(A/N: It's been forever and I'm sorry! Life has been rather shitty for me as of late. Also, this chapter was really hard to write for no real reason. It just seemed like there were just so many directions it could go in...but I think I captured what I wanted. I also had to figure out what the heck Xingians eat for breakfast -_-' Although I think of Xing as basically China, I represent the culture as an amalgamation of various Asian traditions, whatever I happen to know of and/or deem appropriate. Not being an anthropologist, I do the best I can.)

.

It was the cold, grey hour before dawn when Envy finally returned, preferring to leap up to the windowsill and jimmy the window open, rather than enter through the apartment complex's series of doors. Once inside, it collapsed onto Kimblee's bed as though exhausted, although the heaviness resided more in heart than body.

"Good morning." Kimblee said, woken by the jostling of the mattress.

"Mf firmly rr ur ufughs." Envy muttered into the pillow.

"Pardon?"

Envy raised its face from the down-stuffed cushion. "I said my family are all assholes."

"What happened?"

"Nothing much." It didn't want to go into details. "Everyone is just being all weird. It's like none of us knows whether we're enemies who've lived together so long we've grown accustomed to one another, or comrades who have grown to despise each other for the same reason."

"I'm guessing tonight was more enemy than ally." He reached out and laid one hand on Envy's shoulder, frowning slightly at the contact. "I forgot how cold you get."

"It's cold underground." Envy responded vaguely, all but impervious to his touch. It had considered not coming back at all; in the wake of the confrontation with Lust, it had been in the mood to kill rather than cuddle. But it seemed rude, even by Envy's standards, to just vanish without a word.

Kimblee was not about to be ignored, and in his own bed at that.

"Come here then." He pulled Envy closer, and felt its tension as he did so; not resisting him but lacking the languid acquiescence of before. Envy's frame was about as pliant as a two-by-four. He sighed. "They're never going to let me have you, are they?"

Envy frowned slightly. "What do you call last night? And I'm here now, aren't I?"

"Maybe it betrays my human softness, that I would hope for an entire night unbroken. And you are here, but you brought them all back up with you."

"Wouldn't mind if I brought Greed back with me." Envy said, a hint of antagonism in its tone.

He arched a brow. It seemed Envy was trying to pick a fight. But as onslaughts went, this was one he could deal with; one he could shrug off, in fact.

"You did bring him back with you. He's in here," he touched Envy's temple softly. "And I'm not willing to concede that territory. Be with me for a little longer, I'm not ready to share you yet."

Envy's mood softened, at that. It noticed for the first time upon returning how soft the bed was, how warm he was…and that he was still wasn't wearing a stitch of anything except the sheets.

"Now that you mention it," Envy said, moving closer and shifting into a male form, "You and I have some unfinished business."

.

By the time they were finished, the sun had risen in earnest. Envy was reminded involuntarily of Father, as the light shone through the window and fell upon their bed. Bright, life-giving, utterly remote and untouchable.

"And that," Kimblee said, still slightly out of breath, "is how I know there is no just God in heaven."

"What?" Envy snapped, disrupted from her musings.

"No such entity would grant me such good fortune."

Envy laughed. Speaking of God…

"There was one good part of me going underground. Father gave me permission to let you in on more about us, about what we're doing." She smiled, perhaps the happiest one he had yet seen. "I have so much to tell you."

"Would you mind telling me over breakfast?"

.

Although Envy didn't much care whether she ate or not, she found the process of food preparation in itself quite fascinating; all the more so because, at home, Kimblee favored cuisine seldom found in that country. For his part, he found her rapt attention slightly amusing, for in his line of work he regularly performed all manner of bizarre, experimental alchemy, and Envy witnessed it often enough. Yet she had never responded with half the interest as when he made what was, to him, quite basic fare.

"What's that?" She asked, as he stirred herbs and seasoning into a pot of thick, whitish porridge. She stood behind him, arms around his waist and head on his shoulder. He wore a white terrycloth bathrobe, while Envy was draped in one of the bedsheets. She liked it's residual warmth, and how it still held the scent of both their bodies.

"My mother called it jok. I've heard other names for it, though. Congee, lugao…it varies depending on the region, I think."

He held up a spoonful of the dish for Envy to try. It was mild and savory, and quite unlike anything she had tasted before. She was silent for a moment, then,

"Is it…is it nice, having a mother?"

"Better to have one than not to. They say that a mother is one who will care about you, even if no one else does."

"Didn't yours?"

"Care about me? Of course."

Envy frowned, for his voice and face were far from happy.

"And...?"

He smiled. "How about this: you tell me your family's story, and I'll tell you mine."

"Fair enough. So," she pointed to long sticks of dough sizzling in oil, "what's that?"

.

Once situated at the table, Envy ate with one hand while sketching a map of Amestris with the other, paying more attention to the food than the picture. All the same, she lay down each stroke with deft precision, knowing each line and letter more intimately than her own shifting self.

Once done, Envy smiled at him slyly. "Ever wonder why its shape is a circle?"

Once again, he had the feeling of one receiving a revelation from God.

"No…"

"Probably for the best. Wrath would be pissed if people suspected it was by design."

"Then…this whole country…"

"And every major historical event therein, designed by us for our purposes."

"Crops sewn for your harvest."

"Exactly. How well do you know Amestrian history?"

"As well as a soldier ought."

"We'll see. It's pop-quiz time."

