Hello.

It's 2 in the morning, my sleep schedule's messed up and I had an Irish coffee so I can't sleep and this has gotten way too long but it's not done so here's the first part I'll finish it later k bye.

Also, warnings for kinda medical horror. It's one of those boring talking chapters so feel free to click and leave. I won't blame you.

Imma eat a cookie.

Edward realized he was awake and immediately wished he wan't.

He lay in the rapidly cooling bed, the crowing of a cockerel and the baying of cattle audible through the wall of the house. After a good half an hour, he conceded that he was not going to go back to sleep and shifted his stiff body out of the sheets and onto the cold floor. It was with great reluctance that he dragged himself across the room and down the hall to the water closet to urinate, change his pouch, and brush his teeth and hair.

He stared at his reflection, noticing the small bag of fat forming under his chin. Now that he was no longer eating for both himself and his brother, he'd found that eating less was causing him to gain more.

Granny had said that it was just a part of getting older.

Winry had said that it was a part of being lazy.

Granny had said that was also a part of getting older.

Ed yawned and threw a fresh shirt over himself.

Whatever it was, it wasn't going to stop him from making bacon and eggs and mushrooms in a frying pan with a hot cup of coffee.

Coffee.

Ed decided that nothing was going to stop him from getting his morning cup of coffee.

XXX

Al had made him some hash browns and toast about an hour ago, judging by how cold they were. Ed threw them back into the skillet for a few minutes to get hot again and took the whole meal outside to eat on the porch. Alphonse was there, sitting in his favorite rocking chair, empty plate and mug on a stool beside him as he lay back with his eyes closed. At first, Ed thought his brother had fallen asleep while perusing the view. Then he spoke with such abruptness that Edward nearly dropped his breakfast.

"Told Winry you weren't dead."

"I'm sure she'll be disappointed to hear the news."

Edward sat down in his own chair and forked a mouthful of bacon and eggs and mushrooms.

"On the contrary, she enjoys having you around… for the retirement pension."

Al half-opened a golden eye and somehow managed to convey an entire face-full of mischievousness.

But Ed was not to be intimidated.

"She doesn't need me for that. I gave it to you in my will."

This was true, even if it was a joke in the current context.

"Well, she'd miss your chiseled body and stable embrace. We both know my arms are still too weak to hold her the way she likes it."

Ed stood up, taking care to place his plate and coffee on the nearest flat surface (Winry's empty chair). Al had crossed a line.

Even if Edward had managed to say anything, Alphonse wouldn't have heard him. He was laughing too loudly. Whatever vengeful outburst Ed had prepared died at the sight of his baby brother laughing to the point of choking. He would have gone through it all a hundred times over just to have the privilege of thumping Al on the back to keep him from suffocating on his own giggles.

When they had both caught their breath enough to hear something other than each other, they both looked up at the sound of hooves.

Mack Anderson, the village postman, was leading his pony up the road from the town nestled among the fields of wheat and sheep. The brothers watched him, both now fully awake.

"He's out awfully early," Al commented, standing up from his chair to see better. "He never comes all the way out here unless it's important."

"Must be important, then," Ed logically concluded.

He and Al shared a glance and an unspoken conversation, then Edward clambered off the porch and started trekking down the gravel pavement to meet the man and his steed halfway.

Mr. Mack was wearing a heavy riding jacket. Ed realized that Risembool must be entering fall if it was that chilly in the mornings now.

"Hey, Mr. Mackin', what's a' crackin'?" Edward greeted him with the same sing-song phrase that the village children had used for as long as he could remember.

Mr. Crackin' Mackin' looked down his beard at the man who was boy compared to himself. Edward had never once seen him smile.

"Go fuck yourself."

This was the response the man had given for as long as Edward could remember.

Ed's grin widened and he finished the ritual with a sarcastic bow.

"I will most certainly try."

Ed straightened, still beaming.

"What'cha got for me today, Mr. Mack?"

"Urgent package from Central."

Edward had been joking. It took him an embarrassing fifteen seconds to realize that Mack Anderson was not.

Ed's smile slid off his face.

"Is… is it from the brigadier general?"

Mustang was the only person in Central that Edward could think of who might send him an "urgent package."

