Title: A Fangirl's Dream
Summary: With an anime loving best friend, Ivy has heard plenty about whatever show of the week they're into. But when she manages to cross the gate during an attempt to take a shortcut home, she finds herself in a frightening position. The main character in an Another World fanfiction trope; and with reluctance, she finds herself teaming up with the main characters to get back home.
Pen Name: FanfictionIsMySideHustle

Ivy quickly found herself back in Mr. Lee's General Store the next day.

"Yo, Mr. Lee!"

The man smiled pleasantly surprised, "Already looking to buy something for Pinako again?"

Ivy shook her head, eyes already skimming to wear the book section was. "Just getting some fresh air." The alchemy book was still there. I didn't actually get to finish reading you yesterday. "And some window shopping. Never been to Resembool before." She made a nonchalant stroll to them as Mr. Lee continued on from his place near the register.

"Ah. Are you planning on staying long?" He didn't sound suspicious. Ivy settled with it being that small town hospitality. "Resembool's usually not the first on anyone's list of places to visit."

Ivy looked over the table of contents again, hoping for some kind of clue. "Hmm, dunno. Maybe a little while. I think Winry's trying to make me stay. I woke up to a book on automail on my pillow this morning."

Introduction by Tycho Brahe
Preface
One: The Law of Conservation of Mass
Two: The Law of Natural Providence
Three: The Three Phases of Alchemical Transmutation: Analysis, Deconstruction, Reconstruction
Four: Forbidden Alchemy
Five: Alchemy and Modern Amestris
Afterward

Chapter four. Ivy decided, absently hearing Mr. Lee laughing at her comment. She'd seen enough movies to know that weird and supernatural things were always found during the forbidden chapter about things you weren't supposed to do. Or during a quick offbrand google search. Ugh why, couldn't this universe take place in a time with computers? I guess that would be too easy.

"... Ivy?"

"Er, yeah?" Ivy called back out. "Sorry, I was looking at these books you had. Can you repeat that?"

"Oh, sorry about that!" There was a bit of shuffling in the front and a quiet 'darn machine, needs polishing'. "I said that Winry's a stubborn one, just like her grandmother. She's a sweet girl. I'm glad she has a new friend, she's been working like a bee since Edward and Alphonse left the town. Did she tell you about them? Ed's a famous alchemist now!"

Oh trust me, I know. "Not really, I never really got into alchemy. But I think there are some pictures of two boys in their house, so I think I know who you're talking about."

Mr. Lee sighed, sounding distant. "The young ones grow up fast."

Ivy bit the inside of her cheek and when she heard nothing but the sound of Mr. Lee working quietly, she gave a mental sigh of her own. Mr. Lee was nice, but she needed to do her research right now. Ivy sat on the floor, flipping the pages until she landed on the page she was looking for.

Forbidden Alchemy

Alchemists to the ordinary persons shall seem like unrestricted individuals, able to will the powers of creation and destruction with seeming ease. However, as discussed before alchemy isn't an art without its rules and principles. The basis of alchemy, Equivalent Exchange, was discussed thoroughly in Chapters One and Two. It will always remain true that an alchemist can only create something made of the same materials. That 'rule', however, can often be misconstrued by beginning alchemists. Equivalent Exchange is not just a principle but a limitation of all alchemists.

Though through trial and error, scientists have come to agreements as to what is and isn't considered law breaking when it comes to alchemy.

The most common infraction of amateur alchemists is making gold. Many believe alchemy is a practice they can use to achieve great wealth and prominence. On the contrary, that is one of the first laws of alchemy. One may not make themselves wealth through means of alchemy. And now there are even administrations in place to verify the legitimacy of the gold they receive and see if it had been made through alchemical purposes.

Another-

Ivy turned the page. Okay, okay, no gold can be made through alchemy. Kind of a waste. She thought as she looked over the next page, seeing something about how it was illegal for alchemists to transmute false medals and awards. (Upon further thinking, Ivy did concede that it would be kind of a dick move if every alchemist and their mom suddenly started getting rich because they decided to make themselves some quick gold.)

