Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction ❯ Disaster or Destiny? ❯ Unveiling the Truth ( Chapter 8 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

We played nearly the whole trip, stopping only once to eat. Out of the twenty games we played, I won twelve and he won eight. Of course Ed, seeing the score I had written down, complained that I had claimed two of his victories for myself.

We finally reached our destination, and I groaned at the thought of having to use my crutch. Ed gave me a look of sympathy as I fumbled with it. “You gonna be alright?”

I slowly stood up and tried to mask the pain with a smile. “I really need get used to this, I’ll be using it a lot in the next week.” I started towards the exit. “I’ve been sitting too long anyway, I need to walk.”

We got a room at an inn to drop our bags off, then started towards Central Library, where Al wanted us to meet him. I hated walking this slowly. “Ed, you go on ahead if you want. I’m really slowing you down.”

He looked at me and raised an eyebrow. “And leave you walking alone, by yourself, when it’s still dark outside and you’re completely helpless?” His gaze returned to the road ahead. “I don’t think so, there’re still weirdos out.”

My eyes turned back to the road as well, and I smiled to myself. I knew he’d never make me walk by myself, but I guess it was just nice hearing him say it.

I started slipping a little too far into dreamland, and forced myself to think about more important things. “So what do you think Al wants to tell us so bad?”

Ed shrugged. “Not sure, but I hope he found something good. He probably went to the library to look up some stuff since he had to wait for the morning train.”

We finally reached the library - Ed carried me up the stone steps at seeing the look of horror on my face when I saw the hike ahead of me - and we found Al looking through some files and books. He saw us and excitedly started gathering up papers he had laying around and spread them out on a table. “It’s about time you guys got here! I can’t wait to tell you this - “ He stopped suddenly when he noticed me leaning on the crutch, and the concern in his voice made up for his inability to show it on his face. “Marie, what happened? Are you okay?”

I smiled at him. “I’m fine, thanks to your brother. Don’t worry about me, Al. You’ve got enough on your hands.” I began skimming some of the papers. “Now what’s all this about?”

Al turned anxiously to the papers spread on the table. “Brother, do you remember that break in four months ago? It happened just before Marie showed up.”

Ed looked from the papers to his brother. “Yeah, what about it?”

Al reverted his glance to me. “I think that might have something to do with you coming here.”

“What break in?” I asked.

Al started looking around the pile for something and dug an article out of the mass of papers. He handed it to me. “Read this.”

The words, Break in at Central Library stood out in bold letters on the page.

Last night there was a break in at Central library. Files and books were found scattered around, but nothing was missing. Authorities failed to capture the culprit, but a witness claims to have seen a man fleeing the scene. No detailed descriptions were given. The only lead investigators have is the odd way he broke in; the locks on every door he must have gone through were shattered into hundreds of pieces, but besides that everything else was intact.

“So what does this have to do with me?” I asked, skimming the article again.

Al sat down and advised us to do the same. “Before I get to that, let me start from the beginning.” He handed Ed another paper, and I scooted closer to him and read it over his shoulder.

Al continued when he saw both of our eyes widen at the article. “Yes, it’s confirmed. There has been a Philosopher’s Stone created in the past. The odd thing, as you might have noticed, is that the creator, the woman in the article, has the same last name as Marie.”

Ed stared incredulously at the article, then at Al. “Al - “

Al held up a hand up to silence him. “Hold on, let me tell you how I strung all this together. Now this woman was a State Alchemist. The state knew about her research on the Stone and her focus on its ability to open inter-dimensional portals. But few people, even fewer than today, knew what it took to create one. She must have been one of the first to discover the method. She’d been researching for years, when one day she just disappeared. Her husband confessed he had known that she had created a Stone, but he knew next to nothing about alchemy and even less about the Stone and what it could do.”

He glanced at both of us to make sure we were still with him, and then continued. “Now the rest is speculation, but I really don’t see how I could be wrong. I know that just because you have the same last name, Marie, that doesn’t mean you’re related. But I’m almost positive you are for other reasons. When she disappeared, all her husband could tell authorities looking into her disappearance was this, and I quote: ‘All I really know is that she said something about having to use the Stone to get her back, if she ever succeeded in opening a portal. For this reason she taught me a small amount of alchemy so that I could call her back if I needed to, since you apparently need to know alchemy to do it. But, when she disappeared, the Stone disappeared along with her, and there was nothing I could do.’”

“Anyway,” he continued, “When he was questioned about her research, he said that she kept that a secret from everyone, including him, and he had no idea how to access it.”

He took a breath and went on. “So anyway, I think he’s lying about the Stone disappearing. She was very rich, and when she disappeared he inherited her estate and all of her money, because she had no living relatives. I think he just hid the Stone somewhere so he could leave her wherever she was. The fact that he got remarried two weeks after her disappearance makes me almost positive this is the case. Most people believed he had been having an affair all along and suspected him of murder, but there was no evidence since she really had disappeared.“

“Okay, finally my point. If he’s telling the truth, which he probably did because it helped save his own skin, you need to use the Stone to call the person back, right? If this is true, she must have known that the Stone would be left behind, not disappear along with her, and after all the work she did I’m sure she knew what she was talking about.” He indicated the articles on the table. “I’m almost positive these were the files that were scattered on the night of the break in. The culprit, on finding this information, found the hidden Stone and used it. Since the Stone’s creator couldn’t be called back - she was undeniably dead by then - it called back her descendant.” He nodded toward me. “You, Marie.”