"Don't fuckin' know," Mack answered characteristically. He pulled a white postal folder out of his limp letter satchel and all but thrust it up Ed's nose. Edward took it and brought it away from his face so he could read the names of the sender and receiver.

That was definitely "Edward Elric" typed on sticker paper.

It was typed.

Oh, shit.

Before Ed could ask anything else, Crackin' Mack wheeled his pony around the young man and started his way back home. It wasn't as if he would have answered if Ed had asked anything.

XXX

When Edward got back to the porch, he found Alphonse waiting with his now steaming breakfast.

"It got cold so I transmuted it to make it hot," he explained, trading the folder for the plate and cup.

"Did you put your fingers in it?" Ed asked, half joking, half serious.

"I transmuted the water in and around it, I'm surprised you didn't hear the popping."

Al turned the folder over in his hands while his brother ate. He whistled when he saw the typed letters.

"A typewriter, huh? This is official. D'you think it's from the brigadier general?"

"If it is, why didn't he just put his name on it?"

"Maybe it's official."

"Why would he send me official intel? I'm not a State Alchemist anymore."

"Maybe it's money. Maybe the new regime is sending us our overdue one billion Cenz for saving Amestris!"

Ed nearly choked on a mushroom.

"Do you really think they'd give it to us if they had it?!"

Alphonse didn't answer. He was ripping open the folder and pulling out the contents. A sheaf of papers, crisp and professional, slid out of its packaging. Al thumbed through the stack, studying how many pages it was made of.

"What's it say?" Ed asked over his coffee. He knew that the papers were addressed to him, but he never passed up an opportunity to watch his brother's facial expressions.

"'To the esteemed Mister Edward Elric, formerly known as the State Alchemist Fullmetal:

'We at the University of Amestris in Central City hope that this missive finds you in good health. Your service to our country can never be properly appreciated or earned…' blah, blah, blah… bend over so we can kiss your ass –"

Ed managed to bring his cup to his face before he spat his coffee.

"Hey! You're not allowed to say that!"

"I'm sixteen, I can say whatever I want!"

"Well, I'm the older brother so –"

"So you'll die first. And if you don't shut up, you'll die before I finish reading this."

Edward growled and sipped the coffee he'd just spit out.

Al skimmed through the introduction, which ended up being the entire first page, and finally found the body of the essay.

"'We thank you again for your generous donation last year to our institution's medical department for study and your permission to place the specimen on display in the Central City Museum of Natural History…'"

Al's voice trailed away and he looked up at Ed.

Ed stared back, open-mouthed so that the mouthful of eggs he'd been chewing was disgustingly visible. He caught himself, swallowed, and reached out for the papers.

"Al, let me see that –"

"Brother, what is this?"

"I don't know, that's why I need to see it!"

Alphonse handed his brother the page he'd been reading and took to perusing the ones below it.

…for the education and betterment of the people. It is with these objectives in mind that we humbly ask that you repeat your kindness with the defunct viscera recovered from Fort Briggs, North District (approximation).

Under the recently legislated Corporeal Prerogative of the Individual Act, established by Fuhrer Grumman February 3rd of this year –

Edward remembered hearing about that on the radio while eating the apple pie Winry had made for his birthday. He knew it was one of the many "human rights" laws Mustang had said he would petition for in lieu of the Bradley regime.

– it is forbidden to manipulate, remove from, or add to an individual's body in any way without the individual's consent, not excluding of the body or section of body is no longer connected to the individual. In accordance with the CPIA, we cannot recourse the defunct viscera as long as you retain ownership of the defunct viscera, which can only be relinquished by you explicitly (such as through written correspondence or personal conference.

The verbosity was giving Ed a migraine.

"Hey, Al? What's a viskra?"

"A what?"

"A viskra. V-I-S-C –"

"Do you mean viscera? The C is silent."

Reading through the nights of the past four years had made Alphonse a walking encyclopedia.

"That thing. What is it?"

"It's your internal organs. Your insides. Y'know, your lungs, heart, stomach, intestines, kidneys… basically everything that's not bone and you can't eat it."

Ed thought about pointing out that, in the event that the body in question was human, none of it should be eaten.

