The 8th Sin
-Chimera-Tamer-
Yay! Response:) Response is always good in a story. Okay, I'll keep around the 2k words range. Here in this chapter, I'll be introducing a new OC who will be here to stay. :)
On with the story then! I haven't updated my profile, so I haven't got much to say about this OC.
Please read and review!
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Freesia froze at the mention of the man's name. It somehow clicked something in the back of her head, but it just wouldn't come to the surface... Instead, it came out the wrong way, "...Greed... What kind of a name is that?"
Her companion didn't look the least surprised at her response. He replied shortly after that by saying, "Well, mind gracing me with yours? It's a bit unfair for me to tell you my name and you not telling yours."
"An exchange of equal values, huh? Are you an alchemist?" she said a bit too straightforwardly, actually making her look dumb in the process.
Greed shook his head, a smirk still playing on the corners of his mouth, "Unfortunately, not."
She shrugged, "Pity. Anyway, my name's Freesia. Nice to meet you," she said, smiling sweetly at the taller man before her.
"Likewise. So tell me, what kind of a name is 'Freesia'?" he asked innocently, obviously teasing her. If it wasn't because of the darkness, she could have been able to see the look in his eyes, all giddy with glee.
She huffed and turned away, "I don't need to answer that. All I know is that it's a good name, it's MY name, and I like it very much. So there," she stuck her tongue out playfully at him, the little puppy she's been cradling in her arms appearing to do the same. The puppy doesn't seem to like Greed very much, but it seemed pretty much the contrary with Freesia. She somehow felt safe with him, secure. As if she can just stick around him without having to worry about anything else.
Greed shivered slightly as another cold breeze blew past them. He never did like the cold, neither did he do well in it and now certainly wasn't a good time to start liking it, "Well, I guess I'll be off now. You ought to go back where you came from yourself," he said curtly, removing his hands from his pockets only to gather his jacket around himself, though it didn't help much in keeping him warm as his arms were completely exposed to the chill. He turned around and was about to walk away when Freesia called out to him,
"Hey, wait!" he didn't stop. He just went on and before he knew it, she was walking in stride with him, "Do you mind if I join you?" his was asked on purpose; she didn't want to lose that feeling of security just yet.
The dark-haired man threw her a sideways glance, "I won't be held responsible if your parents get mad at you."
Freesia smiled, shaking her head, "They won't. They know this is my morning routine. Besides, they're barely home, so I spend most of the day wandering around. You're the first person who actually comes out and talks to me at this hour and that makes me feel kind of special, in a sense," she said a bit vaguely, earning a confused look from the older man beside her.
They reached a kind of 'secluded' place in town, in a bar known as the 'Devil's Nest'. It was pretty much empty in there, save for a few drunkards asleep at the counter, beer bottles of their cups sitting mere inches away from their faces.
Freesia was busying herself with the sights as she has never entered a bar before that she actually missed Greed passing by her. Now she was all alone, in a quiet bar with only her new pet puppy for company. (She decided that she wanted to keep it, no matter what her father says!)
"Greed...? Where are you...?" now she was feeling kind of scared. Being in a place full of people she didn't know was creeping her out. Her puppy wriggled out of her grip and sniffed around before padding off into one of the rooms, "Ah! Shu! (It means 'curse') Come back here!" she cried quietly, following the little black-furred creature as quietly as she could and at the same time, trying to grab the little critter.
By the time she got a hold of her pet, she found herself in a... kitchen. Shu barked once and Freesia had to force his mouth shut to prevent from waking everyone in the vicinity, "Alright wise guy, one more bark out of you in this place and I'll be sure not to give in to cuteness the next time I see you," Freesia said, to her dog and that made Shu whimper.
Greed was in the same room, leaning against one of the counters and having some alcohol with the hopes that it would warm him up. He'd heard her talking to her dog and was smiling at her, in a way that made Freesia sure that it wasn't genuine, "That dog can bark all it wants and barely wake anyone in the lobby up front. The only light-sleepers in this place are sleeping in the back."
