How to Get What You Work For

by PurpleTurtle21

After a friend attempts to perform alchemy from one of her favorite anime shows, Amelia finds herself on military property and about to go to prison for trespassing, until the Fuehrer offers her a chance: She gets a one-year trial period learning under a certified alchemist and if she passes, she gets a get-out-of-jail-free card. Now if she could only find someone to teach her…

39. The Fight for Light

39

As everyone walks to make their way out of Kanama, preparing for the short trip ahead for the next morning, everyone is anxious to see the end of this battle that they've been leading up to for the last few weeks. There is a sort of tension between them all, all of them thinking of what's to come, what might happen, trying to plan out what they can do and how they can come out of it alive. Greed's mind is focused on his goal, the one he hasn't said to anyone in the group and the reason he's making sure to return to Central on the Promised Day with his little crew. Amelia and Edward are both thinking of what they can do to best protect each other in battle, how they can make sure everyone comes out as uninjured as possible and they get to see the happy ending the story promised them.

"Listen guys," Edward said, his comments directed to Heinkel and Darius. The pair of chimeras had been essentially acting as their reluctant caretakers for most of this journey, and they were good men who knew exactly what they needed to do, but at the same time this was hardly their battle to fight, "You don't have to tag along with us, you know. I'm thinking you'd be better off going your own way before things start to get too serious." Amelia glanced over at Edward, surprised he was giving the two men a chance to run like he had offered her back in Resembool.

"Hey, hold on. That isn't your call to make, pal. I'm the one in charge." Greed said, grinning but speaking with a firm tone to remind them of that position, though it goes somewhat ignored.

"I mean," Edward continued as if Greed hadn't spoken, "If it's just about trying to get your old bodies back…" He only had two other chimera men to compare them to, Zampano and Jerso, the boar and the frog chimera, who Al had rallied into getting their old bodies and old lives back.

"That's not it," Heinkel dismissed his concerns.

"These bodies do have their perks," Darius added on, "To be honest, I really don't mind staying like this."

Greed let out a barking laugh, "Yeah! Now that's the spirit!"

"So, why stick with us, then?" Edward asked, curious behind the motives of their reluctant caretakers that had been with him and Amelia since they left Fort Briggs.

"Well, why wouldn't we?" Heinkel countered his question with another, "It's not like we have anything better to do."

Darius put a finger to his temple, his eyes closing in concentration, "My animal instincts tell me something good's coming. So, I'll ride this thing out with you." He looked down at the kids as they all walked further away from the glow of the slums behind them, "Besides, I wouldn't exactly feel right just leaving you kids behind to fight monsters on your own." Amelia smiled, glad to see how warm-hearted Darius was about this, and clearly that was something winning over Heinkel, though he didn't want to admit it.

She looked over at Greed, "And how about you, Mr. Leader?" She asked him, "I take it you have your own score to settle in this fight?" She had to think that was his main motivation, though he never seemed particularly eager to share his personal goals beyond what was readily available. Despite his impulses, Greed was able to think farther ahead, and she could see that. He was always working carefully in his mind to make sure he got what he wanted, no matter what the situation was. She could only imagine he had an elaborate revenge planned for the deaths of his old crew, and perhaps his old body.

"Are you asking me why I've decided to return to Central?" He turned back to Amelia with a smug grin, "I'm not telling you, little princess." She rolled her eyes at the nickname, but she couldn't say she was surprised that he was refusing to tell her. He had a habit of keeping his thoughts to himself, though she imagined Ling would be able to come forward and say something about it if she could manage to speak to him again.

As they continued on down their darkening path ahead of them in the forested area between Kanama and Central, there was a slight shift in the air. It was enough to give Darius and Heinkel pause as the new scent came to them, which was enough to give pause to the others. Whenever the animalistic men stopped, it was usually for a reason. In the quiet of the night, they could just barely hear the rattling of metal in the distance that was slowly growing, but the sound didn't reach the ears of Ed, Amelia, and Greed just yet.

"What is it?" Amelia asked, wondering why they had stopped.

"What's the hold up?" Edward asked, more displeased than anything that they were pausing their journey.

As the seconds ticked by, the sound became louder and before they knew it the two teens heard the sound of familiar, metal footsteps clanking closer and closer to them. The two looked ahead, seeing a familiar 7-foot-tall silhouette make its way out of the dark forest. Amelia's eyes widened at the sight of Alphonse's armor standing just at the tree line of the forest they were about to enter, the metal gleaming in the dim light from the slum behind them. Edward's were just as wide, and at the sight of his younger brother, he dashed forward to meet him, exclaiming, "It's Al!"

Amelia followed behind, though at a slower pace. She was a bit confused, wasn't Alphonse supposed to be with Major Miles? Wasn't that what Winry had told them? She was glad to see him after so long, but she couldn't help but wonder if something went wrong. Greed, Heinkel, and Darius all stayed back where they were as the two teens went to greet the suit of armor. "Oh man, you freaked me out there!" Edward greeted him with a wide smile, coming to a stop just a few feet in front of the familiar armor, "Feels like I haven't seen you in years. How've you been, Al?"

"I'm glad to see you're okay, brother." Alphonse's voice rang through the armor as Amelia approached. She still couldn't hide her anxieties as she came up to him.

"Al, is everything okay?" Amelia asked, "We heard you were supposed to be with Major Miles in the east." With the two of them in front of their group, neither of them noticed how Greed seemed to be stiffening up, a feeling of unease welling up inside of his body, but it wasn't coming from the homunculus, but rather the body of the person he was inhabiting.

"That's actually why I'm here, we need to talk," Alphonse's voice came, but at the same time something seemed off to Amelia. It sounded like Alphonse, and it looked like Alphonse, but at the same time… this was Alphonse Elric. He hadn't seen his brother in weeks, separated because of a chance blizzard back in the north and the two had been running around and around to find each other again. When they had been separated before, Alphonse could hardly contain himself at his reunion with his brother and embraced him without thinking about how his armored body might poke at him. Now he was talking so stoically and so coldly, what could have happened to him?

"Uh, sure," Although Edward agreed, sharing that worry, Amelia put her hand on his shoulder to prevent him from taking a step forward. As Alphonse turned to lead them into the darkness of the forest, they both noticed how stiffly his body moved. It wasn't like him at all. She squeezed Edward's shoulder urgently, and he glanced over at her, seeing the anxiety on her face. Edward noticed that stiff walk, and he looked back to his brother, bringing one hand up over Amelia's to try and ease her anxieties, his feelings of relief clouding his judgment slightly as he looked up at his brother's body, "Hey, uh… are you sure you're feeling alright Al?"

The armored body stopped at the question, though it didn't turn around, "What do you mean?" It asked. No one could see how Greed was shuddering and trembling, his eyes wide as his host tried to regain control, urgently wanting to warn the others.

"Well… you seem a little…" Edward wasn't sure how to describe it at first, but before he could even come up with the right word to describe this strangeness of his brother's personality, someone else interrupted.

"Ed!" Ling's voice urgently shouted from Greed's form, the homunculus hunching slightly as a hand covered his face, Greed trying to keep Ling from pushing himself into control as much as he could, "Get away from him!"

"Ling?" Edward and Amelia both turned to the homunculus, though Amelia glanced between him and Al, taking a cautious step back.

"That's not… He's a…" Ling's voice was struggling to come out, and Greed was still pushing him back down, but the fact that the two were fighting again at this moment couldn't have filled the two teens with more dread. They could hear the faint rattling of metal again, and Amelia took a massive step back, gasping at the sight of a dark shadow rising out of Alphonse's body like a dark steam from all the places where his body hinged and moved. The sound of her shock made Edward look back, seeing the same thing she did.

The next moment, the only sensation Amelia could think to describe was like knowing lightning was about to strike. Before she knew what she was doing, she and Edward were ducking down to avoid a sudden darkness, shooting out at them like lightning strikes, thankfully everyone dodging to avoid anything dangerous. Edward grabbed Amelia as the shadows retreated as quickly as they came, pushing her back towards the others and moving to stand in front of her as they realized this was not Alphonse. "What– What the hell was that?!" Edward exclaimed. He was poised and ready for a fight, Heinkel already having drawn their only gun while the others readied themselves for another attack.

"I see that you're working with them now, huh Greed?" A voice began to overlap Alphonse's, the armor quivering as if it was overflowing with the darkness that was seeping out of it, the armored head turning shakily towards the group as it addressed their homunculus ally. Slowly, it turned to face them completely, Edward horrified to see the familiar armor facing their way with such a bloodthirsty aura, "How pathetic that you'd share your consciousness with a human. Your soul couldn't be any weaker!" As the two voices spoke out this defining line, the darkness revealed a gathering of red eyes that glared out at them from the armor, the sight disgusting Amelia and sending a chill down her spine.

"That's not Alphonse…" Amelia muttered out, speaking Edward's thoughts aloud as she looked at the being in front of them.

"It's Pride," Greed said, his voice returning to his body as he still shook and struggled to regain control.

"You don't mean that–" Edward cut himself off, fearing he already knew the answer of what was in front of them.

"Yeah, that's my brother. My oldest brother, I guess you'd say." Amelia felt another chill go down her spine. Another homunculus, one they hadn't faced yet. Given what they already knew about the homunculi, they had only met so many. If she counted down the deadly sins, Lust had been defeated by Colonel Mustang, Gluttony was a hapless idiot without help, Envy was a sadistic shapeshifter, Fuhrer Bradley was Wrath, Sloth was a massive monster of a man, and Greed was on their side. That just left Pride, the one homunculus they had yet to meet, the one that supposedly took the form of Selim Bradley. But seeing the shaking armor in front of them with that black shadow oozing out of it like smoke, it was hard to imagine that he was in there. She doubted it, but she couldn't deny that it was a smart tactic for one of their own to disguise themselves like this so they could be more easily captured. If he had been a better actor, they might have just followed him into the forest.

"So, you've made up your mind to betray us no matter what Greed," Pride began, the voice of a child greeting them from inside Alphonse's armor as Al's voice began to fade away into the tinny echo of the metal armor, "Which makes you nothing more than an annoyance to us at this point."

Greed glared down at his homunculus brother, "Damn it, how did you even know I was here?!" He growled out. Pride didn't answer, though with the way a few of the eyes squinted, it was clear that he was smiling. Amelia shuddered as she thought she saw what looked like a set of grinning white teeth in the darkness of his shadowy form. Despite his name, Pride clearly wasn't about to give them any information, even if it was information now useless to them since they had been found after weeks of traveling around and hiding.

"How dare you disguise yourself as my brother!" Edward snarled out, angry that he had fallen for their trick, but angrier that they would manipulate him like that.

"Who said this was a disguise?" Pride's shadows lifted up the helmet, the inky insides swirling away to reveal an all-too-familiar blood seal on the inside of the chest cavity, right where Edward had drawn it, "This is, without a doubt, your brother's actual body."

Amelia felt like she was going to be sick as she saw it. Alphonse's body was being controlled and manipulated by this homunculus, undoubtedly against his will. She couldn't help but see how it was so violating to have someone do that to you, and she could feel anger building up inside of her, her mind already trying to work on how they could get rid of him and his shadows so they can get Alphonse back to himself.

Edward was just as horrified and disgusted as she was, but thrice as angry, "You bastard…!" His fists were already trembling in his fury.

"First things first," Pride put the helmet back in place, "I need to deal with Greed. Now, fullmetal alchemist and apprentice, if you would be so kind as to come with me…" He trailed off as if it were an invitation they had the right to refuse but as he spoke, shadowy tendrils started to slither towards them along the ground, small hands that reminded her of her time in the gate, though she wasn't sure this was done on purpose. They were moving closer, growing from the darkness of the trees behind the armor.

"Heinkel, you guys should run for cover–" Before Edward could finish his warning for the two chimeras, he could see the two men already hiding behind a tree 15 feet away, "What the–?! You don't waste any time!"

"Our animal instincts are telling us that we should stay the hell away from that thing," Darius replied.

"It'd probably be smart for you to run, too!" Heinkel said, looking over at the two teenagers that were left to face that monster.

"We'll be just fine," Edward said, turning back to face Pride, "They need us and Al for their plans, so they aren't gonna kill us, but that doesn't mean we have to go easy on 'em." It was the one advantage they had; the Promised Day had not yet arrived. The sacrifices all needed to be present and accounted for, they couldn't use corpses for whatever reason, they had to be taken alive. Edward tossed away his red coat that he had been carrying on his arm, "I've got no problem taking him down!"

"You're right, I must take you two alive," Pride confirmed, though the eyes in his armor sharpened into red glares, "But if I slice up a few of your limbs in the process, so be it." The last words said with a cold tone of voice, clearly prepared to do what it took to achieve his goal of eradicating Greed and taking them both alive with Alphonse back to Central. The tendrils that had grown withdrew, only to explode outwards in a fierce attack that Amelia and Edward managed to dodge, that sensation of a lightning strike forcing their bodies to move in the nick of time. They split up, Amelia going one way while Edward went another, trying to fan out and make it that much harder for him to attack them both, though his shadows didn't seem to have too much of a problem keeping up with them. As they ran, Amelia could hear the sound of the shadows piercing the earth that held her footprint, running in patterns until she managed to get far enough back that he wasn't able to reach… seemingly.

