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Winry grinded her teeth as the knife ghosted over her stomach. She hissed as Barry flicked the blade, drawing more blood. She opened her tear filled eyes and saw a small trail of red dripping down her bare stomach. Her white tank top had been cut away, leaving her clad only in her black tube top and skirt. After only giving her ankle a slight flesh wound he had proceeded to cut her in several other parts of her body. Her arms, legs, and stomach were all covered in scattered cuts. All of them were bleeding, but none of them were deeper than half an inch. That didn't mean that they didn't hurt like hell. Years ago Winry had cut her hand on broken glass and it had really hurt. Now she felt a very similar pain all over her body.
There she was; chained, helpless, exposed. At the mercy of a man who had tried to kill her and was currently hurting her.
"I'd finish by hacking at your neck until your head was completely removed." He finished his graphic description of how he'd violently murder Winry with a small cut on her shoulder. "But you'd be dead at this point so that wouldn't really matter, my little lamb."
'Why does he keep calling me that?' She inwardly sobbed before her heart dropped. 'Because he's right. I am a little lamb. A helpless lamb about to be slaughtered.' She was dragged out of her thoughts by fingers roughly grabbing her face and violently turning Winry to face her tormentor.
"It's rude not to listen while someone's talking." His face had changed from an amused look to one of anger. "And why aren't you begging? All the other lambs begged for mercy." Suddenly he shoved her head back into the hard wall, causing Winry to see stars. Her vision swam as pain exploded in the back of her skull. Somewhere in front of her, she could hear him standing up. His footsteps echoed as he stomped over to the door and the sound of a door slamming rang out.
Winry groaned as vision slowly turned to black. "Wh-what the hell?" She muttered before she lost consciousness
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"And you have no idea where the Chopper could have taken Miss Rockbell?" Mustang asked into the phone. His tone was annoyed yet also serious.
"Uhhh...well no Colonel Mustang but we are following several leads." Came the nervous voice of Lieutenant Pence from the other line.
"Are any of them feasible?"
There was a pause before Pence spoke again. "No sir. This Chopper is very good, sir. He left almost no evidence at the scene...well except for the...uh finger. None of the neighbors saw him entering the house or leaving it with Miss Rockbell. To be honest Colonel, we've got very little to work with."
'Then do your damn job!' Mustang sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "What else have you and your men done?"
"Well...we've put the city on lockdown and have become searching every warehouse or abandoned building in the city. I have every soldier on duty."
Mustang drummed his fingers on top of his desk. "And what about Fullmetal?"
"We..." Pence paused. "Don't know where he is."
"What!" Mustang barked.
"He ran off after learning that Ms. Rockbell had been taken." Pence said nervously. "We couldn't keep up with him."
"Find him, you idiot." Mustang growled. "He could be playing right into the Chopper's hands for all you know."
He ignored Pence's feeble "Yes sir." and slammed the phone down. The Flame Alchemist then turned to Hawkeye who was standing silently next to the deck. "Lieutenant, get us two tickets on the next train to Rush Valley. I want to be there as soon as possible."
Hawkeye nodded. "Yes sir." She then turned and quickly exited the office.
Mustang sat back into his chair with a heavy sigh. This was turning into a damn nightmare. First he learns that the notorious serial killer Barry the Chopper had escaped from prison five days ago. Then he calls the Elric brothers to warn them, only for Fullmetal to run off as Mustang expected he would.
But Mustang hadn't expected that the Chopper would target Winry Rockbell.
"I'm a fucking idiot." He muttered to himself. 'Of course the girl would be in danger. I should have sent soldiers to Rush Valley as soon as the Chopper had escaped.'
Mustang remembered the day that the Chopper had attacked Edward and Ms. Rockbell. He remembered how the poor young girl had trembled in fear while she'd been led out of the Butcher shop.
'I put a blanket around her and led her to an ambulance.' He recalled.
Mustang didn't know Winry Rockbell very well. He had only met her a handful of times. But during the Milos incident; he, Lieutenant Hawkeye, and her had traveled for several hours on their way to meet the Elrics. The girl had insisted on coming, despite the situation being possibly dangerous. He and Winry had talked for most of that time. The main topic had been Edward and Alphonse. He learned more about their difficult childhood and their close friendship with Miss Rockbell. Mustang had found her to be a smart, thoughtful, kind, and charming girl.
"And now she's in danger." Mustang sighed sadly. He remembered what the Chopper's victims had looked like. There was no telling what sort of horrors Winry was experiencing at the moment.
