Running at a moderate pace, a young brunette jogged through a forest. She stopped to briefly catch her breath, taking note of her surroundings as she did.

"Ten miles," she muttered to herself. "Only fifteen more to go." She got ready to resume her run when a sound caught her attention. The ringing of a bell pulsed through the trees of Windshire Peak and reached the brunette's ear. She sighed and flipped strands of hair that had escaped her ponytail out of her face. Shifting her weight from one foot to the other, she ran off in the direction from which the sound came - her home.

Edward Elric drummed his fingers impatiently on the small table in front of him. He glanced at the clock and then groaned.

"We've been here for three hours! What the hell is taking her so long?"

"O-Oh, I'm really sorry," Olivia apologized quietly. "It just that my sister trains herself on the mountain and…and it takes her a while to get back sometimes. I'm really sorry, and if there's anything I can do -" Edward silenced her with a raise of his hand, though he said nothing. The dark-haired girl looked at her feet, her mind in deep thought. 'It does take her a while to get back, but still...she should have been back by now. I wonder where she is...?' With this last comment, Olivia looked at the clock.

"Olivia's right, brother," Alphonse said with his unusually echoic voice. "Windshire Peak is huge, and if she trains all over the mountain, it may take her hours to get back."

Edward was about to say something, but he was interrupted from a voice in the back of the cottage.

"Olivia, I'm home!" a feminine voice said. A brown-haired girl came into the room where Edward, Alphonse, and Olivia were located. She looked at Edward and Alphonse with a surprised expression, but it soon turned into a glare that Edward had seen in the picture in the Lightning Shard Alchemist's profile.

"Are you Shina Fekir?" Edward asked.

"Yeah, I am," the girl replied. "What's it to you?"

"My name is Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist. And that's my brother Alphonse. We're here to take you back to Central under Colonel Mustang's orders."

Shina laughed briefly. "The Flame-Ass Alchemist gave you orders and you're actually obeying them? Wow, you must be a loyal dog of the military. I stopped doing his bidding a long time ago."

Edward looked at the alchemist before him in shock, and then smirked. "Well, can't argue with you on the 'Flame-Ass Alchemist' thing, but get this straight. I'm not a loyal dog of the military because I want to be; it's 'cause I need to be."

Shina looked at the blonde boy questioningly and shrugged. "Whatever. Anyways, if you want to get to Central, you're gonna have to wait 'til tomorrow."

"Why's that?" Alphonse asked.

"Because the last train for Central left around ten minutes ago." Shina motioned towards the clock hanging on the wall behind her. It was seven forty-two. "You guys can stay in the guest room upstairs if you want to. Or you can stay in the inn down in the town, which just happens to be the hot place where drunken bastards hang out. Not to mention the fact that they serve horrible food that is said to cause really bad food poisoning and that they don't really wash the sheets and things like that. Oh yeah, I've heard that they've had a really bad rat problem recently, too…"

"We'll stay here," both of the brothers said at the same time, shuddering at the thought of staying at an inn like the one the Lightning Shard Alchemist had described.

"Umm, sister, you shouldn't tell stories like that," Olivia said timidly to her older sister. "They do laundry and umm...there probably aren't any rats there."

"But the food still causes food poisoning and it's a hot spot for drunken bastards," Shina shot back.

"I think staying here would still be better, right Al?" Edward asked his younger brother. The suit of armor nodded.

"Alright, Olivia, you make dinner for all of us. I'll go make the beds," Shina said, already halfway up the stairs. Olivia nodded silently and started towards the kitchen. Just before she entered the next room, she turned around slightly.

"Oh, if there's anything I can umm...do for you, please let me know...like make you some tea...or something."

"Will do," Alphonse replied. Olivia smiled slightly and resumed her way to the kitchen.

"She's kinda strange, isn't she?" Edward wondered out loud, leaning back in his chair and balancing it on its two back legs.

"She's probably just shy, brother," Alphonse said. "You can't blame her for that."

"Yeah, guess not," Edward said vaguely, looking blankly up at the plain white ceiling above them.