There are times that a single line enters my head an inspires a whole story. This is one of those times. I literally wrote this at lunch today. Limited editing and absolutely no backstory.

Anyway, ain't no one gonna like the way i ended this chapter.

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Ed woke up seated in a cold metal chair, her arms were tied behind her and a single spotlight lit the area from above. Her head fucking killed. A quick look around and it became painfully obvious she'd been kidnapped again. Could she not even grocery shop in peace? Dammit!

It was one of the better kidnapping setups she'd seen in a while, nothing to learn and no one to see. Just an empty room of nothingness, a warehouse maybe? She yelled into the surrounding darkness, "I had fucking eggs in that bag you fuckwits!"

A snide remark from the right, "You should be used to losing your eggs."

Ed's head whipped around, her eyes trying to find anything to focus on. The only people that knew she'd lost her ability to have children were Al, because he'd been there, and probably Winry because they were married.

"Who the fuck are you? How do you know anything about me?"

Suddenly there were muffled noises from the left and she turned to focus on that. Straining her ears for anything that could help her get out of this shit.

"Don't make her angry. She won't listen to reason if she's upset." A second voice, on her right again. And how the hell did they even know she was a woman to begin with?

"Edaline, you're here because we need your help with a project."

"Fuck off."

"Listen first please. We need you to help us build something. It requires the utmost discretion."

"Well you're talking to the wrong damn person then aren't you? Why the hell should i care about discretion or your stupid plans?"

"I'm glad you asked, we have someone here we think might help you change your mind. You know, as collateral."

Collateral? For what?

"You come help us and we'll let him go. We only need you for a month or two."

There was no way they had Al, she'd just talked to him this morning and he was still in Resembool. If they somehow had Al she was going to crater this place.

Footsteps behind her, someone moving from one side to the other out of her line of sight, then shuffling again on the left, outside the spotlight. She flinched at the heavy chalkboard-like scraping as a metal chair was dragged over into her line of sight.

Mustang. Bound similar to her and gagged on top of that. Glaring at her and pulling against the chair. Shit. He'd probably heard everything. At least he looked ok, only a few bruises. She avoided his eyes as she checked him over. Thank god he was gagged, she didn't think she wanted to hear his thoughts right now.

She focussed on the shadow of a figure just behind Mustang's chair, "You think I'm going to trade myself for this jackass? I don't even like him."

"Actually Edaline, here's the thing. I think you do like him. Would you like to know how i know? It cost me a lot so I'm going to tell you anyway."

"Save it because I don't care."

He ignored her, "It's because I've done human transmutation, I've been through the gate. I know you are in love with him because truth told me so. Amongst other things."

Oh great, an actual psychopath.

He stepped into the light to face her, moving to obstruct her view of Mustang before continuing his story. "And so Edaline, I know a lot of things; I know you're a woman, I know you can't have children, I know you love Roy here, and I know how you're going to react when I do this."

Ed saw what he was going to do and couldn't do a damn thing to stop it. She still tried though, ripping her automail leg from its binding and putting a significant amount of effort into lunging at the man.

She came up embarrassingly short, managing only to topple forward and sideways as he pulled a gun and shot Mustang in the leg.

How did she manage to always attract these kinds of people? This is why she'd moved away from Resembool when Al and Winry had decided to settle down there. It was why even when she'd returned to Central months ago she'd taken great pains to avoid Roy Mustang. Why she'd told Riza to stay away from her two weeks ago when the woman kept insisting they spend time together.

She listened to Mustang's gagged-swearing and watched as his blood pooled on the floor next to her. She'd failed to stop it and she'd shown her captor the truth of the her feelings, all in one go. Fantastic.

The gun wielding psycho motioned to the second man and she grunted as her chair was hauled back into the upright position. She fought against him, and failed again, as he reattached her automail leg to the chair with a stronger rope, and when she eventually looked up, the gun was now pointed at Mustang's head.

"Change of heart?"

She refused to look directly at Mustang, he was probably so pissed at her. Another victim of her existence.

"What do you need me to do exactly?"

"Excellent! I knew you'd come around. We can sort the details out later. Todd! Can you wrap her up securely until we get to our destination."

Wrap her up?! The hell did that mean? "What do you need me for!? Where are we going?!"

"Edaline, does it really matter? Do what I say or I come back and kill him. Easy peasy. You won't even notice the time you'll be so busy working. The year will fly by."

"Year?! You said months!" She could hear some kind of truck backing up in the distance as 'Todd' began the process of double checking and re-securing her to the chair. Figures they'd opt out of setting her free, even for a moment.

"You're still getting hung up on the tiny details. What does it really matter if it's a few months or a few years? It's not like you were doing anything with your life anyway."

Ouch, even if it was true right now, she'd wanted to be a teacher. She'd been looking into employment at the university; now it looked like she was going off to some Alchemist slave farm.

She caught sight of Todd with a sheet and finally turned her attention to Mustang. Locking her eyes to his. "Tell Al to stay with Winry, she's pregnant!" The sheet went over her head, "Don't let him come look for me! He has to stay-"

A collar snapped around her neck, keeping the sheet in place and cutting off her sentence. An odd sensation flooded through her. A dream she'd had once? She could hear a one sided conversation between gun guy and Mustang.

"Relax, she's fine, she just has a thing about collars and it's easy to take advantage of it when she's already panicking. And that was panic you heard in her voice, but I'm not going to kill her after i just went through all this effort to ensure she comes willingly."

More cursing. Her chair tipped backward and she felt herself being dragged toward the sound of the truck.

"Well obviously not completely willing, but we'll release her when we get to our destination, we just have to make sure she doesn't pull any last minute tricks. Here's your gloves by the way, you can figure out how to get free after we're gone."

She heard Mustang's chair fall over and then nothing more from inside, they'd gone through a door and she felt the chair jostle as she was loaded onto a truck.

A voice beside her startled her, "Don't worry, he'll be fine. I tied a bandage around his leg to stop the bleeding, I can't use him against you if he's dead. My guess is he's out of there in an hour."

Ed was regaining her wits. "If he finds anyone fucking following him he's going to fucking kill them and then he'll come find you."

"I'd love to believe you sweetie but if that were true then we wouldn't have got him in the first place. Just do your job and he'll stay alive. Now, I think it's time you had a nap."

"I don't need a nap you fucking psycho, I'm already tied to the chair! I can't go anywhere!"

Ed felt a pin prick in her arm. Shit. She wouldn't even be able to hear where they were going.

The smugness in the guy's voice made her even more uneasy, "Sure you do darling. It's a long trip."