So! If you haven't read the manga/watched the original anime, the events in this chapter may seem a touch foreign to you. No judging, it's hard as hell to go through THREE different sets of media to get the bulk of this universe - so, if you've only had the opportunity to watch Brotherhood, you'll only peripherally recognize what happens here. Rest assured the overall plot is canon-compliant. Have fun!
After everything, Mustang had done Ed a kindness, it seemed. Lissa was surprised when he'd passed on new, changed orders—for Edward to go to a small mining town known as Youswell for an inspection. He'd given up on making Ed take on Tucker's work, apparently. So that very day, once Ed had been bandaged up, Lissa, Ed, and Al boarded a train bound eastward, towards Youswell.
"I think the last time I came east of Central, I was going to Resembool," Lissa observed, sitting sideways on the train bench with her legs kicked across Ed's lap. She was kindly keeping her boots off him, at least.
Ed made a face. "I hope this place isn't as boring as Resembool."
Lissa peeked over the back of the bench at the empty carriage and grimaced. "Yeah, I don't think we're gonna be so lucky."
"I kinda like it," Al piped up, ever the more optimistic one. "It's like having our own private carriage. Like we're VIPs or something."
That caused Edward to scowl—Lissa could feel him tense up under her legs. "Well, we're not. This is my job now. Dog of the military. I gotta roll over and wag my tail whenever they want me to." He crossed his arms over his chest. "There's nothing special about it."
Lissa tapped his shoulder to get him to look at her. "Not if you have that attitude. Look, we're both stuck in this, Ed. But at least we can decide to have a little fun doing it, right?"
"Why would you stick with this, anyway?" he asked her, apparently not willing to lighten up just yet. "After all the crap we just went through, why would you stick around to become a state alchemist? Why not just…go somewhere else? Al and I don't really have a choice, but you could get out anytime you wanted."
She jerked her legs off him and turned away, angry even though she knew it was a stupid reaction. "I can't."
Al's armor clanked as he leaned in. "Why not, Lissa?"
Blinking slowly, she turned to see them both staring at her in confusion, realizing something very vital. "You guys…don't know how institutions like the one I grew up in work, do you?" she asked hesitantly. She hated this part, the truth of how she lived. But if they were going to be so stupid and insist she should just leave…she had no choice but to explain it.
"Er…I thought it was just like any other group home," Ed admitted, shrugging.
Lissa rolled her eyes. "Well, it's not. For normal kids, if you're a ward of the state they'll just stick you somewhere until you turn eighteen, then turn you out on your ass. You go to a state-run school and it doesn't cost much to raise kids like that. But…for alchemist kids…it's different." She gripped her newly-transmuted black leather jacket and glared at the far end of the train car, trying to find the words. "They say it costs more, at facilities like mine…because they train us and give us specialized lessons, to prepare us for becoming state alchemists. But since it costs more, we're expected to pay back the money it cost to raise us and put us through school."
Edward's eyes were wide. "Wait, you're saying they put you in debt to the military just for—giving you a place to stay? What the hell?"
"Not just that," she admitted tightly. "You're expected to become a state alchemist, no questions asked—and once you do become one, you get all the normal research grants…but you owe the state back for the cost of your housing and education and everything. And every year they stack up the interest too. Most kids I knew came there when they were about our age now, so they only owed a few years back. But…I came there when I was seven. By the time I'm allowed to take my exams, I'll owe nine years of debt to the state. I'll have to make monthly payments until I pay it off—or until I die."
"But that's…that's not fair," Alphonse protested, sounding upset. "Did they not give you a choice? Were you forced to go there?"
Lissa felt a bitter smile crawl up on her face. "They gave me a choice. I already knew a lot about alchemy, so I was dangerous…especially since I work with intangibles… So they told me I could either spend the next eleven years of my life locked away for safety reasons, or I could sign up for the state alchemist program."
"That isn't a real choice!" Ed yelled, incensed. She looked over at him in shock to see his face contorted with rage. "Who the hell says that to a seven-year-old kid?!"
She swallowed hard. She hadn't meant to upset him with this… "I don't think it was set up for kids that age… Usually seven-year-olds aren't alchemists at all. So I just kind of…broke the system, I guess."
Edward shook his head fiercely. "That's no excuse." He let out a harsh breath and looked at her, the rage fading to pity she didn't want. "I'm sorry, Liss. I had no idea. I never would've said that if I'd known." He leaned into the back of the seat and let his arms fall to his sides, looking…sort of lost. "I guess we're both really trapped then, huh?"
