Central High

6. Best Friends With The Best Fathers

Lydia and Fear stood there, watching as the military issue car left the school parking lot. Lydia smiled at Fear and the girl had a puzzled look on her face. "Since when was the Fuhrer and his son back in Central?"

"Probably since an hour ago. They must have had a breakthrough in the defenses of Drachma and they gained control of that area so they could return. Dad was talking about it, Amestris sent in the State Alchemist, Daniel Armstrong. You know, The Frozen Cell Alchemist? He's lethal on the battle field; he can freeze your cell's energy and you die instantly. He's Olivier's kid, and he's a one man army." Lydia explained and Fear nodded in understanding. She knew better than anyone that the State Alchemists are Amestris' secret weapon in war since her father was who they originally sent the state alchemists after. The military and the homunculus didn't get along very well.

"Great, the enemy came back to home base..." Fear growled and set her skateboard on the ground again and got on it, Lydia following her lead. The pair began to skate out the gates of the school and onto the main street. "But, I'll admit that his kids don't seem too bad. Especially his daughter, she seems harmless since she'd be so easy to manipulate if the need arise." Fear murmured to herself and Lydia smiled, hearing her friend's opinion on the girl. Lydia had started to feel a draw to her, she couldn't simply explain why this draw existed but she couldn't ignore it.

"I like her. I think we should give an honest try to befriend her." Lydia suggested and Fear simply nodded, thinking back on what she saw when she looked into Ái's mind; that image of a hospital... It was a brief image and Fear had ignored it, but now that she thought about it... it seemed important. "The only issue is how shy she is... She's kinda scared of us, isn't she?"

"I wouldn't say she's scared of us, just easily overwhelmed by us. She's a mouse and we are popular. She's cautious of us and timid but not actually afraid. I can tell if she was afraid that she'd run from us and she hasn't done that. She's a hard one to read, her mind is all over the place." Fear corrected and Lydia gave an understanding response in the form of a grunt. The pair crossed main street and skated past the skate park and regular park to head for the shorter's home. The air was still warm and neither of the two expected it to cool off tonight which was a blessing since Fear lived under the city with her family. The fuhrer hadn't checked for them down there because he assumed them to be dead along with Father, not expecting his death to actually make the homunculus all be reborn. He instead sealed off the exits so all that needed to be done was create a hidden entrance and they were safe down there. Humans overlook the stupidest things.

"Any thoughts on the brother?"

"Not really. He seems decent but he's wounded." Lydia looked at her friend shocked. He seemed fine to her. Was he hurt in the war?

"He was? He seemed fine, how do you know?"

"Two things; one, he winced when she hugged him and two, I could see a white bandaging on his shoulder peeking out from under his uniform." Fear explained, she had been hardly listening to the boy, analyzing everything about him. His stature, his personality, his age, his frame, his tone, none of it went unnoticed by Fear. She even looked into his fears and saw that he was afraid of many things, some were rather odd though, such as a fear of his father. Fear wasn't sure why it was there, but it was, deep down. She didn't see any negative memories attached with the fear so she hadn't the slightest clue why it existed.

"Ah. Wonder how that happened; he's a tower general so he just waits in base camp and gives directions. Then again, ambushes are common with Drachma troops. He seemed alright though so it can't be anything too serious." Lydia thought aloud. Fear glanced over to her friend with a questioning look. "Ok, what's with the look, Fear?"

"How do you know so much about the Drachma troops?" Fear asked and was startled when Lydia nearly fell off her skateboard as she face-palmed. "What? Did I say something wrong?"

"You really are out of it today... Remember, my dad is in the military." Lydia teased and Fear just sighed. "Long day?" The shorter of the two girls just nodded and just continued to skate in the direction of the entrance to the tunnels.

"I just hope dad leaves me alone when we get home... I'm too tired to deal with his bullshit..."

"Driving you insane is his way of showing you that he loves you; my dad does the same thing, but to be fair, we do the same back to them. We're teenage girls, we're meant to be a pain in the ass with our hormones and bitching." Lydia joked and Fear nodded in agreement, laughing.

"Yeah~ I am a pain in his ass at times. In fact, just last month I stuck my pet snake in his bed when we had an argument and he was paralyzed in fear cuz he had no idea what kind of snake he had slithering around under his shirt. It was funny until he realized it was just a garter snake and started yelling at me then gave me a nice quarter sized bruise on my left shoulder."

"Hey, I transmuted my dad's automail leg into the floor board of the living room when he fell asleep reading on the couch. Both him and mom were pissed, they took away my electronics and took my door off of it's hinges so I had no privacy..."

"Yikes, at least you didn't get beat."

"Your a homunculus; I'm sure it didn't hurt that bad."

"True." The two girls laughed as they turned the corner around the building and pulled up the iron door hatch under the dumpster, leading down dark steps into the tunnels of Central City.