A few days later Mustang came to visit them, "Reyna, how are you feeling?"
"Much better, there's only an ache where my muscles are sore from healing, why?"
"Ed and Al are heading North, to go after a little girl who knows alkahestry. I'm not sure if you're aware that a little while ago, all alchemy stopped working in central. But the girls alkahestry did. All you know is medicinal correct?"
"Yeah." She stood walking over to him, "I take it that means you're going to want me to go the North soon?"
"I since we don't know why it stopped working, we don't know if your capabilities did too. You need to see if you can figure out how to use your talents with alkahestry so that you will be able to fight them even if they cut off our version of alchemy." Mustang turned to look at her, seeing Jean laying down behind her, watching the conversation, "If you can, leave tomorrow with them. We don't know how much longer we have."
"Have for what?" She asked him trying not to look back at Jean.
"Until they come for you. We know they will now after Lust said to you what she did. We know they want you alive and under their control, we cannot allow that to happen."
"I agree." Spoke Jean. Reyna turned around to look at him, he knew that she was worried to leave him so soon since he had just begun his treatments for his injury. But her brother was right, they would come for her, and he didn't want her to be powerless against them since he would probably do no good in a real fight anymore, "The next few weeks will be nothing but paper work and them teaching me how to deal with not being able to walk anyways, so it'd be better for you to do something productive."
She nodded and looked back at Roy, "Alright, I'll join them. I also have a contact in a Drachman border town that may be of some use to us if we need the extra man power at some point."
"Is he military?" Mustang raised an eyebrow.
"No, but he runs a rag tag team of hunters. They know what they're doing and I saved his life so he owes me one."
"I'll let you know. Prepare what you need to and be on the first train to the North tomorrow with them." Roy put his coat on, "I hear their planning on heading for the Northern Wall. Have you been there?"
"Not specifically, but I passed by it on my way back into Amestris. Had a scuffle with one of their soldiers, if he's still alive he'll vouch for me." She shrugged.
"If…he's alive?" Roy gaped at his little sister.
"Yeah, I was coming from Drachma, he thought I was a spy, we fought until I convinced him otherwise." She sat down on the bed next to Jean, "Took him longer than I thought it would, I left him in front of Briggs though."
"Since when are you a person who fights about stuff like that." Roy rubbed the back of his neck, wondering what else his sister got into on her travels.
She smiled at him, "It's the cold. Makes me hate everyone and everything. It's great really."
Jean laughed at her, "Really now? It's great hating everything."
"Yeah it gets out all of my built up frustration." She grinned.
Roy shook his head at her and left them in the room. Reyna stretched and looked at Jean, "Wanna go for a walk before dinner?"
"Reyna…" he looked sad.
"The doctors said that you could go around in the wheelchair a little bit now, and I want to make sure you get some fresh air before I leave." She took his hand in hers.
"I know and I want to go, it's just a little embarrassing having to get help into my wheelchair." He wore a small smile, knowing he could be honest with her.
She squeezed his hand, "I don't mind it. I'm stronger than I look and it gives me a legitimate excuse to hug you."
"I wouldn't mind going for a walk then." He smiled at her as he pulled the blankets from over his legs, turning his body and moving his legs to hang over the edge of the bed. She brought the wheelchair over and locked the wheels before wrapping her arms around his waist and lifted him up to turn him and sit him the chair. He leaned down and unlocked the chair, "They said when I'm in a bed that's lower I'll be able to get in and out of the chair myself."
"Until then, you've got me." She said grabbing the handles of his chair.
"Except when you're in the north." He smiled looking up at her, she loved how he was smiling more and more like his old self as the days went on.
Reyna gave him a quick kiss before opening the door, "Yeah well it'll give you some time to practice so you can impress me with those arm muscles when I get back."
Jean enjoyed the time outside of the hospital. After they were out of the building he pushed himself in the chair and she walked next to him, they joked and laughed as they moved through the city like they used to do. She bought him a new lighter to replace the one that he lost during the fight with Lust and spending time with her outside of the hospital made him feel like nothing was different for him, that he was still normal.
Reyna was waiting at the train station when the Elrics arrived. They saw her standing there in a coat, scarf, and a cap on her head. Al looked at her, "Reyna, what are you doing here?"
