I'm terrible sorry for the long wait, I hope the fact that this chapter is the longest I've written so far will make up for it...

Oh and because someone pointed out that I never made this clear (thank you!) here some infos :

Timeline & Co.:
- Ed and Al never decoded Dr. Marcoh's journals, they found the stone they used to transmute Al before they tried that.
- Maes Hughes died the same time as in the manga/brotherhood
-The failed transmutation of Al happened shotly after Hughes death, the story goes from there on and is set in the manga/brotherhood univese

And as always: Thanks for the reviews :)

Chapter 21

Two Can Keep A Secret If One Of Them Is Dead

Seven more days of waiting and the phone rang, waking them from their sleep and sending them to chase through Central's streets.

"A man in a white suit, wearing a white hat escorting a woman with, uh, target features to a near alley, reported to watch point 5," the soldier on the other end of the line said.

"Interfere when he reveals a ready, or starts to draw, a transmutation circle, I'm on the way!" Mustang answered, already pulling on the uniform jacket that had been draped over the back of the chair by the desk. Ed had started to dress the moment Mustang's demeanour changed from sleepy to professional so he was ready when the colonel was.

"So they decided to let Kimbley go on anyway. Either they came up with a new plan faster than I thought they would or I concluded wrong," Mustang growled, unlocking his car and jumping in.

The engine howled as the vehicle sped away from its parking place. Ed had no clue where they were going but he trusted the colonel to find their way and concentrated on not hitting his head somewhere when the car jerked and screeched around a corner at a speed that would cost Mustang his driving license or his life if he tried it in broad daylight and without the possibility of a murder getting away hanging over their heads.

"Watch out, that guy is dangerous," the colonel told him, and Ed heard the "Stay safe" lying underneath.

Before he could think of an answer, Mustang forced the car to a screeching halt at the entrance of an alley and left it, taking the car key with him without bothering to lock the doors. Glove on and pistol drawn, he carefully made his way in the alley, Ed hot on his heels. Just when they stepped out of the lights on the main street the shadows ahead of them fled from the crackling light of alchemy. They charged, running over to where the glowing array illuminated the alchemist and his victims. The four MPs that were guarding this place were all either unconscious or dead, Ed couldn't tell, and strewn across the floor. A woman was in the circle and, when the light started glowing, her eyes shot open and she opened her mouth in a silent scream.

She was lucky though. She wouldn't end up dead. A string of flames forced the alchemist away from the circle, illuminating his face for a moment. Zolf Kimbley grinned at them, and then started running.

"Wait there for the backup soldiers, they'll be here in a minute!" Mustang yelled over to the panicking woman, who was slowly sitting up, and ran after Kimbley. For a moment Ed was torn, but then he heard the engines of several speeding cars disturb the already no-longer-peaceful night even further and chased after the colonel and the culprit.

It was hard to catch up to Mustang, but once he was there he realised that they were steadily catching up to Kimbley. Being stuck in a prison cell until he was told to go and kill obviously left the Crimson Lotus Alchemist in an unfit condition. Getting closer and closer they followed him trough the labyrinth of alleys in Central's not-so-nice areas. And then they came around a corner and found Kimbley at a dead end. The alchemist was leaning against the wall blocking his way and grinned.

"Roy Mustang, the Flame Alchemist...Last time I saw you you were a naïve little boy who wanted to play soldier but faltered when he got what putting on that uniform really meant. Though I see you have filled those empty eyes of yours with determination by now. Did you finally get the fact that being a soldier means you'll have to kill as much as the higher ups tell you, not just as much as you think you can bear? Or did you just stop caring, I wonder? And then there's Edward Elric, Fullmetal Alchemist... The stories about you even reached little old me in Central Prison, though that's no wonder considering that quite a lot of people in there were brought in by you. I got to tell them I met you in person, I bet they'd like to hear the story."

"You're awfully confident Kimbley, I doubt you'll ever get the chance to tell them before you'll face the firing squad for your crimes," Mustang observed coldly.

"Crimes? But all those people came to me on their own... I promised them a new, beautiful body so they could start a new and better life and they agreed to take the risks. It's not my fault the transmutation didn't always work out..." The fake innocence on Kimbley's face made Edward feel sick.

"Like there ever was a transmutation that worked out," Ed snorted. "You turned them inside out on purpose!"

"And even if we can't prove that, this kind of transmutation itself is still forbidden for it is far too close to human transmutation and human experiments. You'll be executed," the colonel added.

