Hey guys, new story. Yay.

I mention this in the summary, but this takes place pretty much at the end of FMA:Brotherhood/the FMA manga as an alternate ending to what actually happens. If you haven't watched/read it already, obvious spoilers ahead.

The air was charged with a strange energy. Many events had led to this climax but even after the final blow was dealt, felling the creature who claimed to have harnessed god's powers for itself, conflicting emotions ran rampant. Nobody knew whether to cheer or cry. The young man who stood in the center of the clearing could barely register what had just happened.

On one hand, the threat was gone and humanity was saved but many lives were taken as the cost for victory. The young man morbidly noted that this small war seemed to follow the laws of equivalent exchange, just like the alchemy that had been used to end it.

He looked down at his feet to see a broken suit of armour that once housed the soul of his little brother. Alphonse had exchanged his soul so Edward could get his arm back once again. Edward was now in a frantic state of mind, thinking of all the possible ways to try and bring his brother back.

He promised Alphonse that he would never use a human soul to restore either of their bodies so the only option was to use something else. But there was nothing in the world that could be equivalent to a human life. Edward racked his brains to try and think of something that he could use.

With a spark of inspiration, he realized something that the world might consider to be even greater than a single human soul.

"May, back up," he said to the tear-stained girl who lay hunched over his brother's old body. Picking up a stick off the ground, he started to carefully draw a pattern in the dirt. He cringed a bit at the pattern on the ground, but continued with determination. Hopefully this would be the last human transmutation circle he would ever see.

Despite the shock on his friends' faces, he stood in the center of the circle and clapped his hands together. "I'll be right back," he said. He hoped that his expression was much more confident than he felt. "Here comes the Fullmetal Alchemist's final transmutation." He slammed his hands against the ground and felt the disturbingly familiar feeling of being deconstructed. He felt his body disappearing from the world and his consciousness slipping away with it.

When he opened his eyes, he saw nothing but a white silhouette of himself, sitting casually in front of a large door. "Come for your brother, eh?" The thing, "Truth" as it called itself, never seemed to talk. Edward only felt its words resonate inside him. "How do you plan to extract a human being? How will you pay? Will you offer me your entire being?"

Edward ignored its suggestion and walked past it as casually as he could. As he walked up to the door that seemed to hold all the secrets of the world, he felt his confidence gradually increase. The only thing that would be equal to a soul would be the laws of the entire world itself.

"All is one, one is all," he thought to himself.

"I've got your payment right here," Edward said, not even bothering to confirm his suspicions. "It's really big, though."

A moment of silence passed before anything happened. "The gate of truth lies within every human being. Thus, it is also the potential of those human beings to use alchemy." Edward heard the words echo through his mind. The words were mostly emotionless, but he thought he could sense a bit of surprise in them. "Will you sacrifice the power to use alchemy and simply become an ordinary human being?"

"I've always been an ordinary human. Just a little man who couldn't even save one poor girl they turned into a chimera. Someone who caught a glimpse of the 'Truth' and started over-relying on its gift only to fail again and again… It's all been one long dance."

"Are you sure you're alright with losing this?"

Edward turned around to catch a glimpse of Truth's featureless face. "I don't need alchemy as long as I've got my friends."

As Truth gave him a wide grin, Edward turned back around to face the Gate and mentally prepared himself to pay the largest toll that alchemy had to offer but Truth's next words shocked him.

"I sincerely hope that's the right answer, alchemist," he heard. It took him a second to register what it had just said. He turned around to see Truth giving him a wide grin and an uncharacteristic shrug.

"What- what do you mean by that?" Edward asked uncertainly. He never imagined that the being known as Truth wouldn't know the truth to something, but here it was. Truth only shook it's head.

"You of all people should know that there isn't only one Truth," it told him, pointing up towards the sky. Edward followed the direction it was pointing and his eyes widened in shock. It was another gate. "I am just one of many. You just live in a world that follows my word."

