Had a long day behind me, I hope this chapter didn't turn as crappy as I think it did, I didn't really feel in the mood I guess :/

Uh, well, I didn't really want to announce it grandly or anything but um, yeah so tomorrow is my birthday (the 17 th of June) and I MAY not update, just so you guys know! I may update "Letters from War" and such today though.

ANSWERS TO REVIEWS:

GrumpyCatWriter101: Hey there, I just wanted to say thank you for standing up for me like that, rarely experienced it till now really :) Honestly, your review really touched me and I really, deeply appreciate the effort and time you put into it, but I don't want readers to get into conflicts because of my stories. I'm not sure why HackerSlash behaves the way they do, but I hope my stories haven't possibly offended them one way or another. It's not the first time I get hater comments and I try not to let that influence me as much. Sometimes it's hard, other times it's fine. But really, I feel a bit better reading your review and I want to really thank you again :) The act of committing suicide itself, well, I would never do that, it may sound offending, but I think it's cowardly. Sure, people are sometimes driven to the brink of insanity in their life and don't know a way out, I understand that, but...just ending your life because of it? People would miss you, friends, family, some people you may not even know but still inspired and I think it would be worse than what you yourself could inflict upon yourself that way. Killing yourself to end your problems isn't gonna end somebody else's and I don't think I could die that way knowing that, knowing that I let other people I care about and would never hurt, to bring them down so much just because I'm desperate in a moment of my life. (smiles) Nah, I would scold myself over and over again if I even thought about such things, that's why I try to stay as optimistic as possible, you know? People are like mirrors, when you smile, they smile too. :) I know it's not always the case, but I'd like to think it could be.

Alright, enough sentimental ranting on my part ^^ phew, anyway, here's another chapter ready to be read! Enjoy dear readers! :)

NOTE: This is a modernish AU but with elements included of the FMA:B world (automail, alchemy, Lan Fan is still Ling's bodyguard but works in an office too...etc.)

Um...Santa?

"Dear Santa, for Christmas, I would like a stripper, thanks!"

A long, drawn out groan of frustration and mortification echoed in the empty room as Lena leaned back in her comfy couch and sat with a pulsing headache, a parched throat and a still fuzzy mind in her humble home.

She remembered drinking too much with the girls last night...hell they've gotten drunk off their asses. Even the ever correct Riza got drunk, heavily might one add. She shook her head but stopped and grabbed it with her hands the moment she realized it caused her dizziness to worsen.

"Aw...damn..." she whined, blindly reached for the bottle of water mixed with aspirin she mixed just this early morning to get rid of her headache. Usually, she was a bit more responsible and didn't need stupid alcohol in her system to have a good time with her friends, but last night, it had been a horrible day for them all.

Lena had encountered a grabby pervert in her self-defense course and had flipped when he kept being persistent, when she punched him for good measure, her superior asked her to 'cool off for the rest of the day'. She had stormed angrily out of the gym, not interested in hearing her colleague defend her by saying it wasn't her fault and her boss countering that she hadn't seen the ordeal and couldn't do much except for send the offender away and Lena home to 'cool down'.

Tch...

Mei and Lan Fan had had a lot of work to do yesterday, bone breaking overtime hours nobody got paid for fairly, the usual.

Riza had a straining battle with paperwork after Roy neglected his desk duties, again, and she had been the one to fix his mistakes. Of course. Lena sighed, shaking her head, she still asked herself how she didn't shoot him somewhere where it hurt every time he pulled stunts like these.

Winry had a very busy day with her automail shop and dealing with a very cranky Edward, for whatever reason. Winry had mentioned something about constantly shadowing her, following her around like a hawk, nagging her at work, getting disapproving looks from her customers and of course starting screaming matches with granny Pinako over their respective heights, despite Ed now being taller than Winry.

Not to mention, Greed or Ling hadn't shown in quite a while. She suspected they were up to no good as usual, but still...not even a phone call...Greed hadn't come home since two days ago and when she phoned Lan Fan to find out where her boyfriend ran off to, the only explanation she offered was that they may have run off together.

Ha!

If Lena wasn't so sure Greed loved her to bits, she would actually believe it. Those two were like a married couple at times, bickering like bloodthirsty hyenas one second and hugging and cuddling the next...well mostly on Ling's part, Greed was a bit more of a tsundere that way.

She sighed and her eyes roamed over the surprisingly neat handwriting she recognized as her own on the small square piece of paper, she snorted in disbelief, "...Jeez...just how drunk was I? A stripper? Couldn't I have been a bit more imaginative?" she asked herself aloud, letting her head fall back to hit the soft cushion of her couch, "Hmm...doesn't sound all that bad actually," she shrugged, heavy lidded eyes closing slowly as she drifted off to sleep, curling into a ball and forgetting the world for another precious few hours.

"Dear Santa, for Christmas, I would like a new set of wrenches and automail oil,"

Winry stared at the letter, transfixed, before lifting her trusty wrench in the air and asking aloud, "...A new set of wrenches?" she shook her head vigorously, "Why would I want that? I already have the best one on the market!" she clutched the tool closer to her as if showering it with her affections before huffing and leaning forward to rest her forehead against the kitchen table.

"Never again..." Winry sighed long and hard, feeling the effects of last night's alcohol beginning to take its toll on her. She usually never if rarely ever drank, she was a lightweight or somewhere in the middle actually. Yesterday, she just had to let loose. Ed had scared away half of her customers yesterday, what has gotten into him, she couldn't figure out.

The man had been restless yesterday, nagging her about every little thing and when Alphonse had taken him away for a sparring match, she relished the peace and quiet that took over the busy house.

