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Chapter Text

Day 1 of Amestris.

With no memory of how I arrived, I awoke in the middle of the town of Urbukya, in the East area of the country of Amestris. Last I remembered, I had joined the Traveler’s party and travelled alongside them to Inazuma, though past Inazuma, I can’t seem to grasp clear details. I hope I didn’t lose control. Please let Mondstadt and Teyvat be safe. I was found lying on the main street of the town, according to Ms. Amelia, the woman who is kindly allowing me temporary residence at her abode.

Where I am currently in this world greatly resembles the region of Mondstadt in architecture, landscape, and climate. However, it is considerably smaller, mostly consisting of wooden houses and a rough population of a few hundred. Judging by its location on the map that Ms. Amelia has shown me, I am not far from one of the main cities of the country of Amestris. Amestris itself appears to be several times larger than the whole of Mondstadt (the region of Barbatos) and only a small part of one of seven continents on this planet. The size of the planet itself must be larger than that of Teyvat, yet the gravitational effect appears mostly unchanged. Could this be due to Celestia’s presence above Teyvat changing the gravitational field of the planet? Or perhaps Teyvat is larger than we know and adventurers have yet to unearth the whole of the planet. It could also be due to the material at the core; Teyvat’s core is, after all, believed to be the malleable pure magic that powers the ley lines.

I am unable to use my Vision. To be expected, as the Vision is a wielder’s connection to the floating island of Celestia, gifted by the Archons. Celestia’s source of elemental power is the ley line network beneath the surface of Teyvat, most clearly exhibited in domains, where ley lines that are closest to the surface take the form of trees. There does not appear to be any ley line network in this world, at least not under Amestris. Instead, there are two constant source of energy: the movement of tectonic plates and something else that I can’t quite place yet. It feels like not unlike the Heart of Naberius that beats within my chest.

Theoretically, as I, created from the ley lines and chalk of the Earth, am the source of my own alchemic energy, I should still be able to perform alchemy as I have before, even without the presence of the ley lines to draw elemental energy from. I have tested my hypothesis in three categories, with five trials each: inanimate objects such as stone and glass, living objects such as plants, and animate objects such as animals. As hypothesized, the alchemic transformations worked using the ley line flow within my own body. However, the strength of the reactions have weakened, as my main source of alchemic energy is no longer present. The ley line energy within me also has a limit. It would be best to refrain from using alchemy and learn how to draw from the energy of this world if I am to conserve my energy for now.

Day 2 of Amestris.

Alchemists exist in this world as well. Most notable are those employed by the military, who hold the title of State Alchemist. They are funded for research under the condition that their powers are those of the military and they will obey three tenets: do not disobey the military; do not create gold; do not create human life.

I am a contradiction of this final tenet, even though I myself do not partake in the creation of human life. As a product what is forbidden by the final tenet, it would likely be in my best interest to hide my identity for now, even though Rhinedottir isn’t here and never will be and my master is the one who actually broke the law here. In any case, I did it well enough in Mondstadt, it shouldn’t be too difficult here.

Crafting tables for Alchemy on Teyvat were a relic of the past, from far before the Archon war, much like the Teleport Waypoints that the Traveler was able to unlock. The circles and symbols on those tables were what allowed one to draw power from the ley lines. Circles. It appears that alchemy remains the same no matter where you go— it is life, and the transformation of matter. How to connect it to the tectonic plate movement, though? The energy release here must be less stagnant than that of the ley lines. Perhaps another external circular energy direction matrix. 

I will conduct trials of different matrices tomorrow.

Day 3 of Amestris.

As expected, the trials proceeded smoothly. An external circle redirected the energy too far, and an internal circle pulled too much energy. The circle interspersed on the main circle worked, converting the energy to a stagnant form that resembled that of the ley lines. However, the energy does not have the concentration of elements that the ley line flow naturally does, and extra matrices must be used to convert it as such. With this in mind, a trial run of tableless— perhaps it is circleless, since crafting tables do not exist in this world—  was successful.

As usual, my favorite thing to do, bringing my artistic creations to sketchbook, is still possible. I made a crystalfly today to act as a lantern while I studied the few history books that Ms. Amelia offered me.

I’m… glad.

Albedo snapped his journal shut, and with some gentle waves, pulled the small crystalfly flitting around his head back to the sketchbook it was born from.

It was still the middle of the night, but the air outside felt clear and fresh. Silent, in a way that the city of Mondstadt never was, silent like the plains and mountains and fields that the Traveler showed him. Silent, like Dragonspine Mountain.

From his window, he easily hopped onto the roof of the humble two-story house that Ms. Amelia owned. the stars were unfamiliar. Albedo took out his sketchbook. The mountains ahead were rather aesthetically arranged, pleasantly interposed such that each peak was visible. Rolling hills with scattered trees, a small town overlooked by nature…

His hand flew as his pencil recreated the serene beauty in front of him. This world may not be Teyvat, but it was still quite beautiful.

He stilled.

What was that?

That rumbling beneath his feet. Like a small earthquake, like a Lawachurl running towards him.

He turned his head to the source, a tiny black dot in the distance that grew steadily larger, kicking up a cloud of dust as it neared.

It was unnatural, Albedo thought as he jumped off the roof with a practiced roll and summoned his sword to his hand in a shower of golden sparks. The eyes of the vaguely humanoid creature seemed empty and glazed over, and yet a great grin stretched across its face, a large slobbering tongue hanging from it.

“A person…?” the creature grinned. “Can I eat it? Can I?”

With large clumsy movements, the creature charged forth, arm like thick sausages dangling behind it. Albedo swiftly dodged, slashing at the creature’s arm with the sword and drawing blood. Not like the hilichurls that bled black ashy dust, then. 

He flicked the red blood off his blade and watched as the stumbling big creature swayed on its feet like a disoriented boar that bumped into a cliff. Red alchemical lightning arced through the air, leaving a smoky smell in the atmosphere. The slash on the creature’s arm stitched itself back together, the grotesquely severed muscle fibers wriggling like thin worms to converge and fuse, skin stretching back into place, leaving a seamless intact arm.

The speed of its alchemical regeneration was far beyond the bounds of alchemy Albedo was aware of. For normal beings, at least.

“That hurt…” the creature sucked its thumb and cried.

Albedo allowed himself to tsk at its bothersome ability and considered attacking again. The regenerative properties of this creature couldn’t be endless, and its movements were large and sloppy enough that he could easily dodge with a dash or jump. If the source for his healing was alchemy, then Albedo was certain that the creature must have some sort of alchemical catalyst within it, programmed to regenerate the body as quickly as it could. Perhaps with that, he could figure out more about the alchemy of this world.

“I’m supposed to go to Lust…” the creature mumbled, “but I’m still hungry. Just one snack… Can I eat you?”

The creature charged forth again. Albedo let his training take over his body, allowing his feet to move in a practiced dance of bladework and dodging. Red lightning flashed with every wound Albedo inflicted, illuminating the village.

Lights started turning on as people came out to check what the commotion was.

Albedo could do without the horrified screams while he was fighting, thank you. The creature couldn’t do much but stumble around helplessly as Albedo’s quick swordwork left wounds all over its body. The regeneration was taking its time catching up, and Albedo watched as the creature slowly became more sluggish.

He thrust a gloved hand onto the ground. Solar Isotoma. Even without his connection to the Geo Archon, he could alchemically create the golden flowers that aided him in battle. The stone bloom sprouted beneath the creature’s feet, the rubble it produced stabbing its feet. As it stumbled back, Albedo mounted it, relishing the sensation of elevation as the bloom sprouted and rose.

Jumping into a diving attack, he thrust his sword deep into the creature’s stomach, ignoring how the crimson blood that spouted forth stained his white coat.

But still the creature regenerated. With a flash of red lightning, the creature slowly climbed back onto its feet.

But the creature had stopped grinning, and now just looked off into the distance. “Lust… I just need to go to Lust,” it mumbled, lumbering off quickly towards the East.

Albedo once again flicked his sword clean of the creature’s blood, only to find that the crimson liquid seemed to disintegrate into black dust, leaving the metal spotless. The blood on his coat also seemed to disappear somehow.

Interesting.

He let his sword fade again, and adjusted his clean coat.

Very interesting indeed.

Day 4 of Amestris.

Ms. Amelia and the townspeople were grateful for my help in fending off the creature, but not keen on letting me stay after I stabbed it as I did. Understandably, they don’t desire the presence of a safety hazard. Me. Amelia did apologize, however, and sent me to East City with a substantial pouch of this world’s currency. It is rather odd, seeing coins without the symbol of Morax embossed on them. I suppose this must be what the Traveler felt seeing Mora for the first time. 

Again, this world’s advancement in technology fascinates me— though perhaps it is simply the novelty. The train, made of a metal body, would require more ore than the smiths gather in a month, and must require some more efficient method of acquisition. How far into the future past the world I know must this planet be, to be able to mass produce these, which would seem miraculous in Teyvat? The year here appears to be 1914, however, I am unfamiliar with how time is measured on this world. Time in Teyvat was measured in years after the Archon War, after all.

Albedo shut his journal. Heavy clanking steps approached, and Albedo was staying vigilant for abnormalities since meeting and engaging in battle with the creature from yesterday.

A young voice that seemed to echo from behind metal called out. “Brother! The last free seat is here. We‘ll have to squish a little though.” Albedo didn’t know if he was more surprised at the glowing red eyes behind that helm or the sheer size of the suit of armor before him. He didn’t think that it could practically be used for anything, much less by someone who sounded so young. But this was a new world, and he couldn’t be skeptical of anything considering his own presence here was far out of the norm.

“Nice job, Al!” shouted another young voice. Albedo looked down from the armor to see a blond teenager in a red coat.

They both took their seats across from him, just as the train began to move. Albedo looked at the passing station with growing interest. The bumpy movement wasn’t quite like gliding, which was always smooth and unpredictable like the winds, but he couldn’t quite find anything else to describe it as. The constant sensation of going forward, even as the seat and the car and the people around him stayed still relative to him.

He quickly sketched the train car and the blurred scenery outside. When he looked back up, the armored boy was looking at him.

He couldn’t tell too clearly, but from the way those red glowing eyes twinkled… was he interested in Albedo’s art?

“You draw really well, don’t you?”

Oh. He was talking to Albedo.

Socializing was a bit of a pain, but as usual, Albedo would deign not to show it. Drawing was a topic of interest for him anyways. “Yes,” he responded with one of his usual smiles; of course he drew well, it was a skill he had cultivated. “I find it rather enjoyable, not to mention useful for scientific study to be able to accurately recreate an image.”

“Oh? You’re a scientist then? What do you study?”

“Well…” telling them couldn’t be detrimental, could it? Alchemy didn’t seem particularly common here. “Alchemy, I suppose.”

“Another alchemist! Brother, it’s a small world, isn’t it?”

“Yep, sure is, Al,” the blond brother sighed. It was the sort of disappointed sigh a child would give upon receiving a lackluster Christmas present.

He was being underestimated, wasn’t he? He was definitely being underestimated. This rarely happened In Mondstadt; Albedo was renowned enough there that nobody dared to question his knowledge. Of course, he wasn’t in Mondstadt now, but the thought still made something within him tick. How irksome.

He returned to his nearly finished sketch, polishing some of the details before flipping to a new page. A crystalfly, perhaps; drawing from memory was after all just as valuable a skill as drawing from observation.

Meanwhile, the armored boy— Al, was it? Chided his brother for his dismissing tone. Albedo heard the hushed whisper of “Brother! Just because you’re a genius doesn’t mean you can just dismiss other people’s alchemy.”

“Yes, yes, okay Al,” the brother grumbled. 

“At least make an attempt to talk to him,” Al pouted. He didn’t actually pout but one could hear it all too clearly in his voice.

The brother sighed. “So? What field of alchemy do you specialize in?”

Albedo considered just outright dismissing the question, but figured a little showing off was warranted. “Mostly… still life and creation,” Albedo lifted the finished crystalfly sketch out of the page with a single glowing hand.

It sprung to life, flapping its wings, the glowing dust trail sparkling as it flew around the three boys.

Albedo watched the dismissal in the brother’s eyes morph immediately into wonder, fascination, and then to a calculating gaze, full of questions and hypotheses. Those were the eyes of a scientist, eyes that Albedo recognized all too well.

“How,” the brother breathed out. “Equivalent exchange should dictate that this isn’t possible. Not to mention, no circle. No clap.” The golden eyes burned with curiosity as they turned to Albedo’s own teal orbs. “Do you… have a Philosopher’s Stone?”

Albedo narrowed his eyes. Sharp, this one. “It is entirely possible while following the laws of equivalent exchange. As you should know, everything living has a soul within it, with its power varying depending on its sentience. The crystalfly will fade in a few minutes after expending the residual soul of the wood used to create this paper. Earth is the substance of time and memory, that from which all life is born. And this,” he let the crystalfly land on his finger, “is rebirth.”

The crystalfly returned to paper and crumbled into dusty shreds over his palm. The brother gaped.

“That’s…” the brother dressed in red gulped. “But how? Souls aren’t so easily manipulated; a toll is required. Life itself, while malleable, is fickle, isn’t it?”

“Earth grounds life,” Albedo explained. “It is its source and its origin and thus, so long as you have the right array, the matrix is able to attach life to dirt, chalk, possibly even stone. That said, you are correct. Souls and life alchemy are fickle. They often do not last long unless attached to their natural living body.”

“I don’t… think I get it,” the suit of armor hummed. “You said that the soul would come from the previous life of the paper, correct? But the paper form of the tree is already long dead. To make life from it, you’d have to revive the soul, and to revive life that has already departed goes again the natural laws of the universe. The circle of life only goes one direction.”

“It isn’t so much reviving as it is… rejuvenating,” Albedo mused, one hand on his chin. “For example…” he pulled a twig out of his pocket, “this twig has been disconnected from a tree, its main source of life, and should thus already have a departed soul, yes?”

The brothers nodded, watching intently.

“But the life is still present. In plants specifically, should you choose to preserve the life, flowers can still bloom given the proper procedures. If you simply pull the right components together that would allow it to do so…”

He flicked his wrist, letting the unfamiliar alchemical energy of the tectonic plates swirl like the erratic cicins of Teyvat within him, taking the shape of a circle. The branches he envisioned on the twig manifested themselves with a byproduct shower of golden sparks.

“You can do this,” he concluded.

The brothers were speechless, but the one in red gathered himself first. “That still doesn’t explain how you’re able to do alchemy without a circle,” he grumbled, one gloved hand ruffling his hair in frustration.

“Ah,” Albedo noted that it apparently wasn’t common in this world. It wasn’t in Teyvat either, but only Sucrose and Timaeus had ever questioned him about it, and never very far, since they respected his privacy and silence on the matter. “Well, I’ve always been able to do this. Not sure why,” he lied.

He had an idea of why. He represented Ouroboros and the cycle of rebirth, and thus was able to channel the energy of an alchemist reaction within himself rather than using a literal circle. He wasn’t going to tell that to them though.

The brothers fell silent. Albedo honestly couldn’t quite tell what the armored one was thinking, but the one in red had countless questions whirring around his mind, no doubt. Albedo let him think what he wanted. He had a sharp mind, for sure, but perhaps the idea of an alien from another world might be to outlandish for him to conclude based on the evidence Albedo had given him.

That said, Albedo wasn’t going to give anymore hints. He wasn’t like the Traveler, so open and naive and trusting of anyone. And the boy wasn’t like Albedo, who could assume that the Traveler came from another world both through rumors and through pre-existing proof of alien life.

As Albedo settled on another thing to sketch— it was rather good practice doing so on a moving vehicle, which would jostle his arm every so often— Al spoke again.

“So, what are you going to East City for? If you don’t mind me asking.”

“The State Alchemist Exam.”

Ed wasn’t sure what to think of the teenager that sat across from him. He hated the way that smile seemed too practiced and insincere— those kinds of people always bothered him.

But his genius was undeniable. Many alchemists never considered wood as living, using it as simply another material to reshape. But to rejuvenate and recreate life? That was a spectacle. A miracle. 

Ed couldn't believe he had never heard of this person before. Surely, the way he spoke, he had to have been an alchemist of some renown, right? But he didn’t have a silver pocketwatch, and he dressed rather oddly. Thigh-high boots?

Ed got his answer pretty quickly. Albedo wasn’t a State Alchemist yet, and people who weren’t tended to fall by the wayside in terms of fame. One only had to look at his teacher, the passing housewife, to figure that out. In any case, Ed was curious about him.

“Then we might end up coworkers,” Ed took out his pocketwatch. “Nice to meet you. I’m Edward Elric, Fullmetal Alchemist.”

“And I’m his little brother, Alphonse!”

The teen nodded at each of them in turn. “Albedo,” he introduced succinctly. 

Ed noted the way Albedo didn’t give a last name. He wasn’t one to pry though.

Still, something about Albedo gave him chills. It could be his terrifying prowess in alchemy, or it could be the way his teal eyes and pale face were completely unreadable, an impregnable veneer of perfection and professionalism.

He realized too late, after they had already gone their separate way from Albedo, that he never did answer his question or whether or not he held a Philosopher’s Stone.

“Last name?” The lady at the registration table asked again.

Albedo bit back the annoyance that was starting to build inside him. “I don’t-“

“Look,” the lady interrupted, fed up. “I don’t care that you don’t have a last name, make one up if you need to. But this registration form needs two names and I’m not filing it unless you give me the other.”

Albedo wasn’t sure if he was more indignant at being chastised like a child or startled by his late realization that a second name could be any name he wanted, even his title.

“Kreideprinz,” Albedo answered.

“Please take a seat in the room,” the lady sighed. “The exam will begin shortly.”

With a nod, Albedo left the table.

Albedo Kreideprinz. 

He looked down. Perhaps the title his master had gifted him was useful for something after all.

As soon as he walked into the room, Albedo could tell he seemed out of place among the adults. His outer appearance must have looked like that of a young man in his late teens, and if what Edward said about the exam was true, then most people studied their whole lives for this.

A written portion and then a practical one, to demonstrate their knowledge. Sure, Albedo could do that.

The written exam distributed, the person at the front shouted, “Begin!”

Albedo could have smirked at these questions. With ease, he responded, drawing flawless circles now and then. This was the exam that so many dreamed of passing? Child’s play. Sucrose had finished the textbooks for these in mere months. He had to admit though, as he turned in his exam the earliest, perhaps this would have given Timaeus some trouble.

He was soon led from the room by a soldier dressed in sharp-cut blue into another spacious room, with observers lined up against the walls and the viewing space above.

It appeared that the practical exam would have more observers, then. Albedo took the chalk that had been provided at the entrance out of his pocket.

“You will have ten minutes to demonstrate your practical knowledge of alchemy to the judges,” the examiner declared. “Begin.”

Albedo could feel the demeaning and underestimating eyes on him, once again stirring something irksome within him. With practiced ease, he crouched to the ground and began sketching Beth, the crystalfly form of the Anemo hypostasis. This would require more material and more matrices, but upon activation of the external circle and redirection to the interposed circles, Albedo would be able to absorb and morph the alchemical energy within himself through the matrices he knew by heart, and return it to his creation. He couldn’t quite do this the way Sucrose could, by summoning Beth from the blessing of Barbatos and the always-blowing wind of Mondstadt, the Anemo Archon’s land, but…

“Arise,” he commanded, and with a hand slammed to the ground, the stone reshaped itself, thinning into translucent white wings; the crystal solidified, sparkling in the sunlight; wind blew wildly through the chamber as the large crystalfly awoke with a strong flap of its wings and demanded the attention of its observers.

The usual teal-green hue of Anemo that accompanied its warm glow was absent, the sparks that usually told of elemental power replaced with dusty white chalk bits that floated in the air, jostled with each flap of the great chalk crystalfly’s wings.

In the natural light from the window, though, each piece of floating dust almost seemed to gleam in its own lackluster way, as it waltzed slowly through air currents to the ground.

Albedo had interacted with the people of Mondstadt long enough to know that the expression coloring the judges’ faces, their dropped jaws, and their widened eyes conveyed shock. Some tinted with what Albedo believed was fascination, some with reverence, and some with fear. He’d made quite an impression on them, it seemed.

In other words, nothing out of the ordinary, after he had once presented these skills to the Sumeru Academia that used to relentlessly visit him.

“I’ve completed my demonstration,” Albedo said calmly to the examiner, his expression unchanged. “When may I expect my results?”

The examiner collected himself, face smoothed to once again look as prim and proper as his blue uniform, and cleared his throat. “Well, you’ve most likely passed, but the confirmation will come tomorrow at the latest. Please return to the examination site tomorrow at 1500.” 

Albedo nodded to confirm that he understood, and turned to leave the room. If this went well, his financial stability in this world was ensured.

Now if he could just find a place to stay for the night…

Ed grumbled under his breath as he walked out of East City’s military headquarters. A favor, his foot! If the colonel had wanted Liore dealt with, he might as well have gone himself. 

That colonel bastard was infuriating. Even if Ed had to admit that the lead in Liore was promising and the closest they’d gotten to a philosopher’s stone yet, and even if Mustang was introducing him to a bioalchemy specialist tomorrow. Ed knew that his stupid smirk and unreadable eyes hid ambitions and elaborate plans to achieve them. He was just a scheming bastard like that.

Having to rely on the colonel’s help, even if he’d been doing so for years (not that he’d ever admit it) always left a sour taste in his mouth. Ed grumbled again as he walked towards the barracks he and Al were staying in,

And paused, seeing Albedo right outside the entrance to the headquarters.

Was he lost? Ed cocked his head, squinting in confusion at the blond alchemist. Those unreadable teal eyes seemed lost in thought, though for what, Ed couldn’t fathom.

Ed decided against ignoring Albedo. They were acquaintances by now, at least, right? The least he could do was extend a greeting.

“Yo,” Ed called out. 

Albedo’s eyes widened in a rare show of emotion, surprise, and quickly smoothed over. “Ah, Edward.”

Ed cringed. “Just Ed is fine. Anyways, how’d the exam go?”

“Well,” Albedo nodded. “The examiner said I was likely to pass and instructed me to return tomorrow.”

Ed whistled a noise of appreciation, impressed. “Well done. Not many pass it first try, though it isn’t a surprise considering what you showed us on the train.” 

“...”

Albedo didn’t reply, and Ed didn’t know what to say.

A single bead of sweat rolled down Ed’s cheek as they stewed in the awkward silence— was it as awkward for Albedo as it was for Ed?

Finally Ed held out his gloved left hand. “Well, it’s not confirmed yet, probably, but congratulations. I guess we’ll be coworkers then,” Ed settled for politeness, hopefully dispelling the silence between them.

Albedo’s lips curved ever so slightly to give Ed a smile, one of those obviously fake practiced ones meant for social niceties, and shook Ed’s offered hand.

“I suppose so,” Albedo calmly agreed. “I look forward to working with you.”

The handshake lasted far longer than Ed knew was socially normal, but neither he nor Albedo broke it, so it just ended up continuing until Ed finally put his hand down.

“So? What are you doing out here? How long have you been standing here?” Ed asked. It was truly unusual for him to be the one starting— or at least, trying to start conversation with a near-stranger, but Albedo had piqued Ed’s curiosity on the train and he couldn’t quite seem to quash it.

“I’m searching for a place to reside for the night, until I can return tomorrow and use the barracks,” Albedo held up his near-empty coin pouch, eyes once again pensive the way they were before Ed had come up to him. “Most hotels and lodgings in this area are more… expensive than I anticipated, however.”

Was that… was that a frown? On Albedo’s face? Ed snorted an unceremonious chuckle. That might’ve been the first time he’d seen anything other than indifference or a polite smile on Albedo. “That’s what you were so lost in thought about? I thought for sure you were considering a theory or hypothesis, not where to stay for the night,” Ed laughed.

The frown became more pronounced as Albedo spoke. “Normally, I would be, but—“

“Come stay with me and Al,” Ed interrupted. “We’re allowed to put up a guest or two at the barracks.” Why Ed was offering, he wasn’t certain; he owed nothing to Albedo and knew Albedo was, at best, suspicious for how quickly he could create and dismiss life through alchemy, but he couldn’t seem to think of Albedo poorly.

Those teal eyes looked at Ed in some emotion that he couldn’t quite place as he led Albedo to where he and Al were staying.

Huh. 

Turns out there were more people like the Traveler, people who naively trusted so quickly, people who would offer kindness so easily.

People who would trust Albedo.

Albedo couldn’t tell if the current feeling of warmth in his chest that sometimes came from eating Sucrose’s candies or getting a hug from Klee was a good thing or not.

Ed poked his head into the next door. “Hey, Albedo, have you gotten settled?”

Albedo looked almost sheepish despite the lack of expression on his face, as he stood in the center of the room. “I didn’t have anything to settle to begin with…”

And finally Ed realized how Albedo didn’t even carry so much as a trunk, much less any changes of clothes or amenities. Ed frowned. “Do you want to go shop for some?”

Albedo shook his head. “It’s fine,” he declared in a tone of finality. “Did you have any business with me?”

“Oh right!” Ed grinned. “It’s about dinnertime, and I wasn’t sure you knew the direction to the cafeteria. Wanna come with?”

Albedo frowned slightly again. “Do they give large portions?”

“So-so. How come?”

“I have a small appetite and often find that large portions lose flavor and are no longer enjoyable when I’ve already eaten a satisfactory amount.”

What a roundabout way of just saying he doesn’t like eating large portions. Ed shrugged. He’d met weird people in his life and Albedo was no exception. “You can ask for a smaller portion. Or I could just finish what you can’t finish; I’m always pretty hungry.”

A dinner spent discussing the principles and energy sources of alchemy was a dinner well-spent indeed.

Albedo didn’t question Al’s absence, though Ed was sure he must have noticed it. And for that, Ed was somewhat grateful.

“Welcome,” said the man, with his hands folded behind his back and smirk on his face. “I am Colonel Roy Mustang.”

Albedo nodded. “Nice to meet you, sir,” he greeted, making sure not to externalize his disdain for these pleasantries and niceties that always got in the way of actual business. He’d done that when he’d joined the Knights of Favonius, and though Varka, the jolly man he was, simply laughed it off, Lisa later alerted Albedo to his unusual impoliteness in such a formal setting.

Somehow, the colonel seemed almost surprised by Albedo’s greeting, and Albedo wondered if he’d somehow committed another social faux-pas despite all the Knights of Favonius’ tips.

“Looks like we fortunately won’t have another Edward Elric,” the man chuckled.

“I am Albedo, not Edward Elric, sir.” Albedo deadpanned.

Mustang waved a hand in the air dismissively. “I figured most teens were insubordinate and hotheaded like him.”

Before Albedo could respond, Mustang pulled out an envelope and wooden box from beneath his desk. “In any case, Kreideprinz, congratulations on passing the State Alchemist Certification Exam. Here’s the silver pocketwatch, proof of your certification. Your certificate of appointment and detailed regulations are here.”

Mustang stood in anticipatory silence as Albedo pocketed the silver watch and opened the envelope.

This official document certifies that the nation of Amestris, Prefecture of the Generalissimo, appoints the name Chalkdust to Albedo Kreideprinz, in the name of Fuhrer King Bradley.

“Chalkdust?” Albedo wondered aloud. 

“Your State Alchemist title,” Roy explained. “You may choose to introduce yourself as the Chalkdust Alchemist.”

Albedo nodded in understanding. So that was why Ed introduced himself as the Fullmetal Alchemist yesterday. Albedo now had two titles, it seemed, though one was in use as a surname. How interesting, that his title of Chalk Prince would follow him even to another world, even if Chalkdust wasn’t quite the same.

Albedo nodded. It was a good title. Dust was small, forgettable, easily blown away, the mere remnants of what once was. Albedo similarly didn’t intend to stand out in this world.

“As a State Alchemist, you’ll find yourself with fewer duties than the average major, as the state has dedicated time and resources to allow you to research. You will have to report substantial progress in research at least once a year to avoid being discharged, but otherwise, your time will be split between your research and missions.” Mustang paused, as if just realizing something important. “How well do you fight?”

“Decently, with a sword… and some stone alchemy.”

“You’ll have to demonstrate at some point, but I’ll assume that I can send you to places that might be dangerous?”

Albedo nodded. Even as shut-in as he was sometimes, he was still a Knight of Favonius, and knew more than enough how to handle himself against even the hardiest Lawachurls.

Mustang nodded. “Good. How soon would you like to begin working?”

Albedo grabbed the opportunity quickly. “Now. Time is always limited; I’d like to begin my research as soon as possible.”

Mustang smiled. “Good.” Albedo didn’t waste time. “Where will you begin? We have the space and funding to set up a lab for you anywhere you want.”

“Information is necessary first.” Albedo intended to find out as much about this world as he could before he dove into making his own discoveries. First… “Bioalchemy,” Albedo declared.

He needed to know what life forms existed on this world, to differentiate from Teyvat, which held both elemental monsters and hilichurls. He wouldn’t have as much of an opportunity to study them in the wild as he had before, if he was going to be taking missions on the side, and biology, the study of life, was essential to the alchemy he studied.

Mustang blinked. “Coincidentally, Fullmetal and his brother are currently studying the previous research and sources of Shou Tucker, the Sewing Life Alchemist. Would you like to join them?”

“How do we keep on meeting?” Ed cocked an eyebrow as the other blond alchemist stepped out the black car.

“Chief, you know him already?” Havoc grinned. “The that makes this quick. Albedo’s the newest State Alchemist, the Chalkdust Alchemist!”

“Congrats. So? Why’re you here?”

“Just to look through Mr. Tucker’s recent research and sources. He is a specialist in bioalchemy and life is essential to the alchemy I study… thus it is only reasonable that I check the most recent knowledge regarding it before beginning my own research.”

“Ah,” Ed nodded. Again, Albedo’s way of speaking threw him off sometimes, being as formal and professional as it always was. He lingered next to Lieutenant Havoc as Albedo walked steadily like clockwork up the path to Tucker’s house.

He turned to Havoc. “He… doesn’t know what Al and I are here for, does he?”

Havoc shook his head. “The colonel didn’t say anything to him. He’s just interested in ‘bioalchemy’, is all.”

“Uh-huh…” 

Nina poked her head into the library.

There was another one! This one kept reading too, flipping pages every now and then and staying as still as statues otherwise. He had really pretty teal eyes. Nina really liked his eyes.

She wondered how close she could get before they noticed anything or looked up.

She tiptoed to the one in armor, who was as big as a bear…

and was stopped by a hand on her shoulder. 

“The brothers are working right now,” the one with pretty eyes said gently, as he kneeled. “They’re really busy, and might be annoyed if you bother them, you know?”

Nina couldn’t be deterred. “But except for Alexander, I don’t have anyone to play with!” She pouted. She knew Dad sometimes gave in when she pouted, so it had to have some effect. “And, and Dad’s always working, so I thought they would maybe play with me instead…”

He smiled, and Nina knew she had won. “Then how about this? After I put away these books, I’ll come play with you a bit.”

Nina nodded enthusiastically. “But, will they feel left out?” She frowned and pointed at the brothers. “They might want to play too…”

Albedo looked over to the brothers, who were each buried in stacks of tomes, eyes flicking back and forth over text, devouring the theories and experiments like Amber with a sticky pot roast. There was no pulling them from their books, Albedo thought.

“Let’s go play first,” Albedo smiled. “Maybe they’ll join us later.”

Over the course of playing with Nina, Albedo ascertained three facts.

One. Nina was similar to Klee. She had the same sort of childish glee when he lifted her onto his Solar Isotoma and let her ride it into the air. She would hop off as he gently let it down and shout, “again, again!” like a pendulum. She’d get gradually more tired of the same activity as it repeated, and finally, after between seventeen and twenty five repeats, would request a new activity or return to a previous one.

Two. Nina was nothing like Klee. Klee, with her unrestrained enthusiasm, was like one of her bombs— predictable to some degree, but bouncy, alive, and exploding with energy. She was erratic and powerful, like the wildfires she caused. Nina, on the other hand, was more like a bubbling potion that took its time to boil over. She was excited and bouncy and moved around, but she was also careful and apprehensive when looking at something new. Her curiosity would always win over though, and she’d tentatively poke at it before breaking into a wide grin and playing with it. Likely the result of growing up with an alchemist, Albedo thought. With dangerous and volatile experiments around, if Tucker knew what he was doing, he would warn her of the dangers of unfamiliar objects. Albedo was… glad that she had a healthy amount of both restraint and curiosity. 

Three. Nina was lonely.

And this was what he disliked discovering the most. The way Nina would keep clinging onto Albedo’s arm as if Albedo would leave at any moment and that was unacceptable, the way her eyes would frown ever so slightly when Albedo wasn’t looking at her or was out of her sight, even if she still wore that bright smile… well, Albedo technically couldn’t actually break the heart beating in his chest due to certain circumstances, but Nina’s watery eyes did a good job of it.

Albedo promised himself that if he could return to Teyvat, he would play with Klee as much as she wanted.

As Ed turned the pages, he couldn’t get the sound of laughter out of his head. It kept coming at an almost constant interval, throwing his eyes off the line he was on as they swivelled around the room to look for its source.

“Again, again!” Nina giggled. Ed could barely hear the muffled voice from the basement library, ringing out of the little window that looked out to the lawn. 

He stood up and stretched his neck and back, feeling like a sack of potatoes the way his had been stagnant the whole day. Perhaps a break would do him some good.

He walked out the door to the immediate boof of Alexander, who also spontaneously crushed him under his weight.

“Al…” he choked out from beneath the dog, “ help-“

All the while, Nina, taking a piggyback ride on Albedo’s back, couldn’t stop laughing.

Ed looked up to see something he never expected to see, even though he’d barely known Albedo for two days.

A smile.

Not one of those practiced, calm, unflappable ones that were a mere polite upturn of the lips meant only to serve a purpose in social situations, but an actual smile, gentle, kind, with bright teal eyes that for once seemed to twinkle with joy and life, even amusement.

“Hello, Edward. Finally taking a break from the books?”

Ed grumbled, though there was no malice behind it. “I don’t want to hear that from you. And I told you, just call me Ed.”

Al laughed, and Ed fumed. “You traitor! Come help get this big loaf of a dog off my back!”

On the ride back to the barracks, Ed was curious. “You’re unexpectedly good with children.”

If Albedo noticed the subtle jab— that Ed hadn’t expected Albedo to be good with children— he didn’t say anything, only deigning to nod.

Ed thought that was that and the conversation was over, and turned back to the window and the buildings they passed.

“I… had a younger sister,” Albedo said.

Ed didn’t expect him to say anything… much less something so personal. He simply nodded. “I see.”

“She’s still alive,” Albedo almost rushed, as if he just realized that saying so might make someone jump to grave conclusions.

And then sagged ever so slightly in his seat. “Probably. I just won’t be able to see her for a while.”

“Probably?” Ed cocked an eyebrow.

“Yes, well…” Albedo pinched his nose bridge. “She does enjoy playing with explosives quite a bit. Thank goodness she’s not as destructive as Alice yet, though she will be in a few years…”

Ed deadpanned. “Ha… haha. You have an interesting family.”

Albedo smiled, one of his genuine ones again that Ed had come to enjoy seeing over the afternoon.

“Interesting indeed.”

Their first warning should have been the silence.

Never, in the week that they had visited, had Nina not been awake. In fact, she would jump out of the house at the sight of the military’s black car, run out of the house, and greet Ed, Al, and Albedo before even Shou Tucker could welcome them.

That should have been the first sign.

The second should have been the rain, or the stronger than usual aching in Ed’s ports, or the way they saw too many black cats in one alleyway on their way here, but nothing could really change what happened at this point.

They were too late.

They couldn’t have done anything.

They couldn’t do anything now.

Al knelt by the Nina and Alexander chimera, eyes dim, armor rattling. “I’m sorry… I’m sorry, Nina, Alexander…”

“Big brother…?” The chimera repeated again.

Ed’s breathing still hadn’t slowed down in the slightest. Shou Tucker’s silent body laid on the ground, face bloodied by Ed’s fist.

A single crater in the wall above Tucker’s head. No light in the godforsaken lab except for the dim lamp of the hallway. The muffled sound of thunder outside as the storm began.

These would forever remain imprinted in Albedo’s head as the moment he first experienced hatred.

Something sinister twisted his insides like a snake. It was almost like the purple energy of the cursed sword he’d gifted the Traveler, power that was stagnant yet tense, erratic yet cold. Power that took all of Albedo’s effort not to let it explode and engulf him like those burning warming bottles he’d carried around Dragonspine.

Yet his exterior remained icy cold, teal eyes narrowed, pure white chalk body completely still.

“Damn it!” Ed roared, swinging another mighty fist into the crater. Dust sifted down from the cracks in the ceiling as the building shook.

He dashed out of the door in a frenzy.

“Ah, brother!” Al shouted.

“Go,” Albedo finally said. “I’ll watch them.”

Al nodded, and chased after his brother.

Meanwhile, Albedo kneeled next to the chimera.

“I’m sorry…”

Al thought he finally realized what Ed meant when Ed said that Albedo was scary.

Sure, Albedo’s alchemy was terrifyingly skilled and practiced, and unusual in a way that the brothers both itched to investigate and uncover.

But just now? When Albedo had spoken, after staying as still as a statue for entire minutes?

There was a blizzard in Albedo’s eyes, a biting cold in Albedo’s voice.

Al had never seen Albedo like that before. And he hoped he’d never have to see it again.

Albedo swallowed his hostility. The most important thing right now was to see how he could help Nina, and Shou Tucker had already experienced his fill of pain, it seemed. Anything Albedo did would probably pale in comparison to the fist marks left by Edward.

More importantly, he needed to see how Shou had done it. If he could determine the steps taken to reach the conclusion, then perhaps he could rewind them to arrive once again at the source. Anyone else could have trouble doing so, but maybe Albedo could-

“Who’s there? Show yourself!” Albedo swiftly folded the haphazard notes and pocketed them.

“Just us, Chalkdust. At ease.” Mustang, then.

Albedo kept himself tense as they came in with more military personnel to clean up the lab.

“You seem to be doing better than the brothers, at least,” Mustang sighed. “Ed could barely speak.”

“Understandable. He likely hasn’t seen anything like this before,” Albedo mused. Ed was young, naive.

“And you have?”

Albedo couldn’t answer. Tucker had said it all in his defense to Ed. Was this not the duty of an alchemist? To venture into the unknown and transform it into the known by any means possible? The monsters he fought and studied, the life forms he created and ended with his own hands, they too were but products of science like Nina was now. 

He himself was but a product of science. Like Nina.

“What will happen to her?”

Mustang shrugged. “As a specimen of research, she has become property of the state. Tucker may continue to study her as he pleases, or she will be given to another alchemist or lab.”

“Let me take her,” Albedo said.

Mustang looked at the boy, who seemed nothing like the broken Elrics on the steps of headquarters, whose teal eyes burned with the rage of ten thousand and the determination of a rock wall, and he chuckled.

As much as Albedo hid his emotions like an unmovable statue, as still and stiff as he was, his eyes couldn’t lie.

“Mr. Tucker gets the first claim to her,” Mustang said. “If he agrees, then you can take her.”

“No! No, no, no!” Tucker shouted rabidly, finally coming to life. His wounds were treated, and the startled soldiers who helped him stood back as he stumbled towards the young alchemist.

“I’ve finally defended my State Alchemist certification, for us to live a happy life together. She’s my daughter! I won’t let you take her away!”

“For ‘us’?” Albedo finally let the coiling tense snake of hatred within him strike, feeling his blood suddenly move from stagnant to boiling to bubbling over, and shouted. “You’ve done this for yourself. You have no right to her, you have no right to call her your daughter. You disgust me.”

“Then see what Nina wants! She’s still my daughter, she’ll want to go with Dad, won’t she?”

Nina, looking for all the world like a lost little girl despite her appearance, swiveled her new snout back and forth between her father and the boy with pretty eyes, and saw in the former the way she screamed until her throat was hoarse as blue lightning surrounded her and Alexander, the crazed look in his eyes that she had never seen before except for once, once upon a time when her mother had shouted that she was leaving and Nina knew somewhere in the back of her mind that Mom didn’t actually leave, never took a step out of the door.

And she looked at Albedo, with his cold teal eyes that were still warm somehow, and saw herself placing two fingers to Albedo’s wrist as he showed her life, warmth, the pulse of the vein and said, “isn’t it amazing, Nina?” She saw the beautiful blue flower of stone turn and rise and unfurl itself into gold and his sturdy hands as he showed her how to safely climb on and jump off, and his sturdy arms as he caught her without fail every time.

She looked at Albedo.

“Brother…” she said. “Brother…”

“That decides it,” Mustang declared. “Shou Tucker. Your experiment has been confiscated by the state. Temporary ownership will be granted to the Chalkdust Alchemist. Go get yourself cleaned up.”

Chapter Text

"Nina? Can I call you Nina?"

The chimera nodded slowly. It felt to her like moving was too difficult, like she was in a vat of clear honey. But she nodded.

"... brother…?"

"Yes, Nina?"

He looked sad, she thought. She knew that the smile he wore on his lips was the same as any other, but the teal eyes told everything. And Nina didn't want to see those pretty teal eyes so muted. Those eyes were made to shine.

Albedo absentmindedly pat her on the head.

Mustang and Riza had left already, returning to headquarters to file Albedo's temporary ownership of Nina as a research subject. And Shou Tucker…

He sat despondent in a chair next to the window. Perhaps he was considering what he'd done. Albedo hoped for Tucker's sake that he was, because as steady and calm Albedo's eyes looked, his hand twitched to summon the familiar weight of his sword to his hand. And humans weren't as… durable as hilichurls.

The thunder rumbled again outside.

Nina nuzzled Albedo's still hand with her snout.

Lightning. The rumble of thunder. If only the situation weren't so grave, Albedo would've enjoyed drawing and immortalizing the tumultuous clouds and the arc of light that branched through the dark sky like veins streaking fire, pure energy, into the living, breathing, blowing storm.

It was no time for sketching. His eyes might have been on the white lightning in the sky, his ears might have picked up the claps of thunder, but what ran through his head were countless circles, matrices, symbols of blue lightning, golden light.

No, that circle wouldn't work. There was no guarantee that it would maintain the delicate cell structure of the inside lining of the blood vessels.

Then— but no, this one wouldn't maintain the elasticity of her joints.

But— No, he needed to guarantee the redirection of the soul was seamless—

Maybe— No. None of the circles he could think of had enough room to include all the matrices needed to reliably rebuild her body and ground every bit of soul in it.

Nina's size, approximately that of Alexander's (previously) and maybe a bit smaller, implied that either her matter was denser than it should be, or that the extra matter was sacrificed in the reaction in order to ground the soul. The latter was most likely given that Nina appeared to have a mostly healthy body.

If that matter had instead been sacrificed towards grounding the human soul, then it would be likely impossible to reobtain. Which made reversing this reaction properly almost impossible.

It probably would be impossible if it weren't Albedo. But it was Albedo.

If the possibility of returning her to her original body was impossible, then…

Albedo's eyes widened ever so slightly at the realization, mind running a mile a minute as new equations balanced themselves in his mind, familiar voices and lectures overlapping, new circles within circles within circles imprinting themselves, mind so occupied and filled and away from the world that he didn't notice when Nina whimpered at him and when Shou Tucker finally stood again and when the footsteps approached.

And so it went.

There was a clap of thunder.

"Are you Shou Tucker, the Sewing Life Alchemist?"

There was a hand outstretched.

There wasn't so much as a scream as the Tucker's arms fell to his side, lifeless. He was dropped to the ground like a ragdoll.

Nina let out a cry of pure agony, bit and tugged the bottom hem of Albedo's coat, and finally Albedo moved.

He swept up Nina, carried her over a shoulder, sword already summoned to hand with the spark of gold and boots already taking him to the door and out of the room.

How absentminded must he have been to have not heard that man's approach? Albedo grit his teeth. If it had just been him, it would be fine, but with two other humans with him, he couldn't afford to lose touch with the world so easily. He should have still been vigilant, even if he knew that there were guards outside.

Said guards laid on rainy pavement, blood pouring from their orifices, and Albedo dashed past them with a quick silent apology. He'd call Mustang regarding them later, when he and Nina were safe again.

Not now, though. The man with a big x-shaped scar on his face was hot on their heels, and though Albedo was almost certain he'd be fine, it was his duty now to protect Nina.

With every step he bounded, every puddle he kicked up as he ran, Albedo kept his greatest asset, his mind, moving. When the scared man had grabbed Shou Tucker's head, there had been the universal sign of alchemy, lightning. Undeniably, the skill the man was using was alchemic in nature, but that level of destruction was abnormal.

Or… reminiscent of failed attempts of alchemy, but on a controlled scale. Interesting. In any case, alchemy required an understanding of its components, and Albedo was almost certain that nobody on this world knew exactly what he was made of. So he might not have to worry about the scarred man's skill as much.

The problem was Nina. Nina needed proper protection if Albedo planned to engage the man, and he wouldn't be able to provide it in the middle of the fight. So this was the first job— find the Elrics, or rush to headquarters, whichever he would reach sooner.

Easier said than done when there was a murderer hot on his heels. Albedo continued to move, legs turning and bracing and stepping and lifting in practiced motions. Sooner or later, his stamina would fail him— Albedo just needed to find someone first—

"Edward!"

Ed looked up, face empty and eyes vacant, rain streaming down his face, hair and clothes soaked, and promptly screamed, "Oh, holy shit!"

He clapped, blue lightning flashing in the ground and passing beneath Albedo's feet before it the low grumble of shifting stone joined the pitter-patter of rain, walls sprouting out of the ground into a cage of pure stone behind Albedo.

Nice handiwork. Albedo took the shortest moment he could to appreciate the seamless walls that barely showed the rectangular ridges of alchemical manipulation, and quickly got down to business, putting Nina down as gently and quickly as he could beside Alphonse. The armor was larger, better for protecting Nina. Edward was smaller and faster, better for fighting.

Albedo turned around and held his sword in a guarded, battle-ready stance. "Protect Nina. He just murdered Shou Tucker, and hasn't stopped chasing us. Be on guard."

Ed looked at him questioningly, until the stone wall burst open, little bits of gravel flying through the air, large chunks of stone cracking as they hit the ground.

And in the center, the man with the x-shaped scar. Albedo narrowed his eyes. Now he could fight.

"The Fullmetal Alchemist and the Chalkdust Alchemist. That saves me trouble," The man grimaced-grinned. Albedo honestly wasn't sure which it was, but the expression on the man's face was anything but kind, and that was all Albedo needed to know right now.

He'd said 'Fullmetal' and 'Chalkdust,' hadn't he? So he was probably targeting the two State Alchemists, which for now left Al and Nina safe, at least as long as the man ignored them.

"I'd say for now run and take Nina to a safe place, but you likely won't listen. So, don't let him touch you," Albedo warned.

Ed swiveled his head around. "What do you-"

Albedo was already gone, charging in.

The man and Albedo engaged in a deadly flurry of bladework and footwork, the scarred man's hands always barely centimeters away from Albedo. But still, Albedo kept dashing around, slashing once, twice, twice again, and then a thrust. The sword he thrust with his left hand disappeared with a shower of golden sparks and reappeared in his right hand, leading seamlessly into a large arcing slice, which cut into the scarred man's shoulder.

Albedo winced ever so slightly as he hurriedly corrected a misstep, jumping back for a moment to assess his state. This was no lawachurl or even mitachurl— those monsters' broad attacks and predictable patterns had made it easy to dodge and counter. There was no time to think through complicated strategies with an opponent like Scar. It was move or be hit, and Albedo wasn't certain what the man's hand attack would do to him, but he wasn't going to take the chance just to satisfy his curiosity.

Ed couldn't let Albedo outdo him. He transmuted the familiar blade onto his automail and charged in too, hopefully allowing Albedo a moment's respite.

As he jumped to dodge the man's outstretched palm, Ed barely registered the immaculate stone flower on the ground, and quickly dodged out of the way of the glowing stones that floated midair and suddenly burst, blasting out golden rock pellets that almost seemed like flowers. They seemed to push the scarred man back at least, and Ed would take any advantage he could get.

Albedo rushed back into the fray. "Duck!" he shouted as he fiercely slashed at the scarred man, who jumped out of the blade's path with ease. Albedo and Ed changed positions, Albedo taking the charge and Ed rushing around to try and surprise the man.

Ed had to wonder where both the man and Albedo had learned how to fight. Albedo was faster than even Ed, and seemed evenly matched with the man. No time to think though; the man ran forth again and—

Albedo's sword went in for the slash, and halted, caught in the man's palm.

Blue lightning arced around it, and for once, Ed saw Albedo surprised, eyes wide, as the sword shattered into pieces before their eyes.

Both the boys brought up an arm to shield their eyes from the sharp pieces of metal that burst outwards like shrapnel with the force of a bomb behind it.

The scarred man effortlessly took the opportunity to grab Ed's automail arm, his large hand sparking with electric blue alchemy again, but to no avail. The clothing ripped, and underneath it, a gleaming metal arm revealed itself.

Both boys hopped back with all their strength, finally putting distance between themselves and the man again. Ed, as soon as he could, clapped his hands and willed another cement cage to burst from the ground.

Ed panted, the adrenaline of the battle kicking in. His lungs burnt. He looked at Albedo, and realized one fundamental fact.

He was outmatched.

Here he was, already tired and weary after not even a few minutes of intense dodging, and he was already almost out of breath? Albedo didn't even seem the slightest bit tired, and the man they were fighting fared similarly well. Ed was out of his depth here.

And yet.

And yet, Albedo had been right, when he'd warned Ed. Ed had not even the slightest intention of backing down. His eyes had taken on an almost manic glint when accompanied with the grin he wore. "Al, get Nina away from here!" Ed shouted.

"We can all run," Albedo said with almost enviable calm, wiping the dust off from the side of his chin.

"Huh?"

"It's the best option; he seems to be targeting state alchemists," Albedo reasoned quickly, already running ahead. "Al, if you can get Nina to a safe place—"

Meters away from them, the stone cage was broken again, with a terrifying rumble that shook the ground. Ed's feet moved themselves, following Albedo's dash away from the scarred man.

As they ran, Ed weaved through a thin alleyway to reach the parallel street, Al carrying Nina close behind. Albedo looked back. The man was still far enough that, as the brothers left the alleyway, he had enough time to slam his palm to the ground and raise a stone wall behind them.

"Albedo!" Ed shouted as the gravel grumbled, shifting beneath their feet, rising and rising.

Albedo knew that walls were ineffective against that man. But if it could buy them precious time to get Nina away, then he was willing to give it a try.

He reached into the dimension to pull out his sword again, feeling a recoiling lurch from the deep pits of his soul as his hand grasped at nothing. No sword. He allowed himself, for once, a single word to express all his frustration, in the absence of young and impressionable ears.

"Shit."

His alchemy was meant more for support than anything, and already a stretch in this world where his connection to Celestia was gone. He could keep running and dodging, buying time for the brothers to put Nina somewhere safe and get Mustang to help, but even he had a limit to his stamina.

He never let anything show on his face, but he was certain now that the scarred man knew Albedo was cornered. Albedo had no weapon, depleted stamina, and a dead end blocked alleyway.

"Answer me this, alchemist," the scarred man spoke, and wasn't that a surprise? Albedo had expected the man who had killed Tucker wordlessly to try the same with him. "Why do you protect that creature?"

Albedo immediately knew he was talking about Nina, and grit his teeth in a rare show of rage. "What would you have me do? Kill her?"

"What more does she have to live for? She will be passed from lab to lab, her only fate to be studied and dissected by scientists. Alchemists. By the likes of you."

Albedo couldn't bring himself to argue.

The man wasn't wrong.

That is, if Albedo weren't here. Albedo himself was a living contradiction of the fate the man predicted for Nina. He couldn't broadcast it to a murderous stranger though.

Albedo lowered his eyes and let the man believe what he believed. And Albedo ran. With what little stamina he had left, he turned, and took every step as far as he could.

"Too slow," the man's voice was right behind him, too close, right up against his ear, and Albedo could feel, with his rising heart rate from being startled, the too-hot too-large hand against the side of his head.

The familiar yet foreign heat of offensive alchemy burned on his skin, and dissipated with the telltale fizzle smoky smell of a failed reaction.

Albedo could have smirked. Of course. His hypothesis was right. He wasn't human. And armed with this knowledge, this became not a game of tag… but a battle of the martial arts. Honestly, Albedo would be more comfortable having a blade, but it would be a liability in a battle against a man who could destroy it with a touch. But he was not a Knight of Favonius for nothing.

The scarred man had the physical advantage. He was larger and stronger, but so long as Albedo could dodge being hit unconscious, he should be fine.

Before Albedo could react though, the man was already in his space.

Albedo was vaguely aware that he'd been struck in the back of his neck.

"In the end, you will be unable to save the girl," the scarred man declared gravely, as if his ultimatum was simply fate.

Albedo was tired of fate. So, so tired. "... I will," he uttered with his final strength.

The world seemed to spin and every little voice seemed too loud and too quiet at the same time and tiny curls of black licked against the edge of his field of vision. This wasn't his first time experiencing lightheadedness— no, far from it— and he couldn't afford to lose consciousness here—

But at least Nina was safe.

His eyes closed against his will.

Blue lightning flashed around the boy's body.

How?

Another flash of blue.

Why? Why wasn't the deconstruction working?

Another flash of blue.

He'd assumed the first two times that he'd accidentally brought to mind the wrong material to deconstruct, and that therefore the halfway-transmutations had failed.

But at this point, after so many tries, there was no mistaking it.

This boy was most certainly not human. Then what? He looked and moved and acted like any other person, and yet…

"What have you done?!" shouted the tiny Fullmetal Alchemist from behind him. So he had returned for his friend. How convenient, yes.

"I have passed the judgement of Ishvala upon him, as I will for all State Alchemists," he replied as he stood from the boy's still body.

The boy wasn't dead. He hadn't had time to kill the boy without the use of alchemy, being so baffled by the boy's unnatural composition. He could feel a pulse, right next to that odd four-pointed star tattoo on the boy's neck. But it would rile up the Fullmetal Alchemist, and anger often got the better of these Amestrians; it made their moves easier to predict.

As expected, the boy's eyes widened in a mixture of horror, fear, and an intense pyre of rage awoke in the shining golden irises. "You… bastard!" the raw scream tore from the alchemist's throat as he charged forward, automail arm once again transformed.

"Wait, Brother!" "Wait, Fullmetal!" "Edward!" simultaneously called from beside the black automobile that had just arrived.

No bother. Scar, for he had no more name, stepped forth and once again grabbed the boy's metal arm with ease. "Too slow."

The alchemist's hot head and slow movements cost him his metal arm, and would soon cost him his life as well.

The sickening crunch, crackle, pop, clank as Winry's handiwork came apart, metal bits and chunks flying from where his arm once was, signalled only one thing to Edward.

Imminent death. No alchemy. Down a limb.

He stumbled back weakly on the pavement as the scarred man stepped steadily forward and flexed one hand.

Three sharp gunshots rang through the air like the trumpets of an angel's horn. That precise timing and accuracy to hit the shoulder when the scarred man moved so quickly could only be Hawkeye. Ed held back his urge to sigh in relief as the man clutched his bloody shoulder.

And finally, the deep booming voice of Major Armstrong called out, and Edward could finally sigh.

The cavalry was here, and no matter how strong Scar was, he was only a man in the end.

"Ah! He's waking up! Brother, hurry up!"

Albedo blinked his eyes open to the unnatural white fluorescence of ceiling lights. There was the uncanny smell of lemon in the air, too much like the cleaning spray that Barabara had liked using in the Cathedral's clinic. Albedo resisted the urge to wrinkle his nose.

The bed was too cushy and had too much give. Albedo, with some effort, pushed himself up to a sitting position.

"Hey, Albedo!" Al greeted. "Are you alright? How are you feeling?"

Albedo must not have been himself. "Like I was just run over by a herd of Shield Mitachurls," he answered honestly.

Too honestly.

He mentally gave himself a stern warning to pretend he hadn't said that. "Fine, Alphonse," he corrected himself.

"Uh-huh…" Al seemed at a loss for words.

"Where's Nina?"

"Oh!" Al perked up. "She's at headquarters right now, being taken care of by Lieutenant Hawkeye."

Albedo allowed himself a deep sigh of relief. Nina was safe. Good.

"Oi, Albedo!" finally came the other Elric's voice. It was loud, with a characteristic throatiness that was unique to Edward's shouts of anger. He was angry, wasn't he?

"Yes, Edward?" Albedo turned to him as if it were a query from a Sumerun Scholar. That is to say, behind five layers or more of practiced courtesy, politeness, and the slight tone changes he always used normally.

That is to say, he responded to Edward as if nothing had happened.

Ed fumed. "'Yes, Edward,' my ass!" he grumbled. "You- you…"

Now that some of that single-minded rage had dissipated, Albedo wasn't certain what exactly it was on Ed's face. Sadness? No, not quite. It was ever so slightly familiar, like those faces Sucrose or Timaeus would make whenever he decided that to maximize efficiency, sleeping at his desk would be best, or the face that Alice would pretend she wasn't making when she thought Albedo wasn't looking.

Ah.

It was concern, wasn't it.

"I thought you died," Ed finally said.

"... I didn't." Albedo didn't know what to say. "I…"

"You made that wall! You separated from us, and I came back to see you on the ground; what was I supposed to think?!"

Ah, there was the rage. Albedo bowed his head.

"We thought you'd stopped breathing— you- why was your pulse so steady when you weren't breathing?"

Could he escape without giving an answer for this one? He wasn't too keen on answering this one, though he supposed it was inevitable that people would question it eventually. He couldn't consciously remember to breathe when his mental facilities weren't functioning, and the operation of his body wasn't dependent on the intake of oxygen. But regular humans breathed.

This was why he disliked social situations such as this.

He couldn't answer, but the people around him expected one, which obligated him to answer even at his own risk.

There was a thick tension in the room, an apprehensive silence awaiting Albedo's response, and-

"Oh! Albedo, you're awake," Riza's voice came like a saving grace from the doorway. "Nina's been whining and wanting to come see you, so I brought her."

"Brother," Nina repeated, and it could have been Albedo's ears fooling him, but Nina's voice sounded the slightest bit brighter, the slightest bit quicker, the slightest bit more human.

His teal eyes softened. "Hello, Nina. I'm glad you're safe."

"Brother, safe. Brother, hurt?"

"I'm fine now," Albedo offered a reassuring smile. "Would you like to go outside and play?"

Nina's nod was all he needed to escape the room, and he gladly took the opportunity, flipping aside his covers and leading the chimera out the door.

"Eh- Mr. Albedo, your injuries!" Al shouted.

"And I wasn't done yet!" followed Ed.

Albedo gave them a quick wave as he led Nina through the hallway following the signs towards the hospital's courtyard, completely unapologetic. He was certain they wouldn't see the slight frown on his face when he was turned away.

The warmth in his chest that he'd felt that time Edward offered him a place to stay… It had grown again.

Ed growled. "That idiot! I wasn't finished yet!"

"Well, brother, all's well that ends well, don't you think?" Al placatingly held his hands up, though he knew it would be futile. Ed was like a fireball, sometimes. He sighed.

"Oh, right. I forgot to tell him," Riza realized. "I suppose it can wait."

"Hm?"

"Mustang filed Albedo's request for temporary ownership of Nina as a research subject, and the State has approved it."

Ed saw red.

"What?"

Albedo smiled as Nina sat beside him. She was much more lively now, to Albedo's great relief. After all, the chimera wasn't her natural body, and any signs of dissociation between the soul and body would make Albedo's challenge more difficult. For the time being, he was free to recalculate, re-evaluate, and envision the circles he needed at ease.

The solution to his dilemma, the steps for reversing the reaction, would be beyond anything he'd done before.

Even the greatest alchemists couldn't make life from scratch without great, great sacrifice. But if it was Albedo…

Albedo went against every law of nature. Albedo himself was the impossible realized. And surely, surely, for the sake of Nina, he could realize the impossible once more.

If there was no way to retrieve her and Alexander's previous bodies… then the only way forward was to create one anew.

This was the realization he had come to before the scarred man had interrupted.

If he could create a vessel for her soul, one that could grow and was in every way the same as that of a normal human, then she could be human again. She could live normally again.

He'd have to draft circles, consider it from every angle. There was no room for error, not with Nina, and experimentation was out of the question. Theory alone had served him well enough before, but a human body was a different ballpark altogether from the simple wings of a crystalfly or the pure elemental energy that composed vishaps.

Ah… if only he had his sketchbook with him. But he didn't want to return to the tense room where he was certain Edward and Alphonse hadn't given up their questioning quite yet.

For now…

"Brother?"

"The sun is quite nice, isn't it?" Albedo smiled.

"Do you really think, Edward, looking at the way he looks at Nina, that he has any malicious intent towards Nina?"

Edward had to admit that he had leaped to conclusions. The thought of Nina being treated as a research subject didn't sit well in his mind. Made his blood boil, in fact. Nina didn't deserve what happened to her, and he'd be damned if he let anything more happen.

After all, in the end, he couldn't restore her. He couldn't save her. Neither he nor Al could, and admitting that crushed something inside of him to pieces. His arrogance, perhaps? What good was he, his two hands, and his alchemy if he couldn't save a little girl?

But what had he done? He'd simply ran away and wallowed in the rain, assuming that Nina would be safe for the time being. If Albedo hadn't stayed behind to watch and protect her…

Ed shuddered at the thought. Scar was the most terrifying person he had ever met, barring Teacher. Ed wasn't sure he'd be able to protect Nina from Scar like Albedo had, and honestly, he was terrified by that. He had gotten lucky. Scar was seconds away from killing him.

So how was Albedo alive? Ed couldn't stop returning to this question, it was like a beacon in his mind. A warning siren, a red flag. Something about Albedo was odd— many things, in fact. First, his unnatural alchemy, dealing so closely with life. It wasn't unheard of… ugh, Ed did not want to think about Shou Tucker. But even Tucker's skills paled in comparison to Albedo's, who'd somehow converted paper into a butterfly. That. That didn't just happen; life was complex, couldn't be molded without the most precise care and calculation, and Albedo had done it like it was nothing.

There was Albedo's odd stone alchemy that he'd used to play with Nina and used again in the middle of battle. The stone flower that sprouted out of the ground. Ed knew he could recreate that with ease, but something about the way that design in particular, the four-pointed flower, kept appearing… in any case, Ed took note of it.

Then there was the way Albedo seemed… out of touch with the world, somehow. Ed wasn't sure he'd ever seen anything like Albedo's outfit, as mundane of a point that was. It was so oddly crafted, with touches of leather where they weren't needed, a metal arm-piece and thigh-piece that both seemed to serve no purpose. Ed wasn't usually one to nitpick on other's outfits considering the way he himself dressed, but Albedo's outfit was elaborate in a way that Ed wasn't sure he'd ever seen in this world.