"I don't think so. Our government isn't as opposed to experiments on humans as you might think."

"You think so because some higher ups were the ones to send you out to kill? Well, I'll let you know there are people and people within the ranks."

"How right you are, Colonel." Kimbley was delighted. "And since you figured out so much, don't you think said higher ups will get me out of this?"

"They won't save your ass. In fact I think they served it to us to save their own."

"And here is where you are wrong again."

There was a click and then a pistol was pressed against Ed's neck. Flame and Fullmetal froze.

"Drop the gun and put your hands up colonel!" the young man behind Ed said in a sadistic-sounding sing-song voice and closed up to Ed, grabbing the boy's flesh arm and forcing it behind Ed's back so the young alchemist couldn't suddenly clap and flee. Mustang's face was carefully blank as he dropped his gun to the floor.

"Who do you want me to kick it to?" he asked in mocking annoyance as he lifted his hands to the left and right of his head. Provoking the enemy so he might forget that he was still wearing an ignition glove, Ed realised.

It seemed to work, for the young man behind him didn't seem to like that Mustang sounded like an exasperated adult talking to an annoying kid. He snarled. "Kick it over to Kimbley."

Mustang shoved the pistol with his foot and it slithered away from him and in Kimbley's direction. "So they arranged a minion for you?" he asked Kimbley with raised eyebrows.

"Minion?! I am no minion, Colonel. In fact I am the one holding the strings right now, so you better don't annoy me!" Edward could see greenish black, long hair out of the corners of his eyes as he tried to visualise the face of his seething captor.

The colonel's eyebrows rose a bit higher but he only said; "So, what do you want?"

"You, out of our way. You are quite the nuisance, though we originally thought that if we entertain you a bit we might be able to keep you around for later use. But you are so damn stubborn that the effort isn't worth it. So we'll kill you. Kimbley will draw this nice transmutation circle and you will let yourself be transmuted if you don't want me to blow out the pipsqueak's brains here."

Edward's eyes widened. They wanted to transmute the colonel?! He stared at Mustang who remained calm, still not fully convinced that the boy with the terrible hairstyle was calling the shots here.

"I see. So since I am going to die and Kimbley will take some time to draw that circle, would you mind answering some questions while I wait for death? Kind of like a last wish?" the colonel inquired smoothly. Edward knew the guy behind him was grinning.

"Oh, of course, I bet this might be fun. If you ask the right questions you'll die so so unhappy!" Spit sprinkled on Edward's neck as his captor laughed. He really hoped Mustang was so calm because he was planning something; this situation was getting rather unpleasant.

"Why did you use my array?" the colonel questioned, turning to Kimbley who was digging for some chalk in his pockets.

"Simple. My original orders we so boring." He grinned at the other culprit, who snarled in a rather irritated way. Kimbley put on a fake contrite face, which only served to anger the other even further. "You see, learning this array and turning people inside out was easy for me. But then it just wasn't as fun and fulfilling as blowing them up. They promised me action and all I got were these little trips. But what is the rush of alchemy without hearing the results? The wonderful sound of exploding things and collapsing buildings, oh how I miss it! You know them, Flame, you've listened to them too while we turned the towns of Ishbal into rubble and ashes... And then there's the fact that I already know how things will end up when I keep on doing what they say." He nodded towards his accomplice. "It's so easy, so predictable, I don't like it. So I want to see what happens if I put some stones in their way. I want to know what happens if the great Flame Alchemist actually managed to get this close to us. I want a surprise. You see, I didn't have many surprises during jail time. It's time to make up for it, so do something Mustang! I wanna watch the world turn in another direct-argh"

"You won't watch anything." Kimbley dropped to the ground as a woman in black, who had jumped down from a roof and landed behind him, drew back what seemed to be her fingers, only they were long and sharp like spears. With a sickening splashing sound the sharp black digits pulled out of Kimbley's stomach, leaving the Crimson Lotus Alchemist as a crumbled, bleeding heap on the floor.

"Damn it, Lust, what are you doing?!"screeched the one who still held Ed captive while the woman regarded her now normal-shaped fingers, bored.

"Shut you mouth, Envy," she drawled in a low, sultry voice. "Kimbley was even more annoying than Mustang, no amount of reprimanding would make him more obedient. Also, your plans so far have only brought more trouble than solutions, so sit back now so I can clean up your mess." The last part was spoken sharper, more like an order.

