A/N: Another drabble-sequence, as I like to call them. In other words, drabble length but together they form a linear timeline and tell an overall story. I typically use prompts challenges for these, and this time it's the 100_prompts challenge on livejournal, prompt table #100-B. Prompts will be in order – though somewhat obscure at times. For example, "immortal" in this prompt is referenced through a small mention of the Philosopher's Stone. :D

For Nina
I. Immortal

His limbs were tied up in strings, stiff and barely mobile and yet moving steading without his violation. They were subtle gestures: tracing out transmutation circles that flowed from his subconscious mind into hair, fur, skin and ground while his lips whispered up a cauldron of both despair and hope.

That soft braid had unravelled and mutated but he could still feel the curls under his flesh hand. That was his ground, as his mind drifted through hundreds of alchemic theories and circles, weaving them into a cohesive net that he pushed, mentally, to his palms. And through all that he whispered; still, he whispered things that made no sense to him – words dictated simply by the pull of his marionette strings. The only words he did recognise were the one he heard: repeated, over and over again by a voice so broken and morphed.

'Let's play…brother.' And that last word echoed through tunnels in his mind.

The voice was unrecognisable to him now, though his heart wailed as it listened and some tears splashed onto the automail hand. It was dim though, and he forced himself to ignore it all; what mattered was what he was thinking now, those alchemic equations he was weaving into a complete transmutation.

A small part of him remembered what had brought them here: the Philosopher's Stone. Maybe, if they had never sought it, they would never have seen such a sad and horrible thing – but, if they hadn't, they also couldn't fix it –

He lifted his hands from the fur, feeling a few strands of brown hair cling to his fingers, and he clapped: a strong, determined, sound that broke through the gentle murmurs of his thoughts. But when he brought his hands down – dictated, still, by those marionette strings driving him – the rhythm broke, and that single, repeated, word became a shout in his ears.

'Brother!'

But his hands had already met their target, despite the grip, tight and sharp, pulling against the puppeteer.