Note: Short update is…late and EXTREMELY short. I'm sorry, I just have zero inspiration at the moment . But take this as it is, I suppose.
Also school starts tomorrow. Not fun.
S . I . N . H . E . A . R . T
IX.
cast
"The world is a stage, but the play is badly cast." Oscar Wilde
Hmm. There doesn't seem to be any activity coming from the side of those brothers. The other potential sacrifice is running around trying to climb his way up.
But that girl… I should send Envy to take a look at her. She hasn't done much, but she seems familiar somehow. Perhaps I'm looking too closely at things, but it wouldn't hurt to be cautious.
These humans are deceitful creatures, after all.
Meanwhile, though…
"An Ishballan stinking of blood is getting close. Gluttony."
"Yes. Can I eat him?"
"…don't leave one strand of hair."
A widening grin.
Scar was uneasy. Although he walked beneath a silent bridge with nothing but—he whipped around with narrowed eyes, and then relaxed infinitesimally—rats for company, it was hard to shake off the feeling of unease. He should have been at home in the darkness—it was where he'd been living ever since he decided to take this path of revenge, after all—without its soldiers and prying eyes, and yet, absurdly, he felt safer in the daylight. At least he could see his enemies coming, then, just as they could see him.
And a part of him, deep down, recognized that there was something lurking in the darkness…waiting for him to fall into its abyss.
Scar shook his head. Just because he was devoted to Ishvalla didn't mean he had to fall prey to superstition and stupidity.
But still, that girl.
The shock that had been in her eyes. And that recognition, almost like she had seen him before… Perhaps it was because it had been a long time since he'd been able to look anyone other than his victims in the eye, but he now felt yet another absurd fear, as if that girl knew something no one else alive knew.
Suddenly, the rat from before squeaked. He tensed. Footsteps were approaching behind him.
It was time for another battle, it seemed.
In the darkness…a hungry leer gleamed.
Ed read the notes over and over again—his and Marcoh's—as if rereading them would change them, as if they might morph into something better before his disbelieving eyes.
They'd worked endlessly after finding Marcoh's "recipes" in the first branch of the National Central Library, trying to decipher Marcoh's code, fueled by the excitement of finally having what they'd searched for for so long right beneath their fingertips. They'd forgone sleep—Ed having to bear with Al's protests—and sometimes even food in their efforts.
And yet.
In his stupor, Ed vaguely imagined that he could hear Truth laughing at him in the back of his head. Is this what you set us up for? He wanted to scream, he wanted to rage, he wanted to sob. Is this what the answer was all along?
It was too cruel.
But the answer was right in front of him.
"…Brother, go eat breakfast," Al said quietly.
"I'm not hungry," was the answer. And it was the truth. Who could be hungry at a time like this? "I'm just…"
…tired went unsaid.
The brothers fell silent. After a while, Ed spoke again.
"It's like…just when I start to think that it's within my reach, it runs away."
Almost like Ming, he realized. But the thought of the person who had led them to this was too bitter to swallow at the moment, so he pushed it away.
"And finally, when I feel like I actually got hold of it, I've been knocked down by what I caught."
He laughed humorlessly, covering his eyes with his metal arm—the thing that represented everything they had ever wanted, and everything they had ever lost. "Looks like God really hates people who break his rules."
Al didn't say anything.
What was there left to say?
"…hey, Al?" Ed said quietly. "There's something I always wanted to tell you, but…I was too scared to say it…"
"What is it?" Al said. In another situation his tone might've been curious and encouraging, but here it fell flat. It was hard to muster up any positive emotion after the shock they'd received, the despair they'd just been force-fed.
Regardless, Ed took a deep breath and prepared himself. "Do you—"
"Wa…please wait! They're still resting!"
"ELRIC BROTHERS, ARE YOU INSIDE?! IT IS I! CAN YOU OPEN THE DOOR?!"
The voice was so loud the two brothers literally jumped out of their seats. "What should we do?!" Al said, terrified.
"Ignore him, ignore him!" Ed said frantically. "The door's locked and he'll eventually go away!"
The man who instigated such fear in them was none other than the Central Amestrian military's infamous musclebound Major Armstrong. Apparently, it was he who Mustang had contacted regarding Ed and Al's security during their stay in Central—and it was he who the Elric brothers had been forced to meet after their first day of research.
They inwardly shuddered at the memory of that day. The mustache, the sparkles, he "manly" tears, the sparkles, the insane megaphonic voice, the sparkles the muscles, the sparkles, and oh God, the sparkles…!
"I HAVE COME, EDWARD ELRIC!"
