Well, since I was getting nowhere with just editing the first draft of the story, I decided just to rewrite the whole damn thing, which, surprisingly, didn't take that long. And so, here you go, the new and improved Strange Connections.
The next morning dawned dark and cloudy, but Ed didn't mind. He wasn't much for being bright and cheery himself. He spent several minutes getting dressed, not wanting to go after this killer, but realizing that he didn't have a choice. After all, he'd agreed to it in the first place…
He ate breakfast silently before leaving the hotel, returning Al's farewell with no emotion in his voice. He'd see Al later today. He just wanted to get this over with right now, and he hoped that maybe he'd get done early enough to avoid having to delay this trip. Of course, he doubted that would happen, but he could hope, right?
He walked by Winry's shop as he headed for the more rundown part of town. That black dog from yesterday was there as well, lying in the alley and watching Ed curiously as he passed by, but Ed ignored it. Or at least, he tried to. The worst case scenario was that the dog was Envy, but Ed had some feeling that told him it wasn't. Either way, he shook his head and continued on his way.
He heard the footsteps behind him a while later, and he continued to purposefully trap himself in the maze of alleys in this part of town. Finally, he turned, not at all surprised to find himself being attacked.
He jumped lightly out of the man's way and kicked out, but to his dismay, the movement, in a once in a lifetime fluke, caught him off balance and he fell back. He managed to get to his feet, but the man was too quick, and Ed soon found himself on the ground again. Ed swore and tried to bring his hands together, but the man practically fell on top of him and wrenched his hands apart. He then pushed Ed's left arm down with his knee, and after he pinned down Ed's right hand, he used his remaining hand to grab Ed by the throat. Ed struggled, but the man was surprisingly strong.
By this point in time, if Ed had had even the tiniest bit of doubt in his mine, it was long gone. This was the killer.
"Heh, you're a state alchemist?" the man asked. "The military must be getting pretty desperate these days."
Ed scowled, and continued to struggle, but this really was a bit too much for him to do without air. He was beginning to feel the effects, but he couldn't give up, not now…
"But since you're an alchemist, I'll be nice, just this once," the man continued. "I won't bruise your pride by killing you with alchemy. This is working just fine."
Ed was beginning to lose consciousness now, and he stopped struggling to break free, concentrating instead on struggling to stay awake. He couldn't die, he couldn't…
He heard barking from somewhere nearby, and before his eyes closed, he saw a blur of black, a split second before the man was knocked off of him. Ed rolled to his side and heaved several deep breaths. He knew he was still in danger, but right now all his body wanted was air, and he didn't have much of a choice but to try and fulfill that need. Once he had recovered enough, he sat up, trying to make sense of what had just happened.
"Are you all right?" asked an unfamiliar voice beside him. It had an accent, but Ed couldn't tell much from it other than that, so he looked up. Crouching next to him was a man who, despite the fact that he couldn't have been more than a few years older than the colonel, looked as if he'd been living on the streets for years. But it wasn't that that bothered him. It was the fact that the man was acting as if he knew Ed from somewhere.
"Yeah…" Ed muttered as he pushed himself to his feet, leaning against a wall for support. His legs, or at least his flesh leg, felt uncharacteristically weak, though that was probably from what had just happened… "What happened to that dog, though?"
"Oh, you'll see him again soon," the man said with a wink.
Ed raised an eyebrow. "Have you been following me?"
"Yes, and it's a good thing I have, otherwise you would have been killed," the man said, sounding more cheerful than the situation called for.
"Fine," Ed muttered. "But who are you?"
The man smiled. "I was wondering when you'd ask," he said, holding out his hand. "My name is Sirius Black. Dumbledore sent me."
Ed frowned. It seemed like a believable story, but the suspicious side of him was still very strong. "Is that so?"
"I'll even prove it to you later," Sirius said. "But I think we should be getting away from here. I was told not to use magic except in emergencies, and that man could be back at any time."
"Magic?" Ed asked incredulously, but the only answer he got was a gentle shove toward the end of the alley.
