I'm sorry to get anyone's hopes up, but this is not a genuine update. In fact, I regret to inform you that this story will officially be discontinued. It's been so long, most of you probably figured as much by now. As to why I'm discontinuing, I just got so busy with things outside of Fanfiction. I'm currently in my last leg of college, and I'll be graduating soon. Plus, I fell out of the fandom some time ago. I still love FMA, but...these things happen. To come back to write this would be forcing myself, since I'm not as interested and it's just been too long, and I'd never want writing to be a chore.

BUT! I was messaged recently by a reader, and they suggested that I close things up with a summary. I've done this here, as you can probably see below the line. It's better to at least know what I had planned, yeah? I hope this suffices. Truthfully, it's been forever since I thought about this story, but I tried my best to remember the main plot points I intended to write about.

Lastly, I want to thank you guys. A lot of people don't know what Fanfiction is, or they don't understand it, but it has been one of the most positive things in my life. Not only did it help me through some serious bad times, but Fanfiction is literally the reason why I chose to become an English major and also why I intend to pursue a career in Editing. Writing these stories, it's given me valuable experience. Not to mention you guys! You have no idea how grateful I am to each and every one of you! You guys were the reason I kept with my writing. Your support and feedback made me realize how much writing meant to me, and how stories can change lives, even if just a bit. Because of you guys, I realized that my greatest passion is sharing my writing with others and helping others with their writing. That's why Fanfiction will always hold a place in my heart, and I hope that someday I can return to writing it. If not for this fandom, than some other. Who knows, maybe I'll work on original fiction and get published. I'd probably use the same pen name even, LeFay Strent. I think by now it'd be weird not to. Haha!

That being said, it's time to close up this chapter of my life. New horizons await us my furry friends, even if we can't go there together.

The main conflict in the story was that the worlds were converging, now that Taylor had been taken from the gate. As the story progressed, the gates would become more unstable and would have been pulling Taylor through the gate a few times in an attempt to pull her back in. The story would have gone between the worlds as Taylor and the gang tried to deal with this and other issues. The other issues would have been different for both worlds. In Amestris, Scar is on the loose and cannot be dissuaded this time, as well as the recently escaped Kimblee. Meanwhile, the uprising in Liore would be taking place. In The Blood Alchemist, the events with Cornello and Liore? That never really happened, so this is where the main building tension in Amestris would be coming from. Also, a new character, Grayson, appeared, mainly to act as a red herring, but he would also eventually get involved with the events in Liore as well as Taylor's gang. His motivations were based on his career as a journalist/biographer etc., and he wanted to be the first to document the amazing feats of the Fullmetal Alchemist, which is why he was so curious about Edward.

While Amestris had its problems, Taylor's world also had issues. Not only would Taylor have to deal with her family and friends and her sudden return, her and her friends aren't as safe there as she might think. Envy appears in order to reap revenge against Taylor and the rest. How is Envy still alive? At the end of the Blood Alchemist, Envy went into the gate, and he sorta got trapped there. After Taylor and the rest shake the gate, Envy pretty much falls out into the real world. However, how does he just find Taylor and them then? Well, due to his and Taylor's stay in the gate, Envy would have a sort of…tie to her. Almost like he can sense her. Besides that, Truth would use Envy as a pawn to bring Taylor back to the gate. Truth doesn't have Fate to use as a pawn anymore (explanations on that later), so he makes due with Envy. Envy's just concerned with his vengeance, tbh.

As Taylor and the rest are switching between worlds, matters get more complicated in Amestris. Ling shows up, just like he does in Brotherhood, with the intentions of finding immortality. He runs into Ed and them and stays for the remainder of the story. Ed and Al become more involved with Liore as everyone struggles to track down Scar and Kimblee. Scar has been rumored to have fled to Liore, so the military wants to get him. Scar ends up hatching his plan from the first anime series, the one where he turns the whole city into a transmutation circle and uses the invading soldiers as material for a philosopher's stone. He succeeds, and whether he dies while trying, it's unknown. A philosopher's stone is created, and because of Taylor's presence near there and her strange connection with the gates, and the fact that she once harbored the power of the stone in her once before, the stone is drawn to her and she absorbs it.

