Rating: PG for alluding to sex
It took me a while to figure out what was wrong, but eventually I realized. I was tired, and it was a sensation entirely unfamiliar. Maybe some distant memory provided an inkling of what it used to be like, but like most memories, it was intangible and fleeting.
I don't know what Envy did to manipulate that short alchemist into creating the Stone, but it wasn't my worry. And focusing too long on it left an odd feeling in my chest, an emotion I needed to explore, but not this moment. Right now, I just wanted to understand this fatigue, this alien ache.
The memories were liquid at first, flowing between my fingers as I grasped frantically. Flashes of tan skin, lean body against mine, wire frame of glasses cool against my cheek, hung in the periphery of my mind, but refused to solidify.
The light seemed too bright, so I rolled over, trying to keep the glinting rays out of my face.
The moment I shifted, I heard the tinkling sound of metal skittering over slate. I rubbed my eyes wearily, staring at an ornate locket. The hurt seemed immense to me; every muscle in my body seemed to complain. Still, I reached over and grabbed the locket, gasping quietly as delicate tan fingers with blunt nailed pried it open, the thin, pale fingers I was used to replaced by these foreign klutzy digits.
Memory.
The locket was full of it, scattering over the slate floor, bound into delicate strands of hair, some laying in chalk dust, the complex remains of an array.
Pure, sweet memory and aching muscles,
laying on the cool slate floor of an abandoned church, bird nests in
the rafters, sun coming in through the holes in the roof. My clumsy but
sublimely human hands looped the chain around my neck, dull silver
contrasting with dark fingers and hair. My arms complained as I swept
my hair away to fasten the clasp, but it was the dull ache that
reminded me of the simple and desirable elegance of the pain of
humanity.