Chapter 20:
Elysia's captor leaned close to her neck, taking a deep breath and gripping her shoulders tighter.
Elysia leaned as far away as she could, quickly meeting his advance with a scathing retort, "And you smell revolting."
"And you're completely under my control." The bat responded, running a clawed finger down her arm.
The leader looked up, "Don't play with the hostage, Night Bird. Either hold her normally or we chain her to the wall."
They were all assembled in the meeting room, the few bare light bulbs barely lighting the room.
The group of chimeras had dwindled in size from almost twenty to a mere seven remaining. A few brutish chimeras were transformed - Elysia spotted a lizard, a rat, and a snake amongst them.
A raven chimera was crouched in the rafters with a crossbow hanging loosely in one hand.
The final was a man, not a chimera, sitting in the corner forlornly. "I don't like this, Barb. We should just let the girl go and hope the Promised One lets us live for our insolence."
The leader, Barbed Prince, laughed. "You're an idealist, my boy!" His face darkened, the mirth still glittering in his eyes though. "We're already damned, so why repent now?"
The human fidgeted nervously, glancing at the door with a desperate gleam in his eyes. With a shout, he raced to the door in a frantic blur, reaching the door right as it blew apart in a burst of flames. The man flew backwards, snapping his neck when his body smashed into the far wall.
Night Bird inhaled deeply, his chest expanding against her back at the smell of blood.
Elysia struggled once again; being held by sadistic bat wasn't the best hostage situation she could imagine.
The bat tightened his grip on her as Mustang and Selim charged in.
The first two chimeras that attacked, the rat and the snake, vanished in the shadows with strangled yelps.
The lizard glanced around before falling to one knee, "My lord." His reptilian voice hissed, "Please forgive my insolence."
Pride's face remained neutral, "You wouldn't be in this room if you truly respected me."
Elysia closed her eyes as the shadows descended.
A scream of rage ripped through the air.
Elysia opened one eye to see Selim's face blood red as he was completely immobilized against the wall. An arrow was imbedded in his skull, a little to the right of his power node, but from his immobility it was obvious that it still had an effect.
He didn't make any noise as he glared furiously at the chimeras, his shadows frozen once more.
Mustang ran to help him but the raven chimera tackled him from the rafters, pinning him down and removing the gloves.
The Barbed Prince stood from his podium, "You know, for a god-like being, you're a little too easy to incapacitate."
Pride narrowed his mauve eyes, "Who are you?"
"Me?" The leader gestured to himself as his bones cracked and skin rippled. "I'm the plague of the desert, the warrior-"
Pride cut him off, his arms shaking violently as red sparks lit his face. "I don't care for your narcissism. Who are you?"
"Are you in any room to be making demands, boy?" Night Bird hissed.
Pride's eyes flicked to him, and then settled on Elysia. Relief shot through his mauve eyes before being replaced by sheer anger. "What's the point of maintaining a hostage when you already have me?"
"Why to ensure your cooperation, of course." The Barbed Prince purred. "And my name? I'm the Barbed Prince, shadow master of the chimeras."
His transformation was complete, a grotesque scorpion chimera with beady black eyes, mandibles, and two barbs replacing his hands.
"Though, since you've delivered the Fuehrer to us on a silver platter, I don't think I'll be in need of your services anymore." The Prince waved his hand. "Night Bird, dispose of the hostage."
Elysia felt the beast pull her in closer, "Of course, my liege."
She kicked and bucked against the beast, but it only served to entice him as he snarled lightly. "The more you struggle, the more enjoyable this is for me."
She screamed when she felt his claws ripping slowly into her neck.
Selim howled, "Let her go!" He jerked forward, still immobilized. "Release her now, you abhorrent brute!"
The Barbed Prince berated him lightly, "I'll have you know that your precious Father created us slightly above the level of mere brutes."
The fight almost completely drained out of Selim at those words. "What did you just say?" He whispered harshly, his voice echoing metallically.
Night Bird lifted his hand, observing a bead of blood that was running down his clawed finger. "Your Father didn't trust in just you homunculi. He used chimeras to guard the tunnels instead of your shadows, did he not?"
The Barbed Prince grinned, "So he set us up in time release cocoons with inbred memories to guide us once we awakened." He shrugged, "Some of the chimera's artificial memories took, but many did not. Those chimeras died not soon after their birth."
Elysia yelped as Night Bird's claws returned to her neck.