Was it bad that they could hear the bolded and capitalized letters in that voice? Ed and Al stared at the looming Major, transfixed in their horror. He…he broke the door!
Behind him stood a traumatized-looking Lieutenant Ross and Sergeant Ross; Ed could immediately deduce what had happened from their terrified faces, and glared at them for giving him and Al away. The Major began ranting loudly, but his words completely flew over Ed's head, except for one sentence.
"Sometimes the truth can be cruel."
Yes, it can, was the silent answer in Ed's head. Then his thoughts ground to a halt.
The truth?
The truth…
"The truth," he said aloud. The words had a ring of finality to them, but also a ring of familiarity…
"What's wrong, brother?" Al said.
"Do you remember what Ming said?" Ed said quickly.
"Huh?"
"One last thing, though—when you go to Central, remember to look for the 'truth behind the truth.'"
"The truth behind the truth…"
The look in her eyes. As if she had been trying to tell him something, something important, something she couldn't say but he couldn't miss.
"I get it," he said suddenly. "There's still something. Something important." And Ming wanted me to find out what it is.
For a moment, he felt anger. If she had known something like this would come up, why hadn't she just told them in the first place? Why put them through despair? Through all this frustration? But Ming wasn't there to answer those questions, so they would just have to wait.
In the meantime, he had another question to answer.
"We have to find out more," he said to Al—and to the other soldiers in the room, who were listening to him raptly. "Maybe if we look at the military research institutes—like the one where Marcoh worked—are there any maps of Central?"
Maria Ross snapped to it. "I'll find you one right away," she said quickly, heading out the room. Then she paused and turned to eye them all with a critical eye.
"Don't get into any trouble before I come back," she warned.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Ed grumbled half-heartedly as she left.
The men stood in silence for a while. Finally, Armstrong said, with uncharacteristic quietness, "Dr. Tim Marcoh is the one from whom you obtained this research?'
"Huh?" Al said, when Ed didn't reply. "Um! Er, yes."
They couldn't mention Ming. Or rather, they wouldn't mention her, wouldn't get her more deeply involved than she already was.
"I see," Armstrong said. Then, abruptly, "He was a colleague of mine during the Ishballan War."
The name brought distant memories to Edward's mind. Two smiling faces…a kind woman and a warmhearted man…Winry's tears.
"A fellow State Alchemist," the major continued, clenching a fist. "To think that he was involved in such nefarious work…I'm ashamed."
Ed did not reply, and they lapsed back into silence. To him, to be a State Alchemist—a dog of the military—was already an act of shame, a principle drilled into his head for years by Pinako and Izumi. But he'd given up pride, given up shame, for the sake of his goal. For his and Al's bodies. For that which now seemed so close and so far at the same time…
Five minutes later, they were all standing around the table, a map of Central spread out before them.
"There are currently four locations within Central that are alchemic research institutes for the military," Major Armstrong—as the one who had been in the military the longest, and held the highest rank, he was also the most knowledgeable—said, with uncharacteristic seriousness.
Or, Ed absent-mindedly mused, it wasn't uncharacteristic at all. It was just uncharacteristic that everyone else took him seriously.
"Among those four is the one that Dr. Marcoh worked for, the third research institute," he went on, pointing. "This one is the most suspicious."
Edward frowned. "Yeah…I passed through all of them after I got my State Alchemist license. This one didn't look like it was doing research that was all that important, though." It doesn't look like anything we should be looking for...huh? "Huh?"
Something caught his attention.
"What's that? This building, right here." He pointed.
"Oh, that's…" Ross flipped through a reference volume. "Previously that building used to be the fifth research institute. It is currently unused, though. Due to the danger of structural collapse, entrance is prohibited."
Edward's eyes narrowed. "It's this one."
"Huh?" Sergeant Brosh said. "Why?"
"There's a prison next to it," Ed said, quietly.
A perfect source of humans…no. Materials…for a Philosopher's Stone.
Mustang surveyed the area before him critically. Parts of the buildings and road were collapsed; some of what lay in front of him was little more than dust, brick, and rubble. It must've been a fight; there was no other explanation, for from what he had seen, Scar was not the type of terrorist that committed random acts of destruction to make a point.
He was a terrorist whose acts of destruction were his point—far more dangerous.
"Well?" he said, turning away from the scene of ruin. "What do you think?"
Hawkeye glanced up from where she had been examining the torn and bloody jacket they'd found caught on a stick in the water. "It's definitely what Scar was wearing."
Mustang felt something swoop in his stomach. Judging from the condition of the clothing, Scar was either dead, or severely injured. Either way, their plans were caught in a snag. "Is there a corpse?" he asked.