"I won't-" the one behind Ed, obviously Envy, started, but Lust calmly interrupted him.

"If the Flame Colonel here is to die in a fight with the fleeing culprit, wouldn't it be much more convincing if he gets stabbed by the panicking killer than when he died in an array that takes ages to draw and with little Fullmetal around, supposedly able to distract Kimbley from the transmutation, because we were never here? No, I think we better put a new hole in the colonel and burn Kimbely's corpse to make it lo-"

And then she just exploded. They all stared at a few tiny pieces of flesh, the only thing left from her, and Kimbley, who had crawled over, grabbed her ankles and transmuted her in his favourite way.

"Don't call someone a corpse unless you checked their pulse!" the bleeding alchemist rasped. The others didn't know if he was laughing or coughing then. "Looks like I'm still gonna watch! Oh, making you explode really felt good!" Now he was definitely cackling like the maniac he was. "Blowing them up is the best thing!" Sheer madness seemed to keep him able to talk.

Envy hissed in anger. "You stupid, useless human- ARGH!" The green haired boy dropped his gun, nursing his hand, only to clap it over his left eye with another pained cry a second later. Mustang had used the distraction, aiming two pin point flames with incredible speed, allowing Ed to get out of Envy's grip.

"Oh you think this is a win for you, but it isn't!" the wounded creature exclaimed, sounding just as utterly mad as Kimbley, and regarded his burned hand with the one eye left, like it was something really amusing.

"You'll die!" he told Mustang and then ran away, laughing like crazy. He jumped on a near dumpster and from there on continued on a narrow roof, vanishing from their sight.

For a moment Ed and Mustang simply stared after him, puzzled to no end. Then Ed went over to Kimbley. The man was a horrible person and most likely beyond saving, but Edward just couldn't watch someone die; he had to try and save them. He knelt next to Kimbley, but was stopped by Mustang's hand on his shoulder.

"One question Kimbley..." the colonel started.

Kimbley just grinned. "Yes, you really learned to play the game..." He snickered and coughed, blood trickling from his mouth. "Information for life."

Mustang ignored that. "You killed a lot, but did you also kill Maes Hughes?"

"Hughes...I helped create the points on the map he saw, so maybe indirectly it was a bit of my fault...but I didn't shoot him."

Mustang frowned, but nodded. "Yeah, you would have blown him up." The colonel let Ed go and the blond pressed down on the wound in the Crimson Lotus' stomach where Lust had stabbed through.

"Such a kind-hearted boy..." Kimbley mused. "I wonder how you were ever able to use that stone!"

Ed assumed that the blood loss was slowly getting to Kimbley's brain. "I'm an alchemist, why shouldn't I be able to use that stone?" he snapped, annoyed with the horrible man.

"Ohhh so you don't know?!" The blood in the corners of Kimbley's mouth made his grin look even wider and even crazier. The injured alchemist blinked, having difficulties keeping his eyes open, but still kept speaking, low and slowly.

"A deal, equivalent exchange...I'll tell you the truth about that stone... if Flame can discover the truth about the immortality of homunculus for me... They're so annoyingly arrogant because of it...but I wonder... how many times can they withstand being burned to death before they can't... regenerate any more?"

Mustang's eyes widened. "Regenerate?!" And he spun around just in time to face Lust as she pierced him with those long, blade-like fingers of hers. Edward watched in horror as she grabbed the colonel's wrist, pulling off his ignition glove and shredding it as she dropped him to the ground. Mustang landed in a crouched heap and with a pain-filled hiss."Why do I always have to clean up after Envy?" She sighed.

"Colonel!" Hawkeye's voice interrupted everything the Homunculus might have done or said then. She and Havoc came racing towards them, panting. "Step away from them!" the female lieutenant ordered, sounding outraged.

"My, my, the shabby backup finally found us. At least in shaking you off Envy was successful..." She smiled at Havoc. "Hello Jean."

"Celaris?" he said in confusion.

"Not really, but there is no need to explain." Lust started walking towards them. "I'll just make you join your superior."

Ed had already rushed over to said superior, frantically applying pressure on the stab wound in his side. He hated that he had to choose between people's lives, hated that he couldn't help both. He felt guilty as hell, but Mustang was just much more important to him than Kimbley.

"Colonel?" he asked in panic.