Defunct viscera.

Edward knew that "defunct" meant "broken." He'd heard Winry scream at him that he'd made his automail "defunct" more times than he could count.

Defunct viscera.

Broken insides.

Broken…

…recovered from Fort Briggs…

"Brother? Brother, you've turned green. What's wrong?"

XXX

Edward knew he had given up a piece of himself to heal the wound Kimblee had given him in the mine shaft.

It had never occurred to him that the might have left a piece of himself behind.

The letter contained an extension – one Doctor Tanner Atkins, professor of surgery and medicine at Central City University – and Ed barked at the frightened Risembool operator to connect him to Central, then demanded the terrified Central City operator to put him through to the university, then the unimpressed receptionist to give him Doctor Atkins.

Doctor Atkins was ecstatic.

"Major – I mean, Mister Elric! How wonderful, you received my correspondence regarding the –"

"How the hell did you get my body parts and what parts do you have?!"

Stunned silence.

"I… I'm sorry, Mister Elric, I'm afraid I don't understand –"

"The fu –" Ed caught himself. Al had made him promise to work on his swearing if Al promised to take it easy with physical therapy (when Alphonse's weak legs had given out during a morning walk and he'd scraped his palm on the gravel road, Edward had been in hysterics; with Al's immune system being what it was, Ed wasn't sure his brother could survive an infection).

He took a deep breath and started again.

"I have no memory of making a donation to your organization. Would you please clarify what specimen I am supposed to have donated?"

An awkward silence.

"Ah. I'm beginning to see the confusion. The 'donation' my correspondence refers to was brought to us before the legislation of the CPIA, and so contact with the original owner of the removed tissue was not a legal obligation. Even so, I was under the impression that the practitioners who removed the tissue had informed you of their plans for it and you had given your consent."

More awkward silence.

"Was their petition fraudulent?"

Edward didn't know when he'd wrapped an arm around his stomach, his right hand pressing over the belt and pouch and scar beneath.

He felt suddenly ill.

"Mr. Elric? Are you there?"

"I… I don't know."

"You don't know if you're there? You certainly sound present."

"No, I don't… I don't know if I… gave consent."

He'd said things during his recovery.

The words were blurred, their meanings fuzzy, like a conversation he'd had in a deep dream.

He hadn't cried out – he never cried out, never screamed, couldn't bear the idea of Al seeing him like that…

He'd begged for Winry when the spasms had become too much, and Heinkel's mane appeared instead, his composure had cracked and he'd sobbed into the lion's fur.

"…Well, um… I see… I suppose you must have been heavily medicated after the procedure… perhaps you agreed and did not remember or you agreed without understanding what you were agreeing to or…"

The sound of papers shuffling.

Edward was beginning to feel dizzy, he needed a chair.

"I believe I have a possible solution, if you would hear it."

Ed wouldn't have answered if he could.

"We need a response from you, either in writing or in person, on whether or not you release ownership of the defunct viscera –" The phone shook in Ed's hand as he shivered – "so I propose that you pay a visit to Central. We can have an in-depth discussion and settle this matter. Is that doable for you?"

"Um…"

"The university will pay for all expenses – transportation, lodgings, food. We can schedule the meeting for whenever is most convenient for you. It is not an exaggeration when I say that we are completely at your service."

Please don't sue us.

Edward choked on the laughter in his throat.

"Brother? It's gone awfully quiet, are you –"

Upon seeing Ed's pale face, Al swiftly fetched a chair from the kitchen and shoved his brother into it, taking the phone from Ed's hand as he did so. He heard Alphonse begin speaking with Doctor Atkins. He couldn't focus on their conversation.

There was no way that the clinicians had given the university the pieces of his insides they'd cut out of him for free. Maybe they'd charged some outrageous shipping fee or claimed that Ed had donated the ruined bits of him to the doctor who'd saved him, who had then decided to sell them to the field of education out of the goodness of his heart.

It didn't matter how it had happened.

He was on display.

He'd been dissected and studied, preserved and shelved, like an addition to a biological alchemist's collection of pickled deformities.

His deformity –

"Okay… okay, thank you, doctor… no, no, this isn't your fault… we'll see you on Saturday. Bye."

