"Is this everyone?"

Major Cordon's voice was steady, but he could feel his heart beating in his throat. Each spasm shook him to the bone- reminding him, with every breath, that what he was doing was very, very dangerous. The faint light of the moon made shadows deep, unknown, threatening. Any place could be holding a spy, recording his every move, or a special ops soldier ready to snipe him- after all, he had come out here to betray his country.

The old Ishvalan woman nodded at him in response to the question, her red eyes alight like rubies in the dark. She had the look of war on her face and body- torn clothes, bruises, lean cheeks- and so did the group of seven children gathered around her. They stared up at him, their soft faces marred by looks of distrust, seeming despite the physical differences so much like his own sons and daughter back home in Central.

Innocents.

Innocents that he and so many others had been sent here to murder.

That was what had made him do this- he had discovered, like so many other soldiers in this war, that the Ishvalans with their dark skin and red eyes were people, with thoughts and feelings and lovers and families, just like any fair Amestrian. That was why he was here.

Cordon knelt.

"Hey," he said to the children, using the same gentle tone he did with his own family, when he tucked his children in to bed.

"It's going to be okay, you guys. We're going to get you out of here. You're going to be safe."

Their wide eyes looked back at him silently, already so haunted by the war. No child should be like this, he thought. Not ever. He would save them from it, if he could.

The old Ishvalan woman had told him there were groups of smugglers waiting in neighbouring districts to receive the children, and send them somewhere safe. He only had to take them a certain distance- through the city mainly, where there would be a higher chance of running into Amestrian forces- but even that would be enough. He had already seen too many killed in this war, and he couldn't stand to watch children die as well. Despite his conviction, his palms shook as he stood again, and his throat was dry. He knew exactly what would happen to him if he were to be caught tonight. He had already seen it.

The old woman reached into her pack and drew out a piece of paper. "Here is the map of all our routes," she said calmly. "You can be trusted with it now, I think." She offered him a slight, sad smile, a look of gratitude mixed in with terrible desperation.

"Good luck."

Cordon shook her hand strongly, his heart swelling with both terror and a strange feeling of pride. Was it a thing of pride, to become a traitor? But he felt he had no other choice; he had to do this, it was the only way to stay sane, the thing he knew was right in his heart of hearts. "Alright children," he said, willing his voice not to betray the unsteadiness in his mind. "Come with me. Remember to be quiet and stay together- we'll be out of this, soon. I promise."

As the group headed away into the darkened alleys of the broken city- leaving the old woman behind in the dark- Cordon hoped that his words were true. He had spent so much time working himself up to this moment- to actually coming out and doing it, leaving the safety of the army camp in the night and coming to the meeting place one of the smugglers had given him- that he hadn't considered much how he would continue on afterwards. How strange would it be, to return to bed and pretend to wake up normally the next morning, a traitor? A traitor, but someone who has done nothing wrong, he thought.

The map of the Ishvalan smuggling routes was quite ingenious. Many of the marked paths for leaving the district weren't even on Amestrian maps. The people of the nation were cleverer, perhaps, than the Fühur's government assumed. Perhaps they would be able to survive this way- perhaps these children would get to grow up and live normal lives again. The thought gave him comfort.

Taking a turn onto the first path on the map, Cordon looked more closely at the children. It was for these pure lives that he was doing this- these victims with their haunted eyes and dirty feet, stumbling from broken homes towards an uncertain hope, a hope that only he could give them. It was a heavy responsibility, like the one he had taken on when he had held his firstborn in his arms.

One of the children, a little girl with soft hair and huge eyes- clutching a torn teddy doll to her chest- looked up at him, her mouth half open in awe. Once again, he was reminded of his daughter- his youngest child- and it hurt to see her reflected here, in such a horrible situation and place.

"Where are we going, uncle?" she asked. The fear in her voice made Cordon ache a little inside, because he understood it so well. Of course, she would be afraid of a white man, after everything that had happened. He wondered if she had any family left. He smiled at her, as gently as possible, and paused, unfolding the map again to show her. The other children shuffled closer as well, their fists tight to their chests, trying to trust this stranger with the military bearing.

"You see?" He told the girl softly, tracing the red lines of the paths with his fingers. "This is where we are, and this is where we're going. It's a very sneaky route. No one is going to catch us."

The little girl blinked slowly, her expression blank as she stared at the map. Did she even understand, he wondered? Then she spoke, her voice high and sweet and surprisingly clear, like the voice of an angel.

"You're right about it being very sneaky," she said in a matter-of-fact manner, and her lips quirked up into a small smile. "But you're not so right about the second part."

Cordon opened his mouth to reassure her- they would be safe, they would make it, everything was going to be fine- and then he stopped, because for an instant there was something very strange in the expression of the little girl- something that didn't belong on such young and innocent features. Had he imagined it? Just for a second there had been a flicker in her sweetness, a flash of something almost cruel. Suddenly the air in his lungs seemed much heavier, and the shadows of the darkened alleyway swelled. What was this feeling?

The little girl smiled again and looked straight up at Cordon, her eyes piercing, and this time with a horrible shock he realized that he hadn't imagined it, that something was terribly wrong-

And then the little girl began to change.

