Arisa pov:
Angel seemed almost forgotten to me in the short time I had been in this world. The secret life I had lived seemed far away and the least of my worries as I exposed my skills in alchemy just to fit in, in this world. But perhaps it was fine in the sense that I felt normal here, unafraid to talk to people as the alchemist I was. Though for how long I could hide my past was the question.
I was only mildly perturbed by the eight pairs of eyes that landed on me the moment I entered the office room. I guessed the one at the very back near the windows, seated at a big desk, with dark hair and eyes to be Col. Mustang, the man in charge of the remaining seven. From his posture and the rather bored expression on his face, I figured that he was the type to be lazy sometimes, procrastinating too. The woman next to him though, with blonde hair and holding a bundle of papers, seemed stern.
A boy my age or younger stood in front of the colonel, his long, blonde hair braided, along with someone in a huge armor suit. Ignoring the curious stares of the others in the room, I stepped up to the desk and came to a stop next to the boy, glancing curiously once into his golden eyes before meeting the colonel's gaze. Wordlessly, I held out my unofficial appointment letter. The colonel took it from my hands and read through it before a smile came to his lips.
"So, you're the girl who passed the State Qualification Exam," he said more to himself, "the first girl alchemist in the military."
As he put down the letter and leaned forward on his interlocked hands, the boy spoke, "First girl to become a State Alchemist?"
"You've been off on missions so I believe you haven't heard. This here is Arisa Lee, the first girl to take up and pass the State Alchemist Qualification Exam, acing it no less, just like you did. She's sixteen years old and quite a powerful alchemist with alchemy similar to yours, Fullmetal," said the colonel with a chuckle.
The boy glanced at me with a raised brow, "She's a year older than me? She's short."
"Nii san! You can't say something so rude to someone on the first meeting!" the person in the armor spoke in fluster.
"That's right, Fullmetal. You shouldn't comment on others when you're so small yourself."
The colonel's comment seemed to immensely irk the boy. His face contorted in anger and he slammed his hand on the desk while yelling, "Who are you calling a bean-sized, pipsqueak you can't see without a magnifying glass?!"
"Nii san, he didn't say that!" Yet again, the one in the armor spoke, flustered even more than before.
I chuckled at the lively atmosphere here, getting the feeling that I would be able to fit in well. Although, breaking up the lightning crackling between gazes seemed important for now.
"I'm not really bothered by what you said so don't worry. I'm quite aware that I'm short for my age but a smaller physique is an advantage in many situations," I said and the boy seemed to calm. He scoffed though, looking to the side.
"Anyway, let's proceed with some introductions," said the colonel. He then stood up and continued, "I am Col. Roy Mustang, the Flame Alchemist. These are my subordinates –Lt. Riza Hawkeye, Lt. Jean Havoc, Lt. Heymans Breda, Warrant Officer Vato Falman, and Officer Kain Furey. These two are the Elric brothers – Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist and his younger brother Alphonse Elric."
I was happy to know that three of my colleagues were alchemists – I wouldn't be the odd ball of the group. Straightening up then, I introduced myself, "I am Arisa Lee. It's nice to meet all of you and I hope we get along well. I look forward to working with all of you."
"Congratulations on officially becoming a dog of the military. The Fuhrer had already informed me of your arrival so here is your pocket watch and your authorization letter."
I looked over the silver pocket watch he handed to me that had the military's symbol embossed on it. I pressed the button at the top and it opened to reveal a clock ticking inside. It was like those old pocket watches that I remembered nobles carrying around in movies based in the late 1800's. Then again, I was in the year 1914, so it was expected.
"What is the pocket watch for?" I asked, meeting eyes with the colonel again.
"It is proof that you are a State Alchemist. It also amplifies your alchemy. Why don't you read your authorization letter? The Fuhrer has given you a rather cool title."
Pulling the authorization letter from the paper folder, I read through it. A grin came to my lips at the title I had been given, that I would use during the time I was a State Alchemist. "The Silver Wing Alchemist – that is a cool title. I like it."
"It's a powerful name. Congratulations, Arisa san," Edward said.
"You don't have to be formal with me – I'm not that older than you and I'm not really used to it. Just call me Arisa."
"Is it fine to call you Arisa nee chan?" Alphonse asked hesitantly making me chuckle. Though I would have found it silly before, it seemed pleasant now. Having interacted with quite a few people in the past month I had been here and receiving affection and other emotions I had been isolated from for as long as I could remember, it stirred a sort of comfort in me to be treated nicely now.
"Sure, that's fine too."
"Nii san," the boy wailed loudly, and I could nearly see tears falling from the eyes of his armor, "there's finally another person who's treating me my age!"
