The Logic of a Child

By: IMBSA

IMBSA: OK, this idea was hanging around in my head, and I finally bugged my mom about it and then she bugged me and now I'm sitting in front of my computer, typing this up. Part of—all right, a LOT of my inspiration for this fic came from another fanfic on this site called "No Need for Chibis" (I think). It's somewhere in the Yu Yu Hakusho section. It's funny, so I must thank the author for that. And the reason why I have a botched alchemy experiment….Well, they're just fun, albeit a little overused, but I had no other idea. And why they would be screwing around with plant alchemy….I don't know….

Disclaimer: "I am not a vegetarian because I love animals; I'm a vegetarian because I hate plants."

IMBSA: This is only my second FMA fic, so please be nice. I'm up to chapter 26, I believe in the manga and episode 19 in the anime, so I don't know very much. Please excuse me if I have anything wrong! By the way, this is royai, slight Edwin, so if you don't like either, then I suggest you stop reading and go back. Enjoy!

""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""

"Why the hell are we doing this?" Colonel Roy Mustang rolled his eyes at Ed's complaint. Ever the blunt one, FullMetal was.

"Would you like to go to the Fuhrer and ask him that yourself?" Roy questioned. "The only reason you and your brother were given this task is because you learned some useful things from those boys back in Xenotime and we don't have any plant alchemists on military payroll." He paused deliberately. There was a subtle threat in his next words. "Of course, if the brass knew about them, I'm sure the Fuhrer would have no problem 'convincing' them to help." He sighed. "I'm only here to supervise and make sure you get this assignment done." Ed's eyes narrowed and he was about to retort sharply when Alphonse cut him off.

"Big brother, you know what the Colonel says is true."

Ed was not convinced. "I still don't agree with it though. This could fall in the wrong hands."

"It's only a head of lettuce. How dangerous could it be? Don't tell me you're afraid of some healthy greens." He smirked. "Jealous that its head is larger than yours? Besides, I'd've thought that you would jump at the chance to make people shorter than you, runt."

Ed blew up. "Who are calling so short a speck of dust could be his twin!"

"SH, big brother! You'll wake someone up!"

"Who'd be crazy enough to be sleeping in a mess hall kitchen?" Ed asked incredulously.

"Your voice carries and echoes."

"So does yours in that big metal suit!" Alphonse looked down sadly, unable to argue his big brother's point.

"Stop your family feud." Roy commanded. "We need to get back to the experiment, if you've forgotten our reason for being in here."

"Why are we even here! Don't you see enough of this damn place to last you your entire life?" Ed could not stop asking questions.

"We're here so if something blows up, we won't have to go to work tomorrow." Roy replied as though his logic was perfectly understandable.

"I don't think we'll be going anywhere if we blew up."

"Precisely my point."

"That's a dumbass point for a few days of vacation. It doesn't even make sense!"

"It won't blow up." Alphonse reassured them. "I've seen Fletcher do this a lot of times before and he hasn't caused an explosion."

"Yeah, well, he's a little more practiced than we are." Ed responded slightly bitterly.

There was a pause.

"That's true," Alphonse admitted forlornly.

"Let's just do it." Roy, once again, butted in.

""""""""""

"Satisfied?" Ed asked as they gazed at the once-leafy head of lettuce.

"It's not as short as, say, you, but it's fine for our first attempt. We should try it again tomorrow." He continued, unperturbed at the sight of Alphonse struggling to hold back a supremely pissed off Ed. "Well," Roy stretched, "been nice, but I need to go now. I've got a lot of work to prepare for, with the Fuhrer threatening to drop in tomorrow. Not to mention all the paperwork Hawkeye shoved on me today, and what she'll most likely shove on me tomorrow."

"Yeah, your life's just one huge sob story." Ed scathingly interjected as his commanding officer nonchalantly passed him on his way out. "Shoveling a lot of crap there, ain't ya, Mustang?" Much to Ed's dismay, Roy left without a word, as if he had not heard the boy. "Horse's ass," he muttered darkly.

"Big brother…." Alphonse paused. "So what should we do with the lettuce?"

