The Golden Sun: Chapter Twenty-Three: Truth

AN: Thanks for all the help from my Jewish commenters, giving me help with the Ishvalan side of things, it's definitely appreciated!

It's been awhile since an update, but I was cramming for nursing boards, which I've now passed :) There is now a tentative schedule for fic updates for my WIPs on my fanfic tumblr if you guys even want to see what's coming up each month. Every WIP is getting updated in the next few months, then its free game for whatever I want to work on.


"Man, no wonder the Chief looked so pissed."

"Pissed? I thought he was gonna vomit!"

"Let's be real, Breda, he was probably going to do both."

"What are you all going on about?" Roy asked tiredly as he came through the door, all his men saluting him politely as he hung up his trench coat.

"You mean you haven't heard the news, Boss?" There was an unlit cigarette between Havoc's lips and Roy was only letting it slide because he hadn't reached for his lighter yet (there had been one disastrous week when Hawkeye had tried to get him to quit cold-turkey; he'd gone through a frightening number of suckers before she'd conceded defeat), but as soon as he did, Roy was prepared for reprimanding him.

"Just tell him, Havoc," Hawkeye sighed, probably noticing that Roy was too tired to deal with Havoc's usual antics.

Havoc grinned around his cigarette and Breda snorted. "So, you know how the Chief was proctoring the State Alchemist Exam?"

"I might've gathered that," Roy admitted dryly. After all, he'd basically been avoiding the kid during the entire time he was proctoring, though he still wanted to know what Ed had done to get so chummy with Major General Armstrong; Major Miles, he could understand, but not Armstrong.

Olivier Armstrong was known for being an ice queen as much as she was known for being an unconquerable fortress, and she had never been known for being kind to children or even wanting to be in the same room as one. So, her allowing Ed to sit at her table with her left hand…that was something else, and there had to be something more to that, but Roy wasn't exactly in the position to ask Ed that.

"Well, you know that there was only one pass, right? A Shou Tucker that specialized in bioalchemy that decided to complete his physically exam at home by making a chimera."

Roy paused, suddenly aghast. "He did what?" Sure, it wasn't a taboo to attempt to do so, but it was certainly frowned upon and creating a chimera wasn't exactly a thing you wanted to be known for.

"Yeah," Breda jumped in, making Havoc scowl, evidently he'd wanted to finish the story himself, "but the Chief thought there was something hinky with the end result, so he went to talk to an expert on bioalchemy at the university, and he found out that Tucker hadn't actually made a chimera."

"Technically—" Falman tried to interject.

"Listen, Vato, I'm pretty sure that merging a dog with a human doesn't technically count as a chimera!"

"Again," Falman said, "technically—"

Fuery arched an eyebrow over the rim of his glasses as both Havoc and Breda shushed Falman, but Roy wasn't paying any attention to that. His ears were ringing, his vision was swimming.

"What?" Roy managed to force out weakly, looking to Hawkeye as if she was the only one who could break the illusion with a semblance of truth.

"They're telling the truth, sir," Hawkeye informed him. "Shou Tucker has been arrested for unlawful usage of alchemy, and perhaps first-degree murder after everything's said and done."

Roy was starting to feel like how he did on Meat Day. His stomach was roiling and all he could remember was when Master Hawkeye had explained it to him.

"There is one alchemic art almost as depraved as Human Transmutation and it's the creation of chimeras," Master Hawkeye had said seriously, made difficult by the need to cough every few sentences. "It may be considered a legitimate branch of bioalchemy by the military, but don't think for a second that makes it ethically or morally good to attempt."

He'd heard rumors about the military attempting it a few years ago, but no one seemed really sure what the results of those experiments were. No one outside the higher ups of Central Command, most likely.

He pressed a hand to his forehead. "And this all happened in a day?"

He was proud and impressed with Ed, but Ed was generally a pretty distrustful person, probably to combat Al's naivety. He'd seen the darkest parts of alchemy, of course he'd treat something like a chimera with the utmost suspicion.

