Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction ❯ Disaster or Destiny? ❯ Far From Home ( Chapter 1 )
[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]
By: kiori 
A bit of background, and Ed gets some sense knocked into him.
Anime/Manga: Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Adventure / Action / Romance | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 12.26.2005 | Updated On: 04.03.2006 | Pages: 1 | Words: 2.3K | Visits: 1.2K | Status: Work In Progress
A bit of background, and Ed gets some sense knocked into him.
Anime/Manga: Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Adventure / Action / Romance | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 12.26.2005 | Updated On: 04.03.2006 | Pages: 1 | Words: 2.3K | Visits: 1.2K | Status: Work In Progress
"Damn it Edward, will you get over it and focus on the task at hand?" I said with frustration as I dragged Ed away from Colonel Mustang's office.
"That guy does nothing but insult me! I'm sick of him talking down to me like I'm some little kid!" I was having trouble restraining Edward as he fought his way back to the Colonel's office, a murderous look in his amber eyes.
"Well technically, Edward, you are a little kid..." I replied with a smirk, knowing it would only make the situation worse but finding it impossible to pass up the opportunity to tease the vertically challenged, blonde haired, short tempered teen. Ed suddenly seemed to forget his anger towards Mustang and rounded on me instead.
"WHO ARE YOU CALLING SO SMALL THAT HE CAN‘T EVEN BE SEEN WITH A MAGNIFYING GLASS!!????" Edward glared daggers at me, looking like he would explode at any minute. If there was one thing Ed hated, it was people making comments about his short stature. Anything you said to him that contained the words tiny, small, short, runt, etc., would definitely earn you a murderous glare and possibly a broken limb. I wasn’t worried though, the two of us had grown to be pretty good friends during the last few months and I was used to Ed's tantrums. I knew Ed hated my teasing, and a lot of the time I felt bad for doing it, but I couldn't help but love the way he reacted when I did. He was cute when he was angry.
I turned around and continued to walk towards the door, trying to restrain myself from laughing at the look on Ed's face. "Calm down Ed, you’re overreacting.”
Reluctantly, Ed let out a sigh and followed me, still wearing a scowl.
We made our way to the military barracks we were staying in while we were in East City. We’d just returned from our last mission, more of a distraction to make the military think we were actually doing work that anything else. The Colonel made us do stuff like that once in a while. He knew what we were really after, and didn’t want to make it public knowledge.
Now that we had reported to the Colonel, we were going to continue our research on the Philosopher's Stone. Both of us needed it, but for different reasons; Edward Elric and his brother Alphonse so they could return their bodies to normal, and me to get back home.
In an attempt to resurrect their dead mother, Al had lost his entire body, and remained in this world only because Edward had attached his soul to a suit of armor using alchemy. Edward’s right arm and left leg were also taken, and in their place were metal limbs, or auto-mail.
My situation, however, was completely different. I didn’t even know if the Stone was really what I needed. I was not from this world. Where I came from, alchemy was practically a forgotten science. It was 1921 at home, and the study of alchemy had long since been abandoned by most people. There was only a six year gap between worlds, as it was 1915 here, but for some reason alchemy was not only far from being a forgotten science in Amestris, it was widely known and practiced by many.
One day at home my surroundings simply vanished. I don’t remember anything about the transfer from home to this new place. I remember feeling dizzy and opening my eyes to find myself in a completely different place than I had been in only seconds before. I was no longer home. The Colonel had found me wandering around and when I reluctantly told him what had happened, I was sure he thought I was crazy. He originally though I had lost my memory, but I still had all my memories from my world intact. Who ever heard of losing your real memories and having them replaced by fake ones? No, something much bigger was definitely going on.
I found out I was in a country called Amestris. Based on what little I had seen at that point, it looked similar to a European country. When Mustang told Ed and Al about me, they recalled reading something about the Philosopher’s Stone possibly having the ability to open inter-dimensional portals. Not only could this get me home, but this power could be what the boys needed to get their bodies back.