"Let's get going, shall we?" Sirius said, but when Ed looked back to protest, all he saw was that black dog. He looked around to see where Sirius had gone, but there was no sign of the man.
"What the…"
"Brother!" Ed looked back towards the street. He saw Al running toward him, with someone else just behind him.
"Hey, Al," Ed replied, trying to keep calm. "What's up?"
"What happened to you? You look a little–"
"I'll tell you later," Ed replied, looking at the man behind his brother. It was Dumbledore.
"Hello, Edward," he said with a smile. "I suppose your trip to Hogwarts will be delayed for a while, then?"
Ed blinked. "Uh, yeah, I guess so."
"Would you still like to come when you're finished with this business?"
Ed exchanged glances with his brother, and they both nodded. Dumbledore smiled.
"You can come back with Sirius, then. I will see you there."
Ed watched as the old man walked away. Then he turned to Al. "Come on, let's get back to the hotel."
"Yeah, sure," Al replied. They were walking for a while when Al stopped, turned to Ed and asked, "Brother, why is there a dog following you?"
Ed looked back at the dog. "Um, I think that's Sirius. Right?"
The dog sat down and made as if to confirm that statement.
Al looked as if he wanted to say something about that, but he stopped and shook his head. "But they don't allow dogs in the hotel, do they?"
Ed looked down at the dog, who cocked his head before running off. Ed stared after it as it ran into a nearby alley, and he was about to go after it when Sirius walked out, looking fairly pleased with himself.
"Uh…" Al began, but Ed just shook his head. He should have realized that something like this would happen if Dumbledore was involved…
"Forget it, Al, let's just go inside. I'm sure we can talk about it then."
And with that, Ed walked into the hotel, determined to figure out what the hell was going on.
"He attacked you?"
Ed nodded. "Yeah."
Al rested his head in his hands. "I should have gone with you."
Ed shook his head. "Don't feel bad about it, Al. I didn't prepare enough. We'll just try again tomorrow."
"And I can help," Sirius added.
Ed raised an eyebrow at Sirius. "You sound pretty excited."
"I haven't been outside in months," Sirius replied. "Besides, you were almost killed once today. I don't want you to be hurt again."
"Okay, who are you?" Ed asked. "You're acting like you know us."
"I do," Sirius replied. "In fact, we've met before, but you were too young to remember."
"Is that so?" Ed asked, still feeling a little suspicious. "Prove it."
"All right," Sirius replied. "Edward, you hate milk, your hair was cut very short as a child, and you had a lot of fun playing with little boy named Harry Potter," Sirius finished, holding out a picture to Ed. "Don't mind the fact that it's moving, that's common in the wizarding world."
Ed ignored the last part of that sentence as he looked down at the picture. Sure enough, the picture was moving. He watched as a much younger version of him, probably from when he was a year old or so, waddled around a living room with a black-haired boy, who appeared to be a few months younger than him. There were three adults in the background, one of which Ed recognized as his mother. She was holding Al in her arms, and she had that familiar smile on her face. The other two were most likely Harry's parents. Ed didn't particularly care about that at the moment, though. He was more focused on his own family, as well as the boy he was playing with in the picture.
"None of the adults in this picture are alive today," Sirius said sadly as Ed handed the picture to his brother. "It's too bad. You and Harry could have been good friends."
"What happened to them?" Ed asked.
"They were killed, but I'll save that story for later," Sirius answered. "There's a lot you need to know first. But you'll meet Harry when you go to Hogwarts. He's been living with his aunt and uncle."
Ed nodded. "Yeah, okay…"
"But Mom looks pretty happy in this picture," Al remarked. "I wonder why Dad isn't in it."
"He probably had better things to do," Ed replied tersely before turning to Sirius. "Anyway, what's the deal with all this 'magic' stuff? You'd better not be talking about alchemy."
Sirius laughed. "No, your alchemy doesn't exist back in our world, just like our magic doesn't exist in your world. In fact, if the passage between these worlds hadn't been found by one of the previous headmasters of Hogwarts, you'd never hear about magic around here again."
