AN: The characters and concepts of Fullmetal Alchemist belong to Hiromu Arakawa. This story revolves around the first anime of Fullmetal Alchemist, not the manga. Do not flame because of that small difference, I've read the manga and seen the real anime that follows it, but the first anime is what captured my heart about FMA, so this story is tribute. Enjoy the story. The lyrics are "Stitches" by Shawn Mendes, I do not own the lyrics to the song. - Carrie.
"Got a feeling that I'm going under,
But I know that I'll make it out alive.
You watch me bleed until I can't breathe,
Shaking, falling onto my knees.
Tripping over myself,
Aching, begging you to come help,
And now that I'm without your kisses,
I'll be needing stitches."
Darting forward, the armor reaches for Carlina with a clawed hand. The alchemist evades only to find the saw blade coming up at her left side. She throws up her left arm to block. Sparks occur as the blade grinds against her automail, giving her a moment to roll away. She puts more distance between them, observing the surface scratches on her automail. "Your arm was real the last I saw you, child," the armor darts forward again, grasping for her other arm.
Lina dodges the arm and the scalpel swinging at her. "Who are you? What do you know of my family," Carlina calculates the reach of the wires coming from the armor's back. Ten, up to fifteen feet? Have to keep my distance.
The armor lunges for her again, Carlina rolling back closer toward the wall. She feels her back hit the concrete. The girl runs along the circular wall. More steam flows out of the knee joints in the armor. The lower half of the legs split into four, piercing into the stone wall. Her opponent scuttles toward her like a spider along the wall. The armor reaches for her with the claw again, this time Carlina claps her hands on her automail. Her automail hand turns into a spear head.
She jabs the spear into the wrist joint of the armor, twisting and pulling with her other hand. The hand pops off and clatters to the floor. In the second she destroyed the first hand, the other hand propels forward. Cold metal presses against her forehead as 87 shoves Carlina's head back into the wall. Her ears ring from the impact against the concrete.
"Such a shame, you used to respect your elders. I never would have thought you would disarm me," the suit chuckles, the glowing eyes peering down, "If you calmed down a little, this conversation would be easier to have." The ringing subsides a little, Carlina kicks the body of the suit of armor, twisting to escape. "I guess I have to help with the calming part," the voice sounds disappointed. Lina feels the tip of the syringe poke through her lips, she grabs the syringe with her human hand. As she feels liquid splash on her tongue, she slices with the spear head and severs the wire. 87 drops the girl to the floor, where the alchemist pulls the syringe out of her mouth.
A bitter aftertaste lingers as she spits on the ground a few times, gagging. "What did you do to me," Carlina rolls further away from the armor and gets back into a fighting stance. "Relax girl, the more you move, the worse it will feel. If you sit, it won't feel as bad-" A crate full of medical papers explodes toward the figure, cutting off the voice. Using the fluttering papers as cover, Carlina stabs the spear at the helmet. The spearhead lodges in one of the vertical jaw slots.
With a tug, she pulls the piece off the head of armor. The jaw hangs from the spearhead as Carlina squints at the suit. Clutching the space with her remaining hand, 87 stands straighter and stares at the girl. The legs retract back into their original position with a small cloud of steam. "I'll make you regret every piece of my armor you broke today. I can have some fun with you before handing you over to them." After staring for a few more moments, things fall into place for Carlina, "You don't have a body in there...do you, 87?" When some time goes by without an answer, Carlina transforms her automail back to normal. "An astute observation, but it won't do you any good once the drug kicks in."
Ignoring the chill that shoots down her spine, Carlina clutches the jaw piece from the armor in her hand. Rushing forward, she sweeps her leg at 87's knee joint. The armored hand clamps on Carlina's shoulder as the scalpel stabs below the right side of her collarbone. Gritting her teeth, the girl transmutes the jaw piece back on the helmet. A solid metal visor that blocks the view of her opponent.
87 cries out and claws at her face. Groaning, the alchemist pulls the scalpel out of her skin. Clamping her automail against the wound, she stumbles out of the operating theater. Turning, a faint trail of blood drops connects her every move to her exit from the theater. She maneuvers herself into one of the side rooms. Carlina moves her automail to inspect the wound better. Ignoring the blood, she tears the tattered shirt sleeve off her automail arm. After tearing strips and tying them together, the bleeding ceases. She formulates a plan, still unsure what kind of drug 87 used against her.
Five minutes pass. The doors of the operating theater slam open. 87's head scans the hallway before locking on the trail of blood. "Little fly, I will make you pay for this," 87 rips the final piece of metal away from the helmet, scratches visible where the saw blade cut it away.
Down the hall, Carlina sits underneath one of the desks. She covers her mouth with her hand. Her vision loses focus. The sound of the metal legs draws closer. Taking a chance, she peers around the side of the desk. 87 enters the room across the hall where the blood trail leads. "Found you, little-" The voice turns into a scream as crashing sounds echo down the hall. Crawling out from her hiding place, the girl enters the other room. The suit lays in a pit full of spikes, impaled in various places. "You are too clever," 87 sounds bitter, the eyes narrowing up at Carlina. The claw holds up the mass of hair that once hung in a bun at the base of the girl's neck. "Luckily, I'm not one for vanity," Lina runs her fingers through her hair. The pink locks are at the length of her shoulders, "I was hoping you'd go for an easy grab if you saw my hair poking above the desk."
