Family
Chapter 10: Time to Hussle
"Hmph.. Colonel Elric got in the way with plan… He may become a pest…" Bradley snorted reading the newspaper.
"Getting a bit old to be King, Pride?" Lust said out of nowhere.
Bradley looked up absent-mindedly. "Huh? How long you've been there?"
"Long enough…" Lust flipped her hair. "Look… we need to get rid of that Mustang girl."
"I don't see the reason…" Bradley answered. "She's just an ordinary girl in the crowd…"
"You don't get it, Pride.." Lust frowned. "She could become another one of those mice who just try to get in the way… like Elric. And she's not alone."
"Surely, she may be still upset of the death of her father, and the absence of her mother… But I don't think she would have figured out that WE are the ones that killed her father…" Bradley looked over at Lust. "Or are you just jealous?"
Lust sneered. "Don't come crying to me when she comes to kick you're …" Lust disappeared into the shadows.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Like Gabriella would expect, she got rid of 'Mika' and found an apartment. The only thing that was on her mind was getting some money (but once again… hussling money wasn't a big deal) and to study for the alchemy exam.
Thanks to Colonel Elric, he granted permission on Gabriella to have access to alchemy books in the Central Library. She, of course, did not let it go to waist.
"Well.. here it is.." She muttered to herself looking up on the grand architecture of the library. She walked up the stairs and entered.
It didn't take long for her to have access to the books. But since she wasn't, yet, a State Alchemist, she had a limit of books to look at.
She started to dive into the basics, since she truly didn't learn the basics of alchemy. She was more used to using the element fire.
"Learning the basics, I see?"
Gabriella turned to a young man in a uniform. He had black hair with messy bangs and wore glasses. "Yeah. I never actually got to learn alchemy… I was actually getting acquainted with the fire element in alchemy."
"Ah, yes. You must be Gabriella Mustang; Flame Alchemist I presume?" Said the young man. "Uhm.. I'm in the Investigations Department so I pretty much just snoop in other people's files…"
"Uhm.. okay…" Gabe said looking through the book.
The young man hit his forehead. "Oh yes. I'm sorry. My name is Major Ralph Conner …" He introduced. "You're father, when he was alive, gave me a strong influence in alchemy…"
Gabriella looked up. "You knew my dad?"
"No.. not really. I was interested in his alchemy techniques…." He said scratching his head. "Anyhow, I hope you pass the exam and become a State Alchemist… Sorry to interrupt.."
"No problem…" Gabe said bluntly.
"Anyway, good luck.." Ralph waved and left.
XXXXXXXXXX
A week has past and Winry finally had a baby and turned out, as expected, to be a boy, Kai. The news poured out like always, but wasn't much of a surprise. Ed would talk about it time to time, trying not to lose focus on his work. Winry would talk about it like it was no tomorrow.
On the other hand, Gabriella's studying had made progress. As always, she was a quick study, like her mother, and would take her responsibilities seriously.
The apartment she bought wouldn't be described first class – nor luxurious either. The heater was jammed, the left over furniture was old, and kitchen appliances were screwed. Luckily, Gabriella wasn't the type of person who would eat every second. All she cared about was studying.
XXXXXXXXXX
After months of studying, Gabriella finally returned to the Military Headquarters. "Well, I hope all that studying paid off…" She muttered to herself. She walked in to take her exam.
The place was quite huge then she would expect. The room seemed endless with the amount of people in it. She looked down towards the bottom of the room and saw the military staff.
There was Colonel Elric, King Bradley, 3rd Lieutenant Conner, and some other important military members. The other lieutenants and members must've been serving the war.
Anyhow, Gabriella sat down in her seat. She looked down to her test and she saw a packet 1 inch thick. "What did I get myself into?"
Bradley knocked on his desk with the little Judge Hammer thing which echoed throughout the room. "Let the alchemy exam commence!"
XXXXXXXXXX
About a week had past and the alchemy scores were sent in. Lust wasn't happy about Gabriella's scores.