Not about a gate. Not about a gate. Not about a- Ivy set down the page she she was about to turn, pausing to read the bold lettering she barely managed to notice.

Above all else, the utmost law that must be followed by alchemists is never attempting Human Transmutation. The act of using alchemy in any regards to human life. This may include human experimentation as well as attempting to raise the dead or create new life.

A being of myth, the Homunculus-

Ivy felt the urge to twist her foot around on the floorboard and bounced her leg instead. She knew Edward's face well enough. Eyes and hair both a matching gold color with a red cloak. I wonder if the military found out about his trying to bring his mom back to life and that's why he works for them. Ivy leaned her head back, trying to remember if Akasha said anything about. Nothing came to mind. Maybe some alchemy dude took their bodies and is making them pay off their debt like a weird loan collector? And he's in the military too? Or…. Ivy laid her face in her palm, exasperated. She should have just watched the show when Akasha was obsession over it.

She flipped forward a couple of pages before trying to check the index. Which the book didn't have.

"Hey, Mr. Lee? You don't happen to have any more books about alchemy do you?" She stood up, patting off rear of dust particles. "I have a friend I think might wanna read more on it since she's an alchemy fanatic."

"Hmmm no. That's the only one we have." Ivy's lips contorted into a frown. It really never is that easy. "We usually get our books imported from other cities via catalog if you'd like to check. This town isn't really one for alchemy. Those two boys I mentioned were really our only exceptions."

Ivy placed the book on the shelf. "And this is a shot in the dark, but do you have any books on fancy gates?"

"Gates?"

"Yeah."

There was a pause and Ivy walked around the corner to see the man in deep thought, hand on his chin. "Well what kind of gate do you mean? Like brick laying or architecture? I think we might have a book on architecture in the catalog if you'd like to look?" The man bent walked from behind his desk to where a large binder sat atop a pile of crates. "I just gotta new one so there's probably something in here."

Ivy's leg bounced. "It's cool, Mr. Lee."

Mr. Lee stopped, blue eyes twinkling in surprise. "Really?"

Ivy's felt her right foot teetering forward to her tiptoes, bouncing a bit. "I feel like Winry might think I'm cheating on her latest attempt to bring to me to the dark side if I bring a book on architecture back." She felt a lump in her throat hoping that it'd make the man laugh off her questions.

"Well let me know if you ever change your mind." Was his reply, closing his catalog and walking back to the register. "I'm always looking to get more loyal buyers and if we need to order things on the catalog to get a new regular, I'll order new things on the catalog to get a new regular!"

Ivy snorted. "I'll let you know when I'm ready to make a purchase." With a wave, she bid the man farewell. Another day of nothing and now I'm going on day eight. She clenched a hand into a fist. Maybe because the book is just for beginners? Ivy bit her tongue as she felt a sinking feeling of dead as she she immediately shook her head to herself. Beginner's guide or not, a book talking about the basics would talk about something like a gate that lead to different dimensions.

The only reason that book wouldn't have something like that in it was because her gate thing didn't exist.

Or at least, it's something the person who wrote that book doesn't know about.

Great.

The walk to the Rockbell's was solemn, even as she walked through the door and spotted her baby. "Hey Den." The black-and-white dog padded over excitedly, nuzzling her leg. Ivy forced a smile. "Thanks for trying to cheer me up. Did you get stuck in the world of the forgotten too?" There was no Rockbell to be found in the living room or kitchen. Probably working. "Come on, girl."

The last time she checked, both Winry and Pinako were downstairs today since the workshop upstairs was a bit too crowded for the amount of limbs they needed to make.

"Hey, I'm back." She opened the door and peered in.

"Hey welcome back." Winry smiled, looking up from her latest project.

"If you wanna leave the door opened, make sure to put something Den can't get across." Pinako warned, not looking up. "We don't want Den to eat something she shouldn't. She gave us quite the panic the last time it happened." Pinako pointed her screwdriver to an open toolbox. "She ate a bolt and we almost turned the entire house upside down."

