Chapter 9

Edward stood up. "I have to leave you two ladies for a moment. Be right back," he said as he got up and went inside the café. 'There's gotta be a bathroom somewhere around here,' he thought anxiously. Seeing Millie, he asked her where the washrooms were.

"Just down the hall there, on your left just before you reach the kitchen," she replied with a smile. "I'll be out with your refill and the lady's soda in a minute." He nodded his thanks and hurried off in the direction of the kitchen.

After he came out of the washroom, he heard noises coming from the kitchen. While this in itself wasn't alarming, it was not the shouting of lunch orders and the clanging of pots and pans he heard, but rather the noises of some sort of scuffle. Sliding up to the open doorway of the kitchen, he peeked in, immediately furious by the sight that met his eyes. Inside were four men, three of them dressed in different styles of clothing- one looked like a businessman with a three-piece suit and black bowler hat, one was in a cheesy cowboy getup, and the third dressed in a bizarre combination of the two, bowler hat and cowboy boots. The only article of clothing that suggested they were part of a group was a red bandanna visible on each man. Businessman had it tucked like a handkerchief in his breast pocket, Cowboy wore it as a scarf, bandit-style around his neck, while Mismatch had it tied around his left bicep. The one that got his attention, though, was the last one. He stood in front of the others and looked to be their leader, yet he wore simple blue jeans and a white t-shirt. The only flamboyancy in his dress was a black leather jacket. His bandanna has tied around his forehead under his pageboy length dark hair to act as a sweatband. He was currently harassing a short, black-haired woman with dangly earrings.

"Now, now, sweetie," the brute said mockingly sweetly, "you're behind in your monthly dues. You know that I let you off with a discount, but you still gotta pay 'em." He enclosed her slender wrist in one of his ham-sized paws, yanking her up by it. "How are me and the boys here supposed to put food on the table if our 'investments' don't put back the money we put into 'em?" His cronies behind him guffawed, as if in on some joke.

To her credit, the diminutive woman stood her ground firmly. "Please, Damian. All I'm asking for is a bit more time, and you'll get your money. Besides, right now we're operating this place in the red, and Milly still needs some money to get medicine for the twins-"

She was silenced by a swift slap across the cheek. "Don't tell me your problems," he growled, all trace of the sickening charm wiped from his face. "I don't care if you're running a deficit- all I want is the money that's due to me for being the nice guy that I am and not torching this rat-hole to the ground with you in it." He gave her a shake just to show her what a nice guy he was. "And as for that whore, she and those bastard children of hers can rot out on the streets for all I care! Let them be plagued by syphilis, typhoid, and boils!" he raged, slapping her again, this time eliciting a whimper from her.

Edward had seen enough. He was not a crusading do-gooder who sought out evil in all its forms- he was just a weary traveler, trying to get home. But when a situation arose along the way and he was there to do something about it, then he was going to; otherwise he would not be able to face himself afterwards. It had always been thus; even when he was known far and wide as the Fullmetal Alchemist those many long years ago. Bolstered by the memory, he stepped into the doorway, in full view of the men, his hands stuffed in his jacket pockets. "Hey jackass," he called, hoping he sounded more confident than he felt, "I know you're ugly as sin, but you don't need to take out your frustration on the lady."

The leader and his lackeys looked up in shock at the bold appearance of the interloper. After a second's pause, he threw the woman to the side of the room. "Well, well- Boys, this fellow here seems to have a death wish. Take care of him." His smirk faded when he realised that his 'boys' hadn't moved from their spots behind him. They seemed frozen in place in terror.

"T-that's him," Mismatch said, raising a shaking finger to point to Edward. "That's the guy who killed Carlo!"

"I heard he's got the same skills as Vash the Stampede!" Businessman added, taking out his handker-bandanna and wiping his brow, which was perspiring from fear. "After all, he shot Carlo with his own gun!"

"He doesn't have the same skills as Vash the Stampede, he is Vash the Stampede!" put in Cowboy. "I mean, look at him! He's tall, blonde, and he's got a red coat. I'd have to say that matches the description of the Humanoid Typhoon." Businessman and Mismatch were shaking their heads in dumb agreement.

Their leader, however, was looking at them like they had grown three extra eyes and tails. "And I made you three my lieutenants." He said in disgust. "Afraid of old wives' tales! Carlo accidentally shot himself, and what Montoya saw was probably a sand cloud." It wasn't unusual for people to mistake the many particles of dust and sand that were picked up by the wind for things such as distant cars and people, sometimes even towns on the horizon, .

