Following Ruri out of third period...
Ruri looked down at her schedule again. It read:
0) 8:00 Homeroom, room 5
1) 8:15 Practical Studies, room 6
2) 9:30 Structural Studies, room 3
3) 10:45 Break
4) 11:00 Alchemic Theory, room 2
5) 12:15 Lunch, Cafe/Courtyard
6) 12:45 Alchemic Theory II, room 2
7) 2:00 Self Defense / Endurance Training, Obstacle Course Outside
8) 3:15 Break
9) 3:30 Mini class- Transmutation Circles
10) 4:00 Mini class: Alchemy's History
At 4:30, everyone will let out. Snack shop opens at 4:45 and closes at 8:00. GROUNDS NOW CLOSE AT 9:30. Every student must be in his or her own dorm by this time. Good luck!
Ruri sighed. At least it was lunchtime, right?
Fighting through the crowd clogging up the halls, she headed to the rotunda, where she and Ed always planned to meet. She got every class with him except 1, 2, 9, and 10.
She brushed past him saying, "Catch me if you can!" Smirking, he ran after her through the halls, reaching for her billowing jacket tied around her waist. She ran around the pole in the Cafeteria and stopped abruptly in line. As he caught up to her, she said, "Jeez, you're slow."
Ed flew into a frenzy. "WHAT, IS IT BECAUSE I'M SHORT? HUH! WELL, I'M NOT, SO--" But he was cut off by Ruri's hand, which slapped across his mouth. Several people were staring from nearby tables.
"Could you be any louder!" she hissed.
Outside after getting lunch...
Ed broke the silence. "Hey," he said. "Do you want to come see Al with me later?"
Ruri looked up. "Sure. I can't believe their cramping him up in the Staff room all day."
"Yeah..." He looked away.
"Have you seen anything strange lately?"
"Huh?"
"Ed," Ruri frowned and lowered her voice. "We're here on a mission for the military! We need to check out what's going on. Remember, Roy told us that the students were acting strange."
He looked over at her. "So...?"
"So have you seen anything strange?" she repeated.
"Nope."
"Ed! Hey Ruri!" Ben called as he rushed up the hill to meet them. Ed and Ruri immediately dropped all forms of conversation.
He plopped himself next to Ruri and said, "Hey, what's up?"
The two teens glared at him. Ruri scooted away just a little bit.
"Hey," he said again, "Are you doing anything tonight, Ruri?"
"I.. uh--"
"There's a new Cafe just south of the school grounds. I'd like you two come with me."
"Sorry, no thanks..."
A deep sense of sorrow tainted his face. "Where will you--"
"She'll be with me." Ed cut in. His glare became as sharp and hard as diamond.
"Oh yeah? Is that right?" Ben snapped.
"Yes, in fact it is." Ed snapped back. Ruri sighed and closed her eyes, shaking her head. Immature... she thought.
Ben crossed his arms. "Pfft. Like she's actually wants to go with you."
"As a matter of fact, I would." She thought it best to end the fight before it got ugly. "I'm Ed's girlfriend."
Ed's jaw dropped as Ben's eyes bugged in disbelief. His former stare ("Oh I love you, Ruri! Come to me, kiss me...") had hardened and melted at the same time. But anger flared all the same. ("Ruri, how could you be his girlfriend? How? HOW!") He's buying the whole thing! she thought happily.
"Fine. See you guys later." Ben stood up and almost jogged away, trying to keep his cool.
"GIRLFRIEND! Ruri, what were you thinking!" Ed stared at her, blushing slightly.
She smiled flirtatiously. (Is that a word...?) "You know you want it to be true! HAH!" She stood up and threw the trash to a nearby trash can, laughing hard. "Whew..." She wiped the tears from her eyes.
But she let her guard down for a few seconds, giving Ed passage. To tackle her. He lunged, hitting her square on, He meant to knock her over, and he succeeded. But what he didn't want was to knock himself over, too. Instinctively, he wrapped his arms around her, trying to regain his own balance.
Not a chance.
Both of them fell, rolling down the grassy hill. Ruri and Ed both landed on their sides, close together. Ed's arms were still around her waist.
