I SURVIVED GUYS! I AM ALIVE! YAY!

I wish I had had more time to set this chapter up so it didn't seem as out of the blue. I've done my best to set it up throughout the chapters but... ya'll be the judge.

"That's really quite amazing, Liwu," Al said, grinning at his son's handiwork. The sculpture was the exactly five feet two inches and was a stunning likeness of the boy's mother when she was angry.

The boy grinned back. "Thanks."

"You missed something though."

The grin melted away. "What? What was it?"

"Her mouth's closed."

"Why is that a problem?"

"Usually by the time she's uncrossed her arms, she's about to start yelling."

Liwu laughed along with his father before glancing at the book he had used to draw the circle and making a slight adjustment in his circle and activating the circle again.

Instead of adjusting the sculpture so that her mouth fell open as if she were about to yell at him to do his laundry, though, the sculpture exploded, blasting both Al and Liwu backwards.

Al coughed a few times before glancing at where the sculpture had stood. There was a black mark on the ground where it had stood left from the explosion.

"Liwu?"

"I'm alright," the boy said, though he was coughing too. Then he swore.

"Liwu!"

"Sorry, Dad. What happened? Why didn't it work? What did I do wrong?"

Al got to his feet and examined the adjustment he had made to the circle. "You accidently disturbed the carbon ratio when you messed with the design."

"I did?"

"Come look," Al said, gesturing for him to come closer. He did so, looking upset and brushing the front of his pants down. Even though the boy had taken to wearing slacks at school to try and fit in a little better (though from what Al understood, his son hadn't made any friends yet) he still wore Xingese clothes around the house more often.

"See? You must have accidently brushed it away."

"Really? Something that stupid?"

"In alchemy every tiniest detail counts. You should know that by now, Liwu."

"Yeah I know," he grumbled before crossing his arms and looking away.

"Hey, it was just a mistake. Everyone makes them. It's okay."

"Yeah I know but… it's been three years. Shouldn't I be able to do something as simple as that by now? I understand it, I know how to do it but it just isn't coming. I still need to look at book to draw complex circles… even Emily isn't using the book anymore."

"You can already do a lot, Liwu. You can't compare yourself to your sister, it just comes naturally to her. Some people are like that."

"You're like that. So is Uncle Ed."

"Well, yes. But we didn't just magically become perfect at alchemy. We had to work on it. Your Uncle Ed and I were obsessed with alchemy when we were kids, we didn't do anything except learn about it. It's not surprising you're not learning as fast as we did."

"But Emily is."

"I… yes well she's also started younger. It's easier for younger kids to pick it up now and then get better as they understand more complex theories. She never had to struggle with building that foundation in it."

"Or I'm just not as good as her."

"No, Liwu it's not that. It's just…" Al bit his lip before taking the plunge. "Well I warned you when I said I would teach you alchemy that some people just… have trouble picking it up…" A lot of people actually. There was a reason alchemists were so valuable. Because they were so rare. Very few people were ever actually able to pick the art up. It didn't help that most alchemists refused to take on people as pupils.

While he thought that this might comfort his son, that there wasn't anything wrong with him for not being a natural at alchemy, it seemed to do the opposite. His head shot upwards and locked eyes with Al's. "I'm not one of them! I can pick it up, I swear!"

"Liwu I told at the beginning of this that I would stop teaching you if I thought that you were going to hurt yourself trying too hard."

"No! Don't stop teaching me, please." His dark eyes were wide and pleading. "Please Dad."

"I'm not going to stop… but if you don't forgive yourself for not being a natural I might. It's perfectly normal not to be able to do alchemy well, Liwu." Liwu didn't respond, having looked away. Al waited for a few seconds to see if that would prompt a response, but he didn't say anything.

"Well… come on. Let's wash up and help your mother with dinner. Chris is coming over for dinner tonight."

Liwu did lighten up a bit at that. Liwu had taken quite a liking to the older boy that had taken to frequenting the family meals. He came over every few days. Al suspected that it was because he didn't like the loneliness of being at Gracia's. Considering Elicia was already married with her own family (Al had been thunderstruck when he heard that) it was just him and her alone in the house. And she had taken on so many projects to fill her time when Elicia had gotten married and left that he was probably home alone most days.

So eating dinner with them with three kids all with distinct personality… it was probably a nice break from the silence.

It had taken a while for Liwu to adjust to having this new presence in their home (and Al was happy to see that it was becoming a home instead of a place that he was forced to move to), but once he had opened up around Chris they started down the path of becoming friends. Al wasn't quite sure how the friendship worked considering Chris was five years older than his son, but Chris didn't seem to mind having the young boy attach himself to him and Al didn't mind his son using Chris as an almost role model. There were a lot worse people to model yourself on.

Though he wasn't quite sure as far as Liwu perhaps planning on following in Chris's footsteps joining the military when he turned 18.

They entered the back door and stopped in the bathroom to wash their hands before joining Mei and Nina in the kitchen. Nina was already working on setting the table for six and Mei was waiting for something to finish boiling.

"We almost ready for him?"

"Dinner will be ready any moment now."

"Okay," Al said, smiling and moving to help Nina with setting the table. "Where's Emily?"

"I think she's trying to find Cookie." The cat had moved with them to Amestris, though reluctantly. Thankfully she seemed to have taken to their new house well enough.

"As long as she's here for dinner."

The doorbell rang and Liwu offered to go get it.