"Colonel?"
Mustang looked up to see Hawkeye at the door. "I've booked two tickets on the next train to Rush Valley sir. It leaves tonight."
"Good. Thank you lieutenant." Mustang said before frowning.
'Edward's in Rush Valley right now. His childhood friend has been kidnapped by one of his former enemies. I can't imagine what he must be going through.'
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Ed ran through the busy streets of Rush Valley, past vendors and their customers. He didn't care that he was bumping into people. He didn't care that he was kicking over baskets and boxes. All that he cared about was finding her.
He saw a fire escape up ahead and ran to it. He jumped and hoisted himself up so he could get a better look around. From his current position he could see the entire street. But it was the same as the last street, busy with nothing suspicious happening.
'Damnit I can't see anything. Fuck, there's gotta be something. God dammit!'
It was fucking useless. He was doing nothing but waste time, wasting Winry's time.
After being shown her finger Ed had gone into shock. That psycho had hurt her, made her bleed while he had done nothing to stop it. Once he had recovered, the lieutenant explained that Barry had left no clues on where he had taken Winry or if she was even still alive. He'd told Ed that they were searching the surrounding area, but had no sound leads. Ed had freaked out, screaming at the soldiers before running outside to look for Winry himself.
Ed swore loudly before jumping down from the fire escape. He took off running as soon as his feet had touched the ground. Somewhere, somewhere there was a clue to where Winry had been taken. He had to find it, he had to find her.
'I was too late.' Ed cried to himself. 'I was too late and now he has her. Oh god! What if he's hurting her right now? What if...what if he's killed her. No! No, she can't be dead. She can't be! I can still find her, I can still save her. I have to! I gotta save her. I gotta…I gotta tell Winry how much I care about her.'
Ed's pace faltered as despair began to seep into him. Eventually he stopped moving altogether and simply stood there in the street. 'What if she dies without knowing how I truly feel about her? What if she doesn't know that she isn't just my mechanic, that she isn't just my friend!'
"Brother!"
Ed whirled around to see Alphonse standing behind him. The two siblings stared at each other before Ed's head dropped. He felt tears pricking at his eyes.
"I don't know what to do Al." He almost sobbed. "She's out there, and he has her."
"I know brother." Al hung his head as well. Usually he would try to say something positive, something to cheer Ed up. But now, with Winry having been kidnapped by a sadistic murderer. He simply had nothing to say.
"This is all my fault Al." Ed said.
Al raised his head to look at Ed.
"He took her to get back at me, he's...hurting her to get back at me." Tears were falling from Ed's eyes, surprising Al. He hadn't seen Edward cry in years.
"I...I don't know what to do." Ed said hopelessly. A long moment of silence passed before Al spoke.
"But you do know Barry the Chopper." He said.
"What?" Ed raised his head.
"Think back brother, he'd kill people in his butcher shop right? Where they were alone and no one else was there."
"Yeah." Ed said.
"Then he'd bring Winry to somewhere private. Where no one would disturb him. Like an old warehouse or something."
"Yeah but this is Rush Valley! There's got to be a hundred old warehouses in this damn city." Ed said exasperated.
"Then we better start looking." Came a voice from behind Al. A voice said from behind Al. A young woman with dark skin stepped out from behind the suit of armor.
"Paninya?"
The young girl looked as tense and nervous as Ed felt. "There's about 24 unused warehouses in Rush Valley. I heard the soldiers say that they were going to search them, but they're stretched too far. So it'll take them time."
Ed bit his upper lip. "Then we've got no time to lose." He straightened and faced Al and Paninya. "We should split up to cover more ground."
"Are you sure that's wise?" Al asked.
"No, but it's faster." Ed said. "Paninya, where are these warehouses?"
The metal legged girl frowned in concentration before pointing down the street. "If you keep going down this street you should find 8 of them all lined up. They're impossible to miss." She then pointed towards the eastern side of Rush Valley. "There's 10 more in that direction and 6 to the north. I'll take the 10 to the east."
Ed nodded "Thank you Paninya. I'll search the ones down this street. Al, you get the ones to the north."
"Okay." The younger Elric sibling said.
"Alright. If any of you find her be careful. Do not underestimate the Chopper at all!" Ed started to fill energy and hope come back into him. "Let's do this."
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Her arms felt numb, the lack of blood flow was seeing to that. This was making it much harder to find a way out of thick manacles around her wrists. Her attempts to escape had resulted in bruised wrists and scraped skin. The fact that her arms were being suspended over her head made it harder to see any weakness on the metal clamps.