Ivy winced to express her discomfort at the idea. "Ouch. Sorry, girl, you gotta stay out." She made quick work of sliding a couple boxes in front of the space. "And don't give me that look, you. This is for your own good." Den's pout stayed and Ivy almost felt her heart sway, but she turned around and made her way to a closed crate and sat on it. "I feel like a monster."

"You'll get used to it soon enough." Pinako chuckled. "Better a pouting mutt than a sick one."

"True." Ivy leaned against the wall. "How's work?"

"Ten more limbs to go." Pinako answered. "We should be done by the beginning of next week if we pull a couple all nighters."

Ivy hummed. It was hard imagining doing any kind of all nighter that wasn't for homework. "Do you ever get orders like this for automail too? Or just the traditional stuff?"

Pinako shook her head, "Only traditional. Automail delivery is best handled by those fanatics in Rush Valley."

Ivy looked over in Winry's direction when she heard mumbling from her desk. "Lucky fanatics." Her cheeks puffed out. Her Rush Valley obsession, according to Pinako, manifested at a young age. They'd been ordering catalogs for her to look at the most recent models and trends among engineers ever since. "They have the best access to good tools t- oh, did you start reading the book I lent you yet?"

"Er.." Blue eyes glittered like the eyes of a hawk. "Not yet? I went on my jog, showered, then left out again this morning. I didn't get to start yet. But I will soon!" At least to avoid another pair of sad puppy eyes glaring back at her. "Automail does seem pretty interesting and cool."

Pinako sounded like she was smiling. "Flattery will only get you a new toolkit on your pillow next time."

"I-I wasn't going to go that far!" Winry stammered and Ivy chuckled. "I want her to become an engineer because she wants to! I was just… helping her see the options. It isn't like Ed and Al were interested in automail!" The younger Rockbell crossed her arms. "It was always alchemy this and alchemy that with them and I always felt left out!"

Ivy held back another snort. Winry was just the automail version of Akasha.

"These Ed and Al guys sound like quite the unique pair of brothers."

"That's one way to put it." Pinako stood up, setting her newly finished prosthetic in a crate with the other completed works and grabbed a new framing base. "They were always giving us a handful. Now they're off adventuring around the country." She pointed over at a cork board covered in photographs.

The entire thing was like a collage.

Ivy cocked her head to the side, eyes settling on one of Edward sitting on the couch. Fork in his mouth, right arm missing. "Traveling, huh?" Another picture she saw was a picture of Alphonse feeding Den a small fish. There was even a picture of the two of them as toddlers, a woman with brown hair and green eyes holding Alphonse. Their mother. The person holding Edward had their face obscured.

"Has been since he was 12."

"Do you know where they are now?" They were master alchemists after all. "I've always wanted to travel around too. I'm kinda jealous." I sound so nonchalant, I scare myself. Ivy's eyes drifted over to a photo of Winry with her hair cut to her chin as she wore a pink dress with daisies on it, holding Den close to her chest. Her left leg was all fur.

"That's the problem with these boys." Pinako sighed. "They're about as good as calling to check in as Den is about not trying to sneak off with food."

"Ah." Ivy fell silent, her next question of asking how often they visited falling to the wayside. "I'm sure they'll call eventually. Or maybe even visit." And if they did, maybe they'd come with books or something about this gate.

I guess I just have to wait and see.

One Month Later...

Oh my fucking god these guys are never coming!

Ivy plastered her forehead onto the kitchen table.

It had been a month since she had unwittingly arrived to the town of Resembool and despite the wait, the Elrics still had yet to grace everyone with their presence. Lack of money kept her in Resembool and lack of money made her reconsider her inability to do alchemy and just say the fuck the law. But knowing my luck, I'd just end up getting arrested.

Ivy wondered if that action would at least get her somewhere than remaining in Resembool. No matter how pleasant it was living in the countryside with the Rockbells, time and time again it was shown that her efforts in waiting it out and hoping something would happen wasn't going to pay off.

Ivy straightened her back out, looking out the window at the green hills she had grown accustomed to seeing instead of the familiar sights of cement roads and tall buildings being passed by multiple Toyotas. It was still hard to believe that she in a fictional setting.

