Manami groaned softly, finally coming to. She felt that she was laying on her stomach... and that her whole body hurt, like it had gotten run over by a truck… still, she forced herself to at least open her eyes. She blinked a few times in confusion and quickly realized that, despite that her eyes were open, she still only saw black.
Where was she? Was she blind?
"Ghh…" Manami groaned again as she twitched her fingers, feeling something was her left hand. She went to grip it a little tighter, remembering what it was.
Al's hand.
"Al… what happened..?" She croaked, but heard no response.
"..?" She went to start pushing herself up, pulling her hand back a little as she did so. It was when she pulled Al's hand back and she heard the metal scrape along the concrete under her that she realized...
It was weightless.
Manami went to lift it and feel around with her free hand, realizing very quickly that Al's hand cut off at the wrist.
He wasn't with her… and she felt her heart drop.
"Wh-What's going on..?" Manami asked herself, feeling her chest start to tighten up as she got more and more scared by the second.
She went to stand as she looked around, seeing some dim light in the distance… but the light wasn't bright enough to where she could see anything around her. She swallowed thickly as she took a step forward, then another, and another… just as she started walking at a normal pace, she felt her foot suddenly sink.
THUNK!
"WAH!" She cried out as she fell over, gripping Al's hand tightly to her chest as she braced herself for falling on hard concrete.
SPLASH!
Manami instead found herself falling face first into something wet, and she quickly pushed herself up so that she she could breathe. The pool she fell into thankfully wasn't too deep, to where she could be on her hands and knees and not be submerged.
"What the hell…" She groaned, lifting a handful of the liquid around her to bring it closer to her face. She tried as hard as she could to see, but couldn't… but she could definitely smell it.
"?!" Iron?! Blood..!
She quickly shook the blood out of her hand and went to stand, backing up until she tripped backwards onto the concrete slab she started on, landing on her butt.
"Where am I…?!"
She started to shake, going to grip Al's hand tightly to her chest.
"Hello?!" She cried out, only hearing her voice echo in response.
"Is someone— anyone— out there?!"
Nothing.
Her breathing quickened as the panic began to set in.
"Al! Ed! Ling!" She called out her friends' names as loud as she could… to hear no response.
"..." Manami looked down to Al's hand in her shaky hands, despite that she couldn't see it. She felt her eyes well up with tears, and heard a few tears fall from her eyes and land on the metal part of his hand with soft clinks.
What was she going to do? She was stuck here, in this hell… alone.
Finally, she let out a choked sob.
But she suddenly thought— she swore— that she heard something. She drew a sharp breath and held it to be as quiet as possible so that she could listen.
"Ling…!"
It was a voice..!
"Alphonse..!"
"Ed..?" Manami whispered to herself, looking toward the source of the familiar voice. It seemed to be coming where the dim light was also coming from...
"Manami..!"
"ED!" Manami yelled as loud as she could, her voice cracking a little.
"Manami..?!" He seemed to hear her. "Where are you..?!"
He sounded far away.
"OVER HERE!" Manami yelled again, going to rub at her teary eyes with her wrist. "I'M OVER HERE!"
"Stay there..! I'll come to you..!"
As he got closer, Manami could hear splashing, and she could see the dim light growing brighter. She looked down to see Al's hand much better than before.
"..." She went to slip her hand into it like a glove, and clenched the fingers into a tight fist.
"Manami!" She looked up to see a silhouette finally start to approach her.
"I'm over here..!" Manami called back, the light revealing the red ocean around the concrete slab she stood on. Ed's blonde hair finally stood out from the shadow.
"Are you alright?" He asked her, stepping up on the slab and approaching her.
"Yeah… where are we though?" She asked him, and he shook his head.
"No idea… have you seen Al or Ling?"
"Well…" Manami went to lift her hand to reveal Al's hand gloved over it.
"I think the rest of Al isn't here."
"What are you wearing it like that for?" Ed raised a brow, and her cheeks stung a little from embarrassment.
"I-I just put it on so I wouldn't lose it!"
"Whatever…" Ed sighed. "Come on, we got to get moving."
