Circulus, Perfecta

DISCLAIMER: I own nothing. Credits belong to the Dowdle Brothers and Hiromu Arakawa.

"-But when the small part, in this case, me, dies; the body remains. Water. Carbon. Ammonia. Lime. Phosphorus. Salt. Saltpeter. Sulfur. Magnesium, fluorine, iron and aluminum. The body's only a combination of those simple elements, nothing more. We're destined to be decomposed by bacteria and become nutrients for plants. Then you follow the process further...Those plants nourish herbivores, and those herbivores nourish carnivores. Even others like us. And though we lose awareness, our lives keep moving through the system. The great flow that contains the universe! Call it the cycle of life. The course of nature. Each of us is just a small part of that current. One in the all. Yet without all the individual ones, the all can't exist. This world flows by even grander laws we can't even imagine. To recognize that flow, and work within it, to decompose and then create; that, is alchemy."

JUNE 14, 1940

PARIS, FRANCE

Big Brother, Age 35

Little Brother, Age 34

"Paris was on fire in hours. When they came, at first I thought it was thunder in the distance. Lightning travels at around 18,000 miles per hour, easily breaking the sound barrier. The thing with explosions aren't the sound, but the shockwave. I remembered that fateful day where the rain felt perpetual. The day I lost my arm and leg. The day Alphonse lost his body. The day we tried to bring back Mom..."

"Al, get away from the window. You're making me nervous." Edward spoke to his younger brother.

"Somehow I knew that it'd come to this, brother. An entire world at war." Alphonse said silently, with grief.

"We've always been at war, Al. Since we were kids. This is just another obstacle to overcome." Edward retorted with grim indifference.

Hitler and his Nazi army breached France's border and had just entered Paris. The brothers Elric decisively decided to retreat to their subterranean laboratory across town.

"Let's head to the lab. It's safest there, underground. We can take a shortcut through Jean Pierre's cafe." Ed advised him.

"Right."

Jean Pierre was a friend of the brothers and owner of the Hepcat Cafe. A small restaurant where Ed and Al often ate, considering it was only a half mile walk away from their Paris safehouse apartment. Warning sirens began to play as they made their way to street level, the Nazi Luftwaffe shrouding the sky.

"Do you think the French have mobilized ground forces? You would've thought we'd see troops by now." Al shouted over the not-too distant explosions.

"For our sake, I hope they have. Did you bring that pistol Tokarev gave you?" Edward asked, as he was a critical quick thinker and a better shot than Al. Ed kept the gold plated Ruger in a holster concealed in his trench coat.

"I doubt we'll ever be allowed back in the Soviet Union after the last time, brother..." Al reminisced with a chuckle about he and Edward's trip to study shocked quartz near Tunguska, which ended abruptly after Ed got into a literal military ballroom brawl. The Parisian streets were now practically empty as they reached the Hepcat cafe.

"Jean Pierre, open up!" Edward knocked, but the door popped open after only two hits.

"I don't like the looks of this..." Al spoke as he drew his gun.

"Suspicious, no?"

A woman, not much older than twenty eight years of age, approached the brothers from out of the shadows while holding their friend with a gun to his back. Both aim their firearms in her direction.

"Whoever you are, let him go! Now!"

"Nice to zee you, Ed. Al, how are you?" Jean Pierre gently uttered, with nervousness written all over him.

"Easy, mon cher. Don't be hasty." the lady warned in the politest manner. "We've been watching you both for sometime."

"That's not creepy at all." Alphonse sarcastically joked. "And who is we?"

"My name iz Commander Alyssandra Marlowe, former archaeologist, now squad leader. 'Zese men are under my command. We are 'ze French underground resistance and you both are 'ze foremost alchemical experts of the world. I need your help, professors."

"We haven't taught in years, it's just Dr. Edward and Alphonse Elric. Are you going to let our friend go now?" Ed replied in a most serious tone.

"I will, but first, let me explain why we are here. You are aware of 'ze Catacombs, no?"

"Of course. The world's largest tomb, home to the bones of over six million people." Ed declared. She threw him a map of Paris with the Catacombs' vicinity circled in red ink.

"See anyzing familiar, mon cher?"

Ed and Al's eyes lit up in shock and borderline horror as they realized what they were looking at.

"No..."

"Th- this is a Grand Arcanum transmutation circle! But why?!" Al questioned with exclaim.

"You know as well as I do, Doctor Elric; I've read your books. You're not 'ze only ones who have studied alchemy. A transmutation circle underground surrounded by bodies iz not a coincidence, and my research continues to support 'zat theory."

"And what exactly are you expecting to find down there, Commander?" asked Ed, pain and frustration in his eyes. Something deep in his mind already gave him the answer.

"Why, what has any student of alchemy wanted to obtain? 'Ze Philosopher's Stone, bien sur."

But to obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is Equivalent Exchange, the first law of alchemy.

END OF PART ONE