Chapter 15

The mechanics of Ed's detached hand was easy enough to understand, but the techno-telepathy aspect of this symbiotic relationship between mind and metal was much more difficult than he had realized. Something was stopping his hand from obeying his orders and he couldn't figure out why.

"The amalgamation is there, but it just won't comply with my commands, Al," Ed explained, as the hand merely circled around in a 360 degree rotation without reason. It was like it was in a command runt. "I think something short-circuited during the last command I sent it. I knew something like this would happen."

"What do you mean you knew something like this would happen?" Al asked.

"The technology isn't perfected yet and there's a few bugs to iron out, but I thought I fixed the command module when this happened last time."

"Fine time for it go mental on you, brother," Al remarked. It continued to go around in a circle as if it were a dog chasing its own tail. Al wished it would stop. And suddenly it halted in its tracks and angled itself towards him.

"What just happened?" Ed asked curiously, seeing it stop.

"It just stopped," Al replied curiously.

"What did you do?" Ed asked.

"Nothing," Al said. "Strange thing however, I wished it would stop and it did."

Then Ed had a thought. "Wait a minute," he said, and tilted his head back slightly to look at Al, Al looked down at him. "Could the reason why it stopped is because you're touching me? Maybe it overloaded by the coalition of two brainwave patterns because we're connected and it just shut down?"

"I don't know," Al said. "We're two different people and it takes commands from your mental pathways, not mine. Why would it all of a sudden start to obey me?"

"Because maybe you're the dominating mind at the moment," Ed reasoned. "I'm exhausted; maybe you're not. I don't know. And as your hands are touching my temples at the moment it might be interpreting the electronic pulses coming from you as my brainwave patterns filtered through a separate conductor."

"So I can make this thing move now?"

"Apparently, and it thinks you are me at the moment."

Cool. Was the first thing Al thought and the hand reacted accordingly giving him a thumbs up. He smirked. Quickly thinking of a few commands to confirm Ed's theory, he made it play dead, sit up, and crawl on its fingers around in a circle. It obeyed each command without hesitation.

"This makes this a whole lot easier," Ed said.

"How's that?" Al wondered.

"Each of us has our own task now instead of me doing all the work. You can control the hand and I can focus on the levitation technique."

Al produced a smile. Ed was absolutely right. And that could've been the reason the hand short-circuited before. Ed was attempting to move the hand and perform the levitation technique at the same time and that had to take a toll on Ed mentally. And in his mental state of exhaustion it was no wonder that happened.

"Let's try it again," Al said.

Ed nodded. "Hopefully we'll free ourselves this time," Ed said.


Ed's automail hand began to levitate off the floor and Al commanded it to pick up the scissors.

As Al saw it, hovering in the air before him, it looked eerie to him, like some sort of a ghostly specter with a mischievous or malicious purpose. But if he wasn't witnessing it first hand, he wouldn't have believed it.

He brought the hand closer and turned it 180 degrees to face Ed, then he adjusted its angle downwards and brought it to the tape just above Ed's left ear. He inserted two fingers through the loops of the scissors and tightened its grip around the handle. He then took a quiet deep breath and commanded it to insert a blade underneath the tape and cut.

All of sudden the hand malfunctioned and it stabbed Al in the left hand, the scissors jabbing deep into his skin. He screamed out in agony as the blades of the scissors wedged themselves deep in his hand; blood filtered out of the would, through the electrical tape, down his hand and onto the bed sheets.

Al gritted his teeth and groaned heavily in pain. "Al! You alright?" Ed said.

Al let out a series of a frustrated heavy grunts to voice his pain. He sounded like he was angry. He then reached down and grabbed the scissors with his teeth and plunked them out of his hand, spitting them to the floor. Ed's automail hand dropped limp to the floor like a broken toy.

Al looked at his hand and felt a deep throbbing. "I'm fine," he finally said. "Our little experiment with the levitation technique didn't work."

"I'm sorry, Al," Ed said frowning.

"Any other bright ideas?"

"No," Ed said flatly, sad.

Thinking past the pain, Al had an idea and beamed with a smile. "But I have one, brother," he said. "Who says a person has to perform Alchemy by using their hands only? Why can't a person use their feet? A clap is a clap, right?"

Ed's eyes widened with new hope. "Hell yeah, that's right," he said. "If you can produce a clap with your feet you can break the binding spell. I never would've thought of that. Albert Einstein was right, discoveries are made by accident."

