The Price of Life Part II

Cornello ran through the halls of the cathedral until he stopped at his open office door to see Gilbert sitting on the desk.

"You little runt, you're not getting away," Cornello yelled at the albino. "Just give up, will you? News of your trickery will spread throughout the town in no time anyway."

Gilbert sighed, resting his chin on his metal hand.

"Shut up! Everyone within the church is under my direct control! They'd never believe a stupid follower if she contradicted me!"

"My, my. I feel sorry for those poor followers if yours."

"Followers are just pawns for war! I don't have time to be sorry for mere pawns! If I ask them to, they'll die happy and fulfilled believing they did it for God!"

At this Gilbert grinned slightly as the mad man ranted.

"I'll mass-produce them! Limitless fanatics from masses of idiots who can't even tell alchemy from miracles! Did you think that you could stop my plans so easily! You underestimated the power of blind faith!" Cornello finished laughing as though he was a mad man.

"Ha ha ha ha ha!" Gilbert laughed loudly stopping Cornello's laughter.

"What's so funny!"

"That's why I keep saying you're a third-rat, Baldy," Gilbert said chuckling.

"You little brat! How dare you insult me!"

"Know what this is?" Gilbert asked in a sing-song voice holding up the switch for the speakers. Cornello then noticed the microphone at his feet and that the switch was turned on.

"You … you couldn't have …. YOU LITTLE RAT!" He yelled. From a rooftop Ludwig and Rosé stood; the former holding up the bell which had been turned into a speaker.

"How long has that switch been turned on?" Cornello asked.

"From the very beginning. You just exposed your entire plan."

People in the town stopped, listening to what the fraud had said about them and this plan.

"Wha … wha … what? You dumb brat …" Cornello growled, touching his cane, "I'm going to kill y-" he was cut off by Gilbert turning his auto-mail into a blade. In return his cane was now a gun.

"Too slow!" the teen yelled, slashing the blade against the gun, cutting off part of it. "Didn't I tell you? There's no comparison between us."

"I won't … I won't give up …" Cornello said, "as long as I have this stone I can make miracles again and again!" He yelled starting to fix his weapon. Suddenly he cried out in pain as the gun fused into his arm.

"My arm! My arm!"

"Wh …" Gilbert for once was speechless.

"Agghh! It hurts! Aaggghhh!"

"Why … why did it …?" Gilbert asked before grabbing the front of Cornello's shirt. "Shut up! It was just a rebound! Don't make a big deal over one or two arms. The stone! Let me see the Philosopher's Stone!"

"Aggh! M … my stone!"

Everyone froze as the stone cracked and fell onto the ground breaking into pieces.

"It … broke" Gilbert asked. "How could this happen? How could a pure substance like the Philosopher's Stone break apart?"

"I don't know, I don't know anything! Nobody told me a thing! Agggh! … Please spare me. I was wrong …" Cornello pleaded.

"It's a fake …?"

"I'm powerless with the stone. Help me …"

"After coming this far …" the white haired teen said, brokenly. "I thought I could finally go back to normal … and it's a fake …" he let go of Cornello to fall to his knees in despair.

'Heh, heh, heh … he's not paying attention to me! This is my chance,' thought Cornello. 'I'll get even with them even if it means giving everything to kill this one kid.'

"Hey … old man …" Gilbert asked.

"Uh … Y-yes!"

"First you lied to the townspeople, than you tried to kill me …" he began, the tell-time sounds of alchemy being formed was filling the room.

"Wha …?" Cornello asked. Ludwig and Rosé than entered the room seeing what was going on.

"Huh …?" went the younger brother.

"… and now after all the trouble you put the awesome me though, you're telling me the stone was a fake?" Cornello moved back as a giant first pounded right where he had been standing a second earlier.

The room's walls and ceiling had been turned into a giant statue of Leto.

"THIS BETTER BE SOME KIND OF JOKE!" Gilbert yelled. "FEEL THE IRON BLOW OF GOD'S WRATH!"

