and bent just like a real arm. Bio-mechanics were horribly behind in my world.
"This is incredible," I said in awe, looking up to Winry. "And you can do this? Already? You're so young!"
It took people decades to learn at the pace Winry must've. To get this far...
The girl beamed at me, grinning.
"You bet! It's not easy though, and I'm still learning..." She trailed off, but I shook my head furiously.
"No! Winry, this is amazing! You're amazing!" I said, looking back at the arm. "I have never seen automail before I saw Edward's arm, I used to think once you lost a limb, that was it. You were done. But not anymore. These babies are incredible! How do you connect the nerves? What about the force behind it? How can you recreate the muscle?"
I asked so many questions, it was a bit silly, but Winry was more than happy to explain everything to me. She showed me that each wire connected to each and every nerve of the nervous system in the arm through a port. She explained this my showing me Ed's shoulder port. I was so engrossed I almost missed Ed's complaints of being a display model for this.
She showed me how the hydraulics connected to the nervous system, and how the port in Edward's arm connected to each of his nerves. It was a lot to take it, but I kept up as much as I could. Winry was even more incredible that she learned all of this and retained it easily. Not to mention knowing exactly where each nerve was located...
Amazing didn't cover this anymore.
"Are you sure you've never seen automail before? Not at all?" Winry asked, but I just shook my head.
"No, my small town didn't have anything of the sort. People lost limbs and just moved on with life. They believe that, once something leaves us, it's gone forever." I snorted then though, glancing out the window. Winry hesitated in building the arm. I glanced over to her, noticing how sad she looked.
"Ah! I'm sorry! Did I say... something...?"
Oh crap.
Even Ed looked depressed. Al was hunched over too.
Dammit.
"So... why are you traveling with Ed and Al?" Winry asked, finally the cold air seemed to dissipate from the room. Ed leaned back on the couch, Al uncurled his helmet from his shoulder.
"Jeez Winry, why are you being so nosy all of a sudden-"
"I need to learn alchemy." I interjected. The room became quiet as I glared at the floor, but I could sense someone staring at me. "I made a promise, and the only way I can keep it, is by learning alchemy. If I keep this promise, I can finally go home."
It was a break through for me, telling how I felt to a near stranger. Yet I was saying it more to Ed and Al. They weren't strangers, they were...
Friends.
A warmth covered me again at the word.
"Alchemy won't solve all of you problems you know." Winry said, making me look at her, perplexed. She continued to work on Ed's arm. "You don't need alchemy to fix your problems, you've got two good arms right? Why don't you start using them?"
She'd struck a cord.
"You were born with a brain, right? Use it to solve your own problems!"
A small smile played at my lips.
"Yeah," I agreed. "I guess you're right."
However, for this problem, I definitely needed to learn and understand alchemy.
Author's Note!
Heyo! I'm back again! A big thanks to AuthorChick96 for reviewing! I hope you guys have enjoyed this story thus far!
Also, if anybody has any ideas or moments they really really want in the story, whether it be cute, funny, or sad moments, please let me know!
I would love to hear your input!
I would also like to hear your guesses at where the plot is going! What do you think is going on with Erin's Father? Is there anything confusing going on thus far? Any questions, concerns, complaints? I'm open to it all!
I also didn't even noticed I kinda am following the first anime plot... hehehe... whoops, so much for originality! I'm trying to tweak the plot a little bit more to make it more original but... eh, when I get there I shall fix it!
Also, I would like you guys to know that this story should be roughly 52 chapters. That includes the prolog and epilogue. I already have three scenarios for the ending written down, but I'm still debating on whether to write a sequel or not... Ah well, I have over forty chapters until then!
So rate and review!
Ya know you waaaanna!
Cheers!
Iland Girl