Haven't updated this one in a while, sorry XD;; Been busy writing 'Ward 17', another FMA/HP crossover :3 I suggest you check it out if you don't mind a bit of blood and gore~

Disclaimer~

Chapter Five - Just Another Rumour

"Wake up," an airy voice reminding Ed of a wind chime sang in his ear.

"Nngh."

"Wake up, Ed," she whispered again.

"Don' wanna," Ed mumbled groggily, not really caring at that moment who exactly was trying to wake him up. He just hoped they'd listen to him and go away.

His previous joyous thoughts of slumber, however, vanished as soon as someone blew harshly into his left ear. Ed let out a strangled yelp of shock and ungracefully lurched forward out of the leather armchair, spinning around wildly with eyes that couldn't possibly be wider. "W-who..?"

Luna giggled softly, though it rang through the empty room clearly in the deafening silence. She waved timidly to a very disturbed Ed. You couldn't blame him, really. He didn't usually wake up in a foreign universe with a girl he'd barely known for a week blowing in his ear.

"... Luna? Why-" Ed started, before abruptly cutting himself off mid-sentence as he noticed his surroundings and foggy memories began returning to him. He blinked as he processed the new information, reminding Luna of a deer caught in the headlights. "Oh. I guess... we fell asleep."

Luna nodded dreamily. "I think we did."

Ed glanced out of the imaginary window Luna had recently vacated in favour of waking Ed up. The sky was a misty orange colour. "It's evening out there."

Luna slowly turned her head to face the window. "It seems to quiet to be the evening, though. Usually there would be loads of noisy students passing right about now."

The two paused, holding their breath - still, they couldn't hear anything other than Ed's creaking automail. Ed scrunched up his face in concentration, forcing his still very slow and rather groggy mind into full power a little sooner than it would have liked. "Hang on - wasn't it daytime earlier? When it was really evening? So... oh." Ed scrunched up his face again, but this time in annoyance as he came to the realisation. Luna blinked patiently, waiting for him to start making sense. "Great," Ed growled. "It's the middle of the fucking night. Dumbledore said I was allowed out after curfew, but I don't think we can say the same for you, Luna..." Ed trailed off, running a flesh hand through his long, tousled hair, wincing as his finger caught on a tangle.

Luna whispered, "Usually the whitlings would be able to make me invisible so I could get back to the common room without trouble, but none of them seem to like me at the moment. I think we're going to have to sneak out."

Ed sighed, suppressing the urge to roll his eyes at the completely obvious conclusion Luna had come to. "Follow me, and try not to make any noise. Don't worry, I'm used to sneaking around places at night." Ed gently snatched a slightly perplexed Luna's hand and tugged her towards the door. Luna opened it and as soon as they were (un)safely outside, the door disappeared with a rather loud 'poof!' and a burst of odd-smelling smoke. Ed winced at the attention-attracting spectacle.

"Sorry," Luna apologised, though it was hard to believe she was sincere when her dreamy tone of voice suggested strongly to Ed that she was mentally on the other side of the world.

Wherever that was.

Ed physically shook the confusing and unwarranted thoughts out of his head, and they proceeded to wind their way though deserted corridors, and Ed cursed loudly when Luna tripped up a flight of stairs, waking a nearby painting.

"Oi! Whatcha doing out afta 'ours?"

Ed froze, and discreetly shoved Luna into a crevice in the stone wall next to him, hoping at least she wouldn't be spotted.

"I'm talkin' ter you!" The old, half-balding man hobbled up to Ed, pointing a mangled, accusing finger at Ed's face, which Ed barely managed to repress the urge to recoil at.

"I have Dumbledore's permission," Ed almost snarled. He didn't like this man one bit.

"Well let's bring yer to 'is office then, shall we? See what he says then!"

"Feel free," Ed replied nonchalantly, his bare hands stuffed into his leather pockets.

The man's face balled into one of ugly anger. "I'll give yer a bit of advice kid." Ed's eyebrows furrowed. He wasn't a kid. "You don' want to get on the wrong side of Argus Filch, yer hear me?" the man now identified as Filch growled, before stalking off in the direction Ed assumed was the Headmaster's office. "An' bring the dratted girl with yer!"

Ed's eyes widened slightly before narrowing at the old man's perceptiveness. Ed thought he understood why Dumbledore hired the man as the janitor/warden/parole officer in the first place. Ed sighed. "C'mon, Luna."

Luna trotted out from the gap in the wall, walking closely to the right of and slightly behind Ed as if she was frightened, though her facial expression and the fact she seemed to be humming something resembling an old nursery rhyme told Ed a completely different story. She didn't seem worried at all. Ed shook his head almost imperceptibly in disbelief. This girl was so strange. He doubted he'd ever understand her.

