Hi, everybody! I just want to let you guys know, the older versions of the Elric brothers will be called Edward and Alphonse while the younger ones will be referred to as Ed and Al. Also, since there will be references to the end of Brotherhood, Edwin and other canon pairings will be mentioned.

Disclaimer: I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.

Ed scowled, balling his gloved hands into fists as he stormed down the concrete steps of Central Library. His fierce expression rivaled that of the lion statue he swept past at the bottom of the staircase while he shouted. "I can't believe they kicked us out! We barely got a minute to research anything!"

Al considered pointing out that technically the librarians had ordered Ed to leave, not him, which meant maybe he could go back inside. However, that would probably just redirect his brother's outrage onto himself so he simply said, "It's not their fault the library closes early today." His voice softened in an attempt to soothe Ed's anger. "They were just doing their job."

Ed scoffed, too angry to see his brother's point, and started grumbling to himself about transmuting the doors shut and forcing all the librarians to sleep with their cherished books or redecorating the library into something more fitting of his tastes. Most likely he was already planning out where to add skulls to the architecture.

"And you know that book is one of the last existing copies," Al added thoughtfully. "It would be irresponsible of them to let anyone check it out."

"So what?" Ed glowered. "I'm not just anyone, I'm a state alchemist," he growled. "They should have made an exception." He stomped even harder down the sidewalk, the occasional streetlamp illuminating the ire marring his face and the clang of his automail foot more conspicuous in the silence of night.

"It's bad enough we had to postpone our trip to Liore, but then the hospital had to take their precious time to release me!" Ed threw out his hands. "The library was nearly closed by the time those idiots let me go!"

Al figuratively bit his tongue so he wouldn't mention that Ed had basically broke out of the hospital. He wished Ed allowed himself a few more hours of recovery, but his brother was stubborn and Al had to admit he made a reasonable argument for leaving. They did need time to find a hotel for their last night in Central, and if they'd waited for the hospital to release him, they would have found most hotels were already booked.

And though they considered asking the Hughes' for help, Al had eventually decided he didn't want to impose on the family and Ed was certain Hughes would just drag him back to the hospital after finding out he checked himself out. It was obvious from the little time they spent with the man that Hughes held a strong parental instinct and soft-spot for children, and would never let Ed wander Central with only partially healed wounds.

Al sighed in remembrance, somewhat regretful he hadn't been more assertive, while Ed's boots scuffed against the sidewalk and tossed a few pebbles into the vacant streets. "The whole reason we came to Central was for that book, and now we don't have any time to read it."

The younger Elric suddenly noticed his brother was yards ahead, so trotted faster to keep up with Ed's anger-fueled gait. "Don't worry, Brother," he said once he caught up. "We can come back to the library tomorrow before the train arrives."

"But I wanted to finish that book tonight!" Ed's head snapped up so fast his braid practically flew behind him. "It has a section on the Philosopher's stone!" Suddenly his shoulders slumped in a rare show of weariness and his pace slowed until he came to a stop.

"It might have the answer we've been searching for all these years." His voice faded into a bitter whisper, eyes downcast and hands clenching in frustration.

Al stopped beside him, bowing his head to take in the elder Elric's disheartened look. "Brother." Despite the metallic ring to his voice, Al's tone conveyed a gentle sympathy that Ed couldn't ignore. Therefore, it wasn't long before he tilted his head up to show he was listening, though it was still lowered enough that his bangs shadowed his expression.

"If the answer is there," a sprinkle of hope littered Al's words, "It will still be there tomorrow morning. After all, we've already waited four years, I think we can last another night. Right, Brother?"

It was more of a statement than question, but Al purposely left it open-ended since he knew Ed preferred coming to a conclusion on his own rather than be told the answer—probably due to Ed's "older brother pride".

However, it took a moment for the older boy to respond to the encouragement. Yet soon Ed raised his head just enough to reveal a tight smile on his face. "I guess you're right—"

Blue lightning shot up from the earth, Ed gaping before hastily leaping back from the light show a mere foot ahead of him.