Havoc, who had been left in charge of the investigation, shook his head negative as he lit up a cigarette. "Not so far. We're still searching, but it's going to take weeks to go through everything under the rubble."
"Regardless, with the amount of blood lost, he probably isn't in good shape," Hawkeye murmured.
Mustang frowned. "Don't let your guard down until you find his dead body," he said. Don't give up hope until it's beyond all reason.
He ordered Havoc to continue clearing away the rubble, using the excuse of not being able to go on a date until he could see Scar's corpse as a reason to force the men to work nonstop without breaks. In reality, though, he was worried for different reasons. From what that girl had said, the Ishballan would play a critical role in the future; if she had been telling the truth, then it was important that they locate and negotiate with him as quickly as possible.
…but if she had been lying, then they could have a dangerous terrorist running amok.
"Has anything good happened recently?"
Izumi looked up with a start. "What?"
The doctor finished scribbling down his report and set the clipboard aside, smiling at her. "Although I can tell that you've been exerting yourself for the past few days, you seem to be doing better. Things like this are usually affected by a patient's mentality."
"Ah…" Izumi hesitated.
Then she smiled back.
"Yes, actually. My daughter came home a few days ago."
Unfortunately, when Izumi said Ming was grounded, she really meant grounded. Ming was barely allowed to leave the house, except to do chores like shopping and retrieving the mail—and spar with Izumi, of course, but the older woman thankfully took Ming's broken arm into account and kept those spars few and light. Ming couldn't complain—the punishment was still light compared to what she knew Izumi could still dish out—but she mentally admitted that it was hard to get used to staying in one house after traveling from place to place for so long. So although she didn't say anything, she did take the time to enjoy the rare occasions she went out.
"Ah, Ming! Getting groceries for Izumi again?"
She smiled and nodded at the flower shop owner, an old woman currently bent over her zinnias. "Yes, ma'am."
"She certainly knows how to work you, don't she?" said her husband, emerging from inside the store. He wiped his hands clean of soil as he spoke. "Well, let us know if you need anything from here."
"Yes, sir. Thank you."
It amazed Ming that the residents around the Curtis's shop still remembered her—the quiet, unassuming little girl from over four years ago. It amazed her even more how easily they accepted her back into the fold of Dublith's social curtain—then again, Dublith was a much larger town than Resembool, which was probably more apt to gossip and ostracize.
"Thank you for your purchase and come again. Have a good day."
"Thank you," Ming said lamely in the face of the stall owner's cheeriness, accepting the bags of vegetables.
It had been easy, too easy even, to fall back into the rhythm of daily life in the shop once she'd returned. Wake up in the morning. Make breakfast. Eat. Help with the shop. Eat lunch. Head out for chores. Come back to help with the shop. Help cook dinner. Eat dinner. Dishes. Sleep. She hadn't even lost her carving or cashier skills, much to Izumi's surprise and Mason's delight—
Ming hadn't been surprised. It wasn't often that she forgot anything.
—and neither Izumi nor Sig tried to breach the elephant sitting in the room: what Ming had been doing for the past few years. Ming had tried to explain—as vaguely as possible, of course—during dinner on that first night home.
Home. Such a strange word.
She'd given them the same excuses she'd given the Elrics: she was traveling, she visited places all over Amestris, she went sightseeing, she—
"You didn't leave the country?" Izumi had said.
Ming's words had stuttered to a halt. Slowly, she had picked them back up and said, "I didn't have enough money for that."
And then the conversation had gone of course to where Ming had gotten her money over the years—to which the answer had been odd jobs and fixing things with alchemy—but Ming hadn't missed the way Izumi's eyes had dimmed, or Sig's frown had deepened. Her answer had been reasonable and even partially honest. Just not wholly honest, and all of them knew it.
Of course she couldn't have left Amestris; that was where all the trouble was.
The truth, though. Could she tell them? Would she tell them? It wasn't just that the land they lived on was nothing more than a chalkboard for something sick and twisted and greater—that the art they practiced was something much more sinister than it seemed—that the children they had accepted into their fold were embroiled in something dangerous beyond their imagination.
It was that the little girl they had adopted so long ago hadn't been a little girl at all…
Ming ruthlessly slammed the lid down on those thoughts as she walked down the street. Izumi was standing at the door, chatting animatedly with a customer.
"And our beef was brought in from local farms—there's one only about two hours away from here—" she glanced up and caught Ming's eye. "Oh, Ming. Welcome back."
"I'm back," she said, the routine laughably domestic.
