Chapter 1: Al in a day's work.

Rain beat a pattering staccato on canvas tenting, soft and soothing—until thunder crashed directly overhead.

Alphonse Elric sat up with a start, the last wisps of his dream fading as he remembered where he was.

That was strange. I could almost swear I've had that dream before… He shrugged.

Yawning, he rolled to his feet and stuck his head out of his tent, making a face as cold rain immediately soaked his scalp and neck. Outside the lights of the camp pierced the night, reflecting across the rain-slick ground. Uniformed men and women hurried back and forth, shielding themselves from the elements with oilcloth, coats or sheets of canvas.

Gah, it would have to get all muddy right before a scouting run, Al thought irritably. Being in the south for its short but intense rainy season was starting to wear on him. The mud never bothered him so much as the rain. Rain made him think of home, and of cozy days spent watching its gray progress across the hills. And the more he thought of home the more he longed to be there.

He pulled his head back in and sat back down on the regulation cot, reciting his mantra as he stuffed his stocking feet into his boots. One more day until I can go home. One more day until I can go home. One more day...God, I can't wait.

"Lieutenant Colonel Elric?" someone was calling outside Al's tent, his voice pitched over the rain. "Lieutenant Colonel?"

Alphonse hopped on his one shod foot to the tent flap and yanked it open. "Get in here, Hakuro. It's too miserable to stand around out there."

Corporal Thomen Hakuro smiled gratefully and darted inside. "Thank you, sir. I've mail for you."

Al clapped his hands and touched his lone camp table. An array that emitted heat and light emerged on its surface, bathing the drab canvas in a warm glow. He smiled at it, mentally thanking Roy for showing him this trick. "Here, dry out over that for a minute."

"Thank you, sir," Hakuro repeated, hunching over the array. Alphonse stifled a chuckle as the younger officer's glasses immediately fogged up. The hapless Thomen reminded him a great deal of the now-Captain Fury.

Hakuro had been attached to Al's unit as an expert in communications, despite his being hopelessly myopic and notoriously clumsy. He and Al had met when Hakuro had tripped and fallen against him in the mess tent, sending his laden tray straight into Al's face.

Al still had to fight the impulse to laugh whenever he remembered the incident. The awkward corporal had blanched sheet white when he realized the man blinking at him through gravy and unidentifiable meat bits was the famed Soul Alchemist, Lieutenant Colonel Alphonse Elric.

Al had first attempted to assuage the officer's panic by smiling kindly through his sopping mask of goop. Far from reassured, Hakuro had flinched and turned an astonishing shade of white. Closing his eyes tight behind his glasses and bracing himself as though for an executioner's axe. But after a moment passed without reprimand, Hakuro dared to crack one eye, just in time to see the lieutenant colonel briefly lower one eyelid. Despite the wink, the young officer flinched again as the Soul Alchemist inserted a goop-coated finger into his mouth, swallowed and winced in disgust.

"Corporal Hakuro--"

Alphonse wouldn't have thought Thomen could have gone any paler without passing out—but the younger man had managed it, attaining the color of paste when Al addressed him by name. There was a hush as every neck in the tent craned around for a look, morbidly riveted by the luckless officer's fate.

"Thank you for your assistance in testing the assault capabilities of canned meat. It seems that my theory was correct: military rations are better suited as an offensive arsenal," Al stated, straight-faced.

There was silence as every man in earshot processed that Lieutenant Colonel Elric had in fact said what he just said. Then someone at the far end groaned in the same moment someone else laughed, and it wasn't long before the entire mess was roaring.

Hakuro's anxious look melted into one of stunned gratitude as he realized he wasn't going to be bellowed at. Alphonse watched, caught between amusement and sympathy as the young officer's mouth opened and shut, apparently attempting to stammer out either his thanks or an apology. Young Hakuro seemed far too stunned to stand without assistance, so Alphonse pulled the smaller man to his feet with one gravy-splattered hand, then shucked off his uniform jacket and used it to wipe his hair, hands and face. When he finished he offered it to the younger man, reversed to expose the clean lining. "Your glasses are coated, Corporal."

Hakuro looked at the ruined jacket uncomprehendingly, his expression turning horrified all over again. "Sir, I can pay for your uniform—"

A chuckle escaped Al as he reached over and whisked the shorter man's glasses off his face. He wiped them with the un-spattered part of his jacket as he spoke. "No you won't. Not if I've anything to say about it. You've done me a favor." He handed the glasses back to Hakuro, as clean as he could make them. "Uniforms aren't really my style. Thanks to you I'll be in civvies for the rest of the operation. As long as no one lets on that I've got a spare." He cocked an eyebrow at the younger man, grinning in a way that, to Thomen's mind, suited mischievous six-year-olds, not lieutenant colonels who could have you cleaning toilets for the rest of your career. "You wouldn't report me, would you, Corporal?"

Hakuro gaped at him slack-jawed for a moment, then shut his mouth with a snap and saluted. "No sir!"

Al remembered this as the younger man set his glasses on the table and worked up his courage to speak. The effort it cost him informed Al that the corporal wasn't delivering the mail out of his usual thoughtfulness.

When Al had inquired as to how someone so obviously academic had ended up enlisting, Havoc related the word through the officers' grapevine that the young man had been pushed into service by his father, the General Hakuro, in order to "make something of him". From an ironic Colonel Breda and sympathetic Captain Fury Al was informed that the young man's assignment had been an intended slight, a chain on Al's neck some higher up in the political and military hierarchy who had an ax to grind with his brother's name on it. Breda's sardonic addendum to Havoc was forcing those not suited to be anything but civilians into military life often did make something of them. Corpses, usually.

Al had been surprised to learn that this Hakuro was the son of the General Hakuro, whose family he and his brother had saved on the fateful train ride that brought them to the attention of the state.

Corporal Hakuro, for his part, seemed all too aware of the disappointment he was to his father—a man who might have been Fuhrer, had democracy not reared its ugly head.

Saddled with Thomen, his debilitating esteem, and its constant strain on team performance, most officers would have assigned him to some anonymous corner and quietly filed for a transfer.

Alphonse decided to offer Thomen an opportunity to build the confidence he lacked. After close questioning and queries into the younger man's academic background, Al took the corporal under his wing and reassigned him to communication and cipher after discovering his native talent in both areas. Before his transfer, Corporal Hakuro had sat behind a rifle at a dead-end post. The part of Al that loved learning and intelligence for its own sake cringed at the near waste of an eager and brilliant mind.

But Thomen's shyness still crippled him to the point that even speaking up amongst friends was an exercise in resolve, so Al waited patiently as Thomen mustered his fragile confidence. He seemed to find it in a picture of the twins that stood on the camp table, with a smaller photo of Arelana laughing (Al's favorite picture of his wife) tucked into its frame. "Sir, I want to request permission to be a part of your scouting mission today."

Al stilled. He had been expecting something like this. "Why?"

Thomen looked at him as though he couldn't quite believe Al had asked. "To help! I mean, to serve the country bravely." The younger man squared himself into what he likely believed a determined and heroic pose.

Lieutenant Colonel Elric looked at him without expression. "Request denied."

Thomen stared at him for a moment, looking crestfallen but somehow unsurprised, before he looked away. "So. I am useless." The Corporal's was voice soft and so dead with conviction that Al's eyes narrowed in realization. If that's what he's been telling himself—or someone has been telling him—all along, it's not surprising he has no confidence in his abilities.

Feeling old, Al closed his eyes and thought hard about what he would say next. Thomen was smarter than this, he knew. If it hadn't been for the young man's blasted general father…

"Corporal, why do you think I put you with cryptography and research?" Al held up a hand, forestalling his subordinate's reply. He had to wake the young man to his own worth, before he did irreparable damage trying to prove he had some. "I'm about to tell you. It was because in the field your effectiveness was limited to the number of bullets in a gun. You were merely a means to pulling a trigger, a titanic waste of your own intellect and the time and effort that went into your education. It also should have occurred to you that sitting behind a gun rather than behind a cryptograph had the potential of killing our own men, not only Aerugan soldiers." The lieutenant colonel held up his hand again to fend off another denial from his subordinate. "Not by any action of yours. But had I failed to take action and put you where you were badly needed, any subsequent deaths would have been squarely on my head. Do you understand, Thomen? I put you on cipher because employing resources to prevent casualties on both sides is my job. And I'm not tapping you for this mission because communication will not be an issue, and you're too valuable to be rifle-fodder." And far too eager to be rifle-fodder for me to allow you to come along. Al closed his eyes and turned his face from his subordinate. "In the end, believing how vital you are to others is entirely up to you, Corporal. But please take my word for it: Life is too precious to waste hating yourself and refusing to value your own talents."

Al looked back at Hakuro. The young man appeared to be listening to him, even if bitterness still clouded his eyes, and that gave him hope. Al continued:

"As long as I'm in command, resources will go where they're needed, and a soldier will be put where he can preserve the most life. That's why you're not in a ditch behind a rifle. That's why I'm here commanding soldiers despite the fact that I may have to kill with alchemy, a tool that should only be used to preserve lives. My being here preserves lives on both sides because alchemy provides alternatives to killing. Another man wouldn't have the option."