He heard the click of Al putting the phone up and then his brother's twiggy fingers were grasping his shoulders.

"Brother, I… It's… Are you all right?"

"I'm fine, Al."

It was a knee jerk reaction, to brush off his brother's concerned touches and hide his distress behind a wall of indifference. It was stupid, anyway. All they wanted was Ed's permission to have something Ed no longer needed.

And it was for science!

Who was Edward to stand in the way of science?

He had simply been surprised. Who wouldn't have been?

But he was fine now.

It was fine.

Ed stood from the chair and stretched leisurely, as if he'd been waiting patiently for Alphonse to finish his call.

"So, what do you want to do today? Wanna go into town and grab some ice cream sodas at the drug store?"

Al's worry was immediately replaced with amused exasperation (which was Edward's intention exactly).

"Brother, you just had breakfast. Don't you think it's a little early for ice cream sodas?"

"It'll be noon by the time we get there if we walk. We can have lunch at the inn!"

"It's ten-thirty now. It'll still be thirty minutes to noon by the time we get there."

"Brunch then."

"No one has ice cream sodas for brunch."

"We're not no one," Ed let his face break into a conceited grin. "I'm the former State Alchemist and your my baby brother, which means I can do whatever I want and I can tell you what to do."

"No, you can't! I'm sixteen, I'm a grown man, no one can tell me what to do!"

Al said this as he led the way to the front door.

"But I'm not no one."

"Remember what Teacher said about popularity – being famous doesn't make you smarter."

"Yeah, it just means that no one cares if you're stupid."

"But you're not no one."

Al broke into a sprint, jumping off the front porch and jogging up the road before his big brother could tackle him.

XXX

Friday night came faster than Edward liked.

His dreams were odd and incoherent.

He was trapped in the rubble on the Promised Day, a metal rod spitting the meat of his shoulder, the pain dulled by the knowledge that it was over, it was over, they'd failed, they were all going to die, but at least they would all go at once and it was over…

And Father came, staggering like an undead in a ghost story, and he was going to drink Ed's soul like it was a particularly exotic tea…

He reached into Ed's mouth with his failing fingers, pinching Ed's tongue and pulling it from between his teeth, but instead of just his tongue all of his insides came snaking out, like a ribbon from a magician's sleeve. Father laid out the stalk of organs on the ground, presenting it where all could see, and everyone was suddenly there, crowding around him and studying his insides and Edward lay there, forgotten, feeling like a discarded package who's contents had been collected.

The crowd turned Ed's inner workings this way and that, commenting on the color of his lungs and the length of his intestine.

And then Kimblee was there, standing in front of him, looking down at him, his suit as crisp and white as ever.

"We've seen his viscera. I wonder what his nerves look like?"

Kimblee plunged his hand into the hole in Edward's stomach, the hole he'd put there, and Ed could feel him ripping his spine from his back, feel his brain being sucked from his skull and it was like his entire body was an automail port and Kimblee had decided to fiddle with the wires –

And then he was awake, drenched with sweat and shaking.

Winry had woken him, her hand still on his right shoulder from shaking him. The scar tissue from the automail tingled.

"Breathe, Ed. It's all right. You were dreaming."

Her face rippled with the flickering of the oil lamp on the bedside table.

"Your humerus pinched your brachial nerve again," she said, squeezing Ed's shoulder until he felt the ball shift in the socket and the tingling vanished in a stinging burst. The automail port had distorted the ligaments, making them loose and letting the bones shift so that they sometimes caught muscle and nerves between them. Winry said that the cartilage would tighten up in time, but until then, Ed sometimes felt like he had an automail arm all over again.

Edward trembled against her like a frightened rabbit, not sure what to say and so choosing to say nothing.

Instead, when Winry removed her hand to wipe his bangs from his sticky forehead, he lifted his shirt off, letting the cold night air evaporate the perspiration. Winry blew out the lamp and settled into the bed next to him, pulling the blankets off him and using them to cover the sweaty sheets, like she did when he had a fever while recovering from the surgery.

"Are you sure you don't want me to come with you tomorrow?" She asked for the fifth time since Al had told he where they were going and why.

