Author's Notes

Some technical stuff. When you die in the Fullmetal Alchemist world, your soul passes through the Gate. With the Gate open, it's possible to pass through like how Hohenheim and Envy did, body and soul. So it should also be able to work the other way…right? Alfons was shot "dead" while the Gate was open, so he could wind up on the other side of the Gate, just the ending would be slightly alternate. After all, Alphonse vanishes from the other world, the alchemy world, so there is a space for him. The technicalities will be explored in due course. It's no fun revealing everything at once, but that is the basic premises for this fic. Of course, that does require some tweaking so that's why I say it's slightly AU.

I'm just assuming the distance between Resembool and Central is 2 days by train, and between Liore and Resembool is less than a day.

I'll explain the events that happened in the three years between 2003 anime and CoS gradually. If I do start my other fic, Assassination, before finishing this one, note that while it similarly covers those three years, the two are actually separate fics and are in no way continuities of each other. It may read like that (once I start it), but it isn't.

From the 2009 anime, Roy obviously knows conventional alchemy as well as his usual fire alchemy. So I'm carrying that over and say he knows it here too. Everyone should know basics before specialising. That's how it works with uni courses.

You can also see parts of the main side-plot emerging here. Anyone want to take a crack at it?

Lastly, thank you to all of you who read the prologue and took your time to give me your views. This chapter is for you all. Enjoy.

In the Midst of a Dream World

Alfons Heiderich is shot in Munich. When he wakes up in the middle of what looks like a war, the first thing he thinks is that he's failed. In fact, that's the second thing he thinks too. Post CoS/Slightly AU on tech.

Alfons H & Roy M

Chapter 1

Upheaving the Rubble

The civilians in Central were blissfully ignorant. In fact, a handful of them died that way. A group of children that had been playing inside crushed to death as the building collapsed over their heads. Some adults trying to clean up the mess the tremor that had struck the centre and east of Amestris almost simultaneously a three-day ago buried under the rubble they had been attempting to clean up. Families loitering on the streets, going about their business as per normal, only to find the ground they stood on suddenly give way and send them through the cracks. Others wandering on the streets shot without any warning before onlookers became aware that war and destruction were descending upon themand attempted to flee for cover…too late for some. Shot in the crossfire as the mysterious suits of armour rose to the surface and launched an attack that was soon met with a return-fire as bullets rained from the sky.

Others locked themselves in their homes, blabbing about evil omens and rising demons and wondering as to the status of the military. Some of them had been strong supporters of the military centralised Government and frowned upon the assembly that had taken its place. Before the coup de tat led by Colonel Mustang and his team, Central had been impenetrable fortress. Those who'd never had a part of the wars that radiated out of their country where shocked and terrified, reminiscent of little children cowering under the bed in a thunderstorm. It was ironic that the country's centre had been so far away from war. The outskirt towns such as Ishbal and Liore, the Northern Wall of Briggs that divided the land from Drachman territory, and even villages that had the misfortune of being near to one of them, such as Resembool which was near in distance or the slums which were near in another sense, had seen and felt far more war than them. Even the ravaging of headquarters as the military split into two fractions had not affected them, being localised to Central Command and the Fuhrer's personal residence. What had affected them though was the divide.

There were others who preferred the new government, the assembly that gave the military less than total power and the people a voice. It lessened the wars on their borders. It expanded the trade; for the first time in almost a hundred years they had such a flow between their countries. Rich garments and art masterpieces from Xing. Machines and coarser garments from Drachma. Raw materials from Aerugo. Many a things from the culturally diverse Creta who had similarly deassembled and reassembled their government after the peace treaty came into effect. All that and more. They abolished weapons trade however, after all that had happened in Ishbal.

The new peace felt good after the wars that had loomed above them. Not all the men of Central remained there. Many travelled, studied or worked in other places. Not all of them were budding State Alchemists studying day in and day out for the alchemy exam that hadn't changed its tradition of failing all but one or two in a year. The division in the military had been broken down; no longer were they tools for war, but their talents were of use nonetheless.

But in times of danger, the first place they all looked to the leaders of their country, and to the military. Those not so fantastical to believe in crawling undead demons rising from the ground and dropping from the sky wonderedin the midst of it cracking and unearthing a mount of earth and debris. Where had the invasion come from? How, at the exact same time a tremor had struck? Was it natural…or some other sort of power? Machine? Alchemy? Was war and destruction upon them? Why wasn't the military defending them?

It didn't take long for their ears to be met by the sounds of machine-guns blasting, and finally the clacking of metal moved away, colligating in the grounds in front of Central Command HQ. More blasts and shockwaves rocked them, but they closed their eyes and prayed.

It took fifteen or twenty minutes, half an hour at most before silence finally resonated, but it felt like an age. Men dropped their guards and loosened their holds on their weapons, thankful even if they would deny it in years to come, that they had no active role to play in the siege. Little children crawled out of the table and into their mother's laps. The women themselves shook, wondering if the earth would shake again and throw them off its surface. Wondering of the demons that had been shouted off in the streets would rise again and devour them…or where they at last safe.