At the sadness and resignation in Al's tone the younger man's tight expression slackened into understanding, tinged with not a little embarrassment. Alphonse, seeing this, pushed his memories to the back of his mind and gave his subordinate a direct look. "I suspect you would have realized sooner just how indispensable you truly are, if your father hadn't expressed his opinion on the matter to you."

Thomen looked at him, eyes widening behind his glasses. "How did you--?" He bit down on his words as Lieutenant Colonel Elric pointed to the letters still fisted in the other man's hand, giving him a half-smile of wry empathy. "No one goes to get mail and doesn't check for their own." And you never look quite so unhappy in your own skin as when the general deigns to write. It was unprofessional at the very least, but even Al's slow fuse had started to burn at the constant "encouragement" the corporal received from his father. He'd never read them, but his subordinates and Thomen's compatriots had no such scruples. Even 2nd lieutenant Connor, who had served during the Fuhrer's tenure when the army's corruption was at its peak, had been aghast at some of those letters. "It's your business how you deal with your father, but I may remind him that he still owes me a favor, and I would thank him to not second-guess how I assign my subordinates, especially to my subordinates."

Al wondered if the surprise in Hakuro's face was due to his daring to rebuke a general, or daring to do so within his son's hearing. As it turned out, it was neither. "My father owes you a favor?"

Thomen's commanding officer gave him a half smile. "You were probably too young to remember the Eastern Rebellion hijacking that train to Central."

"I do remember, but I don't understand how --" Al watched sudden understanding leave the younger man's eyes wide and jaw agape. "I never realized…that was you with the Fullmetal Alchemist?" Thomen seemed to realize how incredulous he sounded and flushed. "Lieutenant Colonel sir, I apologize for my tone."

Alphonse laughed. "Don't worry about it. Most people still don't know that I was the armor suit that followed my brother around. There're times I have trouble believing it. Or believing that the boy in the General's cabin would ever serve under me." He winked.

"Well, I wouldn't…I wouldn't mind if you did write my father, sir." Al had to smile at the tiny spark of defiance in the corporal's eye.

"I'll do that, then. But before that…would it be all right if I claimed my mail? The briefing is in fifteen minutes." Al held out a hand for his share of the Corporal's burden.

"Oh! Sorry sir. Forgot I had them." Hakuro sheepishly handed him the letters.

Alphonse took the envelopes and fanned them. The first, Arelana's, got tucked inside his coat pocket to read when he got a moment alone. The second was recognizable by its cramped, spiky handwriting as Ed's. Al grinned and ripped it open, holding it up to the glow of the array.

The letter was unusually short. Checking the stamp on the envelope affirmed that his brother had written from the laboratory in East City a day before his leave ought to have begun. Alphonse hoped for both Edward's and General Mustang's sake that his brother's leave hadn't been pushed back again. He had heard about what happened the last time his brother had been dragged away from his own research to assist "some jumped-up, pompous, brigadier general's toady" (Ed had assigned the other state alchemist this distinction with his usual grace and tact) in a state research project that overreached the other man's abilities. Ed had been forced to finish the other alchemist's research on ethyl mercaptan (the chemical that made skunks so potent) to discover possible military applications.

When Al's brother had got back to Central, he had sealed the windows of General Mustang's office (it had been vacant at the time; Edward had mounted his attack during the lunch hour) and alchemized a vile cloud of the substance inside of it. The elder Elric thought it very poetic to provide evidence of the chemical's effectiveness—all while wreaking his revenge. His final touch had been to carefully tape his report inside the door before he triggered the array and ran.

Yet the letter held nothing of his brother's usual blow-by-blow account of his escapades. There were only a few short sentences that looked as though they had been scrawled more hastily than usual:

Al—

When you get a chance, take a look at this array and see if you can make it more stable.

--there was a stream of alchemic diagrams, followed by a complex array. It was far neater than his brother's handwriting. It looked as though Ed had drawn the diagram first, and then wrote the letter around it.

Louis and Rick asked when their dad was coming home when I talked to Winry. They told me to tell you they love you. A letter arrived from Lana today; she asked if I could forward it to you. I didn't peek, so don't worry—Al chuckled at that, drawing a glance from Hakuro. There had been a time when he'd had to hide letters by his then-girlfriend from his older brother. Ed had never quite forgiven Al for the teasing he had endured for writing to Winry. His retribution ten years later had been to commit particularly sappy parts of Al's letters to memory and recite them aloud, while his thoroughly mortified younger brother chased him around and over the furniture.

--Hers should arrive with mine. Miss you, Al. Take care of yourself—

Ed

Al smiled to himself as he examined his brother's diagram. With a second look the smile faded into recognition, then intense concentration. Alphonse snagged his chalk out of a pocket, removed the pile of reports and alchemy manuals to his cot, then started to scrawl on the bare wood of the table. Biting his bottom lip, his hand and arm a blur, Al copied his brother's diagram twice, checked them against the original, and then started making changes in the second copy.

"…Stabilize in the third instead of the fourth…the regeneration point is right…"Alphonse muttered to himself, tapping the chalk above a sigil. "Move the earth element to there…Ha!"

Hakuro, who had moved to stand behind the lieutenant colonel, jumped at his sudden shout. Al redrew the array with his additions, stared at it critically, and began to laugh. "We did it!" Almost ten years, but we did it. We're past the difficult part.

Hakuro stiffened in shock as he was swept into a rib-crushing hug. "We did it!" the lieutenant colonel crowed again.

"Sir?" the corporal finally managed to gasp. "…I—can't breathe—"

"Oh. Forgive me," Immediately contrite, Al set the smaller man back on his feet. He started to laugh again, wiping his eyes and beaming.

"Brother, you're a genius!" Alphonse whooped suddenly, throwing his arms wide in boisterous, boundless triumph. Hakuro backed surreptitiously for the door, fearing another spine-cracking embrace. He had never seen the lieutenant colonel display this alarmingly physical brand of insanity before. "Sir?" he attempted.

The Soul Alchemist whirled as if he'd forgotten Hakuro existed. "Oh! Sorry! Do you need me to dismiss you?"

"Yes sir. But sir…" he faltered, until curiosity regained the upper hand. "What were you drawing?"

"This?" The lieutenant colonel gestured with his chalk, his smile blinding. "This is a theoretical array that my brother and I have been working on to return human-chimeras to their original form. My brother's finally created a failsafe for all organic components to reform if the human components reach a terminal deconstruction point."

In the grip of his excitement, it took Alphonse a moment to realize that Hakuro was staring at him blankly.

"Oh, um…" Al groped to translate the alchemic jargon. "Chimeras can be separated into their original bodies, but with this array, if they start to die during the process they'll be reformed without self-destructing."

He was smiling so hard his face hurt. He and Ed were one step closer to being able to resolve human chimeras. One step closer to ensuring that what had happened to Nina would never happen again. We couldn't save you, Nina. But if we can save others…it will be one less ghost to haunt Brother…maybe even chip a bit more from the mass of guilt he insists on carrying…

He couldn't wait to let his brother know about the array. Alphonse groped briefly in his pocket for paper and a pen, then thought for a moment and shoved it all back in his jacket. Why write when I'll tell him myself tomorrow? He smiled inwardly, picturing his brother's reaction.

"Amazing, sir," Hakuro contributed, sounding awestruck. He stared at the diagrams as though trying to decipher them. Al grinned at him, and the Corporal smiled back shyly.

"Corporal Hakuro, could you do me a favor?"

"Anything, sir." Hakuro's smile was full-fledged now. The lieutenant colonel's enthusiasm was infectious.

"Whoever's on cleaning duty for the tents shouldn't touch anything in here, especially the table. In fact, my tent is off limits until I clear them. Could you tell them that?"

"Sir!" Hakuro saluted smartly, then turned on his heel and marched out.

Al abruptly realized that he was standing on cold, soggy canvas with one boot off, his shirt only half-buttoned and his suspenders hanging limp against his legs. He sighed with humor and finished dressing.

----------

"Oi, Al. Over here." Brigadier General Jean Havoc waved affably from the where he stood by the door of the officers' tent, shielding his inevitable cigarette from the rain with his other hand. Havoc never had been one to stand on his rank with friends.

A bright grin flashed back at him under the younger man's hood. "Am I late for the briefing?"

"Nah," Havoc waved dismissively, cigarette flaring in the dark as he took a long drag. "We're waiting for two more after you."

Al wrinkled his nose at the wreath of smoke surrounding Jean's head. "Those things'll kill you someday, you know."

Havoc grinned around the cigarette and blew a puff of smoke, watching lazily as it mingled with the misting rain. "Not before my wife does." Havoc cocked an eyebrow at his subordinate. "Besides, I'm your commanding officer, not your brother. Don't think you can manhandle me like you do him," he asserted around another stream of smoke. "I haven't gotten to talk to you since you reported in last week. How are things? How's the boss, anyway? He blown up anyone important lately?"