Knock knock!

"I'll get it!" Ivy called out, already on her feet. She needed something to do. "Hello? This is the Rockbell Automail shop. Are you here for a maintenance check?" She smiled expectantly at the man on the porch. He looked to be in his 30's in a top hat and long brown leather coat. More often than not, when someone knocked here, they were actual clients. Other times, it was someone who wanted help trying to get help something running.

The man smiled, eyebrows raised. "I didn't know that Dr. Rockbell had an apprentice." He jolted a little, then quickly added: "Oh, I'm here for a maintenance check. I've been putting it off for a while now but my wife finally told me to get my butt up here."

Ivy chuckled. "I haven't even been able to start making my own automail so I wouldn't necessarily say I'm an apprentice. I just help out. Winry kinda got me roped into it." Because I really did wake up to an old tool box on my pillow. Much to the blonde's obvious delight, Ivy had begun learning a little about the upkeep of traditional prosthetics though she mostly resigned herself to passing tools and fiddling with a couple of old things in the house. As it turned out, the science of automail was an extensive deep dive that required lots of studying."Come inside, I'll let Pinako know you're here."

"No need. I was already expecting him." Pinako's said matter-of-factly from behind Ivy and the client. "It's about time you got up here. I was starting to think I was going to have to go into town myself. How's the leg?"

"A little loose." The man admitted. "I was hoping to get it tightened. My wife wants a full look-over though."

"Of course." Pinako gestured to him to come to the workshop. "Ivy, are you coming to watch?"

"Sure. I think Winry doesn't need me to help with anything." The blonde was upstairs doing the engineer's version of studying and even if she was enthusiastic as could be when it came to Ivy's own learning, Ivy still left the girl to her devices to work in peace. "Did you want me to do anything?"

"I just want you to see a little more on the basics of maintenance and upkeep." She pointed at the man's leg. "His is traditional, so it's best to get practice here than jump into maintenance of automail. You don't mind if she gets the chance to fiddle do you?"

"Not at all! I'm Erick."

"Ivy."

Erick sat on the stool and rolling up his pants leg to reveal his prosthetic. His stump ended at the knee and the belt strap wrapped around the artificial calf and ankle to up his stump, keeping the thing tied together to the pylon pole. It had an official name, it turned out. Ivy already making quick work opening the toolbox. Digging through this thing was becoming as routine as Ivy's morning jogs. "What tools are you gonna need?"

"The socket wrench and adjustable." Pinako knelt down, observing the damage. "Is it the ankle joint that's loose?"

Erick nodded, "The thing's been knocking into the staircase awkwardly and I keep nearly falling. It's been stressful."

"Hmmm." Pinako's sharp eyes looked to Ivy. "Any idea as to what you think the problem might be?"

"Um…" Ivy's mind scrambled for an answer. Pinako was that teacher. The one who prompted you until you eventually stumbled onto the answer for yourself. "Well the first thing that comes to mind is that there's a loose screw where the rest of the prosthetic connects to the foot so tightening them altogether should do the trick."

"And what might have made the screw come loose?"

"A lot of activity? Or maybe rusting?"

"And what would you suggest-"

It felt like years had passed until Pinako had actually went forward with removing Erick's prosthetic and getting a closer look at it. Turns out, it was a bolt not a screw (Winry had drilled in the differences between the two fasteners a while ago) and it had been jutting out from its original placement.

"We'll still be looking over the entirety of the prosthetic altogether, of course and see if there's anything that needs to be replaced to help the overall limb work smoother." Pinako had said.

"In this case, it's better to just better to replace the entire foot piece since the casting of it is starting to get grimy and not even cleaning it is returning it to it's old color."

"The pylon is simple, made with light metals-"

"I suggest-"

"Wow, that feels great!" Erick exclaimed at last when his leg was reattached to the rest of his body. Ivy sighed, relieved. "I knew I could count on you, Dr. Rockbell. You did great too, Ivy. I could barely understand anything being said."

Trust me I can hardly believe I was able to either. "I've got a great teacher."

"Spoken like a true apprentice, after all."

