Chapter 2
March 20th around noon in god knows where
As I walked onto the dirt and gravel road, I could tell that I was not in Iraq anymore. If anything it looked like some place in Europe, with farm fields and gently rolling hills, and mountains way off in the distance. It was truly a beautiful day. Not too warm, but not cold either, perfect for walking.
What I did find curious however was that I didn't really notice any tracks in the road that would pertain to motorized vehicles. It seemed like the only tracks I really saw were those that might be on a wagon, as well as the tracks from horse hooves. This confused me, as I didn't know of any European country where people still traveled around by horse and buggy. But honestly I wasn't overly concerned. I had my identification on me, and had the gold coins that US government issued to Special Forces units (which Marine Recon is considered), so I felt like things were actually not that bad all things considered. Hell, I could have still been stuck inside of that chamber to die a slow death in a dark hole.
I continued walking, and I could see farm houses in the distance, apparently the field I landed in must have been fallow this year, as most of the other fields nearby were tilled up for the spring planting. As the afternoon wore on, I had probably walked maybe 5 more miles, when I reached a fork in the road. It had arrows pointing to 3 different towns, all separated by some unknown unit of distance, but the numbers were apparently Arabic numbers just like I was familiar with, so I simply took the road to the closer town, known as Resembool, which was surprisingly in English.
I had never heard of Resembool, but I didn't really care at the time, all I wanted to do was find a nearby place of residence that looked like it might have a phone. So I kept on walking, and occasionally spotted a farmer way working way out in his fields, but other then that things were pretty quiet, just the sound of the trees rustling in the breeze, and the sounds of birds.
Eventually I saw a sign on the road side that said Rockbell automail. I had no idea what automail was, but I assumed it must be a post office of some sort, so I made my way up the dirt "drive way" if it could be called that and walked the quarter mile to the house at the top of the hill. I figured if it was a business then perhaps it would have a telephone of some kind, given that this area almost looked like an Amish community given the lack of technology I'd seen on my walk. The sun was starting to set by then, so I was a bit concerned that who ever ran the business might not answer the door when I came up, but I was surprised to see young woman come out to greet me at the porch of the house. This girl was particularly striking, perhaps in her late teens, with blond hair and blue eyes.
"Hello. My name is Gunnery Sergeant Dominic Moreau, of the United States Marine Corps; could the owner of this business by chance help me?" I said in my most courteous voice, hell for all I know they don't even speak English here.
"I'd like to know where I am, as well as the date, as I seem to be lost." I continued.
As I approached the porch the girl apparently became a bit uncomfortable.
"Don't come any closer. I didn't see your weapons when you approached, as those strange clothes made you difficult see, and I don't serve soldiers." She said.
"I don't have any desire to hurt you; I simply want to know where I am, when I am, and how I can return home." I answered.
"You're serious aren't you? You really don't know where you are?" She said incredulously.
"Well, to answer you're questions, Sergeant, you are in the country of Amestris, near the city of Resembool, and the date is March 20, 1924. As to your last question, I've never heard of America, so I couldn't tell you how to get home." She continued.
At hearing this I nearly dropped over. I had never heard of Amestris, and the date couldn't be right unless they used a different calendar in this country.
"Are you serious that the year is 1924? How is that possible, the year is or was 2003, before I traveled through the black gate?" I answered.
"You traveled through the black gate? Are you an alchemist?" She answered with that sort of skeptical look in her eyes.
"ED!!! AL!!! COME OUT HERE, THERE IS A MILITARY ALCHEMIST ASKING STRANGE QUESTIONS!" She shouted.
Before I could respond, two young men around the same age as the blond woman, came out to the porch, one a fairly short man perhaps 5 feet 3 inches in height, with blond hair and metal limbs, the other appeared to be his brother who was roughly around 6 feet tall with sandy brown hair.
"And who might you be?" The short one said mockingly.
"My name is Gunnery Sergeant Dominic Moreau, of the United States Marine Corps." I replied.
"Wait a second, are you serious? The United States if I remember correctly is on the other side of the gate in the world without alchemy. How did you get here? I thought that the way to Amestris was sealed after the Thule society tried to invade a few years ago?" He shockingly answered.
"Well, to tell you the truth, I don't really know what happened. I was in a battle in some ancient ruins, when an explosion caused my comrade and I to fall into an underground chamber. A following explosion sealed us in. When I turned on my flashlight, my comrade who was seriously wounded landed in the center of this peculiar symbol on the floor, and his blood filled the grooves that that made up the symbol. When I went to assist him, I set my hand in this hand shaped indentation that cut my hand, and some of my blood ran down and settled in the indentation. Then all hell broke loose. The floor started to glow red, and this black gate appeared. A voice then said "The price has been paid", and with that I could see eyes in the gate, and I was pulled in along with my comrade Eric. I then blacked out, and when I woke up, I was lying in some farmer's field perhaps 10 miles from here all alone, I think the gate claimed Eric." I explained.