"Brother!" Al cautioned, but there was no need since Ed was already a safe distance away.

Still, Ed's eyes were wide and his voice breathy as he gasped. "Alchemy?" He asked himself more than Al, his gaze already scanning the area for the culprit. With his encounter against the Freezing Alchemist fresh in mind, Ed couldn't help wondering if this was merely the beginning of an attack.

"Who could have initiated it?" Al asked over the crackle of the transmutation, but Ed had little time to ponder the question before the brightness reached a blinding climax.

The fifteen-year old raised an arm to shield his sight, the intensity of the flashes burning his eyes, yet the light diminished within seconds.

Ed lowered his arm slowly in case the transmutation flared again. However, instead of the transmuted pavement he expected to see, he found the same empty streets and deserted sidewalk under the glow of a nearby streetlamp, which was the only thing bringing life to the shady area and—

To a collapsed person lying flat on their back ahead of him.

Al must of just noticed him too because he let out a small gasp that shouldn't be possible when he had no lungs. Yet Ed recovered from his surprise first and rushed ahead to crouch beside the man—no, boy—because this guy couldn't be much older than himself with such a youthful face. His boyish looks being only tamed down by the way his skin clung unnaturally close to his jaw and cheek bones, making them appear more angular than they should be.

"Where did he...come..." Ed trailed off at the realization this boy was lying in the exact spot he had been when the transmutation activated, meaning there was a high chance the two events were related.

But what type of array could have caused such a violent transmutation? And how did it lead to a person being here—unless this boy was the alchemist who activated it. If that was the case, how had this boy transmuted without a circle? Regardless, the alchemy must have failed or rebounded—

A gauntlet hand landing on Ed's flesh shoulder drew him back to the present. "Is he okay?" Al asked timidly, and Ed felt a pinch of shame when he realized he hadn't even checked if the boy was alive before wondering about the science behind his sudden appearance.

"He's breathing," Ed assured as he observed the light rising and falling of the boy's chest. To be certain though, he pulled off the glove on his left hand and lowered two fingers onto the guy's neck. He waited a few seconds, then declared, "His heartbeat is steady, but I'm not a doctor or anything. We should—"

A low moan diverted the brothers' attention back to the young man, whose head shifted so his cheek fell onto the sidewalk.

"Hey, are you awake?" Ed leaned down right as the boy's eyelids peeled apart.

And the alchemist went rigid when brilliant golden eyes stared back at him.

Ed choked on his next words because those eyes were familiar in a way they shouldn't have been. However, the guy didn't seem to notice his shock, really didn't seem to even register Ed's existence if the glazed tint to his golden orbs said anything.

Gradually though, his eyes cleared, and when they focused on Ed's face they widened in recognition. "B-Brother?" For a moment, the boy's face brimmed with hope or maybe relief, but then his eyes fluttered close and he fell silent, unconscious once more.

Yet Ed made no move to help him while that voice, a fraction deeper and lacking the metallic echo but recognizable just the same, reverberated in his head.

"What are we going to do?" Al's tentative question helped Ed to unlock his frozen body and he got to his feet unsteadily.

He didn't dare look up at Al, his gaze stuck on the boy whose hair was bleached a pale blond under the lamplight. Although something told him it was probably just as vibrant as his own golden hair under natural lighting. Mix that with those golden eyes and he almost looked like an older version of someone he hadn't seen in the flesh for four long years. Moreover, the boy had honored Ed with the one title he wore proudly every time Al said it.

But surely he was wrong.

A lot of people called their sibling "Brother." It wasn't like Al was the only one. Even Ed called his younger brother that when he was feeling especially affectionate. Besides, the boy had been barely conscious when he deemed Ed his brother, it might have been a mistake.

And maybe there were other people who had golden hair and eyes, just because Ed had never seen anyone besides Al and their fathe—Hohenheim with such an appearance didn't mean much. He was from a small town after all... Though, they had been traveling all over the country for years now and still hadn't once ran into someone with gold anything. In fact, Ed had noticed a few people staring in disbelief at his appearance before the Fullmetal Alchemist became popular—

"Brother?" Al asked worriedly, having not received a reply for over a minute now, and Ed forced himself not to flinch when his mind automatically compared his voice to the sound of the boy's. Therefore, with great effort, Ed shoved his questions aside and concluded there was only one way to learn the truth.