The Gate was also another dimension and one that Edward had visited during the human transmutation. He was sure that that was where Al’s body and his arm and leg had been taken by means of fulfilling the most important law of alchemy: Equivalent Exchange. This was the idea that in order to gain anything, something of equal value had to be given up. We didn’t even know if there was a currently existing stone, but the fact that I was transported here by an unknown force raised all of our hopes.
When I learned what the stone could do, I immediately began to research it. Once I knew that the Elric brothers were looking for the same thing, I wanted to ask to join them, but never worked up the courage. It wasn’t until Al, being the sweet considerate boy that he was, contrary to what people thought because of his appearance, asked me if I wanted to join them that I finally did. Mustang had probably ordered them to ask me to keep me, otherwise Ed never would have let Al do it, but I still appreciated the way Al made it seem like he wanted my help.
I laughed at the idea of Ed intimidating me. It seemed ridiculous now. He was the reason I hadn’t asked in the first place. He always seemed grumpy and serious, and had never even given me a passing glance when we had seen each other in the library before I teamed up with him and Al. He wasn’t keen on the idea of me joining them, probably thinking I’d just get in the way. But he finally gave in, most likely thanks to Mustang, and for the last four months I had been traveling with the famous Fullmetal Alchemist - Ed’s state alchemist title - and his brother Alphonse.
Despite his aloofness and fierce independence, I found that Ed was actually a very likable person. He was a little quick-tempered…on second thought make that extremely quick tempered…but he was smart, clever, funny, nice when he wanted to be, and good hearted. I had always thought he was extremely good looking as well, but of course I kept that to myself. He had golden hair he kept tied back in a braid, alluring amber eyes and, needless to say, was somewhat short for his age. He was a skilled fighter and talented alchemist on top of it all - he didn‘t even need a transmutation circle when performing alchemy like most people did - and he cared about his brother more than anything. That was why he joined the military as a State Alchemist; he would have access to vast amounts of information on the Philosopher’s Stone, the only way he knew of to get him and his brother back to normal.
As time went by I started to care less about finding the Stone to get home and more to help Ed and Al. Especially Al. It broke my heart to see him stuck in that armor. I honestly wasn’t in any great hurry to get home after I assimilated to this new place and became good friends with the Elric brothers. Sure, I missed my family, but I hated school and didn’t have a lot of close friends back home. It was actually kind of a nice break. The only thing that really bothered me was the fact that my family had no idea where I was or if I was coming back. I had to let them know I was alright.
The two of us reached the barracks and went inside to find Al. When I saw he wasn’t inside, I told Ed he was probably still helping Lieutenants Fuery and Havoc clean out the storage warehouses. He was, after all, a powerful suit of armor that was unaffected by hunger or fatigue.
I turned to face Ed, the depressed look he had stirring that familiar feeling of guilt and regret for teasing him inside me. I sat down next to him on the bed and gave him a small smile.
“C’mon Ed, you know I didn’t mean it.”
He gave me a blank look before moving his eyes to the ground again. “It’s not that. I was just thinking, it’s been four years since I passed the State Exam; four years Al and I have looked for the Stone. And we’re no closer to finding it that we were before.” He stood and walked over to the wall, his head hanging and his fists clenched. He rammed his fist into the wall with his auto-mail hand, causing cracks to spread outward from the indent his fist now rested in.
“I made a promise…” His strained voice was a mixture of sadness, anger and desperation. “I promised my little brother I would get him back to normal, that I would return him to his body. I know he hides how miserable he is. Some days I can tell that he’s almost lost all hope, lost his confidence in me…”
“Edward…” I slowly walk over to him, but before I had a chance to do anything he whirled around, his eyes brimming with tears that he was obviously trying to hold back.
“Four years, Marie! I don’t know how he can even look at me. It’s my fault that he’s like that and I can’t even fix it…” Ed‘s face fell once again. “And I promised myself again after you joined us. I had twice the motivation; two people that needed my help now instead of one. And even then, I still couldn’t do it.”