Where the other two were mollified, Mismatch still looked troubled. "But Damian, what about the watch that was left in Carlo's pocket? That couldn't have been left by a-"

He was interrupted by Damian abruptly picking him up and slamming him into the wall. "I said, there was nothing there but dust!" the larger man growled, throwing fear into his lackey. "Do you want to argue with me on that?" At Mismatch's whimper of "no," Damian smirked. "Well then," he said, removing his hand and allowing Mismatch to slide down the wall, "Why don't you do as I say and GET HIM!" He yelled, turning around to face the would-be hero.

But the punk wasn't there.

"Oh, man," Edward huffed. "Who were those guys?" He had used the momentary distraction to scoop up the unconscious girl and dash into a darkened storeroom further down the hall. 'Whoever they are,' he thought, 'they think I killed someone named Carlo and left my pocket watch with him as proof. And judging from their reactions when they laid eyes on me, they're scared of me- though if it came right down to it they're probably more afraid of their boss.' Their fear, at least for the time being, was an advantage. If he could just get out of the café-

The woman beside him groaned, interrupting his thoughts. She opened her eyes, looking up at him with wide eyes. Not risking the chance she would scream, he quickly crouched to meet the woman's face and put a hand over her mouth.

"Shh," he said quietly, "or we'll both be killed." The woman nodded, signalling she understood and that she wouldn't scream. Edward removed his hand reluctantly.

Instead of the shrill shriek he had been expecting, she asked him quietly, "Who are you?" She didn't seem frightened- Edward could tell this was a woman who was used to handling scary situations. He guessed that to live on this planet, you had to be.

He was about to tell her his name when he remembered the looks of terror the henchmen had shot him. While useful in confrontation, Edward didn't think it would help him in this case, so he used the first name that came to mind. "Alphonse." He said, involuntarily wincing at the memories of his brother that came to him as he invoked it. "What's yours?"

Fortunately, the woman didn't seem to have noticed his momentary lapse of composure- after all, it was dark. "Meryl Stryfe," she replied, "Part owner of this café." She nodded towards the hall, where the gang presumably was. "Those thugs out there were trying to extort money from me for 'protection.'"

"Speaking of which," Edward asked, sitting on the ground beside her, "Who were those guys?"

She gave him a look. "You're not from around these parts, are you?" He shook his head. "They're part of the local gang, the Red Rogues," Meryl explained. "Their leader is Damian, the guy in the leather coat, and he has his hands in almost everything in Azure and the surrounding towns- drugs, bootleg alcohol, prostitution." She shook her head. "But he gets a good chunk of his cash from extorting money from legitimate business owners, and this month I was a bit behind on the 'rent.' Nobody can stop him, since he pays off the police and the mayor's just a puppet. So, the businesses around here are on their own- you can't make it the first time, you're let off with a warning. What you saw there was what happens when you lapse twice- and it would've gotten a lot worse, if not for you." At this, she smiled her gratitude.

The smile faded as she went on. "And if you miss a third payment- well, the places that haven't paid Damian three times aren't around anymore. Neither are their owners." She sighed. "If it wasn't for Millie- my business partner- and the kids, I would've said to the Waste with it when they first came to my door and sold the café right then and there. But Millie needs money for her kids- right now they're sick, really sick, and their medicine is expensive." She looked at him. "Not many people would risk their necks for someone they don't know.Why did you save me, Alphonse?"

"Call me Al," Edward said, brushing himself off as he got up, "We're not out of the woods yet. Now they're going to be looking for you and me, so we-" Just then, they heard voices outside the storeroom door. "Dammit! Quick, hide!" he said, grabbing Meryl's arm and dragging her behind a cluster of stacked crates. He hid himself in a nearby broom closet and just closed the door when the storeroom door flew back on its hinges, slamming into the wall behind it with a crash. In walked Damian and his lackeys, looking around for their prey.

Damian called out, again using that sickly-sweet tone of voice and Edward had to bite back a sarcastic retort. "Meryl, we know you and that guy are in here. Now, I don't blame you for this situation babe, but I'd much rather have you where I can see you so there are no accidents."

Through the crack between the closet door and the wall, Edward saw Damian direct two of his henchmen to start checking behind the boxes. They began to knock over anything that didn't afford them a clear view behind it, moving slowly and methodically throughout the room, pistols drawn to shoot anything that tried to scurry away.