It was cool, though. That, Ed had to admit. Maybe he could ask Albedo where he got it.

It wasn't just the clothes. The sword, too. The way it glowed golden and appeared and disappeared in battle so smoothly. If it were alchemy, Ed was certain he'd know, as an alchemy expert himself. It wasn't. Where was the sword coming from? It broke the laws of alchemy if it manifested out of thin air, but there wasn't the characteristic red lightning of a philosopher's stone. It just didn't make sense.

Besides, who used a sword in this day and age? Maybe the Fuhrer, but because the Fuhrer's strength and speed were unparalleled, inhuman, almost. Albedo was definitely well practiced with the sword. His gliding movements were a far cry from Edward's wild unpracticed swings with a sword that length. That said, a sword wasn't really Ed's weapon of choice.

And finally, the breathing.

Ed was certain that Albedo wasn't breathing. He couldn't even feel the slightest movement from Albedo's chest when he was unconscious, couldn't feel the puff of breath that should have indicated life. And yet Albedo's pulse had been steady.

Ed was just as certain that he'd seen alchemical lightning when Scar was crouched by Albedo's still body, but Albedo was still alive. Scar was a killer. A quick one. Ed didn't think Scar would leave Albedo alive if he could help it, given what the colonel had told Ed about Scar.

Don't get him wrong, Ed was glad Albedo wasn't dead… but confused. Beyond confused.

He flopped back onto the cushions of his own bed, letting his thoughts stew. The mystery of Albedo was truly a force to be reckoned with.

"So? What'll you do now?" Ed asked.

The storm had finally passed, leaving an almost cloudless blue sky as far as the eye could see. "Travel, I suppose," Albedo hummed.

Of course, he had to prioritize returning Nina to her former state, but he'd need a powerful catalyst for it, one that he wasn't sure how to find on this world that was so different from Teyvat.

So he'd return to his original objective. He was here to study the world, and he couldn't do that if he wasn't at all familiar with it. Practically speaking, he was only one person and there was only so much he could see with his own eyes, but… The nostalgic feeling of going out and transforming the unknown into the known with his own hands was something he discovered he quite enjoyed while travelling with the Traveler. (Wasn't that ironic, he thought again. He was now a Traveler.)

"Where to?"

A true Modstadtian would answer, 'wherever the wind takes me,' because Barbatos's wind wouldn't lead them astray— at least, not unless he was feeling mischievous— but that was a moot point in this world, where the archons didn't seem to exist.

Albedo patted Nina's head. Her snout was just tall enough to peek over the side of the bed, making for a quite comical scene where she kept trying to stretch her neck up and rest her chin on the beside. He knew he needed a way to defend Nina and himself first; stone alchemy alone wouldn't cut it. He needed a sword— not a makeshift one made with alchemy using the mishmash of cobble on the street, but an actual sword, crafted with an eye for the exact cut, weight, and grip Albedo desired.

"Are there any good blacksmiths around?" Albedo finally asked.

Ed had the feeling they had entirely switched topics in the span of Albedo's five second silence. He blinked, as Al answered for him. "Not that we know of. You could check Central; there's everything there."

Albedo nodded. "I see. Thank you, Alphonse."

"No problem! Brother and I are planning on returning to Resembool to see his mechanic."

Albedo glanced at Ed, whose right sleeve hung from his shoulder, empty, a currently extraneous piece of fabric. "Ah. I see."

As was the case in any conversation with Albedo, an odd silence followed his statement. It was probably the way he commanded so much attention when he spoke, slow and steady, yet with three words, ended the whole conversation.

"Would you like to come with us?" Al asked innocently.

"Hm?"

Ed sputtered incoherently. "Where did that come from? And would he even want to come to Resembool in the first place? It's pretty out of the way…"

"Well, Colonel Mustang said that since Scar was going around, we needed at least a Major-ranked guard with us… and his first choice was going to be Major Armstrong."

Ed envisioned those sparkles, those shiny pecs and the deep and somehow smooth voice, and shuddered, a chill sneaking up his spine. "No thanks."

"Are you sure you don't need another guard?" Mustang cocked an eyebrow at the three teenage boys and one chimera in front of him. "Fullmetal, you're virtually defenseless right now. And Albedo, were you not injured in that battle?"

"It's okay, Colonel!" Al spoke for all of them. "I'm still fine. I can protect them."

Mustang didn't look particularly convinced. "Uh huh. Well, if you say so. There should be less risk of encountering danger considering where you're going… so just be on guard."

"I'm sorry, sir, pets aren't allowed in the train cars," the attendant held out his hand to stop Albedo from stepping on.

A tick grew on Ed's forehead, and he resisted the urge to punch the train attendant to hell and back. Al whispered a soft, "Brother," in warning, almost chiding, and he sighed. Of course he wouldn't do something so idiotic.

And then he felt the chill.

It actually felt cold. Edward wanted to shrink into his coat.

Albedo's glare was as fierce as a blizzard, and paired with those unusually bright teal eyes that almost seemed to glow, no one was safe from the sudden chilliness in the air, not even the passing civilians who had nothing to do with the matter.

"I've paid for her passenger's ticket." Albedo's voice, slow and steady, left no room for argument.

The train attendant gulped. "I apologize, sir. Rules are rules."

"Ah, I see," Albedo said, in such a tone that completely contradicted those placating and unassuming words. "She's my guide dog," he smoothly lied. Working with the Knight of Favonius's sly cavalry captain occasionally, he had definitely picked up a few tactics. And if nothing else, Albedo knew how to keep unnervingly long eye contact.

"A-ah, yes." The attendant moved aside with a shiver as Albedo and Nina boarded.

Ed snickered as they reached the seats they'd booked, a pair of two-seat benches that faced each other. From this side, they could still wave at Mustang, who was watching from the platform.

"You really showed him!" Ed almost cackled. "That was great."

Albedo carefully helped Nina into the seat before gracefully taking his own.

"... Thanks," Nina said, leaning the side of her head against Albedo's shoulder.

The train ride from East City to Resembool took about four hours. For three of those, Edward and Nina were asleep. For all of those, Alphonse watched quietly as Albedo's hands flew across the page of his sketchbook, sometimes writing and sometimes drawing.

Albedo hadn't made an effort to physically hide whatever he was writing or drawing, and Al gladly took the opportunity to see the machinations of the genius alchemist on paper, even if the journal was encoded and most likely unreadable to anyone besides Albedo.

The drawings were easier to read, though, the fleeting scenery that would pass in one second, occasional circles, diagrams, and-

"Is that Nina?" Al breathed in fascination. With just those few quick strokes, Al could so clearly see who it was.

Albedo hummed in confirmation, saying nothing more.

"Amazing! It looks just like her. You're amazing at art."

"... Thanks," Albedo said.

A comfortable silence filled with the rumbling of the train and the snores of Ed settled over the two awake alchemists again.

Al twiddled his thumbs.

Albedo turned the page.

Al kept fidgeting, before finally, hesitantly, he asked, "Do you think… you could teach me how to draw?"

Albedo seemed taken aback for a moment, and Al wondered if he'd asked for too much too soon, because while Brother kept looking at Albedo as a puzzle that he wanted to solve at any cost— Al too, wanted to unravel the mystery that was Albedo— but Al also saw the way Albedo had walked away from their concern, and knew that he was keeping his distance.

It seemed like a lonely life to live, so far above everyone else in knowledge and yet still pushing away those who wanted to help him.

So Al wondered, in the now awkward silence left after his question, if he hadn't overstepped a line somehow, since Albedo looked surprised.

But then Albedo's face smoothed over into something slight and unreadable and he said, "Alright." A pause. "... What do you want to learn first?"

Al physically couldn't smile with his armor, but if he could, he was sure a wide grin would be splitting his face.

Ed stretched as he stepped off the train, feeling his neck stiffen as a result of his poor sleeping posture. At least he got a satisfying neck crack in.

Al followed, and would probably look wistful if he could. "When was the last time we saw Winry and Grandma?"

They turned to Albedo, who finally got off the train, Nina on his heels.

Ed grinned, not unlike an evil plotter who knew something Albedo didn't. "Hope you're ready to walk pretty far."

Albedo didn't look worried in the slightest. "It should be no problem."

The rural scenery of Resembool greeted them as soon as they left the train station. Rolling green hills and the bright blue sky, grazing animals scattered over the lush fields.

Albedo breathed, taking a deep inhale of the fresh country air, allowing the warm spring wind to fill his lungs. This… was like the wide plain of Windvale, yet not, at the same time. Absent were the overhanging cliffs that Barbatos's fierce winds had carved for his people; gone were the sparse ruins that told of ancient civilization lost. But Albedo felt the same feeling of peace, of his heartbeat slowing, of the scent of grass carried by wind.

"It's not much," Ed began, though the nostalgic look on his face said something different.

"It is home, though," Al said.

"It's beautiful," Albedo said softly. His hand itched to take out a pencil and sketchbook and sketch the view that stretched before them, with the picturesque dirt path leading from the station.

Ed and Al were already walking though, and Albedo followed, keeping a corner of his sight on Nina, who seemed to also be taking in the view.

"Pretty…" Nina said from beside Albedo.

Albedo silently agreed.

"You've shrunk, haven't you? You midget."

"I don't want to hear that from you, you minimum-sized hag!" Ed spat. "Shouldn't you say 'you got taller' in this case?"

"But you didn't." Pinako shot back without missing a beat, before turning to the newcomer. "So? Who's this?"

Ed perked back up. "Albedo?"

Albedo stepped forward himself. "Nice to meet you. I'm Albedo… Kreideprinz."

The name, though it was his title, still felt unfamiliar on his tongue. He'd never vocally used the title Kreideprinz before, believing it unnecessary when he was reputable by the name 'Albedo' alone in Mondstadt. He would have to get used to it though; there was no helping that people here commonly had last names.

"He's the newest State Alchemist! Albedo's amazing," Al added.

Albedo, who often heard such praise on the streets of Mondstadt, usually disregarded it. It was fact; he could do many things that others couldn't. From Al's earnest voice, however, Albedo couldn't bring himself to simply nod and disregard the compliment. The warmth in his chest wouldn't allow it.

With slight uncertainty, Albedo scratched the back of his head, even knowing that it served no practical purpose because that spot didn't itch at all. "... Thank you."

There. Done. That was fine, right? Albedo deliberately ignored the way Ed looked at him slightly wide-eyed as if he'd said something odd. He knew from social customs that one was supposed to express appreciation for praise they received, so he assured himself he'd done nothing out of the ordinary, cleared his throat and continued where he'd left off. "And this is Nina," he gestured to the chimera.

"Nice to… meet you," Nina said. 'I'm… Nina."

Albedo couldn't help the smile that crept onto his face. Nina spoke a full sentence— two, in fact! "If the mental degeneration caused by the reaction was only temporary, she still has the brain and cognizance of a six-year-old child…" Albedo mused. "Of course; she can still learn and mentally develop— she can probably still grow, as well…"

Here, his musings went silent again, a visage of absentmindedness and yet fierce concentration taking its natural place on Albedo.

(So it wouldn't be enough to just make Nina the same body she had before; Albedo would have to make sure the body followed Nina's current mental growth, which may vary depending on how much of her composition was still human versus canine.

He'd have to edit his circles some…)

Pinako looked breathless at the sound of Nina's voice. "... Ed, what?"

Both Ed and Al looked away, shame and guilt covering their faces. "It's… a long story. Anyways. Nina, and Albedo Kreideprinz, the Chalkdust Alchemist," Ed finished the introduction. "They've both got their own circumstances, but they're accompanying us for now."

"Huh," Winry sighed, finally visible from the top deck of the Rockbell house. "Another alchemy fanatic. Great- EDWARD ELRIC, WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO WITH MY ARM-"

Albedo sat, silently observing as Pinako and Winry fussed around Ed, who had already shrugged off most layers of his clothes. The two automail mechanics worked quickly and efficiently, in a way that showed off years of practice, and yet were rather raucous.

"Grandma! Where did you leave that 5/16 offset wrench?"

"Check the green toolbox. Don't forget to bring the spares!"

The hustle and bustle of just two people somehow resembled the liveliness of a whole town. It wasn't unlike Wagner the blacksmith and his apprentice, who were single-handedly responsible for at least a fourth of all the noise within the walls of Mondstadt.

"Right. Ready? 1… 2… 3!"

Ed's face scrunched up; his odd expression of a grimace and pucker combined almost masked the short wince of pain.

"Thanks for the warning," Ed sighed, taking a few extra heaves of breath. "What's wrong, Albedo?"

"Oh." Had he accidentally shown something on his face? "It just appears that the sudden disconnection of your nerves causes you some pain, is all."

Ed scratched his cheek in what Albedo interpreted as sheepishness, before breaking into a grin. "Not at all!"

"3!" Winry shouted, a hint of mischief clear in the voice as she yanked the wrench near Ed's knee in a quick stroke.

"HGAH! I thought I told you to give me a warning!" Ed fumed.

Winry stuck her nose in the air. "Stop acting tough! Besides," she hmphed, "It's best to get it over with quickly anyways, like peeling off a band-aid."

Edward rolled his eyes and rolled his pant leg back down. "Yeah, yeah. Hey, is the flower shop open?"

"Hm?" Winry looked up from where she was tidying the toolbox. "Oh. Yeah… it is." Wordlessly, she took the rest of the supplies back down the hallway, leaving a somber silence behind her.

Albedo… wasn't sure what to do. He was, as much as he disliked it, out of his depth here.

"Make yourself at home," Ed said to Albedo as he put on his coat. "You comin', Al?"

Al, uncharacteristically silent, followed Ed out the door.

Albedo wasn't sure what to do. So he did what he did best, and thought. Ed's lips were upturned, but his brows were furrowed, leaving the impression that Ed was very weakly masking some sort of sadness with the smile he wore. So… something had changed, between Ed asking if the flower shop was open and Ed and Al leaving.

What would Ed need flowers for, that would also make him sad— almost subdued, somehow— and so unlike how he usually acted?

A grave. Someone in the brothers' past?

"They're going to visit their mother's grave," Pinako said.

Albedo almost startled, but he wouldn't be doing a good job of staying vigilant if an old woman could catch him off guard. He'd heard her quiet footsteps padded with slippers.

"I see," Albedo simply replied. "My condolences."

Pinako tapped her pipe on the ashtray twice.

Albedo blinked.

"Not going to ask anymore?" Pinako took a drag out of her pipe. "Aren't all you alchemists too curious for your own good?" There, Albedo thought he could hear the faintest trace of cold hostility, though he could have blinked and missed it.

"Perhaps," Albedo said, because the woman's words certainly had merit to them. The curiosity of alchemists had led to the rise and fall of entire nations, and Albedo knew this better than anyone. "But it isn't my place to know," he truthfully acknowledged. "Nor is it relevant to my research and understanding of their character." he lied.

"You looked away, you're a terrible liar." Pinako pointed out without missing a beat. No one was as sharp as an old woman. "Thank you for your consideration though," she smiled. "I'm sure the boys appreciate it."

Albedo nodded.

People didn't like pryers. Albedo himself greatly disliked unwanted questions. It would hardly make sense for him to 'stick his nose where it didn't belong,' as it were.

"Answer me this," Pinako looked at Albedo with a familiar sort of expression, "Why is Ed's arm broken? What have the boys gotten into?"

She looked down, and Albedo realized that the frown and far-off gaze was worry. The same sort of expression that the Acting Grand Master had whenever something concerned her little sister, or those sneaked glances that Albedo would catch Master Diluc sending to his adopted brother.

The expression that, once upon a time, in the crunchy snow, he'd see on his master, as he fell face-first into a sheet of ice.

"They don't send letters, see," Pinako continued. They just suddenly come home… one missing an arm."

"They got into a fight," Albedo found himself saying. (Admitting. No, admitting would imply that he was keeping it from her. He had no intention of keeping it from her.) "There's been a dangerous man targeting… famous State Alchemists, recently."

Pinako slumped into her seat as if fatigued, with a great heavy sigh. Albedo wondered if he should have just not said anything.

Nina felt awake.

She couldn't sleep, actually.

When she'd first awoken, sometime while they were still in East City, she'd felt this wholehearted sense of wrongness. What was she doing here? Why was she here? Why was she… Where was Alexander?

She felt like she was still dreaming, like none of this was real… but no longer could she give herself this excuse, when moving now felt smooth and easy and she could form entire clear thoughts. She didn't want to go back to having muddled thoughts and incoherent bits of pictures going through her mind. She didn't want to sleep, or be sleepy.

She knew.

She knew that her father had betrayed her.

She knew that she would have died had Albedo not carried her from the room when that big man had come.

She knew that her father died.

So why, why, why did she feel so sad? So heavyhearted? Her father had done nothing for her.

He'd smiled and played with her. He'd introduced her to Alexander. He'd introduced her to the alchemists that had saved her. But then he'd taken two of those away, and Nina wasn't sure what to think anymore.

And finally, now, in this beautiful small town, where she was greeted with the rolling hills and grazing animals and blazing sunset, she was alone with her thoughts.

"Nina? That was your name, right?"

Nina looked up. There was the pretty girl there, with eyes bluer than any picture of the ocean Nina had ever seen. Nina… didn't trust her own voice. Didn't like the way it was too deep, felt a deep sort of stirring within her gut whenever she had to hear it. She nodded.

"The brothers didn't say anything," Winry huffed. "How indelicate. I had to hear from Albedo about you."

Albedo. Albedo, Albedo, Albedo.

Why was Albedo doing all of this for her? Nina had only known him for a few days.

"I understand if you don't want to speak," Winry said softly. "I'm glad you're okay though."

Was she okay? Was Nina okay?"

"I'm… not," Nina choked out. "I'm… sad. I'm… angry."

Every word felt like a cough drop lodged in her throat. Too unnatural. Too much like she couldn't breathe. But how else could she say this? How else could she explain that she still loved and mourned the father that had betrayed her so?

She let out something between a sob and a whimper, and hated it. She tried to bring a hand paw up to wipe away the tears pouring from her eyes, and found that her elbow didn't quite bend that way, and hated it.

"It's okay," Winry hugged her. "It's okay, it's okay," she placated softly, kindly. Nina wanted to believe it, and let the words soothe her as far as she could. Wasn't that amazing? The first time she was hugged since…

Nina leaned into the warm embrace. "I…"

"It's okay," Winry said again. "You… don't have to speak. I can't say I get exactly what you're going through, but… I know you're having a rough time."

Nina nodded, sniffling. She hoped she didn't get Winry's shirt dirty accidentally.

"Just know that I'm here, alright? I know that the boys aren't very good at talking through things or god forbid, hugging." Winry chuckled away some of her own tears. "But I'm here."

Nina nodded.

Chapter Text

Ed sat on the porch, blowing listlessly at the strands of hair that fell in front of his eyes.

Winry had just dragged him out of the house by the back of his collar, as if he was a cat that could be picked up by the scruff of his neck. He was still not over that. But he did have to admit that he probably deserved it for bothering Winry while she was hard at work.

Al was giving Nina an awkwardly positioned piggyback ride, under Albedo's watchful gaze. It was a very serene picture, if a bit unusual, with the drifting clouds above them and the rolling hills in the backdrop. Ed smiled.

"Ah! Nina-"

Clank.

A shift of her paw had resulted in Al's helmet being knocked off, revealing the interior… empty.

Ed's mouth opened.

Al's hold on Nina fumbled slightly.

Nina gasped.

Albedo nodded. "I thought so," he voiced quietly, almost inaudibly.

Ed turned to Albedo with wide eyes. Whatever reaction he had been expecting from Albedo regarding Alphonse's lack of a body, it had not been that calm and completely unphased demeanor. "What do you mean?"

"It was clear from the sound of Alphonse's steps, as well as the predicted density and weight of the armor based on its material and thickness, that the armor holds virtually no weight within it. Which could only mean that it is hollow." Albedo listed each observation as if it were as simple as fact, as widely known as the sky was blue or grass was green. "Of course, my predictions could have been wrong… but the possibility was unlikely. My hypothesis has been proven true with this, though."

Nina lifted and tapped her paw on Al's shoulder, the signal they'd come up with for him to let her down.

Al did it almost hesitantly. "Are you… scared of me?" he turned and asked her, still headless.

Nina fiercely shook her head, so much that the brown hair of her mane whipped back and forth across her face. She gently lifted a paw towards the helmet. "Brother Alphonse is still Brother," she said, before her nose— snout— scrunched up in distaste. She was quick to smooth out the quick wince, but not quick enough. Al may have already gone to grab his helmet, and Ed may have been worried about Al, but Albedo had noted the way she recoiled at the sound of her voice.

"Thank you, Nina," Al's glowy red eyes smiled. "Thank you. Could you go inside and give Winry some company?"

Ed watched with a warm gaze as Al used a large armor-leather hand to pet Nina's head. When Albedo came to stand next to him, he sighed, a great deep exhale that was too tired and weary.

"Nothing fazes you, does it?"

"Not much," Albedo responded truthfully. "But some things." Like Shou Tucker. Or like Klee's dangerous activities. Or Alice's even more dangerous activities. Or the Cavalry Captain's pranks. Or the Librarian's promiscuity. Or Sucrose's lab accidents.

Fascinating, Albedo mused. Mondstatdt almost seems like a setting made for the sole purpose of testing my composure.

"I guess we can't get out of this without explaining?" Ed hunched, and held his hand together, as if bracing himself. He almost seemed to have shrunk.

"... Not if you don't want to," Albedo finally said. "This has already revealed the soul-binding array you used. That is…" Albedo considered how to word it. "My curiosity isn't dispelled, but it has been sated."

And sated his curiosity was indeed. That circle was incredible. The eight pointed star, crudely drawn as it was, still included octagonal symmetry, ensuring the presence of eight kite shapes and eight right triangles, both of which were common stabilising elements of arrays. The rough inverted flamel in the center of the circle was impeccably placed and essentially affixed the volatile and detached soul to the armor. Add in the adhesion between the iron in the blood and the iron in the armor, as well as last minute calculations and supplemental arrays in the mind, and it was truly a stroke of genius.

Ed huffed. "You really are an odd guy, y'know. You could just say you want to know."

Albedo didn't grace that with a response.

Ed's sheepish rubbing of the back of the neck almost didn't match the distasteful scrunched up facial expression he had. With reluctance, as if every word took effort to vocalise, he said, "I… Al and I… I think we're fine with you knowing, in any case."

Al nodded. It was an oddly solemn and serious movement, compared to the usual carefree and almost childish gestures Al usually used. "I don't think we have any reason not to trust you," Al said softly. "You might have gotten a clue anyways, from…"

From when Shou Tucker had tried to justify what he'd done to Nina. When he'd said that he and Edward were the same, doomed to sacrifice for the sake of scientific progress. Admittedly, all of them had been so focused on Nina that Albedo hadn't had time to fully consider was Tucker had implied.

Human transmutation. An attempt to revive their mother.

Albedo got the clue. He nodded.

"I just…" Ed choked out. "We just wanted to see our mother again."

"Our father left us with a lot of books on alchemy," Al filled in where Ed was silent. "We found a teacher and spent a few years mastering alchemy with her. We thought we'd considered every angle. That nothing could go wrong."

"I was wrong," Ed spat. "We paid the price. I lost my arm and leg, and Al lost his entire body. I bound his soul to armor so I wouldn't lose him entirely."

Al shuddered. Every shake, the armor rattled, almost as if a strong wind had blown by, despite the air being almost deathly still. "I… didn't see what we created. But Brother…"

"It was a monster." Ed clenched his fists. "I don't know if it could be called human."

A silence settled between the three of them.

Albedo remembered the final tenet of alchemy in Amestris. Do not create human life. So they had broken the tenet, and were now State Alchemists… and likely hoped to use the resources of the military to restore their bodies. Logically, it was the most likely step forward, and Albedo knew it to be true even if the brother didn't say anything.

Interesting. Perhaps because Alchemy was rarer on Teyvat, and most literature was either locked up or forbidden, there were far fewer stories of accidents or mistakes that were as severe as the Elric Brothers'. Albedo knew first-hand, as a teacher himself, the dangers of Alchemy if not properly performed. But life was a complicated subject, and likely the only other people he had ever met who dealt with bioalchemy were Sucrose and some— very very few— Sumerun scholars.

A story like that of the Elric Brothers was a rarity. And that… interested Albedo.

Albedo acknowledged the small part of himself, like a tiny little crystalfly drowned by the light of day, that felt… sad. The brothers had met a fate that, although perhaps they somewhat deserved for their lack of knowledge and great hubris, was greatly unfair to alchemists as bright as them who had pure intentions.

"... So, now you know." Ed brushed the hair out of his face, sending Albedo a straightforward look. "This is mostly a… cautionary tale. You intend to restore Nina's body, don't you?"

When Albedo didn't respond for three seconds, Ed raised a fist, with a dark expression on his face. "If you don't…"

"Of course I do," Albedo said.

Ed calmed down a bit, sagging back into his seat on the porch steps. "Good. Well, human transmutation… it's forbidden for good reason."

Al nodded. "There are a lot of differences since then, such as Nina still being alive and your vast knowledge of biology. We know your alchemy is amazing… but we're only human after all. Please, please…" Al bowed his head. "Be careful."

That was where they were wrong… but they didn't need to know that. Albedo nodded, keeping the warning in his mind. One should always assume that Alchemy, when done wrong, will backfire in the worst way possible. This rule that he had learned appeared to be universal.

"I appreciate the warning," he thanked in his own way. "But if I may ask…. Did you have a catalyst when you performed your transmutation?"

"A catalyst?" Alphonse looked at Ed, who shrugged. "Like the philosopher's stone? Or like the silver pocketwatch?"

"I don't think so," Ed answered. "We did try using our own blood as a guide for the soul." He winced, as an image of the basement and the chalk-circle and the tub full of chemicals came unbidden to his mind.

Albedo was thinking more along the lines of items that had been infused with the energy of either Celestia or the ley lines. Objects that were beyond mortal comprehension and beyond most mortals' capacities to obtain. Things like parts of a Liyuen adeptus's body, or parts of a hyper-sentient or powerful being like a dragon. Even a gnosis, or part of an archon. These objects were almost like condensed physical representations of pure ley line energy aboveground. A single strand of hair from a Liyuen adeptus, depending on how powerful it was, could provide energy for hundreds, if not thousands of complex transmutations.

Then he realized that this wasn't Teyvat and archons and adepti and dragons didn't seem to exist here, and they would probably be greatly confused if he attempted to explain to them what a catalyst meant to Teyvat. Albedo held back the explanation. "Never mind. In any case, I believe I have an idea of why your reaction failed."

Ed and Al both rubbed their arms nervously. Something about the way Albedo spoke regarding the biggest mistake of their lives made them very uncomfortable.

"I don't doubt that the body-creation aspect of the circle was well done… Given your current alchemy skills, you would have more than enough ability to accurately recreate a human body… But the soul array must have been difficult to fit inside a circle as well. Lacking a powerful catalyst, it would likely be impossible to keep the soul anchored for long enough… and the reaction would have to consider cooling after the thermal energy release of the reaction's occurrence anyways…"

Ah. Ed and Al realized simultaneously. It's the way he treats it like a failed experiment. Clinical. Cold. Calculating.

He didn't seem to be considering the horrifying price it had cost them and the pain they had both gone through because of it. Albedo didn't treat it as a mistake never to be repeated, but like a minor setback in an experiment. A failed trial, as it were.

It sickened Ed.

"Do you…" His teeth clenched. "You don't seem to understand. We lost almost everything because of that transmutation. And you're treating it like, like an experiment." What, did Albedo have a heart of steel? Was he human?

Albedo paused. He opened his mouth to say something. And then closed it.

"I…" Albedo looked down. "I apologize."

Ed threw up his arms. He was too tired to be angry right now. He stormed back into the house, every loud step ringing out into the silence between the three of them.

"Sorry," Al said. "The transmutation… it means a lot to us," he tried to explain. "On some level, I guess… we're also scared that it would have… been possible to bring her back. We just failed." And they'd have to live with that guilt for the rest of their lives, went unsaid.

A silence fell between them again.

".. You don't have to answer this if you don't want," Al prefaced, "but… can you understand how we felt? Do you think… you'd try the same if you lost someone dear to you?"

Albedo thought. There was Alice, who took him in with no questions and gave him more warmth over a week than his master had over Albedo's entire life; there was Klee, who was a blazing ball of sunshine that took up half his time. And there was Rhinedottir, who… well, once upon a time, losing Rhinedottir had been his greatest fear and worst nightmare.

And it had happened. Rhinedottir had disappeared. It had been Klee's endless energy and the ceaseless tireless work of being the Knights of Favonius's Chief Alchemist that pulled him away from any notions of something irreversible, as well as the knowledge that he was, in the end, a shadow of his master. He would have nowhere to begin, for he, his knowledge, and the scant memories that Alice had were all that was left of Rhinedottir now.

"... No." Albedo replied. "Maybe, once upon a time," he looked off with a faraway gaze, "but not now."

Al knew that look. He saw it all the time, all too often on people he knew. "Have you already… lost someone dear to you?"

Albedo took out the twig from his pocket that he liked to fidget with. But even fidgeting in this case was using what she had taught him, just as everything he did every day reminded him of her somehow.

"Once." Albedo finally said. "I probably… would've given anything to see her again."

When Albedo didn't elaborate, Al sat quietly next to him.

"She was my master— alchemy teacher," he continued with a wistful gaze.

Why was he saying anything? This wasn't the Traveler, or Timaeus, or Sucrose; only the Traveler had ever gotten close to uncovering all of Albedo's past. But… in this place, this peaceful picturesque home where there was nothing but the rustling of the wind-touched trees and his own deafeningly loud thoughts, he almost felt compelled to speak.

Social obligation? No. Maybe. Albedo didn't know. He hated when he didn't know.

"Can you… tell me more about her?" Al asked softly.

Albedo hesitantly obliged. "She was amazing. The best of her craft. She never cared about gaining a reputation among the best scholars, and quietly did research as she travelled."

A flick of his wrist, and the twig regrew into a branch with leaves.

"She taught me everything I know about alchemy. The alchemy of life." Khemia, he didn't say, because he didn't know if the art existed in this world.

A flick of the wrist, and the branch dispersed into golden sparks, leaving behind only a twig again.

"She was… cold. And strict. She used to give me these very difficult assignments, and said she'd leave if I didn't complete them."

A flick of the wrist and a branch of leaves.

"I did all of them. Perfectly, even. I wanted nothing more than to travel with her. She… " Albedo paused, as if he couldn't quite find the right words for it. Staring off into the distance, with his lips parted, he was completely still. "She raised me."

His own face stared back at him from glass, curved glass, the glass of a culture tank. "This… is new life," Rhinedottir breathed, with an expression of fascination that Albedo didn't know at the time, but would come to very very rarely see. She was the source of Albedo's life, the source of everything Albedo was. He couldn't simply explain that. So he didn't.

A flick of the wrist and a twig once more.

"After the last big discovery we made… she left me a letter and disappeared."

He put the twig back in his pocket.

"I… haven't seen her since," he finally looked up.

Al looked back at him patiently, maybe sadly, with that unreadable glowing red gaze.

"The truth of the world," he let the familiar phrase, one he'd mused on plenty during the Traveler's journey, sit on his tongue. "What could it be?"

She had left him with life. With the greatest feasible alchemic catalyst they had ever discovered. With a letter and instructions to go to Mondstadt. She'd left him at his own devices in a nation of people, the one thing Albedo had never understood and never would understand. He should have been sad, or angry, or a combination of the two, but he just felt empty.

Inside the house, Ed sat behind the door, with his legs drawn in and an uncharacteristic hunch.

The house wasn't soundproof.

Albedo had reordered and recorded every circle he needed to create a body for Nina. Everything he knew had been taken into account. Everything that Rhinedottir had taught him, strewn throughout the pages and pages of text and circles. There was no room for error.

This would have been more doable on Teyvat. There, where catalysts existed, equivalent exchange as Amestris knew it was probably broken every day in alchemy. Because immortal beings and those with connections to Celestia existed, their catalyst-powered reactions still had to be balanced, such that the energy from whatever catalyst they used was equivalent to what the reaction needed to accomplish.

He silently lamented the lack of possible catalysts in Amestris. With no clear catalyst, the detail that he could consider when dealing with the soul-migration array was limited. It was a fact that souls did not attach for long to bodies that they weren't naturally situated in, and were especially fickle because of this. Albedo had to make sure that, whatever catalyst he used, it would have enough energy to stabilize the adhesion of Nina's soul for the lifespan of a human.

Which was why, unfortunately, his own heart and blood could not be used.

He'd considered it. Of course he'd considered it; it was the only other feasible option on this world besides the philosopher's stone that he knew of right now. But…

The Heart of Naberius was meant for use on Teyvat. Its strength lied in the strong connection it had to Celestia, and if that connection was absent, then it was subpar as a catalyst, especially for something as volatile as soul-binding.

Which meant that the only other option right now was the Philosopher's Stone. A substance that did not exist on Teyvat, but according to the Traveler and different scriptures, likely existed in varying forms over different worlds. Albedo didn't know what form it took in this world, and this uncertainty was his current roadblock.

Albedo let out one of his rare sighs, silently wishing that he could have one of Sucrose's candies for their amplifying effect on productivity and general efficiency. He supposed he missed the melt-on-your-tongue morsels she used to bring to his desk once a week as a result of her sweet flower propagation experiments.

Nina walked over to where Albedo sat still, next to the table. "Brother's busy?"

Albedo smiled. He could at least give her good news. "I've figured out most of what we need. You'll be able to have a human body again, Nina."

Nina gasped, eyes widened and jaw hanging open. "Really?"

Albedo didn't miss the way she recoiled at her own voice again. She'd gotten better at masking it though; the cringe on her face was now a lot more subtle.

He nodded. "There's one thing I'm missing, but the rest should be attainable. We'll just have to keep looking for that one thing. It's what Edward and Alphonse are looking for too, so you'll even get to spend more time with them."

He didn't tell her that the brothers had been looking for it for years. He didn't tell her that he didn't know how long it would take before she could have her body back again. He probably should have. But he'd seen the spark, the light of joy in her eyes again, and he just couldn't bring himself to say so.

If he couldn't find a catalyst... he could surely make one. And if he couldn't make one, he'd find a way.

This, he promised. Both to Nina and himself.

Nina looked happy. But then she opened her mouth to say something, and before any sound could come out, snapped it shut immediately.

Albedo frowned. "Nina. What's wrong?"

She shook her head.

Albedo cocked his head. "Alright then," he said with a smile. Strategy number one with kids: make everything into a game. "Let's see if I can guess in three tries what's making you unhappy." There was an ever-so-slight lilt in his voice that was just barely readable as amusement.

Nina's eyebrows, which had been drawn together, loosened some. She tilted her head questioningly.

"Hungry?" Albedo guessed, holding up one finger.

She shook her head, this time more playfully, letting the hair of her mane flit across her face.

"Then…" Albedo pretended to think hard. "Tired?"

Nina shook her head again.

"That's not it?" Albedo asked, feigning surprise. "Then what could it be?"

She laughed. As much as she could without vocalising it, anyways— she exhaled forcefully, smiling.

Albedo smiled. He was glad he could lift her mood some. "Alright, alright. Is it… because you don't like your voice?"

Nina hesitantly nodded. She wondered how Albedo would take it. If she'd ever complained much to Father that man, he'd always wave her off, saying he was busy. And Albedo had to be busy, from the way he kept looking at those books almost unblinkingly.

"Well…" Albedo frowned. "We can't have that."

Nina's voice was key to her communication, given that her fingers didn't have the dexterity to write— yet. Albedo considered. It was incredibly unideal for her to be unable to communicate if they were going to be travelling together for a while. He couldn't be attentive to her needs if she couldn't voice them, after all.

But how could he fix her voice?

A direct transmutation of her voice box, to make it sound more like her original voice? But it was risky. Again, with Nina, there was absolutely no room for error. Especially so if he was going to transform a part of her current body. This was risky.

He needed information. He needed to know exactly how the voice box should look, and how he could reshape it without causing unnecessary harm to her. He couldn't take the risk of deconstruction and reconstruction here; he needed every step to be absolutely seamless. No time or space between the steps of deconstruction and reconstruction, such that it would simulate more of a transformation than a transmutation.

Albedo paced as he considered the transformation.

"Books. I need medical books," he finally said, walking purposefully towards the Rockbells' workshops, where both Winry and Pinako were.

Meanwhile, Nina watched, bewildered.

The next few days found Albedo buried in stacks upon stacks of the Rockbells' medical books relating to human and canine anatomy.

As Pinako set the table with a few bowls of stew, Winry shouted. "Ed! Albedo! Nina! It's dinnertime!"

When all had gathered at the table except for one, and Ed was already shoveling spoonfuls into his mouth, Pinako cocked an eyebrow. "Where's Albedo?"

"Reading," Ed grumbled between large bites that made his cheeks bulge like a chipmunk's. "Still hasn't been out of that room in days."

Pinako sighed. So it was another one of those types of alchemists. There was no helping it. "Winry," she passed her granddaughter the extra bowl of stew. "Go give this to him, would you?"

So there Winry was, outside the guest room that they'd lent to Albedo for the time being, and…

She couldn't bring herself to move or to speak.

Albedo's hand waved around a cloud of dust particles that had configured themselves in the air above his hand in a perfect translucent model of the larynx and surrounding muscles and bones. The particles themselves drifted lightly in the air, moving as one with the contractions of a muscle.

It seemed almost unreal to Winry. She imagined that if she'd ever seen snow, it might look like those particles. They lingered in the air, rising every so slightly, then dipping back down to be brought back up by a slight golden glow. The way that he reordered the particles smoothly and effortlessly with a gesture of his hand. "Then… a developing second layer in the lamina propria…"

Winry could just barely discern the particles that thickened near the glottis, where the vocal folds were.

Open on one side of Albedo's desk was one of the thickest anatomy tomes Winry's parents had left behind. On the other, there was a cross-referenced photo-realistic drawing of Nina from the neck up.

"Commencing trial 11.3-2L."

Winry watched, anticipation making her body tense. The dust particles within the structure came to life, vibrated, almost as if excited, and the simulated vocal folds closed.

"Frequency still slightly too low," Albedo noted. "Then the adjusted layer needs to be compensated with a slight decrease in length…" His mumbles descended into something quick and almost incoherent, teal eyes locked on the results page of his journal with an intense gaze as his hand recorded notes, flying across the page to catch up to his voice.

The dust floating above his hand calmed once more.

"Um…" Winry hated to interrupt. "Albedo?"

The alchemist almost seemed startled, though it could have been a trick of the light. The dust particles that had been held so nonchalantly in the air were suddenly weighed down by gravity again, and the model of the larynx that had precariously floated in the air fell apart, the dust falling and kicking up a cloud of more dust on impact with the table.

Winry hurriedly placed the bowl of soup at the foot of the door. "Ah! I'm so sorry for interrupting," she stammered. "Dinner was ready and you weren't there, so Granny—"

"Thank you," Albedo nodded. Without saying any more, he turned back to the notes on his desk.

Winry let out a breath she didn't know she was holding as she gently closed the door.

"I think… I understand why Ed and Al are so amazed by him," she breathed out to herself.

He tested it countless times. He knew exactly how many trials he'd done, how many times he'd simulated the throat using the dirt, the source of all life, and fine-tuned the details of the transmutation.

There was no room for error. Not when dealing with airflow, something integral to Nina's continued living. But Albedo was certain he'd considered everything. He'd simulated every little tweak, every little change, gotten his alchemical reaction rate to the fastest it could be to prevent Nina any harm.

But…

"Nina," he said, after he finally came out of the room, putting the books he'd borrowed back on their rightful shelves. "I figured out how to change your voice. Do you want to have your old voice back?"

Nina nodded. Of course she did.

"Even if it might be scary? Even if I use alchemy?"

Nina hesitantly nodded again.

"Are you sure? Do you trust me to do this right?"

When she didn't move, Albedo was prepared to flip to the next empty page in his journal, and not revisit the several he'd filled with notes and calculations and test results. If she didn't want him to do it, then he would respect it.

But then she opened her mouth. "I trust… Brother," she said slowly. "I want… I want my voice back."

Albedo promised her silently that he would do this right.

"Miss Winry," he popped his head into the garage, where sounds of mechanical tinkering filled the air. "Does this house have any anesthetic?"

There was no mistaking the fizz of volatile alchemy in the air. Metaphorically shaken from his absentminded dozing off, Ed's eyes snapped open. Both he and Al were both in the same room, so it had to be Albedo.

And like hell was Ed going to let Albedo do anything to Nina.

He slammed his door open, dashing straight for Albedo's room, fumbling every other step with the rough spare leg he was still using. Al's armor clanked as he followed behind Ed.

The door rattled, locked. Ed's heart stopped. He'd said he trusted Albedo, but this…

A deep-seated dread planted itself in the pit of his stomach. Nausea overcame him. Had he made another mistake?

"Albedo!" he screamed, pounding the door as hard as he could with his one flesh arm. "What the hell are you doing?!"

The crackle of alchemy. The blue-gold light that hadn't stopped flickering beneath the crack of the door since they'd gotten there. The silence of both Albedo and Nina. Ed could see the stormy sky, the manic look beneath Tucker's glasses, the cold and desolate basement lab.

"Damnit Albedo, let me in!'

The alchemic light died down, and the crackling quieted into residual pops of static in the air.

Was he too late? Was Nina...

"Brother, stand back," Al said.

Ed wordlessly did as Al asked.

"Sorry, Winry and Granny!" Al shouted, as he rammed the entire weight of his armor into the door, which was not made to withstand such force.

With a loud bang, the lock popped apart, and the door slammed open. The hinges complained with a loud and shrill creak, but it didn't matter as the two boys charged into the room, where the remains of an elaborate circle drawn in chalk had been scattered and smudged slightly. And in the middle of it sat Albedo, gently cradling a still Nina's head with an expression the boys had never seen before.

The terror of ten thousand was clear in his wide eyes and drawn eyebrows, in the tightly pressed lips.

Ed assumed the worst.

Because as much as he was afraid that Albedo had done something to Nina, even Ed had to admit that in conflict with that, Albedo cared about Nina. Cared a lot about Nina. And if Albedo was so worried about Nina, so scared for her, then...

"You…" He stomped over to Albedo, who hadn't moved, and still had two fingers on Nina's neck.

Ed grabbed a fistful of Albedo's blue shirt with an iron grip, and glared straight into his eyes with the intense gaze of the blazing sun, threatening to incinerate Albedo on the spot with only a look. "What have you done to Nina?"

Albedo didn't look at his eyes though. His unnatural teal gaze was still affixed to a point behind Edward, where in the circle, Nina laid still. Because he had almost no doubt that it had gone perfectly, but what if it hadn't and Nina...

Then, Albedo's eyes finally lost the terror that outlined them, replaced with something akin to relief.

"... Brother?" Nina called out weakly.

Al gasped.

"Nina! Your voice!"

Ed unceremoniously dropped Albedo to the ground and turned to Nina.

"My voice… my voice…" it was slightly raspy, almost hoarse. But it was undeniably hers, with the exact pitch, the precise timbre it had once been.

She coughed.

"Water!" Al shouted. "We need a cup of water, water, water…" he trailed off, rushing out of the room with clanking metal armor to grab water for Nina.

"My voice!" Nina shouted, regardless of how her throat tingled with mild discomfort. "I have my voice back!" She tried clumsily to sit up with her four limbs, fumbling. She couldn't tell if she was shaking from the pure adrenaline of having her voice back again, or from how weak her arms and legs felt from the anesthetic Albedo had given her beforehand.

Her head still felt woozy.

Please, please, she silently begged to whatever higher power may exist in the world. Please let this not be a dream. Please let this be real.

"Brother?" She said, as Ed knelt down next to her.

"You're… Are you okay, Nina?"

Nina smiled as best she could with the face she had. "I am. I am. I…" she choked again, on tears that were too familiar, but were this time for a much happier occasion. "Thank you." She couldn't say it enough. "Thank you, thank you, thank you, Brother Albedo!"

Ed took a big sigh of relief, letting all the tension in him dispel. All at once, everything relaxed, and Ed was left taking repeated gasps and sighs, waiting for the pounding of his heart to slow down.

All the while, Nina jumped around them, tail wagging uncontrollably and had not stopped speaking. "Brother! Brother, Brother, Brother fixed my voice," she kept repeating.

Al rushed back into the room with the glass of water.

And Albedo thought.

If he could, if he didn't feel so fatigued from using internal alchemy to get every detail of the larynx and the vocal fold correct, he would pull out his sketchbook.

Because this moment, this one snapshot in time, this little slice of happiness… With Al giving Nina a cup of water and Ed trying to hold back tears of joy and Nina, Nina humming and speaking every second she could get,

He wished it could be immortalized.

With her voice back, Nina was more verbose than ever. Among the sounds of machinery and tinkering in the workshops, Nina's voice became a common fixture in the Rockbell house. If she wasn't talking to someone else, then she was humming a song, or singing, or talking to herself.

If they ever had any doubt on their minds before, then by now, it had disintegrated.

Albedo would surely be the one to turn Nina back into a human. And on some level, Ed and Al were beyond grateful that Albedo's terrifying knowledge of alchemy would be able to help Nina, but…

"Restoring an entire body is different from rearranging and adjusting the larynx to change her voice," Ed said to the alchemists gathered at the table. "I don't know how you did it without invoking Truth and human transmutation, but you'd better have a fucking plan for when you try to bring her back."

"Truth?" Albedo cocked an eyebrow curiously.

Al also seemed confused from the way he looked at Ed. Ed's face scrunched up in something akin to displeasure or frustration.

"I keep forgetting you haven't seen it, Al…" he grumbled under his breath. "I don't suppose Albedo has either… even I'm not sure it actually exists…"

Before the silence between them stretched awkwardly long, Ed cleared his throat. "Anyways!" He shouted with false gung-ho, before glaring fiercely at Albedo. "We, Al and I… do know some human transmutation, given…"

The fierce glare faded immediately like a fire doused with water, but Ed continued. "... we'll help where we can. So let us know what you're planning."

Albedo nodded.

A little swirling something inside him told him to say, as sincerely as he could make it seem, "Thank you, Edward. Alphonse." The warmth in his chest grew once more, and Albedo quashed it with memories of Dragonspine Mountain and the frostbites that numbed his fingers and toes. They were acquaintances; coworkers at best, and he refused to let this warmth challenge his professionalism and rationality, when he hadn't ever given those up even for Sucrose and Timaeus.

"Then," he began, "the plan is to make a body and transfer her soul to it."

As Ed and Al, who looked simultaneously awe-struck and horrified, let this information sink in, Albedo took their silence as a sign to continue.

He withdrew and unfolded a few pieces of folded paper from his pocket: Tucker's notes. Ed immediately glared at it as if it had personally offended him, and it might as well have. He was tempted to throw those papers into the compost and burn them himself.

Albedo spoke. "Based on what I've found of these… it would likely be simpler to give her a new body. He…" here Albedo took a deep breath to again dampen the rage that grew within him at the thought of the man. "...Tucker created the chimera by deconstructing the bodies of both Nina and Alexander down to the molecular level and reconstructing them seamlessly."

"Then now that they're combined—" Ed's eyes were calculating, but still burnt with an undercurrent of anger and a slight hint of guilt, sadness, shame, or a combination of these. "Discerning which is which would be virtually impossible at the molecular level, given their physiological similarities."

Al nodded. "So then the only other way would be to create a new body altogether," he hummed. "That's…"

"Yeah, Al." Ed's single flesh hand gripped the tablecloth so strongly that his knuckles paled. "That's very similar to what we tried." He looked at Albedo, a look of despair and hope both clashing on his face. "You— you know how to do this, right? How to do this correctly?"

'My master created me, a fully functioning and growing life form that is human in almost every way, shape, and form,' he didn't say. 'She taught me everything I know and everything she knows or knew, and that includes the near-extinct secrets of Khemia, the art that has created me,' he couldn't say.

He settled instead for a nod. "I do."

"Hold on," Al cut in. "If Nina's and Alexander's bodies were so physiologically similar… would it be possible to transmute the rest of her body to be human again? Like you did for her voice."

The brothers watched apprehensively as Albedo put a hand up to his chin in consideration.

But it was not in consideration of whether or not it could be done, but rather what to tell the boys. Because if Albedo said to them that changing bone structure, changing skin and hair follicles and blood vessels and everything was perhaps too difficult with the extra mass that had to be discarded for this to work, he would be lying— somewhat. It was difficult, but not too difficult; nothing in alchemy was ever too difficult for Albedo.

But he had considered the possibility before, of simply trying to transform Nina back, and with absolutely no room for error, in a single trial… well, he didn't want to take a risk with Nina's current body.

There was also the fact that it might hurt Nina. That the transformation all at once might be too much for her, even with anesthetic. That she again might feel the pain she once already had and had never deserved. Albedo knew, from the way she had hesitated to allow him to fix her voice, that Nina harbored a… severe aversion to alchemy, especially on herself. And Albedo didn't ever want to subject her to it unnecessarily.

But was migrating her soul any better? She wouldn't feel physical pain from the transition, given that the soul would not have a body to feel pain from, but having one's soul ripped from their body could not be spiritually healthy. And that was exactly what Albedo was proposing at the moment.

"I've considered it," Albedo finally answered. "It was the first thing I thought about."

The brothers waited for him to continue.

"But with Nina, how complicated her current body is, and my lack of access to her interior organs, my precision might fail me. I would only have one chance. And if I fail…" Albedo closed a hand around the twig in his pocket, an anchor for his turbulent thoughts. "I cannot fail. There is no room for error."

Ed gravely nodded. "That's true.

Albedo this time withdrew his notebook. "I have everything prepared already. The necessary circles and calculations, detailing everything from the shape of her eyes to the capillaries in her toes. The benefit of creating a body first is that without a soul, the body itself should be inactive and safe to inspect beforehand for function and form before the soul is placed in it."

Ed gazed greedily at the leather-bound pages in Albedo's grasp. Albedo had to admit that Ed hid his thirst for knowledge relatively well, compared to someone like Sucrose who was constantly eyeing his journal almost hungrily, but without the courage or initiative to take it directly from Albedo. He was certain Sucrose had at least snuck a few peeks at it when he was absent, though.

"Before you ask, I'd prefer not to share my notes with either of you," Albedo clarified. Of course he wasn't going to share his master's knowledge with just anyone.

Ed slouched minutely at that, but quickly straightened himself. "Makes sense," he admitted. "If you're ready though, why haven't you don't anything? You didn't wait to change Nina's voice— I can't imagine you'd wait to give her her body back."

Albedo held back a sigh. The setback. "The Philosopher's Stone," he said. The catalyst.

"Same as us, then…" Al looked nervous. "I guess it was needed for a successful human transmutation."

"Seems like we'll be searching for the same thing then," Ed leaned back in his chair. "Me and Al for our bodies, and you for Nina."

Albedo nodded, a rare smile taking its place on his face. "Indeed. It appears we shall have to stay travel companions for a while."

"Then where to next?" Al asked.

Ed shrugged. "The Colonel Bastard hasn't given me anything yet. Didn't you want to go to Central, Albedo?"

"Yes," Albedo hummed. He still needed a new sword.

"Then it's decided," Ed grinned. Things were looking up. They had Albedo to help them, and Nina was safe. "To Central!"

The night was silent except for the occasional chirp of a cricket. By now, Alphonse had learnt how to stay completely still, such that his armor wouldn't rattle accidentally in the middle of the night and awaken his brother— not that Ed could be awoken by anything short of a catastrophe though.

He could hear Ed sigh from the bed.

Which meant Ed was still awake.

"Brother, you should sleep," Al whispered.

"I know, Al." Ed's voice didn't sound tired though.

"Are you worried?"

There was silence again. Ed shifted in his bed. Al didn't move.

"Where did that come from?" Ed did a good job of masking it, but Al wasn't his brother for nothing. Al could hear the slightest waver, the nervousness that the confident voice belied.

And Al was nervous too. "Because Albedo plans to create a new body altogether for Nina and it's too similar to what we tried and I don't know if he can actually do it." Al twiddled his thumbs, letting himself move. "And… I don't know if I want him to succeed or fail or if either is good."

"Ah," Ed hummed, in the tone that Al could tell meant Ed knew exactly what Al was talking about.

He was silent.

"Do you…" Al paused. "Do you think our bodies are unrecoverable? Like Nina's?"

Ed shifted in his bed again. "... I don't know, Al. But I think the situations are different. Tucker didn't sacrifice Nina's body at all for the reaction," Ed's face scrunched up distastefully, "but he must have sacrificed something if he transmuted her. I think it was… Alexander's soul. Based on the notes Albedo showed us."

Al's red eyes dimmed. "Then because Nina's physical body is still here, just changed…"

"Yeah." Ed sighed. "We have no way of knowing if our bodies are still recoverable or not."

They fell into a peaceful silence again.

"...Hey, Brother? Do you think Albedo will do it? Successfully, I mean."

"He'll do it. Successfully… I don't know." Ed laughed humorlessly. "I think… with Nina still here and alive, and his alchemy, and the philosopher's stone…"

"He'll be able to. With the philosopher's stone, anything is possible" Al finished. "I hope he does. For Nina. But…"

"Yeah." Ed grit his teeth. "The amount of power he has… it's almost terrifying."

If we had that power, we maybe could have properly brought back our mother, neither of them said, even though both of them thought it. We wouldn't have messed up and turned our mother into a monster.

They both fell silent.

"I don't think he's a bad person though," Al finally said. Albedo was cold, and distant, and the most aloof person either of them had ever seen… but Al was sure that Albedo was a good person. He wouldn't try so hard to help Nina or look at her in such genuine affection if he wasn't. He wouldn't have agreed to teach Al how to draw or shown them his alchemy if he wasn't.

Ed gave his new arm a few experimental swings. The metal clicks and clinks inside it of moving cogs and pistons was familiar. The weight on his shoulder would take a bit of getting used to after the shoulder being weightless for the past week and a half, but Ed was glad to have his automail back again.

After a customary spar with Al, he patted off the dust from his hands— and transmuted his arm back to normal before Winry came out and threw a wrench at his poor head. "Looks like we're ready!" His trunk was all packed and ready. "Albedo? Nina?"

"Coming!" Nina shouted from the house. She bounded out the door beside Albedo, full of enthusiasm. "We're going to Central, right? I don't think I've ever been in Central! What's it like? I've heard that Central Command looks like a castle!"

Ed grinned, leaning down to tousle the hair on her head, which had been pulled back to not obstruct her eyes. "It is! Central is huge, you know? Are you ready to go see it?"

Nina nodded. "Brother Albedo! Hurry up!" Her tail wagged excitedly.

"Yes, yes," Albedo said as he walked down the porch steps. Nina's endless excitement was an absolute joy to see, perhaps on par or even better than the ethereal moment of birth when the otherworldly flower he'd found on Dragonspine mountain had unfurled its petals and bloomed. Nina's smile, though not human in appearance, was familiar and calming compared to her state previously, when she was almost despondent.

As with Klee's abundant enthusiasm, Albedo let it play out. A child's curiosity and excitement was healthy to have, and Albedo had long since learned that few things could actually quell it. So he would guide it if he had to, and let it run its course otherwise.

This time, in the much more rural train station, with no actual train attendants to regulate it, Albedo had no trouble getting Nina a seat next to them. "It'll be a much longer ride to Central," he said to her, "so you might as well sleep while you can."

Of course, with all the excitement she'd built up, she couldn't sleep. So she whined. "Ehhhh?" she stretched it out, pouting the best she could. "How long will it take then?"

Albedo huffed in amusement at her antics. She was certainly in great spirits. "Twice as long as it took to get from East City to here," he answered, again amused by the way she sagged as if betrayed by the train and time itself.

"Fine…" she grumbled. "But if I'm sleeping, you need to sing that song for me again!"

Now was Albedo's turn to frown. "That song?"

"Yeah! That pretty one that you sang when I fell asleep before you fixed my voice. I like it a lot! And your voice is really pretty!"

Albedo sighed.

"And if I do this you'll promise to sleep?"

Nina nodded fiercely. "Promise! Pinky promise, even!"

Well.

Albedo had also learned long ago to choose his battles wisely with kids. So, uncertainly, he started humming.

Nina leaned her head on his shoulder.

The crescendo of the harp that the bard Venti had so often played with his hand waving like the cecilias over the strings, the decrescendo as it rose and fell and then rose again, the lilt of a melody of wonder filled the air. The traveler's at first wavering hum began, uncertain, small, and quiet.

It was a melody Albedo had heard countless times around campfires, on the quiet snowy nights of Dragonspine Mountain.

Venti plucked the strings with a soft but quick trill at the end of the Traveler's first melody, which had trailed off at a high note, waiting to be continued. Venti played with an encouraging smile at the Traveler, who repeated the tune again, louder. The crackling of the campfire no longer drowned the tune, which rose, gloriously, into the stars, before another trill brought it dipping lower, lower, and lower. But the crescendo, and the hopeful step up in the tune, had opened the floodgates.

The Traveler was all but gone, head among the stars as they opened their mouth and sang, carrying the ethereal tune through the night. A voice strong yet beautiful like a violin sang a crescendo and decrescendo, up to a bright peak, every note building on the one before it before a sigh, a decrescendo and ritardando brough the melody to a slow and serene end.

In the residual silence behind the melody, the familiar soft hum of the beginning tune repeated once more, a soft epilogue that retraced a warm and familiar beginning, this time, ending.

Albedo closed his eyes and hummed, the familiar tune sitting unbidden on his tongue— one of the first melodies he'd heard and listened to and enjoyed. Mondstadt was a city of freedom, full of music and bards and countless songs… but never had a song so perfectly conveyed the wonder of discovery and exploration as the one the Traveler would sing for them.

He could only hope that he could do it justice with his own voice.

Nina nodded along to the tune. It had touched her heart when she first heard it. She surely wouldn't fall asleep to it… but just hearing it was enough to set her heart at ease.

The brothers watched.

They couldn't help but feel like they were intruding on a personal moment, but in that moment, they could only watch, captivated by Albedo's song.

Chapter Text

The train stopped to drop off passengers at a town somewhere between Resembool and Central. Albedo reckoned, based on the map he had folded between the pages of his journal, that by now they were close to East City, but probably not going to stop there.

He neatly folded the map and tucked it into his journal again, returning to a half-finished sketch of the Elric brothers. Alphonse gazed out the window while Edward leaned on his shoulder, unceremoniously draped over the train's cushioned bench like a languid cat.

Drawing people had always had a layer of depth that drawing plants lacked— their complex emotions could be changed by even the slightest tilt of the mouth or repositioning of the eyebrows.

Now was a good chance, in any case. Albedo had hardly known Edward for two weeks, but he was almost certain that Edward would only be stationary enough to draw if the boy was either reading or sleeping. In this latter case, while Edward was unconscious, he also lost the intense sort of gaze in his eyes that made Albedo feel…

A little flickering indignance, but also a taut cord that might snap at any second if Albedo touched it. Wariness. Albedo felt as if he was being pitied and yet scrutinized at the same time.

It was in no way Edward's fault that he felt this way— Albedo's… emotions, he supposed he could call them… were his own responsibility. Albedo had made a choice to reveal to the brothers his past, and show them parts of himself that weren't typical of this world, and this was the result of that. A simple cause and effect. A hypothesis and result. It was a logical consequence.

Albedo inwardly sighed, staying still outwardly as Nina was still leaning on his shoulder and he didn't wish to jostle her with an intake of breath that was unnecessary for him.

Alphonse was just as still as Albedo, with the exception of his quietly twiddling thumbs. There was a silence between them that wasn't uncomfortable per se, but wasn't the kind of easy quiet that it would have been had Al been here alone with Ed.

Well. Now was as good a time as any. "Alphonse. Would you like to begin learning how to draw?" Albedo offered quietly.

Alphonse looked up from his thumbs. The red glowing eyes were as always, unreadable to Albedo. It was almost a jarring contrast to the hopeful and surprised "hm?" that followed.

Almost as if he'd registered Albedo's words a bit late, Alphonse paused before nodding enthusiastically. "Yes! Where do we begin?"

"I suppose… would plants be a good start?" Albedo hummed. "Still life is often an apt precursor for harder subjects, as it gives the artist a foundation in accuracy and composition." He flipped through his notebook, one of many that he had brought along with him on his travels, and unfortunately, the only one he had access to currently. The others were likely tucked away into his shelf back in Mondstadt.

Alphonse reached somewhere on his armor to procure a journal and pencil, and set it gently down on his lap. "So… how do I begin?"

"Unfortunately we don't have a live reference with us at the moment," Albedo stated, flipping rapidly through his own journal's pages. "So for now, try using this as a reference. Recreate it the best you can, and I'll evaluate it afterwards."

Albedo held the journal out to Alphonse, who took it almost reverently with one hand as he observed the beautiful flower on the page. The gentle curve of its stem and wave of its petals among the roughly etched wildgrass gave it the illusion of motion, a solitary cecilia swayed by the gentle caress of wind.

"This is beautiful…" Alphonse breathed. "It looks so… alive."

Albedo returned Al's wonder with one of his rare smiles that seemed reserved for only the warmest of moments (or Nina), and Al felt a corner of his heart melt for the cold young man in front of him, who was so clinical yet kind, so indifferent and yet so warm.

"They are pretty, aren't they?" Albedo's teal eyes were lost in nostalgia, seeing not a sheaf of paper with charcoal lines, but a green stem and white petals and the way the wind ruffled them. The part of his heart and soul that loved Mondstadt, its jagged cliffs and vibrant flora and wondrous views, lit up within him, carrying with it the comforting warmth of a Statue of the Seven, or the kiss of unobstructed sunlight on Starsnatch cliff.

When Albedo fell silent, Alphonse decided not to press him. Instead, with his large leather-gloved armor hands obscuring more than half the page, he did his best to clumsily outline the petals, and then the stamen and pistil that peeked above the six petals.

Of course, with his large hand and armor, which was meant more for the broad movements of battle than the fine-tuned and precise strokes of art, the drawing was far from a masterpiece. Though he had experience quickly denoting perfectly geometric shapes for the purpose of alchemy, those had always been on a larger scale and used chalk, a thicker and much more forgiving medium than pencil.

Compared to Albedo's drawing, Al's paper seemed almost like the chicken-scratch of a child, with shaky lines and a poorly contrived attempt to mimic the natural bend of the lines.

Alphonse sheepishly held out his sketch for Albedo to evaluate. Albedo's calculating gaze was unsurprisingly nerve-wracking when trained onto Alphonse's drawing, a product of his short efforts.

