Inferno

When Ed came to, it was to a familiar voice asking, "What do you intend to do with him now, Sir?" It only took him a minute to realize it was Marcoh's voice, and that something salty and unpleasant-smelling was right under his nose. The latter, he recognized as smelling salts intended to wake someone who had passed out.

"Ask him more questions, of course," Wrath's voice answered, sounding annoyed. "And so you realize this, I was testing a theory and never expected that he would actually be harmed—every single time he was previously in danger, he was somehow protected. This was only one more affirmation. I would have been shocked if I could have harmed him now."

"With all due respect, Sir, that doesn't excuse trying to harm a child in the first place," Marcoh answered with a sigh.

The smell was really getting to Ed, so he reached up a hand to shove it away as he struggled to get his eyes open. After a minute—and after he'd shoved the bottle as far away from his nose as he could and could breathe again—he managed to get them open...And just blinked dazedly at Marcoh in his military uniform for a moment. He could see Armstrong standing behind the man, watching worriedly, and turning his head showed the Führer sitting in his seat from earlier again, arms crossed as he watched the Doctor with an annoyed expression. He couldn't see Envy just then, but he was pretty sure he was there, too.

Oddly, he was actually a lot calmer, even though his situation hadn't changed.

Then, Marcoh gave him a small smile and asked, "How are you doing, lad? Feeling all right after that scare?"

After a moment and a dazed blink, Ed answered, "I'm awake, anyway."

Marcoh huffed a small, amused chuckle. "That you are. Does anything hurt or feel uncomfortable or strange in your body?"

Blinking again, the boy replied, "I don't think so?"

"Good. Let me know if that changes," the black haired man offered, making it clear he wasn't planning on leaving any time soon.

"Fine," Bradley sighed, that time sounding resigned. "So, if—"

He was cut off abruptly as a snapping sensation came and power surged over the area, causing a moment of shaking as the ground adapted to the sudden shift. From the tent flap, Envy-in-another's-skin's voice called urgently, "You have to see this, Führer!" Wrath rose to look as both Marcoh and Armstrong turned to watch them apprehensively.

And Ed heard Ishbala's voice directly in his mind say, :Good, you are still well. Others are coming to you now. You need only wait a short time longer.:

Relief was the first thing he felt, and a test of the surrounding energies told him Ishbala's energy was now just as accessible to him as Minerva's. There was no wall in the way—the other alchemists had chosen to take it down right then, even without him. Which left the question of who had filled his role, or if he'd just put enough holes in the wall that Ishbala could break it even with only fifteen casters. Admittedly, either was possible, especially if Ishbala had reacted emotionally to the danger to Ed when he'd been kidnapped by Armstrong.

Of course, there were four obvious options for who could have been the sixteenth caster, if he assumed Shiro had gone back to town, as he was one. Then, there was Al, who could well have gone with Zahir and Nasima, and if they realized Ed wasn't going to be there, he probably would have volunteered, since all they'd have needed was the power. And since his father and Roy had just gotten into town, in the attack, either or both could have gotten pulled in, though oddly, it was a lot more likely Hohenheim would have left the battlefield to do something like this.

But wait—who would be coming for him during an attack on the major Ishbalan city? Shiro? While it would be a relief to know the man had healed, by himself, he'd never be able to get Ed back, probably not even if Ed helped. Well, not unless Marcoh and Armstrong decided to turn traitor. No one else would really just ditch the Ishbalans, would they?

Suddenly, the Führer returned to face Ed, asking, "Do you know what's happening out there, child?" He looked terse and just bordering on fear.

Blinking, the boy asked, "What's happening? I mean, what does it look like?"

"There are lights in blue, green, and brown falling all around us, and plants are growing rapidly in all directions," the homunculus said.

Ed blinked again. Yes, that had been a very likely result of them releasing Ishbala, so they were effectively experiencing a 'pyre-snow'. "The lights are pyreflies. They're the same lights we saw when that woman soldier disappeared, and they're doing the same thing—growing stuff. I guess there's just a lot more of them this time."

"Pyreflies?" Wrath frowned in utter confusion.

"It's a crossing of the words 'funeral pyre' and 'firefly'," the boy explained (and damn, it had taken him a bloody long time to figure that one out!), lifting his shoulders in a shrug. "It's real soul energy which floats like fireflies. At one time, we saw them a lot around death, but not very many—it was the soul returning to the whole of the planetary sentience. But, that also means it's generally the raw energy of the planetary sentience, but so compressed that it becomes visible—almost like muscle-man's sparkles, because I don't think those could even exist unless he was somehow compressing energy to make them visible."

