Disclaimer: I do not own anything from Fullmetal Alchemist!

Author's Note: This is my first Fan Fiction work so I'm super nervous about posting. It's been an idea of mine for quite a while, and I finally decided to write it down! Depending on the reviews I get, I will post more chapters, but I am a college student so if I'm not seen for awhile its becuase I'm studying for tests and doing homework! Anyways, please enjoy!

My name is Charity Leanne Evans, and I was born May 25, 1997. I am the daughter of Leah Evans, a high school teacher, and Jackson Evans, a well-known chemical engineer and physicist. I suppose every story starts somewhere, and mine is no different. For me, everything started two years ago, the night my father disappeared. I'll never forget that night, June 3, 2010. I was thirteen. The police came to our little house in downtown L.A. after our neighbors reported hearing screaming and a loud bang coming from our house. Mom was crying as they questioned her; she didn't know where the sound had come from either. She told them she had woken up to the sound and saw my dad wasn't in the room at the time. I was standing in the hallway in my nightdress as the police looked through our house trying to find my dad, but he was gone.

Things were pretty rough for us after that. Mom fell under suspicion for his disappearance, but, since nobody found any evidence, the police dropped the charges. People started calling our house dangerous, and our neighbors avoided us. At first, a lot of the children at school started to tease me. They would tell me my mom made my dad disappear and the police would catch her eventually. I would always tell them they were lying until one of them got mad at my denial and threw a rock at me. I wasn't a brown belt in karate without reason, and the rest of the school would just avoid me after I knocked him out. I thought he deserved it until I got home and saw the expression on mom's face. She was crying as she told me I could do so much better than that. After that, I decided to work harder in school to live up to my dad's name. I guess that was my way of trying to remember him. It turned out that I inherited my dad's brilliance, chemistry and physics came easy to me and I loved them. It's no surprise that I would also inherit my dad's fate…

…

"Charity! I need you to take this box of canned pears to the basement. I'm unloading groceries and need to take care of the frozen food!" I hear mom yell from downstairs.

I sigh and close the book I had been reading. "I'll be right there!" I call back as I walk down the hallway. I enter the familiar kitchen where mom is running back and forth trying to find room in the freezer for everything, her disheveled hair falling out of its normally tight ponytail.

"The box is on the counter. Thank you for your help!" she says as I lift the heavy weight off the counter.

"No problem. I'll put this next to the green beans in the storage pantry." I say as I open the door to the basement and head down the stairs.

I hate going in the basement. My dad spent a lot of time down there doing his experiments so lots of science equipment fills the shelves. Mom and I never had the heart to clean it out. I don't bother to turn on the light as I pick my way through the mess towards the food pantry and set the pears down. "Phew, that box was heavy!" I sigh. I'm about to head back to the stairs when I trip over something and fall over. There's a loud crash as lots of things fall off the shelves onto the floor, and something hits my head. "Ouch! Guess that's what I get for leaving the light off!" I rub my head as I shakily get to my feet using the wall as a support. I'm almost up when, all of a sudden, the wall sinks under my hand and I hear a scraping sound as a portion of the wall next to me swings open like a door. I stand there stunned for a moment gapping at this new door when I hear mom's voice calling down the stairs.

"Charity, are you alright? I heard a crash."

"I'm fine mom!" I hear myself say. "I just forgot to turn the light on and knocked over some stuff. I'll be right up!" Heart beating fast, I push the wall back into place and decide to check it out later tonight. I don't want to tell mom about it just yet. Not until after I've looked at it.

The rest of the evening passes quickly. Mom and I both talk about our day while we eat dinner sitting on the couch. Afterwards, I do the dishes while mom puts the food away, and then I kiss her goodnight before I head up to my room to finish my homework. I hear her talking on the phone with another teacher from the school she works at for about half an hour before she climbs the stairs and goes into her room. I wait patiently as I hear the shower turn on. Glancing over at the clock it reads 10:15 p.m. when I hear the shower turn off.

I let an hour pass before I open my door and look down the hallway towards mom's room. All the lights are off under her door so I grab the flashlight from my desk, slip out of my room, and head down the stairs. I open up the door to the basement and wince as it creaks; then, I turn on my flashlight and begin the descent. My hearts is racing as I reach the bottom of the stairs and look at the "wall." I quickly cross the room and begin examining around the spot where I felt my hand sink. Everything looks the same so I start to randomly push at sections of the wall hoping something will happen. I feel my hand sink again and watch as what appears to be a hidden switch takes shape as it sinks into the wall. I hear the same scraping as earlier, and watch as the wall swings open once again, then, I'm left in silence.

