Knowing More Than Recommended
Note: Rating has changed to M. I hope I finish this soon, but I've been busy with school work recently. This'll be the second long FMA story I complete (the other being the awful first version of this same story. This one is way better than that one, in my opinion. XD)! I say this because it's near impossible for me to stick with a story I've been writing on for more than two years. I usually just give up, but I'm really trying on this one! Maybe after three years of writing, it'll get finished.
Is there anything you guys definitely want to see happen by the end of this? Do you guys want a happy, sad, or bittersweet ending? Or do you just want to be surprised? I write for the fans, so lemme know. -blows kiss-
Shout-out to: Yolea Irk's, Youz, Ce-Ce Riddle, Kumajirou17, Skippy the Hobolo and BAYALE for their feedback for last chapter. =D
This chapter features: Episode 36 "The Sinner Within." Ed and Al learn about a Philosopher's Stone rumor from the Ishballans on a relocation train. They are pointed in the direction of an exiled Ishballan, who tells them about Scar and the Grand Arcanum. Meanwhile, Winry learns that Roy Mustang was the man who executed her parents during the war. After being told by Ed and Al she can't travel with anymore, she returns to Central and finally learns about Hughes' death.
-/-/-
"Don't even think about picking up that cat, Al!" Ed warned, his temper at bay.
Al laughed nervously as a black cat purred and rubbed itself around Al's feet, then moved on to Kelsey and Winry. The cat glanced up at Edward when it reached his legs, as if seeking permission to rub its side against Ed's leather boot.
Edward gave the thing a mean glare, which scared it into running off into the bushes. Al seemed heartbroken. "Brother! That was so cruel."
"Yeah, Ed. What did that cat ever do to you?" Winry sided with Al.
"Whatever! Look, here comes somebody." The alchemist drew their attention down the dirt road they were standing on, which was near the edge of a forest. Coming up the path was a modest old man with his horse-drawn cart. Edward waved at the old man, hoping to hitchhike on his cart since they were all headed east.
Ed and his brother decided awhile ago that they were going to find a different way to get their bodies back other than sacrificing human lives. They hoped to find some answers in the Ishbal ruins, which were east, out near Liore.
"Come on, everybody!" Edward motioned enthusiastically after the old man accepted Ed's proposal. The man told them he would start heading south about fifteen miles down the road, so they'd have to get off by then. "Alright, that'll give us plenty of time to rest our legs."
Out of the group, the girls were most relieved to rest their legs. Unlike Ed and Al, they didn't walk everyday for several miles. Winry's strength was in her upper body, and Kelsey, back in her world, usually only walked a mile from high school to library with her friends. And Kelsey, unlike the others, could not get used to the lack of cushion everywhere they went. Never again would she take the holey seats in 80's model cars for granted! The old man's wooden cart was lined with a thin row of hay and didn't know the meaning of the word 'shocks.' Each and every bump of the road was felt on her tush.
"Ow," Kelsey whined after the cart hit yet another rock. "Are we there yet?"
-/-/-
Kimblee waited casually outside with his tattooed hands in his pockets while he leaned against a stone wall of the headquarters. The blaring desert sun gave farmers tans to the current PT crew that exercised in the heat. The alchemist watched them indifferently while he waited.
Even in his white tank top, he was working up a sweat. Damn thick, military-blue slacks. Not to mention the nostalgia was starting to become a bitch.
Anyway, the alchemist waited casually for a certain Colonel and his blonde-haired Lieutenant. Yesterday had been the day he'd dropped the H-bomb, aka revealed that Bradley was a homunculus. Of course, he'd done it completely in secret by the use of a note, which Mustang was instructed to burn after he'd read it. If the man found any truth in the message whatsoever, he was supposed to seek Kimblee around this hour. Hopefully their meeting would be brief and private, if Mustang didn't hate his guts enough to show.
In the opposite degree, Kimblee didn't have to worry about the Colonel turning him into the Fuhrer or anything because the man was just too self-justified. The alchemist smirked and kicked some dirt with one of his feet, still waiting.
A small object flew from the right and landed at the bomber's feet. Upon inspection, Kimblee saw it was a bullet.
So, they had sought him out.
The Crimson alchemist walked away from the open, around a corner to a more secluded part of the exterior structure. The Colonel's blonde Lieutenant, the sharpshooter, waited. Without her superior.
So, the Colonel apparently still hated him. Understandable, Kimblee guessed.
"Kimblee," the sharpshooter began, but he cut her off.
"It's Lieutenant-Colonel Kimblee to you, sniper," he teased. This was true, and he did outrank her.
Hawkeye put a palm on the handgun strapped to her side as if to say 'you are messing with the wrong sharpshooter!'
Kimblee visibly surrendered with two hands. "Calm down, Lieutenant. Deliver your message and we can go on with our lives."
The blonde only glared. Her posture didn't relax until well into her speech. "The Colonel believes you. For him, the facts clicked together quickly. He wants to know what you intend to do with this information, and he assumes that you want him to be a part of it."
The bomber couldn't stop smirking. "You make an excellent messenger bird, Hawkeye." She glared again. "Tell Major Flame that I want to take him out."
The woman looked confused for a second. "I thought you wanted the Colonel's hel-"
"Not Mustang, sniper. The head-honcho."