She glanced back behind her, seeing the slum was still only a short distance away. If this got out of hand, a lot more people could get hurt, "We have to keep him away from the slum!" She had no doubt that Pride would use the slum dwellers as hostages if it meant they would comply. Edward nodded as he heard her warning, bringing his hands together as he transmuted the ground, pushing up the clay and dirt into a high wall to block him in around the trees, only to watch as it came undone, cut up into diamond shaped chunks of dirt sliced by those shadowy tendrils the two still worked to avoid.

"A barrier's not going to work against him!" Greed called out, the homunculus doing what he could to dodge the shadows that were trying to stab and pierce him. His shield thankfully protected him from the worst as he hopped and dodged like the others, though when he came into a space where Pride was waiting for him, the tendrils wrapped around his body tightly, holding his limbs and keeping him in place. Once he was secured, Pride pulled back the other tendrils he had been using as he began to speak again.

"Now then, I've captured your friend. Ready to give up?" Pride asked, "You're not going to make me threaten the lives of the slum dwellers too, are you?"

Edward grit his teeth, holding back the venom he wanted to spit at the homunculus for using other people like this. "True to form, he always goes straight for the cheap shots in order to get what he wants…!" Greed said, struggling in his grasp as he looked over at the two alchemists.

"You'd think someone with a name like Pride would have a little more class than that…" Amelia said. Pride only chuckled at her comment, and she could hear the condescending tone behind it that said he knew he was better than her. She wasn't sure what to do. He had played them and played them well. She could see his shadows creeping towards them, the tentacles blending in with her own stretched out shadow on the ground, save for the eyes and teeth of Pride's body that showed in the inky blackness. It seemed like they were cornered, they wouldn't want Greed to be hurt, and certainly none of the innocent people in the slum… was this it? Was it that easy for them to lose here and now…?

"You know… I think it's about time I start winning some of these fights for a change," Edward said, her words catching her attention as she watched him bring his hands down for another transmutation, seeing the energy flowing through the ground to the telephone pole not too far behind them, the one that was giving power to the slum. She watched as the transmutative energy struck it, feeling dark tendrils coiling around her ankles just before the lights went out. She gasped as she could feel the grasp on her body suddenly disappearing in the darkness as the entire slum of Kanama lost power from that single transmutation.

In the sudden darkness, everyone waited with bated breath to see if Pride would keep attacking them… but they were met with silence. Amelia could feel relief sinking into her body as she realized, for now at least, Edward had made the right call by throwing them into this darkness. They were left totally blind in it. She couldn't make out anything at all though she could still hear and smell everything else just fine. Although it wasn't exactly convenient, this tactic was working at keeping Pride at bay, he was just as blinded as they were in the dark. She turned in the direction she remembered Edward had been in, wondering how far away they were from each other. "Edward?" She called out for him softly, not wanting to alert Pride to their positions in case he could still attack in the dark.

"I'm here," He called back, and she started to take steps towards his voice.

She moved slowly, her arms held out, "I can't see a thing…" She took one step, then another, and her hand brushed by a familiar metal. Edward had been reaching out to her in the darkness too, and she took hold of his forearm, finding his automail hand and holding onto it. He squeezed her hand back in turn, a greater sense of relief filling both of them as they were able to find and hold each other again.

"Yeah, sorry about that, but at least Pride's stopped attacking us," Edward said, his body moving right next to hers, feeling his automail shoulder against her own in the darkness.

"Greed," the two could hear another voice in the dark.

"Is that you, Heinkel?" Greed asked.

"It's me. What happened to the power?"

"I don't know, but it's saving our asses. Pride can't cast any shadows without a source of light and he's just as blind in this darkness as the rest of us." Hearing that gave Amelia some comfort. Pride couldn't fight in the dark, no light meant no shadows. She was surprised she had never considered that before, but it made sense. There was no reason a shadow would be able to exist without some kind of light source to differentiate it from all the rest of the darkness.

"So, we got rid of him, then?" Heinkel asked.

"No, he's just lying in wait," Greed answered, "He'll be back at it as soon as the lights are on again– Oh! Dammit." Amelia smiled a little to herself as it was clear from that quickly uttered curse that Greed had tripped from where he had been walking closer to the two chimeras.

"So, what do we do now?" Darius asked.

"We're completely blind right now, I don't know that there's much we can do…" Amelia said softly. Their battle was on pause until the lights came back on, which hopefully wouldn't be anytime soon.

"Hey Heinkel," Greed's voice spoke again, "Did you notice the shadow cast by Al's body?"

"Yeah, it's kinda hard to miss those freaky tentacles," Heinkel replied.

"No, not those. He kept close to the edge of the shadows from the forest. His actual body's probably just beyond those trees."

"His body? So he's not inside the armor?" Heinkel asked.

"No, he's got a special container that he uses when he's traveling around."

"What kind of container?" Heinkel could see where this was going, his voice growing more serious as he knew what Greed was asking of him.

"It'll look like a child, a little one. No more than maybe 7 or 8 years old." Greed answered, and Amelia's eyes went wide as she remembered the talk she had with the Major when this fugitive's journey started where they had exchanged what intelligence they had. "If you can find it and destroy it, we should be in the clear."

"I'll see what I can do," Heinkel said, and there was rustling as he walked on into the forest. He was a lion chimera; it would be easy for him to see in the dark once he transformed… he was the best option out of the five of them to go fight Pride when he was just as helpless as they were.

"It's Selim," Amelia whispered to Edward, "Remember how I told you what the Major said?"

"I guess we know which one he is now… I didn't think he'd be like this, though." Edward whispered in turn.

"How did you know taking away the lights would work?" Amelia asked, impressed that Edward had managed to figure it out so quickly.

"Uh…" She frowned as she knew that nervous tone of voice, "It was kind of a lucky guess?"

"Lucky guess?!" Amelia hissed, her hand coming up to smack him in the chest.

"Ow! Hey!"

"What happened to not being so reckless anymore? You pinned everything we had on a guess?!"

"It was an educated guess!" Edward snapped back in his defense, "You saw the way his shadows blended in with ours! I took a shot and it worked, why am I being punished for that?" She could hear the faint sound of his fabric rustling as he rubbed at the spot she had hit, "That really hurt."

"Sorry," She said softly, "I agree, at least it worked and we're safe for now…" But that didn't really give them a lot of wiggle room on what to do next.

"Ed," A voice coming from behind made them jump, "Hey, Amelia?"

"We're over here," Amelia called back to Darius, hearing as his heavy footsteps grew closer to them as they stood together.

"Where's Ed's brother?" Darius asked as he came closer.

"Same spot as earlier," Edward answered, "His body clanks whenever he moves." There hadn't been so much as a clink out of him now. It made Amelia a little worried that Alphonse might still somehow be under Pride's control if he wasn't regaining his consciousness now that his body was supposedly freed.

"Alright, let's get out of here for the time being," Darius said, Amelia feeling his hand coming forward onto her back to encourage her to walk with him.

"I'm not gonna leave Al behind like that!" Edward snapped.

"I know how worried you've gotta be, but what if we get close to him and it turns out to be a trap?" Darius asked, and Amelia could feel Edward's grip on her hand tightening, clearly not wanting to entertain the idea, but he had a point. "We've gotta stay close to one another until Heinkel's done with Pride. We don't want to accidentally attack each other."

"Al should be okay," She tried to comfort him, "If Pride doesn't have any control over him now, he should be waking up any second and moving away on his own."

In the darkness, she could hear Edward's breath shaking as he tried to control his feelings. It was a horrible situation for him, she knew that. They had been separated for weeks on a chance encounter only for them to reunite with Al's body having been manipulated like a puppet to the will of their enemies. She knew he had to be boiling with rage, but he was managing to keep it contained for now. He took in a breath and let it out in a quick, resigned huff, "Alright, fine. So what now?"

"Greed already went further into the trees," Darius said, "I can sniff him out and lead you to him as well as I can. We'll just have to wait and see what we can do once the lights come back on." Edward didn't like it, but they didn't have much else they could do in any kind of practical sense, so they would have to move forward from there and keep working as best they could on a plan.

Darius directed them through into the forest, it was impossible to see, Amelia still holding onto Edward's hand so they wouldn't be separated, her other hand out in front of her to feel for any trees that might be in her way. She tried to make out what outlines she could in the dark, but there was no light at all. The sky was overcast and with the lights in the slum out, the nearest source of light was Central, too far away to be of any good to them. As they walked deeper into the trees that led them closer to Greed, they could hear strange sounds of something knocking into something else, weight being thrown around in the darkness, though it sounded far enough away to not be a danger to them.

"Is that Heinkel?" Amelia asked as she heard the repeating thuds in the night.

"It's always your best bet to let the nocturnal animals handle fighting in the dark," Darius said, feeling his way through the blackness as they did.

"Yeah, makes sense…" Amelia muttered. As they got closer to Greed, they could feel the land evening out, a good spot for a meeting place in the dark. Darius suddenly stiffened, the hair on his neck standing up straight with the intense dread of ravenous hunger focused on them.

It only took him a moment to react to these feelings, reaching out to grab Greed as he pushed Edward and Amelia away, "Get down, now!" He shouted, pushing them all to the ground as something came flying towards them, the tree that Greed had been leaning on suddenly creaking, the sound of some unusual growls reaching their ears as the tree splintered in the mouth of something. The remains of the tree started to fall, slowly collapsing under the weight it could no longer carry, snapping in half as something chewed on its wooden remains.

As they all scrambled up, remaining silent as they tried to determine who this new enemy was, they could hear a voice calling out to them in the dark, "I smell you fullmetal alchemist, and I smell Greed!" The voice was all too familiar to Amelia, remembering the sound of his voice as he happily cried out how he was looking forward to eating a girl.

"Of course he'd bring Gluttony," Greed exasperatedly muttered.

"That fat slob?" Edward could hardly believe it himself.

"That makes sense, now I know how Pride managed to track us down. He used Gluttony's sense of smell to follow our scent." Greed said. Amelia was a bit shocked to learn his sense of smell was that strong, though she supposed a lot was possible with the homunculi.

She could hear him taking in a few more sniffs in the air, "I smell that girl I never got to eat. I also smell someone I never smelled before… and they smell tasty." The clear pleasure and anticipation in his voice at the idea of eating someone new sent disgusted chills down Amelia's spine.

"It's all you, go for it," Greed said, patting Darius's shoulder, "Oh and he's a homunculus, by the way."

"How do you expect me to fight a monster like that?" Darius asked, the fear present in his voice as he realized he was going to have to be their protection in this battle.

"He's relying on his sense of smell to guide him in the dark," Greed said, as he said this, they could hear Gluttony crying out and falling with a thud, likely from having tripped over something, "So right now, I'd say you're evenly matched for a fair fight."

"My animal instincts are calling me an idiot for listening to you…" Darius sighed, Amelia hearing the sound of his shirt ripping apart from his chimera transformation into his ape body, hearing his fists pounding on his chest to rile himself up even more, "So I guess I'm an idiot! The first strike is mine!" As he charged forward, Amelia pushed herself to stand, pulling Edward with her.

They could hear the sounds of Darius punching and hitting Gluttony over and over again in front of them. She wanted to back away, but she had no way of knowing how close they were to where Pride was and if they would be going in that direction. The battle sounded like it was getting farther away, with Gluttony crying out in pain as Darius landed blow after blow, though she could swear they were fighting right in front of them. She heard him grunting with effort as he brought his boot up to Gluttony's chin, his head smashing down against the homunculus's skull, grabbing him and throwing him up into the air to overwhelm him. "Now, for the final blow!" As Darius victoriously called out his move, Amelia felt Edward's hand slipping from her grasp as a sudden breeze moved beside her. She gasped, looking back to where Edward had slipped away from her, though she saw nothing. She could hear Edward's faintly pained groans as she realized Darius had hit Edward with that last shot instead of Gluttony like he had intended.

"Why Mr. Gorilla…? Weren't we sticking close to avoid attacking each other…?" Edward wheezed out, the wind knocked out of him and feeling that intense ache from being hit in his stomach.

"Sorry," Darius's apology was genuine, but it wasn't like there was much else he could have done. Amelia moved over to where his voice was, reaching down until she felt his hunched over back.

"You okay?" She asked, knowing Darius probably hit him really hard if he was going all-out.

"I need to catch my breath…" Edward said, panting harshly. She reached for his arms, offering to help him stand and he took it. She couldn't deny things didn't look good for them here, Gluttony was their main problem with them now with his advantage of smell over them in the dark. Darius's sense of smell wasn't much better than a normal person's, if only slightly, so he wasn't the best opponent for him, but he was the best they had out of their group at that moment. And then when the lights came back on, they had to worry about dealing with Pride and his shadows again.

"I don't know if we're going to make it out of this…" She muttered, a little worried. It seemed like they were very much backed into a corner. She and Edward would make it out of this alive, but that wasn't speaking for any of their other friends.

