"Alphonse?"

My eyes slide open slowly, only to be instantly snapped shut as the bright overhead light caused a stab of pain in my head. I sluggishly brought my arm up to cover my eyes and groaned. My voice rasped pathetically in the room, throat torn open from my screams. I must have blacked out from the shock. Dimly, I noticed I was dry and comfortable, save for the pain in my throat and head. Whoever was talking to me now must have pulled me out of the rain. My clothes were also dry.

For one quiet moment, I allowed myself to deny what I knew to be true. I allowed myself to imagine I was waking up by my lover's side. As he would every morning we woke together, he would gently rub my swollen belly in an achingly sweet fascination that only children and men were capable of, and then he would caress my hair. He would gently kiss my forehead before getting up to shower as I pretended I was still asleep. I would bask in the early morning glow of dawn, not willing to wake up. I would smell our scent on the covers that I threw over my head, the familiar scent of home.

But reality was a harsh mistress. What I smelled was not the comforting smell of home, but the harsh scents of motor oil, metal and antiseptic. I was not on my soft waterbed, but what felt like a hard cot. And it was not the gentle voice of my beloved calling for me to wake, but the rasp of an old crone. And I knew, without a doubt, that if I placed my hand on my stomach, as I had every day for the past five months, I would only feel the flat plane of one who is empty.

Agony washed through me anew. How could this happen? How could I have lost my baby without me noticing? It wasn't possible to have a miscarriage without noticing, that was just insane! Was it possible that I had just lost my memories? That was just too far fetched. But my hand twitched in remembrance of what I felt, what I was feeling. Empty. Tears slipped from underneath my arm and down my face.

"Alphonse!" The raspy voice I heard from earlier called loudly next to me, but I did not acknowledge her. "Al, can you hear me? Are you in pain?" I wish this old woman would just go away, couldn't she tell I was grieving? "Alphonse!" Why did this stupid old woman keep calling me that?

Finally, irritated that she would not shut up and leave me to my misery I grunted a response, irritating my injured voice. "That's not my name," I said harshly.

There was a startled gasp and the woman finally, blessedly fell silent. For one hopeful moment I thought she would leave me alone. But alas. "If that's not your name, then what is?"

I pulled my arm from my face and blinked rapidly until my vision cleared of tears and the harsh light. I turned my aching head to regard the woman beside me. The old woman was small, almost ridiculously so, only reaching just above the cot. Her thin lips were pulled back in a tight line and her eyes were wide open in shock behind round spectacles. Hysteria bubbled up in my throat, but I held it back with some effort. I was talking to a midget. Could this day possible get any weirder?

Belatedly I realized the woman had asked a question. "Alexandria," I muttered. I wondered idly if I was hysterical, since no matter how I cleared my throat, it still came out high pitched and breathy. "Are you a doctor," I continued with some effort. "I feel disoriented. I think I may have a concussion."

For a moment, the woman did not respond. She only continued to stare into my eyes as if I were the strangest thing she had ever seen. Irritation spiked in me again, but I held it back. Was this woman deaf?

Eventually, she answered. "You could say I'm a doctor." She walked to the other side of the room and I tracked her movements. I noticed for the first time that I was in a room with various equipment scattered around. On my other side there were a couple of monitors that I didn't recognize and a tray with wrenches, screwdrivers and a few other tools that were unfamiliar to me. The whole scene seemed a strange mix between a hospital room and a car garage.

The woman's return to my side pulled my out of my idle observations and when I met her eyes again I couldn't help but notice her slight flinch.

"My name is Pinako Rockbell," she introduced herself gently, "I am going to examine your head to see if you have any injuries. Is that alright?" I nodded dully and her small fingers began carding through my hair. She hummed to herself. "I don't feel anything, do you feel any pain?"

"Feels like I got kicked in the head and then thrown off a moving truck." I mumbled. Pinako nodded to herself and pulled out a small flashlight to check my pupils. Again, she reacted oddly, but seemed to shake it off to give me an examination. While she checked my responses she started asking me questions. I remembered this was standard procedure for head injuries and cooperated.

