Calmly, I wiped a glass behind the tall wooden counter, enjoying the momentary calm of the hours before the bar opened. Master Orkan was still passed out upstairs, sleeping off the drink he had consumed the night before while entertaining customers, no doubt. It was our day off though, so I let him sleep.
The popularity of the Plaid Skirt had skyrocketed after the transmutation Izumi had performed as payment for my training. It also helped that the owner of the Roaring Bull had mysteriously closed down his bar after he decided that he should open a mine on the outskirts of town, where precious minerals had (conveniently) been found. Izumi swears up and down that it was just a very fortunate coincidence, but both Master Orkan and I knew better.
My first impression of Master Orkan was not good to say the least. The old man was irascible and rude, always yelling and saying harsh words. On my first day of training, after being unceremoniously dumped in a spare bedroom the size of a closet, Orkan grabbed me by the collar of my shirt and dragged me out of bed to the large field behind the bar. There he immediately commenced to 'test' me.
In other words, he beat the shit out of me.
The deceptively thin and wiry man was a blur of movement that I could barely follow with my eyes, let alone react to. No matter how I dodged, he had another hit coming that I couldn't avoid. No matter how I tried to hit him, he always had a counter. All the while, he spit foul insults and degrading words at my face, trying to make me angry. He did.
"Come on you little twerp, you call that a dodge?"
"Get up, ass-wipe, that was barely a love tap!"
"You're going to have to do better than that you half-pint weakling!"
Frustrated that I couldn't touch the guy, and fed-up with his insults, I lost it. "Shut up!" I screamed. His smug face was the last thing I knew for a long while.
I woke up the next day. The old jackass had knocked me out and dragged my sorry butt back to the bar. When I finally came to, he was sitting over me, smoking a pipe. I sent him my fiercest glare and he snorted in amusement. He reached down and I flinched. He ruffled my hair.
"You've got good reflexes, but you move like a drunkard, and you try to reach farther than your body is capable of."
I froze. Had he figured it out? Izumi had warned me that if I went around telling people what happened to me, I was likely to get shipped off to the nearest lab and dissected. His next words put me at ease.
"I am going to pound that out of you, boy. If you actually knew your body's limits you wouldn't have done as badly as you did." He looked away from me, turning his fierce eyes to the wall. "But you did better than most idiots I've had to train." This was said with the air of a man who did not give compliments easily or often, but when he did, it meant something. I gaped at him and he avoided my eyes uncomfortably.
After seeming to shake it off, Orkan pulled me roughly to my feet and flashed me a menacing grin. "Real training starts now."
The next few weeks were a blur of pain and degradation for me as Orkan remade me from scratch. Just as he promised, he helped me learn the limits of my body. And what a body it was.
Alphonse was small, but surprisingly durable. I don't know if it was because he had endured rough intensive training, this was the result of being torn apart and remade or if the people in this strange reality were just stronger than in mine, but the kid could take a beating. Attacks that would have taken me out of the fight before I could now shake off with only some bruising as a result. Also, I had noticed this before, but it still amazed me how quickly I could move and how far I could jump. It was like living under water for your entire life and then suddenly coming to live on the surface. Orkan helped me adjust to my new strength and I gained abilities I would never have dreamed of in my other life.
A routine was established. Before sunrise I would wake and do an hour of conditioning before meeting Master Orkan in the training field behind the bar. There we would spar, and he would teach me how to react to every scenario imaginable. He never went easy on me, and I never complained. This was what I asked for after all. At noon we would stop and take a bath and a short nap before preparing the Plaid Skirt for business for the night. From three in the afternoon till one in the morning, I waited tables and made drinks at the bar (Master Orkan never let me drink though, the jerk). In the morning it would start all over again.
That old man really knew his stuff, I'd give him that much. He trained me in everything from weapons to hand-to-hand, single to multiple opponents, armed and unarmed opponents, hostage situations, and even how to fight wild animals. He even went so far as to drill me on situations where I was a commanding officer and responsible for subordinates in combat scenarios. The training was intense, both in body and in mind, and if I hadn't been passionate about my cause I might have given up.
I wondered how an old man like him could possibly have this much knowledge about fighting. He must have been a great commander in his youth and possibly a part of the military. One night, I asked him. "Kid," he said in his gruff manner, "the day I tell you my life's story is the day you tell me the reason you want to fight so bad." I didn't ask again.
There was one thing Master Orkan could not help me with, and that was fighting against an Alchemist. Oh, he could describe how to dodge spikes made out of concrete, or how to get out of a trap an Alchemist had set, but there was only one way to learn how to fight an Alchemist: by fighting and Alchemist.
Once a month, I would travel to Izumi's homey little cottage. I would stay for dinner and we would exchange pleasantries. I would say hello to her giant bear of a husband and they would put me in the spare bedroom of the second floor. Then I would challenge her to a duel.
Izumi's training was in some ways just as intense as Master Orkan's. True to her word, she did not teach me how to use Alchemy, only taught me enough to be able to combat it. And then she would attack.