Just as Albedo could never tell what Alphonse was thinking, Alphonse found Albedo's teal eyes unreadable. And wasn't that odd? Alphonse couldn't help but compare Albedo to his brother. Both geniuses in their own right, yet stark opposites in personality. His own brother was larger than life, carrying with him a whirlwind of fire in his eyes and a brilliance like the sun that almost never died down. Albedo, though, was much more like… ice. Ethereally beautiful, cold to the touch, stiff and still, and yet no less home to life and warmth.

Albedo hummed. "Not bad for your first try," he said.

Alphonse beamed. "Really?"

At the excitement in the boy's voice, Albedo couldn't coldly criticize Al's drawing. "... Yes," he awkwardly settled for. "You probably don't have particularly precise motor control considering your situation…"

Alphonse's shoulder fell, disheartened.

"But it is still very well done," Albedo hurried to appease him. He inwardly cringed. There was only so much social interaction Albedo could handle for a day even in Mondstadt, and talking to people and fine-tuning what he said so that they wouldn't feel displeasure from his words was not at the fore-front of his skill set. "You should try pressing lighter on your pencil next time. First lay down the rough shapes of your subject."

Albedo withdrew his trusty charcoal stick from his pocket with an easy twirl, a flick of his wrist to test his grip. "See," he spoke as his hand flitted across the page. "The petals are essentially rounded triangles, and the stem is just like a soft parabolic curve— more curved on the end towards the petals."

Alphonse watched in wonder as, with ease, the shape of the flower manifested.

"Then the details." His grip shifted closer to the charcoal's tip, tilted ever so slightly to a sharper edge. "The best way to make the natural deviations in shapes dictated by the randomness of nature, such as the minute waves on the side of the petal, is to relax." The wrist and joints fluidly bent, accommodating the twists and turns of the lines.

"And… there," Albedo lifted his pencil to evaluate his sketch. "The lines of the underlying rough sketch can be erased afterwards, but not if one leaves too heavy an imprint in the paper for the graphite or charcoal to remain within the grooves. Try to put less pressure on the pencil next time."

Alphonse nodded.

That was probably the most Albedo had ever spoken about anything, excluding his mumblings on alchemic equations and circles— though anything he said about alchemy was usually rather cryptic and difficult to follow anyways.

Alphonse liked it. Albedo's voice had a deep and soothing timbre to it, and… it seemed like Albedo truly enjoyed art.

His teal eyes, which were always unreadable, seemed to have the slightest bit of something resembling a smile when he explained how to draw.

"Thanks, Albedo," Alphonse said.

"Hm?" Albedo was taken by surprise. "... of course."

Alphonse couldn't stop thinking about the sketch of that lone flower in the grass, even as Albedo rested alongside the others. (It seemed even the sleepless and unflappable alchemist needed his rest.)

It seemed similar to some lilies. Was definitely a monocot based on the number of petals and sheath-like leaf along the stem. Alphonse wasn't the most knowledgeable regarding plants, but he thought it looked a bit like a white trillium. Yet still not quite.

It was beautiful. He wondered if it was Albedo's favorite flower. Albedo did seem happier when looking at it. Maybe he could find it at a flower shop in Central and gift some to Albedo as thanks for teaching him how to draw.

As the train approached Central, the trees started thinning, and the grass hills and forests became cobblestone roads and brick buildings.

Nina leaned up against the window, tail wagging excitedly. "Are we almost there?"

Albedo nodded. "Be patient, Nina. We'll be there soon."

Nina giggled. "I know, I know!" This would be her first time in Central, and as much as she tried to contain it so she wouldn't bother Albedo or Ed or Al, but Albedo didn't seem angry with her at all, and it would be her first time in Central!

She looked back at Albedo. He was doing that frowny-thing he sometimes did where he would be smiling but his eyebrows tilted down ever so slightly, like he was worried. She knew that look all too well.

"Brother Albedo? Is everything alright?"

Albedo didn't seem to have noticed that he was making such an expression. Nina held back another giggle as his face immediately smoothed out again into a straight and almost princely look of indifference. She knew that he did that a lot, snuck these sorts of expressions in when he thought no one was watching. She wondered how he'd learned to hide his face like that so well.

In any case, Albedo smiled disarmingly. "Nothing much, Nina," he reassured. "Just… be careful when you speak while we're in Central, okay?"

Nina nodded, as she always did, but frowned. Be careful always meant not to do something, from her experience. "Does that mean I shouldn't talk?"

If Albedo asked it of her, she'd probably listen without a second thought. Albedo was a really smart person, and he'd already done so much for her. She could keep quiet while they were in public easily.

But Albedo was quick to wave away that suggestion with a flick of his hand, a slight pull downwards on the corners of his lips, as if to swat the thought of her silence away like one would a fly. "No, of course not," he hurried to say. "Do what makes you most comfortable. Just ignore those who seem scared or tell you to stop. Your voice is beautiful."

Nina grinned the best she could with her unfamiliar mouth. "Mhm!"

She couldn't help but notice the sad way the brothers looked at her, for some reason.

Nina understood what Albedo meant now.

She had been telling Albedo and the brothers about her favorite things to do on snowy days. It was easy to talk to them, with the voice she had. She really couldn't stop speaking sometimes, because if she could ignore the way that her too-long nose or snout peeked into the bottom of her field of vision, she could pretend she was normal again.

But she stepped off the train, and immediately fell silent.

It was too late. The words that had left her mouth had already been heard, and the tens, hundreds, thousands of people surrounding the train, waiting to board or waiting for someone to leave or getting off, seemed to turn their gazes to her.

With fear. So much fear. Disgust. And they were large, too large, like she couldn't see past their noses but knew that if she could have seen their eyes she would have felt terrible. She was now a freak of nature, unnatural, not a part of the world that everyone else was in. Because why else would they be looking at her like that?

She already felt terrible. Her heart trembled, and a tiny pressure in her chest pulled it down, down, down. Her throat felt caught, unable to move, like a snagged thread on a sweater that was out of place.

She froze.

She felt a weight on her back. Light, but still heavy enough that she knew it was there.

"Sorry, Edward, Alphonse. We'll be waiting for you outside the station," Albedo spoke. Was his voice always that close to her ear? No. Albedo was crouched in front of her, but without his signature white coat. Oh, she realized. He lent me his coat.

There was a hand on her back, ushering her forward with a gentle push. She lifted the back legs that felt to her like bags of bricks, and, guided by the hand, protected by the coat, walked.

Under the black hood of his coat that had flopped over Nina's head, she could barely make out the shuffling feet that moved out of the way for her. Albedo's black boots to the left. A hand still pressed to her back, grounding her.

The sound and chatter died down, the pairs of shoes lessened, and finally, under the hood, she could see the light of day. Were they outside the station? Then the light was gone again, and the sound was more and more distant, and finally, the hand on her back stopped guiding her, and she sat.

"Nina," Albedo's voice cut through the quiet. With one hand, he lifted the hood of the coat he had lent her. Her bowed head looked up at the hood's removal, straight into Albedo's concerned eyes.

"Are you okay?"

She didn't want to trouble him. She could just say yes and they could join up with the Elric brothers again and things would be back to normal as soon as they could get somewhere where it was just the four of them again.

She shook her head.

She didn't feel okay.

"Hey, it's alright," Albedo's gentle voice soothed her, smoothing her frazzled nerves. "It's okay," he repeated. "It's okay. You don't have to be okay."

Nina hiccuped. She could feel the wetness in her eyes again, the same kind that she had felt in Resembool before Albedo had fixed her voice. What could she be sad over? Albedo had fixed her voice. That should have been more than enough for her to feel happy, and yet she didn't.

"Would you…" Albedo looked sheepish as he swallowed once and continued. "Would you like a hug?"

Nina sniffled. A hug. A warm hug. That sounded nice. She nodded.

And in the warm embrace of Albedo, she could hear it, the soft beating of his chest and life within him. She could feel the oxymoronic cold warmth that she'd come to associate with Albedo's smiles and teal eyes and general demeanor. Her breaths came out as entire body-wracking sobs, but they slowed, slowed and eventually turned into something resembling breaths as Albedo rubbed her back repeatedly.

"You know," Albedo spoke. "A lot of people used to look at me oddly when I went to the city."

Nina sniffled.

"I came at a time when everyone there knew each other, and travelers were few and far between. Nobody knew who I was and why I was there, so they all looked at me like I shouldn't be there."

How could he put it into words? How could he explain the invisible barrier between him and those who could involuntarily pull up the corners of their lips and let out sunny cries of laughter and pour salty tears out of their eyes over anything from spilt milk to the greatest losses? How could he say in any way that the way he was an outsider, to the very core of his being, could match dear Nina's grief?

Nina could feel Albedo sigh. An intake of breath, and then a deep exhale, sinking into the embrace.

"I know… I can't compare it to what you must be feeling right now," he said, pulling away from the hug. He looked her straight in the eyes. "But Alice and Klee… and everyone else accepted me as their family, even though I only knew them for a week."

Nina looked back at his earnest, teal, unblinking eyes.

"And… the looks became a bit more bearable after that. Because I knew that in the eyes of those I cared about, I was simply Albedo." Every word seemed to be pausing, hesitant, and unsure. "So… know that I love you for who you are, Nina."

She nodded. She believed Albedo. Her big brother had not lied to her yet, and she knew, even in his hesitant words, that his eyes weren't lying.

"I promise you I'll restore you, Nina. I promise."

He stood. "Shall we… meet up with the Elrics then?"

Nina nodded. A residual sniffle shook her frame, but she stood. "Yeah."

Albedo could have sighed in relief.

Hypothesis proven successful— an embrace and a recounting of one's own experiences are effective in calming a child.

He didn't know what he was thinking, trying to calm her down. He was not an adequate person for the job. He did not know what she was thinking. He could only think logically and rationally about what was bothering her and try to solve it, but to "solve" the hundreds of people at the station who looked at her the way they did was simply impossible.

He felt another pang of icy rage at them. He could understand that a speaking chimera was marvel-worthy— surely, if he hadn't known Nina before he himself would have been curious. Thus, judging the people at the station would only be hypocritical of him, and he strived to not have unreasonable double-standards dictating his actions.

But Nina was Nina, and this meant that he was already emotionally invested in her physical and mental wellbeing, and surely some double standards could be allowed for the sake of family.

Family, huh.

(Albedo remembered. The cold gaze of Rhinedottir. Her face, opposite of the campfire, perusing the results of their journey for the day with a cold calculating gaze. An indifferent well done in passing before they both rested for the night, two words that meant everything to Albedo.

Albedo remembered. The knowledge that weighed in his chest when he'd seen life emerge from a culture tank for the first time— life that was not his own, and yet reflected him so much— a stone monster that had been infused with the Geo energy of Liyue's earth. The knowledge that the source of his life was not natural, that he was not natural, and the chilling sleepless night that followed.

Albedo remembered Rhinedottir's cold look when he spoke and asked and how she turned away, wordlessly. I'll leave if you ask this ever again. Understood?)

When they finally saw the Elrics again, their large suit of armor and iconic red coat standing out like a bright poppy in an ashen field of cobblestone, they saw two others. Albedo recognized the neatly-pressed blue uniforms of the Amestrian military— he had seen far too many during his stay in East City not to.

Ed grumbled under his breath, eyebrows furrowed. "Guards. Guards! I don't need guards," he indignantly sputtered.

"Better safe than sorry," Alphonse placated, sounding rather resigned to Ed's sour mood. "Ah! Albedo and Nina."

Ed looked up, and upon seeing the pair, ran forward. "Albedo! Is Nina alright?" he knelt before Nina to give her a reassuring pat on her head, which was once again under the black hood of Albedo's pristine white coat— though the bottom edges seemed dirtied already with dirt, having been dragged on the ground. The coat was comically large on the chimera, and draped over her shoulders almost like a cloak.

Albedo nodded. "She will be fine. But it would be best not to let her around large crowds for a bit." He tried giving his best semblance of a reassuring look. He couldn't be certain if he'd succeeded without having a mirror to check, but judging by the way Edward let out a sigh of relief, he believed it had been effective.

"Excuse me, sirs," one of the officers, a short-haired woman cut in. "We have a car prepared to take you and the Elric brothers to Central Command so you can get situated at the barracks."

Albedo allowed himself to fall into the familiar formality of professionalism. "Understood. Please, lead the way."

Ed's sour mood returned in spades. "You're okay with this? I don't think we need guards."

"Well," Albedo hummed, "to begin with, Scar's disappearance meant you were supposed to have a guard with you. My own combat ability is halved since my sword is out of commission. Rationally speaking, having additional guards is safest. It also helps to have escorts in a city I am unfamiliar with."

Ed huffed. "Trust you to be like this." He sighed. "Fine. Lead the way," he waved a hand dismissively towards the two bodyguards.

Albedo was sure Ed's disrespect had disgruntled the two officers. They struggled to hold back indignant expressions towards the boy's nonchalance. He wondered if perhaps he should apologize on Edward's behalf.

No, he didn't think he would.

Albedo learned on the car ride that Second Lieutenant Maria Ross and Sergeant Denny Brosh were there to escort him and the brothers during their stay in Central City. It was, as he thought, due to the threat of Scar, who had disappeared since that incident in East City.

They hadn't stepped a single foot into the Central Command building before they were suddenly accosted by a too-smiley man.

"Ah! The Elric brothers! Were you going to head for the barracks? Didn't I tell you that you were more than welcome to stay at my place whenever you're in Central? Come to my house! Elicia really wants to see you again! And Gracia will be so happy to make food for you! Have you seen Elicia?" he pulled out a long strip of photos, which unfolded like an accordian to stretch from his hand all the way to the ground.

The Elrics couldn't get a word in edgewise.

Albedo thought this man was awfully reminiscent of the big burly Cyrus, who went on and on and on about adventuring. Which was why he'd already had his branch out, twiddling it between his fingers. It was probably not a good idea to so passively fidget with alchemy in public as he had before; it was much more of a spectacle in Amestris than it was in Teyvat.

"Oh, and you're the new alchemist! Chalkdust, right?"

Albedo was wholly unprepared for the man's attention to veer so quickly to him, and looked owlishly at the man's extended hand for a moment. Ah. A handshake. He pocketed the small branch and firmly shook it, as Grandmaster Varka had once told him was socially acceptable.

"Right. Albedo Kreideprinz. Pleasure to meet you. And…"

To his right, Nina was hunched over, imperceptibly shaking, half-hiding behind his legs. She was still scared…

"This is Nina."

The man's smile turned into something somber, and Albedo wondered how many people knew about what had happened to Nina. Granted, Albedo hadn't been trying to keep her a secret— it would be a discredit to her if he were to treat her as anything other than human.

The man crouched to take a closer look.

Albedo tensed. He cautiously let the barest wisps of alchemical energy gather in his hand, prepared to defend Nina should anything go awry.

"Nice to see you again, Nina," the man smiled disarmingly, before standing up once more.

Again? So he had met Nina before?

Albedo must have externalized his surprise, as Ed explained. "Oh yeah. You were unconscious, weren't you? Colonel Hughes was in the area when… that happened."

The man grinned. "Lieutenant Colonel Maes Hughes." The introduction's formality and seriousness immediately launched straight back into "look at Elicia! She's turning three soon, did you know? Did you know?"

Hughes's smile had to be the gushiest, most affectionate look Albedo had ever witnessed. The corners of his mouth stretched almost past the limits of their muscles. His eyes, with little crow's feet at their edges, grinned brightly and effortlessly.

Albedo let the tension that grabbed hold of his shoulders and halted his breath dissipate like dust particles scattering.

Larger than life. In his five seconds of knowing him, Albedo concluded that he'd never come across someone who loved their family as wholeheartedly and devotedly as Hughes— at least, the probability of such was near nil.

"Anyways," Hughes finally folded up the photos and tucked them with a loving pat into his breast pocket, "If you're going to be in Central for a while, you might as well stay at my place! We've got plenty of room."

"I wouldn't want to impose, sir," Albedo faltered. He had originally come to Central for a purpose, anyways, and the sooner that purpose was fulfilled, the better.

"Nonsense!"

Before Albedo knew what was happening, he was grabbed by the hood and almost dragged out of Central Command, Nina on his feet and the brothers smiling sadistically at him.

"At least come over for the day, and you can come back to the barracks later if you want!"

Albedo reasonably judged from Ed and Al's resigned expressions that he, in fact, would not be returning to Central's barracks that night.

Sergeant Brosh and Lieutenant Ross looked ambivalently at each other.

"Should we… follow?"

The home was warm. Not large, by any means, a two story apartment on a crowded street some twenty minutes away from Central Command. The chestnut-colored wood furniture was balanced by tasteful dashes of muted colors here and there, making for a very disarming and welcoming atmosphere.

"Come in, come in!" Hughes grinned, ushering them from the doorstep.

"Oh! We have guests," someone inside noted.

Hughes beamed. "Meet me dear wife, the most beautiful woman in Amestris, Gracia!" He gushed.

Ah. Albedo made a mental note. This was a lovestruck voice. "Pardon the intrusion," he spoke almost sheepishly, stepping into the home.

"Nonsense!" Gracia chuckled kindly. "I'll go boil some tea."

As the boys' bodyguards stood outside the door, the others got situated in the living room.

Where Albedo felt out of place being in someone else's home, the Elric brothers were the opposite. They lounged cozily— but still respectfully— on the couch, looking glad, even nostalgic to be here. If they noticed Albedo's discomfort, they showed no signs of it.

They'd been here before, for sure. If they could relax, then Albedo surely could as well. Eventually.

He was never in his element with other people, he reflected, still rigidly seated at the edge of the sofa.

"Anyways," Hughes took a seat, "I didn't just call you here to see Elicia."

Ed half-inwardly scoffed. Hughes definitely would, whenever he could. But a modicum of alertness reached his eyes.

"A message from Mustang," Hughes said. "There's been rumors of miraculous healing in a small town in the East. "

Al gasped, and Ed leaned forward in his seat. "Another lead, then."

Hughes nodded. "It's a small one… but it's better than nothing.

The Philosopher's stone. The catalyst Albedo needed to restore Nina. Albedo may not have shown his interest as obviously as the brothers, but his ears were piqued.

"This had better not be another Liore," Ed growled. "Last time he sent me on a lead, we ended up involved with a cult," he grumbled towards Albedo.

Ah. That must've been an ordeal. Albedo never did understand faith and belief, even in Teyvat, where gods' existences were confirmed and he had met the archon Barbatos himself.

Hughes barked out something resembling a laugh. "Well, it shouldn't be. The town's pretty quiet from what we can tell."

"That's great!" Al chimed. "We should leave as soon as possible then. Do you think we could get a train there today?"

Ed unfolded a map from his pocket. "Which town?"

Once they'd gotten it mapped, Ed stood with renewed fervor. "Should we go then, Al?"

"Ah," Al stammered. "Albedo, are you coming with us?"

Ed almost forgot about Albedo, to be honest. For the longest time, it had always been just him and Al searching for the stone on their own. Their sins, their atonement, their promise to each other. His promise to Al.

He rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. He had forgotten that he wasn't the only one searching now, that others needed the stone just as he and Al did. "Right. Albedo?"

Albedo silently apologized to Nina. She'd probably be sad to see the brothers go.

"Sorry, Edward, Alphonse. I'll decline this time."

Alphonse seemed surprised. "Eh?"

"To begin with, I came to Central to find a swordsmith. Without a sword, I cannot effectively protect myself nor Nina," he reasoned. "It is within the confines of alchemy to create a sword, but not one crafted with mastery and an understanding of the blade, unless one is well-practiced in the art."

Ed nodded. "We get it," he smiled. "I promise we'll call immediately if we find anything. I guess we're parting ways for now?"

"... Yes," Albedo hummed.

"We'll meet again soon, right?" Al looked at Albedo. There was a disappointed waver in the red eyes' glow.

A "goodbye" lodged itself in Albedo's throat, from the pit of his heart. It would surely only be a short time apart, yet Alphonse looked at him the way Klee would when Albedo announced a trip to Dragonspine for a month or a conference in Liyue.

It didn't have the chance to leave his mouth before both the brothers were outside, discussing plans with the bewildered bodyguards.

It was goodbye for now to the Elric brothers, but certainly not for long. Of this, Albedo was absolutely certain. He'd join them once more when he had a suitable weapon to defend himself, Nina, and the brothers with.

"Anyways, it's impressive," Hughes leaned back in his chair. "Few people outside of the Fuhrer fight with swords nowadays."

"I was trained with it," Albedo responded truthfully. Rhinedottir's tasks had inspired a healthy-enough instinct for survival and self-defense in his youth, and combat skills were a prerequisite for joining the Knights of Favonius, no matter how prodigious an alchemist he was. For a while after he'd joined, Acting Grandmaster Jean and Cavalry Captain Kaeya would ensure he knew how to fight. But back to the matter at hand. "Would you happen to know any swordsmiths in Central?"

Hughes propped a thoughtful hand on his chin. Of course he did. He had to get his throwing knives from somewhere.

Whether or not he'd tell Albedo where it was? A different question altogether.

He looked at the teal-eyed young man on the opposite couch, who looked stoic as stone, who held the weight of a military station and the title of State Alchemist on his too-stiff shoulders, the boy who couldn't possibly be much older than the Elrics.

Something about him was different from the Elrics. Where the Elrics were truly children— they might have said they hadn't been children for a long time, but they were, whether they thought so or not— Albedo Kreideprinz held himself with the utmost formality, eyes blank and too-adult, face stuck almost constantly in an expressionless veneer.

The boy, like the Elrics, grew up too quickly. Hughes could tell. Just like Mustang, who had been the youngest State Alchemist in history before the Elrics came along. Just like Edward, who seemed to carry guilt heavy enough that it might as well have been the weight of the world on his shoulders. Just like Alphonse, who couldn't touch or taste or smell anything. But different, because where all three were undeniably expressive, alive, human, Albedo was stagnant. Like a sculpture, in a cold stasis of adulthood and formality.

So did he want to give the boy a sword? No, he wasn't keen on it.

But Albedo was trained, and Hughes couldn't begrudge him of his self-protection, and if there was anything Hughes knew about alchemists, it was their stubborn bordering-on-stupid tenacity. If he didn't show Albedo, Albedo would certainly find a swordsmith himself.

So Hughes nodded. "There's a good one on the edge of Central's fourth and fifth districts, you can commission a sword from there."

With a quick "thank you" and a fleeting glance to Nina, who was enraptured by her conversation with Gracia's, Albedo stood, wasting no time.

"Wait, I can lead you there!" Hughes quickly added. "The guy doesn't usually take commissions since he's pretty busy. It'll help if I'm there."

Albedo barely sent him a look as he walked. "Much appreciated, Colonel Hughes. Would it be alright if Nina comes with us?"

Hughes grinned. Albedo with a purpose was very single-minded, like an arrow that couldn't be swayed by any gust. "No problem at all."

The metal shop was a dingy place filled to the brim with noise, be it the crackling pyres, the hissing red-hot metals, or the cantankerous clanking and banging of metal against metal, one shaping and molding the other. Albedo was quick to leave as soon as his commission had been placed, not keen on exposing his eardrums to the extended uproar.

Hughes laughed at the bare and soon-scarce scowl on Albedo's face when he exited.

"Not a fan of noise?"

Albedo crossed his arms. "Not in particular." Oh, he was well accustomed to the racket that Klee always stirred in her workshops and that Sucrose accidentally produced in failed forays into unknown compounds. Did that mean he enjoyed it? No.

The sword would take a week to complete since the shop was moderately busy at the moment, so Albedo was stuck in Central for a week, he supposed.

"So where to next? Anything else you needed to do in Central?" Hughes grinned.

Albedo thought for a moment, but really, the answer was obvious.

"Is there a library?"

Ed grumbled. "Why did you have to come along? We're not in Central."

Maria Ross sighed for what felt like the umpteenth time. "I've been assigned to you. I've been relieved of my other duties to protect you, so I might as well."

He gave her the stinkiest side-eye he could manage. "Might as well…? You might as well just take the time off."

She absolutely could have. She definitely should have, if this was how the eldest Elric brother was going to be. That said, "I was entrusted this role by Major Armstrong and have no intention of abandoning it."

Edward choked. "Major A-Armstrong? He sent you?"

He settled back into his seat with a sulk bordering on a childish pout, and Maria wondered why she hadn't considered mentioning this before. If the major was all that was needed to shut Edward up, she should've done so far sooner.

It would be remiss of Denny Brosh to describe Albedo's eyes upon entering the library as anything other than sparkling.

There was only a short moment of it before the alchemist had strode forward purposefully, straight to the alchemy section of the shelves, situating himself right beside the rows of books, already beginning. But it had been there.

Brosh had honestly thought Albedo was a bit inhuman. Not in a philosophical sense, but in the sense that he was so robotically perfect, precise in his every movement, stoic like ice or stone. Walking through the streets of Central, which would have been relaxing for anyone else, seemed only to pull this curtain of tension and formality and ice-cold meticulousness tighter around the boy.

Boy, because Brosh couldn't imagine anyone looking as young as Albedo did being an adult, because Albedo could hardly be any older than Edward Elric, who was most definitely too young for what he did. Yet not a boy, because the way Albedo held himself was distinctly adult, not like a child playing an adult. His even speaking tone and piercing gaze gave him the same authority as any adult around him.

So when Albedo walked into the library and saw rows upon rows of towering shelves packed to the brim with books, sheets of paper bound together, he wondered what Albedo saw to make his lips part, to make his eyes widen ever so slightly, to make those almost empty teal irises focus, and suddenly gain the depth of oceans of desire.

"Probably knowledge," Nina spoke from beside Brosh, and Brosh jumped.

Nina giggled. "Sorry! Did I scare you?"

Yes, she had, because never in his life did he imagine he'd be talking to a girl-dog chimera. He felt bad for the girl and what had happened to her, but he wasn't used to it. Time would tell if he ever would be. "I should be the one saying sorry!" Brosh sheepishly held two hands up.

"Alchemists are all like that," Nina looked at Albedo. In her beady white eyes, which Brosh thought were too empty, there was a watchful, sad gaze trained on her guardian. "Always reading. They're always after the "pursuit of knowledge," whatever that means."

Because she had grown up with an alchemist, she knew how they would stay up late into the wee hours of the night, with an almost crazed look in their eyes, searching for what they could not see and did not know how to obtain. When the other alchemists, her (now) big brothers had come, she'd thought she'd get someone to play with. They'd granted that for her.

But there would always be a distance between the alchemists and herself. A gap of knowledge, a wall of purpose and ambition. Always with their nose stuck in their books. Nina loved them, but there would always be books, alchemy, science, and whatever the "pursuit of knowledge" meant coming before her.

Albedo spared a short glance back to the bodyguard and girl still standing at the end of the shelf. "Sorry, Nina. If you're bored, Brosh could probably play with you outside."

"I could?"

Albedo completely unapologetically turned back to his book pile, which had already risen to a foot tall in the span of these few minutes.

Nina's tail wagged with restrained excitement. "Then let's go, let's go!"

The train ride to the small town in the East hadn't taken long. To the Elric brothers at least, a five hour ride had been nothing. Ed had slept the whole way through, and Al had taken to trying his best to press charcoal to a paper despite the jostling train.

When they'd arrived, it was already nighttime. The Elric brothers wasted no time finding an inn to stay in before asking the sparse people around the crossing whether they'd heard of miraculous healings in the area.

There was, unfortunately, no new information when the night ended and Ed trudged back up to his room. They'd try again tomorrow.

Albedo learned, to his great misfortune and displeasure, that the library actually closed at night.

This was, of course, to be expected. Even Lisa, who was lenient about allowing Albedo into the library whenever he wanted so he could fulfill his duties as Chief Alchemist, would keep strict visiting hours for the library for anyone else.

That said, Albedo was used to being the Chief Alchemist. He was accustomed to spending nights in the library poring over thick tomes of text, with only a warning from Lisa that 'sleep was healthy for a growing boy.'

As if he'd grow. But he digressed. Albedo frowned at the librarian next to him.

"Sir, it really is past the library's closing time. If you do not leave, I will call the authorities.

Albedo frowned more. "May I check out some of these books, then?"

"Well," the librarian cocked their head, "some documents aren't allowed to be brought outside, but I'll see what I can do. Which books?"

Albedo pointed to the several stacks of books piled like a wall surrounding him. "These, please."

The librarian gawked incredulously. "No. Pick ten at most."

Outside the library, Brosh and Nina looked at Albedo, who was carrying a stack of 12 thick tomes, nose barely peeking over the stack in his hands. "Do you… need some help?"

"I'll be fine," Albedo kept walking.

"Hah…" Alright then.

"Still nothing…" Edward growled under his breath.

He and Al had spent the better part of the entire day asking around town about miraculous acts of healing, and then subsequently being looked at like they'd sprouted a second head.

Then again, he was asking about something rather farfetched. With no context. Ahhh, of course they would look at him weirdly and then avoid him.

Edward sighed.

Al meanwhile stopped another passerby, and spoke with that disarming voice of his. Better Al than Ed, he supposed; Al was always the easier brother to talk to.

"I'm sorry sir, but would you happen to know of any doctors in the area, or any miraculous acts of healing?"

The man shook his head so fiercely Ed thought it would fall off. Ed scoffed. The man was probably scared of Al, to Ed's great displeasure. Unfortunately, Al had already scolded him about scaring away people who were scared of Al. (Brother! You know scaring them when they're already scared isn't going to help!)

"Ah, but," the man stammered, "i-if you're looking for a doctor, you should probably go to Dr. Mauro! He helps anyone free of charge, and he's the best doctor this town has ever seen!"

"Thank you!" Al's smiling voice responded. The man was quick to rush away from them.

"Dr. Mauro, huh?" Ed sighed.

Al shrugged, his armor clattering with the motion. "We've heard the name a few times already. Should we?"

"Yeah," Ed scowled. "It's not like we have any other leads. Let's go."

Behind them, Lieutenant Ross followed silently. The brothers certainly had a… unique way of doing things.

Theories Regarding the Sources of Alchemical Energy was a long read, written with rather dull and mundane language, in Albedo's opinion. He would have much preferred reading Alchemical Runes and Symbols, 7th Edition. Not that he needed runes to perform alchemy, but discovering the symbols' associations to different elements and materials and then envisioning how to balance them seamlessly in a circle while reading was a fun artistic exercise, one he much preferred to these frankly ridiculous theories on the origins of alchemy.

He was abruptly yanked to one side of his chair, practically falling out of his seat, stopped only by the wooden armrest to his side. Nina giggled as she used her large paws to shake Albedo's arm. "Brother, brother! Come play with us!"

Albedo had a denial on his tongue, an eye already back to his bookmarked page. It was like Klee in his lab again. He could never say no to those bright red-orange eyes of hers, and had taken to posting signs outside his door so she wouldn't distract him from his work. He had eventually, with great difficulty, learned to say no to that pleading gaze of hers.

"Sorry, Nina, I'm—"

But then he felt two small holds on his other hand, looked the other direction, and saw the curious emerald eyes of Elicia Hughes, and his denial crumbled.

Ah. How could this be his folly? He sighed and stood from his chair. "Alright, fine. But only for half an hour."

Nina grinned, and Elicia laughed sunnily. "Yay!"

Maes and Gracia watched as Albedo effortlessly hoisted Elicia into a piggyback ride.

"He's really good with them, isn't he?" Gracia smiled, and as usual, to Maes, it was the most gorgeous sight in the world.

He nodded. "He'd make a great older brother."

Gracia chuckled. "You know you can't adopt every teenage alchemist you find."

"Watch me!" Maes grinned with joking bravado. But his face soon fell into something more somber, a humorless smile that could only be described as bitter. "They're… they're too young."

Gracia nodded silently. She had never asked Maes to tell her about his experiences; she'd been there for every shivering and cold-sweat-filled nightmare, hugged him through his shaking sobs and tears, loved him through all the guilt he blanketed himself with. "They are."

Watching Albedo handle any and every affair gave Maes a feeling. A deep-seated dread, like a hole in his chest. A pressure in his chest, a too-heavy heart. Albedo acted in every way, shape, and form, more like an adult than most adults Maes knew.

Watching Albedo now, though, with a soft curve on his lips and a smile in his eyes, patting Nina's head with one hand and carrying Elicia with the other, Maes's heart felt more at ease.

Albedo probably didn't even realize that he was smiling like that right now, otherwise it would be gone already, replaced with the stony exterior he'd come to expect out of the boy. It made the sight feel all the lighter, all the more miraculous.

Maes wouldn't pretend to know what Albedo's past was. He knew better than anyone else that to dig these things up was not his job, nor would it help anything.

But if he could see that smile linger longer on the boy's face… he would do whatever he could.

When Ed had woken up today, he hadn't expected to have a gun pointed at his face.

Ed stumbled back, startled. His balance on the stair's steps lost, he yelped. Quickly, Al's trusty grip on his arm yanked him back. "Brother!"

Ed righted himself with a haggard sigh, glaring at the man. Dr. Mauro, was it? "What the hell was that for?!"

"I-I know you've been searching for me!" The doctor sounded more scared than Ed. Good. "What are you here for?! I won't go back to Central!"

Ed cocked his head, bewildered. "No one even said anything about Central!" Was this man deranged? "We just wanted to ask a few questions."

"Don't play dumb!" the doctor barked. "I know you're the Fullmetal Alchemist! You must be working with the military! Am I wrong?" there was an unsettling clattering sound from the gun held in his shaky hands, and Ed took an uneasy step back.

He heard a deep breath behind him, and regretted not covering his ears before Lieutenant Ross shouted. "Excuse me, sir! Please, for the love of God, calm down!" Ed quickly stepped out of the way as she stomped up the steps with the force of a fierce maelstrom.

Against her glare, Dr. Mauro stepped back, cowering and lowering his gun.

Ross huffed with a nod. "Good. Now we can have a civil conversation."

Chapter Text

By the next few days, Albedo, Nina, and the Hughes family had settled into a routine. Comfortable, perhaps, Albedo would describe it as.

He started the day at sunrise on the dot, as per usual. He made some tea for Gracia and himself, prepared some food for Elicia and Nina, and nodded while Gracia protested that he was a guest and shouldn't be taking these responsibilities. He waited with Nina in the living room, a book in his lap and Nina peeking over his shoulder, until Brosh rang the doorbell and drove the two of them to the library.

The library was still a place of perpetual wonder for Albedo, and would likely continue to be until he'd read every single word of every page of every tome in it. Unfortunately, practically speaking, there was only so much he could do with his mostly-human capabilities. His reading speed may have been above-average, but unless he could clone himself and somehow transfer the clone's knowledge back to himself, reading as much as he actually wanted was out of the question— otherwise he'd be sitting in the library for years, if not decades and centuries.

Nina knew Albedo couldn't be torn from his books in a library of all places, and resignedly followed Brosh out to the courtyard, where the sun usually shone on them as they played small games. Sometimes Brosh brought puzzles like sudoku grids to occupy the both of them. Nina had been proud to learn that she was quicker at sudoku than Brosh, who would usually end up filling in numbers as she dictated and worked through the puzzle in her mind.

Then, they would return to the Hughes home, Maes Hughes would invite Brosh in for some refreshments, Brosh would politely decline the offer (albeit awkwardly), and Hughes would dismiss him with a salute. Then, Albedo pored over the texts he had brought home from the library while Gracia prepared dinner, Albedo would be distracted from his reading by the two girls, and would only return to his books once more when both girls were asleep.

Gracia and Maes would head to bed, not before wishing him a good night and requesting that he sleep soon for his health. Albedo would continue to read late into the night regardless, until there was approximately a 30% chance he would fall unconscious over the desk and his books. Otherwise, if the fog in his head didn't obstruct his rational thinking, he would retire to the bed Gracia and Maes had prepared in the guest room.

Repeat. It was exactly as Albedo had described it. Comfortable.

Nina had gotten much closer to the Hughes's as well. "Brother! Brother!" she called from his right side.

"Hm?" Albedo acknowledged, without peeling his eyes from the words on the page.

"Look!"

'— alchemical research developments in the past twenty years have stagnated somewhat due to widespread political unrest.' Albedo quickly finished the sentence before finally setting the book down to give Nina his full attention.

Her brown hair, which had previously hung over her face and obfuscated pearly white eyes, was now brushed back into a neat french braid over her back. Her eyes smiled. Albedo watched her spin to display her new hairstyle proudly. "How does it look, how does it look?"

The smile came to Albedo's lips without prompting. "You look wonderful, Nina," he told her truthfully.

Nina's eyelids crinkled in a wide smile that Albedo took a mental snapshot of— if he sketched it later, before the mental image could fade, perhaps he could even capture the bells of laughter that rang joyously in the warm lights of the Hughes household.

"Mrs. Gracia braided my hair for me! I can't look in the mirror, but I'll trust what you say!" Nina giggled. "Are you busy? Can you play with me and Elicia tonight?"

Albedo looked back at the unfinished stack of books on the table. There were still two more he wanted to finish before going to bed, and judging by thickness and density of the typeface, they would probably take a few hours each.

But Nina looked happy. With big pleading and anticipatory eyes that Albedo was almost certain she practiced, the word 'no' simply couldn't leave his mouth.

He sighed, resigned to playing with the girls again tonight.

Brosh tapped Albedo's shoulder. He was well aware that his voice alone couldn't rouse the alchemist from his almost trance-like reading.

(After that first night, the librarian had requested that he alert Albedo a few minutes before the library closed so that Albedo wouldn't stay past the closing time. Brosh had had to employ Nina's help to tear Albedo's nose even a fraction of a centimeter from his books.)

Albedo hummed a short acknowledgement, neither willing nor bothering to shift his eyes away from the page.

"Um… sorry to interrupt, Albedo," Brosh whispered in the near-silent library. "Edward Elric called; we're holding the phone for you."

"Ah," Albedo finally looked up. "Did he say what it was about?"

Brosh shook his head. Edward was very purposefully being vague about what he'd found, but still demanded that he put Albedo on the line as soon as he could. "But he's being pretty impatient."

Albedo nodded knowingly. "Of course." Edward had promised to contact Albedo if anything regarding the Philosopher's Stone came up.

With a short wistful glance back to his stack of books (how dramatic, Brosh thought; he'd only be leaving the books here for a moment while he took the call anyways), he smoothly stood and followed Brosh to the telephone booths.

Fascinating, Albedo once again mused upon seeing the rows upon rows of these contraptions. Long-distance communication was unheard of in Teyvat. Some of the more skilled alchemists that had pieced together more than the basics of crafting were trying, mostly to no avail, to create such a thing. If it could be achieved, Albedo had no doubt that it would be one of the most groundbreaking inventions to sweep through the seven regions, but alas. Technology in Amestris was simply on another level altogether from the scant inventions in Teyvat.

He pressed the cold metal of the telephone against his ear. "Edward?"

"Albedo!" Ed's voice over the line was far from how he sounded in person. It was grainy, staticky, muffled and unnatural— like that of an Abyss Mage. But Albedo recognized the inflection, the throatiness of Ed's exclamations, and supposed that as lacking in sound quality as the telephones were, they served their purpose of communication incredibly well.

"We really hit the jackpot, Albedo," Ed's voice crackled over the line. "We have a really big clue. Al and I are heading back to Central as soon as we can to find it; it should be hidden in Central's First Library."

"Central's First Library?" That was rather convenient. Albedo cocked an eyebrow, despite the audio communication not conveying this. "What is it? I've frequented the library often these past few days. I can search for it while you two return."

Ed was all too eager to respond, "Look for anything written by Tim Marcoh."

Albedo hummed a short confirmation. "Do I want to know how you discovered this… clue?"

Ed's indignant grunt transferred through the phone fine, it seemed. "Doesn't matter, does it? Anyways, just keep an eye out. Al and I are going back as soon as we can."

"How soon do you two expect to return by?"

Albedo could practically hear Ed deflate. "We unfortunately couldn't book any tickets for today; not many trains run past this town. But we'll probably be back by tomorrow night…"

"Understood," Albedo nodded. "Then, I'll see you tomorrow evening."

He made to put the telephone back onto the box on the wall, more than ready to return to the pile of books still awaiting him in the library. Before he could though, Edward's voice came through the line again. "Albedo, wait. How's Nina doing?"

Albedo pressed the device to his ear again. "She's doing well, I think." The thought of Nina playing with Maes, Gracia, and Elicia in the background as he read brought an unbidden smile to his face. "The Hughes's love her. Elicia calls Nina 'sister' now."

"That's… great," Ed said, probably for lack of anything else to say. "Tell her hi for me, alright?"

Albedo hummed a curt confirmation. "Was that all?"

"... Yeah. See you soon, Albedo."

One walkaround and perusal of the Alchemy bookshelf revealed nothing. Albedo wondered just how well-hidden Edward's clue was. Tim Marcoh… Tim Marcoh…

It definitely wasn't where it should be, at the very least. Albedo had scoured the shelf for authors whose names began with 'M' many times over by now. Was it even in the alchemy section? Albedo supposed, if he were to hide something, that he wouldn't put it where someone would search first.

After an hour of re-examining shelves, Albedo resigned himself to reading for the rest of the day. He could at least confirm for the brothers, whenever they would arrive, that there was nothing written by 'Tim Marcoh' in the Alchemy section.

To scour the entire library was too tall a task, honestly. The library was several towering stories tall, well worth the title of First Library for the capital city of a nation. Albedo was already hard-pressed to search the Alchemy section; one small part of the whole building. He estimated that the alchemy section alone was approximately two times bigger than the library at the Knights of Favonius's headquarters.

Albedo would try again tomorrow.

Albedo would have tried again, but the books enraptured him as soon as he stepped through the door, pulling his mind away from the task and into the land of theories and hypotheses.

The books here delved into the field of alchemy with more depth and detail than even the Sumeru Academia. Of course, Albedo had always been of the opinion that Sumeru Academia hadn't actually done anything of note in the past century. Where Sumerun literature failed to meet his standards, however, Amestrian research managed to surpass them. With greater technology, more innovative alchemical pursuits were possible.

Albedo already held an innate dictionary of alchemical runes in his mind, as any skilled alchemist should. Under Rhinedottir's guidance, that dictionary had extended from those of ancient adeptal and divine origin to new symbols the two of them had created themselves. With Amestris's alchemy, more specialized and developed past the point of use for only welding two objects together, Albedo could now expand his dictionary to include runes of another world.

It wasn't just alchemy. Every field of science in Amestris was evolved past Teyvat's knowledge of it. On Albedo's left, a book that detailed findings on abiogenesis was open to page 115, and on Albedo's right, an advanced biology textbook gave references for the terms. There was so much sheer knowledge concentrated in this one location.

Perhaps this was why, when the raucous alarm came, Albedo's stomach fluttered with some panic.

"What's going on?" He asked the nearest person, who was running in the general direction of the exit.

The person wasted no time shouting, "fire alarm!" and continuing to run.

Fire. An image of a pyro vision appeared in his mind, accompanied by the memory of reiterating to Klee over and over again that her Jumpy Dumpties weren't allowed to be brought out in the Favonius Library or his lab. Combustion, an exothermic chemical process that required the oxidant of atmospheric oxygen and a fuel, usually wood.

Wood. Paper. The fire was in the library; books would be lost.

Nina and Brosh were playing in the courtyard, which had a quick pathway to the front of the building. They would be safe. Knowing this, Albedo made the split second decision.

Save as many books as possible— keep the knowledge alive; maintain the accumulated memories of the brightest minds.

Albedo sprung into action. The weaponry dimension was something most Vision-holders could access, because most who held a Vision had to channel their powers through a tool. Due to the rarity of Visions, not much research was conducted on the weaponry dimension, but those who held a Vision simply had an instinctual knowledge of how to deposit and withdraw their weapon.

His was currently empty, the weight of his sword thankfully absent; 'thankfully' because the lack of a sword meant he had space. He held his gloved hand over the stack of books on the table, eyes open and tracking the wispy golden sparks of power surrounding the books.

The books shimmered gold, dematerializing and fading, and Albedo felt an uncanny weight and blocky shape with a sense that would be difficult to describe. He was most accustomed to holding a sword.

Albedo could feel it. The dimension stretched to allow the books. He knew he could fit more, could bring more out of the library and out of the fire with him. The most important to him: the alchemy tomes. Older tomes were more likely to have duplicates since they were more foundational; the more recent works built on these foundations. The works were sorted by author and then title; authors were generally a good measure of time period— he had no real choice other than going row by row to save as many as he could.

The smell of smoke reached his nose one bookshelf in. If Albedo had organic lungs, it would likely have been damaging. Albedo did not. He simply stopped inhaling. "What are you doing?" A voice passed by, quickly disappearing with retreating footsteps. Albedo continued. Four shelves.

The crackling of flames out of the corner of his auditory senses became clearer. Six shelves. The heat was beginning to encroach on his skin. Seven shelves.

There was no way he would be able to take the whole alchemy section with him, Albedo knew. His hand felt sluggish as he lifted it towards the eighth shelf. Weaponry dimensions were not meant for this kind of weight. Albedo was already pushing it with a single shelf, knowing that they were at most meant to hold one catalyst, and one only.

Another day, he would have been fascinated at the prospect. Using the weaponry dimension as a storage unit rather than a single-weapon arsenal was unheard of on Teyvat. Now, it was all he could do to walk, one foot after another, the unseen weight of hundreds of books over his back, pulling his arms down, dragging his feet.

The pyre flared overhead, countless books already lost to it. The blackened walls of the library would fall eventually, and before they did, Albedo had to store as many books as possible. In the stasis of the weaponry dimension…

The weaponry dimension…

The strain of books tugged on his mind, sharp, skull-splitting, hot-white pain searing through his head. This was unanticipated. He might have reached his limit.

He didn't have time to spare a wistful glance back at the books he could not reach, on shelves that were quickly engulfed by flame. The fire was spreading, alarmingly quickly, and Albedo needed to leave the library, now.

The floor and walls and tables blurred. The crackle of fire pulsed in and out of his ears; Brosh's urgent shout of "Albedo!" echoing as if the name was ricocheting around the inside of his head.

The red and yellow shapes in his vision suddenly turned blue and gray; stone buildings replacing burning wooden shelves and the blue sky too bright after the blackened ceiling. Spots danced in his vision.

Albedo's ears were bombarded with a clamor of voices, surprised shouts mingled with urgent demands and instructions that he couldn't discern. What he could hear—

Crying. The librarians that he had come to recognize, that had helped him check out books and alerted him to closing times.

With the last of his energy, he pulled, and like a broken dam, legions of books and spilled forth. His weaponry dimension, overflowing with unfamiliar matter that he had forced into it, liberated its contents in droves. They collided with concrete ground, denting covers and bending the corners of pages, but they were not consumed mercilessly by the flames, and they were readable.

A stunned silence hung in the air as a final book fell from his hand.

The spots finally overtook his vision.

Albedo fell over.

He awoke once again to too-bright fluorescent lights overhead.

"Oh! You're awake!"

Albedo tried to sit up, but the cushiness of the mattress worked against him. With arms that shook too much for his liking, he pushed himself up against the pillow, attempting to use it as a backrest.

"How long was I unconscious for?" When the fire happened, it was nearing noon and the sun was at its apex. Now, out of the window, the sky was still light.

Brosh smiled apologetically. "You were out for the night. The Elric brothers have already returned." So the sky was not still light. More time passed than Albedo had thought. It was unfortunate. Time was the most valuable resource, and unconsciousness due to his own error was time lost.

The brothers were scheduled to return that— or the previous evening, Albedo remembered. Did he manage to save the book the brothers were searching for? Unlikely, given that Albedo had not found it in the alchemy section yesterday. If it wasn't in the alchemy section, the only area of books that Albedo was able to save, then it was likely ashes by now.

He'd have to apologize. Perhaps he would have found it if other books hadn't distracted him this morning.

"Albedo!" Ed's angry voice echoed in the hallway, penetrating through the closed door.

Brosh quickly excused himself as the alchemist stomped into the room.

"Welcome back," Albedo greeted.

Ed made a sound. Albedo wasn't sure if it was a growl or him gnashing his teeth together, or perhaps both. "Fucking dumbass," Edward hissed. "Every time I think he might have a modicum of common sense…"

"So?" Edward whirled around and glared at Albedo with an intense burning gaze. "How, pray tell, did you end up in the hospital again?" His voice rose with every word, until he was barely shouting the question.

Albedo opened his mouth to speak. "Well—"

"Goddamnit Albedo," Ed huffed, looking for all the world like he was dealing with an insufferable child, grinding out each word slowly and strictly. "That was a rhetorical question."

Albedo noted this. "I apologize. I thought you would like to know the events leading up to my hospitalization."

Edward heaved a great sigh of frustration, running one gloved hand through his golden locks before crossing his arms in a standoffish manner. "... Sgt. Brosh and Nina already told me the gist of it."

"Oh." Albedo sat there, at a loss for words as he often was in tense and emotional conversations such as these. That would be… false, he supposed— he wasn't at a loss for words. He just wasn't voicing anything. He had a list of sentences he could recite to possibly set Ed at ease or at least pause his questioning and pacing around the room. 'Calm down, I'm fine,' for example.

He figured, however, that the last thing Edward wanted from him at the moment was an insincere reassurance. Ed was more than capable of discerning when Albedo's words were artificial. So Albedo sat silently as Edward grumbled on.

Albedo didn't regret his actions. He'd managed to save probably half a century's worth of alchemical research. If only he could have found some way to counteract the strain of stretching his weaponry dimension so far; he would have been able to save so many more. The loss of so much knowledge that was advanced so far past anything Teyvat knew… It was a shame.

"'Oh,' he says. 'Oh!' No 'I'm sorry for worrying you, Ed,' or god forbid an 'I'm alright!'" Edward ranted up a storm, impervious to Albedo's unwavering glance. "What the hell were you doing staying in a burning building as long as you were?! Don't answer that, that was rhetorical too. But y'know, generally, when people hear a fire alarm and smell smoke, they don't fucking run further into the fire!"

Al chose this moment to walk in, ducking under the relatively small doorframe. "Calm down, brother," he tried to placate with his soothing voice. "All's well that ends well, right? And the nurse said it was luckily only mild smoke inhalation. Albedo will be free to go after a few hours."

Albedo knew very well that it wasn't smoke inhalation, but it was a convenient excuse, he supposed.

Ed gave Al a harried sigh. "Fine! I'm calm, I'm calm," he said, looking anything but calm.

Al chuckled lightly at Ed's unceremonious plop into the guest chair, before turning to Albedo with his own red eyes.

"We were really worried, you know."

Albedo averted his own teal eyes. The wavering life in the red orbs gave Al's eyes an almost sad look, one that reminded Albedo too much of a moist layer of unshed tears over reddening sclerae. He didn't think he could hold eye contact with those eyes for long. "... I'm aware. I'm sorry."

"Please," Al's armor barely shook, but the sound of metal against metal reverberated through the silent room. "Please never endanger yourself like that again."

"... But it was the ideal course of action," Albedo said candidly. "Those books held centuries of knowledge and disappeared overnight with the flames. The efforts of countless researchers are now nothing but ashes."

The room was so silent that one could hear a pin drop.

"Albedo," Al began, voice wavering with something bordering between fear and uncertainty. "No life is worth a few years of research. You're… you know you could have died."

Albedo knew he wouldn't die that easily. His decision was calculated, taking into consideration every variable he had, including the matter his flesh was made of and the substances that coursed through his veins. Albedo knew that inhaling smoke was a non-issue because he could function without respiration. Albedo knew that fire against his skin would cause a deterring pain but was ultimately reparable so long as he had the proper minerals at hand.

Any of Ed's anger that had been calmed with Al's presence rekindled itself tenfold. "Is that how you see it?" He leaned forward. His voice was quiet, uncharacteristic of his explosively loud outbursts, catching Albedo off-guard. "Were you just going to sacrifice yourself for books?"

Against Ed's hard stare, Albedo found that the response he had prepared would not leave his mouth.

Al placed a placating hand on Ed's shoulder, pulling him back slightly. "Albedo," he continued, voice laced with palpable disappointment. "We worry about you. You matter to us, and the thought that you threw yourself into a fire just to save some books… frankly, terrifies us. Please. We don't want to lose you."

There was nothing Albedo could say.

Al's eyes were difficult to look at. Albedo averted his eyes, sight landing on his ungloved right hand. A slight hairline fissure that would be imperceptible to anyone else ran along the back of his hand, over his metacarpals. He would have to take some time to repair it soon, though it was inconspicuous enough to be hidden under his usual gloves.

The fissure over his life-like flesh was a reminder. As impervious as he was to certain aspects of life and death, Albedo was still technically mortal. He had known when he decided to save the books that his life would not be in mortal peril, but had he really? The strain of carrying so many books was unpredicted, and if Sergeant Brosh hadn't helped him towards the exit, Albedo may very well have been unable to leave the library before it burnt down.

Had Albedo ever been truly incapacitated to a point that his "life" was in danger? When journeying alongside the Traveler, his wounds had been neatly sealed by the Statues of the Seven and the blessings. When travelling with Rhindottir during his apprenticeship, Rhinedottir's healing magic had always soothed the tears and cracks in his flesh that he had gained while training. Here, there were no such things.

Albedo realized now, here, that he could die. He could fix his wounds himself, but this was only assuming he had the consciousness and state of wellbeing to perform alchemy on himself. If he was indisposed or unable to perform alchemy, he would actually cease to exist. He would die.

In every way, shape, and form, Albedo was like a human (but not). In a way, Rhinedottir's blessing had been his ability to blend in with the human crowds he eventually assimilated into. In this world where healing magics didn't not exist, there was a possibility that he could be damaged beyond the point of repairing.

Albedo had never felt so mortal in his life. It was a novel feeling. He would have to keep this in mind.

"I… apologize," Albedo finally said.

"Good," Al replied, voice steadier. "Brother and I are glad you're alright."

Brosh poked his head into the room. "Is Edward calm now?"

"I'm always calm!" Ed fumed.

Al nodded, the smile having returned to his eyes. "Yep."

Brosh sighed in relief. "Good. Nina wants to see you too."

From behind the sergeant, Nina bounded forward and through the door, using her front limbs to hoist herself into a standing position beside Albedo's bed.

She was crying.

"You got hurt," she hiccuped. "You came out and fainted and you had to come to the hospital, I was so worried." Her paws kneaded the mattress's bedding anxiously.

"It's alright," Albedo said, lowering his voice the way he used to when he'd soothe Klee after she skinned her knee running too quickly over the paved Mondstadt pathways. "I'm alright."

Nina sniffled. "Are you sure?"

'Sometimes, she just needs to be hugged,' Winry had told him in Resembool. "Would you like a hug?" he asked her.

Nina nodded. Albedo felt extremely disconcerted as he gingerly wrapped his arms around her, over her shoulders, allowing her to lean into his torso. To describe the uneasiness, it was akin to the time he'd once attempted to channel elemental energy through Sucrose's Anemo Vision instead of his own Geo Vision. Suffice to say, Albedo felt very out of his element.

Albedo pulled out of the hug when Nina's sniffles subsided somewhat. The girl looked up at Albedo with round white eyes that were calmed but still wide with terror, and Albedo saw wet red-rimmed crimson eyes that spilled tears over snow-dusted cheeks, illuminated by the light of a torch desperately set ablaze with a Jumpy Dumtpy.

Once upon a research trip, Klee had looked at him with the terror of ten thousand in her eyes and her frown, desperately holding his frostbitten numb fingers up to the fire before he could succumb to the sheer cold that was past nipping at his nose and instead bit into every inch of his exposed skin with a piercing chill. She cried inconsolably for hours that day, insisting that Albedo stay near the fire until his fingers no longer twitched.

Albedo almost forgot that he had a duty beyond knowledge. To those who cared for and were concerned for him, he had a duty to be present, to live, to exist.

"It's okay, Nina," he reiterated, this time more sincerely. "I promise I won't run into danger like that again."

He couldn't promise not to be in danger, because his profession came with inevitable occupational hazards. But this, at least, he could promise.

"Pinky promise?" Nina asked quietly, still frowning.

Albedo nodded.

Nina's fingers were surprisingly dextrous as they locked pinkies. Albedo wondered if she could effectively hold objects like pencils or Liyuen chopsticks in those hands. If the former were possible, then it could be a good idea to continue Nina's education while they travelled, if the opportunity presented itself and Albedo wasn't too busy.

"I must apologize as well," Brosh interrupted his thoughts from beside the doorway. He frowned bitterly as he spoke, "It was due to my negligence that you were in danger from the fire. I've failed as an escort."

"Your apology is accepted," Albedo replied, "but unnecessary. You did your job and protected Nina, and if not for your support in leaving the library, the walls likely would have fallen before I could escape. Regardless of your presence, I might have tried to save whatever books I could anyways."

Nina huffed from his bedside and Albedo calmly patted her head. "I will correct myself. I might have then, but I will not in the future."

Albedo's disregard for his own life was, quite frankly, very scary to Brosh. He was glad Nina was able to elicit a promise from the alchemist not to endanger his own life, because Brosh thought he would have a heart attack if Albedo did something like this again while Brosh was his escort.

"Besides, you're not at fault," Al chimed in helpfully. "You're not the one who set the fire after all."

Ed slumped in his chair, shadows hanging over his head. "We finally get a clue on the Philosopher's Stone and this happens. Awful coincidence…"

"Coincidence…" Albedo mumbled under his breath.

"Hm? Albedo, did you say something?"

"No," Albedo looked pensive, gears turning in his head that Brosh probably couldn't hope to fathom. "This is simply a very conveniently timed coincidence, if so."

Cavalry Captain Kaeya's fifth lesson: Very few aligning incidents that conveniently further or hinder one party's interests are actually coincidences. Cavalry Captain Kaeya's third lesson: The walls have ears; be careful about what you say and in whose presence you say it.

Ed caught on quickly, eyes widening.

Brosh vaguely wondered if he should have stopped listening.

"In any case, about the book you were searching for," Albedo figured now was as good a time as any to bring it up, "I apologize, but I wasn't able to find nor salvage it. I focused my efforts on the Alchemy section, but when I searched for it the day before, I couldn't find it."

Ed groaned, resting his face in one hand. "So we're back at square one," he muttered. "Lovely."

"No need to apologize," Al said kindly. "All of us are just glad you weren't hurt too badly in the fire. Besides, it wasn't guaranteed that the book would be there in the first place."

"If I may," Ross interjected, walking into the room, "We do actually have a lead."

Ed perked up immediately.

"There was a worker in the Library's 1st Branch who was well-versed in the data. She is no longer employed, however…"

Ed slumped again. "So we shouldn't expect much. We'll go after Albedo's discharged, then."

"If you're done here, then I can escort you to the remaining books from the First Library for now," Ross suggested. "In case the book was saved."

Al nodded respectfully. "Thank you! Come on, brother, Nina."

Ed didn't quite storm out of the room, but his mood was certainly overcast as he grumbled. Al followed, ducking under the doorframe again. "Get better soon, Albedo."

Albedo's jacket made it out of the fire mostly intact but slightly worse for wear, with a few ash and soot stains near the hems. On one tailcoat, there was a palm-sized portion bitten off by the fire. It was no longer the pristine chalk-white that Albedo knew the citizens of Mondstadt looked for in their Chief Alchemist.

Albedo held little sentimentality over the article of clothing, but artistically, it was unfortunate that the bright golden four-pointed star patterns were dirtied. The four-pointed star was the fundamental rune that his— Rhindottir's and Khaenri'ah's— bioalchemy revolved around; arguably as critical as the circle in Amestrian alchemy.

"Are you sure you don't want to get a new jacket?" Ed glanced dubiously at Albedo's outfit on the ride to the lead's house.

"It's still wearable," Albedo replied matter-of-factly.

The worker Brosh mentioned, Sheska, turned out to be a mousy woman who lived in what should have been a haven of books but was instead hazardous towering stacks and heaps of tomes. How many of those books that were tossed aside to pull her out of said heap had gotten damaged? It seemed impossible to find anything.

"Do you happen to know of any research documents by Tim Marchoh?" Ed asked slowly.

"... Yes, actually," Sheska blinked owlishly. "There was. I remember it clearly because it was handwritten and shoved into a shelf in the wrong section."

Ed and Al both brightened for a moment before the realization set in that now, it was certain that the book was lost.

"Sorry," Albedo felt the need to apologize again.

"Don't be," Ed sighed. "You tried."

"Do you want to read his research?" Sheska asked.

Ed waved a dismissing hand. "Yeah, but it's burnt now anyways. Thanks for your time."

"I remember all of it though."

Ed whirled around, revitalized. "Really?!"

Sheska nodded. "I remember the contents of every book I read! It will take a while, but I can transcribe his research for you."

All three alchemists left Sheska's book-infested flat in considerably better moods.

Albedo's sword was completed the next day, a week having passed since he placed the order.

It didn't quite match the previous Mondstadtian sword he had— the weight was slightly more concentrated towards the tip and the reach was just a bit longer— but a few trial swings found him already accustomed to it. Overall, the sword was satisfactory. Nowhere near the power of something like the Festering Desire he had given the Traveler, but still sharp and strong.

"I still think you could have just made one yourself. Or had me make you one," Ed crossed his arms. "Does getting one from a blacksmith really make that much of a difference? You have to carry it around, too."

Albedo let the sword in his hand shimmer gold and dematerialize, taking its rightful place in his arsenal. "Weapons are not my specialty," he explained curtly.

Ed stared at his now empty hand, wide-eyed. "How did you do that?"

"Hm?"

"I mean, I didn't question it before when fighting Scar because it was an emergency but how— how are you making your weapon disappear like that?" Ed's question tumbled out of his mouth so quickly the words seemed to trip over each other.

Albedo considered how to answer. The weaponry dimension was a concept only in Teyvat, where it wasn't odd to have elemental "magic" or levitating books like catalysts. Not much research had been done on why Vision holders were able to carry weapons so; they simply were. With the coming of the Traveler and their own skills of another world, some facts were clarified, such as the weaponry dimension not being limited only to Vision holders, but even more questions arose. The Traveler was in every way an anomaly, and their power to summon a sword was something they held long before their arrival in Teyvat.

But Albedo digressed. It was a concept Amestris was unfamiliar with, and thus difficult to explain without revealing his origins. In the first place, Albedo wasn't making an active effort to hide that he had travelled worlds now— but if he had ostentatiously announced it, he had no doubt that he'd be met with disbelief and ridicule.

However, this was Edward. Albedo couldn't simply wave it off as alchemy. It wasn't alchemy, and Edward was more than familiar with the field to realize so. And… it would be a shame to lie to Edward.

"It would be difficult to explain," Albedo finally answered. "You must realize by now that it has nothing to do with alchemy. This is something I would not be able to teach you."

Ed's golden eyes caught Albedo's with a fierce intensity. It was reminiscent of the eyes that had been so determined to glean something from Shou Tucker's research. Ed looked at him with the knowledge-hungry eyes of an alchemist, like an unsolved puzzle, an increasing mystery, and Albedo welcomed it. Perhaps one day he would discover Teyvat and elemental magic and the divine beings that governed it— but today was not that day.

