The mission
On the train to East City Ed and Riza sat next to each other with Riza sat near the window looking at the scenery rush by. Ed was reading through the file again going through every detail. "They didn't give us much information, hopefully General Grumman can fill us in a little about the situation." Ed said to Riza who just stared on of the window.
"Err...Riza?" Ed held onto her hand which made her blink. She turned to see Ed looking at her with worry in his eyes. "Riza are you OK? You seem really distracted." Ed asked her moving closer and wrapping his arm around her. Riza put her head on his shoulder. "Yeah I'm OK, just thinking that's all." She replied giving Ed a kiss on the cheek. "What about?" He asked. "Nothing really important. What were you trying to tell me?" She asked cuddling close to him, Ed thought about questioning her more about it, knowing that it had to be something important for her to zone out like that but decided not to. 'If she wants to tell me then she will' he told himself.
"I was just saying that I hope Grumman can give us some more information." He said answering her question. "I'm sure he will." She said smiling. They sat holding each other the rest of train ride there.
It took the whole day to reach East City from Central and by the time they got there it was dark. They stepped of the train and Ed stretched. "Ah finally, I hate train rides." He complained rubbing his auto-mail ports. It was snowing and the cold was making his arm and leg ache.
Al was very disappointed when Ed didn't get his real arm and leg back but when Hohenheim had tried to help his sons become normal again Truth had told him that he only had enough for one without it taking his soul as well as all the others. The plan had been for him to help his sons but also to make himself human again so that he could live with his family. Ed in the end had told him to help Al and to leave him. It had been the right thing to do and Al knew it, he had his dad back and no-one had died because of him, but it didn't stop him from feeling guilty about it. Hohenheim had stayed for a little while before decided to travel again but he did say that he will come back every so often.
Riza held onto Ed's real hand. "Come on lets go and check into the hotel that the Colonel booked us into." She said holding his hand as they walked. They found the hotel and went up to the front desk. A receptionist came over to them. "Hello may I help you." She asked give them both a smile.
"Yes we have come to check in." He said to the receptionist who looked down at him.
"OK sweetie, can you give me you mum's name and I'll show you both to your room."
Ed looked like he was about to blow a fuse, he was about to scream at her when Riza spoke up.
"Actually miss he isn't my son, have you heard of the Fullmetal Alchemist?"
The receptionist looked at her for a moment before she got all flustered.
"Y...you me...mean that this is Edward Elric, The Fullmetal Alchemist.?" She said going red with embarrassment, Riza just nodded.
"Oh I am so sorry Mr Elric, it's just I never expected you to be so...young." She apologised.
"That's OK, it happens all the time." Ed said giving the woman a fake smile. She smiled back before finding there room numbers and handing them their keys.
"A Colonel Mustang booked the rooms saying that two people from the millatery would be staying." She said. Ed looked at his key.
"There must be a mistake, we thought that we would be sharing a room." Ed said looking pissed off again and making the receptionist flinch.
"I'm sorry Sir but Colonel Mustang was quite clear that you two would be sleeping in separate rooms." She explained hoping that it would save her from the blonde boy, Riza said that it was all right and dragged Ed up to their rooms.
"Stupid bastard, why did he put us in separate rooms?" Ed complained. He had been hoping to have a shower before getting something to eat and sleeping cuddled close to Riza.
"It's probably because he doesn't want any distractions during this mission." She explained. Ed just grumbled. "It's not like we were going to do anything, we're all not as perverted as him." This made Riza giggle, they found their rooms and kissed before going in to have a good nights sleep, tomorrow was going to be a busy day.
The next morning Ed and Riza went down stairs to have some breakfast before heading to Eastern HQ to see General Grumman. It didn't take long for them to find his office since Riza had been stationed there with Roy a few years ago. She knocked on the door and waited for the permission to go in. The a quick "Come in" was heard they went in and closed the door behind them.
"Major Elric and Lieutenant Hawkeye reporting in Sir." She said saluting as Ed stood next to her casually. Grumman looked up from the papers he was signing.
"Ah Major, Lieutenant the Colonel told me that you were coming." He said putting down his pen. "He asked me to pass on a message, something about your brother arriving to Resembool safely." Ed nodded.
"Yes he said that he would inform me when he arrived." Ed replied sitting down in a chair.