Envy directed his attention to various points around the map, asking him to name noteworthy military actions in those areas. He wasn't used to thinking of such things in terms of geography, but managed to supply the events which Envy seemed to expect. His excitement grew as each event was plotted. Whether he was familiar with the history or not, the story it told him was unmistakable. He had worked with that very circle in Lab Five countless times, twenty feet across at the widest, sacrificing prisoners in threes and fours.

And now…this...

"Each point is forged by death and devastation." Envy explained, as the transmutation circles was delineated, segment by segment, across the country. "A crest of blood carved into the very land, as Father puts it. And the points are connected by a tunnel deep underground, the work of my brother Sloth. A cruel irony, that his is the heaviest labor of all of us."

Kimblee ran one finger reverently around the circle, halting where the next point was due to be made.

Ishbal.

"I always wondered why the government maintained a presence there, having no resources or desirable territory."

Envy actually giggled. "The only resource we're interested in is their lives. And it will become a lot more than a military presence. The Amerstrian government tends to run roughshod over Ishbalan culture, so you have animosity on that side. And I'm going to perpetrate some crimes as Ishbalan terrorists, get everyone all riled up on both sides. Stoke the flames of hatred, sooner or later the fire will spread."

"And they'll carve the bloody crest all by themselves."

"Exactly."

"And then…" He continued along the perimeter. "Briggs?" He frowned. "That will be a tougher case."

"Not really. Anything to do with the army is ripe for exploitation. It's not as though men of war have any strong motive to keep peace or preserve life."

"True. Especially not the Briggs people, from what I've heard."

"The Promise Day will be a solar eclipse." Envy continued. "As an alchemist, you might know about that..."

"Something about cosmic unification, but the language is very vague. I've always understood it as a coming together of opposing forces and energies to create an otherwise impossible equilibrium. They compare it to God..."

"I'm a little hazy on the details of this part myself. I was born in this world, and it has to do with Father's knowledge of powers beyond it. He's never been content with this world, ruled by humans and determined by the random laws of nature. He's going to pull down God from above us and steal His crown. So he says."

"I can scarcely imagine..." Kimblee closed his eyes briefly, and there was a moment of deep silence. He considered himself one who admired power, never to shrink away from or denounce it. But this…it was so far beyond the scope of his imagination, the very existence of himself, his kind, the world as he knew it…

Then, abruptly, he laughed.

"What's funny in that?" Envy asked, looking at him oddly.

"Your Father as a God above, who cares nothing for me and my kind. In a sense, it won't be different at all."

Envy burst out laughing as well. "Hell, I'd never thought of it that way."

"Why would you? It's a human perspective. But what will be the fate of humanity - and of me, as a human?"

"Human civilization will go on in some form. They're useful in a number of ways. The greatest difference will be that Father will impede their use of alchemy. As for you... you'll live longer than any of your kind – as long as I do, if I have any say in the matter. And Father might be persuaded to let you retain your use of alchemy. If you're loyal."

"I'll see that I am. I'd sooner die than go without it."

"He'd probably let you keep it. With the power of God, it's not as though you'd pose a threat. So..." she smiled, chin resting on one hand. "If you had a world to do anything with...?"

"You'll have to give me a moment to consider that. Tell me what you would do, as you've had longer to speculate."

"I think I'll ask Father to make me a world with dual suns, so that night would never fall. Or maybe a single sun, and a moon so bright it was just like the sun."

"Don't you like the dark?"

"I hate it. I've lived in darkness all my life. In my world, no more dark, no more coldness. It will be like a garden, stretching endlessly beneath the sky."

"Would you let me live there with you?"

"Of course. If you'd be happy in such a place."

"Perhaps...I think I would want humans in my world, though. Supposing I had one."

Envy grimaced. "Ew, why?"

"Even immortal, I'll always be human. I'll always have questions concerning my own kind – like, for instance, what if women were in charge, instead of men?"

"It wouldn't be different."

"It could be."

"There's no difference in me, whether I'm male or female."

"But for you those conditions aren't permanent. Most of us have to live as just one or the other."

"Still. What that means is all in context. Humans, at their core, are all the same. They just want as much as they can get, with as little effort possible – food, money, power, sex – all that. The difference in this society is that women are less often in a position to get it. Change that equation, and they'll change with it."

"Human civilizations do differ from one another on some levels, though, even if the people who comprise those civilizations are basically the same. Even if it did turn out exactly like it is now, I'd want to see that play out. I'd want to see if there's anything that would change the fundamental structure of humans societies."

"You want to understand the differences between humans, because you want to understand why you yourself are so different."

He stared at her a moment, speechless.

"…Maybe you're right. I've never thought of it that way."

"Look for the answer in human civilization if you want. The way you describe it, it could be amusing, but I doubt you'll find insight to yourself that way." She reached across the table, taking his hand in her own, fingering the transmutation circle on his palm. "Because you are different. And by definition that will always defy explanation. When you're cut lose from time and season, you'll become less human, but more yourself. Whatever makes you a surprise to me, when the rest of your kind is so uniformly tiresome. When that happens, you might not need humanity anymore."

"When that happens, will I need anything at all? And what's the point of life, if not?"

"I don't know. But don't you want to find out?"

.

(A/N: So, the format for this story is going to change a little...I think. There are a few exchanges between these two which I want to illustrate, almost a series of one-shots in that, while interesting (to me, anyway), they don't directly advance the plot, and I didn't include them before for that reason. Although maybe now I've said it, it won't turn out that way. I guess this is just to say that, if things seem to slow down, it's not that I've gone stale, I'm just giving them a rest for a while. Because the worst is yet to come, muhahaha! Thanks for reading!)