I sat there and gawked at Al and the article Ed was still holding before I finally managed to speak. “But we really don’t know…I mean like you said, it’s all speculation.”

Al stood up. “That’s why we’re going to her house. Maybe we can find her research. She probably hid it with alchemy, so we might be able to get to it.”

Ed was still staring at the article, wide-eyed. “I can’t believe this…after all we’ve done, there’s been a Stone this whole time. Why didn’t we ever find out about this?”

“These articles about her are over one hundred years old. They’ve probably been buried all this time and forgotten, or maybe hidden on purpose. In any case, the guy who broke in dug them out.”

I stood up and looked at all of the articles, most of them about the break in and my so-called ancestor’s disappearance. All the information was still sinking in, and I was having trouble believing most of it. “One thing I don’t get is, if he got a hold of the Stone, how come this thief hasn’t used it for something big? We haven’t heard about anything happening.”

Al gathered up the papers and began putting them away. “I don’t know, but I think we might be able to answer most of our questions if we can find that woman’s research.”

I was snatched out of my thoughts when Ed got up and started for the door. “Let’s get going then. How close is this house?”

“It‘s in the forest, just outside the city. Apparently it’s been empty for years.”

Ed was already half way out the door. “Good. Grab Marie, she‘s too slow.”

I glowered at him but got on Al’s back anyway, and he led the way to the house.

We finally reached an old, broken down estate that looked like it had once been a beautiful mansion. The first thing I noticed was that the lock was broken in the same way the ones at the library had been.

Ed examined the shattered pieces of wood and metal and tested the door. It opened. “This is definitely the same guy that broke into the library.” He stepped inside and motioned for us to follow. “Let’s just hope he didn’t find the research.”

The house didn’t exactly look inviting, and the steps I took inside were hesitant ones. It was completely dark, save for the small amount of light coming through the windows from the pale sun that was just beginning to rise. Everything creaked and groaned, and my imagination kept trying to tell me I was hearing noises upstairs. I moved in between Ed and Al, my eyes darting around the house nervously.

We managed to explore only about a third of the house in forty-five minutes. After another unsuccessful search in one of the many rooms, Ed turned to Al and I.

“We should split up. This place is huge and I don’t want to stick around too long if we can help it. You never know who could show up.”

I apparently failed at my attempt to mask my fear, because Ed looked at me and raised an eyebrow. “Don’t tell me you’re scared.”

“Well then don’t ask me if I am, because you won’t like the answer.”

Al came to my rescue. “It probably wouldn’t be a good idea for you to stay alone anyway. There‘s a chance the person who took the Stone could be here.” He turned to Ed. “You two look together, and continue from here. I’ll go on the other side of the house and we’ll meet in the middle, then move up to the next floor.”

He left before Ed could argue, and we were silent until we heard the clanking of his metal steps fade away.

He rolled his eyes. “Don‘t worry, I won’t let any monsters get you.”

“Shut up.”

We moved from room to room, searching in vain for anything that resembled research. I found a door in one room that looked like it led to the room next door to it. I opened it to find only a musty closet with a wooden cabinet inside. I opened the cabinet, and not seeing anything, started to close it. But a second glance told me there was something strange about the inside of it; I couldn’t see the end.

I got down on my hands and knees on the dusty floor, and poked my head inside. When I waved my arm in front of me and met only air, I decided to go in farther until I found the end, on the off chance that the owner had hidden anything in there. It couldn’t be that long, right? Unfortunately, I never found out how long it was. After about fifteen seconds of crawling through the dust and cobwebs, I heard something click, and the bottom of the cabinet, at least the part I was on, disappeared from underneath me. I screamed as I began to spiral down what I guessed was some sort of chute or slide, I couldn’t tell in the pitch blackness that surrounded me. After sliding for thirty seconds or so, I shot out of the bottom and landed on cold, damp stone.

It was so dark down there I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face. My fear of the dark wasn’t exactly helping matters, either.

Then I heard the footsteps. As if I wasn’t scared enough. They echoed through the place, so I couldn’t tell which direction they were coming from. I whipped around frantically, searching in all directions for the source. Not that it did any good, it was too dark to make anything out. The footsteps grew closer, and I sat there on the cold floor, paralyzed with fear. I wanted to call out for Ed, but I couldn’t seem to make my voice work.

When they sounded as if they couldn’t get any closer, they suddenly stopped. I thought I could hear raspy breathing, but at this point I didn’t know what was real and what my fear was causing my imagination to conjure up.

