I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Brotherhood. But there will be some direct lines from the story.
This story deals with a gender-swapped Ed.
And please feel free to comment and or give suggestions.
We were sitting in the car with the two escorts Brosh and Ross. The four of us were sitting in the back of a very roomy military car. Brosh asked a question
"Why do you wear that suit of armour if you're not the Fullmetal Alchemist?"
Al and I looked at each other 'Crap!' I screamed in my head.
"It's a hobby." I said quickly. They started whispering to each other and I looked out the window hopefully they believe us. I saw it the biggest library I have ever seen. "I can see it I can see it!" I cheered jumping up and down in my seat. The two of them got out of the car and started telling us about the library. I saw the burnt shell of the first branch.
"Just a few days ago, all the books inside were burned in a mysterious fire." Ross finished. I ran over to the main building and went to the receptionist desk.
"Do you have any books on Tim Marcoh?" I half asked half yelled.
"Tim Marcoh? She started flipping through the records. "There's nothing in the catalogue, meaning it either was never there to begin with or in burnt down in the fire." She responded I dropped to my knees in defeat. "Hey are you all right?" she questioned Al grabbed me and pulled me into a standing position.
"Thank you for helping us." Al said. He tried to get me walking again.
"What about Seska? She might know she was working in the first branch before." A man said behind the desk piling books up and taking them away.
"If you check Seska's house you'll be able to find out quickly." The receptionist said. "She is kind of a book worm."
'Okay a lead that's great we don't need to start from scratch.'
It wasn't a long ride to her house but when we knocked on the door nobody responded.
"The lights are on she has to be home." I said. I clapped my hands together to unlock the lock, the I pulled the door open. I wasn't expecting to find the room filled with books. "What the hell somebody lives here?" We walked through the lanes made between the pile of books.
"Ms Seska!" Lieutenant Ross called out. "Are you here?"
"I can't believe anyone could live in this." Brosh said.
"Shh!" Al shushed us. We all listened in the quiet room, when all of a sudden a little peep came out from under the books. "Brother there's a person under there. We started to dig through the books trying to find the person under there. The person we found introduced herself as Seska and told us about herself.
"Okay do you remember reading reasearch files written by Tim Marcoh?" I asked as serious as I could be.
"Yes I remember they were handwritten." She stated,
"They really were at the first branch." I hung my head low "That means they were completely burned. We have to start from scratch again." I said.
"Thank you for your time." Al said as we walked to the door.
"Did you want to read those papers?" Seska asked
"Yes, but there's no way we can." I stated
"I remember all of it that was written down." She told us "Remember everything after reading it once word for word without a single mistake, it would take sometime but I could make a copy for you."
"Thank you Ms Bookworm." I grabbed her hand and shook it up and down so many times. I was over the moon.
Five days later.
"I'm sorry it took me so long to recopy but there were so many." Seska showed us a pile of papers on a desk "The complete works of a Mr Tim Marcoh." She gestured to the desk.
"She really did it" Al said in shock
"There are incredible people in the world aren't there Al." I was in shock myself.
"Wow it all makes sense now. If there was this much there was no way that Mr. Marcoh could have run off with them." Al said as he walked closer to the table.
"This is really Mr. Marcoh." I was smiling uncontrollably
"Yes without a doubt Tim Marcoh's culinary research documents. "1000 flavours for today's menu."" Seska said
"Huh?" Everyone asked 'No we were so close' I thought 'So we do have to start from scratch again.'
"Add a dash of water to 1 table spoon of sugar..." Ross read out loud "This really is '1000 flavours for today's menu."
"Hey You! Just how are these documents important!" Brosh yelled at her
"Impor.. Oh no I only copied them as I read them." I told us with fear in her voice.
"So this is something completely different written by someone with the same name? What a waist of time." Brosh continued. I was flipping through the papers, I couldn't just help and think how awful these recipes would be if someone actually make them. Then it clicked in, 'they are coded.'
"Ms Seska are you sure this is what Mr. Marcoh wrote? Word for word?" I asked
"Yes I'm positive." She said desperate to prove to us that she had the right documents.
" You're incredible thanks." I started grabbing as many documents as I could. "Okay lets get these back to central library."
"Yes there should be plenty of dictionaries there." Al said grabbing a huge pile for himself.
