"This is quite a city," Kirina said as she looked out the window of the car.

"Have you ever been to the city before, um, Kimiya?" Mustang asked.

Kirina shook her head. "Nope. You must've, though. You look like a State Alchemist. Is the driver a State Alchemist as well?"

Hughes turned to her and smiled. "Nope. I work for the military, but I'm not a State Alchemist."

"Oh, what do you do, then?"

"I'm part of the Investigations Department."

"Are they State Alchemists?" Kirina pointed to Ed and Al.

"My brother is," Al said. "I'm not."

Kirin turned to Ed. "Mr. Elric, just how old are you? Twelve? Eleven?"

Ed steamed quietly, mumbling something under his breath.

"Here we are," Hughes said. "You can stay with us, Kimiya."

Kirina brightened. "I can't wait to meet your daughter. She sounds wonderful!"

Ed sighed. Hughes had talked about Elicia for more than half of the car ride and that had been a long, long time. Every single minute, a sentence began with, "She's so cute!" or "She's so adorable!" or "She's so delightful!" and so on.

"Okay, everybody out."

"Hughes?" Ed whispered.

Hughes turned around. "What?"

"Find information. Find any information that you can find on female State Alchemists and see if any match up to Kirina."

Hughes nodded and turned back to Kirina. "Okay, let's go."

"What about those three?"

"They'll be fine."

Kirina turned around and gave Ed a pitying glance. Ed scowled and turned around.

"Okay, open up!" Hughes said, knocking on the door.

Elicia opened it. "Hi, Daddy."

Hughes picked her up and hugged her. "How's my cute little girl?"

Elicia smiled at Kirina. "Who are you?"

"I'm Kimiya."

"Kimiya. Does it mean green?"

Kirina looked taken aback. "Why, no. Why do you ask?"

"Your eyes are a pretty color. Like emeralds."

Kirina smiled. "Thank you."

Gracia came out of the kitchen.

"Honey, I'm going to go talk to Mommy now, okay?" Hughes said and set her down on the floor. "You play with her, okay?"

"Want to play with my dolls?" Elicia asked.

She didn't wait for her to respond, just took her hand and let her into the living room.

"This is Mary, Susan, Maggie, Amelia, Annie, and Lulu," she said, pointing to the dolls. She picked up one with yellow hair and bright, green eyes. "Lulu's my favorite. You can play with her."

Kimiya took the doll. "Thank you. I haven't played with dolls since I was little."

"Did your parents buy you dolls?"

"No, they made me dolls. They were alchemists."

"Daddy has friends who are alchemists. He works very hard and sometimes he's not home, but I know he loves me. He spends time with me whenever he can."

Gracia walked toward them. "You'll be staying with us for a while. Is that all right?"

"Yes, Mrs. Hughes. Thank you."

"Mommy, can she sleep in my room?"

"Well . . ."

"Please?"

"All right?"

"Yay!" Elicia grabbed Kimiya's hands joyfully. "We 're going to be sisters!"

"Ed," Hughes said next morning during breakfast.

"What is it?"

"I found something. A girl who became a State Alchemist at the age of seven."

"Seven!"

Hughes nodded. "It was in an old, rusty file cabinet. No wonder no one remembered her. And it's no mistake. The girl's name was Kirina Miracle and she supposedly died during the war."

"Convenient excuse," Ed mumbled, reading the folder Hughes had given him. "Yep, there's no doubt about it. The features are all the same."

"So, what are you going to do now?"

Ed grinned his famous toothy grin. "Investigate on my own."

Have you ever noticed that Ed shows his teeth a lot? Whenever he smiles, he always, always shows his teeth and it gives him the appearance of an evil maniac hatching a plan. (Well, that's what it looks like to me.)