But when the braver or more foolish of them ventured into the streets, they saw buildings entirely caved and demolished, worse the further they were. Roads cracked and split. Blood seeping out from beneath slabs. Armours burnt and half-melted lying on the streets closest to the centre, already starting to smell of rotting and singed flesh, spread in a radial effect and apparently accompanying their suddenly derelict city. And spread amongst it all, men in the military blue uniforms attempting to formulate a sort of clean-up plan.

The buildings that surrounded the crater were the worst off, save HQ itself for the simple reason that it had been built with force of arms in mind. Many had thought it would collapse when the two earthquakes hit, but while it had shook hard enough to force the expulsion of the contents of some weaker stomachs on the higher levels, the structure was mostly standing once the last armour collapsed in a heap and the floating ship in the sky crashed where the market had once stood. The explosions that had rained from the ship had blasted a few chunks off the top and sides, but all in all the building didn't look like it would collapse on its weight.

The rest of the buildings however were a different story. Where the ground had burst open and caved upon itself, all that was left of the proud houses and businesses that had once stood were slabs of wood, concrete and crushed ornaments. Blood soaked under some of them, crushed bodies long robbed of life. There was part of a small arm lying limp, the rest covered by a large concrete chunk. Blood trickled down her arm, congealing at her closed fists which even now were clutching a yellow teddy-bear that was slowly staining a crusted red.

That red was reflected in the sky, as the last blaze that had lit it up had persisted an abnormally long time. Minutes, as opposed to the milliseconds it should have taken the light to vanish after it had exhausted its fuel and oxygen supply. But the temporarily restored Brigadier General Roy Mustang, making his way back to ground with the steps he had alchemically built from the material broken from one of the ships, had reckoned without the nature of the Gate, a conundrum which apparently no-one fully understood, except perhaps Edward Elric. But he had come and gone like the hurricane he was, and this time his dear little brother had gone with him.

He turned away from the body and surveyed the rest of the city. The steps towering ten metres above in the sky looked almost humorously out of place amidst the destruction, but it was only its usefulness as transmutable material that kept him from snapping his fingers and getting rid of the once abomination that had been partially responsible for so many lives.

His left eye still saw the crushed little girl, her blood splattered on her precious stuffed animal. It reminded him of the Rockbells, collapsed in the living room of their apartment and hand weakly reaching out to caress the picture of their only daughter, glass and gloss being the only thing they could give their farewell too as their life slipped away. A frightened Ishbalan child, hands shaking as he held the rifle as a defence and comforting item as much as a weapon, terrified, hesitating to fire as his fingers froze in a poise to snap. Masses of people, waving guns and pitchforks and anything they could get their hands on, just trying to defend their country as a single snap of his pristine white gloves destroyed it and them with the help of a little red stone on his middle finger, the one that symbolised strength.

His other eye saw soldiers splitting up area and function. Some were dragging carcases into a heap in front of Central Command. Others, mostly alchemists and under the direction of Lieutenant Colonel Alex Louis Armstrong, were working on fixing those houses currently standing on their feet but in danger of collapse. The ones that had already fallen were, for the time being, left alone except for Black Hayate sniffing about for signs of life and First Lieutenant Riza Hawkeye watching them both from afar.

His onyx right eye met her amber pair a moment. Their last meeting almost three years ago, full of anger, depression and guilt, burnt in both their minds. She looked at the ranking stars on his coat, in part the source of their argument. In the midst of the battle her normally stoic expression had cracked with glistening tears as her heels had snapped together and her right arm had raised in a salute. Slowly, she repeated her actions, but there was no overwhelming relief, no joy. Her amber eyes looked straight into his soul until he returned the salute and she dropped her hand.

Roy lowered his hand, averting his gaze to the stars that symbolised his rank, lifting one hand to touch the newest one, one he knew full well he hadn't received on legitimate terms and as such did not deserve. He had, in the aftermath of the coup de tat and the supposed defection of Fuhrer President King Bradley, been in no condition to take command of Central, and even if he had been, he was at least two ranks shy of the position. Lieutenant General Grumman, who had aided as much as he dared behind the scenes without damaging his reputation, had sidled into the vacant chair, and as the overthrow had proven to be entirely successful, he suffered no legal ramifications for his actions. He had however, upon his physical recovery, chosen to step down from his position as both a high ranked officer and a State Alchemist. Both his apparent escape from "just" punishment and his surrendering of rank had led to a wave of reaction.

He had stayed with the military however, having nothing else, and had requested to be stationed at a cold remote outpost down South. Riza had wholeheartedly disapproved of his course of action, easily foreseeing the direction in which his thoughts had been heading, and that had led to their less than happy parting.

For a moment, in the heat of battle and unity in defence of their city and their country, she had given him a smile that had read more than perhaps even she realised. But now that was over. It was all over. All that was left was to destroy the Gate and all records of it, so nothing of such a magnitude could ever happen again. It was true that despair would always drive mankind. One day in the future the legend of the Philosopher's stone will resurface. Some poor misguided fool will attempt Human Transmutation. Or perhaps some unfortunate will somehow wonder into the Gate through a tunnel they were yet to find.

But he had given his word.