"There's always a way out." Winry muttered.
"Usually there is, but not today."
Winry jumped out of her skin and stared horrified at the room in front of her. Sure enough, Barry the Chopper was standing by the door. When did he come in?
Barry gave a sigh and rubbed his face. "Oh I'm sorry about earlier. I simply don't know what came over me. Sometimes I just lose control." His feminine voice held no concern.
"That happens to me often. I just lose control of myself. It happened with my wife. Tell me little lamb, do you remember what I said back in my butcher shop all those years ago?"
Winry let out a shaky breath. "Y-you said that s-she was nagging you about something."
"And?"
"And f-for no reason at all, you killed her." Winry finished.
"I hacked her to death with a meat cleaver. Just like that." He added. "And when I saw how finely I could slice her, I wanted more. It was exhilarating. Reducing people to their most basic building block. It gave me power, a sense of joy that I had never felt before."
Barry turned back towards her and crouched down again. "I suppose it all goes back to my wife. I did only kill women who looked like her. They were the perfect specimens. She was very beautiful, like you Winry. Long blonde hair, a nice slender body, and eyes with a tint of blue." His coarse hand reached out and ghosted over the hem of her tube top. Winry gasped at the contact and shied away from him. His hand then once again roughly grabbed her face and turned her to face him. "In fact you do rather look like her quite a bit. Hmm I wonder?"
Suddenly his mouth was on her's, his teeth gnashing at her lips, his tongue forcing it's way in.
Winry's eyes widened and began to thrash against him in an effort to get his mouth off of hers. His disgusting tongue brutally shoved its way into her mouth. His teeth bit at her like a rabid dog, opening small gashes on her abused lips. Winry gave a muffled cry and clenched her eyes shut; waiting for it to be over. Why was this happening to her. Why doesn't he just end it already.
'No! I can't give up. Ed will find me, I know he will.' She inwardly sobbed.
After a few moments he pulled away from her. His hands stopped their bruising grip on her face. Winry gasped for breath as air filled her lungs. She weakly opened her eyes to look at Barry. He was sitting back, his mouth was covered with her blood. It was as he had messily tried to apply lipstick. His tongue darted out and began to mop up the red liquid. He twirled it around the outside of his mouth, collecting all of her blood.
"Hmm." He said after a moment, his face had a thoughtful look. It was as if he was comparing two different wine brands. "No, I'm sad to say you don't taste like her at all."
Winry merely sat there watching him.
"You taste even better."
Winry couldn't hold it in anymore and began to fully cry. Tears flowed from her eyes onto her stomach, mixing with the bloody wounds on her belly.
Barry smiled proudly and stood up. "As much as I would like to stay and spend more time with you. I have to leave. I hope you have noticed I've been kind to you so far, my little lamb. I could have chopped you to bloody pieces by now. But I won't get ahead of myself. Now I have to go and prepare for our guest of honor."
Winry sniffled and raised her head. She glared at the man in front of her. A strange feeling filled her. It was a feeling of pure disgust and hatred. She hated this man. Winry had never wished death on another human being until Barry the Chopper had forced his way into her life. "Fuck you." She whispered. "You're not going to get away with this."
"Not going to get away with this? But who will stop me?" Barry asked amused.
"Edward! Ed's going to find us and he's going to kick your ass again!" Winry spat.
Barry's grin was slow and positively shark like. "It's funny that you mention that." He chuckled before leaving the room once again.
Winry sat in silence for several minutes before dropping her head.
"Ed...where are you?"
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"Shit!" Ed slammed the door shut behind him as he raced out onto the empty street. He turned back to glance at the warehouse that he had just searched. He had searched every inch of that damn building. No Chopper, no Winry, nothing! With a sigh of desperation he looked back down the street at the warehouses that he had already searched.
"That's all eight of them. Fuck!" Ed huffed as he leaned against a wall for support.
Ed felt exhausted, he had been running ever since he'd split up with Al and Paninya. His brief hope of finding Winry had diminished more with every empty warehouse. Now that he had searched all of them, the hope was gone completely. He had a sinking feeling that Alphonse and Paninya had also found nothing.
"Shut up idiot." He muttered as he stood up. "She's never given up on me, so I'll be damned if I give up on her!" Ed was broken out of his thoughts when he heard a shaky voice behind him
"M-mister?"
Ed turned to see a trembling little boy standing a few feet away. He looked to be about ten years old, wearing a red shirt and blue shorts. His face was tear stained and his shaky hands held a dog leash. "Yeah?" Ed asked. "Did you lose your dog? Listen kid, I'm sorry but I really can't-"
"Are you Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist?" The kid blurted out.
