That Was Alchemy, Sir Chapter 8, a fullmetal alchemist fanfic

A/N: Yes! *Fistpumps* Reviews! Thank you so much! Special thanks and a shoutout goes to InconsciousSin, for being such an awesome regular reviewer. She has pretty good stories, so check out her profile!

I do not own Fullmetal Alchemist. All rights go to Hiromu Arakawa. I only own this story.

Unknown

Two spent shells fell to the floor in front of Riza. The pistol fell out of her hand and she collapsed to the floor, wounds screaming at her.

"You… Riza… what… what the fuck was that?" Roy worked his jaw, trying to comprehend what he had just seen. Alchemy?! But Riza didn't know how to perform alchemy!

"Close your mouth and get moving, colonel! Get the equipment off of those two also! There'll be more - urgh - coming soon." Her voice was a little hoarse, courtesy of the stranglehold the Drachmans had used on her during one of their "questioning" sessions with Roy. He snapped his jaw shut and nodded, getting to work while casting discreet glances back at her and her hands. Wincing, she pushed herself off of the floor. Roy was busy taking the grenades, knives and guns off of the guards. Supporting herself with the wall, Riza picked the pistol up off the ground and inspected it. The somewhat improvised transmutation had resulted in a standard-issue pistol, and her hands went on autopilot, disassembling and checking the gun over like they had a thousand times before. There were no major imperfections or damages present on the gun parts, a fact that surprised her. The transmutation had used pretty low grade metal.

Riza reassembled the pistol and safed it, sliding it into the waist of her pants. "I'll expect a full explanation later. Riza, take these. We'll need heavier weapons if we're going to make it out of here." Roy handed Riza a machine-pistol which she held in one hand. The other hand was occupied holding closed a reopened wound in her side. Roy noticed the blood leaking out around her hand. "Shit! Are you alright?! What happened?"

Riza waved him away. "I just reopened my wound. It's not bleeding too badly, I'll live." She examined the machine pistol, noting its weight and balance. "Looks like a M11C7. I'll have to fire it one-handed, so I won't be much use except for suppressing fire. 7mm. Holds 20 rounds." The familiar routine of checking over a weapon distracted her from the bleeding and refocused her attention. Roy was holding another submachine gun. He had the use of both hands, so he could actually aim and control the thing. Riza, on the other hand, had no way to control her gun with just one hand given her injuries.

Roy nodded grimly, knowing that Riza could deal with her own problems. "We'll have to pick up the Elrics on the way out. You're going to have to explain your newfound abilities to them too." Stopping for a moment, Riza looked up in surprise.

"The Elrics are here too? They don't know anything do they?"

"No. I made sure never to mention military secrets around them. I… I wanted to keep them as free of the military as possible." Roy looked away, a little embarrassed but still proud of his actions. Riza smiled a little, a sad, understanding smile.

"I completely understand sir. And anyways - get down!" Acting on instincts honed in Ishval, Roy immediately hit the floor. A weapon chattered and a spray of 7mm whistled over his head followed by a strangled gasp and multiple Drachman curses. "Hostile down. The others are behind cover." Another burst sailed over him, raining bits of concrete and dust on him. Riza was trying to suppress the other Drachmans, keep them from firing. "Get off the ground and strt shooting colonel, if you please!" She was in combat mode now, all business. Grunting, Roy rolled onto his knee and brought the smg to his shoulder. Adrenaline was coursing through his bloodstream now, suppressing the pain from his bruises and cuts. His angle enabled him to fire a burst into the chest of another Drachman. The last one poked his weapon around the corner and sprayed bullets into the room, forcing Roy and Riza to run for cover. The firing stopped and a grenade bounced into the room. "Grenade!"

Riza dove for the grenade and flung it out of the room. In the process a three-round burst winged her shoulder. She got her revenge though as a muffled curse sounded from behind the doorframe and the grenade went off.

Riza and Roy waited, guns aimed at the door. When no more targets presented themselves, Roy peeked around the corner. One of the Drachmans, the one initially shot by Riza, lay in a pool of his own blood. Her initial burst had stitched a trail of bullet holes from the middle of his chest to his throat, courtesy of the recoil on the machine pistol. The second Drachman was facedown on the floor. Roy's shots had destroyed his heart. The third was collapsed against the wall, thrown there by the closeness of the grenade blast. His body was riddled with shrapnel, eyes wide open and a trickle of blood running from the corner of his mouth. He was dead.

"Okay. Damn. We should - gah! - get going. My wounds are going to slow us down so we need as large of a head start as we can get. The others will have heard those shots and we don't have the equipment. Do you - urgh - know where the Elrics are?" Riza gritted her teeth against her injuries. She needed to stop performing all these acrobatics, they were reopening lacerations and bullet holes she didn't even know she had. Her bruised throat wasn't helping matters.

"Oh- uh, yeah, I got dragged past Alphonse. I think I remember the way there. You wouldn't happen to be able to, uh, reassemble him, would you? I mean, now that you can do… you know…" Roy trailed off, still a little uncomfortable and weirded out at the concept of Riza doing alchemy.