"What, Ling?" Greed's voice carried over to them, and Amelia looked over in that direction. It wasn't often that Greed spoke to Ling right in front of them, and she had to wonder what the prince was saying. As she helped Edward up, they felt a sudden burst of wind pass in front of them, watching as red light began to form and Amelia could see that it was because Greed's arm had been ripped off as his body was trying to regenerate it. Gluttony must have attacked him straight on… "Argh! It's not like I have a choice! But don't go trying to run off with this body!"

"Just drop it! It was my body to begin with," Ling's voice slipped out, and in the faint light of Greed's regeneration, they could see Gluttony charging for him again with his mouth open wide.

"Time to eat you!"

"Look out!" Amelia cried, not realizing what a bad warning that was in the dark, only to hear the sound of Gluttony's heavy body being thrown onto the ground, his weight used against him to push him into the dirt and out of the way.

Ling chuckled a little as he stepped back from the large homunculus. "Heh, thanks Greed."

"Ling?" Edward called out to him, shocked to see him again.

"That's right!" Ling called back.

Their reunion didn't last too long, with Gluttony getting back up, sounding frustrated, "You're making me mad! All I want to do is eat! But you won't let me eat you and I'm getting hungrier! You're being mean! So, I'm just gonna have to swallow everything!" She could hear the gross sounds of flesh shifting, but she wasn't sure what was happening.

"I sense something bad," Darius warned.

"Bad? How bad?" Edward asked.

"It's coming this way," Ling warned.

"What is?!" Amelia asked fearfully.

"I've felt this presence before," Ling continued.

"Will you freaks tell me what the hell you're talking about?!" Ed demanded, "Hello?! Normal guy here, I can't see in the dark!"

Before they could even get an answer, another rush of wind whisked by them. This one didn't carry the weight behind it like Darius's blows or Gluttony's body and was somehow much quieter. They could hear the sounds of someone moving quickly, and in the span of a few seconds, they watched as Gluttony's body came undone, the red light of his regenerative body glowing in the dark, illuminating the damage that had been done to him, and revealing that he had been planning to swallow everything like he had done the last time they met him. His open stomach illuminated in the darkness.

"What happened?" Edward asked, only to be met with Darius's hand coming onto his head and pushing it down.

"Stay down kid," He warned. They watched as Gluttony's body fell apart, his arms and legs cut into pieces that slipped away from his fat torso.

"What did that?" Amelia asked, keeping her head down like Darius had warned.

"Is there something else out there?" Edward asked.

"I'm not sure," Ling answered, "But I think it might…" He grinned as he recognized the chi in front of him, "It is!"

Gluttony groaned in agony as his body began to regenerate, that red light the only source they had and the only way they could see what was happening to their enemy at all. "I smell you!" Gluttony gasped out. Before he could say anymore, another blow was dealt, slicing off some of his teeth and his arm again. "I know that smell…!" He could hardly act before a blade came down to pierce through his skull, using it as a hook as they brought their body around from on top to in front of the homunculus, pulling him forward and throwing him to the ground, cutting his head open and leaving him to recuperate in a pool of his own blood. The figure took a step back from the sight, revealing their silhouette to them in the dark. They were dressed in all black, hooded, but with a bright automail arm that had a blade sticking out from the elbow. Amelia's eyes widened as she realized who it might be.

As the red light of Gluttony's regeneration grew with its efforts to grow his body back, she was able to see Ling smile and step closer to her, "I'm glad to see you're okay. I was wondering when you'd find me, Lan Fan." At the sound of her name, the warrior turned back to them, showing the male-presenting mask she would wear before going back to focus on Gluttony, "We'll handle him from here, you guys make sure to find somewhere safe for now!" Ling said, charging into the forest with her as Gluttony started to get up, his open stomach ready to swallow the earth now gone as his body was returned to normal. He was pushed farther and farther back into the trees; Amelia faintly hearing his cries of pain and calls for unfairness as Lan Fan and Ling continued to brutally attack him in the dark.

"How… can they even find him in the dark like this?" Amelia couldn't help asking, wondering just how in the world they were managing it.

"The ruler of Xing controls the chi, known as the Dragon's Pulse," A voice answered her in the dark. She felt Edward grabbing her shoulders, moving her behind him and putting her in between him and Darius as they heard the voice continue speaking, "This knowledge allows him to govern the flow of our kingdom. As the personal servants of our ruler, we too are trained to read the flow of chi. Not only that, we're also trained to act in the darkness."

"I recognize that voice…" Edward muttered, "Old man Fu?"

"Long time, no see, huh kid?" He greeted them, confirming his identity.

"I still can't see you, Fu," Edward replied, blinking in the dark, though he did relax and let Amelia come back to his side again, "But… wait, how were you able to find us?"

"We've been hiding out in Central, trying to keep an eye on things for a while now," Fu answered, "We detected several large chi converging out here, so we followed them." They heard another thud, all of their heads turning towards the sound of one of the battles ongoing, most likely the one between Ling and Gluttony, "There are two enormous forms of chi battling nearby."

"That's probably Greed and Gluttony," Amelia said, knowing Ling was still in Greed's body, so he would still carry his philosopher's stone that likely led the two ninja there to them.

"Greed huh? The one who swallowed the young lord…" Fu's voice lowered a hair, enough to show his clear hatred of the creature that would harm the person he had sworn to protect. He let out a long sigh, letting go of his feelings for the time being as he continued to speak and focus on the task at hand of informing his blind allies of their enemies' positions, "And then, there's another large chi within the forest."

"Our companion is fighting a homunculus called Pride out there," Darius explained.

Fu hummed, his head turning towards the slums of Kanama, "There's one more in the settlement nearby, and there's something disquieting about that one. It seems to dwarf the others in comparison."

"That… would probably be Edward's father you're sensing," Amelia said, knowing that probably didn't help things, but it at least told Fu who it was and if they were a threat.

"You think so?" Edward asked.

"Well, I mean if he's sensing chi based on philosopher's stones…" Amelia trailed off, the answer obvious to them but not very obvious to Fu.

"Are you saying that your father isn't human?" He asked, shocked.

Edward stiffened, still uncomfortable talking about his father, even after such a recent stint with him, "Trust me, he's the least of our concerns right now. We've gotta figure out how to deal with these homunculi."

"You don't have to worry about Gluttony," Fu said, "Lan Fan's dealing with him."

"Lan Fan is fighting Gluttony…?" Edward muttered, then realized just how long it had been since they had last seen Lan Fan. Last time, she had her arm cut off, and the arm she had now was clearly automail, but at the same time he knew something was off, "Hold on! It hasn't even been a full seven months since her automail was attached!" Amelia's eyes widened as she realized it from Edward's words. It hadn't even been a full year, and Edward had barely been able to manage that kind of rehabilitation on his own, recalling that Alphonse had mentioned he had been coughing up blood doing it. "That's crazy, old man. She's not going to last without help!" He instantly took off to the trees where the fight with Gluttony was taking place.

"Edward, wait!" Amelia called out to him, only to watch as he was thrown back from a sudden explosion, the sound shaking the ground and making her whimper as she went to cover her ears from the intensity of it. She saw Edward get thrown onto his back, stunned from the explosion that had knocked the wind out of him, "Ed!" She rushed over to help him again.

"I said not to worry," Fu said calmly, "We have resources besides hand-to-hand combat."

Edward sat up, angrily calling out into the dark, "Give us some warning next time!" Only to be met with another bomb going off in front of them, Edward and Amelia covering their eyes from the bright flash of the explosion that was so bright in the dark. They both started to cough as the smoke from the gunpowder reached them, the two pushing themselves to stand as they went back to where they had been, "Damn…" Edward patted the dirt off of his clothes, and Amelia did the same, "Alright, that eases my mind a little." He paused as he thought of something, realizing the tools they had at their disposal if Fu was here to help them while Lan Fan was helping Ling fight Gluttony, "Tell me something, what all do you have besides explosives?" He asked, turning to Fu… or at least where he thought Fu was.

"Hm? All sorts of things: tear gas bombs, flash bombs, flares," Fu listed off. As he did, Amelia noticed something out of the corner of her eye, turning to see lights coming on in Kanama, likely people lighting lamps and torches, probably scared from the sounds of explosions so close to their homes.

"The lights are coming back on…" She warned, suddenly realizing just how tight of a time constraint they were on now, "Those people will be coming to investigate all this noise."

"Which means Pride can use the shadows again," Edward noted.

Darius gasped, "We need to get over there and help Heinkel!"

"Yeah," Edward agreed, "Amelia, I'm going to fight Pride head on, and I'll need you to stay with Darius in the dark as much as you can. If we need it, you're our last line of defense."

Amelia wanted to argue, but she knew he had a point. They needed to move carefully, they had an advantage somehow, at least for his plan, and he needed to focus to be able to take advantage of it, "Yeah, I'll be here." She promised.

"Thank you," He looked back at Fu, "Can you help me? I need you to detect Pride's chi and lead me to him. I could really use your help, old man." Fu let out a soft hum as he heard Edward's request. He couldn't imagine that it would come so easy for the young man in front of him to ask for help. When he last saw him, he had to try and convince himself that it was better to work with Ling and his servants to capture Gluttony, which resulted in the tragedy of Lan Fan's arm being lost. To see him asking for it so plainly now was a bit of a surprise, but the old man could understand how easy it would be for the untrained like Edward or Amelia to struggle greatly with fighting in the darkness unlike him or his granddaughter.

"I'll do what I can," He replied, starting to walk towards the direction of the single collection of chi in the forest.

"Ed," Darius's voice caught his attention before he left, "Watch yourself, kid. Don't forget what Pride is, alright?"

Edward nodded, "Right, I'll remember," he said before he and Fu continued to move in the darkness towards Pride to try and help Heinkel before things got worse. "Come on, I'll tell you the plan on the way," the two followed Edward as they walked behind Fu, keeping close, "I think we should take advantage of Pride's cheap shots."

"How do you mean?" Amelia asked.

"Remember how Greed said he always took the cheap shot to get what he wants? If that's true, then he'll possess Al again and try to use him as a hostage to get us to go with him." He looked over at Fu, "When that happens, I need you to use a flash bomb over them, old man."

"That's all you need?" Fu asked, surprised it was something so simple.

"Pride's power is using the shadows to his advantage," Edward said, "He's probably still attached to Al with those shadows now. He hasn't moved since we last left him at the edge of the forest, I think that's because part of him is still in there somehow. Flash bombs are made with magnesium, it's typically something that burns bright enough to get rid of shadows for a short while. I think we can use that to detach his control on Al and get him to safety."

"You think that will work?" Darius asked, a little doubtful.

"Well, I doubt it'll be easy. I'll have to get his attention, keep it focused on me for a while." He looked over at Darius, "Mr. Gorilla, when that flash bomb goes off, I need you to charge in and grab Al so that we can get him somewhere safe."

"And if he regains consciousness back in time, we might be able to really outnumber these guys!" Amelia said, starting to catch onto his plan, "I mean, I can't imagine it would take long for a soul to come back to the world after its body's been freed."

"Right," Edward grinned, glad that she was able to understand his plan. "We'll need you guys in the background, ready to fight. I'm sure this is going to be a long test of endurance, so we need as many fresh fighters as we can get." Amelia smiled, glad to know that Edward wasn't asking her to stay back out of fear she might not fight well but was doing so to make sure she was able to fight with all the energy she had.

As they kept walking through the trees, the group was able to make out a light in the forest, "Oh no…" Amelia muttered when she saw it, her heart dropping to her stomach as she realized they had run out of time. People were already here, and probably looking into one of the battles that was still going. Heinkel had been fighting Pride non-stop. He had to be exhausted by now, even if the homunculus couldn't fight back.

"A monster!" Someone shouted out, and Amelia's heart raced anxiously as she realized they might be talking about Heinkel, "Oh no, it's got a kid!"

"Shit, they found Pride," She cursed in a hushed voice. Edward made a gesture for her to stay back with Darius, the two silently agreeing to do so as they heard the slum dwellers running off screaming.

"There's two monsters!" She watched as the light near them began to grow, and her eyes widened as she realized that it was from a fire. They must have brought a burning lamp with them that was now setting bushes ablaze around the clearing that Ed and Fu started to make their way into. She looked up at Darius, finally able to make out his face in the growing light of the fire, the two of them walking carefully among the trees as they started to look for helpful vantage points that would make it easier for them. As they walked, they could see Heinkel was bleeding badly from a deep cut on his shoulder, no doubt put there by Pride when the light came back on. She glanced up at Darius, who looked ready to kill that child that would dare hurt his lover, but he didn't rush into battle. Darius was a soldier first and foremost, if anyone knew how to keep cool in the heat of battle, it was someone like him.

"I'm glad they shed some light for us. Now let's shed some of your blood," Pride's voice carried through the air as they moved, seeing his shadow pointing towards Heinkel, "Goodbye chimera." Darius watched as the shadow shot forward, clearly ready to kill, and was about to jump in himself when he saw Edward rushing out from the trees, blocking back Pride's shadows with his automail just before they had the chance to pierce Heinkel, who flinched as he saw them coming closer.