"Pretty much, sir," Falman informed, twisting his pen between his fingers, giving them a break. "Apparently, the Fuhrer's been praising Ed and giving him commendation for his quick thinking keeping them from appointing a murderer to a State Alchemist."

Roy thought of the sadistic Crimson Lotus Alchemist, Solf Kimblee, leaving a sea of blood through Ishval in his wake, and the irony didn't escape him.

"Ed looked like he wanted to sink into the carpet," Fuery supplied helpfully, and Roy's mouth twitched, imagining Ed's face looking like he'd swallowed a sour lemon, as that was always the expression he seemed to wear when dealing with the military (which was a lot, since he was, of course, a member of the military; pointing that out had earned Roy a fiery glare).

"General Hakuro has put through a transfer request for Lieutenant Colonel Elric," Hawkeye informed Roy without looking up from her (his) paperwork and Roy, who had turned to enter his office, paused where he stood.

He couldn't even remember how many transfer requests had come across his desks for the Elric brothers -because if you got Ed, you got Al, there was no way around it and people had long since decided to stop telling Ed not to take Al on assignments- there'd been so many and Roy had grown accustomed to incinerating them with an efficient snap, because though Roy sometimes irked Ed, he at least trusted him to keep his secrets, and there was no knowing if another superior officer would do the same.

But now, Roy couldn't be sure of what Ed thought; he hadn't even spoken to the boy since he'd started working with General Hakuro with the State Alchemist Exam.

Breda's mouth fell open. "Wait, is the chief leaving?"

"Would explain why we haven't seen him much," Fuery conceded, looking slightly crestfallen. He'd always liked the Elric brothers.

"The colonel hasn't signed any papers for transfers," Hawkeye reminded them.

"But is he going to?"

Roy forced himself to keep walking and refrain from shutting his door too painfully loud, pressing a hand to his face. God, he was so tired, and he was tired of dreaming of golden eyes blank and unseeing and a soul array cracked across the center.

Beyond the door he could just barely hear: "Havoc, if you absolutely have to light that damn thing, then go outside!"

Roy allowed himself to huff a light chuckle at the sound of Hawkeye's irate voice and Havoc's returning grumbles, it was enough of a distraction to snap him out of his dark thoughts. He shook his head and sat heavily in his chair to look upon the heaping pile of papers that Hawkeye had been kind enough to leave him and all he could do was sigh and pick up his pen.


At first, all Al could see was a flash of bright light, and then it cleared.

"AL!" Al could see Ed, not as he was now, but the way he'd been when they'd tried to bring back Mom, with wild eyes afraid, and two flesh hands reaching out towards Al.

Al had never really remembered what happened after they charged the transmutation circle. That had always seemed to relieve Ed, and when he'd told Teacher, she'd replied in a stony voice "That's probably for the best" even when she agreed to talk to some friends about trying to get his memory back.

Whatever she and Ed had seen…the Gate that Ed only spoke of in delirious fever or in the throes of a nightmare, it had to be truly frightening. Because nothing, not even the military, frightened Teacher. She'd downed bears before, and a bunch of men in blue coats coming to her door asking about supposed Ishvalan children she had living with her, speaking a language that was illegal, a language that both brothers had long-since forgotten, hadn't been enough to scare her off. Ed had pushed Al behind the sofa and Al had felt like a coward for staying there, hiding, while Ed spoke perfect Amestrian with a smile full of sharp teeth.

"That's how you destroy a culture," Teacher told them late one night, pale from coughing up blood, but so very serious. "Your mother's tongue is not allowed to be spoken, her people -your people- are the minority now…because the military exterminated them…do you understand?"

Ed, more prone to anger than tears, had clenched his hands into fists, while Al ducked his head, thinking of his mother singing so many songs in her native tongue and each of them sounding so beautiful as she worked in the kitchen.

"Your mother's family is dead because the military views their race to be lower, less than a typical Amestrian. Don't ever forget that."

And Al didn't think they ever had, but it was easy to fall into the trap of becoming desensitized to the violence the military caused and was involved in. They called the Colonel the Hero of Ishval, so Al knew there was Ishvalan blood on his hands, but he didn't think it really hit them that hard. They were both born in Amestris, in North City, they didn't know anything of war, except the occasional explosions that had happened near Resembool, and it helped to know that most soldiers hadn't enjoyed fighting in the war. The Colonel still had PTSD from it and would occasionally get a haunted look about him.