"Do you come here often?" his companion asked, putting Shu down on the ground. Greed chuckled,
"I own this place."
Freesia let out an 'oh' before starting to feel a bit hot. The place may be small, but it was plenty warm, "I know I quite like the heat, but the temperature in here's close to cooking me," she said with a giggle and removed her jacket, folding it in half and placing it on a nearby table. She didn't notice Greed watching her the whole time and was surprised when he grabbed her right wrist, "Greed?"
He was frowning at something on her arm. She followed his gaze and found that it landed on her 'birthmark', "It looks odd, doesn't it?"
"Odd? That's an understatement. You do know what this mark means, don't you?" Greed growled, not releasing his grip on her.
The pressure he was exerting on her was on the point that it was painful now, "Greed, stop! That hurts!" She tried wrenching her hand out of his grip, but to no avail.
"If you're intent on playing the fool, then let me remind you; this mark proves you're not human," Freesia froze at that. What was he trying to say? "You're a homunculus," he growled, then brought his left hand up for her to see. The same mark was on the back of his hand, "Just like me."
-Meanwhile, in a little house in Central...-
"Ah-choo!" a young woman, probably 18 or so, blew her nose with a tissue and sighed, scratching her head and pushing back her wild mane of red hair. Notes were scattered all over her table, most of them containing alchemic circles and difficult formulas. She was currently bending over a particularly complex one, trying to see if she could use it or not.
"Hey Marcus, what do you think? You think I'll pass with this alchemic circle?" she held the piece of parchment up for a small goblin-like creature sitting on another table behind her to see. It peered at the formulas and looked at the alchemic circle before rolling into a really tight ball, almost in disgust.
The young woman sighed again, "I guess you're right... The last time I used this, I ended up with a chimera without legs... Why did that Shou Tucker have to use my basic concepts? After all, so far MY chimeras have at least been tame enough to help around the house."
Marcus grunted something behind her, "Be quiet, Marcus! Don't compare yourself to Mr. Tucker's chimeras. He creates monsters. I create company," she said brightly, standing up and hugging her little goblin friend," Just so you know, I'm not very confident in my next recertification exam..." the little chimera in her hands started bopping her on the head with it's small but agile fists, causing her to feel as if a pair of cymbals have just been played right in front of her ears,
"Ow-ow-ow! Marcus! That hurt! Quit it!" she cried, putting the small creature down onto the floor, "Look, I know you don't like the idea of being transmuted with a chimpanzee, but it was the only thing I could do to save you, okay? You're my little brother. Try to understand."
Marcus grumbled something under his breath and she laughed, "Be grateful it's your pet chimpanzee, baby bro! I wanted to make you as human as possible!"
Just then, the phone rang. Running over to it, she picked it up in a hurry, slipping on a marble on the floor and ended up falling, bumping into a wall and dropping the phone altogether with a yelp of surprise. The person on the other end of the phone could only hear the odd, strangled sound followed by a loud crash and was lucky enough to hear the whole din finished with the touches of a particularly large vase smashing down on the head of it's owner, followed by an agonized cry before a series of footsteps came over and a voice finally came through the device, "Hello? Oww... Corporal Melody Exhall speaking..."
"H-Hello? Corporal, it's Sheska. Wow, I wasn't really expecting you to be up this late..." said the timid voice on the other end of the contraption,
"Oh, hi Sheska! So, how'd it go? Did you manage to analyze it completely and get a positive result?" Melody sounded very hopeful, her emerald eyes gleaming with anticipation.
Sheska was silent for a while, "Well... about that alchemic circle you said was going to make you pass your recertification exam..."
"Uh-huh? Did it work? Was the formula alright? I don't have as many reference books as you have, so I was afraid to use it before I got confirmation from more reliable sources. A.K.A, your library of a house."
"Well, according to the alchemy books, everything's perfect. The only problem is... One of these 'How to make Chimera' book state that the array here is a bit off... plus you used a complex kind of formula teamed up with a simple array, the book predicts that you may end up with a chimera that has a missing head, at least one missing limb, or has no brain at all..." Sheska said slowly, recalling word by word of the short paragraph in the aforementioned book.