"Oh my G-" Cornello was cut off by the first pounding down just in front of him.

"It's a fake?" Ludwig asked his brother.

"Yeah, it was the whole time. Just when I thought we were going to get your old body back …" Gilbert said, flexing his metal arm.

"We need to worry about you first. Auto-mail has a lot of problems," Ludwig glanced at his brother's work, sighing.

"Oh well, I guess we'll look somewhere else … back on the road again," the albino said, standing up.

"But …" He turned to Rosé who was on her knees. "There must be some mistake … I mean … they told me that he could come back to life …"

"Give it up, Rosé. It could never have …"

"What did you do to me …? What do I do?" the girl asked now crying. "What am I supposed to believe in now? Are you going to tell me? Well are you?"

"You need to figure that out on your own," Gilbert said, picking up his red coat and throwing it over a shoulder. "Stand up and walk. Keep moving forward. At least you have strong legs to take you there," with that the two alchemists left the crying girl to herself in the ruins of the room.

XXX

"Bring out Father Cornello!"

"We want the truth!"

"You lied to us!"

"Open up!"

"Explain yourself!"

An angry mob was outside the church demanding for Cornello to come out.

"… Damn it," Cornello muttered. "I can't believe they ruined my plans. I won't allow it," he walked past the half eaten corpse of the chimera. "I've invested too much in this to let it fall apart …"

"Really, zou were zo close … and now everyzing's ruined," a heavily accented voice said to the priest who looked shocked.

"Long zime no zee. Wish it zas longer," the speaker was a young woman with wavy dirty blond hair which was tied back into a French knot and blue eyes. She wore a one piece pure black dress with sleeves that turned into gloves and high heeled boots. Next to her was a male with a similar outfit only in a one piece jumpsuit idea without the boots or sleeves. He had light brown hair with a curl and amber eyes and was eating a foot of the chimera. "You've caused a zot of trouble, You Holiness."

"Wh … what's the meaning of this!" Cornello yelled. "The Philosopher's Stone you gave me broke into pieces! How dare you give me a fake!"

"Please," the woman said. "Did zou think ze would hand zover the zeal thing to a person like zou?"

"You … you said that I would be able to take over this country by using this stone!"

"Mmm … I zid zay somezing like zhat, zidn't I? All ze wanted zas for zou to cause alittle chaos in zhis region. Zhat's all. What? Zou look surprised. Zid you really zink zhat a third-rate despot like yourself could become zhe ruler of a country?"

"Aha ha hah! You're really too much!"

"Veee Lust, can I eat this old guy?"

"Non, non, Gluttony. You're going zo zet a stomach ache if zou eat zhe likes of him," Lust said. "If zou eat zhis third-rate … non, zhis fourth-rate fool …"

"AAARRRGG!" Cornello yelled. "You're all mocking me – you and everybody else!"

Lust just moved her hand towards Cornello's forehead and her fingers turned to into spears and one impaled itself in his forehead.

"Zou … are no longer any use," Lust said as Cornello dully noted the tattoo on her upper chest and Lust pulled her fingers out of the dead Cornello's forehead.

"Aww when zings were starting to go zo well. Father zill be furious," Lust moaned, dramatically.

Gluttony just moved towards Cornello's corpse.

"Zo zhat should our next plan be …? Zey! I zought I zold zou not to eat zhat!" Lust said as Gluttony began to eat the dead body.

To Be Continued …

I've finally brought in some of the actual bad guys! Yay! I'm looking forward to doing Envy and Greed but for now I have Lust and Gluttony. Here are my reasons for picking France and North Italy for those roles.

France as Lust is too good to pass up. However Fem!France makes more sense for later scenes in the manga. And besides this is France we're talking about.

Gluttony was harder because I needed someone who ate a lot and was child like. When looking over all the Hetalia characters I thought of Feliciano. My reasoning; have you seen the amount of pasta that he intakes?

My goal for this fic is to upload at least one chapter per week and I will try my best to reach that goal.

Any guesses on Mustang and his crew? Please send me any feedback on this story.