Edward tensed a moment then sighed, looking back to the colonel. "Anyway, Colonel, I'll submit the written report tomorrow. That's fine, right?"
"Yes, you can rest up today. Good work."
Edward and Alphonse bowed and excused themselves though stopped at the door a moment to address me, "By the way, Arisa, you can be informal with us too."
"I'll keep that in mind," I agreed with a nod in acknowledgement before they left. Then, I said to the colonel, "Colonel, who are they? You said that the huge armor is the younger brother – how is that possible?"
There was a flicker of strange emotion in the Colonel's eyes before he looked down at his table in thought. meeting my eyes after a moment, he said, "I'm sure you will be working with them in future, so it's good if you know about them. Those two brothers have had a rather hard childhood. They lost their mother when they were very young and their father left much before that. They tried to revive their mother when they were ten and eleven years old respectively, performing forbidden Human Transmutation."
"Human Transmutation..." I repeated, not liking the direction this conversation was taking.
"The younger brother, Alphonse lost his whole body through Equivalent Exchange. The Fullmetal lost his left leg and then his right arm when he sealed his brother's soul in that armor. That armor is hollow, and the only thing binding his brother to this world is the blood seal inside it. Edward uses Automail prosthetics for his limbs now."
My heart dropped to the pit of my stomach at the colonel's words. Seeing the results of Human Transmutation firsthand only made it more obvious to me the reason why it was forbidden. As I had thought before when reading of Homunculi in Shou Tucker's library, nothing could be considered equivalent to a life.
"I happened to read that failed Human Transmutation results in a body with no soul called a Homunculus. Is that true?" I asked.
His gaze at me was stern, "That is what we have heard as well. But we have never met a Homunculus so we don't know what they look like, what they can do and what they are after if they really do exist."
My thoughts wandered to the hazy appearance of the soldier I had seen in Central. I had not seen anyone else with such an appearance or presence...could he have been a Homunculus? Well, there was no proof of that and I was probably just having an off day, being I injured and all. There was no need for me to dwell on it unnecessarily so I changed the topic.
"By the way, Colonel, I was informed during the exam that the military gives State Alchemists additional funds for personal research or work. Would it be possible for me to get the funding too?"
The sudden tense silence that enveloped the room had me wondering if I had asked something I shouldn't have. The colonel's eyes were narrow and his question gave me the answer to my confusion, "Are you looking for the Philosopher Stone too? Perhaps you did something in the past – I heard you can use alchemy without a transmutation circle."
He was mildly surprised when I laughed at his question. I turned around pulling my hair to the side so he could see the red tattoo of the transmutation circle just below the nape of my neck. When I thought he had a good look at it, I turned back and said, "I can't use alchemy without a transmutation circle but I have a permanent one that saves time and effort when I need to use alchemy in a hurry. And I'm not looking for the Philosopher Stone."
"I see, that's good to know. If you were interested in the Philosopher Stone, I was going to consider asking you to help the Fullmetal. What do you want the funding for then?"
I returned his smile with one of my own. "There's someone I want to find – my teacher. He taught me everything I know in self-defense and encouraged me to develop my skills in alchemy even though others around me often made me an outcast for being different than them. It's been several years since I've had contact with my teacher and I was hoping I could look around on missions and see if I can find him."
"Very well, I will put in a request for your funding." He then held out a pouch for me to take. Opening it, I found money inside. "This is for your expenses, a fifty percent advance in your monthly salary. Here is the key to the room you will be staying in when you are in East City. I will have Officer Furey take you there once you have reported back from your first mission, which you will see to right now."
"What's the mission?"
"I want you to do a basic scout around East City. Since you are new here, it will help you get an idea of the city and its people along with deal with any sort of trouble you might come across. If there is anything that catches your eye, you are free to take spot decisions and action."
That was an easy mission, and would, as the colonel had said, give me a chance to get to know the city I would be working in. Surely, it would be a few days before I was sent out of the city for a mission, so until then I would have to stay here helping with local issues and paperwork.
"You're dismissed."
Bowing to the colonel, I left his office and headed down the hall. As I made it to the entrance, I saw the group of men who had flirted with me earlier. They watched me curiously and I grinned, holding out the new silver pocket watch for them to see. They widened their eyes slightly before grinning in return.
I stalled a moment near them when one of them spoke, "So, we'll be seeing you around often. You better be good and respect your seniors because of you don't, we can have you kicked out."
"Get me kicked out?" I mused, raising a brow. "Unfortunately for you, that's decided by the success and failures of my missions. It's not your decision."
"What did you say, brat?! Don't act so cocky on your fist day here!"