"I don't know and I don't care." Ed tossed over his shoulder as he stalked sulkingly out of the room. Al sighed and followed his brother out. Of course, as luck would have it, a green spark ran down the sprout and it slowly returned to its original size the moment they had left the room. It seemed to settle down quietly. Another green spark ran through the veins of the plant, an ominous sign of what was to come.

""""""""""""""

Early the next day, Roy made his way to the kitchen. A thought had struck him before he fell asleep just what the repercussions would be if someone got a hold of the tainted vegetable. Bearing that in mind, Roy opened the doors to the mess hall kitchen in search of the vegetable in question. He could not find the little sprout that he last left on the counter. Sure, there was a huge head of lettuce where they had conducted the experiment, but he knew that it was a sprout he was looking for. He looked around, hand going chin in a thoughtful manner before he shook his head and left, figuring that Ed and Alphonse must have taken it with them.

The moment he exited from the delivery door, two someones entered from the door to the hall itself.

"We're lucky the cooks aren't here yet." Winry Rockbell observed happily as she came into the mess hall kitchen. She was visiting Ed and Al (a fast-becoming frequent occasion; Roy asked Ed when she would be moving to Central whenever he got the chance).

"Oh, you just don't know." Riza agreed, walking in behind her. "I can't stand that gruel they serve."

"So what are we gonna have?" As the words left Winry's lips, both spied an unattended and rather harmless-looking head of lettuce sitting on the counter near the sink. "I'm in the mood for…salad." Winry continued, looking the lettuce over appraisingly.

"I don't know." Riza answered, eyeing the vegetable suspiciously.

"Oh, come on, Ms. Riza. How long has it been since you've had a salad? Or even fresh food?"

Riza was still apprehensive, but her mouth betrayed her and said, "I guess."

Winry smiled and both women turned to wash the head of lettuce in the sink.

""""""""""""""

"Hey, FullMetal. Where's your deadly green foe who's finally shorter than you?" Roy had intercepted them on their path to the kitchen, the very place he had just left and was currently walking back with the brothers' company.

"What are you talking about, Mustang?" This, of course, was Ed. "You hungry or something?" His voice was so acerbic, Roy wondered why he wasn't a puddle of melted flesh.

"No. I just looked in there and I couldn't find it."

"What do you mean you couldn't find it? You mean you lost—"

"Exactly what I said. It's not there."

Ed gaped at him. "Not—" He sputtered. "Well I don't have it!"

"We left it on the counter." Alphonse verified.

"On the—that means it reverted back to its normal size sometime after we left it. I didn't see the sprout, but I found a head of lettuce."

"That means the effects aren't permanent, then." Ed muttered thoughtfully. "We'll have to fix that." He looked at Roy. "So why are you—" The teenager was cut off by a series of loud crashes coming from the mess hall kitchen. All three—well, two, since Al's armor allowed for no facial expression—males' eyes widened.

What had happened to their harmless "healthy greens"?

They ran to the delivery door and yanked it open, all three trying to fit in the door at once. They fell to the floor and hurriedly picked themselves up. And then their jaws dropped. At first glance, nothing was out of place. It seemed like someone had been trying to make a salad with a head of lettuce that sat, half –way sliced, on a cutting board. The same lettuce, it seemed, that was subject to an age regression experiment by Ed, Al, and Roy the night before. Two plates which held a good amount of leafy greens were on the counter, both looking partially eaten.

The men's jaws had dropped when they found the source of the noise.

Two little blonde girls, one's hair slightly darker than the other's, sat on the floor in the middle of the kitchen, surrounded by pots, pans, and spoons of all sorts, bottom cupboard doors open wide. One was stirring an invisible concoction in a huge stew-pot. The other was banging loudly with a spoon on the bottoms of upturned pots while singing a nonsense song. They could have been no older than four, at the very most.

But that was not the reason why the brothers and the Colonel were surprised. The reason was that one of them—the one singing—was wearing a white sundress, the other a perfect replica of a first lieutenant's military uniform. When the girls noticed their visitors, they blinked up rather innocently with pairs of painfully young eyes. Eyes that they recognized quite well, despite the obvious age gaps.

"Oh my god…."

""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""

IMBSA: Eheheheh. I couldn't resist. I saw some really cute picture where the FMA cast was younger and that also helped me to write this. Well. R&R!