The Iron Sole Alchemist (Chapter 31) The First Day in a New World
by Howlin
(Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to this universe, places, or characters, and only claim the protagonist, Loki, Sloth, The Gunslinger Alchemist, The Swarm Alchemist, and his subordinates as my own creations. This is fan fiction, and I don't profit from it. Please don't sue me.)
. . .
It was evening when all of our preparations were complete. All three of us wore large backpacks loaded with red stones. We had no way of knowing how much power it would take to open the Gate on the other side, and it was entirely possible we'd lose some transitioning through the Gate. Pinako was holding a newborn baby boy that a neighbor had let her babysit. I'd drawn Dante's transmutation circle on his belly. Winry had recovered, reloaded, and refurbished three pistols from the wreckage of the airships in Central, and each of us wore a holster at our hip.
"Last chance to back out," I declared. "Once we do this, we leave this entire world behind, and face the unknown on the other side. Is everyone sure?"
Winry gave a determined nod. Sloth smiled and bobbed her head. Pinako looked on somewhat disapprovingly, but resigned. I nodded an acknowledgement and touched the transmutation circle on the baby's belly.
Blue light poured off the array, and Pinako prepared to run with the child like we had practiced. Winry, Sloth, and I focused on the looming Gate we found ourselves before.
"This is what they saw that night," whispered Winry with a tremble in her voice that could have been either fear or sorrow.
The massive carved double doors swung open, and as the knowledge of the universe poured through me, I saw the tentacle-like arms of the Gate Children reaching out for us. Winry was, for the moment, overwhelmed by the novelty of the experience, and just stared straight ahead. Sloth and I each gripped one of her arms and jumped into the hungry mass of inhuman arms.
Sloth used her powers to keep them from getting a grip on us as we passed beyond the initial cluster of black humanoid creatures that gathered as the Gate opened. That didn't make them harmless. Even if they couldn't get a solid hold on us, they had the ability to break our bodies down with alchemy on touching us with their palms, and Sloth couldn't prevent that.
So, the only defense was a good offense. Sloth slashed one arm like a knife, severing the tentacle-like limbs from their host bodies when they approached from her side. New limbs grew back as the originals vanished like popped soap bubbles. I launched licks at anything that came near, deconstructing the creatures using the arrays on my soles. Both of us kept a tight grip on Winry, who was starting to perceive her body again through the rush of knowledge all three of us were experiencing.
The Gate swung closed behind us. In time, the creatures withdrew. The smothering mass of darkness gave way to an endless vista of light in all directions. The three of us pressed forward, the omniscience still flooding our minds granting us the insight needed to navigate this intensely alien landscape.
Ahead, there was another Gate. Another knot of the shadowy creatures reached out for us as we approached. I put Wonry's arms around my waist and faced the heavy stone double doors as Sloth fought off the creatures coming for us. I clapped my hands and placed on on each of the double doors. With tremendous physical and alchemic effort, I forced it opened. The three of us tumbled through and landed in a heap. The tentacle-like arms withdrew and the Gate swung shut.
We were on the other side.
. . .
As the three of us started to untangle ourselves, a voice called out in a language none of us had ever heard before, but which we'd learned as a side effect of passing through the Gate.
"How did you get in here?"
The speaker was standing in a stairwell holding a pistol in front of him. He was dressed in a grey military uniform. He quickly noticed the firearms we wre carrying and trained his own weapon on us.
"So, the resistance is sending women and children to fight their battles now," he said with amusement. "Reach for a weapon and you're dead. Now, on your feet."
Winry was still human, and I wasn't particularly interested in testing out if my immortality and regeneration were intact in this world. The three of us stood and kept our hands visible. More out of habit than any expectation of success, I activated the transmutation circle on the sole of my shoe as I came fully upright. Either we'd ended up in the wrong world, the reports of alchemy being impossible here were exaggerated, or the backpack of red stones I was wearing made the difference. Either way, arcs of blue lightning surged through the floor, and the part he was standing on collapsed beneath him.
Sloth was already bolting for a nearby window before the soldier crashed into the floor below. "This way! Let's go!" she called Winry and I.
The window opened on a narrow street. From our vantage point, we were on the third story. Sloth exited first, phasing her fingers partway through the brick as she scurried down to ground level. Winry tried to climb after, but lost her grip shortly after getting below the window sill. Sloth caught her and hurried her to her feet as I humped down, landed on my feet, and cushioned the impact slightly with alchemy. Then the three of us took off at a dead run through the streets of this foreign city.
