AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Hoooooooly mother of troll Jegus! I have not updated this in such a long friggen time! I am so sorry - I have been so busy with my senior year of High School that this story has slipped my mind! So forgive my inconvenience. AND HOLY SHIT - SEVENTY-ONE FOLLOWS! Excuse me but I must slap my self for several obvious reasons.

anyways, I hope that this chapter isn't mediocre to the other ones. And if you all must know, if there is anything that I could do better - TELL ME! That little box that says "type your review for this chapter here..." isn't there for pretty - its to say "HEY! I NEED TO TELL YOU SOMETHING!" or something like that... but yeah. So if you have something to say - say it! It makes me happy to know what people think of my stories.

ALSO, like I said in the last chapter - I have a forum called "Adopt and Challenge" - so if you're in need of an idea for an FMA crossover - or have too many ideas that you cant handle - go there. I have two challenges/ideas up. So with that over and done with - lets get to the story shall we?

"If a problem is fixable, if a situation is such that you can do something about it, then there is no need to worry. If it's not fixable, then there is no help in worrying. There is no benefit in worrying whatsoever."
~ Dalai Lama XIV

Chapter Eleven:

Dread

"A sound soul dwells within a sound mind and a sound body."

"Humankind cannot gain without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is Alchemy's first law of Equivalent Exchange."

FullMetal ran as fast as he could, he was after an unknown man that were with two Keishin-Egg-looking people. He ran and ran, then when he cornered them, the man that was between the two Keishin Eggs grinned. He showed that a red stone was in his mouth. He then clapped his hands together, red lightning flashed then he slammed his hands onto the floor. Everything then faded to black…

When FullMetal was brought back, he saw that the two Keishin Eggs were furious and were under some rubble, the man however, was gone. FullMetal was on all fours, he tried to get up but a jolt of pain rushed through him, starting from his gut. His eyes went wide. He looked behind him only to see a support beam was in his gut, through and through.

He was impaled…

FullMetal woke up panting, his stomach hurting. He realized he was back in reality... it was only a nightmare... a nightmare... He figured that he should've been used to them but like the others, it shook him to the core, as if he was a cold-blooded animal thrown into the Antarctic water... He looked out the window only to see, contradictory to his mood, there wasn't even a cloud out in the sky and the sun was laughing happily and shining brightly. He frowned and began the usual morning ritual then began making his way to Professor Stine's Laboratory...

It had been two weeks since the incident with Maka and Soul... and he still felt terrible but determined to make sure that it didn't happen again... but he still felt terrible. Maka and Soul didn't blame him, and they forgave him, but he still felt guilty.

Stein made several treatments that, in theory, should help him dominate the madness within him. He had been going at this for five days now. The treatments were simple and a bit agonizing, the worst being that Kyukon Water, which absorbs soul wavelength like a desert does to normal water... and it hurts...a lot.. How Black Star was able to conquer it was a mystery (although he did hear Tsubaki mutter something about Black Star drinking it)... and speaking of the darn hot-headed Meister... the only other thing that was bad about the treatment was... the Soul Shock therapy... and Black Star was the one to mainly do the therapy…. It was beyond painful to get a soul wavelength forced into your own soul! It was like getting hit by lightning and living to tell the tale. The first time he had to go through "Black Star's Big Wave" he coughed up a fairly large amount of blood... but he'd rather deal with the treatments than letting the possibility of his Maddification possess him again... It was something he feared on a daily basis... The other treatments were fairly simple and much less exhausting than the other two, but he didn't like one... and that would be having to wield Tsubaki in her Dark Sword Mode... it was exhausting and beyond terrifying. The first time that he and Tsubaki had to do that treatment, Tsubaki transformed back into her human form and looked as though she had nearly died... Turns out, she only was only able to possess him for twenty minutes... The treatment lasted an hour - he possessed her of the rest of the time, and during that time, she was dealing with his madness counterpart...

He remembered what she had said happened in the Soul Realm...