"In that?" Manami gestured out to the blood around them.
"Yeah, in that." Ed frowned back at her. "Or is it too gross for you?" He teased.
"It most certainly is too gross!" Manami snapped back. "Besides, how do you even know where you're going?"
"I don't." The blonde sighed. "But it beats staying here and doing nothing."
"..." Manami sighed, watching him step off the concrete slab and trudge forward. She approached the edge of the concrete and took a deep breath.
"It's just water… just water…" She stepped in, still shivering. Since she knew now that it definitely wasn't water, she couldn't pretend otherwise.
"Ugh…!"
She followed after Ed, and they walked in silence for a long while.
"It's safe to assume Al isn't here…" Ed mumbled. "But Ling…"
"I'd say there's a good chance he's in here… but where?" Manami asked.
"Only one way to find out… LING!" Ed yelled at the top of his lungs. "WHERE ARE YOU, LING?!"
"LING!" Manami yelled out too.
They called his name for a while, until finally Ed tried a different approach.
"IDIOT PRINCE!"
"Who are you calling 'idiot'?!"
Ed and Manami turned to see Ling approaching them with a torch.
"You can't just call the future Emperor of an entire nation an idiot!" He yelled at Ed.
"Are you okay?!" Ed asked as he and Manami went to approach him, but then he suddenly stopped.
"?" Both Ling and Manami blinked in surprise as Ed suddenly backed away from the both of them.
"H-Hold on," Ed's eyes narrowed. "One of you could be Envy."
"You walked around with me this whole time and just figured that out?!" Manami barked.
"Well, how do you know that I'm not Envy?"
"Because Envy isn't a bean." Manami simply replied, and Ed gritted his teeth.
"Who are you calling a bean?!"
"That's Ed…" Ling and Manami sighed.
"If you'd like, I can recite the entire food service menu from the hotel, top to bottom?" Ling offered, and Manami chuckled weakly.
"And Ed still owes me three hundred thousand Cens…"
"Good, we're all us." Ed huffed. "Ling, do you know where we are?"
"No," Ling pointed to where he came from. "I came from over there, where there was nothing but darkness."
"Me too…" Manami swallowed. "I thought I was blind when I first woke up…"
"The last thing I remember is that Gluttony swallowed us…" Ling mumbled.
"So this place is his stomach…" Ed put his free hand on his hip.
They looked over to see planks of wood that were on fire.
"Pretty sure this is the house we were hiding in." Ling said.
"And the Lieutenant's car..." Manami pointed out the nearby vehicle.
"And the Colonel's flames. Guess it was good for something after all." Ed sighed. "So…"
"How do we get out?" Manami dared to ask.
"That's the question…" Ling went to rip two branches from a nearby tree, lighting one to hand to Ed, then handing the other lit torch to Manami.
"We got to keep moving. There's got to be a way out."
"And if not, I'll make us a way out!" Ed raised his hand and clenched it into a fist.
"Make one where?" Manami raised a brow, and Ed paused for a moment.
"Well… here, hold this," He handed his torch to Ling.
"There's ground under our feet, so…" He clapped his hands and went to make a small well. He went to take his torch back and throw it down.
"I see now…" Ling mumbled as they all put hands to their ears, listening intently.
… but there was nothing.
"Did it land and I just didn't hear..?" Manami asked quietly.
"No…" The boys sighed.
But suddenly, Ed went to run, Ling and Manami quickly running after him.
"If we just keep running straight, there's got to be an exit!" He yelled.
"There's got to be walls at the end of this place!" Ling agreed.
They ran for as long as they could, but Manami started to slow to a walk from exhaustion.
"We're just… wasting our energy…" She panted.
"We're not…" Ed groaned, as he and Ling also slowed down to walking paces. "There's got to be a way out…"
"How long have we even been doing this anyway..?" Ling mumbled. "It feels like forever…"
"I don't know…" Manami whined. "My legs are starting to feel wobbly…"
"Walking through water is tough enough, but blood is even worse…" Ling groaned.
"Just a little more, guys…" Ed grunted. "When we get out… we can take a nice hot shower… sleep as much as we want… eat as much as we want…"
"With a hundred Cens limit for Ling…" Manami scoffed.