Carlina makes her way down into the pit, being cautious around the debris of her trap, standing near 87's head. "Alright, I'm going to pop your head off. Then, you can answer all my questions and guide me out of here," she transforms her automail into a spade edge to pry the head off the neck. Plunging the end into the joint where the head meets the neck, she begins to wiggle it back and forth.
Hearing something move, she leans to the side as the wire with the scalpel attached shoots toward her. The small blade breaks off in the shoulder joint of Carlina's automail. The metal limb goes limp. Before she can react to her automail failing, the saw blade swings at the girl's head. Dodging the saw blade, Carlina grabs the wrist of her automail with her human hand. She jams the blunt end into the neck joint of 87's armor. The saw blade swings again and Carlina attempts to evade. The world spins and she slumps against the ground. Her surroundings blur together more and her limbs feel heavy. Everything comes back into focus as she feels sharp pain in her human hand.
Looking up, the blurred vision begins to subside. Her breath catches at the amount of blood she sees on the concrete around her hand. Blocking out the feeling of dread, she fumbles to grab the object closest to her hand. As the saw blade swings again, she slams the large rock against the wire. The wire makes a crunching sound.
The saw blade rotation decreases and it inches toward the girl across the floor. She slams the rock against the wire until the saw blade stops moving. Finally, her heart drops as she inspects the hand holding the rock. The pointer and middle finger of her right hand are gone. Blood oozes from the stump and down her hand. She wedges the rock between the palms of her hands, angling it toward the armor. Using the last of her adrenaline, she smashes the neck on 87's suit, disconnecting her head.
"If you hadn't disabled my syringe, I would have painkillers," 87 taunts the girl. The eyes look puzzled as Carlina begins searching the armor's chest cavity. After a moment of digging, Carlina finds a syringe. Placing the syringe between the soles of her boots, she stabs it into the stump of her missing fingers.
She presses her chin against the other end of the syringe to inject the medicine. After the injection, she uses her teeth to pull the syringe from her hand. Carlina repeats the process two more times. "How did you know those were there," 87 sounds angry. The girl rips strips of black gauze off the armor to staunch the bleeding and wrap her hand. "I didn't know you would have individual syringes, or that you would have what I needed. I remembered one was a local anesthetic. The other was a clotting drug, and the final a slight painkiller," she takes a deep breath. Her human hand begins to shake, "But, man, I'm losing pieces of myself bit by bit today. What drug did you put in my mouth earlier?"
87 rolls her eyes, "Diazepam. It's used as a tranquilizer. The dosage you received was less than intended, so you only lost some motor functions." 87 begins to chuckle, "You lost far more today as a side effect of those impaired motor functions." Carlina picks the helmet up and puts it in a sling made of gauze, hanging it off her motionless automail. "I'm ignoring all this until I know the boys are okay," Carlina swallows the lump in her throat. Leaving the room, she turns and walks down the hall away from the operating theater.
The pair wander through the halls in silence. Carlina stumbles and sways a few times from the effects of the drug combined with blood loss. Coming to a cross in the hallways, she presses her back against the wall and slides into a sitting position. Unfurling 87's head from the sling, she sets it on the floor in front of her. "Alright, three options. Which one should I take?"
"It depends on your motive," the head answers, rolling its eyes at the annoyed look on Carlina's face, "I mean it. If you want to leave the Laboratory, go left. If you want answers about your parents, this place, myself, then go down the middle. And if you feel like going to the heart of the testing facilities, you need to go right." The girl sits in silence, her gaze moving between her options and mutilated hand. Finally standing, she returns 87's head to the sling and walks straight ahead. "You aren't going to run while you can," the voice sounds incredulous, before laughing as Carlina's pace quickens. "I need to know if you were bullshitting me about knowing my parents. I'm also curious about your circumstances. You sounded as though you knew me back when my parents were alive...and the more I can find out about this place, the better."
Shouldering open the door to the records room, Carlina squeezes through the opening. She sets 87's head on top of a desk covered in dust before perusing through the filing cabinets. As more time passes, she feels the effect of the tranquilizer dissipate. By the time her search is over, four folders sit next to 87 on the desk. Lina grabs the one with her parents' names on it. Taking a deep breath, she uses her pinky to flip open the cover and begin reading.
Silence envelopes the room while the girl absorbs the information. She lets out her held breath and shakes her head, "You made it sound worse than it was, naughty girl. My parents worked at the Lab, I visited them here a few times but, they weren't involved in the project." Her voice chokes for a moment as she wipes her eyes, "They were using alchemy to try and heal people. They received fake stones in their division, but were not told anything about the refining process. Rather, any of their research that was productive for the production of philosopher stones, got forwarded to a different department."
