Keiyou: This fic had been on a major Haitus for... well the title of the chapter explains it best. It had occurred to me that I wanted to walk into this story with at least some knowledge (or lack thereof) about what was happening and why it happened. The result was two and a half years of poking and prodding for info while life continuously stepped in to show me what-for.

Well, here is the result, I hope you enjoy it. ;3

Ch. 6, Research.

"So you say it's a smell that makes you lose your memories."

Vato nodded, crossing his arms and sighing. "It's hard to distinguish. At first I thought it was flowers that the lieutenant had in her office, but then…" He arched his eyebrows as he tried seeing past the fog in his mind.

Nothing.

"Flowers?" Armstrong whispered. "I only remember something that reminded me greatly of the perfume my first girlfriend would wear, white lily and jasmine."

Breda fought the will to ask when the major had been dating and asked something that seemed a bit more on the side of important. "Hold, on a second. How could you both smell something different if you were there at the same time?"

Russell blinked. There were too many lose ends. If what they were saying was true, then what was it that made them interpret different smells? Russell scoffed. He knew so little about biology other than what he learned the red water stone did to affect the human body. Enhance the power in someone's strength if used right, so it was an amplifier of the human functions.

Did that count any of the five senses? Sight? Hearing? Taste? Smell….

If Ed had become able to do something with the stone that made them forget what it was that happened it must be something that manipulates the mind.

But what?

The library was deathly quiet as Russell sat at the table with his arms crossed and his eyes closed tight in concentration while the small group waited, fidgeting with anticipation.

Then Russell opened his eyes and shrugged his shoulders. "Nope, I don't have any idea what's up with him."

The breath the four of them had been holding came out in disappointed huffs. "Are you sure?" Fuery asked in a small voice. "There has to be something you could guess."

Russell shook his head. "I wish I could, but from what I'm hearing it sounds like an experiment gone awry, aside from that I couldn't tell you the reason for it without seeing what it was the shrimp used in his lab."

Fletcher was sitting adjunct from his brother with a book in front of him, looking at the text and frowning. "You did say that there's others getting the supplies he used, right?"

Armstrong nodded, looking at his watch and reading it by the light of the candle from the table. "Yes, they should be here soon." At least he hoped they would, it was quickly becoming dawn and the longer it took for them to find out what went wrong with Edward Elric the more it meant possibly never finding out.

xxxx

Ed clapped his hands and held them to the door. When the wood shifted into a hole tall enough for him to go through he stopped the transmutation.

Looking around in case somebody seen him, he went inside the eighth warehouse.

Clicking on an overhanging light he approached the place where he acquired the bottles from earlier, seeing extra.

"Yeah, these where the ones, alright..." He muttered, taking one and giving it the stink eye as he read it's contents. One of them had been what screwed up his experiment, and he'd be damned if he didn't try to find out which one it was. Gathering the others he stuffed them in his pocket, wishing he hadn't lost his coat.

Ed shuddered involuntarily. His coat. It had gotten crushed under the rocks he trapped that man under. If he hadn't been planning ahead in case he got caught...

Ed curled his hands into fists. He needed to get the antidote for his dilemma, and fast.

He exited the warehouse, fixing the door to it's rightful state before he ran off towards the laboratory that gave him the red water stone sample. If they were willing to part with one they could stand to loose another.

Only this time he wasn't planning on asking for it, not a chance.

xxxx

Alphonse slowly opened a window, trying his hardest to make sure it didn't squeak on him and wake up the young girl who'd fallen asleep on the floor with a flower patch blanket next to a dozen drawing papers.

Relief came to him as the window was wide enough for him to slip through. "I'm sorry, Alicia." He thought as he slid the window back into place. "But I need to go find Ed."

The streets glowed from the rain earlier, and Al could hear puddles splash from under his feet as he jogged down the sidewalk.

As he ventured away from the Hughes's home, he thought back to before he and Ed separated for the day.

"I'll be back tomorrow, brother. Will you be alright by yourself?"

"I said I'd be fine, Al. I've got those books from that old man to keep me company."

"Alright, but don't stay up too late, Winry's going to be at the station tomorrow."

"I know, I know…"

"He didn't find something in the books, did he?" Al pondered, stopping by a streetlamp.

Before he and his brother got back to Central the two had run into a group of thieves in a small town trying to rob an old man. The man thanked the brothers by giving them a set of old alchemy textbooks they haven't read before.

Ed had been pretty eager to dig right into them. Maybe they held some clue about why his brother is acting strange. With a fresh start he raced for the dorms.

xxxx

From the front of the library the doors swung open. Russell turned his head after the officers and his younger brother did, and watched as three people marched in, obviously being the others that the Major Armstrong had been saying would be here.

Except this entourage looked far from the ones Armstrong said were the most eager to find the cause of the mystery.

In fact they looked downright pissed off, aside from the blond guy. He more or less looked ready to piss himself.

"Gentlemen," Roy said, seeing the two boys and raising an eyebrow, but it didn't last very long. "It seems our situation is a bit more critical than we've previously believed." Suddenly Roy stepped back and pushed Havoc forward, making the broken looking man-thing stumble forward.

"Go on, Havoc. Explain to everyone what it is that's been causing all this catastrophe." He leered at Havoc as if saying something along the lines of a promising death if he didn't speak up soon.

"W-well.." Havoc stammered. "I have the k-keys to the storage block eight."

He paused for a moment before continuing. "See, the thing is… I had something in there that Ed used on the red water stone."

Eyebrows from the listening party of Armstrong shot up. "What was it?" Breda asked. He'd been the most eager to know the details of this case since he hadn't run into Ed to confirm the others claims with his own eyes.

"I…I…"

"Tell them or I will!" Roy snapped, his eyes glaring daggers. "I won't be pretty about it!"

Havoc gulped audibly and shut his eyes tightly as the words fell from his lips. "I hid a bottle of 'Nerve' in the warehouse!"

The room became so silent not even the fall of a pebble could escape their notice.

"What the heck is 'Nerve'?" Russell frowned.

Suddenly, like a textbook dictionary had been present, Vato suddenly began rambling. "One 'Nerve'. Proper name; Liquid Pheromone. Street name; Liquid Date . It is a manufactured product of the southern countries made for attracting the opposite sex. It comes in two varieties for men and women-"

Suddenly a hand went down on the desk, interrupting Falman's tirade and everyone looked at the source. "That's it!" Fletcher said jovially. "It's animal instinct that's making all this happen!"

Russell sighed. "Yes, Fletcher. I think a lot of us got the hint."

"Wait a second!" Fuery cut in. "That stuff is illegal. Lieutenant why were you hiding something like that in the warehouse?"

Havoc wept like a broken water balloon. "I hid it there because I am a shallow man with no sense of worth who can't get a girlfriend without being as low as sewer scum to the point that I'll stoop to anything rotten in this world just to manipulate the meek!"

Around the word shallow Armstrong's group minus the Trigram brothers figured those were Roy's exact words.

And they had to agree.

After the initial explanation Roy looked rightly miffed, yet Hughes could see the worry lines creasing his brow. Ed was running because of a stupid thing Havoc did, and was paying the price for it when the boy only wanted to find an easier solution to right the wrongs of his past.

"I have to say I still don't believe it." Hughes said at last, stepping up. "To think Ed's been running because of an amplified amorous seems too bizarre." Hughes looked at the group and smiled. "Now who are these boys here, Major?"

T.B.C.