"Would you two care to explain why you were wandering the corridors at three a.m.?" Dumbledore smiled warmly at them over his half-moon glasses, a friendly expression to most, though Ed felt rather looked down on while held in that steely gaze. It made him quite uncomfortable, and the most he could do was inspect the broken buckle on his left boot and let Luna explain.

"We were in the Room of Requirement, sir," she started dazedly, and Dumbledore's genuinely surprised expression told Ed the Room of Requirement wasn't something especially well-known.

"Bullsh-"

"Argus," Dumbledore commanded. Filch shut up.

"Go on," Dumbledore turned his attention back to Luna.

"We fell asleep there. We woke up and it was nighttime. Ed tried to sneak me back to Ravenclaw common room, but Filch caught us."

"I see." Dumbledore nodded slowly, before smiling. "As neither of you were intentionally out after curfew, I shall let you go." Dumbledore nodded at them to leave, and they did so, Ed's irritable stroll a striking contrast to Luna's strange Irish dance-like skip to the door. "And please don't let this happen again."

Luna giggled and Ed let out a garbled, "yeah, yeah."

As soon as the two shut the doors behind them, Filch spoke up. "Funny pair, aren't they?" he asked gruffly.

Dumbledore chuckled. "Quite."

"Ungh," Ed groaned as he slumped gracelessly on the plain blue sofa in the Ravenclaw common room. "That was a hell of a lot more trouble than I hoped it would be."

"But at least we're alive," Luna commented, apparently not paying any attention to what she was saying.

Ed turned around in his seat, looking over his left shoulder at her, and gave her an odd look that she completely missed. "Why wouldn't we be alive?"

"Oh, you know... The walls have a tendency of eating people..." Luna sounded even more dreamy and distant than usual, and Ed concluded with a roll of his eyes that talking to her was utterly useless at this point in time.

"Sure."

Ed stood up suddenly, an important thought occurring to him. If Ravenclaws were really as nerdy as everyone made them out to be, then surely they'd have a ton of books lying around here somewhere, right? Ed risked a glance at Luna. Nah, he thought, she's too out of it. She'd probably direct me out of the window. He huffed under his breath. Looks like I'm gonna have to find them myself.

Ed spent the next three scourging through the numerous rooms and libraries for any books that would be relatively helpful as far as time- and space-travel were concerned. The Gryffindor common room had only two cramped bookshelves, both of which were stuffed top-to-toe with magic books. The Ravenclaw dorms, however, had innumerable bookshelves scattered throughout the entire complex arrangement of small rooms that made up the Ravenclaw common room. Ed had so far found a total of twelve books mentioning time- and space-travel in more than one paragraph, and his mood was near the clouds. They'd only had five promising books in the entire main library! It looks like I'll be staying in Ravenclaw a lot soon. Ed grinned almost hysterically at the thought. If there was one thing he liked more than solving international problems and saving the country, it was figuring out how to solve international problems and save the country.

He returned into the main room (the one with the three sofas, two desks and a fireplace) and dumped the stack of books unceremoniously on the coffee table. He glanced at the furthest sofa away, where Luna had been when he'd last seen her, and let out a small smile and a quiet sigh of amusement when he saw she'd fallen asleep. Again. Does she have something against sleeping in her bed or something?

He dumped himself on the nearest sofa to the coffee table, and began to work systematically through the books, marking every page that even hinted at time- or space-travel.

He'd managed fifteen page-markers in twenty-three minutes before anyone showed any sign of getting up. Ed blinked at how fast the time had gone by while he was collecting books. He glanced at the tattered grandfather clock in the corner of the room. 6:30, roughly, he thought.

The first kid to show himself (around quarter to seven) balked at the sight of the mysterious boy with a metal arm and hair like spun gold sitting in front of a roaring fire, marking pages in old, yellowed books with neon page-markers.

Ed noticed with amusement out of the corner of his eye that the boy seemed utterly lost for words, so Ed prompted him. "Hello," he greeted, though not particularly friendly, not malicious either.

"H-hullo." The ragged-looking third-year (Ed guessed by his third-year Potions textbook he was carrying) hurried past Ed, dropping in a weird half-bow before practically shooting out of the door.

Ed showed a strange, amused smile at the regard people obviously held him in. The people he'd never actually talked to in person always stammered around him and shot him strange glances. They treated him more respectfully than they did their teachers, Ed noted, and it gave him an odd sort of pride. He'd never really had the chance to indulge in people looking up to him before, what with Colonel Bastard always in his face about assignments he couldn't read or meetings Ed had missed with the excuse of 'alien invasion' over the phone. Ed smirked at the memory. He'd practically laughed his guts up afterwards, especially after he'd heard that Bradley had stood up for him in his absence at said meeting, claiming 'I have as much proof that there was an alien invasion in Fullmetal's apartment half an hour ago as I do of the fact that Major General Hakuro is off sick with the flu.'