"What is your name?"

"Alexandria."

"What is today's Date?"

"August nineteenth."

Pinako pressed her lips together. "Where do you live?"

"Austin, Texas, United States of America." The questions were coming faster, and I struggled to keep up as she began looking over my body.

"When is your birthday?"

"October first."

"Are you male or female?"

"Female."

"Do you remember what you were doing before you passed out?"

"I was going to bed. I kissed my boyfriend goodnight and made sure the door was locked. Then I went to sleep. The next thing I know I'm in the middle of a field and I can barely move. I made it to a house nearby and then-then-" I couldn't continue. My hand clenched spasmodically over my flat stomach and a fresh wave of tears fell down my face.

Pinako immediately looked concerned. "What's the matter? Does your stomach hurt?" I shook my head in the negative and clenched my teeth painfully. "No," I ground out, "but it should. I should be in utter agony and bleeding to death. I should feel like someone has gutted me, and my organs are missing. I should because she's not there."

The old woman looked confused, and began forming the word 'who' on her lips before horrible realization overtook her features. "You were pregnant," she whispered.

Were. As in, past tense, as in, no longer. I was pregnant. And now I'm not. A sob passed my lips and I curled into myself, and heart-breaking shudders went through my frame as I tried without success to hold back my cries. Pinako gently patted my hair as I rode out the waves of my grief.

"Oh boys, what have you done?"

Eventually my cries subsided into choked gasps. Pinako never left my side, although it had to have been at least two hours. The pain in my head had only intensified with my sobs, and I was finding it hard to concentrate. But one question kept pounding through my mind. "What happened to me?"

The question was abrupt after hours of crying. Pinako paused in her gentle petting and sighed deeply. She looked over me contemplatively before bending over to dig in a box by her feet. Without looking up she said, "I'm not sure." She stood back up and brought a wet cloth to my face, drying my eyes as if I was a child. "A few days ago, Alphonse Elric and Edward Elric, two children who live nearby, came to my door in the middle of the night covered in blood. Edward had lost an arm and a leg, and Alphonse…I managed to save Edward's life, but neither of them would speak, other than to say 'I'm sorry'." The old woman shuddered and pulled back once my face was clear. She looked down at the floor. "I went to their house to investigate, and what I found was absolute Hell. There was a huge transmutation circle on the floor of their basement and in its center…I can only surmise that they were trying to bring back their deceased mother, but what they created wasn't human. I buried the poor creature in the back yard."

My muddled mind tried to grasp what the old woman was saying. Two kids were trying to bring their mother back to life? Like necromancy? What the heck was a transmutation circle? Out of all that, one thing registered clearly. "Alphonse…you called me that when I first woke up."

Pinako nodded. "You see, from what I can tell, the transmutation went horribly wrong. Somehow, Alphonse was ejected from his body and attached to a suit of Armor. I don't know much about Alchemy, but I can only assume that was Edward's doing. I figured his body was destroyed in order to fuel the recreation of Trisha Elric's body but…"

"But?" I intoned dully. Most of what she was saying was flying right over my head. I had no idea what she meant by Alchemy since all I knew about it was that it was a dead branch of science. And how could someone be ejected from his own body? What did all of this have to do with me?

Pinako sighed again, her expression pinched. Slowly she brought out a hand mirror and held it to my face. Familiar forest green eyes stared back at me, but that was where the similarities ended. A sad boy with wide eyes and short cropped, bright blonde hair gazed dully into the mirror. He couldn't have been more than ten years old. His eyes were red rimmed from crying and his small lips were swollen from being bitten down to stifle tears. I blinked, and so did the reflection.

"Is that–" I paused as the boy in the reflection spoke as well. I continued with a feeling of unreality. "Is that me?" I reached for the mirror and Pinako relinquished it gently.

"Yes. Somehow, you have been taken from where you were from and placed into Alphonse's body."