"You don't have to pity me," she told him bluntly. "Not you two."
"Why?" Al asked her sharply. "Because of what we did? We did that to ourselves, Lissa. Everything that happened to us in Resembool was our fault. You didn't ask for any of this—you just lost your parents. How can we not feel bad for you?"
She looked over at Al, feeling bad for her reaction. "I'm sorry," she murmured. "I just… I guess it's bad all around."
Edward smiled and draped his arm over her shoulders—she didn't mind that it was automail, it still was a sweet gesture. "Yeah, you're right about that. We all got dealt a shit hand, didn't we? But it's better this way, for us all to be together. At least we understand each other, right? And we can help each other get through it too."
Lissa bit the inside of her cheek to keep herself from blushing. "Yeah," she agreed softly, leaning her head over onto his shoulder and closing her eyes. "You're right about that. I'm really glad I met you guys."
"We're glad we met you too, Lissa," Al told her sweetly.
By the time the train pulled into Youswell station, Lissa was feeling better—not entirely up to her usual standards yet, but not nearly as bad as she'd been before. The boys seemed lighter too, the buzzing around her ears reduced to a faint hum that she could put out of her mind. Thankfully, because she wanted to focus. As much as she was just Ed's trainee, she also felt kind of…responsible for his performance, too. That meant she had to be really on it here, his first real mission.
They hopped off when the train ground to a halt, and Lissa tugged her backpack higher on her shoulders. It held everything she had to her name, after all, plus her newest addition. Ed had told her in no uncertain terms that any alchemist worth their salt kept coded research notes, so she'd begun keeping track in a notebook.
Or…she was trying to. Encoding things didn't exactly come naturally to her.
"So this is Youswell, huh?" Ed muttered, squinting at the too-quiet town around them, at the people just…sitting around like all the life had been sucked out of them. "I thought a mining town would be livelier… But this place… It's like a ghost town here."
"Weird," Lissa agreed as they stepped away from the station. "I wonder what's up?"
They'd scarcely taken five steps away from the train station when Edward suddenly yelled out in pain. Lissa saw him get clocked right in the head by a piece of lumber, carried by a boy who had to be about their own age. "Whoops, sorry!" the boy apologized, turning and grinning at them sheepishly.
Edward scowled at him. "Hey, watch where you're going, you little-"
But the boy wasn't listening at all anymore. "Dad!" he yelled, setting the end of his lumber down on the ground. "Look, tourists! Do you guys know where you're staying? Have you eaten? Where'd you come from, anyway?"
"I guess we're a novelty," Al observed, looking down at Lissa in surprise.
From up above them, working on some higher mining platform, an older man looked down and grinned. "What's that, Khayal? What are you going on about?" he called down.
The boy, Khayal, lifted Ed's arm and waved it around. "Customers, dad! Big spenders!"
Ed jerked his arm away and stuck his hands in his pockets irritably. "Who said we're big spenders?" he grumbled.
Lissa giggled and threaded her arm through his. "C'mon, Ed. We might as well go with it, right? It's not like we know our way in this town anyway."
The older man up on the platform tugged off his hardhat and waved down. "Hey! My name is Halling, I run the local inn. We'll take good care of you, honest." He stuck his hardhat under his arm and headed for the ladder leading down from the platform. "Here. Lemme show you folks in."
"See?" Lissa murmured, smirking. "A place to stay."
Ed wrinkled his nose. "Yeah, whatever."
They followed Halling and Khayal through the sleepy town as the sun set around them, and Lissa reflected that it could be a pretty town—kind of picturesque, if it wanted to be. But not feeling this run-down and tired, for sure. How strange. Why had Mustang sent them here anyway, to this far-east town after all the high-profile things Edward had done recently? She wondered, just fleetingly, if maybe he was trying to punish them with boredom. She wouldn't put it past him.
Halling led them into the front door of the liveliest place they'd seen yet. It was full of coal miners and the like, all drinking and sitting at rough wooden tables all around. Lissa felt a bit uncomfortable, as one of the few females in sight. She knew if she did become a state alchemist, she'd be even more surrounded by men—but still, that didn't make her feel any better about it.
"Sorry if it's a little bit dusty," Halling told them as they entered. "I know it's not much, but since the coal mine's wages are so low, I gotta work here at the same time to keep dinner on the table."
Lissa smiled at him. "No, it's lovely." She paused at the little desk by the door with the boys, while a woman—possibly Halling's wife, she thought, though she wasn't sure—checked them in on her logbook.