"U-um... Hello? Are you the new student?" a bold Ravenclaw asked. Ed glanced at her - or it might have been a 'he', Ed wasn't quite sure.

"Yeah," he replied nonchalantly, turning his expressionless mask back to the book he was currently littering with bright colours.

"I wasn't sure i-if you realised since you're new, but, um... breakfast started fifteen minutes ago."

"I know," Ed assured her/him lightly, refusing to give eye contact when s/he stood there awkwardly waiting for it.

Eventually, s/he just nodded her/his head uncertainly and briskly strode out of the room, leaving Ed to his own devices once more.

Ed sighed. Even if he did stay here, he'd still get the stragglers and breakfast-skippers constantly nagging him about why he wasn't going to breakfast. He may as well just go.

So, with minimal reluctance, he dragged Luna out of her deep sleep and made his way to the Great Hall.

Oh, how he wished he'd stayed in the common room.

Or I could've at least left Luna there, he added as a grumpy afterthought.

Still, Ed bravely decided that rumours never slowed the Fullmetal Alchemist down before, so why should they now? Just because Hogwarts consisted of about three times as many people as Central Headquarters, none of which were mature enough to resist gossiping, and every time he passed someone's seat (especially someone female), they'd exclaim mockingly, "Oh no! I wouldn't want to catch the weirdness off him, would I?" and then burst out in shrieks of laughter that made Ed want to smash their heads against a wall - or preferably five - it was, essentially, no different from being teased in the military.

Apparently, as he later discovered from a seemingly nice girl at the Ravenclaw table, Draco Malfoy (the bastard) had caught Ed and Luna wandering around the corridors last night while he was sneaking out of the infirmary to get some fresh air. Rumours had immediately erupted, of course, the favourites being that he and Luna were secretly engaged, Luna had 'infected' him with her weirdness and they were now both completely insane, or, what Malfoy had apparently been spreading was that he and Luna had been caught making out in the corridor by Filch, who had dragged them to Dumbledore who had subsequently given them each three weeks' detention.

"Bullshit!" Ed had loudly and rather violently exclaimed upon the news, scaring most of the Ravenclaws half to death with his murderous glare that Luna (sitting right next to me!) was somehow managing to ignore.

However, Ed decided not to worry about it too much. He was sure he could find something to annoy Malfoy with, and he never really liked any of the students here anyways. Well, apart from Ron and his bunch, but they didn't seem like the types to spread rumours.

"Come on, Minnie, or we're going to be late!" a Ravenclaw girl from somewhere down the table shouted rather urgently. Ed didn't know why. Class didn't start for another fifteen minutes.

Ed wondered what his next class was. He knew he had History of Magic and Transfiguration at some point today, but he didn't know when, and what the other four lessons were. His brow furrowed in concentration as he sipped pumpkin juice and tried in vain to remember his first lesson.

"Don't eat that," a dreamy voice spoke from beside him as he picked up a strange leaf. "The squirmples always put poisonous herbs on them."

Ed blinked. "Oh!" he exclaimed, his fist hitting the table. "Herbology!" He grinned at Luna, hurriedly getting up out of his seat. "Thanks."

Luna smiled distantly at him. "You're welcome."

Ed abandoned the red leaf and sprinted towards the greenhouse. It wouldn't do any good to be late for his very first Herbology lesson, would it? Damn this castle for being so fucking big.

"... As some of you know, this is a mandrake root. Now, mandrake roots can be very..."

"So," Ron whispered eagerly from Ed's left. "Are the rumours true?"

There was a suspicious thump and a muffled cry, alerting a few of the students to Ron's newfound home on the floor and Ed's too-innocent-to-be-good smile.

"Geez, mate! I was only asking!" Ron huffed, getting back up, not bothering to dust himself off.

Ed glared.

"So..." Ron started again, more timidly this time, "Are they true?"

Ed sighed irritably, resting his chin in his left palm. "No. Well, the part about Luna and I being out after curfew is true, but none of the rumours are true. We're not engaged, I'm not insane and we were definitely not making out."

"Oh." Ron looked almost disappointed, and Ed considered hitting him again, before deciding the teacher wouldn't overlook a second yelp and I would probably land him in detention. Again.

Ed answered the unasked question lingering in the air. "I found Luna in the Room of Requirement yesterday evening, and we fell asleep. We woke up, and it was the middle of the night. We tried to sneak out, but Filch caught us and took us to Dumbledore. And no, he didn't give us detention."

Ron nodded in understanding, mouthing 'Oh.'

"Seriously," Ed grumbled under his breath, "Do people here have nothing better to do other than spread rumours?"

Ron grinned.