. . .
Once we were confident we were no longer being pursued, we stopped in an empty alley to regroup and catch our breath.
"Is everyone okay?" I asked.
Winry and Sloth both nodded.
"That didn't look like the same uniform the soldiers that attacked Central were wearing," said Winry. "And your alchemy worked. Are we in the right place?"
"I'm not sure," I admitted and slung the backpack of red stones I was wearing onto the ground. I dug through it for a bit before finding what I was looking for. "Looks like we're probably in the right world," I concluded as I held a small handful of red stones out to Winry. They lacked the slight glow of the other stones in the pack, and were soft enough to crumble to powder in a person's hand.
"The plan was to bring these stones to power enough alchemy to open the Gate when we find Ed and Al," Sloth reminded Winry. "Looks like we'll need to be a lot more careful using alchemy until then. That little bit of alchemy used up more than we were expecting."
On a hunch, I reached into Sloth's backpack and dug out a number of burnt out red stones. "Looks like your powers use them up here too. We could be in trouble if we can't find Ed and Al quickly."
"We won't get anywhere if we keep drawing attention," declared Winry. "Hide the weapons."
"Without alchemy, we'll need those readily available if we're attacked," I argued.
"You heard what the soldier said," countered Winry. "We showed up in the middle of some kind of occupation. He mistook us for resistance fighters because we were armed."
"She's right, Greed," said Sloth, unstrapping her holster and stowing it among the red stones in her backpack. "It means being a little more vulnerable, but no one's going to help us find Ed and Al if they think we're the enemy."
"Fine," I conceded. "We'll try to blend in."
"If there's an occupation going on, the excuse that we're travelers probably won't cut it for explaining why we don't know certain things," said Sloth. "I'll ask the really obvious questions. Looking like a four year old should be all the excuse I need."
"Good call," I acknowledged. "Winry and I'll follow your lead."
"Once we get a handle on the basic situation, I found an insignia from the invasion force we can look up and have a place to start looking for Ed and Al," added Winry.
Our plan sorted out, the three of us stepped out onto the street and started casually strolling. More eyes were drawn to us than I was expecting. I was about to suggest Sloth ask someone about it when she took off at a run toward a couple who'd been watching us from the other side of the street. Winry and I ran after her.
"Why awe you wooking at us funny?" Sloth demanded of the couple, invoking Nina's speech impediment and looking gravely offended.
"I'm sorry, we don't mean to stare," said the woman to Winry as we caught up and took Sloth by either hand.
"Are you trying to get yourselves killed?" asked the man, much less kindly. Jamming a finger into my chest, he continued, "Bad enough you're walking the streets in this part of town, but you're risking your wife and the mulatto girl bringing them along."
"You really should be more discrete," added the woman. "If the soldiers catch sight, they'll make an example."
Suddenly, the two stiffened and briskly walked away. A pair of uniformed soldiers had rounded a corner. Spotting us, they ordered us to stay where we were and started unholstering pistols. Instead, we ran into a nearby building, which turned out to be a cafe.
"You can't hide in here!" exclaimed one of the workers in a panic.
Sloth led the way to a side window with Winry right behind and me keeping an eye on the soldiers from the rear. A gunshot rang out and Winry's body stiffened. It was a moment before I realized I'd been the one shot. Sloth scrambled out the window and I shoved Winry after as two more bullets flew in our general direction.
Since the bullet in my back didn't seem to be impeding my motion, I resisted the reflex to heal the wound and potentially use up more red stones. Once I was out the window, Sloth and I had to half-carry Winry for a few steps before her legs started working again after the shock of being shot at. When we finally stopped running after finding another alley to hide in, I dropped my backpack to assess the damage.
"Are Edward and Alphonse even alive anymore?" asked Winry, nearly sobbing. "We've been in this world less than a day and targeted twice."
"This wouldn't be the first time they've been in a war zone," I declared. "Liore was much worse than this toward the end." At which point, I coughed up some blood.
"You were hit," said Winry, suddenly much calmer. "Take off your shirt and let me take a look."
I complied as Sloth took Winry's backpack and moved into position to watch the alley's entrance.
"It's a good thing you homoncluli are durable. You ran three miles with a bullet lodged in your left lung. Doesn't that hurt?" she asked as she confirmed the lack of an exit wound.
"Sort of," I replied. "I did have automail installed once, so this is sort of a bee sting by comparison. Then there was the whole 'putting by body back together' experience after the human transmutation. Let's just say I've had worse."