Hawkeye almost couldn't believe her ears. "We can't just get rid of the King! We should take this information to the public and let government remove him."
"Don't know if you noticed, but Bradley is the government around here. Going to the people will only spark more rebellion and war, which I'm not against, but it would take more time than if we just took care of it ourselves."
She couldn't argue with that logic. Still, it didn't seem like the way to handle it, but that was her womanly intuition kicking in. Without a goodbye, she moved to depart. "It's better if we're not caught around each other again. We'll communicate through a note system to reduce suspicion."
"Whatever," Kimblee replied, just to tick her off. She turned the corner, but he stayed for another minute so their pairing didn't attract attention.
Damn, he thought as he walked back inside the headquarters. He was turning into a self-righteous bastard. Note to self: stop actin' like Mustang.
-/-/-
The Flame Alchemist casually wiped the sweat off his forehead with a handkerchief he received from one of the (attractive) local ladies he met before arriving at the desert headquarters. The cloth was pink with a little floral design on the corner- Hawkeye seemed to be visibly seething as Mustang dried his skin with it, before tucking it away in his pocket. When he glanced at her again, she seemed indifferent.
He knew better, however. "Want me to give you one?" he asked her, testing her mood.
She didn't seem all that enthused.
"He said he wants to take out the Alpha, and he wants you to help him do it. Said we should 'take care of it ourselves,' and prevent internal rebellion." Of course, she referred to Kimblee and their conversation about assassinating the Fuhrer.
Mustang pondered the news for several moments. He already knew Hawkeye wouldn't like what he thought about it.
"As much as it pains me to admit, he's got a point."
Her amber eyes flared. "You do realize that if you're involved, you can never reach the top. The people won't allow it."
"I didn't say we'd help him, I just said he has a point."
Riza crossed her arms under her breasts. She lost patience with this subject rather quickly. "If my opinion means anything in this, I think we shouldn't get involved. There's a war about to break out in Liore, we should focus on finding Scar."
"I agree. But there's plenty of chaos in war- we know that better than anyone. With chaos comes opportunity to create a power vacuum and fill it again. As much as I want that psycho locked up, Crimson can help us. I don't want a homunculus running the country, creating wars for reasons as selfish as creating the stone. It needs to stop, someway or another." Mustang pinched the bridge of his nose as he admitted this. He was really agreeing to work with Zolf J. Kimblee, wasn't he? "Tell him that we will operate under my terms, not his. And no innocent blood will be shed."
"Are you sure you don't want to consult with Hughes before making any decisions?" Her eyes were soft and familiar now. Those were the eyes he knew and loved.
"It's best if we keep him in the dark... safe." Mustang's smug expression turned to a frown at the thought of his friend, Maes, getting hurt again.
His blonde Lieutenant walked over and set a warm hand on his shoulder; he clasped his fingers into hers, recognizing that the connection was familiar and... wholesome. The two separated when they heard footsteps outside the door. The Colonel's subordinates entered the office to see their superior gazing out of the window, while the Lieutenant stood near the tea dispenser on the opposite side of the room.
Secrecy was the key to everything in their forbidden games.
-/-/-
The Elric entourage spent the night in a farmer's barn before they were going to head east the next morning... Kelsey stuck around with Winry, who offered to fix the farmer's tracker, while Ed and Al said they were going to go 'scout,' which basically translated to 'go find some trouble.'
Turns out that Kelsey found herself in a part of the episode the FMA guidebooks described. There was a part of episode 36 where Ed and Al stumble upon a train carrying Ishbalan refugees to the designated camps the military forced them to live in... Ed decided to be a nice guy and relieve them of the heat for awhile by messing with a water tank and making it rain- in exchange for information on Ishbalan alchemy. Even though the refugees didn't know anything ('cause alchemy was forbidden and all), they pointed Ed and Al in the right direction, which was to talk to the one exiled Ishbalan.
After learning this, the Elrics were discovered by the military, who were looking for Ed because Mustang wanted Ed on a shorter leash as wartime crept closer. At that point, Ed and Al had to hitch a get-away-ride from Winry and the tracker she fixed. "The farmer said I could keep it if I fixed it, but I don't think he realized who he was dealing with!" she exclaimed. Kelsey sat in the back of the tracker, wide-eyed and gripping the sides for dear life since Winry liked to drive a little crazy.
Turned out that Kelsey saved the Elric brothers lots of time by telling them the Ishbalan method to create a Philosopher's Stone. She previously didn't know about this method until she saw a quick note scribbled into the guidebook by Brandon. "The Grand Arcanum is what it's called... It actually requires more lives than Marcoh's method of creating the stone. That's what Brandon wrote."
Needless to say, Ed had not been in a very good mood after learning that.
Kelsey and Winry both tried to be optimistic and cheer Ed to keep heading east to the Ishbal ruins. "Maybe there's a forgotten clue there that you guys can find," Kelsey suggested brightly. Ed shrugged.
See, unlike Brandon and Amy, Kelsey didn't know that nothing waited for the Elrics at the Ishbal ruins except crumbled stones and a bunch of sand.
But ignorance is bliss... while it lasts.
A/N: Click that review button below! It's rather painless... promise. :)
