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Loath's violet eyes widened as she stared at the vast training area. Rubble, boulders, and various items littered the broken earth. Timidly she began to walk towards it, her curiousity piqued. Suddenly she felt a rush of wind whirl past her and right into the debris. Loath quickly ran to catch up to her "brother" however, she ended up tripping on a coil of barb wire and getting herself entangled. Instinctively she began thrashing wildly and screeched for help. Wrath appeared on a boulder next to her and looked down upon his helpless "sister".
"You've gotta do it on you're own." He stated.
"Why! I can't do this on my own! I'm going to DIE!" The poor, tied up homunculous wailed.
"No you aren't, we don't die. We CAN'T die, it's impossible. Now, listen up, you have to find an alchemic array and when you find it, stand in the middle and wait. Got it?"
"Oh..oh..ok. We can't die?"
"Nope. See ya!" And with that he lept off the boulder, leaving her alone.
There's no sense in struggling anymore, it only gets me more tangled, she concluded, so it only seems logical to look at where it's got me. Her slitted eyes scanned her body and the hideous barbs wrapped around her left ankle and right thigh. She tried to move her legs to get a better look but a sharp stinging, almost ripping sensation tore through her leg. A thin coat of blood obscured the silver but she still managed to find it with her hands. Clumsily her fingers went to work trying to pry it out of her flesh and she managed to get it off her left ankle after about fifteen minutes.Now she could twist her body to get a better angle and this time she was able to rid her right thigh of the barb wire in only ten minutes.
Her legs were grotesquely displayed before her. The wire had constricted around her ankle and thigh, cutting off the circulation and the barbs had embedded themselves deeply into her muscle tissue, shredding several ligaments and nerves on their way out. Loath lay there panting, her blood soaking the cracked dirt. After a few minutes of recuperation she slowly got to her feet, wincing at the pain that had severly lessened. She stared in shock at how fast her legs had recovered and how the muscle and skin were healing but not leaving any marks. Once she got over her shock she finally went in search of this alchemic array.
She only knew a few things about alchemic arrays, they were dangerous, they were intricate, and they were the basis for alchemy. Dante had taught her all these things and she just didn't like alchemic arrays. She got a bad feeling deep in the pit of her stomach every time she saw one, but she just chalked the feeling up to irrational and ignored it. This time she made sure to avoid the barbed wire on the ground by jumping from boulder to boulder and occasionally on dillapidated roof tops and over chain link fences.
"Good she made it. Hope she's not hurt too badly. I hope she doesn't hate me now."Wrath sighed from a pipe he was currently spying on Loath from.
When he saw her writhing on the floor he began to get scared, but he calmed down when she got her wits about her and began untangling herself. However, he was still scared that because he had indirectly caused her pain that she would hate him. Oh well, Mommy would be there for him, right? And with those dismal thoughts still in his head he ran after her.
After ten minutes of searching Loath began to get bored and started to pay more attention to the environment instead of her goal. She had never seen such a strange brown solid which easily crumbled beneath her weight. She clawed at the ground and let the grainy powder fall between her scarlet crusted fingers to the floor. The curious female soon grew bored with the dirt and bounded over to a chain link fence. It felt cool to touch and sleek as well, except for the gnarled bits.
Wrath didn't get it. Why the HELL was she so fascinated with the ground and a bunch of metal? It confounded him so much he emerged from his current hiding place and walked over to the fence she was currently pawing.
"Why are you doing this?" He asked, giving her a look of befuddled incedulousy.
"I don't know, it's intresting, I've never seen anything like it."
"It's all over the place, let's go find the array." He grabbed her wrist and started to tug, but Loath refused to budge.
"No! I like this stuff, can I stay please?" She begged him through pristine eyes of violet innocence.
"But, but, I want you to come with me!" He cried incessantly.
Now Loath was at a crossroad. Be nice and go along with her little brother and obey the rules, or satisfy her own desires and disobey the rules. She felt inclined to disobey the rules and be selfish but it just seemed wrong. She had been taught that rules were to be obeyed at all times, and that won precedent over her own well being.
Reluctantly Loath rose from her place on the ground and allowed herself to be dragged over to a big patch of dried earth. As they got nearer Loath could make out lines in the ground in the shape of an alchemic array. However her attention was immediantly centered on the trembling creature Wrath pushed into the alchemic array and...chained?
The poor thing was wailing and moaning and sobbing and just couldn't seem to stop. Curious, she timidly walked over to it and looked into it's eyes. She was met with evergreen orbs clouded by torrents of tears and narrowed by swollen red cheeks. He attempt to fling himself onto her feet but was restrained by the chains binding him to the center of the array.
"What ARE you? Why are...like this?" She suddenly recalled seeing Wrath act akin to this and herself as well, but that was only when...
"Is the snake man going to hurt you too? Or has he already?" Loath asked with genuine concern. The proximity of the two beings closeness and the appearance of Loath sent the man into a fit of sobbing hysterics. She began to feel really bad, nauseous almost. Why was he...afraid...of her? What had she done wrong? Was she, possibly...turning into the snake man, without KNOWING it?