She looks at the helmet sitting on the desk. "Oh, sure, now you shut up," she scoffs and grabs the folder that details the layout of Lab 5. After a few moments studying the map, she rips out the page for the floor she's on. Storing the page in the sling attached to her automail, she picks up 87's file.
Her eyes widen after reaching the end of the file. She slips the file back on the desk and sinks into the chair next to it. "You're Danica Matthews," she feels winded. "I was," 87's eyes trail from the girl to the file, "and I'm sure you found out why they disposed of me this way?" Carlina rubs her face and takes a few deep breaths. "You were stealing stone samples. You would take them home, and use them to siphon the life out of your daughter… Jill was never crippled, was she? Your daughter was only in a wheelchair because of you?" The room goes silent as Carlina stews in her thoughts. Without speaking again, she picks up the final file about the stone experiments and reads.
87 waits until the girl finishes reading to speak, "Think what you will of me, but my daughter would never have done much. She was needy and lazy." Shoving the helmet into the sling, Carlina thinks of what to say. "You were the supervisor I met a few times. Also, now I know you are the one who forwarded their work elsewhere. Your daughter was a good child, and now I see she was only raised for your benefit, like cattle to slaughter."
At the cross of the hallways again, Carlina pulls the floor map out of the sling. She considers going deeper to the heart of the Laboratory. Her hand pulsates as the injections begin to wear off. When she turns to go down the hall that leads to the exit, she hears a sound echo from behind her. The hairs on the back of her neck stand up as the floor rumbles beneath her feet. She catches herself on the wall and waits for the tremors to subside. "An explosion? How, why," she looks at the helmet in her makeshift satchel. Without an answer, she runs down the hall that leads deeper into the lab. She reaches a space where the entire floor is missing, a room visible a few floors down. Alchemical arrays line the walls and floor of the room a few stories below, but it is empty.
Carlina skirts around the perimeter of the room, walking through a hole in the wall. She hears the sound of panicked voices and continues, heart thudding in her chest. She rounds one of the corners and sees Scar standing in the hallway. The Ishbalan is looking into one of the rooms through a small rectangular window. "Scar," she ignores the pain in her hand, glaring at the man.
"While now would be a time to end you in your weakened state, Electric Alchemist, your friends are in trouble," Scar gestures to the cut out window. Being careful to stay away from Scar's arm of destruction, the girl leans on her toes to peer in through the opening. "The Homunculi! But, why does Ed look ready to do a transmutation," Carlina's stomach aches. "While I should have sent the boy to God when I had a chance, I cannot allow this to continue. It poses a risk to us, being so close to the site of their abhorrent experiment. Stand back." Scar places his palm against the wall close to the floor. His arm blows a hole through the ceiling of the room the brothers are in.
The force of the explosion knocks Carlina off balance, she falls to her knees. 87's helmet rolls out of the satchel and falls into the room below. The helmet lands in one of the puddles of red water. Scar runs away as Carlina drags herself closer to the hole, peering in. Her throat tightens as Ed takes a step forward into the puddle of red water.
Blue light envelopes Ed, the transmutation he had started stored energy in his body. 87's helmet disintegrates in the light. Carlina bows her head as her vision darkens, only able to see silhouettes in the bright blue light emanating from Ed. As her vision refocuses, she sees the Homunculi have fled. Alphonse, his armor missing all its limbs, calls his brother's name. Tucking her limbs in to her body, the girl rolls out of the hole and lands hard against the floor. She gasps for air and pulls herself in a sitting position as the double doors slam open. "Kids," Ross looks at the teenagers, her gaze focusing on Edward's body twitching in the pool of red water.
"Lieutenant, wait," Carlina cries out, watching as Ross walks toward Edward. The woman envelopes him in a hug, and the light fades until it disappears completely. Armstrong goes to pick up Al's armored torso, as Denny runs across the room to the girl. "Your face," he looks stunned, Carlina finally noticing the ache in her jaw and left eye. "A little bruising," she tries to reassure him. Her human hand instinctively reaches up to touch her face.
She sees the panicked expression fade into horror. A second of confusion occurs before she remembers the wounded state of her hand. Looking down, she sees the wrapped gauze has unraveled enough to expose the place her fingers used to be. Carlina laugh, her throat burning as tears start rolling down her cheeks. "Yeah, I've had a pretty rough day here. They won't be able to find my fingers, let alone reattach them," she stares at her mutilated hand in her lap, next to her unresponsive automail one. The edges of her vision blur as she looks up at Denny, hearing him yell something unintelligible. Everything goes black as she faints against the Laboratory floor.
AN: Happy 2018, readers! Things have been hectic, as always, but I promise I have been trying to work on chapters. Got a nasty sickness at the end of 2017 and I'm finally almost over it now. I hope everyone had a good holiday season and has a splendid new year ahead of them. Please comment, subscribe, rate, send me messages, anything. Feedback helps immensely. Until next chapter! -Carrie.