With Al at the Hughes estate keeping Nina company, there was no one there to lessen the intensity of Ed's intrigue. Albedo felt unusually scrutinized by that gaze, but then Ed turned away.

"I won't ask, then," Ed let it go.

"Thank you." Albedo adjusted his glove. "Shall we return to the Hughes estate then? No doubt Nina and Al are awaiting us."

Four days later, Sheska finished transcribing 1000 Recipes for Today's Menu by Tim Marcoh.

As Ross and Brosh leafed through the pages incredulously, Ed had a pensive gaze as he held onto the first packet.

"It had to be hidden. There was no way the research could look like research, which means this must be a code," he mumbled.

Albedo nodded. Encrypting notes like this was a less common practice in Teyvat, since not many bothered with the sciences in the first place. The power of the Philosopher's Stone to defy the laws of alchemy, however, was too great to simply leave in a library.

"Sheska! You're sure this is Dr. Marcoh's research word-for-word?"

The mousy young woman nodded. "Absolutely certain."

Ed grinned. "You're amazing! Thanks!" He turned to Al and Albedo. "Alright! Let's bring these to the Central Library."

Al agreed cheerfully, "they'll have a collection of related books there."

Albedo looked at the bemused pair of escorts. "Please inform Hughes and Nina that we will not be returning for an indefinite period of time." With this breakthrough, he couldn't afford to lose his train of thought to Nina's and Elicia's round pleading eyes. He would likely sleep in the library, eking out every second of his time there for its worth.

"Oh! And," Ed turned around, holding out a piece of paper and his pocket watch, sounding unusually at ease and authoritative as he said, "Lieutenant Ross, this is my registration code and silver pocket watch ID. Withdraw this amount out of my annual research funding and give it to Sheska."

Albedo took out his pocket watch as well. "Should I-?"

"No," Ed interrupted, "I've got it covered. Save your funding for anything you need to help Nina."

"This specific combination of water, sugar, and salt— looks like another mention of the squared circle. Seems to be spanning over three pages now."

Ed and Al were slumped over the table, groaning. "This is so damn hard…" Ed mumbled. "I'm amazed you can keep going for so long, Albedo."

Albedo spared them a quick glimpse while gathering the pages of the fourth packet to be straightened out and rearranged. "I don't want to waste any time, after all."

Ed sighed loudly, his exaggerated exhale blowing up a few pages of the heavy manuscript in front of him. With a sudden spurt of energy, he pushed himself up, the fire in his eyes rejuvenated. "Alright! Let's do this."

"'Albedo, the refining process of the prima material derived from nigredo. In this stage, the stone will take a white appearance, the impurities from nigredo having been expunged.' Albedo, huh?" Ed sent a pointed glance to the resident enigma.

"I was named by my alchemy teacher after all," Albedo replied without missing a beat, eyes still glued to his own page of the document.

"That's cool," Al commented offhandedly.

They quickly returned to a focused silence pervaded by the sounds of pages being flipped and pens scratching against notepads.

"Boys? I've brought dinner!" Hughes poked his head in through the doorway. "Gracia cooked you a quiche! You'd better eat it."

Albedo gave a distracted hum of acknowledgement to the man at the door. "We'll eat in a bit," he didn't take his eyes off the page.

"Huh…" Hughes left the picnic basket with the quiche on the floor beside the door, and then closed it.

Nina's head perked up beside him. "Are they done yet?"

Hughes smiled apologetically to the girl. "It seems not."

"No way… It couldn't be. This must be referencing something else," Ed grumbled. "Al, could you bring me Flamel's Codex again?"

Al nodded, reaching a hand over to the stack of books on his right. Albedo leaned over the table. "What is it?"

"Here," Ed shifted the document for Albedo to see, using one gloved finger to point at the word.

Albedo's unchangingly calm visage shifted pensively every so slightly, his eyes narrowing. "No, this might be literal. Just to make sure, perhaps check the 18th edition of Alchemical Runes and Dwight's third manuscript.

Tension pulled Ed's face into a tight frown. "Literal? But that would mean…"

"It isn't out of the realm of possibility," Albedo said bluntly. "We can eliminate it if it fails."

Ed flipped furiously through the books.

The dull thud of a book hitting the wall resounded through the room on the other side of the wall. Brosh and Ross stood alert, the sound having shaken them from their reverie.

"This is bullshit!" Ed's voice shook with rage, accompanied by the tumbling of a pile of books swept to the ground.

The two officers looked at each other apprehensively. They were in agreement. Silently, they opened the door a smidge to peer at Edward's outburst.

"This is the most logical result, after all. What else could create a stone that can defy the law of equivalent exchange?" Albedo's voice was clinical and apathetic, unfazed by the anger burning in Ed's eyes. "There is nothing in this world that defies the laws of physics humans have already laid out, and thus—"

"Then this is okay to you? I really misjudged you, Albedo," Ed spat his name with raw vitriol, golden eyes trained on the alchemist.

"That's not what I said," Albedo's own cold teal eyes narrowed.

"Then why the hell are you so calm?!" Edward marched up to him, fury weighing his steps into stomps, and clenched the front of Albedo's shirt in a shaking fist.

The brothers did not hear the undercurrent of upset in Albedo's icy calm voice. With measured and slow movements, Albedo pried Ed's hand off of his shirt, and turned to the door. Ed's flaring anger was unquenchable, and Al's despondent misery was inconsolable. There was no purpose for him, who could not understand or change this, to remain here. He walked out silently, solemnly, closing the door behind him.

Brosh and Ross looked at him, concerned, questioning.

"The main ingredient for the Philosopher's Stone is living humans," Albedo summarized. "Try not to tell anyone."

He did not remain to see their horrified faces.

Every night since they had started, Hughes would bring Nina to the library to catch a glimpse of her brothers buried nose-deep in books and notes. It gave her some peace of mind before she slept, even if the boys wouldn't be returning home that night.

It was during one of these short visits that Hughes and Nina found Albedo listlessly wandering the hall outside the room he and the brothers worked in, head hung and teal eyes shadowed.

"Brother?" Nina immediately leapt to him, circling his legs with worry. "Are you alright? Did you solve it?"

Albedo gingerly knelt down and wrapped his arms around her.

He had never instigated a hug with her before. Nina leaned into his embrace, picking up her own arms to wrap around her brother in what she hoped was comforting.

"I'm sorry," Albedo whispered so quietly his voice was almost inaudible. "We can't use the Philosopher's Stone."

The reveal should not have been surprising to Albedo. The soul was the most powerful alchemical catalyst, and the more souls, the more powerful. Yet somehow, it was. It was this exact kind of formula, the sacrifice of lives for the sake of others, that led to the inevitable ruin of Khaenri'ah. Time and time again, Rhindottir had imparted on him the weight of a human soul. To never underestimate it. To never attempt to quantify it. To never use it for one's personal gain. Now, her words came to fruition in a way Albedo had never felt on Teyvat.

He could not use the stone to restore Nina. It went against everything his teacher stood for, everything she had taught him. To defy her teachings would be to throw away the last remaining piece of her he held, and he could not. Not for Nina, and not for anybody.

But this did not mean his quest was over. The impossible had been achieved before, proven possible, and now was no different. If the Philosopher's Stone was not the catalyst he searched for, then Albedo simply had to find another.

"I promise I'll turn you back," he whispered as he pulled out of the hug and stood.

Chapter Text

Hughes grimaced, uncharacteristically serious as he assessed the alchemist. "I take it the results weren't so good then?"

"No," Albedo shook his head. "The Philosopher's Stone is unusable to both me and the brothers. We'll have to find another catalyst."

"I'm sorry to hear it," Hughes said glumly. "How are the brothers taking it?"

"Not well," Albedo looked back at the door. The room had been silent since he'd left, as far as he could tell.

Hughes patted Albedo gently on his back. "They'll bounce back. The brothers are strong."

Albedo didn't doubt it, but the grief of losing one's purpose was not something easily and trivially shaken off. The brothers had been searching for the stone for so long now, sights set on the stone specifically, that it didn't seem like they had alternatives to investigate.

To Albedo, it was only natural to move on. It had never been in his nature to dwell on things that were useless to dwell on, and being the most feasibly powerful catalyst did not make the Philosopher's Stone an exception from this rule.

"Will you finally come home tonight?" Nina asked.

Did Albedo have anything left to do at the library now that they'd deciphered Tim Marcoh's manuscripts? Nothing very specific or particular, but there was always something to do at a library.

"I'm sorry, Nina," Albedo brushed a hand over her brown hair. "One more day."

He'd need all the time he could get to find some other way to help Nina.

The sound of steps akin to a charging elephant reverberated from the stairs up to the hall. "Elric brothers!" a sonorous voice bellowed.

Up the stairs, followed by the 2nd Lt. and Sgt., a large nearly-bald man with a single sprig of blond hair curling over his forehead appeared, arms held open and ready for a disconcertingly muscular embrace. Albedo did not have time to hide himself before the man's bright blue eyes landed on him, an intense… something glittering in his irises.

"You must be Albedo Kreideprinz, the new Chalkdust Alchemist! Allow me to introduce myself. I am Major Alex Louis Armstrong, otherwise known as the Strong Arm Alchemist! I have heard your plight; such a tragedy! To think that the Philosopher's Stone hid such a terrifying secret…" tears poured out of his eyes. "Allow me to embrace you!"

Albedo narrowly dodged the first hug, but could not escape the second.

So there he stood, embraced by the Strong Arm Alchemist, feeling a soreness creeping into his lower back at the smothering squeeze of the great muscular arms. He sent a very pointed glance towards the two officers that stood by.

"Sorry…" Ross looked away.

Brosh twiddled his fingers nervously. "It's kind of hard to keep a secret when someone that suffocatingly stuffy closes in on you…"

"Now!" Armstrong preened, far too proud of himself for the accomplishment of hugging Albedo, "where are the Elric brothers?"

The Elric brothers looked disgruntled when Armstrong intruded into their room, to say the least.

"I have heard your plight!" he cried. "What a tragedy! To think that the Philosopher's Stone hid such a terrifying secret…"

Almost word for word to what he'd told Albedo. Was the man naturally so extraneous, or had he actually practiced a speech for this?

Edward's eyebrows rose. He'd just noticed Albedo's presence then. "Weren't you going to go back with Hughes?"

"I stayed to look into possible alternatives. Armstrong found me earlier."

"I see." Edward rubbed the back of his neck, a sheepish gesture. "…Sorry about earlier. I shouldn't have gotten angry at you."

Albedo wasn't sure what words he should say. "Your apology is accepted," he nodded.

"To think that the government had been doing such a thing…" Armstrong lamented. "The truth can be so cruel!"

Ed's eyes widened in epiphany. Albedo's eyes narrowed in curiosity. Edward's mind was on par with his own, and if Edward had an idea, then it was worth listening to.

"The truth…" Edward mumbled, voice low and barely audible. "Al, do you remember what Dr. Mar— Mauro told us?"

The name was unfamiliar. Albedo looked to Alphonse for an answer.

"He's the doctor that told us about Dr. Marcoh's manuscript," Alphonse supplied.

"The truth beyond the truth," Ed continued. "Same as a research document. What can be seen from outside is just a portion of the whole truth."

Ed looked up, eyebrows furrowed in a newfound determination. "There's still more."

Armstrong took up an entire sofa by himself, leaning over the large map of Central they'd laid flat over the table. "There are currently four active government-owned laboratories in Central. The document was by Dr. Marcoh, yes? Dr. Marcoh worked at the Third Laboratory. This one," he jabbed a finger at a point on the map, "is most suspicious."

The map was, in theory, simple to understand. In practice, Central was many times larger than the entirety of Mondstadt City. Albedo didn't think he'd truly grasped the sheer scale of the city until now, looking at every small building delineated on the map.

"We've been to every lab in the city, but this one wasn't particularly…" Ed trailed off, his eyes wandering over the map.

His finger landed on a building with a red X drawn through it. "What's this?"

"The Fifth Laboratory, but it's currently unused. No one is allowed to enter it due to the risk of collapse."

That was awfully convenient.

"This is it," Ed echoed Albedo's thought.

"Hm? What makes you say that?" Brosh leaned over the sofa's back to get a clearer view of the map.

Ed's finger shifted. Central Prison. "There's a prison right next to it."

Indignance welled up in Albedo. "They can use prisoners to create the stone," he stated plainly and coldly.

Everyone's expression soured as Alphonse spoke up. "The prison is under a different jurisdiction, but if it's involved… Could the government have something to do with this?"

"I feel like I've stuck my nose into something unspeakable…" Ross paled.

"In any case," Armstrong stood and re-rolled the map, "This is turning into a very heavy political matter. I shall look into it. Until then, the 2nd Lt. and Sgt. are not to speak a word of it."

"Yes sir!" The two saluted.

he turned to the State Alchemists, very pointedly staring at Edward. "You three are not to do anything either!"

Albedo was silent as the brothers shouted some insisting platitudes that they wouldn't. He had no more purpose for investigating the stone at this point— the stone was already established as useless to him. If Edward wanted to pursue the "truth beyond the truth" that the doctor they'd met had teased, then that was his and Alphonse's objective.

Albedo mulled over the possibilities silently. Unless said truth somehow nullified the use of humans in creating the stone, there was no use for it. If the truth was connected to the involvement of the government, then all of them would be in direct danger for investigating it.

However,

It would be remiss of Albedo to not notice the mischievous gleam in Edward's golden eyes. He and Alphonse were almost certainly planning to infiltrate the Fifth Laboratory on their own. The thought of them doing so gave Albedo a shuddering feeling in his chest— apprehension. Perhaps even concern; Albedo recognized it from having watched Klee run into very flammable forests with bombs gathered in her arms.

He knew the feeling of concern probably more intimately than anything else because Klee had a Pyro Vision but that did not equate to unequivocal control over fire, and she could easily put herself in danger running over grass set aflame by her own bombs.

Because he didn't know what he'd do if she were harmed because of his negligence when Alice had entrusted her to his care. Because she was supposed to be like a charged particle, quick-footed and active and never-stopping, and seeing her hurt and crying was just wrong.

The situation was different here. Edward was not a child, and had more than enough life experience and cognitive functioning to realize what was dangerous and what was not. What he planned to do was dangerous, but Edward had surely weighed the risk and decided that danger was necessary in his pursuit of knowledge.

Albedo would not be the one to stop him. But Albedo worried.

The brothers were silent as Ross and Brosh left the room, taking their stations outside the door.

Albedo glanced at both of them in turn. "You're planning on going, aren't you?"

Edward rolled his eyes. "No duh. We can't just sit around when something as big as this is dangling right in front of our noses. Are you coming?"

Great. They were on the same page. Albedo nodded.

The Fifth Laboratory sat forebodingly behind walls possibly taller than Mondstadt's, guarded by military personnel in black standing sentinel before the main entrance. Albedo leaned over the corner to observe them as the brothers deliberated.

It was… a novel experience, he supposed, having to sneak around in the shadows. While he was adept at making himself scarce when he desired solitude, he had never done so out of necessity. Here, the nature of their investigation— probing into a military power so large and influential that would be unfathomable in Teyvat— demanded secrecy.

"How do we get in?" Al pondered.

"Should we just make a door?" Ed did not have as much of a mind for discretion.

"They'll notice the light from the transmutation," Al replied.

Ed crossed his arms. "Then…"

Both brothers looked simultaneously up at the barbed wire.

With ease, Al made a foothold with two hands and propelled Ed atop the wall, where he sat and began to unravel the barbed wire.

"Have you done this before?" Albedo wouldn't have been surprised if they had, with how smoothly they'd moved.

Al nodded. "Brother's made a few… less-than-legal pursuits before," Al said resignedly.

"Hm…"

"Will your gloves be fine climbing up the barbed wire?"

His gloves were made of several layers of the toughest leather he could find in the wild. They had been fine for exploring and climbing the jagged cliff edges of Mondstadt's mountains, so they would probably be fine here as well. "Sure."

Ever polite, Al stepped aside as Albedo grabbed the barbed wire.

The vent was just barely large enough for Albedo to join Ed in entering the building while Al waited outside— perhaps for the better, since Al was practically impervious to any danger in his state.

As soon as Albedo jumped down from the air vent and landed in the dimly lit concrete hallway, he knew something was wrong.

Perhaps not wrong, per se, but something was there.

Unlike the nausea that once stirred deep in his throat upon confronting the sword crafted out of Durin's pitch-black bones and red-hot malice, this unease felt quieter. It was unfamiliarity mixed with a slight tension. It was like the sensation of a string pulled taut, but not quite tightly enough to snap.

Something— someone, maybe even multiple beings— was here.

It was a resonance with something of alchemical nature, and Albedo, for all that he was cautious of the dangers that surely awaited Edward in his investigation, couldn't help himself.

Just like when he spotted the dimly pulsing light of Durin's violet-red magic in the Favonius storeroom, his feet moved before his mind was conscious that there was a force drawing him in.

"Albedo?" Edward turned around, facing the alchemist who inched in the opposite direction of their objective. "You okay?"

Albedo stopped his feet, coming to a near silent halt. "... Yes," he said without turning around. He was fine. Whether this was meant to convince Edward or himself, Albedo didn't know.

Should he tell the truth? Should he say that he felt a resonance, and knew that there was something— or someone— here that should not be? Should he stay with Edward and risk meeting them eventually or tell Edward to follow him and put Edward in danger? On all logical paths that Albedo could think of, any that involved him and Edward sticking together would eventually place Edward in direct danger.

Yet leaving Edward alone in and of itself was dangerous. Undoubtedly, there would be guards protecting research on something as volatile and powerful as the Philosopher's stone.

Perhaps the guards were the presence— presences Albedo felt, in which case Albedo confronting them would allow Edward a diversion to study the premises as he needed. If not though, leaving Edward alone would defeat the purpose of accompanying him in the first place.

Of course, Edward was not defenseless. He was more than capable of protecting himself usually. So, to leave Edward alone and search out the source of his resonance while Edward investigated the stone? Or to stay beside Edward and possibly meet them anyways?

To fulfill his original objective of protecting Edward, the latter. To possibly answer some of the questions that had plagued him since encountering that being the third night he spent in Amestris, the former.

Albedo should have been more vigilant.

Instead of turning around to join Edward, Albedo stood unmoving, clutching the twig in his pocket. "You go on. There's something I want to check. I'll let you know if I find any related journals or notes."

"Alright…" Edward nodded. "Let's meet back here in half an hour." He turned and walked towards the center of the laboratory.

The corridors were eerily silent. Albedo's normally quiet footsteps echoed jarringly loud against the walls.

Rhinedottir had once taught him that the unknown was to alchemists as treasure was to pirates. It was theirs to make their own, to convert into the known, to share with the world or keep close to their chest. The unknown was something they all sought, because while they found comfort in knowledge obtained from others' past pursuits, true progress could only be made when one journeyed out and grabbed the unknown by their own two hands to examine.

Discerning what of the unknown was important to study and make known was one of the jobs of an alchemist. To Sucrose, it was the small measurements and details. One milliliter of mist flower corolla essence meant the difference between a dead sweet flower and a flourishing one.

To Rhinedottir and Albedo, it was larger concepts in the creation and maintenance of artificial life. What caused Durin's corruption and death 500 years prior meant the difference between failure and success. Impurity and perfection. Nigredo and Albedo.

Durin had, before Albedo, been Rhinedottir's crowning achievement. An artificial life form so close to perfection that she had seen fit to let him free, to allow him to explore the world and meet other humans. Durin had been Albedo's kin. And Durin had become corrupted, and attacked the city he had fallen in love with.

Albedo was not Durin, and yet Albedo knew upon taking his first step onto the snow-capped mountains, with an absolute certainty etched into him like the alchemical arrays engraved into his being, that he was inextricably connected to the artificial dragon.

From Durin's ashes buried in snow arose the chalk prince.

Albedo would not be here if Durin had not fallen, and yet Durin's corruption was almost an omen. A prophecy. You do not belong to Mondstadt, it said. One day, you too will fall to the same corruption and raze that which you love to the ground. For Gold, for Khaenri'ah.

As his "heart" pounded in his chest with very telling resonance, Albedo was thankful that at the very least, if anything went awry, he was as far from Mondstadt as he could be. Studying the Festering Desire sword had been a risk, if only because prolonged exposure to Durin's corruption through the sword had left a curling bit of darkness in him that wouldn't leave him, like the smell of smoke clinging to his coat.

He would normally tuck such thoughts squarely into the untouched corner of his mind occupied by other thoughts of Rhindottir, focusing his attention instead on topics that needed his more immediate attention: required work for the Knights of Favonius, supervising Sucrose's experiments, keeping track of Klee— or, in his current situation, acclimatising to a new culture and environment.

But the creature he had fought that night in Urbukya, with instantaneous regeneration— that had not been human. Amestris, despite all of its futuristic developments, was far more firmly grounded in the laws of physics and alchemy than Teyvat, where Visions and Constellations and Celestia seemed to constantly defy what was previously known about them.

If there was something inhuman here, then as slim as the chances were, perhaps Albedo could find some information regarding his own existence—

"Hello there."

The coquettish voice was cold, reminiscent of Fatui Harbinger La Signora's. Even Albedo could tell that those uttered words were meant more as a warning than a greeting.

Albedo swerved around, his arms slightly heavy and his feet slow as if he were moving in shallow water. The resonance's effect on his mind must have been delaying his reaction time somewhat— he was slower drawing his sword to his hand than he should have been, even as golden sparks quickly gave way to his newly forged blade.

At the other end of his sword, a woman with lavishly curled black hair and sharp eyes smirked, unfazed by the blade pointed at her.

A blood-red Ouroboros tattoo, the symbol of infinity and eternity. Albedo narrowed his eyes. A representation of infinite regeneration? If she was related to the creature he'd fought that night in Urbukya, then he would have to expect most of his attacks to be ineffective.

Albedo didn't think he'd ever been so directly confronted by something so sheerly and dangerously foreign to him. At least, not in a very long time. The "heart" in his chest beat strongly, though whether it was from the resonance or his own nerves betraying him, Albedo did not know.

He took an unnecessary gulp of the stale dusty air; inhaled, exhaled, as if the stagnant air of the dark laboratory could calm his swirling mind. Expectedly, it did not— nor was it able to slow his beating heart.

"Hello," he greeted back as calmly as his voice would allow. It had never been in his nature to waste time. "You're a homunculus, aren't you?"

The woman did not seem to expect the straightforward question, if her raised eyebrows were any indication.

"Who created you? What catalyst is powering your existence? I'd appreciate it greatly if you could provide answers to these questions," Albedo intoned.

Her eyes narrowed. "You're awfully direct. Yes, I am a homunculus," she answered.

"Why did you answer, Lust?" Another voice, younger.

Albedo was not easily startled, but his resonance-addled mind jumped for him. He had known that there were multiple presences, and yet he'd somehow forgotten and allowed his guard to fall, exposed his back to a potential danger. Cavalry Captain Kaeya would have laughed at him— he didn't often make such amateur mistakes.

Behind him, another person laid nonchalantly on the counter, grinning. There was an Ouroboros tattoo on their thigh, and their dark green hair spiked and fanned out behind a black headband, almost like porcupine quills.

Lust, they'd called her. The same name that the creature he'd fought in Urbukya had dropped. There were at least three of them.

Lust crossed her arms. "He'll be killed anyway for discovering us. No harm in giving him answers he won't have any use for shortly."

"Then do it," the other one sang.

"A shame," Lust sighed, sounding more bored than regretful. "You were a promising sacrifice."

It took Albedo much too long watching her extend her arm and raise black-gloved fingers for him to realize that he should dodge. It happened in a split second— the arm whipped out, and straight towards Albedo's head flew a spear of black.

Albedo let instinct take over and move his feet. The straight black spine soared perilously close to his eyes as he dodged. Keep them open, he willed even as the spike passed a mere centimeter away from his eyes. Sight was the main source of sensory information, and he had to glean as much as possible from this exchange.

His fraction of a second delay cost him a nick over his eyebrow, stinging slightly as he rubbed his glove against it to wipe away the bit of chalk that came loose. He found his footing quickly and planted his heel on the concrete, his sword deflecting the next extended finger-spear. It scraped against the cutting edge of his sword, the clean metallic shing ringing out as a testament to its sharp and smooth edge. And the finger spear's hardness.

The sound of steps heavier than they should have been echoed behind him, and he twirled away from the kick whirling towards his head before it could touch him, bending seamlessly into a slash across the other's torso.

Red lightning illuminated the room as the other homunculus regenerated. Albedo barely caught a glimpse of a crazed bloodthirsty grin before the other homunculus dashed forth again, except to his left there was another finger rushing towards his abdomen. Albedo ducked from a fist, anchoring his sword to sweep a foot the other homunculus's shin.

This is where he made his first mistake.

The other homunculus's leg was not that of a human. The leg was far denser than he expected, budging only an inch to Albedo's kick, and Albedo knew that despite his predilection for the sword, his physical strength was nothing to scoff at. He should have inferred that the homunculus was heavier based on the footsteps he'd heard, shouldn't have hinged his planned movements on being able to topple the other homunculus.

His stopped kick did not transition back to a steady standing position as he'd planned, and without the continuous movement, Albedo was open, vulnerable.

He was easily stabbed by two sharp black fingers piercing cleanly through his abdomen.

Albedo grit his teeth. Being non-human did not excuse him from feeling pain. The sensation of pain was essential to survival, to awareness of danger to one's life. It was hot, searing, sharp and sudden and jolting, and interrupted his mind, halting everything for a moment just to call attention to itself.

It was excruciating—

But it was negligible. It was nonlethal, and so long as Albedo could find time to repair it later, it would not impair his functioning. What he needed to do… the last time he'd encountered one, homunculus blood when separated from the owner had disintegrated to black dust. He needed to remove the spikes from himself, but Lust would not necessarily retract her fingers herself. Hypothesis: body parts separated from the homunculus will disintegrate.

Albedo slammed a free hand to the ground, willing the creation of a Solar Isotoma to sever the spears as he regathered his sword and stumbled back, pulling the spikes out of his abdomen before they became dust in his hands.

He pressed a hand to his abdomen, but there was no use applying pressure to a wound that did not bleed.

To be more precise, he did not bleed blood. Rather, what poured from the holes in his right abdomen was powdery chalk.

Against the dark gray concrete flooring, the chalk that fell was stark white, visible even in the dim lighting. Lust's eyes widened, the other homunculus's grin fell, and both halted their assault to stare at the white powder that continued to spill from his wound.

Lust's eyes narrowed. "You aren't human." It held a measure of uncertainty, but was stated with confidence in the fact. Uncertainty, then, towards her next action?

Albedo's homuncular nature seemed to be outside of her expected parameters. Albedo stood tensely at guard, sword clutched tightly in his hand.

The other homunculus's head snapped suddenly towards the doorway.

"What is it, Envy?"

"The Fullmetal pipsqueak," they scowled.

Albedo froze.

"If we don't go soon, he'll know more than he should."

The two homunculi nodded in a silent consensus, and rushed out of the room.

"Wait!" The shout tore itself from Albedo's throat. "We're not done here—"

He hissed, the unnecessarily sharp intake of breath doing nothing to stop the blazing-hot pain that once again lanced through his body from the holes in his abdomen.

Strenuous movement or activity would be a terrible idea— combat especially, since it could leave even more wounds on top of exacerbating the one Albedo already had. With his injury, his physical capabilities were extremely limited.

But Edward was in danger.

Albedo had to move. Now.

Later, he would reflect that perhaps he should have found the materials to fix his wound here before running after the homunculi. Here and now, with his thoughts engulfed by the voices of Lust and Envy— the Fullmetal pipsqueak will know more than he should— Albedo made his second mistake.

Ed would freely admit that he was more than a bit woozy from his fight with the Slicer brothers. He didn't have much volume in blood to lose to begin with.

Maybe this was why he barely registered the footsteps outside of the large chamber that foretold the skewering of the Slicer helmet's blood seal. Maybe this was why as he looked up to the sinister grin on green haired murderer's lips, he could only stare, horrified, as they continued to stab the life out of already lifeless armor.

The armor had writhed. He had looked like he was in pain, hands flailing desperately with every stab to his blood seal. This could happen to Al. He wouldn't let it happen to Al but what if it did?

This person knew exactly what they were doing by destroying the seal, Ed knew. Ed could see it in their eyes, in the way they sneered like they were squashing an ant while stabbing the life out of cold armor.

"You guys nearly killed a precious human sacrifice!" the murderer sneered. "What were we going to do if you screwed up the plan?!"

Ed gnashed his teeth together, making every fiber of every muscle in his body pull overtime to drag himself up from the floor, leaning against the concrete pillar behind him more than he liked. He felt the ache over every inch of his body, and knew that he was exerting himself to just stand. He stood no chance.

That did not stop him. It could not stop him; he was made of tenacity and effort and even if his every joint felt like they were on fire, he would make himself stand.

The woman's dark-red painted lips tilted into a coy smile as she sauntered over. It infuriated Ed. Everything about the way the two people walked and talked, towering above him and looking down on him like he was an ant beneath their feet, downright infuriated him.

The nausea washed over him like a wave as he finally pushed himself up into a stand. His vision wandered a bit, in and out of focus and blurring in spots. What Ed did recognize of the dimly lit chamber backdrop: the white coat and blond hair and teal eyes from the entrance.

Albedo had arrived, and looked at least in better condition than Ed did or felt. That said, it was not difficult to look in better condition than Ed, since he was fairly certain half his face was covered in blood dripping down from the slash over his eyebrow…. not to mention the gash on his automail port shoulder that was screaming at him.

"Albedo!"

Now that he paid attention to the alchemist, it was clearer that even if the injury was not obvious, Albedo was hurt in some way. The alchemist was limping subtly, his steps just uneven enough that Ed could barely tell he was trying to favor one leg.

Ed felt a pang of guilt— he'd been the one to invite Albedo, and now Albedo was hurt and Albedo had promised to Nina to not jump into danger again— but quickly blinked it away, because he had questions.

Questions such as, were you able to find anything? or why did you come from the same direction as them? Who are they?

What came out of his mouth instead was a garbled, "You— they— wha?"

The atmosphere very clearly changed the moment Albedo stepped into the chamber, turning from sinister to apprehensive, cold amusement to tense wariness. There was a rigid silence all around, pervaded only by the Albedo's footsteps as he walked towards Ed and reached a stand-still at Ed's side, facing the others.

Something about Albedo's presence was stopping the… Ed supposed they would be enemies, considering they'd both murdered a man each right in front of Ed. In any case, the enemies very carefully watched Albedo in his simple walking movements. Ed wondered why.

The green-haired one scoffed. "So you're already on the blond brat's side? Che." They rolled their eyes. "What a waste. You could do so much more, with what you are."

Ed felt his eyes widen. What you are. Not who, but what. He added this to his growing catalogue of Albedo's oddities.

Albedo was silent.

Fine. Edward had more than enough questions to go around.

"Who the hell are you two?! What plan; what do you mean by sacrifice?!"

The green-haired one leaned in close, close enough that Ed could feel the person's warm breath on his nose. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Albedo shift a step closer to Ed himself, almost like a protective gesture

"Oh? Is the pipsqueak picking a fight?" they jeered, lifelessly dark purple eyes curving into a taunting smirk.

It took Ed a second to gather air into his breathless and burning lungs, enough so that he could growl back, "Quit calling me a pipsqueak!"

They tilted their chin up. "A pipsqueak is a pipsqueak, don't you think?"

Anger had always been Ed's greatest motivator and fuel, and the person before him had given him more than enough.

Ed kicked his steel-toed boot up, hoping to nail their chin, but found no purchase. The only reward he got from doing so was an additional aching leg that felt as heavy as tungsten as it fell from the unsuccessful kick. Ed cursed.

They hopped backwards, nonchalant. "I don't like fighting. It hurts when you get injured."

Well then they certainly shouldn't have provoked him. He could be downright nasty, even if he was so tired that his bones seemed to screech with weariness in every movement. "You picked this fight," Ed ground out, clapping.

Clank.

His automail arm fell limp at his side.

Shit.

Everyone there stared blankly at his dysfunctional arm.

"Looks like it's broken," the woman said.

Shit shit shit shit shit.

"Lucky!" the green-haired one sang, prancing over.

Ed hated the moment he saw the large white coat invade his vision, hated the miniscule sigh of relief he exhaled as Albedo stepped forth as a shield. He hated it because he wasn't there to be protected, and yet he knew that with his arm out of commission and his whole body aching, he would be absolutely useless in a fight.

He hated it because of a stormy day and the wall that sprouted from the ground when they were supposed to run together from Scar, because he knew Albedo was putting himself in danger again— breaking his promise to Nina— and it was probably entirely Ed's fault.

He knew he was openly glaring at Albedo's back, but it wasn't as if Albedo would see. The alchemist was more concerned with the people in front of him.

The green-haired one tapped the Slicers' sword against their shoulder, smiling whimsically. "Yeah. Protect him— he is a precious human sacrifice after all," their voice sounded entirely too smug.

The woman's eyes narrowed. Unlike her companion, she was not smiling. "You don't belong on their side."

It was a statement said with the finality of a pronounced fact. And she was talking to…

"Albedo." Ed grabbed the alchemist's arm, gripping it tighter than he knew was comfortable. Albedo hid many things, but these people, they knew something.

Ed looked up into Albedo's teal eyes, which were emptier than Ed had ever seen them— somehow a feat considering Albedo emoted the least of anyone Ed knew. He looked up and he searched, looked for any indication in those eyes that would confirm or deny whatever they were saying.

"Albedo, what do they mean?!" His voice would go hoarse by the end of the night, but his anger had always been loud and obvious and destructive, like a raging pyre or rampaging forest fire. "Tell me!"

"Edward. Be quiet for a moment."

Ed froze.

There was a cold current in Albedo's voice, like the biting wind of a blizzard, that Ed never expected to hear directed towards himself.

Albedo easily shook Ed's loosened grip off of his arm.

"I do not belong on your side either," he finally spoke.

"But you could," the woman crossed her arms. "There must be something you desire. The philosopher's stone is yours to use if you wish it. You must have one too, don't you? If you truly are what you seem to be."

No. Albedo couldn't have a stone, not when they'd spent so long searching for it and finally figured out the secret, not when Albedo had agreed with them that the Philosopher's stone was unusable. Albedo wouldn't do this to them, wouldn't dangle their hopes away from their noses and rip it away from them.

Except had Albedo ever actually answered that question Ed had asked that first day they met? Had Albedo ever explicitly said, no, I do not have a Philosopher's Stone?

There was no way to tell what the other alchemist was thinking from watching his back, but Ed still stared straight at the back of Albedo's head as if doing so alone would unlock the alchemist's mind. Edward had tried his best for so long to simply quell his curiosities regarding Albedo out of respect, but there were too many secrets at this point, and Ed didnt know what to think.

"…I do not," Albedo declared, "have a Philosopher's Stone, nor will I ever use one. No object should ever necessitate destruction of life for the sake of creation."

Ed wondered why it sounded like life meant more to Albedo than any other word.

"Boring," the green-haired one sang.

"In any case, thank you for answering one of my questions," Albedo said coolly.

The woman raised a curious eyebrow. Ed couldn't see if Albedo was smiling as he spoke. "You said I must have one 'too.' The alchemical catalyst in your chest… is a Philosopher's Stone, isn't it?"

Ed veered his attention to the woman and green-haired one, eyes burning— whether with unshed tears, or just Ed's sheer anger, Ed didn't know. The Philosopher's Stone they'd been pursuing for so long, right in front of him— yet useless to him, because neither he nor Al would use it.

He would laugh at the irony if he didn't feel so much like lying down and just closing his eyes right now.

He was so tired.

Just as they finally discovered that they couldn't use the stone, it appeared right in front of his face, as if the green-haired one's taunts weren't enough.

The woman's smile fell. "You're sharp, dear alchemist. Are you sure you won't join us? We could give you anything you desire."

"Unfortunately, you would not be able to," Albedo whispered. Ed barely heard it.

The green-haired one cackled. "There's no more to do here, Lust. Let's just blow this place up and be done with it."

"This discussion isn't over," Lust's eyes were still trained on Albedo's. "This place will collapse in a matter of minutes. You'd better leave soon with our precious sacrifice."

The two walked away.

In stunned silence, Ed couldn't even so much as shout 'wait' to their retreating backs.

"Edward." Albedo's voice went in and out of his ears, echoing once or twice, reverberating too loudly in his mind. The blood loss had no doubt caught up with Ed, and another spell of nausea swept his feet from beneath him.

"Can you walk?" Albedo's voice was shakier than Ed remembered it, though whether it was because Albedo was concerned or because Ed's ears were foggy, Ed didn't know.

"Yes!" Ed snapped, and tried to hoist himself up on his automail leg. His body, heavier than lead, did not cooperate. Ed scowled. "…No."

Albedo carefully slung one of Ed's arms over his shoulders, before slowly but surely making his way towards the nearest exit sign. The ground began to rumble.

Too many things didn't add up.

The plan and whatever he was being used as a sacrifice for— they wanted Albedo on their side. They thought Albedo had a Philosopher's Stone. They had a Philosopher's Stone. They couldn't be human, could they? The woman's fingers had extended into sharp spear-like claws, and that should have been impossible. It hadn't been alchemy, it hadn't been natural.

Albedo had refused to use the Philosopher's Stone. Albedo did not have a Philosopher's Stone, and yet he was capable of circle-less alchemy— heck, clapless alchemy too. Ed didn't know if he should feel reassured or not that Albedo claimed to not have a stone. Maybe he'd understand the mysterious alchemist a bit better if Albedo clapped to create a circular conduit for alchemical energy, but he didn't.

The only other time Ed had ever seen anyone do alchemy without a circle or clapping was with Father Cornello in Liore. With a fake Philosopher's Stone. A Philosopher's Stone that Albedo claimed not to have. Nothing made sense about Albedo.

Albedo was capable of inhuman feats. So were the people who'd killed the Slicers. Albedo refused to join them, but the fact that he could join them if he wanted to spoke volumes.

Was Albedo even human?

His thoughts were in disarray, swirling around in mind like a hurricane of disconnected thoughts. They swirled and soared and tried to piece themselves together but simply fell apart. Ed knew that this dizziness would cost him his consciousness soon.

They were out of the building. The sound of rubble falling wracked his brain, every thud louder than the last, an assault on his ears and his already shaky legs.

"Brother!" Al was worried. Al was okay.

With the last of his strength, Ed mustered the fiercest glare he could towards the enigma that supported him. He was angry, confused, hungry for answers. "What the fuck… was that?"

Edward shortly fell unconscious, most likely due to blood loss. Albedo shrugged him off into Al's waiting and ready arms, mindful not to jostle the holes in his own abdomen much.

The ground rumbled with the force of concrete chunks thudding against it, almost like the quaking sensation of a Regisvine slamming its corolla into the floor. Usually, Albedo would have no trouble rebalancing himself. Usually, though, he didn't have two holes in his abdomen.

Albedo stumbled on his feet, and added another to the growing mental list of mistakes he was making tonight. This was not how Rhinedottir had taught him. It was shameful, and dare he say, irritating.

"Woah!" Brosh caught Albedo's arm, steadying him by his elbow. "Careful. Let's get out of here!"

Albedo nodded, not sparing the energy to speak. Bear with the pain for just a bit longer, and he could fix himself.

Alphonse twiddled his thumbs nervously in his lap, sitting across the fuming guards in the car towards the hospital.

Really, Brosh looked more sheepish and worried than angry. Ross, however, was all silent fury and fiery black eyes with furrowed brows. Rightly so, given how Ed and Al had snuck out without telling them.

Al would have sighed if he didn't feel so nervous. It was like he was a child again, caught sneaking into the cupboard for some dessert before dinner— except the cupboard was a secret laboratory entrenched in a military conspiracy and the dessert was information regarding the most powerful alchemical object in the world.

And for what? Ed leaned still against Al's side, blood still leaking from the wound on his forehead. His black leather clothes did little to conceal the bloody gash on his shoulder. Albedo sat next to Ed, white coat drawn close to his body.

Though Alphonse had seen Albedo unconscious before on multiple occasions, this was probably somehow the worst condition he'd ever seen the alchemist in. Though it could have been a trick of the light, Albedo looked paler than usual, eyes looking down and unfocused.

He looked withdrawn, Alphonse realized. Even when they'd first met Albedo, there had always been a polite sort of courtesy in the way his eyes gleamed, making direct eye contact. Now, Alphonse half expected Albedo not to respond if Alphonse said something to him.

And yet those teal eyes hadn't lost any of their intense brightness. Alphonse wondered what Albedo was thinking right now.

The fact of the matter was that they'd gained nothing but injuries and more questions from this reckless venture of theirs.

As Lieutenant Ross directed hospital workers to carefully move Edward onto a stretcher, Albedo stepped aside and, as inconspicuously as possible, crouched down to gather a handful of dirt, quickly sneaking it into his pocket..

Ross dutifully filled the paperwork for Edward's admittance at the hospital's front desk as the boy was rushed away on a wheeled stretcher. Finally arriving at the hospital had been like stepping out of a hot room— now that her biggest source of stress was safe and her adrenaline had worn off some, she felt ready to collapse.

She could not collapse. She'd already failed once tonight, allowing the Elric brothers to sneak away. Her job was to protect them, and look at the state each Elric brother was in: one bloody and having his wounds treated at the hospital, the other silently despondent.

Kreideprinz, at least, seemed to be in better condition. The other State Alchemist had two small tears at the front of his jacket, but was able to move just fine, and did not show any signs of pain on the car ride to the hospital.

Just in case, it would probably be best to admit him for a check-up as well, in case there was internal bleeding or anything. "Mr. Kreideprinz?"

Kreideprinz was walking towards the restroom, and though she couldn't say he was wobbling in his steps, even she could tell that his body swayed from side to side slightly— just enough to be concerning.

Checking him in could wait until after he was finished with his business though. And in case anything happened… Ross sent a glance to Brosh, who stood at attention behind her.

He understood without any command from her, and jogged to catch up to the alchemist.

Honestly. Teenage State Alchemists would be the end of her.

Albedo would have preferred to fix himself in a more private location, ideally a personal lab. Unfortunately, he did not have one here, nor did he have time to find one. The bathrooms of the hospital, though public, would have to be secluded enough for now.

Thankfully, it was empty when he walked in. Perhaps he should have had the foresight to do what he was about to do in a stall instead of out in the open, but he'd already made so many mistakes tonight that one more was almost negligible at this point. His abdomen stung, and Albedo was not so patient as to let the stabbing pain afflict him or his thoughts through the night.

He withdrew the handful of dirt from his pocket, shifted it so that it sat evenly distributed between his two palms, and closed his fingers, allowing familiar alchemical energy to course through his arms and extend to his fingers. When he opened his hand, one hand held the wasted byproduct of impure minerals sorted cleanly out of the powder in his right hand.

Chalk, purified flawlessly, the dust finer than flour, light and loose as if it had been sifted. His alchemy was certainly still perfect even if his cognitive functioning was not.

He lifted his shirt and nudged the flow of alchemy to redirect itself to his wound. In his hand, the chalk pressed against his skin quickly took form, first shifting to fill gaps in the membranes of his internal organs. It was a process that out of necessity, he fully understood.

It was not simply the reconstruction of purified chalk, but also a kind of metamorphosis that required Albedo's specifically precise alchemy to perform— the chalk was still chalk, but it had to be transformed into a material that could support life, that was flexible and dynamic. It was the suspension of miniscule chalk particles in the air that allowed the fluidity of his material, allowed the movement of his body.

This kind of alchemy drew nearly every ounce of his careful concentration. He could not afford any risks when it came to his own physical form, not when it was practically the last thing Albedo had left of Rhinedottir.

He barely took notice of a blond head poking in to the restroom and quickly ducking back out. No losing focus. He would simply have to address it later.

With the holes his organs and muscles mostly filled, the chalk started forming thin films of skin layered over one another. Unlike the instantaneous healing of the homunculi Albedo had encountered here, his skin did not stretch and seamlessly restitch itself. Instead, his chalk dust slowly but surely affixed itself to the edges of his wound, each particle cemented as more built upon itself, slowly but surely closing the hole.

If Albedo had to make a comparison, he would consider it similar to accelerated crystallization. Once, he'd spent days drawing and redrawing growing crystals in a glass dish, each time noting the minute changes, the bonds that new crystals would hold securely as newer molecules attached themselves to the advancing structure.

Done. He briefly inspected the smooth skin where it had been pierced. The pain was mostly alleviated now— any lingering bits of it would fade in a few hours.

He supposed if he actually needed to, he would have taken this moment to sigh. Rhinedottir would have been disappointed if she had been present this night to witness all of Albedo's blunders. Would she have been proud to know that even if he'd messed up so many times tonight, his alchemy was still flawless? Would she have smiled if she had heard him renounce the offer of a Philosopher's Stone?

Rhindottir was not here. It was no use to consider improbable hypotheticals, so he pushed it from his mind.

Brosh had dutifully followed the teen alchemist to the restroom to ensure that nothing happened. From what he knew of Albedo from accompanying him to the library, the alchemist was far too good at concealing information about himself for his own good, whether it be just general facts like his birthday or something as meaningful as his current emotional state.

Brosh was concerned. It seemed entirely in character for Albedo to hide an injury, despite how rationally he usually thought. It was definitely better to be safe than sorry.

But what he just saw? Brosh didn't know what to think.

He didn't even know or remotely understand what Albedo had been doing. All he knew was that Albedo's wound was sealing itself— or Albedo was sealing it. Either way, it was unnatural. It was inhuman. It was not a feat that was supposed to be possible using alchemy, based on Brosh's admittedly rudimentary knowledge of it.

This was so above his pay grade. He was supposed to be here to protect two State Alchemists that shouldn't have needed much protection in the first place; not to keep secrets and be an accomplice in a probably-illegal investigation into a government conspiracy.

But what if he needs help? A voice in his mind that sounded suspiciously like Nina supplied. You were right. He was hiding an injury. Even if Albedo seemed to be handling it fine, Albedo was hurt.

The smart thing to do at this point would have been to walk away and try to forget what he'd walked in on. That was what Ross would probably do.

A part of Brosh, the part that read adventure books as a child and sought excitement in life, was curious. It clamored for Brosh to stick his nose back in and help, not just because he wanted answers, but also because helping the young alchemist who was most likely in pain was probably the right thing to do.

Brosh took a deep breath to steady himself. Inhale, exhale, slow his racing heart,

And he turned around and walked back in.

"You saw," Albedo said matter-of-factly.

Brosh nodded and gulped. He was nervous. The deep breath outside to calm his heart did not help, because the moment he walked in and saw the light-haired alchemist and the white coat, his heart was doing somersaults.

The way Albedo was completely unphased was just… scary. Here was Brosh, terrified for his life because he'd discovered something he probably was not meant to, and there was Albedo, inhumanly still and unnaturally perfect. The thought briefly crossed Brosh's mind that maybe Albedo would silence him, and immediately his imagination ran wild— an alchemist as knowledgeable as him surely had a method or two up his sleeve for disposing of unsavory individuals.

Brosh was not an unsavory individual— ah, that wasn't the issue. He was being unrealistic. He shook himself as if doing so would bring him back to reality.

Another nervous gulp. "You… were injured, weren't you?"

Albedo nodded, looking down at the holes in his jacket. "It's been taken care of."

In the lighting, Brosh could just barely see a line on Albedo's forehead. He squinted— it was a cut of some sort, but instead of bleeding red, it was just a slightly indented mark, like someone had left a shallow groove on a smooth rock using a knife.

Brosh must have been gaping quite obviously, since Albedo's eyes widened ever so slightly in realization, like he'd forgotten the cut above his eyebrow.

"Oh, right," Albedo whispered, pressing a gloved hand to the cut. The area flashed golden and when the light faded and he pulled his hand away, Albedo's forehead was healed.

Brosh opened his mouth and closed it.

Wording, wording. Wording was important; Albedo was technically a Major rank or equivalent because of his State Alchemist certification, and probably held more than enough power to get Brosh in trouble.

"Please pardon me for speaking out of my station," he made sure to begin with, because that was standard and safe, right? "…But what exactly are you? What was that?"

He mentally kicked himself. So much for careful wording; good going insinuating right off the bat that Albedo wasn't human.

Albedo clapped a few times, patting the remaining white dust off of his gloves. Brosh bit his lip. Albedo wasn't saying anything. Right. He shouldn't have asked. Brosh could keep a secret just fine. This was fine.

"… Are you sure you want to know?"

"Huh?" Oh. Albedo was giving him a choice.

Albedo was giving him the opportunity to just plug his ears and walk back out. He was giving him the option to reconsider involving himself now that he knew Albedo was fine.

Again, the smart thing to do would have been to say no. Brosh couldn't help himself though, and instead nodded slowly— and maybe a bit apprehensively.

Unsettlingly bright teal eyes looked straight into Brosh's own, the steady gaze unreadable.

Brosh felt the urge to anxiously fidget under Albedo's silent staring. It felt almost like his choice was being appraised and judged by a higher authority somehow. He supposed that would be accurate, since Albedo held a higher military rank than him.

"… I am human," Albedo finally answered. "…But perhaps not that simply. I was… made of a different material. That is all I will say."

The significance of Albedo's few words was not lost on Brosh. 'I was made.' It carried implications that went so far above Brosh's pay grade that he wondered again if he should have just shook his head to have plausible deniability. At the same time, it explained so much— like why Albedo never seemed human to Brosh; like the way Albedo could be mistaken for a carven stone statue sometimes, completely still and unbreathing.

Brosh took a deep breath and collected himself. "... Do the brothers know?"

Albedo finally averted his eyes. "Edward probably suspects something."

Ed was so fucking suspicious.

Chapter Text

By the time Edward woke up, his entire body still hurt like a bitch.

It actually felt like it hurt even more like a bitch than before, when he'd either been high on adrenaline or just straight up unconscious, with no in between. Then again, Edward was probably high on painkillers right now as well, so maybe he didn't have a good frame of reference.

His groggy attempt to sit up failed miserably. The moment he tried, the pain went instantly from a dull, constant-but-bearable pressure to thousands of scalding needle-sharp stings piercing into his side.

Shit. He hissed, grit his teeth and held his breath, waiting for the sudden excruciating pang to recede once more into a more manageable throbbing.

The telltale whispers of rattling armor nearby rang in his ears. "Brother! You're awake!"

Ed flopped back onto the pillow and took a gulp of the sterile-smelling hospital air. The refreshing coolness of oxygen against his throat did little to relieve his pain.

"Please don't try to get up! You'll reopen your wounds," Al fretted.

"Hey… Al," Ed tried to smile. His voice came out much feebler than he expected, but it was fine. He just needed to warm up his vocal cords a little.

Al sighed, a mixture of relief and concern and resignation. "How are you feeling?"

"Like shit," Ed answered with no hesitation.

Al chuckled softly, the vibration and collision of armor pieces against each other echoing a quiet song of clanking metal through the room. "Well, I'm glad you're safe. We probably shouldn't do anything that reckless for a while, huh?"

Ed nodded weakly. "Damn it."

Al sat back down in the comically small chair beside his bed. Ed took the chance to look out the curtains— it was still dark. "What time is it?"

"Almost 5 AM," Al answered. "I'm surprised you woke up so soon."

Ed beamed with one of his trademark hardy grins. "You know me! Nothing can get me down for long! I'll be up and running again before you know it, so don't worry, Al."

He'd imagined himself saying it enthusiastically, energetically, but Ed hadn't been lying when he said he felt like shit. His voice still sounded like a low croak, the vibrations irritating his parched throat.

So, of course, his words had the absolute opposite effect from what he intended, and Al just looked even more worried.

"You should go back to sleep, Brother," Al spoke softly. "You need it to heal. Maybe you'll also grow taller then." The jab was quiet, lacking most of its usual teasing energy.

It still managed to elicit a weak chuckle— more like a huff of air than a laugh— from Ed. "Maybe," he rasped.

But he conceded. The best way to ignore pain was to sleep through it, so Ed closed his eyes and tried to lapse back into the lulling calm of sleep.

It didn't work. He felt an itch under his bandages and the pain seemed to pulse stronger and pull him back from the brink of sleep every time Ed felt the clutches of unconsciousness on his mind. It wasn't like he could toss and turn until he was comfortable either— just trying to sit up slightly had left him drained and motionless.

He wanted to blame any other reason for why he couldn't fall back asleep. Any reason other than the image of a white coat, bright teal eyes, and four-pointed golden star tattoo that refused to leave his mind no matter how many times he'd mentally swatted it away.

It felt like hours had passed over the span of mere minutes, Ed trying his best to ignore the sound of his heartbeat in his ears.

"Can't fall asleep," he mumbled, "Stupid injuries."

"Try your best," Al said in a tone somewhere between genuine and snarky. It brought a smile to Ed's face.

They sat in silence for a bit. Naturally, Ed's overactive mind wandered.

The Laboratory. The people with the Ouroboros tattoo. Albedo's teal eyes and white coat flitted through Ed's mind again.

"Hey Al?"

"Hm?"

Ed hesitated. "What… do you think of Albedo?"

Al hummed in consideration. "…What about him?"

"I don't know. Just in general."

"Well," Al held a finger to his metaphorical chin, "he's definitely very… mysterious, I guess? And never talks much about himself. But he's nice."

"Mysterious," Ed repeated under his breath. "We basically don't know anything about him. We don't know where he's from or why he got his State Certification or anything. There's just— nothing about him adds up."

"True," Al chimed. "I mean, there was that time when he wasn't breathing after encountering Scar, but he woke up just fine."

"Right?" Al's vindication for his suspicions made Ed feel much more justified. "And there's his weird alchemy, that doesn't use any circle or clapping. The light from his transmutations isn't even blue sometimes—" he cut himself off with a cough, the motion jostling the wounds on his torso and shoulder, sending renewed spikes of pain through his body. Ow.

"Maybe you should slow down," Al suggested. "Do you need a cup of water?"

Ed's face scrunched up in an expression of exaggerated displeasure. "I'll be fine. Anyways," he continued, "the way he just makes his sword disappear! Did you hear what the workers at the First Library said? He just— made a bunch of books appear out of nowhere. A complete and utter contradiction of equivalent exchange," he huffed.

Al nodded. "You're right. There's a lot we don't know about him."

He paused. "But…" Al looked straight into Ed's eyes, "I still think he's a good person."

Ed averted his own.

Al was kind. Al was also usually a better judge of character than Ed.

"I know," he settled on saying. "It's just… confusing."

"Mhm," Al hummed.

They sat in silence for a bit longer.

"Did something happen in the laboratory? With Albedo, I mean."

Ed used a hand to pinch at the creases in his brow as if it would relax them somewhat. "Yeah. It was… kind of fucked up, not gonna lie."

Al waited patiently for Ed to collect his thoughts.

"So, after I beat the Slicers— a pair of serial killers who had their souls bonded to a single set of armor— there were these two people who had Ouroboros tattoos," Ed began.

"The symbol of infinite longevity…" Al noted.

"Right. And I don't think they were… human. One of them was able to extend her fingers like claws or something to meters long and break through a steel helmet with them."

"I— what?" Al stammered.

Ed chuckled, eking out any bit of humor he could find in this conversation. He winced when the gash in his side protested again. "Yeah. I had about the same reaction. It was weird. Like something out of a storybook."

His smile fell. Even weirder was… "They asked Albedo to join them— offered him a Philosopher's Stone and everything."

Al gasped.

"He turned them down," Ed quickly clarified, "he talked with them about some kind of nonsense of having a Philosopher's Stone in them or something, but…"

"That meant he had to be related to them in some way then," Al whispered. "And we know that Albedo's capable of some pretty impossible things, so it's not too far-fetched, either."

"Yeah."

They stewed in the silence with their thoughts swirling aimlessly around them.

"I just have no idea what to think anymore," Ed muttered under his breath. Was Albedo a friend? An enemy? Was he human? Did he lie about not having a Philosopher's Stone, and if not, how was he doing alchemy? Why did those people try to recruit him?

Albedo had always been wrapped in nine layers of eccentricity and mystery, and Ed had previously been content leaving it be. But the thought of Albedo possibly joining the people who had killed so easily and so nearly cost Ed some even graver injuries felt like… betrayal.

By all means, Ed felt like he had a right to hate the guy for hiding so much. An alchemist's curiosity was not easily quelled, and Ed's questions now felt less like weights on his mind and more like burning pyres that would not extinguish until he had answers for them.

Without knowing what Albedo truly was, Ed was extremely uneasy. He didn't know if he should tiptoe on eggshells and try to avoid talking about it like he had been before, or just march up to Albedo and demand answers. And honestly, he was leaning towards the latter at this point.

"I still think he's a good person, though," Al interrupted his thoughts. "He's a bit cold sometimes, but I think it's just how he grew up. He said his teacher wanted perfection from him. He's helped us a lot, and he really does treat Nina like a younger sister."

Ed had to concede to that point. He agreed; Albedo had proven time and time again to be both a kind caretaker to Nina and a formidable ally to Ed and Al in both intellect and strength.

Except that was before the people that had murdered two men right in front of Ed had asked Albedo to join them. That was before Albedo had shaken off his grip with an icy glare.

"I do not belong on your side either," he'd said. He belonged neither on the side of those people… nor on the side of Ed and Al, whatever 'sides' he had meant.

Did he not see himself as their ally? Did he think he didn't belong on Ed's and Al's side after everything was said and done?

Ed sighed and closed his eyes, relegating all thoughts of Albedo to a think-about-later category. If he kept wracking his brain like this, he wouldn't be able to get any sleep at all.

His throat itched, and a layer of sweat had formed thanks to the layers of thick blankets piled on him. Dammit.

Albedo hadn't wanted to wake Nina and the Hughes family up by returning to their home well past midnight, so Brosh had ended up calling a car for him to lodge temporarily at the barracks.

Brosh had also notified Hughes of Albedo's whereabouts, apparently, which was how the tired alchemist found himself opening the door of his room in the morning to find the man and Nina right outside.

Despite having just seen her several hours ago the night before, it felt to Albedo like a considerable amount of time had passed since the last time he'd seen her. Perhaps the events of last night had altered his perception of time? Or perhaps it was because he'd spent entire days with the brothers at the library, only catching a few glances of Nina per day.

Nina puffed her cheeks in a childish display of anger as Albedo leaned down to pat her braided hair.

"I'm sorry for leaving you for so long, Nina," Albedo smiled. "Forgive me?"

"... Fine," Nina huffed.

Albedo stood back up. With his short stature, he needed to tilt his head up a bit to look at Hughes.

"Don't be a stranger, Albedo," Hughes crossed his arms and leaned on the doorframe. "You should've come home last night! Why didn't you?"

Albedo looked away. He couldn't quite meet Hughes's eyes, which were filled with concern. "I… was worried I'd bother your family. It was quite late. I apologize."

"None of that," Hughes waved off his words nonchalantly. "Don't apologize for your consideration. Just know that you're welcome whenever, alright? Even at ungodly hours of the night."

Albedo nodded. The warmth in his chest swelled.

Albedo thought he was getting more used to riding in an automobile by now. It was an odd sensation, being moved at a relatively consistent speed higher than any wagon was capable of. It was smoother and faster than horse-drawn wagons, but bumpier still than Mondstadt's cargo-carrying air balloons.

The scenery of bustling store-fronts and towering apartments passed too quickly for any clear image to cement itself in Albedo's mind. He'd have to try walking around and sketching it at some point.

Hughes's chatter easily drowned out the subtle din of the car's machinery. "So, did you have any plans for today? Or do you just want to come with me and Nina to visit Ed?" He asked.

Albedo answered honestly. "I didn't have any plans—"

"Great! Coming with us then," Hughes interrupted happily before Albedo could elaborate.

Albedo opened his mouth, and then shut it.

He didn't have any immediate plans, but he wasn't certain Edward would be very receptive to his appearance, so he'd wanted at least to make himself scarce for the day, or until Edward approached him.

Hughes had gone off on a tangent about plans for Elicia's upcoming birthday party though, so Albedo couldn't very well interrupt to correct him.

Shortly, they reached a large building proudly draped with large emerald Amestrian flags. The stone brick walls reminded Albedo of the Knights of Favonius Headquarters, though the size was a different question. This building easily exceeded any building in Mondstadt— Albedo would speculate that it was closer to the size of Mondstadt's Cathedral than the Knights' headquarters Albedo was more used to.

"I just need to give Sheska a word or two, and then we can head over to the hospital," Hughes explained.

This was where Hughes worked then, Albedo noted. "Sheska is working here now?"

Hughes blinked. "Weren't you there when the brothers got me to hire her?"

Albedo averted his eyes. "I was busy." Not untrue. Whenever Albedo was absorbed in a task, he gave his full attention to it. "In any case, I'd like to request a favor from her, if she isn't too busy."

Albedo's browse through the Third Library he and the brothers had holed up in for the past few days had truly proven that the best source of knowledge in the nation was the First Library— which was nothing but a pile of ashes now. Unfortunately, he had not had the foresight to search for and save books relating to Nina's circumstances when the building had collapsed.

He could take a few days to explore the Second Library for information, but Sheska would likely be his best chance of finding any primary research documents concerning chimera bioalchemy.

When Hughes alighted from the car, Albedo opened the door on his side and stepped out as well. Nina followed.

"Welcome to Central Command Branch Office 3!" Hughes announced with more grandeur than the building was due. "It'll be a short-lived visit though! Next stop, Central Hospital!" Under his breath, he added "Sheska will need to work some overtime."

Albedo exhaled. "Do try not to shirk too much of your duties onto her."

"Ah!" Hughes mock-cried. "I've been betrayed! Scolded by my own s—"

He suddenly paused, stopping himself.

Albedo wondered what Hughes meant to say.

Hughes picked up the nonchalant atmosphere back up effortlessly, swerving back to Nina. "Nina! Back me up!"

Nina's chiming laughter echoed through the sunlit hallway like bells. It was an idyllic scene. Albedo wished he had the time to pause and sketch it.

Maes stood back as Albedo relayed a request to Sheska for any documents she had on medical alchemy and chimera transmutation.

That had been a close call.

He wasn't sure Albedo would take it well being called his son. Surely he had his own family and circumstances regarding them.

It had just felt all too perfect at the time… but even Maes did not know if he could treat Albedo as a son.

Elicia was his first experience in parenthood. Elicia engulfed almost the entirety of his mind when Gracia didn't, and it reminded Maes: this was what it felt like to love. It was a joy in every moment, even the toughest. It was unsolicited pride, unequivocal care, unconditional affection.

He didn't know if he could give Albedo and Nina that. He didn't know if either of them even wanted it.

But he could tell he was feeling it, in the slight nudge of concern in his heart when Albedo leaned unmovingly over books for hours on end, in the warmth in his chest as he watched Nina prance around with braids in her hair. It was there, and it was growing.