Ed frowned. "So you're saying there's some kind of portal that leads from here to some world full of magic and wizards and all that?"
"That's the basic idea, yeah," Sirius replied casually. "But don't get the wrong idea about our world. We've got muggles just like here."
"Muggles?"
"Non-magic folk," Sirius explained. "Most of them don't even know we exist."
Ed sighed and muttered, "Great, this is just what I need," under his breath.
"What was that, brother?"
"Nothing." Ed stood up. "I'm gonna go talk to Winry for a while. See you."
They left the hotel early the next morning. Al had gone ahead to wait for them, and Ed was currently walking to the same place as yesterday, Sirius trailing behind him in dog form. They wandered through the alleys for a while, Ed keeping an eye out for any signs of the man they were after.
It was getting close to lunchtime when Ed realized the guy probably wasn't going to show up around here. He sighed and slumped down against a wall, and Sirius sat down beside him, looking at him curiously.
"So much for him pursuing a victim until the end," Ed muttered. "Is he afraid of you or something?"
He looked up and stared at the sky; it was fairly dark, but he didn't think much about it. Less light meant a better chance of his target coming out. He continued to stare for a while longer before he heard an unusual sound from somewhere beside him, much like a dog's version of laughter. Ed scowled and tossed a stray chunk of metal in Sirius's general direction. There was a clang, and Ed looked over to see Sirius hiding behind some trash cans.
"What are you doing?" Ed asked. Sirius looked at him and jerked his head toward the other end of the alley. Ed looked up and saw the outline of a person running past. It was just a flash, but Ed had the feeling he knew who it was.
"He's here, then," he muttered. "Should we wait up for him? We wouldn't want to miss him," he remarked as he brought his hands together. He stayed where he was, in case he was being watched, and kept as still as possible, concentrating on the best options he had with the materials around him. He wanted to immobilize him, which meant either preventing all movement or knocking him out, and as long as he wasn't caught off guard again-
Of course, his life never did work out the way he wanted it to.
He woke up in his hotel room, his head hurting so much that Ed thought it would explode. He stared at the ceiling for a while, trying to figure out what had happened, when Al appeared in his field of vision.
"Oh, you woke up. How's your head?"
Ed grunted in reply before asking, "What happened?"
"You were knocked out, I heard Sirius howling, and we managed to take him out together. But brother, are you okay? I mean, you've been out for almost a day–"
Ed tried to sit up at this. "Are you kidding me?"
"Brother, lie down," Al gently commanded. "They had a doctor check you out after that guy was arrested, and they said you'd be out for a while, but that you'd probably be fine. Even so, you need to take it easy for a while, got it?"
Ed frowned. "Where's Sirius?"
Even though Al's face could show no emotion, Ed could tell his brother was smiling. "He's staying at Winry's. She was glad to take in 'Rush Valley's new canine hero.'"
Ed frowned. "Why'd they let Winry take him in?"
"Because he refused to leave your side," Al replied. "I talked to him later on, and he said he didn't want to chance getting taken to the pound or anything like that."
Ed groaned. "Great, just what we need. More complications."
"Brother, are you sure you still want to go to Hogwarts after all this?"
"Well, Winry's still not done with my arm and leg, so we need some way to pass the time," Ed replied. "Besides, we've put it off for about four years, Al, and maybe…"
Ed was silent for a moment before Al poked him in the arm. "What is it, brother?"
"I was just thinking, maybe we can learn a few things while we're there. I mean, it's not like I'm expecting to get any help, but maybe we can get some advice. And even if we don't," Ed continued. "I get the feeling that we'll meet some people who knew Mom, and…"
"You want to hear about her?" Al asked. "Why are you so sentimental all of a sudden?"
"You got a problem with that?" Ed snapped. "It's just that all we know about her is from our perspective. Granny didn't tell us much we couldn't have figured out on our own."
"I don't have a problem with it at all, brother," Al replied calmly. "I just didn't expect to hear you say it out loud."
"Oh. So what's the plan now?" Ed asked, trying to change the subject.
"We're leaving tomorrow morning," Al replied. "But brother, since it took a while to get everything figured out, we probably won't be going to the school for a while."