"Last chance, sweetheart, or else I'm going to get mad. And even if I don't find you, I'll have plenty of fun with that cow that you call a friend. Of course, you could still be unconscious, in which case all this talking is pointless." Damian said, a dangerous amusement entering his voice. From his jacket pocket he extracted a lighter and a cigarette. He cupped the cigarette, flipped open the lighter and lit it. The one goon had almost reached Meryl's hiding place. "So, I guess that must be it. Well, that's fine then. I'll see you around." He motioned for the goons to stop searching (one of them coming within a hair's breadth of coming face to face with Meryl). Mismatch left the room, coming in a second later lugging two cans of something. Edward didn't realize what it was until they had started sloshing the contents all over everything and the smell hit his nose. Gasoline. The bastards were going to burn them alive.

The dousing finished, the goons skedaddled out of the room to safety, leaving only Damian behind. He grinned, and Edward was strongly reminded of the lizard-wolf chimeras that Shou Tucker had created- they shared the same cold malice and delight in other people's suffering. He flipped open the lighter again and touched it to a pile of gasoline-soaked rags close by. The pile readily caught ablaze, and he left the room laughing, closing the door and locking it behind him.

He was staring up at the Earth.

Before Chrno could ask why the planet on which he was supposed to be standing on was staring at him like a great blue-and-green eyeball, a spasm of intense, gut-wrenching pain shot through his body

"Agh!" he cried, falling to his knees and clutching his chest. 'It's begun,' he thought. It was the final stage of Astral deprivation: His body was so starving for energy that it was literally ripping itself apart to get it. That it should happen so quickly showed just how much power he had sacrificed to get through the Gate. He screamed as the pain steady worsened, until he was in constant agony.

Hitomi knelt down worriedly as another spasm wracked the stranger's body. She was no nurse- she was still in high school, for heaven's sake! The only thing she could do was comfort him, so she reached down and gripped his hand. Instantly she felt as if being sucked through a giant straw, being stretched and strained and steadily diminishing in energy. It took every last ounce of strength she had to break the connection and she sat back, exhausted.

Chrno groaned and sat up. He was feeling slightly better, but he knew it was a matter of time before the pains came again. And after the pain… He shook his head to clear it. He wondered how the pain had stopped, until he looked over at Hitomi and saw her sitting there, pale, sweaty, and looking at him in fright. In a flash he understood.

He must have unconsciously assimilated her Astral energy when she touched him. While he had done the same thing on a number of occasions, he always asked consent and the amounts were always small. Horned devils do something similar- only they pull in the Astral energy that's just floating around them. However, he had been in such a state that when Hitomi grabbed his hand he sucked as greedily at her life force as a babe at the breast. He tentatively reached out towards her and she skittered away, afraid now of any contact between them lest that horrible experience be repeated.

Before he could apologize, a small noise quite like a pebble falling down a cliff caught his attention. He looked up for the source of the sound and saw a black blur falling out of the deepening night sky at him. Before he could move out of the way it was on him, clawing and biting.

"Merle, no!" Hitomi cried, trying to get and finding she didn't have the strength. "It's all right! I'm all right!"

The attack ceased and the blur had leapt away from him, hissing and landing in a crouch in front of Hitomi, back arched like a cat. Chrno could see two huge blue eyes staring balefully at him. A dying ray of sunlight illuminated it and Chrno could see bright pink hair, deeply tanned skin with what looked like black slashes all along the arms, legs and face and the fact that it seemed to be wearing a one-piece dress that (barely) reached the mid-thigh. From this, the slightness of the frame and the high pitch of the hissing it was giving off, Chrno took it for a young female. What really got his attention were the two catlike ears perched atop the head and the tail that, like the other visible parts of her body was banded with black tattoo-like rings and ended in a large white pouf. Suddenly, Chrno understood.

"Cat-Devil!" he cried. He reached into his pocket for the spare pistol and clip of ammunition he had taken to carrying with him at all times, keeping his eyes focused on the thing that had just attacked him. Having found it, he slammed the magazine into the butt of the gun and pulled back the barrel of the gun, bringing the top bullet of the magazine into the chamber. He levelled it at the devil.

"No, Chrno!" Hitomi cried, finding her strength enough to leap and tackle the cat-devil, bringing them both to the ground, the cat-devil hissing and Hitomi on top.

The cat-devil spoke. "Ow, Hitomi!" she cried, rubbing her head.

Chrno hesitated. At Hitomi's encouraging nod, he ejected the clip and the bullet already in the chamber, pushing it back down on top of its brothers. He slammed it back into the butt of the gun so that it was loaded, but with no bullet in the barrel, before he put it back in his coat pocket.

"You know her?" he asked Hitomi, eyeing the cat-girl warily. He still didn't like her, and judging from the glare she was giving him, the feeling was mutual.

