Chapter V: Regretless

"Another knife in my hands,
A stain that never comes off the sheets.
Clean me off,
I'm so dirty babe.
It ain't the money and it sure as hell ain't just for the fame,
It's for the bodies I claim and lose."

("I Never Told You What I Do For A Living" – My Chemical Romance)

No one understands what it's like to be a true scientist—a true alchemist—as I believe the two are both opposites and undeniably connected. To come closer to measuring the extent of the un-obtainable… to reaching out and brushing one's fingers against the flesh of truth… that, in all its glory, fuels my very being. A true alchemist never stops until his questions are answered—he never stops until his skills have been mastered. A true alchemist will sacrifice his life to finding the answers he seeks, never faltering until he achieves his mind's desires. Yet, for all that I have contributed to the world of alchemy… I am left without a wife, daughter, and human body. Desire is so cruel; when it sinks its claws into a man's mind, he will stop at nothing to smother its seemingly insatiable flames.

Yet… my life is perfect.

So what if I've been enslaved in this monstrous new body? It's nothing a trench-coat can't cover up, and one gets used to viewing the world from upside-down.

So what if I killed my wife and daughter in order to save my own career with the military? Any true alchemist would have done the same—the funds for one's research are as important as the air we all breathe. In any case, I can bring Nina back, and we'll be happy once more. I swear, even if I have to sacrifice what's left of my own soul… my Nina will come back to me, and she will be as perfect as she was before.

I was supposedly ordered to be executed for my "inhuman" experiments, but fortunately the military higher-ups realized just how powerful my research could one day become. With the bonus of continuing my own personal research on the side, I was given permission to continue various chimera-based experiments with the military. General Grand himself expressed an interest in creating an army of super-soldiers—chimera soldiers—so if I'm "evil," what makes the military? You can not support evil without being evil yourself. And if I'm inhuman… well… it's not like I really care all that much. Honestly, I thought that whiny brat Edward Elric was going to spontaneously erupt into flames when he found out that I had used alchemy to transmute my Nina into a beautiful chimera. As if he had room to talk! I heard that he tried to bring his own mother back from the dead—I'll bet he was surprised when all he got in return was a screaming mass of assorted body parts and his brother's fleeing soul. In essence, we're both exactly the same except for the fact that my experiments were far more successful. The boy was painfully ignorant; did he simply ignore the fact that in almost every alchemy book in the world there is a warning and explanation of the "unforgivable sins?"

It's a painful truth that you can not breathe life into the dead, however, as the Sewing Life Alchemist, I have discovered that creating something anew and making it better than it was before… is perfectly acceptable by the laws of alchemy.

Now all I can do is devote my life to making it work.

I swear on this damned soul; I will breathe a new life into a perfect new body for Nina...

…and we will live happily together again.

But for ever hard piece of truth I've found throughout my life…

…there is a lie that can not be explained.