"Not lately," Al shrugged, defending the facts if not his brother's sanity—something that Al often questioned himself.

"Brother's fine. Kids keep him happy and busy. The general's keeping him busy and insane."

Havoc laughed. "Mustang's loving every minute of Fullmetal hating his guts, I'm sure. How's your end of the family?"

"Well, Louis and Rick are doing really well with alchemy. The last time I was home they managed to alchemize their spinach halfway into chocolate before the entire thing destabilized and blew up." Al's smile was rueful. "That was fun to clean off the walls."

Havoc laughed. He could afford to; his daughters didn't routinely attempt to transmute things into chocolate pudding. Al's sons, on the other hand, seemed committed to the discovery of new and bigger messes.

"How's Arelana?" Jean Havoc rolled on.

Al's eyes glazed over and he smiled dreamily, taking on the vaguely stunned look that earned him choruses of eyerolls and giggling from friends and family alike.

"Lana is wonderful."

"Jeez, Alphonse. Almost ten years and you're still like a moonstruck teenager." Havoc smirked knowingly at his subordinate.

Al gave the older man a goofy grin. "So? What's wrong with that?"

"Nothing, except you two force everyone within five meters to either flee for their lives or stay and die of how ridiculously sweet you are. No, you can keep the hormones, thanks. Me and Annette do just fine, and I couldn't be happier with my girls." Al had met Havoc's daughters at a military ball. They were a very cute ten and twelve, with their father's blue eyes and varied shades of their mother's auburn hair. "Though I never got how you and your brother managed to snag two of the best-looking women in Amestris after only two years after getting back from—from wherever you were--" Havoc waved a hand blankly "--when I had to look over a bloody decade to find a girl the General couldn't steal away from me."

Al's grin made his sweet-natured, still-boyish face into something more demonic in nature. It was this smile that let people remember he was, in fact, related to Edward. "You never thought that the General's getting married had anything to do with the sudden drop in competition?" He offered innocently.

Jean stared at him for a moment, cigarette dangling from his lip. "Anyone ever tell you that you fight dirty?"

Al's grin got a little wider. "Only Brother, and only because you have to cheat better than he does to beat him."

Havoc looked as though he were groping for some retort to salve his dignity when something beyond Al's shoulder caught his attention. "Looks like the rest of the group is here." Al followed his eyes to the mist-lined silhouettes materializing through the rain, familiar figures bulked by oil cloth or greatcoats. Havoc flicked the cigarette away to smolder in a puddle as Al pulled the flap aside and they all filed in.

Once salutes were exchanged and everyone had found a seat, the brigadier general's manner turned from his usual easy good humor to deadly serious.

"We've had reports of alchemy up at the installation in the north-west quadrant," Havoc began. The tent fell immediately silent. Havoc indicated the position with an unlit cigarette on the map of Aerugo's border with Amestris pinned to the canvas wall.

Lieutenant Klaus raised two fingers. The brigadier general nodded to her. "Isn't that where our border guards were reportedly taken?"

"Yes." Havoc's face was grim. "It also appears that people from the border villages on both sides have been rounded up and taken there. Children, mostly."

Al propped his elbows on the table, resting the lower half of his face behind his hands. He didn't want to voice his suspicions before Havoc gave him a reason to do so. He was trying to find some alternative to what he feared alchemy and captured children implied.

"It looks like alchemy is only being employed inside the complex, not on the perimeter. That could change, so we're keeping you well-equipped in case of assault, but few enough that you should be able to get in and out without triggering an alert. Make sure you leave no trace of entry. We don't want to let on how you got in if another assault has to be made. Remember that we pull out to join General Talbot in the west tomorrow. If you have the opportunity to free any prisoners, take it."

Havoc leaned forward, bracing his hands on table. The movement threw his face into the oily shadow of the lamplight. The fresh fag in his teeth was the only feature that defied the dimness other than his eyes, which considered them all unhurriedly. Al found himself straightening unconsciously to attention even as his team did the same. Jean had been a friend when he was a boy, and time and trial had only tied the Flame Alchemist's one-time group of subordinates more closely over the years that bridged now and then. Havoc had always been swift in action and deliberate in his consideration, and if he gave a man his loyalty and protection there was no question of that man's worth.

Apparently Al's group met his approval, for Havoc nodded once and gave them a grim smile. "If you're caught inside the complex, all bets are off. I want you to grab everyone you can and get out of there. No heroics. Burn your way out if you have to. Any questions?" The brigadier general glanced around the table. When no one offered to speak, he straightened. "Reconvene to leave at the south end of camp in half an hour. Lieutenant Colonel Elric is in command. Dismissed." As they rose to leave, Havoc cut Al a look and tapped two fingers on the table, telling him to stay behind.

Once everyone was out of earshot, Havoc leaned in next to Al, propping himself against the edge of the table and striking a match. "So, what do you think?"

Memory snapped the softer lines of Al's face taut and sharp in the hazy light. "I hate to say it, but this report sounds like the Fifth Laboratory. I can't see any use for prisoners around alchemy except as test subjects. Children would be even more…convenient," his mouth twisted on the word. "…because of their weakness and smaller food requirement." It was discomfiting to realize how easily he could think along the lines of a less ethical alchemist. Then again, Brother and I have come across so many, and tread such a fine line ourselves in what's considered ethical alchemic practice, it shouldn't be surprising I can recognize and predict their methods. "What do you think?"

"I think you've got the target in your crosshairs." The tip of Havoc's cigarette flared as he took a long breath. Alphonse wouldn't have ventured to guess whether his grimace was at the taste or the subject matter.

He asked, "There weren't any actual sightings of chimera, right?"

Jean shook his head once, a sharp jerk down and away that burned a line in the air with his cigarette. "Doesn't mean they won't be there, though." His frown deepened as he pulled the butt from his mouth and tapped the unlit end against the map's edge. "The brass pushed this operation through on the quiet this afternoon, which is why this isn't the scout-and-skedaddle I said it'd be. Someone high up is real jumpy about this place. Not that there was anything said directly to me." He took another drag, closed his eyes and released it with a thoughtful look. "But the general consensus seems to be that there'd be no crying from on high if this place happened to burn to the ground."

Al's expression darkened. If Havoc's information had come from General Mustang, then there was no doubt of its accuracy. "That's not been the usual policy." As a matter of fact, their standing orders were to avoid provoking Aerugo, to the point of masking the size of the force patrolling inside their own borders. Open hostility and gun-waving toward the fomenting elements inside the southern nation had been ruled out early as Amestris observed the progression of the Aerugan's civil war, a war that had already lasted three years. One thing even the most hell-raking Amestrian generals did not want was for warring Aerugo to suddenly unite against their longtime rival to the north.

That had been the spoken consensus, anyway…

Al closed his eyes and blew an irritated breath through his bangs. If there was one thing he despised, it was being manipulated. Particularly without ascertaining his puppeteer's intent.

"Are they actually thinking about starting an incident with Aerugo?" he asked. Are we about to be forced into another pointless war? was left unsaid.

Havoc only shrugged, smiling his easy smile and rolling his eyes at the woven ceiling. "Figure we'll cross that bridge if we get to it, chief. I only made brigadier last year, remember, and there'll always be things that the old dogs don't let the upstart pups know." Havoc's lazy gaze turned serious again as he glanced back at the younger man. "Anything else?"

Al nodded, reaching over to indicate a bold red line on the map with his forefinger. "Something's bothering me about the perimeter. There should be more security than what's marked on this, if all the prisoners in the area are getting transported there." The state alchemist tapped the latest report among those spread across the Amestrian half of the chart. "But the scouts backed the numbers every time. The Aerugan patrols consist of a handful of two man teams, no more, and they're very slack about observation."

"Could be overconfident." Havoc shrugged, elaborately casual.

"Or this whole thing could be one huge booby trap. Which is what you're thinking." Al gave his commanding officer a knowing look. Havoc smiled back grimly.

"When it looks too good to be true…"

"It is." Al finished the adage. He got up to take a closer look at the map. "Every angle of approach is through dense woods. There could be just about anything in there, but if its alchemy we're watching for…Brother and I could have rigged arrays to go off if more than a certain number of people passed over them, or if someone weren't carrying something the traps were rigged to ignore." Al's brow furrowed. "There's no more than one team of two patrolling at any given time? You're certain?"

Havoc nodded. Al's mouth thinned. "Probably triggered by number of bodies, then. That would be the simplest and most foolproof way of doing it. Rigging the traps for iron content or something would be more fiddly, not to mention having animals set them off accidentally…" Al trailed off, deep in thought. "The traps probably don't extend into the complex, since they have to move prisoners around in varying numbers. Meaning we should take the guards out at distance."

"Sniper?"

Al shook his head. "No good. You could set arrays to go off if two people were to die inside their influence. I know I could, anyway. We need to move them, somehow…" And I will not kill… not until there is no other choice.