Everyone first blinked in surprise, then Armstrong began laughing as Marcoh snorted and chuckled. Envy began chuckling as Wrath's lips twitched in honest amusement. "Were you aware of doing that, Major?" the Führer asked, lips still twitching.

"Er...Well, yes. I don't do it by thinking about it, it's more...subconscious? It started when I was a child, and I found out how it worked and how to occasionally manipulate it by testing it. For those of us in the Armstrong family who inherited the ability to use alchemy, we have—several small vortices of energy around us where the energy we give off compresses, especially if we exert it without directing it into an attack. That's part of what makes the generational progression of it through the family so important—those same vortices allow us to pull in surrounding energy to enhance our skills or buoy our energy in a long battle," Armstrong explained.

"Hence how formidable you are," Bradley agreed, shaking his head in amusement, then looking back at Ed. "So, while they're going to create new growth, they aren't something to be alarmed about because they're non-harmful?"

"They aren't," Ed agreed. "But, whatever caused them might be."

That made everyone blink, and the Führer turned to go to the table and look at the map. He was obviously thinking hard about something—

But he was interrupted by a scream from outside the tent as several explosions sounded and the sound of fire rippling across a huge space reached them. "Oh, fuck!" Envy began in alarm, pulling back, but no one had any more time to react as the entire tent went up in flames—

Before it could fall, it was sent hurtling back and away from them by a strong gust of wind, and they all looked in the direction the wind had come from—

And could only stare at Roy Mustang as he hovered about a foot off the ground, surrounded by a whirlwind of fire, his arms spread as he directed them along different paths in the surroundings. It was like watching a conductor at an orchestra, with only the exception of what he was 'directing' and the glowing lines around his wrists. Ed could tell he was using several array systems at once to do what he was doing because he was nearly completely surrounded by an array globe. Then, he looked again and realized Roy had been modifying the arrays for the effect he wanted, and the array globe was a single system integrating several elements so he could manipulate it the way he wanted to.

Damn, that man had truly taken his books to heart and run with it—even if he'd never gotten Hawkeye's 'master array' for fire manipulation, giving him 'magic' had just proven it compensated. And because Ishbala had been released—he could use it freely, so he was taking advantage.

A bloody inferno—the entire camp was on fire, and they had nowhere to go. He was suddenly reminded of a bloody smug Genesis at full power fighting a battle he knew he'd win.

Shiro then drew everyone's eyes as he moved up beside Roy and generated something so similar it was eerie, but it was wind-based. It was the reason the tent had been blown back, and the reason the fire had spread so far so fast.

"If you don't mind, we're going to be taking Jed back!" Roy called over to the Amestrians while everyone was still busy staring at the two furious men in shock.

"...Well, this complicates matters," the Führer commented slowly, then sighed. "It looks like we'll have to fight at full strength. Major, don't let them take the boy." Bradley then reached up to pull off his eye patch, showing the odd-colored, marked eye underneath, and drew his blade to point it at Roy.

Envy began giggling maniacally, then agreed, "This will be fun!" His form rippled, shifted, and grew into the grotesque, dog-like form Ed had seen when they'd been swallowed by Gluttony. Since Envy hated that form, he must have been feeling Shiro and Roy were a huge threat. He also aimed directly at Shiro and jumped forward to attack him.

Before he could land a blow, both Shiro and Roy directed their energies to lash out and attack him, throwing him back as he howled with pain—but they'd missed Wrath's advance. Since the Führer was capable of moving at super-human speeds, he'd gotten past Roy's guard before anyone could blink, stabbing him through the heart—

And Ed felt a surge of emotion and power as he murmured, "Great Gospel!" It was only after he'd cast that he realized he'd hit his Limit Break and had called on a power no child should have been able to. Regardless, it activated around both Roy—which shoved Wrath back and undid the damage—and Shiro...and around Armstrong and Marcoh, himself, and two other nearby sources. The moment Wrath's eyes landed on him, he knew he was screwed—

A gunshot sounded, and Wrath froze as his head tilted to the side oddly. After a long minute, his head straightened and he turned to look off to a point some distance to the side of Roy and Shiro (he had an obvious bullet wound through his head, though it faced away from Ed), so Ed followed his gaze—and saw Riza there! She had a rifle, not just a handgun, and the rifle was pointed at Wrath. She was also showing the glow and the wings of Great Gospel. Who, and where, was the last one who'd gotten it, though?

A tap on his shoulder made him start and turn to look—at Maes as he gave him a grin and asked softly, "Ready to go, Ed?" He was the last one who'd been protected by his Limit Break.

"I thought so," Marcoh sighed suddenly. "But 'Great Gospel' gave it away."

"Wait, what?" Armstrong asked, looking warily at Maes.