"So Mustang tells us that your in need of our help." He told the General, Riza looked angry.
"Major I don't think that you should be talking to a General in that way." She reprimanded, Grumman laughed. "Don't worry about it." He said reaching for a file.
"As you already know, there has been many attacks towards the millatery here, the attacks were small and we were able to arrest a few people. The problem is that no matter how many people we arrest we can't seem to stop them." He said reading through the file.
"Haven't you been able to get any information out of the people who have been arrested." Riza asked, Grumman shook his head. "No all of them are refusing to talk."
"That's not the only problem, there fighting us with our weapons. Which you already know is illegal for civilians to have." He finished handing the file to Ed. Riza looked through it.
"But Sir our weapons are kept in a secure place which only millatery personal know off." She said. The General nodded.
"Yes that is correct which leads me to believe that there is a traitor am amongst us, that's why I asked you here I want you to find out who this person is and catch them." He told them given them their orders. Riza saluted "Yes sir we won't let you down." Ed stood up. "OK well the first thing we should do is look for abandoned buildings that could be used as hideouts where they can hide the stolen weapons." Riza agreed so they asked the General for a map of the city then said goodbye and returned to their hotel to discuss what they should do next.
In Riza's room they put the map on the coffee table and circled all the buildings that they thought would be suitable as a hideout. They ended up with three possibilities.
"OK so there are at least three places were they could be." Ed said looking at the map.
"Lets start with this one." Ed said pointing at the spot on the map. They left to check out the old worn down buildings, but there was nothing in any of them. One looked like it would fall down at any moment and was too dangerous for anyone to be in.
"This is annoying, where could they be hiding the weapons." Ed complained, they had walked through the city and even asked people if they had seen any suspicious people around but they all had said that they hadn't. They were at a dead end.
"Let's just go back to the hotel and get some rest." Riza suggested looking at her watch. "We have been searching for hours." So they went back to the hotel to rethink everything.
Ed and Riza sat on the couch looking at the map again trying to figure out where the weapons could be.
"How about the warehouses, they aren't really used any more and are big enough to hide the stolen weapons in." Riza said pointing them out on the map, Ed agreed.
"Yeah it would be the perfect place. No-one would suspect that they were hiding right under the millatery's noise." He checked the clock. "It's starting to get late, lets go and get some food then get some rest, we can check them out tomorrow." He suggested standing up to head downstairs to the cafeteria hoping that tomorrow they would be able to find what they are looking for and hopefully the traitor as well.
Mean while back in Central Roy was sat at his desk signing paperwork. Before Riza had left she told Roy that he was to do his work whilst she was away and appointed Havoc to watch him and make sure that he did, apparently she scared Havoc more then he did. Roy shivered at the thought, who was he kidding no one was scarer than Hawkeye, except maybe Ed after being insulted about his height. There had been too many times when Roy had to talk to Ed about his temper. 'Now Fullmetal, I know that you are upset that the Captain had called you "Short" but that does not allow you to alchemize his shoes to the floor and hit him.' Roy laughed at the memory Ed had only been fourteen and had blow up when the unexpected Captain who had recently been moved to Eastern command had saw Ed and asked him if he was lost. When Ed had said that he was a state alchemist the man laughed saying that he was to 'small' to be a state alchemist and that he would help him. This comment had made Ed go made resulting in the man getting assaulted by the vicious blonde.
Roy was pulled out of his thoughts by someone knocking on the door. 'I hope this isn't Havoc with more damn paperwork' he thought rubbing his hand that was sore from all the signing. "Come in." He said as he continued to read and sign the parers on his desk.
"Hey Roy, how's things." Hughes said entering the office and sitting down on the couch.
"Hey Hughes, I thought that you where on holiday with the family." Roy said signing his name on the bottom of yet another form.
"I just got back and thought that I would come and see my best friend." Hughes replied. "So how was the party? I hear that a few interesting things happened." Roy stopped reading the form in his hand and looked at his friend.
"That would depend on what you believe is interesting. What have you heard?" Roy asked, Maes gave Roy a sympathetic look. "I heard that you got dumped by your date who went and left the party with Havoc." Maes answered. "I also heard that Hawkeye went to the party with Ed." He finished, Roy put his head in his hands.