"Distraction, then. Have to draw them to you."

Al nodded. "That'd probably be the best bet. Second option is putting a hole beneath them and hoping outside alchemy doesn't trigger the arrays. Another is to take the oxygen out of the air around them until they pass out. If I were laying traps, I'd allow for the possibility of unconsciousness in my own men. Soldiers aren't so disposable that you can let them die if they fall asleep on duty."

"Not yet, anyway. We're still a valuable resource." Havoc's lighter clacked in emphasis as he lit a new cigarette. "I like the oxygen trick. I recommend that you lure them to you and use it to drop them. We need people for questioning. Go on and get ready. And Al…" Havoc paused, exhaled in a sooty cloud.

"Don't die." He said it straight, then cracked a grin. "Your brother would kill me."

Al smiled crookedly, saluting as the tent flap closed behind him. "I'll do my best."

----------

They were within sight of the final fence before Al found the first array.

Part of him had been hoping the scouts information had been false, that smoke or flash-grenades had been mistaken somehow for alchemy. Aerugo's original government had a standing campaign to eradicate alchemy—and alchemists when they were found. It was a policy that had served Amestris well—several secret practitioners had smuggled themselves and their research across the border, to be put to work by the Amestrian government and swell the ranks of state alchemists at their disposal. Aerugo's rebelling faction was more fanatical if anything, declaring alchemy a perversion against nature in an echo of Ishbalan sentiment.

Finding an alchemic array on Aerugan soil sent anxious serpents sliding through Al's guts. But he pushed his unease away. He had a job to do, and distractions were expensive.

They had been moving slowly, using sticks to brush aside debris, when Alphonse spotted a half-concealed pattern from the corner of his eye. He had his group back up a few yards, then cleared the rest of the half-rotten leaves away and studied the hidden trap intently. It was not of a type to be triggered by alchemic reactions. Al's guess to Havoc had been correct: this array, and those connected to it, were rigged to go off if three men or more passed over just one of them. It was a nasty piece of work, made to react moments after it detected the requisite number of bodies. Meaning it would wait until more people had moved within its influence before it went off. Then it would deconstruct all the organic material within a two foot radius. They weren't designed to kill. They were designed to maim, to leave a man screaming and without whatever limbs had been in range of the reaction, but alive. Al stared at it, feeling his stomach go hollow.

Do they want invaders for questioning...?

He looked away toward the looming black bulk of the prison.

Or do they have another reason for taking people alive?

Despite the tense situation, it was with great satisfaction that Al put his hands together and pressed them to the ground. At least these little monstrosities will be going hungry today. "Be ready in case this gets someone's attention," he called back to the group.

There was a smell of ozone and a flash of blue light as a wave rippled though the ground, erasing the dirt-drawn arrays. Al watched for the light of new reactions triggered by his alchemy, but there were none.

He moved back into the knot of soldiers. "All right. I've removed the ground traps but we still need to watch for arrays on the trees. I'm going to drop the guards when they pass into the blind spot from the fortress windows. Daniels and Tocker, take their guns and stay in the middle. Then we'll go through the fence. Everyone ready?" Curt nods and grim smiles were his reply. They all moved stealthily into position, crouching amidst the trees. It wasn't long before the trees thinned enough to spot shapes moving along the fence.

"Lieutenant Colonel…"

"I see them." Al clapped and held his hands out to the air. For a moment it looked as though nothing had happened. Then one guard staggered into the other and both collapsed to the ground. Al smiled tightly. There'd been no noise, and the downed guards were invisible from the windows. Best of all, no one had been killed.

Al thought, Let's hope we can keep it that way…

He waved his group forward to the fence. They disarmed and bound the sleeping guards, then stepped back so that Al could conceal them under a layer of alchemically-merged leaves. Then they were through the fence and in the shadow of the north wall. "Lieutenant Klaus, where's the best place to make a door?"

The lieutenant scanned the squat, two-story structure, her eyes narrowed in thought.

"If it's a typical installation, we should bore in there." She pointed to a spot on the north east corner. "No more than two feet from the ground, though, or else we'll run into the basement ceiling."

"Right. All right, Klaus behind me to navigate, Lane behind her. Double up once we're through. Daniels and Tocker, Peterson and Ellis, Connor and Bell, Hart and Wallace. Don't follow until I give the word."

Al pressed his hands to the wall, and a square plug of it vanished. The cross section of the hole was a good meter thick. He crouched, peering through the darkness for movement and mentally evaluating the crawlway's dimensions. Here's where being taller than Brother becomes a problem. The thought let him smile a little as he wormed through on his elbows and knees. Alphonse got to the end and held his breath, listening intently for any noise other than the pounding of his heart…then widened the tunnel toward the floor and shoved himself the rest of the way through. He landed cat-soft on the stone floor, alert for anything as his eyes adjusted from the nearly pitch-dark of the outside to the light filtering through the door on the far wall.

They were lucky. It looked as though they had broken into a spare office or archive room. Al crossed to the sole door and made sure it was locked. "It's clear."

One by one his team moved into the room. "Ah. Nice to be out of the rain." Sergeant Marcus Lane, being himself and therefore a smartass, often felt need to comment on a given situation. Al smirked a bit as Klaus shushed him. "Where're we going, Lieutenant?" Al addressed her.

"Floors above us should be the main cell block," Klaus responded immediately. "This level should be high security cells or laboratories, or some combination. You can probably go straight through the floor about…here, to be in the corridor between the cells." She pointed to a corner overhead.

"Good. I want to check the floors above us, then head back down and hopefully come out the way we came. Let's move this table so we can get a leg up." No need to use alchemy unless I have to, Al added to himself. Less to clean up later. He picked up an end and Lane grabbed the other, moving the metal desk soundlessly into place. Then Al stepped up from the floor and placed his hands on the ceiling. After a small flash, he pushed the section he had cut slowly through the floor, listening for footsteps as he did so. Hearing nothing, Al shoved the plug the rest of the way through and set it to the side, then grabbed the lip of the opening and pulled himself off the table to peer around. They had moved into a closed corridor, with iron bars marking the cells that lined one side. Why is does the place seem so deserted? We should have run into more guards by now…

"Wow, Colonel. Been working out? Ow." From the sound of it, Lane had run into Lieutenant Klaus' fist once again.

Al quietly dropped back onto the table. "Looks like the coast is clear. But you first, Sergeant, in case I'm wrong."

"Ha, ha, sir." Lane shoved his rifle through first, then Al made a stirrup of his hands boosted him after it.

Al helped Klaus through last, then jumped high enough through the opening that his chest and arms cleared the hole. He flung his hands out to brace against the floor above, pushing up until he sat on the edge, then pulled himself clear and replaced the bevel. It slid seamlessly into the floor.

His team had fanned out around the hole, rifles drawn. "Lieutenant Colonel…" For once, Lane sounded unsettled. "Sir, look." He lowered his rifle and gestured toward the cells.

Al looked, felt his jaw clench. Even Klaus's stone façade cracked slightly. "Children…" she murmured.

Behind one iron-ribbed door, the dim light of the storm filtered through the sole window and outlined a small form. It whimpered softly.

Al's face twisted as the sound wrenched something in his chest. It took effort to turn away toward his men. "Go and wake them up as quietly as you can. Hart, guard the door at the other end. Get my attention if someone comes, but don't shoot unless they spot you. We're getting all of them out now."

"Sir." His team spread out along the cells.

Al turned to the nearest cell and the pair of terrified eyes that peered at him through the bars. Instinct told him to crouch down, making himself smaller and less threatening to the frightened child.

"It's all right," he whispered, smiling kindly. "We're here to rescue you. My name's Al, what's yours?"

"Kaila." Her hair had been shaved, and she was so thin and brittle-looking that Al hadn't been able to tell what gender she was until she spoke. Hope seemed to flash across her face when she dared to look him in the eye.

"Hello, Kaila. Would you mind if I got you out of there?"

"You have keys?" Kaila's tone was definitely hopeful now.

"I've got something better. But it might be a little startling. Can you promise not to yell? I don't want the guards to come," Alphonse explained gently, ignoring the little mental voice that was telling him tohurry, hurry, hurry. You couldn't hurry a frightened child; Al had learned that much from his sons. Especially when it would only take one child crying out at the wrong time to get caught. Kaila nodded vigorously and covered her mouth with both hands. Al clapped, touched the bars—and with a flare of blue light, a child-sized section of iron disappeared.

"Like fireworks." Kaila whispered, her brown eyes were wide and wondering. Al smiled. "Let's get you out of there, Kaila."

The girl's bare feet made soft slaps on the stone as she walked out to him and Al realized he had a new problem. We have to get them through the woods without shoes. There isn't anything organic here to transmute into leather or cloth. That meant slower progress back to camp. Which meant they would be even more vulnerable than he had counted on. Need to give them some kind of protection in case the guards pick up on what's happening…

Down the row, whatever lay in Connor's field surgery bag had opened two more cells. "Sir, these two are too weak to walk. They've been starved." Outrage tightened his sharp face.