Laughing, Ruri said, "Well, we better go. Don't wanna be late on the last day of our first week, do we?" Ed mentally shook himself out of the shock and nodded. Standing, they brushed themselves off and headed inside to the next period.
During Seventh Period, or the Self Defense thing outside...
In the girls' locker rooms...
"Hey, Ruri," a girl called.
"Hmm?" Ruri turned as she was pulling on her training shirt. "Oh, hey Caitlin, what's up?"
Caitlin was a girl that Ruri had met a couple days ago. Turns out, she was new too, and she roomed in 708 A, right next to her. It was instant friendship, since both were kind and funny, and since...
They looked almost like twins.
At first, both teens had thought it was way too creepy, or just a trick of the light. But as they talked, Ruri found they had a lot in common.
"Are you headed out for training?" Caitlin asked. She pulled her blonde hair out of its low bun and brushed it out.
"Yeah, do you have attack or defense training?" Ruri asked back. She knew that each student would switch from attack to defense, or defense to attack training times throughout the year. Then the major exam... (Ruri has Defense, then Attack, then Defense, then ending the last quarter of the year with Attack again.)
"Attack, what do you have?"
"Crap. I have Defense. But at least the fields are right next to each other." She smiled hopefully. Caitlin nodded, but looked a little disappointed. "Hey, what day is it?"
"October 12th, why?"
Ruri went into immediate panic. It's... it's my birthday... I'm 15... She sat down, shaking, eyes wide and staring at nothing.
"Hey Ruri, hurry up in there!" a teen voice called from outside.
Ruri quickly smiled, knowing Ed would wait as long as she took. "...That's... That's Ed. I'll introduce you when we meet with him outside."
Caitlin nodded again, happy for the great friend in front of her. "Ha. Let's hope he doesn't hate me..."
Ruri got a sudden idea. "Hey," she said quietly. "Since we look so much alike, maybe we could pull something off... Let me use your hair tie."
Caitlin nodded and handed the black band to her, but looked confused.
Ruri pulled her hair into Caitlin's famous low bun, which was always kind of messy since she didn't care much about her appearance.
"Now let me have your earrings, and you can use my bracelet and choker..." Once the girls had completed the switching of the others' possessions, they looked at each other. (Ruri and Caitlin were both wearing long wide sleeves)
It was like looking in a mirror.
With Ruri's trademark choker and Caitlin's bun, no one could tell the difference.
And that was just what Ruri was planning on. Quickly, so they wouldn't be late, Ruri pushed Caitlin out of the Locker rooms and peered around the corner. Ed was leaning against the wall, arms crossed. He glanced at Caitlin.
"It's about time, you took forever in there. Come on Ruri, we're going to be late. As he walked away and reached for the door, Ruri stepped out.
"Are you going to leave without me?"
Ed whipped around, eyes flickering between the two, narrowing suspiciously. "That's not funny."
People walking by to their training session even turned to stare.
"Yeah it is!" Ruri and Caitlin said together. They looked at each other and burst out laughing.
Out on the Defense field...
Whoah, look at him go, Ruri thought, eyes gleaming with amazement. Ed was on the obstacle course, blasting hole in walls of rock, punching and kicking, flipping over spears, handling a sword, all like a pro. He seemed weightless, how high he could jump and back flip, but so solid how he could block dozen blows with his auto mail arm. Transmuting his arm into a jagged blade, Ed easily decapitated a dummy in his way. He jumped over and sliced through the back of another, going through the marked area where the heart would be. Grabbing the flag from the end of the course, he ran back to the starting point. Ruri didn't even see a drop of sweat on him.
"Good job, Takahashi. Your time is 2:37 and 55 milliseconds," said the coach. "But, remember, this is defense."
"Thank you." He bowed and walked up to Ruri.
"Nice going," she said, playfully shoving him in the shoulder.
"Piece of cake," he said, smirking.
"Look," Ruri pointed to the field on their left. Caitlin was up, and she bolted into the course. Sprinting faster than Ruri had ever seen, she jumped and held up two fingers on her right hand, both close together. A stream of green shot from her extended fingers, blasting the ground below her. A disk of dirt transmuted into stone. But instead of sitting there like a normal stone should, it flew up to her quickly descending feet. She posed there for a quick moment, and then continued.