Tsubaki looked around the Soul Realm, she was in the very realm that was that of her brother's. She saw that FullMetal was in front of her. He was on his knees, his hood up and hiding his eyes. She watched as he got up, when he put one foot on the water like surface of the realm, the purple "water" seemingly began turning black right were FullMetal's feet were. The black "smoke" began filling the "water". Tsubaki then noticed that the "water" had no reflection for either of them, unlike the last time she was there. Instead of a reflection, she saw that there was a city under them and the "water" was acting like a glass floor, keeping the both of them from falling into it.

She looked back FullMetal, "FullMetal, what's going on?!"

He simply grinned at her. Then a hand reached up from the water and grabbed her by her leg, pulling her under. After feeling as though she had blacked out, she found herself on a black road. She got up and looked around, she almost panicked, but she realized where she was.

She was in the Soul Realm that belonged to that of FullMetal. She had never seen such a place that was so strange... She looked over to the city that Maka had called "Central City", but what was it the central of?

She was about to walk over to the Central City half when she heard, "I wouldn't go there if I were you," she turned to see the little girl that Maka called 'Nina', the little girl looked up at Tsubaki with pleading eyes, "FullMetal is awake, and he knows you're here, he will do the same to you that he wanted to do to Maka... I don't think that you want to be a broken toy..."

Tsubaki stared at Nina, "Trust me, I can take care of myself..."

"But wouldn't it be better to retreat?" Nina asked, "Why don't you go home and take a long bath?"

"No thanks, I'm fine." Tsubaki said as she began to make her way over to the Central half.

"Okay, but don't say that I didn't warn you..." Nina said.

Tsubaki slightly regretted not going to the Death City half because navigating around Central was very challenging, she was lost, she had never been to a place like Central, in her entire life. As she was walking about she encountered Nina once again, but this time she was with a large white dog, and the two were playing in a big yard in front of a large house.

"Tsubaki!" Nina called, "Come and play with me and Alexander!"

Tsubaki blinked, "I never told you my name... How do you know, my name?"

Nina blinked then shrugged.

The Magic Dark Arm narrowed her eyes. That kid was acting too innocent to have been attacked by FullMetal's madness more than once... wait... Innocence!

"You're the manifestation of FullMetal's innocence aren't you?" Tsubaki exclaimed

When she blinked, the dog and Nina were gone, and in their place was a little boy that had short gold hair and gold eyes. He wore white shorts and a black shirt, he looked up at Tsubaki with eyes that certainly shouldn't belong to a child, he looked like was defeated, almost dead. But there was one thing that Tsubaki could tell he was... he was FullMetal as a child...

"What's left of it actually..." he said.

"Why are keeping me from looking around here?" she asked.

"Like I said before, FullMetal is up, he'll be looking for you to put you down six-feet under..."

She looked at the child startled, "But aren't you FullMetal?"

"You could say that we are one in the same thing, but a different piece of him… Think of it like a puzzle that lost seventy-five percent of it's pieces, and only twenty-five percent remain, and its up to the puzzle itself to find the missing pieces... but it is blind..."

"But someone can always come and help, and that is what I'm here to do..." Tsubaki said.

"And I'm here to make sure that you don't get hurt..." the child said, "So how about you come with me and not get hurt along the way..."

"Just because Black Star and I only have collected one soul, doesn't mean that we're weak," Tsubaki said, "and I'm not going to give up on you, so stop trying to keep me from helping you!"

The boy looked at her surprised, he looked as though he was about to cry, "If I didn't know better... I'd say you sounded exactly like-..." he grit his teeth, "...YOU KNOW WHAT, GO AND RUN ALONG LIKE THAT GEAR HEAD AND GET INTO TROUBLE, LIKE MY PAST EXPERIENCES OF DOING EXACTLY THAT DON'T FUCKING MEAN ANYTHING!"

She stood there shocked, after a moment of processing what he said, she looked at him sadly, she saw that he was about to run away, but she swiftly grabbed his arm and picked him up and hugged him.