There was a moment of silence, until snarling not far away made them look back at the battlefield right in front of them—the battlefield surrounded by an inferno—to see Envy and Wrath attacking Roy and Shiro, but being repeatedly blocked and stalled by Riza's gunfire. Somehow, that was mind-boggling—this should have been the other way around, yet he knew this was the way it was this time—and Ed just sort of froze as he watched the battle.

Then, another power surged suddenly, and 'Father' appeared. And it was because of his style of dress that Ed knew it was the First Homunculus, not Hohenheim, because Hohenheim never wore those ridiculous, white robes. The bottom of his stomach dropped and he experienced a sense of vertigo when both Roy and Shiro were thrown down by what appeared to be a mere motion of the man's hand (it was actually high-level alchemy).

At least they weren't harmed and recovered quickly because Great Gospel hadn't faded yet. That meant it was approaching its maximum three minutes of protection, however, and was about to fade—it wasn't likely it would protect them through the next attack. By extension, he needed some other way to protect them, and he needed it fast, but other than Carbuncle—whose shields would be the same as Great Gospel and fade quickly under pressure—nothing came to mind.

Roy reminded him of Genesis just then.

Genesis had created the same array he'd used on Lust.

Would it work on the First Homunculus?

Holding a hand forward, Ed focused on the arrays and sent them out in 'Father's' direction, and they rapidly followed the ground to reach him. The being's eyes widened as his closer foot and leg began dissolving—

And then, they were all gone. 'Father', Envy, and Wrath all just weren't there anymore. He desperately asked Ishbala, :Where did they go? How long will it be before they attack us again?:

:They are outside my range, Chosen. They may return to the battlefield later, but for now, they are not here. You have time with which to return to a safer location,: Ishbala assured him gently.

It was only then when he looked down in relief—and realized he was still sitting, untouched and unharmed, in the same chair Armstrong had put him in when they'd arrived at the tent in the first place.

Holy fuck...That was bloody surreal.

He couldn't stop it and began giggling, still trying to assimilate the absurdity of the situation as it stood.

The others traded confused looks and began gathering around him, waiting for him to calm down, but then Maes commented, "You know, we really should just get out of here while we can. We have no way of knowing when those three will be back, and they were clearly not human."

"Besides the fact that the man looked like Hohenheim, just in different clothing, you mean?" Roy asked in annoyance, then lifted the still-giggling boy. "Let's get you out of here, Ed, before anything else strange happens."

Carbuncle floated down onto the chair-back and asked, "Do I count as strange?"

"You're Carbuncle!" Marcoh gasped at the creature.

"Yup!" it agreed cheerfully.

"How?" he asked in amazement as the others blinked.

"Ed summoned me. How else?" Carbuncle asked in reply, tone utterly amused.

"He was adamant a person couldn't just create a Summon—you'd have to be found, and agree to be summoned, and—" the Doctor began.

"I've been with Ed for around nine thousand years," Carbuncle cut him off, and everyone froze in something like stunned horror, other than Ed, who was still giggling about the absurdity and surrealism of the situation. Though, the boy did briefly wonder why Shiro had frozen, when he already knew how old Ed really was. "Exactly why wouldn't I come help one of my best friends when he asked me?"

There was a long silence, then Roy faced Armstrong and said, "When Ed used Great Gospel before, it took you as an ally and shielded you as well. Even though you're the one who took him from Shiro, you're not an enemy. Come with us?"

"Um...Perhaps you could explain to me why you call an Ishbalan child by an Amestrian name?" Armstrong answered slowly.

"He used alchemy to make himself look Ishbalan so Amestrians wouldn't notice his presence in the Ishbalan town," Roy told him. "He's Von Hohenheim's older son, who has apparently spent an insanely long time living, growing old, dying, and being reset to do it all again. With his memory intact."

"Erm..." Armstrong blinked, then stared at the giggling child again for a moment. "And those men who were all apparently not human?"

"Right now, we really don't know much about the details," Roy sighed faintly.

Realizing he had a way to fill them in without doing it himself—he was still stuck in giggle mode and couldn't seem to shut it off—he turned his mind to Carbuncle and asked, :If I give you the details, could you give them to the others?:

:Sure thing!: Carbuncle agreed, so Ed focused on transferring the necessary data to the Summon.

"We'll probably have to find Priest Ishan in town to get more details," Roy went on to say, and Armstrong seemed thoughtful.

"Actually, I can tell you!" Carbuncle cut in cheerfully, waving its wing ears happily as it hopped from the back of the chair to the top of Roy's head. The young man sent an annoyed look upward, but had read that Carbuncles were child-like in nature so didn't really react otherwise. Or, at least, Ed assumed that was the case, otherwise he'd have fire-blasted it.