Until the little demon came back.

Not so little anymore, he was still a demon spawned from hell when he wanted to be and Winry definitely didn't need that attitude when she was repairing automail or working on her customer's limbs and reconnecting their nerves. A very painful process, one Edward had almost disturbed but with a well aimed throw of her wrench, it had prevented any further disaster.

All in all, she had been exhausted. Alphonse had been such a kind and supportive soul, offering her cool drinks when she looked parched and chiding her to taking breaks in between busy work hours, occupying her customers while they waited for their turn so time went by faster for them.

That stupid buffoon of a brother of his had been the complete opposite, as nature dictated.

Throwing temper tantrums like his sixteen year old self, daring to disturb her concentration while she measured a new automail limb for one of her customers, asking her what this and that was and what the whole point of it was.

Ugh.

It was, surprisingly, granny who stopped her from committing homicide by throwing Edward out of the house, unfortunately with Alphonse and ordering them to spar or go for a walk, anything to cool that thick head of his.

It had worked, for the most part. When they returned, Edward seemed a bit more pacified but that did nothing to deter him from annoying her.

Sometimes, he would do it unconsciously. Just by being near her, when she would be able to smell the scent of his cologne after shaving or the simple smell of him, the fresh air outside, a bit of metal and the shampoo he uses would break her concentration in a split second. He wasn't aware of it of course, otherwise she would have buried herself long ago in her backyard were that the case, but she still hated him for it.

Or the shiver that would involuntarily run down her spine when she heard his low voice talking to her just beside her ear, saying words she often overheard because of her traitorous mind focusing more on how his voice sounded like than the words in them.

And here she was sitting at the kitchen table with a wrench in one hand and a blasted letter in the other that said her Christmas order of automail oil and wrenches to Santa.

Life couldn't get any better than this.

"Dear Santa, I would like Alphonse-sama to notice me!"

With a dazed giggled, Mei slumped forward in her bean bag, surrounded by candy wrappers and a equally dazed panda sprawled on a smaller, miniature sized bean bag beside her larger one.

Well...at least she didn't prank call people while drunk, as did certain other people.

She shook her head, clutching the soft material of her bean bag closer as she groaned and whined into it, feeling the headache stubbornly refusing to leave her.

"...Never...never...never...never again...ouch..." Mei whined, both hands moving to her head to steady her field of vision as she refocused back on the stupid, drunk letter.

What did she even mean with notice? He was noticing her! They were friends for Xing's sake!

Mei groaned, moving a hand over her eyes and blindly reaching for the curtains to pull them to the side and bathe the room in darkness as she made a split second decision to sleep over the words she wrote in her drunken haze last night.

She didn't think it was anything good.

"Dear Santa, for Christmas, I want Mr. Santa to seduce me,"

Staring suspiciously at the wrinkled piece of paper on her coffee table, Riza slowly sipped her coffee, feeling the biting headache that had split her skull apart subsiding considerably thanks to the warm beverage in her hand.

Well...the handwriting definitely wasn't hers...in fact, it looked a bit like Lena's...

She groaned, rubbing at the sides of her forehead as she tried making sense of the situation.

Last night, she got drunk with her friends. Check.

They drank a bit too much. Check.

They made drunken prank calls to people she couldn't remember at the moment. Check.

They dressed up Xiao Mei in a frilly, pink outfit and cheered when the little panda actually danced. Check.

Riza groaned, running a hand through her hair at all the stupid and irresponsible things she let herself indulge in last night.

She could just hope the people they had prank called weren't any she knew.

Why did life hate her so?

A message not even two minutes after she had thought that arrived.

Jean Havoc, 9:44 a.m.:

"Uh, hey Riza, you know I'm not sure if you're in the condition to read this but care to explain why I got several calls yesterday from some drunk women telling me to 'show those big guns' and explain what else I'm smoking apart from my cigarettes? What does that even mean? .

A mortified groan later and Riza covered her face with her hands.

Another beep, another message.

Kain Fuery, 9:48 a.m.:

"Hello ,Lieutenant! Um, I'm sorry to bother you so early on your day off but...I've received strange calls yesterday...I'm not sure but I think one of them was Lena and you...or all of them..err...I received disturbing orders to write a full report on 'why geeks are cute' and to change my name into 'Fuery the Puppy'."

By the time Riza finished reading it there was a big lump on her bed, covered by a blanket as another beep rang through the air and Riza froze.

Heymans Breda, 10:05 a.m.:

"...What in the world have you been smoking , Lieutenant?"

The lump shifted.

"Dear Santa, I would like...for my love interest to acknowledge me as more than just his bodyguard...and possibly romance me...thank you,"

Lan Fan's tea lay forgotten on her table as she stared in horror at the letter she wrote last night, mind clouded with the influence of alcohol and sake.

Face flushing with embarrassment and shame, Lan Fan grabbed her blanket and covered her head, shaking it vigorously in disbelief at her own stupidity.

A warrior such as her, trained in the art of stealth and martial arts...

...let's her judgment become clouded by alcohol and write a childish letter to someone she didn't even believe in?

She groaned, miserably sipping her green tea as her body felt weak from consuming so much alcohol.

She wasn't so sure if it was the amount that made her weak or simply the fact that she even drank alcohol. She rarely ever drank sake, so that was speaking volumes.

With a shaky hand, she gripped the side of her head, face red in embarrassment as she envisioned the very obvious man she had written about.

...There weren't many Xingese Emperors with a bodyguard anyway...

To be continued in Part 2 if readers are interested to see more! :)