Ed stared at the kid in surprise before his eyes narrowed. "Yes."
The boy reached into his pocket and held out a folded piece of paper. "He told me to give this to you." The boy spoke shakily.
Ed's eyes widened. "What? Who did?"
"The man...the man with the knife. I-I was walking my dog when he stopped us. H-he grabbed me a-and then he hurt my dog!" The boy started to cry again, obviously traumatized by what had happened.
Ed's face softened and he knelt down in front of the boy, placing his flesh hand on the boy's shoulder. "Hey, what's your name?"
The boy lifted his head and wiped his face. "It's Trevor."
"Okay Trevor." Ed spoke softly. "What happened next?"
"The man showed me a picture of you. Then he gave me this letter." Trevor pointed to the paper. "He told me to find you and give you these or else he'd kill my dog then m-my family."
Ed cursed under his breath before putting another hand on Trevor's shoulder. "Trevor, listen to me. Everything's going to be okay. I'm not going to let him hurt your family."
"Who is he?" Trevor asked, his eyes wide.
Ed sighed. "A very, very bad man." He glanced at the letter and took it from Trevor. Standing back up, he opened and began to read.
Hello Edward.
It's been a long time, hasn't it Edward? I've read about you in the newspapers; you've made quite a name for yourself. You're more famous than I'll ever be. I heard from several other prisoners that you don't kill. I'm disappointed with you, Edward. Someone like you can't afford to be so careless. You never know what can come back to haunt you. When we fought in my Butcher shop you were going to kill me but you didn't. Now I've come back to haunt you, I've killed three more people. And I also have your Winry.
Ed's eyes widened. 'Have? She's still alive!' He started to read again/
Lambs are docile creatures Edward. Innocent and beautiful. Winry is a lamb, Edward; a sweet little lamb. She's not like you or me, Edward. We're different, we've chosen to live our lives different from the lambs haven't we. I've chosen to be the wolf. You've chosen to be a shepard. Now come and save your little lamb...if you can/
I'll give you a hint, I'm somewhere within the Rush Valley county. Come and find us soon Edward, or else the wolf will have its fill.
This won't be the last letter you'll get. The next one will be much, much heavier.
Ed's fist clenched the paper in his hand.
"Will you get my dog back?"
Ed glanced at Trevor and his eyes softened. "I'll try Trevor. I'll try." He turned to look the boy in the eyes. "Thank you Trevor, you've been very brave. But now you need to head straight home. Okay? Tell your parents what happened and have them call the military."
"Okay." Trevor said.
"Good. Now where did you meet that man?" Ed asked.
Trevor pointed to the easy part of the city. "About twenty blocks that way. In t-the alley near the grocery shop. About an hour ago."
Ed deflated at the news. Barry would be long gone by now. "Thanks Trevor, now run home!" Ed ordered him. The boy nodded and took off running down the street.
Ed took off running. Even though Barry wouldn't be there, he could have left a sign. Maybe another letter. Ed's stomach turned when he remembered Barry's promise. Old storm clouds were ahead and soon it started to rain.
Eventually he was in the alley. The rain pouring down on him. He covered every inch of the alley, from end to end. He looked in trash cans, under boxes, and behind dumpsters. But there was nothing. No letters or packages of any kind. On the one hand Ed was grateful. This meant that Barry hadn't removed any other of Winry's body parts. But now he had nothing, this was a dead end.
'I don't know where to look!' He growled as he thought about Barry's letter. 'That motherfucker! He took her just to get revenge on me. This is just some sick game to him. Fuck! Winry is being hurt and there's nothing I can fucking do about it!'
Ed slumped against a nearby wall and slid to the wet ground in defeat.
"Winry…" He sighed her name. His best friend, mechanic, and his confidant. In his difficult, fucked up life; she had been a constant light. No matter how long him and Al were away, or how far they went. She was always waiting for them, for him. Images of her flashed through his brain. Her smiling when she'd see them coming down the road, frowning when he'd come back with a busted arm, crying when he himself wouldn't.
'The only reason that I'm even still alive is because of her. The only reason I can still walk is because of her. I owe her so much. I...love her!'
Ed let out a choked sob before he buried his head in his hands. Time passed slowly as he sat there crying. He didn't care about how he was getting strange looks from passerbyers. He didn't care about how tired and hungry he was. All he could think about was how he had failed Winry, the girl he loved.
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