"I'm NOT bad! I didn't do anything did I? What did I do! WHAT!" Loath collapsed upon the ground and shook the terrified creature by his shoulders, tears threatening to fall from her own violet orbs. Abruptly she released him and began rocking back and forth cradling her head between her two perfectly healed knees.
"I'm NOT the snake man. I'm NOT the snake man. I'm NOT the snake man." Was the mantra rapidly falling from her salt drenched lips.
"What? Snake man? You mean Envy?" If Wrath was confused before he sure as hell hadn't a clue now. Why is she crying? Why? What was there to cry about? Wait was she actually crying for that...HUMAN!
"Are you crying for that thing? Is THAT why you're crying?" Wrath's voice now carried contempt.
"Don't cry for THAT. It's the cause of our misery. It should be HATED! It should be KILLED! STOP CRYING! STOP!" Loath looked up at her little brother, unaccustomed to such sharp, malice laced words coming from her own brother.
"Why do you hate it? Why should I?"
"It's a HUMAN! And an ALCHEMIST! WHY SHOULDN'T I!" This caused Loath to shie away a little.
"Is it a RULE, that we must hate humans?"
Wrath thought a minute, it sure SEEMED like a rule. His hatred was what drove him and the others. Hell he'd been told he was COMPOSED of vengeance and hatred, it could very well have been a rule.
"Yes, it's a rule."
Loath took a very good look at the creature, no, HUMAN, in front of her. She really didn't want to kill it, but it was a rule. Slowly she picked herself up, eyes cast downward, turn her back to the man and walked outside the circular array, Wrath at her heels. The bound man continued to scream for mercy, this time even more vehemently.
"Now, watch me." Wrath knelt on the ground and activated a neon blue light that shot up from within the cracks of the array.
"Now rip off your arm."
WHAT! Loath stared in shock as her mind processed the order. What good could come of that!
"And your leg."
This had to be nonsense, just HAD TO BE! It made NO SENSE. NONE AT ALL! This time she looked at him with shocked skeptiscism.
"I MEAN it, trust me." Her little brother looked up into her eyes with the purest honesty, begging a little even.
Trust? She DID trust him, they trusted each other. Should she put herself through such pain because of a simple word, one simple word? What value did that word hold? Her little brother seemed adamnt about it though. And he already said she couldn't die. AND it was an order. All those reasons overruled her fear of pain and she ruthlessly latched onto her left arm. In three seconds of agonizing pain she tore the bone from the socket. Blood splattered everywhere and fell in rivers from the huge hole in her shoulder where her arm used to be.Torn ligaments and tendons hung uselessly from her shoulder and arm, alabaster white bone jutted out from the gapping hole, flesh hanging from the tip, dripping scarlet life in small droplets.
Without thinking she violently tore her leg off as well. the ripping noise her leg emitted made her want to hurl. Without her leg to balance on she fell to the ground, schreeching and writihing.
"HURRY! Grab your arm and leg and get in the array!"
Mindlessly Loath squirmed into the blue light and at once became enveloped in it.
A big blackish purple door stood before her, and embedded in it were EYES. Thousands upon thousands of violet eyes, just like HERS. Currently it had innumerous amounts of small blacks handsgriping on to the human alchemist. Suddenly, she was surrounded by tiny black hands herself that wrapped themselves around her and began to drag her into the darkness.
"NO! NOOO! NOOOOOO! I don't wanna go there!" She furiously struggled against the mass of hands. then, strangely enough, they released their grip on her and took her limbs instead.
Loath looked around, trying to find the alchemist but couldn't and concluded the door had gotten him. Suddenly the Door open up and the black hands were back, surrounding her yet again, only this time when she managed to escape she had new limbs.
It was hard to tell the difference between her old limbs and the new ones but it was there. The pigment of the new limbs' skin was a bit darker than hers. In fact, the shade seemed much like the alchemist's. Too tired to care anymore, the female homunculous woozily fell to the floor, unconcious.
The instant Wrath told her to rip her own limbs off he instantly regretted it. THe gruesome sight of his own sister tearing herself apart was just digusting,and the screaming made his blood curdle. Especially since he knew that he was partially behind the cause of her pain. Does she truely trust me that much? He felt strange at this thought. This feeling wasn't anger or sadness or pain, and not really love. He didn't have a word for this new feeling. however, it didn't last long. Thoughts of the dreaded Door filled his head, He could practically FEEL the tiny black appendages taking hold of him, those violet slitted eyes watching him, it made him shudder violently.
BUt that feeling was soon intensified a hundred fold when he saw the alchemic light die down to reveal his sister, face down on the ground, unmoving.
"Sister? Sis..sist..sister? Loath...? LOATH!" He ran to her and threw himself down beside her, sobbing. All of a sudden he felt her skin tremble lightly and her leg twitch.
"You're not dead! YAY! You're still here! You didn't abandon me!" He curled into her and clutched desperatly at her clothing, burying his face into her chest, tears raking his small form, taking comfort in the rythmic falling and rising of her chest.
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Maruken: Whew, so how was that? Finally some light psychological angst.