By now, the only people that have made it all the way to the sixth chapter of my life must be the foolishly bored ones that have nothing better to do. Lest I have been unclear in my previous introductions, I find that if I were to not warn you about this painfully true story, I myself would feel a sharp twinge of guilt deep down, somewhere in between my liver and pancreas. So, if I have not stressed this enough, I will repeat: This does not have a happy ending, will not have a happy ending, and in reading this I can ensure that a small part of you will die inside.

On that note, allow me to describe what has begun to happen now. I could almost feel my patience level dropping as I walked next to these two strange boys and toward the central headquarters, or whatever it was called. The short, irate blond one on my left side kept shooting me strange, angry-looking glances, as if I had run over his cat or something.

What I wanted to say to the pesky state alchemist was something along the lines of, "I'm so sorry to inconvenience you by (allegedly) being attacked in an alleyway with no form of protection. Next time, maybe you should tell me when you're more prepared to save my sorry ass, and I'll try to keep all the assaults in this particular timeslot"

I mean, seriously. Come on.

I felt a strange feeling creeping from my stomach to my throat as we slowly approached the military building. Perhaps this thing I had mistaked for excitement was actually fear; for I had never had such a lump form in my throat, nor had I ever felt so anxious and reluctant at the same time.

I inhaled slow, deep breaths through my nose, and kept my expression blank. I could hear the clanking armor of Alphonse Elric to my right, and a sort of muffled but still vaguely similar sound from the blonde-headed State Alchemist on my left.

We were walking up a long row of steep steps toward the entrance of Central. I felt a knot tie in my stomach, and momentarily focused on my trivial curiosities as to why the architect that designed this building had made it so wearily extravagant. I was practically panting for breath and sweating by the time we had stopped climbing steps and were walking through the front doors.

My first reaction was a cringe, and I squeezed my eyes shut. "Why the hell is this place so damn bright?!"

Alphonse chuckled. Edward rolled his eyes and muttered something about 'wasting time'.

I scowled, and my speculations as to why someone would want the pipsqueak dead were slowly evaporating away.

My second reaction was to whip my head around and stare with wide eyes at everything we walked past as the brothers led me down the winding hallways. It was like a maze—every hallway looked the same, and it never seemed to end.

Soon, my feet were hurting. I had blisters on my heels from the boots I wore. My shoulders slumped. "How long have we been walking?!" I asked exasperatedly.

Edward Elric whipped a pocket watch out of his (go figure) pocket. "Two minutes."

I groaned. "Liar. It feels more like two hours."

Abruptly, he stopped. My shoulder slammed in to his. "Ow!" I cried out, clutching my shoulder with the hand connected to the arm of mine that wasn't throbbing in pain. That hurt way more than it should have.

Edward looked away, cheeks going slightly pink but not saying a word. Alphonse looked away, also, both brothers avoiding my eye contact. I stared at them in shock. "What was that?"

Edward avoided my question. "Sorry," he muttered, not sounding very sorry at all. "Anyways, we're here."

I noticed the door we stood in front of for the first time. "Oh," I said, completely forgetting about my aching shoulder, "Is this the office where your Mustard person works?"

"Mustang," corrected Edward with another roll of his golden eyes. I had to fight every urge of my body to not roll my own at his annoying arrogance. He knocked a gloved hand against the door, and after a few moments' hesitation, there was a, "Come in."

Edward opened the door and entered without another second of waiting, and Alphonse and I shuffled in after him.

I won't bother to explain what the office looked like, because I'm sure that if you have an imaginational range larger than the size of a teaspoon, you can pretty much picture it for yourself. At the desk in the far end of the room sat a man in what were probably his late twenties, early thirties. He had a head of messy black hair and matching eyes, which were narrowed. His lips were curved into a smirk, and he had piles upon piles of papers cluttering the desk in which he sat.

I watched his eyes flicker from Edward to Alphonse to me, wavering a second longer on yours truly. My blue eyes were just as sharp as his black ones, and we stared at each other for a few long, silent seconds. His lips twitched upwards ever so slightly. I allowed myself to mirror the stranger's smirk. Neither of us blinked, and though there had been no rules established beforehand, or any heads up, we both knew that this had turned into some kind of complex staring contest.

Finally, he looked away from me, up at Edward. I let my chest rise with pride at my first success in the long mission ahead of me.

"Who's your friend?" asked the man, and I twitched slightly with irritability, disliking greatly to be talked about as if I were not in the room.

"This is Nem," Alphonse introduced. I cringed. Why, oh why, had cruel fate forced me to adopt this horrendous nickname that I had spent almost thirteen years detesting? Dear Lord, I hoped this assassination would be over before the accursed name stuck.

The silence of earlier returned, and I suddenly felt uncomfortable, because I could feel three pairs of eyes on me. With a casual flick of blonde hair, I remembered what my position was supposed to be, and I took in a deep breath.

