Chapter Fifty Three

                                    

                                          


                          
i will set my soul on fire, what have i become?  i'm sorry.
                          
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•••
                          
"Okay, so what's our game plan here?" Mustang asked the group, who had joined into a circle by then.
                          
"What we've been doing since we got here," Sonia stated bluntly.
                          
"Which is what, exactly?"
                          
"We keep running into a bunch of setbacks," Ed grunted, clearly frustrated. "Trouble's come to us, not the other way around."
                          
"He's right."
                          
"Well we can't just wait for the enemy to come to us," the colonel interjected.
                          
"Anybody hear that?" Jerso asks, looking up and around. From above, pipes shift and groan. Voices are muffled through the ceiling. Before Sonia has a chance to get a good reading on the qi, the ceiling collapses and two bodies tumble out: one a dreaded monster, the other a tiny Xing warrior.
                          
"Mei?"
                          
"Envy?"
                          
Once realizing where she was, the alchestrist runs towards her allies, Scar in particular. He's not happy to see her as she is to him.
                          
He growls, "You didn't go back to Xing with this monster to glean his immortality?!"
                          
"I'm sorry!" She continues to explain to him, trying to simmer down his anger.
                          
At the sight of the two of them, Mustang, for one, looks stunned. "I guess I stand corrected. Trouble really does have a tracker on you two kids."
                          
"Well, well, well." Envy stood up off the ground where they fell. They stretched with over-exaggeration as the entire group watched, their eyes glued on the homunculus. "Feels nice, having a more desirable vessel." They licked their lips, absolutely giddy. "Whatever those ugly creatures were, they sure did help."
                          
"They're right," Sonia confirmed. "Their soul count definitely grew since they were a little lizard."
                          
The Ishbalan's facial muscles grew tense. "All of this could have been avoided if you had left for Xing!"
                          
"Oh, don't blame her, you brute," Envy called, laughing. It's all my fault. I'm very persuasive." A whistle let out of their mouth and they smiled a villainous smile. "Looks like we've got a sturdy team here. Some hideous chimeras, Fullmetal, See-All, Flame... even working together with the state alchemist killer Scar! How ironic, huh? Don't you all just wanna kill each other? Your history is sooo bleak! Or am I reading the room wrong?"
                          
Mustang was the first to confront them, stepping forward with a gloved hand at his side, ready to snap at any moment. "No mind games, Envy. We don't have the time."
                          
The homunculus giggled. "I'm just a talkative type!"
                          
"Talkative, eh? Would you care to tell me something, then?"
                          
Sonia's fists curl up into balls and she leans towards them with anticipation. She already knew the Colonels' burning question. After all this time, would she finally get to know?
                          
"Who killed Maes Hughes? The truth, homunculus. Or it will be your tongue."
                          
The monster looked to the floor in silence. After a few moments, low chuckles erupted from their throat until it eventually crescendoed into a large fit of laughter.
                          
"It took you this long?" Envy scoffed in disbelief but then smiled with glee. "I take responsibility for that death, Colonel Mustang. No one else. An easy kill, that's for sure. After all, what kind of pathetic human falls for a trick like this?!"