"Bradley… the Mustang passed the exam…" Lust glared. "I don't like this. Not one bit. And you know how I am when I am dissatisfied…"
Bradley smirked. "As I said before, Lust, there is nothing to worry about. Roy Mustang and Hawkeye didn't have a clue about our schemes. If they don't know about it, their daughter won't. That's all there is to it. Let me rephrase that: The children are always stupider than the parents."
Lust frowned. "Well, I still have a bad feeling about this…"
"Fine… then I'll make her exam have high difficulty… Does that satisfy you?" Bradley maliciously smiled.
XXXXXXXXXX
Gabriella kicked her apartment door open without using her keys.Yes.. that's how crappy her apartment i/yrt hrd ts)
"Bills… bills… bills….. advertising…" Gabriella mumbled as she sorted the mail. "Ah… Test scores."
She threw the bills somewhere leaving interest in them. She opened the letter neatly with a pocket knife she always kept in her pocket. She unfolded the delicate piece of paper open and read the calligraphy writing.
"Dear Gabriella E. Mustang," She read aloud to herself. "You have passed the exam bla bla bla You did a great job bla bla bla…" She continued skimming through the letter. "Bla bla bla, due to you're significant performance in the preliminary exam, we decide to let you take the PHYSICAL COURSE' which is tomorrow." Gabriella shrugged and set the letter on her kitchen counter. "Physical course, eh?" She said.
No matter of how good the news was, she wasn't surprised by the fact of it.
XXXXXXXXXX
Next day, Gabriella made her way up to Headquarters.
Gabriella looked up at the giant clock. "6 AM? Why this time?" She said drowsily. Her voice was hoarse, her eyes were droopy, and strands of hair were sticking out due to the lack of sleep.
"Gabriella!"
Gabriella lazily turned and saw Winry jogging a little bit to Gabriella with her strolling a baby carriage.
Gabriella peeked inside the baby carriage. "Well… Congratulations on you're new baby boy. Kai was it?"
"Yes…" Winry tickled lightly on the baby's tummy as it giggled and cooed. "Who's my little, Kai? Who is? Who is?" She said in a babyish tone.
Gabriella, somehow, couldn't bare to watch. "I gotta go…" She continued to walk up the stairs.
"W-wait! Don't you wanna know where you have to go for the battle assessment?" Winry called out.
Gabe turned. "Battle assessment?" she echoed. "Some physical…"
Winry nodded. "Yeah. You're doing a battle assessment! Everyone in the military are in the battle arena waiting!"
"In 6 AM? You're joking…" Gabe said sarcastically.
XXXXXXXXXXX
Gabriella made it to the battle arena minutes later. The arena was next to the main building and was surrounded by bleachers – rows filled with almost everyone in the military.
"I never knew there would be so many people…" She said to herself.
"Amazing, isn't it? Never heard the crowd gone this wild ever since your father defeated one of my students…"
Gabriella turned to see Ralph on the opposite side of the arena with a smile on his face, humming a random tune.
"Major Conner? What are you doing here?" she asked a bit surprised.
Conner kept on smiling and hummed a tune. Gabriella sweat dropped.
"Ladies and gentlemen! Welcome to the Final Alchemy Exam!" Announced the announcer. "Today's opponents… is the famous descendant of Roy Mustang, Gabriella Mustang known as the Flame Alchemist! And to my left, is Major Ralph Conner, also known as the Steel Alchemist!"
"What? Are you saying I have to fight him?"
Ralph stroked his black messy hair. "Don't ask. Fuhrer's decision."
Gabriella frowned. Never thought that Major could be an alchemist… I wonder what he has up his sleeve….
"Alchemists.. get ready!" The announcer said.
Gabriella put on her gloves. "What makes you so special, Major?" Gabriella sneered.
Ralph's grin grew wider. "You'll see…" He clapped his hands and the ground below his feet started to glow. He was absorbing all the metal in the soil and shaped them into tiny floating orbs.
"Ready, and fight!"