But perhaps that was just Al being far too forgiving.

He shook himself out of those thoughts as Ed's younger form disappeared. It was like Al was trapped inside his own head when he was ten, unable to do anything but watch events unfold around him.

Everything faded into a sharp white light, no, not white light…a completely white area, like a room that stretched on for miles with no end in sight.

But Al wasn't alone. There was a great grey slab behind him, bearing something that looked like a version of the Tree of Life that Al had read about in some of Hohenheim's books on alchemy. It was the exact same shape as the one he'd once found doodled on the inside of one of those books. It was beautiful, but Al didn't had time to marvel.

He turned around and started at the only other thing in the violently blank area. It was hard to describe, but seemed almost like a human-figure, as white as the room they were in but they seemed to almost blur at the edges. And then they smiled, a wide terrifying grin.

Al could hear a heavy creaking sound behind him and his eyes widened as he turned to see that the slab, wasn't just a slab, it was a double door that had swung open to reveal a single eye. Al barely had the chance to scream before he was pulled through by hundreds of tiny black hands.

He was pulled through space, just hanging in the free air, darkness all around until images started to spin around him like camera rolls with flashes of his life. There were so many, too many to count…of Mom, and Ed, and Teacher and Sig…

Al's body was breaking down, he was losing more of himself, little by little.

"Mom!" he screamed, only to realize that he was staring at his own face, and then Al was nothing, looking out at Ed through the thing that they made.

Then Al knew nothing more.


"We should call Ed," Sig said not long after depositing Al's unmoving body of armor on a spare bed that he'd once claimed when he still had a body. Now it was far too small for Al's hulking armor, but it wasn't like there was a better place to put him.

Izumi had shouted Al's name three times and it had changed nothing, he still wasn't coming around, if it was possible for a suit of armor to come around. The whole situation made her incredibly nervous. Binding a soul to an inanimate object hadn't exactly been proven and it might not have been on the same level as Human Transmutation, but it was certainly frowned upon and considered impossible to succeed at.

"Soul Alchemy is a dead-end branch of alchemy," Izumi had once heard an old friend, Dante, say about it.

The fact that Ed had managed to trade his arm to pull Al's soul back from the Gate was a miracle enough, but binding a soul to the antique armor of their father's…that was something else entirely. It was remarkable, Izumi could say that, though she didn't think Ed was particularly proud about that moment, it was a reminder that he was the reason that Al was encased in steel; he saw it for all the negatives and none of the positives. Izumi could understand that viewpoint, even if she didn't agree with it.

"Ed's probably at work right now." Izumi gritted her teeth in aggravation. She still wasn't a fan of how he was working for the military, but at least she knew that he was using them as much as they were using him; she only hoped that another war didn't break out because the idea of someone as young as Ed fighting in a war just made her stomach turn. "Or he's out of town on assignment."

It was hard to tell these days, but at least Al had called to let them know there was a number they could now have to keep in contact with them. Izumi and Sig weren't quite sure how Ed's schedule worked right now, just that he'd been helping out with the State Alchemist Exam when Al had come to visit.

"That doesn't mean he shouldn't know," Sig pointed out and Izumi sighed.

She frowned fiercely at Al's unmoving body. "If he's not back to normal by six o'clock…I'll call Ed."

Sig was agreeable to that, dropping a hand to pat Al's helmet, like he had when Al still had his body. Izumi softened slightly before glancing to the clock. That gave them about eight hours.


It had started to rain and Havoc didn't want to come out too far and extinguish the lit end of his cigarette. Havoc wasn't ready to quit smoking yet, or at all, but he was currently entertaining the idea of limiting his cigarettes a day, so losing one to the rain would put a dent in his daily supply.

Havoc huffed, taking a long drag, glowering out into the rain only to blink at the figure sitting on the steps. He couldn't remember the last time that he'd seen Ed out of the military uniform…actually he could, and it was before the State Alchemist Exam and that whole mess had started.