A few seconds passed before Edward regained his senses. Shaking his head, he steeled his mind and turned to face Truth. "What does that mean for me?"

"It means that I don't know how to transmute myself. You were the only human to ever try."

"So is that it? Is this the end?" Edward asked, clenching his fists together until his knuckles turned white.

"No," it replied, giving Edward a spark of hope. "Probably," it continued, giving a small chuckle.

"I don't know how to transmute myself, but that doesn't mean that nobody knows how," it said as it pointed to the sky once again. "Go to another world and learn how their truth works. Maybe they'll have an idea on how to trade me off for your little brother. Simple right?" Looking between Truth and the gate it was pointing to, Edward grimaced but nodded his head.

"Of course," he said grimly. "I'll be back before you know it."

The door above him opened up and Edward saw darkness within, but it was unfamiliar to him. Somehow it seemed to be different from the door of Truth that he was so used to, but that wasn't going to stop him.

As a group of shadowy tendrils extended down to claim him, he turned to his world's Truth. "Got any tips for me?" he asked.

Truth never dropped its smile. "The other world follows an entirely set of rules. You'll be a foreign object, so be careful about what might happen over there. Will you be eliminated by the world itself? Will you still subscribe to your world's Truth? Will your body assimilate to the laws of the new world? Who knows? It's been a while since I've been so clueless." It shook its head though it was still grinning. "Whatever the case, have fun. Hopefully you'll see me again soon."

Edward nodded as he felt the new Gate of Truth pull him towards itself.

"Also, don't worry about time," Truth said with a final set of parting words. "These are two completely different worlds. Just focus on learning all that you can. After all, I'm pretty curious about how this new world works too."

Then everything seemed to explode.

Whenever he entered the Gate, which was much more often than he had liked, he felt as if the entirety of his body was systematically being deconstructed. It was a painful and unnerving process whenever he felt his body simply leaving him. This Gate was different in that he wasn't being deconstructed but instead, he felt his body being overloaded with a large amount of energy. At least with his Gate, you couldn't feel the pain in an arm you didn't have. With this Gate, he had no such solace.

But it was over in an instant.

He opened his eyes to find he was lying down on his back. The ground was surprisingly soft and he could feel a light breeze tickling his face. His vision was blurry, but he could see a lot of red around him, illuminated by a soft light above.

After moving around a bit, he confirmed that he was still completely there, though he still wasn't all too used to having both of him arms being made of flesh. Moving around, he heard a soft crunching sound and after picking a small object off the ground and holding it close to his face, he confirmed that it was a bright red leaf.

"Nothing too strange yet," he commented to no one in particular as he got up slowly. He leaned on a tree before rubbing his eyes. His vision was still slightly blurry, but it was getting better now. Edward was pleased to learn that it was only temporary.

A moment passed before Edward could finally gather his bearings, and he straightened himself up. "Well, I guess there's no time like the present," he said as he patted down his clothes, or at least what was left of them after the intense battle with the Homunculus. "I hope this world has people in it other than me," he mumbled to himself.

Though he gave out a big sigh, he decided to be grateful that he was alive in the first place, and that he had the opportunity to finally revive his little brother's body, even though it involved travelling so far into the unknown. He was grateful that the Gate hadn't decided to kill him, and he was grateful that he wasn't killed as soon as he fell into this new world. As peaceful and empty the forest seemed, he had no way of knowing exactly how much danger it held. Fortunately him being alive meant that he probably wasn't in any immediate danger.

It was also nice how he could actually see, despite it being night time. He had the bright moon to thank for that.

Despite the fact that he had literally punched a god to death mere minutes before, he was surprised to find his eyes widening after looking up to acknowledge the current source of his light.

"I guess that settles it. I'm not in Amestris anymore."

The broken moon continued to shine its light down.

So this chapter was pretty short, but that's pretty much because I wanted to provide a short explanation and reason as to why Edward is in the RWBY universe in the first place. I could've made the chapter a bit longer I guess, but what's done is done.

If you enjoy this, thanks for enjoying.