"That's a snack." Ling muttered.
But suddenly, Ling collapsed with a loud SPLASH! Luckily, he landed on a log, and didn't submerge in the ocean of blood around them.
"Ling!" Manami gasped.
"Are you okay?" Ed went to approach him.
"I can't…" Ling panted.
"Come on, you're giving up?!" Ed yelled at him. "You're gonna stop now, after we came all this way?! Get up!"
"Ed… maybe we should just take a break…" Manami suggested, quietly.
"Stand up, Ling!" Ed yelled, ignoring her. "Pull yourself together! You're being pathetic!"
"Ed!" Manami yelled, now impatient. "He's tired, we're all tired! Yelling at him isn't going to bring back his energy— it's only wasting yours!"
"..." Ed turned his head and clicked his tongue.
Manami sighed as she went to kneel down next to Ling. "Can you stand? Even to walk a little further to some higher ground?"
"..." Ling shook his head.
"..." Manami sighed. "Hold this, then." She went to hand him her torch and went to wrap his arm over her shoulder.
"Just leave me here…"
"Nope!" Manami grunted as she struggled to pull him up. "Ed, you want to be actually helpful and give me a hand here?"
"What, we're just gonna drag him around until we're out of energy ourselves?" Ed muttered.
"I'm not just gonna leave him here." Manami spat. "I've been trying to be patient, but even I have my limits— quit being a damn brat and help me!"
"Fine! Geez…" Ed huffed as he went to shove his own torch in his mouth. He walked over to grab Ling's other arm and wrap it around his own shoulder and they both hoisted the Xingese prince up.
"I see something over there…" Manami gestured her head to a spot that seemed like it was above ground. She started to walk, and Ed walked along with her, dragging Ling through the blood.
"You're heavy as hell…" Ed muttered through the torch in his teeth.
"I'd disagree… but I don't have the energy…" Ling panted, but then he noticed how Manami's body was shaking.
"Manami, you're shaking… you're gonna give out any minute."
"Shut up…" Manami grunted. "I can make it…"
They struggled to take the last few steps until Manami tripped over the concrete, dragging Ed and Ling down with her so that they fell over on another slab of concrete. The torch in Ed's mouth fell out and rolled a few feet away.
Manami struggled to push herself up and look over at the others. "Everybody okay..?"
Their legs were still submerged, but at least the upper halves of their bodies were on the concrete.
"I got 'im… you get yourself up there…" Ed went to climb up onto the slab before grabbing both of Ling's arms so that he could pull.
Manami used her shaky arms to pull herself completely out of the blood, collapsing on her stomach afterward. Ed yanked Ling's body until it was also completely out of the blood, then fell back on his butt and fell back onto his back.
They laid there in silence for a long while… until the sound of their stomachs' rumbling broke it.
"So hungry…" Ling moaned.
"Me too…" Ed turned his head to look at Manami. She had since rolled onto her side, her back facing him. He watched her back for a moment to see if it was still moving up and down.
Good… she was still breathing.
Manami stared blankly at her hand, Al's hand gloved over it. He was by himself right now, doing who knows what…
She wondered if she would ever see him again. The thought of that harsh reality made her heart hurt.
She clenched her fist tightly in Al's and gritted her teeth.
"You know…" Ed mumbled, and Manami weakly looked back over her shoulder to see Ed taking off his boot to dump the blood out.
"Leather goods are edible…"
"..." Ling and Manami's faces twisted with disgust.
"You're seriously offering a prince to eat a shoe?" Ling asked.
"You got any better ideas?" Ed frowned.
"Yeah. Dying." Manami muttered and turned back over.
"Oh, come on! Who's being the brat now?" She heard him clap his hands, working to transmute something.
"Okay, got us a pot… now to purify the blood around us to make water to boil…"
"I'm gonna vomit." Manami whined.
"If you don't want any, it's just more for Ling and I to eat." Ed said simply. "So it's up to you."
Manami's stomach rumbled after he said that.
"... I can't believe I'm about to do this…"