Two boys with golden hair and eyes were in a room full of scientific research materials. One of them had just finished drawing a complex circle on the floor using a brush with white paint. "That oughta do it. You ready?" The other boy nodded and grunted in response. "Don't be scared, Al. Everything's perfect."
Rain started to pour outside a small house located in a series of rolling green hills. "Okay, this is it, Al. Let's go for it." The boy named Al nodded and grunted again. The two boys placed their hands on the edge of the circle and pressed down, causing a bright glow to emanate from the circle, followed by crackling electricity and a small vortex. The boys each wore a big smile on their face as the process began. The circle initially had a light blue color but dark smoke slowly began to rise from the ground as the light turned a deep purplish-red.
The boys started to look worried. "Ed, something doesn't feel right." A light shattered and a book's pages flew open. Suddenly the smoke faded and the circle seemed to open to reveal a single large eye with gray irises, a white sclera and a black pupil. "Brother? Brother, something's going wrong here." Al questioned nervously as shadowy tentacles reached out from the edges of the circle and a pan at the center containing various ingredients vanished into thin air.
One of these tentacles made contact with Al's left wrist, breaking off his hand; Al recoiled and screamed in terror as the tentacles grabbed at him. "Al!" The boy named Ed cried out to his brother just as a tentacle touched his left ankle, breaking off part of his leg; Ed screamed in agony and collapsed. As the tentacles grabbed at him and his brother, Ed tried to come up with an explanation for what was happening. "It can't be… a rebound?" As he finished thinking out loud his attention was drawn elsewhere. "Edward! Brother! Ed! Help! Ed! Brother, please!" Al desperately cried out to his brother as he was being grabbed by the tentacles, disintegrating due to their touch. Ed gasped and quickly reached out. "No, Al!" "Brother!" "Al!" The brothers reached out to one another as they were engulfed in a burst of light.
Edward, or Ed then found himself in a blank, yellow-tinted white void before a large door with intricate carvings supported by a frame and columns with ornate designs sculpted on them. Edward looked around curiously. "Al? Wait, what was I doing, I just…" "HELLO." A voice suddenly boomed. Edward jolted upon seeing a blank figure outlined by a black haze sitting in front of him. "Who are you?" "OH, I AM SO GLAD YOU ASKED. I AM CALLED BY MANY NAMES. I AM THE WORLD, I AM THE UNIVERSE, I AM GOD, I AM TRUTH, I AM ALL, I AM ONE, AND I AM ALSO… YOU."
As Edward was pointed at the door behind him suddenly swung open with a loud creaking. The large eye from earlier opened as did millions of multicolored pairs of smaller eyes. "YOU HAVE DARED TO KNOCK ON THE DOOR. NOW, THE DOOR IS OPEN." As Edward turned around the door opened wider and more tentacles reached out to drag him inside when he tried running away. As he kicked, flailed and screamed in protest the figure called Truth looked on with indifference. "QUIET, CHILD. IS THIS WHAT YOU WANTED, ISN'T IT? I WILL SHOW YOU… THE TRUTH." Edward continued screaming as the door closed.
It suddenly felt as if all knowledge imaginable was being sent directly into his brain to the point it might explode. "It's too much, make it stop; make it stop!" Then strange childlike beings grabbed at him, giggling as he was torn apart again. "Lemme go, please! What's happening to me? Stop it! Make it stop! Make it stop!" Then something became clear but Edward wasn't quite sure what, only that it involved the truth of everything. "Mom! Mom, please!" He reached out to what seemed like his mother before he was sent back to the door.
"HOW WAS IT?" The Truth questioned Edward, who turned back towards the door. "I see… my theory of Human Transmutation wasn't wrong… it can be done, it's possible…" He walked up to the door and put both his hands on it. "It's still just missing something! All of the answers I need are right here! The truth about Human Transmutation… hold on, one more time, show it to me one more time! Please, you have to show it to me again! The truth was inside there! Everything was in there!"
The Truth stood up passively. "I CAN'T DO THAT. I'VE ALREADY SHOWN YOU ALL I CAN FOR THE TOLL YOU'VE PAID." "Toll, what toll? What do you want? A payment?" Then something began to manifest on the Truth's outline. "THIS. SURELY YOU KNEW." Said manifestation took the form of Edward's left leg as he looked down in horror to see it disappear. As he turned to the Truth it had a wide grin on its face. "IT'S THE LAW OF EQUIVALENT EXCHANGE. RIGHT, YOUNG ALCHEMIST?"
Then Edward was back in the real world, clutching the bloody stump where his leg used to be while yelling in pain; nearby were Alphonse's empty clothes. "Al… Alphonse, say something. Al, no… stay with me! Dammit… this can't be happening! It can't be! This wasn't… this wasn't supposed to… no! He's gone, what have I done! Somebody help me… somebody… please, Mom… Mom, please…"
The electricity stopped crackling and a cloud of smoke cleared to reveal the results of Edward and Alphonse's work. Edward gave a broken smile that slowly turned to an expression of shock. "Mom… is that you?" In the center of the circle lay a mass of flesh with exposed bones and organs lying on its back that reached out with a groan as what was supposed to be its heart thumped until it coughed up blood and collapsed. At the sight of this Edward's pupils shrank in terror and he let loose a piercing cry.
He began weeping. "No… this… this is wrong… This isn't… this isn't what I wanted… this isn't what we wanted… Al… Alphonse… Alphonse… Alphonse… Al… it's all my fault… this is all my fault… Alphonse, no… I'm sorry…" He dragged himself to the corner and knocked over a suit of full-body armor; then he started painting symbols on the tops of his hands, on his forehead and on the inside of the armor's collar. "No, dammit… you won't take him too… give him back… he's my brother… take my leg, take my arms, take my heart, anything, I'll give 'em to you, whatever you want, you can have it! Just give him back! He's my little brother, he's all I have left!" He clapped his hands together as energy surged from them. In the strange place beyond the door Edward struggled to reach a figure that looked like Alphonse as the shadowy children pulled at him again. "Al!" Edward screamed his brother's name while extending his hand as far as he could.
Later, Alphonse woke up with a groan to discover that his body was bulky, hollow and lacked any form of sensation besides sight and hearing. "Huh? What is this?" Alphonse didn't have much time to think about his situation as he looked past his metal hand to see his brother missing his left leg and clutching a bloody stump that should've had his right arm in its place. "I'm sorry… Al…" Edward's voice trembled as he barely held back his tears. "Brother!" Alphonse ran over and held Edward in his arms. "What happened to you? And me… what happened to me?!" "There wasn't much time… I used my right arm as… material in a transmutation… all I could manage was to attach your spirit to the armor in the corner…" "Oh no… but… what about Mom?" "You should look… it wasn't human…" Alphonse gasped in shock. "I don't understand, Ed… what happened? Your theorems and equations… they all seemed right." Edward's voice had dropped to a whisper. "The theorems weren't the problem, Al… it wasn't the math… it was us…"