He let out a small sigh of relief, "Just in the nick of time, pops." He said, Heinkel starting to relax as he realized he wasn't dead yet, "Who would've thought a little kid like this would be a homunculus." He lowered his automail arm, which seemed to take on a different shade in the light of the growing forest fire, "I admit you fooled me, Selim Bradley."

Pride smiled as Edward acknowledged who he was, "Appearances rarely show the whole truth," He said, his smile growing a bit smug as he baited Ed with, "Isn't that right, little alchemist?" She could see the fury flashing on Edward's face at the L word.

"Oh, he's dead now," She muttered.

"Now where were we?" Pride's shadows shot forward towards Edward, and she watched as he kept blocking them off with his automail, dodging where he could, standing in front of Heinkel to protect him from the worst of it. Amelia kept moving with Darius, the two being careful to watch their surroundings now that they could actually see them. She could smell the scent of wood and leaves burning as the fire started to grow, but there wasn't much they could do to stop it at this point. As she looked to Edward, she could see sparks flying from where Pride's shadows made contact with his automail but didn't seem to cut anything. She could see the confusion on his face as he didn't seem to be making any progress, and as they kept going, she noticed more about the body of Selim Bradley.

"He's really beaten up," She quietly commented to Darius as they moved closer to the clearing, "Heinkel really did a number on him." That could work to their advantage. A philosopher's stone could only help them heal for so long and considering Pride's body existed in the container of Selim Bradley, it might mean that his container was weak enough to break open soon.

"Good, maybe I can smash the little brat myself," Darius growled, watching as Pride kept shooting his shadows towards Edward, the alchemist standing firm in front of Heinkel and keeping him safe from the worst of it as he blocked off the majority of Pride's hits, though he was losing more and more of his coat sleeve as the attacks went on.

After a constant stream of attacks that all seemed to go nowhere, Pride withdrew his shadowy tendrils with a furrowed brow, and Edward grinned as he stood there, panting. "Looks like I made the right decision keeping my northern automail after all," He extended his hand to Pride, "This carbon-fiber base has turned out to be pretty handy!"

Pride's eyes widened as he realized what Edward had done, taking a page from Greed when arming his defenses and concentrating the carbon in his automail arm as an effective shield. "Smart move," Amelia whispered her praise from the sidelines, incredibly proud of his quick thinking.

Though she was thrilled to see him making his own advantage against Pride, a good misdirection from their real plan, she could see his expression shift from shock and anger to calm and collected with a smug smile. He was going to bring Al back in to manipulate them, "Get ready, I think he's going to make his move," She warned Darius, the two of them getting ready to run when they had to, knowing that it was going to be important for them to move fast. He didn't make any more attacks on Edward, standing there with that smug grin that Ed decided to antagonize a little.

"What's the matter? You're not giving up, are you?" He taunted, keeping Pride's attention on him as he brought up his automail finger, wiggling it to tell him to come at him again.

"You brought this on yourself," Pride answered with a chuckle, and before Edward could ask what he meant, they could hear the clanking of Al's armor as he was made to walk closer and closer to the clearing, finally stepping into the light, dark shadows filling his body and red eyes poking out through the cracks and empty spaces, shadows spreading with every metallic step on the ground. Seeing him standing there with dark tentacles waving at all sides, it was an intimidating sight to say the least.

"Al!" Edward cried out.

"I figured this might give me the advantage, unless you wanna destroy your brother," Pride said, reveling in his intellect for making such a smart play, not realizing he was doing exactly what they wanted. He really was quite arrogant, the epitome of the emotion he embodied.

Edward only grinned, "Now, old man!" He shouted, and Darius tensed as he watched Fu run out from the flaming bushes to hop into the air, throwing a flash bomb up above Alphonse's possessed body.

"A flash bomb…! No!" Pride's voice cried out, and in the brightness of the light Darius and Amelia could see how Pride's tentacles were disintegrating away, though just barely in the bright attack.

"Mr. Gorilla!" Edward shouted out for Darius.

"I'm on it!" Darius called back, running straight for Alphonse as the tentacles began to fade away from his body, the light thankfully lasting for a few long seconds. Long enough for him to charge in and grab his metal form before it fell to the ground, holding it tightly as he sat back, panting for breath as Edward rushed over to him.

"Al!" Ed called out to his brother, but he didn't respond once he was free from Pride's hold, and they still had to act quickly, "He's not conscious. You gotta get him out of here, now!"

"And you're positive he's not still possessed?" Darius asked, wanting to be sure.

"Yeah, I've noticed that if you sever a part of their body, it disintegrates into dust." Edward explained, "The flash bomb severed the shadows holding Al's body, so he's free from Pride's grasp."

"You're not getting away!" Pride's voice angrily declared, shadows surging towards them in a massive, furious wave to have the upper hand taken from him.

"Have another!" Edward shouted, throwing another flash bomb into the air as Darius picked up Alphonse's limp body and carried him quickly into the trees as they waited for it to go off. As he ran, from her place in the forest Amelia could see a still-healing Gluttony running over to Pride.

"Did you see that bright light Pride? Huh?" He asked the other homunculus, clearly confused about what was going on. The other flash bomb went off, blinding the two homunculi, and severing the shadows Pride had attached to his container as it burned brightly for another few long seconds, long enough for Darius to rush back into the trees, Amelia running with him as they went to get Alphonse to safety.

"Come on, I found a spot!" Amelia said, directing him to follow her into the trees until they were just far enough away to be out of sight from the others, sitting Alphonse down on the ground, "Alphonse, hey!" She called out to him, only to receive no response from his armor, "Shit…" She muttered, reaching for his helmet and carefully taking it off of his armor, seeing the blood seal inside, "He's still unconscious."

"Well, you can revive him, right?" Darius asked. Amelia's lips pressed together, feeling a bead of sweat forming on her head as she looked at the limp armor that really may as well be completely empty now.

"I mean… it would be one thing if he were unconscious with a body, I could just try CPR but…" She had no idea how to revive him from unconsciousness when they were only dealing with an armor-bound soul. She didn't want to risk any transmutations to his body, either. She knew this was Edward's work, and he was really the only person they could completely trust with keeping Al's soul intact when it came to transmutations on his armor, "I'm… not really sure how to wake him up, but I'll think of something." She had to, otherwise they were all in deep shit. She wasn't sure where to even begin, and as she looked at Alphonse's body, she could feel that sensation of helplessness as she tried to think. Knocking on it or touching it was a very bad idea, she could potentially erase part of it if she wasn't careful…

Before she could really start to look into options, Darius jumped and turned towards the sound of footsteps heading towards them. She jumped up with him, fearing it might be one of the slum dwellers, prepared to explain that Darius wasn't the monster the others had likely tried to tell them about, only to see a familiar face appearing in the dim light from the fire behind them.

"Mr. Hohenheim?" Amelia called out, surprised to see him there.

"I thought I would come and see what all the commotion was about when the power went out," He said, glancing over Amelia and Darius, his eyes immediately zooming in on Alphonse as he saw him sitting limply by the tree, "What happened?"

"A homunculus named Pride took over Al's body and possessed him," Amelia explained, watching as Hohenheim stepped closer to Alphonse to look him over, "We managed to sever his control over him, but he's not waking up, and I'm not entirely sure how to get him to come back to us…" Hohenheim looked down at Alphonse's blood seal, his eyes narrowing as he gazed over his son's limp body, knowing that this was going to be a battle his sons were not going to be able to avoid, certainly not now.

"Let me see what I can do, where's his helmet?" Hohenheim asked, Amelia handed it to him, watching him put it back on the armor, "Let me take a look over him."

"Thank you," Amelia said, putting her trust in the more experienced alchemist, looking down at Alphonse worriedly. Although Edward had been furious to learn that Al was being manipulated like a puppet, she was more worried for him. Alphonse was such a gentle soul, she was afraid of how this would affect him to know he was taken over like this, and she prayed it wouldn't hurt him too greatly… though she would understand if it did.

As they worked to try and bring Alphonse back to himself, Edward had stayed behind to face Pride and Gluttony as they both dealt with being blinded. Pride standing still and conjuring his shadows again as Gluttony lay writhing in blinded agony from the flash bomb. "You're pushing your luck," Pride warned him.

He watched as Ling and Lan Fan came to stand by Edward, showing they were outnumbered. It was one thing to fight two humans, but two humans and a human with homunculus regenerative properties were a different challenge on their own. He had to re-evaluate their situation as he stared down their enemies, glancing over at his younger homunculus brother as he watched him begin to recover, the last cut on his body beginning to heal over his massive stomach.

"They've really roughed you up," He commented as he looked over at him.

"Yeah, but only because Greed and that girl weren't fighting fair!" Gluttony said, speaking in the tone of a child that had always irritated the older homunculus, "They were both doing something so they could see me in the dark." Pride surrounded himself with a single shadowy tendril, it was the most he could manage in terms of defense, not that they were openly attacking him as he spoke to Gluttony.

"Is that so?" He looked over at Greed and Lan Fan, recognizing them from when they had fought Bradley, figuring out that Ling had assumed control and they both used their ability to sense their presence to take the advantage over Gluttony. He couldn't help but consider it pathetic that a homunculus would dare to let a human override them, but there wasn't much to help it now. This put them both at a severely weakened position separately… though there was a rather morbid alternative that could work to his favor. As soon as the idea hit him, he knew what had to be done in the name of victory for their Father. Licking his lips subtly, he turned to look over at Gluttony again, "Gluttony, how many times have they killed you now?"

"I lost count," Gluttony admitted, "But I know it was a lot, though."

"They've beaten me up pretty badly as well," Pride said, his shadows growing behind him, his tendrils moving closer towards his fatter homunculus brother as he continued to speak, keeping him at ease, "The way things are going, there's a very real chance they might annihilate us."

Edward and Ling both looked at Pride curiously. They were waiting for him to attack them again, knowing the two homunculi were worn out and tired by now, with Gluttony having died enough times to have the potential to wear out his stone completely, but hearing Pride admit to it was a strange thing to hear… and it made them both uneasy as they saw where his shadows were heading in squirming, writhing tentacles along the ground towards Gluttony's feet.

"Yeah, but that's okay because Father will fix us!" Gluttony naively commented, only to look down and see the shadows that were surrounding him, his childish optimism quickly turning to fear as he realized what was happening, seeing his older brother looking at him with a dark smile of an expression, "No! Please don't do it, Pride…!" He tried to step around the tentacles that were reaching for him, feeling them grabbing at his small legs to try and hold him in place. He fearfully cried out, looking to his older brother for mercy, and only seeing Pride lick his lips once more as he realized he had the intent to devour the homunculus that ate everything and everyone, a massive shadow rising up behind him that had a huge set of sharp teeth that opened slowly.

It only took a second before Pride had it grab onto Gluttony, much to the shock of Edward and Ling as they watched that massive mouth carry Gluttony up into the air, squeezing down tighter and tighter to cut him in half with a disgusting snap.

"No Pride! Don't eat me!" Gluttony begged as his upper body began to disintegrate away, "It hurts! Please help me! Lust!" His last cry for help fading away as his mouth disappeared, his legs landing on the ground and his broken half revealing the location of the philosopher's stone in his body. Before the body began to regenerate, Pride's shadows and writhing tentacles all pierced through the fatty flesh, digging deep through the homunculus's body to dig into his philosopher's stone before it could spend any more energy regenerating the homunculus he had just eliminated himself. Everyone watched as the shadows all converged on Gluttony's remains, turning into a pulsating black mass as Pride began to absorb him to take his philosopher's stone and add that power into his own body.

"He devoured him… one of his own kind…!" Ling gasped out in horror and disgust. They could hear the revolting sounds of flesh and bone being broken apart among the shadows as Pride continued to take in the other homunculus's power with a satisfied smile on his face. It only took a few more seconds before the stone was absorbed into his body through his shadows and there was nothing left of Gluttony to be seen.

"Ah…" He sighed in satisfied relief from his meal, "This should make things much easier. I can practically smell every movement you make. I could do without the ravenous hunger, but I suppose I'll just have to sate it. Oh, wait…" He sniffed the air, taking in the scents of those around him, and a familiar one that he had smelled before when they met, weeks ago in the tunnel under Lior, the lookalike sending a declaration of war to his Father, "I recognize that scent… You're somewhere close by, aren't you? Hohenheim."

---

Olivier sat with the other generals, going over all the intelligence they had. They had been tailing Mustang, leaving General Grumman to handle the recovery of King Bradley's "remains" from the river where his train had exploded. She listened as the latest report came in, that the bar Mustang frequented was owned by his foster mother Chris Mustang, also known to the locals as Madame Christmas. They were all running around, trying to figure out his next move, and it didn't help that none of his other team members could be found, either.

"From what we've uncovered, Mustang's gathered his subordinates and is sneaking around." General Fox said.