"You may have shown me you're new juggling act… but doing that is going to take more to defeat me." Gabriella snapped her fingers and made a giant explosion of fire at Ralph.
The crowd, and Gabriella waited patiently for the dust to clear to see what became the outcome of him.
"No way he could've avoided that…" Gabriella's eyes widened. "What the?"
As soon as the dust cleared, it revealed a giant metal orb surrounding Ralph. He then morphed it back into its marble size.
Gabriella was shocked. Not one opponent has been able to defend or avoid her flames. "How did you do that?"
Ralph tapped lightly on his amber cufflings with a transmutation circle on it. "I use the transmutation circle in my cufflings to control any type of metal into any shape and size." Ralph smirked. "So, you see, Gabriella…. I guess you realize that I've found the perfect defense to you're predictable attacks…"
Gabriella growled.
Finally, the metal orb started to separate into two. Each metal orb would keep on multiplying like cells doing meiosis Until there were thousands of metal beads floating in the air.
"I want to see you dance…" Ralph thrusted his arm at Gabriella sending the tiny beads of metal shooting at her feet like bullets making ricochet sounds.
"Ack!" Gabriella started to jog on her toes in place trying to avoid the metal beads from hitting her feet.
"HAHAHAHAHAHA!" Ralph laughed as he sent each and every metal bead ricocheting at the ground. All the metal beads morphed into a long medal rod that tripped Gabriella face-flat on the dirt.
The crowd started laughing.
"Some Mustang descendant!"
"Yeh! She has to be a fake!"
Gabriella lifted her head and glared at the audience ready to snap her fingers. Everyone remained silent.
Gabriella turned to Ralph who lifted the metal rod like kinesis and it floated straight into his hand like a jedi. "I'm sorry about this Gabriella…."
Gabriella smirked. "Sorry? What's the means to apologizing? We've only just begun!" Gabe did a spin kick and tripped Ralph to the ground. She then stood up by doing a back flip and started to snap her fingers sending explosions at Ralph, but he defended against it by using his giant metal shield.
"This isn't working… he's defending against all of my attacks…" Gabe mumbled.
Then, through the dust, small beads of metal started shooting at Gabriella at the speed of bullets. Gabriella put her arms in front of her face.
Finally, the dust settled leaving Ralph across the field from his opponent. Gabe smiled. "Seems that you missed.."
Ralph adjusted his glasses. "Really? It doesn't look like it…"
Gabe looked at her gloves; all torn up from the metal bullets. "Crap!"
Ralph then morphed the metal into a long chain and started to swing it overhead.
Gabe tried to run but her feet were stuck in the ground by Ralph's metal. "Oh shi—" Gabriella tried to struggle out of it.
"Checkmate.." Ralph swung his chain that started flying at Gabriella.
"comeoncomeoncomeon!" Gabriella frantically tried to struggle her feet out of the metal.
But the chain collided and hit the ground making a giant explosion of dirt and rubble.
The audience waited eagerly to see the outcome of the battle.
A minute passed and the dust was about to settle.
Ralph frowned. "I'm sorry…. Mustang…" He then saw a figurine running towards him. "wha?"
Then, suddenly, out of the dust running on top of the chain leading to Ralph was Gabriella running at a fast speed. "Take THIS!" She leaped and did I jump kick on Ralph's arm. Ralph collapsed clutching his arm in pain. He looked up to see Gabriella standing before him. "Look what I fixed up…" She held up her newly repaired glove.
Ralph's eyes widened.
BOOM!
Ralph was sent flying across the arena, but still going strong, he managed to stand up.
There was a long silence between the fighting competitors and the audience.
Gabriella; giving a cold glare; waited patiently seeing what Ralph would do next.
Ralph closed his eyes. "You win… Mustang…" He then fell on his knees surrendering,
"And the winner is…… GABRIELLA MUSTANG!"
"What?"
The crowd went wild throwing confetti and flowers everywhere.
State Alchemist ExaminationPassed
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Sooooooooooooooo sorry if it took me so long! I'll make it up to you! I promise!
