Half/Inch prologue
Hey, going to start my stories. :-)
Half/Inch
Chapter: Prologue
Type: Fullmetal Alchemist fanfiction
Posted on- 7/31 and 8/2 (in two installments)
CONTAINS SPOILERS!!!
---Story begins here---
Hey! I haven’t written on Fanfic in what… three, maybe four years.
Please note the following
EVERYTHING IS EXPLAINED. If you’ve never seen Alchemist, you’ll be able to follow this story just as easily as if you have seen it.
HOWEVER…
CONTAINS MEGA SPOILERS THROUGH EPISODE 45! This story starts off during the end of episode 45 for chapters 1 and 2, and then splits off into its own story.
Having said this, enjoy!
Night approached fast, as the cashier at the Rizenbul train station leaned back into his chair, letting his squarish cap fall slightly off his head, tilting cocked to the left and poised to fall off. It had been a ridiculously slow day; it was in-between seasons for crop production and none of the farmers of the small agricultural village had use for the trains.
‘Well, at least I’m still getting paid for this,’ the man thought, noticeably bored with himself, until he realized an average-looking boy rapping hard on the till with the back of his fist.
His black hair fell past his shoulders, and he was hidden almost completely by a large woolen pea jacket that fell just an inch above the ground. Everything he wore was a gothic black, even a pair of sunglasses (which seemed far out of place this late) save a pair of stark white gloves that brought immediate attention to the sixteen-ish boy’s hands.
The cashier straightened immediately upright.
“Uh… one ticket please on the 8:20 to Central,” the boy said, sounding slightly nervous.
The cashier, looking behind the boy, figured out why. A large item of undistinguishable form wrapped in canvas tarp stood upright, with a lone piece of brown luggage leaning haphazardly against it.
“Sir,” the cashier said, “there’s been a couple instances of fugitives lately. I have to look at that large… thing you seem to be bringing with you, you know, routine check. And it costs extra for oversized pieces, too. Sorry kid.”
The cashier came out behind the till. He could see the boy was sweating profusely, whether it was due to his heavy coat or the fact that the cashier needed to check his luggage, he wasn’t sure. Unhooking the rope in the tarp, it fell away to reveal…
“A bronze statue of Major Armstrong?” the cashier asked. He’d seen the military officer a few times coming in and out of Rizenbul, and his picture occasionally in the paper, but never expected this.
“Ah, I’m sorry, it’s not very good,” the boy said modestly. “I was commissioned to make that for the big guys in Central and I have to deliver it for some ceremony tomorrow. Well, I just wish they had given me more time or some better supplies, but you work with what you have, you know?”
The cashier nodded out of politeness, as he was unable to draw anything past a stick figure, let alone cast someone’s likeness in bronze. He at least understood the sweating (the boy was probably nervous that his work would be criticized).
“Hey,” he said looking at the boy, “I’ll wave the extra luggage charge. But just this once. When the train pulls in, do you need help loading this?”
The boy scratched the back of his head and replied with a soft, “Yeah, that would really help,” slumping exhaustedly into one of the wooden benches. Snoring immediately ensued.
‘The poor kid probably dragged that statue all the way here,’ the cashier thought. ‘I guess I’ll just wake him when the train arrives.”
The train was as bumpy and disjointed as ever. The boy held mercilessly onto the ends of his coat as the wind flapped through the train divider where he stood, outside and in the fresh air, instead of inside one of the dining or sleeping cars. His ears were perked on edge, listening for any sound that might be a cause for concern. The exposition back in Rizenbul was by far a close one, and the boy was only glad that the smaller suitcase had not been searched- it, of all things, may have been reason to land himself in jail.
He sighed and loosened his prying grip on the railing. What was he worrying about, anyway? He’d known David Wellstien, the clerk at the station, for his whole life, and yet the man hadn’t recognized him. Why would the cops be able to?
Meanwhile, in the car ahead of him, three burly MP’s- military issued police force- came barging in, guns waving and eyes glaring, scanning the passengers for one rogue officer.
“Hey, everyone here!” the squattest of the three exclaimed, “We’re looking for a criminal of the military, a major by the name of Edward Elric. He’s five-foot-one, blonde hair, with pale brown eyes, almost golden. He’s at large and on the run with his non-militant younger brother whose physical identity is unknown as he customarily wears a six-foot-nine suit of armor. If you are hiding either of these people, you may be charged with related crimes.”
Nobody stirred in the car as the three men combed through the center aisle, opening compartments and glaring at several of the passengers. Finally satisfied, the head MP yanked open the door to a billowing rush of air and the lone boy, leaning halfheartedly against the railing between cars.
“You!” the squat policeman yelled, and the boy in black stood upright, towering at least six inches over his tormentor, who happened to be five feet tall.
“Yes?” the kid asked.
The policeman looked half-heartedly at the expensive sunglasses, but after noticing the boy’s black locks without a hair out of place, as well as his height, dismissed the thought of having possibly found his man on this train, and thrust open the door to the last compartment, which was only luggage.
The giant bronze statue stood, like a lone man in a sea of insects, almost with a glistening halo as the squat MP brought his lantern to the edge of its smooth surface. Rapping it hard with the end of his bayonet, the surface began to crack; at first a scratch, then a deep gash running down the front end.
The boy’s left eye twitched, and out of muscle memory, hit the MP square on the chin, grabbing the massive statue in one arm and the suitcase in the other. The squat man, enraged, lashed out at the boy’s ankles, sending him flying over the railing and rolling several times onto the ground.
Before the MP, who was far out of shape, could chase him, the boy picked up his strewn things and ran at breaking speed in the opposite direction of the train. By the time the military would be able to stop the mechanical gargantua the boy would be much too far.
After fifteen minutes and feeling windless, the boy stopped, huffing and clutching his chest. The pea coat had since been discarded; it was easily noticeable that this seemingly average-sized boy was actually on a pair of half-foot stilts.
Throwing down the sunglasses to reveal a shimmering pair of slightly dilated lion-colored eyes, a wild amber with a sparkle from the run, the boy proceeded to untie the wooden platforms from the bottom of his shoes, tripping and landing face-first into the mud next to the mangled bronze he had been carrying as it if were a sack of feathers.
“Brother?” a voice echoed faintly from the statue. “Brother?”
The boy spat mud and wiped the side of his mouth clean with the back of his left glove. Except for a lone lantern standing guard over a worn out sign-post, it was pitch black. Any normal person would have thought the statue haunted.
Considerably worn out, the boy attempted to untie his stilts with a slightly annoyed reply. “Hey, Al. Never felt better. How about you? We almost got to Central, too, didn’t we? Just one more hour. One more friggin’ hour and we’d both be out of this shit.”
Al, seemingly inside the statue, sighed in tune with his brother. After finally wrenching off the second stilt, the boy clapped his hands once; the bronze literally melted away at the boy’s touching of it. A large suit of armor covered in insignias slowly revealed itself from within the statue.
Al turned his helmeted head slowly, as if to work out the kinks of being encased, then laughed.
“Ed, you really need a mirror.”
END- Prologue
Please feel free to give feedback- spelling errors, etc. I cannot see very well, so large font (if it's even possible here) would REALLY help.