Inspiration struck Al like his brother's metal fist. "Everyone back away from the cells. I've got an idea." Al clapped his hands and ran down the row, brushing each metal grid with his hands as he passed it. The metal glowed white-gold, then pooled. As if possessed by a will of its own, the molten metal streamed from all quarters to form two softly-glowing mounds that rose and solidified before Al. The metal crackled and its outline sharpened, and suddenly two suits of armor stood before him, mirror images of the armor his soul had once inhabited. Al touched each gauntlet with a brief smile of satisfaction as blue sigils gleamed across the metal and red witchlight flared to life in the hollows of each helmet. The disorientation of looking back at himself through another set of eyes was still unsettling, but he had grown accustomed to it. Me, myself and I. Al smiled to himself. The armor suits cocked their hollow heads, empty eye sockets twinkling as though they shared his amusement. These would be the defenders the kids needed to escape without pulling too many from Al's own team.

With the bars gone, the captives waded into the midst of their rescuers. Klaus in particular gathered a large knot where she crouched, reassuring them with her kind hands and steady voice. Al took a quick count: about twenty all told, four of whom seemed too starved to move without help. They were all very small; the oldest was probably no more than eight. Some were crying, pathetically relieved and utterly exhausted. Several were gawking at the suits of armor. Al's team was staring as well, though some less openly than others. "Lt. Colonel, what in…?" Tocker murmured.

Al patted a metal shoulder. "Don't worry. These'll help us get the sick ones out."

Lane slapped his forehead melodramatically in Tocker's direction. "Jeez, you rookies are ignorant. Haven't you ever heard how the Lieutenant Colonel earned his handle?"

The sergeant's smirk turned sickly as the Lt. Colonel in question cast a dry look in his direction. "I seem to recall that you had to be convinced that the armor suits weren't ghosts the first time you saw them. Lieutenant Klaus, just how long did we spend talking Sergeant Lane out of that tree?"

"Exactly one hour and two minutes, sir. And he was a warrant officer at the time." There was the barest hint of a smile in Klaus's voice.

Lane smiled crookedly and raised his hands over his head. "I surrender. I'll never pick on rookies again." Tocker and Daniels shot him meat-eating looks. Klaus merely sighed in a way that suggested if the sergeant got shot he would thoroughly deserve it.

During this exchange one suit of armor moved over to where Ellis had propped the children too ill to walk. It crouched and scooped up the two that looked most fragile with a delicacy that belied its hard bulk. Then it turned its glowing gaze on the other two, and the Lt. Colonel's voice echoed from its hollow body. "Get on my back, please, and I'll carry you out of here." Wide-eyed, the children obeyed, scrambling onto its shoulders.

Al indicated the suit that toted the kids. "Peterson and Ellis, I want you to take the children back the way we came. I'll send this one with you. Remember, if the armor gives orders, it's me talking." Both men shot looks at the metal automaton, but took the statement in stride.

"All right, you lot," Peterson stepped up and called cheerfully to his charges. "I need you all to line up behind me. Whoever's the quietest gets a prize when we get back to camp. My buddy's gonna follow you, and the, uh…armor person will lead the way."

"Armor person, huh?" Al's voice sounded amused coming from his own mouth and both suits of armor. Ellis gave all three a fish-eyed look. The second set of armor found the seam of the bevel and lifted it out, and the one carrying the children dropped through. Peterson jumped down after it and Ellis lowered kids to him. He turned and saluted before jumping through himself.

"The rest of us are going to make sure this floor is clear of prisoners and then go back to the lowest level." Al continued once the bevel was back in place.

They searched the remaining cellblocks on the floor and found no one. The hollow feeling in Al's stomach grew with every cell they found empty. Are we too late? Did they move them, or…? He shook his head. Better to leave that thought unfinished.

They retraced their steps through the archives room. Al waited until his team had armed themselves to unlock the door. Beyond it was a hall washed lividly by the low-powered lamps. Bloody light seemed to drip from their rifle barrels as the cluster of soldiers moved through the passage.

After an abrupt turn they were faced with a huge set of barred, metal doors. Al could see the tell-tale fracture patterns of transmutation running across its surface, far larger and coarser than in something he or his brother would have transmuted. Al ran one hand across it thoughtfully. The coarse work indicated either little control over the alchemic response or that making it had stretched an alchemist to the limit of his or her power. Don't think much of their taste, either, Al thought, grimacing. The heavy iron writhed with the frozen likenesses of human faces, mouths agape and contorted as though they were screaming in agony, all seemingly straining to escape their metal confines.

Alphonse's eyes traced the intricate horror as he thought: I think I can give up the hope that this was a detention center that just happened to house a laboratory…

"Eww," Lane muttered, catching sight of the grisly artifact. "Somebody needs to fire their decorator."

Alphonse fought down the sudden mad urge to laugh. Someone else giggled nervously.

"Then let's pretty it up a bit." Al rolled back his sleeves, mimicking Ed's customary gesture before he charged headfirst into trouble. Everything I know I learned from you, Brother, Al thought affectionately at his absent sibling. For once Edward would be well out of danger.

"Everyone behind me, and stick close once we're in." The armor trudged to his side and Al paused, reminded of the first time he had invaded a lab like this. The specter of Shou Tucker was what made him look to his group. As his gaze encompassed them they could see the face that had always seemed too young and far too amiable to belong to a war-forged state alchemist had changed. Now his men could see, some of them for the first time, the steel that lay at their Colonel's core, unyielding as the grim shadow looming beside him.

"You may see things in here," the Soul Alchemist reminded, swiftly and softly, "that no one should ever have to see. Remember: do not shoot unless you are physically threatened. What seems like a monster may be human." And what seems human may be a monster, Al added silently to himself, glancing again at the faces in the door. The eyes of the Sewing-Life alchemist seemed to loom over them all, pale and empty with madness. Alphonse shook the image from his mind and looked to the armor, which nodded to him. "Everyone ready?"

There were nods and whispers of "Sir!"

Al nodded back silently, his pride in them evident. He turned back to the door.

"One—" Al placed his hands together. Rifles cocked behind him.

"Two—" His hands were on the door.

"THREE!" Light flared as the door was obliterated. The armor charged through, Al and the rest in its shadow. They skidded to a halt inside, eyes darting into every corner.

It took an eternal instant for Al's eyes to adjust to the lack of light before a sickly glow drew his gaze to the floor. The glow grew brighter, spreading like spilt lamp oil across perimeter of the floor. Vacuum took Al's heart as comprehension dawned—they were standing on an array!

"NO!" he cried, and clapped his hands—

The layer of dense ice had barely solidified beneath them before the array ripped it apart. The force of it threw Al's team into the walls and back through the doors. Al himself, closest to the heart of the reaction, leapt as high as he could, attempting to clear its field of effect. Icy shrapnel raked his face, leaving a burning trail across his cheek and eye. A large chunk of ice glanced across his forehead at blinding speed. The blow crumpled his knees on landing, and he barely caught himself as he fell forward. He pushed aside the surge of nausea, though with less success than he would have hoped. He was straining through the ringing in his ears to identify the noise echoing from further inside the chamber when something struck the back of his head.

Stars burst in the blackness and then he saw nothing at all.

---

Alphonse awoke to laughter. He shook his head muzzily, grimacing as something warm dripped into his eye and across his lips. He touched his tongue to it and tasted metal. Blood. His blood, and probably having something to do with the sledgehammer he would swear was laying into his skull. He squinted into the darkness around him, searching for movement from his men and the source of the laughter. His vision doubled once, then resolved, and he could make out a thin form clutching something to itself, shaking as it giggled shrilly. Alphonse winced as the high pitch of it pierced his head.

"Who are you?" Al demanded, flinching at the way his head throbbed when he talked. He repeated the words in his rudimentary Aerugan, reaching as though to clutch his head, though he was truly trying to bring his hands together and hoping the movement would go unnoticed. It was only then that he realized he had been restrained. His arms tugged uselessly against whatever was pinning his hands above his head.

The figure stepped into the stark light of one of the few overhead lamps, and Al could finally see what it held before itself. He recognized Lieutenant Klaus's slack from, face and hands made ghastly pale by the lights, and held in the grasp of a wiry, wasted-looking man in clothes that must have been fine once, before neglect made them ragged and lent them dark, questionable stains. The man was holding a pistol to the unconscious lieutenant's temple. "Let's get those hands up, shall we? I'm sure Amestris can't afford to lose yet another of its precious alchemists. And it would be a shame to have to shoot such a lovely young lady." The pistol-wielder spoke Amestrian with a strong accent. With his chin he indicated someone behind Alphonse, who spared a glance behind himself. Daniels and Connor were on their feet, though barely, which let Al hope that he hadn't been out for more than a few minutes. Tocker was on his hands and knees. Lane was sprawled on his chest, face down, and he wasn't moving. Alphonse hoped fervidly that the sergeant was only unconscious.