“Look at me, Ed.” He slowly raised his eyes to mine, and I slapped him hard across the face. “I’m so sick of you doing this! You think that this whole thing rests on your shoulders, and you talk like Al and I are burdens that do nothing but provide you with an impossible task and make you feel guilty because you haven‘t completed it yet!”
Ed stood stunned, his cheek red from the impact. I forced my voice to soften. “This job belongs to all three us, and we all carry an equal responsibility in accomplishing it. What happened to Al is just as much his fault as yours. He agreed to perform the transmutation. I know you feel guilty because he lost more than you did, but you had no control over the situation and I know you would have gladly switched him places if given the choice. If you really want to help Al, why don’t you follow his example and try to stay positive. If you keep this guilt trip up you’re going to lose it, and then you’ll never be able to help him.”
Ed sank onto the bed and looked up at me, his hand on his cheek. I folded my arms and gave him a stern look. “Sorry Ed, but in case the speech didn’t work I had to try and knock some sense into you.” I began to roll up my sleeves and gave Ed a mock threat in an attempt to ease some of the tension. “Now did I get my point across, or do I really need to resort to physical violence?”
Ed frowned at me. “Believe me, the bruise that’s going to leave will be reminder enough.”
I turned towards the door. “It’s your own fault Ed. I’m getting to the point where I’ll do anything to get you out of these depression slumps you‘ve been falling into lately. I hate it when you’re like this, and so does Al.”
“Can you really blame me? Everything I’ve done the past four years has accomplished nothing!”
“You’re being so selfish Ed, can’t you see that! Do you really think Al and I feel any better about this than you do? You can‘t give up on yourself and you need to realize that you have us to help you. I worry about you when you do this and I know Al does too, and it’s not fair for you to do that to us.”
I opened the door, turning in the direction of the room I was staying in to go pack my things. Before I shut the door, I turned to Ed and said, “And you’re wrong, we have accomplished more than you think. We have a great deal more information that we had before, and that puts us that much closer to our goal.” I shut the door, leaving Ed to contemplate what I said and hopefully to consider it instead of disregarding it, as he often did when someone gave him advice or told him he was wrong.
Author's Note: The name Marie comes from Marie-Louise von Franz, a New Age alchemist who wrote about alchemy from a psychological perspective. She was born in Munich, Germany in 1915.
"That guy does nothing but insult me! I'm sick of him talking down to me like I'm some little kid!" I was having trouble restraining Edward as he fought his way back to the Colonel's office, a murderous look in his amber eyes.
"Well technically, Edward, you are a little kid..." I replied with a smirk, knowing it would only make the situation worse but finding it impossible to pass up the opportunity to tease the vertically challenged, blonde haired, short tempered teen. Ed suddenly seemed to forget his anger towards Mustang and rounded on me instead.
"WHO ARE YOU CALLING SO SMALL THAT HE CAN‘T EVEN BE SEEN WITH A MAGNIFYING GLASS!!????" Edward glared daggers at me, looking like he would explode at any minute. If there was one thing Ed hated, it was people making comments about his short stature. Anything you said to him that contained the words tiny, small, short, runt, etc., would definitely earn you a murderous glare and possibly a broken limb. I wasn’t worried though, the two of us had grown to be pretty good friends during the last few months and I was used to Ed's tantrums. I knew Ed hated my teasing, and a lot of the time I felt bad for doing it, but I couldn't help but love the way he reacted when I did. He was cute when he was angry.
I turned around and continued to walk towards the door, trying to restrain myself from laughing at the look on Ed's face. "Calm down Ed, you’re overreacting.”
Reluctantly, Ed let out a sigh and followed me, still wearing a scowl.
We made our way to the military barracks we were staying in while we were in East City. We’d just returned from our last mission, more of a distraction to make the military think we were actually doing work that anything else. The Colonel made us do stuff like that once in a while. He knew what we were really after, and didn’t want to make it public knowledge.
