Chapter fourteen: Shot

"Are we there yet?"

"Yes Coniniaue, we're back in central."

"Great." She tumbled off the train, unaware. "Let's hurry up and get this stupid repost back to Mustang. I…"

BAM. ZIP. SPLAT.

Later, at the hospital

Edward sat with his face bent over his knees, his face in his hands. Alphonse sat next to him.

Alphonse broke the silence. "Brother, do you think Coniniaue is okay?"

"Alphonse, if I was every sure of anything in my life, I'm sure Coniniaue was okay." He mumbled. But it kept replaying in his mind. That awful noise when the bullet struck Coniniaue:

SPLAT.

"Bodies go splat! Splat, splat, splat!"

"It sounded just like what Dominique said." He muttered.

"What's that, brother?"

"It sounded like Dominique. Splat. Do you think Dominique followed us all the way to Youswell, and then followed us back on the train before ours? I think that she shot Coniniaue because the bullet made a SPLAT noise when it hit…"

Mustang entered the hospital, Hawkeye trailing behind him. "The gun was no type of any known gun to the military." He read off of the report he got from the doctors. "Nor was the bullet. This guy has been making his own guns and bullets. Fullmetal?"

Edward glanced up. "Yeah?"

"What kind of noise did the bullet make when it hit Coniniaue?"

Tears welled up in his eyes. Edward dropped his face in his hands again and cried, "Splaaaaaat…"

Just a little later, in Coniniaue's room

"Coniniaue! Are you okay?" The moment the doctor said he could, Edward burst into her room.

Of course. She was asleep.

"Brother, calm down!" Alphonse gently pushed him back into a chair next to Coniniaue's bed. "Wait until she wakes up."

Edward sighed. He glanced up at the doctor. "Where did it hit, Doc?"

"It pierced her skin next to the alchemic tattoo above her right breast." The doctor explained, putting on her glasses. "We have detected energy flowing from the tattoo. The force around it makes it so nothing can touch it, except Coniniaue herself, of course. A state alchemist such as you should know about blood seals in empty vessels? Well, her tattoo is like that. If it is touched, she will die."

"So… She can't die?"

"Oh, she can die. You see, she is not an empty vessel. Because she has things inside her—No blood, though—she is still considered human, and therefore, can age and die like yourself, sir."

"Ah. Coniniaue is a very complicated woman…"

(Bleh… Sorry. No fighting, but a little drama Eh, good enough, right? Don't worry, Ed will have a run-in with Dominique soon!)