"Pick him up," Ed told his brother, and felt Al sending an inquisitive glance his way. "We'll take him back to the hotel and then I'll figure this out." His voice was flat and his mouth a thin line because if he allowed any emotions out he'd definitely lose control of them.

"Oh, okay." Al sounded uncertain, but he trusted Ed, so his hesitation was barely noticeable while he gently scooped the boy into his arms.

"Come on." Ed kept his eyes trained ahead as he took the lead at a much more reserved pace than when he had stormed out the library. Yet while his feet pulled him forward, his mind couldn't help reflecting back on a time long passed.

"Brother?" Al looked up from the science textbook, his golden eyes round like their mother's—

Ed shook off the memory with a sharp jerk, and though his brother's clanking footsteps briefly paused in concern, he was grateful when Al took the hint and made no comment.

"What did you do?!" Edward gripped the alchemist by his cloak collar and slammed him against the concrete wall. "Tell me what you've done." His growl was hardly above a whisper, but carried all the threat of a viper poised to strike.

"I-I, um, he's..." The cloaked man stuttered, unable to find his former confidence in the face of those piercing golden eyes, which burned like a flame through the shadows.

With no lights on in the dank basement, those narrowed eyes and clenched teeth—uncannily resembling fangs right now—were all the man could make out of his assaulter as he seethed. "Where is my brother?!"

Edward tightened his hold, causing the collar to choke the hooded figure. Then he pulled back his left arm, knowing it was stronger than his right despite all the physical therapy he had been doing to regain its strength.

"I swear if you killed him..." His hand curled into a fist and shook with both rage and despair as the possibility his little brother was dead stabbed his heart to the floor. To think everything they'd been through to get his body back...just to have it end like this...

"Wait!" The knuckle stopped an inch from the alchemist's eyes, and the man practically swooned in relief. Edward gave him a mere moment to recover, his impatience growing by the second. "I— He's fine!" he continued, hoping this would calm the raging man.

Edward's tension did ebb a bit, though his grasp on the man's cloak collar didn't lessen. "Then why isn't he here?" he hissed, very much wanting to break the man's jaw, but the rational side of him knew he needed that bone intact to speak.

"Because that was the whole point!" The words came out like water freed from a dam, the weak-hearted alchemist unable to contain himself in the face of physical harm. "The transmutation, i-it's supposed to transport things! H-he should be just twelve or so miles away."

Edward raised a brow, skeptical, but as he took in the man's quivering body, he knew he'd spoken truth and his little brother was likely okay.

His gaze went blank at this, the teen overwhelmed from sheer relief that he hadn't messed up, hadn't failed the only family he had left, and he would see a very alive Alphonse soon.

A thump shattered the moment and Edward saw he'd unconsciously dropped the man onto the floor, who whimpered from the impact.

The Elric's eyes narrowed, his glare pinning the alchemist in place. "So you're not a complete idiot." He chuckled darkly. "Then where exactly is my brother supposed to have shown up at?"

"Fourth Street!" the man blurted, wishing he could crawl into the darkest hole and never have those demonic golden eyes look in his direction again. "I don't know the exact location, but he should be—" Edward took a threatening step forward and the man corrected. "Is! He definitely is in one of the abandoned buildings on Fourth Street!" The terrified alchemist held up his hands and turned away, expecting retribution to be served upon his body.

Edward's face twisted in disgust at the man's obvious lack of a spine. He sort of reminded him of Yoki, but at least Yoki had eventually proved himself to be a somewhat useful and decent man.

"And let me guess." Edward pushed his thoughts aside, needing to confirm more information. "Your goons are waiting for him to show up there, so they can tell you if your half-baked experiment was a success."