"Can you regenerate it?" she asked.
"You probably shouldn't," declared Sloth. Pulling a few dead stones out of my pack, she said, "We already lost a few more running away."
"But I didn't use alchemy running... My shoes!" I shifted my position to look at the soles of my feet and observed the transmutation circles I'd originally applied to improve traction and stability on uneven ground. They were using up red stones with every step. I grabbed a cobblestone and defaced the arrays.
"We probably should've planned this better," noted Sloth in a deadpan.
"Hold still!" ordered Winry as she grabbed me by the back of my head and forced me down on the pavement. "If you're not going to just regenerate that, then I need to get that bullet out and patch the hole. Even if you feel fine, you're bleeding, and that's not going to make people less suspicious."
"You two take care of that," said Sloth. "I'll head out and gather more information. I think I'll have better luck on my own."
"Sloth-" I started to say before getting pushed back to the ground.
"I said, 'don't move'," emphasized Winry.
"I'll be fine, Greed," said Sloth. Then she darted out of the alley and around a corner.
As Winry shoved a pair of pliers from her pack into my bullet wound, she asked, "So, how exactly did you two end up on the same side? First time you showed up in Risembool, she'd been trying to kill you."
"She was having her memories tampered with by her father, who was using her as a weapon. I managed to remove the blocks and she ran away with me."
"And you've been together ever since," finished Winry as she pulled out the bullet and started packing the wound.
"I think the longest we've been apart since then was when I left her with you to head up the mountain," I confirmed.
"Do homonculi get infections?" asked Winry as she poured some alcohol into the bullet hole.
"I don't know," I admitted. "Ordinarily, I'd expect the regeneration to sort that out, but here, or after running out of red stones, I couldn't say."
"We'll keep an eye on it just in case." She proceeded to stitch the wound closed with a needle and thread.
"Automail techs need to be both master mechanics and master surgeons to do what they do, don't they?" I said as Winry finished up.
"I'm more than just a pretty face, you know," she teased, "and with your abilities out of action, it looks like I'll be doing the heavy lifting while we're here."
Sloth arrived back as Winry was repacking her tools.
"Okay, my plan worked," declared Sloth, proud of herself. "The city we're in is called Paris. It's in a country called France that's been taken over by one called Germany. Germany's fighting a huge war trying to take over this world. They're also rounding up people based on their bloodlines and shipping them off to camps."
"That makes sense," mused Winry. "Ed said this world had a violent history, and that the invasion was about getting weapons from our world to use to conquer this one."
"It doesn't look like word's spread about us specifically," added Sloth. "The soldiers tried to stop us because of how you look, Greed."
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"Apparently they treat dark skin as a mark of inferior breeding," she replied with a wrinkle of her nose. "They enforce segregation of different groups. On the plus side, your group isn't one of the ones they're sending to the camps, but you apparently need papers to freely travel, and seeing you with me and Winry makes them think you're breaking their laws about mixing races."
"It figures," I noted with an ironic smile. "I leave one world's prejudices behind and land in the middle of whole new ones."
"Obviously we need to find someone who can forge documentation," said Winry. "The first soldier said something about a resistance."
"I don't think the 'naive child asking around' trick will work for finding a secretive resistance movement," said Sloth.
"Well, then," said Winry, "I'll just have to do the asking around. They aren't checking everyone's papers, and I don't look like someone they need to stop."
"Civilians wearing matching patches are part of the mistrusted underclass," said Sloth. "Approach them alone and say you don't like what's been going on. Otherwise, don't talk to them at all."
"Got it," replied Winry.
"We can't stay hidden in this alley forever," I added.
"There's a train station," said Sloth. "Greed and I'll meet you near there."
"Good luck," said Winry.
"Stay safe," I advised. "Sloth and I can take a lot more damage than you can."
We went our separate ways. I had to hope Winry could navigate this strange culture safely, but I couldn't worry too much about her. I had to focus on navigating a hostile, occupied city myself.
. . .
Sloth and I stuck to back routes, avoiding the main German patrols. We occasionally got turned around in the enormous city, and had to ask for directions. The marked citizens, usually wearing yellow hexagram patches, were the most friendly in pointing us in the right direction. Once at the train station, we scoped out a vantage point to watch the crowd from.
I settled in to watch for Winry while Sloth went to work the crowd and gather more information. As I waited, a group of people wearing the hexagram mark were escorted up to the train station by armed soldiers. Most of them looked frightened, and a couple broke down in tears as they were forcibly led up to a waiting train.