But Al was already a head of him slipping off his shoes and attempting to slip off his socks, however that seemed more challenging that he had realized.

Normally he would just pull them off, but as he didn't have use of his hands, he had to some how use his toes to peal them off. But it wasn't working like he had planned. "Damn it," he softly said, and Ed heard him.

"What's wrong?" Ed asked.

"I can't get my socks off," Al said.

Al continued in his attempt, digging his toes in between the sock and his leg to peal them off, however he was unsuccessful. With old socks he could probably do it, but he was wearing band new socks which he had bought in town last week and they were snug against his skin. Of all days to wear a new pair of socks, he thought. Then he had an idea and looked at Ed's automail hand laying limp on the floor a few feet away from him and wondered if it still functioned.

He gave it the command to stand and it jumped to action. Excellent, he thought. There must have been a short-circuit when he tried to use it to cut the tape, but what a time for it to have one! He told it to come over to him and it obeyed his command without hesitation.

"Your hand's working again, Ed," Al said, "and I'm going to use it to take my socks off."

For whatever reason Ed snorted an amused smirk, but Al didn't see what was funny. But he didn't bother to ask.

Al commanded the sock into position to take off his right sock first. It cupped its fore and index fingers inside the sock and began to peal it off. It did the same with the other. But with the left sock it pulled harder and flung backwards when it was released, rolled, and got caught up in the sock. It wiggled in the sock like a dog with its hand trapped in a cookie barrel, aimlessly moving about.

Al could help but snort a chuckle. Ed found it equally amusing.

"You know, that would make a great pet," Al said.

"My hand isn't something for your amusement, Al, and I hope your foot fungus is cleared up," Ed said, watching it struggle inside Al's sock. "Now hurry up and clap your feet together and get us free. I'm worried about Winry."

"Me too," Al said.

He brought his feet together and made the closest approximation to a clap sound he could make. Then he recited the chant and lifted the binding spell.

Ed moved his arms and then his legs. He then grinned big happy that he was finally free. He then grabbed the scissors from the floor and began to cut the tape from around his head, freeing Al's hands.

They were now free of each other.

Ed's automail hand dropped silent.

Ed scratched his head and then picked up his hand, reattaching it. He then turned to his brother and looked at Al's hand. "Let's take care of that hand, Al," he said. Al washed it and Ed applied some antiseptic ointment to the wound. Every single muscle in Al's body clenched as the pain of the cleanser in his open wound coursed through his body. It felt even more painful than being stabbed. Ed then wrapped Al's hand in gauss. "Feeling better?"

Al nodded. "Thanks brother," he said.

And Ed smiled. "I'm just glad you're okay," he said.

"Brother, who's Albert Einstein?"

"I thought you might ask that," Ed said, and he started to explain. "He was a brilliant inventor, philosopher and thinker, and he helped me convert my hand actually." Ed went on. "I confined in him in the other world because he was an inventor and I needed some advise in how to build propulsion for a rocket. And he was very interested in my hand. He had conceived of a similar premise of prosthetic limbs to help people who lost an arm or a leg since they didn't have this technology. He examined my automail and using his knowledge of brain wave patterns and how they carried carrier waves much like radio signals through the human body, helped me build it. He was a very fascinating man. I wonder if he's alive in our world? If he is I should go look him up. In the meantime, we have more important matters to deal with. Namely, where's Winry?"

All of a sudden Winry came out from an adjacent room and the boys were startled that she would suddenly appear out of nowhere.

"Winry, where have you been?" Ed said.

And Al said, "We've been worried about you."

"I was in the middle of womanly business," she said annoyed. "What. Do you think I'll come running whenever either of you call my name? Please! I have more important things to take care of. Besides, I only left for a moment."

Womanly business? Ed observed. Girls don't talk like that. Well, they would if they were being controlled by the supernatural presence of a man, like Envy. "Winry, did anything strange happen while Al and I were joined by the Mind Melding?" He didn't want to let on that they knew Envy had taken harbor inside Winry's body. However, he did want to know how much of an influence he was having on her.

"Like what?" she said.

Al looked at Ed, and Ed gave him a short shake of his head warning him not to reveal what they knew; what Maes Hughes had told them.

"Anything out of the ordinary?" Ed remarked.