Al glanced at his restraints, taking stock of anything he might be able to exploit. His hands and feet were incased by stone stalactites that had sprouted from the floor and ceiling. He shifted around, testing for weakness, but the rock held him fast enough to abrade his skin when he shifted, and dangling this way offered him no leverage.

He grunted involuntarily when the movement jarred his head and an alarmed shout of "Colonel!" came from behind him. Tocker had caught sight of his CO's predicament.

"Don't move!" Al warned.

"I'd listen to him if I were you," the alchemist mocked. "Now, I wonder what my net has caught me…" He trailed off as Klaus opened her eyes and stiffened at the cold metal mouth pressed to her head. "I suggest you remain on your best behavior, my dear." The alchemist leered at her. Klaus's jaw tightened.

"Lieutenant, don't provoke him." Al injected as much calm as he could into the words. I have a plan. He tried to telegraph the thought to his lieutenant with his eyes alone. Alphonse thought he saw her get it, despite an ill-timed twitch as blood ran into his eye again, gumming his lashes and obscuring his vision.

"Oh, wisely spoken," the alchemist mocked, gracing Al with a twisted smile. "I suppose as you are my…guests…I should introduce myself. I am Varso, Aerugo's most talented biological alchemist." The man made a derisive bow over Klaus's helpless, raging eyes. "Now—Lieutenant Colonel, isn't it?" the alchemist smirked, glancing at Al's epaulettes. "Although Amestrian ranks and reputations are so puffed up I suppose it hardly matters—yet Mother always preached good manners, even if they are wasted on Ammies, so if you'd be so kind as to introduce yourself…" Varso tittered shrilly.

"Alphonse Elric." Al bit out his name, twitching helplessly as blood trickled down his chin. His head was hammering worse than the few times he'd actually received a brain-rattling blow from Winry.

The Aerugan alchemist's pale eyes widened. "Elric," he repeated. "You're the Fullmetal Alchemist?"

"No. That's my brother." Al missed Ed suddenly. If his brother were here and fourteen again, he would have turned into a blond ball of fury at the mistake. But Brother's safe and sound asleep in Riesembul, which is exactly where I'll be this time tomorrow if I can distract this guy for a few more minutes…

"Actually, you're lucky it's me and not him. I'm a bit more understanding of crackpots and incompetent alchemists." Al said brightly, forcing his face into a broad, blithe smile, goading the man into some misstep he could exploit—so long as it didn't get him killed first. Above all else, he wanted the alchemist's attention on him and away from the others.

The man's veneer of sophistication and arrogance cracked, and for an instant Al looked in the eyes of insanity.

Then the alchemist slammed back into control, his face smoothing to its former condescending mask. "Oho. You're a brave one, I'll give you that." Varso's look of contempt shifted slightly, his eyes taking on a gleam of avarice. "I have heard you Elrics can do alchemy without an array, even a tattooed one. Tell me how you accomplish it," the alchemist demanded abruptly, "Depending on the answer, I may just let you live." The man's eyes were feverish pinpoints of darkness in his head. That, the desperation in his face, and the odd, erratic way he spoke only confirmed Al's impression that the man truly was something less than sane.

"Tell me!" Varso hissed, shoving the pistol brutally into the lieutenant's ear.

"Human sacrifice." Al gritted. His eyes were blurring in time with the throbbing in his head. But he only had to distract the man for a few more seconds…

The man threw him a puzzled look that flattened once again into arrogance. "I've already done that. There's no telling how many lives have gone into my work. But I have never accomplished such a thing."

Al's heart turned to lead, sinking cold and heavy into his guts. "You sacrificed people." He might have suspected it, but confirmation still chilled him to the bone. Science and alchemy give insanity an irresistible scope. His brother had said that, a decade and a world ago, and it sickened them both to be proven right over and over again. Behind him, there was a silence so complete it seemed to swallow sound. His team's horror was a palpable thing.

"Of course. Isn't that what you meant?"

"No. It wasn't." Al whispered. He kept bitter triumph from his face as the man edged closer, eyes bulging with greed. He was absolutely desperate to possess the Elric's famous method of instant transmutation. Indeed, what alchemist wouldn't be desperate to possess such a powerful gift?

Only those who already knew the cost.

"I sacrificed myself," Alphonse Elric finished softly. Accidentally, for my mother. Unwittingly, for the Philosopher's Stone. Willingly, for my brother, he added silently.

The other alchemist stared at him, incredulous. "What do you—?"

It was in that moment Al struck, the instant when the man's attention focused completely on him. The armor suit had taken the brunt of the alchemic reaction and been blown into a far corner, out of the Aerugan's sight and—apparently—out of mind.

But not out of the lieutenant colonel's. An overlooked steel fist shot out of the shadows and wrenched the gun up and away from Klaus. The alchemist screeched and pulled the trigger, discharging the gun harmlessly into the ceiling. The armor batted him away from Klaus with one hand, giving the lieutenant a gentle push in Al's direction with the other. The Aerugan alchemist turned and lunged for the armor suit, exposing the twin arrays tattooed on his palms. The armor neatly avoided its attacker's hands, then grabbed the staggering alchemist by his wrists and hauled him off the floor. It stood stoically as its now-helpless burden kicked and screamed to his heart's content.

"Lieutenant, would you mind reaching into my coat pocket and pulling out a piece of chalk and the paper?" Al requested over the racket, wincing.

When Klaus had done this, Al picked the simplest array from one of the sheets of paper. "Now, draw that one once on the stone around my feet, and once by my arms." As she carefully did so, Al called back to the rest of his men. "Sergeant Connor, please make sure everyone's still breathing. Daniels, and Tocker if you're up, restrain our prisoner. If he keeps yelling, gag him." Al's head hurt enough as it was. Once Daniels had restrained the alchemist (he had fallen silent when Tocker took off his sock and offered it as a gag) and Tocker had his gun on him, the armor clanked over to Al and touched the arrays. Al dropped to the floor as the stone crumbled, his gray duster flaring out around him.

"Thank you, Lieutenant."

Klaus's salute was heartfelt. "Thank you, sir."

Al nodded back soberly before striding across the room to where Lieutenant Connor, the field medic for the group, was crouched over Lane. Hart was standing next to them clutching his arm, which was bleeding and hung limp at his side, seemingly broken. Wallace stood next to him, tearing strips from her uniform to fashion a sling at Connor's direction. Bell had been blown back through the entryway but was making his way over. All of them were cut around their knees and legs and lower torso where the ice had raked them, but their boots seemed to have largely protected their feet

Alphonse released a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding and raked a hand through his hair. They had all survived. He winced again as his adrenaline faded and the Central City Symphony began a long, percussive march inside his skull.

"How are we doing?" Al asked Connor, bending carefully. He had the unsettling feeling if he moved his head too sharply he would pass out on the floor.

"Not too bad, considering." The second lieutenant smiled tightly as he detailed the casualties. "Lane's seriously concussed, compound fracture on Hart's arm and maybe a fractured rib along with it. Bell's managing to limp over, so I guess he's fine. Most of us need stitches. Cuts and scrapes, mostly." He turned to the red-headed man coming up behind him. "How're you doing, buddy?"

Bell grimaced. "I came back down on my knees. They aren't real happy with me, but I'll live."

"Glad to hear it." Al chuckled before grimacing to match Bell. Connor caught the change and did a double take, squinting at him in the sickly light. "Sir, you need to let me look at you."

Al didn't need a mirror to know that he looked like he'd been through a meat grinder. He'd been near the epicenter when the array went off, and he and the armor had bore the brunt of its effect. The armor was only dinged and dented, as though it had stood out in a particularly bad hail storm. Al's face, on the other hand, was stiffening with blood and stung with cuts. The front and arms of his duster were in shreds, and he could feel where more icy shards had penetrated his clothing. "I'm all right. We need to look around and get out of here before someone comes to see what all the noise was about." He knew they were fortunate that reinforcements hadn't already shown up.

Connor looked at him consideringly, as though debating whether he could browbeat his commanding officer into getting seen to. His commanding officer saw the speculation in his eyes and gave him a flat look. "Don't make my head hurt more than it already does, Lieutenant."

Connor shrugged. If Al had been anyone else, the field medic would have instructed his fellow officers to sit on him. But a six-foot-two national alchemist was beyond his ability to bully.

"If you pass out, don't cry to me."

Al smiled wryly. "I'm sure I won't. Let's move."

It didn't take much to convince Varso to guide them to where the prisoners were kept, in isolated cells off a corridor of the main chamber. He seemed almost …eager, in fact. Al didn't like that one bit, and discreetly signaled his group to keep their guard up. He wasn't about to walk into another trap.

---

He could smell them before he saw them. The scent of blood, sweat and human waste grew stronger as they passed deeper into the dark. There was an added taint to the air, unwontedly familiar: the acrid bite of pain and fear. With a clap, Al deconstructed the door of every cell into emptiness and, one by one, the captive men stumbled out. One more aware than the others turned and peered at Al. "Lt. Colonel? Is that you?"