"No," he answered instantly, cringing at the quiver in his voice. "No, this… this has nothing to do with you."

"Anything to do with you has to do with me. You're my patient, Ed, and I'm worried about your health."

"Al's already coming, I'll be fine."

Winry sighed. He felt her breath on his bare back. A sudden urge, physical and embarrassing, bloomed in his belly and he resisted the impulse to either turn around and hold her against him or squirm towards the wall.

Neither of them spoke after that.

They slept and there were no more dreams.

XXX

Edward had forgotten how much he enjoyed trains.

He'd forgotten how much he enjoyed being pampered because of his status.

He was no longer a State Alchemist, but his endeavors were well known, especially on this line. Ed and Al were treated to hot, gooey brownies in cold ice cream in their car, per Ed's request. At Alphonse's insistence that they have something healthy for lunch, Ed added a couple of sandwiches to their tab. When asked what he wanted them, Ed asked for bacon, lettuce, tomatoes, and extra mayonnaise.

Al sighed at the counter-productivity of it all, but said nothing.

As they got closer to Central, the fields and farmhouses grow smaller and closer together, and Alphonse watched as his brother seemed to grow smaller and closer together with them.

"Brother? I know we haven't been back to Central for awhile –" They actually hadn't been back since they'd left the hospital a month after the Promised Day, Ed's left arm healing and both of the brothers in physical therapy to strengthen atrophied muscles, but strong enough to perform the exercises on their own. " – so if you want, maybe we could go see the colonel – I mean, the brigadier general, and the Hughses. We can always call the university back."

We don't have to do this.

You don't have to do this.

Edward gave Al a withering glare that was just so Ed-like that Alphonse couldn't keep himself from smiling, though the smile was slightly sad.

"I ain't nervous, if that's what you're thinking. I've seen my insides loads of times. You see one hunk of cut beef, you've seen 'em all."

"Yeah, but… Brother, lots of people have seen your insides now. They might want… You know, it's okay for you to say no, right?"

Ed snorted, stretching out on the compartment seat, his new layer of belly fat rising and falling as he breathed.

"What would they want, my autograph? 'Hey, I saw your guts at the museum, will you sign my son's shoes he wore when he was a baby?' How would they even know it was my guts? Do they have my name on them, or something?"

As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Ed knew he didn't want to know the answer.

Al saw on Ed's face that he didn't want to know the answer.

XXX

Ed was used to being poked awake by Al.

He was not used to being poked awake by the stewardess.

Al sat across from him, blinking sleep from his own eyes.

"Um... sir, I'm sorry, but we've arrived."

Edward stared at her, yawned, stretched, pulled out his wallet, and tossed a ten-thousand Cenz bill at the woman's dress.

"Brother!"

Alphonse was awake now.

In response to his brother's outburst, Ed chucked a second bill, this time more accurately aimed at the stewardess's upper body.

Alphonse grabbed their luggage and Edward and swiftly departed.

XXX

Ed had been to the university with Al once to peruse the library.

Edward had learned many things about university's students and very little about its library.

After a displaying jock trying to get his female classmates to look at him decided to call Ed "a little lolly sucker" and Ed had responded with breaking the young man's collarbone with a well-aimed sock to the shoulder which had left him sobbing on the carpeted floor, Alphonse had scooped up his brother as if he was a particularly aggressive alley cat and clomped back to the military dorms as fast as his sabatons could carry them.

In the months following, Alphonse had been the only one to set foot on the campus to borrow books and occasionally buy food from the university's café. Many months following this, Edward found himself being led across the common area by a smiling Al who looked perfectly at home among the arcing buildings pocked with windows.

Few students or staff looked their way, and if they did, it was only a glance. It occurred to Ed that they probably looked like students, in their budding manhood and cases in their hands, arriving at the dormitory on their own schedule or on their way to a lecture.

He studied his brother's contented expression and wished one of those were true.

XXX

The Hall of the Sciences, whose name did not reflect the creativity of the architect who designed it, felt more like a church to Edward than a house of learning. The stone dome through which they entered the Hall was deathly silent, every whisper echoing up into the curved ceiling. Students sat on benches or on the marble floor, reading textbooks or writing papers (sometimes both) while muted speech rumbled from behind the large oak doors on the far side of the room.

