The Cycle of Pain and Hope

By Teenangel

Summary: a different ending to FMA, reaching from Alphonse getting his body back, to far into the future. Not what you expect at all! Blood, violence. Future fic. edxwinry alxelysia spoilers.

Author's note: some things may not be accurate to the anime, bear with me. And I swear this story has a happy ending!

Disclaimer: Got bored the day after finals, college student, so broke, wouldn't even bother.

Al went back to the cemetery, where he'd talked with his "cousin" Alan yesterday. The flowers were dry, dull, petals scattered like white blood drops over the grass. He clapped his hands and made some new flowers.

A car stopped in the distance, footsteps could be heard coming down the gravel path; Al waited to speak until loving arms were wrapped around him, the scent of book glue and roses on the sleeves. The sun was setting and the sky of Resembool was filled with layers of cool glowing colors. Tears fell on his cheeks—for the sunset, for himself.

"Allison," he croaked.

"It's okay Uncle Al," she said.

"No," he looked down at his smooth young hand, gripped by the wrinkled pale fingers of his niece, "it's not okay. Why—"

She hugged him tighter, "I'm sorry I could never figure it out, although it must have something to do when you were the stone or when your body was in the gate. It is a headache to explain you into the family tree."

"I came back so young, and I aged, then, it just stopped—just stopped, I can't even remember when I noticed, noticed that I looked younger then Elysia, when I looked the same age as my own son. And then—then younger them," he grabbed onto her, "I had to watch them all die, Ali, everyone from my past. I should be with them."

That emphasis, "Uncle?"

He unwrapped himself from her, and stared pleading with brown eyes that were dying everyday even as they lived, "Please, Ali. I know it seems wrong, but, brother…your father, it's not fair."

"No, it's not," she stood up and stared down at her Uncle, "And it's not wrong, and I will."

He pulled on his hair, sobbing into his knees, "It's so terrible to ask it of you, so terrible to even think of it. But I've tried myself, I can't do it, not good enough at least, it always heals. I can't…"

She placed an old finger on his pink lips, "If you could do it, you wouldn't be Alphonse Elric. It's not in your nature."

"Yet, I ask it of you."

Ali weakly smiled, "It is in my nature."

They stood in the clearing Ali had brought Wrath to decades ago. Some of her young descendents seemed to have been using it for the same purpose she innocently used to, as she found bits of alchemy created statues and branches with weird patterns. She couldn't remember what if felt like to be innocent.

Al wiped his eyes, "Who would think, it would come to this."

"I have taken many lives, many of those were people...close to me, but as Furher I am used to carrying burdens" she said. She faced her Uncle and hesitately hugged him.

Al's eyes widened as she embraced him closer; cold metal slid between his ribs and a burning sensation bubbled through his veins; blood trickled out of his mouth, leaving purple tracks on her uniform. He closed his eyes as pain ebbed into numbness, reminding him of his suit of armor. A grin played on his face.

"I'm really dying?"

"Transmuting the iron in you're blood," she said.

"Human trans-transmutation," he choked.

She let a tear drop, "No human lives forever."

"Thank you," he watched her hot tears stream down from golden eyes and mix with his blood, "I love you, Ed." His form hung on her like a heavy doll. She clumsily lowered him to the ground, pulling out her blade from his chest. His body was white, devoid of blood, eyes half opened, with a lovely smirk on his face as if his brother had just amused him.

"I love you, Uncle Al, good bye" she kissed his cheek.

She stood in front of his grave where she'd put him, where everyone thought he already was. Clap, she put her hands on the granite stone, and the date changed: Alphonse Elric 1900—2006.