"How is this possible?" I choked out. I sat up slowly and began to really look at my body. I was small, probably no taller than four and a half feet. This body was young, but hard, as if it had gone through rigorous training or hard labor. I lifted my shirt to regard my flat chest and was startled to find abs where baby fat should have been. I stood abruptly and tore off the remainder of my clothes, which I now noticed were a pair of blue pajamas, and stared at disbelief at the body I was so suddenly thrust into. Indeed, where there should have been nothing, there was the penis of a prepubescent child. With a sick fascination, I poked at it, and flinched at the feeling. This is so wrong. Disregarding the fact that all of this is absolutely impossible, why am I a prepubescent boy!

I turned to Pinako in confusion. "Ok, assuming I am not hallucinating in the worst way, let's say I believe all of this. If I am in Alphonse's body, then what happened to mine?" A surge of sudden realization made me dizzy. Maybe my body was still alive! And that meant–

I looked at the old woman in desperation. "I don't want to give you false hope," she said slowly," but there is a possibility that your body is alive out there somewhere without a soul." My heart leapt into my throat. "But!" Pinako continued quickly when she saw my expression, "there is no way to tell that. It could very well be that your body has died from the extraction of your conscious self. As far as I know, nothing like this has ever happened."

My heart plummeted at her words and I stared down at the floor. That didn't sound too promising , but at least there was a possibility. "Is there any way to get back to normal?"

Pinako shook her head. "I don't know, but you could start by asking the person who brought you here in the first place. Edward Elric."

FMAFMAFMAFMAFMAFMA

In the end it was Alphonse I met first.

Pinako left me in what I'd like to call the med-garage after helping me redress and settle back into the cot. She explained that she would go and explain to the boys what was going on, and that I should wait there while she broke the news. While I waited, I contemplated all I had learned.

A couple of ten year olds, assuming they were the same age, tried to use some form of necromancy to bring back there dead mother. The spell, or 'transmutation', went wrong and one was chopped in half and the other was ripped out of his body, and some kind of monster was created. And then, the boy's empty body was filled with a random soul. Me.

Crazy laughter bubbled up into my throat and came out in a strangled whine. This is the most insane, ridiculous, nonsensical thing that has ever happened to me. With despair I could only wonder what had happened to my body. Was I still asleep in my bed? Or did I die when I was brutally ripped out of my reality, causing my unborn child to die as well, and my lover to find that his budding family was destroyed in one fell swoop. I could almost convince myself that this was all just some twisted dream, but the pain in my head was real, and the sensations when I touched myself were real. I could only hope that my body had survived and they were able to keep me alive, at least until I could find a way back, or until the baby was born. Yes, as long as little Alyssa was born…

Depressing thoughts continued to swirl around my head until I was abruptly interrupted by what sounded like pots banging on the floor in the hallway. Alarmed, I sat up and jumped to the floor, hastily regaining my tenuous balance. Whatever was coming, I wanted to be ready for it.

A second later, the door was brutally slammed open, and I was faced with the largest man I had ever seen. He stood at least seven feet tall and was wearing a fierce looking suit of armor. The light gleamed off of sharp spikes and heartless metal, but what terrified me the most was the glowing red eyes that peered at me with malice. Before me was a demon, and I froze. My heart leapt into my throat and my muscles seized in terror as the demon paced towards me slowly, the metal armor banging on the floor like a peal of death. Was this what it was like to be stalked by a monster? Was I going to die? A leather hand reached towards me and I flinched badly with a startled cry and pressed against the wall.

"What is going on?" A timid voice that was identical to what I was starting to recognize as my own rang out of the armor with an odd tinny quality and I stopped dead in my attempt to escape. I looked slowly back into the eyes that had so scared me the moment before. "What are you? Why do you look exactly like me?" The child's voice was high pitched and wavering, as if trying not to cry.

Then it clicked. "Are-" the suit of armor flinched badly at the sound of his own voice, "Are you Alphonse?"