"Roy wants me to accompany you to continue to learn about alkahestry." She smiled at them and looked at Ed, "And no nothing of it had to do with keeping an eye on you two. If it were that I wouldn't have agreed to it."
"Oh, it'll be nice to have you along!" Ed said excited to have the woman with them, he knew that she was also being involved by the homunculi and that she was a powerful alchemist. As they boarded he looked at her, "So hows the Second Lieutenant doing?"
"He's coping with what happened. As time goes on and he recovers he'll learn to live life in a new way and that it'll be just the same as it was before." She smiled at the young boy, "Have you been to the north before?"
"No. I can't wait to see snow again."
"Trust me you'll be sick of it by the time we leave. The north has no shortage of it." She looked out the window watching Central, move out of sight, her brother and Jean along with it.
In their fight with Buccaneer she had frozen the mans feet to the ground as he had Ed by the arm, she was afraid to try anything else with her now stronger abilities because she didn't want to hurt the boy. When the Major General called for them to stop she looked up and saw the man she had almost killed, Miles, an Isvalan man that did indeed vouch for her as not being a Drachman spy.
The boys told Armstrong why there were there, or rather the edited version and she only said enough to match her. When Miles went to show them around and give them work to do he looked over at her, "Thanks for not leaving me for dead."
"I'm glad you didn't die."
"You seem nicer."
"The cold hasn't kicked in yet." She said looking at him from the side, "Give it another day."
They had finished their work and were being shown around by Falman and on the lowest level of the wall they witnessed the men hearing banging coming from underground and saw a beast of a man break the floor under them. Instinctively she moved to stand in front of the two younger boys as the giant man stepped out of his hole. Ed and Al noticed the mark at the same time she did and the oldest boy whispered, "Reyna do you see it?"
"I do. And he's not going to be an easy one to take down." She ground her feet, ready for anything to happen next. The creature just looked at them and then fell asleep. She moved her head back towards them but never took her eyes from the homunculus, "Did he just pass out?"
"I think so…" Al said perplexed. Ed then yelled at the monster and it woke up.
The thing said he didn't care about them and continued to move in order to dig his 'annoying' hole. Buccaneer shot a warning bullet at them and said that they were Drachman spies and both Ed and Al protested and she turned to look at the man above them, "Don't do that! You may piss it off and you aren't down here to deal with the consequences, I am!"
As Ed yelled more at the man on the balcony he didn't notice Sloth throwing a giant metal tube at them and she grabbed the boy and threw him out of the way barely avoiding the tube herself. When the creature was on an elevator heading up she created an air burst lifting her up to the higher level to make her way to fight him faster.
She reached the level before the brothers and saw Armstrong hit it with a rocket, but nothing happened. Jumping up on the railing she looked at the woman, "I suggest if you have anything bigger, you get it. It's going to take a lot to bring him down."
Armstrong looked at her, "I don't like people telling me what to do."
"And I don't like people that are too superior to see when they should take some advice. Now if you don't mind, I'm going to distract him." She jumped off of the banister and down to the same level as Sloth.
Miles looked at Armstrong, "Ma'am Duval is an expert in…strange combatants. I believe we should trust her."
Armstrong looked from the man to her men now running up the stairs to her saying firearms wont work on the thing and she ordered all noncombatants gone and hopped into a tank.
As the creature threw Reyna to the side she saw the tank aim for the creature and she watched as the missile blew away half of its face and she grew angry seeing the face reform. When they kept firing and nothing worked Reyna yelled, "Got anything bigger Major General?"
The firing paused and Sloth threw things out of his way and she ran but saw Ed and Al arrive in time to block the people running away from getting hurt. She listened as Ed tried to explain but she cut him off, he couldn't be held responsible for this if she said it, "Because we've encountered them before. And that's all we can say. We want it gone just as much as you do."
Armstrong asked for fuel and she had a sinister smile on her face as she looked at Reyna, "Since you told me what to do, I'm now going to tell you what to do. Distract it, lead it to where we tell you. Now hop on."
Reyna jumped onto the front part of the tank and watched as it ran into Sloth, pushing it backwards. When the creature started lifting up the tank she scooted back as the others rammed into it but it still wasn't working against his strength. She wished she could touch the ground, get it to lift him back into the elevator and it did, she couldn't believe what happened as the creature got flung back and the tank was on the ground again. She had never been able to do something like that before, just by thinking about it. It scared her. The elevator doors shut and Miles looked at her, "Was that you?"