I sit against the wall for a minute and try to calm my nerves. I can hear my heart in my ears and my breathing is ragged. Why am I so scared? Am I afraid of what I'm going to find? I think as I stand up and walk up to the hole in the wall. What appears to be a study room waits for me on the other side of the wall. I step into the room and leave footprints on the dusty floor. The wall-door behind me has a latch and handle so I pull it closed and cough as dust flies into the air. I shine my flashlight around the room. There is a desk up against the far wall with papers covering its surface. The shelves in the room are filled with all sorts of gadgets and bottles. A chalkboard to my right is filled with numbers and equations. The room doesn't look much different from the one I just left. Did dad have a secret study room down here? Why?

Curious, I walk over to the desk and look at the papers filled with complex equations. There's a journal sitting on top of a relatively large stack of papers so I pick it up and open it. My breath catches as I recognize my dad's handwriting. I thumb through the journal until I come to the last entry:

June 3, 2010

Today, all the results of my work should finally come to fruition. I've been studying the existence of other dimensions for so long, and now I'm at the finish line! I've discovered what I like to call a circular pattern to space through my calculations and now all that's left is to apply this. I've drawn the circle out and lined it with copper wire to conduct the electricity. The mercury sample in the center should react. It's been several years of experimentation and hard work to get this far. If this goes well I can only imagine what it will do to the science community! My goal is right in front of me.

I read his words over twice before I close my eyes and set the book down. Is this was dad was doing down here? I open my eyes and glance at the floor where I see a large circle drawn underneath the layer of dust. A thin wire traces along the circle and joins in the center. It reminds me of a pentagram only it's not quite the same. I shiver and bend down to examine it dusting off the floor as I go. When I get to the center, I see a small copper dish where I assume the mercury would go.

The scientist in me is squealing in delight as I piece together how the whole thing works. Despite how simple he made it sound in his notes, the whole thing is rather confusing. The angles of the lines in the pattern of the circle all seem to have their own equation, and symbols surround the pattern. Nothing is in English when it comes to symbols, although I do recognize some Greek letters. I glance up at the chalk board and examine the math equations scribbled everywhere. Most of them are hastily scrawled and hardly legible and seem haphazardly written everywhere with no logical order of steps. I sigh and stand up to look at the circle from a higher view. That's when I realize with a jolt that the equations scribbled on the board follow the pattern the circle runs in. I begin to match up the equations from the board with the circle until I reach the center and find only a single line associated with it: 80-g14. Great, there are no equations for the center. Just numbers. What does it mean?

I glance back at the desk where the journal sits and remember my dad's words about the mercury in the center. I look up at the periodic table above his desk and grin. "80 is mercury's atomic number, but what does g14 mean?" I walk over to his desk and begin looking through dad's papers hoping to find a clue. I see a paper where g32 is written and begin to look it over. I glance down at my watch and it reads 1:23. It's getting late. Good thing school's out… I think absently as I'm scanning the page. I groan as I realize that g32 means 32 grams. Dad labels stuff backwards! Really! That made this whole thing more difficult that it had to be! I scowl at the circle. "So 80 is mercury's atomic number and g14 means 14 grams. That's simple enough."

I walk over to a shelf lined with bottles until I find mercury and then I set a beaker on a scale and weigh out 14 grams. I take the mercury to the center of the circle and pour it in the copper bowl. "Why am I doing this?" I wonder out loud as I step back and inspect my work. "I'm just too curious for my own good, but I really want to know what my dad was doing down here." I turn and look at the lever connected to the copper wires sitting on the floor next to the desk. I've already figured out that it turns on the electricity to activate the circle. I walk up to it and start to reach for the switch. I hesitate with my hands just above the lever. Do I really want to do this? I feel a brief shiver of fear run down my spine before I find my resolve. I grab the switch and pull the lever before I can second guess myself.

I hear the electricity run through the circle and see the blue sparks that jump off the wires. The mercury in the center is glowing bright white. I watch in awe as it seemed to float in the bowl and form a black center that slowly expanded. Then, suddenly the mercury falls into the bowl and there is a bright flash of red light. The sparks coming off the wires are red now and I watch in horror as a giant eye opens in the center of the circle. "What is this!" I exclaim as black, hand-like tentacles reach out for me. I scream in pain as they grab me. It feels like I'm disintegrating! I look at my hand as it seems to break apart right in front of me! "What the hell!" I scream and I close my eyes in terror. This has to be some sick dream! I think.

Suddenly everything is quiet and I'm not in pain anymore. I open my eyes and find myself in a large white space. I spin around and see only more white space without any doors or windows. It's completely empty. I immediately start to panic. Oh my… I just DIED! I KNOW I just died! I'm dead! This must be heaven or something like that! Shoot! I didn't believe in religion so does that mean this is hell?