"How would you know the details?" Marcoh asked in surprise.

"Because even if Ed's still giggling too much to tell you himself, he and I can talk into each other's heads, so he can say it right into my head, and I can tell you," Carbuncle replied. "He doesn't need his voice for that. But we still should probably move. I can shield us through the fire so you don't have to try to put it out!"

Roy and Marcoh traded looks, then sighed and nodded. "Let's go, then. Tell us while we walk, Carbuncle," Marcoh gave agreement.

The whole group started moving as Carbuncle said, "Okay, so, Ed told me some hundreds or thousands of years ago, Xerxes was a powerful but insular nation that agreed with slavery. One slave got smarter than the others, but no one knew how. It earned him freedom of a sort as long as he worked for the King to enhance his power, and they turned the nation into an array—the same array Amestris is being turned into now. The former slave, the slave's former owner, and a strange being kept in a jar by the slave's former owner spear-headed the creation of the array, which was intended to turn the King into a god.

"In theory, that would have worked, too, except that the thing in the jar, who had taught the slave to read, write, do numbers, and use alchemy, had deliberately made some small modifications to the array which no one would notice, but would drastically impact what it would do. The former slave became the Philosopher's Stone, frozen in time, the being in the jar gained a new 'jar'—a physical body mimicking the appearance of the former slave—and everyone else in Xerxes ceased to exist. Well, more accurately, they're still semi-alive and aware in the Philosopher's Stone until their soul energy gets used up and they finally die."

Carbuncle paused there for a moment to flutter its ears while they were passing some of the tents and a few soldiers came from between them in a panic and started shooting as they screamed about monsters. The Summon's shields kept all of them safe, which also caused the soldiers to run screaming in the other direction once they ran out of ammo. Because Ed was still giggling, that just set him off on another round. He also began to wonder if walking safely through the middle of a bloody inferno felt strange or surreal to any of the others with him. If it did, they hid it well.

"The thing in the jar is the man in the robe we just saw," Carbuncle told the others when they were back down to just the noise of the fire and Ed's giggling. All their eyes widened in shock. "When he and the former slave left Xerxes, they went in two different directions—one went to Xing and founded alkahestry and the other came here to found alchemy. The one who came here started separating pieces of himself to create those creatures like the other two men he took with him—those are effectively his kids. They're called homunculi, and there were seven—Pride, Sloth, Lust, Gluttony, Envy, Greed, and Wrath. Lust has been destroyed. The Führer is Wrath, who is both the youngest of them and has assimilated into an actual human body. The dog-thing is a shapeshifter named Envy, who can look like anyone or anything, but the dog-thing is his true appearance. The others are out and about. Any other questions?"

"But—Hohenheim looks like that man—he's—the former slave?" Marcoh stuttered in shock. "He's a Philosopher's Stone? Wait, how long has he been alive?"

"How long ago was Xerxes destroyed?" Carbuncle asked in reply, sounding amused. "That'll tell you how long he's been alive. And yes and yes to the other two."

"If he's not human anymore, how did he have children?" Riza asked in surprise. "Or did he adopt them?"

"Oh, no, they're biologically his. And, go figure, they're literally the only two he ever had, their mom is just that impressive," Carbuncle answered, hopping lighting on Roy's head a few times before reaching down to pat the top of Ed's head. "This kid explained that his body never died, it was just turned into a 'jar' to hold all the other souls the Stone was made of. That means his body still has the biological functions of any other man's body, he just doesn't age and can't be killed by mundane things—the Stone automatically repairs damage it can repair. Which uses up more of the souls. When all the souls are used up, he'll be able to die. Or, I guess he'd die when the energy of the last was used because he's only lived this long to start with thanks to that artificial energy boost."

"So if they already successfully made the Stone once, why are they trying to do it again?" Shiro suddenly asked, brow furrowed in confusion. "If they already met their goal, it would not need to be repeated."

"But 'they' actually didn't meet it," Carbuncle answered, flying over to land on his head instead, then leaned over to peer into his face. "The First Homunculus used that one as a reward to Hohenheim for helping him, so he didn't get to use it himself to become a god. Even though it was a 'reward' from the First Homunculus' perspective, it wasn't from Hohenheim's. But, having done it meant the being from the jar could set that aside and focus on getting his own Stone—now that he looked human, he could actually start to manipulate things personally to do that."

For a long moment, there was silence, and Ed's giggling had finally tapered off. By then, they'd reached the edge of the burning camp (though that area had already burnt itself out) and could head out across the arid lands to circle around the fighting—they could still hear some of that in the distance—and head back into the city from the side. It was obvious they were all thinking hard about what they'd learned, though.