Al squinted through the dark, trying to match a name with the voice. "Badenmeyer? Major Badenmeyer?" He vaguely recalled the man, a pike-thin individual with nearly colorless hair and eyes. He and the major worked briefly together on an intelligence assignment in East City. His humorless, collected demeanor and doggedness in his work had reminded Alphonse of Farman. The man was also a sharp chess player; Al remembered barely scratching a draw during the lull before their reassignments.

It was hard to reconcile the seemingly unshakable officer with the wasted man before him. A sound that was almost a sob wrenched itself from the man's throat. "Thank God you came. Thank God. What they did to us…you can't imagine…" The dingy glow of a lamp caught one side of the major's face as he moved out of the shadows toward them, allowing Alphonse a stomach-twisting glimpse of what Varso had inflicted on his captives. Dark scales ran down one side of Badenmeyer's face and neck and continued beneath the ragged remains of his uniform. His eyes caught the lights and threw back an eerie red shine. Alphonse held the major's gaze, determined to see only the man behind the terrible violation. Grimly he thought: We alchemists have so much to answer for…

"It's all right, Major." Alphonse purposely mimicked the bracing tone Granny Pinako had used with her patients, trying to ground the other man and give him some purchase on the moment. "We're getting everyone out. Are these all of your men?"

"All of them that survived. Joels, Talc, Freeman, Mahler and Dovart were killed by the Aerugan's alchemist, along with Sergeant Held." The major recited the names in a dead voice, as though speaking drained what little energy remained to him. "Did you see the alchemist? He's dangerous, sir--"

"We captured him," Al informed the other man grimly, jerking a thumb over his shoulder.

Badenmeyer stared past Al to the captured alchemist. When his altered eyes locked on the man he went utterly still, tense as a wire at its breaking point. A sound like the grinding of an avalanche rose from him, killing all other noise in the corridor.

Al moved first, blocking his prisoner from the major's view. "Badenmeyer, don't. Please."

The Major's eyes blazed, and his lipless mouth peeled back in a snarl full of overlarge teeth. "You'd defend him? After what he did? What he did to us? Look at me! I'm not—I'm not even…." Badenmeyer wrenched his eyes from Al's to stare at the wall, visibly reining himself in. After a moment he turned back, slowly and deliberately, to face not Alphonse but the Aerugan. "Just look at us. He has to pay."

Looking at him, Al could hear Martel's shriek of hate as they confronted the Crimson Alchemist. The memory blended into Ed's cry of accusation when they had stumbled upon Shou Tucker and his most terrible work, his screams of denial when the alchemist compared his crime to their own. He could see the metal fist slamming into Tucker's face, over and over and over. He could see Martel lunging for Kimbley, the flash of her dagger nothing compared to her steel-hard intent. Badenmeyer's eyes held the same look as Ed and Martel; horror and pain had been the source of their rage, blinding them to everything but the fact that their tormentor was before them, and erasing him might mean erasing the pain...

Once again Al was standing between a man and murder, just as he had for Martel, just as he had for his brother, all those years ago.

He spoke gently, trying to cut through the other man's emotion and get him thinking again. "If he isn't interrogated, we'll never find out all of what went on here. We'll need that information to reverse the damage he did." They stared at each other for a tense moment, sober bronze eyes to night-shine red. If revenge had become more important to the man than a cure…

Suddenly Badenmeyer seemed to deflate. He broke the stare and looked back toward his group. After a tense moment he spoke coldly: "Yes sir."

"You!" Both Al and the major started as the captive alchemist abruptly shrilled at them from down the corridor. "Elric! Don't forget my masterpieces! You can't leave them here!"

"'Masterpieces." Al was horribly certain anything this man considered a masterpiece would fall into the category of things he never wanted to see.

"Yes! In that chamber there!" He thrust with his head toward a door at the opposite end. "If you were a true alchemist, you'd understand their significance! They are my life's work! No one else could even approach the genius it took to create them--"

"Tocker, gag him."

"Yes sir." Tocker removed his sock from his pocket and stuffed it in the alchemist's mouth with relish.

---------

Behind him, Al could hear and smell someone's most recent meal being heaved onto the concrete. He couldn't really blame them.

He had tried to brace for what they might find as they broke through the steel door. It hadn't helped much. Cries of shock and horror began as they came through the doors and were almost immediately stifled. They were soldiers, after all. The major's team made no sound at all, having faced the horror before them now head on…but Alphonse was the only one who would proceed any further into the room. In the center of the bunker, glass and metal tanks of yellowish preservative were bolted to the floor and backlit, displaying the terrible fruits of the madman's efforts. Al reached out to touch the curve of the glass, so cold it bit his fingers even through his gloves. Behind his hand, beneath the glass, what had been a little girl was suspended in viscous fluid, her wide blind eyes floating level with his own. Her pale hair drifted around her like a pall and her skin was stretched thin, as though it was barely adequate cover for her tiny, brittle bones. Crowning it all was the deformity that for Varso and his compatriots must have been the pinnacle of their work, their most brilliant achievement. In place of arms, twisted, pinion-covered limbs sprouted from her shoulders, looking for all the world like the wings of a half-plucked chicken. Mouth and eyes agape, she was like some sad and alien bird crushed and drowned in a rising tide. Every tank held a chimera that was much the same, more or less birdlike, all with the faces of children between ten and three years of age. Al looked at them, the shadows around his mouth and eyes etched deep into his face. The entire setting was eerily similar to the laboratory where the Sewing-Life Alchemist had betrayed him to the homunculus Sloth. There too dead half-children had been preserved, as empty and lifeless as the children before Al now. He wondered if he would have nightmares of this place, with his sons faces encased within the glass. If they had lived, Brother's array might have made them human again. We came for them too late...just like Nina…

We'll never even know what their names were…

A muffled sound caused Alphonse to turn, searching for the source. Behind him, the captured alchemist was laughing around his gag, his eyes full of a vicious, insane delight. Al felt his face harden as fury, having simmered since the discovery of the stolen children and the fate of the previous team, spilled over his control. His eyes shot to the armor suit that restrained the Aerugan alchemist in a wordless command. Answering, the armor trapped both of the man's hands in one fist and dragged him up before Alphonse with no more care than he would have afforded a sack of grain. The steel hand wasn't gentle as it ripped the gag out of its captive's mouth.

"What was your military's purpose here? Why did they want avian chimera?" Al rapped out before the other man had a chance to protest.

"Surely even an Amestrian alchemist could have figured it out by now--" the man began, sneering. He was cut off by when an armored hand closed on his throat.

Backlit by the sickly light, the Lieutenant Colonel's face was hooded by the pervading darkness, and the armor beside him seemed an extension of his shadow—a shadow with burning eyes. The grim, hollow voice that echoed around the chamber might have come from the steel or the man. "If I tell it to, that hand will close. Which do you prefer, a broken neck or asphyxiation?" Alphonse hardened himself to necessity, schooling his expression to be as implacable and cold as the fist closing around his captive's throat.

The Fullmetal Alchemist wasn't the only Elric who knew how to intimidate people.

And it worked. Varso's eyes darted to him, bulging with fear—"Soldiers! They wanted soldiers that could assault from the air!" He choked out, drooling in relief as the remorseless pressure withdrew. The Amestrian soldiers looked on as though they'd like nothing better than to take their turn at his neck. Al closed his eyes and stepped back, considering. It made a terrible sort of sense. Aerugo must have heard of the success of the aerial assault on Amestris during the war of the gate. Being metal poor, they had resorted to the materials at hand—namely, human lives. They had probably started by preying on enemy soldiers, until the weaker, unarmed children became too tempting a target…

"Colonel, look out!"

At Bell's shout, Al looked up. Within the shadow of the tanks, a darker shadow was inching toward him. It stopped when it felt Al's eyes on it, shrinking into itself. Al squinted at it. Was it shivering? Something about its pose seemed very familiar…

A memory of his son Richard sobbing over a scraped knee let Al recognize what the figure was, and what it was doing. Al slowly crouched on one knee and spoke in the gentle tone reserved for injured animals and banishing nightmares. "Don't cry. It's all right. We're here to help. What's your name?" Alphonse questioned, hoping with all his might that he would be understood.

"I don't know." The voice was strangely high and fluid, its inflection that of a child no older than eight or nine. Bell lowered his rifle, mouth slack in dawning horror as the words echoed forlornly around the chamber.

"I don't know!" the voice sobbed again suddenly. It lunged forward—

And Al opened his arms. He rocked back as the figure crashed into him at full tilt, but he didn't fall, and he didn't let go of what flung its strange arms around him and sobbed in piping breaths. "It's going to be all right." Al whispered, praying it wasn't a lie. "You're going to be all right."