"I'm off my game Maes, I couldn't stop staring at Hawkeye the whole night. I just couldn't believe how beautiful she looked, I completely forgot all about my date." Roy said leaning over his desk, Maes thought about this for a moment. "Then why didn't you just ask Riza to go with you instead of that other girl? I know that you like her." Hughes asked making Roy sign with frustration.
"Because I didn't think that she would go, and now it's to late to ask her to go out with me now." Roy said looking depressed, Hughes looked confused. "Why not? I'm sure that she likes you too." Hughes questioned.
"With Fullmetal." Was all Maes heard for a response. "What was that.?" He said thinking that he might have heard him wrong.
"I said that she is dating Fullmetal." Roy repeated, Hughes leaned back into the couch cushions a smile creeping onto his face. Roy gave him a strange look.
"Maes what is the smile for?" He asked watching as the smile got wider.
"So he finally asked her out then has he, it took him long enough. I thought that you would beat him to it, but I guess not. I guess I owe Havoc some money."
Roy looked shocked.
"You mean that you knew that Fullmetal liked her and you didn't tell me and worst you betted to see who would ask her first." Roy said with anger in his voice, it was bad enough that he lost his date to Havoc but then he had to go and bet with Hughes that he wouldn't be able to get Hawkeye.
Just then Jean walked into the office. "Um, Colonel sorry to interrupt but fuhrer Armstrong wants those papers signed by the end of the day." Roy gave Havoc a look that was murderous. He went into his desk draw and pulled out his famous spark gloves and put them on.
"Um Colonel is something wrong?" Roy stood up and slowly walked over to Havoc.
"First you STOLE my date at the party, and NOW I find out that you have been placing bets as to who would get Hawkeye and BETTING AGAINST ME!" Roy screamed, Havoc ran screaming for his life hoping that he wouldn't be fried.
Back in East City, Ed and Riza had gotten up early so that they could cover more ground trying to find the stolen weapons and the person that had stolen them. They went to the warehouses like Riza had suggested and checked each one thoroughly so not to miss anything.
"What were these warehouses used for anyway?" Ed asked as he opened warehouse four and started searching.
"They were built for storage, but over the years there have been forgotten about and left to rot."
"Well nothing here, what about you?" Ed asked walking towards Riza.
"No nothing." Riza signed "Well four down another eight more to go."
They went through all of the other warehouses and found the same thing, there was nothing suspicious in any of them.
"Aaahhhh, where could they be, it's not like they could just vanish into thin air." Ed said frustrated, Riza sat on a bench in the park near the hotel and thought about there mission.
"Maybe we are going about this the wrong way." She said speak aloud her thoughts. Ed sat down next to her.
"Why would someone steal weapons from the millatery but not use them?" Ed thought about it for a moment before realising what Riza was getting at.
"They must of stole them to sell them, but they must be storing them somewhere." Ed said thinking of other places where the weapons could be. Then suddenly he had a idea.
"Riza could you show me the armoury, I have a hunch." She agreed and showed him the armoury. The room looked normal, the door had been broken into by what looked like an explosive charge. Ed went to the back of the room and examined the back wall.
"Just as I thought." He said examining the wall, Riza went to see what he had found.
"What is it?" she asked not seeing anything out of the ordinary. Ed pointed a spot on the wall.
"Someone has used alchemy on this wall." Riza looked puzzled. "How can you tell?" She asked not understanding how he could know that. Ed showed Riza the little marks that had been left from the alchemy.
"What are those." She asked noticing the small marks. "These are alchemy scars, when a person performs alchemy they leave little traces of it even if the thing transmuted is turned back to it's original form." Ed explained "These aren't very noticeable, so an ordinary soldier wouldn't have noticed went they investigated, but an alchemist can easily stop it." He clapped his hands and transmuted the wall revealing a staircase leading below the building. They walked down the stairs till they came across a corridor that looked like it had also been transmuted, they walk down the corridor and came across a door. Riza took out her gun ready just encase anyone was in the room. Ed opened the door and found that no-one was in there, Riza but her gun away and looked around the room with Ed, the room had boxes full of weapons.
