"I may be empty…but not worthless." Alphonse Elric
"Their lives have no meaning in this disembodied state."
But Ed couldn't believe that, couldn't, because that would make him a murderer, instead of a savior, a boy doing a selfish deed instead of a loving brother trying to make a deal. And he knew, he knew because Al himself had told him, that his little brother, his baby brother, was in pain in the armor. He knew, which is why he had to set things right.
"No meaning?" he murmured, looking in the red, the red like blood floating in containers, in the wall, and saw a boy, Al, staring at him with that look of adoration, hero-worship, he'd worn every day of his life, still wore, in his voice, in his deeds. "I can't believe that."
"But Hell…" he climbed to the top of the nearest canister, the one with Al's face in it. It was a long climb if you were four foot nine. "Your life has value, even in this state…" He was speaking to the mask on the floor, ripped apart from his own beloved brother.
And that was how that horrible, wretched, indescribable night took a new turn, with Ed doing everything he could to make a new Philosopher's stone, anything he could to take his mind off of Al. Al. Who must be worried sick at this point, who had probably contacted Mustang, who was waiting outside of the laboratory even as Ed planned and plotted, ready to use ex-human's lives in order to achieve his goal.
But then…everything came crashing down. Literally. Envy, Lust, Gluttony, though he didn't know their names then, plus his old mentor, the Sewing Life Alchemist, Shou Tucker, all there to witness his mistake as the ceiling caved in and fifty-odd prisoners fell from the sky.
And Al. Al, who wasn't outside, watching, waiting, as always, for Ed to come out safe and alive so they could move on to the next phase. Al, who, like Slicer and Homicide, was encased in armor, trapped.
It hurts in here, brother. Ed would always be sorry, always be atoning for that sin of making sure his brother was in perpetual pain.
Al was lying on the floor, arms gone, legs gone, unable to do anything about the proceedings. Just looking at the stripped armor made Ed wince, wondering where the missing limbs had gone to, how Al had been beaten (tricked?) into submission.
Their eyes locked across the floor, even as Lust spoke, as Gluttony stood sentinel. Ed stared into the hollow sockets, reading what was behind the emotionless mask. He could feel emotions rolling off his brother in waves, mostly, and this was a new one for Al, usually so optimistic, upbeat, confusion. And anger. And pain. Always pain.
They needed to get out of this one, that way Ed could explain everything. Meeting up with Slicer and Homicide had taught him that there were more things like Al out there, things like his brother yet different. He needed to talk to Al, and make sure, make quite sure, that Al was ready, willing, to keep fighting.
He believed that Al had a soul, had a heart, trapped in the body by the seal he'd made three years ago with his own blood. He had to believe that, or else he would have nothing. Nothing.
"It's an equivalent exchange," Lust was explaining, her voice modulated, lilting, sounding like nails on a board to Ed's ears. How he hated that voice. "I'm willing to tell you everything you need to know about how to make a Philosopher's Stone."
And wasn't that what he's been waiting, searching, hoping for? He'd scoured every library, every book, looking for a way out of the deal, out of the bonds of, exactly as Lust had mentioned, equivalent exchange. But now that the information within his grasp, he couldn't reach for it. Couldn't, because now he knew that evil had a face, and it was very beautiful.
"And in return," already Ed was hardening, waiting for the blow, "You will use it to turn all of us into humans."
It was such an odd request, made more perplexing than the many questions they'd been fielding lately about Al, about the 'perfect soldier', about their terrible, accidental discovery of eternal life. Why would these…things, these homunculi…want to be human at all, since most people wanted exactly what they had: immortality.
He sighed, trying to figure out how to refuse the offer without dying, and glanced at Al. Al, his baby brother who had lost so much That Day, much more than he, Ed, had had to give up. Al, who remained by his side for three years of dead ends, rooting for him when he went to take the alchemy exam even though Al himself could have passed it in flying colors. Al, who was a much better person, more caring and loving and kind, than Ed could ever hope to be.
Al deserved a body, deserved a life, more than anyone Ed could think of. He tilted his head, refusing to look at the homunculi, at his brother, helpless. He stared at the ground instead. "And why," he questioned, keeping his voice just as measured as Lust's, "should I trust you?"
"Oh but you misunderstand me Fullmetal. We're not asking. We're telling." Ed's head jerked up in time to see her grab the helmet…Slicer. Though the…Ed had to use the word man, if only to follow his own logic…had tried to kill him, Ed felt something for the mass-murderer. He drew in a breath, watched as Lust placed a long finger right over the ruin, "Do have any idea what will happen to an attached soul when you do this?" She moved the finger.
Moans of pain, suppressed agony, permeated the silent room. Ed twisted in indignation, rage, "Stop it, you can't do that! He's another human being!" Human being, like Homicide, like his brother, like the prisoners waiting to be made into a stone that could have returned all of them to their bodies.
"Edward Elric…" Ed strained to hear the words, "I want you to…" Lust sliced the helmet in half, destroying the seal, killing the unkillable.
Then, even more alarmingly, she got up off of Al's body. It was one of those out-of-body experiences, where you can see what's happening, guess what's to come, and be powerless to stop it. Like a car accident, a gunshot. Lust placed her finger on Al's blood seal…Ed's blood.
When Ed heard Al's tiny gasp of air, a gasp of surprise, of pain, that's when his heart stopped cold in his chest, when it shriveled and turned to ice.
"This won't take long."
Ed was on his knees, struggling past the hurts he'd sustained that evening to get to the most precious thing in the world. She could take away Al's life with a press of her finger, a power no one else had had in the past three years. His heart turned black, still.
"No!" His scream was not his own, it was low, primal, a wail from another century, another time. Agony as simple and complex as had been around since the beginning of time. "Please don't hurt him!"
He didn't' hang his head, stared straight at Lust as he pleaded, begged for his brother's life, for his own life. Because what was Ed without Al? A rebel without a cause, a conscience-less lost soul. "He's my little brother, please don't take him away, I'm begging you!"
He was a strange sight, a fourteen-year-old with a stopped heart, begging for his brother's life on his hands and knees to a homunculus that could kill him with a single flick of the finger.
"Brother!"
How many times had he heard that word, that one word, come from Al's mouth? It jerked him back, grounded him even at the most terrible times. Two syllables, and Ed remembered what he was living, fighting, risking his life for. He was somebody's brother; that's how he defined himself.
"It's okay," Al's voice was so low, so helpless, that Ed felt his stopped heart break in two, felt it shatter at the next sentence, "what am I, after all?" This was so far from okay that in another time, another place, another fourteen-year-old might have laughed.
"Don't give up on me now, Al!" he clapped his good hand against his useless one, ignoring the strange tears stinging at his eyes. He had a theory, unable to be proven, now or ever, that he cried for his brother who could not, that part, most of the tears he shed were those Al wanted to let fall but couldn't.
Al would be crying now, an inch, a whim away from death, and with that thought the remains of his ruined heart disintegrated as he approached his final task. Because, in the end, the good of the many did not necessarily equal the good of the few. Al was worth more than anyone, anything, even his morals, even Ed's own fragile, wavering soul.
I love that episode (#22: Created Human, for the record) It has one of the most poignant scenes in the series, in our opinion.
Please, please review.