"That's the lecture hall. These students are for the next class," Al whispered just loud enough for his voice to resonate in the silence but not enough for his words to go with it.

"How do you know that?" Ed asked as Al took him by the arm and pulled into a side hall.

"I would attend lectures sometimes while you were reading or sleeping."

"And they let you?!"

Alphonse shrugged.

"The professors are paid to dole out knowledge, not to be picky about who that knowledge gets doled out to."

They had also probably been too intimidated by the armor to say anything, Ed thought as the encroaching walls of the corridor soaked up any excess sound, making it acceptable to speak at a typical volume.

The brothers passed by several closed doors. When they came across one that was open, they would catch a glimpse of classes being held in conference rooms or experiments taking place in laboratories. The air smelled of gas candles and diluted bleach and… was that the metallic scent of transmutations?

By the time they reached the staircase leading to the professors' offices, Al was dragging Ed up the stairs while Ed was craning his neck to look this way and that, looking for a tell-tale flash of blue from an open door or a passing student carrying a book with an array on the cover.

XXX

When they passed by the door with the plaque that proudly proclaimed Professor of Alchemy, Edward squealed and pointed like a schoolgirl at the window of a pet shop.

"Yes, Brother, they teach alchemy here. Come one, I'm sure the professor is busy and we're late for our meeting with Doctor Atkins – here it is" He knocked beneath the plaque reading Doctor Tanner Atkins, Professor of Surgical Medicine.

The door opened nearly instantaneously.

"Mister Elric! Um – Misters Elric! Welcome! Please, come in! I – We are honored to –"

"Do you have a professor of medical alchemy?!"

Doctor Atkins stared, open-mouthed.

Al brought a hand to his face.

Ed danced on his toes with anticipation.

Then Alphonse started laughing, and then Doctor Atkins started laughing, and Ed started asking what was so funny.

XXX

"We don't have a professor of medical alchemy per se, but one could pursue studies in both medicine and alchemy to become a medical alchemist, if that is your question."

"Where's the alchemy professor?" Ed launched into his next questions without preamble.

"Professor Bryan Reeves is in the lecture hall, explaining the structure and properties of esters."

They were walking down the hall to the staircase, from where the professor would lead them to the storage facilities on the lower floors.

Ed made a rude noise.

"A whole lecture on that?! Esters are easy, they're just acids that've been mixed with alcohol."

"You know that, Brother, but the students don't know that. That's why they're learning about it now."

"Couldn't they have learned that from reading the book?"

"I'm pretty sure they don't have Dad's notes, Brother."

"They shouldn't need Hohen – Dad's notes to understand it, it's basic!"

"Not everyone learns the way you do, Brother. That's why the world isn't made up of you's. And thank God for that!"

"Hey!"

The brothers continued squabbling as they descended the stairs and as Doctor Atkins unlocked the steel doors to the storage facilities. The cold air that rushed over them shiver.

The overpowering smell of dung made Ed's nose wrinkle.

"What the –"

The squeaking of mice answered his question.

"For medicinal experiments, I assure you," the professor clarified at the boys' horrified expressions. "We keep the chimeras in the lab on the far side. Strictly rodents and reptiles and all carefully regulated and cared for. We see them as members of the research team rather than simple subjects and treat all specimens with respect."

"What about the ones who die?"

Doctor Atkins smiled sympathetically as he unlocked another set of steel doors.

"Many of them are kept for dissections for biology students. Once that's done, they're buried in a field maintained by ecology department. The spiritualism students hold a funeral for them every three months."

This seemed to place Al's mind at ease, but Ed made a face.

"You have spiritualist classes?"

"In the Hall of Sociology, yes. Sometimes, even people of science need to be a part of something bigger than themselves."

"They are. It's called science."

"Brother! We've talked about this."

Before Alphonse could repeat his spiel on the importance of open-mindedness, Doctor Atkins brought them into an even colder room that smelled of formaldehyde. Al couldn't keep himself from hugging himself to keep warm. The walls were lined with lockers. Doctor Atkins read the placards on the lockers, moving from one to the other, until he found the one he was looking for. He unlocked it, opened it (making the room even colder and setting Al's teeth to chattering; Ed held his brother close to him to warm him up), read the placards on the trays inside until he found the correct one, then pulled what looked like an oven mitt onto his hand and slid the tray from the locker, placing it on the table behind him.

