The 8th Sin

-Hidden-

Thanks very much to Sarah, who has kindly corrected me on the spelling of the Ororobus tattoo. God, I'm totally helpless at translating all the Japanese words in the anime. They only have Chinese friggin' subtitles! Argh!

Some things will be explained... Maybe. In this chapter, I purely make it up as I go. Sorry!

Anyway, also thanks very much to my other reviewers, thanks for your bits of advices, I'd like to try and apply them as much as possible so this story can be much more interesting for anyone who reads this.

Please read and review!

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Everyone looked at the dark-haired girl. Three with surprise and the guy with the sleeveless top in the background glaring at her over the book he was reading. Rin stepped up to her; placing his hands on her shoulder and asked, in a dangerous tone,

"Freesia... What did you just say this man is?"

Okay, now there definitely was a déjà vu feeling all over again. But she wasn't tempted to just go purely on instinct and run away again. Instead, she freed herself of his grip and stood in front of Greed, almost in a way that made it look as if she were trying to defend him from an unknown force from an unknown source. (Or plainly, something invisible. Worse yet, something that she just imagined. :P)

"Okay, I know you guys aren't very fond of homunculi, but just listen to me for a minute!" she cried, pulling the best pair of puppy-dog eyes she could. Rin wasn't one to give in to cuteness, but in this case, his two companions were the one, who stopped him,

"She did say 'homunculus' didn't she?" Jonathan asked skeptically, eyeing his rival closely.

Rin gave up. He'd been trying to conceal the fact that she was a homunculus from John, but obviously, it wasn't working. Melody knew too, so he half-suspected that she must have told him anyway in a slip of tongue. He turned around to face the other alchemist and said, "Yes, she did say that. She's a homunculus. If what she said earlier on is true, then the man behind her is also one."

Meanwhile, while the three alchemists were having a discussion, the two homunculi were also deep in conversation. Greed had pulled her down to sit on the bed next to him and the first thing he did was sit cross-legged on Rin's bed, "Nice going, genius. I was planning on getting out of here and going somewhere safe. You just HAD to go and blow my cover, didn't you?"

Freesia rolled her eyes skywards, "Exactly WHERE is this safe place you're talking about? If it's Dublith, I'm betting your bar isn't even there anymore, judging by you, being the head honcho there getting dragged out of your turf and taken all the way here. Besides, Rin's nice. He knew I was a homunculus, and he's keeping me here with him. His friends should be alright, too."

Greed huffed, "Yeah right and pigs have wings."

"I'm serious here! Besides, you can just put up your Ultimate Shield and get away from here, easy as a snap of your fingers," For a second, the two of them stared at each other blankly.

Greed broke the silence, "You KNOW about my Ultimate Shield?"

Freesia scratched the back of her head, "No... I'm pretty sure I don't... But... How did I know?" that was so dumb a question, Greed could have punched her in the face for looking so stupid.

"Never mind... Forget I asked you that. Hey, wait a sec. Homunculi are born due to the failure of an alchemization. Who made you?" the sin of greed asked as his companion pondered for a moment.

She looked at her hands. He had a point; if homunculi were created from alchemy, then who created her? Who was she? She may have gained new knowledge from meeting Greed, Pride and Envy, her memories returned to her in small fragments, but what she knew for now wasn't enough to unravel her true identity. Sighing, she let herself fall flat on her back on the bed as she stared up at the ceiling, unable to answer Greed's question.

"I have no idea..." she said quietly, but it was loud enough for Greed to hear her. Just then, she remembered something. She sat up and faced the elder homunculus, "Remember when we were in the Devil's Nest?"

Greed raised an eyebrow at her, "After how you bowled me over? It's pretty hard to forget."

"No, no, that's not what I meant. I mean, when you first saw my Ouroboros tattoo," she cut herself off, wondering how she knew the name of the mark she now despised but shook it off seconds later, convincing herself that it was just a mere part of her memory coming back to her, "You mentioned a man's name. It started with a 'D', if I wasn't mistaken. Who was that person?"

Greed frowned at her and was going to counter her query with a question of his own when Rin interjected, "Freesia, how did you get that man..."

"His name is Greed," Freesia said in an annoyed tone.

Rin grumbled something under his breath, "Fine. Greed. How did you bring him in? Or rather, WHY did you bring him here?"