A woman fell to her knees and grabbed at the legs of one of the soldiers, begging hysterically. She earned a backhand that looked like it broke her jaw for her efforts. Then the soldier unholstered his gun.
This wasn't my fight, wasn't my war. These weren't my people, and this wasn't even my world. I was here to rescue someone and go home. Doing anything to draw attention to myself would endanger that mission, and might lead to me being trapped here.
But this was wrong, and I had far less to fear from German bullets than these people did, even with my regeneration off the table. I reached into my backpack, drew the pistol I'd been carrying, and shot the soldier in the chest before he could execute the civilian.
A dozen German soldiers spun toward me and fired in my direction, heedless of what was downrange of me. I was on my feet, and running in a wide circle. My shoes weren't boosting my speed anymore, but my homonculus body was still stronger and faster than a human one. Bullets flew past me as I circled around until I was between the soldiers and the train.
The woman had since been pulled back into the crowd of marked captives and disappeared. Whatever happened from this point, I'd saved her. A bullet grazed the side of my temple, and I was tripped by something I hadn't noticed. A superhumanly strong grip pulled me under the train as I fell.
Sloth had maneuvered there when the shooting started. She knew how I'd move and when, under the circumstances. Sloth and I were soon on our feet, darting between trains and pursued by a small group of German soldiers. Our high speed and use of cover made us impossible to accurately target.
When we'd gained enough distance, we fled into the city. A few twists and turns, and the two of us stopped in a dark alley to regroup.
"That was our meeting spot for Winry," Sloth complained. In a more understanding tome, "Did the woman get away?"
"She's still with the other prisoners," I said, "but they probably can't single her out again, especially if they're looking for us."
At that point, strong arms grabbed both Sloth and I from the shadows. A hand with a vice-like grip covered each of our mouths, and an arm attempted to pin our arms at our waists. Sloth was lifted off the ground by her assailant.
They'd bitten off more than they could chew. I bashed the back of my head into my assailant's noze, and heard it break. Then I pushed off with my feet and slapped the surprised man into a brick wall, knocking the wind out of him and releasing his grip.
Sloth simply grabbed hold of the restraining arm and pried it off her. Once she opened his grip, she planted her feet against the man's stomache and launched herself away and him into the alley's opposite wall.
"It's okay!" called Winry's voice from deeper in the shadows. "They're on our side!"
Winry stepped into view, and the two men held their hands out and gave Sloth and I space.
"Who are you?" I demanded of the men.
The one who'd attacked me was holding his nose to stop the bleeding, so the other man answered, "We're with the French Resistance. Your friend here asked for our help. After seeing you fight those Nazis, we figured we were on the same side. You'll be happy to know your distraction let us get that group of Jews to safety."
"They got away?" I asked hopefully.
"We're distributing them through some safehouses until we can find a way to get them out of the country," he confirmed.
"And you had to grab us like that why?" demanded Sloth with annoyance.
"We might've startled you otherwise, and we might not get a chance to explain," said the one with the nosebleed a bit sheepishly.
I put a hand on Sloth's shoulder and looked at the man. "Let's just agree that was a bad plan and move on to what we do next."
"Agreed," said the uninjured man. "First, we need to get you three to a safehouse. The Nazis are looking for you."
"Lead the way," I replied.
. . .
The safehouse was a two story building in another part of the city with a concealed entrance to an attic we could squeeze into on short notice. The men left shortly after dropping us off. Someone would be back by later.
Sloth started going over our stock of red stones again once the door was closed. Winry looked over the kitchen and started salivating over the appliances. I found a corner and sank to the floor trembling.
"Greed?" asked Sloth when she noticed. "What's wrong?"
"I don't know," I admitted as tears started to well up in my eyes.
"We're not draining the stones anymore," she offered somewhat helplessly. "Walking, talking, and using our strength doesn't look like it uses them up. Just our active powers and probably our regeneration."
"That's not what's bothering me, but thanks. That's good to know. It's that soldier."
"Which soldier?"
"The one I shot to save that woman. I don't understand," I said as the tears started running down my face.
"Humans can be cruel," Sloth offered.
"And I killed him," I said, still trying to process the situation.
"I don't think it's supposed to be easy, having to do something like that, even for the best reasons," added Winry. She'd stepped closer, but the look in her eye said she was seeing something from the past.
"I've killed people before," I admitted. "Two chimeras in Liore. Broke the blood seal on an animated suit of armor. I didn't like doing those either, but why does this feel so much worse?"