"Mustang's got to have something to do with the Fuhrer's train," General Smith declared, "Hell, he's probably the one behind the Ishvalans pouring into the city! I doubt that it's a coincidence."

"It does seem like it's all perfectly timed," General Klemin agreed.

At the head of the table still sat Father, the Good Gentleman that all the generals trusted, "Then where do we find him?" he asked the other generals, "You're all more experienced with the way this Mustang character operates than I am. What would you predict to be his next plan of action?" He spoke calmly, sitting with his chin in his hand, eyes closed in a relaxed state. He clearly had no desire to get overworked about this situation, and as he presented the question to his generals, they were all silent as they tried to think about what they might do as a next move in Mustang's place.

"If I were in his place," Olivier began, getting everyone's attention, "Well, I would most likely take the Fuhrer's wife as a hostage." She could see how easy it would be to manipulate the public with a figure like her on their side. First, she would need to prove to her that her life was in danger by trusting their own soldiers, from there it would be a matter of getting her story out to the entirety of Central and Amestris so that she could tell her harrowing tale. It would get the people on their side, and Mustang could easily use the Fuhrer's name to manipulate the populace to distrust the military and invoke an investigation into the corrupt inner workings of Central Command.

Father lifted his head up from his hand, "Why bother doing such a thing? He must know that's futile." Olivier didn't respond, keeping silent as the other generals stared her down. If they couldn't see the plan, then she knew they would have the upper hand in this battle, and she couldn't deny she was looking forward to watching their stern-faced expressions turn into ones of fear and dismay as they realized they were losing. "So, he's going to take a pointless hostage and make sure that he's branded as a traitor. Even further proof that humans are relentlessly ridiculous creatures." Father sighed.

Olivier continued to remain silent, having every intention to play her role as well as she could while their plans were still in motion. It would take quite a lot from Mustang to prove that they were on the side of Mrs. Bradley, but she imagined as tenacious as he was, he likely already had a plan to do just that.

---

Amelia and Hohenheim were doing what they could, with Hohenheim agreeing with her initial fears that performing any kind of transmutation, even one just to send energy through the armor, could potentially damage or hurt Alphonse. She was grateful to have him on her side, and she worried as they continued to try and wake him up, "Al can you hear me?" He called to him, "Come on… wake up! Alphonse!" There was no response from the empty armor, and Amelia was wondering if they were doing something wrong.

"He's… I mean, his soul is still attached, right?" She asked, "Pride wouldn't have been dumb enough to risk damaging his seal."

"No, I doubt he did anything to put Al's soul at risk," Hohenheim agreed, "But I'm sure we can rouse him somehow." He removed his helmet, looking inside of his armor at his blood seal, "It's intact, we have nothing to worry about there."

As they continued to work on Alphonse and getting him back, Edward was facing Pride, who was a bit distracted by the scent of Hohenheim but knew that he had been sent to retrieve him as well as the Elric brothers and their little apprentice. 4 sacrifices in one fell swoop, it was almost a kind of serendipitous fate.

"Tell me something, Edward," He turned to the teenage alchemist with a cruel smile, "Do you think your father would step forward to save you if I chopped off one of your limbs?" Before he could give him the chance to answer, his shadows all surged forward into the air, Edward, Greed, and Fu all jumping back to avoid them. Edward watched as the shadows chased after him midair, his automail hand coming down to knock it away before it could grab him, barely managing to get his balance back enough to land on his feet. He skidded backwards, standing up, watching as the shadows all came down in his wake, piercing into the earth one after another in front of him until he was knocked back against a tree and forced to stop. He pinned himself back against the bark, watching the lines of shadows that were in front of him like dark fence posts. He watched as they split apart, each line becoming two, all looking as thin and flimsy as paper, but knowing just how dangerous they really were. He could see Pride at the end of those shadows, smiling cruelly as more appeared behind his small body, the shadows in front of him stilling into a sort of tunnel.

Edward grit his teeth in his growing frustration. Just a minute ago, they had Pride and Gluttony on the edge, but no one would have guessed he would have been so sadistic as to consume another homunculus to gain power over them. Now it seemed that Pride had his second wind, creating another shadowy stream that shot forward to the makeshift tunnel he had created in front of Edward, seeing the gleaming teeth of the mouth it made that opened up as it got closer. "Look out!" Greed's voice called for a warning, it was enough to move him into action, ducking at the last second as the mouth reached for the place where he had been standing, watching as the teeth cut the tree he had been standing against in half, running out to avoid the tree as it rumbled to the ground.

As Edward ran off, Pride directed his attention to Greed, his shadows shooting out and reaching for him. Greed managed to flip backwards, avoiding the black tentacles as they buried into the ground where he had been, doing it over and over again until he pushed himself up into the branches of a tree. His arms covered in his ultimate shield as he watched the sharp tendrils flying up after him, bringing them up to defend himself, managing to block the blow of one, watching as it was sent back by a second blade as Lan Fan came to the tree, pushing all of her weight down on the monstrous attack in a split second and jumping up into the branch, "Young Lord!" She called out to Ling, hoping he was alright.

"Not quite," He grinned at her, "The name's Greed."

Lan Fan's concern quickly twisted into anger, "It's you! Give the prince his body back!" She demanded fiercely.

"Now why would I wanna do something like that?" Greed asked, enjoying the brief bit of fun he had with her before he turned his attention back to the battlefield, his playful grin disappearing as he saw one of the darker tendrils making its way up to them, "Oh, boy. Heads up!" He warned, watching as the massive, sharp jaws of the tentacle opened around the tree, the two managing to jump away in time to avoid the worst of it as it cut off the branches where they had been standing, the rest of the tree beginning to fall with them in the air. Greed couldn't avoid another set of tentacles that wrapped their teeth around his shoulders and took him away to do as much damage as possible, his shield thankfully protecting him from the worst. Lan Fan was left drifting, pulling out her kunai when she saw the body of the prince in danger, only to feel a sharp twinge in her shoulder that made her drop the one she held in her flesh hand as she reached to ease the pain, continuing to fall to another tree, her knees hooking on a branch and catching her upside down before she could fall to the ground.

She could see where her kunai fell on the ground farther away, looking up as Edward rushed over to check on her, "Are you alright?!" He called up from the ground.

Lan Fan didn't answer, her hand still on her automail shoulder as she tried to gather her senses back through her pain. She didn't get much time, watching as shadows moved around her from behind the tree, her eyes growing wide as she saw the red eyes within the darkness looking back at her. She pushed herself off the branch as teeth came crashing down around her, cutting the tree into pieces as she fell, seeing another set of teeth awaiting her midair. Edward shouted as he pushed himself up, kicking her out of the way and pushing himself out of the target spot as the teeth snapped around thin air rather than Lan Fan's body. The two landed on their feet, stepping back to put a little space between them and the shadows.

"I didn't ask for your help," Lan Fan snapped.

"Oh, shut up!" Edward snapped, "Your arm obviously hasn't healed yet."

Lan Fan gasped, offended that he had noticed, "I can take care of myself!"

"Then prove it to me and start acting like you can!" Edward barked back, "We're gonna need your help tomorrow." Lan Fan's eyes widened, half-expecting that Edward would deny her participation in tomorrow's infamous battle with his comment on her automail, but she nodded, her expression relaxing and concentrating on the task before them with their newly powered homunculus problem.

Meanwhile, Fu was helping Heinkel off the battlefield, carrying him on his shoulder as best he could with Heinkel moving on his feet as fast as his body would take him. He was too injured to keep fighting and exhausted from his efforts of trying to kill and destroy Pride's body in that short time he had in the darkness. Even though they weren't proving to be any kind of threat, that didn't mean that Pride didn't try to come after them. Whether it was to kill them to get them out of the way or take them hostage to use as pawns to get what he wanted was anyone's guess, but Greed managed to step in, blocking the shadows that reached out for the chimera and the old ninja, his shield forcing them back as he jumped in front of the oncoming attacks.

"Get him out of here!" Greed ordered, wanting to hurry and get them somewhere they didn't have to worry about them.

"Sorry I couldn't kill the little bastard," Heinkel said, looking at the monstrosity his friends were stuck facing.

Greed couldn't help letting out a single, sardonic laugh, "Don't sweat it. Can't exactly fault you for that one. Even I consider him to be a monster." He said, looking back at the powerful homunculus, standing in a pool of darkness he created, tendrils curling up and lashing out, forming teeth and eyes to try and destroy them. All while he stood there, confidently, smugly smiling as he could see victory playing out with his new power.

Fu picked up the pace, he and Heinkel moving faster to get him into the trees to hide with the others that were working to get Alphonse back to himself. Amelia and Hohenheim were slowly starting to see some progress, with parts of the armor starting to shake or move and they both started calling out to him in his armor.

"Alphonse, wake up," Hohenheim called out.

"Please wake up, Alphonse," Amelia called out to him, both of them looking down into his chest cavity at his blood seal as they slowly started to see his body moving. Amelia jumped as she saw him suddenly sitting up straight, gasping at the sight.

"What…? Amelia? Dad?" Alphonse's voice came out of the armor, and Amelia couldn't help smiling widely.

"You're awake!" She said happily, unable to stop herself from embracing him, though she jumped back as soon as she felt his shoulder spikes poking into her side, "Ow! Oh, forgot about those."

"Hey," Hohenheim spoke gently, greeting his son with a smile.

"Here, you might want this," Darius said, offering Alphonse's helmet back to him, which he took and fastened back in place, whole again.

"Thank you," He said to Darius, doing a double-take as he realized he was a chimera, before looking back to Amelia and Hohenheim, "So uh… where am I?" He looked between the two, "I thought you were supposed to be in Kanama, Dad." Amelia was a little surprised to hear him called that from Alphonse, given that Edward outright refused to address Hohenheim by anything but his name.

"This is Kanama," Hohenheim confirmed.

"Then…?" Alphonse looked over to Amelia for an explanation.

"Ed and I came out here to find him," She said, gesturing to Hohenheim.

"But I was in the east, so how did I…?" He trailed off, gasping as he realized what had happened, "That's right, Pride! The homunculus Pride, he took control of my body!"

"I know, your friend Amelia told me all about it," Hohenheim said.

"Are you okay?" Amelia asked, worried for him, knowing that had to be difficult for him to deal with.

"It was… It was like he was manipulating my soul," Alphonse said, his voice quivering, "I feel violated…" Amelia couldn't help but sympathize with him, coming up to him and putting her hand on his arm, trying to show that she was there for him.

"I can't imagine how awful that must have been," She said, "I'm sorry you went through that, Al." Alphonse nodded, grateful for her support as she offered it.

"How did he manage to do that?" Alphonse asked, "How could he control my soul like that?"

"The homunculi are basically your relatives," Hohenheim explained, "They're like second-generation clones of me." He put his hand to his chin in thought as he tried to explain the situation, "So they might be able to interfere with your seal since we share the same blood."

Before they could continue their talk on theories, they all heard the bushes rustling as Fu came to them with an injured Heinkel. "Old man Fu?" Alphonse asked, surprised to see him.

Fu came closer, helping Heinkel to kneel down as he brought his arm off of the old man's shoulders, helping him down. Darius was already making his way over to him as Fu spoke to the others, "Can you clean and dress this man's wounds?" Amelia's eyes widened at the sight of the blood, seeing it dripping down his body like water, though most of it had stopped, she could still make out the flesh that had been ripped open on his arm and shoulder from Pride's attacks.

"Jesus, Heinkel. I didn't realize he had cut you that deep," She said, watching as Darius tended to him gently, one hand on Heinkel's back as the other worked to clean away the blood and try to help him get better. She didn't interfere, letting the two have their moment together. It would do them good to have some peace together away from the battlefield. She looked up at Fu, "Is it getting bad?" She couldn't help worrying, it hadn't been that long since she had separated from Ed, but she feared the worst. "They had Gluttony and Pride on the ropes when we grabbed Al."

Fu walked over to them, looking Hohenheim up and down, and Amelia's eyes widened as she realized he must be sensing his chi, "I'm guessing you must be Edward's father," He said.

"That's correct," Hohenheim responded.

Fu didn't say anything more, seeing Amelia beside him was enough to confirm that he was on their side, "That shadow monster devoured the fat homunculus whole, and he's overpowering us."

"What?!" Amelia gasped, her eyes looking back through the trees to see if she could see any of the ongoing battle, "Is Ed okay?"

"Greed and Edward are doing everything they can, but I don't know how long they can last," Fu answered, and Amelia's stomach twisted up tighter. Alphonse looked out towards the growing light of the fire, unable to help feeling like this was his fault for letting Pride catch him in the first place. "The fires have given him all the light he could wish for, and I'm out of flash bombs. We need a new plan, and fast."

"And not just for us," Darius said, looking back over his shoulder at the lights from Kanama, "The slum dwellers are going to be headed straight for Pride any minute now."

"I have to go help," She said, seeing the growing light from the forest fire above them, taking off her coat so that it wouldn't get in the way, heading towards the growing blaze.