Instead of answering, the suit of armor crouched down to inspect me closer. "No," he said to himself, "its eyes are green. How can this be possible?" With a slight clank he reached forward to touch my face. I flinched away instinctively and he paused. "It's ok," he said gently, but his voice still wavered in disbelief. "I won't hurt you."

He slowly moved his hand closer, and this time I allowed it. He touched my face– and both of us reacted violently. I cried out in utter surprise as another's emotions invaded my mind. Like a sledgehammer I felt despair, confusion, terror and desperate sadness overtake my own emotions. Combined with my own, the feelings were too much to handle, and I nearly shut down in order to escape it.

A few moments passed by and I wearily opened my eyes as the feelings faded. The pain in my head was back with a vengeance and I found it hard to focus my vision. I blearily looked around the room from where I had fallen to find the real Alphonse on the other side of the room, his arms wrapped about his legs and his head buried in his knees. Oddly enough, he was trembling, the suit of armor vibrating and clanking together. A little after I looked over, he lifted his head and stared at me.

It was in that stalemate that Pinako decided to make her appearance. "Alphonse, what–" she took in the scene, both of us staring across the room, my face one of terror and Alphonse inscrutable. "What happened?"

"Granny, what is that thing?" Alphonse asked. "It looks exactly like me, but it's not." His voice shook, and I could barely make out what he was saying.

Pinako grimaced, but answered in a soothing voice. "Al, this is Alexandria. Like I was trying to tell you, it looks like she was taken from her own body and somehow filled the space in yours."

"But that's impossible! Ed said it disappeared during the transmutation!" He shouted suddenly, startling us both.

"I know Al, but look at him-er-her! If there is another explanation, I would love to hear it!"

His head snapped over in my direction and I flinched at his sudden movement, half expecting another backlash of foreign emotions. That didn't happen, but what did terrified me more. "If that's the case," he said, his voice getting dangerously sharp, "then give me my body back!" The trapped boy's voice rang loudly through the armor and shattered off the walls. He stalked forward menacingly and I did my best to press myself through the wall. His fist slammed into the space next to my head and I cried out.

"Alphonse!" Pinako barked sharply. Alphonse froze, hovering over me like a statue. I looked up with my wide terrified eyes and flinched when I heard a soft whimper. There were no tears, no possible way to tell how his face looked, but I realized with startling clarity that he was crying. My fear drained away, and what he said broke my heart all over again. "I'm sorry," he whispered with his strange echoing voice, "I'm so sorry."

"It's ok," was my automatic response, even though the words rang hollow, and even as I was sure he was not talking to me. It was not ok, and it may never be ok again. But it seemed like that was all Alphonse needed to hear. His whimpers continued and I wished I could reach out to him, but I was afraid of what I had felt earlier. So I just sat, and allowed my own tears to fall.

Pinako sighed by the door and pulled Alphonse away from me. She led him out of the room with soft whispers I could not make out. When she returned, she silently helped me back onto the bed. She swiped her hands over my unfamiliar blonde locks. "I think we've had enough excitement for one day. It's late, and we should all get some rest. I will come wake you in the morning." When I didn't respond, she left and turned off the light with a soft goodnight. I fell into a troubled sleep minutes later.

Whew, that was some emotional rollercoaster. Don't worry guys, this story isn't going to turn into a sob-fest, this is just the beginning. I have to work through all this nasty emotional stuff to get to the action. I'm really not sure what color Alphonse's eyes are, but in most of the pictures I see of him as a human they look light brown, thus why everyone is reacting to Alex's eyes in shock.

About Alexandria. The reason I had her a pregnant woman was because that was the most traumatic way I could think of to be taken from your body; with another person directly relying on you to survive. That, along with the fact that she has become of the opposite sex, just adds to the overall drama. Her coming to terms with becoming a He should be pretty fun to write. There is going to be quite a bit of commentary on gender identity throughout this fic.

Well, tell me what you think! See you next time!