DISCLAIMER: I do not own FMA, or any other related series.

WARNING: MENTIONS OF GORE AND DEATH

(-Ed-)

It was a throbbing ache in the back of his skull and the sound of humming machinery that awoke Edward up from his slumber.

It took only a few seconds for him to realize three things. First; He was tied to a chair. Second; Cold ebbed at his limbs and bit his skin. Third; His automail arm was gone.

He groaned, nerves aflame and burning. It took him nearly a minute to open his eyes, a sharp pain shooting through them every time he tried. His sight was spotted with white dots, and he could hardly see what was in front of him.

When his mind finally caught up to him and what he had been doing before complete darkness had taken over, he croaked out, "Madison?!" in distress, scrambling up in the chair. The yell of concern got caught in his throat when he sighted the woman standing only five feet before him, humming a sickeningly sweet tune as she held the cleaver against the swirling stone, the edge gleaming in the light.

"Ah, I see our little alchemist is awake," the woman sung when she heard Edward's shout, twirling around to face him. Her grin was a sickening, malicious and bone-chilling one, and Edward couldn't help but try to back up in his chair. "Word is around town that the two of you can transmute without a circle." Holding up Edward's automail, she grinned sadistically as Ed grit his teeth. "So I had to take a few... precautions."

It was the woman's gaze to her side that alerted Edward to Madison's predicament, strung up awkwardly by both of her wrists with the only thing keeping her up being the small box under her feet. She had to stand on her toes to not strain her arms, but it didn't ease her pain in the least. Her face was stained by the tears she had shed for who knows how long, making her scarlet hair stick to her cheeks. Face blotchy and red, her eyes never left the woman as a gag obscured her whimpers.

"Oh, where are my manner's? Let me introduce myself." The woman chuckled, reaching a hand up to her hair and tugging down. Edward gasped in astonishment to realize her hair was actually a wig, and she was actually a he. "My name is Barry," he sung, holding his arms out, "and this is my butcher shop."

"You're a man?" Edward growled out, gritting his teeth.

"Guilty as charged!" Barry snickered, walking towards Madison. The red-head whimpered, tugging on the chains in a pathetic attempt to escape the man's path. Flinching, she leaned away from him when his arm wrapped around her shoulders, pulling her close.

"Get away from her!" Edward shouted, fury leaking through his veins as he struggled around the chains around him, preventing him from doing anything and only watching as Madison struggled against Barry's hold.

Barry ignored the plea, however, stroking Madison's hair and grinning at her muffled screams from the gag. "You see, this little pest," he hissed, hand tugging painfully at her hair and causing more screams, "had stopped me from having my desired kill today." Edward blearily realized he must have been talking about Winry. Unaware to Ed's thoughts Barry leaned ever so close towards Madison, breath warming up the skin of her face. She tried to lean away, struggling and only resulting to cause pain to shoot up her arms. As she whimpered pathetically, Barry continued, "So you're going to sit back and watch as I take my sweet, sweet time cutting her into little. Tiny. Pieces."

"You sick bastard!" Screaming wasn't helping Edward. Not when he was bound and utterly useless. He couldn't do much except stall Barry until help hopefully arrived. "Why have you been doing this? Killing all those woman?" he inquired, hoping that it would preoccupy the man to give them a few more minutes to spare.

The question seemed to throw Barry off, as he hesitated to think about it. "Why? Hmm, curious question." Laughing, he let go of Madison, to both of their utter relief. "I... suppose it began when I was in an argument with my wife. She just nagged and nagged and nagged!" Edward flinched when Barry swung his knife down of the table harshly, resulting in a loud thud. "Without meaning to I, well chopped her to pieces. But after that I wanted more. I wanted to slice more nagging woman up. Wanting to watch their skin tear under my knife. Wanted the world to watch."

Scoffing, Edward huffed, "Why would you kill someone for such a ridiculous reason?!"

"Why? Why?!" Barry whirled around, freezing Edward in place when he caught the gleeful glint in his eyes. "Because I can! Because I love seeing people reduced to their basic decency, because I love knowing that I was the one in control, that I could take someone out of this world and no one could stop me!" With each word Barry strides closer, eyes piercing through him. Ed instinctively tried to scoot backwards but it was useless. He couldn't fight, he couldn't defend himself, he couldn't do anything.

"Stay back!" The demand was out of his lips before he could register it, and as soon as it was uttered Edward was bewildered by the pathetic whine that he had spoke.

Barry halted before him, so close Edward could nearly taste the blood-lust teaming off him in waves. "People kill others every day. Men claim to have morals but when the situation calls for it they kill in the most brutal fashion. Why do you think that is?"