By the time Nina and Al laid the last of the silverware, the two boys came back, Chris smiling sheepishly. "Sorry for intruding again, Uncle Al."

"Absolutely not a problem," he said smiling. "Right Mei?"

"We're happy to have you over," she said carrying a pan of casserole into the dining room and putting it on the table. "And we're happy to eat, so let's all sit down, shall we? Liwu, go find your sister."

"She's right there," he said, pointing at Nina. Everyone except Mei chuckled or laughed while she just raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, of course, Mom."

Emily came in the room trailing her brother a few minutes later talking about how she had found Cookie under the bed and trying to get Cookie back out from under the bed because she didn't belong under the bed… they all laughed and teased her a bit.

Even though it was a thoroughly enjoyable evening, Al couldn't help but notice that Liwu seemed more subdued during dinner. So after goodnights and hugs and kisses as Al brushed his wife's hair, he couldn't help but explain his concerns to her.

She confessed that she had noticed it too.

"I just can't help but feel like his heart isn't really in it."

"Then why would he want to keep learning?"

"I don't know… I keep feeling like he's not learning for himself. He's trying hard. He's working incredibly hard, and I can tell that the fact that he'd not quite getting it bothers him deeply. But I can't understand why. I've told him enough that that's natural. A lot of people are rubbish at alchemy."

"Well he had grown up in our family. You're a brilliant alchemist. I'm an alkahestrist—"

"You're a brilliant alkahestrist too." She smiled at him.

"Fine. I'm a brilliant alkahestrist. Ed's a famous alchemist. All of us learned at incredibly young ages. Maybe he feels like he needs to learn alchemy to fit in."

"But we've never said anything like that!"

"I know, Al. But… you know Liwu's always been… uncomfortable with the fact that he's adopted. Ever since he learned about his adoption he's felt like he needs to prove that he's a part of the family."

"Of course he's a part of the family! We love him just as much as Nina and Emily."

"I know that Al. He's my baby just as much as Emily. And we've never treated him as if he's any less for being adopted, but he's sensitive. And maybe learning alchemy is his way of trying to prove to you that he is your son."

Al's shoulder's sagged. "But… he doesn't have to… what do I do?"

"I don't know Al. Trying to stop his lessons might make it worse."

"But he's going to drive himself crazy trying to learn something he doesn't care about. No good comes when someone does that."

Mei pursed her lips before rubbing her hands across his shoulders comfortingly. "Come on. Sleep on it. Maybe you'll come up with an idea in the morning."

He sighed. "Alright."

He climbed into bed while Mei turned off the light, crawling into bed herself and tucking her head against his chest.

Nina crept away from the door as quietly as she could.

"Did you know that Sarah didn't know you spoke Amestrian?" Nina informed her brother when she met him outside of the school.

"What?"

"She didn't think you spoke any Amestrian at all. She thought you only knew how to speak Xingese."

"I speak Amestrian fine," he said frowning.

"Well I know that," she said, walking quickly to keep up with his longer legs as they started walking home. "But she didn't. So I told her that she was an ignorant, biased idiot!"

"Nina—!"

"But I told her in Xingese so she didn't know what I said! And now she wants me to teach her how to speak it."

"That wasn't very nice, Nina." The blond shrugged before running ahead to snag a dandelion that was growing from the grass of a nearby lawn.

"Neither were the things she said about Xingese people. So I had to tell her off for messing with my people."

Liwu raised an eyebrow. "But you're not Xingese. You're Amestrian."

"No I'm not. I'm just as Xingese as you are."

"… Nina…"

"And you're just as Amestrian as I am."

"No," he said slowly as if explaining something to a stupid child. "I'm Xingese because my biological parents were Xingese. Your biological parents were Amestrian."

"So?"

"What do you mean so? It's genetics!"

"I mean so what? Who cares? I'm half Xingese and you're half Amestrian because we have one mom who's Xingese and a dad who's Amestrian. We've lived in both countries and we speak both languages. We know both cultures."

"But Nina we're both adopted. We're not actually Mom and Dad's kids, so we aren't—"

"Yes we are."

"What?"

"Yeah we're actually Mom and Dad's kids. We're sure not whoever our real parents's are kids." She stopped momentarily to check the grammatical correctness of that sentence before shaking her head and continuing. "My parents left me alone in an ally. If I wasn't found I would have died. Family doesn't do that to each other. So they're not my family. Mom and Dad and Emily are my family even if I'm not biologically related to any of you. And you're my family too. You're Mom and Dad's family too."

"I… well I know but…"

"You sure don't seem to know."

"What do you mean?"

"You don't even like alchemy."

His jaw dropped and he spluttered for a few minutes as Nina skipped ahead to pick more flowers.

"I like alchemy!"

"No you don't," she said turning around and giving him a look quite reminiscent of her mother. "Now will you stop pretending you do just so you can try to earn the love that Dad's already giving you and more?"

"That's not why I'm doing it…"

"Then why are you?"

He opened his mouth to answer… and then it fell shut.

"Exactly," she said, nodding briskly and running to the door of their house, which they had just approached.

Liwu stood there staring at the door which had been left open as Nina ran inside and announced her arrival to the house.

He went straight to his room and stared working on his homework, but couldn't really focus.

When he heard his father's arrival, he stood up and went to the hall to greet him.

"Hey, Liwu," Al said, grinning with Emily in his arms. "How was your day?"

Liwu looked at Nina who had also come to welcome her father home. Her father. Liwu's father. "It was… pretty good. Though… um… about you teaching me alchemy…"