Red lightning crackled and sparked along her dark skin as it dissolved, her legs shooting up like stalks and her hips becoming fuller, her dirty clothes darkening and shrinking and drawing tight around her thighs and chest, now revealing, the innocent image suddenly becoming something almost promiscuous. Her small child's body stretched as the unnatural lightning went up and up, soft baby features giving way to hard angles and paper-white skin and powerful muscles, her delicate brown hair curling up and sprouting out again twisted and the colour of rot-

-an adult's body grown out of a child, like some disgusting parasitic plant-

The other children ran away screaming and Cordon fell to the ground as the transformation was completed, the strange being's hair falling to rest with surprising grace about her- his?-broad shoulders. Swiftly, the thing that had been the little Ishvalan girl grabbed the map from Cordon's weakened hands, skipping lightly over his trembling body as she did so. Cordon realized that in those few seconds the rest of the children had disappeared- had they really run off, or had they melted into the shadows, unreal from the beginning? Cordon didn't know. He didn't know anything in that moment, as his understanding of the world and of reality's definitions had been shattered. To see a picture of such innocence become so twisted- reshape itself into something so strange and demonic and almost slutty- was purely horrifying. He had never seen anything like that ever before, and it shattered him. Vaguely, he was aware of a wet heat in the crotch of his pants, but the sensation was floating in the back of his head only- all conscious parts of his mind were full of white noise, a ringing not unlike the aftermath of an explosion.

Then the little girl- the woman? the man?- started laughing. It was a horrible sound, hot and hysterical and cruel. She laughed and laughed and laughed, the sound drilling holes in Cordon's sanity, burrowing deep below his skin and into the marrow of his bones.

"You are so funny!" She shrieked, muscular form doubled over as a child would in mirth- he was reminded of his daughter again, when they played, but perverted- "Did you shit yourself? Waah! What an amazing reaction! Humans are so gullible!"

Slowly the high-pitched screams of laughter trickled down into softer cackles, and once under control again she pulled up the map she had taken. "And what a prize you've won for me," she purred, tracing the routes on the map with her fingers. Cordon just sat, frozen, his jaw hanging open and his eyes wet. His heart was beating so hard he was half expecting it to burst.

The little girl turned to look at him, and Cordon could now see that this monstrous, wanton version of her face had very large, violet eyes, and inhumanly sharp teeth. She frowned at him, almost pouting, her attitude not unlike a child denied sweets- please let him not think her like his daughter again-

"Is that it?" she asked, flicking her hair with one hand. "No more screaming? No 'what, who are you, what is this'? Not even going to fight?"

Cordon just sat there, feeling tears start to well up in his eyes, and the girl (if she was a girl, something in her voice and her build and the stance of her legs was telling him she might very well be a man, and that fact made her sexuality even more horrifying) sighed theatrically, folding the map in four and tucking it under the tiny, tight black top she was wearing, where its outline could be faintly seen against her chest.

"I guess that's it for you, traitor," she said, putting her hands on her hips. "But thanks again. You saved me a lot of work! They only give people access to those routes at the last second, you know. And if I had to torture them out of one of the leaders, they'd catch on and the whole operation would be kaput!" With that last word she made a gesture like a small explosion with her hands, smiling ear to ear.

"Now we know where they're going, and who they are. You've helped your country a lot, Major."

These words stirred something in Cordon then, some last scrap of his strength as a man, a reminder of what he had come out here to do.

"Don't…" he gasped, "don't hurt the children…" his voice was as feeble as a baby. He felt, deep inside, that he was going to die (there was no way the world could continue to exist properly after tonight) but if he was going to die those children couldn't accompany him- surely it wouldn't be for nothing-

For an instant, the girl seemed to become sympathetic, putting one hand over her heart and looking at him sweetly. Then that instant was over, her face contorting back to something vicious.

"Ha! Oh, I promise...I will," crooned the monster, and she threw her head back to laugh again, and that terrible, insane sound snapped something inside of Cordon and he flung himself at her, primal, his hands forgetting that he had a gun and trying to claw their way around her throat, because to him she was everything a father feared for his children. He didn't know what had become of the Ishvalans, or what he would do next, all he could think was that he had to wring the life out of this abomination before it could make another sound-

There was another flash of the red lightning, and Cordon found himself stopped, his body straining forwards but unable to move, his arms suddenly weak.

"Wow, you're sure a spunky one," said the monster, raising one fine eyebrow as if amused. "You certainly have more in you then I first thought. Not that I would really envy your position right now, but…" she giggled, girlish, as though she had told a joke, and it was then that Cordon looked down.

From the elbow onwards, her arm had become a scythe, the red light still dancing in slight sparks about the gleaming metal. The blade was buried in Cordon's chest, straight through the center, blood blooming thick and heavy around the wound. Only then did he start to feel it- a numbness in his extremities, and the beginning of a terrible pain in his chest…

"Nice knowing ya," she chirped, and with another wave of red sparks the weapon withered and became an arm again, a shower of hot blood spraying the ground, and Cordon's legs gave out. His body seemed to be disappearing on him, his vision growing dimmer, the sounds of his heartbeat fading away in his ears…

His last thought was that he had failed, in every possible way. He had failed so much it was almost funny…

And then Major Cordon thought nothing anymore.