Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters contained herein, I merely make them dance in what I hope is true to their rhythm.

Chapter 3

The Palaver of Pandora and the Pleonectic Predator

I refused to talk with him. This creature, this Greed, would not beat me in a battle of wills. I went over to Stormageddon and stroked his mane, glaring at Greed the whole time. He simply laughed.

"How many times do I have to tell you?" he said smugly. "I decide when and if that beast of yours awakens. And the only way I am going to do that is if you decide that you need my help." He sat back against the tree lazily. "Take your time, of course. He'll die of thirst long before I let up." He gazed into my eyes seriously. "Don't kid yourself about a battle of wills, kid. You and I both know you lost that a long time ago when you decided to open a box."

Something snapped inside of me. "It was a jar!" I yelled, leaping up and storming toward him. I didn't know what I planned to do to him, whether it be hitting him upside the head with a coconut, or just placing my hands around his throat and choking him. Both actions, I knew, would be utterly pointless. I couldn't hurt him, and I certainly couldn't kill him. I stopped just short of leaping on him upon realizing this.

He smirked. "Are you ready to talk now?" He leaned forward. "Have a seat," he said, gesturing to the ground. I didn't move, and his eyes narrowed. "Trust me; you'll want to sit down for this. I don't think you can stand the entire time." His eyes now glinted maliciously. "You humans were always weak in the knees when certain... things are spoken of."

An image of myself murdering the librarian and her husband flashed through my mind, and my legs did indeed give out under me. I slumped to my knees.

"That's better," he said. "Now, I am by myself, but of course every leader needs someone to follow him around."

I couldn't stop myself. "Or her around," came out of my mouth.

He raised an eyebrow. "Aren't you the progressive one?" he said. He went on. "I need lieutenants if I'm going to rule the world. I need someone who will obey my every order, and without question. They will be treated with respect by all, including myself, but they will never rise to my position, and they must swear to never try to usurp me."

I scoffed. "Like I want the responsibility of ruling the world on my shoulders," I muttered. "I couldn't even handle the responsibility of keeping a single bo... a single jar closed."

The corners of Greed's mouth turned upwards. "Very good," he said. "You're a fast learner." His eyes flickered to where Stormageddon lay prone. "But if you had been listening carefully, you would have noticed that I said lieutenants. It was a plural. Could you vouch for someone to be at my left hand while you are at my right?"

I frowned. "I don't remember volunteering to be your right anything," I said. "Why would I agree to help you?"

"Because," he said silkily, "like it or not, you need my help just as much as I need yours. You're trying to get my former compatriots locked up again, yes?"

"Not just them," I said. "You're going back in that box, too."

He waved my reply off like a fly. "Sure, whatever you say," he said in a bored voice. "Do you know how to capture them? They can't be harmed by any normal means, and certainly not killed. We're ideas at their most basic. And an idea is something that is truly immortal!"

He finished this last statement off with a flourish, like he was a performer on stage. I rolled my eyes, but I knew he was right. I didn't have a clue how to capture the homunculi, and shook my head.

"No," he said, bobbing his head in acknowledgement of my response. "Well, I do happen to know how it could be done."

I raised an eyebrow. "I'll believe whatever you have to say when, and only when, I see it for myself."

Greed nodded. "That's very wise of you," he said. "Never trust anyone, especially your superiors." He grinned wickedly. "With that in mind, at least listen to what I have to say."

I twirled my fingers, indicating for him to go on.

He smiled at the motion. "Now, I don't know exactly how it will work, but I do know how it starts."

I stopped him. "Wait, first you say that you know how to capture them, and now you're saying you don't?" I stood up. "I don't need this, and I don't need you."

He stood up even more quickly and forced me back down. "You will listen to what I have to say. You will not interrupt me again. Do you understand?"

He had terrified me with how quickly he had moved. I sat back down without arguing.