"Now, is that one room or two, for one night?" she asked, smiling over the top of the desk at them.
Edward glanced sideways at Lissa, looking a bit uncertain. They hadn't exactly discussed sleeping arrangements, she realized with a jolt, and because they'd been staying in separate places back in Central it had never come up. Well, there was the one night they stayed in the dorms, but Lissa had taken her own room then because it didn't cost anything extra. If she stayed in a separate room every single place they visited, that would double what it cost for Ed and Al to travel. The thought made her stomach churn—she owed enough money as it was. "Just one is fine," she piped up quickly. "As long as there's a couple beds and a couch."
Thankfully, Halling's wife didn't think anything of it. "We can do that, sure."
Al tilted his head curiously. "And…what are your rates?" he asked.
Halling grinned and barked a laugh from where he'd begun serving customers across the room. "Well, they're not cheap, that's for sure."
Ed waved a hand passively at him. "Eh, I'm sure we can cope. Despite our appearances, we've got plenty of cash."
You shouldn't have told him that, Lissa thought derisively.
"Oh, is that so?" Halling smirked and held up two fingers. "It's two hundred thousand."
"WHAT?!" Ed yelped, his jaw dropping. "Two hundred thousand?! Are you trying to rob us? What, are you gonna put gold bars on our pillows?!"
But Halling didn't back down. "It's a fair price, seeing as our inn's the finest in all of Youswell."
"Not to mention the only inn," Khayal interjected, grinning widely.
"We don't get guests passing through very often, so we gotta get what we can from you folks," Halling explained brightly. "That's just business, I'm afraid."
Ed scowled at him for a moment—then dragged Al and Lissa into the corner and yanked out his wallet, crouching down to look through it. He'd brought plenty, but not for these rates. "Ugh, this isn't even close to enough," he lamented.
"We spent all that money on Winry too, before we left," Al tacked on sadly.
"Oh man… I don't wanna sleep on the street," Ed groaned, closing the wallet and stuffing it back into his pocket.
Lissa didn't particularly want to do that either. "Maybe we can pay them some other way."
Edward's eyes lit up. "Oh, right." He wiggled his fingers helpfully. "Hey, uh, Mr. Halling?" he called, rising from the floor and flashing a winning smile. "So, um…what about a trade, instead of the fee? Something of…equal value?"
"A trade?" Halling asked dryly. "What exactly are you proposing, kid?"
Just the fact that he was willing to listen meant they had a shot, and Ed clearly knew that. "Here, bring me something broken. Something that can't be repaired."
There was a sort of communal shuffling around in the room—a few discussions, murmured too softly for Lissa to hear. Then a table was cleared near the middle of the room, and one of the miners sat a broken pickaxe down on it, in several pieces. The handle had been splintered in a couple places, pretty severely, while the axe head itself was severed right down the middle.
Ed winked at Lissa as he strode up to the table, clapped his hands together—and with a burst of blue transmutation energy, he repaired the axe perfectly.
Amid the shouts of it looks brand new, this is amazing, and the like, a few more objects were brought by. Some mining tools, what looked like a hitch for a wagon, and Halling's wife brought by a vase that had some sentimental value to her as well. The spectacle was perfect, especially with Ed's little hand-clap flourish thing. Lissa knew how he did it—he'd explained that ever since he and Al had attempted human transmutation, he'd been able to perform alchemy without drawing a circle first. But he didn't like to explain that to anyone else, so she kept her mouth shut when a couple people absently wondered how he did it.
"Who'd have thought our first customers in ages would be real-live alchemists," Halling laughed, a huge shift from how he'd been acting before. "I took a crack at alchemy myself once, a long time ago, but it never went anywhere. Tell you what, you kids fix a few more things, and I'll give you a big discount for you room and meals. Sound good?"
"Definitely!" Ed told him brightly.
Lissa felt a tug on her pants, and turned to see a little girl who barely came up to her knee holding a stuffed doll with a ripped-off arm up to her. "Do you think you can fix my dolly?" she asked softly. The girl's mother was behind her, looking hopeful.
"Of course," Lissa agreed instantly. "Hey, Al, can I borrow your chalk for a moment?"
Al shuffled around inside the armor, hidden behind his little drape, and withdrew the stick of chalk he kept for drawing transmutation circles. She was used to using the circles drawn on her skin, but the ones she'd put today didn't allow for basic repairs. Stupid, really. She'd have to get better at that. Lissa thanked him and took the chalk, then knelt down beside the little girl and carefully drew out her transmutation circle.