Now that we had reported to the Colonel, we were going to continue our research on the Philosopher's Stone. Both of us needed it, but for different reasons; Edward Elric and his brother Alphonse so they could return their bodies to normal, and me to get back home.
In an attempt to resurrect their dead mother, Al had lost his entire body, and remained in this world only because Edward had attached his soul to a suit of armor using alchemy. Edward’s right arm and left leg were also taken, and in their place were metal limbs, or auto-mail.
My situation, however, was completely different. I didn’t even know if the Stone was really what I needed. I was not from this world. Where I came from, alchemy was practically a forgotten science. It was 1921 at home, and the study of alchemy had long since been abandoned by most people. There was only a six year gap between worlds, as it was 1915 here, but for some reason alchemy was not only far from being a forgotten science in Amestris, it was widely known and practiced by many.
One day at home my surroundings simply vanished. I don’t remember anything about the transfer from home to this new place. I remember feeling dizzy and opening my eyes to find myself in a completely different place than I had been in only seconds before. I was no longer home. The Colonel had found me wandering around and when I reluctantly told him what had happened, I was sure he thought I was crazy. He originally though I had lost my memory, but I still had all my memories from my world intact. Who ever heard of losing your real memories and having them replaced by fake ones? No, something much bigger was definitely going on.
I found out I was in a country called Amestris. Based on what little I had seen at that point, it looked similar to a European country. When Mustang told Ed and Al about me, they recalled reading something about the Philosopher’s Stone possibly having the ability to open inter-dimensional portals. Not only could this get me home, but this power could be what the boys needed to get their bodies back.
The Gate was also another dimension and one that Edward had visited during the human transmutation. He was sure that that was where Al’s body and his arm and leg had been taken by means of fulfilling the most important law of alchemy: Equivalent Exchange. This was the idea that in order to gain anything, something of equal value had to be given up. We didn’t even know if there was a currently existing stone, but the fact that I was transported here by an unknown force raised all of our hopes.
When I learned what the stone could do, I immediately began to research it. Once I knew that the Elric brothers were looking for the same thing, I wanted to ask to join them, but never worked up the courage. It wasn’t until Al, being the sweet considerate boy that he was, contrary to what people thought because of his appearance, asked me if I wanted to join them that I finally did. Mustang had probably ordered them to ask me to keep me, otherwise Ed never would have let Al do it, but I still appreciated the way Al made it seem like he wanted my help.
I laughed at the idea of Ed intimidating me. It seemed ridiculous now. He was the reason I hadn’t asked in the first place. He always seemed grumpy and serious, and had never even given me a passing glance when we had seen each other in the library before I teamed up with him and Al. He wasn’t keen on the idea of me joining them, probably thinking I’d just get in the way. But he finally gave in, most likely thanks to Mustang, and for the last four months I had been traveling with the famous Fullmetal Alchemist - Ed’s state alchemist title - and his brother Alphonse.
Despite his aloofness and fierce independence, I found that Ed was actually a very likable person. He was a little quick-tempered…on second thought make that extremely quick tempered…but he was smart, clever, funny, nice when he wanted to be, and good hearted. I had always thought he was extremely good looking as well, but of course I kept that to myself. He had golden hair he kept tied back in a braid, alluring amber eyes and, needless to say, was somewhat short for his age. He was a skilled fighter and talented alchemist on top of it all - he didn‘t even need a transmutation circle when performing alchemy like most people did - and he cared about his brother more than anything. That was why he joined the military as a State Alchemist; he would have access to vast amounts of information on the Philosopher’s Stone, the only way he knew of to get him and his brother back to normal.
As time went by I started to care less about finding the Stone to get home and more to help Ed and Al. Especially Al. It broke my heart to see him stuck in that armor. I honestly wasn’t in any great hurry to get home after I assimilated to this new place and became good friends with the Elric brothers. Sure, I missed my family, but I hated school and didn’t have a lot of close friends back home. It was actually kind of a nice break. The only thing that really bothered me was the fact that my family had no idea where I was or if I was coming back. I had to let them know I was alright.
