Manami and Ed made their way down the long hallway, until they finally found a fork, where there was an option to turn left or right.
"Which way?" Manami glanced both ways before looking to Ed.
"Hmm..." Ed kept glancing between left and right.
"We could split up." Manami mentioned, making Ed blink in surprise.
"I didn't think you'd suggest that..."
"I know we'll be here longer if I go with you one way, because you'll just want to check out the other way afterwards." Manami huffed, earning a sheepish grin from him. "I'm only suggesting this on one condition. We meet back here in ten minutes and then leave." She said sternly.
"Only ten minutes..?" Ed asked.
"Promise. Ten minutes and we're out, or no deal."
"Alright, alright..!" Ed held his hands up. "I promise!"
"And I will absolutely beat your ass if you break it." She warned. "Now pick a way and I'll go the other."
Ed sighed and went to turn to the right. Manami turned to the left.
"Ten minutes!"
"Ugh, I know!"
Manami really didn't want to split up, but she wanted to get out of here more. She made her way down the hall where she peeked through each door to only find abandoned offices... there wasn't much to see, really...
Until she made her way to a door at the very end of the hall. She slowly went to open it, flinching at how loud it creaked, before she stepped inside.
Manami noticed immediately that it was a little colder in here... and looked around to find herself in what looked like a laboratory. Cylinder-like tanks stood about six feet tall, all empty. She noticed that they were placed to follow a design on the floor.
No... it wasn't just a design, it was a transmutation circle.
"..?" The walls even looked like glass, and she could see the gray concrete behind it. Were these tanks that ran along the walls of the lab?
What was held in there..?
She had a bad feeling about this place...
And suddenly, she heard the door creak shut behind her. She froze in place when she heard a voice speak... and one that was not Ed's.
"My, my..."
Manami felt the hairs on the back of her neck standing, and quickly turned to see not one, but two people standing there. One of them was a woman with long black hair wearing a matching dress and gloves. The other one appeared to be a man, with long green hair, also wearing black clothes that revealed a lot more skin. His shoes and gloves were identical in the sense of showing his fingers and toes.
"Looks like we caught ourselves a mouse." He spoke, a grin spread across his face as he went to approach her.
Manami slowly took a few steps back, realizing now that she wasn't going to be out of here in ten minutes.
"Come quietly and maybe we'll kill you painlessly." His devilish smirk grew bigger as his walk turned into a run.
Manami braced herself as he swiped at her, and she quickly moved to dodge out of the way. The stranger turned to the side and went for a kick, but she jumped out of the way again.
"Get over here, you little..!" He lunged at Manami this time, but she quickly kicked at his stomach to keep him back. He grabbed her leg and pulled her closer, but she managed to block his next attack and even land a punch across his face.
"Stay away!" She yelled, staggering backwards and recovering her stance. She had to find a way out of here, but the woman was standing in front of the only exit.
The man growled as he lifted his hand to touch where she had punched him.
"Envy, quit playing around and just kill her already," The woman spoke, seeming bored. "Or I will."
"Don't you worry, the fun is over!" The one known as Envy growled as he lunged at Manami again, even quicker this time. She tried to block his attack but he only kicked through it and knocked her back against the glass wall.
"Why you..!" She went to reach in her pockets for her fans, but she felt something stab through her right shoulder and stop her dead in her tracks as she yelled out in pain.
"GAH!"
She saw something stretching across the room... coming from the woman's finger? And she looked down to see that it was going through her shoulder, pinning her to the glass wall behind her.
She couldn't move.
Suddenly, she felt a hand against her face as he lifted her head and then slammed it back against the glass wall, over and over.
Bang, bang, bang, BANG!
The hand let go of her face and her head dropped for a moment. Her thoughts were fuzzy, her vision was blurry, a loud ringing filled her ears, and her head throbbed in pain...
"That's what you get for putting your dirty hand against my face..." Envy hissed. "And now..."
"Wait." The woman spoke, noticing something. Her spear-like finger had stabbed through this girl's shoulder, making her overcoat fall off her shoulder a little.
"That mark..."
"Hmm?" Envy went to yank on the shoulder of the coat, revealing the same mark they saw on any human sacrifice.
That symbol.
"Interesting..." The woman retracted her finger out of Manami's shoulder, earning a small whimper.
"It appears we found ourselves a precious sacrifice..."
"S-Sacrifice..?" Manami grunted, slowly lifting her head. "The hell... are you talking about..?"
Envy grabbed the crown of her head to push it back against the wall and leaned down to her eye level. He reached to hold her wrist with his other hand, pulling it back so that he could get a better look at her shoulder.
"That means you'll be making it out of here alive." He whispered into her ear. "Lucky you."
He suddenly kneed her in the solar plexus, knocking the wind out of her. Manami fell to the floor, her body curling up as she gasped for breath.
Her vision was getting too blurry... the ringing was becoming the only thing she could hear. She saw a blur of green bend down to look down at her. He reached for her head and yanked her up by her hair, making her yelp out in pain.
"But just because you're making it out of here alive, doesn't mean you'll be making out of here unharmed."
He then slammed her face into the floor, and everything went black.
Ed wasn't in the best shape, either.
He had just finished the battle with the second of the "Slicer" brothers. He was victorious, but he was wounded and lost a lot of blood. His automail arm was acting funny, too.