"And for helping us." I grabbed my check book out of my coat and started righting out a large enough number to get her mother the help that she needed. "Second Lieutenant Ross! Here's my registration code, my signature and my silver pocket watch as proof of my identity." I gave her the everything I just said. "Go to the national Alchemist division at the president's office, withdraw from my annual research funds the sum of that I wrote and give it to Seska." I waited for her response
"Yes sir." Ross responded I smirked at the sir bit
"Seska thanks a lot Bye." I closed the door behind me "Okay Al let's go... What are you still doing here Brosh?!" I finished with a yell
"I am your escort, so where you go I go." He responded
"Damn you sound like Hawkeye. I'm not the Colonel I don't need a babysitter." I told him
"Orders from the Major sir." Brosh stated. I felt pity for him because he had to listen to the major.
"Okay fine but don't get in our way."
I was a short drive to the library and once we got set up I filled Brosh in on what was going on.
"So it's coded in and the only person that knows the code is the one that wrote it. Then how are you going to crack it?" He asked
"With a little knowledge and a lot of patience." I looked at the paper, 'A lot of patience.' I couldn't help to think. Al explained to him how most Alchemist follow a basic pattern when writing their codes.
"...Brother's are written like travelogues, even I couldn't understand them." I smiled at that
"Come on Al lets decode this and take a look at the truth."
After a few weeks I was ready to throw in the towel.
"It's just to damn hard to crack." My forehead was on the desk so it came out muffled and incomprehensible.
"Couldn't we just ask Mr. Marcoh?" Al asked
"No way! He would tell us that we didn't deserve to know if we couldn't break the code." I went back to work "We have to do it by ourselves."
"Excuse me..." I heard a mouse like voice ask.
"Seska!" I called. She came to thank us about the money we gave her and tried to give some of it back. But I told her compared to what the data is worth we should give her more.
"So have you finished decoding it?" She asked. I made a very reassuring face that told her no.
"Any luck on the job hunt?" I asked back. She made the same face. It was good to know both of us were striking out. She thanked us again and Al responded to her. I was to determined to crack the code.
"Yo!" I heard A man cheer. 'What know!' I mentally yelled.
"Lt. Colonel Hughes!" I recognised him as the ma who saw me off at the train station. 'Maybe I was trading babysitters.' I mused.
"I told you guys to holler if you popped by Central." He playfully scolded us.
"Oh we were sort of busy." I said gesturing to the papers.
"Yeah I was busy too couldn't get away from work." He started scratching the back of his head. "Latley there has been a lot of crimes in Central. And the deal with the case of Mr. Tucker still hasn't been finished yet." He let slip I looked away and broke the pen that I was holding in my right hand.
"Sorry brought back some unpleasant memories." He apologised.
"Did you just come here to visit us even though you're busy?" Al asked
"Nah, I needed a break don't worry about it." He sat down across from us. "Damn the first branch has to burn at a time when it's usually busy. I would usually store old records there in the book collection but now.." He trailed of and let his hand fall on his desk. With that motion I realized that he liked talking with his hands. 'Wait first branch, book collection..' I thought in my head. Al and I must have been thinking the same thing because we both looked at Seska. We explained to Hughes about her memory skills.
"I did read the military detective records to but..." She trailed off
"You're hired!" He cheered he grabbed he and started dragging her out of the door. "Don't worry we pay very well." he continued She called out to us thanking us as she was dragged out of the room.
"Come on little brother back to work." I said as I picked up a new pen.
More days passed when everything fell into place.
"No fucking way." I screamed.
"What happened were you to fighting." Brosh asked and he and Ross came into the room.
"No it's not that." Al responded. I was working on trying to calm myself down.
"Are yo angry because you haven't broken the code?" Ross tried
"We broke it the code, has been broken." AL told them surprisingly calm
"Really isn't that a good thing?" Brosh asked
"Is there anything good about this shit!" I yelled slamming myself to the floor. " "The devils research" is what people call it." I snarled. The two soldiers approached me carefully. "The raw materials needed for the philosopher stone are living humans!" I screamed.
Roughly a cliff hanger, sorry if you find if it is. See you next time and sorry about the wait between post. And Remember feel free to comment. The death of Hughes is approaching...or is it? See you next time