As of this moment, I was no longer fifteen year old Nemesis, the human who longed to be a homunculus and strived for perfection and praise from her beloved Envy, but I was now scared, timid Nem, who had been attacked by a strange and frightening man and hadn't a clue as to why.

"I was attacked," I whispered in my most timid voice, "By a strange man. I haven't a clue as to why."

"It was a homunculus." Edward clarified, "we think."

"You think?" asked Mustang, "Or you know?"

The blonde-headed alchemist twitched an eye. "I said think, not know. We think it was a homunculus."

"Well, before you come here bothering me, why don't you try to make sure you know these things." Mustang waved a dismissive hand. I pursed my lips at the colonel. Did I not mention the fact I was a sweet and innocent young damsel in distress here? Sheesh. And here was this military official, not caring that a poor little girl was attacked.

"What makes you think it was a homunculus?" Mustang asked, glancing up from the paperwork on his desk, black eyes flickering back and forth from me to Edward and back to me again.

Oops. I forgot. "W-what's a homunculus?" I stammered, inwardly praising myself for my acting skills. All three men ignored me.

"She says he changed forms." Edward explained without so much a glimpse towards me. "She has a name." I said irritably. Even if you don't know what it really is, I added in my head, but now was no time to get technical about things.

Colonel Mustang looked at me again. I stared right back into his cold, distant eyes. "Are you an alchemist?" he asked me. I paused, considering how to answer. Honestly, no. I remember when I was young, Dante had tried to teach me simple alchemy, but it just wasn't my calling. Oh well.

As you can see, I'm heartbroken by this.

So, if I said yes, it would be a horrendous lie. On the other hand, why would a homunculus just attack some useless girl on the street for absolutely no reason? It made no sense. Even if Envy had a naturally violent nature. If I said yes, I would have an excuse as to why Envy attacked me—I could say he had tried to get me to come with him (presumably to attempt a Philosopher's Stone creation) and I had refused. But I already said I didn't know why he attacked me. I thought to myself, cursing mentally. Well, maybe the role I'm playing is of a particularly slow girl.

I sighed. It would be less convenient in the long run to say I was an alchemist. After all, what if they asked me to prove it? Or worse, bored me to tears with some sort of alchemy terminology loser talk? I don't think even I could handle that. Besides, the homunculi would have to be very desperate to start picking up alchemists from the street to transmute stones.

"No." I finally answered, "No, I am not an alchemist."

"Took you long enough," Edward muttered. "Brother!" chastised Alphonse in a hiss, "Stop being rude!"

Alphonse stared at his brother, through the armor I imagine, and Edward sighed loudly and dramatically, as if he were being asked to complete some sort of atrocious task. "Sorry." He said, rolling his eyes.

"Apology accepted." I said crisply, turning back to the colonel, who yawned and said, "Probably just your every day street thug. You can go home, miss. Fullmetal, bring her outside."

No! I couldn't leave yet! This was terrible! Panic gripping my insides and squeezing, I quickly spluttered, "I wouldn't feel safe going back outside!"

The three turned to me, giving me strange looks. Well, Edward and Colonel Mustang gave me strange looks, and I'm sure if I lifted up Alphonse's headgear armor thing, I would see his face all squeezed up in a weird expression as well.

"I don't care what any of you say," I did my best to keep my voice shaky and frightened, "That…that thing that attacked me…it wasn't human."

Colonel Mustang sighed. "If it's really that important to you, Fullmetal can lead you to one of the empty dormitories. They're usually for military use only, but…"

"Thanks," I said quickly, "But…you see…" I thought frantically for a reason to stay close to the Elric brothers. Getting separated from them my first night on the job certainly wouldn't look good on my future assassin resume. (That's a little murderer humor for you. We're usually quite lighthearted, despite popular belief.)

"I'd actually feel safer staying with…them," I tried not to let my nose wrinkle in distaste at the unpleasant lie, gesturing toward the Elric brothers. "After all, they did save me."

I held my breath for half a minute, hoping that the blood rushing to my cheeks would be mistaken for a blush.

Mustang leaned back in his chair, eyebrows traveling up his forehead. "Well, if that's how you feel." He said brightly, shooting a look at Edward, who seemed flustered. "N-No!" he exclaimed, cheeks red with a real blush, as opposed to my fake one, "This is a military base! I'm sure you're already well-protected!"

"Come on, Fullmetal," Mustang smirked, "Going to ignore the wishes of a damsel in distress?"

I cringed, literally biting my tongue to keep from snapping at Mr. Sexist. I was perfectly content with rescuing myself, thank you, it's not my fault this is how events happened to turn out.

"Fine," grumbled the pipsqueak alchemist, and I folded my arms over my chest, satisfied. "Excellent. I feel much safer now."

And so, I followed the Elric brothers out of the colonel's cluttered office, grinning to myself. Well, I'd say that I did an excellent job today, my first day of plotting to kill Edward Elric. I think I'll give myself a pat on the back later.

Unfortunately, what I didn't know was that not only would my clever plan eventually crumble to pieces, but I wasn't nearly as deceptive as I personally believed myself to be.