I could feel a presence around me, could feel someone, or something, watching me. I felt something touch my shoulder. I couldn’t decide if it was human or not. I whipped around and came face to face with two glowing yellow eyes. Seeing those two eyes floating in midair, completely surrounded by black, made my blood run cold. I think I screamed loud enough for the people in the next town to hear.

Whatever it was, it quickly turned and rapidly scuttled away at the sound of my scream. I heard something above me, and moved just in time to dodge something that fell from the ceiling. I continued to scream at the top of my lungs, backing away from whatever had fallen.

“Marie! Calm down, it’s me! Are you okay? What the hell happened?”

I had never been so happy to hear Ed’s voice in my life. Or anyone else’s, for that matter. I still couldn’t see a thing, but I lunged in the direction of the voice, desperate for the touch of someone familiar.

I managed to get a hold of him and held on for dear life, throwing my arms around his neck and clutching the back of his shirt. I could tell by the way he stiffened that he was more than a little surprised. I was having a hard time holding back tears.

“Don’t leave Ed I don’t want to get separated again! Please don’t leave!”

“Whoa! Who said anything about leaving?” He seemed to realize how scared I was, and put his arms around me. I suddenly forgot where I was, or maybe I just didn’t care. I rested my head on his chest and held him as tightly as I could. At that moment his voice was just about the best thing I’d ever heard in my life.

“Calm down, I’m not going to leave you. Now tell me what happened.”

I honestly don’t think I’ve ever been so scared in my life. I was scared during the whole homunculi incident, and I was scared during the assault on East headquarters, but this was a different kind of fear altogether. There was something about being completely alone in the dark, with no idea what is around you, that scared the hell out of me. Having the danger right in front of you, where you can see it and you know what’s coming, that was somehow less frightening to me.

Reluctantly I loosened my grip on Ed, but I didn’t let go of him. “There’s something down here. I don’t know what it was, but it touched my shoulder and it didn’t seem human…especially its eyes . . .”

“So that’s all you saw were its eyes?”

“Yeah.”

I looked up to where I guessed his face was, but still couldn’t see anything. The blackness was impenetrable, my eyes just wouldn’t adjust to it. My voice was still a little shaky. “I’m sorry, you probably think I‘m being stupid. But I’ll be honest with you there’s nothing that scares me more than being alone in the dark.”

“Hell no, I would’ve screamed too. There’s just something about not being able to see danger that’s a lot scarier than having it standing in front of you.”

I smiled at the his echo of my own thoughts. “Glad you understand, ‘cause I don’t think I’ve ever been that scared before.”

He stood up, pulling me up with him because of the death grip I had on his arm.

“Ed, don’t let go I’m scared.”

“Calm down, I’m not going anywhere. Now where did that thing go?”

“I don’t know, it ran when I screamed and I couldn’t really tell where because of all the echoes and the sounds you were making up above.”

“Can’t say I blame him, or her, or it. I would’ve ran too at the sound of that scream.”

“Shut up, you said yourself you would’ve done the same. Can we please just get out of here?”

“Hey, if you’ve got any ideas, feel free to lead the way ’cause I can’t see a damn thing.”

“Well if we came down, there’s got to be a way back up, right?”

“Not necessarily.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Maybe this is a dungeon or something. There’s no way to get out the way we came, so it’d be an ideal place to keep prisoners. This house is old, who knows what kind of weird stuff went on here.”

I jumped at a sound from behind us that sounded a lot like another footstep. Ed grabbed my hand and started in the opposite direction of the sound. “We’re going this way. I’m not exactly keen on the idea of a fight in the dark.”

He was moving at a fast pace that was difficult for me to keep up with because of my leg. I went as long as I could without saying anything, but the pain was finally too much to handle. “Ed, I can’t go this fast much longer.”

He stopped suddenly. “Jeez, Marie I completely forgot about your leg! Why didn’t you say something?”

“I didn’t want to slow us down. Let’s just slow it down a little, then I can keep up.”

“Don’t be stupid, you can’t run around with an injury like that. Get on my back.”

“Ed, I can walk. It’ll be the same pace as it would be if you carried me if we just take it a little slower. You’re going to hurt your back, carrying me around all the time…“

“Marie, shut up and get on.”

Too tired and scared to argue, I sighed in defeat and climbed on his back. I felt bad, making him do this again, but it was a relief to have the weight off my leg.

He started walking again, and proved me wrong when he kept up the same pace as before. “We’re bound to run into something eventually. This place can’t be that big.”

But two hours later, we both began to wonder if it ever did end. We kept our hands out to watch for turns, but other than that there was no change in our surroundings.

Ed was finally starting to slow down. I don’t know how he had managed to go as long as he did. “Ed, let’s take a break. You’ve been carrying me for over two hours.”

“Not until we find some light or a way out, whichever comes first.”

As if something had heard us and decided to be merciful, we saw light coming from around the corner. We made the turn and saw that the walls of the hallway were lined with torches. I blinked at the sudden light. As glad as I was to be out of the dark, somehow this change was not welcome.

“If these torches are lit…” I began nervously.

Ed finished for me. “Then we’re not alone.”