"You won, so I will tell you all that I know." The older brother, whose soul was only attached to the helmet, spoke. "I don't know about the stone... but I can tell you who made it. In other words, who gave us the task of guarding this place."
"Who? Who are they?" Ed asked eagerly.
"They are—" But he was cut off. Ed's eyes widened in horror as he saw something stab right through his helmet. No, two things.
"That was too close." A feminine voice spoke, as the sharp things lifted the helmet and retracted to her, for Ed to realize those things were her fingers.
He couldn't believe what he was seeing.
"You almost gave away our entire plan, 48." The woman said, then looked to Ed.
"So the FullMetal shrimp is here too?" Another voice spoke, revealing a guy with green hair.
Who were these people?
"So does that mean this is yours?" He asked as he threw something on the ground in front of him. It was...
"Manami!" Ed yelled, earning no response from her. She was limp on the floor.
"Manami!" He yelled again, then glared up at him.
"I swear, if you killed her—"
"Nope." The green-haired fellow shook his head and put his hands on his hips. "She just put up a fight, so I had to beat her down."
That didn't make Ed any less angry.
"How did you find out about this place?" The woman asked him. Ed only gritted his teeth, not intending to answer. She sighed.
"No one was supposed to see this, but I suppose nothing could be done about it now." And with a flick of her hand, the helmet in her fingers was split in two.
"BROTHER!" 48's younger brother yelled. "Brother! Damn you, we can still fight!" He protested, as the green-haired guy walked up to pick up their sword.
"We can still fight! Give me a new body! Give me—"
The sword went right through his blood seal.
"Shut up, you buffoon!" The green-haired guy yelled. "You were going to kill a precious sacrifice! Did you have any clue?!" He kept stabbing the blood seal "And then you were going to tell him our secret?! Were you planning to take responsibility if you ruined our plan?! HUH?!"
"Envy. He's dead."
"Pathetic." Envy shrugged. "You gotta hate it when they're weak." He turned to face Ed, seeing his horrified expression.
"Where were we? Oh, your girly friend there. She's not dead. At least I don't think she is..." He bent down next to her and held a hand to his ear as he listened.
"Mmm... yup, still breathing. But barely." He gave Ed a devilish smirk. One that made his blood boil. He walked over and bent down in front of Ed.
"Nice to meet'cha! I'm impressed that the both of you made it in here! But since you guys saw a loooot of stuff you shouldn't have," He leaned closer to Ed's face. "I should probably kill you both. I could start with her, yeah?"
Ed instinctively went to kick him in the face, which he managed to dodge in the knick of time.
"Hoo! Shrimpy's getting feisty!" Envy laughed as Ed went to stand up. "Listen, I don't like to fight, so—"
"You started this, so I'll take you on—" Click. His automail arm fell limp and dropped to his side. It completely stopped responding.
"H-Huh?!"
"Looks like a technical difficulty." The woman pointed out. Envy danced over to Ed.
"Lucky me!" He went to pat his head, but then his fist closed with a fistful of Ed's hair to hold him down as he kneed him in the solar plexus. Ed coughed and gasped for air as Envy held him up by his hair.
"Just so you know, I was joking about killing you guys." Envy said. "You should consider yourself lucky that your arm broke, or you would have put up more of a fight like she did, which means I would have had to bring you down just as hard."
Ed grunted in pain, his vision getting blurry.
"Don't forget. We let you live." The woman spoke, before turning to look around the room.
"It seems that we've gotten everything we need out of here." Envy said to her.
"Yes, though it was not part of the plan for them to find this place." The woman replied.
"Well, the plan is in it's final stages. We're not doing anything here anymore anyway. Let's just blow up the place."
BOOM!
"What the?!" Al looked back to the building. That was an explosion!
Second Lieutenant Maria Ross and Sergeant Brosh had found Alphonse at Lab 5 after realizing he and Edward weren't in their hotel room. They found him fighting another suit of armor wielding a machete.
"Sergeant, we have to evacuate!" Ross yelled to Brosh, and then looked to Al "What are you doing?! We have to go!"
"Brother and Manami are still in there!" He cried, going to run towards the building, but Ross grabbed his arm.
"You can't go in!" She protested.
"Let go!" Al yelled back. "They're still in there!"
But she wouldn't let go.
"BROTHER! MANAMI!"
"Hello!" An unfamiliar voice greeted them, and Al saw someone emerge from the dust, carrying a person over each shoulder. "I have some deliveries for you!"
"Ah..." Al was speechless. Who was this person?
"They're not in any risk of dying... buuut you should probably get them to a hospital ASAP." The stranger said, lowering them to the ground. It was Ed and Manami, both injured and unconscious.
"You guys gotta do a better job of looking after them," The stranger said to Ross. "They're precious, after all."
"Sergeant, give me a hand!" Ross turned her head to yell for Brosh, who came running over. "Holy crap, they're really hurt!"
"Save that for later!" Ross turned to look at the stranger. "You should get out of—"
But he was already gone.
"What are you doing?!" Brosh yelled to Ross, with Ed already on his back. Al was with him, holding Manami in his arms. "We gotta go! The building's gonna be coming down any second!"
Ross quickly got up and caught up with them, and they ran as fast as they could off the premises as the building finally collapsed into a pile of rubble behind them.