I answered my own question.
"Because they didn't look human? What kind of sick bastard cares more about another person's life because of how much they look like him?""
Sloth put her arms around my bicep and leaned her head against my shoulder. She didn't have anything to say to that, but she just offered her presence. It helped.
Winry backed off and gave me some space. Before she'd fully withdrawn, she quietly offered, "We can't choose our feelings. All we can control is our actions."
I'm not sure how long I sat there sobbing. I do know after a while, the tears were more over things that had happened in the past than over killing one soldier before he murdered someone in cold blood.
. . .
When the resistance members returned, I'd regained my composure and was reclining in the same corner companionably with Sloth. Winry had disassembled the various kitchen appliances and had the parts laid out on the table and floor. The men stopped in the doorway and stared for a moment.
"You've never been bored?" I chided them. They blinked then came the rest of the way inside.
"We have walking papers for you," said one of the men. "They'll pass a casual inspection, but anyone looks too close, assume your cover's blown."
Each of us accepted a package of documents. As I looked over mine, Winry asked, "Can you help us find someone? We're here looking for two young men named Edward and Alphonse Elric."
"Name doesn't ring a bell," replied the resistance member. "And I'm afraid you're not going to get the chance to keep looking. The Nazis are distributing your description. We have to get you out of the city."
"Once we find them, we have a plan for getting out," I said. "This is a rescue mission."
"You're not going to be rescuing anyone if the Nazis catch you," emphasized the resistance member. "And they haven't exactly been shy about killing women and children."
"Thank you for everything," said Winry, setting a hand on my shoulder. "Those two aren't exactly subtle. If you haven't heard anything, we're probably going to need to move on with our search anyway."
"They'll be fighting," I said with confidence. "They'll probably be aiming for a decapitation strike like they did in Liore."
"You think those people you're looking for are crazy enough to try and kill Hitler on their own?" asked one of the men.
"More likely they'll try and capture him alive and make him order a surrender," I replied.
"Either way, that's where we should be going," said Sloth. "We might meet up with them along the way, and if we don't, we can end this war and make it easier to look for them."
"That's a nice idea," said one of the resistance members to Sloth in that patronizing tone some people take when explaining things to small children. "But to get to him would mean infiltrating Germany proper, evading the army, dealing with his bodyguards. That's not something a few people can do on their own, and certainly not while protecting a little girl the whole way."
"Which way is Germany?" asked Winry with a determined look in her eye.
"You can't be serious," said one of the resistance members.
"We're serious," I said, rising to my feet. "It's the closest thing to a lead we have. These papers can get us on a train heading that direction, right?"
"We're not going to let you go," said the man.
"Remember how things went last time you tried to grab us?" asked Sloth rhetorically. "We're going."
When the three of us started to head for the door, the two men moved to restrain us. Sloth hit the one approaching her with an open palm to his stomach, and he flew back five feet from the blow, impacting a wall hard. The other man stopped dead in his tracks.
"What are you people?"
"It's sort of hard to explain," I said, stopping to check the condition of Sloth's opponent. Once I confirmed he was okay, I continued, "Suffice it to say, we're stronger, faster, and tougher than any normal human."
"Holy crap," said the one who was still conscious. "Why didn't you tell us you were super soldiers?"
"We were trying to keep a low profile, obviously," said Sloth.
"Operative word being 'trying'," I sighed.
"Hey," said Sloth, "You were the one who attacked the soldiers earlier.
"What did you think I was talking about?" I replied.
She gestured at the groaning man struggling to his feet.
"Oh yeah," I said. "That too, I guess."
"Point is," said Winry, "we can take care of ourselves. If you can help in any way, we'd appreciate it, but we are going."
"Look, if you're serious about this, you'll need a lot better plan than getting on the next train to Berlin and breaking into the High Command."
"We're listening," I said.
"We have a small villa out in the countryside you can use as a base of operations. We can provide you with equipment and intelligence. Maybe you raid a few Nazi facilities for more of both, then we help smuggle you into Germany proper. Hell, if these guys you're looking for are messing with the Nazis, they might have some clues where to start looking."
"He's got a point," admitted Sloth.
I nodded to Winry, who said, "We're in. Lead the way."
. . .
The villa was a small farmhouse with a concealed cellar where a card table had been set up, and maps were laid out on it. The Resistance provided food and medical supplies, and I gave them a shopping list for red water precursors. If we were going to be spending our downtime on a farm anyway, I wanted to be able to replenish our resources.