"Yes, yes!" The man nodded vigorously, practically groveling, and Edward rolled his eyes. "There's a radio upstairs. You can call them and ask them yours—"

He choked, metal colliding with his stomach and smacking him harshly into the wall. The alchemist slumped, loose pieces of concrete chipping away behind his head while he fell unconscious.

"Thanks for the offer." Edward smirked, dropping the silver pipe. "But I prefer face-to-face conversation." He turned from the unconscious figure, satisfied at making the man pay—though less severely than if he had more time to spare. However, his pleasure dimmed when his eyes fell on the transmutation circle covering the basement floor.

The smirk fell off completely at the sight of blood smeared onto the middle of the chalky white circle.

Al dabbed the rag into the cool bucket of water on the dresser before folding it into a rectangle and lowering it onto the golden-haired stranger's head. The fourteen-year old hoped it wasn't too cold, but since he couldn't actually feel it, he watched the boy's face for any sign of distress. When the unconscious teenager didn't even twitch at the placement, Al inwardly smiled over his accomplishment.

Though his mood dampened as he continued observing the boy lying on the bed. There was something extremely familiar about him, and it wasn't the "I passed by this guy at a train station once" type of familiarity. No, this was definitely the "I have seen this face up-close and personal before" kind.

Perhaps they used to go to school together back in Resembool...or maybe he was a friendly soldier who worked near Colonel Mustang's office and had greeted him and Brother once.

Al shook his head, feeling that neither of his theories were quite right. Honestly, he might have dismissed the possibility of knowing this person altogether if it weren't for Ed's odd behavior.

"Doesn't make sense...shouldn't be...never read about travel... How?" Ed muttered to himself for what had to be the tenth time while staring at the night sky through the window.

Al watched him, starting to seriously worry about the elder Elric because he had been acting reserved and evasive ever since they ran into this stranger. He had tried asking what was wrong during their walk to the hotel, but Ed had remained stubbornly tight-lipped the entire time and never even glanced Al's way. That in itself made alarms go off in Al's head because Brother normally told him everything.

Even stranger, Ed's standoffishness began right after the boy said something to him before passing out. Al hadn't been close enough to hear what was said, figuring the guy wouldn't react well to a large, armored figure looming over him. Yet Al regretted not listening more carefully since the teenager's words clearly held some significance to Ed, as they made the elder Elric appear downright spooked in a way Al wasn't used to seeing from his confident—sometimes overly so—older brother.

"Who are you?" Al whispered curiously, looking down at the young man once more.

Maybe he was some criminal Brother had stopped in the past, and that was what had made Ed so uneasy—but, no. Ed wouldn't have risked taking a criminal back to the hotel with them, he would have just called the police and went on complaining about the librarians. Also, Al really didn't get an evil vibe from the boy.

Mostly because while the teenager was of average height, his body was definitely lacking in weight. Ed and him had been thorough in making sure the boy wasn't in need of a doctor, meaning they went so far as to check under his clothes for wounds. They fortunately hadn't found any injuries, but both Elrics had been taken aback by the lack of meat on the stranger.

With clothing he appeared fine, if on the skinny side, yet underneath he looked frighteningly similar to the starved, homeless kittens Al often tried to take home. Having a thin, borderline frail body like that, made it hard to imagine the boy being a threat to anyone. Truthfully, he looked more like one of the victims Ed had saved rather than a criminal.

Suddenly it occurred to him that this boy might have been a victim of abuse or neglect, and Al felt sympathy well up in his heart at the possibility.

"Did you check his pockets?" Al was shocked out of his reverie when Ed stalked over to the bed, coming in between him and their guest. "Was there anything in them?"

Al glanced at Ed curiously, wondering why his brother was so anxious for information on this apparent stranger—if he was that—but soon relented. "No, I couldn't find anything. See?" He lifted the sheet he had placed over the boy, revealing the boy's pants pockets were turned inside out.

He then lowered the sheet back down, but his brother placed a hand on his arm to halt the motion. Ed was staring critically at the teenager, particularly at his off-white hoodie.

"Brother, what is it?" Al questioned, his gaze wandering over the teen in search of whatever detail had entranced his brother.