Now there's a big issue, because some people would kill for the stone's power. Among them are Ling, who is more determined in this story to attain the power of immortality, and also Kimblee who reappears at some point and wants the power for himself. Also, the military's kinda there too. It's a mess. A fight breaks out between all parties, and in the middle of it, Taylor's connection with the gate ensues again and the gate opens up once more to pull through everyone around Taylor, which includes Taylor, Ed, Al, LeFay, Ling, Kimblee, and perhaps some of Mustang's team and/or random soldiers. They're dumped in the real world, just in time for Envy to show up again as well. The final battle ensues, just as the gate refuses to close and the worlds converge, thus bringing all the fighters into the white limbo space between worlds. At some point during the battle, Envy kills LeFay (let's face it, I'm surprised I even lived this long), and Taylor, enraged, throws out all the power of the stone in one big burst.

Everything is enveloped in the blast and the light, and Taylor finds herself in complete darkness. In the darkness, Taylor looks around until she runs into none other than Fate. Fate reveals to her how he came to be, and why Truth's game started in the first place. Fate used to be human, in Amestris. He was LeFay's brother's double for that world (as to why this is, it's mostly a coincidence, but there are some theories about how the worlds are connected, how the people we've met in one world, we see their likeness in another. And who knows, Taylor might have ran into other familiar faces at some point too, perhaps her own sister? Eh, Idk). Anyway, Fate tells Taylor how he was an alchemist and made the mistake of attempting human transmutation to bring his dead wife back to life. Fate found himself in Truth's domain of course, and this is when Truth began his game.

See, this is where my theory for how the gates and Truth came to be comes in, at least in context for this story. Truth wasn't originally the gate keeper or God between worlds or whatever. He's powerful, but he's really just a parasite. He came in and took the space over. If there was a true gate keeper before him, he took them out and took on their power and played puppet master for these two connected worlds. But he lacks the power to stabilize the balance forever, and must rectify this. In order to do this, he needs two souls from each world to willingly give themselves up to their respective gates. He makes a deal with Fate to help Truth out in this matter, and Fate blindly takes it at the promise of his wife returning to life. But Truth can't let the gate absorb Fate yet, since that would destabilize the gates much faster. So he gives Fate the power to bring in candidates from the real world, and as Fate continuously does this, and each of them fail to become a willing sacrifice, Fate loses his humanity over time. When Taylor was absorbed by her gate, Fate went into his as well, and the balance was restored. But LeFay messed that up and upset the balance on a major scale by taking Taylor out. Whoops.

Now Taylor is left with scarcely any options. First, she must destroy Fate, once and for all. But that will not be enough. She must destroy Truth, Truth who has been weakened exponentially by the destabilization, and return the connection to what it was before Truth ruined the space. Taylor does what she needs to, first destroying Fate and then Truth. How she does this, I'm not completely sure, but I assumed she used alchemy to basically explode them or something. After she destroys them, the space is reset. The worlds return to their previous distance, and the white limbo fades to a beautiful garden place, essentially a Garden of Eden where souls can peacefully travel through as they move in their cycles. Once this is done, Taylor is reunited with her friends and they're able to go back to Amestris.

I did originally have ideas for a triology, but thinking on it, the ideas for a third story seems excessive and cliché. I thought to bring LeFay back in Amestris as a homunculus, because an alchemist tried human transmutation to bring her double back to life, but she shows up instead as the homunculus. And then something about Envy surviving yet again and he made it back to Amestris as well, and he, along with LeFay's homunculus, were going to have dastardly plans, probably create some more homunculi (which there was the idea to make Hawkeye's homunculus, where Envy would manipulate an alchemist somehow to try to resurrect Hawkeye, because Envy still wants revenge and he knows this would emotionally affect the protagonists). Also, as that's going on, Amestris would be dealing with a looming war against Drachma. Eh, I can't remember much other than that.

Dedicated to my dear friend, Taylor, and all my wonderful readers. Thank you for giving me purpose and showing me that dreams are worth something.