It had only been slightly longer than a week that Albedo had stayed with the Hughes family for, and he and Nina made such natural fixtures that Albedo's absence to work with the Elrics had been more abnormal than not. Something had irrevocably shifted in the family's dynamic— Gracia had made an extra cup of tea in the evening for a busy alchemist who wasn't there, Elicia had pouted and whined while Nina had reassured her that Brother Albedo would come home soon for sure.

Hughes recognized that Albedo was mysterious. He didn't know where Albedo was from, why he was an alchemist, or what his goals were, and yet Albedo's quiet courtesy and consideration had easily carved their own place within the household. Albedo's eyes were cold bright teal but his sparse and slight smiles gave the home more light and warmth than any lantern or lamp could.

As long as Albedo wanted it, Maes knew that the whole Hughes family would gladly welcome him and Nina.

When they arrived at the hospital, Albedo was prepared to make an excuse so he could avoid Edward's room.

Unfortunately for Albedo, Nina looked up at him with her large eyes, delaying him just enough so that Hughes could grab onto Albedo's arm and drag him to Edward's room anyways. Plan failed.

Hughes's grip was not particularly tight, but Albedo found himself being pulled towards Edward's room regardless.

"Yo, Ed!"

Hughes's characteristically boisterous greeting brought a great deal of energy to the room. Ed chuckled from where he sat in the bed.

Then, he caught sight of bright teal eyes, and froze.

Albedo looked exactly how Ed was used to seeing him— not a hair out of place, stony mask of courteous and neutral stoicism firmly in place. There was none of the biting coldness Ed saw in his eyes last night, and he didn't know whether he should have been reassured or disconcerted by that.

"Edward." Albedo greeted quietly. "I'm glad to see you doing well. I hope your recovery goes smoothly."

There was a tension stretched taut throughout the room like a web of unsaid words.

Ed didn't know what to say back, or if he should say anything at all.

Albedo was still, seeming almost like a statue. The longer Ed looked, the more it was unnatural— Albedo's shoulders didn't bob up and down with his breathing, Albedo's hands didn't sway at his sides from gravity. Ed could swear that Albedo wasn't even blinking.

"… I will excuse myself," Albedo finally said, before leaving the doorway.

Despite Albedo's apparent indifference, his departure was all too clearly an awkward and hasty retreat.

Hughes blinked, head swiveling between the two young State Alchemists. "Did I miss something?"

Even his confusion did not give much levity to the room's heavy atmosphere.

"Brother, you were glaring," Al scolded.

Ed let his unconsciously furrowed eyebrows relax, finding that they were drawn tighter than he had realized. "Oh."

Al sighed. "I'm going to go talk to him."

The clanking steps of heavy armor quieted as Al left the room.

Al thought it was awfully rude of Ed to be so openly hostile towards Albedo when the enigmatic alchemist hadn't done anything to put his character into question so far. Perhaps Albedo was a bit unnatural, but Alphonse was a walking and talking empty suit of armor, and Ed was the youngest State Alchemist while missing half his limbs. 'Unnatural' was sort of difficult to define to the Elrics.

Simply put, he hoped to apologize to Albedo on Ed's behalf, and check afterwards how Albedo was doing. He couldn't tell if Albedo had been injured last night or not, but he'd caught a glimpse of Albedo leaving the hospital under Brosh's escort last night— so at least Albedo wasn't seriously injured like Ed was.

Still, Albedo last night had seemed… shaken somehow. Silent, withdrawn, unresponsive; nothing like the almost-flawlessly neutral and graceful confidence he usually held himself with. He'd seemed fine just now, when poking his head into Ed's room, but even so, Al could hear the way his voice was deliberately steady and quiet.

Al just wanted a verbal confirmation from Albedo himself, that he was okay.

"Albedo?" Al finally saw the familiar white coat on a waiting bench next to the restrooms. "There you are."

"Oh. Alphonse," Albedo greeted. "Hello."

Al took a seat next to Albedo, easily occupying most of the bench.

Albedo had a sketchbook open in his lap, and a pencil in his hand hovered over a picturesque sketch of a hooded statue underneath a large tree, surrounded by sprawling plains of wind-tousled grass and bright skies of soft clouds.

Al took a moment to marvel at the beautiful piece before starting. "Sorry for Brother's rudeness earlier."

Albedo had a peaceful expression on his face, not bothering to look up as his pencil flitted across the page. "There's no need to apologize," he hummed. "Based on Edward's temperament last night, his reaction today was expected."

"I… see," Al paused, not sure if he should push Albedo to accept the apology.

Too long of a silence had passed for him to bring it up again, so Al moved on. "Anyways, I also wanted to ask if you were alright after last night."

Albedo nodded politely. "Thank you. I am fine," he replied, with no elaboration. "And you?"

"Huh?"

"Are you alright after last night?" Albedo returned his question to him.

"Oh." Al simply sat for a moment, caught off-guard by the hint of concern in Albedo's usually neutral voice. "…"I'm fine too," Al chuckled weakly. "Suit of armor and all that."

The armor wasn't something Al usually drew attention to. Ed and everyone else— Winry, Granny Pinako, Colonel Mustang even— always tried so hard to make Al feel human in any way they could. Al truthfully hated the armor with a passion, but voicing it did no good. Al usually focused instead on what he hoped to do when he was no longer armor.

Then again, could he leave the armor if he were an armor puppet?

Albedo made a short sound of either thoughtfulness or absentmindedness— Al couldn't quite tell which— and flipped a page of his sketchbook. "I see."

The two sat in companionable silence, Al's armored form probably looking comically large next to Albedo's slight stature.

Al wasn't sure whether to be grateful or not that Albedo hadn't commented on his uneasiness. Perhaps the former. He didn't want to burden Albedo with his own existential crises.

Existential crises. He was a walking and talking suit of armor. Was he human at all? Or was he created by Ed like Barry the Chopper had tried to convince him?

No, Al was certain his memories were genuine. Otherwise, Ed would not have felt so guilty about turning Al into a suit of armor. Otherwise, Ed would not have become a Dog of the Military for both of their sakes. Otherwise, Winry and Granny Pinako would not have spent so much effort supporting both of them on their journey.

Al should have known better than to listen to a serial killer, but every uncertainty seemed to wedge itself into his mind, refusing to leave— did Ed really care? Had he become a State Alchemist for them or for himself? Were Winry and Granny supporting both of them or just Ed?

No. No, Al was being foolish. Ed had blamed himself so much for harming both of them with the taboo, and Al was not going to invalidate Ed's emotions by believing a serial killer he had just met over his own brother.

Al knew he was a genius. Ed had always maintained one step ahead of Al, mostly due to being a year older than him, but Al was more than well aware that he himself was never far behind.

Al could rationalize that at eleven years old, Ed would have had neither the knowledge, material, nor capability to synthesize an armor puppet. To begin with, making armor puppets from scratch most likely wasn't possible. Movement and sentience required a soul, and to create a soul was unheard of— most alchemists, as purely scientific thinkers, hardly even believed in the existence of a soul.

A soul bound to armor would remember being human. Since Al had previously been the only armor-bound soul he and Brother had known of, they hadn't had anything to compare against. But now, with the armor-bound souls he and Ed had fought last night, this hypothesis had been proven consistent across four examples.

How realistic would it be for Ed to fabricate ten years of brotherhood and eight years of memories, excluding two from infantile amnesia?

Unrealistic. Outside the realm of possibility, even. Al felt like groaning for even considering it.

Still, the thought wouldn't go away. Like a weed, even after picking it, it grew back tenfold, until it was the only thing on Al's mind.

The other thought that appeared was more of a traitorous suggestion, especially after Ed had voiced his suspicions that morning. Maybe ask Albedo, his mind supplied. He's a trustworthy alchemist with even more knowledge than Ed.

He said it before he could back out and stop himself.

"So, this will sound kind of out of the blue," he blurted, "but how hard would it be to make a… soul? Out of alchemy, I mean."

He did not miss the way Albedo completely froze, somehow momentarily becoming even more statue-like than he already was. "Why do you ask?"

Al scratched at his helmet, the metal grooves so unlike the soft blond hair he thought he remembered having. "…No reason," he lied. "Humor me?"

Albedo appraised him with bright eyes that made Al want to fidget. "I see."

He looked away, and Al resisted the urge to sigh in relief as those intense teal eyes stopped boring into him. "Creating a soul is not… impossible. It is much easier to do with simple life forms such as insects and small animals. Creating a sentient soul, with human cognition and intelligence, however, requires a great deal of effort and material."

Al sat, slack-jawed. Not that he had a jaw to slack, but he was amply flabbergasted. "It's— it's possible to?"

"Theoretically," Albedo nodded, still not looking Al in the eyes.

But Al could hear the certainty in Albedo's voice. Albedo was far more familiar with the topic of souls than anybody following the laws of alchemy should be— human transmutation is forbidden.

"… It is not impossible," Albedo added, "But it is extremely difficult, and likely could not be done in a single lifetime."

Though Albedo's answers had not been what Al expected, his worry dissipated. He could probably write off what Barry had told him as a ploy to cause him unrest. It would be impossible for him to be an armor puppet Ed created after all.

"Of course," Albedo said. "Why would you think so?"

"Oh," Al sheepishly twiddled his thumbs. He hadn't realized he'd spoken aloud. "The person I fought outside the laboratory last night said so. I shouldn't have listened."

Albedo put a hand on his chin.

"If it's any reassurance…" Albedo hesitated, as if words of comfort were more difficult to say than the most complex alchemical theorems he usually recited with ease.

Al patiently waited for Albedo to gather his thoughts and finally speak. "Created armor puppet or not, your existence and sentience are real. Additionally, it is nearly impossible to overwrite the information a soul holds. If you hold memories of your time in a human body, then it is very unlikely that they were fabricated."

It wasn't exactly what Al needed to hear. But in an odd and very distinctly… Albedo way, it did end up being reassuring.

"Thanks, Albedo," Al tried to smile.

If Albedo noticed the way Al's voice faltered, he didn't mention it. His eyes returned to his sketch.

Ed's suspicions from that morning rang in Al's mind. Ed and Al knew more than they should have about human transmutation, but only about the aspects relating to the creation of a physical body and the binding of a pre-existing soul to said body.

Albedo was speaking of creating a new soul altogether.

As he returned to Ed's room, Al's mind ran wild. This sort of alchemy could not be studied freely. Albedo would need the means and resources to experiment, which only the Amestrian government could provide— unless Albedo was a foreigner? But even Drachma, the largest country bordering Amestris, couldn't match up to Amestris's developments in alchemy.

But… if Albedo had researched how to create souls with the help of the Amestrian government, then surely he should have known about the secret of Philosopher's Stone— yet Albedo had seemed just as surprised by the Stone as Al and Ed. Not to mention, Albedo had just joined the State Alchemists a mere month ago. Or had that been a ruse?

But even though he had never been able to tell what Albedo was thinking in his silent demeanor, Al didn't think Albedo would lie. No one who dedicated their life to a pursuit of fundamental truths of the universe could maintain a lie for long, Al thought.

Albedo was puzzling.

Gracia leaned over the blond alchemist, who was absorbed in his sketch.

"That's beautiful," she breathed. Over elegant railings peeked a fountain of stone surrounded by charmingly small wooden shopfronts: to the right, a cozy restaurant with an open stove; to the left, a tent over shelves and stacks of tomes near a sort of elaborately-designed table Gracia had never seen before.

Albedo nodded, not looking up from where his pencil etched in the figures of two people near the table.

Marveling at the art, Gracia nearly forgot her original purpose for bothering Albedo. "Sorry for interrupting! Could you help me decorate for Elicia's party tonight? I can't reach the top of the cabinet."

The alchemist looked up. "Of course," he stood, taking one end of the brightly-colored streamer from Gracia's hands.

"Ah, thank you!" Gracia beamed. "Just over there, if you could."

As Albedo summoned a floating stone platform shaped like a 4-petaled flower to carry the banner up, Gracia wondered if he realized how softly he was smiling.

Apparently Winry had arrived this morning from Resembool to fix Ed's dysfunctional arm.

Nina insisted on visiting Ed, so consequently, Hughes had cooed and asked Albedo if he wanted to come along. Albedo said yes. He couldn't very well leave Nina and Hughes unsupervised for the day.

"You're not pushing work onto Sheska again, are you?" Albedo's eyes narrowed.

Hughes made an exaggerated gesture, mock-affronted. "Please! Give me some credit. I requested this day of leave a month in advance. Because…"

Nina hopped up and down in her seat, a bundle of uncontained excitement. "It's Elicia's birthday today!"

"I'm aware," Albedo said. "You two have been talking about it nonstop, after all."

Hughes beamed. "Maybe we can rope in Ed's mechanic too! Her name is Winry, isn't it? I bet she needs a place to stay tonight."

Albedo sighed, well aware that refusing Hughes's invitation, especially on the night of Elicia's birthday, would be nigh impossible.

How odd. His facial muscles were still pulled into a smile.

"Winry. Can't you find a hotel somewhere else?"

Winry frowned at Ed. "Mr. Hughes is being so nice to offer. It'd be rude to turn him down at this point."

Ed grunted a halfhearted acknowledgment to her reply, not at all placated.

Winry would have teased him for being so uptight, but she was more worried than anything. Ed's serious and set jaw was drastically different from his usually casual scowls. "Why are you so worried anyways?" she asked. "Mr. Hughes seems like a nice man."

"It's not Hughes I'm worried about," Ed huffed.

How cryptic. Winry placed impatient hands on her hip. "Then what is it?"

Ed didn't look into her eyes. It was a clear enough sign that to him, the conversation was over, but Winry had had enough.

"Are you ever going to tell me anything?" She snapped.

Ed slumped, looking more tired than any 15-year old had any right to look. Winry wondered if she shouldn't have been angry— but then remembered that Ed and Al never told her anything, causing her more worry than necessary.

She didn't need weekly updates. She didn't need to know every detail; she knew that whatever the boys involved themselves in was usually dangerous. She just wanted at least a word.

She didn't want to lose the brothers.

"… It's Albedo," Ed finally answered.

Winry paused. Her memories of Albedo from when the brothers had visited Resembool…

"But he's nice, isn't he?" Winry furrowed her eyebrows, trying to recall how Albedo had acted in Resembool. Ed wouldn't be so worried for no reason, but Albedo had never seemed malicious at all. "And he takes care of Nina."

Ed bit his lips the way he did when he was being stubborn. Winry refused to acknowledge that he looked cute when he so— certainly it was because of nostalgia.

Instead, she did something just as familiar, and flicked his forehead where his eyebrows scrunched up.

Ed leaned back, wincing as Winry smirked. "What the hell was that for?!"

Winry chuckled. "You're being stubborn."

Ed grumbled indignantly, rubbing his palm at the spot she'd flicked.

"Look," she adopted a more serious tone, "I don't know why you're so antsy about this, but I don't think he's a bad person. At least don't be mean to him in front of Nina. She wouldn't want to see two people she cares about fighting each other."

Ed nodded mutely.

Winry hoisted her duffel bag over her shoulder with a smile. "Good. I'll see you tomorrow, okay?"

"Yeah," Ed replied absentmindedly.

"And don't forget to call if anything happens to your arm!" She ducked out of the room.

How much did Ed truly know about Albedo?

Albedo was a skilled alchemist, possibly without parallel, able to practically defy the law of equivalent exchange on a consistent basis.

Albedo was trained in swordplay, and skilled enough to use it confidently in battle, despite the fact that swords were far outmatched by firearms and used solely by the Fuhrer now.

Albedo only recently obtained his State Alchemist certification, despite having more than enough ability to have done so earlier.

Albedo had lost his teacher.

And wasn't that confusing? Because it would have been so much easier to think of him as just a cold and aloof scientist, but no.

He was too human to hate. It never seemed so because of the way he held himself— calm and clinical, polite and measured in every action. But his humanity was there, and impossible to ignore, especially when juxtaposed to the rest of his character.

He was raised by his alchemy teacher. He had a little sister. He skipped meals in favor of little sweet morsels when he was too absorbed in his work, and he was the kind of person to stand lost in thought on the side of a busy road to think about where he was going to stay for the night.

He valued books and knowledge over his own life. He had a frankly inspiring single-minded determination to help Nina, when doing so did not seem to benefit him at all.

Albedo was confusing.

But Al thought he was a good person, Winry thought he was nice, and Nina thought the absolute world of him.

Maybe Ed thought so too. Albedo was a good person, and that was why Ed was so angry at him— because if Ed trusted Albedo, Ed also wanted to be someone Albedo could trust. There was no trust in the way Albedo had basically disregarded him that night, or in the too-many-to-count secrets Albedo was keeping. There was no trust in the way Albedo said that he belonged on neither side.

Maybe Ed could work towards being the person Albedo could trust. Being angry at him certainly wasn't helping.

Ed sighed. As much as he hated to admit it right now, Albedo was probably a good person. A single isolated incident did not invalidate Ed's judgement of Albedo's character up to this point— allowing it to do so would be irrational. But he still wanted answers.

He would get those answers eventually, he was sure.

Winry chuckled resignedly beside Albedo. The party poppers rained multicolored confetti over squealing toddlers on the other side of the room.

She sighed. "You knew about this, didn't you?"

Albedo's lips tilted into a curve that almost seemed like a coy smirk. "Perhaps."

Nina hung back nervously from the crowd. She'd been shaking earlier, but sitting closer to Albedo seemed to calm her down.

Winry looked to her left. Albedo was plaiting the sides of Nina's brown hair into a neat bundle at the back of her head, resembling his own hairstyle. Albedo seemed for all the world like a kind older brother.

"You're good at braiding," she commented.

Albedo nodded. "I do it for my own hair every morning," he explained curtly.

She thought he would leave it at that. In all her attempts to start conversations in Resembool, Albedo had always given curt replies, clearly unwilling to continue speaking. She always thought it was a bit awkward… but he definitely seemed a lot more comfortable here. His posture was relaxed in a way that it hadn't been in Resembool, and his eyes for once lacked the hard glint of constantly-churning theories that all alchemists seemed to have.

"… I also used to do this for my little sister sometimes," he added with a smile on his face that she had never seen before. It reminded her of candlelight somehow— subtle and warm, but fragile, as if a single wrong word would put it out.

She couldn't help but smile too.

Albedo took her silence as an invitation to continue, for once. "I haven't seen her in a while, and I don't know when I will be able to see her again… but she'll be fine. Klee has the others to watch her."

"Klee, huh?" Winry grinned disarmingly. She felt briefly guilty for probing, but Albedo was… interesting, to say the least. Maybe if she could find out more about him, then Ed could feel more at ease.

So she said, "that's a lovely name. What's she like?"

"Like a charged ion," Albedo replied with no hesitation. "She was always excited and running towards the next item that caught her eye." Albedo neatly tied off the braid in Nina's hair, and gently patted her hair in calm repeating strokes. "She used to really enjoy… catching fish in the rivers."

(Exploding them and blasting them out of the water half-cooked already, he didn't say. There was a lot he didn't say. Like how she smiled mischievously when Cavalry Captain Kaeya came to pick her up so she wouldn't bother Albedo's research during the day; like how she pouted when Acting Grandmaster Jean put her in time-out for destroying Mondstadt's local ecosystem whether by accidentally burning down entire forests or having eradicated all the fish from a blackened portion of the riverbed.

He didn't say that Klee meant clover, or that to him, she had been a shining four-leaf clover tethering him to humanity. She had never failed to be the brightest spot in Albedo's life since Rhinedottir's disappearance—)

Rambunctious laughter from Elicia's young toddling friends filled the silence between Winry and Albedo. Even as Winry fidgeted with the hem of her skirt, she knew Albedo wouldn't continue to speak— his eyes held a far-off gaze to someplace Winry could not see.

There was probably much about Klee that Albedo had left unsaid. Winry could feel the quiet and warm affection that radiated from Albedo though, she thought. It was somewhat… endearing. For all that he surrounded himself with cold walls built meters high and layers of impenetrable courtesy, with the smile he wore right now, he looked simply like someone who didn't know how to express himself.

"Do you miss her?" Winry asked.

"Always," Albedo answered. Winry couldn't quite place the tone of that one word— love or sadness or frustration or a combination of the three?

"Well, I hope you get to see Klee again soon."

Nina swiveled her head around, careful not to jostle her hairdo much. "Will I be able to meet Klee one day?"

Albedo patted her head with a far-off gaze. "Perhaps."

When he'd first arrived on this world, Albedo had made a decision.

To research an entirely unfamiliar world would take time and effort. With a limited pool of physical and mental capabilities, he would only make considerable progress by devoting himself solely to one pursuit: either searching for a way home, or studying this world.

The latter reasonably outweighed the former. To venture into the unknown, especially one as vast as this world, was an alchemist's natural duty. It was Albedo's natural duty, because Albedo was created to be an Alchemist and Rhinedottir had taught him exactly what being an Alchemist meant.

The former was hardly even worth considering— his knightly duties could be fulfilled by Sucrose, and his familial responsibilities could be performed by the knights. For all that Alice had aided him in establishing himself in Mondstadt, practically speaking, Albedo was not indispensable to the city.

Sentiment was something Albedo only ever partially understood. Sentiment pertained to alchemy as intent. Intent was creation; it was what allowed for the same alchemical arrays to produce different products.

Sentiment pertained to art as the expression of emotion. Capturing emotion in art came down to accurately portraying the facial musculature in an exact position such that emotion could be interpreted from the expression.

Sentiment pertained to Albedo as affection. Despite his limited understanding of the emotions that seemed to dictate humans' actions, Albedo was well aware that he was not immune to them himself. He knew what the warmth in his chest meant.

He loved Mondstadt and its carefree air of freedom. He loved Klee and Alice and their explosive antics. He loved the Knights of Favonius for their duty and dedication, and Sucrose and Timaeus for their passion and integrity. Time had fostered interactions and experiences with them, and strengthened the affection Albedo held for them.

He loved Nina and her shy, bubbly enthusiasm. He loved Maes Hughes for his uplifting banter and gushy infatuation. He loved Gracia for her considerate nature and Elicia for her innocent joy. He… enjoyed spending time with the Elric brothers and discussing alchemy with them as intellectual peers. The longer he spent here, the more time would contribute to his connections here— the more he would cement his place here, like he had in Mondstadt.

Amestris was yet another place where Albedo did not belong. Albedo was a stranger to this world and its history. Albedo was an outsider here, like the Traveler had been.

Briefly, he wondered if Rhinedottir leaving him in Alice's care had been his greatest test. If he, a homunculus that Rhinedottir had created, was able to make connections with humans, then he would truly be her crowning achievement as an alchemist: a created human so human-like that it could love.

Mondstadt and Amestris could physically never meet. For Albedo to have one, the other had to be sacrificed. Equivalent exchange, one home for another.

Perhaps it was selfish of Albedo to wish he could have both.

Sketches were merely facsimiles of the locations he knew, but before the images of his beloved city could fade from his mind, Albedo wanted to preserve them.

Windrise's Statue, he labeled on one corner of a page. Mondstadt City Lower Plaza. Knights of Favonius Headquarters. Barbatos’s Statue. The Favonius Church.

He paused on the last sheet.

Klee's sunshine smile beamed at him from the paper, immortalized in charcoal.

(He ignored the fact that it was as ephemeral as the paper it was drawn on, that like a clover, she would grow and change and eventually wither and fall.)

I love you, Klee, he wrote. Stay safe.

Chapter Text

With everyone gathered around Ed's bed, the hospital room was rather cramped.

Ed shifted uncomfortably as Albedo took a seat in the bedside chair. This time, his eyebrows were furrowed more out of consternation than hostility— he really didn't want to apologize as Al insisted he should.

So he started with something more neutral. "Uhm," he cleared his throat, stalling, "I'm… glad you didn't get hurt at the laboratory."

Albedo stiffened imperceptibly. "Thank you," he replied steadily. "Glad to see you have recovered as well."

Despite the niceties, the tension between them was palpable.

The sound of Major Armstrong clearing his throat cut through it sharply, bringing the room to attention. "Shall we begin, then?"

Hughes hummed thoughtfully. "Armor-bound souls, a large transmutation circle, human sacrifices… and two people."

Ed nodded. "Hold on, let me show you what they looked like…"

He thumbed the page in the notepad, his eyebrows furrowed in effort as he nibbled the other side of the pencil. His crude sketches of those two people in the laboratory were surely… good enough, right? Recognizable at least.

"Hm."

Ed jumped, very much not yelping, thank you very much. Albedo had been so silent that Ed hadn't realized he'd been watching over his shoulder as he drew.

Right. Albedo was an artist.

With a grumble, he held the notepad and pencil to Albedo. "You can probably do it better."

"No, please, by all means," Albedo spoke with his characteristic neutral tone, "I enjoyed watching you work."

Ed gnashed his teeth, an indignant shout bubbling at the back of his throat. The sheer sass— Albedo even sounded as genuine as he always did, despite the ease with which he twirled the pencil now in his hand.

Al chuckled as Albedo leaned over the paper. There was a hint of a smile on his face.

"Anyways," Ed shrugged, "the alchemical array in the chamber matched what we found in Dr. Marcoh's notes. It was kind of… familiar." Ed put a hand to his chin, thinking. "Al, do you know if you've seen it before?"

"Maybe…" Al hummed. "In Dad's study? We can't really check anymore though."

"Yeah…" Ed crossed his arms. "In any case, it's being pretty heavily guarded. Who knows what those people with the Ouroboros tattoo were?"

"Speaking of which," Hughes leaned over the other alchemist in the room, "I never get tired of watching this."

Quickly taking form on the page Albedo held, the image of Lust and the Ouroboros tattoo on her chest crossed her arms and smiled coyly. Beside her, Envy titled their chin up, wearing a grin dripping with malice.

"Truly fascinating!" Armstrong cried. "To think you were hiding such artistic talent… truly inspiring, Albedo Kreideprinz!"

"Thank you," Albedo replied nonchalantly, passing the notepad to Hughes.

Hughes rapidly flipped between the pages of Albedo's masterful sketch and Ed's crude rendition, then cackled. "Clear difference here."

Ed sputtered. "Shut up! I'm not the artist here. Give me that," he snatched the notepad.

Okay, yeah. He had to admit. It was really good. Rolling his eyes, he passed it to a still tearful Armstrong. "Yeah. Anyways," he finished recounting, "those two came in and things after that are kind of foggy from blood loss."

He looked very pointedly towards Albedo. "Your turn."

Albedo took back the notepad and spoke as he began another sketch that Ed couldn't see. "I went separately from Edward, hoping to find notes and records of experiments. Before I could, I encountered these two and engaged in combat with them."

Hughes frowned, but everyone's eyes were on Albedo.

"One of them is called Lust, and the other is called Envy," he continued. "Both of them have instantaneous regeneration, most likely catalyzed by a Philosopher's Stone somewhere in their body. When they regenerate, there is a byproduct of red alchemical lightning. Parts of their body that are cut off disintegrate into a black dust, so it is impossible to study the substance they are made of…"

Ed's eyes widened. "Red lightning." That's how Albedo knew they had a Philosopher's Stone.

"You managed to get all that from your exchange? Well done," he grinned and mussed up Albedo's brushed-back hair, but the alchemist didn't look upset at all, simply using his hands to pat his wild hair back down.

"The cardinal sins?" Armstrong mused. "Perhaps they are codenames?"

Albedo made a quiet noise of questioning before holding up the notepad again. "In any case, assume that there are more than these two."

The sketch he set down on the table showed pearly white eyes on a large, stocky round figure and an unsettling grin. "I thought the name 'Lust' sounded familiar— it was during an encounter with this being, a few days before going to East City. It had an Ouroboros tattoo on its tongue as well."

Ed's eyes widened. "You did?! When was this?"

"A day before I met you and Al on the train," Albedo answered. "I was in the town of Urbukya at the time, and it was running towards the North, if I remember correctly. I briefly fought it… but it escaped."

"And that was when we were in Liore…" Ed's eyebrows furrowed pensively. "Never mind. Continue, please."

Albedo nodded. "Envy and Lust knew that Edward was in the central chamber and broke combat with me when they thought the Slicer would reveal something to him. I regrouped with Edward after following them, and thereafter they blew up the laboratory to erase the evidence."

Ed slammed a hand onto the table.

"Brother!" Al scolded quietly.

"We both know that's not all that happened, Albedo," Ed glared with fervent frustration.

Albedo easily held his angry gaze with his own teal stare.

"Now, now," Hughes placed a hand on each alchemist's shoulder, "no need to be like that. If Albedo doesn't want to share, it's fine."

"No," Albedo brushed Hughes's hand gently off his shoulder. "Ed is right. I am not being completely forthcoming here."

Al's eyes wavered, worried. "Albedo…"

Somehow, the single slight motion of Albedo's shoulders up and down as he took a single breath felt as exaggerated as the deepest of sighs.

"… Lust and Envy tried to recruit me to their side using a Philosopher's Stone as incentive."

Hughes and Armstrong stiffened.

"I refused them," Albedo continued. "The stone's existence opposes everything my teacher stood for. I cannot use it."

Armstrong was the first to unfreeze. "Do you know why they were trying to recruit you?"

It occurred to Ed and Al that Armstrong had never seen Albedo fight, had never quite witnessed the miracles Albedo performed.

To Ed and Al, the answer was already evident, unspoken, hanging in the air between them. Albedo meant something to them. Albedo was an existence closer to those of Lust and Envy than mere humans. The question at this point was not why they wished to recruit him, but specifically what he was.

Ed leaned forward in his seat, anticipating Albedo's answer.

Albedo opened his mouth, but no words came out. In uncharacteristic hesitance, he closed it again.

"Don't answer if you're uncomfortable doing so," Hughes interrupted the apprehensive silence. "You didn't join them, so we don't need to know why."

Albedo froze, the way he did whenever he was caught off guard, and finally nodded. "Then… I apologize," he looked away to a nondescript corner of the room. "I cannot say."

Ed simultaneously felt the urge to kick Hughes, the wall, and himself. This manifested instead as flopping back onto the bouncy mattress with a halfhearted groan.

Ugh. He really wanted answers. To probe for them when Albedo was uncomfortable sharing was an asshole move, and Hughes was right, Albedo didn't need to share. But dammit, he really wanted to know what was going on, and his patience was running thin.

Maybe he'd try asking Albedo again after—

The sound of the door opening interrupted his thoughts with blaring alarm.

Brosh and Ross were supposed to warn them if anyone was coming near.

Ed froze. That was no standard uniform. His eyes trailed up slowly and all too nervously towards a black mustache and memorable eye patch.

The nail in the coffin was Hughes's and Armstrong's immediate form-perfect salutes, backs ramrod-straight.

"F-Fuhrer King Bradley!" Armstrong stumbled, but his voice echoed strongly.

Perhaps it was fortunate that the Fuhrer gruffed a dignified "As you were" before Ed had the chance to salute. He was never good at saluting anyways.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed that Albedo had not saluted either. He stood rigid, the perfect picture of attention— Ed could never look so serious whenever he tried to.

Perhaps it could have been chalked up to Albedo's usual mannerisms, but Ed thought he looked far too accustomed to standing straight like so— like he was not in a hospital room, but in an office, looking up to a superior. And yet Albedo hadn't saluted.

Hughes bowed respectfully, a bit of wariness seeping into his eyes. "What are you doing here, Your Excellency?"

"Just here to visit a friend in the hospital," the Fuhrer chuckled lightheartedly, holding out a basket with a plump melon.

"Thanks," Ed casually grabbed the basket before his mind could catch up with his mouth and arms.

He stifled a sputter as he did a double take. The Fuhrer was in his hospital room, gifting him a melon. Holy fucking shit.

Why was he here? Right in the midst of their meeting about a government conspiracy of a yet-unknown scale? This was far from a coincidence.

He meant to surprise them. Surely, he meant to throw them into disarray, because there was no way the timing of a casual and purposeless visit would coincide with their organized meeting so conveniently.

He'd already succeeded. Ed gulped. There was an unsettling dissonance between the Fuhrer's relaxed stance— arms behind his back, soft chuckle, eyes crinkled in a polite smile— and the attention he commanded with his presence alone.

"I understand you've been investigating the senior staff members, Major Armstrong," he commented almost conversationally, a slight edge in his tone.

"I— er," Armstrong stammered, "that is— how did you—"

"Don't underestimate my information network. And Edward Elric," the Fuhrer turned, his striking green eye opened. "The Philosopher's Stone."

Ed's heart pounded in his chest. Suddenly, the Fuhrer seemed twice as tall and imposing. Simultaneously, a wintry chill ran down his back and his skin burned as if the room were an oven, yet there was no discernible change in the room's temperature.

"What have you found out? Depending on how much you've learned…" King Bradley's single eye narrowed, and Ed sweated anxiously in anticipation of a threat— prison, being discharged, having his state certification taken away— anything but what he heard next.

"With all due respect, sir," Albedo answered for him, "I don't think it is your business."

Albedo's calm and unfazed voice shattered the uneasy silence, replacing it with an apprehensive quiet.

The realization that Albedo had just directly spoken back to essentially the highest-ranking leader of the nation hit them with the subtlety of a sucker punch. Hughes sharply inhaled, stifling a choking gasp that Ed was unable to, and Armstrong held his breath, as if a single inhale or exhale would knock over everything standing, including Al, whose armor rattled briefly as he shifted.

"Albedo Kreideprinz, the Chalkdust Alchemist, was it?" The Fuhrer's attention turned.

Ed wasn't sure whether to be thankful that the pressure of the Fuhrer's stare on him like a stranglehold had lifted so that he could finally breathe, or worried for Albedo, who didn't seem to have any concept of his situation's gravity. The latter won, and despite no longer being on the receiving end of the Fuhrer's intimidation, Ed felt an increasingly intense concern clench his heart.

Amidst this, Ed felt overwhelmingly dumbfounded. Surely Albedo knew who he was speaking to? Was he actually not aware who the Fuhrer was, or was Albedo just that daunting?

The Fuhrer stood tall and proud, hands folded squarely behind his back. "I've heard that you fight using a sword."

Albedo nodded. "Yes, sir."

"Hmph," King Bradley exhaled, as if sharing a humorless joke with himself. "Would you like to test your hand against the Fuhrer himself one day? I'm afraid my skills have gotten quite rusty over the years."

"Of course," Albedo replied in his characteristic unreadable stoicism, eyes narrowing as if to pick up the gauntlet thrown down. "A spar with the Fuhrer would be quite a humbling experience, I'm sure. I would be honored."

The two locked eyes in the silent room. Albedo's gaze did not waver.

The Fuhrer abruptly broke out in hearty chortles.

Ed took another double take.

"Just kidding!" The fucking Fuhrer slapped a large hand on Ed's shoulder far too casually. "Don't look so defensive," the man grinned, as if he hadn't just terrified and scarred them all.

Ed's brain short-circuited for a moment. "Huh?"

Before anyone in the room could process this exchange, the Fuhrer spoke again, more gravely. "I know there is unrest among the ranks. Something must be done about it. However…" he leaned down over the packet on the table.

"That's—" Armstrong rushed to explain.

"A list of people who were involved in researching the Philosopher's Stone," the Fuhrer finished for him. "These men have all gone missing a few days prior to the collapse of the Fifth Laboratory. The enemy is always a step ahead of us." He set the packet down and stepped aside, looking pensively out the window.

"Even with my information network, as it currently stands, I have no handle on the enemy's size, their objectives, or how far they've penetrated us."

"In other words," Hughes noted solemnly, "it's dangerous to be poking around."

"Indeed," King Bradley turned back around. "Lt. Colonel Hughes, Major Armstrong, Elric Brothers, and Kreideprinz. I've determined you to be men that I can trust."

He tilted his head down and lowered his voice. "I will not permit you to stick your noses further into this matter, nor speak of it to anyone. Under the present circumstances, when you cannot tell friend from enemy, you cannot trust anyone! Consider everyone in the military an enemy, and act discreetly!"

Ed gulped down the lump in his throat.

"However," King Bradley grinned, but the mustache framed his mouth in such a way that what should have been a smile looked far more like a humorless grimace. "When the time comes, I will have much work for you to do. See that you are ready."

"Yes sir!" Hughes and Armstrong saluted dutifully as Edward watched, dumbstruck.

"His Excellency! Where is His Excellency, the Fuhrer?" A voice called in the distance.

"I will now make my retreat." It was an uncanny sight, the Fuhrer hopping out of the window frame like a guilty child sneaking out of his room. "I secretly slipped out of work, you see. Farewell!"

As the others crowded near the window, watching the Fuhrer leave, Albedo stood aside, twiddling the white twig in his pocket between his fingers.

Albedo did not watch Fuhrer King Bradley leave.

As a scientist, he was not inclined to believe in pseudo-scientific concepts such as intuition.

By all means, the Fuhrer should have been just a charismatic leader worried for his men. The inflection of his voice, his tone, the curvature of his mouth— every hint pointed towards a character of dignity, of nobility, of honor.

Every hint should have pointed towards a leader. Like Grandmaster Varka or Jean, Albedo thought. Both Varka and Jean had held the same such charisma. They'd commanded troops with their heads held high and their swords poised for victory.

The Fuhrer's short exchange with him had not been a simple act of intimidation. The malicious intrigue Albedo perceived in the set of the man's jaw could not be dispelled with a lighthearted 'just kidding' or chuckle.

Perhaps Albedo had been the only one to notice the distinct way the Fuhrer's eyes had narrowed when they landed on him. The hairs on the back of his neck still stood, unsettled by a gaze that was no longer there but felt imprinted in his mind. A chill had washed over him, and his "heart" had beaten with a fervor he only rarely experienced.

He'd never believed in intuition, but viscerally, he knew: Fuhrer King Bradley knew something about him. The only question was what exactly he knew.

It couldn't be his otherworldly origin— he hadn't told anyone of it, even the kind lady who'd housed him the first three days. It could be the fact that he was a homunculus but it was unlikely— he had only told one relatively trustworthy individual himself, and though Lust and Envy had seen him bleed chalk, that alone was not enough to confirm what he was.

The Fuhrer would have already known of his alchemical knowledge from his State Alchemist exam. If he'd been observing Albedo's actions, he would have already known about Albedo's unnatural (in this world, at least) use of the weaponry dimension as well.

In any case…

Cavalry Captain Kaeya's 3rd lesson: the walls have ears. He absolutely could not reveal any more about himself while he was in Central.

Hiding information about himself wouldn't be difficult, surely. He'd spent years in Mondstadt doing the same, after all.

Hughes sighed. "You're… awfully bold, Albedo."

"Thank you," Albedo nodded, unsure how else to respond.

"More like batshit insane," Ed sat on the bed, practically catatonic, making a pathetic attempt to catch his breath. "You do know that was the Fuhrer, right? And you know who the Fuhrer is?"

"I… am aware of this country's ruling structure, yes," Albedo answered honestly. It had been one of the first things he'd looked into upon his arrival, after all.

"You agreed to a spar. With the Fuhrer," Ed reiterated slowly.

"…Yes."

"… Hoooohhh," Ed vocally exhaled once again, drawing out his breath as if it would help calm his beating heart.

The opening door interrupted their thoughts. "Ed? I got the tickets you asked me to! Tomorrow at noon is fine, right?"

Winry paused. Everyone seemed shaken somehow. "Did something happen?"

"Ah… a storm just passed," Ed answered cryptically.

"Uh-huh," Winry hummed skeptically. "... Sure. Here you go."

"You're quite on-the-go," Armstrong commented. "Have your injuries even fully healed yet?"

Evidently not, given the bandages still wrapped around his head, but Ed stood and stretched to look fine anyways. "How long do you expect me to stay in this disinfectant-reeking place?" He scowled indignantly.

"Where to next, then?" Hughes looked at the tickets over Winry's shoulder. "Dublith?"

"Yeah," Ed nodded. "Al and I talked it out, and we're going to go visit our teacher—"

Al's rattling armor gradually grew in volume, cutting Ed off. "I'm scared after all, Brother…" his high voice shuddered. "I'm sure she's going to kill us!"

Winry deadpanned as Ed joined his younger brother in cowering. "Just who is your alchemy teacher?"

"Still, it is quite a distance to Dublith…" Armstrong mused.

"Really?" Winry tilted her head. "Where is it?"

Conveniently, a map was rolled out nearby from the earlier meeting. Al hummed. "Around the middle of the southern area."

Winry looked at the map, and promptly shouted.

"What?" Ed's head whipped up to face her, alarmed.

"Rush Valley!" she exclaimed, pointing to a point on the map just above Dublith. "It's the Holy Land of Automail!"

Ed sighed as Winry's eyes sparkled with an unquenchable delight. "I've always wanted to go there! Take me with you, take me with you, take me with you!"

"Go there on your own," he grouched.

"Well, it's on the way, anyways," Al mediated. "Should be fine, right?"

"... Fine," Ed rolled his eyes.

"Yahoo!" Winry cheered with the energy of the sun in her voice. "I'll go call Grandma!"

" I wonder if Albedo wants to come with us?" Al mused. "Albedo?"

A quick scan of the room revealed that the alchemist had already left the room.

"Wha—" Ed's eyebrows furrowed, perplexed. "When did he even leave?!"

King Bradley's steps in the hallway of his home were muffled by the posh carpet beneath his feet.

"You were hasty, Wrath."

King Bradley stopped in his tracks, and turned. "Oh? Do pray tell, how so."

A sneer formed in the shadows. "The Chalkdust Alchemist already knows of Lust and Envy, and was able to track them to a precise location in Laboratory 5. Gluttony may be compromised, as well. Show some discretion."

King Bradley opened his single green eye. "He won't tell," he said with the confidence of a ruler. "The seeds of distrust have been sowed. He would not further endanger his own identity so."

"Indeed…" a red eye in the shadows narrowed. "You will answer to Father for this if it backfires, however. Know your place, Wrath."

King Bradley merely chuckled and continued walking.

Hughes found Albedo sitting on a bench in the hospital's courtyard, staring straight at the sun with his typical unreadable expression. "Finally found you. Have you been here the whole time?"

Albedo turned and nodded wordlessly.

"Maybe don't stare up at the sun too much," Hugh chuckled, taking a seat beside Albedo. "It can damage your eyes, you know."

"This sun… is quite large," Albedo noted quietly, almost whispering.

"That's how the sun is!" Hughes beamed. "Do alchemists look at the sky often?"

"I wouldn't know," Albedo answered truthfully. He would not pretend to have insight on the minds of this world's alchemists— he hardly even understood the minds of Teyvat's alchemists. That being said, the stars of Teyvat's reversed heavens had never been studied in as great detail as astronomy had here. "Celestial bodies could theoretically be harnessed as a source of energy for alchemy, but the conversion of sable energy at such a great distance to the Earth…"

Hughes blinked. "You lost me at 'know.'"

"I could simplify it, if you'd like." Albedo had often had to simplify such concepts for Timaeus— he was well-accustomed to it.

"Nah, I'm good," Hughes grinned. "I'll leave the hard science stuff and thinking to you."

"Hm," Albedo nodded.

With the warm sun and peaceful breeze, he felt quite… content.

"Anyways, Al wanted to ask if you would go with them to Dublith. They're going to meet their alchemy teacher there, it seems."

Ah yes. The brothers were departing once more. In all the time Albedo had known them, though admittedly a short few weeks, they were so often in motion. Golden eyes and golden hair, constant travel… Albedo acknowledged that most of his temptation to join them was at least partially habitual.

He turned to Hughes and shook his head. "Could you relay to the brothers that I will not?"

"Sure," Hughes nodded. "They'd probably like to hear it straight from you though."

"I would prefer not to… aggravate Edward anymore," Albedo averted his eyes. That, and… he didn't want to say any more. Even Sucrose and Timaeus, arguably the two people closest to him outside of his adoptive family and the Traveler, had never found out about Albedo either. While he trusted the brothers to keep silent, Kaeya's lessons replayed in his head.

One person and two homunculi— possibly more— already knew he was not entirely human despite appearances. Altogether, three too many. (He cursed his missteps that night once more. He had been rushed and careless.) On Teyvat, the information had been dangerous. Any relation to Khaenri'ah was watched closely by the Abyss Order and likely the archons, and knowing enough about the nature of his creation could give anyone a hint towards how to corrupt his matter into… something like Durin.

Such information should have been obsolete here, in this world where no one knew of Rhinedottir, where dragons did not exist, where Khaenri'ah had never fallen to their own hubris and the gods.

Now, it was not. The revelation of his status as a homunculus meant that he would be watched, by a dangerous, possibly pseudo-immortal organization able to collapse a large government-affiliated laboratory with no questions, no less.

He did not say any of this to Hughes. Hughes did not ask, after all. Hughes simply looked at Albedo with a soothing gaze, as if he could sense the turmoil within him.

"I get it," Hughes put a reassuring hand on Albedo's shoulder. "They're your friends, so I hope you can resolve whatever is going on between you and Ed before the brothers leave, but you don't have to. Again, just do what you feel comfortable doing."

Albedo could well and truly say that his next two words were heartfelt.

"Thank you," he smiled.

The smile would not convey everything. It would not, by itself, communicate his appreciation to Hughes for showing him to a reputable swordsmith, for welcoming him to his home, for accommodating his late-night reading tendencies and watching over Nina when he could not.

By the way Hughes smiled back though, he supposed it must have been enough.

Albedo heard familiar thundering steps— heavy metal automail filled by the hospital's standard-issued slippers— rapidly approaching him as he walked towards the exit of the hospital. He turned.

Ed stopped running, looking only slightly winded. "Albedo."

"Edward," he greeted back with a nod.

Too many of their conversations (if they could even be called that) in the past few days had been punctuated by long and awkward pauses where neither of them spoke.

"I heard from Hughes that you wouldn't be coming with us to Dublith," Ed began.

"… Yes," Albedo replied. "I still have unfinished business in Central. I've requested more transcripts from Sheska to see if I can find any more information about chimeras."

"I see," Ed's eyes darted around, as if searching for anything to look at besides Albedo's eyes.

"I apologize—"

"Sorry—"

Both paused, trying not to speak over the other. "Should I speak first?" Albedo tried.

Ed made a casual hand gesture of agreement.

So Albedo spoke. "I apologize. It was not my original intention to be dishonest or hide anything for you or Al. There is just… a lengthy explanation, and the information may be quite… sensitive in current circumstances."

Ed snickered, rolling his eyes. "That was way too long and formal."

Albedo tilted his head. "Was it?"

"Yeah," Ed leaned on one foot, crossing his arms. "You could just have said 'Sorry' and I probably would have forgiven you anyways. Like this." He took a deep breath. "Sorry. I was rude and angry at you recently for almost no reason." He shuffled his feet. "See?"

"Was that an apology, or an example?"

"Just—" Ed sputtered. "Treat it as an example or something! I'm leaving."

"In your hospital gown?" Albedo pointed out.

"Not leaving the hospital, dumbass," Ed snarked. "Just going back to the room."

"Understood," Albedo replied.

Ed turned to walk back, but stopped. "Are you sure you don't want to come with us to Dublith? I mean, I understand if you don't want to, it is our alchemy teacher after all."

Albedo remained silent, so Ed continued, albeit awkwardly, with a hand rubbing the back on his neck sheepishly. "I just thought— never mind, uh…"

Golden eyes, golden hair, and a tendency to tiptoe around the topic of an alchemy teacher. Albedo remembered then that yes, he had told Al about Rhinedottir. And Ed…

"Meeting your alchemy teacher would be… nice," Albedo admitted quietly. He'd made peace with Rhinedottir's sudden absence long ago, and he himself had taught alchemy for years— seeing another perspective on learning and teaching could be insightful. "I would have to meet you there, though. I did already request those transcripts from Sheska, after all."

"Great! I mean, good," Ed smiled uncertainly. "She's kind of terrifying, but she's one of the smartest and strongest people I know."

"I see," Albedo said, for lack of anything better to respond with.

"Well." Ed turned around without stopping this time. "Good night, Albedo. See you in Dublith."

"… See you in Dublith," Albedo smiled.

"Looks like I'll be going to Dublith after all."

Hughes hummed. "You don't look upset at all."

"Why would I be?" Albedo flipped a page in his book.

A companionable silence settled between them.

"Are you leaving with the brothers tomorrow, then?"

Albedo shook his head. "I'll meet them in Dublith after a few days more in Central— Sheska owes me a few transcripts."

Hughes snickered. "She's working beyond overtime at this point. Maybe I should give her a few more days off."

Albedo lightly exhaled. Hughes recognized it by now as the alchemist's own way of subtly laughing. "Perhaps if time allows tomorrow, I can help lighten her workload somewhat."

"Don't worry about it," Hughes waved a hand nonchalantly. "Focus on what you need to focus on; we can handle it."

Albedo looked at Hughes with half-lidded skeptical eyes, and Hughes failed to stifle a chuckle. "Sheska can definitely handle it, in any case. She's a smart girl!"

Nina was pouting.

Albedo hadn't spent much time with her lately, and though Gracia was very nice and Elicia was adorable, she missed her brother's silent company.

"I can't go with you today?" She whined.

"No," Albedo shook his head. "It would be terribly boring. I'm sorry, Nina."

And he always apologized for not being with her, but she didn't want an apology. Apologies were just words, and words didn't always mean much to the ones who said them.

She made a noise of displeasure in the back of her throat, frowning. "I promise I won't bother your work if I come along…"

"I know."

Albedo knelt down so that their eyes met. Nina didn't usually like looking into people's faces— even though some tried to hide it, she could tell that they looked at her differently, looked down on her in a way that she hadn't experienced before she'd changed.

There was never any sort of disgust or disdain in Albedo's face. If she looked closely enough, she could sometimes even make out a smile in the minute curvature of his lips or the slight narrowing of his eyes. She liked his eyes. Albedo had very pretty eyes.

"If you're not here, who will watch over and play with Elicia?" Albedo stroked her hair gently. "If you really want to come watch me read for a whole day, I won't stop you, but you can do more here."

As if to prove his point, Elicia, just out a warm hug from her father, giddily toddler over to hold onto Nina.

Nina continued pouting, even though the feeling of Albedo's hand on her head had long dispelled her loneliness and worry. "Fine," she acquiesced, "but come home early tonight, 'kay?"

Albedo nodded, and stood, turning to Winry. "Send my regards to the brothers, please. Safe travels."

Winry bowed. "Thank you for helping Ed and Al. And thank you so much, Mr. Hughes, for everything."

Hughes grinned. "Don't worry about it. Be sure to call whenever you're in Central, okay? You can always find a home here. I'm sure Elicia will miss her second older sister lots."

"Of course!" Winry smiled.

"Here's the next transcript you requested, Mr. Kreideprinz," Sheska held out a pile of paper.

"Thank you," Albedo said without looking up, eyes still poring over a page. "Please leave it on the table."

It was almost eerie how well he fit into Hughes's office space, Sheska noted, placing down the papers. He worked with an efficiency that Sheska greatly envied, able to multitask reading and processing information while giving and taking instructions. If Sheska could have done that, she probably wouldn't have been fired from the First Library.

"Oi," Hughes called from his desk on the other side of the room. "Don't forget to drink some water! You've been at it for a while."

Albedo finished the page and set it down, pushing his chair back and stretching in a smooth and practiced motion. "Thank you for the reminder."

Sheska took a peek at the notepad next to the papers. It was filled to the brim with scribbled notes and revised alchemy circles that she didn't recognize.

If Albedo saw her poking around, he made no comment. "How is your work going?" He turned to Hughes.

"Fine," Hughes hummed nonchalantly. "I just need to…"

"Colonel," Hughes's subordinate opened the door. "Here's the newspaper."

Hughes spun around with a grin. "Thank you!"

"Is that part of your work?" Albedo deadpanned.

"It's called keeping up with current events," Hughes sang, wagging a finger as if he were a wise old man giving profound advice. "It's useful, you know. Lots of scary stuff happening in the world… like the Liore insurgency?" He pointed to a passage in the newspaper.

"Yes, there was a new religion, "Letoism" or whatever, that was suckering the people," Hughes's subordinate elaborated. "Seems like it's finally under control."

"Between Ishval and the insurgencies, the East is having a rough time of it, huh?" Hughes hummed pensively.

"Not just the East," the man replied. "There are uprisings and border skirmishes in the north and west as well."

"The bodies are piling up all over, aren't they… the government might just be overthrown before long," Hughes mused.

Suddenly, his eyes narrowed sharply.

"Colonel?"

"I'm heading to the archive room," Hughes said, standing.

Hughes prided himself on being sharp. Not necessarily smart or intelligent— that was for the genius young alchemists to be, like Roy, or Albedo, or the Elric brothers. Those were the ones who were truly gifted, granted the ability to process, understand, and store information that Hughes probably couldn't even fathom. Those were the ones who soaked up any and all knowledge right before their eyes that they could.

Hughes did not envy them. He knew where his strengths laid, and in supporting them, he knew that he would pick up the details they sometimes missed, put together the pieces that they sometimes dropped.

Something like this— why did he have to be the first person to discover this though?

It was coincidental. He'd planned to let sleeping dogs lie concerning the Philosopher's Stone conspiracy since that morning when the Fuhrer had come to personally warn them. The newspaper and his experiences in Ishval just happened to intersect with border skirmishes and battles, and now he couldn't unsee it; the circular map of Amestris had burned itself into his mind.

It was coincidental, and yet all the pieces had fallen together as if fate itself had entrusted Hughes with this forbidden knowledge.

Overwhelming dread engulfed him. He knew danger. He had known danger for the better part of his life, joining the army as a young man, training to kill, joining the front lines or Ishval among mass-murdering human weapons. At least then, he'd had the reassurance that the danger was as far as could be from his dear fiancé.

Now, he had a wife and daughter. His best friend was working up the chain of command, and a young girl and alchemist, both of whom he cared for as deeply as if they were his own, lived under his roof. He could not afford to be in the danger he would now inevitably find himself in.

He felt dread, and yet a traitorous bit of relief. He was the one to discover this first, and not the Elrics, or Albedo.

None of the boys were naive or unqualified to handle this, by any means. But the fact that they would probably be able to lift this knowledge onto their own shoulders with little regard to their own wellbeing was in and of itself the reason why Hughes hopes they would never have to know. They shouldn't have to carry the weight of a nation's future on their shoulders. Not at their age.

This was exactly why, even as Albedo shot him a questioning glance from across the office, Hughes left the room silently.

Albedo was deeply entrenched in this conspiracy already, and would certainly have to know eventually. Albedo was mature. Unusually so, for his apparent age. He would have handled the knowledge well, surely. Despite this, Hughes wanted with all his heart— wanted so much that it hurt sometimes— for Albedo to have a sense of normalcy while he was under his wing.

He knew exactly where the large national map in the archive room was, even in the dark, with only the light of the hallway to guide him. He hastily fished it off a shelf and laid it flat on the table.

Liore. Uprisings. The Philosopher's Stone, which used live humans as ingredients. The Ishval War, a circle for each incident over the circular map…

Alchemy is always about circles and symmetry, Roy had once told him.

There was a single moment of blissful silence in his mind as it refused to process the implications of the map before him, and then a rush. Everything, at once— the nation was how many years old and so near-perfectly circular still, they'd sent him and their soldiers to quell all these uprisings— did they know what they were doing? Someone had to. Someone high enough in the chain of command to direct entire legions of troops towards these bloodbaths—

The door that he'd left open clicked shut.

Albedo reorganized the pile of papers on his desk, setting them down before adjusting his chair.

"That's the third time you've done that," Sheska pointed out.

Albedo knew. "Is it?" he asked anyways.

It was already a few minutes past 8 pm. He and Hughes had agreed to leave the office early today per Nina and Elicia's request, so whatever Hughes had to do in the archive room could not have taken long.

Seven minutes and counting had already passed.

Albedo stood. "I'm going to go look for Hughes."

"That's a nice tattoo you got there," Hughes smiled humorlessly.

Lust smirked coyly. "You know too much, Lieutenant Colonel Hughes."

Albedo didn't have a breath to hitch when he saw the trail of blood leading away from the archive room. Instead, he froze to his core. He felt the heart in his chest stop; the chill of Dragonspine bit his skin and he felt a force akin to sudden lurch jar him even though he was not moving.

Visceral terror struck him like a thunderbolt.

Albedo did not believe in intuition. Hughes was in danger. He could point out each and every exact aspect that led to the single conclusion, anything from the large droplets of blood on the ground that had to have fallen after dripping down his arm to the smear of crimson on the wall that Hughes had likely leaned his bloodied shoulder on.

He could have and his brain was naturally inclined to so he did even though no one was there, but there was no time because it was Hughes's blood and Hughes was supposed to be glasses and kind grins and jokes, a neat blue uniform or clean pressed black suit and never red, never the color of blood, and he was getting ahead of himself—

Where was Hughes?

Albedo immediately dashed after the trail of blood.

The dim and warm yellow light of the nearby street lamp did nothing to subside Hughes's shivers. The blood loss was inevitably catching up to his body, even though coursing adrenaline was doing its best to keep it at bay.

"This is Eastern Command Center," the voice on the line said steadily.

"Put me through… to Colonel Roy Mustang," he panted, but did not hesitate. He trusted Roy more than anyone in the world; surely Roy would know what to do.

"We have a rule against connecting external lines," the voice shot back with far more levity than Hughes can handle right now.

"This is Lt. Colonel Hughes, in Central!" He snapped. "I'm calling from outside because it's an emergency!"

"Your code, please."

Hughes grunted in frustration as he fumbled for his pocketbook. "Uncle, sugar, Oliver, eight, zero, zero!"

"Code confirmed. Please wait a moment," the receptionist intoned.

There was no way to convey over the phone just how urgent this one call connection was. "Hurry up!" He roared into the receiver, even though the receptionist was probably already connecting him to Roy. "The military is in trouble!"

There. The telephone booth— Albedo finally caught sight of Hughes.

And behind him, a familiar but not quite her face raised a blue-uniformed arm with a gun in hand—

"Stop!" Albedo quickly shouted the first word that came to mind, stepped forward, his sword in one hand and the golden sparks of Khemia's golden stone flower alchemy already swirling in his other palm, poised to unleash the alchemy of the abyss upon his adversary.

Hughes turned to him with wide alarmed eyes first and then the sound of a cocking gun behind him drew his attention.

"Put the phone down," the image of Maria Ross threatened with a deadly smile on her face.

"Put the gun down," Albedo threatened coldly in turn, "and drop the disguise."

Hughes chanced a slow look behind him, at the lieutenant's too-wide smile that was much more like a smirking sneer. "Oh?" The voice unnervingly deepened to a playful voice that was decidedly not the lieutenant's. "How could you tell, chalk alchemist?"

"Lieutenant Maria Ross has a mole under her eye," Albedo spoke too quickly, and despite his steady voice, his panic was evident. "Now step away from the telephone booth, Envy."

"Man, I thought I got it perfect, too," Envy laughed in a sinisterly chipper sort of cackle, not at all fazed by Albedo's battle-ready stance. He tapped his cheek and with shuffling skin and red lightning, a mole materialized. "Is that better?"

Hughes gasped, but Albedo was far more concerned with the immediate danger than the revelation of Envy's ability. "Step away from the telephone booth," Albedo reiterated, louder this time. "You'll be making an enemy of me."

"Aw, how cute," Envy crooned mockingly. "The chalk alchemist actually cares. But no," they shrugged, "I don't think I will. He knows too much— ah-ah, you shouldn't move either— these guns are awfully easy to misfire, you know."

Envy could tell the exact moment that the chalk alchemist realized that the situation was entirely out of his hands. In a shockingly human way, his unshakeable teal eyes just widened, and Envy could so easily see the sheer terror in them.

But the alchemist was as foolhardy as the older Elric, and the odd golden light of his alchemy did not recede as he spoke, trying to reason.

"… Please don't do this," he tried.

Envy barked a throaty laugh. "Do you realize how desperate you sound right now? You could kill me right now and you wouldn't, just because you're so pathetically human," he spat the world with as much vitriol as he could muster. "You should be above this. I don't know what the others see in you beyond the whole chalk—"

Albedo could see, against the faint glow of the street lamp, the glint of the small knife in Hughes's hand.

He met eyes with Hughes. There was an unspoken determination there— a rueful smile on his lips, a blink that Envy couldn't see, a signal Albedo couldn't understand but inferred enough of to know that Hughes was not going to just stand there helplessly and be shot.

Albedo's eyes widened. "Please don't do this," he pleaded, because at least while they were in a standstill, Hughes was safe and even though Albedo didn't know how to proceed from there, a standstill would give his mind time, time enough to think and figure out a way to control the situation.

To the backdrop of Envy's monologue, Albedo could see Hughes hesitate. Albedo could see his breath hitch and his smile fall.

But then Hughes smiled again. Reassuringly this time. It will be okay, the smile said.

Albedo did not feel like it would be, no,

But at once, three things happened.

Before Envy finished speaking, Hughes whirled around with a small throwing knife wedged between his index and middle fingers and the force of a hurricane in his spin as he jabbed the knife right into the eye of the false Maria Ross,

Albedo slammed his palm swirling with potent golden energy into the ground and the waiting alchemical power exploded into four-petaled flowers of earth beneath Envy's feet that blustered the homunculus with a mineral storm,

And a single gunshot reverberated into the silent night.

The connected telephone line beeped imperceptibly.

Hughes slumped onto the ground silently.

Envy's eye crackled with unheard red alchemical lightning and even as they writhed in pain and tore the knife from their face, their mouth opened in a too-wide laugh.

Albedo couldn't hear. His ears rang like they would after Klee threw one of her bombs too close.

Albedo's body moved before his mind did, dashing to Hughes's side, slashing out with his sword towards the homunculus still standing there.

Envy dodged easily. Their acerbic voice was too crisp in the deafening silence. "Look at you now! Where's your calm demeanor? Where's the cold stare? You're weak."

When Albedo's mind caught up, the alchemy was already ready, swirling in his palm once more as he swiped a hand out and called forth Tectonic Tide with all the might he had left in him.

Even without hearing Envy's screech, and even leaned over Hughes's body trying to discern the damage, Albedo knew his attack had hit, in the same instinctual way one knew when a sword struck someone.

Envy retreated and Albedo stamped down the rising frazzled sensation in his chest. Assess the damage, stop the bleeding if you can, bring to the deaconess or the Church of Favonius if severe, bring to a Statue of Seven if not because Barbatos will bless those who live on his land—

The realization hit him like a lawachurl's heavy swing that he was not in Teyvat, that medical procedures in Teyvat were beyond outdated to Amestris, that Statues of the Seven and the Church of Favonius and healing magic did not exist here, that his knowledge was utterly and completely useless and—

"…Albedo," Hughes gasped. "…the phone."

Albedo grabbed the handle of the receiver dangling a few feet away, moving as little as he possibly could from Hughes, and pressed it to his ear.