"And just what do you plan on doing that they're not already trying?" Fu asked, making her stop in her tracks, "If you go to join the battle now, you'll only wear yourself out as they are. We need to come up with a new plan to keep Pride from attacking." Amelia couldn't deny that he was right but at the same time…

"I can't just leave Ed out there to fight for his life alone!"

"Amelia," Alphonse's voice caught her attention, "I think I might have an idea." He turned to Hohenheim, "Dad, you're a pretty brilliant alchemist, right?"

Hohenheim let out a small hum, "Hmm… I guess I know a thing or two," He admitted.

"I got an idea, but I'm gonna need your help to pull it off," He began, "Pride isn't able to create any shadows without a source of light, right? So what if we trapped him?"

"Trapped him?" Hohenheim repeated curiously.

"Yes, a barrier thick enough to keep out any light."

"Barriers don't really work on him," Amelia said, "We've already tried to block him off, his shadows cut right through it if he sees it coming." She paused, "Though… if we were able to misdirect him, we might be able to get away with it." She looked up at Alphonse, "We were able to do that when we were rescuing you, Pride lives up to his name. When he's sure of himself, it's that much easier to catch him off-guard. We managed to get him to bring you onto the battlefield, and we used Fu's flash bombs to cut off his shadows from you."

"I thought as much," Alphonse said, "That's why we'll make it look like I'm trying to attack him from behind." He turned back to Hohenheim, "You said you'd met once before, I'm sure he knows you're a powerful alchemist. When you come out, he'll keep his focus on you."

"Do you think that will be enough to get him to back off the others?" Amelia asked, looking over to Fu.

"When he devoured the fat homunculus, he gained his ability to follow scents," Fu said, "He said he could smell every move we made. I don't know if that focus alone will be enough to get him to pull back his attacks on the others."

"I don't think Pride is dumb enough to attack relentlessly continuously, he knows he can't last forever," Amelia said, "If we can trick him into thinking he's won, we'll have him."

"And I think I can do that," Alphonse said, "I'll stay in the barrier with him."

"What? Al, no!" Amelia quickly turned to him, "You can't sacrifice yourself like that!"

"But think about it, I'm the best choice!" Alphonse insisted, "If anyone else was stuck with him in the dark, there'd be all kinds of problems, but I don't need to sleep, or eat, or even breathe. I can stay in there, and make sure he stays in there with me." Amelia couldn't deny that it was a good idea.

"But you'll be stuck in there with that psychopath… for what, forever?" She asked.

"No, just until the Promised Day is over. By then, whatever plans they have will be useless, and I'm sure I can think of a way to get out of the barrier without releasing him by then. Or find some way to destroy him." Alphonse said. Amelia couldn't deny it really was a good plan, but at the same time she worried about him. Alphonse could see it on his face, and as he turned to her, she could almost swear his armor was smiling at her, "It's alright, I think I can handle Pride for just one day."

"But there's no way Ed will just let you do this," Amelia said, "He's been fighting this hard to make sure that you're okay after he came to us pretending to be you."

"Do you think you can hold brother off long enough for us to do it?" Alphonse asked, "Just to keep him away until we can manage to get everything together." Amelia jumped as she heard a loud bang, the sound of a tree being cut up again no doubt. She pressed her lips together, not liking this plan at all, but they didn't really have many other options at this moment.

"Yeah, I think so," She said, sighing resignedly. She looked up at the suit of armor, smiling at him, "At least I got to say hello to you before you went in there." Alphonse chuckled.

"It's good to see you too," He said, "And sorry about poking you before."

"Hey, I can hug you better when you're standing." She said, coming up to prove it, wrapping her arms around his metal body as well as she could, though her fingers couldn't meet on his back, smiling up at him as she pressed her face up against his chest plate, "See?" Alphonse laughed again, his hands coming around her back to return the hug.

"Thanks, Amelia," He said, patting her back a couple of times and she released him. She looked back at the battlefield, the brief warm moment between them lost as she remembered what was ahead of them.

"God, this is going to suck…" She muttered to herself, looking back at Hohenheim, "I'll come out on the battlefield with you. If nothing else, I can probably help sell the idea that we're planning something more direct." He nodded in agreement.

"You are the last line of defense, after all." He said, looking to Alphonse, "We'll see you out there." Alphonse nodded, Hohenheim walking in one direction as Alphonse left in another.

Amelia looked over at Heinkel and Darius, the two watching her go. She nodded to them, letting them know they could stay there and be with each other. It would likely be the last moment of privacy they would have before they all had to rush off to Central. Hopefully, this would put an end to this fight. She came up beside Hohenheim as they started to move out together, her eyes looking over as she could hear the shouts of the others as they avoided the worst of Pride's attacks as he decimated the clearing they were in.

She could see Edward and Greed getting thrown back while Pride stood in the same place as before, in the middle of a massive, inky shadow that spread through half of the clearing, "Now then," She heard him say, "I can see you more clearly without those trees in the way." She watched as his shadows reached for a tree at the edge of the clearing, just barely able to make out Lan Fan standing on a branch, trying to camouflage herself though it clearly wasn't working, "There's not much point in trying to hide from me, I can smell each move you make."

Greed groaned as he and Edward slowly started to push themselves back up from where they had been knocked down, "Ugh, damn it…!" He looked over at where Edward was hunched over on all fours as he worked to get up, "Hey, you still breathing over there?"

Edward raised his hand into a thumbs-up, his voice shaking and rough as he called back, "Does wheezing count?"

"This isn't really the time to worry about others, is it Greed?" Pride spoke, looking over at him, "As soft as you've become, I wonder how much longer you can survive."

Greed glared at him, "Shut up, you beast!"

"What a horrific thing to say to your own brother, Greed," Pride said in mock hurt, "Honestly," His faux hurt turned into a malicious grin, "I might have to eat you."

Greed, ever full of piss and vinegar, grinned right back at Pride, "I promise that I won't go down easy, brother." He spat out the term as if it was poison staining his tongue. Pride only smiled, though his expression shifted as a new scent caught his nose again, turning to see Hohenheim and Amelia entering the clearing. As soon as she saw Ed, she started to make her way over to him as Hohenheim calmly approached the powerful homunculus.

"Oh, so you've chosen to show yourself, eh Hohenheim?" Pride put his attention on him, that malicious smile seeming to grow more eager now that he had made an appearance. His eyes shifted briefly to Amelia as she went over to Edward, helping him to stand.

"The hero always waits until the last second to make his move," Hohenheim replied.

"Are you alright?" Amelia asked in a whisper, Edward holding onto her hand as she helped him stand up.

"Yeah, I'm fine, but what are you doing here?" Edward asked, glancing over at Pride, "This isn't exactly a good place to be."

"You said I was the last line of defense, remember?" Amelia replied, "How badly are you injured?"

"Nothing I can't walk off… I think." Edward said, sighing a little. He looked back to Hohenheim and Pride as they kept speaking to each other.

"'Hero?' Interesting, you must think you can defeat me." Pride joked.

"No, I'd never think that," Hohenheim replied calmly with a defeated smile, "I'm not dumb enough to try and fight you." He watched as Pride's smile began to fall as he began to wonder just what he was planning. Amelia could see the gears turning in the homunculus's head as he looked to Hohenheim, and then to Amelia, his eyes narrowing suspiciously. Slowly, his shadows began to retreat from where they had been focused on others, once occupying the whole clearing, now concentrated around his small body. Amelia felt some relief as she saw that it was starting to work, though she tried not to show it. If Pride could contain his shadows, it would be that much easier to trap him and use that against him. If he had any sense that's what they wanted him to do, he'd attack instantly so she kept her face as neutral as she could.

"Stand beside me," She whispered to Edward, "Get ready," He wasn't sure what he was getting ready for, but he listened, his body stiffening and steeling itself for what was to come, giving the impression that she was giving commands to Edward to prepare for their plot. Pride's eyes shifted between them, but his gaze was nearly entirely focused on Hohenheim.

Hohenheim stood there for a few moments, his expression serious and focused as he took in the landscape, calculating what would need to be done before he started to calmly take a few more steps towards the homunculus, watching as his shadows rose up in preparation of his attack. Instead, what he heard was Alphonse's battle cry as he charged at him from behind in the bushes of the clearing, heading straight for the homunculus, only to have his shadows wrap around him and stop him before he could ever put a hand on him. The homunculus looked up at Alphonse, his tendrils wrapped around his body tightly to hold him still as he calmly spoke, "Are you joking? This was your pathetic plan?" Alphonse didn't respond, still trying to move to reach him even as he was held captive, "You should've run when you had the chance." Pride yanked Alphonse's arms back behind his body hard enough to send his helmet flying up, landing a few feet away before he forced the armor onto his knees beside him.

"Al, no!" Edward rushed towards him, Amelia grabbing his shoulder and pulling him back, "What–?! Ame–" She shook her head, her eyes looking at him calmly, trying to reassure him that he needed to stay back and that it was what he was supposed to do. He calmed down, looking back to Hohenheim as he glanced over at Edward, though his focus went right back to the homunculus that now held Alphonse captive.

"Hmph, it seems as though your son enjoys being held hostage," Pride mockingly commented, "It's either that or he's supremely stupid."

Hohenheim's expression remained stoic, though anger burned behind his eyes that Pride could clearly see as he stayed focused on him and him alone, "That's crossing a line, Pride. Don't ever mock my son." As he spoke, the light of his transmutation moved from his body to the earth around Pride and Alphonse, streams of light shooting out from where Hohenheim stood to the points he wanted to take, the earth breaking apart and rising up, the ground shaking tremendously as the crust of the earth was slowly unmade before them, transmuting into something greater as the tendrils of earth rose higher and higher, much to the shock of Edward, Greed, and Amelia. She hadn't expected him to make it that big! Each piece of the earth that came up was easily 4 feet thick, and filled with rocks and dirt, enough to make a formidable dome that rose up over Pride and Alphonse together, trapped as they were brought closer together around them.

As Pride began to realize what was happening in those brief seconds, Alphonse grabbed him and held his body against his metal one, trapping his container and making it so he couldn't get out. It was enough of a distraction for the transmutation to finish, though not without Pride making one last attempt to get back at the older alchemist, shouting his name in a furious rage as the earth began to close in around him, "Hohenheim!" A shadowy blade shot out from the seams of the dome as it began to close, shooting straight for Hohenheim who didn't even flinch as the shadow stopped just inches from his jugular as the dome was finally sealed shut. Amelia watched as the shadow came undone, shaking with disruption before turning to dust before them.

She let out a long sigh, her shoulders slumping easily as she saw that their plan had finally come to fruition, "It worked," She said, relieved.

"That's amazing…" Greed muttered, looking over the work itself, "He actually managed to confine Pride." It only took him a moment to realize that their fight was finally over, grinning and making his way out of the clearing to go find the path he wanted to take to exact his own plans for the coming day, leaving behind all the others to pursue his own ambitions now that he was free to do so.

Edward, though amazed at the creation, that feeling of awe soon turned to anger as he looked at Hohenheim, "What the hell are you doing?!" He snarled out, "Al's trapped in there with that monster! How could you do something like that?!"

Hohenheim stoically turned to Edward as he heard him shouting at him, "It wasn't my idea, Al was the one who suggested this." He explained, watching as Edward's anger turned to shock, "It would have been nearly impossible to defeat Pride, and it was only a matter of time before the fight spread to the slums. Since we knew we couldn't defeat him, I acted as a decoy and we imprisoned him. We've bought ourselves enough time to figure out how to destroy him."

"Well you could've at least told me what you were–" Hohenheim cut Edward off.

"Your brother told us not to," He said, looking at Edward, "Amelia said that you'd be against it, and he agreed. Okay?" Edward's anger dissipated again, glancing over at Amelia who looked back at him apologetically as they all looked back at the massive prison that now held Pride and Alphonse, "Al came up with this plan because it was the only way to make sure everyone would survive. Try to understand." Edward's shoulders slumped, his anger turning to grief now that he realized he couldn't help his brother, but more that he wouldn't be able to be reunited with him like he had been hoping. Hohenheim turned, heading back to the bushes, "Now, let's get to work putting these fires out."

As he left, Edward didn't move at first, and Amelia stayed behind with him. He looked over at her, "You knew about this?" He wasn't accusing her, he wasn't angry with her, more sad than anything else, but she nodded.

"If you knew about it, you would have stopped it, I'm sorry we had to keep you in the dark on this," She apologized, knowing this had to be hard, "But Al will be okay, he'll make sure Pride stays put until we can figure out what to do." She came up, her hand squeezing his flesh shoulder to try and comfort him, "He's your younger brother, he knows how to be strong like you." Edward was quiet, looking up at the earthly prison for a few moments, knowing that his brother was in there, trapped inside with a monster like Pride, but willingly sacrificing himself so everyone could live, and they could make the most of the day ahead of them without his interference. His eyes narrowed, some anger coming towards himself as he hated these feelings of helplessness that came with knowing there was nothing he could do. He left Amelia's grasp as he marched up to the wall of the dome.

"Al!" He shouted, hoping his voice would reach inside, "Hey, Al!"