"How should I know?" Edward tried to snap back, but even he could heard the shakiness in his voice.

In a second, the knife sliced through his shoulder.

The pain didn't register at first, until a searing streak of lightning shot through his shoulder. He groaned, biting down on his teeth to hide how agonizing it was. He shook, the reality of the situation finally taking over. He might die.

No. No. He couldn't. He had a mission, dammit! He had to make up to Alphonse, he had to right his wrongs of what he had done. He couldn't die here!

"Course, most men always have that need, that call to kill," Barry continued, leaning down to look Edward directly into his eyes, unaware of the screw scratching against the chains. "But their society prevents them from doing so. Their own cowardice doesn't allow them to appease their primal instinct. Unlike State Alchemists," Barry snickered, patting Edward's head. "I once witnessed an entire town slaughtered, imagine that! Back then I didn't realize why that fountain of blood called to me!"

Mom. Dying. Hunger. Hope. Light. Blood. White. Groaning. Monster, not right, not human, it's wrong, he did this.

"You're wrong!"

Barry shouted in alarm and stumbled backward, blocking his eyes from the harsh light of the rocky transmutation. He recovered far more quickly than Edward had anticipated, and his harsh angry eyes glared at him. Edward shouting in alarm, diving to the side mere moments before Barry's knife came whizzing down to where Edward had been moments before. Whipping his head around, he kicked his leg to grab the pole he transmuted the chain into, eyes widening when Barry turned to him. He stuck his automail leg up, halting Barry's knife before he was able to hit Ed.

"Emf!" Madison's muffled scream tore through the air, and it distracted Barry long enough for Edward to scramble up and run away.

The warehouse was large and like a labyrinth. Edward tore through it, bumping into large meat carcasses and pushing through them. Barry's joyful singing of, "Edward~ Where are you?~" followed him like a shadow, but he ignored it. His torn shoe tripped him up, though, and he fell to the floor with a shout. He huffed, whirling around, only to see Barry standing before him. Edward scrambled backward, trying to get away from Barry and his chilling grin, only to bump into the wall. Blindly in a panic, he swung his transmuted spear back in forth. It seemed Barry hadn't expected it, since the spear tore through the flesh of his hand, causing him to stumble back in pain. Edward wasted no time jumping up and running away.

Madison's muffled screams and shouts tore through him. He couldn't leave her alone, he had to get her out of here, they both had to get out of here and away, where it was safe. God, he had taken everything he had for granted. He missed his house, his home, his mom. He missed Alphonse.

He followed the light of where they had been before, and it was an absolute relief to see Madison still waiting. He ran up, reaching his lone hand to release her gag before working on releasing her arms from the chains. However, it was about as difficult as one would suspect. "C'mon, c'mon, c'mon," he hissed, succeeding on only one of them.

"Ed!" Madison shouted in alarm. He took it as a hint to dive to the side, which was smart since Barry missed him by mere inches. He knocked over the table, and he scrambled backwards, only to see his automail glinting in the light.

He snatched it before he fell backwards again onto the ground, looking up into Barry's furious eyes. Edward was frozen in fear, his limbs locked into place and refusing to listen to reason, all thoughts gone except for one thing; his looming death.

Madison was like a saving grace. She must have deconstructed the other chain in the time Barry had cornered him and leaped up onto Barry's back with a shout. He hissed in alarm, tugging at her arms and swinging around his knife wildly in his haste to wrestle her small body off him, but she held on tight and refusing to let go. Ed watched as they struggled, before glancing down at the automail in his hands, gulping down the fear of what he was about to do. Had to do.

With a large inhale, he plunged his automail into the port connecting to his nerves.

An agonizing scream tore through his throat, nerves shooting aflame as the machine connected to his port. The fear of the situation fled his mind when the only thing that replaced it was pain as he whimpered pathetically. It was quick, dodgy process and not at all in a professional environment, but it had to be done.

Blearily through the agonizing pain, he lifted his head and watched as Barry finally tousled Madison to the ground. She wheezed in pain from the harsh landing, before snapping her head up to the grinning Barry to meet his eyes before he plunged the blade down. Edward watched, uselessly, as the knife slid through her abdomen. She choked, looking down at the blade that was intruding her body through hazy eyes, as if she didn't quite understand why it was there or why it hurt as much as it did.