"Why you gotta draw that?" the girl asked curiously, peering over her shoulder.
Lissa smiled to herself. "Well, I'm just learning. The blond kid over there is kind of my teacher, that's why he can do it without the circle—but most alchemists need a transmutation circle before they do anything." She finished the circle and carefully took the girl's doll, already assessing its state. It was a clean rip, not much fraying or damage, and it didn't seem to have lost any stuffing. Perfect.
"Can you fix it, Miss Alchemist?" the girl asked her anxiously.
"Yup! I definitely can." Lissa placed the doll in the circle and pressed her hands to the edge, focusing inward. In seconds, the floor lit up with blue energy—and when it died down, the doll was in one piece again.
The girl gasped and rushed to grab it, holding the doll tightly to her chest and giggling. "Yay! Thank you so much, Miss Alchemist!"
"It's Lissa," she told her, rising to her feet and smiling down at her. "And you're very welcome."
"Hey, Liss!" Ed called over, waving to her from where he'd now taken a seat at one of the tables. "Come on, we've got food!"
Lissa ruffled the girl's hair and crossed the room to rejoin the boys, pulling up a seat beside Ed and picking up her knife and fork eagerly. She hadn't realized until she smelled food just how hungry she was—but now she was starving.
"So, what brings you guys here to Youswell?" asked Khayal, leaning on the edge of the table. "There can't be much here for an alchemist like you to do."
Ed flashed a grin as he went to dive into his food. "Oh, it's business, actually. I'm here to inspect the coal mine."
Silence.
Lissa picked her head up and stared around the room, stunned by the sudden hostility. "Um, Ed… Maybe you shouldn't…"
"Inspect?" Halling repeated. "Then you're part of the military?"
Edward looked up at him, eyebrows furrowed now. "Well, yeah. I'm a state alchemist, actually. My name's Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist."
And the whole title. Lissa could've rolled her eyes at him. Zero awareness.
In seconds, Halling had snatched up his food and carried a squirming Ed out the door by the back of his cloak, where he tossed him into the street unceremoniously. His suitcase soon followed. All around Lissa and Al, the other miners were chattering angrily, giving them suspicious sidelong looks like they were part of some scheme to ruin their lives.
"Hey! The hell was that for?!" Ed demanded, picking himself up out of the dirt.
Halling stood in the doorway, glaring down at him. "We have no food or beds to offer the dogs of the military," he announced harshly. Then he rounded on Al and Lissa and fixed his glare on them. "What about you two? You state alchemists too?"
"Well, no," Al admitted, sounding very nervous. "We aren't, but…"
"They've got nothing to do with it!" Ed yelled, now standing out in the street and scowling in at the miners. "They don't even like what I do to begin with. They aren't military."
Halling grunted, seeming to consider it for a moment—then he turned back to Edward and ground out, "Fine then. They can stay." He grabbed the doorknob and added, "You can sleep on the street like the rest of the dogs." And with that, he slammed the door shut behind him, leaving Ed stuck out alone.
Lissa looked up at Alphonse uncertainly. "We can't just leave him there," she whispered.
"But they won't let him back in, either," he sighed. "Okay. Lissa, you try and find out why these coal miners hate the military so much, and I'll work on finding a way to sneak my portion of food out to brother, so he doesn't starve at least."
She sighed deeply, unhappy, but nodded anyway. "When you go, will you tell him that I'll come check on him later too?"
Al patted her shoulder gently. "Of course." He got up to go speak with some of the other miners, while Lissa turned and caught Khayal's eye, a bit surprised when the boy came and sat down next to her in a huff. "So…your dad really doesn't like the military, does he?" she asked him curiously.
Khayal scowled. "How could he? Everyone around here hates the military. Especially that greedy First Lieutenant Yoki. He's in charge of Youswell, and he's the worst. He bribes all the higher-ups in Central to look the other way, and he keeps everyone's salaries as low as he can and takes all the money for himself."
"And it's only gonna get worse, now that he's got that sneaky little state alchemist around to do his dirty work," Halling griped as he passed.
"Why do you hang around with him, anyway?" Khayal asked her.
Lissa tightened her hands into fists under the table. "Well," she began, trying to keep her cover of hating the military, "if you had the choice between just having one single reminder of how trapped you are, or a constant flood of reminders every day, which would you pick?"