Hermione's last sentence to him still rung clear in Ed's head. 'Don't get into trouble.' Unfortunately, had Hermione known Ed better, she would have known saying such a thing was pointless as Ed always got himself into trouble, regardless of whether it was intentional or not.

Ed hoped he wouldn't get into trouble tonight, though, because he'd had enough trouble for today, thank you very much.

Ed wandered aimlessly down the corridor. Class had ended about twenty minute ago, and he'd insisted to Harry that he wanted to go on a walk, and yes, he'd come back soon and no, he wouldn't do something stupid.

Ed tried his very best to keep that last promise, but unfortunately, doing stupid things was in his nature, and when he felt himself wander past the Room of Requirement, he just couldn't resist.

Ed walked up to the wall, glaring at it as if that would somehow magically make it open. "Luna...?" he dared to whisper.

A pair of dark, intricately designed wooden doors suddenly materialised, reminding Edward of the Gate, a thought that churned the bile in his stomach up until it neared his gullet.

The doors soon swung open, though, saving Edward from reminiscing memories he'd rather forget, revealing a smiling Luna, dressed in a woolen winter coat, clutching a mug of what Ed guessed was hot chocolate.

"Hello, Ed," she giggled, before patting the seat next to her on the burgundy sofa in front of a six-foot-tall fireplace.

"Yo." Ed grinned, plopping himself on the edge of the seat and leaning as far forward as he could without actually jumping into the fire. It was the end of autumn, and as much as he enjoyed parading around in a tank top, his ports hurt rather agonizingly, and Ed was grateful for the warmth now turning the tips of his automail fingers a dull red as he shoved them into the flames.

There was a comfortable silence for what Ed guessed must have been half an hour, though it felt like five minutes to the boy whose head was so full it was overflowing with knowledge and the girl whose head was so empty she could barely give you the time of day.

"Ed," Luna whispered.

Ed murmured, "Mm?"

"Who is the 'Fullmetal Alchemist'?"

The simple sentence hit Ed like a ton of bricks. He'd completely forgotten about that cursed Potions lesson. And unfortunately for him, Luna might've been crazy, but she definitely wasn't stupid. There was no point in lying. "It's one of my names."

"What does it mean?"

Ed gave her a curious expression.

"All names have meanings, silly. 'Luna' means 'the moon', and 'Edward' means 'wealthy guardian'. What does 'the Fullmetal Alchemist' mean?"

Ed stared. Then, though it was barely audible, he laughed. "'The Fullmetal Alchemist' is part of my official title back in my home country. When a person passes the State Alchemy exam, they're given a title like that one."

Luna smiled. "I see." A pause. "What's a State Alchemy exam?"

Ed leant close to Luna's ear and whispered, "Can I trust you?"

Luna whispered back, "I made a promise to the jinkles that if I ever told a secret, I'd perform Avada Kedavra on myself."

Ed smiled. "In which case, I can tell you. Luna, have you ever heard of alchemy?"

Luna nodded. "Isn't it some specialised wandless magic?"

Ed shook his head. "In a way, I guess, but it isn't really anything like magic at all. Alchemy is a science. In alchemy, you must abide by the law of Equivalent Exchange and Conservation of Mass. You can't make something out of thin air, or change a dog into a teaspoon, for example. The law of Equivalent Exchange means that you can't receive something without giving something up of equal value in return."

Luna nodded.

"Alchemy requires a transmutation circle - a circle with lots of other shapes, lines and ancient runes in it. My brother and I don't need one though, which is why I passed the exam.

"I won't go into the details of alchemy, as it would take a few months to explain everything. But I'll say that there are three stages to an alchemical 'transmutation' - as in transfiguration - and every transmutation needs these three stages, no matter how simple or complex the transmutation is. They are analysis, deconstruction and reconstruction. First you analyse the materials and the elements they contain. Then, you deconstruct the materials into the basic elements, and finally you reconstruct the elements to form a new material, i.e. the outcome of the transmutation."

"And the State Alchemy exam is an exam to see how good your alchemy is?"

"Not quite. The State Alchemy exam is an exam that only the best of the best pass. They assess your alchemical skills, and if you pass you become a certified State Alchemist, and you're given an official title like mine."

Luna nodded absently. "You passed this exam." It wasn't a question.

"Yes. I was the youngest person ever to pass - I was only twelve at the time." Ed chuckled.

Luna smiled in understanding. "You didn't tell anyone because it would just cause complications."

"Exactly," Ed sighed.

Luna turned to face Ed fully, and slowly put a finger to her lips. "I promise I won't tell anyone."

Ed smiled. "Thank you."

Teehee~ I love the Room of Requirement, don't I? :3

How was it? I have a sinking feeling it doesn't live up to the standard I'd like it to... X3