"Why not?"
"They have some kind of break," Al replied. "And it probably wouldn't be too good to go right before everyone's about to leave."
Ed frowned. "So wouldn't it just be better to wait to go until after that break?"
"Well, Sirius said that it'd be better if you got used to the idea of magic beforehand," Al explained. "Plus, he seems pretty lonely, and a couple extra weeks couldn't hurt much, could it?"
Ed sighed. "Al, we can't afford to waste that much time, even if it is just a couple of weeks. We need to get back up to Briggs as soon as we can."
"Oh, speaking of which, we got a message from the colonel yesterday," Al said. "He got in touch with the major general, and she's going to continue the search for Mei Chan under the guise that they're searching for Scar. But brother, I really think it'll be worth learning a little about magic. I mean, Sirius said that he learned that dog trick on his own–"
"When did he say that?" Ed asked.
"The night before last, when you were asleep," Al answered. "Anyway, if it's possible to turn yourself into an animal without being like Envy, then maybe we can…"
Ed shook his head. "No, I don't think we're capable of using magic. I mean, the best we can hope for is some kind of advice from Dumbledore, but to be honest, I don't want to drag anyone else into this mess."
"In that case, can't we just go because we were invited? I mean, Dumbledore always put an effort into keeping in touch–"
"Probably because of that bastard Hohenheim," Ed snapped.
"Brother, you're being an idiot. Do you really think that's the only reason he's kept in touch for so long?"
Ed sighed. "No, I guess not. Look, maybe we should just drop it for now. We'll talk about it tonight, okay?"
"Yeah, sure," Al replied. "Oh, and you might want to visit Winry before we leave."
"Yeah, yeah, I know," Ed muttered. "I'll go over in the morning. We'll have to pick up Sirius anyway, right?"
Al nodded. "Yeah. Well, I'll go pick up something to eat. See you later."
They went over to Winry's place early the next morning. She was sitting out front with Sirius at her feet, and she waved and walked up to greet the two, Sirius following without hesitation.
"Hey, Ed, can you come with me for a minute?" she asked, gesturing to a door in the back.
"Sure," Ed replied, and he followed her inside, Sirius trailing behind.
"Sit down over there," Winry said, gesturing to a chair by the table before grabbing something off a shelf. Ed didn't have the best view, but he could see that it was made of metal. He got a clearer view when she walked up to him.
"You finished it already?" he asked in surprise.
"Just the arm for now," Winry replied. "I figured you could get used to it on your trip, and tell me how it is when you get back. That way I can fix any problems you have before you go back up north, since you'll probably find some way to break it up there."
Ed scowled, ignoring the amused look in Sirius's eyes. "I'm not gonna break it."
"I know you, Ed. You'll find some way." Winry cleared off a spot on the table and laid the arm down on it. "But since you're leaving today, you don't have to pay me until I switch to your new leg. Aren't I nice?"
Ed rolled his eyes as she disconnected his arm. "Sure, Winry."
Once Winry had attached his new arm, Ed spent a moment recovering from the familiar jolt of pain in his shoulder, watching silently as Winry put his old arm somewhere nearby. "I might use it to test a few things later," she explained before sitting down across from him. "How's it feel?"
Ed tested it out for a moment before looking curiously at Winry. "It's light."
"I reinforced the most important parts, so it should be fine. So, are you taking the town hero with you?"
Ed glanced over at Sirius before nodding. "Yeah. We're stopping by his home on the way, so we might as well drop him off."
"So he isn't a stray?"
"To the military, he is," Ed replied. "Speaking of which, you don't know where we're going next, right?"
Winry shook her head. "You haven't told me."
"Okay, good," Ed muttered, mostly to himself, but Winry heard.
"Why's that a good thing?" she asked.
"If you don't know, then there's nothing the military can do about it," Ed replied simply.
Before Winry could reply, Sirius let out a disgruntled whine. The two looked down at him before Ed grabbed his coat and headed outside.
"He's a pretty interesting dog," Winry remarked. "It's almost like he can understand what you're saying."
