Chapter 3

"Eden?" Edward asked groggily. He was still trying to recover from the dehydration. Instead of answering, the man

(Vash)

got up and went over to

(His name is Vash the Stampede)

the other side of the room, where Edward now noticed heavy curtains hanging. Vash pulled them open, showing a picture Edward did not expect in the least when his eyes adjusted to the influx of light.

Trees. Edward saw a literal forest, hundreds of trees that looked to be centuries old if their size and girth were to be believed. But Edward knew that was impossible- had he not wandered through the desert four hours along with- what's-her-name; something like Roze, he knew that much. Rose, Rosie, Ro-

("ROSETTE!")

Rosette. Now he remembered; he had heard the name screamed out just before they had gone. He clutched his side, where the little bitch had tackled him and stared out into the seemingly endless sea of green. He realized that Vash had been talking to him, and was now looking at him expectantly. "Sorry?" he asked.

As patient as the hills, Edward's caregiver repeated his question. "I said, since my brother's taking care of your friend, are you hungry? We'll have to go into the Mess hall, but we can get you something to eat."

Edward's stomach growled at the mention of food; he had forgotten that the tea he had had at the convent had been the only thing in his belly for the past several hours, perhaps longer now. He rummaged around in his pockets until he found what he was looking for- a pocket watch with a raised dragon rampant on the front. Clicking it open, he saw that it was past sunset, around nine thirty at night. When he had been at the convent, it had been around eleven in the morning. He looked outside again- it could have passed for noon. He shrugged. 'Maybe the days are longer here,' he thought.

Edward closed the watch and looked up at the man. When he had been taken care of before, first by Auntie Pinako after the failed transmutation of his mother, and later Winry after all the times he had wrecked his right arm, they always had this non-assuming look on their faces, as if they were willing to wait till the Wastes froze over for him to recover. Even when Winry moaned about the condition of his automail and how he always got into situations where it was mangled, mutilated, or outright demolished, the same look was in her eyes; and he knew she was only complaining so loudly because she was relieved it had been his metal arm, and not him, that had gotten destroyed.

The man, Vash the Stampede, had the same look about him- that he was willing to go at Edward's pace of recovery and would not try to guilt or cajole him into trying to heal faster so he could leave. It was the first feeling of home he had experienced in over 10 years.

"Yes, please," was all he managed to say without choking up.

"Eden?" Rosette asked the man called Knives. He nodded.

"My brother has this fascination with Earth, you see. One day he was poking around the Ship's computer and came across this old article about some place called Eden and it being a paradise. So when we established the Settlement, he was bound and bent it was going to be called Eden." He gestured again to his spent body. "In this condition I can't fight him, so I let it go."

Now Rosette was even more confused. 'Ship? What kind of a ship- a boat, a plane, maybe even a car?' She decided to file it away for a later time.

"Where exactly is here?" Rosette asked.

Again that studying look, as if mentally debating whether to impart her with such knowledge. This time it seemed the odds were not in her favour, as he gave a kind of shake of his head, almost as if throwing off the notion of telling her.

Out loud, he said, "Ready for dinner?"

"Halt! Who the Waste're you?" the Red Rogue sentry called to the stranger. There had been some activity from their main rivals, the Wild Cards, in the area recently, and the Red Rogue leader wasn't taking any chances of an invasion of their hideout by them, and so had posted guards up every day and night. It was just his luck that he'd pulled the short straw and got stuck with night duty.

When the man was only 500 yars away and still coming towards him, the sentry's grip on his rifle tightened. He was cold, he was hungry, and he was tired, but he was no mean shot. Maybe the guy was deaf; or maybe he had a death wish. Either way, he'd had his warning. Like the Big Boss had said, sitting surrounded by floozies and spineless yes-men, that habitual shark's grin once again on his face: "Warn 'em once, so we can tell the Calvary if they investigate we played by the book.

"After that, they're fair game."

The sentry got into a shooter's stance: legs in a steady A-frame position, the butt of the rifle secure against his shoulder, right hand on the reloading chamber, left on the on the sloping underside of the gun, index finger on the on the trigger, eye on the scope, lining up the target with the crosshairs. Just as his finger pressed the trigger, his eye registered that the target had disappeared.

The next thing he knew, he was lying on the ground and bleeding like a stuck pig from a bullet wound in his stomach. The thing was, the other guy didn't have a gun. He knew that as plainly as he could see the smirking face above him, pointing the same rifle he had had in his hands a second earlier, barrel still smoking, down at his fallen form.

The sentry knew he was going to die, and so asked one question; "Who the Waste're you?" His murderer crouched down, casually glancing over his body as if the man were but road kill, running his fingers through his straw-like hair, world-weary golden eyes gleaming. He rummaged through the pockets of the blood-red overcoat he wore until he found what he was looking for; a pocket watch with a raised dragon rampant on the front. Clicking it open, he looked at it while he spoke, in a voice that sounded like it had just matured out of adolescence but it sent chills down the sentry's spine.

"My name is Edward Elric, the Full Metal Alchemist." The killer whispered. "Not that it matters much to you, because your time in this hell is almost over." So saying, he tucked the watch into the doomed man's pocket and straightened. Turning around, he began to walk away towards the desert. He stopped. "However," slowly he spun around again to face the sentry, raising the rifle as he did so, "that means that your time in the next Hell is just about to begin."

Edward laughed as he emptied the rest of the gun's contents into the prone man's form, garnering satisfaction from each agonizing twitch and jerk of the body and the lifeblood that seeped from it, so dark in the cold moonlight, slaking the desert's thirst with crimson water. He threw the spent gun aside and flexed his metal right hand. From the corner of his eye, he spotted movement from the hideout.

Another guard had obviously heard the noise and come to see what the commotion was. When he saw his comrade, lying dead in a pool of his own blood, he fled back into the hideout. Edward watched the man run inside, presumably to alert his boss, and smirked a little. His job here was done.

Whistling a tune, he walked back out into the night desert and disappeared.