AN: The next few chapters, including this one, contain very colorful word usage by Ed and Envy. This mainly goes back to the wonderful name they use for Hohenheim, but there are other words in there. Just warning you folks. And on with the show:

The Ties That Bind
Chapter Seven:
Vengeful Child

"...Damn you... Envy..." I managed to gasp as I glared up at him. A handful of stones nearby weren't painful to me. Two tanks of the liquid, however, were about ten times worse than my automail surgery. I couldn't even get on my feet, it hurt so bad. I was on my hands and knees, placed not a foot away from the two tanks of gel-like Philosopher's Stones on either side of me with Envy standing over me.

I didn't have any doubts about coming here. That was the worst part of it. I knew Tucker hadn't left the old gun factory he used to work in, but I didn't know that Envy and Gluttony survived our last encounter months ago. I thought they had gotten caught in Al's transmutation of me and were destroyed or else sent to the other side of the Gate. I had even thought I had seen Envy force his way through them. I've really started to suck at figuring out things lately.

"Brother!" Aw hell... They got Alphonse too? I managed to turn my head toward my brother's voice, and saw him being restrained by Gluttony. Al was fighting with all his strength against the Homunculus, but he wasn't anywhere near strong enough to break free of him. I should have never let him come with me to do this.

We didn't even plan on fighting. We were just going to make sure Tucker was still here before we called in Mustang to come pick him up. Of course, we'd stay there to make sure he didn't leave, but it wasn't supposed to be eventful. But Envy had beat us to him. All that was left of Tucker was a few pieces of hair.

Envy had managed to trick Tucker into thinking that me and Al could somehow bind Nina's soul to the lifeless doll of her he created using the Stone before. He had even gotten a hold of two tanks of the liquid Philosopher's Stone from Lab. 5.

"Let him go!" I managed to say, refusing to give Envy the satisfaction of hearing me scream in pain. He smirked at me before kneeling down to my level.

"Oh, no, I can't do that." He turned his head away from me and toward Gluttony and Alphonse. "Because, you see, he's also one of the Bastard's children, and I can't just forget about him." He stood up and took a few steps back, that sadistic grin on his face. "But what to do?" He asked rhetorically. "I had planned on just killing you and your brother, possibly letting you watch while I killed him... But I don't think I'm going to do that now that you're half-dead already."

"...Bastard...!" Envy smirked.

"Yes... I think that's what I'll do now..." He swiftly came up beside me and kicked me in the side, sending me into one of the containers. Luckily, I didn't knock it over. I cried out in pain despite myself, and clutched both my hands to my heart, the source of my pain. Envy's kick wasn't to hurt me, it was to flip me onto my back and nearly immobilize me with pain by being so near the Stones. He achieved that goal. I couldn't see through the pain, but I did feel him rip off my black jacket and pull my hands away from my heart. I had a slight advantage before that, because he didn't know where my seal was, but he had just gotten me to reveal it. "So, that's what's happening to you..."

"...Go...to...hell!" I spat weakly. He laughed a bit. I managed to get one eye open, but from the way my head was laying it was impossible to tell what Envy was doing. I then found myself suddenly pulled up and then slammed down onto my back, hard. I managed to not vocalize my pain this time as I looked up at the dark ceiling overhead.

"Brother!" I managed to hear Al's cries again. The pain had started to subside, but it was still there. He'd probably been screaming like that for a while now, his voice was starting to crack. If I could just keep Envy's attention on me until Teacher arrived, maybe she could rescue Alphonse. She had to be on her way by now; we told her that we would only be up here for an hour. She told us that she would come and get us no matter what if we didn't show back up, but could she take on Gluttony? Probably. I'd just have to keep Envy distracted. He appeared standing over me, upside down in my eyes.

"...Don't you... want to know about... Hohenheim?" I asked, and saw the change in his eyes. It went from playfully murderous to rage at the mention of our father's name. I smirked up at him, and he snarled at me.

"Where is the bastard? I'll kill him!" I laughed, even though it hurt.

"You're too late. He sacrificed himself so I could come back from the other side." For the briefest of moments, I thought I saw grief flash across Envy's face. No, I was in way too much pain to be seeing clearly. There was only rage, and now it was all directed at me.

Shit.

--

"He sacrificed himself so I could come back from the other side." My father was dead. For one instant I felt sad, but no, I couldn't do that. HE LEFT ME TO DIE! No, I could never feel sad over his death. AND HE DIED FOR THIS BASTARD! How dare he? How dare he die for the son he knew for all of a year? Oh, he would pay now. Edward, the object of our father's affection, would now suffer for both him and Hohenheim.

I picked him up by the collar of his jacket and punched him in the face. His head hung limply. He probably couldn't feel it from all the pain the stones were causing him. Serves him right. The Bastard ended up with not one but two Homunculus sons, and the second one still had his soul. At least his body is dying because of that.

I punched him again for good measure, sending blood flying to the ground from his bleeding lip, before I threw him to the ground on his back again. I smiled.

"Who should I torture first, then?" I asked him, not expecting an answer. "I can either kill you and let your brother watch, or I could kill your brother while you watch." He tried to roll over onto his stomach, but I stopped him. I kicked him into one of the containers of Stones again. He screamed from being so close to them... Hmm... What if I forced him to eat some of the Stones? Would they tear him to pieces or would they devour his soul and turn him into a braindead shell, like Gluttony? Whatever the outcome, it wouldn't be pleasant, that was obvious from the way he clutched his Ouroboros. I smiled before I walked over to the container he was laying against, in too much pain even to move away from it. I held one hand under the small spout on the side of the container before I turned the handle with my other hand, allowing a decent sized glob of Stone to fall into my hand. I quickly shut it off. "Gluttony, bring the other one over a little closer so he can watch." I ordered the lard who stood in the corner. He was holding the younger brother from behind, keeping his arms back so he couldn't bring them together and transmute. At least Gluttony was smart enough to figure that out. He stood just outside the young brat's reach of the tanks, and had him turned toward me and his brother.

"Let him go!" He shouted, and I smirked some more.

"Why should I? Our father loved you two the most, so don't you think it's equivalent to get my revenge?" There is only one thing I understand about alchemy, and that's equivalent exchange. That was my whole philosophy behind my revenge on Hohenheim and his other two children. The younger one faltered and I smirked; he hadn't ever considered I did what I did for a reason. Then, a look of anger and hate filled his eyes.

"You've already satisfied your equivalency! You already killed Brother once!" Ah, touché, little brother.

"But not with you. Don't you think that you should suffer as well?"

"Then take me! Just leave Brother alone!" Aww... He was willing to sacrifice himself for his brother.

Idiot.

To Be Continued
And so begins the one-person-ness and the intenseness. There's a lot of action in these next couple of chapters. I personally love the first-person stuff, and it gives me a chance to reveal a lot about the characters and stuff. It kinda killed me to have to write Envy like this (I do not like anime-Envy that much. Manga-Envy's so much cooler!), but that's what the role calls for. Hope I don't overdo it for him...

Thank you to my three wonderful reviewers (seriously, I didn't think I'd get any reviews since I said that I would be updating today, but I did. Yay!): Bar-Ohki, Yugisrose, and Sora Livana. Thanks so much!

NeXT: Sacrifice and Revenge and Equivalence on Saturday, May 17th, 2008.

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Shadow Kat-Lyn