Oh, he realized with a detached sense of fascination, I'm shaking.

"Hughes? Are you there? Hello? Hughes?" Roy Mustang called.

"The nation…" Hughes breathed, voice struggling to come out as if every word cost an insurmountable amount of effort, "Philosopher's Stone…"

"He's injured," Albedo said, because what else was there to say? Or perhaps there was just too much to say (and he hated that word, 'too', there was too much uncertainty, too much relativity, never any precision but there was also no time for precision right now) and he didn't know how else to get to the point in a coherent manner.

"Who is this?" Mustang's voice became instantly alarmed.

"Albedo," he answered quietly, quickly, "Hughes was shot, and I can't— I don't—" the words didn't want to form even though he knew them to be true, "I don't know what to do—"

"Take a deep breath. Where are you right now?" Mustang asked steadily.

Albedo did not take a deep breath because he did not breathe; if he inhaled and felt air on his lungs that were so unaccustomed to breathing, it would be jarring and he needed every bit of his awareness right now. "A telephone booth— the stone path outside of his office, five minutes, near the park," his eyes darted from landmark to landmark.

"Okay," Mustang sighed, failing to disguise how harried he was himself, "Here's what you're going to do. Hang up, call 112, state your name and state alchemist title, and tell them that Lt. Colonel Maes Hughes has been shot. Tell them your location and they'll send an ambulance— do not move from where you are, and make sure Hughes stays conscious."

"Okay," Albedo paused, recollecting his bearings. "Okay."

The night passed in a flurry of lights and voices and instructions and questions.

Somehow, Albedo's coat managed to remain completely unblemished through everything.

Albedo didn't bleed blood, after all, and any of his wounds could be easily sealed with alchemy. His jacket could only be stained with the blood of others. Perhaps it was at least somewhat fortuitous that it was not stained with Hughes's blood.

Albedo was the Chalk Prince. The Kreidprinz. Albedo had been taught alchemy and science, how to understand the fibers of existence that dictated the world, since his very creation. He'd been taught to analyze every detail of every sense, to take what he saw and heard and smelled and catalogue it carefully such that he would always be in control or at least aware of every energy, of every life, of every being.

"Albedo?" Gracia's voice. Gracia's voice shook, and shaking implied fear, anxiety, uncertainty.

Awareness became control. Control became comfort. In the process of this metamorphosis, knowledge facilitated the change from a piece of information to an action, from an action to a consequence. Nothing happened by coincidence, no judgement should be made on baseless intuition, every situation must have a solution.

"Albedo." Gracia's voice again, firmer, louder, implying worry, concern, still lingering nervousness.

"I couldn't do anything," Albedo whispered.

Why, he wondered, did those words, which were so unnecessary to him in this moment, come so easily now?

"I was there, and I was unable to prevent it," Albedo whispered again.

If he had spent less time analyzing the archive room, he would have arrived sooner. He could have watched Hughes's back as Hughes made the call. If he had sprinted faster, if he had attacked before Envy could lift their arm and the gun to Hughes's back, if he had exchanged his cooperation for Hughes's safety—

"Albedo."

Contact against his arms, an embrace. The warmth almost burned to the touch against his freezing skin, and first he flinched, but it was Gracia.

Soothed by Gracia's lulling voice (still shaking, still scared and worried, but calming and quiet and a reminder of warm lamps after a night of too many sounds), Albedo leaned.

The world tilted a few degrees, and seemed to right itself at the same time.

"I'm sorry," he whispered.

Chapter Text

The circle of life and death was a ceaseless and irreversible cycle, integral to the universe, to the self, and to alchemy.

This was the first of many things Albedo would learn about alchemy. It was also the first law of many to be stretched and broken.

To use Khemia was to understand life and death on a deeply scientific level. Biology accounted, perhaps, for life, but Khemia was the study of life's perpetuation and revival in circumstances where it was not allowed. It was the art of grasping at warm tendrils of what life should have been and dragging from it the wraiths that would be able to tough the unrelenting darkness of the abyss.

Rhinedottir never asked if Albedo understood. It was expected of him to understand. In the lifespans upon lifespans Albedo had witnessed, he was no stranger to death. Knowing it was the key to pulling life from its brink, the key to Albedo's birth and Albedo's creations.

He watched with scientific intrigue and observance as the energy of life faded from one of the many glass-caged creatures of his teacher's laboratory. He would not know what the word "brother" meant for many ages to come.

He would not experience what the death of a loved one would feel like for many more ages to come.

Albedo's fingertips itched from remnants of the alchemical formations that had failed to protect Hughes. Albedo had seen his skin lose color, his lifeblood spill onto the pavement, viscous and crimson and deadly. Albedo had felt the way Hughes's heartbeat had faded, growing fainter and fainter.

It was nothing like when Rhinedottir had left him. When she'd left, it had been abrupt. One day, his teacher's heartbeat had been there, and the next moment, upon waking, it had disappeared, replaced by something foreign thrumming in his own chest.

But he would still hear her, even as he descended the snowy mountain and new voices threatened to flush out the sound. He'd still heard her heartbeat, the still and steady sound consistent like clockwork. He'd heard echoes of her voice etched into the condemning words of her letter: "Find the truth of this world."

He'd never heard Rhinedottir's heartbeat fade. Perhaps part of it had stayed with him, in his own chest, so that he could never escape from it. Perhaps it had been irrevocably engraved into his mind. Perhaps the knowledge that Rhinedottir was still somewhere in that world, wandering, taking notes, researching, meant that he'd never felt the full pain of her sudden absence. He'd known it was imminent anyways; she'd always told him she would leave him if he failed.

Had he failed? Find the truth and meaning of this world. Surely when a parent told their child such a thing, they meant for that child to live happily. He'd found happiness, and then had chosen to favor unknown knowledge of a brand new world above it— because knowledge too was a joy that Albedo could not sacrifice, for all of his principles. And then, within this unknown world, he had found happiness once more, and yet it slipped through his fingers like the particles of chalk that bled from his wounds. It faded from his grasp just like Hughes's heartbeat, which grew fainter and fainter and fainter.

Hughes's heartbeat had faded in a way that Rhinedottir's hadn't. Albedo felt mind-numbing fear.

Somehow, he always managed to fail. Fail to protect those he loved, fail to obtain information he needed, fail to live up to Rhinedottir's final wishes.

Gracia's embrace was warm.

There was something unfamiliar about hugs, Albedo pondered.

Embraces were not a common occurrence for him— embraces that were long, that spoke volumes and multitudes of meanings beyond what words could convey. Klee had oft opted for tugging on his coat or his hand, or begging for piggyback rides. Alice had ruffled his hair, leaving platinum blond strands in gravity-defying directions. Rhinedottir had taken those flawless strands of chalk turned hair and plaited them neatly behind his head. Rhinedottir had never quite embraced him, but still he remembered her touch as vividly as he remembered the feeling of snow crunching under his boots.

Hugs were dictated by an underlying ocean of known and unknown biological information and anatomy. Motor control called for the arms to lift and wrap around a figure, and muscles moved in accordance with the mind's design.

Albedo had always found hugs foreign. Perhaps it was the way that human arms couldn't seem to bend correctly around his rigid chalk form, or maybe the way his own arms could never quite find comfort in any position around someone else.

Unlike Klee's quick and flitting holds and Alice's burningly bright squeezes, Gracia's embrace didn't pinch at his sides or constrict his arms. It was something gentle, with the precision and tenderness of a potter tending to a fragile piece of something precious. She held him like he might shatter if she held too tight. (She hugged him like Rhinedottir never had.)

Her heartbeat, slow, quiet, painfully human, reached his ears, overlapping with the echoes in his ears of Hughes's fading pulse. Eventually, it overtook the echoes, bringing something like calm back to Albedo's head.

Gracia was alive. Gracia was alive, and they were in the hospital, the waiting room, with a slowly ticking clock and the subtly stinging smell of something sterile surrounding them. The world moved around him, people speaking, people breathing, people living.

Human heartbeats were special, Albedo had thought from the moment he'd first stepped foot in Mondstadt's walls. They rose and fell, sang joy and sorrow, sped like flapping wings of a small bird and slowed with silent restful nights. They were nothing like his own, too consistent and steady like the pendulum of the grandfather clock in the Knights' Grandmaster's office.

Human heartbeats were beautiful, yet they faded in and out of his consciousness, in and out of life, with frankly alarming speed. Humans were only mortal. Hughes was only mortal, Gracia was only mortal, Elicia and dear Nina and Edward and all of them were, in the end, only mortal.

Ah. Perhaps this was what Alice had meant, when she'd asked if living in Mondstadt was difficult, with a knowing gaze in her eyes that Albedo had not understood then.

Albedo, with his hundreds of years' worth of understanding in Khemia, really knew nothing of death.

When Gracia pulled away, the hospital's waiting room with its uncomfortable leather chairs and quietly ticking clock joined his senses with a brief moment of unsettling and abrupt clarity.

"Albedo?" She looked at him with red-rimmed eyes. Albedo could see the tear tracks leading down to her chin as she spoke quietly. "Are you okay?"

He opened his mouth to say he was fine— his physical form had come out of the ordeal completely unscathed, not a single particle of chalk displaced, not a single thread of his coat marred— but this was not the answer Gracia was looking for. Without speaking, Albedo closed his mouth again.

Gracia seemed to understand what he meant, her lips pulling into a thin near-frown, eyebrows tightened in concern. She thankfully did not question Albedo's lack of response.

Above all, Gracia seemed tired. Exhaustion etched lines under her eyes to match the tear tracks, and Albedo felt a pang of guilt. Whether it was because he had failed to protect Hughes, or because he did not seem capable of shedding tears for Hughes, or because Gracia had had to pull him out of his stupor just now, Albedo did not know.

Her eyes did not stray from his for a single moment, even as he searched his mind for something to say to her.

I couldn't do anything— but that wasn't what Gracia wanted to hear. I should have done more, been quicker, been smarter— but that wasn't quite it, either, was it?

The crux of the issue was that Hughes had been struck down by, as of yet, an invisible enemy. An enemy that he and Edward had drawn out with their search for the Philosopher's Stone, an enemy they had been warned to be careful with, that they had not shown due caution and delicacy. An enemy Albedo had fought, insulted, potentially provoked.

Edward was perhaps blissfully unaware of the consequences of their investigation, but Albedo knew.

If it weren't for them involving Hughes in the mess they'd tangled themselves into the moment they'd broken into the Fifth Laboratory, then Hughes would no doubt be home right now, sleeping in his own bed after having read Elicia a bedtime story and kissed his wife good night.

"It was my fault," Albedo finally said, and he meant it. His fault for causing it, his fault for not having prevented it. Perhaps he couldn't claim fault for what was out of his control, for Envy's actions and Hughes's last struggle, but he was a scientist nonetheless; he should've been able to predict it, if not control it.

"Nonsense," Gracia rebuked immediately, hardly giving Albedo's words a thought. "Don't say that."

"It was," Albedo insisted, frustrated. "You don't understand; if I hadn't involved him—"

"Don't presume that I can't understand," Gracia admonished sharply. "I may not have a scientist's intellect or a soldier's training, but I am not completely clueless."

"... I'm sorry." Albedo looked away.

Gracia sighed audibly, her shoulders falling with the action. "I know. My husband got himself into something dangerous, didn't he? If he chose to shoulder it, he had his reasons. He is kind."

She rested a shaking hand on Albedo's glove. "Be kinder to yourself. If not for yourself, then for the kindness he's shown you."

Albedo nodded hesitantly.

The early morning saw the sky painted a clean dark blue, too dark to be called day, yet not black enough to be considered night.

Sunrise, soon, would come and replace the blue sky with a canvas of reds and yellows, giving way to bright blue and white clouds. Now was a transient moment of complete and pure silence, when the whole world seemed asleep. There was something beautiful about this moment, on the precipice of night and sunrise, that no one else was conscious to witness.

A few hours ago, Albedo had shrugged off his white coat and draped it over a sleeping Gracia's shoulders.

It had withstood the harsh eternal Dragonspine winter, and could hopefully provide some warmth to her, even though Albedo knew the chill was not why she shivered in her sleep.

And Albedo, meanwhile… Albedo thought. He wasn't entirely certain how the night had passed, the vast majority of it blending into a sort of blur as he looked back on it.

He had to have thought. In silence and alone in consciousness, there would have been nothing else to do, certainly. There were only dead ends in his mind though, trails that had gone unchecked and spiraled back into themselves only to end pointlessly— stoichiometric calculations for transmutations of no practical purpose, strings of elements and the transformations that led them into each other, plant classifications and the nutrients they would require to survive in Dragonspine conditions. Everything and nothing at all.

He was unused to doing nothing.

There was nothing he could do. Hughes's life was out of his hands and in the care of professionals, people who had studied a field of science that scarcely existed in Albedo's knowledge of Teyvat. There were few medical applications of alchemy, and even knowing they existed, they had been of lesser value to the Knights of Favonius than Albedo's other research.

Albedo was out of his depth, no longer the expert. Naturally, the only thing he could do was make himself an expert, and yet he had not moved an inch the entire night. It would have been pointless; libraries and bookstores had been closed and much too far for Albedo to simply walk to them.

So he sat. And now it was early morning.

He did not feel tired.

Maes was alive.

"Unfortunately, he shows no signs of regaining consciousness anytime soon," the doctor relayed solemnly to Gracia. "We don't know when he'll wake up, but his life is no longer in danger."

"Thank goodness," Gracia cried, in the softly reverent and relieved way only someone grieving could. "Thank goodness."

"Your husband is a very lucky man. If he'd arrived any later, he would've…" the doctor rubbed his neck sheepishly. "Well. No need to say it, I guess."

Gracia looked towards the young alchemist, who remained seated nearby, watching her wordlessly and expressionlessly, eyes not even lidded by any sleepiness. She'd learned somewhere along knowing him that even if his face betrayed none of his thoughts, his actions spoke volumes of his sentiments.

She tugged his surprisingly comfortable white coat closer around her frame and wondered if he'd closed his eyes any longer than a few minutes that night.

"Very lucky indeed," she nodded.

Hughes was alive.

Hughes was in danger.

Overwhelming guilt crushed by a crashing wave of relief gave way to alarming caution ringing in his head. The world around him seemed to phase in and out of his awareness as each emotion sapped something out of him, ripped the energy from his limbs and left him more exhausted than climbing a Dragonspine cliff would have.

Hughes was alive.

There were no words heavy enough to describe the gravity of death, Albedo thought. It was irrevocable, necessary, and dictated by the natural order of the world. It was meant to happen in its own time, and not at the discretion of any human, lest they step into the garden of the gods.

Albedo may not have understood death the way Alice had hoped he would (painful beyond measure, tearing a part out of him, terrifying and inevitable), but Albedo knew it intimately regardless, in the most scientific and clinical way he could. Albedo knew exactly how irreversible it was, and exactly how much and little he could pull life against its grain.

If Hughes had died, Albedo knew that he would have been able to do exactly nothing about it.

If Hughes had died, he would have had to carry with him the weight of another one he cared for lost, the weight of Gracia's and Elicia's sadness, the weight of a home rendered empty and solemn indirectly by Albedo's own hands.

But Hughes was alive, and injury was reversible with time.

Albedo hadn't failed them yet. His hands clenched involuntarily at his sides.

But Envy had meant to kill, and Albedo had no illusions of the fact that they only hadn't succeeded because they had let their guard down and taken their time to taunt Albedo. In the haze of everything going on the night before, Albedo had nearly forgotten (Albedo did not forget. He couldn't forget things, even if he wanted to; his mind was designed as the pinnacle of alchemy).

They'd tried to kill Hughes twice. Once in the storage room when Hughes had stood up and went to check something, once at the telephone booth, likely having failed in the storage room. The homunculi were able to infiltrate the office building. They would certainly have no trouble infiltrating a hospital that, unlike Hughes's office building, had no soldiers roving its halls.

There was no telling when they might come back to finish the job. Albedo was his last defense. Albedo, who could recognize Envy by alchemical resonance, Albedo, who could sense when any homunculi were nearby. He alone was capable of protecting Hughes, making sure the life that had been tenderly pulled back from the clutches of death was not pushed back into its arms.

Gracia gestured with a welcoming outheld hand and a sad smile. "Come on, Albedo. Let's go home."

Albedo, feet planted in the ground, silently shook his head.

Gracia's face fell in acute sadness— that wasn't the right word for it, disappointment— and Albedo averted his gaze from her searching green eyes.

"Are you sure?" She asked quietly. "Nina's waiting for you."

A still moment passed in the early morning's silence. Albedo stood, unable to respond, frozen to his spot.

He opened his mouth to say something. He wanted to go home and see Nina. He wanted to sink into the bed he'd grown accustomed to, wanted to sketch and take solace in deft control of paper and pencil, in old and new worlds, images of familiar and reassuring faces.

And then closed it. He couldn't.

Gracia retracted her hand.

"I'll be back with some food then. Get some rest, okay?"

Rest did not come, nor did Albedo wish for it to come.

Sitting still and stewing in his thoughts made the world an unintelligible haze that unsettled Albedo to no end, but sleep would bring far worse agony.

Albedo's mind was not designed for mindlessly sitting around for hours on end, with nothing to accompany it but a vast disarray of thoughts tangled with the memory or experience of… pain. Or was it grief? Albedo did not know what to call it, only observed that it was not settling in his mind and fading with time as other emotions usually did.

At first, Albedo had considered closing his eyes and resting, as Gracia had recommended. Travels with his teacher and later, long Dragonspine nights rife with the threat of hilichurl attacks, had taught him to sleep lightly. He could certainly awaken if anyone or anything came into the room.

A little known fact of Albedo's mind, however, was that in sleep, he did not dream. He did not conjure the fantastical images or outlandish scenarios that only unconsciousness could foster. He remembered, replayed the day's eminent events, and reorganized his mind.

He only closed his eyes for a few seconds before the ghost of a gunshot rang in his ears, a thud following shortly. Envy's cackling, alchemical crackling, stone striking against stone as Tectonic Tide manifested—

He opened his eyes before the mental image had any time to form.

He did not want to relive it so soon.

Now there was nothing to occupy his time with, besides a pronounced task of protecting Hughes from further harm. A task of unparalleled stagnancy, paired with conflicting tension and anticipation.

Would the homunculi return within the hour? The day? Wait a week? It was unrealistic and irresponsible for Albedo to expect to protect Hughes alone, and rationally, he knew this. Rationally though, he was the only one with a unique capability to sense homunculi. Rationally, he was functionally unable to die so long as he remained at a state within his capacity to restore himself.

Albedo did not allow himself to dwell on the irrationality of his actions, lest he dredge up musings on the ambiguity of his humanity that were better left for another time.

(Hughes mattered to him, more than Albedo could describe. Hughes, who he'd hardly known for a month, Hughes, who opened up his home to him, Hughes, who gushed happily over his wife and daughter and Nina. Albedo knew there were lengths he would go to for Klee, and to a lesser degree, the Knights and Alice, that he would not even consider for the average Mondstadtian. He knew he'd become affectionate in Rhinedottir's absence. He did not know just how much he cared— that is to say, beyond measure.)

The sun rose outside the curtains, and the long day began.

Albedo looked up unblinking as the door opened, relaxing minutely when he saw Gracia. He didn't feel Envy's presence, but did not think to check her appearance for abnormalities anyways. Gracia was… Gracia.

For some reason, it was almost unthinkable to imagine Envy disguising as her. Regardless, if Envy did ever try, Albedo had no doubt that they would be unable to replicate the way she smiled, or the way her eyes crinkled at the edges when she looked affectionately towards her family.

"I brought some breakfast," she held up a basket. "Did you rest at all?"

"A bit," Albedo lied. Though he had not slept a wink, Gracia didn't need to know.

She took a seat and handed him a carefully wrapped breakfast sandwich, which Albedo gratefully accepted, realizing that he hadn't eaten since lunch yesterday. He chewed slowly, savoring each bite of Gracia's home-cooking.

As he gradually finished his meal, Gracia took out a blue blanket and mini sewing kit to occupy her time.

They sat in calm silence for a moment or two. The steady movement of Gracia's arm pulling thread through fabric repeatedly caught the corner of Albedo's vision.

Then, Gracia straightened in her seat. "I nearly forgot," she dug into the basket, where a sliver of Albedo's sketchbook poked out of the basket. It had clearly been handled with care, placed in such a way that the corners couldn't be damaged or bent. Gracia took it out with the same care treating it as if it was a precious item.

Gracia held it steadily towards Albedo. "I thought you might be bored, so I brought you your sketchbook. There were a few on the desk, but this was the one I saw you drawing in most often, so I hope it's the right one."

Ah. This was the sketchbook that he'd drawn pictures of Mondstadt in, the one with landscapes and city scenes and portraits of friends.

He tenderly took it from Gracia's hands.

Albedo flipped through the pages, taking in each of his creations. His memories, crafted in charcoal and deposited onto paper. His home, his works, concentrated into a book.

Albedo didn't realize when he had begun smiling, whether it was when he pressed a finger to the depicted alchemy table in the city, or when he traced out the shape of Klee's elfen ears.

The pictures of home settled his thoughts and washed away the tension from his shoulders. They carried with them the melancholy of something dear left behind, but the stronger association of warm and lively memories, of learning and growth and comfort.

This too, was something Albedo had tried fiercely to protect and fallen in love with in the process. This too, was something beautiful that Albedo hoped to maintain.

"Thank you," he whispered, still entranced.

Gracia smiled.

"Which came first?" Alice had once asked him. "The chicken or the egg?"

An illogical question, Albedo had decided. It was of little consequence which came first, because it was, on their timescales, a cycle which had no beginning or end. Theoretically, the evolutionary ancestors of the chicken had come first, but that was irrelevant to them.

"Ah, but there's the rub," Alice had giggled. "I'm not talking about a literal chicken and egg." She'd held up her hands, grinning. "Is it the chicken's duty to tend to and cherish the egg, or did the chicken arise from destroying the protective shell of its egg?"

"I don't see what you mean," Albedo had said. "It still doesn't matter."

"Well," Alice had crossed her arms. "There can only be one, since that's how the question is framed. If the chicken comes first, then it's a simple matter of protecting the egg. But if the chicken comes from the egg, then it is truly alone, having arisen from destroying the shell that housed and nourished it."

"So, I ask again. Which came first? Did the chicken love and protect the egg first? Or did the egg tenderly and unknowingly rear a creature that would one day destroy it?"

Albedo did not draw anything new, afraid that devoting his time to drawing would divert his attention from the task at hand, to protect Hughes. In any case, he'd drawn everything he'd wanted to in this book already.

He and Gracia sat in companionable, if slightly tense silence, accompanied by the occasional voice and footsteps outside the door of nurses and doctors and patients roaming the halls.

One pair of heavy footsteps halted outside the door, and Albedo tensed. There was no sign of Envy, but now he realized it wouldn't be above them nor the other homunculi to send someone to do their bidding.

The door opened.

Albedo stood, hands at his sides; not lifted or ready for action, but poised just so that he could shift to a fighting stance if needed.

Major Armstrong walked in with all his blond mustached and muscular glory, and Albedo felt the slightest bit ridiculous.

"Young Kreideprinz," Armstrong greeted, much quieter than usual, voice lacking its often booming quality. "I came as soon as I heard."

There were a few unkempt hairs out of place on Armstrong's usually pristine blond mustache, and telltale reddened moist eyes of a grieving weep. His uniform was not necessarily disheveled, but it was not perfectly clean-pressed as Armstrong usually kept it either. A quick but thorough scan revealed no signs of alchemical transformation on skin.

Envy was not here, but over-cautiously, Albedo ruled that Envy would not take the effort to replicate subtle details indicating Armstrong's grief. Envy didn't seem human, that way. (Albedo himself knew that in Rhinedottir's absence, he'd had barely a hair out of place, nor a crease on his coat.)

"Major Armstrong," Albedo greeted, falling back into his seat.

"Thank you for coming, Major," Gracia stood.

Armstrong waved a hand casually. "No need to stand, Mrs. Hughes. I'm here as a friend, not as a Major." He bowed his head, saying with solemn sincerity, "I'm sorry we failed your husband. He is one of the bravest men I know."

Gracia smiled sadly. "Thank you. I'm glad Maes has such good friends. Fortunately, he'll be alright, according to the doctor."

Armstrong shot a sidelong glance at Albedo, who met his gaze in turn with a stare. We need to speak, he hoped to convey.

The Major subtly nodded, returning his attention to Gracia. "That's good to hear."

Exchanged pleasantries aside, Armstrong was beyond glad that the night hadn't ended on a worse note.

Albedo excused himself from the room after the Major, rushing to catch up with him in the hallway.

"Not here," the Major hushed before Albedo could speak.

They finally turned into a less conspicuous hallway, eerily left in the shadows by the morning light.

"Kreideprinz," Armstrong leaned forward, concern furrowing his eyebrows. "Are you alright—?"

"It was them," Albedo started immediately. "They came for Hughes— I still don't know why, but they meant to kill."

"... I had figured," Armstrong sighed, long and weary. "Kreideprinz. For your own safety, I must ask you to step out of this. You've placed yourself in more than enough danger. Let the adults handle this from here."

Albedo shook his head. "I cannot, Major." I'm the only one who can fight them, he didn't say. I'm the only one who can sense them. He hoped that Armstrong would be able to tell that his words did not come from overconfidence nor sentimentality, but from a position of knowledge— he alone knew the full extent of his own capabilities and the partial arsenal of their enemies.

Armstrong, disgruntled, began to rebut, "But—"

"Please understand," Albedo interrupted. "Keeping me out of this would be useless, Major. This is not a threat for—" mortals to deal with, "not a threat to be taken lightly."

"That is exactly what I hope for you to understand," Armstrong crossed his arms. "You won't step out? Even for Nina's, Gracia's, or Hughes's peace of mind?"

"I would never be able to," Albedo responded. To leave the homunculi alone as Armstrong was asking would be tantamount to pulling apart strong magnets. Now that they'd established a mutual acknowledgement, there was no separating his existence from theirs. They may not have been Rhinedottir's creations, his siblings, like Durin or the rifthounds were, but the kinship— for lack of a better word— was there.

Even if Albedo tried to step away, he had no doubt that the homunculi would not let him.

He left all of this unmentioned to Major Armstrong. The aforementioned man gave Albedo a long-suffering sigh.

"Oh," Albedo also noted, "In case you were planning on giving Edward and Alphonse the same speech, the brothers will likely say the same," he added. Albedo had not known the brothers for long, but their tenacity was admirable, and their stubbornness was unparalleled. "For different reasons, even if they were to leave this mess well enough alone, they would still be watched and targeted."

Sacrifices. Albedo let the word sit in his mind uneasily, leaving it unspoken. He was sure he didn't need to say it for Armstrong to remember it as well.

Armstrong hefted an even longer sigh. "... Fine. But your involvement should not come to the detriment of your own health," he insisted. "You need to rest."

Albedo averted his eyes. Gracia had instructed the same, and he hadn't fulfilled it. He couldn't fulfill it, and even though Gracia did not know he hadn't slept, he could imagine her disappointment if she found out. (Rhinedottir's glare after he came close to failing was always sharp and piercing, leaving Albedo's palms prickling with determination to do better.)

"I cannot. They could be back anytime."

"Yes," Armstrong glared, "but it is not your responsibility to protect Hughes. It was never your responsibility."

"Well I can't very well leave him unattended, can I?" Albedo snapped back, voice barely raised. "What can a hospital do to stop them? How many poisons exist in this building, how many people can they disguise and infiltrate as?"

Armstrong stepped backwards as if physically struck by Albedo's words, and Albedo straightened, taken aback by the bite in his own tone.

"… I'm sorry, Major," Albedo backtracked, regaining his composure. "I spoke out of turn."

"No, it's alright," Armstrong exhaled. "You're worried. That is understandable."

They let the tension settle a bit before Armstrong continued. "If it helps, I will assign guards to Hughes's room, and do whatever is within my capacity to protect him."

"Thank you, Major Armstrong," Albedo relaxed slightly.

"But," Armstrong interjected, "in return, you must leave the hospital for at least an hour."

Albedo opened his mouth to protest, but Armstrong stopped him. "Whether you think so or not, you need to rest. This is non-negotiable, Kreideprinz. Sitting in the same place for hours is unhealthy."

You can't do anything against Envy if they decide to strike, Albedo thought. Against any of them. They're not an enemy you can fight.

And you can? A voice in Albedo's head intruded on his thoughts. What were you able to do last night?

Albedo did not have a smart enough rebuttal for this.

Alex Louis Armstrong had never seen the young Chalkdust Alchemist lose his composure and raise his voice before today.

Albedo Kreideprinz was unraveling, and Alex was terrified. He did not know how to stop it, didn't know how to stop the young Kreideprinz from burdening himself so. Though there were no circles under Kreideprinz's eyes, there was a look in his eyes. They were practically glazed over in exhaustion, alive with the slight spark of persistent purpose.

If the purpose sustaining Kreideprinz's insomnia was guarding Hughes, then, Alex thought, he was a truly tragic individual. Touched by the talent of gods, doomed to monumental responsibility.

Alex didn't doubt that Albedo had stayed up for the night, given the haunted look in his eyes. There needed to be a change of guard, if not for Albedo's own sake, then for everyone else's peace of mind. An exhausted alchemist was hardly a capable guard, in any case.

A quick phone call later, Brosh and Ross had arrived at the hospital. Alex all but pushed Albedo Kreideprinz out the exit, Brosh following on the Chalkdust Alchemist's heels. It was perhaps a good decision to assign Brosh to watch Kreideprinz; though the alchemist may or may not have noticed it himself, more than once his feet had stumbled clumsily over the hospital's smooth linoleum floor.

He brushed his shoulders for a job well done, and returned to Hughes's room. Hopefully, Brosh would take over and convince Kreideprinz to go home and sleep.

"He's gone then?" Gracia looked up.

Alex nodded. "I told him to leave and rest. He didn't seem to be getting any here."

Gracia looked back down at the blue blanket in her lap. "Good," she smiled sadly. "I thought so too."

Alex shifted his weight onto his other foot, searching for something to say, but Gracia spoke first.

"He really didn't sleep at all then, did he." It was not a question, just a statement seeking confirmation.

"… Neither of us will ever know unless he says so himself," Alex replied hesitantly. "Though I suspect he indeed did not."

Alex also suspected that Gracia was holding back tears for the sake of propriety. He deigned not to comment on it.

"To the Hughes residence then?" Brosh suggested carefully once they were in the car. Albedo had walked with great reluctance, and Brosh did not want to potentially anger him.

"No," Albedo said. "To the Central Library, Second Branch, please."

Brosh sobbed internally. Get him home and get him to sleep, Major Armstrong had instructed. "Are you sure?"

Albedo nodded. "I need to research."

Far be it from Brosh to disobey a superior officer. "Alright then."

After the Chalkdust Alchemist had hung up last night, Roy had gone and bought the first train tickets he could to Central, for himself and Riza. The one-way fare was exorbitant out of his own pocket, given that he couldn't visit a friend on the military's payroll, but he had more than enough savings. More importantly, he needed to see Hughes.

On the cusp of Roy's promotion to Central, Hughes just had to go and get shot, the idiot. Roy would give him a piece of his mind and then hunt down the person who'd done it, he swore.

One nearly sleepless night and too-long train ride later, Roy rushed into the Central's military hospital as quickly as was proper, barely stopping himself from running. "I'm here to see Maes Hughes," he all but shouted at the receptionist, who shrunk back from Roy's glare.

"He's in room 231, sir."

Roy didn't waste any time marching up the stairs and through the halls. He practically slammed the door open, ignoring the protest of the guard stationed outside. (Guard stationed outside, one of Armstrong's, he noted for future reference.)

"Roy," Gracia gasped. "You startled me."

"Sorry," Roy stepped in, his anxiety simmering back into calmer worry. "I came as soon as I could. How is he?"

"He'll live," Gracia smiled slightly. "They're not sure when he'll wake up, but it seems like he'll be fine."

Roy sighed, relieved. "That's good. Very good. How are you? And Elicia?"

"Elicia's good," Gracia's smile grew. "She misses her godfather. It's been a while, Roy. You should visit more."

Roy sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck. "I know." He paused. "You didn't answer my question though. How are you?"

Gracia's smile fell into something more mournful, but still remained hopeful. "I will be fine. Thank you."

Roy discontinued his conversation in favor of examining Hughes. The man didn't look right without his glasses, Roy thought. Hughes had always been a lively figure in Roy's mind, a light of hope even through the horrors they'd committed together.

Hughes had almost died, Roy thought. Both men were intimately familiar with how many times a gun needed to be shot in order to kill, and both of them knew it was terribly easy. A single well placed bullet could do the trick.

Hughes had not died, but Roy was now past relief, bounding forth into cold fury. Who did this, and why?

"I'll find whoever did this," Roy promised out loud, more to himself than to Gracia. "They will have hell to pay."

He turned around and left the room, coat billowing behind him.

Gracia pulled the sewing needle steadily through the blanket.

Mustang began from Hughes's office and retraced his steps the best he could.

"He went to a storeroom," Hughes's assistant told him. "Seemed like he'd realized something and needed to check it in the records. The Chalkdust Alchemist went looking for him a few minutes later."

The nearest storeroom was in a state of mild disarray, some books strewn about carelessly, tossed aside in combat or pursuit and escape. The streak of blood outside gave Mustang a foreboding sense of dread. Hughes hadn't been safe in his own office building.

Whatever Hughes had looked at in the archives, Mustang doubted he would find it, unless the enemy were truly careless. Given their unreported infiltration, however, Mustang didn't think they would be.

From there, a trail of blood droplets led him into the telephone room and then back out. The operator, distraught, managed to convey that Hughes had entered and left, and Albedo, a few minutes later, had barely peeked in before rushing off again. A picture of the events slowly formed.

Hughes read something, saw something, something that triggered a realization. He went to the storeroom to confirm it, but was attacked there, likely stabbed in the shoulder by the height of the blood smear in the wall.

He needed to call and tell someone, but suspected that the phones were tapped and therefore dangerous, so he found an exterior phone to call from.

For whatever reason, Albedo had followed him to all these locations, but did not catch up to him, at least not until the telephone booth.

The final site of the crime was not difficult to find. So soon after the incident, it still hadn't been cleaned yet: dried blood caked the sidewalk at the edge of the telephone booth, and close to it, bricks were messily upturned in what Mustang guessed was the Chalkdust Alchemist's doing.

Albedo Kreideprinz had a unique sort of alchemy, see. Mustang had been fascinated when he'd rechecked the scene of his fight against Scar. Remnants of crumbled stone flowers littered the ground where the fighting occurred, elaborate yet seemingly effortless. There was no time to waste with beauty on the battlefield, but Albedo's alchemy seemed like art nonetheless.

Flowers were a focal point of Albedo's alchemy, despite the title of Chalkdust Alchemist. Four-petaled, polished to glistening almost like gems. It was a pattern that appeared in more than just his combat alchemy— the markings of transmutation his alchemy left behind did not have the usual rectangularity of large-scale reconstruction, but rather appeared like smooth petals blooming from the source material instead.

The more Mustang thought about it, the weirder Albedo was.

Putting aside his unique alchemy, he was the picture of politeness, but seemed to lack some knowledge in social convention. He ostensibly dealt with alchemy pertaining to life, but performed most alchemy in stone and minerals. The perfect steadiness of his stance and gait and general mannerisms were not merely the act of a young adult feigning maturity, but rather seemed ingrained into him, maybe even trained— yet he'd lost his composure last night, on the phone.

Albedo was odd. Mustang had known this, but only now did he consider the extent of Albedo's oddity.

"Colonel," Hawkeye interrupted his thoughts, "I've brought Major Armstrong."

The aforementioned Major saluted respectfully.

"Thank you, Lieutenant," Mustang stood. "Major, I have a few questions."

Armstrong looked too nervous to be irrelevant to the situation. Bingo.

Those who attacked Hughes. "We have some suspects." Multiple suspects, multiple enemies. Mustang was looking for a group.

"We don't know who they are." What were suspects whose identities were unknown? Suspects implied investigation, which Mustang doubted was moving quickly enough to ascertain suspects so early. Likely something Armstrong, and perhaps Hughes, were looking into then.

"I cannot say." No disclosure, despite Mustang pulling rank. A gag order, possibly from within the senior staff.

This investigation was immediately veering into politically dangerous territory. Mustang did not feel any urge to back down though.

"You're free to go, Major," Mustang held his hands behind his back, standing straight. "Thank you for your time."

"Of course," Armstrong nodded, eyes shadowed with nervously sweaty brows, before walking away.

"… I forgot to mention," Armstrong paused, "the Elric brothers were here until recently."

"I see," Mustang smirked. "And did they find what they were looking for?"

"Unfortunately not. It is, after all, an item of legendary proportions."

"I see," Mustang looked away. "Thanks." The Philosopher's Stone. Somehow, it was inextricably linked to the case. Good to know, but still a piece to the mystery that Mustang did not know how to fit in. How very interesting.

Armstrong did not move from his spot, hesitating.

"Major?" Mustang inquired.

"Another thing," Armstrong added. "Albedo Kreideprinz… he is in your care, is he not?"

Mustang thought back to the shaky voice on the telephone, lost and uncertain, and nodded after a moment. "He is my subordinate, yes."

"If you could, please watch over him," Armstrong sighed.

"Duly noted," Mustang nodded again. "Is that all?"

"Yes." Armstrong finally walked away.

Mustang wasn't sure what to make of the last tidbit. Watch over, not protect, nor be wary of. It could have any number of connotations. For certain though, Albedo was the only witness to the assault on Hughes. Mustang certainly wouldn't be letting that go.

"Come, Lieutenant," Mustang ordered. "We're returning to the hospital."

Hawkeye easily fell into step with him. "That wasn't much information."

"Quite to the contrary," Mustang smiled slyly. "The Major is far too unsuspecting, I tell you."

Albedo flipped through the dense medical codex, absorbing the words as quickly as he could.

His progress was… unideal. The sleep deprivation had caught up to him, and he found his eyes closing involuntarily for longer and longer. Still, he managed to pull himself from the brink of unconsciousness by sharply inhaling, the jolt of cold air usually startling his lungs enough to reawaken himself.

He went over a sentence for a third time, and then a fourth. Then he flipped quickly through the reference text he had open on the side, and returned to it again.

Comprehension was not coming as easily as it usually did, leaving Albedo with a sharp and moving dissatisfaction in his head— frustration. The headache slowly building behind his eyes was of no help either.

A pocket watch clicked distractingly behind him, and Albedo once again lost his position on the page, eyes flicking from term to term with nothing sticking to his memory very well.

He resisted the urge to pull on his hair as he rested his temples on his hands. Was this what Sucrose felt on those sleepless nights in the lab when she went into study or research crazes?

"Albedo," Brosh spoke quietly, nudging his shoulder. "You've been here for three hours. Did you find what you needed?"

"Not nearly," Albedo clicked his tongue, not caring to hide his annoyance. Unfortunately, in his condition, he couldn't learn this world's medicine in just a few hours. Even at his peak, it would take him at least a week or two of full-time studying to have at least a rudimentary understanding. He'd only intended to stay for an hour and then return, but losing track of time while reading was not uncommon for him.

He needed to be an expert. He needed to know exactly what to do to stop bleeding, to stabilize someone if this ever happened again. He should have known better, should have done better.

But digging into medicine as a whole meant unearthing more than just emergency medical treatment. Diseases were counterable; internal wounds could be operated on; so much existed outside of the scope of Teyvat's knowledge. The Sumeru Academia could never hope to measure up to a world so advanced in time.

He had thought it fun to explore in the comfort of Hughes's home. Now, researching with greater fervor, Albedo realized that it was also rather bleak. There were as many untreatable diseases as treatable ones, if not more. The vast majority of the country's budget was devoted to military pursuits and combative alchemical research rather than improvement of medicine.

Albedo snapped the codex shut.

Brosh jumped.

"I'll borrow these," he stood up. "Then we can return to the hospital."

Brosh followed as he walked to the checkout desk. "Back to the hospital? Shouldn't you go home and sleep?"

"I don't need to," Albedo lied, hefting the two books onto the wooden countertop.

"Chalkdust," Mustang greeted.

Albedo's foot halted in the door to Hughes's room. "Colonel," he returned slowly, examining the man's appearance. "I thought you were in East City."

Mustang shrugged. "I took some leave to visit. Hughes is an old friend, after all."

"I see." When he ascertained that it could not be Envy disguised, Albedo finally moved his feet and stepped into the room. He gave Gracia a tired nod before falling into the seat beside her, disregarding her concerned green eyes.

"I thought you would be with the Elrics," Mustang commented. "Major Armstrong told me that they were here until a few days ago, weren't they?"

"Two days ago," Albedo replied nonchalantly, pulling out the book he'd borrowed from the library. "They're headed to Dublith, I believe."

"Found a lead?" Mustang raised an eyebrow.

"Just visiting their teacher." Albedo squinted at the words on the page. They were blurring together a bit now. He rubbed at his forehead, though it did nothing to recede his headache.

"You look terrible, Chalkdust," Mustang noted as less of an opinion and more of an observation. "Haven't you ever heard of sleep?"

Albedo rubbed at an eye, surreptitiously checking if he had the circles indicative of exhaustion around them that he'd so often seen on Sucrose and Timaeus— no, he didn't. Was he so clearly tired that it showed in his actions?

The Colonel hadn't sounded concerned or piteous so much as casual, though, and that felt… refreshing. Like Albedo hadn't disappointed him.

"Sleep is inefficient," Albedo finally replied, turning a page in his book.

"You don't look particularly efficient right now," Mustang humorlessly huffed under his breath. He hadn't missed the way Albedo's eyes glanced over the text with no spark of understanding.

Very well, Mustang thought. Armstrong certainly made his point clear. Watch over him, indeed.

It was almost laughable that after seeing countless dead at his own hands, Mustang was taking pity on a young man who was unraveling at one near-loss. The Elric brothers had seen hell and been back, but the teal-eyed pale-haired alchemist before him was an enigma with unknown experiences.

Mustang couldn't blame him though. Personal loss was painful, and something Mustang had reckoned with before. He shuddered to think of how he would react if, unspeakably, Hughes had actually kicked the bucket.

Fine then. Mustang would hold off his questioning for now, out of respect for Gracia and Hughes.

"Well," Gracia stood up. "How would you two feel about dinner? It's about time."

"It would be lovely, Gracia, thank you," Mustang answered politely.

"Albedo?" She turned to the silent alchemist.

Albedo looked up from his book. "But I should—"

"Nonsense," Gracia interrupted. "Nothing is too important to stop you from eating. Come have dinner."

"I—"

But Gracia was already pulling Albedo out of his chair. Mustang chuckled under his breath. Gracia was impossible to say no to, for more reasons than one.

"Come on then," she pushed a reluctant Albedo out the door. "Let's go home."

Albedo seemed to relax slightly upon seeing the guards stationed outside the room. Resigned to Gracia's mother hen-ing, he followed behind her less hesitantly than before.

Mustang was glad to come along. It had been ages since he'd had any of Gracia's home cooking, and he quite missed it. He was content to follow the relaxing atmosphere of Gracia's and Albedo's interactions from the sidelines. It looked quite comical, in fact. Albedo followed Gracia's footsteps like a duckling imprinted on its mother.

Then, suddenly, something in Albedo seemed to snap.

Albedo halted, frozen completely mid-step.

If Mustang had thought that exhaustion had made Albedo's eyes look haunted, he stood corrected. Now, Albedo's eyes looked truly haunted, widened, crazed, like the eyes of a cornered animal.

"They're here."

With those two words, Mustang immediately straightened into military uptightness. "What do you mean? Explain. Now," he demanded, projecting a commanding voice.

"It's them," Albedo held an ever-so-slightly quivering hand up to his head. "The ones who attacked Hughes— they're back."

"How do you know?" Mustang narrowed his eyes in scrutiny. "Answer me!"

"I can't," Albedo quickly replied, voice almost frantic. "I can't explain, but I know they're here, and I need to go back, now."

Mustang clicked his tongue. More secrets and non-answers. Lovely. "Who are they? Why can you not explain? What are you not telling me, Chalkdust?"

Gracia tugged sharply on Mustang's wrist. "That's enough, Roy."

He hissed. "If Hughes is in danger, I need to know, Kreideprinz." Gracia tightened her grip, and Mustang decided to withdraw. "I won't ask anymore, but I need you to be certain. Can I trust you?"

Albedo nodded gravely. "I'm certain they're near, Colonel."

Gracia's hand on his arm was shaking.

Mustang examined Albedo's teal eyes and the gravitas behind them. No, Albedo was not lying. Somehow, Albedo knew something.

Without further ado, Mustang took a pair of fire-arrayed gloves out of his pockets and pulled them on.

The sound of military-issued boots thudding and squeaking against the hospital floor quickly approached. Mustang mentally cursed. They're here, Albedo had said, but only military personnel had come. This was becoming troublesome— Mustang could pull some strings, but he wouldn't be able to excuse assaulting this many officers on just one person's baseless accusation.

They quickly surrounded them. Mustang pulled Gracia aside and held out a shielding arm, whispering a hushed "stay behind me."

"Halt!" One shouted. "State Alchemist Albedo Kreideprinz, you are being detained as a prime suspect for the shooting of Lieutenant Colonel Maes Hughes. Any attempt to resist will—"

Within the blink of an eye, Albedo somehow procured a sword and leveled its point at the neck of the officer beside him. Golden alchemical energy swirled at his other hand, barely noticeable unless one was looking for it.

Simultaneously, five guns clicked in warning, barrels raised and locked onto Albedo.

Mustang squinted. That didn't seem like alchemy, but there was hardly anything else it could be. A sword, out of seemingly nowhere, without even a clap. No circle existing would allow him to pull metal from thin air.

"Please, officers, there must be some kind of mistake—" Gracia tried to interject, but Mustang shushed her fiercely.

There was a moment of standstill, the officer threatened looking down his nose at Albedo, whose glare was filled with vitriol. Mustang had never seen him so angry before.

Then, finally, the officer pinched the blade between thumb and forefinger, slowly moving it away from his neck. Albedo stiffened and took one step back, but the sword was held still.

Expressionlessly, the man leaned forward and whispered something into Albedo's ear. Albedo's eyes widened.

Mustang carefully watched the interaction with mounting confusion and suspicion.

The officer held up a hand, and tentatively, the other officers put down their guns.

Then, in a burst of golden sparks, Albedo's sword dematerialized from his hand.

"Now was that so difficult?" The officer tilted his head up, looking down at Albedo with derision and, if Mustang was reading him correctly, slight amusement. "No one has to get hurt, alchemist."

Albedo continued wordlessly glaring as the officer clapped a heavy hand on Albedo's shoulder and pushed him towards the exit.

"Pardon the intrusion," the officer dryly remarked as all the officers turned and followed them out.

The noise left with their footsteps, leaving behind only a moment of silent emptiness.

Behind Mustang, Gracia collapsed unceremoniously on the ground.

Mustang held her forearms, attempting to help her up, but her legs failed her.

"This is wrong," she pulled away and held her own arms, trying to brace herself. "They're wrong, Roy, please," she took a shaky deep breath. "Help him. He wouldn't…"

Mustang nodded without promising anything. He wouldn't, she said. Right now, at least, Mustang was inclined to believe her. Albedo's panic had seemed too real to be fake, both over the phone and just now. But that aside, Albedo was looking more and more suspicious.

He'd gone willingly with the officer after their little… exchange. They hadn't even placed him in cuffs. What had the officer said to get Albedo to put down his sword?

Too much about him didn't add up.

Roy drove a distraught Gracia home, apologized that he couldn't stay for dinner, and then returned immediately back to the hospital, where Lieutenant Hawkeye was still waiting.

"Sir," she saluted as he came into view.

Mustang wasted no time on pleasantries. "Find me everything you can pertaining to Albedo Kreideprinz. Do it under the radar," he ordered. "This is of utmost importance."

"Understood, sir," Hawkeye nodded.

"Where's brother Albedo?" Nina asked Gracia, skipping all greetings. "He hasn't been home since yesterday morning. He said he'd be home early yesterday. Why isn't he back?"

Gracia stifled something like a sob, not letting it exit her chest. "He'll… he'll be back soon," she stuttered. "In no time! You'll see."

Nina, for lack of a better word, pouted. "... I don't believe you."

I wouldn't believe myself either, Gracia thought.

"How about some dinner?" She evaded the topic. "Have you girls eaten yet?"

Nina cocked her head but did not comment on the sharp change of subject. "Yeah, Ms. Meyer helped us heat up the quiche."

"Dessert then," Gracia pushed the chipperness in her voice past the urge to cry. "Let's have some peanut butter cookies. Nina, could you go get Elicia?"

Albedo had truly taken for granted the easygoing peace that Mondstadt had shown in its everyday life. Though the Knights of Favonius were, for most purposes, Mondstadt's main military unit, the extent of combat they were called for was usually the occasional stray hilichurl, and on rare occasion, hilichurl camps that had come too close to some settlements.

The Knights were by no means a large organization, nor an authority. They trusted the citizens of Mondstadt to maintain their own peace in freedom, and mostly dealt with exterior threats. The dirtiest hands among the Knights likely belonged to Kaeya and those subordinates within the Cavalry that followed in his footsteps, taming the Abyss and striking at the underbelly of the Treasure Hoarders that would dare to step foot beyond Liyue into Mond.

Thus, there were hardly ever situations such as the one Albedo found himself in now, where internal investigation led to interrogation for one of their Knights. Knight recruitment was strict and reserved only for those who showed utmost loyalty to Mondstadt, after all. Albedo himself had only gotten in on Alice's recommendation.

He supposed he'd perhaps been isolated from any unpleasant workings within Mondstadt by spending most of his time on Dragonspine, anyways. Arrest and interrogation was something he'd heard about from Kaeya's drunken rants at Angel's Share, but he'd never seen nor experienced it.

He mused on this, sitting silently in the bleak questioning room they'd brought him to.

Envy's presence poked the edge of his mind, leaving Albedo restless and uneasy. Had he made the right decision? Was this only a ploy to remove him from his position and kill Hughes while he was detained? The homunculi did not seem the type to keep their word.

"Relax, chalky," Envy whispered into Albedo's ear, smirking. "We're only here for you. The old man can live for now. So, come peacefully, or my hand might just slip." They glanced surreptitiously at Gracia, and then flicked their eyes back. "What'll it be?"

Thus far, Envy hadn't left the range where Albedo could sense them. That they were nowhere near Hughes, at least, was a small comfort.

The heavy door clicked open, and Envy, still disguised as an officer, walked in, followed by another broad shouldered man.

Albedo glared as they took their seats across from him. The harsh white light illuminated the upward-facing planes of their faces in high contrast, giving their features a heavy-set gravity.

"Why don't you tell us what happened last night?" The officer that wasn't Envy spoke.

Albedo continued wordlessly glaring.

"If you remain silent, it will be assumed as a guilty plea," the officer slammed a hand down on the table.

Envy tilted their head up to look down on him. "Humor us, why don't you, Mr. State Alchemist."

Fine. Albedo leveled a neutral and indifferent gaze at the officer to counter their unwavering stare. "Hughes left the office a few minutes past 8," he recounted monotonously. "He went to the records room to check something, and didn't come back, so I went looking for him and found his blood on the wall."

"From a stab-wound in his shoulder, yes?" The officer continued staring unsettlingly into Albedo's eyes. "Continue."

"I followed his trail of blood to the telephone room, and then out of the building until I reached the telephone booth, and—" Envy was there, holding a gun to his head.

Albedo froze mid sentence. Envy was a homunculus, a being outside the realm of what many humans thought possible. I can't describe them without sounding like a lunatic, Albedo realized, and Envy knew as well, judging by the demeaning smirk on their borrowed face.

"Well? Out with it," the officer prodded.

What could Albedo say? Literally describing his memory was out of the question, since Envy had borrowed 2nd Lieutenant Ross's face for most of the encounter and Albedo refused to involve her. Lie and make up a false perpetrator? Or describe Envy's default appearance, a teenager of ambiguous gender wearing only a crop top and miniskirt? The officer would think Albedo was joking.

With no options left, Albedo quietly spoke. "I cannot say."

"What was that?" The officer leaned forward.

"I cannot say," Albedo repeated, louder.

"I don't think you understand, Mr. Kreideprinz," the man folded his hands together calmly, resting them under his chin. "If you do not speak, you are the prime suspect and will have to assume responsibility for this crime."

Albedo could not afford to be imprisoned in this world. Nina came to his mind unbidden; she was his dependent. If he were arrested, she would be returned to the state, subject to experimentation.

But an outlandish testimony would land him in a cell regardless.

Albedo, with growing horror, realized that there was no way out of this, and that in coming willingly, he'd walked himself to his own downfall.

Envy looked positively gleeful.

"Case closed, then," the officer clapped, startling Albedo.

"But Hughes was shot," Albedo tried uselessly, voice a little too quick and defensive. "I don't have a gun."

"It would be child's play for you, a State Alchemist, to borrow one from a lesser officer, citing emergency purposes. The bullet was a .45 caliber, matching standard military-issued handguns." the officer rebutted. "Not to mention, he was stabbed, and you happen to be the only alchemist with the ability to pull a sword from out of nowhere."

"My sword is clean," Albedo argued. "It has no blood on it," because he'd only used it to fight the homunculi in the Fifth Laboratory and their homuncular blood turned into ashes and disappeared.

"You could have cleaned it. And what's to say you don't create your sword anew whenever you use it? That is not admissible evidence."

Albedo opened his mouth to contend, but had nothing to say.

"You had the means to do it," the officer continued, "no evidence, no alibi… we'll see about the motive. Why was Hughes stabbed and shot, Mr. Kreideprinz?"

Don't ask me, Albedo glared fiercely across the table to where Envy lounged quietly on their chair. "I didn't do it."

"Then whose fault was it?"

"I cannot say."

"Speak, Mr. Kreideprinz. You've been warned."

"I cannot say."

"Was it, or was it not your fault?"

Albedo paused, but his sleep-deprivation-addled mind answered for him: "It was my fault for getting him involved but—"

"So you admit guilt?"

"No! It was them!" Albedo lost his patience spectacularly and pointed towards Envy, who continued smirking, unphased.

"Please keep the jokes to a minimum, Mr. Kreideprinz," the officer remarked, unimpressed. "In any case, it seems we're done here."

He stood, and Albedo stared, exhausted, as he exited the room, leaving Albedo alone with Envy.

Envy clapped slowly, every sound echoing and magnifying itself in the small room until Albedo's ears rang. The crackle of red lightning filled and echoed throughout the diminutive room, Envy's usual green-haired appearance unfurling from head to toe.

"Magnificent show, chalky. Truly magnificent."

Albedo did not grace them with a response, but fell deep into his seat with a twisted sense of relief, knowing that the pretenses were over. "What was the point of this, Envy?"

"Making a point," Envy gave a sinister grin. "Really, you played your part wonderfully. Didn't even need cues to know what to say."

They leaned forward and into Albedo's range of discomfort. Albedo shrunk backwards uneasily. "Good on you for realizing so quickly that you can't say anything about us. Because you're one too, aren't you?"

"Don't put me on the same level as you," Albedo rose to their challenge, glaring straight into Envy's purple eyes. He was a creation of Rhinedottir, her magnum opus.

"Feisty," Envy chuckled, then leaned back. "This is the bad end!" They sang. "You get arrested. We kill Hughes and take back that chimera dog girl, and you get to rot in a cell for the rest of your pitiful existence."

Albedo stood and readied his hand for calling his weapon, the metal chair behind him squeaking terribly against the floor. "I won't let that happen—"

"I'm not finished," Envy raised an eyebrow, voice low and humorless. "Sit down. You're swaying."

And so he was. Albedo's legs were shaky with dozens of hours of lost sleep, and standing up so suddenly had left black spots dancing in his vision that weren't clearing quickly enough.

He hesitantly sat back down, recognizing his position, but was still ready to attack.

"Or, you can just follow a few of our conditions, and we'll let you continue traveling and leave Hughes alone like nothing ever happened. Capiche?" They grinned.

"I already said I won't work with you," Albedo replied. "Why do you think I'll cooperate now?"

"Because you don't have a leg to stand on," Envy rolled their eyes. "Keep up, will you? We could take away everything you so pathetically care about in this world, so it really would be in your best interest."

Envy was correct. Albedo grit his teeth.

"What are your conditions?" He asked, finally.

"Good, good! You're finally getting it," Envy cackled. "For now, don't fight us, don't tell anyone about us, and don't tell anyone about this arrangement. We won't even ask you to kill anyone. Good deal, isn't it?"

Albedo narrowed his eyes. It was almost too good of a deal. "That's all?"

"Yep," Envy popped the p. "Take it as a favor. Believe it or not, Chalky, the others actually want to help you a bit. Crazy, isn't it? Can't imagine why."

Albedo's eyebrows furrowed. "Why would—"

"Beats me," Envy shrugged. "I wanna beat you to a pulp, anyways."

"I appreciate the honesty," Albedo deadpanned. "In the interest of honesty, I also want to stab you. Many times."

"Ouch," Envy grinned. "Good thing you can't then, huh?"

"I haven't agreed yet."

"But you will," Envy leered derisively.

And again, Envy was correct. Albedo would.

"Shake on it," Envy held out a hand.

Albedo looked at the hand, and saw his only option. The only way to keep Hughes and Nina safe, the only way to ensure with his own power that they would remain out of danger.

He put his hand forward, and shook Envy's hand, disgusted.

This is the hand that nearly killed Hughes, he thought over and over again.

As their hands pulled apart, Envy quickly snaked their fingers around Albedo's wrist, gripping so tightly that if Albedo tried to pull his arm away, he would have lost a hand.

Albedo hissed. "What are you—"

Envy deftly twisted the arm, maneuvering Albedo's hand so that his palm faced upward, and dropped a red spherical stone into it.

A Philosopher's Stone.

Albedo's protest died on his tongue, because a rolling sickness made his stomach lurch at the sight of it. Human souls compressed and crystallized. Suddenly, he felt nauseous.

"A show of goodwill," Envy smirked, fully aware of Albedo's discomfort. "From us to you. Use it to cure that chimera girl or something."

"No," Albedo immediately refused. "Take it back. I don't want it."

"Too late," Envy released his wrist with a forceful shove. "It's in your hands now, Alchemist. Throw it away if you don't want it."

Throwing it away was out of the question. Using it was out of the question.

"See you later, Chalkdust Alchemist," they sneered, and in a smooth motion spread out like fine scales reflecting light on a fish, red lightning followed a trail of alchemical transformation along their body. Once again, they were a nondescript officer. "Your charges are clear. You're free to go."

Albedo closed his fist carefully around the stone and tucked it into the inner pocket of his coat.

Damn you, Envy.

Gracia perked up at the sound of a knock on the door. This late, there were only a few people it could reasonably be. She made her way to the door, and,

Oh. Albedo stood there.

"I'm back," he smiled with that small subtle smile he reserved for their home.

She immediately hugged him. To make sure it was real, to calm herself, to give him comfort.

"Welcome back." This time, she didn't bother holding back her tears.

Gracia had fed him dinner and herded him to bed as soon as he stepped foot through the doorway. Gracia knew exactly what she was doing when she made him look at Nina, curled up on his bed and hugging his pillow.

"She missed you," Gracia chided softly. "You'd better apologize to her and make it right in the morning. Go sleep, Albedo."

Albedo nodded in agreement. He was glad to fall into the plush mattress and thick covers after the sheer whirlwind of exhaustion the day had brought.

Click. Boom.

Hughes's body fell. Envy screamed in pain. Albedo's mouth opened in a silent cry he didn't remember hearing.

Thud—

Albedo rewound the image; Hughes arose, a knife pulled out of Envy's face and a gun flew back to their hand, Albedo stood still.

Hughes's comforting smile rose to the forefront, magnified.

Time progressed once more in slow motion. Albedo opened his mouth to plea, but no sound came out.

Click.

Boom.

Hughes's body fell, slower and slower, approaching yellow brick asymptomatically, never reaching it. Envy lurched back, face twisted mid-scream and mid-cackle, red lightning obscuring their features. Albedo's step forward never reached the ground, alchemical energy holding itself still in frozen time.

Time came undone once more as Albedo rewound the image.

Click. Boom.

The bullet tore through blue fabric and a wellspring of crimson followed in its wake. Hughes's body descended, his right knee failing first, his fall tilted outwards from the booth. His hazel eyes widened unblinkingly, a drop of sweat on his brow.

The knife lodged itself into Envy's eye, a look of excruciating pain suspended on their face, Ross's face, tiles of alchemic transmutation crawling across skin as the form of Ross ebbed and the form of Envy replaced it.

Albedo was just a few steps away from the telephone booth, from Hughes and Envy. A few steps away was not near enough. His unused sword weighed heavily in his hand, but his arm couldn't fall. If his sword had been quicker, if he'd unleashed the alchemy at his fingertips sooner, if he'd stopped closer—

A soundless shout tore itself from Albedo's throat.

Back, again. Back, again.

Hughes stood in the telephone booth. Envy stood behind him, raising a gun. Albedo ran, ran, ran.

Click, boom.

Nothing changed. These were, after all, only memories.

Albedo opened his eyes.

Nina was fiercely shaking his arm with her clumsy furred hands, movements quick with panic and worry.

She stopped as Albedo sat up and looked at her.

"Did I wake you?" Albedo asked quietly.

She nodded shakily.

He rested a still hand on her head, gently patting her hair. "I'm sorry, Nina. Go back to sleep."

"… Are you okay?" Nina asked.

She stepped aside as Albedo smoothly swung his legs over the side of the line bed and stood. "I'll be fine. I'm going to go make some tea."

Nina tilted her head inquisitively. "I thought tea woke you up."

Albedo smiled and walked towards the door. "Not all tea. I'll make one to help me sleep. You should be sleeping, Nina."

"Okay," she agreed slightly groggily. Judging by the moonlight, Albedo guessed that it was around half past 2– a terrible time for Nina to be awake. She seemed too tired to disagree, jumping easily back into her own bed. "Good night, then."

"Good night," Albedo whispered.

The kitchen light was on already, the warm glow unusually bright in the middle of the night.

Around the corner, Gracia sat at the table, a photo album open in front of her and a half-full mug beside it.

Gracia turned around to look at who had entered the kitchen, frowning when Albedo came into view.

"Nightmares?" She asked quietly.

"… I suppose you could call them that," Albedo replied.

"Sit," she instructed gently, "I'll pour you some tea."

"Thank you," he took the seat across from her as she stood.

There was already a recently brewed pot of warm chamomile on the countertop. Gracia only had to pull out a mug and pour some. Albedo sat silently, letting the sounds of Gracia's movement behind him fill his ears.

