Ed leans back against the rough sandstone wall of the narrow alley, and flares his nostrils as he breathes in a deep cleansing breath. The sky glows a deep crimson hue high above his head, and he allows himself a precious moment to marvel at the wispy clouds there which he knows are really glorified ice particles scattered high in the stratosphere.
A quick half second later, he turns his gaze low blaze before him, and swallows down the not-so-tastey morsel he chews in his mouth. He pushes down the quiver of guilt he feels as he licks at the meaty juices, for the rabbit he roasts in the small metal can is likely someone's, (or more likely, some child's), lost pet. He muses that would be as good an explanation as any; it was easy enough to catch. His stomach roars and gnaws at his middle, and the next hearty bite he takes banishes any further concerns in his mind of the weighty matter.
His first day of freedom did not go as well as he hoped.
His exit from the hospital doors was simple enough, even after emerging dizzy and breathless from the stairwell. He knew that brief malady was simply caused by general dehydration and sheer lack of food; he had suffered from both before after all.
That. And. He is flabby. He swallows down the morsel and crinkles his eyes as he recalls the happy days he spent alone with his brother on an island.
Training for Alchemy... His eyes drift to the mass of rags on his left, then sweep over his bare legs and arms. They are definitely thinner than they should be. A the skin is pale. He scratches at the odd marks tattooed on his forearm as he recalls the angry glares of the street vendors, then snorts at the only garment he has on. The hospital issued boxers are soiled with dark, caked mud, and odd smears of green.
He judges he looks like a slightly cleaner version of the beggars he often passed by on the streets in Liore. With the local language being beyond him, he tried his best, all day long, to make trades. He felt like a lowly street performer doing it at the time. Mostly, he pointed like a monkey to basic things like food and clothing, and make grand sweeping gestures while saying "alchemy" quite loud and slow. It was no wonder to him why the merchants didn't really want him around.
Scant glimpses he made that afternoon of panic filled, darting eyes also said loads of another possible motive: the merchants didn't want to upset the guys with metal on their headbands.
Less than a week ago, those guys had been in a public scuffle with himself, and they happened to walk up and down walls.
He gnaws another chunk out of the rabbit.
They didn't want to see another such spectacle any time soon, nor suffer from the loss to their business it would cause. It simply wasn't equivalent to do business with someone those in authority had issues with. He understood that.
Sizzling fat spatters and the fire flares, lighting up the growing shadows. He shifts his seating and scrawls additional computations onto the dirt by the rag pile, and narrows his eyes into a squint as he adjusts his estimate of the mass with his left forefinger. With his right, he tosses the naked bones at the far wall.
That pocket watch spoiled me. He thinks. Even my hard earned reputation, of being the Alchemist of the People? Way logical to be completely meaningless here.
(where ever here is. Xing? Maybe?)
He swallows the last morsel and licks at the juices at the corners of his mouth as he carefully checks his raw equations. He then shifts himself comfortably before the rags, and slaps his palms together. The blue lightening leaping off the discarded fabric far outshines the blaze.
Brief discharge snaps into the air as he steps into the transmuted black trousers. He hooks his thumb through a sturdy loop at the hip, and frowns as he pulls. He's eying the gap as he hears the crisp snap of his noise making trap down the way.
He kicks the can over and douses the fire with the pile of sand--(Hey it's everywhere)-- and crouches low beside a rough shelter of metal pipes and more cans.
He hears a wailing coo of a baby echoing off the alley walls, but the chime of metal striking a the far wall, followed by a soft thunk in the dirt nearby catches his immediate attention. He jumps away to the side and back pedals.
He enters his stance as he peers into the shadows.
"We eben." He hears a familiar sounding voice call out of the shadows. The words are garbled and barely recognizable as xingese, but the baritone is definitely male.
"Who are you?" Ed replies in the same language.
A heartbeat passes, and the baby giggles.
"We eben." The voice in the dark insists robotically. Ed lowers his brows as his heart hammers against his ribs.
How long has it been since he's actually spoken with anyone? Reluctantly, he breaks his stance and stands. He scrubs his mind for the scant xingese words he knows, and cobbles together a sentence he hopes makes sense.
"I'm.. Not that good in xingese. Can you...Do you understand me?" Ed calls again, darting his eyes in the dark.
"HEY!! Talk to me!?" Ed calls out, wincing at the lilting whine tainting his voice. He almost bolts after the speaker, but the baby sounds he tracks vanish at his first lunging step. Ed turns about to use both ears, and tilts his head listening to the silence. Was that a scrambling of scraping sandals? He lifts his eyes up, tracing the inky shadows of the walls.
He thinks he hears the faint echoes of a baby's coo wafting down from the very top. He thinks it's not exactly an easy climb. He skews his brows and darts his eyes back to the object that thunked in the dirt.
Something small, round, and metallic glints in the moon light.
He takes in a sharp breath. After a few thunderous heartbeats, he strides over, and crouches low.
His diamond hard, gauntlets fingers hover just shy of touching the silvery surface of what appears to him to be the back of a very dented up pocket watch.
He decides he's being ridiculous, and grimly grips the cool metal surface. It flips over with a little toss. He sees the thin chain whipping about, and then widens his eyes.
Emblazoned on the other side is a roaring lion caged within the hexagram: the great crest of the Amestrian military.
Ed swallows and looks closely at the edge. He frowns deeply when he sees the telltale transmutation marks that solidly seals the metal. It takes him less than an eye blink to confirm the watch as his own.
Dawn finds him squatted against the wall, watch cupped in one hand, staring blankly at the wall. He snaps open the watch glances again at the rough memento he once carved into the interior that reads:
Don't forget.
Then, with a gentle clap, Ed seals it up once more.
Sent via a stray supercharged nano particle of unobtainium....
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