"Lighter, Havoc's lighter," Mustang ground out, pulling a small, military issued pocket knife out of his uniform. Ed scrambled to his feet. He had no idea what Mustang had in mind but even while the colonel was practically down, Edward trusted him to be the one of them who still had a grasp on the whole situation, keeping a level head and forming some sort of plan. He wasn't a colonel this young for nothing, right? He had to know what he was doing!

"Havoc, your lighter! Need it!" he yelled, running a good bit towards Lust before clapping, making sure the alchemy would reach her. Usually he'd never directly aim for impaling someone like that, but she had regenerated from being blown to pieces so he let the spears rising from the ground hit her full on, buying Havoc a moment to cease firing bullets and fish out his lighter. Ed barely caught the thing when it flew over to him; he was distracted by the impaled body, feeling nauseous.

But then he had it and turned back to Mustang. The man was on his knees by now, having simply cut away the stronger buttons of his uniform jacket and ripped away the weaker ones of his shirt to get access to his wound. He wasn't treating it though. Instead, he was guiding the blade of his small knife over the back of his hand with utmost precision, biting his lip in concentration and pain.

"Lighter!" he ordered in a hoarse voice, reaching out when his trusted array was ready. Ed handed over the lighter, staring in slight shock at Mustang's hand. "Now look away. Look away!" he snapped again when Ed just kept staring, now in bafflement. The boy turned away, deciding to try for Kimbley again. He was shaking. The colonel knew what he was doing, right? Right? He couldn't lose another person who was important to him, he couldn't!

Ed was just about to press his hands on the barley alive Kimbley when there was a snap, the stench of burned flash and a muffled cry of pain. His head snapped around. The colonel was curled up on his side, just releasing the collar of his uniform jacket, which he had bitten down on to keep quiet and not bite off his tongue, before taking a shuddering breath. His shaking hand, holding the lighter, was hovering over the burned shut wounds. While Ed was still staring with wide, shocked eyes, the colonel started to get up.

"Wall!" he managed between clenched teeth. "Put a wall between her and my subordinates!" he then ordered, his voice growing stronger as he climbed to his feet.

And Edward was relieved. No matter how horrible the colonel looked, he was back on his feet! He got up too, running towards Lust. Hawkeye and Havoc didn't miss, but he still ran along the alley's walls once again, just in case a bullet strayed. Clenching his teeth, he once again impaled her, distracting her to get close enough to erect the wall between her and the two other blonds. Then he ran back. Mustang raised his hand with the cut-in array and the lighter once Ed was back with him. The boy could see black eyes narrow and then Lust was ablaze.

"Didn't you just learn from Kimbley to check your victim's pulse before you deem them harmless!?" the colonel scorned coldly.

Edward had seen Mustang using flame alchemy before, but never when the man was out to kill. It was awful to watch, so he closed his eyes. It was terrible to hear too, but just when he lifted his hands to his ears he heard Kimbley. It was luck, pure luck; if Lust had screamed or Mustang had snapped just then then the barley audible voice would have been drowned out. Ed's eyes snapped open again and he turned around.

"He's killing her..." Another snap sounded. "I can hear it..." The blaze of a flame. "I know how death sounds..." Lust screamed. "Do you hear me, boy?"

It was strangely hypnotising to hear someone who looked so dead talk. Like the soul was already detached from the body and haunting you from the after world. Kimbley's head had lolled to the side, facing the fight, though the fire only reflected in already dull eyes. His lungs, his heart, a tiny bit of his brain and his vocal cords seemed to be the only parts of that body still alive.

"Yes..." Ed said, coming over and kneeling next to the alchemist whose once white suit was now red enough to turn the Lotus Alchemist crimson for real.

"Good 'cause I won't...say it again, heh... ." He took a last, rasping breath. "The ingredients... for a philosopher's stone... are live... humans... their souls...lots, lots of 'em..."

Ed's eyes widened in horror.

That day:

Zolf J. Kimbley died with a bloody smirk on his face.

Lust, supposedly immortal homunculus, left this world as well.

Roy Mustang, though gravely injured, was the one who brought the creature down.

Jean Havoc went to call for an ambulance and yell at the backup for being too stupid to find them sooner.

Riza Hawkeye stood guard over them, making sure no new danger appeared and her superior was safely brought to the hospital.

And Edward Elric... Edward Elric vanished in the white fog that slowly filled him out, for there was no way for him to exist with the knowledge that he had used human souls to fuel the failed transmutation of his brother, was there?

Smother the fire, reset the soul, go back to numb.