"He didn't sleep in your room, did he?" Ed asked.
Winry laughed. "Oh come on, Ed, he's just a dog. But if it makes you feel better, he didn't."
"Good," Ed muttered. "Well, we need to check out of the hotel now, so I guess I'll see you when I get back."
"Okay. See you then."
They got out of the hotel fairly quickly, Ed's things having been packed during the night by a rather bored Al, and followed Sirius on a road out of Rush Valley. Once they were out of sight of the town, he turned off the road, and they walked between two steep cliffs to a small opening. Here, Sirius became human again, and he picked up an unusual-looking rock and held it out in front of him.
"You'd better grab on, it's almost time to go."
Ed raised an eyebrow. "What's the rock got to do with it?"
"It's a portkey. You have to be touching it, so you'd better hurry," Sirius explained.
Al reached out first, and when the armored hand was resting on the stone, Ed relented and placed his hand on it as well.
A few seconds later, Ed was repeating the same phrase over and over in his head: don't panic, don't panic, don't panic, don't panic, and refused to move, even when the world had returned to normal and Al was trying to pull him to his feet.
"Brother, if you don't get up now, I'm going to drag you," Al threatened, tightening his grip on Ed's arm. Ed finally snapped out of it and stood. However, one look around almost caused him to collapse again; only Al's grip kept him on his feet.
They were in a city. There were houses all around them.
Ed stared at his surroundings as Sirius led them forward. There was another man standing on the sidewalk, and Ed wondered briefly why he hadn't reacted to their sudden appearance. Then, as they got closer, he realized that this person was expecting them.
"Oh, good, you made it," the man said as they walked up to him. "How did it go?"
"Pretty well," Sirius replied before turning back to Ed and Al. "Edward, Alphonse, this is Remus Lupin."
After introductions were made, and Ed was subjected to yet another oddity of this world, Sirius was leading the two through a dark hallway. Ed didn't even bother looking up; whatever Al saw up there was enough to startle the armor, so he decided he didn't want to see it.
"Sorry about the state of things here," Sirius whispered as they made their way up the stairs. "This house has been in my family for generations, and let's just say they weren't the most pleasant people, shall we?"
"Why are you whispering?" Ed asked as they passed by a large curtain, keeping his voice low out of sheer fear of being attacked by someone, or something…
"I don't want to wake up my dear old mum," Sirius replied moodily, gesturing to the curtain. "There's a portrait of her behind that curtain."
Ed frowned. "But why does it matter? It's not like a portrait can talk or…" And then he remembered where he was. "Oh…"
They entered a small room, and Sirius closed the door behind him. "Well," he said, his voice back to a normal level. "Here we are. You know, you're adjusting pretty easily to all this," he continued, looking straight at Ed.
"The logical part of my brain's shut down in self-defense," Ed retorted.
Sirius laughed. "Careful, you might need that later on. So, how about lunch? I realize Al probably doesn't want anything, but I'm sure you're hungry."
Ed blinked. "Eh? How'd…"
"Dogs have a pretty good sense of smell," Sirius explained. "And I've never known a human to have no smell other than the faint odor of cats."
Ed immediately glared at his brother. "Another one?"
"No!" Al snapped. "It's been empty for a while, brother."
Ed turned back to Sirius, satisfied with that for the moment. "You didn't say anything up until now."
"Well, I had the feeling you'd rather keep that bit of information private, but now that we're here, I don't think you'll be able to keep that secret for long. Not at Hogwarts, at least," Sirius replied before adding, "Or more specifically, not this year."
"Why not?" Ed asked.
"Umbridge," Sirius said simply. "She's been giving Dumbledore hell this year with all her new rules and regulations. To be honest, she'll probably cause trouble for you when she finds out about Al."
Ed and Al exchanged nervous glances before Al spoke up. "Well, we still have a while before we go there, right? It's not like we have to think about it right now or anything…"
"Good point," Sirius said. "Now come on, let's go eat."
And I know I haven't been very good at updating fics lately, but I promise I'll work on it. I think I have writer's block, though…