Freesia was dumbstruck for a moment. Now, what was the reason she brought Greed in earlier...? Ah yes, Pride. But she can't just go and tell them another homunculus named Pride just came by, dragging Greed by the collar and intending to kill him. To add to the list, she can't just tell Rin that she went out playing hero and saved Greed's skin.

In the end, she just described the assaulter, "Well, I just saw Greed being attacked by a military man. Or at least, I think he's in the military. He wears the same blue pants and black boots like you guys do. Uhm... He's kinda tall, slightly taller than me with a moustache and an eye patch. He's got short, black hair by the way and looks to be around his forties or something... Why are you guys looking like statues there?" Freesia asked as the three alchemists in front of her froze at the description.

"Guys?" she tried to snap them out of their trance, but to no avail. Greed merely retreated to reading the book he'd picked up earlier and went to sit at the windowsill, where the cool evening breeze was blowing. He didn't want to be a part of this conversation.

Melody was the first to break the silence, flopping down into a nearby chair, "King Bradley...? That's impossible! He was... Wait… Did he follow the rest of the mercenaries back to HQ or didn't he?"

"Huh?" Now it was Freesia's turn to be clueless.

Rin objected to her idea, "That's nonsense. It must have been someone who looked like the President. A doppelganger, if you like."

Jonathan saw the logic in this, "Probably. But even so, what does the President have to do with a homunculus?" he questioned, turning to look at the homunculus sitting on the windowsill, reading quietly without a care in the world.

As Greed was reading, he was listening in to their conversation at the same time. He sighed as he flipped to a fresh page in the book, 'Oh, you alchemists have no idea how deep in this homunculus business the 'President' is in...' he thought to himself. Why would he bother wanting to tell them anything? It wasn't as if Pride was going to come and hunt him down soon. Pride played an important role in this place called Central.

Freesia hadn't a clue of what they were talking about so she thought she'd go down to the kitchen since she was hungry. However, she didn't like the idea of going downstairs alone. Her solution was simple; she walked over to the window, grabbed a surprised Greed by the wrist and dragged him along with her to the kitchen. She did inform the alchemists of her whereabouts before she left the room.

"I'll be having dinner if anyone needs me," she called before she exited the room. Even when she did, Rin followed her outside the room for a bit and stopped her for a moment,

"Are you sure you're not going to run away from the house?"

"Does it look like I'm going to?" she asked cutely, not releasing her hold of Greed's wrist, who didn't like being dragged around.

"Yes, as a matter of fact."

Freesia pouted, "I won't. Besides, if I leave, there aren't any more fridges for me to raid for a midnight snack," she said flippantly, earning a smile from the purple-haired half-chimera.

He seemed to trust her at this point, "Okay, go ahead but your friend here stays with you. I don't want you letting him out of the window or anything."

"What do you take me for, a burglar?" Greed grumbled behind the female homunculus.

Rin ignored him, "Anyway, Melody, John and I have some work to do. I'd appreciate it if you don't disturb us and make sure I don't see any of my furniture ruined by the time I'm done, okay?"

Freesia didn't like it very much whenever he started bossing her around, but he was just taking care of his property, "Yes, DADDY, I'll try not to turn this whole place upside-down!" she said exasperatedly and before Greed could free himself from her grip, she broke into a jog, forcing Greed to be pulled along like a dog on a leash.

Once they reached the kitchen and Greed had freed himself from her deadly grip, he went and said, "You know, you have got to be the weirdest person I have ever met."

Freesia sighed, "Keep that up and you'll find yourself mailed to Pride's doorstep as a birthday present," she said in an annoyed tone. Pulling out a bottle of grape juice from the fridge and two cups from a cabinet, she filled the two cups and offered one to Greed as she sat to enjoy hers.

Neither said a word for a minute before Freesia broke the silence, "I know what you mean by me being the weirdest person. I can't help it alright? Back in the Devil's Nest, I was cornered. I felt pressured and I barely knew anything about myself. As these wacky accidents keep on happening to me, more and more of my memory, those of which I thought I'd forgotten for good, start coming back to me. Including some of you."

Greed frowned at her. He didn't remember ever seeing her, so he had to ask, "Do you remember where you've seen me?"

Freesia stared off into space, "Well... not exactly, but I do recall sitting in a chair near a huge house in a forested area. There was a woman standing beside me, but I can't remember her face. She said something to me and through the windows, I saw you. That woman said your name was Greed. Then she mentioned some more names and pointed at some more faces That's just about it," she finished, taking another sip of grape juice.