Ed's red coat was soaked through -Hawkeye was always telling him he needed to get something thicker but he'd shrugged that suggestion off; it wasn't like he'd ever traveled anywhere exceedingly cold- and his shoulders were shaking, his head bowed.

Havoc guessed the whole Tucker thing was hitting him pretty hard. He was nearly fifteen, but he was still a kid, and the idea that Tucker had actually merged his wife with an animal of his own volition had to be frightening.

He heaved a sigh and held out his cigarette, letting the rainwater extinguish the tip before he dropped it to crush it under his heel.

"Hey, Chief," Havoc dropped to sit down beside him, letting the light rain fall on him as well, "not having a very fun day?"

Ed's hands were formed into fists pressing into his eyes and Havoc could see his teeth gritted together. He barely shook his head.

Havoc looked him over once more before checking his watch. "Hey, Chief, you wanna grab an early lunch?"

Food was a good way to get through to Ed, not like Al, who would hastily jot down any good food they came across (Breda, Havoc was sure, was Al's favorite of Mustang's subordinates, mostly because he was always willing to add new foods to his ever-growing list of what he wanted to eat when he got his body back), but Ed did seem to eat more than anyone his age did.

As if in agreement, Ed's stomach gave a loud growl.

But Ed didn't even move from his position. Havoc nudged his shoulder against Ed's, feeling his uniform getting damp from the rain where he'd sat down, almost regretting it, but not quite. "Come on, I'll even take you to that Xingese place you and the boss like so much."

That made Ed look up, eyes red, face swollen. He must've been crying for quite some time. Havoc wondered if the situation reminded him of the time he and his brother tried to transmute their mother. Now that was a subject that Havoc always knew to never bring up. In fact, he was sure Mustang was the only one that had dared to do so, and only to impress upon them the gravity of their actions and their situation.

"With eyes like that you probably look a bit more like your mom," Havoc said, belatedly cursing internally after realizing how insensitive it was.

Ed was remarkably thrown off for a brief few seconds, actually, it was probably the first time that Havoc had seen such a look on his face. "R…really?"

His voice was small, which wasn't like him, then he shook himself and cleared his throat. "How do you even know what my mom looked like?"

"Well," Havoc drawled out, "let's just say I got a little curious after you tried to pick that fight with Mustang, only not really, because you didn't really make it into his office."

The expression that warped across Ed's face was hard to describe, caught somewhere between annoyed and embarrassed, which was pretty close to his typical expression.

"I was actually up in North City for a few weeks before I was reassigned to East under Mustang," Havoc admitted, "everyone up there talked about the Glacier Alchemist. Didn't realize that she was your mom until recently, though…your mom was a total badass, did you know that?"

That earned him a surprised almost-smile, barely more than a faint twist of his lips, but Havoc would take it. "Yeah?"

"Apparently she took on a whole battalion by herself, armed only with one pistol and two alchemic gauntlets," Havoc shook his head. "A lot of the stories about your mom are a bit crazy."

Ed brushed his wet bangs out of his eyes. "Got any more stories?"

Havoc grinned. "Come on, kid, if you eat something, I'll tell you some of the stories I heard about your mom."

And that, more than anything else, was what got Ed moving, accepting Havoc's hand and pulling himself off, looking down at his drenched self and clapping his hands together to transmute all the water out of his water-logged clothes. Not exactly the normal use of alchemy, but at the least the kid probably wouldn't catch pneumonia on the way over.


"Why do all your stories involve bears?" Ed asked, his straw between his teeth. At least the kid hadn't eaten Havoc out of house and home -not that he had much of one, living with Breda, Falman, and Fuery in the Central Command barracks- which Havoc was glad of; he only had so much money…maybe if he mentioned it to the Boss he'd reimburse him…probably wait on that since they weren't really talking…

"You ever been up to North City?" Havoc snorted as they walked. Since lunch the rain had cleared up, so they were walking back to the command headquarters, taking their time. "Bears every-fucking-where!"

"Al and I were born there," Ed said.