Her own scream echoed through the warehouse, as agonizing and painful as his had been. Barry slid the knife out, snickering like the mad-man he was when she tumbled to the ground in a heap, curling in on herself as she shivered and whimpered painfully. Concern and worry, but most of all fear overwhelmed Ed as he gazed at the prone form of Madison. She naturally was a pale person, perhaps from staying indoors for too long, but this was unnaturally pale. Her skin was grey, ashen, the blood drained from her face as a large puddle slowly grew under her instead. If he couldn't see her chest barely rising and falling, he would have thought that she was dead.

Barry continued chuckling, and from the corner of his eye, Ed saw the way Barry grinned gleefully at Madison's prone form, the way his knife gleamed in the dull light. He wanted to tear Madison apart, wanted to chop her into pieces.

He couldn't let that happen.

Grunting, he clumsily clapped his hands and extended his automail into a blunt blade. There wasn't much thought to what he was doing, just an idea in his head. All he knew was that even though he was upset with her, beyond frustrated that she hadn't trusted him, he didn't want her to die. He didn't want Barry to kill her, he didn't want her gone. So when Barry raises his cleaver to slice her skin, Edward rushes forward and protects her body with her own. The cleaver strikes his automail, and even though Edward had stopped Barry's attack on Madison, the man doesn't halt his advances. Blow after blow after blow strikes his arms, small cuts slowly raining upon his skin. He barely notices them, adrenaline running through his veins as panic screams through his head. He doesn't want to die, he doesn't want to die.

His elbow connects with Barry's knee, causing the man to topple over and the cleaver to skitter away from his hands. Edward doesn't even hesitate, doesn't think about his next action beyond, 'I can't die, I won't die,' as his blade descends upon Barry.

"Don't!"

Ed doesn't recognize the voice, doesn't even stop to think about the fact that Barry was in front of him. All he registered was that there was a hand on his shoulder, someone was behind him and he was going to die, he didn't want to die!

The clang of metal against metal struck the air. Edward blinks for a few seconds, having to take a second to realize this wasn't Barry. Glancing up, he takes in the emotionless face of armor that had been his companion for two years. Heart rising up into his throat, he chokes out a pathetic whisper of, "Al?"

"It'll take more than that to kill me, brother," Al gently breathes, placing a hand on his shoulder. Ed can only let out a sob, and he can't even hold back the tears making their way down his cheeks, nor the way he begins to curl in on himself. "Are you hurt?"

"I-uh..." Ed licks his lips, swallowing the lump that forms in his throat. "A little, and Madison..." Al glances to the body that Ed has yet to move away from. A small gasp leaves him, and he turns to a soldier (where had he come from? Edward didn't even notice) before asking for a medic. His hands are shaking, barely registering when someone takes Barry away. "I thought he was going to kill me," Ed lets out a hysterical sob, something between a laugh and a cry. "I thought we were going to die. I thought I was going to die here."

"I know, brother," Al whispers. "I know."

(-Madison-)

It takes awhile for me to actually wake up. Bits flicker in every now and again between the darkness, with nurses and doctors coming in to poke and prod at me. Its similar to those old film reels, where the movie would play but a lot of the images were obscured by a black screen. Most of it is all blurry, and I'm out of it again until the next time I'm awoken.

I'm not even sure how much time has passed before I wake up, still a little weary, but mostly coherent. The room I awake to is small, only the bed I lay in, a small table to the side of it and a few chairs placed against the wall. I have to blink a few times, my sense of time all out of whack before deciding it must be early morning or late at night from the nonexistent light coming from the window.

My limbs feel heavy, and it takes some time to move my fingers even a bit. I'm frustrated by the time I can move my hand, and even then it takes a bit. A scoff escapes my lips as I lean back against the pillows, thinking of what Ed would say to my weakness right now.

A sudden rush of images fill my head, forcing a gasp from me as I'm hit with the wave. Heart pounding faster and faster, adrenaline filling my veins as I recall the events, the reason why I'm in this room. My hands are pushing down my blanket without my control, pushing away the fabric of my hospital nightgown before I can even register why.

Breath catching in my throat, I stare at the rugged flesh there, with the cris-cross of stitches. There's a sob that wants to be let out, but I swallow it down and roughly pull the blankets back up. Tears sting at my eyes and threaten to fall down my cheeks, but I blink them away.

'Don't think about it,' I say to myself. 'You're gone. He's gone. You aren't going to die.' Yet even with those thoughts running through my head, my heart refuses to stop pounding. The hairs on my arms are standing up, as if I expect Barry to come tearing down the door to kill me, even as I keep telling myself that he won't.