"Sorry, brother," Alphonse's voice reached him as he got to the wall where Edward was, "It's not much of a reunion, huh?" Edward couldn't respond, struggling to find the words to express his sadness, his relief, his frustration at himself, so Alphonse kept speaking, "But… this is all my fault, so I had to do something. And besides, I only have to stay in here for one day. I promise I'll be okay, brother." Amelia watched as Edward's hand that was pressed up against the earthy wall curled into a fist, knowing he had to be frustrated that there was nothing he could do to help.

"I know, Al," Edward said, "This wasn't your fault. But you made a good plan. I'm proud of you." It was all he could say, he didn't want to tell his brother off for being a reckless idiot now that they were reunited again, but he could almost see Alphonse smiling at the admission of pride.

"Thanks brother," Alphonse called back.

Amelia came up to the wall, her hand coming up, "You did a lot of good, Al. I know we'll get you out of there safely."

"Thank you, Amelia," Alphonse replied, and she smiled.

"We'll make sure to say goodbye before we head out, we've got to put out these fires before they start to spread into the slums," She said, looking over at Edward, who nodded solemnly. He hated that he was so powerless here, but they had to focus on what they had now. They had to prioritize everything to protect as many people as possible, and he knew the best way to do that was to keep Pride confined as they continued on their journey into tomorrow. "Come on," She and Edward left the earthy prison behind, going to work with Hohenheim to help douse the fires that were growing around the clearing.

---

An hour or so had passed since Alphonse had been trapped inside of the darkness with Pride, or at least it felt like an hour. He could hear some muffled voices from the others working to help fix the mess left behind by the battle, but he couldn't make out any words. He could hear a light scraping sound in the blackness, his body turning to face it, realizing that Pride was trying to dig his way out of the prison since the walls were made of the ground.

"That's pointless," He told the homunculus, "I doubt my dad would have made the walls thin enough for a child to tunnel out." He listened as the sound stopped, hearing the small footsteps of Selim's body as he moved away from the wall. "It's not that hard to surprise you when you think so little of us humans." He heard the footsteps come to a stop, "You think you've got us all figured out, but you don't know a thing about us. You're too arrogant to see that things might not go your way." He heard the sound of something hitting the metal of his helmet left somewhere on the ground, likely a stick that Pride had tossed when he could no longer use it to dig, "Like your plan to use us. It was too sloppy to actually work."

"And how's that?" Pride asked, speaking for the first time since they had been trapped together after he found out Alphonse had no intention of leaving.

"Well, the plan needed us, right? As your sacrifices? The whole thing hinged on us doing what you wanted," Al explained, "But what if we had simply decided to run away to a different country? That's all it would have taken, and your entire plan falls apart." He could hear the sound of gentle clanking again, and he realized Pride had found his head, picking it up from where it was on the ground to put it down somewhere else.

"True, and there are some humans selfish enough who would have done exactly what you said." Pride conceded, surprising Alphonse that he wasn't immediately dismissing his thoughts on their plans and how sloppy it was. "But then… not all. Just look at Wrath's wife. There was a time when we took a trip to the city, and I was almost run over by a car. The car swerved, of course, but not before she risked her life trying to shield me with her body. She had no idea that I could have easily protected myself, but I was genuinely shocked by her selfless concern for my safety." He paused briefly, "I've always known what it was to have a father, but I have never had what you would call a mother. I was quite intrigued by her and how she cared for me, and I realized what it was like to have a mother."

"When you say Wrath's wife, you mean Mrs. Bradley right?" Alphonse asked.

"Yes, that is correct," Pride confirmed, reaching for the stick he had tossed away and holding it in his hands again, confirming for himself once more the place where Alphonse's helmet was on the ground by touching it.

"How could you deceive her all this time?" Alphonse asked him.

"I won't deny that I was just playing house with her," Pride said, bringing the stick he held down onto the metal helmet, "But I also can't deny that my time spent with her has been pleasant. I quite liked it."

"But then–"

"As I was saying," Pride interrupted him, "There are a handful of humans like Wrath's wife. They're willing to give up their own lives in order to protect the things they care about." He brought the stick down on the helmet again, hearing the metal ringing out in their dark confinement, "And one step up from them, we have you and your brother. Chosen to be sacrifices for the infinite strength of your spirits. You never would have fled and abandoned this country. In fact, you even went so far as to bring the fight to us." He knocked on the helmet once more, listening to the metal ring out again in the darkness. "So, explain to me again: how were our plans so sloppy?" He smiled to himself in the blackness, hearing nothing back from Alphonse on his comments, knowing he had won their little debate from showing they knew exactly who to choose as sacrifices for their plans, tapping on the metal helmet once more, thinking this would be a suitable way to send out a message, though it would take some time for it to reach Father in his home.

---

Putting out the fires around the clearing was fairly easy, though that didn't help their issues of the debris left behind from their fight. The slum dwellers did eventually start to make their way there to help with the fires, but they were able to get them to go back home once they were assured there were no issues. Amelia managed to get them to believe that a bunch of kids had somehow gotten their hands on some old fireworks that caused the fires and explosions that they heard, and they were able to take care of it. No one came too close to the earthy dome that Hohenheim had made and with the assurance that no one would have any reason to come closer, they knew Pride would be safely encased inside with Alphonse for as long as they could stand.

Heinkel's wounds were dressed, but as the others worked to clean up the fallen pieces of tree that came from their fight, massive logs that needed to be moved and maybe given to the slum dwellers to make use of. It was exhausting work, and it was late in the night, and as soon as Edward noticed how tired Amelia was getting, he came over and took her workload out of her hands, insisting she stop working and rest. She argued with him that he would have to do the same, and with the promise that he would sleep as soon as she was done, she went to have a quick nap in the forest under the watchful eyes of Heinkel as he sat out on the work with his injuries.

She only slept for a few hours before getting up and pushing Edward to go rest and do the same thing he had done to her, taking his workload out of his hands. They bickered back and forth when she did this, but eventually he conceded when she reminded him that he had promised. Clearing out the debris and moving it to a location where it would be better put to use was the hardest part of their work, though it was made more difficult when it was just those few of them. Greed had disappeared somewhere, they weren't sure where, but no one could find him. He hadn't told anyone he was leaving, but somewhere between Pride's confinement and them working to put out the fires, the homunculus just decided to bail. It was confusing, and worrying for Lan Fan and Fu, and despite the fact they wanted to go searching for the prince's body that currently harbored the homunculus, they stayed behind to help with Heinkel. Soon the darkness of the night started to slowly disappear with the early hours of the coming morning. As time went on, it was becoming more apparent that Heinkel would need better medical attention than what they were able to provide. His injuries were too deep to be ignored, but unfortunately Fu's medical training only went so far.

As the morning sun slowly started to rise, Edward and Amelia sat with Heinkel as they changed out his bandages, transmuting gauze from some forgotten tree bark and grass. Amelia could barely stand the sight of his wounds as she wrapped them but looking away didn't help her to make them look better. Heinkel noticed her grimacing expression as she tended to him, unaware of the storm of memories flying in her head about that one night with General Hughes where she felt the most helpless she had ever been in her life, "Sorry, I know this can't be an easy job."

"What?" Amelia looked up at him, broken out of her reverie of dark memories of Hughes's death.

"Tending to an old man's injuries like this," Heinkel specified, and Amelia shook her head.

"No, that's not it," She said as she finished him off, "Blood just… brings up some bad memories." Edward looked over at her curiously as he finished off the bandages on Heinkel's head.

"What memories could you have with blood?" Edward asked.

"Just…" She sighed, standing up, "That night with Hughes…" She looked down at her hands, suddenly feeling as if her fingers were as dirty as they were that night, the sensation of blood covering and moving through her fingers as she failed to give proper CPR to him, spurting up from his body, "I tried to help him and I couldn't stop the bleeding… or get his heart to beat again." She almost felt like she could still see the dried stains of blood on her skin like she did that first night in the hospital. She shook her head out of those thoughts, knowing she had more to focus on than bad memories, "But I'm okay, I'll get over it." She put her hands down at her sides, moving them behind her back as she feigned a smile, "I'm fine."

Edward didn't really look like he believed her, Heinkel stayed neutral about it, more focused on the pain he was feeling as his injuries were bandaged again. "Well, one thing's for sure, we need to get Heinkel to a doctor somehow." He sighed, "I doubt they have one in the slums…"

"We'll figure it out," Amelia said, "If nothing else, Heinkel can take a day to heal and rest while we handle everything."

"I can't say I like feeling so discarded like that," Heinkel muttered.

"You're not being discarded, we're not going to force you to fight with an open wound," Amelia said in return, "Look, just rest, and call for us if something feels off," She looked up at Ed, "You almost done?"

"Almost," Edward said, "I just need to put another layer on. I'll meet you there with Mr. Gorilla."

"His name is Darius, but okay," Amelia said, watching Edward roll his eyes as he continued to work on bandaging Heinkel. She went out to the clearing, crossing it quickly, glancing up at the great earthy dome that Alphonse was still trapped inside of. She had gone to check on him a few times, some to talk to him and catch up, others to just stand there and make sure he was okay. Alphonse had been through quite a great deal since they split up, but she was glad he seemed to be well for the most part. She decided to take one more check as the sky began to brighten, the light of the sun slowly coming in the barely forming shadows. A part of her was afraid that the confinement might change with the rise of the sun, that somehow some small crack or something would shine light inside and Alphonse would be toast. She went up to the dome again, climbing up the steep incline of where the ground split in half for the heavy walls, slowing her breath as she pressed her ear to the seam along one of its sides. She could very faintly hear the sound of metal being hit, it was something everyone had heard at one point or another over the last hour. When she asked Al about it, he said that Selim was just playing with his head and she let it go. There wasn't much they could do, she couldn't even really hear if they were talking, and she knew her fears about the sunlight pouring in were just paranoia by now, but she still worried and listening to the silence made her feel better.

"What happened here?" A voice startled her, getting her attention as she looked at the dome, wondering if it came from inside.

"It's been cleared to the ground, the whole area," A gravelly voice stated in awe, one that was a bit more familiar to her. She poked her head around the dome to see a group of men, including Doctor Marcoh, Scar, Yoki, and the two other chimeras that had traveled with Al and Winry back in Briggs. "And what caused that?" Doctor Marcoh asked again, looking up at the confinement dome, "That's not natural." She slid her way down the side, getting the attention of Scar and a few others from the noise, though someone else beat her to greeting them.

"Hey, is that Jerso and Zampano?" Darius called from behind them, getting their attention.

"What the– Darius?!" Jerso exclaimed, shocked as the gorilla chimera and former comrade-in-arms made his way over to them, putting down the log he had been carrying as he came over to them. Amelia made her way around them on the opposite side, making eye contact with Scar and briefly nodding her head as the others began to talk. "Let me take a guess, Kimblee ordered you to track us down and kill us, now didn't he?"

"Huh?! You're joking, right?" Darius asked, "You can't really still think that we're working for Kimblee?"

"No way, of course not," Zampano sarcastically replied, "And as soon as we start trusting you, you'll kill us."

"I would never do that!" Darius insisted.

"I'm not falling for it, I bet Heinkel's hiding around here somewhere, just waiting for a chance to ambush us!" Jerso argued.

"You idiot!" Darius snapped.

"You're the idiot!" Jerso barked.

"Shut up, swine!" Darius snapped.

"Zampano's the swine!"

Amelia sighed as she could see that the three chimera men seemed completely caught up in their own fight, completely unaware that they were all allies now as she came up to the others. "Doctor Marcoh?" She called out to the man, getting his attention.

"Doctor Marcoh!" Edward called out at the same time, running over from where she had been with him and Heinkel. He glanced between the two teenagers as they came over to him, all the while the chimeras were arguing in the background.

"Oh, Edward, Amelia," He greeted both of them.

"What did you call me?!" Zampano's voice echoed in the early morning.

"What? No, the gorilla said that, not me!" Jerso defended.

Edward glared up at Scar, clear disdain in his face for the man, knowing everything he had done in his past, "So you're still working with Scar." He turned back to Doctor Marcoh, "I'm sorry to have to spring this on you right away, but we really need to get–"

"Argh, shut up!" Darius snapped, taking the log he had put down and tossing it at the two chimeras, missing both of them but he nearly hit Edward who thankfully was able to dodge it before it could smack him in the face. He looked up at them with wide, angry eyes.

"Darius!" Amelia called out in a scolding, shocked tone.

"Hey! Piggy, Gorilla, and Fatty! Shut up and stop fighting!" Edward snarled out.

"You wanna mess with us, shorty?!" All three chimeras demanded at once, the sound of it shocking the three of them, and then turned into an awkward laughter that slowly grew to be more genuine. And just like that, the suspicion and animosity was forgotten between them, "I guess you would have attacked us by now if you were planning on it," Jerso said apologetically.

"Yeah, you don't even have to worry about it," Darius said, starting to chat with the others, "So, how have you guys been, anyway?"

"What?! Now you're suddenly fine?!" Edward growled, furious that they had called him short, though he calmed down as Amelia put her hand on his back.