Havoc was learned more about the Elrics in a day than he had in the whole time he'd been assigned to Mustang's command.

"Yeah?" Havoc didn't so much as blink, continuing on like it wasn't news to him. "I always figured you two were more country boys than anything else."

Ed snorted. "We are. We moved out to Resembool when…I guess after Mom resigned from the military. Mom's family was from there."

"Pretty big Ishvalan community, I guess," Havoc conceded and Ed looked up at him sharply.

Havoc held his hands up in a placating gesture. "Hey, I'm from Welogl, we're pretty out there too. I had a lot of Ishvalan neighbors growing up."

Welogl was in the same region as Resembool and it honestly wasn't that far off from Resembool, but they dealt more in mining than Resembool did, though Havoc's family did own a general store in Welogl, the only one since it was such a small town. Welogl and Resembool were the towns that were the closest to Ishval, so immigrating to them led to higher numbers of Ishvalans in those towns.

There were so many Ishvalans in Havoc's classes growing up that he didn't realize how unusual it was until he joined the military. It was almost like experiencing culture shock to, for the most part, only see pale faces looking back at him.

"I used to, uh, make these flower crowns with this one girl," Havoc scratched him cheek slightly. "Eden Lieb…I'd always make her these flower crowns with red flowers, to go with her eyes, you know."

For a second he thought Ed would laugh at that, the idea of Havoc -Havoc who smoked and excelled with using a rifle and who maybe didn't have as much luck with the ladies as other people (such as Roy Mustang)- sewing flower crowns with a girl when he was little.

Then he remembered that Ed and Al's best friend was a girl, Winry, the same girl that also happened to be Ed's mechanic. Ed would be the first to frown upon people gendering activities while Al stared down imposingly behind him and after all the times people assumed he was a girl simply because he had long hair, it wasn't all that surprising that he and Al were open-minded that way.

Eden…god, he hadn't thought about her in years. He'd see her walking down the street with her brother, her long white hair flowing in the wind, red eyes as bright as her smile as she tilted her sunglasses down to catch his eyes.

Havoc had tripped over his feet too many times because he saw Eden looking. He'd sworn he was going to marry her one day, but his mother had just laughed at that.

"That Lieb girl is out of your league," she'd said, and really, she wasn't wrong.

"Did you ever fight in the war?" Ed asked him suddenly, drawing Havoc back to the present.

"Nah," Havoc let loose a long drag of his cigarette, "Everyone but Hawkeye and Mustang were still in training when it ended…kinda glad it ended before I had to fight; killing people that looked like my neighbors and friends would really've messed me up, psychologically-speaking."

Ed scowled at that, looking up to Havoc. "You're talking about Mustang."

"Both of them, really," Havoc admitted before pausing. "Look, I don't know why you guys started…hating on each other, but if you want to understand what it was really like out there…you should talk to Hawkeye."

"And ask her what it felt like to murder my mother's people?" Ed clenched his teeth together. "No thanks."

Havoc held his cigarette between two fingers. He supposed it made sense that Ed and Al thought of the Ishvalan Civil War as being so removed from themselves and they'd probably grown up so used to Ishvalans that they didn't really consider the effect the war had on their mother or that she wasn't viewed by some to be Amestrian. They probably hadn't even realized that their mom was Ishvalan, they'd been so young when she died that viewing her and themselves as not being Amestrian would've been a bit confusing.

They'd probably thought of the war in the abstract, not realizing that maybe some of their family could've been killed in it, and that must've hurt more now than anything else.

"She'll give you unbiased facts, she'll straight up tell you how it was, and how she feels about it," Havoc told him, dropping a hand to ruffle the top of Ed's head, screwing up his braid, much to his annoyance. "Think about it, all right, Chief?"

"Yeah, whatever," Ed was too distracted trying to undo his braid and redo it quickly, but the smile on Havoc's face was one of relief.

Maybe talking to Hawkeye would help him figure things out. Havoc hoped it did; the office was way too tense right now. Father-son spats weren't pretty, that was for sure.


AN: Some Havoc lore drop! You'll see more of Havoc and his past, that's for sure :)

As always: PLEASE REVIEW!