"W-wha-" he stuttered.

"You don't have to do everything by yourself," she said, "you know you need help, so you should accept it when it offered, not turn it down and suffer for it. You're being childish."

He slightly whimpered, "How can I not be when I never had a childhood to begin with... if you want to help... then try not to die..."

Suddenly the sensation that he was there in her arms was lost... he disappeared. After that little moment, she continued to look around Central. She decided that heading for the center would be a good place to get a good look of the realm. But she ended up in a confusing situation. When she got to the center, she found herself at a military base. She was about to walk in when she was shot at.

She turned to see the person who was shooting at her, only to find herself staring at a woman in a military uniform, she blond hair along with dog ears and a tail.

The woman glared at her, "No Trespassing!"

Tsubaki looked at the building then at the woman, "What's behind those doors that is so important that it needs to be guarded?"

"That is for Edward to know, and no one else." the woman claimed.

Tsubaki was surprised by the answered, after a short moment she narrowed her eyes, "Who's 'Edward'?"

"Enough questions, leave now." the woman growled.

The weapon knew that if she stayed the woman would attack her like the guard-dog that she was acting as, she wished that the woman answered her question but she made her decision. Tsubaki walked away from the center of the combined cities, leaving Central's military base. When she got to the bottom of the large staircase, she decided to continue explore the Central half.

She couldn't help but feel that Central was just as big- if not - bigger- than Death City. She was shocked by how many places that were so different in the soul realm, that was just on the Central half. There was a place that was desert like- just like how Death City was surrounded by one-, there was also a grass-land that had a small town in it- which was more like a village if anything. It really caught her eye.

When she got there she saw that there was so many farms and places that looked like they were constantly cared for, but one place stood out, above all the rest. It was two buildings, one building was on a hill and wasn't too far from the hill that the other was on. The first one that she went to was a small building that had a sign that said "Rockbell's Automailistry".

The building looked quite, like all the others. Looking from side to side, she walked up to the door, and opened it… only to see that the building looked like the home for someone, rather than a business. She sighed and began looking around. She saw that there were metal and anatomy books, there were also bedrooms, an operating table, and even mechanical arms and legs.

"Why would FullMetal's soul remember so much detail about a place like this"she wondered, sure in certain parts of the building, it was cozy and warm, but others looked like it would be a place that should be a part of Professor Stein's interest.

She then came across a small board on a wall that had pictures of several people. One had an old woman on it, another had a girl that looked a lot like Liz but the girl in the picture had a bright blond hair, not dirty-blond.

However, there was one picture that caught Tsubaki's eye. It was a picture of two boys. One was FullMetal, who was wearing his old clothes, like the way he did when he was off on that mission with Maka and Soul. The other boy however, looked a lot like him, a LOT, but he looked to be younger than FullMetal. The boy's hair was a duller shade of gold, but his eyes were just as bright of gold as the Alchemist's, his long hair was tied up in a high ponytail, and his bangs were angled in such a way that it slightly reminded Tsubaki of herself. The boy wore a similar outfit to the Alchemist's. He wore a black tee-shirt, brown pants, and a dusty brown hooded cloak with the very emblem that was on FullMetal's red cloak, new cloak, and on his backpack.

She stared at the picture then thought, "That must be his little brother..."she put a hand over her mouth, "He must be looking for FullMetal... if he finds out about his amnesia, who knows how he'll take it..."

She was about to look at the other pictures when she suddenly felt that someone was behind her. She turns around and was shocked to see who was behind her.

It was FullMetal.

He looked exactly like the way he did in the picture. But something was off... there was a strange look in his eyes. He grinned at her, she had a feeling that the person before her wasn't the FullMetal she knew.

He summoned the weapon that he could transform into and broke it in such a way that the blades were only held by the chain inside of the handle. He threw the blades at her and swung the handle, causing the blades to impale her and throw her through a wall and outside. The blades were then removed as she fell into the pool of grass, blood dripping through her clothes and onto the grass. Before she could get up, FullMetal put his foot on her head and dug her head back into ground.