It had been far too easy to fall back into the rhythm of daily life. Here, under the hot southern sun, it felt almost as if time had stopped. But it hadn't, and the world (Ed and Al, the military, the Homunculi, Father) was still moving on around them, streams of icy reality that slowed to pool in this warm little dell of quietude. She'd come back because Ed had told her to, because she had wanted to confront her guilt. Because she had known once she did so, she could move on and plunge herself back in the river where death and sin and conspiracy reigned.
And Izumi had welcomed her. Accepted her. Kept her.
Something cold curled in Ming's gut.
A few more days, she thought.
A few more days…and I have to move.
"If I may ask…what exactly are you doing, sir?"
Mustang looked up briefly from the records he was going through. "Ah, Lieutenant," he greeted. She raised an eyebrow, giving him a wry look.
He couldn't blame her for it, either. His usually immaculate desk was a mess, buried under a pile of papers. "There's something I'm looking for," he said by way of explanation.
"…if you are searching for Scar, sir, surely the work can be delegated to Second Lieutenant Havoc," Hawkeye said quietly, placing the other records he had asked for on the one area of the desk that had been left bare. "It is his task at the moment, after all—"
"Yeah, I know," Mustang said, flapping a hand. "That's not what I'm doing here, though."
She frowned at him. He waited. She frowned deeper.
"They're records on Ming Curtis," he caved.
Hawkeye's expression cleared. She was certainly a scary woman when she wanted to be. "I see. Have you found anything worth noting, sir?"
"Quite a bit, actually," he said. Picking up the paper closest to him, he scanned it. "These records go in reverse chronological order. She was first listed as a missing person four years ago in Resembool. Several military personnel searched for her in the area but were unsuccessful; no one even saw her board a train."
"As I recall, the Elrics were part of that search, sir," Hawkeye said quietly.
Mustang set down that paper and folded his hands, resting his chin on them. "That's right." He closed his eyes. "Fullmetal begged to be put on the case. Out of all the personnel, they searched the hardest, and after two months without results, they fought to keep the case open, even though we had no proof that she was even alive."
"There was no evidence of death either," Hawkeye pointed out.
"Yes, and now she's finally been unlisted; the case is closed," he said. Opening his eyes again, he pointed at a second sheet of paper—a map. "In the past four years there were several personnel reports of girls matching her description, but they're scattered all across the country, and none of them were confirmed. Unfortunately, our system for locating missing citizens is much less efficient than our system for locating missing criminals," he added under his breath.
"But we knew all that already, sir."
"We did, actually, which is why I called up South Headquarters and asked for their records," Mustang said, holding up another stack of information. "And things get a lot more interesting before she runs away."
Hawkeye waited as he shuffled through them.
"Here," he finally said. "This one. Curtis isn't the Curtises' biological daughter—she was adopted eight years ago, at the age of six. The official adoption papers were registered in…" He paused. "Here, in East City."
"An orphan, sir? Or a relative?"
"That's the interesting part." His voice dropped, but hardened. "Her previous circumstances are extremely vague; there's a doctor's signature here on her medical record affirming that she has retrograde amnesia. It also says she had multiple injuries, including fractured ribs."
Hawkeye's eyes grew sharp. Anything or anyone that would abuse a six-year-old child deserved more than a few gunshots in her book.
"I don't want to jump to conclusions," Mustang said as he set down the papers, "but amnesia doesn't come out of the blue, and it sounds like hers was definitely induced by trauma of some kind. The question is who—or what." He closed his eyes again. "It's also very interesting that we don't have a complete history of her past; we have no idea who she was, or where she came from."
"With all due respect, sir, none of that might matter if she doesn't remember it," Hawkeye pointed out. When he stayed silent, she frowned. "You think she does."
"I think she's hiding a lot more than she lets on, and some of that may be about her origins," he said ambivalently. "Unfortunately, my search only goes so far. Hughes works in investigations, so I was thinking of asking him to help me…well. Investigate."
For a moment he felt a flicker of guilt, but brushed it aside. The girl may not have been expecting to be researched in such a way, but she was too trusting, too naïve. She was in an adults' world, now, and adults learned and knew everything about their allies…and potential enemies.
Ming Curtis…I'll pin you down and solve all the mysteries around you. Then we'll see if you're really an altruist...or just a liar and a fool.
These people…the prince, searching for his other half. The general, slowly moving his troops. The avenger, fighting for his life. The darkness, seeking to destroy. The brothers, uncovering the truth.
And the truthspeaker, suspended in time.
Together, they begin to move.
Edited 8.13.13