"So, it looks like we're going to have to fight a war to get Ed and Al back," I sighed when the three of us were alone together.
"At least we have support now," said Sloth.
"Are we going to be able to open the Gate home with the red stones we have left?" asked Winry.
"I'm not sure," I admitted. "I don't want to risk using more up figuring that out until we can make more. How long should I expect that bullet wound to take healing without my regeneration?"
"For a normal human," said Winry, "It'll take a couple weeks before the wound stays closed without stitches, but there'll be a risk of reopening it for months. That's ignoring the fact that you've been shot through a lung, which is a bit more disabling for most people."
"Okay, I'll be the one to ask," said Sloth. "How did you find the resistance so quick?"
"Old family secret," Winry said mysteriously.
"We might get separated," I argued. "If this would help us find each other..."
"You're no fun," pouted Winry. "My parents were doctors during the war in Ishbal. They treated injured on both sides of the fighting. Members of resistance groups get injured and don't usually risk going to a normal hospital. I followed a trail of medical supplies to a secret hospital and offered to help their injured in exchange for their help."
"I wouldn't have thought of that," I admitted.
"I'm not planning on being dead weight on this trip," she said with determination. "I may not be a fighter, but what I can do is going to contribute to getting Ed and Al home."
. . .
Safely working with Red Water required specialized equipment. Back in our world, I'd have transmuted perfectly airtight containers, ventilation systems, and the like.
Here, Winry put her mechanical aptitude to use building the equipment out of whatever she could find around the farm.
While Winry took apart a tractor for spare parts, Sloth went over the paperwork the resistance left us. She picked out a handful of targets and put together basic plans for our raids.
Feeling less than useful, I busied myself counting and weighing our current stock of red stones. I'd hoped that a stable initial measurement might be useful in determining how quickly we were burning through them, but it was mostly just busywork.
By the end of the day, Winry had a chamber for me to work with, and I planted a few philosopher's flower seeds I'd brought. She'd gone all out preparing it, automating the watering cycles, adding wipers to the glass so it could clean itself if it got too grimy for the sunlight to get in, and several tanks for the red water and its ingredients for when those were delivered.
"We can make our first raid tomorrow," said Sloth. "If we have something to show when the resistance gets back, it'll encourage them to keep helping."
Winry sat down at the kitchen table with us carrying a plate. Since Sloth and I didn't need to eat, it seemed wasteful for us to indulge while we were guests with such limited resources to begin with.
"You should stay back and keep an eye on our stuff," I told Winry. "You're still human, and they're going to be shooting at us on this raid."
"I didn't travel to another universe to mind the shop while you go out and do the work," she protested. "Neither of you knows much about machines, and that's what all the really big weapons are on this side."
"That's why we can't risk losing you," said Sloth. "Greed and I can get torn to shreds with machine-gun fire or blow up with a bomb and still come back. It'll burn out more red stones doing it, but if you're gone, we permanently lose our technology expert. Hell, if you lose us permanently, Ed and Al can handle the alchemy to get you home. We're expendable."
"Okay," said Winry, "it is really creepy hearing talk like that coming out of a little girl."
Sloth chewed on her upper lip and blushed.
"We're not planning on dying out there," I said. "As for 'creepy,' she hasn't exactly lived a charmed life. Her father toyed with her mind and alternated between using her as a weapon and using her as a doll. Anyone who goes through something like that should count themselves lucky if their worst problem is coming off as 'creepy'."
"Winry," said Sloth in a small voice, "I don't want you to die. Let us handle this. Please."
Sloth and I walked out and up to the room we'd picked out, both hoping we'd made our point.
"Am I really creepy?" she asked when we were alone.
"When she points it out, I can see what she's saying," I admitted. "And I don't much like you talking like your life's worth less than anyone else's." I put a hand on her cheek and turned her head so we were looking one another in the eye. "You are a wonderful, warm-hearted, unique person, and the world would be a lesser place without you. I love you, so don't you insult me by implying I'm a poor judge of character." I leaned down and gently kissed her on the lips.
"I love you too, Greed," she said when our lips parted. "We've got a big day tomorrow. I know we don't need sleep, but I think we could both use the rest."
"It's been a long day," I agreed. We laid down together and fell asleep in one another's arms.
. . .
Author's comments:
There's only so prepared you can be for walking into an alien world. Sometimes you just have to improvise, and keep improvising until you can get your feet under you.