Hitomi nodded. "Chrno, this is Merle- the one I told you about, remember?" Chrno thought back and remembered her saying that Merle was a childhood friend of Van. He could certainly see why- they were both of the 'attack first, ask questions later' variety. "Merle, this is Chrno- he's a friend." Chrno was surprised that she was still vouching for him after what he had just put her through.

Merle did not look convinced. "But he attacked you, Hitomi- I saw it! You touched him and it was like he sucked out your soul-"

"I'm fine- no really, Merle," Hitomi quickly interrupted her, an embarrassed look upon her face. Suddenly, she smiled. "But thank you for worrying about me." Merle looked taken aback by this show of gratitude, then looked away.

Before Chrno could analyze this strange relationship between the two girls, something caught his attention. "Hey, d'you two hear that?" he asked. Merle's ears perked up and she listened intently, while all Hitomi could do was shrug.

"Sounds like… something big flying," Merle said.

"A Zaibach floating fortress?" Hitomi asked nervously. The cat girl shook her head.

"No, no. Those have more of a humming sound, since they're so slow and big. Whatever it is, it's a lot smaller and faster. I think we should-"

"Hey! You there!" A voice from above them shouted, and they all looked to see where it was coming from. Chrno could not believe his eyes. Standing on a rocky ledge above them stood a man in what Chrno could've sworn was old-fashioned medieval armour. He was the one shouting at them. "Who are you, and where's your authorization?"

"Dammit!" Merle hissed. "We've been spotted- run!" and with that, she bounded over the rocks until she, like Van, had disappeared from view.

Meanwhile, more armoured soldiers had heard the shouting of their fellow and had come to investigate. Before Hitomi and Chrno could escape, they found themselves surrounded by a dozen or more heavily armed men.

"Don't worry, Van will rescue us," Hitomi whispered to Chrno as they were being lead, shackled, down to the valley where the bulk of the armoured soldiers were. It seemed to be their camp. "Oh, I'm going to kill Merle." She moaned and was jabbed in the back hard with the butt of a spear by one of their captors. She took the hint and didn't speak for the rest of the trip.

Chrno's mind was working furiously. The amount of Astral energy he had taken from Hitomi had not been much- enough for a half hour, tops. Then the horrible pain would begin again, and he would most likely die. He needed to find a way to get out of here and find some Astral energy-

His thoughts were interrupted as both he and Hitomi were stopped and shoved harshly to their knees. "We found these trespassers over by Pillock Mine, Ma'am. There was another one, but she escaped- we're still looking for her. What do you want done with these two?"

'Ma'am?' Chrno's head jerked up. A woman stood there clad in a silver body suit that covered everything except her face and upper thighs, which were clad in mid-thigh grey-leather boots, looking almost like an older version of Merle- the same catlike ears, the same black bands around her face and tail. Only colour and length of her silvery hair was different. She looked down at him and took his chin in her hand. She studied him with cool blue eyes, taking in his odd clothes, his long purple hair, and read the defiant expression in his blood red eyes.

"They can go with the other one until Lord Folken arrives," she told the soldiers, releasing Chrno. "Good job. Oh, and call off the search for the other one- she won't have gotten very far, and even if she has, she won't be able to do anything. She is of no concern to us."

"Yes, Miss Eriya!" The guard bowed and hustled the prisoners past the woman, where, Chrno could see, a figure in a red shirt had his wrists bound above his head and attached to a long rope that connected to a piece of wood some ten feet above him, which was connected to two sturdy planks of wood, one on either side. Hitomi gasped. "Van!" she cried.

It was not a pretty sight. Evidently Van had been captured some time before, as he was sporting a black eye and a bloody lip. His head, which had drooped forward, jerked upright when he heard Hitomi. It was as if someone had lit a fire under him- all at once he was jerking at the rope, trying to free himself.

"Now, now," a female voice said smoothly, and from the shadows behind Van stepped a figure that Chrno knew at once was Eriya's sister- though her fur was coloured gold as opposed to silvery-grey and her eyes had a warm, pinkish tinge to contrast her sister's cool blue irises, there was no mistaking it. "We wouldn't want to you overstrain yourself, would we, Lord Van?" she asked rhetorically.

She made her way over to Hitomi and, like her sister did with Chrno, cupped Hitomi's chin in her hand, turning her head left and right, up and down. "You made quite the fuss when you saw we'd captured this girl," she said over her shoulder. "Tell me, Lord Van, what is she worth to you? Perhaps telling us just what brought you here?" She let go off Hitomi's face. "Bah. Chain them like the other one. Lord Folken should be here soon to greet his dear little brother. See you later," she called over her shoulder as she headed towards the encampment.