"Did you check the hoodie's pockets?" Ed didn't wait for the answer before he randomly picked the left one and started rummaging through it. Quickly a triumphant grin spread across his face and he pulled back his hand with a manila envelope held between his fingers.

"Perfect!" Ed cheered, and noticing the envelope's seal had already been broken, he lifted the flap and pulled out the letter inside.

"Brother!" Al admonished, distressed by the lack of privacy being given to their guest.

Ed waved him off while scanning the letter feverishly. "Come on, I'm just looking for a name." His eyes drifted towards the paper's top and lingered there. Then his eyes widened and his jaw went slack for a second before he snapped it shut.

"What is it? Do you recognize the name?" Al asked, worry and curiosity intensifying at Ed's reaction.

Though Ed didn't seem to hear him as his gaze dropped from the top of the letter to skim the rest. Al couldn't see what it said as his brother hunched over it protectively, but from the way Ed had paled, his former concern was flaring up again.

"Brother?" His voice was a soft inquiry, yet Ed started like a shotgun had gone off. His head snapped up to meet the red glow of Al's helmet and his eyes lingered there before he slowly looked at the resident in the bed.

Ed took a deep breath, still and stiff while he cautioned. "Al, I'm not sure you're going to believe this." His head bowed, and in a manner far too gentle for Ed to have intentionally done it, his flesh hand landed on top of the boy's.

"Believe what?" Al tilted his head in confusion.

Ed sighed, running his automail hand down his face as the hand resting on the stranger's curled around it. It reminded Al of the way Brother used to grasp his hand when he was young and easily startled by the monsters under his bed. Back then, it was like he wanted to share his courage with his younger brother.

Though Al questioned why Ed would display such affection to anyone outside the Elric or Rockbell family—to a stranger no less.

Ed suddenly tensed as if he was bracing for a blow, and Al also tensed while his brother admitted. "This is Alphonse." His voice was rough, a harsh gasp mixed with a squeak. Then again, maybe it was just puberty making an appearance at a very inopportune time.

Surely, it had to have been his brother going through these pubescent changes because what he had said was nothing serious. "Sooo his name is Alphonse too?" Al resisted the urge to scratch his head in confusion. Sure, it was an odd coincidence to meet another guy named Alphonse, but it wasn't exactly a rare name in Amestris.

However, Ed didn't relax and refused to face Al while a harsh bark of a laugh escaped him, a borderline hysterical edge to it before he quieted. "Yes, this is Alphonse..." His voice was brittle as wood crumbling in an inferno. "Alphonse Elric."

Silence swept over the room, potent and heavy.

"I-I don't understand." Al looked down at the boy, turned to his brother, and repeated the motion out of sheer disbelief. "What are you saying, Brother? There's only one me."

Baffled was an understatement to describe Al's feelings, even as he admitted in the back of his mind that this stranger's hair was more golden than the typical blond. And wasn't it possible this boy was so familiar because whenever he daydreamed about what his body would look like, aged fourteen like himself, this teenager was the spitting image of that imaginary body?

Ed didn't reply, merely holding up the letter for Al to grab, which he did. "At the top." Ed's voice was flat, almost resigned, and he grasped the boy—Alphonse's—hand a little tighter.

Al carefully held the letter, hyper-aware it wasn't his and he had no right to read it, but his concern over the invasion of privacy was dimmed by his yearning to understand. Quickly his red eyes scanned the letter from side-to-side until they landed on the date. He gasped.

"I think this is a mistake." His voice quivered, despite how he tried to be stoic.

Ed finally turned away from the stranger, mouth a line and eyes vibrant with anxiety. "Which part? The date or the name?"

Al glanced down at the letter, and he barely registered the To my dearest Alphonse Elric as his eyes lingered on that one incomprehensible line.

April 9th, 1915

I'm not entirely sure when I'll update this, but the next chapter is still being written so don't expect it too soon.

Anyway, expect to get more of Alphonse's perspective and an explanation for how he time traveled in the next chapter.

Until then, bye!

Edited: 4/15/21