"I guess it was since I'm the only alchemist here." She said still a little shocked.
"Good then stay on the hood in case we need that again." Armstrong yelled as the elevator doors opened again and the tank entered it.
Buccanneer looked at the small girl, "I wanna fight you all out one day."
"You're on grizzly bear." She smirked.
Sloth was left out in the cold and they were taken to lock up. The men weren't quite sure how to restrain her since she didn't even have to move to use her alchemy. She told them unless she gave them a reason to, she wouldn't fight them.
When they were taken down into the tunnel and Armstrong asked them again about everything that was happening the two boys looked at her, "I'm not military, I'm not bound by anything, you two are more directly involved, so it's up to you."
Ed decided to tell the Major General everything and she listened as the woman said that she would hate to lose Riza or Jean but noticed her dislike of Roy, a rival she called him, if Roy wasn't aware of this before, he would be by the time she got back to Central. They talked about how the tunnel was more than likely a circle and Falman listed off the bloodiest battles in recent history, creating a transmutation circle, one they said looked like the one from the fifth laboratory and it made her sick, sick and angry. This is why Maes died, this is why so many people have died, why her brother did the things he did in war, and the fact that the people she loved, the people who meant more to her than she meant to herself were involved in, were being held hostage by, it all made her blood boil, she looked at the Major General, "Ma'am, let me beyond the wall."
"What?" The woman looked at her.
"The only way for major blood spread up here is to have Drachma involved. Let me go over the wall, I know some people over there. I can try and convince them to stop Drachman forces from coming anywhere near the wall." Reyna stood tall and Armstrong could see the fire in her eyes.
"I cannot allow you to go, you are far too powerful and important to these things to let you out of the country, Drachma could use you against us. I can however help you to send them a message." Armstrong hated the idea but Miles had told her about the woman's strength and perseverance, she knew if there was a chance at keeping Drachma away from the fort, Reyna would be the one to have it.
"That'll have to do then." Reyna said as a rider on a horse came up to them in the tunnel. As they began their walk back she looked at the woman, "And if no one knows I'm here that would be best. My movements are more effective if they remain as invisible as possible."
Armstrong nodded, having already noticed how illusive she was about her connections to everyone, and it was true having someone who could move freely like her was a good advantage when the military is your enemy. She would have to turn the girl to her side for when this was all over so she was the one with the advantage, "Alright, take her to the far side of the wall, away from our visitors."
After Raven was taken care of she moved around the fort avoiding Kimblee, when she didn't have an option to go and see the boys because the scumbag was constantly around them, she approached the Major General, "I need to make a phone call, secured if possible."
"To who?" The woman looked at her.
"Jean Havoc." Armstrong nodded and she was taken to a phone. She dialed the number for the hospital and waited. Eventually he picked up the phone, "Jean?"
"Reyna! It's been a few days and no one's heard from you we were starting to get worried." Jean spoke quickly.
"You don't need to worry about me. I'm fine." She spoke then took in a deep breath, "Has Roy come by to visit you?"
"Yeah, every couple of days or so, why?" His voice got serious, something had happened.
"Tell him without a hawk to control him a crimson lion has taken two cubs and their otter into the snow to hunt the marked fox. The leopard will hunt them from afar. It may be sometime before they all return." She knew she was being listened to so she had to be careful with what she said, she was on a military line and she didn't know who protected it was.
"Alright…" He played like he didn't know it was a message, "I assume this is that story you two tell each other all the time?"
"Yeah. I finally came up with the next part." She smirked, he was very good at pretending to not know what was going on, "How are you feeling?"
"Good. The doctors have been showing me the stretches I have to do in order to not lose circulation in my legs and oh the amounts of paper work. If you think the other stuff we do is boring, you'd hate this." He laughed.
She smiled hearing him laugh, "Well it's nice to know you aren't sulking without me there."
"No I am, my bed has been cold the past few nights."
"I'm sure we can fix that soon." She said and heard someone walking up to her, it was Miles, "I have to go now. You keep up your exercises and I'll see you soon."
She hung up the phone and turned to the man, who looked down at her, "We can sneak you into Baschool, Kimblee won't even know your there and you can try and meet up with the girl from Xing and the Elric brothers."
"Lets move then." She said taking the coat he handed her.
A/N: Dustin' off this story! Let me know what yall think!