The creature crying into Al's shoulder was a little boy, or had been. Alchemy had stretched his upper limbs long enough to drag at his feet when not folded awkwardly at his sides. The muscles of his legs were overdeveloped, his feet ending in three-toed talons with another vestigial claw sprouting from each heel. Clawed thumbs arched out of the second joint counted from each shoulder, where hands would have been if he still possessed them, or from where the first five primary feathers would have joined a bird's wing. His body was covered in pale feathers, from short, fur-like tufts on his head to huge, fully developed flight feathers that made his upper limbs more wing than arm. His eyes were huge when he blinked up at Al's face, his pupils mere pinpricks even in the wan light. Al stroked the trembling head comfortingly, feeling feathery down under his hand. Sidling out of his torn duster, he knelt and wrapped it as well as he could around the child before lifting him into his arms. The boy tensed for a moment, then sighed and sagged into him. Alphonse felt his heart melt as the feathered arms reached gingerly around his neck.

Please let us be able to save this one…he prayed, though he wasn't sure to whom.

"Are there any others?" he addressed the alchemist flatly.

Varso stared back at him, his expression a sickening mix of jealousy and pride. "It's mine! I made it. You can't have it!"

The boy in Al's arms flinched at the Aerugan alchemist's voice and shuddered, his arms tightening around his rescuer's neck.

"He belongs to himself!" Al's clear, furious shout rang out, silencing the man. "Answer me. Are there any others?"

The man glared at him a moment in sullen silence. Then he replied, "No. That is my best chimera, the only one that survived the transmutation process."

"Fine." Alphonse pitched his voice so that he could be heard by all. "We're moving out. My team, split between the front and the rear, Major Badenmeyer and his group in the middle." Al moved to the front with the suit of armor.

The alchemist it restrained bucked and frothed out, "No! Don't take my creation! It was a trap! They're coming, they're coming, and they'll destroy it when they kill you!"

Damn. Al thought bitterly. I knew this was too easy…"We've got incoming! Everyone, line up now! Double formation! Tocker, Daniels, give the major's men your spare rifles. Lane and Hart, give them yours too and get in the middle. I want Klaus and Bell behind me, anyone else who can shoot in back." Al's eyes went to the burden in his arms. Unbidden, his mind summoned images of what a firefight could do to a small body…

"Here, sir. I'll take him." Lane held out his hands, no longer burdened with a rifle.

Al looked for any sign Lane's face that his concussion was slowing him down. Finding none, he handed the boy over to the sergeant. "If he's too much to carry--"

"I'll keep up." Lane hefted his burden. "Don't be such a worrywart, Lieutenant Colonel sir. Between the two of us, you'll not be winning the beauty pageants ahead of me. Unless they're modeling alchemists who fight grain-threshers with their faces, sir—" the sergeant flashed Alphonse his insufferable smirk as he hefted the boy. "—you'll take first prize in all of those."

Al smiled crookedly. "I'm pleased I'm not so hurt I can't hear your opinions, Sergeant."

"Always pleased to be alive enough to give 'em, sir."

The Soul Alchemist offered another grim smile in reply as he touched the steel door of the bunker. A minute later they were another suit of armor that joined the group at the rear, one more shield for his men. Alphonse hoped it would be enough. "Let's go."

The gruesome outer doors became three more suits of armor, and the battle was joined. With a cry of "Fire!" in Aerugan from some faceless enemy, the passage behind the entryway erupted with deadly metallic hail. The armor suits charged forward without hesitation, unaffected by the torrents of half-molten lead. Ricochets whined along the stone of the corridor, and cries of fear and pain echoed back to Al as the Aerugan's shots were repelled back into their mass. The opposing force split and retreated further down the corridor, laying down cover fire as they went.

Lieutenant Klaus was beside Al, shouting into over the roar of gunfire. "The corridor splits up ahead! They'll try to catch us in the crossfire!"

"Then we'll make out own way out!" The wall of armor defending them was just wide enough that Al could reach the wall without being exposed to gunfire. Suddenly there no longer was a wall, only empty air where it had receded into the floor.

A horrendous, grinding groan from the ceiling barely preceded Klaus's cry of "Sir! That was a load-bearing wall!"

"Too late now! Move!" Al yelled, directing his men toward the new exit. They surged through, the armor coming last and closing the gap behind him. Al had already bored a hole through the ceiling, with stone stairs punching up to the next chamber.

They were through the ceiling and halfway across the open gallery of the main cell block when gunfire erupted again, this time from overhead. One of his brother's more pungent oaths escaped his lips, but Alphonse didn't hesitate. With a blue flare, he condensed another wall of ice from the air to shield them, curving from the floor to arc over their heads. With a wall at their backs, fire from above was cut off from behind and thudded ineffectually into the ice in front. Fracture patterns formed where bullets struck, obscuring Al's view of the snipers. His conveniently transparent barrier wouldn't hold out much longer. Worse, his hands were starting to shake in exhaustion. Grafting several pieces of his soul at once was beginning to take its toll. "Klaus! Where's the northern wall?"

"Through here, sir!" the lieutenant called back, pointing to the wall at their back.

Al made a hole barely wide enough for them to pass in double file and ordered everyone through. Then his knees buckled. Klaus and Daniels saw him fall and just managed to get under his shoulders in time to keep his head off the stone. Between them he managed to stagger to his feet. A second later, a section of the ice shattered, letting the rain of bullets pour through. Bell screamed as he was caught without cover, collapsing like a string-cut marionette as a bullet ripped through his thigh. Face tight with pain Alphonse managed to turn, deaf to his lieutenant's shout of warning as he rallied the last dregs of his concentration. He pushed with all his will…then one of the remaining suits of armor was before the young soldier, shielding him. But that's not going to last…Al watched as the tell-tale shudder ran through the metal figure, a sign that the soul-bind was failing. He couldn't trust it to take the strain of carrying Bell out…Al pushed Klaus and Daniels toward the gap and dashed headlong for the shelter of the armor's shadow. A glancing shot caught him along the shoulder, spinning him halfway around. Then he was at Bell's side.

"Lieutenant Colonel!" Klaus screamed. She and Daniels were starting after him.

"Stay there! That's an order!" Al bellowed back.

Exhausted as he was, hefting the unconscious man was more difficult than he had thought it would be. Please, I'm so tired—no time for that, have to lift, LIFT—! Al locked his legs and strained, by some miracle managing to get Bell over his shoulder. Another suit of armor took the place of its failing counterpart, retreating with them as Al staggered for the opening. Then they were through. Two of Badenmeyer's men took Bell between them, wrapping his leg, and Klaus was under his shoulder, supporting him. Daniels was right behind as they moved toward the wall, the last wall. The sight of it gave Al another needed spur of numbing adrenaline. He clapped and the wall was gone, and there were footsteps behind him—he touched the opposite wall then, and it was with grim satisfaction that he struck then, and saw the huge, ominous crack run like lightning through the wall, then beyond it. Alphonse was halting the alchemic process at deconstruction, much as Scar had done. The effect was just as devastating now, nearly twenty years after the State-Alchemist killer had died at Lior.

With a roar like thunder, the ceiling collapsed on their pursuers, but a rising, grinding shriek from above warned that the rest of the installation wasn't far behind. He staggered through the opening with Klaus and Daniels, then there was earth under his boots, and they were through the fence and into the trees.

Al stumbled against a root and fell sprawling, his weight carrying Klaus to the ground with him. He strained to rise, collapsed back to a knee as his vision wavered and his head spun. Daniels shouldered his rifle, and he and Klaus helped Al to his feet once again.

Alphonse was barely aware of eyes staring up at him worriedly. "He looks concussed, and he's bleeding from his head and shoulder. Klaus--"

" Just go. 'M fine," the lieutenant colonel slurred at them insistently, trying to shrug off their help. "Stop worrying, Ed." Daniels and Klaus traded anxious looks, both thinking Just how hard was he hit…?

Suddenly Lt. Colonel Elric's head whipped around. "Here comes the cavalry," he pronounced brightly. Then his eyes rolled back in his head and he folded in a boneless heap. Klaus knelt over him, yelling into his face and finally slapping him, but it was useless. The Soul Alchemist was out cold.

She and Officer Daniels had managed to lift him halfway when they were suddenly relieved of his weight. They turned as a familiar voice came out of the dark behind them, making them both jump. A suit of armor had come back through the trees. "Sorry about that," it said, its tone sheepish. The two started again; neither officer had ever known the armors suits to speak without the colonel's direction. "Here, let me."

It hefted the unconscious man without effort. Daniels peered at it. It might have been his imagination, but the armor's movements seemed more human somehow, less stilted than before…the soldier shivered as an eerie thought occurred to him.

"Lieutenant Colonel, is that you in there?" he asked.

"Well, technically, it always was, but my control is better when I'm not conscious." The lieutenant colonel's voice replied hollowly. The huge steel form turned glowing eyes on its limp burden and seemed to shiver. "This is really weird. I've never carried myself before." The Soul Alchemist's voice was somewhere between bemused and vaguely disturbed as he peered into his own face. "I didn't realize that array had torn me up so badly…" The glowing eyes shot up at the shouts filtering through the trees. "What am I doing?" The armor remarked abruptly. "RUN!"

Dodging branches and leaping tree roots, they plunged through the pre-dawn darkness, sprinting for their side of the border and safety.