"Tisk, Tisk. If I didn't know any better, I'd say that you were trying to provoke me..." he chuckled. "But then again, do I really know better?" without warning, he swiftly got his foot off of her head, and kicked her on her side, causing her to roll onto her stomach.

Tsubaki quickly summoned a smoke bomb and hit it against the ground, and just like that- smoke arouse around her, hiding her in it's depths as she got back to her feet and ran away from the maddened version of her friend. But a chain wrapped around her, she saw the triple blades before she was thrown into a tree. She grit her teeth. He was really going to make her fight him, wasn't he?

She narrowed her eyes at him, "FullMetal, please don't make me do this."

He simply smirked, "Make you do what exactly?"

She frowned as she summoned the dark sword, she got into a fighting stance. He did the same. They both attacked. It was a fight that was of up most difficulty. Their blades clashing against each other. Tsubaki making straight and diagonal attacks while FullMetal made rounded and curved attacks. He wasn't going to give up easily and neither was she.

She tried to stab him in the gut, but he easily dodged and tried to stab her in the back, but she used her shadow puppet to block the attack. As she turned around she saw the scythe break and the chain was visible.

SHIT!

He spun around and the chain began a barrage of attacks at the shadow puppet and Tsubaki.

...She blacked out for a moment...

But it mustn't have been a moment because she found herself laying in the grass again, she was on her stomach, she was weaponless. She then felt the blades of the scythe being pressed against her neck.

"It was nice playing with you, but I think you overstayed your welcome..." FullMetal chuckled.

The blade was removed from her neck then with a swift movement... it was all over...

After explaining what happened she told him that his madness counterpart wasn't going to give up anytime soon... He began hating that treatment after that... He didn't want her to suffer through that again.

The other treatments were Healing sessions with Marie and taking a potion that his moms made him. Both treatments had the same effect, they soothed the Madness and make it less frequent; the potion however would also sooth the Psychopathic and Sadistic tendencies and the blood lust, which was relief; might as well get rid of it before it manifests...

He was able to use his Soul Perception, which he didn't even know he had until the incident. He was far better than Maka or any Meister, but he was only outmatched by Stein. FullMetal was able to learn how to analyze a soul through and through, and find information on the person whom the soul belonged to... If only he could see his own soul...

FullMetal's outfit changed a bit dramatically, he didn't want to fear himself, so he thought that he should try to take steps to being able to accept his past. He wasn't going to allow the Keishin Egg side of himself dominate him. The changing of his outfit was not only to get himself to be able to overcome the dreading feeling that he had of his old clothes, but an outfit that he was able to wear whilst Keishin Egg Hunting, which is what he had been doing more often. He began hunting more frequently to release some of his... Madness, something that Stein had said was a good idea and that he did it himself, except... for the Professor, it was dissecting... The man was a murderer, but a good guy at heart.

FullMetal had read a good portion of his old note book filled with information on Alchemy, which he used to change his whole wardrobe. He now wore the exact outfit that he had when he was in the Soul Realm.

He stopped walking. There was tingling sensation in his throat, it was traveling upwards. He covered his mouth and began coughing, and coughing, almost like it would never end. Soon he needed to lean against a wall. As mysteriously as it came... he stopped coughing. He looked down at his glove covered hand only to find that there was blood on it...

It was a deep shade of scarlet... It was very pretty. He wondered what it would be like to see some more of it. Well he was surrounded by walking flesh sacks filled with that beautiful scarlet liquid! All he needs to do is tear them open and watch them bleed! His blades would do the job nicely! It will be a quick job, oh but then again why not have fun with them?! He could beat their blood out of them like a piñata - oh how fun that would be!