It looked like a steak.

If it hadn't smelled like preservatives, Ed would have probably mistaken it for one.

"I'm told the Briggs soldiers found it while looking for… after you'd disappeared," the professor said, glancing at Edward and away again.

"They would have thought you dead but couldn't find the rest of you and there were no bear sightings in the ruins where they found it. The only explanation was that someone had taken you and left this bit behind, and they couldn't think of a reason for why they would collect your corpse if not to deliver it to the fortress."

Ed needed a chair again.

"Wait.. so Briggs had this – has had this – for a year?! And they're telling us now?!" Alphonse's face was far too pale for Ed's liking.

"Well… they were a bit distracted by the…" Atkins made a vague waving gesture as euphemism for the Promised Day and the days coming before and after. "And once it was over, they had other matters attend to… I'm told they're still dealing with the casualties, ensuring that deceased's remains and their belongings are returned to their loved ones. That's where they found this."

"They found my brother's kidney in storage?!"

"In the morgue. Although what with the number of dead as a result of the… skirmishes, I doubt there's much of a difference."

Edward stumbled to the wall and settled for leaning against, trying to make the action look like one of boredom rather than weakness.

"There was no identification aside from an explanation form a Briggs captain, so it was sent here for sequence matching. Doctor Reeves and I performed the procedure together. The gene sequence is identical."

"Identical to what?"

Atkins glanced at and away from Ed again. Ed pretended to study the thinness of the fingers on his right hand.

"The, ah… other specimen. The one in the museum. They both from originate from Mister El – your brother."

There was an awkward silence.

Ed sighed, as if exasperated, and returned to the table with the tray.

He forced himself to look.

If Ed had to guess, it was about the size of his fist and obviously squished, its flushed innards visible through the tear splitting it open.

He imagined what it must have looked like inside of him, full of blood and life, working in tandem with his other organs to keep him alive despite every crisis he threw his body into.

Edward was suddenly overcome with the oddest wave of grief.

"So… what would you like to become of it?"

Ed didn't take his eyes off of the small hunk of meat that he had been born with and would now die without - it was a very strange thought – and pursed his mouth.

"Can you put it back in me?"

Doctor Atkins smiled sadly.

"Well, I could certainly have it arranged… but, since it's expired, at best your body will dissolve it into basic components for reuse. At worst, the bacteria that's surely taken root within it will send you into toxic shock, most likely resulting in your death."

"Which one is more likely?"

"The second one."

"So it's not really useful to me anymore."

The words sent another pang of confused mourning through him.

"Well, if I can't use it, I might as well give to someone who can."

Atkins visibly perked up.

"So you'll release ownership?"

"I'm pretty sure I did the day it got punched outta me."

"Wonderful! I'll draft up the paperwork immediately – it's only one page and I have to do most of the signing, don't worry. What time is it? I'll arrange dinner – at my complete expense, of course –"

"What about the other one?"

The professor was pulled from his celebration with the abruptness of a blown-out car engine.

"I'm sorry?"

Al's tone was light, but his face was dark with sincerity.

"The one the doctors in the north gave you without my brother's consent? What about that one?"

"Al, we don't have to –"

"It's on display inn a public museum for everyone to see! I think… I think you should see what everyone is seeing before you decide if you want them to see it or not."

"If you want to see the specimen, it would be my honor to show you. Or, if you simply wish to request it be removed from the exhibit, your desire will be carried out posthaste."

Ed could tell that the professor did not want to remove the specimen from the exhibit.

He could also see that his brother did not want him to make a decision without having all the available information.

And he did not want either of them to see how badly he just wanted this to be over.

So he might as well get it over with.

He blew out a sigh.

"Okay, let's see it."

Sorry, one of the long boring talking ones not much to see here.

I'm thinking about starting an Ace attorney story, but I haven't finished SoJ and I haven't played the Miles games so I don't think I have enough knowledge of the lore yet.