With a nonchalant shrug, I proceeded to walk away from them. "I could say the same thing to you. As a senior, shouldn't you be a bit more mature? Think of yourself first before you talk about others."
They were rendered speechless by my words and the obvious truth in them. No matter what they said, they had no control over me in the military unless they were of a higher rank than Col. Mustang. They sure didn't look like they were of a higher rank though so I had no reason to be a doormat for everything they said.
Smiling smugly at their still shocked expressions, I headed out of the headquarters, ready to take on my first mission.
Envy pov:
Having to tail a silly human under the orders of the old hang was nothing short of annoying. She knew well that I hated any mission that did not involve killing humans or making them suffer and yet she had insisted that I had to be the one to spy on this new State Alchemist. Sure, she seemed interesting when Pride had described her but I was sure that he was overestimating her, having seen her alchemy only once.
As if it wasn't enough having to babysit Wrath when Sloth wasn't around.
A week had passed since I arrived at East City. I had procrastinated instead of finding the girl immediately but I knew I couldn't put it off for long. That old hag with make me suffer then...tch, what an annoyance.
The window of the small house the girl lived in was visible to me from where I stood in a dark side alley. The light was on despite it being well past any normal human's bed time. It seems the girl was still awake. Ruffling my hair once in annoyance, I jumped and landed on the window sill. I was expecting to see her reading a book, or lazing around, but I was surprised to find her standing in front of the desk in the room with some maps and papers scattered on top of it. She was looking at them rather seriously, her eyes darting around like she was trying to find something specific.
"Hehh, I was expecting someone older and at least taller when I heard Pride gloat about how good an alchemist she was. But she really is just a sixteen year old kid!" I mused to myself. I sucked in a sharp breath, jumping away from the window when her eyes darted to where I had been.
She was alert – I had to give her credit for being even more alert of her surroundings than the Fullmetal. She stepped to the window and looked all around, her eyes seeming to scan every detail. She didn't seem to miss a spot and even looked up at the terrace where I was sitting in the shadows. She narrowed her eyes watching the darkness where I hid for a moment before shaking her head.
"Hmm, you're not bad! I didn't think you'd be so cautious around yourself," I said to myself and neared the sill again when she had retreated into her room.
I took a moment to observe her – she seemed small for her age, petite and delicate, with long dark hair tied in a high ponytail, some strands of which fell over her shoulders, and matching eyes that stood out over her flawless skin. She wore casual, comfortable clothes. Her room had barely any furniture – a bed, a dresser, a cupboard, and a study table – with a door that I guessed led to a bathroom. She didn't have many belongings either but I did notice a pair of funny looking glasses lying on the bedside table.
"Okay, so the colonel says it has something to do with using human specimens," she mumbled and I looked back at her. Her arms were crossed while she glanced over the map with her eyebrows furrowed slightly. I noticed that she was looking at the city's layout, specifically at a building circled with a red pen.
It was the sixth warehouse she was looking at, where we Homunculi had forced some of the Research Department personnel in the military to research on Human Transmutation and Chimera. Since most of the Homunculi wanted to become human even though I was totally fine with living like this and killing useless humans for fun, the old hag had forced us to get this research done. It was to see if there was a way to affix the body and soul of a person without it miserably failing like it always did.
A few months after this research was initiated, the Research Department was found to be using humans as experiment specimens. Whether it was because they were prisoners to be executed or innocent humans kidnapped and mutilated because of how obsessed the researchers were, the military scrapped the research on grounds of lack of humanity. But there were still some people continuing the research secretly. An underground passage in the sixth warehouse led to a hidden room where the research continued. One or two units of the military had got information on it but it was heavily guarded because of top secret evidence being stored there. Only the Brigadier General under the orders of the Fuhrer himself could grant permission to go into the warehouse.
"Why can't they just send someone to sneak in and gather evidence? Is it really that hard?" she spoke to herself, frowning and I narrowed my eyes. "I guess that I should just take the initiative to collect the evidence. I haven't got any exercise in a while."
The playfulness of her smile made me curious of what she was planning to do. It couldn't be that she actually thought she had a chance of getting into the warehouse and getting evidence. She was incredibly foolish if she thought so. She would surely get caught.
She picked out clothes from her wardrobe before going into the bathroom to change. She was dressed in full black when she exited – a black jacket that fit her snugly, a black scarf, black pants, black shoes, black gloves, and a black cap. In all, the only skin I could see of her was her face. She picked up some things from her bed side table, put on her strange glasses and smirked.
"Alright, warehouse, here I come."
~~~~~~~~~~
Ahem, Envy is about to see Arisa in action! He's in for quite a surprise and I'm sure he'll be impressed. However, is that really a good thing for Arisa? ^^'
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