FullMetal bit his cheek as hard as he could and held back a whimper... He was getting too carried away with those thoughts... "So this is what the Professor has to deal with on a daily basis?... No wonder he has that screw in his head! He really does have a screw loose!" he licked the blood off of his glove and - Wow… blood is actually pretty sweet… maybe if he-"OW!" He bit himself again. "Either I'm so deep that I might be almost beyond saving - I'm weak - or I'm just as mad as the professor!"

When he got to Stein's house, he was filled with dread... he told himself that this time he was going to be able to handle the Soul Shock and be able to stand strong. When he knocked on the door and was invited in he found that Black Star and Tsubaki weren't there with Stein and Marie.

"Ah, FullMetal, unfortunately Black Star and Tsubaki went on a mission, so I'll have to do the Soul Shock therapy with you..." Stein said bluntly as he adjusted his glasses.

And unfortunate it was, FullMetal had studied Professor Stein's soul for a good week to get his mind off of the Maddification, and saw how big the soul was, compared to others, not even Black Star's was a match against Stein's. Thankfully though, Stein made his wavelength equal to that of the Magic Dark Arm Meister's, so it was like being hit with Black Star's Wavelength even though he wasn't physically there, but the wavelength was still strong and it still hurt, and he did cough up blood, but not as much as the last few times...

After the therapy FullMetal decided to have a long walk around town, to get his thoughts straight, to think of some way for himself to be able to calm the illness without needing the help of others. It wasn't that he didn't like having help, it was just that he didn't like to rely on others too much. Sure, there are times when he'd have to lean on someone for help, but there are also times when he could do something himself and not need help. Just because he has no memory of his past doesn't mean that he doesn't know anything. He outmatched Maka and Ox Ford in every way possible, Math, Science, Soul Analysis, fighting against Black Star, excreta... So why shouldn't he find a way to sooth his madness on his own?

As he walked past a shop something caught his eye... When he turned and looked at what had caught his attention, he was surprised to find that it was a music shop. A shop that not only sold CDs and vinyl, but also instruments... Now that he thought about it, it was a common saying that artists expressed their emotions through their artwork, be it drawing, stories, poetry, sculpting, painting, and even...music.

He had also heard that Crona was the best poet in the DWMA even though his poetry would make even the most happiest person like Black Star wish that they weren't born... So if Crona could express his feelings and thoughts through poetry, why couldn't FullMetal express his emotions and thoughts through music?

The Gold-Scythe walked through the door to the Music Shop and began looking at all the instruments to find one that truly...spoke to him. He felt that it would be best that no one knew of his new musical interest so it would have to be a small, simple instrument. He soon felt torn between the harmonica and the flute. He wanted an instrument that he could hide but also take with him but still simple to play. The harmonica looked a bit too small and complex, and the flute was fairly large but simple enough. The flute it was then.

He checked the price and saw that he had enough, bought it, and hid it under his right sleeve, so that way it wouldn't be seen by any of his friends. He decided to go to the library to find a book on the instrument so that way he could learn to play it.

He just hoped that his idea was sound and that it would help. He didn't want to be a puppet to his own madness.

Chess was both a gentlemen's game and a strategist's game, and it was great way to strategize war tactics and good way to collect one's thoughts - and now that Alphonse thought about it - it was a great way to calm one's nerves. After a few games against the Fuhrer, he bought his own set and began playing against Winry, Teacher, and who ever he knew that played the game. All in all it helped him collect his thoughts and calm him self.

To day however, he just couldn't find a way to calm himself. Everyone, even Winry were in the library reading books on the one subject that he knew all too well: Alchemy. He was also in the library with them, doing the same. But he wanted to calm himself, and he didn't think that he could concentrate on both a strategy game and on learning Alchemy at the same time.

Ever since Winry came up with the theory that Ed was in another world, they all had been reading and trying to fit the theory with the facts. But all in all it made sense, but what Alphonse didn't understand was why Mustang had called Ling and May over to Central. He didn't want them to see him like this, not at all.

He looked out the window. It was nice day, the sun was shining, there wasn't even a single cloud out in the sky, not even in the distance. Such a nice day, but why did he have such dread?...