"No, should there've been?" she said. "Before I left the room you two were still bonded. Al's hands were taped to your head and you were bound by his Alchemy binding spell. Which makes me curious. How did you get free?"

"We worked together to free ourselves," Ed simply said. "However you should've been here to help us so we didn't have to go through all that trouble." Ed then he took a step forward and looked her straight in the eyes. "The question still stands: Where were you?"

"Do you want me to spell it out to you, Edward Elric? I was in the bathroom!"

Edward's expression was that of a disbeliever and she looked at him with a confused expression. Then she looked at Al and his expression was similar. "Why are you two looking at me like that?" she said.

"'Cause we don't believe you," Al openly said.

"How dare you say something like that Alphonse Elric!" Winry said. "Why would I lie about something like that? I was in the bathroom. I'm sorry I choose that time to leave you guys, but how was I supposed to know you'd wake up now?"

Al turned and said to Ed, "There's something in her voice that makes me believe her, brother," Al said.

"Don't let'em fool you, Al, we've been fooled by him before."

"Him who?" Winry said.

"Envy," Ed said. "He somehow transferred his consciousness to you, Winry, and now he's hiding out in your body."

Winry looked stunned. "Envy! But I thought Envy and the rest of the Homunculus were dead?"

"We thought so too," Al said. "But we learned that Envy somehow stored a part of his consciousness in Ed's body before he died to wait in his brain. A few weeks ago that essence awakened and started to dominate Ed in an unusual way."

"You mean the waking hallucinations?" she said.

"Yes," Al said. And he went on to explain all that they had experienced inside Ed's mind for which Envy strategically manipulated and domineered. "Now that we're out of Ed's mind, we believe Envy has also escaped and is in you."

"But I don't feel any different, I feel normal," Winry said, unsure. She looked over her body, but felt no difference in how she felt or looked. "If Envy is in my body, wouldn't he have shown himself by now?"

Ed rubbed his chin with his right hand thoughtfully. "Yes, which strikes me as odd," he said.

"How so, brother?" Al asked.

"Envy wanted a new body and now he has one, why hide now?" Ed ventured.

"Maybe the transference weakened him?" Al speculated. "You saw how weak his other self was inside your mind, how easily we were able to capture him."

"True, but I'm not convinced that Envy is merely hiding inside Winry," he contemplated. "I think there's more to this escape than meets the eye. There's something we're missing, a piece of the puzzle that doesn't fit."

"I have no idea what you're talking about, Ed?" Winry spoke.

"I'm just thinking out loud," he said. "I'm not sure either, but until Envy surfaces we'd better keep a close eye on you, Winry."

"And if he does surface, how'll we get him out?" Al wondered.

Ed didn't have an answer for him. "We'll deal with that later," he said. "By the way, Winry, where's Den? I don't see him around and he's always at your side."

"He went for a walk with grandmother to town," she said. Ed thought that was suspicious but it was kind of plausible and it could explain why both of them weren't around. "There's a sale going on in town, and as I couldn't leave you, I gave her a list of what I wanted -- a wish list I made last week in preparation for the sale -- and asked her to get the items for me. Some of these items are upgrades for your automail arm, Ed, to replace worn out parts."

She went over to him and lifted up his metallic arm, eyeing it over. "And since you've grown another inch, your arm needs to be extended and the muscle density expanded to correspond with the rest of your body. You don't want to go around with one arm shorter and thinner than the other, do you?"

Ed finally gave her a smile. She sounded just like the Winry he knew. She enjoyed tinkering with his automail arm, making it bigger and better, and sometimes it appeared she cared more about it then she did about him. However, deep down, he really didn't think so. All of sudden she noticed his wrist, and turned his hand over, palm upright. There was a deep slit going all the way around. "What's this?" she said. "I don't remember this being here."

Ed gulped nervously. "Ah…" he was speechless. Damn, she's seen it, he thought. She's gonna kill me. "I'm made some modifications," he said.

"What modifications?" she started to sound irritated. And Ed told her about what he had done to his hand. "You did what!" she finally said, exploding with anger. "Why in heaven's name would you go and do something like that?"

"If you'd just seen what happened a moment ago and how we escaped with Ed's detachable hand, you wouldn't be so angry," Al said. "It saved us!"

She turned and looked at him with fierce looking eyes, the kind of eyes of an animal you didn't want to challenge or they'd eat you alive! And he took a step back and cast his eyes away from her. She saw herself as the Alpha of the pack and he didn't want to stare her down. Winry was frightening at times.