Flying on her disk, she pointed at a nearby block of wood, changing it to a bow and arrows. Quickly bending down, she jumped off, and picked them up. From her jacket, she made a quiver to stick the extra arrows in.
"How does she keep the disk up?" Ruri whispered, amazed.
"Easy. She transmutes the air under it to something that can hold it up."
"I knew that."
"Right."
"And look, her hand sign is the same as mine. That's pretty cool."
"Girls..."
Caitlin knocked the arrow into place and shot it at the nearest target. It hit dead center. She did various other moves, including fence, flip like Ed, and decapitate several things.
Like Ed, she bowed and walked to the back of the line, as the other coach repaired everything with alchemy.
"Matsumoto, you're up." Ruri shook her head and walked to the beginning. "Ready?" She nodded. "Begin!"
Ruri leaped off the ground and made the same sign as Caitlin with her fingers. But her stream of alchemy was black, streaked with ice blue.
She blocked herself with shields of ice transmuted from the available water, drove spikes through the hearts of enemies, and basically fought with such intensity, she forgot who she was.
The next couple seconds was a blur.
An arrow shot from the forest, pelting toward her.
She didn't have time to react.
A person behind her was screaming her name.
So she did the only thing she could think of.
She released her wings.
The unfamiliar white startled her, and the arrow lodged itself in her shoulder...
The voice called out one more time before she lost conciseness.
"Ruri!"
Two hours later, in the Institute's clinic...
"Ugh... Ed, get off me..."
Ed's eyes flew open and he smiled, a tear falling down his face. She felt it land on her wrist as he moved closer.
"Ruri! Damn, that was close... Are you okay?"
"Yes, how are you?"
"Can you hear me?"
Ruri glanced around the white room. Al was on her right, and she could see the familiar head of Caitlin at the foot of her bed.
"What happened?"
"Someone shot you with an arrow..." Caitlin started. She trailed off.
Al continued. "But right before it his you..."
Ed finished. "You sprouted wings, Ruri. Only we saw before you fainted and lost them again."
Ruri stared. "Wings..."
They looked at her, wanting to know what was going on.
"WINGS! SHIT ED! I NEED TO GO!" She sat up, pain shooting through her shoulder where the arrow hit.
"Why? And where!" Ed pushed her down again.
"Anywhere... I need to... Talk to you! We need to talk! Let's go!"
"Fine." She felt his arms slide under her knees and shoulders. Lifting her like a bride, he said, "'Scuse us."
In Ed's room...
Ruri was crying and sweating, pale as his sheets as he set her down on them. Ruri sat up and leaned against the wall. Her eyes were filled with devastation, tragedy, angst, and sorrow as he sat beside her.
Putting a hand on her cheek to bring her back into focus, he said. "What's wrong?"
She took a deep breath. "When... When I was little, my prophecy had been told to us... my family... from a woman who came to our door. She was tall and beautiful, with long brown hair. Her name was Aradia. I remember every word she said...
"Dear child, when you grow and blossom like a flower, when you are fifteen, you will grow
the feathers of life. You will feel it in your soul from then on. People will no longer see you as a normal girl.
Laws of nature will be broken, and by you alone. But do not fret, for it will do you no harm.
The one you love will be there with you, always by your side.
And friends will surround you. But never let down your guard.
It may cost you your life.
Tears slid down her cheeks as she looked over at Ed. "I can feel it." Standing on shaky legs, she bowed her head.
And her wings came out once again.
Ed rose in shock. He let the silky white feathers slide through his fingers as his eyes ran over them. But Ruri wasn't done.
"Ed?"
"... Yeah?" he whispered. His eyes never left her wings.
"You know the woman I told you about?"
"Yeah?"
Ruri took a deep breath.
"She had a son named Alphonse with her."
Ouch! Alright, thanks for the reviews! I loved them! especially the one from edward's-love hoping my surgery went well... still don't know how to spell... that was a long chapter! XD I'm bleeding still, but not much. They put me on laughing gas, and all I could think was, "Hey, that's not my voice! Where am I? Who am I?" Ha.