That wasn't the truth—but it could have been, had she been assigned to anyone else. Lissa felt incredibly lucky to have pulled this off, getting assigned to Ed, because he was her friend and she cared about him and Al. They made her forget exactly how stuck she was, what a bad situation she was going to be in no matter what she did. Without them…her life would've been so much worse. But if she voiced that to Khayal, then Halling would toss her out just like Ed.
"Kid like you deserves better than that," Halling told her decisively. "'Alchemist; be thou for the people.' That's their phrase, isn't it? What a load of crap. They're all self-serving money-grabbing thugs."
She couldn't help herself. "I don't know about that," Lissa told him honestly, looking up from her half-eaten plate of food. "I've known a lot of state alchemists… After my parents were killed, I ended up in Central so I've at least seen most of the big-name state alchemists. And…some of them are terrible. They treated me like dirt beneath their boots. But, at the same time…there were some who treated me very kindly and made a big difference in my quality of life."
Halling scoffed. "Kind state alchemists. I don't think there's such a thing."
"There is," she insisted firmly. "You just have to go looking, that's all."
As the evening wore on, Lissa caught Al sneaking his plate of food out for Ed, which made her feel better. At least he wasn't going hungry. She felt terrible, sitting in here while he was stuck outside, but he'd gone out of his way to make sure she and Al could stay inside—and it felt like she'd be turning her nose up at the kind thing he'd done if she ruined that.
Al rejoined her once he was finished, settling carefully into the chair beside her and sighing. "I feel bad, coming back in here when brother's still outside," he admitted to her quietly.
"Me too," Lissa told him. "But he'd only be upset with us if we got ourselves kicked out."
His shoulders slumped. "I guess so. Did you learn anything, at least?"
"Tons." She quickly filled him in—the taxes, Lieutenant Yoki, and the miners' rage at the injustice. And apparently, he'd heard the same thing in his own searching. "It sounds like some really bad stuff is going on here, from what I've been hearing," she mused, absently tracing transmutation circles with her fingertip. "Bribery, over-taxation, all of it… This Yoki guy sounds super corrupt."
"Brother thought maybe he can fix some of it," Al confided, leaning in closer to keep their conversation private. "We talked about it when I went out earlier. I mean, he is here to inspect the town, right? Maybe he'll find evidence of something bad."
"I hope so," Lissa muttered. "Even though these people tossed Ed out like that, they're not bad people—they're just angry that they've been abused for so long."
Al nodded solemnly. "Exactly. There's no way we can just leave here and pretend nothing's wrong… We have to do something, don't we?"
There was a commotion at the door—someone shouted out of my way, and Lissa looked up to see three soldiers in full uniform walking in the front. Two were armed with swords, scowling, while the leader held a handkerchief to his face like he'd smelled something rotten. "Mh, seems your inn is as filthy as ever, Halling," he observed snidely.
Halling glared at him from the far side of the bar. "Lieutenant Yoki. You know, you should cover up your face more often, it's a good look on you."
Yoki lowered the handkerchief and narrowed his eyes. "I'd hold my tongue if I were you. The taxes on this establishment are long overdue—and the insolence doesn't stop here, no. I could say the same for the whole town."
"My apologies," Halling all but sneered. "I can't do anything to fix our low wages, unfortunately."
Yoki cast a disdainful look around the room. "Though it seems they're still high enough to afford alcohol, aren't they?" he mused. "So I suppose it won't matter if I simply…lowered your income a little. As payment for the unpaid taxes, naturally."
The room erupted into anger. Lissa surreptitiously tugged one of her jacket sleeves up, to make sure her transmutation circles were still in place. She didn't like the energy of the room one bit. Feels like…fire, like anger… And that sickly-sweet metallic feeling of money being handled. This can't be good, not at all.
Amid the shouting, Lissa noticed Khayal clenching a dirty dishrag—then he shouted, "You can't push us around like that!" As he yelled, he reared back and threw the rag directly into Yoki's face.
"You little brat!" one of Yoki's guards snarled.
Too quickly for anyone to react, Yoki strode forward and backhanded Khayal across the face, so hard the boy went crashing to the floor in a heap. Then the Lieutenant lifted his fingers and made a small motion to his guard—who stepped forward and placed a hand on his sword. "Don't show him any mercy just because he's a child," Yoki ordered coldly. "I want him to be an example for these ruffians."
Lissa dropped out of her chair, under the table, and raced forward—she wasn't sure what she intended to do until she slid to her knees and grabbed Khayal, putting herself in the sword's path instead.
Clang!