Melody fell silent on the other end of the phone... "Uhm... Hello? Melody? Are you there?"
"Yeah I'm here. Just give me a sec..." Melody placed the phone on the desk and walked to a small, sound-proof cubicle not too far away from where she was standing. Stepping inside and locking herself in, she shrieked in frustration. After all, her hard work had been for naught and her recertification exam was in three days' time... whatever her task was, she was to use the one alchemic skill she knows how to use very well; making chimeras.
She stepped out of the room a short while later and picked the phone up, "Sheska, I'm sorry to keep you up all night just to help me, but you can wrap it up for now. I'll call you up if I need anything."
Sheska nodded on the other end, "Okay. Good night, Melody. Or... whatever time of day it is..."
"It's two in the morning, Sheska. Go to sleep, you need your rest."
"What about you?"
Melody shrugged, "Expect my office to be occupied by a raccoon version of me."
Sheska laughed before bidding her friend good night. As soon as she put the phone down, Melody slumped into her chair and brushed a few strand of her hair out of her pretty face. How to create human chimeras... that was one of the things her father had been studying and it looked like I rubbed off onto her. According to her father's studies, if one was to become a chimera, one's life expectancy would be increased by as high as 0.9 percent, which was quite a high number. Well, she has been interested in the subject for the longest time, so she was pretty glad she got to take over her father's job as a State Alchemist.
She broke into a fit of coughs shortly after that. It was painful. She doubled over as the coughing became even more violent and before she knew it, blood was seeping through between her fingers as she fell down onto the floor, on her side.
She was breathing heavily when it subsided and was glad Marcus had gone upstairs to sleep. Painfully, she crawled over to her desk and opened one of the drawers. She pulled a bottle of pills from out of it and swallowed two, feeling her breathing return back to normal slowly.
'...Two years... Two years of suffering... God, if this keeps up, I don't know what's going to happen to Marcus. Well, at least if something happens to me...' she thought as she hauled herself up to her feet.
She picked up a book from one of her bookshelves and continued to study, until she fell asleep on the couch with various books spread out in front of her and her ink bottle making a total mess out of a particular book that looked like it came out of the library...
On the building across of her home, a figure sat on the roof, looking at her with an amused expression. His usually cold, cruel features softened considerably when she finally fell asleep, looking so peaceful and innocent, her hair spread out around her like fire. The sight was simply beautiful to him.
"And what brings us to this particular place at this hour?" asked the silky voice of a woman behind him. He merely threw his head back to look at her, his vision in that position making the tall, dark-haired woman behind him appear upside-down.
He smiled brazenly at her and said, "Why Lust, I didn't know you cared," his voice dripped with sarcasm as he returned to his previous position and continued to watch the apple of his eye sleep.
The wavy-haired woman, Lust, followed his gaze and smiled, giggling to herself, "My, my, Envy... Your tastes in women surprise me."
"Doesn't everything about me always?" he asked bluntly, standing up and pushing his locks of dark green hair back, "But, I have to agree. To have someone like her catch my eye IS something to be surprised about."
A fat, bald man... erm... creature... (Receives glares from this character's fans) MAN, tugged lightly at Lust's gloves and said, "Ne, Lust, can I eat her...?"
Instead of Lust answering that question for him, Envy was the one to snap at him, rather angrily, "No. Lay a finger on her and I'll have you barbequed..." his two companions stared at him as if he had grown an extra head before he went off without another word.
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Hoo-kay! That's all for this chapter, folks. I enjoyed writing this chapter very much, especially the last bits, so I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. :-)
By the way, in future chapters, I may be merging some characters from a friend's fic in here. I like his concept and I think it would spice my story up too.
If you have flames, I'd feel quite upset... :'-(
Oh well, you're the readers, you give the verdict. More to come, more to come... Don't worry, I'll try to upload more frequently. After all, exam season is approaching, here where I'm from. :-P