It feels like hours, or perhaps minutes pass when someone finally enters the room. I have to keep myself from jumping or for a scream to tear from my throat, because its obvious this is a doctor only trying to help. She's holding a clipboard, and she startles when she see's me. "Oh!" She smiles, pushing back her glasses. "You're awake." I only nod, not really in the mood to reply to her. My throat hurts from lack of use and screaming back in the butcher shop. Thankfully, the doctor notices and pops out of the room quickly only to return with a glass of water which I gulp down greedily. "How are you feeling?" she asks.

"Like I got stabbed," I reply dryly, watching her lips quirk up.

"Do you mind if I take a look at your stitches?" I shake my head which encourages her to push back my nightgown (thank god they gave me pants), and try not to be too embarrassed as she inspects my stomach. She pokes and prods at the healing patch of skin, muttering quick apologies when I hiss in pain. It feels like an eternity of her looking at my stab wound, and I amuse myself by imagining my friend's faces when I tell them about it when she finally finishes. She leans back and I smooth back the nightgown as she smiles at me. "Well, good news, your injury is healing quickly without any complications."

"The bad news?" I ask. A raised eyebrow is what I'm greeted with, so I continue, "You made it sound like there's bad news."

Chuckling, she shakes her head, "Nothing life threatening, I assure you. However, since you're healing nicely, that means your insistent visitors can come visit you now."

"Visitors?" I couldn't think of anyone who would want to visit me, 'cause anyone who would was either dead or upset with me.

The Doctor taps her lips, a thinking expression on her face. "I believe its a pair of brothers? A blond and one of them strangely in a suit of armor." She ignores my gaping mouth and begins to exit the room with the promise of returning with them. I try not to begin hyperventilating, but its hard with the threat of Edward tearing at my throat when he see's me. I remember when Ed had first appeared, when I had convinced myself I would never see the light of the sun ever again. He had said the words, 'I trust you.' Had that been a fluke? Did he actually trust me, or was he merely there because he didn't want my death over his conscience? After all, he was put into that situation in the first place because of me.

Still, nothing prepares me for when they actually enter the room. God, its like I'm back on the train again, except this time instead of being overwhelmed in awe I'm hit with how totally screwed I am. Edward looks fine, despite a few cuts on his cheek that were pretty much healed over, a roll of gauze wrapped around one shoulder and bags under his eyes. I try to avoid looking at him and to focus on Al, who was the least aggressive of the two towards me.

There's a few moments of awkward silence, before Al breaks the tense atmosphere with an awkward, "How are you feeling?"

I shrug, wincing when it bothers my wound. "As good as I can be with a stab wound, I suppose." Al chuckles softly, but doesn't continue other than that. Shifting nervously, I wait for the bomb to drop, for the screaming and yelling to star; but it doesn't. Finally, I can't take it anymore as I huff, "So, what are you waiting for? Scream at me. Do whatever angry people do, say you'll curse my bloodline or something."

Edward raises an eyebrow. "Why would I be mad at someone who I literally went toe to toe with a serial killer for?" His comment causes an embarrassed flush to cross my cheeks, but most of all I'm only bewildered.

"Well, you didn't seem to think that the other day," I mutter, leaning up against the pillows.

Ed sighs, turning to Al who was only watching our exchange silently. "I... convinced Ed to listen to you," Al finally says. I turn my head to him as he shrugs. "Look, Madison. You were our friend, and we want to trust you, but..."

"You need to trust us, first," Ed grunts out, looking tired yet sad.

I want to tell them. Gods do I want to tell them. "Look, its-" I groan, tugging at my hair. "Its not that simple."

"Then make it simple for us to understand, Madison." I turn my stinging eyes to Edward, who has that determined yet soft look on his face. "You just have to tell us what happened." I shake my head.

This is exactly what I told myself I wouldn't do. I wouldn't make things complicated, I wouldn't cause any problems or change things, but... I wanted to go home. I wanted to see my mom again, my sister, my best friend. I was just Madison. I wasn't special, I couldn't do extraordinary things. Hell, I just got stabbed by a serial killer. Who was I kidding? I had no way of getting home by myself. I don't even think there was a way to get home without the philosopher's stone, which, wouldn't you know it, was the same exact thing they were searching for. I needed the brothers help to get home, and I couldn't do that without them trusting me.

"I was in a hospital like this before. When I was young." The two brothers look at me, Edward incredulously and, well... I couldn't really tell what Al was thinking. "I was maybe 6? I had a pneumonia, not that I knew what it was at the time. All I knew was that my mom was terrified and that I had trouble breathing without a mask. I didn't really know why she looked so heartbroken." I took a deep breath, closing my eyes. "I lied about not remembering where I'm from. I remember everything about my home, my family, my friends."

Al hums. "Why did you lie?"