The sin of greed said nothing at this point. If she knew all of them, then how come none of them knew who she was?

"Anyway, let's get re-acquainted, shall we? As you know, I'm Freesia. It's sort of a miracle that you didn't actually forget my name. I can do a lot of things when I'm pressurized like make my nails elongate, predict my opponents' movements and turn myself to water, just to name a few and I've got an almost never-ending appetite unless I keep it under control," she said plainly, filling her glass with some more juice and downing the whole thing, "And you? I didn't get to know much about you."

Greed eyed her suspiciously, "Why would you want to know more about me?"

She just smiled coyly at him, "Because I've got a never-ending hunger for knowledge?"

That sounded a lot like him. He chuckled and gave in. He may not like her at all, but something about her made it possible for someone who actually loathes her come to like her eventually. She radiates that friendly air that makes people feel comfortable around her. Greed was no exception, "Name's Greed. You know I'm a homunculus, you know about my Ultimate Shield and currently, I'm stuck in Central with an annoying little homunculus who's sitting right across of me, drinking grape juice."

"Hey, I'm not annoying!" she cried, leaning over to slap him playfully on the arm.

Meanwhile...

"How come you guys never told me about those two?" John asked, feeling a bit hurt for not being informed.

Melody was playing peacemaker at the moment as Rin was giving his back to his two companions, working on his desk with some paperwork, "You never asked. Besides, I couldn't be bothered. I was way too busy this morning and I had to do some extra grocery shopping. Really, Freesia eats just about everything in the fridge and she doesn't even gain 1 gram out of all that food!" The winged alchemist grumbled, sounding a lot like a disgruntled father complaining about his spoiled child.

John looked at Melody, who had been apologizing to him for not telling him, saying something that sounded suspiciously like 'Rin made me promise not to tell you'. He sighed, flipping through some more of Rin's paperwork that had piled up at an unbelievable speed throughout his two-day absence in Dublith...

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A chimera sat behind its bars in a dark room with a single bulb hung in the ceiling, illuminating the room in its dim glow. The slow, ragged breathing of the seemingly incomplete beast echoed through the emptiness of the small chamber as a woman entered, an arrogant smirk set on her face.

"Hello there, Demetrius. I never thought you'd live through the transmutation," she paused to giggle for a moment, amused at the thought, "Do you smell anything familiar?" she asked, bending down to look at the beast's slitted, red eyes.

It looked up at her with a sad expression and a very faint scent reached it's sharp nose. It suddenly sprang from it's seated position, reaching it's claws out almost desperately at the woman, who had stood not too far away nor to near to the cage.

"...Li...Lilith...!" it rasped, clawing the air almost feverishly as tears rolled down it's face.

"That's right, Demetrius... Our daughter's still alive. Lilith is still alive... Will you fetch her for me? I've got too many things to do..." the beast stopped moving and retreated to a far corner of its cage, looking down at itself.

The woman laughed, "Oh don't worry, Demetrius... I'm sure she recognizes you. You've stuck to her for so long, she can actually tell who it was just by listening to your footsteps..." with that, she merely unlocked the door to the cage and left the room.

Once outside, Envy was sitting around, doing apparently nothing and out of boredom was feeding Gluttony with the day's newspaper, page by page as the glutton literally chomped them down.

"Envy, I'd like you and Demetrius to go and collect someone for me," she said in a sickly sweet voice as the green-haired homunculus looked at her,

"Why him? I can just do it by myself," he said flatly, tossing Gluttony the rest of the newspaper and standing up.

The woman standing in front of him smiled, "Because he knows the target very well. And I just want to make sure if she's worth it."

It didn't take very long for the cage to be left empty and soon, Envy was following the lead of a wolf-bear chimera through the town as the moon hid behind the clouds, making the night darker still as if the celestial star was afraid of the event that was to come...

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Uh... I think I went a bit more overboard. I re-read this and went, "WTF did I just make Greed and Freesia say? It was utterly pointless, but I had no other ideas. In fact, I wasn't actually thinking of their conversation... Well... at least she revealed something that I'd planned up till today. :)

Okay, so I guess that's all there is to this chapter. I'll try to make the other homunculi appear more often, because they play quite a role in this story.

Please read and review!