Fullmetal Alchemist Fan Fiction ❯ Torn Existence ❯ Avarice Reborn ( Chapter 2 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

I took a deep breath and slammed my hands to the ground.

This had to work. It had to.

My heart began to pound as the swirling yellow light began to turn dark, just as it had when I first tried it. The only thing that offered any comfort was that the light was a slightly different color; more of a dark blue than the deep purple it had been on that night.

Everything that happened afterwards was a blur. I felt a familiar, sickening tug at my right arm, followed by the unexplainable pain of it being torn from my body. I didn’t want to cry out for fear of someone hearing, but I couldn’t suppress the scream of pain that forced its way out.

The Gate was what I saw next. But it was different this time; I saw Marie there, standing in front of me. I reached for her but she disappeared. The familiar black appendages reached out for me and then withdrew with my arm in their grasp.

Gritting my teeth against the familiar pain, I opened my eyes to find myself back on the cold, stone floor of the warehouse. As a result of the alchemic reaction, smoke covered the room, hiding whatever it was I’d created. But I had hope; I had seen her. One minute she was standing there, and the next she was gone. That had to mean I’d succeeded in bringing her back, right?

Clutching the bloody stump at my right shoulder, I squinted through the swirling wisps of smoke. My heart leapt as I heard a faint whisper.

“Edward…”

I moved in the direction of the sound, and slowly a human form came into view. It was Marie.

She was curled up on the floor, naked and shivering. I pulled off my red coat and draped it over her, my happiness causing me to momentarily forget my pain.

I smiled at her as she slowly sat up, tears of joy trickling down my cheeks. I wished more than anything that I could throw my arms around her.

She looked confused, but happy. She raised a hand to caress my face, but her eyes soon moved to my right shoulder and widened with worry. “Edward! Did
you…what’s going on?”

I couldn’t stop smiling. Or crying, for that matter. “It doesn’t matter. You came back to me.”

She struggled to her feet, not used to her new body. I couldn‘t believe it. My best friend, the girl I loved, was standing right there in front of me.

She pulled me to my feet and started for the door. “Ed, we have to get you to a hospital.” She put an arm around me, but I was regrettably unable to return the gesture.

“Ed…I can’t believe you did that. After everything that happened before.” She leaned her head on my shoulder and added, “I’m so happy to see you…but I hate that you put yourself in that kind of danger.”

I kissed the top of her head. “But you waited for me.”

“Yes,” she answered, “I waited for you. I knew what you were going to do. But I had no way to stop you, I could only wait and hope I could help you make it work.” Her gaze wandered to what was left of my arm, and her eyes welled up with tears. “I’m so sorry…”

“Don’t be, I was ready for this. To tell you the truth, I think I got off easy.”

She looked me in the eyes and I thought my heart was going to explode. I still couldn’t believe I’d actually succeeded. Even in the shape I was in, I felt like the luckiest person in the world. Now I had Al and Marie back. I couldn’t have asked for anything more.

We made our way outside and started for East H.Q., which was not too far away. I kept glancing over at her and over time couldn’t help but feel like something was
wrong. She never said anything after we got outside. I had been prepared to be bombarded with questions about Al, to be asked if he was okay and what happened and if
we ever found the Stone. I asked her if she was alright, and she apologized and just told me she needed a while to get used to everything. So I shrugged it off as an after effect of the transmutation and figured she’d need a few days to recover.

Amestris was going through a lot of changes, and I was sure Marie would comment on the fact that she there were no longer military officers walking around in the blue uniforms she was accustomed to seeing. As a result of the Fuhrer’s - who turned out to be the homunculus Pride - death and the corruption that plagued the country while it was under military rule, Amestris was returning to its former state of government, in which all political decisions were now to be given to a national assembly. But she didn’t say anything, or even seem to notice.

Mustang was still around, and I thought he was going to faint when he saw Marie with me. He stared dumbly at her for a while before he finally seemed to realize I was short an arm. He knew instantly what was going on, but I was grateful that he chose to save the questions for later. He shoved me into a car after wrapping a temporary bandage around my shoulder and rushed me to the nearest hospital. Marie stayed behind with Lieutenant Hawkeye so she could get her some clothes.

The car ride was not a comfortable situation. I sat in the back as Mustang drove. He decided to scold me with the silent treatment rather than the verbal abuse I had grown accustomed to.

I finally couldn’t stand it any longer, and I broke the silence in a voice strained with pain. “Aren’t you going to tell me what an idiot I am?”

He wouldn’t turn to face me, but his voice betrayed the anger that was probably showing on his face. “You’re an arrogant, selfish fool, is what you are.”

Nothing he said could bring me down at this point. I was even able to overlook Marie’s distant behavior, confident that she would be herself again in a few days. “Maybe so, but I also happen to be the first person to ever succeed at human transmutation.”

“That aside,” he continued coldly, “did you ever stop to think what would have happened had you not succeeded? What would Al have done if something horrible happened to you? How could you take such a risk, and after experiencing the consequences firsthand?!”

I felt a pang of guilt at his words. Al was the only reason I had ever hesitated. The last thing I wanted to do was leave him, but I had decided to try it anyway. But it
was over now, so I tried to push those thoughts aside. I leaned back against the seat, wishing Marie was there with me so I didn‘t have to bear the General‘s cynicism alone. “The fact is it worked. I have Al and Marie, my best friends, back. Nothing else matters.”

I was fully unprepared for the General’s response. He was silent for a while before he finally sighed and spared me a one-eyed glance; he‘d lost his eye in his battle with Pride. He looked relieved, and a small smile tugged at the edge of his mouth. “You’re an idiot, Ed. But I’m happy for you. And I’m happy for Marie.”

Unable to think of anything to say, I just smiled dumbly at him. We continued the rest of the way in silence, but this time without the tension.

I couldn’t recall ever feeling so miserable in my life. I could barely think; my mind was as hazy as the room I was in. The agony was unexplainable; I felt like I would never again feel a moment without pain.

My breath came out in wheezes and pain shot through my body every time I tried to move. This miserable existence, it was all his fault; Edward Elric.

Someone suddenly appeared at my side. I could make out the form of a woman, and she gazed down at me as she pulled something out of her pocket. They were
small, red stones.

“Eat,” she said as she held them to my mouth.

I did as I was told, and suddenly couldn’t stop. I ate them hungrily and longed for more when I was finished.

“That’s enough for now,” the woman said. I could only see her outline in the dim light.

I must have fallen asleep after that, because I woke up in a bed in another room. Looking at my own form I saw I was actually beginning to take the shape of a
human. I was no longer the grotesque creature I had been the night I was brought back to this world.

Sitting next to the bed was a woman. I guessed it was the same one who fed me the stones. She had short, straight black hair and cold, gray-blue eyes.

She smiled coldly at me. “It’s about time you woke up, Greed.”