"You don't have to dance around it, yes I can perform alchemy, and yes you all will get an explanation at the appropriate place and time, sir." Riza hit the release switch on her weapon, loading another magazine with a blood-stained hand. "Now, shall we?"

Roy smirked. "By all means. You first, milady"

Unknown

It was the gunfire that woke him. Edward had been enjoying a nice sleep on his cot, trying to forget his hunger and general aching. The soldiers had beaten him up, trying to make him talk. He had some nice bruises and cuts to show for it.

The two soldiers outside his cell looked up in alarm, bringing their weapons to bear on the door. There was a single gunshot, and then the door swung open. No fire came through though, so one of them stood up and went to look. He made it three steps before a grenade sailed through the doorway. He had time to shout once before it went off, killing him instantly. The other soldier was shielded from the blast by his comrade's body and immediately opened fire on the doorway.

On the other side Roy swung back into cover to avoid the storm of bullets now whistling by him. "Fuck, didn't get the other one."

"I told you to give the grenade to me, I actually know how to use them." Riza admonished Roy, but not as severely as she usually would have. She stuck her hand around the corner and sent a few rounds into the room.

"That was our last frag." The soldier inside the room stopped firing to reload, but before Riza could aim he started firing again.

"Damn, this guy is good. I wish I had my ignition gloves or at least some chalk!" The sound of the firing got slightly louder. "Shit, I think he's advancing on us. Ideas, Riza?"

She found she rather liked the sound of her name when the colonel said it. "Nothing to draw with, except if you feel like shooting out a transmutation circle. I can't get a proper sight picture on him, he's firing too much." To emphasize her point, a few bullets blasted away chunks of door right above her head. She shook them off impatiently. "We're pretty much out of options, sir. There's no way to flank him and he has good cover." The firing stopped.

"Hey! You out there! Come out with your hands up, and your lives will be spared!"

"Does he really think that'll work? What is this, a movie?" Roy grumbled. Riza took her hand off her wound to reload her gun. She changed out the magazine, wishing that she had something to draw with. "Can't Fullmetal help us?"

"I doubt it sir." Riza coughed up a little blood into her hand. Naturally, Roy noticed.

"Are you alright?!"

"Don't worry. My lungs and throat are kind of messed up, but it's nothing a hospital can't take care of." Actually, it was getting harder to breath by the moment, but Roy didn't need to know about that.

"Are you sure you can't do anything? You're better at this than me." He poked his gun around the corner and fired a few times as a reply.

"No, I'm just as helpless without some time or drawing materials." She was about to shake away the blood when a sudden thought struck her. "Actually, I don't think we're totally helpless."

Edward was up against the metal door of his cell. The sounds of the firefight had died down outside, but he wasn't taking any chances. He'd fought Homunculi and rebels, rogue alchemists and Truth himself. A bullet be an undignified way to go.

From what he could gather, it was probably the bastard and lieutenant Hawkeye. They must have overpowered their guards, although how they did it was beyond him. From what he had heard from that telephone conversation and the screams that sometimes penetrated the concrete walls they must have been hurt pretty bad.

"What the - О, черт меня*! ARRGH!"

Several loud crashes sounded outside Edward's cell. He slowly peaked out of the small window in his door. He was met with a strange sight. A column of earth and concrete partially filled the long corridor/room. The soldier was gone, but based on the groans and Drachman curses he could still hear the man was probably on the other side of it.

"Whoo! Way to go, bastard! Guess you aren't totally useless without your gloves after all!"

"I hear a voice, but I can't see where it's coming from. If I squint I can almost make out something…"

"WHO ARE YOU CALLING A MICROSCOPIC PIPSQUEAK?!"

"I wonder if he's already escaped through the crack under his door, I can't seem to find him."

"AARRRGGHHHH!" Edward would have torn off the door with his rage-fueled strength, but all he could do was beat uselessly at the door with his bound arms. Suddenly the door crumpled and dissolved in the light of an alchemical reaction. In front of him stood Mustang with blood covering his hands. Edward blinked. Mustang looked pretty bad. His face was covered with bruises, his clothes were torn and he had cuts everywhere Edward could see. He would have bet Mustang had a broken rib or two also. But that wasn't what he was focused on. "Wait, the fuck bastard? Where did you go putting your hands?"

"Oh, this? It's Riza's." Upon seeing the look on Ed's face he hastily added, "I-I was using it for transmutations! It was her idea!"

"Don't worry about me, Edward." He looked at lieutenant Hawkeye, just arrived, then did a double take. She looked terrible. Laying aside the bruises, lacerations, black eye and obviously broken ankle, her clothes were torn and covered with blood. She looked like she was holding her insides inside with the amount of blood covering her hand. Blood also flecked her lips and her breathing sounded harsh and strained. Riza was supporting herself with the wall and she walked with a heavy limp. Those were just the things he could see at a first glance. He would have given good odds on her having quite a few internal injuries and broken bones.