"It looks like we found them." Riza said taking a lid of one of the boxes." Ed was examining one of the other boxes, when he heard voices coming from outside of the other door that was on the opposite side of the room. Ed quickly signalled Riza who got her gun ready. Three people came into the room and saw Ed and Riza standing next to each other, Riza with her gun pointing towards the men and Ed in a fighting stance.
One of the men pulled out a gun and started shooting at them, Ed quickly clapped his hands and put them to the ground transmuting a wall to shield them from the bullets whilst Riza shot back. The other two men quickly grabbed a gun each and also started shooting. Ed and Riza where trapped if they moved from behind the wall then they would be shot. Ed had an idea he clapped his hands again and put them on the floor making the floor to come up and knock the three men off balance. Seeing this Riza took the opportunity and shot one of the men in the leg making him cry out in pain, whilst Ed ran up to the other two and knocked them both out. They tied up the three men and questioned the man that Riza had shot.
"Who are you? And who is in charge of stealing these weapons?" Ed asked the man who was refusing to talk.
"Tell us, we know that it is someone from the millatery." The man shook his head. "I'm not telling you nothing." He said, Ed was loosing his patients he went up to the man and transmuted his auto-mail arm into his most scariest blade.
"You had better tell us or I will start cutting very slowly." Ed threatened bringing his blade down to the man's arm. "You wouldn't." He said calling Ed's bluff, Ed brought the blade down even more putting a little bit of pressure on it. The man looked at Riza with scared eyes pleading her to help him. Riza just shrugged going along with Ed's plan.
"I suggest that you do as he asks, he can get really cruel when he doesn't get what he wants." She said giving him an evil grin. The man shuddered. "OK OK I'll tell you what you want to know, just don't kill me." Ed grinned it never failed to scare people into a confession.
"All right first what's your name?" Riza asked bending down in front of the man. "My name is Robert, Robert Damson." He replied moving back a bit from Riza.
"OK Robert who do you work for?" Ed asked. "I work for a man called Bryan Rivers, he's apparently a state alchemist." Robert replied. "Where can we find him." Riza asked putting her gun away.
"I don't know, he rang me the other week same as everyone else and said that he knew who I was and that if I wanted to make some money I should meet him hear and help him with a job." Damson said "He's going to sell these weapons to the rebels who have been attacking Eastern command."
"OK is that everything." Ed asked showing him the blade, Robert nodded. Riza went and found a phone booth to call Grumman.
"Hello this is Lieutenant Hawkeye can you put me through to General Grumman please? My code yes it's Oliver, seven, two, clover, five, three." Riza said giving the woman her code. She only had to wait for a minute when she heard Grumman's voice over the line.
"Hello Sir, I am calling to inform you that we have captured three of the men who were involved in the robbery and is requesting for someone to come and pick them up." Riza said. Grumman agreed and came down with some of his men to meet Riza and Ed to arrest the three men.
When he arrived the two men that had been knocked out by Ed had woken up and where screaming and them to let them go.
"Major Elric, Lieutenant Hawkeye I see that you managed to find the missing weapons, well done." Grumman praised.
"Thank you Sir, we also found out who the traitor is. His name is Bryan Rivers, a state alchemist who has been supplying the weapons to the rebels." Hawkeye explained as Grumman's men took Damson and the other two to the car to be sent to jail.
"Bryan Rivers you say, every interesting." The General said rubbing his chin in thought.
Ed looked at the General. "What is it Sir? Have you heard of him?" He asked, Grumman nodded.
"Yes I have he was a state alchemist, but he was court marshalled for nearly kill his team on a mission a few months ago. He claimed that it wasn't his fault and that he had tried to save them, but the higher ups didn't believe him and got him fired." Grumman explained.
"And that's why he stole the weapons and is selling them to the rebels, to get revenge on the millatery for firing him for something that he claims wasn't his fault." Ed said thinking aloud.
"But how are we going to find him? When he finds out that we have arrested his men and we found the weapons he'll probably run and go into hiding." Riza asked wondering what they should do next.
Then Ed had an idea, he asked if he speak to Bryan. The General said that it was all right and went with them to talk to the man himself.
In the cell Damson was sat on his bed staring at the wall in front of him. "Hey Damson there is something I want you to do for me." Ed said when he got in front of the cell.