Pride narrowed his eyes, "Why would Father set up time release cocoons…" A slow smirk spread across his face, "Don't tell me, the reason that some of the memories didn't take was because Father was wiping them himself? He planned to reuse the chimeras but he simply ran out of time. You were scrapped, but the cocoons reactivated automatically and released you into a future where Father…" He trailed off, choosing to ignore the meaning that he implied.
The Barbed Prince growled, "That is not true! That is false! That is not what-"
The raven chimera holding Mustang suddenly erupted in a mass of flames.
The alchemist sent another ball of flame into the bat chimera, easily turning it into a ball of ash without harming Elysia.
Pride sighed, "When you're done playing hero can you please release me before the scorpion escapes?"
The scorpion was indeed already gone, having escaped in the chaos that erupted from Mustang's escape.
The Fuehrer huffed, instead checking on Elysia. The girl was incredibly pale, but she would live if they got her to a hospital soon. Mustang quickly ripped the arrow out of Pride's head, " I seem to be doing this a lot recently."
Pride ignored Mustang as he stood and surveyed the two piles of ash. "You made them suffer." His voice had taken on its inhuman tones again, "Good."
He walked out of the room, the shadows lowering to the ground and slinking along behind him like a pack of feral dogs.
The Barbed Prince was running as fast as his legs could carry him. His whole plan had failed - it was in ruins.
A sound like the slithering hiss of hundreds of snakes was becoming more audible from behind him.
"So, you truly believe that Father created you and your kin as a back-up plan for we failed?" Pride's metallic voice echoed mockingly down the hall.
A shadow lapped at his heel, enticing a boost of speed from his quickly tiring legs.
(He must be close.)
"You truly had to concoct such a wild idea to command the respect of your kin? That is the sign of a trickster, not a leader."
The shadows barred the escape to his left, so he continued running down the hall, ignoring his screaming instincts pleading with him to escape, to hide, to do anything to ensure his survival.
Pride chuckled, "Oh dear, I seem to have chased you into a dead end."
The Barbed Prince ignored him as he scrambled at the wall, scraping at it in vain to find any purchase on the slick stone.
The shadows swirled around him, nipping at his heels teasingly.
"You killed someone I cared about." Pride informed him. "And then you just tried to do the same."
The Barbed Prince had transformed back into his feeble human form, begging and pleading for his life.
Pride pretended to not hear the pleas as he continued. "I don't care for many people, and you managed to threaten all of them in a short amount of time." The shadows paused, "You killed one of them."
They resumed in a blinding flurry of blood and pain.
"I really can't forgive you for that, you understand, of course." Pride shrugged nonchalantly. "So I suppose I can make you suffer a fraction of what I would have had you managed to succeed."
The Barbed Prince's screams ripped down the empty hall, not one of his once-proud chimeras left to hear his terror.
One last thought flitted through the dethroned prince's mind - a memory - transplanted from his beloved Father.
A blond man leaned over him; his vision was warped by the frosted glass of the cocoon surrounding him.
The man's golden eyes cold as he said one thing to the Barbed Prince. "Your mission is simple - guard the tunnels." He stressed the words very carefully and nodded slowly, apparently satisfied with what he was viewing.
Then, his only memory of his Father was gone, absorbed into a red abyss that raged with the screams of furious souls.
Author's Note: Annnnddd scene. XD Anyways, a huge thank you to everybody who has reviewed/favorited/followed. Hang on because we ain't even halfway done with this train ride... Or rollercoaster, or whatever... Also, a huge thanks to Shocotate once again! And if anybody wants to read another post-FMAB fic, you should totally check out Shocotate's fic. Like, after you read this 1,573 word chapter, go bask in its full like 3,000 word glory. No, seriously, go. It's really good, guys.
QueenCari1129: He's almost here, I think I see a teeny dot on the horizon, though he's always short so he could be closer than I think.
The Keeper of Worlds: Em, well, you see... I still reserve the right to kill Elysia... Not that I'm planning that... Anyways, homunculus-Elysia makes me uncomfortable, though the idea itself does make sense. But my Selim doesn't really have Gluttony's powers anymore, Ed did a sort of reset, I suppose, on Pride's stone so it would make sense that Gluttony's influence or whatever it was was cleansed as well... That whole Gluttony thing confuses me. DX
Krazyfanfiction1: Thank you! And temporary wings would be neat... But Pride isn't jumping off buildings anytime soon. XD
tsukinopen: The Gluttony thing is confusing, so I basically decided that he only has the slight, slight influence of it left. Though I've left it vague enough that if I wanted to change my mind on that, I totally could.
Tina: I swear Ed is almost here. And thank you! I really like forcing them to cooperate as well. XD It's too much fun.