Winry had an unpredictable short fuse when it came to Ed's arm. She was of the mind that she was the only one who had the authority to touch it.

"We're going to have to restore it back to normal," she then said.

"But why?" Ed voiced. "It just saved our butts when we needed it most."

"You know how much maintenance that takes to have it constantly work properly?" But she never gave them time to answer. "A lot, and I don't want to have to deal with it. Besides, I liked it better before. And it's easier to fix."

Winry let go of his arm and Ed looked at his hand, squeezed a fist and released it. She went over and grabbed a wrench from her work bench. "It feels fine, Winry, there's no ill-effects from the modification," he said. "I want to keep it. Besides, you never know when something like this will come in handy again."

All of a sudden Al shouted, "Look out, Ed!" while Ed was busy looking at his hand, and Winry swiped the wrench through the air and struck Ed across the side of the head with it. Ed fell over and collapsed to the ground unconscious.

Winry looked down at him and smirked mischievously. "Never let your guard down, Edward Elric," she said.

"I knew it! You are in control of Winry's body, Envy," Al said. She looked at him, a portion of blood dripping from the wrench.

"Fine time to speak your mind, Alphonse Elric," Envy said. "But it does little help for your brother now. You were always the quiet one."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Take it however you want, but you know exactly what I mean."

"What now, are you going to kill them?" Al asked.

Envy smiled mischievously and chuckled. "No, but I will take your body, Al," he said. Al gasped shocked. "Ed was right, I haven't finished what I started."

"Why do you want my body so bad?"

"Your body itself is useless to me, but what it contains is priceless."

"I don't understand," Al expressed.

"I wouldn't think you would," Envy said. "You're a powerful Alchemist, Al, but you can be dense and clueless. You body holds the secret of life. You were once turned into the Philosopher's Stone and a part of it still resides in you. That is what I want. With it, I can restore my body and plaque the world again."

"But I thought the purpose of all Homunculi was to become human?"

"Initially that was our purpose," he said. "After we accomplished what the Master told us to do -- your father -- he promised us that he'd make us fully human or close enough. But little did we know that we were only fooling ourselves. Why would we convert ourselves to flesh and bone and become as weak as you if we could live forever and use our gifts for a much more insidious purpose. I want to live to again, but not as a human. I want my original body back and you will help me get it, Al."

"But your body was destroyed when you entered the Gate, getting that body back is impossible."

"Impossible you say, hardly," Envy said. "Your proof that it can be done."

"But my situation was different. You Homunculi don't have a soul. My soul was bonded to armor by a blood stain. You're nothing but consciousness."

"The soul, as human's call it, is nothing but consciousness," Envy retorted. "That is the essence of existence. Being sentient is what life is all about. Experiencing your surroundings through sensor perception is in itself life. Spiritual consciousness is nothing but being aware of consciousness. And through existence consciousness begets life. Do you now understand why I want your body?"

Al shook his head, but not because he didn't understand what Envy was saying, but because he couldn't allow Envy to get what he wanted. "No. You're not getting my body," Al said firm. "I'll stop you first, even it means… sacrificing myself and them."

Envy let our a full blown laugh. "How pathetic, Al," he said. "You lie so badly."

"I'm not lying. I will sacrifice my brother, Winry, and myself, if it means you die with us. I won't allow you to exist again."

"How 'bout we make a wager then?"

"Wager on what?"

"Existence," Envy said, smiling deviously. "If you defeat me in battle I'll relent, but if you lose I'll take your body."

"We've been through this, Envy, and you lost fair and square," Al said. "You can't wager on the same bet again. There must be an equivalent exchange for such a transference to take place and a wager is not an suitable equivalent exchange."

"I was never one to follow the rules," Envy said. "Besides, I have trump card. If you don't agree to my terms, I'll kill your brother and this woman."

Al knew Envy was bluffing. It was obvious. If he killed Winry and Ed, he'd lose his advantage and he would die too. But on the other hand, Envy has learned to be resourceful in a crises. He'd proven that when they'd fought in battle. He was sadistic and insane, and highly intelligent. And if given the chance he'd probably just take his body. But Al couldn't let that happen.

"Fine," he finally said. "I accept your challenge, Envy."

Envy smirked amused. "I knew you would, Alphonse, 'cause you're so predictable," he said. "It's time I live again!"

To be continued...