Gracia finally set down the cup in front of him, and once again took her seat.

They sat in comfortable silence, broken only by occasional sips of tea. Neither of them wanted to be asleep right now, but both wanted to rest.

Finally, Gracia spoke. "He's my first love, you know."

"Mr. Hughes?" Albedo looked up from the pattern of light refraction in his tea.

"Mhm," she hummed. "You could call him Maes. He was hoping you would."

"… Maes," Albedo tested the name. It felt unusual.

"I met him when he was just a general officer." Gracia continued. So long ago, but I can still remember it clearly," she smiled. "He fell over his own two feet when he proposed. Nearly dropped the ring, too."

She twisted the ring on her finger, contemplating. "I didn't know if he'd come back from Ishval. It was terrifying."

Albedo nodded, taking a sip from his tea.

"He came back though, and I thought he was out of danger. He'd take an office position and we'd live together and start a family together." She blinked back tears. "He'll come back, right?"

Albedo shrank into himself, shriveling in guilt.

"Sorry," Gracia stretched a cardigan sleeve over her hand and wiped her eyes with it. "I shouldn't ask you that. It's unfair. You can't make Maes wake up sooner or heal him. These things can only happen with time."

"I'll try," Albedo started. "I'm trying. I'm starting to study medicine where I can, and I'm going to check records on medical alchemy and learn what I can. I'm doing my utmost."

Gracia looked, if anything, sadder. "It's okay, Albedo."

Albedo faltered.

"It isn't your job or responsibility to heal him. You've already done enough."

Enough. He looked down into his cup. Albedo had made enough of a mess of things, he'd put Maes in enough danger, he'd done enough.

"You saved him," Gracia said, and Albedo froze.

He looked up tentatively, hopefully, expecting resentment and disappointment and found only affection.

"Did you know?" Gracia leaned forward slightly. "The doctor said that if Maes had been treated any later, he would've died. It was only because you were there that he was able to get to the hospital soon enough."

"I—" Albedo was at a loss for words.

"You saved him," Gracia repeated. "Never doubt that. For even a moment."

She paused. "He and I owe you more than we could ever repay."

"No, I—" Albedo once again faltered. "I should've done more."

"You've done more than enough," Gracia reached a hand over the table to rest on Albedo's. "Thank you."

Albedo's mouth hung open, but he didn't care to close it.

"I haven't been forthcoming though," he spoke with his voice lowered, hesitant, scared. "I'm not what you think I am."

Gracia listened, watching him and waiting for him to continue.

I'm a homunculus, he wanted to say. I shook the hand of your husband's would-be killer. I'm not even from this world. I don't deserve your gratitude nor your affection.

None of the words left his mouth, and he sat there for a minute, unable to speak.

Finally Gracia opened her mouth.

"It doesn't change that you saved Maes. Nor does it change that you're a good older brother to Nina and Elicia, or that you smile when you're in this home."

She sighed. "Don't feel forced to tell me anything. You're a good person, and I choose to believe in that. Playing your own villain by trying to turn me against you won't do either of us any favors."

Albedo looked down. "I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize, either," Gracia tried. "You have no reason to."

I have many reasons to, Albedo thought. "I'm going to go to Dublith," Albedo said instead. "To meet up with Edward and Alphonse."

"I see," Gracia nodded. "I think it'll be good for you to get out of Central for a bit. They'll be good company."

Albedo nodded in agreement. Too much had happened in Central recently. He needed a bit of distance to rethink it all.

They sat in silence again for a moment.

"I'm going back to bed," Gracia stood up and turned. "Good night, Albedo."

"Good night," Albedo responded.

"And," he added as she walked away, "thank you."

Gracia turned her head back to smile warmly at him. "Anytime."

When Nina woke up, Brother Albedo was no longer in his bed, though this was something she was a bit too used to by now. The sight of rumpled covers was a relief, since the covers were only neatly made when Albedo hadn't slept in them the night before.

"Brother Albedo?" She called, poking her nose out of the room.

"I'm in the kitchen, Nina," he called back. "Come have some breakfast.

Nina brightened and bounded her way to the kitchen, where surely enough, Albedo stood at the stovetop, cooking.

"You're back!" She rushed over to his side, excited.

"I was back last night," he ruffled her hair with an unoccupied hand. "Don't you remember?"

"Well, yeah," Nina sniffed, vaguely remembering Albedo tossing and turning and speaking in the middle of the night. "But I was sleepy. It doesn't count."

Albedo chuckled. "Go sit," he pointed at the table. "Breakfast will be done soon."

Nina nodded. Breakfast did indeed finish soon, and Albedo joined her at the table with two plates in hand.

By now, she'd gotten more used to very carefully holding a spoon in her fist and putting it in her mouth. She showed this off to Albedo, who clapped and smiled, and called her mature and elegant.

Nina preened in his attention. She'd missed it a lot.

"Where's Ms. Gracia?" She eventually wondered.

"Colonel Mustang had to talk to her about something." He looked towards the window. "They're just outside, I believe."

"Oh."

"Nina, how would you like to go to Dublith with me?"

"Can I?" She practically jumped onto the table. "We've been here for so long."

"Of course," Albedo cleared away the plates. "We'll see Edward and Alphonse there, too. Maybe we can even visit Winry on the way if she's still with the brothers."

Nina grinned. "I want to go!"

"Alright," Albedo smiled. "I'll get the tickets and call the brothers then. We can leave tonight."

"Gracia, I'm telling you this for your own safety," Mustang tried.

Gracia crossed her arms. "That isn't going to change my mind. I know the risks. I trust him."

"I'm not saying you have to stop," Mustang pinched his nose ridge. "I'm just asking that you exercise caution. Albedo Kreideprinz, for all intents and purposes, does not exist. He just appeared not too long ago, and there's nothing— nothing at all— pertaining to his past. Do you have any idea how suspicious that is?"

"Yes," Gracia replied coldly. "I'm aware. And it's been both mine and Maes's choice to welcome him, and I am going to continue honoring that."

"Hughes has always been too nice," Mustang rolled his eyes.

"We're not throwing caution to the wind when we trust, Roy," Gracia folded her hands in her lap. "Maes always said… he wants to help. He wants to do good, after Ishval."

Mustang stiffened in his seat.

"You understand, don't you?" Gracia's eyes narrowed. "It's not just him being lovably reckless. It's his atonement, and my duty as his wife to support it. It's our strength as a couple, as a family. We choose to trust."

Mustang grit his teeth. "Are you certain? About this?"

"Absolutely," Gracia nodded without hesitation. "He saved Maes, you know. Maes would've died if Albedo wasn't there."

"I see," Mustang replied. "Then I won't take up more of your time. Take care, Gracia."

Gracia nodded as she opened the car door. "Good day, Roy."

The car door closed loudly behind her, and Roy rested his head in one hand, leaning on the side of the car.

"She's a very wise woman," Hawkeye commented. "A good match for Hughes. I see why he always gushes about her."

"I suppose so," Mustang sighed. "I don't like this though. Everything about Chalkdust is looking fishier and fishier."

First, the arrest and the odd exchange between Kreideprinz and the officer. Then, his quick release, even before Mustang was able to make any calls about it, dropping all charges, with the interrogation struck from records. Finally, his empty records.

Albedo had gone willingly with the people he'd claimed had attacked Hughes. The acquittal and release reeked of higher-up involvement and corruption.

Somehow, Albedo was involved with the group that had nearly killed Hughes. Mustang was going to find out how.

"Two train tickets to Dublith, for 5:30 PM, please," Albedo asked the man in the ticket booth.

"Identification?" The man requested, one hand out.

Albedo pulled the silver State Alchemist's pocket watch out of his coat and set it on the counter. The man's eyes widened. "Thank you, sir. Your tickets will be ready right away, sir."

Albedo pulled out his wallet. "How much—"

"Oh, no need, sir," The man enthusiastically waved a hand. "Locomotive services are free of charge to State Alchemists, since they're often called in for quick repairs on the tracks. Thank you for your services."

How convenient. Albedo had not realized that the pocket watch could open so many doors. Tickets obtained, he walked back towards Hughes's— Maes's office building.

"Sheska?" He poked his head into the office.

Sure enough, she was at her desk, nearly buried in paperwork. "Mr. Kreideprinz!" She stood. "Are you here for your things?"

"Yes," Albedo nodded.

Sheska pointed to the desk he'd left two nights before. "It's all there," she said. "Nobody's touched it! Though I did add a few more of the transcripts you asked for to the pile."

"Thank you," Albedo perused his belongings. Indeed, everything was exactly as he'd left it. He gathered them into a pile and pinned them under one arm. "I'll be going then. Good luck with your work."

"You as well, Mr, Kreideprinz," Sheska smiled. "And thank you. For giving me something to do with my skill and showing me that it can be helpful to others. I hope you find what you're looking for."

Albedo lingered for a moment, nodded, and then left.

Sheska laughed a bit internally. Ever awkward, he was.

Once again, Albedo found himself at Hughes's bedside.

He looked like he was sleeping. He looked as if nothing was out of the ordinary.

"I'm going to Dublith," Albedo spoke quietly, uncertainly. "I'm bringing Nina and meeting the brothers there."

Albedo let the silence reply.

"I wasn't sure about bringing her, at first. I wanted her to stay with Gracia, where she'd be safer. It's been a while but I don't think she's over her fear of crowds yet. But I think she's also tired of being cooped up in the house by now. Gracia said she missed me, as well. I think Gracia would be angry on Nina's behalf if I left her here."

Albedo felt the weight of the stone in his pocket but did not reach for it. He felt a bit nauseous again.

"I think Teacher would be very disappointed in me right now. Repulsed, maybe. She would have left me for this if I were still traveling with her."

But it will have been worth it if it keeps you safe, Albedo thought.

"Good thing she's a whole world away, isn't it?" He dryly attempted humor. It didn't seem very funny.

"I hope you wake up soon," Albedo said. "Goodbye for now."

"Where are you going?" Mustang's voice came behind him, almost startling him.

Albedo turned around slowly. Something about the Colonel put him on edge, but not in the disorienting way the homunculi did. This was more… subtle. "If you were listening, then you know already."

"I just got here, Chalkdust. So?"

"Dublith," Albedo replied. "To meet up with the Elrics."

"Hm," Mustang nodded, stepping into the room. "Don't suppose you could tell me anything about what happened to Hughes before you go?"

Ah, Albedo thought. Mustang's words were sharp and clippy, pointed. They hid a slight amount of suspicion and hostility in them.

"Unfortunately not," Albedo sighed.

"And if I, as your direct commanding officer, order you to?"

"I still cannot," Albedo returned.

"I see."

Albedo decided to leave before Mustang could pry anymore. Otherwise, his agreement with the homunculi would be null, and shaking hands with that menace would have been for nothing.

"Going so soon?" Mustang asked behind him.

"I have no more business," Albedo replied. "Have a good day, Colonel."

Mustang clasped his hands behind his back.

Albedo's footsteps halted, but Mustang wasn't facing him to see. "Also…" Albedo started, "please take care of Hughes. Thank you, sir."

Mustang waited stiffly until Albedo's footsteps faded outside of his hearing range.

"Where did you pick this one up, Hughes?" He asked his sleeping friend, sighing. "Now I can't tell what to think about him."

No records. Talented alchemist. The panicked voice on the telephone overlapped with Albedo's short, formal responses.

Watch over him, indeed.

The train departed close to sunset, and the hills outside Central looked a brilliant red next to the bright orange and pink sky.

Nina sat next to him, quietly humming the tune he'd sang for her on their last train ride.

Albedo tapped the back of a pencil to his lips and considered. The long train ride was perfect for uninterrupted activity, but Albedo wasn't inclined to draw right now, and the heavy medical codex in his bag did not seem any more enticing.

He closed his eyes. Red. The sunset illuminated his eyelids bright red, the color of the heart in his chest, the color of the stone in his pocket. The color of Hughes's blood.

Albedo opened his eyes.

Tim Marcoh had encrypted his knowledge of the Philosopher's Stone with cookbooks. It was a creative idea and had succeeded in hiding powerful knowledge within plain sight.

A cipher.

Albedo took out an empty notebook and began writing.

Chapter Text

“Allow me to be the first to congratulate you on your promotion to Central, Colonel Mustang,” Grumman’s old voice rasped through the telephone.

“Thank you, sir,” Roy sighed, relieved. 

He didn’t want to leave Central for even a minute—his best friend needed him there, and Roy would be damned if he left Hughes to his mysterious assailants, or left Gracia to fend for herself.

He’d requested for his imminent promotion to Central to be expedited, but there was no doubt in his mind that the only reason it had been granted so quickly was due to General Grumman.

He was a craftier old man than people gave him credit for, Grumman. The General was easily written off by many as well past his prime, but Roy’s many losses in chess against Grumman could attest that the General most certainly hadn’t lost his sharp wit and strategic intellect.

“And the other favor I asked for?”

“Your men have been informed of their relocation as well,” Grumman chuckled. “I recall Second Lieutenant Havoc was rather reluctant to leave…”

Roy deadpanned. Yes, he did recall that Havoc had lately been prattling on rather excessively about a new sweetheart. He expected nothing less than the best from his men though, and Roy knew that for however much his Officer in Charge complained, he was well prepared to follow Roy to Central.

“Ah, yes,” Grumman added, “we must have a rematch next time I visit Central as well. I’ve left the chessboard with Riza, to be delivered to you.” He chuckled. “Consider it a parting gift.”

“You have my thanks, General,” Roy smiled. “Take care.”

Altogether, the train ride from Central to Dublith took no more than four hours. Nina fell asleep on his shoulder after the first hour, a hooded cape draped over her head so other passengers wouldn’t disturb her. By the time the train came to a rolling stop in Dublith, the sun had long set.

Albedo snapped the journal in his hand shut and tucked it into a secure breast pocket, before shaking Nina awake gently. If he were made of muscle and bone, perhaps his shoulder would be numb at this point—Nina’s head was heavier than it appeared. 

As soon as they alighted, Albedo searched for a telephone. They arrived a day later than scheduled, and in all the chaos, Albedo hadn’t been able to find the time to update the brothers. Luckily, Albedo had been given the phone number to where they were staying with their alchemy teacher: the Curtis butchery.

Slowly operating the unfamiliar components of the telephone, he eventually managed to ring up the number on the card.

Beep.

“This is Curtis Butchery,” Edward’s unmistakable drawl sounded over the phone. “How may I help you.”

Those were the dulcet tones of someone incredibly bored, Albedo noted. He could imagine Edward having been roped into helping out in the shop despite the hour, and the comical thought brought some muted amusement to his mind. He knew that by telephone etiquette he should name himself and promptly state his purpose to not waste money on the pay phone, but…

“You sound rather unenthusiastic,” Albedo said.

“Oh!” The crackly voice on the telephone perked up in recognition. “Albedo, is that you?”

Albedo hummed a quick assent, briefly surprised that Edward could recognize him by voice over the distortion of the telephone. He couldn’t say the same for himself; perhaps unfamiliarity with the technology made recognition of voices over it more difficult. “Nina and I have just arrived in Dublith, and we’re still at the train station.”

“Great, stay there,” Edward instructed. Distantly, there was an unintelligible shout that Albedo assumed was directed towards Alphonse, and then, he returned. “Where were you? Al and I started getting worried when we didn’t hear anything yesterday.”

A chill crept through Albedo’s skin despite the warm night. Were the lamps nearby always so yellow? The brick pattern of the flooring outside the station was a different pattern from that of the park in Central where Maes had—he shook his head.

“It’s… better that I tell you in person,” Albedo carefully replied.

There was a brief silence over the line. 

“… Alright,” Edward acquiesced. “Stay put, I'll come and get you. The place isn’t far, but you might not be able to find it otherwise—it’s kind of small. I'll be there in about fifteen minutes!”

There was a click, and then an extended beep, signaling the end of the conversation. 

How did one go about even beginning to explain the mess that had been the past 48 hours? 

“Let’s find a place to sit while we wait, Nina,” he said softly.

Nina looked up, worried, and grasped Albedo’s hand a little tighter.

Indeed, in short order, Ed made a quick pace to the station. By the time of his approach, most of the arrived passengers had dispersed, leaving a scattered few around the small building, checking their maps or watches. It seemed that those still there were all waiting for someone or something.

Among the brown and gray suits and jackets in the night, Albedo’s white coat, and to a lesser degree, Nina’s as well, stood out like sore thumbs.

They waved, exchanged brief greetings, and soon, the three of them were making their way back to the Curtis household with a slower, more leisurely stroll.

“So, welcome to Dublith!” Ed beamed. “It’s a pretty small city, as you can see, but Al and I spent a portion of our childhoods here.” 

If Ed had looked, he would have seen Albedo’s head swiveling around slowly, almost lazily, as they walked. Where before, Albedo’s eyes had always seemed hungry to see more, they now seemed to drift vacantly, directionless.

“It’s nice,” Albedo said quietly nonetheless. “It doesn’t seem like a very small city.”

“Maybe not compared to the countryside, like Resembool,” Ed shrugged. “I thought you’d be a bit more used to cities after staying in Central recently.”

“Mhm,” Albedo nodded absentmindedly. “Dublith is much larger than my hometown. Central even more so.”

“Huh,” Ed hummed curiously. Albedo didn’t open up often about himself. “What about compared to Resembool?” he prompted.

“Definitely not as remote as Resembool,” Albedo replied in turn, “though close to it near the outskirts."

His responses were clipped, shorter and less eloquent than usual, but nonetheless more informing than ever. A sneaking suspicion crept into Ed's mind that something was… off, about Albedo. Ed chanced a glance back, the first time he fully looked at Albedo that night beyond glancing pleasantries.

Had he always looked so tired?

"I don't like this as much as I like Resembool," Nina chimed in, interrupting Ed's thoughts. "Resembool's prettier and quieter."

Ed brushed away his concern for the moment. "I think so too," he smiled at her. "This was the first actual city Al and I ever lived in, and we were really unused to it at first!"

Nina took his reply as an invitation to talk about East City, where she'd spent most of her life, and Ed happily indulged her in conversation.

All the while, he stole little glances every so often at Albedo, cataloguing everything he could find out of place.

A single hair here. A stumble in his step. a wrinkle in his coat. Mostly, his eyes: they were painstakingly familiar. Ed knew those eyes.

Those were eyes he'd stared into the mirror with himself, just four years ago.

"Albedo! Nina!" Al dropped the broom to the floor as Nina bounced up to him with the boundless energy of a child.

"Al!" Nina giggled as Al lifted her up, uncaring as the hood that concealed her head fell off.

"I'm so happy to see you," Al chirped. "We were worried when you two didn't contact us yesterday! Even Brother got so concerned that he started pacing around the house until Teacher got annoyed."

"I did not!" Ed huffed, posturing not unlike a miffed cat.

Albedo allowed the calming scene of the brothers playing with Nina to sink into his bones like a balm.

"Seriously though," Ed began again, "why were you late? Just how many books did you have Sheska transcribe? You really must have put her through the wringer."

Ah. There it is. Though the smile on his lips would imply humor, Ed's eyebrows furrowed with the beginnings of something that Albedo couldn't quite muster a description for in his current state. The questions came now, and Albedo was a fool to believe that he could delay any further.

Albedo averted his eyes. Nina too, fell quiet beside Al.

"Albedo?" Ed's smile faded.

Al shuffled nervously, but the sound of his armor rang like alarm bells to Albedo's ears. "Did something happen?"

Albedo's mouth began moving.

"Maes was… shot."

A thick silence fell over the group. Ed's eyes widened, and Al went completely still. Nina bowed her head down, in anticipation of the eruption that the momentary quiet signaled. Though Albedo's eyes were held open, still, none of these details penetrated his mind. In his psyche, there held a single image of stillness, one that he did not wish to preserve, had not asked to pause and draw.

At once,

"What—"

"What do you mean?!"

"Is he okay?"

"How—no, why?"

Albedo stood there, unmoving. His body seemed to have intended to fold into itself, and yet he, a being made of rigid chalk, could merely remain still, leaving the sensation of wrongness heavy in his arms and chest. Gradually, hearing failed—just like sight—and though the barrage of words entered his ears, they seemed no more intelligible than a muted, garbled mess. The sound of human voices was no different than the sound of footsteps, or the creak of a door opening, or the ambient clicking and whistling and whirring of the street lamps behind him.

"Will you stop causing a racket outside?!" The creaky butchery door swung open, a new voice and sound assaulting Albedo's senses. "You'll wake up the whole neighborhood!" the woman berated. Her voice was low, firm, but raspy, that of someone who had been coughing.

"But, Teacher—!" Ed and Al both started.

In one hand, she pinched Ed's ear, and in the other, she pulled back on Al's thin white helmet plume, forcefully enough to tip Al backwards. Rather, it did not seem that she was applying force, but Al was leaning back to her pull anyways, as though her authoritative voice had sapped away Al's inhuman armored strength.

"Ow ow ow ow—" Ed yelped.

"If it's so important," she grumbled, "you can finish the discussion inside. After the guests are fed!" Her tone left not even a millimeter of room for disagreement.

Ed and Al both tossed a glance backwards towards Albedo, with intensities bordering on glaring, as their teacher gave both a generously hearty pat on the back.

Albedo still stood.

Nina looked up at his motionless face and vacant eyes, and made a small sound, nudging him with her forehead to follow them inside. He did not budge, rooted like a statue in the night.

When Albedo made no move to follow, Ed's teacher turned back to him. Intense black eyes roved his form up and down, evaluating. "What about it, Mr. State Alchemist?" she put her hands on her hip, and coughed a dribble of blood onto the corner of her lip. "Scared? Did the boys tell horror stories about me again?"

Albedo searched for his voice, and after far too long of a pause under her questioning gaze, finally found it somewhere in his throat, quieter than before. "… No," he said honestly. "I apologize for intruding." For all that she is their teacher, his mind remarked, there is no mistaking maternal behavior when one sees it.

Her eyes widened slightly, the verbal jabs towards the State Alchemist that she had saved on her tongue dying. Though Ed and Al had described their friend as almost disturbingly unfazed and clinical about everything, there was enough uncertainty in his voice to give her pause.

"What's your name?" she asked for good measure.

"Albedo," he replied.

"And I'm Nina," the chimera behind him chimed.

"Izumi Curtis," she supplied in turn. Looking Albedo in the eyes, she said, "Ed and Al have told me a lot about you."

He did not have words to respond with, it seemed.

"If a formal invitation to enter is what you're waiting for," she jerked a thumb back towards the house, "we aren't quite so uptight here. Just go on inside. Eat, talk, sleep. They invited you here, after all."

Nina looked up at Albedo, and found him once against wordless. Hesitantly, she turned her head back to Izumi. "Thank you, Ma'am," she said politely as she could muster.

This time, when she nudged Albedo forward, though it took a little while, he finally moved.

If Ed's and Al's stares were needles, Albedo would be a pincushion by now under their piercing gazes. If not for his body moving without much of his own conscious instruction, dinner would have been quite an uncomfortable affair. As it stood, though, Albedo's movements were as robotic as always, perhaps even more so than usual, containing all their stiffness but none of his characteristically charming grace.

Nina, on the other hand, did not quite have the dexterity to handle delicate utensils, and alternated between lifting her bowl up to her mouth and holding her spoon in a fist.

Albedo's mind was far from the dinner table.

If I tell them that I saw who it was, they will ask and I will be unable to answer, a dizzying voice circled through his mind. However, I am the main suspect in the attack as well as the sole witness.

If I claim the assailant was disguised as Maria Ross, I risk drawing unnecessary scrutiny onto 2nd Lt. Ross. If I claim they were disguised as myself…

An image appeared unbidden in Albedo's mind, the face he saw in the mirror every morning and the clothes he wore on his body right now, on a figure of himself superimposed where Envy stood, a military-issue pistol in his hand, poised right up to the back of Maes's head, so close that it could touch his black, spiked-back hair—

A sudden vertigo struck him so intensely that he nearly threw up what little he had already eaten from the bowl.

"Albedo?" Al tilted his head slightly. "Are you alright?"

"Fine," Albedo responded automatically.

He looked down, and found that his hand had stopped moving, spoon paused at resting position near the bowl. He hadn't finished even half of the stew Izumi had given him yet.

Slowly, he willed his hand back to motion, and took another sip. The meal continued slowly.

Nina finished her stew before Albedo did, and looked at him expectantly as she polished off the final drop from her bowl.

"Good," he patted her head absentmindedly. "Go ask Ms. Izumi for a bath and sleep early, okay? It's already quite late."

Her eyes swiveled between the brothers and then Albedo. Evidently, she was aware of the thick tension in the room and the words to be exchanged soon. "Will you… be okay?" Nina balled her clawed hands into her cloak and pulled it tighter around herself.

"I will," Albedo assured flatly, with more confidence than he felt.

Nina frowned. "…Okay," she finally agreed. "Don't sleep too late though, okay? Miss Gracia says it's not healthy to not sleep much like you."

The secondhand delivery of that remark was awfully pointed and terribly honest of Nina, though it wasn't as if Albedo was unused to receiving such criticism on his habits. Gracia would know better than most what his current state was, he supposed.

He couldn't help but sag a little at Nina's words. A combination of dry humor and exhaustion unknotted some of the tension from his tightly clenched posture like an exhale.

"I understand," he said with the best attempt of a smile he could muster at the moment—a straight and unnatural widening of the lips that felt uncomfortably stretched. "Good night, Nina."

"Good night," Ed and Al both remembered to chime in as well as she left the table.

A silence hung over the three alchemists at the table, disturbed only by the repetitive clinking of spoon against bowl as Albedo finished his meal.

As soon as the stew had been finished and the table had been cleared, Ed and Al exchanged a glance—a silent agreement to take turns asking questions.

Albedo sat with his hands neatly folded in his lap, eyes lowered to the table, not meeting either of their eyes.

"Okay," Ed went first. "I think we've waited long enough. What happened, Albedo?"

Albedo closed his eyes. If he imagined he was simply giving a report…

“Two nights ago, the day you and Alphonse departed from Central, Hughes was attacked by an unidentified assailant and shot once in the abdomen with a standard military-issue firearm,” he recited steadily, as though he were delivering a formal report to Jean. “His blood loss was severe, and he is currently in a vegetative state. It is unknown when he will regain consciousness.”

Ed's expression became more and more pinched, eyes widening in some approximation of horror, with every word Albedo flatly intoned.

Though Al lacked the flesh to emote so visibly, his voice shook: "Why—why didn't you call and tell us sooner?"

Albedo didn't have a good answer for that. When all was said and done, the failure to inform them lied not only on Albedo's shoulders, but on all the parties aware of the attack. Colonel Mustang, or perhaps even Major Armstrong—they had ample opportunity in inform the brothers, Albedo was sure, but so had Albedo himself.

"I was preoccupied," Albedo justified, though the feeling stirring within his stomach felt akin to guilt. "I had tasked myself with…" he paused involuntarily, acutely feeling the weight of the stone in his pocket, "…with guarding Hughes at the hospital."

Ed sprung forth from his chair, hands on the table. "Does that mean you think he's going to be attacked again?!"

"I had reason to believe so," Albedo nodded slowly.

"What reason?" Al asked without missing a beat.

Albedo paused for a moment. The walls have ears. How much can I give away? "…You both know, as well as I do, exactly why."

His prompting worked. "The Philosopher's Stone," Ed whispered in horror, arriving at his own conclusion. "No…"

"It can't be," Al's voice shook. "Then it was—our fault—"

"No," Albedo jumped in before thinking through what he might say next. Al sounded too rattled, and he had to make clear: "you two have no blame here. If anything, I was—"

"Don't you start, Albedo," Ed sagged back into his chair like he no longer had the energy to stand up. He dragged a glove down his face, hopeless frustration coloring his voice. "We've been looking for it for years, we should have known, should have taken their warnings to be careful, stopped when we figured out what the stone's ingredients—"

Albedo could not the words that spilled from his mouth, interrupting Ed's self-flagellating. "I was there!" He shouted, far louder than he'd intended it to be—his careful control over his intonation and volume had broken.

Ed sharply inhaled, leaning back at Albedo's sudden exclamation.

"I was there," Albedo realized his voice was wavering uncharacteristically, but he couldn't care to stop it. "I was there, and I couldn't… prevent it, or do anything about it, and—"

"Albedo," Ed leaned forward, concern in his eyes, but Albedo did not hear.

"—and it was all I could do to guard his bedside afterward; I did go to the library and attempt to learn medicine because I lacked the knowledge to help, and the bullet wound was in the abdomen and not the head thankfully but I could have known how to apply pressure to the wound and alchemically stop the bleeding or close the wound or even remove the bullet if I had read those books even a day earlier," his mouth moves faster than his mind can chase it to stop, "we don't have such advanced medical practices in Mond, and Gracia and Elicia could have lost a husband and father due to my ignorance—"

At once, it seemed like his mind finally caught up to his mouth, snapping it infuriatingly shut, and finally stemming the long outburst. He didn't need to breathe, did not need air in his lungs to expel to speak uninterrupted as he had, and so he did not inhale afterwards as one normally would. Nonetheless, a clawing feeling of hollowness—breathlessness, perhaps—clung to the cavity of his chest.

Both brothers at a loss for words, the silence after Albedo's outburst stretched on.

Then, "At least you were there," Al said quietly, nearly a whisper. "That counts for something. We couldn't even—we were just sitting here, useless, while our friend was attacked. None the wiser." His pained voice struck Albedo as incredibly young. Alphonse was only fourteen, Albedo remembered with a pang of guilt.

Ed hunched forward, resting his forehead on hands perched on the table by their elbows. His shoulders drawn together, his frame was small—and Edward is only fifteen—but the exhaustion in his pose could have aged him five times that number.

"Should we… stop?" Ed let his automail hand form a fist.

Al's eyes darkened. "I… I don't know what I'd do if we dragged more people into our mess and got them hurt, or… worse…"

"…Yeah," Ed nodded weakly. "This was a clear enough warning."

A silence fell between the three of them, none of them willing to interrupt it. A decision on how to continue hung in delicate balance, and it felt dangerous to speak—to tip the scale one way or another.

Hopelessness was a look that did not suit Edward, Albedo thought with a start. Even when he had seen them at their lowest, when they'd finally discovered the secret of the Philosopher's Stone, Ed had at least had the fire of righteous anger behind his movements and his eyes. This despondence, this dispirited surrender… Ed took it with a gravitas that felt, for lack of a better word, wrong to Albedo.

Culpable as he was for Maes's current state, Albedo knew where his intentions laid. "I promised Nina," he broke the silence, each word heavy on his tongue. "I cannot stop here."

"But Albedo…" Al looked up at him.

"I know the possibility that more will be harmed," Albedo argued. "But I—", a firm handshake, a stone in his pocket, "—do not have the choice to stop anymore."

Ed looked up. There's the anger, Albedo thought, but not quite—though anger could describe the furrowing of his brows, it could not quite convey the shadow over his eyes.

"And what happens when someone else you know gets dragged into it?" Ed asked. "What if—" his brows drew together, "what if Nina gets hurt?"

"I won't let that happen," Albedo shouted more than said, the objection flying off his tongue both faster and louder than he intended it to. He looked down and away from Ed's eyes. "Besides," he continued, "we're long past the hypothetical of others being hurt, Edward. People have been hurt; yourself included."

"That was different!" Ed rushed to correct. "It's our goal, so—"

"So it's fine?" Albedo filled the rest of the sentence. "I understand you two started this, and have been involved from the very beginning, but," he clenched a fist in his lap, "involvement is no longer something we have the liberty to decide, whether that be ourselves or others."

Albedo knew. Nina's life hung in the balance already, as a chip in Envy's hand. The brothers themselves were surely not naive enough to ignore the words Envy and Lust had dropped in the Fifth Laboratory: human sacrifice.

When neither Ed nor Al spoke, Albedo tenuously pushed on. "If people get hurt, it will have been my fault for failing to protect them. But you cannot claim blame for involvement alone when that decision seems to have already been made for us—moreover, you cannot stop progressing merely for that fear."

Scientific study demanded progress, and progress demanded sacrifice. A skilled alchemist would carefully balance sacrifice and discovery, to maintain that which they held most valuable. Presently, there was one goal Albedo refused to sacrifice, and it was with this in mind that he had collected himself enough to come to Dublith, and continue moving.

Ed carefully watched with muted awe as a light of sorts re-entered Albedo's fatigued eyes.

"I will not sit by idly and destroy my only way of helping Nina," Albedo declared.

Izumi chose this moment to enter. "Well said!" she called from the doorway.

"Teacher!" Ed and Al both looked flabbergasted. Albedo's head swiveled to the new voice, taken briefly aback.

"Count your lucky stars that your friend is still alive, Ed, Al," she commented. "Of all people, you should know the permanence and irreversibility of death."

Ed sat back into his seat as if physically struck, wordless.

"If you have deliberations you need to make, they'll be better made when you're well rested," she crossed her arms. "Go rest, come back to it tomorrow."

Whether it was the way her commanding voice left no room for argument, or the simpler explanation that Both Ed and Al no longer had anything to say, they followed Izumi's instruction and left the table. Albedo could tell that Ed's jaw was still tensed as he stood.

Albedo moved to stand as well—Izumi's words had seemed like a general dismissal—but before he could, she took a seat directly across from him, her black eyes boring into his with a clear message: he was not free to go just yet.

Albedo was finding it harder and harder nowadays to hold the obligatory eye contact he had practiced to maintain in polite company.

"Albedo," Izumi addressed curtly.

"Miss Curtis." Albedo inclined his head in an approximation of a respectful bow. "Thank you for your hospitality."

Izumi let out a huff of breath resembling a haggard sigh. "It's the least I could do for what the boys have told me you do for them." She clicked her tongue. "For what it's worth, I appreciate you joining them on their wild goose chase, even if there's never a good reason to become a dog of the military."

Albedo thought he could see hints of where Ed's principled righteousness, his propensity for short tempered reactions, came from. There was a faint mirror of Ed in the curve of her lip, the angle of her eyebrow, the little mannerism of her impatient finger tapping on the table, if one cared to look for it.

"I take it you weren't too fond of Edward's decision to become a State Alchemist either?" Albedo asked.

"Oh believe me," Izumi glared, "I was quite livid about it." She still seemed to be so, Albedo thought, if her eyes were anything to judge by, at least.

"But," she continued after a cough, "if that's what they need to do to reckon with their mistakes, that's not something I can stop them from doing."

Albedo held her gaze. "You mean their…" he wasn't quite sure human transmutation—or perhaps attempt at revival—was something to be said aloud in this setting, so he let his sentence trail off.

"You know about that then?" Izumi raised a questioning eyebrow.

"It would be difficult not to, with our mutual goal," Albedo averted his eyes, somewhat sheepish. "They told me some time ago."

"I see." Izumi coughed into a handkerchief, and it came away from her lips crimson red. "I'll save you the wondering, then—I've done the same."

Oh, Albedo thought. There was a truly unique equivalence between master and pupil here, one that Albedo didn't think he'd ever achieved with Rhinedottir despite all his effort.

He realized, against his few and uninformed expectations: "you're a very good alchemy teacher."

Izumi put her cheek on her hand, leaning on the table. "…Do you think so?" she cast a rueful glance towards her abdomen. "This old housewife simply wants them to not have to live with long regrets. I may have accepted the price of my actions for a lifetime, but they… don't have to."

Izumi had paid a grave price for her transgression, just like the shared toll taken from Ed and Al.

Rhinedottir's face flashed into Albedo's mind like a feebly flickering lamp. The price of her actions had been a cold madness eating her from within, something impossible for Albedo to have understood, much less done anything about. He supposed she had, in a way, set him free—let him loose upon the world in likely the kindest way she knew how to at the time.

Albedo did not verbalize any of this. "It's good that Edward and Alphonse are able to visit you," he said instead, "despite already having finished their studies with you."

"Well they've just been excommunicated, mind you, but yes," Izumi rolled her eyes. "They're probably quite glad to be done—I tossed them on a deserted island with nothing but a machete when they began training."

Suddenly, many of Ed's and Al's more drastic reactions to even the mention of their teacher made a lot more sense.

The surprise must have shown on his face, as Izumi barked out an amused cackle that immediately became a violent cough.

"I suppose my teacher did the same, though I did not expect it to be a common practice," Albedo shared. "She left me more often in the mountains, however."

"Oh?" Izumi's eyes widened with interest. "Really? We have something in common then."

At Albedo's questioning gaze, Izumi grinned fiercely. "I did my training in the mountains of Briggs, to the north. There's nothing but a military fortress there, so I stole rations from them and hunted bears when I couldn't."

Albedo blinked. "You are an incredibly formidable woman, Miss Curtis," he remarked.

"Please," she waved a hand dismissively. "I'm just a housewife."

Albedo smiled—he couldn't quite gather the energy to laugh the way he'd intended to.

"The spiders I had to eat during my training were not the most appealing," Albedo decided to share in turn, "though I do feel most at home in the mountains even now. Snow is very… familiar."

"There's a certain beauty about it, huh?" Izumi mused. Her eyes turned gently wistful. "When a fresh blanket of snow falls, untouched as far as the eye can see, it's the most beautiful and yet most fragile view in the world."

It was the kind of view Albedo enjoyed sketching, painting. Freshly fallen snow was sprawling and yet solitary: a contradiction of a single moment, a serenity which would inevitably be marred the moment it was touched, changed. In painting it, it would exist for all time: perfection envisioned, replicated, preserved, such that the ephemeral gained permanence.

His name was Albedo; purification, whitening, perfection. He had been the freshly fallen snow preserved, the beauty untouched for eternity, the masterpiece of pieces. Had he continued to remain with Rhinedottir, would that painting have been completed as she'd intended? She had tossed him into the world, and he was now imprinted with the footsteps of those who had touched his existence, thereby leaving him changed. Was he the painted snow? The real snow? Half paint, half real, perpetually existing outside of either one, too marred to be painted over, too synthetic to melt into the grass with the coming spring—

For the briefest moment of a blink, Izumi did not have black dreads and black eyes—instead, piercing gold and silver gazed through Albedo's teal, blond tresses concealed by a large white hood.

Albedo recoiled, jostling the table, and the visage of Rhinedottir vanished like a candle blown out.

"I—I'm sorry," Albedo hurriedly apologized, "I don't know what just came over me—"

"Albedo."

His mouth snapped shut.

Izumi's tone took the same no-nonsense manner she had used with the brothers. "Have you slept recently?"

"No."

"I thought not," she deadpanned. "I don't know how you don't have any eye bags, but the way you move is a dead giveaway. You looked dead on your feet when you got here."

Albedo sat silently, not bothering attempting to justify himself.

"Go sleep," she instructed, though some softness had re-entered her voice. "You may be a guest but I will be putting you to work just like Ed and Al," she said.

Albedo wasn't sure if she was joking, but he assumed not, given what he'd gleaned of her character from their conversation.

"… Yes ma'am," he humbly inclined his head.

The night was no more restful than Albedo had expected it to be. He had predictably fallen unconscious nearly as soon as his head had set itself onto the soft pillow, and yet the moment the telephone booth with the brick path and the yellow streetlamp appeared, Albedo opened his eyes with a silent start.

He propped himself up on his elbows and then shakily sat up—when had his arms gotten so weak?

Luckily, it seemed that he'd managed to pull himself back to consciousness before he could make a sound and awaken the others. He cast a glance towards where Nina was comfortably curled up on several layers of throw blankets over a sleeping bag, her cloak draped over her like a blanket. On the bed next to her, Ed had meanwhile managed to turn himself 30 degrees in his sleep. His head had fallen off the pillow, and his limbs were haphazardly splayed over the sheets.

"Albedo?" Al's quiet voice called.

He turned his head to the living armor seated by the window. Alphonse didn't sleep, Albedo recalled.

"Are you alright?" Al asked.

Crickets outside chirped loudly, filling the silence between them. In the low light, beyond the slight blue of the moon-dappled yard outside, the only thing Albedo could see was the red glow of Alphonse's eyes.

For more literally than anybody else could claim, Alphonse's eyes were the window to his soul, Albedo pondered. In the lack of any other apparent physical claim to living besides his ability to move, Alphonse's eyes—alchemically soul-powered as they were, blood red to match the seal tethering his soul to the material world—were the proof of his humanity.

As a result, Alphonse's eyes seemed incredibly honest and guileless to Albedo. Albedo, in turn, felt oddly compelled to return that honesty.

"…I haven't been able to sleep," Albedo admitted quietly, almost a whisper, breaking his gaze. "Not since… Hughes. Was shot."

Alphonse hummed sadly. "Is it… nightmares?"

Reluctantly, Albedo nodded. "Every time I close me eyes, I see it."

The telephone booth. The gun in Envy's hand, arm held at a perfect right angle straight to his head. The small knife hidden between his fingers, the damn reassuring smile on Hughes's lips, the smile that spelled his doom—

"Brother had nightmares like that for a while too," Alphonse interrupted Albedo's thoughts, "after the failed transmutation."

Al looked towards his brother with a gentle gaze. Inexplicably, it seemed as though the red glow of his eyes had softened. "He always tries to be strong and pretend he doesn't get them, but…" he hesitated, "I can't sleep, so it's not like he can hide them from me."

Albedo also looked back towards Edward, out completely cold and snoring, not unlike the height-challenged fifteen year old youth he should have been.

"I don't know why he bothers, really," Alphonse continued. "It's silly, isn't it?"

This, however, Albedo, for once, had an explanation for. "No older brother would want a younger sibling to think him weak," Albedo stated, with the same surety that he would deliver an alchemical theory or scientific law. This, at least, he knew from his experience with Klee.

"He isn't weak, though," Alphonse objected easily. "Far from it. He's the strongest, bravest person I know."

Albedo stared down at his own hands. "Even with his nightmares?"

"Especially because of them," Alphonse spoke with nothing but reverence in his young voice, and for some reason, it made Albedo's chest ache, "because I know he's afraid, but he gets up every day to face what comes."

"I see," Albedo clenched his hands together over the soft blanket.

Resilience, persistence—these were things Edward held in spades, some of this strongest traits. Albedo had spent enough time with him, at least, to know this. It was somehow different though, to hear it described from the mouth of a brother, declared so confidently.

After a time, he finally laid back down and pulled the blanket back over his shoulders. If Alphonse was bothered by the silent and abrupt end to their conversation he did not express it.

"Good night," Alphonse whispered instead.

However, Albedo did not close his eyes for the rest of the night.

The next morning, true to her word, Izumi had also had Albedo help out around the shop. As she worked on the pork cuts, she'd had him filet and trim some fresh fish, before letting him have a break and aggressively encouraging him to explore the town.

He'd been thinking about acquiring a travel kit of small paint tubes for some time, and his charcoal stick was starting to shorten after extensive use in his sketchbook.

Art supplies were an essential to Albedo as chalk was to an alchemist—and arguably, a large part of Albedo's unique scientific craft. As such, following Izumi's suggestion, he decided to leave the butchery and explore the town. Sig, Izumi's rather intimidatingly large husband, had also kindly provided some directions.

Though he'd initially intended to ask one of the brothers to accompany him, Edward had already rushed out the door that morning to the southern military headquarters to attend his annual State Alchemist evaluation, and Alphonse was occupied teaching Nina some alchemical symbols.

He slipped out the door quietly and alone, and simply wandered about, meandering through streets and around corners according to Sig's instructions.

The architecture here, much like that of Central and East City, was composed of more stone and bricks, instead of the timber-framed fachwerk homes of Mondstadt. It was the kind of sturdiness that Mondstadt could only afford for select buildings of strategic importance, such as the Knights of Favonius headquarters and the Favonius Cathedral.

He found the art shop with little difficulty, as well as the surrounding plaza full of quaint storefronts. Nina would perhaps enjoy exploring it, though they would have to return at a point in time when the town was quieter. With art supplies in hand though, Albedo was, for now, quite ready to return to the butchery.

Only, as he walked the path back, he was met with the last thing he had expected to feel outside of Central.

Every alarm bell in his head rang with a painful clamor, heralding the loathsomely familiar resonance of what Albedo knew could only be a nearby homunculus.

He stopped to put a hand against the wall and regain his bearings. Every beat of the organ in his chest felt like a squeeze on his ribcage, every palpitation sending a new wave of stinging soreness to his head.

He could only conclude that the effects of whatever resonance he once felt from the homunculi was only amplified in his sleepless state. He'd been watchful, alert, for the twinge of Envy or Lust's presence when at Hughes's bedside, but here, it had caught him off guard, washing over him like a wave of weakness.

"Are you alright, young man?" A kind elderly passerby asked.

Albedo forced himself to stand straight, clenching and relaxing his muscles to rid them of the tingling sensation that permeated them. "Fine, thank you," he tried to respond steadily.

Why would there be a homunculus here, in Dublith? Truly, Albedo should have known better than to expect honesty from Envy's word, but there hadn't been anything to provoke his ire, as far as Albedo was aware. If not for him though, why else would they be here? Had Envy sent someone—or come here themself—to monitor Albedo's words and actions, and ensure that Albedo was holding to their illicit pact?

The timing felt too convenient for it to be a mere coincidence, but Albedo was at the very least well aware that his insomnia-addled mind was prone to concluding the worst from inconsequential evidence.

Albedo ran the rest of the way back to the butchery, praying silently to the wind that nothing had happened yet.

There was a man knocking on the window.

Nina gave him a curious glance. That hadn't happened in any of the houses she'd stayed at before. Usually people knocked on and entered through the door.

He made a gesture that mimed opening the window.

Nina glanced towards the front of the house, where Al had gone to handle sweeping the storefront for Miss Izumi. He would probably tell her not to talk to strangers—Ed and Brother Albedo as well—but she hadn't spoken to anyone besides them in a while, and most people didn't bother talking to her anymore, it seemed.

The man in the window looked kind of like her. Not really, because she was furry and white and had a large snout, but he looked animalistic in a way that Nina didn't see in the streets or on the train. He reminded her of a lizard, with the way his nose was pointed so far forward and his eyes were set back in his face.

And he was bald. He didn't even have a mustache like Major Armstrong to make up for the baldness, so she felt kind of bad for him.

She got off the chair and opened the window.

"That's a good girl," the man praised with a raspy voice. Nina didn't like it—it sounded rough on her ears—but he didn't sound mean about it. "Nina Tucker. How would you like to be free?"

Nina's ears flattened against her head. "I don't know," she said, "am I not already free?"

The lizard man balked. "Of course not!" he shouted quietly. "They keep you cooped up, take you wherever they go, experiment on you. We're chimera, the two of us, you know? And there's more of us, even if it doesn't seem like it."

"You are?" Nina's eyes widened. "I thought… I was the only one."

Her dad had tried so hard to make her the way she was. He had thought it to be the pinnacle of what he worked on, his studies, his livelihood. It was only natural for her to think that what she had become was something special in its own right; unique.

"Yeah, there are more of us," the lizard man nodded excitedly. "And if you come with me, we could take care of you. Help you. We know more about you and how to fix you than anyone else does."

"Then, can you tell Brother Albedo what you know?" Nina cheerfully asked. "He promised he'd turn me back, so if you can help him, I think he'd really like that!"

"No we can't tell him!" The man waved a hand dismissively, as if he could swat the idea away. "Don't you know he's using you? He's just like the rest of them, getting money out of turning you into a freak of nature!"

Nina flinched at his harsh words.

"That's not what I meant!" the man was quick to backtrack, "You're not a freak, or anything, none of us are," he looked pained, "but we should stick together, you know?"

"No, I don't know," Nina tried hard not to growl, "I don't know anything you're talking about, and you're not very nice."

The lizard man looked taken aback.

"Brother Albedo takes care of me, and he promised me, and I'm going to stay with him, because I want to stay with him," Nina continued, voice rising with every word. "And I think you're a stranger, and I'm not supposed to talk to strangers, so I'm going to go get Al and—"

Quick as a snake, the man jumped forth with a cloth in his hand, one that Nina hadn't seen outside of the window frame.

She was unconscious before she even had a chance to call out Al's name.

"Sorry," the man apologized, though Nina was no longer awake to hear it. He craned his neck back to the window. "Dolcetto!" he called with a harsh whisper. "Take her back. She's too heavy for me."

"Yeah, yeah," Dolcetto stretched his neck with a muscled palm at the nape, grumbling at the muscle soreness. He paused when he saw Nina collapsed over the man's hunched back.

"Careful with her, Bido," he growled.

Bido rolled his eyes. "It's not my fault she didn't make it easy."

"Yeah, fine," Dolcetto deadpanned, gingerly transferring Nina's weight from Bido's shoulders onto his own. "Man…" he sighed, "they really fucked her up, huh?"

A crumpled piece of paper rolled onto the ground in front of Al, right into the path of his broom.

He looked up. Faintly, he swore he could hear something scuttling away on the rooftops.

He uncrumpled the paper.

We have Nina. If you want her back, come alone to the Devil's Nest at the west side of town.

Albedo returned to find the house empty. Edward's absence could be explained easily enough —he wasn't due to return from his trip to the southern military headquarters until later—but Alphonse and Nina had had no reason to leave the house today, and Albedo knew for a fact that Alphonse had tasks to complete for Izumi today.

His head pulsed and his chest beat, and this time, there was no alchemical resonance of homunculi to cause it. Unbidden, words from just last night replayed at full volume in Albedo's ears, as if they had been shouted next to his head.

What if Nina gets hurt? What if Nina gets hurt? What if Nina gets hurt? What if—

He dropped his newly bought art supplies haphazardly onto the nearest surface and tore out the door running, uncaring that he left the door swinging loudly behind him.

He did not know where he was going. Somewhere. Anywhere. As wide of a canvas as he could cover of the town. Hopefully she just decided to wander off to walk in a park, or Alphonse had gone on a stroll with her.

He must have looked manic, swerving his head at every street corner until he became dizzy, running and then stopping at irregular intervals.

Nonetheless, he searched.

Al decided not to waste time with any pleasantries.

"Where's Nina?" he demanded.

The man with spiked black hair and a sword on his hip stood from the crate he was lounging on, a sinister smirk on his face. "Come with us and we'll show you."

He swaggered closer, approaching Al, but as soon as he was within reach, Al spun around and kicked the man in the side of his head.

"You misunderstand, misters," Al said. His high-pitched young voice held substantial threat in its tone. "I'm not here to negotiate."

The other two, one large graying man that Al thought might be comparable to Sig in size, and one woman who looked very fit, sprung to their feet, alert.

"Straight to using force, huh?" The man Al had just knocked down jumped easily back onto his feet as well, drawing his sword with a grunt.

Before he could think to strike with that sword, Al knew he had the longer reach, he'd spent long enough fighting in the suit of armor from his dad's study that he knew the length of his arms instinctively, Al thrust his palm forward, right into the man's jaw.

The man's sword mirrored Al's arm and extended forward, just catching the gap in Al's armor at the chin. It would be no use, Al couldn't be physically hurt this way—

He realized too late, with his vision going dark, that the goal was never to harm him. A swift upwards flick of the sword had his helmet—his head, his eyes, disconnected—soaring from his shoulder to land with an echoing hollow clank on the ground.

Before he even had the chance to react, Al stumbled as a new weight swiftly perched itself on his shoulder.

"Pardon the intrusion!" she shouted, jumping into the armor with all the fluidity of a slithering snake.

This was the first moment that Al realized he may be outmatched. These were not some rote kidnappers; they were informed, and had definitely come into this encounter aware somehow that Al was hollow, with a strategy taking advantage of it in mind.

Having a person inside of him was different from having the stray cats that he would shelter from the rain. It felt like he'd suddenly grown bones that had their own mind. Though Al knew the extent of his physical strength, his armored body had never struggled against his movements like this before. It was deeply, deeply unpleasant, and if Al had the organs to, he thought he might wish to throw up.

"You won't be able to stop all my movements!" Al panicked, straining against the tensed human muscles holding him still from inside.

"Maybe not," the lady inside him sounded too triumphant, smug, "but if I dampen your movements even a little…"

"We can finish this," the final man came up behind Al.

Shit. The large man burst into Al's awareness far too late for Al to react, with his motion restrained, and even without vision, Al knew he had lost the battle, the swooning sensation of being thrown to the ground signaling its end.

His armor clashed loudly with the ground as he was incapacitated, pinned to the ground.

The woman inside of him hissed in pain. "I hit my head," she complained with a grumble.

The one with the sword walked up, clicking his tongue in annoyance. He'd recovered just fine from Al's attack, it seemed. "You sure made this difficult."

Al's helmet was still removed; he couldn't see his assailants clearly. He hadn't expected to have to remember them, given that he won most fights quite easily, truth be told. He cursed silently—he'd grown too complacent with the strength and imperviousness of his metal body.

"Alphonse Elric, correct?"

Al did not give confirmation, but the large man didn't need it anyways.

"You're coming with us to see our master."

This had never happened before, Al realized with no small amount of shame. He was the large suit of armor, the intimidating figure that everyone assumed at first glance to be the Fullmetal Alchemist. Nobody attempted to kidnap him; in fact, he'd had his fair share of saving Ed from kidnappers, given Ed's propensity for waltzing straight into danger.

They'd returned his helmet, and then frog marched him into the basement of the bar, where an expansive network of tunnels stretched under the city. Finally, they led him to an unoccupied boiler room with exposed pipes aplenty.

In the corner of the room, on a single ratty blanket—perhaps the best accommodation that they could afford for a hostage—laid Nina, huddled in as small of a ball as her form would allow her to be.

"Nina!" Al shouted, equal parts relief and panic.

"Al!" she perked up, ears lifting slightly. "You're here!"

They sat Al down. Nina immediately huddled beside him, as though if she tucked herself close enough to Al's side, she could disappear behind his back. He didn't know if she realized that there was another presence inside of him; she would probably be less comfortable doing so if she did.

"Just who are you people?" Al asked. He hadn't resisted much on the way down, so hopefully they'd take that as goodwill enough to answer his questions.

The man with the sword grinned. "We're chimeras."

But all of them looked decidedly human, with skin, hair, articulated limbs and fingers—they were far from Nina, who appeared more canine than human.

"There's no way," Al commented with certainty. There was been no record of such advanced bioalchemical research existing; Al was sure that Albedo had checked for them, when he'd made the commitment to return Nina to normal. He and Ed had certainly checked. "It's only ever succeeded with—"

He looked at Nina, huddled beside him. He felt terrible when she flinched under his gaze.

"The proof's right before your eyes," the man shrugged.

The woman's voice echoed metallically from within his armor, "you should realize we don't have normal bodies, yeah?"

Nina startled at the sound of the voice. "That wasn't Al," she quickly noted.

"Don't be scared, kid!" the man chuckled and lounged back nonchalantly where he sat. "It's just Martel. She's pretty harmless."

"I'll kill you, Dolcetto," Martel threatened, though there was a light note of teasing in her voice. "Anyways, I was combined with a snake."

So that's why her limbs were able to extend to reach Al's hands, despite her frame being so much smaller than his armor. "Oh," he said, feeling rather dumb.

"I used to be in the military," she explained. "Got blown up by a landmine in the southern border dispute. They took me to the military's research labs to be used in experiments, and then… I woke up with the body of a snake."

"But that's…" Al wasn't sure what to say. Obviously it wasn't codified as officially illegal if the government itself was carrying it out. But it was certainly… "—cruel," he finished.

"Yeah," Dolcetto agreed with a faraway look in his eyes. "They treated us like lab rats. We survived because we were successful. We wanted to live."

Al was curious. "Mister, what are you merged with?"

Dolcetto raised an eyebrow, amused. "Take a guess."

"He pisses with one leg up," Martel piped in.

"I do not!" Dolcetto loudly objected with a voice like a bark.

"You're a dog chimera?" Al gasped. "Then you're like…"

"…You're like me," Nina finished for Al, voice wavering.

"Yeah," the man nodded. He looked away, a mixture of pity and sheepishness on his face. "I don't know what they did to you, or how they got you in the first place, but… they messed you up real bad."

A choked sound came from the back of her throat. Whatever good spirits Al may have had withered at the sound.

"I don't know who they are," Nina said quietly. "…My dad did this to me."

Dolcetto and Martel froze at that.

"He's dead though," Nina continued.

None of them quite knew what to say to that, delivered as it had been in the matter-of-fact voice that only children could draw on naturally for such horrifying statements.

"Well," Dolcetto hummed, breaking the silence, "you can come stay with us. It's not half bad here, outside of that shitty lab."

"I'm not going to," Nina quickly rejected, just as Martel huffed a small laugh at the idea.

"Are you kidding?" Martel shook her head. "This is no place for a kid."

"What?" Dolcetto whined, "It's not like people like us can live normally in the world. At least here, she can be with people like her."

"She's not like us," Martel argued. "She's not ex-military for one, and she seems perfectly happy already, for two."

Dolcetto threw up his hands in annoyance. "Well she's already here, isn't she?"

"Oh, she won't be for long," Al chimed.

"What does that mean?" Dolcetto cast a suspicious glance at them.

As if it was the most obvious fact in the world, Al spoke. "Albedo's coming for her."

When Ed returned to Teacher's house, there was not three, not two, not even one of his travel companions that he'd expected to find there. Al, Nina, and Albedo were all absent somehow. Teacher seemed to be out for an errand with Sig as well, leaving only Mason, their loyal employee, to watch the store.

"Al left the broom out," Ed mumbled in thought. Al knew better than to leave Teacher's things out and about just to get royally scolded about it later, so something urgent must have happened while he was sweeping.

He clenched a fist around the broom. He had to go look for Al.

The door clicked as it opened, and Nina huddled closer to Al.

Several new people that Al didn't recognize filed in, but most notably, the man in the front sauntered in with great swagger and confidence, like he owned the place.

"So this is him?" the man asked.

The large man who'd incapacitated Al earlier—Al recognized him at least—confirmed with a grunt and a nod.

The man marched up, and without warning, plucked Al's helmet right off.

"Cool! You're really empty," he exclaimed, as though he were examining a toy. He plopped the helmet back on with more force than was really necessary, pushing the rest of Al's torso down as well. Nina winced at the loud sound of metal gnashing against metal.

"Nice to meet ya, kid!" The man grinned sinisterly. "The name's Greed. Let's get along, shall we?"

Al startled when he saw Greed's hand. "An Ouroboros tattoo…!"

Greed raised an eyebrow. "You know about these?"

"I met a stranger with that tattoo in Central," Al revealed nervously.

"Ahh," Greed sneered. "Which one was it? Lust, that old hag? or Sloth, the dim-wit?" He tossed his head back with a chuckle. "Oh well. Doesn't matter."

It did not seem like he was friendly with the ones he, Ed, and Albedo had encountered in Central, Al noted. Nonetheless, he knew them, and his name matched theirs: Lust, Envy, Greed. That was three of the cardinal sins collected.

Greed leaned in, face to face with Al. Al didn't dare take his eyes off the dangerous man in front of him, but in the corner of his awareness he saw Dolcetto usher Nina away, a better, safer distance from the man named Greed. Good.

"So how does it feel to live as only a soul bound to a body that will never die?" Greed stared into Al's eyes.

"How do you know about that—?" If Al had any room to back up, he would, but as it was, his back was already pressed against the wall.

Greed laughed lowly. "All gossip in the underworld reaches me eventually." Under the harsh lighting of the room, his face was covered in shadows that highlighted his pointy nose and sharp jaw.

"And what do you hope to gain by bringing me here?" Al asked, trying very hard not to let any fear enter his voice.

"Well," Greed chuckled, but the smile fell off his face. "Transmuting a soul, affixing it to something else…" he took off his round sunglasses, and revealed sharp purple eyes, "depending on how it's done, you can gain immortality, wouldn't you say?"

It was not a question, so Al did not respond.

"I'm Greed," he bared twin lines of sharp fangs in a threatening grin, "desire, avarice, all that stuff, after all.

"I want money, I want women, I want status, glory, everything the world has!" his voice crescendoed theatrically, and Al gained the impression that Greed had given this speech several times before. "And, of course," he continued, "I want eternal life, too!

"So you're gonna show me how to do it," Greed stared straight into Al's eyes—an unsettling, wide-eyed stare that he wanted nothing more than to avert his eyes from.

Al glanced ruefully down at his hands. "It's not… all it's chalked up to be," he said quietly. "You can't sleep, you can't eat. You can't really live like that. Why would you want that?"

"Ah," Greed tutted, "but you have it all wrong. You don't get tired, you don't get hungry. You can live forever! Who wouldn't want that?"

"But…!"

"But if you're so curious," Greed interrupted, uncaring, "I can show you exactly why I want it." He snapped a finger in a brisk gesture. "Roa."

"Yessir," the large man behind him hefted up his hammer.

"Hey!" Nina yelped in the corner as Dolcetto held up an arm to block her head from view.

"This ain't a pretty sight for a kid to see," Dolcetto's face pinched into an unpleasant expression. "Trust me, just sit tight for a bit."

Roa, with monstrous strength, swung the pointed end of the hammer into the side of Greed's head.

Al watched, wordlessly, without lungs in his chest to hold his breath, as Greed's body slumped to the ground. The sickening, splattering, gnashing sound of stone against skin, skull, brain and muscle reached his ears slowly, as though playing in delay.

Nina screamed.

Another chimera behind Greed—one with a face resembling a crocodile—grumbled. "Keep her quiet if you want to keep her, Dolcetto. Or get her out of here."

"No!" Nina protested loudly. "I want to stay with—"

She was cut off by Dolcetto holding her jaw shut, an apologetic look in his eyes. "Then stay quiet," he warned.

"How could you—I thought—you were allies!" Al shouted in disbelief.

The sound of alchemical lighting suddenly reverberated through the room, beginning abruptly as though it had been present the whole time. Al watched with grotesque interest, unable to tear his eyes away, as flesh reknit itself from the neck up, the bones crawling into place like alchemically shifted stone, rewoven muscles snaking tightly around them, the exposed eyeballs, teeth, nose, sheathed in layers of skin. All the while, red light permeated the room, painting the walls and ceiling with a sickly dim yet lively colored glow.

Greed leaned forward like a corpse possessed and rising from a coffin, until gradually, he stood upright once more, his head fully intact, every hair in place as if his head had not just been mortally destroyed beyond repair just seconds ago.

He grunted, stretched, and cracked his neck as though he'd just woken up. "…and, that's one death."

Al tried to recall what Albedo had said in the hospital, when they'd all gathered to exchange information. "They have instantaneous regeneration, catalyzed by a Philosopher's Stone. When they regenerate, there is a byproduct of red alchemical lightning."

"You have a Philosopher's Stone," Al whispered, incredulous. "You're immortal already."

Greed laughed. "I'll do you one better," he held up the Ouroboros tattoo on his hand, "see this? I'm a homunculus. You know what that is, don't you?"

Of course he knew. Al was there when both he and Ed had pored through their father's alchemy books for any clue on how to successfully perform human transmutation. The theoretical, highest form of human transmutation possible: the creation of an artificial human, a homunculus. It was theoretical for good reason; there was simply no evidential basis that it could be done.