"And what would that be?" He asked still staring at the wall. "Do you know how to contact Rivers?" Ed asked Damson nodded. "OK good I want you to call up Rivers and tell him that there is someone from the rebel group that wishes to talk to him about the weapons." Ed said Robert laughed. "And why would I do that?" He asked looking at Ed and Riza with angry eyes. "Because if you do we will make sure that you are given a lighter sentence, you might even be able to get out." Riza said looking the man straight in the eyes.
"OK I'll do it, it's not like I've anything to loose." Robert agreed and was escorted to a phone to relay the message to Rivers.
Ed and Riza waited in a building that overlooked an alley, they waited for Rivers to turn up so that they could go down when signalled. They had a soldier called Adams who Rivers wasn't familiar with to act as the rebel wanting to buy the stolen weapons. He stood in the alley wearing civilian clothes and the rebel symbol on his coat to help convince Rivers that he was part of the rebellion. Ed checked his pocket watch for the time.
"It's five to seven, Rivers should be coming soon." Ed said as Riza turned and aimed her rifle ready to fire when she needed to. The plan was to shot Rivers left hand to stop him from being able to transmute. Once that was done they should be able to arrest him and take him to jail.
They heard footsteps coming towards the alley. Ed looked out of the window, outside where four men walking towards Adams, they stopped and the man in front spoke to him asking him what he wanted to talk about.
"Are you Bryan Rivers?" Adams asked checking to make sure that it was the man and not someone else in his place, Rivers nodded.
"Yes I am, I was informed by one of my men that you wanted to make a deal." Rivers answered looking and Adams suspiciously.
Riza checked Rivers hands, he was wearing white gloves like Roy's that had a transmutation circle on them. She checked the other three men with him, they all were armed with guns, probably in case things didn't go to plan.
"This is going to be risky, if I shoot at Rivers then his bodyguards might shot Adams." Riza said. "I'll go downstairs and when you shot him I will transmute a wall to protect Adams." Ed said getting up and going to the door, he went downstairs and quietly opened the door. "I'm at the door shoot when your ready." Ed said in the radio to Riza.
She waited for a moment before pulling the trigger shooting Rivers through the hand, making it impossible to use his alchemy.
As soon as Rivers was shot, the other three men got out their guns to shot at Adams. Adams reached for his gun ready to shoot back when a wall came up in front of him.
Riza shot one of the men in the leg causing him to fall to the ground in pain. Ed clapped his hands together and transmuted his right arm into a blade and slicing one of the men's gun in half and cutting his hand in the process. Riza went to shot the last man but her rifle jammed. "Damn." She said as she pulled out one of her pistols and ran downstairs to help Ed. Ed had managed to disarm the last man and was transmuting some rope to tie them up with, he didn't notice Rivers pull out a gun. When Riza got downstairs she saw Rivers pointing a gun at Ed, without thinking she ran to Ed to push him out of the way and was shot in the shoulder.
"RIZA!" Ed shouted as he saw her fall to the ground, blood seeping out of her wound. Ed screamed and in his rage transmuted four large arms from the ground and made them trap Rivers and his men on the ground.
"Riza...Riza are you all right? Say something." Ed said panicking, he didn't know what to do. Adams had ran off to a phone booth, to tell General Grumman that the mission had been completed and that they had Rivers and his men.
Ed felt like crying, 'why...it should have been me, why did she move in front off me. I'm so stupid I shouldn't have turned my back on him, and now Riza is hurt and I don't know what to do.' He thought kneeling next to Riza.
"Ed." Riza said smiling up at him, Ed hugged her. "Riza are you OK." He asked her, she nodded and Ed helped her up. They sat down on the door step and Ed ripped off his sleeve and used it as a bandage to stop the bleeding. A little while later General Grumman and his men were on the scene, the General ordered his men to take Rivers and his men to the millatery's hospital so that they could get their injuries treated before the where put in jail.
"Well done Major Elric, lieutenant Hawkeye you managed to catch them." Grumman said going over to them. Ed and Riza stood up and saluted. "Thank you Sir." Riza replied, Ed released the men to allow the General's men to take them to the millatery hospital.
Grumman Thanked them again and told them that he would inform Mustang that they would be coming back to Central soon. Riza saluted and when dismissed went to the hospital to get her shoulder looked at, Ed silently followed her feeling guilty feeling the guilt rising in his chest as they walk to the hospital.