"Don't say that in front of her granddaughter." Ivy chuckled, arching her back. "She's already wrapped me in deep and if she hears the 'A' word there's no going back." Winry had been excitedly shoving all of her old tools and notes down Ivy's throat. Not that Ivy could read them, Winry had the chicken scratch writing of a doctor. And I thought Akasha's writing sucked.

"Maybe next time she could help do work on an automail prosthetic once she's more skilled." Pinako added.

Ivy laughed and shook her head, "Guys, I said not to say anything or she'd hear you." She took off her gloves, borrowed from the aforementioned mechanic.

"Checking on your friend?"

"Someone's gotta make sure she isn't drowning herself in work again." Ivy replied. Winry would do all nighters even if she hadn't been required to and Ivy spent more than enough nights nagging at her to go asleep. "She's the worst."

Pinako smiled to herself, "Reminds me of me and my husband when we were young. He'd work for hours until I practically dragged him back to bed."

Ivy coughed, "Gonna go bother her now." As she left, she could hear Pinako turning her sights on Erick. 'Speaking of automail, have you considered upgrading?' Erick's nervous laughter faded away as Ivy made her way upstairs to the workshop.

Wires were strewn on the workbench an incomplete pair of automail limbs, an arm and leg. Winry had mentioned something earlier about going through the old models they had and figuring out ways to make them work better. The girl herself was fiddling with the drill press. "Winry, darling, your knight in nagging armor approaches to tell you-"

"I'll eat in a minute." Winry rebuffed, not even looking Ivy's way.

"More like now." Ivy scoffed, hands on her hips. This was too regular an occurrence. "I just finished helping Pinako and I know you didn't eat breakfast." Leftovers from last night and Winry's plate untouched in the fridge. "So up up up."

That made Winry turn around, eyes wide with curiosity. "How'd the maintenance check go?"

"I swear you're worse than Akasha- Winry, lunch!"

"Tell me about the maintenance check!" Winry pouted, hands clasped together and tip toeing closer. "I wanna know how your training is going since you're Granny's appren -"

Pinako's voice rose above Winry's begging, "Winry! Winry! Our regulars are here!" Winry's jaw slacked a bit, as if she were processing what her grandmother had just said. "Winry!"

Ivy looked over her shoulder. "Regulars?"

"It's them!" Ivy looked back at Winry, curious. "Them, Ivy!"

Ivy blinked in realization. Them.

Winry bolted out the door and felt her knees go weak from the surprise. Those assholes are finally here.

She rushed downstairs despite telling herself to play it cool. The noise outside grew louder, a boy shrieking at the top of his lungs. "Winry, you jerk! You coulda killed me!"

"Welcome back!" Came Winry's jovial reply.

Ivy stepped onto the porch, eyes wide as she saw the scene in front of her. Some sparkling giant with a mustache, a suit of armor in a crate, and the love of Akasha's fangirling life sitting angrily criss crossed on the floor.

….

This is so meta.

Author's Note

And here's Updated Chapter 4. This and chapter 3 feel like two of my more shorter chapters somehow but maybe it's just me (nah this definitely feels a lot shorter than the other chapters.) Looking over this chapter, I'm reminded of the fact that I didn't really want to do the timeskip at first. I wanted to build up to the arrival of the Elrics but considering the importance of Ivy and Winry's relationship in this story, I didn't want to have it be a week and the brothers show up and have an emotional leaving the Rockbells that took Ivy in like family. But at the same time the Elrics are an important part of the story, I mean, they're even mentioned in the summary of the story! So even if it might have been nice, I didn't want to slowly write chapter after chapter of Ivy's time in Resembool since not much really happens aside from her learning more about automail. But don't worry, automail gets mentioned in more detail in the story.

If there's one thing I will spoil about AFG and SA, Akasha's focus has been and always will be alchemy though her physical abilities are weak. Ivy, on the other hand, has much better physical capabilities but her interests lead her to the biomechanics of engineering. Studying alchemy and various types of engineering associated with automail has been really fun to use in the story!

If anyone is still reading this, I hope you like this chapter's fixing.