"I can tell by the way you look that you aren't lying, somehow you managed to activate a transmutation circle that summoned the gate, which shouldn't be possible in your world. Is Hitler still trying to lead the Thule society back here to Amestris?" The short man answered sternly.
"You've got to be kidding right. Hitler has been dead for nearly 60 years. It was the year 2003, when I encountered the gate, and from what your young lady friend told me, it's 1924. That can't be right." I said.
"It is correct; however time does not pass at the same rate as it does on your world as it does in Amestris, and given the power of the gate, it's hard to say when you might be in a particular place. By the way, my name is Edward Elric the Full Metal Alchemist, and this is my brother Alphonse, and you've already met Winry Rockbell." Ed replied in a friendly manner.
"So in a nutshell, I'm not in the world I'm familiar with, and there is basically no real hope of getting back?" I asked.
"I'd say that's a fairly accurate description of the situation that you're in. Heck you're lucky you ran into us, because many folks fear the people from your world after they nearly succeeded in invading this world. However, given the situation you're in, and having been there myself, if it's ok with Winry and Pinako, I'm going to see if you can stay here." Ed told me in a sympathetic tone.
Ed then took everyone back inside the house and must have convinced them of my situation. They came back out, and Ed told me to come in. I walked up the porch and entered, and met a nice old lady who must have been Pinako. I still felt a bit of shock, after learning my situation, but I figured that it could always be worse, and hell I didn't really have much in the way of family back home, so if I was stuck here maybe it wasn't so bad.
After coming in, I took off weapons and left them leaning on the wall by the door, and stripped off my vest and helmet, and set the rest of my gear down. I could smell something cooking, as I must have caught everybody just before dinner. I was starving, not having eaten anything but an MRE in the past 48 hours, I was willing to gorge on anything. After getting all of my possessions in order, I followed the group into the dining room for a meal.
"So tell me Dominic, is it okay to call you Dominic? Anyway, has much changed on your world since 1923?" Ed asked me.
"I guess you could say that is an understatement. If you came to my world it wouldn't be recognizable." I answered.
Alphonse sat down across from me and asked "What about the Thule society? Do they still exist?"
"The Thule society, as far as I know, died with the Nazis at the end of the second world war. So I don't think you have anything to fear from them." I replied.
"That's good to know." Alphonse answered.
As this was going on, Alphonse and Edward were asking me all sorts of questions about the Second World War, and about how things were different when I left. I actually felt fortunate that I was a bit of a history buff so that I could answer the multitude of questions, and eventually they worked their way to the topic of Nuclear Weapon.
Ed asked me this, and I told him the truth, that they had been used twice in war, and since then haven't been used, although they have been used to threaten. By this point I was starting to get tired of the interrogation, and was ready to eat, when I looked around, and back in the parlor where my equipment was sitting, I saw Winry digging through it. She was obviously enthralled by some of the things I had in there, and was looking at my night vision goggles.
"Ohhh…. I want to know what it does, and how it works, please let me take it apart." She begged.
"Well, I'll tell you what it does, but you definitely won't be taking it apart. Those are night vision goggles, which can also see body heat. In effect it lets me see in the dark, which as a marine is very helpful in night battles." I answered her truthfully.
"Ooooooo…. Can I try them? Pretty please." Winry put on her puppy dog eyes.
"Alright, it's a good thing you guys have electricity, and that I might be able to recharge the batteries with the equipment I've got, otherwise it'd be out of the question. I guess we can do a demonstration." I told her, and I walked over and took the goggles from her.
"Okay, the first thing is to turn them on, which you do by pressing this button. Then you simply put them on, and you can see out of them in nearly complete darkness. You can also zoom in and out, sort of like looking through a telescope, so that you can see objects that are at further distance." I lectured.
Winry took the goggles from me went out on the porch and looked around, and squealed with glee. "They really do work, I can see all the way over to where Ed and Al's house use to be."
I told her to comeback and hand them to me. She reluctantly did so, and I turned them off and put them back in my rucksack. Pinako then called out to let everyone know it was time to eat. Everyone went back into the dining room where I then proceeded to gorge on the stew that was being served.
I thanked Pinako for the meal, and being physically exhausted after having gone almost two days without sleep asked where I could bunk down, and she told me to follow her to one of the guest rooms. It was a pretty small room, but at that point, anything looked fantastic, and as the saying goes, beggars can't be choosers. So I dragged all of my equipment into the room, stripped down to my skivvies, and was out before my head hit the pillow.