I sigh. "Because... I knew you wouldn't believe me. Or something like that." I scoff. "Its kind of hard to even say it now because I know its gunna sound dumb." Fiddling nervously with my hair, I avoid their gaze. "You know the gate, right?"

"How do you-"

"I'm from the other side."

Its strange. I spent an entire year trying to hold back these words, yet they escaped from my lips with ease. It was like an entire weight had been lifted from my shoulders as I uttered them, and my tense shoulders seemed to loosen. Still, I refused to look at either of the brothers. Who was to say they would only look at me with disgust or disbelief? Would they even believe what I'm telling them? I would understand why, of course.

The sound of scraping wood entered my ears, and I turned to watch as Ed dragged a chair to the side of the bed. Sitting down, he stared at me with those intense eyes of his as he asked, "What do you mean?"

Biting my lip, I continued. "Okay, well, uh... I don't actually live here? I never have. I was born on a planet called Earth." I chuckled. "That kind of made me sound like an alien." Ed didn't look amused with my answer, so I shook my head as I said, "Okay- so I was never born in Amestris, or anywhere that you can travel to. I was at home when this giant eye opened up on my floor." It sucked reliving the memories, but since the Edward had a look of recognition I supposed it was helping him. "It dragged me in and what do you know? There's this blank figure looking at me. I was sure that I was dreaming, but then it told me I was gunna go to Amestris, I was dragged into the gate and I woke up on that train."

"You looked kinda off when we first met you," Al muttered quietly, and I nodded back at him.

"So you never lost any memories," Ed added in. I looked nervously at him, which caused him to narrow his eyes. "Or did you? When we found Nina's dead body," I tried not to flinch too much, "you said you should have remembered."

"About that," I sung, wringing my hands, "I didn't exactly lie about loosing memories. Just, not the memories you think I lost." Ed raised an eyebrow at me, slowly loosing his patience. Breathing out a sigh, I continued, "Okay, okay. This is gunna sound even more crazy but uh... I kind of know most of your lives? Its a story on my side that I've read," I rushed out meekly, quickly closing my eyes so I didn't have to gauge their reactions.

There was a silence, until Ed quietly said, "Can you repeat that...?"

"There's a story on my side of the gate called 'Fullmetal Alchemist', that I once read and thus caused me to know about your lives." I opened my eyes to turn to Edward sullenly, ignoring his bewildered look. "That's why I should have remembered Nina."

"... Then why didn't you?"

I faced Alphonse, and though I couldn't see his expression I felt my heart clench. "My toll for passing through the gate was my memories. Truth took them of future events. That's why I couldn't remember Nina in time to save her." Tears prickled my eyes, and I tightly blinked to hold them back. "Trust me, if I had remembered I would have done everything in my power to save her."

"So that's why you knew we did human transmutation, why Al is empty inside," Ed spoke, as if he finally understood some complex equation.

"That's why I was kidnapped and got stabbed," I said, gently prodding at my stomach. "I remembered that Winry was supposed to be kidnapped just in time to save her and take her place."

A harsh sound of a chair squeaking back hit me as Edward stood up. I looked up at him to be faced with his angry face. I only had enough time to briefly think, 'What did I do this time?' before he was screaming, "Wait a second, you let yourself be kidnapped?!"

"I didn't really have many options, Ed," I said, and when he went to open his mouth to rebut, I continued, "She only had like, five seconds, and I couldn't really find anyone in the area. Would you rather have someone who could decently fight back and nothing to lose, or your childhood friend with family waiting for her?"

I didn't mean to make it sound as bitter as it came out, but what's done was done. To be fair, it was true. Winry had Pinako, and unlike her I didn't have anyone. I didn't even know if my family was waiting for me anymore. Its been a year. They could have forgotten all about me. Still, it was nice to hear Ed let out a small, "Thank you... For saving Winry." I tried shrugging it off, though.

Another silence faced us. I tried to keep my eyes open, but slowly exhaustion was creeping in, and my wound was starting to throb. It seemed the brothers sensed this, since they began to make their ways to the door. Edward hesitated, keeping a hand on the door, before turning to me to say gently, "Thank you for telling me the truth," before he leaves, closing the door behind him.

I feel a smile crossing my face before sleep surrounds me.

AN: Hey guys. I apologize this chapter took so long to come out. My life kind of spiraled for a bit. I'm back to living with my nan, and I had to change schools, not to mention high school is kicking me in the but. Summer was rough, my computer is kind of messed up, so a lot has been going on. I'll try to update more, but I can't make any promises. Speaking of, I've been re-working new ides for the future of this story so I need to plan that all out. Keep looking out for that!

That's all for now. Tell me what you thought!