She lifted her head in time to see the top half of the sword go flying across the room, broken. Above her stood Edward, face set in a harsh scowl, his automail arm up with the lower half of the sword still resting against him—and the soldier wielding it giving him a baffled, terrified sort of look. Lissa knew he must have heard the commotion and come rushing in to interfere.
"Who the hell are you?!" Yoki demanded, furious.
Lissa pushed Khayal away, to his feet, and let him run off into his mother's arms. She didn't want him in harm's way anymore. When she turned back towards the escalating conflict, Edward was holding his hand out for her, so she grabbed on and got to her feet beside him.
"Me? Oh, I'm nobody," Edward dismissed idly, checking his cloak for any damage. "I just heard the First Lieutenant stopped by, so I figured…" He stuck his hand down into his right pocket and pulled out his state alchemist's pocket watch, displaying it for Yoki to see. The man's terror was palpable when he spotted it. "Why not come say hi?"
One of Yoki's guards leaned in towards his commander and asked, "Who does this brat think he is, sir?"
Yoki gaped at him. "You moron!" he hissed. "That watch makes him a state alchemist! It means he reports directly to Führer King Bradley himself!"
The two mumbled some more together, so Ed sighed and tucked his pocket watch away again. "Do you have a death wish or something?" he asked her lowly, looking frustrated. "That wasn't your best plan, Liss. You could've just used alchemy on the guy. And if I hadn't gotten here in time…"
She swallowed hard. "I guess that's why I'm still training, huh?"
Edward squeezed her hand tightly for a moment before letting go. "Just…be careful. That's all."
Yoki cleared his throat and stepped forward, so Lissa moved back, still attempting to keep a little separation between her and the military for the sake of the coal miners, at least. "I apologize for the actions of my subordinate," he began, giving Ed what had to be his most charming smile. It still looked sleazy. "I'm First Lieutenant Yoki, I'm in charge of this—eh—quaint little town. What brings you all the way out here, might I ask?"
"I'm just here to conduct an inspection," Ed told him, shrugging.
Though Yoki's voice cracked when he spoke, he managed to hold it together as he replied, "Oh, an inspection! Well, in that case, might I suggest you accompany me to stay at my mansion? You'll find it far more agreeable than this…filthy place."
Lissa watched something come over Ed's face—the little spark in his gold eyes when he had a plan. "Yeah, sounds great," he agreed slowly, like it was actually a good idea. "Since I'm not allowed to stay here anyway."
With the coal miners watching, a combination of confused and angry, Ed wandered right out with Yoki and his men, without a single look over his shoulder.
"I knew it," Halling growled. "I knew he was just like all the others."
Lissa bit the inside of her cheek to keep from retorting. He hadn't seen what she did—and he didn't know Ed at all, so he wouldn't know that there was only one reason Ed would go off with a slimy man like that. He had a plan.
"Mr. Halling… I'm afraid Al and I don't have enough to pay for a room on our own," Lissa told him honestly, before he walked away. "You've been very kind to us and given us food, but…"
He shook his head firmly. "You were willing to risk your life to save my Khayal. You two are welcome to stay tonight, free of charge. Besides, if anything else breaks, we'll know where to find you, right?"
She nodded and let that go. At least she could sleep in a bed tonight.
Khayal approached her as his dad left and gave her an uncertain smile. "Um, Miss Lissa… Thank you for stepping in like that. But… You're an alchemist, aren't you? So why didn't you just use alchemy on those guys?"
Really, Lissa. Why didn't you?
"Well…" She leaned into the table behind her and sighed. "Alchemists aren't infallible. We make mistakes too, we're just humans like anybody else. But also…the truth is…" Lissa glanced sideways as Al approached, apparently wanting to hear this too. "For most of my life, I was in a place where I wasn't allowed to use my alchemy for just anything. I had to either be with a trainer or have special permission to use it. So I guess I just don't have the instincts built in yet to use alchemy before anything else. That's why I'm training outside a school now, though—to become a better alchemist."
He gave her a curious look. "But you fixed Maya's doll earlier, didn't you? You're already a great alchemist."
Lissa shrugged. "Being able to fix things isn't all that makes a great alchemist. It's all science, and when you're using it out in the world, there's a lot of instinct that you have to learn too. And my defensive alchemy isn't always the best, a lot of what I do is offensive." She found herself smiling as she added, "Ed—the little state alchemist with the red cloak—is really good at all sides of it. That's why I'm learning from him. He saved you, Khayal. Not me."