Even with Ed's and Al's theoretically sound proposal for resurrection, they had failed to create something that lived more than a scant few minutes, and had still paid the ultimate price for it.

"An artificially created human being," Greed confirmed Al's thoughts. "A person that's not really human. That's what I am. But it's not true immortality see? I can still die and feel pain. I just come back from it."

"That's impossible!" Al denied. "There's never been a record of it succeeding."

"Well, you've seen the proof already," Greed shrugged. "It's your choice if you don't want to believe it."

Al fell silent. Greed was right. There was no denying what he'd seen it with his own eyes.

"Let me tell you something, kid," Greed crouched down, a sneer on his face. "There's no such thing as impossible in this world. Your existence is proof enough of that, ain't it? You, living with only a soul.

"So here's the deal," Greed's smile turned into a dead-eyed stare. "I told you my secret. Now you tell me yours. About how your soul ended up like this. Equivalent exchange, yeah?"

Al didn't speak for a moment.

Martel, from inside him, spoke instead. "You'd best talk," she suggested. "Otherwise we'll just take apart your body and examine it out ourselves."

Al redirected, but acquiesced: "It's no use," he admitted. "I don't have any memories from when I got this body, and I'm not the one who did the transmutation. I don't know anything."

Greed wagged a finger at Al's head. "Then, I can just ask the person who did the transmutation for you."

Ed wandered around town with Al's dropped broom in his hand. Truth be told, he didn't know where to begin searching for Al.

"Where's he gone off to…" Ed mumbled, pondering.

"I'd be willing to tell you," a raspy old voice called from the shadowed narrow alleyway between buildings, "once you tell me your brother's secret."

Ed fell quickly and naturally into a guarded stance with the broom in his hand as a weapon against the unfamiliar figure.

There was nothing more suspicious than a voice coming from a dark alleyway, and Ed noted with some amusement, it appeared almost comically suspicious how the hooded man with the raggedy cloak clung to the side of the wall.

Ed smirked. "This'll be easy."

Albedo had searched to no avail for nearly an hour. At this point, he had likely canvased all he could of the town. He'd even ventured into the west side of town, where all the dilapidated buildings, unsavory bars, and casinos were.

Despite his frantic search, there was no indication whatsoever that anything was out of the ordinary aside from Nina's and Alphonse's absences.

He'd initially hoped—perhaps even prayed—that the homunculus's presence he'd felt earlier today was not involved with the disappearance, but such hope was beyond him now. When conveniently terrible events lined up, Albedo should have known better that they would not be unrelated.

He stood, still, in the center of the town.

The pull on his chest, the twang of resonance, was faint. Faint enough that had Albedo not been actively focusing on it, he likely would not have felt it at all.

He closed his eyes.

What were the chances that Nina could be found where the homunculus was? He simply had to take the gamble that she was, with no other leads to guide him.

The pull on his chest, as Albedo gently mentally prodded at it and examined it, was leading him west.

His eyes snapped open. He followed it west.

Ed announced his presence loudly by kicking the door open disrespectfully with his boot, and then unceremoniously tossing the body of the lizard-like man he'd beaten up and hauled over onto the floor in front of him.

"Brother!"

"Ed!" Nina shouted.

Ed's eyes widened. "You're here too, Nina?" he glanced back at Al. That explained how they'd gotten Al, then.

"Brother, that man's a homunculus!" Al warned quickly. "He might have some clues as to how to get our original bodies back!"

Ed's body tensed when the man held his hand up, revealing the blood-red Ouroboros tattoo.

So that's what the tattoo means, Ed noted.

"Would've been easier if I could just deal with the armored boy here, but I'll have you tell me how it was done."

Ed stood his ground, keeping his voice low, controlled. "If you're one of that bunch, just ask them," he glared, tamping down his anger.

"That bunch?" Greed tilted his head inquisitively.

"The folks with that tattoo at the 5th Laboratory," Ed elaborated. "We also ran into some souls bonded to armor there."

"Is that so?" Greed's expression seemed surprised. "Well. It's kind of a long story. Can't really do that."

Ed's stomach turned slightly. It seemed like the homunculus had his own circumstances for disliking the others in Central, but the concrete proof of a connection between them put him on edge.

"Anyways," Greed continued, perching his hands on his hips. "I have a proposal for you. You guys want to get your bodies back, right? The dog girl included?"

Ed simply glared, providing neither confirmation nor denial.

"If you teach me how to transmute a soul," Greed pointed dramatically at Ed, "I'll teach you how to make a homunculus. Even throw in some of the notes my chimera guys stole from the lab when they escaped—for the girl." He grinned. "Good deal, isn't it? Equivalent exchange."

Ed chuckled, anger rising like fire up his throat. "Equivalent exchange? Don't make me laugh! The method to transmuting a soul?"

His voice rose from a growl to a snarl with every word, growing into full-on screaming: "I don't see any reason to give you even a single iota of it! Villains don't get equivalent exchange! I beat them up and drag your secrets out myself! In other words, I get everything and you get nothing!"

The chimera all withdrew from the teenager's explosive outburst as though a strong wind had blown them backwards. All eyes were wide, impressed despite themselves.

Dolcetto's head spun at the loud voice, hands tightly holding Nina's ears against her head so she wouldn't suffer the auditory hell of a screaming teenage alchemist from her heightened senses.

Greed stared blankly at Ed. Then, he clapped slowly. That speech had been downright theatrical.

Finally regaining his bearings, Dolcetto began to draw his sword. "So we're resorting to force again?"

Nina used her jaw to clamp down tight on the back hem of Dolcetto's shirt, to his loud protest as he tripped and yelped.

"Don't hurt him!" Nina shouted.

"Listen here, you—" Dolcetto growled.

"Ulchi," Greed commanded. "Don't kill him."

The crocodile chimera stepped forward, flexing large muscles before charging forward.

Ed jumped in the air over his head with agility only possible for his uniquely small frame. With cat-like fluidity but the weight of a twenty-kilogram metal leg, he spun around midair, delivering a loudly-thudding blow to the man's head.

The man crumpled to the ground.

With a clap and a smooth sweep of his hand, the plate of his automail arm, awash in blue alchemical lightning, transformed into a blade. Tried and true, it was the most reliable weapon Ed had.

"Next," Ed beckoned with the bravado of an easy victory.

Greed watched the exchange with examining eyes and a lazy smirk. But whatever he was about to say was interrupted by the sound of dashing footsteps in the hall outside.

There was no mistaking Edward's voice, especially the loud, enraged tirade he'd given, high pitched voice cracks and all.

The moment he heard it, Albedo sprinted towards it, his sword prematurely called to his hand with a shower of golden sparks.

The resonance grew stronger with every rushed step he took, making his legs feel heavier. This, he was familiar with, at least—the dulling of his reactions and mental acuity as he approached a homunculus, his "heart" addling his body and mind.

But moreso, an uncomfortable tightness took hold of his throat. The last time he'd run into an encounter towards the sensation of a homunculus with a friend unaccounted for, he'd failed.

He would not fail again. He swore.

"Albedo!" Ed shouted at him as he finally came to the doorframe. "Brother!" Nina shouted simultaneously.

"Edward," Albedo greeted back. "Nina." His chest expelled a deep sigh of relief he hadn't been aware was accumulating. Alphonse was there too, beside Nina, both held captive behind a line of fierce-looking individuals.

"Albedo, he's a—"

"I know," Albedo interrupted Ed.

"Well! Look who joined the party uninvited," Greed jeered and mocked a shooing gesture with his hand. "Go away. We don't have business with you, chalk boy."

Albedo twirled his sword deftly in hand, falling into a defensive combat stance beside Edward. "You made it my business when you targeted Nina," he enunciated coldly. "Did Envy send you?"

"That brat?!" Greed tossed his head back in incredulous laughter. "Haven't seen 'em in at least a hundred years! Still a menace, huh?"

Albedo glared silently.

"Nah," Greed shook his head. "I'm not with them. But I am awfully curiously why they've set their eyes on you."

Greed snapped his fingers. "Roa," he commanded briskly. "Take the armor boy away. We take him apart and analyze him ourselves. Dolcetto, you too, just—do whatever, I guess," Greed sounded exasperated.

"Al!" Ed charged forth as the larger man, Roa, lifted Al onto his shoulder not unlike a sack of potatoes.

His automail blade made a sharp, gnashing clang of a sound as the metal tip collided with the solid palm of Greed's outstretched hand. It could not penetrate the diamond-hard layer of gray material that had molded to his skin, drawn forth with patterns of rectangular alchemical artifacts.

When Ed realized his automail blade would not go any further, he jumped back and jabbed again, but every move was easily swatted aside with Greed's arm—whatever material had coated it was impenetrable.

"I have the ultimate Shield," Greed gloated, "you won't be able to even scratch me with that sword of yours!"

Albedo rushed around their exchange, sword poised up with tense muscles coiled, ready to slash down on the chimera guarding Nina—Dolcetto, Albedo recalled his name.

"Shit!" Dolcetto had but a fraction of a second against the instant onslaught of icy-cold teal eyes opened wide to frantically draw his sword from its sheath and slash forward, just in time to catch Albedo's downward swing. The blades clashed with a shrill ringing sound that echoed through the room.

Albedo winced at the sound as it hit his ears and turned into a high-frequency keel, unconsciously drawing a hand up to hold his ear. Had the sound been amplified by his recent sleep-deficiency—?

He snapped to attention as Dolcetto rushed forth again—he was in a battle, and staying alert was of utmost importance—and raised his sword to parry Dolcetto's thrust to the side. Without missing a beat, Albedo stepped gracefully into a riposte at Dolcetto's exposed torso, but Dolcetto leapt backwards in a swift dodge.

Dolcetto leaned his weight forward again to extend his reach for horizontal slash towards Albedo's neck—dangerous, going for the kill, Albedo noted—which he swiftly ducked under.

With the forward momentum, Albedo ducked under Dolcetto's arm and slammed the heavy pommel at the end of his sword's handle hard into the man's ribcage.

Dolcetto wheezed at the jolt of pain that arced through his chest, and fell to the ground, incapacitated.

Albedo allowed himself a short moment to inhale, exhale, letting the dust-clogged air fill his lungs and deliver some relief to his artificial muscles. He hadn't exerted himself much, and yet his sword arm hurt like he'd just dead lifted a great weight. He willed his legs to stay firmly rooted in the ground to resist the swooning sensation spinning his head around, compelling him to fall over.

He let alchemical energy gather in his hand, and pulled some crude stone structures over Dolcetto's unconscious body as restraints.

"Brother Albedo—" Nina winced at the sound of alchemy and broken stone crashing to the ground on the other side of the small room—Ed's fight against Greed was progressing in full force. Ed was a flurry of movement within his element, molding all of the environment that he could to his advantage with rapid claps and hands pressed to the concrete ground.

Despite every environmental factor being in Edward's favor—concrete walls and floors that gave him near infinite access to alchemical structures and weapons—Greed was holding his own incredibly well, and perhaps even had the upper hand on Edward, with his impenetrable skin.

Albedo considered the possible actions he could take at the moment. Alphonse had already been taken elsewhere, and that was the most pressing issue at hand. Edward was engaged in combat and could not leave to pursue his brother, which left only Albedo. However, Nina was here, and Albedo had several orders of magnitude of more confidence in Alphonse's ability to protect himself than in Nina's.

"Stay behind me, Nina," Albedo instructed curtly, clenching the sword in his hand tightly. The only available action to him at the moment was to act as an observer, a guard: ensure Nina's safety while offering what insights he could to Edward's battle, at least until they could switch positions.

Looking at the determined set to Ed's jaws, however, Albedo concluded that the chances of a willing switch were low.

Izumi cursed at the broom in her husband's hand.

When she'd come home to discover the house completely empty, none of the brothers' locations accounted for, she'd quickly flipped the sign from open to closed and sent Sig and Mason, her employee, out to search for them.

"This was lying in the back alley off the road to the west," Sig explained.

"Al's disappeared, and so has Ed…" she mumbled. Albedo and Nina aside, Ed and Al were her responsibilities, and she'd be damned if she let anything happen to them.

"Those idiots…" Izumi growled, worry rising into frustration and fanning the flames of her anger. "I ought to make them my pupils again so I can beat it into their heads how to take care of objects!" she cracked her knuckles menacingly.

"I found something!" Mason jogged up, holding a matchbox that he smoothly tossed to Izumi. "Earlier, a boy matching Ed's description was seen walking into a bar called the "Devil's Nest."

Izumi glared down at the crude cartoonish depiction of a devil printed on the matchbox.

She was going to drag her idiot boys back by their collars if it was the last thing she did.

Albedo could no longer watch.

Throwing himself at Greed time after time, yet finding an immovable obstacle, Ed's automail had naturally, inevitably, begun to give way despite Winry's sturdy craftsmanship.

It came to a head when the forearm plate Ed often transmuted into a blade had finally pried itself free of the bolts screwing it tight to the arm—it flew off with the telltale shrill crunch of breaking metal, before clattering onto the ground.

"Stay here," Albedo quickly told Nina, before jumping into the fray.

Ed had stumbled back, wouldn't be able to react in time to Greed charging in for the opening—

Albedo put all the remaining strength in his right foot, bursting forth with a charging leap, tackling Edward out of the path of Greed's hardened fist.

Ed gasped as the air was knocked out of him, his feet lifting off the ground as a solid weight collided with his side. Albedo stood from a crouch and pulled Ed back to his feet swiftly. "Sorry."

Ed rounded on Albedo with eyes of fire. "Don't get in the way! This is my battle—"

Albedo met him with equally cold ice. "You're going to lose."

Ed's hackles rose. "You can't just assume that—I had a plan!"

They both jumped out of the way of Greed jumping down, implanting with a crater from the force of his fist. Dust and debris stirred into the air.

"Then you should have used that plan before he punched you in the gut a dozen times," Albedo retorted in an infuriatingly calm tone, as though he were pointing out a mistake in a formula.

"I was getting there!" Ed called back hysterically, "It just involved getting him to let his guard down a bit more!"

Greed had changed his target to Albedo, pinning him as the bigger threat at the moment. Good, Albedo thought tiredly.

"Catching him off-guard by breaking your automail?" Albedo continued to reply, even as he strained his arms bracing his sword to block Greed's unbreakable fist. He jumped up and kicked off of Greed's torso, breaking the standstill of fist against blade with a flip. Alchemical energy gathered in his other palm, ready to slam into the ground and release a Solar Isotoma upon landing. However, the flower-shaped shards of exploding rocks did nothing against Greed's hardened skin.

From behind the dust cloud that Albedo's attack had kicked up, Ed soared up, clapping. The whistle of alchemy sung and crackled as Ed vaulted over Greed's head, using his shoulder as a touch-pad to propel himself forward.

As soon as he landed, Ed darted away, shouting as he went: "Albedo! Aim for where I just touched!"

I see, a smirk found its way onto Albedo's face. A plan indeed. Edward truly was a special kind of genius.

With Greed's next lunge, Albedo lithely jumped and brought his sword in an arcing slash down on Greed's shoulder.

This time, unlike the futile strikes of before on iron-hard armored skin, the blade found purchase—the gray layer of material chipped away easily like thin scales on a fish, and flesh parted to the force of sharp metal. A spurt of blood fountained from the new wound.

Albedo withdrew his sword with a sharp pull as the red alchemical lighting flashed once more, re-knitting muscle, repaving skin, and closing the gap in the armor.

This time, Greed did not attack again immediately.

Without removing his eyes from the duo, he swung a hand backwards into one of the concrete stone pikes that Ed had alchemically drawn from the ground earlier in the battle. Easily, the structure failed against Greed's hardened armor, breaking apart and crashing to the ground.

"That was strange," Greed remarked dubiously. "I'm still hardened, aren't I?"

"Do that again," Albedo requested.

Ed bristled at the command but did not disagree.

Greed had redirected his attention back to Ed. Deftly ducking under a high kick and diverting the leg with his arm, Ed clapped and quickly tapped Greed's exposed chest.

Spinning out of the way of Greed's outstretched arm, Albedo quickly switched places with him, driving his sword straight forward into a thrust which penetrated through Greed's ribcage and into his heart.

Greed lurched backward off of the blade, but another Solar Isotoma struck him, this time leaving stone shrapnel painfully embedded deep in his flesh.

Greed coughed up a copious amount of blood, the sound of his wheezing covered by the electric chirping of the Philosopher's Stone alchemically repairing his body. "What the hell," he choked, "did you do to my shield?!"

There was a note of pride in Ed's voice as he spoke. "You may be a homunculus, but if you have a normal body, then a third of your structural material is carbon," he explained. "Depending on the degree to which the carbon atoms combine, its hardness can vary from pencil lead up to diamond."

Ed smirked. "Once you know that, it's all in the realm of alchemy."

Albedo brandished his sword with a smooth flourish. "Now, we can finish this."

"That's more like it," Greed chuckled deeply. "It's no fun otherwise!"

Albedo stepped forward at the same time as Greed charged, ready to once again meet hardened armor with his sword.

There was a lightness in his step that hadn't been there before, a weight lifted. His limbs had felt like lead on their joints for the past few days, but now, he felt as though he were moving like the dancing droplets of water on a heated iron pan.

Ed darted around Greed to the left, once again re-entering his blind spot, but Albedo did not give him the chance to follow Ed with his eyes, delivering a barrage of thrusts, parries and slashes that Greed could only guard against.

The moment Albedo drew back to call forth another Solar Isotoma, Greed shot out a sweeping leg as quick as lightning, before Albedo's hand could make contact with the ground.

The force of the kick to his elbow jolted unforgivingly through Albedo's frame, a flash of pain in his nerves spreading through his body at lightning-speed, leaving his entire arm instantaneously shocked with prickling numbness.

He'd been careless.

Snap.

The crisp sound of cracking stone rang like a thunderclap through the room, almost loud enough to mask the whistling whoosh of air as the limb sailed across.

An arm. From the elbow down, pale, gloved, curved softly but perfectly like a chiseled marble statue, yet limp, flexible, like flesh. 

Albedo’s arm had broken cleanly off.

The entire room came to a silent standstill.

Like snow, little chalk particles dusting the cross section where Albedo’s arm should have been drifted down.

“A—Albedo…” Ed’s voice shook.

Calmly, Albedo stood. Sword still in one hand, he walked past, undaunted. All eyes were on him.

He knelt down and picked up his arm. A moment with his eyes closed called forth all the necessary formulas to restore himself. If they were going to give him the chance to recover in their bafflement, he might as well take it—revealed secrets be damned.

The break was clean enough that the cross-sections fell into place with little to no maneuvering. He held the arm there for a moment. There was no light of red alchemy, nearly no auditory nor visual indication of his body repairing itself, save for the gradual disappearance of the thin cracked line between the two solid parts, like the leaden mark of a pencil erasing itself.

Greed watched this all unfold with pure, unadulterated glee.

"Oh, this is rich," Greed grinned, though it looked nearly no different from the way his teeth were all bared in his fully armored form.

Albedo let his eyebrows lower in full contempt, glaring harshly at the other homunculus.

"Do I have another brother?!" Greed cackled hysterically. "Did Father dearest develop a new formula or something? Welcome to the family!" he sang.

Albedo felt something like indignance born of both familial and scientific pride swell in his chest. He was the magnum opus of the greatest alchemist of Teyvat, Rhinedottir—her work was nothing so crude and cruel as the regenerating human bodies of this world's homunculi, no doubt powered by innumerable souls. He was the Kreideprinz.

"Make no mistake; we are categorically different," Albedo coldly returned.

Greed's eyes narrowed to intrigued slits, his evaluatory gaze sizing up Albedo's form like a cat preparing to pounce.

Don't look at Nina. Don't look at Ed.

Albedo staunchly willed his eyes to stay on Greed and Greed alone—he convinced himself that it was to be alert for when Greed would eventually break the standstill and go back on the offensive (and not that he was afraid, beyond terrified, of what other gazes awaited him if he did look away from Greed to his companions for even a fraction of a second.)

Suddenly, the loud boom of a rock failing and collapsing from the impact of a great force resounded through the room.

Albedo instinctively tore his eyes away, swiveling around to face the new threat.

A threat, perhaps—Albedo took one step backward, lowering his sword the slightest bit—but not to him.

The sound of knuckles cracking was far quieter than the explosive crash it had just come from, but was no less menacing.

Izumi Curtis had arrived.

Chapter Text

"Well, well," Fuhrer King Bradley tutted. "What an interesting discovery on a routine inspection of the South."

The way he spoke, one could believe he was simply commenting casually on an interesting sight during a vacation, despite the troop of armed soldiers behind him and the sword he held before himself, planted lightly into the ground. Fuhrer Bradley himself had stripped off the long coat of his highest-ranking military regalia, and wore only a tight black shirt that stretched taut over his muscles, yet his demeanor was no less regal for it— his shoulders squared, his posture straightened, with his fit physique on full-display, King Bradley still appeared nigh untouchable.

In his many years in the military, Major Armstrong had never seen Fuhrer Bradley personally lead any operations. His blood warmed with anticipation— the Fuhrer's swordplay was said to be legendary, so fast one could not even see him draw his blade. It would be the highest honor to witness it.

Armstrong braced himself, gauntlets at the ready.

The firm command from the Fuhrer's mouth— "Move in!"— signaled the raid's beginning.

"Pardon me!" Izumi called unapologetically, not an ounce of courtesy or patience in her tone.

Ed turned to her, mouth wide open, yet no words came out— not even a note of surprise for her appearance. His eyes kept drifting back to where Albedo stood across the room— arm whole, eyes cold, someone or something strange and unfamiliar and dizziness-inducing.

Focused on Albedo as he was, Ed had only a split second to dodge as an unconscious body came tumbling his way from his teacher's direction. He yelped.

"You imbecile!" Izumi scolded. "What do you think you're doing, not even putting away the broom?!"

Of course. the most pertinent threat in the room had ceased to be Greed, or even the revealed Albedo, the moment his teacher had stepped into the room. With the healthy fear of months of childhood physical training pounded into him, Ed shrieked "I'm sorry!" more shrilly than he'd intended.

"Get your head back into the game," Izumi stomped a stern foot down, turning her sharp eyes to Greed. "You too, Albedo; I don't care what you are."

Albedo stiffened at her address and the contempt that colored her voice low and angry towards him. He forced himself to nod, the movement slow as if impeded by the friction of stone slabs grinding against each other.

As Izumi fixed Greed with a threatening glare, Ed finally found his voice again. "Teacher, he's—"

"I know," Izumi cut him off. "Your voices were carrying into the hallway."

Albedo's grip tightened imperceptibly around the handle of his sword, as though by tensing his arm, he could relieve the tightness in his his head. She knows. That's one more person who knows.

"Hey hey," Greed groused, "give me a break here. I don't make a habit of fighting women—"

She did not give him the chance to finish his sentence before gripping his head tightly in hand, from scalp to face. Immediately, the telltale flash of alchemical blue lightning lit the room: a reaction in progress and quickly complete, leading straight into a powerful high roundhouse kick that collided loudly with the side of Greed's de-armored skull.

Izumi's effortful battle cry drowned Greed's grunt of surprised pain as he spun into a cement wall, which cratered against the impact of his thrown body.

Red lightning arced menacingly as new skin stretched itself over injury-exposed muscle. Greed groaned. "Who the hell are you?!"

Izumi stepped forward, the sound of her sandals slapping against the dusted and rubble-covered floor echoing through the room. "I'm just a passing housewife!"

Greed cracked his neck and stood from the floor with a low chuckle, armored skin fully rejuvenated. "So I'm fighting a kid, a housewife, and a freak version of one of us? That's rich!"

Ed came to stance beside his teacher, center of mass lowered, hands poised close to each other to clap. Albedo hung back, sword in his hand. They'd reached a standstill, warily staring at each other, neither party moving to attack.

Greed huffed. "Unfortunately, this is a bad match-up, so I'll be running. Dolcetto!"

"Yes sir!" The dog chimera responded, brushing his shoulders off as he stood from a corner of rubble in the room.

Albedo cursed, the realization settling in that he had follied in believing Dolcetto to be so easily incapacitated this whole time. Likely, sounds of the battle had masked Dolcetto breaking out of his transmuted stone restraints, the old cement being brittle enough for him to do so with the same inhuman strength with which he wielded his sword.

Greed ran out the door, Dolcetto following quickly on his heels, and Albedo's feet carried him out behind them, with barely enough time to shout out "take care of Nina!" behind him.

"Wait—!" Ed's frantic shout faded with the immediately growing distance, but Albedo could faintly hear him panicking over his teacher. There was no chance of Edward following after him, something Albedo took a sliver of relief from.

"Boss!" Dolcetto called ahead, "I hear soldiers! A large number of them!"

Greed clicked his tongue in frustration. "Get him off my tail first, and do what you can about the soldiers," he commanded, tossing his head back to gesture towards Albedo. "We'll meet up at the escape route."

"Yes sir," Dolcetto grimaced— it would be hard to grin about your hideout being actively raided by the military, Albedo surmised.

Greed sped up to a sprint as Dolcetto halted and spun around to face Albedo.

Albedo brought his sword up against Dolcetto's slash, breaking contact quickly to lunge for the chimera's right shoulder, but his moves were too wide— he no longer had the motor control to stop his swings where he intended, and momentum went into wasted movement which telegraphed his attack clearly.

Dolcetto swiftly dodged into a spinning slash that had Albedo hopping backwards out of his sword's range.

Albedo snapped his attention away from Dolcetto to the sudden boom of gunshots behind him. Sparse bullets from behind Albedo whistled sharply by with the near-simultaneous sound of cement cracking under concentrated pressure as they missed their intended targets and lodged themselves into the decrepit walls.

Albedo held an arm up to block his head from the gunfire, gritting his teeth. His head would be far harder to repair than his arm, and with the reckless abandon with which those guns were being fired, his position in the crossfire was a precarious one. The uncoordinated clicking and tapping of a military boots against the ground drew ever-nearer.

Dolcetto took the opportunity Albedo's lapse in attention provided to dart further away, the spray of bullets following his footsteps yet missing by a margin.

"No you don't," Albedo grumbled, throwing away his defensive stance and following quickly behind.

Behind Albedo, the voice of Major Alex Louis Armstrong boomed. "Hold your fire! That's a State Alchemist you're firing at!"

There was no time for confusion, nor the question of why Armstrong happened to be in the south instead of in Central where Albedo had last seen him just a few days ago. In lieu of expressing his thanks to the Major, Albedo grunted with effort as he slashed down at Dolcetto.

Their blades clashed for only a moment before breaking apart into a flurry of messily exchanged blows, neither blade meeting flesh.

But Albedo had achieved his goal— he'd held Dolcetto into a standstill for long enough that Armstrong and the soldiers he led had caught up.

"Kreideprinz!" Armstrong shouted— the only signal Albedo needed to jump quickly out of the way.

Armstrong's alchemy lit the hallway blue as he slammed a gauntleted fist into the ground, growing stone spikes in a quick and lethal trail towards the chimera.

Swinging out behind from Dolcetto like a giant specter, a heavy pointed hammer crashed against Armstrong's attack with a sound like the crack of thunder, halting it in its tracks.

"Roa!" Dolcetto exclaimed, hopping backwards. "Good timing!"

Albedo leaned forward, but a large blue-uniformed back overtook his field of vision as soldiers flooded forward around him— Major Armstrong stood before him, blocking his path.

"Stand down and leave the rest to us," Armstrong commanded more than suggested, piercing blue gaze fixed on the two chimeras across from them. "Edward Elric, his teacher, and Nina Tucker have already been found and safely retrieved."

"Alphonse is still unaccounted for," Albedo provided, voice quick and breathless as though it were a protest.

"And we can find him," Armstrong reassured. "You are safe now, and should go regroup with them."

Distantly, Albedo could hear Roa and Dolcetto exchanging words: "Where is Martel?" "In the same place the boss is going."

There was no time to lose. Greed was likely focused on escaping the raid for now, but in the off chance that he decided to examine Alphonse's armor sooner rather than later, Alphonse could be— no, Albedo rejected the image from his mind.

Moreover, Greed was a peculiarity, a curiosity — an invaluable data point of a homunculus in this country who had spent a considerable time apart from Envy and Lust, who had been willing to reveal plenty of information to him for a price. To let him escape now would be a failure on Albedo's part as a scientist, never mind as military personnel— he personally could not care less what reason this raid had been conducted for, merely that before its conclusion, he obtained the chance to question Greed himself with the upper hand, no hostages in play.

The feeling of large muscular hands gently gripping Albedo's shoulders shook him. He looked, wide-eyed, into Armstrong's blue eyes, the folds of their lids, the furrowing of brows that indicated concern, or sorrow, or something mixing those two. "Kreideprinz! Leave the rest to us," he firmly insisted.

Albedo shook his head, prying himself free of Armstrong's hands with a step backwards in the same movement. "Major, I still have business with them."

Whatever had shown in Albedo's eyes, or perhaps the crack of desperation that had snuck into his voice, something of Albedo's reaction made the Major reel back as if he'd been struck.

Albedo took the chance to run around the Major, quickly generating a Solar Isotoma with a hand to the ground as a platform to springboard over the armed troops now engaged against Roa. He flipped over him, head nary a foot from the tunnel's ceiling, landing in a roll behind the ox chimera, the momentum of which he used to propel himself back to running speed.

"Kreideprinz!" Major Armstrong called after him, voice fading into the distance, "be safe!"

Though he was too far for Major Armstrong to have seen it, Albedo nodded.

Armstrong haggardly sighed at the sight of Albedo's rapidly retreating back. The lack of self-preservation on that boy was a mystery for the ages.

He did not have long to ponder on it or even worry for the young man, as the larger man who'd appeared came charging through the lines of men like a raging bull, knocking them to the ground easily.

Hammer met gauntlet in an explosive flash of blue lightning as Armstrong alchemically reshaped the hammerhead into a statue in his own likeness.

His opponent, unimpressed, tossed the hammer aside, and charged forward.

Armstrong met him hand in hand, their fingers clasped tightly in a pushing duel of their brute strength— no hammer, no alchemy.

The other man drew his head backwards, then slammed it forward into Armstrong's own with admirable force, the impact sending ripples of booming pain through his cranium. Armstrong did not let go of his hands, instead using his backwards stumble to plant a knee kick into the other man's abdomen.

The other man let go first with a choked grunt of pain, wiping sweat and saliva off his face with a single sweep of his arm.

"You are as strong as I remember, Major Armstrong," the man's deep voice rumbled.

Armstrong's eyes widened. This man recognized him, but Armstrong did not know him, could not conjure any recollection of such a respectably well-muscled yet graying man. He carried himself like a soldier though, Armstrong realized—from the way he held his hammer to the way he squared his shoulders and stood straight.

"I, too, fought in the Ishvalan Extermination," the man confirmed Armstrong's suspicions.

Armstrong knew his eyes had turned pained as he looked at his foe. Was this someone he had shared celebratory drinks with? Someone he'd huddled in a ditch with? Someone who had followed his back into battle, someone he had failed— a wraith of that terrible battlefield, here to haunt him?

"Even more reason to stop this senseless bloodshed," Armstrong attempted to reason. "Please surrender."

"I cannot do that," the man's jaw grit itself tightly, set in determination.

Armstrong watched as slowly, black horns sprouted from the man's forehead, claws growing sharp and large bulky muscles shifting into something decidedly less than human.

Later, Armstrong would have the time to consider the implications of a veteran of the Ishvalan War being hunted down and killed like some manner of undignified creature.

For now though, survival was the priority. He braced his gauntlets and got ready for round two.

Albedo climbed down the ladder to the water tunnels, following the increasingly muddled sensation of his mind feeling like it was treading water fruitlessly, doubtless it would lead him to Greed.

He slowed his pace to a wary jog. Echoing in only the way a water-logged tunnel could, unceasing crackles of unseen lightning and the sickly wet sound of flesh being rent by blade faintly reached his ears.

Around the bend, a suit of armor came into view, seated against the wall, still in chains.

"Albedo!" Alphonse shouted in relief.

"Alphonse," Albedo allowed himself the briefest respite of a short sigh, without pausing his striding run. "Stay here; I'm going to go investigate what's happening!"

He did not stop to hear Alphonse's cry of "wait!" though it echoed to his ears anyways.

It was not far ahead now— the tunnel grew red with the light of the Philosopher's Stone regenerating Greed's homuncular body. He was losing against whoever he was fighting, quite badly, not to mention.

Finally turning at a junction, Albedo reeled back momentarily.

Nobody had warned him that Fuhrer Bradley was here.

Faster than normal human eyes could follow, Greed was repeatedly and systematically impaled and dismembered, at a rate faster than his Philosopher's Stone could recover from. With the constant strain on the stone placed on accelerating healing for what was physically a normal human, he did not have even a second of chance to harden his skin into the carbon-enforced armor it had been when he'd dueled Albedo and Edward.

Albedo wasn't sure what train of thought ran through his head as he acted, only aware of the singular thread: Greed will die.

Before he could think to regret it, Albedo sprinted forth, deflecting King Bradley's swift strike with a deft twist of his blade.

The colliding swords sang a deadly, resonant, metallic clang.

He shuddered at the unexpected force behind the Fuhrer's sword— he could tell the maneuver had cost him his wrist, likely fracturing it enough that Albedo would have to repair it later. It was a small mercy that it still remained attached to his arm, though he could no longer feel his hand.

The Fuhrer's twin blades halted. On the floor behind Albedo, Greed's stone continued crackling.

Albedo stared the Fuhrer straight in the eye— the other had been uncovered, revealing a nasty old scar, but was shut— and he willed his heart to slow. He felt winded and breathless— he hadn't breathed for a moment of their exchange, lungs sealed like glass bottles that were ready to implode with pressure in his chest.

"What is the meaning of this?" The Fuhrer's voice was terrifyingly calm and steady.

"I still have unfinished business with him," Albedo stated, voice wavering with barely concealed exhaustion.

"Hoh?" The Fuhrer hummed, more threat than question. "That is a dangerous thing to admit to in front of the Fuhrer."

An unease crawled up Albedo's spine like a drop of chilled water traveling upwards. Something did not feel right. "Would it not be a wiser course of action to capture him and extract information, rather than kill him here?"

"What makes you think I am doing anything else?" The Fuhrer's voice was guileless, but the swords in his hands were still poised within striking distance of the homunculus writhing on the floor behind Albedo. "This is a creature that does not die, Chalkdust Alchemist. We cannot very well take the risk of him regenerating from incapacitation when we have the ability to deal with him now."

"Nonetheless," Albedo argued back weakly.

Something in the Fuhrer's gaze hardened, and Albedo felt the unease in full force this time.

"Chalkdust Alchemist."

The Fuhrer's voice was no longer firm, commanding, like Albedo had heard from Varka and Jean and attributed to all good leaders— instead it took a low tone that, for all its reserved near-whisper volume, screamed of sinister intent.

"You are out of line. Know your place and what you must protect."

It was instinctual self-preservation, trained upon harsh survival in the mountains against dangerous hilichurls and whopperflowers, that had Albedo unconsciously take a step back as the Fuhrer leaned forward, his large figure an imposing shadow over Albedo's considerably smaller frame.

Nonetheless, whether recklessness, unease, or pure stupidity born of three days of sleep deprivation was coursing through his veins right now, Albedo raised his sword, trepidation in his every movement.

Something clicked in the Fuhrer's demeanor. He had not appeared like the king he was named to be for much of their exchange, but now he was definitively far from it, as his singular eye took on an animalistic gleam.

"How bold," King Bradley stated, raising both swords at the ready. "I suppose that spar we agreed upon will be sooner than we thought."

Albedo's heart raced. Without even beginning, he knew this to be a battle he would lose. His wrist sent rippling complaints as jolts of pain up his arm and through his chest for every second he was merely gripping his sword.

The tense standstill and staring contest between himself and the Fuhrer begged for a signal— any small sound or movement to fire the round that would indicate the instant beginning of their battle.

Before this could happen, however, Albedo felt his world spin around him. The sudden sharp pain at the back of his neck that made him choke out a painful gasp could only implicate one assailant behind him, yet he was unconscious and crumpling to the ground before he could say his name.

"Greed," the Fuhrer addressed. "How foolish. He was fighting for you."

"Yes, well," Greed cracked his neck, armor stretching over skin that had finally had the time to recover. "It's my fight, not his. Besides— he made it abundantly clear that he wants nothing to do with me."

"Is that so?" The Fuhrer narrowed his eyes dubiously.

Greed ended the discussion with a quick swipe forward of carbon-toughened claws onto Bradley's sword. "Come on, old man," he taunted, "let's get this over with."

Unbeknownst to Albedo, in short order, the raid would end, having completed its goal of the complete eradication of hostile forces within the base known as the Devil's Nest. Each and every criminal was killed before they had the chance to be captured or detained, due to their unwillingness to surrender and the lethal force they used against officers.

Roa and Dolcetto threw themselves against the Fuhrer, and died on his sword for their loyalty to their master. Martel, caged within the freed Alphonse, died the same way for her loyalty to her friends. She died within Alphonse, the spray of her blood warming the interior of her prisoner, marionette, jailer, and failed protector.

Alphonse was retrieved from the sewer tunnels unconscious— the gravity of which none aside from Edward, his brother, would realize: Alphonse had not been unconscious for even a second since he'd been ten, a scared child newly affixed to unchanging ever-waking armor.

They pried open his chest plate like a rib cage and dragged the snake chimera, ex-soldier, illegal government experiment, escaped fugitive, from his body. Her blood was still warm, her limbs not yet stiffened by unforgiving rigor mortis.

And with her unwilling sacrifice, her wet blood upon the long-dried seal of his brother's, Alphonse would finally remember: images nonstop like ribbons upon ribbons of film that he flew into, the warm promise of the hand of his mother turned into a terrifying tight grasp on a wrist already decomposing, his own face smiling back at him, the cost of his and his brother's hubris, the forbidden territory of untouched knowledge they had trespassed onto—

Albedo awoke to the sensation of being shaken by a large hand.

All at once, he snapped to alertness— Greed, Bradley, Alphonse, red lightning in the tunnels— and his head flew up, his body following into a sitting position.

"Whoa!" Armstrong narrowly dodged Albedo's forehead, leaning back where he crouched. "Easy, young Kreideprinz. You are safe now."

Albedo's eyes scanned the room. "Where's Nina?"

"She has been escorted back to the Curtis Butchery with the Elric brothers' teacher," Armstrong answered, tone soft and calming. "The brothers remained here for…" He gestured towards where Edward crouched next to Alphonse, worriedly shouting his name like an incantation that would wake him from his stupor.

Albedo's sight followed the trail of blood from Alphonse's hollowed torso to the white sheet that had been placed over the form of a human body, boots peering out from underneath, and he quickly pieced together the events that had transpired. Another failure to add onto all Albedo had done today: as he'd run past Alphonse in the tunnels, he hadn't realized in his rush to reach Greed that there had been a guard still holding him captive inside of him.

Though that guard had been dealt with, it seemed this had been done in the most gruesome manner it could have. Alphonse certainly would not have done this, so it could only leave the one military personnel with access to a sharp implement that could pierce the gaps between Alphonse's armor pieces— the Fuhrer.

He looked at Edward, bandages wrapped around his forehead, golden hair over his eyes as he continued knocking on Alphonse's shoulder plate with his non-automail hand. Right, he'd lost part of his metal arm battling against Greed.

Albedo averted his eyes while Edward's focus was on his brother. He could be assured, at least, that with Alphonse as a priority, Albedo would be lower in Edward's mind.

This did not last long— almost immediately as Albedo thought this, Alphonse's young voice echoed from the armor once more. "Brother…?"

Albedo heard Edward breathe a curt sigh of relief before frantically jumping into more brotherly concern. "You okay?!"

Alphonse's voice was considerably quieter, but calm was not quite the word to describe it. Overwhelmed, perhaps, was more accurate. "Brother, you're covered in blood…"

Having ascertained Albedo's safe return to consciousness, Armstrong left from Albedo's side, planting himself beside the brothers. Albedo kept his eyes fixed to the floor, where he could watch the brothers in his periphery without meeting their eyes.

The words they exchanged were soft in Albedo's ears— "I couldn't save her—" "It's not your fault, Al, let's go home,"— but they became meaningless as they entered Albedo's mind. They were not meant for him, after all.

The steady clicking of the Fuhrer's boots against the ground gave Albedo pause. His eyes followed unblemished black leather up to the Fuhrer's spotless clothing and single eye. Coordinated stomps followed his steps as each of the soldiers lining the hall turned in unison, saluting in sync to his march.

"Wait a moment," the Fuhrer called. "There is something I must ask you."

Albedo stood warily to attention, unconsciously shuffling closer to the brothers despite the gnawing awareness that he was swaying on his feet.

"The mastermind behind this, the man with the Ouroboros tattoo," the Fuhrer began, "did you make any deals with him?"

Albedo heard Edward stand and come up beside him. "No," he shook his head.

"Did you obtain any important information?" King Bradley pressed on.

Edward replied through Albedo's silence. "Nothing that would be beneficial to the military," he returned, spine straight in an image of fearlessness despite the armed soldiers standing behind the Fuhrer.

"Don't misunderstand," the Fuhrer's tone grew heavy, "I'm not asking for the military."

Albedo saw Edward's fist tighten in the corner of his vision, but kept his attention on the Fuhrer and the armed gunmen who lined up behind him.

"If you have arranged a deal with him, then depending on what it is…" Fuhrer Bradley opened his singular eye to reveal a piercing green gaze, "you could be executed."

The guns clicked quietly, muzzles trained on Edward. Albedo tensed. Edward had a body that was considerably less resilient to point-blank gunfire than himself and Alphonse, and he'd learned that men and guns were a terribly poor mix.

"Have you taken up with those who do harm to the heart of the military?" the Fuhrer inquired.

The Philosopher's Stone in Albedo's pocket— Envy's terribly humorless gift for their exchange, the price of Nina and Maes's safety— felt heavy enough to drive a hole through it and fall to the ground.

Albedo felt Edward's eyes on him, a glare in his periphery that Albedo refused to return, his own gaze fixed on the guns behind the Fuhrer.

"No," Edward repeated firmly. "Why don't you ask our resident Chalkdust Alchemist?"

There it was, Albedo thought: he was on the receiving end of Edward's ire once more, due to his own folly.

The Fuhrer's gaze shifted to Albedo, but it was nowhere near as intense as when Albedo had encountered him during his battle against Greed. Even though the guns had switched targets, the cumulative visual pressure of their imposing barrels was nowhere near as fear-inducing as the vividly recent memory of facing the Fuhrer alone with a broken wrist, requesting a spar in the midst of Greed's repeated deaths.

"There's no need," the Fuhrer closed his eye. "I know where his loyalties lie."

Albedo stood frozen. For a moment, Edward and Alphonse, and even Major Armstrong behind them, disappeared. Every shadow on the Fuhrer's face stood starkly in Albedo's mind, a portrait of heavy brush strokes and deep cool tones.

His loyalties. Nina, Maes, Gracia, Elicia. How many did the government truly have a grasp on? Three in Central, one in a coma, one officially registered as a governmental research specimen.

How much did the Fuhrer know of his loyalties, of the deal he had made with Envy already? Why was there no need to question him when he was arguably the most suspicious party— had exchanged blows with the Fuhrer himself ostensibly for the sake of Greed, the undying man?

Edward's voice broke into the near-hysteric pace Albedo's mind had taken up. "Is that all?"

The Fuhrer turned back to Edward, eye sharp. "Your steel arm and your brother's armored form— are they somehow related?"

Edward recoiled from the question with a gasp. Albedo's chest tightened with the recollection that human transmutation was illegal in this nation— Alphonse's form and Edward's arm were the closest definitive proof that the military could have to arrest them.

"… I don't see how this is relevant," Albedo stepped in with a voice that sounded more steady then he felt. "Sir," he added in for good measure.

The Fuhrer's eye closed. Albedo could hear Edward exhale a minute sigh of relief at the pressure lifted.

"What an honest boy," the Fuhrer commented lightly yet pointedly, turning around without receiving an answer from Edward. "We're pulling out," he commanded the troops.

That was the end of the impromptu interrogation, Albedo supposed.

"Take good care of that brother of yours," Fuhrer Bradley left as what sounded to be heartening, but were more unsettling, parting words.

As the soldiers filed out, Armstrong followed, bidding them a farewell wave.

The walk back to the Curtis butchery was silent.

Albedo did not dare disturb this tenuous yet apprehensive peace—if it could be called that—between them, despite the thick tension in the air begging for a voice to disturb and dispel it somehow. He was certain that were he to speak, it would be less of a defusing and more of a detonation— a spark for the fuel of Edward's anger to fan into scalding-hot flames.

This cold silence, Albedo could bear. He was more than familiar with strained silences.

Seconds stretched into minutes, and despite the Curtis butchery being a reasonable walking distance away, the walk itself felt like hours long, filled with nothing but the sound of boots clicking, armor clanking, and the occasional cricket's chirping.

Albedo hung back from the entrance to the butchery once more while Edward and Alphonse walked into their home, Edward quietly stating that he'd search for some rags to clean Alphonse up.

Their home. Albedo was more acutely aware than ever that he was a trespasser, an intrusion upon the space of their childhood. His place was among the lifeless snow, the monsters of the mountains, built hardy and cold for self-sufficient survival. The warmth of a city could so quickly turn to cruel burning, so easily twist on its head the moment one became comfortable within it.

He'd carved a home for himself in Mondstadt— with the chisel of Rhinedottir's recommendation and Alice's endorsement, the hearth of Klee, his first sister, as his light, he'd somehow painstakingly inserted himself into the town, become a presence that was known, respected. He'd been wary that all along he'd been a wedge— driven into the tough stone walls of Mondstadt, designed to make it crumble under prolonged stress. He'd kept his distance, taking his studies up to Dragonspine when possible, maintaining as little social contact as necessary.

Now he'd well and truly wedged himself into this nation, into this world, without realizing. He'd filled an ecological niche that wasn't there, joined a quest that wasn't his, and soon, he would perhaps burn for it, before he could burn them. It would be justifiable. It would be the correct course of action when discovering an invasive species, the logical conclusion to the study of something which should not exist here.

Albedo filled his lungs with the cool night air, crisp and refreshing despite the events that had transpired that day.

For reasons unbeknownst to him, his feet began to walk, carrying him away from the Curtis butchery and into the deserted nighttime streets. Then he began to jog, skipping over rough pavement; then run, passing every lamp; and then sprint, to the edge of town where the forest began.

One foot after another, a steady tap against the ground that was lost to the whistling wind flowing past his face, turbulent airflow filling Albedo's ears.

He did not know how long he ran for. He did not have the muscles of flesh to produce citric acid for soreness and exhaustion, but soreness and exhaustion came to him regardless, sharp electrical signals replicated by his chalk limbs that raced up to his head.

He opened his lungs and breathed. Felt the cold air sting within his chest, as though he were baring his ribcage and heart to the unrelenting winter of Dragonspine.

Then finally, his whole body wracked with tremors, blurriness waltzing with black spots in his vision, he came upon a lake. The trail leading through the forest had long since thinned into wilderness, leaves and vines and thorns painted black by the lack of light.

The lake swayed in his vision, a picture of the island in the middle of it a small dark mass of land swimming through his eyes.

Darkness overtook his vision first, then his senses. By the time his body hit the ground, a dull thud against the dirt and leaves that had no audience in the thick woods, he was already unconscious.

Al stayed quiet as Ed wiped his armor clean. He had a lot to stew on, and plenty of time to stew on it, but before that, something was off about Ed.

His movements were jerky and rough, and Al knew Ed well enough to know how much care Ed took when handling parts of his armor. It was, after all, part of him for the time being. It was something that one was meant to be respectful of, Al understood. Ed had explained it to him before.

Al knew this, so it came less as something to be angry about and more as a point of confusion and slight concern when Ed dragged the rag so harshly across the surface of his detached breast plate, wordless and brooding.

"Brother?" Al queried quietly.

"Yeah, Al?" His voice was still soft— he was tiptoeing around Al's recent experience, Al could tell.

"Is something wrong?"

Ed's hand paused, full stop. Ed did not meet Al's eyes, only grasped the dirty rag even tighter in his fisted hand.

Al waited.

"…D'you remember when we talked about Albedo?" Ed asked back, not quiet answering. "In the hospital, after the Fifth Laboratory."

"Uh huh," Al nodded.

"You said that you think he's a good guy," Ed recollected, still not meeting Al's eyes. "Do you… still think so?"

Al shifted. Without his chest plate, the sound of his armor clinking against itself was less resonant, somehow quieter. He had no doubt in his mind that something had happened, something that had reawakened Ed's suspicions and wariness around the mysterious alchemist.

"…Why?" Al asked, in lieu of answering.

Ed bit his lip, far-off gaze hardening into a glare. "I… I found out something about him today. I don't think he ever intended to tell us about it."

"Well," Al hummed, hoping it would sound disarming enough to release some of the tension in Ed's shoulders, "was it something that he had good reason to hide?"

"He's a homunculus, Al."

Ed's voice was biting, scathing in a way that Al had thought was reserved only for those who his brother held only the lowest of opinions for, such as their biological father. However, Al was too busy turning around the news in his head to ponder on Ed's aggressive delivery of it.

Albedo was a homunculus.

Albedo was an artificial human, same as Greed and the others with the Ouroboros tattoos who kept appearing more and more the deeper entrenched they became in the mysteries of the government. He was one of them. He was not human.

Albedo had learned alchemy from a strict teacher who expected perfection from him. Albedo knew forms of alchemy the likes of which Ed and Al had never seen before. Albedo's anomalous alchemy required neither circle nor clap. Albedo didn't breathe when he fell unconscious.

One by one, clues fell into place in the cumulative picture of inhuman perfection that was Albedo. The new knowledge of his homuncular nature threaded together the pieces into a layer of patchwork that finally made some sense.

"He's… a homunculus?"

Ed nodded, the movement subdued and grave. "I'd like to say it doesn't make sense, but quite the opposite, huh? It makes too much sense."

"Yeah…" Al reluctantly agreed. "How did you… find out?"

"His arm broke off while we were fighting Greed." Ed shuddered. "I mean, it was like he was a statue or something; and there wasn't blood or muscle or bone— just chalk. All the way through."

"His arm was okay, though, when I saw him," Al noted.

Despite the scowl, Ed's eyes held the light of scientific curiosity that any good alchemist would in the face of a new discovery. "Yeah, he fixed it immediately. A different mechanism from the auto-regeneration that Greed had— he had to transmute it back into place himself, but still—functional immortality of a form."

Al let the new knowledge sink in. "I… don't know what to say."

Ed's scowl turned back into a full-on glare. "Well I do. Namely, why didn't he tell us?"

"He probably had his reasons," Alphonse tried to defend.

"He doesn't have any excuse, Al!" The sudden volume increase made Al lean back. "He knows we've been trying to get our bodies back, he's known why for almost as long as we've been working together, and he didn't think that him being a homunculus was relevant? Don't joke."

"Don't yell at me about it! Just because we told him about ourselves doesn't mean he needs to tell us," Al argued. "And don't you think if he had a way to help us, he'd take it? You see how desperate he is to help Nina!"

"Would he?!" Ed rounded on Al, furious. "He obviously cares about Nina but what does he care about us? Joining us on a wild goose chase when he was here the whole time!"

"That's not fair to him!" Al shouted back. "Maybe him being a homunculus isn't even relevant to us getting our bodies back at all! Maybe that's why he didn't say anything, because it wouldn't be helpful to us anyways!"

"Why are you on his side?!"

"Because I don't understand why you're so angry at him!"

"He's the one who's been keeping secrets from us this whole time!"

"And you're the one who's getting butt-hurt about it without even hearing him out!"

"Stop it!"

Both brothers fell silent at the high-pitched scream. Nina sat at the doorway, shoulders drawn in, back hunched in an eerie resemblance to how they'd first seen her after the chimeric transformation. Her form went up, down, her breathing fast and erratic.

"Nina…" Al gently reached a hand out. "We're sorry."

Nina's ears twitched. Her breaths slowed into something more even.

"Brother Albedo isn't even here," she whined. "I thought you all came home together."

Ed was taken aback, as was Al. They looked quickly to each other and then back at Nina.

"He did," Ed confirmed. "We did, didn't we?"

Al nodded. "What do you mean he isn't here, Nina?"

Nina frowned deeper and shifted a little on her legs and paws. "He's not in the house anywhere. I don't… smell him."

Normally, Ed would be a bit more careful with his words around Nina. Tact was the last thing on his mind currently, however.

"Shit!" He cursed.

It took half an hour of fruitless searching around town before Nina resigned to pressing her snout close up against the ground to track the faint trail of Albedo's clean earthy smell. It took another hour of the three of them apprehensively following that trail behind Nina, through the town and into the forest, noting where branches had broken and plants had been trampled, before they finally came upon the shoreline.

Albedo laid on the damp leaf-scattered dirt and gravel, his white jacket starkly bright against the surrounding darkness despite the lack of light: like a little moon in a starless night sky, or perhaps a lonely patch of snow that would wash away with the high tide.

"Dumbass," Ed grumbled under the heavy breaths he took from running the final stretch. "What the hell is he doing out here?"

Albedo's face was expressionless: eyes and mouth closed, still enough to mistake for a statue. It did not look particularly peaceful, nor did it look tortured or troubled. It did, however, look unsettlingly lifeless.

"…Making us go through all this trouble to find him." Ed hated how clearly his voice belied the sheer worry he'd steadily stewed in for the past hour and a half.

Al came up behind him, steps slow so as not to jostle his armor loudly, Nina following. "He came so far out…"

"Well," Ed huffed in annoyance, "since he made us come all the way out here, he may as well walk back on his own feet."

He held up his flesh arm, ready to slap Albedo awake. Though practically for the purpose of waking Albedo, Ed imagined it'd feel cathartic to get a light unserious hit in against the object of his current misery.

Al's arm rushed forward with surprising strength, staying Ed's hand. "Wait, brother."

Ed looked back at Al.

"He didn't sleep last night," Al said. "He's been getting nightmares about Hughes's shooting— I don't think he's slept much at all since then."

Ah. Ed drew back, guilt quickly extinguishing the dour anger that had grown. "Fine," he looked away, "but you're carrying him back."

When Albedo awoke, it was already midday, if the sun's position outside the window was any indication.

He sat up from the bed, wincing at the needle-sharp jab of pain from his wrist as it bent and failed to support his weight.

He rubbed at it with his other hand, the formula for repair automatically coming to the forefront of his mind. An internal wound required no extra material to fix; merely a rearrangement of existing particles. Fractured scaphoid bone, Albedo pinpointed, imbuing his unharmed hand with alchemical energy and quickly completing the transmutation.

He rubbed the back of his neck, too, where a small crack had formed. Though he could relieve some of the pain now, it would probably be wise to repair it properly with some purified chalk when he had the chance to.

He blinked.

For the first time in three days, his thoughts seemed to be… normal. At his usual capacity, even he was not often fully aware of all the brisk analyses and cognitive judgments he made which led to his actions, accustomed as he was to constant existence with a mind that never halted.

Nonetheless, he hadn't realized until now, with the stark juxtaposition of his previous unrested and current refreshed states, just how… incapable he'd been. Thoughts slowed, insight dimmed, reactions as irrational as a creature— Albedo bowed his head in shame, much in the same way he would defer and submit himself to the judgment of his teacher.

His teacher was not here. She could not scold him for his actions, nor tell him where to correct himself.

A head leaned in from the doorframe beside him, and Albedo's own head swiveled to see it, the awareness of a new presence already on his mind like a feathery touch.

"You're awake," Izumi said.

Albedo nodded wordlessly.

"Well, come eat lunch," she leaned back out.

Her tone had left no room for complaint or argument, and Albedo knew that one did not tend to survive long by making an enemy of a woman like Izumi Curtis.

He stood from the bed gingerly, testing the weight on his muscles, allowing himself the surprise and accompanying comfort that his body had restored itself with unconsciousness such that moving no longer caused am exhausting dull ache.

At the table, it was just Albedo, Izumi, and her husband Sig. The food tasted wonderful to Albedo, despite that in all technicality, his body had little need for food. Scrapes of utensils against plates, as well as chewing and swallowing, took the place of conversation. Albedo sat content to let this continue— he was not particularly keen on speaking first.

The meal finished too soon. Sig left a lovingly curled hand on Izumi's small shoulder, which Izumi kissed farewell before Sig returned to work in the butchery.

Albedo watched these interactions and felt the urge to look away, as though he were illicitly peeking through a window.

"So," Izumi began, resting her head on an arm perched on the table. "Homunculus, huh?"

Albedo did not quite freeze up, but it was a close thing. He knew that Izumi had found out yesterday, had it under consideration in the same middling layer of priorities as the brothers knowing, and was certain he would be confronted for it sooner or later, but had been unsure when.

In Albedo's mind, there had been countless scenarios he'd imagined where the Knights of Favonius discovered him. Perhaps due to Durin and the ever-present miasma lingering in Dragonspine that slowly curled around his heart, perhaps due to his own inability to assimilate into the daily ins and outs of Mondstadtian life. Perhaps one day, something would necessitate sharing his secret, and at such a point, the information would be willingly given after he steeled his heart to the potential of losing his place among them and departing for travel once more.

He hadn't made such predictions for Amestris, simply because time had not allowed him to yet. Traveling as much as he had, he hadn't had the steady contentedness of a home such as Mondstadt to breed such concerns yet.

He did not allow his voice or expression to waver in the face of Izumi's clear accusation. "Yes," he responded firmly. "I am."

She tapped a finger on the table, a tic that Albedo could not determine the reason of. "If you don't mind me asking… who?"

Faced with direct questioning from a woman whom Albedo knew little about, he felt surprisingly little urge to lie or misdirect—perhaps due to the respect he had for her as a teacher to the highly principled brothers, perhaps due to his own acknowledgment as a teacher to Sucrose and Timaeus himself. A part of his mind whispered that this was the awaiting confrontation with lower stakes— he stood to lose less from Izumi's poor opinion of him than from any other who had discovered him yesterday.

"My alchemy teacher," he replied honestly.

"I see," Izumi closed her eyes. "I must admit I'm a bit jealous. She managed to achieve what I failed to do."

Her failed human transmutation: "…a child," Albedo ruminated.

"My unborn son," Izumi confirmed, with a pained look in her eyes. "I had a miscarriage."

"…I'm sorry," Albedo responded after a pause. Contextually these were the polite words to say in such a conversation, yet they did not feel quite genuine enough on his tongue to acknowledge the pain of such loss.

Izumi seemed to glean something from Albedo's hesitation, whether that was his uncertainty, the feeling of being out-of-place, or something else altogether.

She sighed. "All those who overstep as such pay the price. There's a good reason that it's taboo. Did your teacher…?"

Albedo shook his head before Izumi could finish her sentence. But, as he opened his mouth to deny it, he carefully rolled the elaboration over in his mind before sharing. "Not the same price as you or the brothers, at least," he supplied. "She…" he looked down at his hands, which had tensed into loose fists, "…her disappearance from the world was unrelated to my creation, I believe."

"I see," Izumi said somberly. "So you've lost your teacher."

Albedo did not grace this with a confirmation, as both of them knew it to be true.

"What a pair of fools we'd make," Izumi chuckled humorlessly, "a mother who failed to make her son and a son created by a missing mother."

Albedo did not know what to say to this. He did not respond.

"Can I ask…" Izumi began. "Is it difficult, living as a homunculus?"

Albedo mulled over the question in his mind, and decided that the least he could provide to a grieving mother was the truth.

"In some ways," he looked her in the eyes, "yes. I… did not live among humans for most of my life, and when it came time for me to, I made many mistakes," his hand wandered to the star-shaped birthmark on his neck, the evidence of his inhumanity. How did one describe the risk one posed against his own home when the malignant corpse of his brother before him was lying on the just-neighboring mountain? How could he describe the slow realization that he could become the seed to destroy a thriving garden?

He thought he'd had something of a fresh beginning in Amestris, where his admittedly few emotional attachments were completely irrelevant, and yet he'd blundered so many times since his arrival. "I still make many mistakes, it seems, if Edward's adverse reaction to my identity is any indication."

Izumi chuckled. "Ed is strong headed. He's angry, but he'll get over it."

I can't be certain of this, Albedo did not say. Though he did not want to consider facing the fiery golden eyes of his traveling companion, his curiosity won out. "Where is Edward right now, anyhow?"

Izumi tossed a hastily scribbled note onto the table. "He's gone. He left this for you."

Meet us at Garfiel's Automail in Rush Valley, it read. Or don't. It's your choice.

P.S. We took Nina with us to see Winry. We'll drop her off at Hughes's in Central tomorrow.

Albedo neatly folded the note into eighths and slid it into the pocket where he kept his sketchbook.

"They've given you the option of choosing whether to talk to them," Izumi said.

Albedo nodded. Words began to fail him once more as the faces of the brothers came to his mind. Furrowed brows, wide eyes, disbelief, anger, hurt.

Izumi waited.

"I…" his mouth opened, "…I don't know. What to do."

For some reason, looking Izumi in the eyes became unbearable. It was only one person, so it was fine, wasn't it? He could allow his posture to wilt and let his head rest on the arms he'd rested on the tables, alleviate his shoulders for a brief moment of the burden of carrying his thoughts.

"You aren't my student," Izumi stated. "I can't tell you what to do."

Albedo remained silent.

"But," she continued, "I trained them. And I know them. I think you underestimate their capacity for understanding and kindness."

"…And if I don't want to see them?"

Albedo could hear the frown in Izumi's voice even without seeing her face. "Then you're a more yellow-bellied idiot than I thought. But, like I said, I can't tell you what to do."

In the end, he and the brothers had not even spent so extended of a time together that Albedo would necessarily consider them close. They were brought together by a common goal, but what else was there to tie them together beyond their mutual profession as State Alchemists?

Albedo's mind was absent as he ordered the ticket. One single ticket on the northbound train to Central, so that if nothing else, he could delay his meeting with the brothers for a short while longer while Edward had his automail repaired.

In the meantime, he would dutifully complete his neglected responsibilities as State Alchemist: report to Colonel Mustang, complete a necessitated few missions. With any hope, these missions, too, would take him on a separate path from the brothers until confrontation became inevitable.

Cowardly, his mind would supply, in a voice that sounded like Izumi. You take whatever advantages you can, when you can, the voice that sounded like Cavalry Captain Kaeya would return.

Returning to Central was hardly going to put him at an advantageous position. It was figuratively the viper's pit: the nest of this world's Ouroboros-tattooed homunculi, where they had widespread eyes and ears.

Something about this was more comforting to Albedo, however, then the thought of golden hair and golden eyes, and red eyes behind steel plate armor.

Nina will be safer with them.