"Now that we've got your little tantrum out of the way," he said, breathing heavily and baring his teeth, "we can get back to the business at hand." He sat back down and glared at me. "I know how to begin the process of stopping my former comrades. You only have to get them to argue amongst each other enough to start using their powers and abilities against each other."

"I thought that you couldn't act on your own without permission from your master," I said. "You couldn't act on your emotion."

He nodded. "That may be true, but that doesn't mean we can't target each other with them," he said.

I thought for a moment. "Wouldn't you be immune to each other?"

He shook his head. "The Master didn't think about the possibility that we would turn on each other, considering he was too proud (he wagged his eyebrows at this) to imagine we could leave his control."

"So what happens when your powers begin affecting each other?" I asked, now very interested.

But he shook his head. "I don't know," he said.

I frowned. "So how do you know that all you just said will begin the process?" I asked.

He smiled. "I don't," he said. "I don't know that for sure, but there's nothing else that I can think of that hasn't been tried before."

I let out a breath in frustration. Greed had started talking like he could help, but it didn't seem like he knew anything at all.

"So let's say, for example, that this is even possible," I said. "And I'm not saying it is possible. Let's say that it will work. How are supposed to get them all together in the first place, and then how are we supposed to get them to turn against each other?"

Greed grinned. "The first part is easy. We have to find a place and time that is extremely volatile, where emotions are already running extremely high. It will also help if there's a lot of food there." At my puzzled look, he continued. "Gluttony needs something to work with."

"Won't people get hurt in a situation like that?" I asked. "If they're let loose against human beings, won't that put people in danger? I mean, look at me!" I held out my hands to him. "These hands murdered a lovely couple because of a simple act of Wrath!"

Greed smirked. "Of course people will get hurt," he said. He folded his arms across his chest and leaned back against the tree. "But I suppose you should have thought of that before you opened your... jar."

I sat up angrily, looking to go after him for that comment, but he held up a hand.

I stopped and sat back. I knew that it was pointless to try to hurt him. He was just trying to rile me up.

"I know that you couldn't have foreseen what would happen when you opened it, because you had no idea what was inside it," he said. "If you had known, that would have taken away your reason for opening it in the first place. Knowledge takes away the need for curiosity, which, of course, is the need for knowledge itself."

I sighed. He was rambling, and there was no point that he was getting to that I could see. I made a twirling motion with my hand for him to go on.

He rolled his eyes at this. "My point is, that yes, people will be in danger of getting hurt," he said. "Isn't that worth it though? If my former comrades begin to irritate each other so much that they use their abilities against each other, isn't it worth the risk?"

I shook my head. "Absolutely not," I said. "It's not worth the risk of innocent lives."

He rolled his eyes again. It was very infuriating that he kept doing it, as though he were dealing with someone of infinite less intelligence than his own. To me, he simply seemed like an annoyed teenager when he did it.

"Don't you see though?" he asked. "Don't you realize? If they actually make it to that point and we can capture them, it will ultimately save infinitely more lives than any loss the humans may suffer!" I frowned, still not convinced. He twisted his neck to the right, frustrated with my stubbornness. "It's all for the greater good, isn't it?" he said.

I sighed. "Isn't there any other way to make it work?" I asked. "Couldn't we get them isolated? If there are no humans around, then there will be less chance for them to be distracted from aiming at each other. I mean," I said, with an air of believing what was coming out of my mouth, "aren't humans the common enemy of you people?"

This appeared to make him stop and think a little. "You know, you have a point," he said. "But how would you get them to show up in one place together without an extremely large human element?"

I shrugged. "I don't know," I said. "You're one of them, and you're out here in the middle of nowhere."

"That's because I got you to meet me here," he said. "Very clever, figuring out that you needed to fly here to read my directions accurately." I sneered at him, and he smiled back. "So maybe what we want is some way to make them believe that they want to go to some place that's in the middle of nowhere and completely isolated from any humans, but they have to think that it's their idea."

"How do we get them to do that?" I asked.

"Bait," he said, wagging his eyebrows at me.

I gulped. I didn't like the sound of that.