The two of us reached the barracks and went inside to find Al. When I saw he wasn’t inside, I told Ed he was probably still helping Lieutenants Fuery and Havoc clean out the storage warehouses. He was, after all, a powerful suit of armor that was unaffected by hunger or fatigue.
I turned to face Ed, the depressed look he had stirring that familiar feeling of guilt and regret for teasing him inside me. I sat down next to him on the bed and gave him a small smile.
“C’mon Ed, you know I didn’t mean it.”
He gave me a blank look before moving his eyes to the ground again. “It’s not that. I was just thinking, it’s been four years since I passed the State Exam; four years Al and I have looked for the Stone. And we’re no closer to finding it that we were before.” He stood and walked over to the wall, his head hanging and his fists clenched. He rammed his fist into the wall with his auto-mail hand, causing cracks to spread outward from the indent his fist now rested in.
“I made a promise…” His strained voice was a mixture of sadness, anger and desperation. “I promised my little brother I would get him back to normal, that I would return him to his body. I know he hides how miserable he is. Some days I can tell that he’s almost lost all hope, lost his confidence in me…”
“Edward…” I slowly walk over to him, but before I had a chance to do anything he whirled around, his eyes brimming with tears that he was obviously trying to hold back.
“Four years, Marie! I don’t know how he can even look at me. It’s my fault that he’s like that and I can’t even fix it…” Ed‘s face fell once again. “And I promised myself again after you joined us. I had twice the motivation; two people that needed my help now instead of one. And even then, I still couldn’t do it.”
“Look at me, Ed.” He slowly raised his eyes to mine, and I slapped him hard across the face. “I’m so sick of you doing this! You think that this whole thing rests on your shoulders, and you talk like Al and I are burdens that do nothing but provide you with an impossible task and make you feel guilty because you haven‘t completed it yet!”
Ed stood stunned, his cheek red from the impact. I forced my voice to soften. “This job belongs to all three us, and we all carry an equal responsibility in accomplishing it. What happened to Al is just as much his fault as yours. He agreed to perform the transmutation. I know you feel guilty because he lost more than you did, but you had no control over the situation and I know you would have gladly switched him places if given the choice. If you really want to help Al, why don’t you follow his example and try to stay positive. If you keep this guilt trip up you’re going to lose it, and then you’ll never be able to help him.”
Ed sank onto the bed and looked up at me, his hand on his cheek. I folded my arms and gave him a stern look. “Sorry Ed, but in case the speech didn’t work I had to try and knock some sense into you.” I began to roll up my sleeves and gave Ed a mock threat in an attempt to ease some of the tension. “Now did I get my point across, or do I really need to resort to physical violence?”
Ed frowned at me. “Believe me, the bruise that’s going to leave will be reminder enough.”
I turned towards the door. “It’s your own fault Ed. I’m getting to the point where I’ll do anything to get you out of these depression slumps you‘ve been falling into lately. I hate it when you’re like this, and so does Al.”
“Can you really blame me? Everything I’ve done the past four years has accomplished nothing!”
“You’re being so selfish Ed, can’t you see that! Do you really think Al and I feel any better about this than you do? You can‘t give up on yourself and you need to realize that you have us to help you. I worry about you when you do this and I know Al does too, and it’s not fair for you to do that to us.”
I opened the door, turning in the direction of the room I was staying in to go pack my things. Before I shut the door, I turned to Ed and said, “And you’re wrong, we have accomplished more than you think. We have a great deal more information that we had before, and that puts us that much closer to our goal.” I shut the door, leaving Ed to contemplate what I said and hopefully to consider it instead of disregarding it, as he often did when someone gave him advice or told him he was wrong.
Author's Note: The name Marie comes from Marie-Louise von Franz, a New Age alchemist who wrote about alchemy from a psychological perspective. She was born in Munich, Germany in 1915.