"You're kidding me, right?"

"It's not as bad as it looks…" Hawkeye looked down at her feet, abashed at the attention. Her voice and general demeanor seemed melancholy for some reason. Edward looked at her skeptically.

"If you say so. Anyways, would you mind -"

"Hey, ублюдки**, I'm still here you know! If you're going to kill me, then… uh… don't leave… um… sorry…" The pinned Drachman soldier trailed off as the trio turned to stare at him. He cringed. "Please make it quick."

Roy frowned, then looked over at Edward. "Say, Fullmetal, how about we let Riza deal with this? Seems appropriate, doesn't it?"

Edward glanced over her sorry state once more. He nodded "Yeah, I'll say. We'll leave this to you, Lieutenant. Whatever you do, I'm sure you've got a good reason." He made sure the soldier's gun was well out of his reach and motioned for Mustang to come with him. The two of them left the room to take care of their injuries, leaving Riza alone with the soldier.

Drachman Safehouse

Underneath Abandoned Industrial District

Central City

1600 Hours

Corporal Vikentiy Anatolievich, Eta Team, Drachman Black Ops, veteran of three failed assaults on Briggs, recipient of the Order of Yakovich, was scared. The bloody, beaten, half-dead woman in front of him staring at him with cold, dead eyes scared him more than the Briggs Bears ever did. At least he had a gun when facing those soldiers. This time his gun was on the floor, ten feet away. The person in front of him had been tortured to a bloody pulp by his fellow soldiers, not even to make her talk, but to make someone she obviously cared about suffer. It was obvious Flame and his lieutenant had a deeper relationship than just superior-subordinate. Anybody who spent more than 15 seconds within 25 meters of them could tell, conversations denying it be damned. But anyways…

"Did you hurt the Elrics?"

What? What kind of question was that? "No." Just keep it simple, don't let her see your scared as shit.

"Did you hurt the colonel?"

"No." Oh God, oh sweet merciful God, please don't let her ask, please don't let her ask, please don't let her ask. She frowned, as if deep in thought. A desperate, hysterical thought crossed his mind. The blood loss is affecting her brain already, maybe she'll bleed out before she can kill me!

"Do you have a family?" Huh? What kind of question was that?

"Yes."

"How old are you?"

"22"

Her eyes widened, and she was plunged into the past.

She was standing in a dark room. The desert air blew around her, making her tattoo tingle. In front of her was a young Ishvalan man, shielding his family from her weapons. "Please, stop! Don't kill them! They're all the family I have!" He was helpless in front of her. "Please, my daughter's only 6! My wife's only 20! I'm only 22! Please, spare us!" It would be so easy just to turn around and leave. But her duty…

2 hours, one grenade, and six bullets later, she returned to camp. She shook off the soldiers who tried to ask her what happened, was she alright, because she wasn't alright. She sat down on her cot, not even bothering to take off her cloak. She stared at the ground, remembering their screams and groans as she finished them off. Could she even think about sleeping, knowing what she had done in the name "duty"?

She stared down the barrel of her pistol, thinking. She had shot it six times today, what was once more? It was probably the only way she would sleep. "Hey, Hawkeye! We need to go!" She looked up. Duty called. Sleeping could wait.

"Dammit." She cursed softly. Riza stepped up to the trapped soldier and drew her transmuted pistol. His eyes widened then squeezed tightly shut. She lifted her pistol, sighted it in, and then…

… safed it, spun it around, and pistol whipped him in the temple. He gasped once, then slumped, out cold. With a glance in the direction of Roy and Edward, Riza whispered a few last words. "Keep your family close. They're all you really have." She coughed up a little blood at the end of that sentence. With that, she holstered the weapon and limped after Roy and Edward.

Central City

1700 Hours

"Hey Havoc, we need you and your team off this case for a little bit. There's a small criminal group operating out of an abandoned warehouse. We have solid intel, but we need another gun. Sorry about this."

"Fuck. Fuck! Come on, I need to work on this! I can't let my comrades down!"

"Sorry, colonel's orders. Not my fault, man."

"God. Fine, give me 10 minutes to gather everyone. Are you sure you need us?"

"Not really, but those are your orders. I'm confused too, but the colonel's tired and acting a little… irrational. In my opinion, it would be best just to do what he says."

"Sigh… I guess you're right. Just give us 10 minutes."

"Take all the time I need. I understand, buddy. And also? For what it's worth, I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry. We haven't failed yet."

A/N: I stayed up late working on this for you guys! It's summer vacation now, so I can afford it. I hope you like this! There will be action next time, more than the lame firefights this chapter.

Yeah, this chapter's action scenes are pretty lame. This chapter is pretty lame. If you could give me some advice, that would be much appreciated! Any help is welcome!

And as always, Review, Fave, and Follow! See you next time.

*О, черт меня! - Loosely translated as: "Oh, fuck me!"

**ублюдки - Loosely translated as: "Bastards"

All translations courtesy of Google Translate