A year passed in this manner, and I began to change. I grew taller, reaching five foot two inches. The constant training burned off any baby fat my body might have had left, although my face still had the sweet quality of a young boy. My voice hadn't started cracking yet, and I cringed to think that in as soon as a year I would have to go through puberty for a second time. At least this time around I wouldn't have to deal with certain womanly problems. Yay me.
"Watcha thinking about," a sweet voice asked from the other side of the bar, startling me out of my musings, and I realized I had been washing the same glass for a good half hour. Tanya, a girl a little older than me leaned over the bar with her arms folded under her considerable bust. She was one of the girls who worked as waitresses at the Plaid Skirt, and who had been showing an uncomfortable interest in me.
"It's nothing," I said a little uncomfortably. I ran my fingers through the chin length bangs that fell beside my face. The rest of my hair was pulled back into a ponytail to combat the heat of the afternoon.
She tilted her head cutely and pressed her chest just a little farther forward, no doubt trying to appeal to me. I was embarrassed to say that I had something of a…female fan club. Over the previous year I had become used to being thought of and treated as a boy, and had even started thinking of myself as male, but I didn't think I would ever really get used to having women throw themselves at me. I guess in a way, I couldn't blame them. I was pretty attractive in a boyish kind of way, and if I had seen Alphonse when I was a young girl, I would have easily fallen for him. Maybe some day I would fully accept being male, but for now, the attention I was getting was still unsettling.
Orkan chose that moment to show his face, stumbling down the stairs grumbling to himself. I sighed in relief as Tanya moved away and tried to look busy. No one wanted to talk to Orkan right after he woke up. He wandered over to the bar and sat at a stool, seemingly without opening his eyes. Wordlessly I handed over what I always fixed for him when he came down the stairs hung over: a shot of whiskey, a tall glass of water, and a peppermint. He threw back the whiskey, and without missing a beat downed the water as well. Once the mint was firmly between his teeth, he finally squinted open his eyes to regard me.
"What are you looking at, kid," he said irritably.
"Nothing, old man," I retorted back as always.
He grunted noncommittally at our normal banter and glanced over his shoulder at Tanya, who was currently bending over a table she was washing and exposing more of her legs under her skirt than was strictly necessary. I whacked him in the face with a towel.
"That wasn't very nice," he whined in his growly voice. Over the past few months, as he gained more respect for me, he had become more candid in my presence; less like an instructor and more like a crazy uncle.
"Eyes over here, ass," I said with exasperated affection.
"Come on," he ribbed, miming poking me in the side with his elbow. "It's not for me that she's bending over like that. Aren't you the least bit affected? What kind of man are you?"
"You know I'm not interested in dating anyone right now. I have to–"
"Yeah, yeah, you have to get stronger blah, blah, blah," he interrupted me, flapping his hand absurdly and rolling his eyes. "Besides, I'm not talking about dating, just a little bit of fun."
I held up my hand to stop him and pinched my nose, as if trying to soothe a headache. "Don't even go there you old pervert. We're just kids." Seriously, who tells a twelve-year-old boy to go bone some girl for fun! If I had been a girl, there was no way he would be talking to me like this. Besides that, I didn't even want to think about doing anything of that nature in this borrowed body.
He laughed his big booming laugh and ruffled my hair, causing me to smack his hand away. "I'm just teasing. Loosen up a little, kid, you are way too serious all the time."
The phone started ringing. I dodged his hand as he tried to ruffle my hair again and answered it. "Plaid Skirt, this is Elric." I had long gotten over the fact that the name of this bar made it sound like I was answering a sex hotline.
"Alex! It's me, Alphonse," a boy's voice answered.
"Al, long time no speak," I said, smiling widely. It had been at least six months since we had spoken last. It was good to hear his voice again.
"Sorry," Al said, sounding contrite. That boy was just too sweet for his own good. "Brother and I have been training like crazy."
"Same here," I said easily. I hadn't called either after all. "So what's the occasion, oh brother mine," I teased.
"He's ready."
Instantly, my smile dropped. "Seriously? It's only been a year." This was huge.
"Yeah," Al continued. "You know Brother. Once he get's that determined look on his face the world bends over backward to accommodate him."
"Yeah," I said, though I really didn't know Edward all that well yet. Still, excitement rose within me. This was way faster than I had anticipated. It was finally time to move forward. We exchanged a few more pleasantries and promised to see each other soon and I hung up the phone.
I hung my head in thought. Edward was finally ready to move forward with our plan, but was I? I had only trained for a year, but I had improved exponentially in that time. Was I really strong enough to move on?
There was only one way to find out. "Hey, old man." He turned slowly and pretended like he had not been listening to my whole conversation. I pinned him with a fierce look and a devious smile. "Gear up and meet me out back." One way or another, I was heading back to Resembool.
Hi guys! Alex grew up a little! Just in case there is any confusion, Alex still constantly thinks of getting home. That's his motivation after all. I'm just not going to mention it every chapter, so please just take it for granted that it is always in the back of his mind. For now, he accepts the situation he is in and tries to acclimate as best he can.
Awww, Alex found a mentor! Everyone has to love having a perverted old uncle (I have three). Next Chapter: our boys finally reunite. Please review!