"It looks like another one without a door managed to fall in. Hello." I hear a voice behind me say.

I jump and spin around to face a strange person sitting before me. It looks completely white and the only reason I can see it is because there's a faint black outline surrounding it. Is it an angel? No, I'm in hell so it's got to be a devil, right? "Who are you?" I ask.

"Oh, I'm glad you asked that. I am what you call the world. Or perhaps the universe, or perhaps God, or perhaps truth, of perhaps all, or perhaps one, and I am also you."

I look at it confused. "What?" I ask.

It looks at me and smiles. "Normally I answer your questions by opening your door, but you don't have one. Just like the last man that fell through. Since you haven't broken the rules of alchemy I suppose I wouldn't even do that."

Alchemy? Then I realize she was talking about someone before me. I ask, "There was someone here before me! What did he look like?"

The white woman (I decided it was a woman since she said she was me, whatever that means) smiles and says, "I sent him beyond."

"Does that mean he's dead too?" I can hear the sob in my voice. This is going to kill mom.

"What makes you think you're dead? You still live if you're here. No, I sent him beyond my domain to answer his questions, although that has caused me a lot of trouble." She smiles at me. "Perhaps you will find him if I send you beyond as well, although I can promise you, you won't like what you'll find. I suppose I can ask for your help in return for sending you after him. People from your home don't have gates, but do have a strong connection to this place. I suppose you yourselves are a gate in a way, and you can influence the gates of others. That's a dangerous existence, but it can't be helped. Will you be my 'Charity'?" The woman laughs like she just made some clever joke.

"I don't' understand what you mean! Where's my dad! If he's not dead then let us both go home!"

"Of course you wouldn't understand" she chuckles. "I can't send your father back right now, but if you retrieve him and manage to get back here, then I can send the two of you home. Going after him could solve the problems he's caused if we're lucky. I'll give you this to help you do that since you'll be doing me a favor." She extends her arm and a weird shadow snakes across the floor and attaches itself to me. "Equivalent exchange, right? You fix the problems your father caused, and I'll give you the tools to do that. Afterwards I'll send you home. So what do you say? Will you be my 'Charity'?" She laughs again at her own personal joke.

I grit my teeth in irritation. "Alright! I'll do it" I sigh. It's not like I have any other choice.

Her grin splits even wider "Why don't we shake hands on it then?" She extends her had towards me. I step forward warily. I'll save dad. Mom, don't worry. We'll both be back soon. I bend over and firmly grasp her hand. An explosion of noise rings in my ears and I pass out surrounded by darkness

…

Edward Elric sat at the table sipping a cup of coffee and looking over his notes. It was late and the kids were in bed while Winry was tinkering in her shop with some automail. Just then the phone rang.

"I'll get it!" Winry called as she ran to pick up the phone. "Hey Ed, it's for you! Sounds like Mustang!"

"Dammit! I told him not to call this late! He probably wants to brag about his daughter. He's as bad as Hughes was!" Despite saying that, Ed was smiling as he picked up the phone. "Hello?" He walked into the next room as he listened to the phone.

Winry sighed and returned to her project. She was only vaguely listening to Edward's half of the conversation until she heard him exclaim, "What!" She heard hurried footsteps and the sound of the T.V being switched on. …military have moved in and surrounded the area. It sounded like the news.

"Ed? What's going on?" She set down her project and walked into the sitting room where Ed was staring at the T.V. She glanced over and gasped. A large crater sat in the middle of Central Command Center giving of sparks of electricity. "What on earth happened!"

Edward wasn't listening to her as he focused on the voice over the phone. "A girl! You found a girl in the middle of the crater!"... "Well obviously alchemy is involved! And, you say it's similar to the disturbance in Eastern Command two years ago?"… "I'll be on the next train in. So will Al." Edward hung up the phone and looked at Winry. "Mustang needs the two of us down in Central. I'm going to head over to Al and Mae's and tell them what's going on, although they probably already know. That alkahestry is pretty amazing at telling when stuff like this happens."

"I'll get the kids ready, we're going with you."

"There's no need for you come. Al and I will be fine."

"I know that! But, since its summer, the kids don't have any school so it's really not a big deal. I wouldn't mind visiting Riza anyway. It's been awhile."

Edward sighed and stretched one arm behind his back. "Alright, we'll all go, I'll see you in a few minutes." With that he stepped out of the house and into the warm mid-June breeze. What the hell is going on? He thought as he walked down the quiet Resembool lane towards the well-lit house down the street.