"Doctor, we have a friend of ours who got injured, we'd really appreciate it if you took a closer look at him," Amelia said, "He has some deep cuts that we think might need stitches."

"Oh," Doctor Marcoh's eyes widened, and he quickly grew more serious, "Let me see him,"

"I'll take you to him," She turned to Edward, "Can you pick up that last log with Darius and get that cleaned up? I think he was just grabbing the last of it."

"Yeah, sure," Edward said, stepping to the side as Amelia began to walk with Doctor Marcoh, Scar and Yoki staying behind to offer their help in whatever task they had. She led the doctor over to Heinkel, who still sat where she had left him, clearly not very comfortable.

"Heinkel," He looked up at the sound of his name, "Doctor Marcoh finally came to meet us," She smiled at him, the older man coming to look at his arm, "He's got a couple of big gashes on his forearm that go up to his shoulder."

"That sounds very serious indeed," Marcoh said, carefully undoing the bandages on his arm, "You're right in that he'll need stitches, this will require a bit of extra work."

"So...?" Amelia looked at him hopefully, watching as he began rummaging through his bag.

"Unfortunately, I don't have anything I would feel comfortable using to help this process," Marcoh said apologetically, "After all of my travels, my medical bag is very low on supplies, and I'm out of sterilizer. I wouldn't be able to stitch him back up without risking infection, which would only make it much worse." He pulled out a small piece of paper, Amelia watching as he drew a quick transmutation circle on it and placed it on the ground, "Here, lean towards your right if you can." He directed, helping Heinkel lean over as he brought him closer to the circle he had drawn, Amelia watching as he brought his hands together over Heinkel's arm, the bandages flying away and her eyes widened as she watched the skin slowly moving back together inside of his wound, lessening the depth of it and seeing how the flesh reshaped itself in the light of the transmutation. "There, that should stop the worst of the bleeding. We'll have to get you properly treated at the hospital once everything is over, but otherwise you should be fine," the doctor said with a smile.

"Thanks, Doctor. I'm feeling better already," Heinkel said as Marcoh went to re-wrap his bandages.

"That was incredible," Amelia said, awed as she knelt down a little closer to where the two men were to look at Heinkel's injuries, "How did you manage to do that?"

"When the body encounters injuries like this, it's already sending out white blood cells and cells to make scar tissue to try and stop the bleeding," Marcoh said as he kept wrapping Heinkel's arm, "Once you learn how our different bodily proteins work together to treat and heal ourselves, we can often help the process along, though there are obviously some limitations. He'll still need proper stitches, but at least this stops the worst of the bleeding." He looked up at Heinkel as he smoothed out the gauze he had re-wrapped, "Just make sure you don't move around too much, and they shouldn't open again."

Heinkel nodded, taking the doctor's advice. Amelia looked over at Doctor Marcoh, "I don't suppose… you could teach me a little bit about that?" Amelia asked.

"Do you have an interest in medical alchemy?" Doctor Marcoh asked, sounding a bit surprised. Amelia nodded.

"I do, especially considering what today is," Amelia said, "Is there anything you could teach me that I might be able to practically use in case we get any particularly bad injuries?" She wanted to be as prepared as possible. Marcoh nodded grimly.

"I'm not sure there's going to be a lot I can tell you, but I'll try to teach what I can." He said. The sound of footsteps caught their attention, the two standing up, though Heinkel remained seated, his nose already telling him of who's coming their way. Hohenheim walked through the brush, coming up to them, "Oh, hello Mr. Hohenheim,"

Hohenheim looked up, smiling as he saw the doctor, "Doctor Marcoh, I'm glad you found us. How was your journey?"

"Lengthy, but hopefully everything will go as planned," Marcoh said with a grin. They could hear more footsteps and could see Darius coming over with the others, leading them over to where Heinkel was.

"Hey, there he is," Jerso said as he saw Heinkel sitting on the ground, "We were just talking about you, Heinkel. Darius told us what happened to you."

"I'm sure he made it sound a lot greater than it actually was," Heinkel said, grunting as he pushed himself to his feet, Amelia reaching to help him up, but he waved her off as he stood up. "It's good to see you guys, too. Where the hell have you been all this time?"

"I managed to convince everyone in the slums not to come out here for a day or so," Hohenheim said, getting the attention of everyone else as the chimeras began to chat with one another, "It should buy us enough time to figure out how to properly destroy Pride."

"Pride?" Marcoh repeated the name in confusion.

"Oh, I guess we should catch you guys up," Amelia said, the groups starting to separate as they all began to talk together.

---

It didn't take long to catch Marcoh and Scar up on what had happened. They were all a little shocked to hear not only did Fuhrer Bradley himself attend the training exercise in the east but that his train was blown up over a ravine. Still, it worked in their favor, at least for now. In their discussion, Fu and Lan Fan had returned from their search of the forest. "Did you find him?" Amelia asked, knowing they were looking for Greed.

"It seems the body of the young lord is somewhere in Central," Fu answered, "Unfortunately, we can't properly sense his chi there. The source of the strange sensation we've felt throughout this nation is in there, and it's blocking our abilities to sense it properly." Amelia nodded, knowing they had to be worried about Ling inside of Greed's body, but there wasn't much anyone else could do for them at this point. They were masters at sensing chi and finding homunculi. If they were lost, they were likely going to be useless in helping them, "Now, what all is to be done about the coming day?"

"We were just going over that," Amelia said, allowing the two ninjas to join the rest of their group to talk.

"The feeling that you're talking about," Scar said, "It's likely the barrier that my brother discovered in his alchemical studies. We have people heading into Central now to find all the points to create a reverse transmutation circle. We'll be borrowing the circle made by the homunculi to finish it out, but thankfully the main points are all located in Central City."

"Yeah, it's real convenient," Edward muttered, "We've managed to figure out that once that circle is activated, it'll be easiest for us to really attack him and let loose. The problem is getting Scar into the middle of the circle to perform it."

"How is that a problem?" Fu asked.

"Scar is currently a wanted criminal for mass murder," Amelia explained, "Amestrian soldiers likely won't just let him wander into the middle of town, especially considering that the middle of the circle is located right in the middle of Central Headquarters." She looked over at Ed, "That's why we'll be using a tunnel that Alphonse found for us to head underground. We should be able to move through there not only to find Father's lair, but it should lead us straight to the center of the circle itself."

"Another issue is going to be Colonel Mustang," Edward said, "He'll be creating a coup d'état at the same time we're doing this. We need to make sure everyone keeps their attention on him and not us, so we'll have to avoid him while he and the others create that insurrection." Fu nodded as he took in everything they were saying, "Aside from that, the main issue will be actually fighting this guy. He's one of the more powerful alchemists I've ever seen."

"But destroying the leather bag he's in should be enough to get rid of him," Hohenheim said, "Once that's taken out of the picture, he should be rendered completely helpless. He won't be able to survive without the skin he's made to look like me."

"I see," Fu said, "And just how many of our enemies will we be facing in Central?"

"Well, Lust is dead, Envy's gone, Gluttony's dead, Wrath was on a train that blew up over a ravine in the east, Pride is contained, so…" Amelia had to pause as she did a mental list of the homunculi they knew of, "That just leaves… Sloth?"

"Yeah, he'll be guarding Father in Central most likely," Edward said, "I doubt he'd just leave himself completely alone in a fight."

"He certainly believes he's powerful enough that he could," Hohenheim added, "I'm sure he'll put Sloth to work somewhere he believes won't need him or is somehow beneath him. Getting him alone shouldn't be too much of an issue, but it's destroying that leather bag that will be the challenge."

"And on top of an insurrection happening at the same time, we'll really need to watch our step," Amelia said, a little concerned.

"Perhaps some reconnaissance is necessary?" Fu suggested, getting their attention, "Lan Fan and I have been hiding out in Central for some time now, we know how to blend in with the general population. I should be able to keep you updated on the actions of this Colonel Mustang and what areas you'll need to avoid as you move through the city."

"I guess that's true…" Amelia said.

"But what if someone sees you?" Edward asked.

"I believe the only one of these enemies that would be able to recognize me is currently confined in that forest," Fu said, pointing his thumb to the dome that held Pride and Alphonse, "Otherwise, there are no homunculi that are aware of who I am or what I look like. Pride and Greed are the only two whose faces I know of, and I imagine that information is the same to them. I'm sure I can find the others, given time."

Edward couldn't deny that Fu would be the perfect one among them, and though he was making these points, he couldn't help but feel like there was something more to what he wanted from this. At the very least he could update them on what was happening and if Sloth had somehow made it out to where he could hurt people again, "Alright, fair enough. We can send you out there," He looked over at the others, "And Doctor Marcoh, you and Yoki will be staying here with Heinkel, right?" The doctor nodded, with Yoki more fervently nodding in agreement behind him. The man had been very silent for most of this talk, but it was clear he didn't want to take part in any of the fighting. They couldn't really see much reason for him to join them, either. Scar was needed for his alchemical ability, and Doctor Marcoh would be able to better monitor and help Heinkel as his condition would slowly, hopefully, improve. Everyone knew what they were meant to do, Amelia and Edward would help Scar find his way to the center of Central so that he could activate the reverse transmutation circle to give them the upper hand on Father. That transmutation would likely prevent that alchemy barrier he had used to stop them from transmuting before, so it was damn-near essential to any kind of victory to take that away from him.

With Edward's leave, Fu made his way off as the other chimera got up from their talk around the fire, having caught up and made friends with one another again. "Where'd the old guy head off to?" Darius asked.

"He's gonna do some recon in Central," Edward answered as he and Jerso came up to him.

"By himself?"

"Yeah, he pointed out that he's the only one who's kept his identity hidden, so it'll be easier for him to infiltrate the city." Edward explained, he looked off into the distance, Fu already long gone by the time he turned to face that way, "He also said that he'd do his best to update us on Colonel Mustang's actions, but I'm kinda getting the feeling that he's mostly concerned about Ling."

"Especially after Greed's disappearance last night," Amelia said, "I'm a little worried too if I'm being honest."

"Sure, that makes sense." Darius agreed.

"So you're all finished discussing things with Scar and the others?" Jerso asked.

"That's right," Edward confirmed, glancing over at Scar who looked off in the distance to the rising sun that still had yet to make its appearance over the horizon, but the sky was brightening quickly, "We've figured out our strategy."

"That so? It's almost time, huh?" Darius asked, nervousness showing in the undertone of his voice, but he didn't say anything to say he was put off by it. He still intended to stick around and help as much as he could.

"Almost," Amelia sighed. They had all been dreading this day for weeks now, and it was nearly upon them once the sun came up and the day began. It was a little nerve-wracking, and she couldn't help but be reminded of her very first piano recital as a child, she had been so afraid to go out and perform in front of all of those people. That sense of impending dread coupled with her anxious need to hurry and get it over with was something she had grown used to when it came to piano performances. Not so much in battles where they would all be risking their lives. Edward started to walk towards the clearing, getting her attention, "Where are you going?"

"I left my coat back there, I'm just gonna go grab it." He said, and she went to follow with him, Darius and Jerso walking with the teenagers as they went into the clearing again. She could easily make out Ed's red coat on the ground as they walked towards it, having been left there after their work. He had been so thrilled when he had found it in the night while they were working on cleaning everything up. He had lost sight of it when he blinded Pride and themselves.

"Are you nervous?" Jerso asked Amelia, who looked back up at him.

"Wouldn't you be?" She asked with a wry smile, she looked back at Edward who kept walking, picking up his coat and starting to dust it off of the dirt that had clung to it from its time on the ground, "We're about to go into a huge battle to save the country, and we're down an Elric brother." She said, looking up at the dome in front of them.

"Your younger brother's sure got some serious guts," Jerso said to Edward as he looked up at it.

"Trapped in total darkness with that monster? I think that I'd lose my mind if I were in his place," Darius agreed, impressed with Alphonse's courage to stay in there for an entire day with Pride.

"Yeah… Al's doing everything possible to keep us safe," Edward said, and Amelia could hear that tone of disappointment in himself, and she knew he had to be beating himself up for not seeing another way to deal with Pride in their fight so he could avoid this outcome with Alphonse, but he didn't seem to say anything towards changing his little brother's plans. "The rest of it…" he looked down at his coat, "Well that's up to us." He shook out his coat one last time before he donned it. Once it was secure on his shoulders, Amelia looked over at him, feeling like she was looking at a new Edward. It had been weeks since she had seen him in that coat, and as much as she told him it was gaudy and flashy and loud, as he stood there in front of her, Flamel cross painted clearly on his back in black, she couldn't deny that it suited him well. As the sun continued to rise, they all watched as that light peeked over the trees, announcing the beginning of the long day ahead of them. Amelia squinted into the bright light, not expecting to have her first-ever sunrise on such a critical day, but she stayed beside Edward to enjoy the sight nonetheless for what might be their very last chance to view the sun rising at all. She quietly reached to take Edward's flesh hand, feeling his fingers tightly wrapping around her palm in solidarity. They knew what the other was feeling, they knew they needed each other, and they would be together through everything that would come their way.

The Promised Day had arrived.