'Back Hayate,' he ordered, shutting the doors to his soul and giving the Lieutenant a short nod, the woman doing likewise and calling her dog to heel. He raised his right hand, poised to snap as he looked at the entrance Alphonse Elric had described to him. Movement to the side caught his eye, and for a moment he turned and looked into the eyes of Winry Rockbell. Her eyes too held no trace of tears, but instead a calm sort of acceptance. No doubt other emotions would follow in the days to come. She had, after all, lost two of her brothers after getting one back. Sciezka was beside her on both knees, but her gaze was aimed several metres from his feet with her head in a hand, the other propping her up. It looked like a piece of rubble had caught her on the way to the surface.

Winry met his gaze, and now her eyes were beginning to glisten. 'You're going to destroy the Gate,' she said, voice shaking slightly.

Mustang nodded, keeping his face impassive.

She half-smiled. 'Make sure you come back out,' the blonde said softly but half-sternly. 'Edward said the same thing, and he leaves me waiting for three years.'

Winry Rockbell was truly an extraordinary woman.

'Sir.'

He looked at Hawkeye, standing tall, broad shoulders furthering the image of strength and her curved figure emphasising her femininity. Her right hand twitched above her holster, as if she were about to draw it and point it at his head. Any minute now, she'd be ordering him to stop procrastinating and get on with the paperwork piled up at his desk.

He was going to have an awful lot of that to do.

But all she did was lock eyes with him again.

'Make sure you come back out,' she said, mirroring the automail mechanic's words. Her tone gave nothing away, and she turned her gaze away before her eyes could betray her, following Black Hayate as he leapt away in the search for survivors in the rubble.

Riza Hawkeye and Winry Rockbell. Both of them were extraordinary women.

He repaired the staircase before carefully descending, taking care not to bring the precarious rubble down on top of him. It would have been more prudent to alchemise the debris into a more stable structure. It would have been better to wait until the surface was stable. But this was something that could not wait. The Gate was too precarious a thing to leave opened, and he couldn't be sure whether Edward (and Alphonse, presuming the latter had given his position away or the former had found him) had managed to close the doorway on their end or had been delayed. It wasn't a thing that could be left to chance. It had sucked only half the fused metal-corpses, the monsters that had once been human in the other world. Their world. It had sucked up one ship, save the part Edward had broken off to provide enough alchemic material for a descent.

The vanished city was there in all its glory. Glory as piles of rubble that was, almost unrecognisable. It appeared as though it was those buildings, a city long believed vanished along with its inhabitants, that had stopped the shockwave from obliterating far more.

It wasn't all just earthquake damage. His soldier eyes could pick out evidence of a fight, but the only sign of alchemy was the transmutation circle in the centre, cracks radiating outward from its midpoint. It alone had survived to a reasonable extent.

For a moment, he simply stared at it from where he had stopped halfway down the staircase, half awed at the magnitude of the array. It would have taken him years more before he would have come up with something half as plausible. But that was hundreds of years of research, summarised into a single circle. The other half of him twisted at the suffering such a material thing had brought about. The wayward spirits chasing after lost dreams and the Philosopher's Stone. The chess pieces moving as the Homunculi played their board.

Those thoughts swirled a moment, and then he raised his right hand, poised to snap-

-before barking interrupted him, along with a blur of black as what he presumed was Black Hayate leapt down from another entrance, circling a particular pile of stones, wood and tiles.

He could hear Hawkeye's voice from the surface, but her words were indistinct. Black Hayate's bark on the other hand was stubborn. It was the sound he made when he found the object he had been told to seek. He should know; he spent enough time playing with the dog in lieu of doing his paperwork.

He lowered his gloved hand and carefully made his way across the floor, making sure the array was well and truly broken before stepping on it. Towards the opposing edge of the circle but still within its limits, Black Hayate sat down and wagged his tail, tongue poking out and flicking up and down in time with the wag in his tail.

'What is it?'

The dog gave one bark, then ran around, covered in white powder and knocking away tiles and stones. It turned out the white was misleading; almost everything was covered with the dust. From his original position, he hadn't seen anything but white and the transmutation circle coated in black, but up close he could make out something yellow, almost blonde. He slipped the glove off his left hand before brushing the plaster away along with a loose stone, finding it hadn't been a large misshaped stone or surface underneath at all, but a body covered head to toe in white, almost as if he (Roy assumed it was male anyway) had taken a bath in cooking flour.

For a moment he wondered if it was Wrath. He had known the Homunculus had left for Central with Alphonse, thanks to his phone-call to Winry a two-day ago, but he had yet to see him. But common sense told him that could not possibly be the case. Wrath's hair was black, and long, and he was a lot smaller. This boy was about 5'7, provided those were his feet and not more stones.

A little more housekeeping, and he'd managed to uncover the face-down form, the white being brushed off and revealing varying shades of brown, and in the process found his earlier assumption had been wrong on both accounts. Not only was he not possibly Wrath, but it also wasn't a "body" per say.

The flesh was still warm to the touch.

Black Hayate barked again and Roy looked up, finding his gaze locking with that of Riza Hawkeye's for the fifth time that day.