DISCLAIMER: Ed Elric, Al Elric, Major Armstrong, Sergeant Brosh, Lieutenant Ross, the 2 librarians, etc. © Hiromu Arakawa / Shukaku © Masashi Kishimoto / Marina © author.

Key:

Normal text - speaking/narration

Italics - thoughts

Do I really need to continue putting disclaimers at the beginning of every chapter???

Ch 13: Got Nuffin

Ed sprinted out of the train as soon as it arrived at the station. He stopped to stretch. "We're finally at Central! All right, now let's head to the First Branch!" Full of energy, the fullmetal alchemist bolted off without bothering to check whether the rest of us were following him.

"Brother, wait up!"

"You don't need to hurry like that; the library won't run away!"

"We've finally gotten a hold of a reliable clue. I can't stay calm!"

I sighed inwardly, and sauntered after my boyfriend, who had come to a standstill. The reason? Two military officers stood at attention towards the end of the station.

The officer on the right spoke. "Major Armstrong, we've come to pick you up."

"Good job. I'll be heading to headquarters now. From here on, these two will escort you."

"What the hell?!" Ed exclaimed, more than a little miffed.

"I am Lieutenant Maria Ross." A relatively young woman with short, brown hair saluted. I noticed that she had a mole under her left eye.

Her partner––a man with short-ish dirty blond hair–– also saluted. "I am Sergeant Denny Brosh. We're honored to take this job, Fullmetal Alchemist, sir."

I observed, amusingly, that Brosh's last comment had been directed at Al. Meanwhile, Ed had sunk to the floor exuding doom-and-gloom, and hugging his knees, head in hands.

"Oh........this happens all the time, but........" The suit of armor pointed to his sulking older brother in the corner.

"I'm already used to it."

I sighed yet again. "Ed........" I knelt down beside my boyfriend and hugged him gently.

"What? Then the small one here is––" I looked at Brosh and shook my head in the negative, implying that he had said the wrong thing at the wrong time. Ed came out of his funk and made a scary face, startling the sergeant. "No, um....." I quickly kissed the blond before he could do anything worse as Brosh decided to rethink his words. "I wasn't expecting such a child!" I mentally face-palmed. Great choice of words there, Sergeant.

Ed suddenly stood up and grabbed his suitcase, whacking me in the nose with it. "Forget it! Major, I don't need any bodyguards! Al, Marina, and I are perfectly fine no––you ok, Marina?" He knelt back down to check out the damage he had caused.

"Ow! Jeez Ed, watch where you swing that thing!" I felt the appendage to see if it was all right. My fingertips came away red, which meant that I had a bloody nose. "Great," I muttered. Shukaku was already on it; green chakra started to pool around my hands a millisecond later. I brought my hands up to my nose, and within a minute, it was as if the incident had never happened. The only thing that would tell an outsider otherwise was the small amount of dried blood on my fingers.

"Sorry Marina-chan! You know I didn't mean it." The blond kissed me gently, being careful to not cause any more damage. "Forgive me?"

"I'll think about it." I scowled, but returned the kiss.

The major cleared his throat and steered the conversation back on track. "I wouldn't mind if you guys were alone, but......."

Ross stated, "We've received information that Scar has reappeared here in Central. That's how it is. Just bear with it for a while." A couple of minutes passed, allowing us to digest that little piece of information. "Fullmetal Alchemist sir, just leave it to us." Ross and Brosh saluted once more.

"I hope you don't become a nuisance."

"Ed!" I rose to my feet and shot him an I-can't-believe-you-just-said-that look, which he ignored by walking away.

Turning to our new escorts, I bowed. "It's nice to meet you, Lieutenant Ross and Sergeant Brosh."

The Sergeant rushed after Ed. "Ah, there's a car waiting for you!"

Upon arriving at the library, we discovered that 1st branch had been destroyed in a conflagration, and that its contents had been all but burnt to a crisp. "You've GOT to be kidding me!" Ed picked up the remains of a book and it fell to pieces in his hands.

"Brother........."

"Our clue burned away........" Ed started to sink back into his funk.

Before he could sink any further, I suggested, "Let's go to Central Library and see if we can't find out any more information."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Twenty minutes later~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"We've been looking since this morning, and these are the only books we were able to find." A man set two medium-sized, wooden boxes, somewhat full of books, on the table in front of us.

"They're in horrible condition," remarked Brosh.

"What do you expect? They were in a fire, after all." I stated, while Ed began to sift through them.

"We found no books written by Tim Marco in the main library. If it was moved from a branch, it should be in the records." A woman informed us.

The short blond stopped scrounging around in the boxes for a moment. "Is there.........a possibility that someone borrowed it?" he wanted to know.

"Yes, but the records of who borrowed what have been destroyed, so........."

"I see."

"Maybe it was just burned with the others." Al put forth.

"If only I––"

"We," I corrected.

Ed groaned in exasperation and started again. "If only WE could confirm if the book was really there or not............Who else worked there?"

"He and I are the only workers in the First Branch."

"Wait, what about Sheska?" I asked.

"............Who?"

I sighed for the third time that day. "A girl my age with short brown hair and big square-ish glasses."

"You mean the bookworm? Oh, she was fired a while ago."

"What for?"

The man answered my question. "She kept reading books during work."

I snickered softly. That sounds exactly like something she would do. "I see. Do you know if she still lives in the same place, or has she moved?"

"She's still in the same spot, as far as I know."

"Thank you so much!" I bowed, and we headed to the car. Our destination: the bookworm's house.