Disappointment (Part 2 - Old Age Home)

The mystery of the book which the Elric brothers were solving with full dedication was suddenly interrupted by the noise of an explosion which took place in a building near their hotel. Everyone present in the room, gazed out of the window and saw the building in front of their hotel was demolished. The incident took place after an hour from the arrest of Richard Green, who was at the interrogation room of Central Command.

Right after the building demolished, first the nearby soldiers and some civilians gathered there to help. Watching the scene, Winry said, "Oh my God that was an old age home."

"Let's go and see if we can help," Ed proposed.

Everyone then rushed to the demolished building to lend help. While going, Ed ordered, "Al, call Central command and inform them about the blast here. Also, call for some medical help."

Al nodded his head with a "hmmm" and went to the reception to make a call, while everyone else moved to help. When they reached there, they found that many people were already gathered there to help find any survivor buried under the rubble, but the military was not allowing anyone to go any close to the incident area. And right at that moment, they heard one more explosion at a distant. Everyone looked in the direction of the explosion. "What was that?" Mei reacted.

"Looks like something bad is happening in this city which we are unaware of," Ed said with a concerned voice.

"Who could be responsible for this?" Winry asked.

"Maybe IFF," Ed replied and continued, "They are a group of Ishvalan radicals who are trying to make Ishval a free country."

"Their actions are nothing less than of a terrorist," Winry rebuked.

"I don't know what's going on right now?" Ed sighed and continued, "All we can do at this moment is to help people in need."

In the meantime, Al reached there and informed, "Brother, I have informed the Central command, and medical help is on its way."

"Good," Ed responded.

While Ed was facing Al, he noticed a man wearing a black hooded cloak. And then a breeze hit the man, moving his hood a bit. It was enough for Ed to see the scarlet eyes of that man. Ed slowly walked toward the man, but before Ed could reach near him, the man saw him and slowly tried to leave that place. Ed was now confirmed that the man had something to do with the blast. So, Ed said while slowly moving through the crowd, "Al, come with me. There is an Ishvalan there who is trying to escape. Maybe he is the one behind the blast."

Al also saw the Ishvalan man who was subtly trying to get out of that place. Both the brothers started following him, but the man noticed them and started running. Watching that, Ed and Al began to chase him. The chase continued for a few minutes, and they never lost the track of that Ishvalan man. Finally, they got fortunate when the man took a turn into an alley which was a dead end. Both the brothers were standing at the entry of that alley and looking at the Ishvalan man who had no way to escape now. All of them were panting due to the long chase they had. "Stop running from us, I promise we won't hurt you," Ed said while panting.

The Ishvalan man faced them and removed the hood he was wearing. He was a tall muscular young man with short black hair and he was wearing a round neck black t-shirt. There was a big scar over and below his right eye. He was clearly not afraid of the fact that he was busted, and that also by the Elric brothers. "Was that you who bombed the old age home?" Ed asked.

The man didn't reply and slowly started moving toward the brothers. "Brother, I think he is going to attack us," Al said with a concerned voice.

"Don't worry Al, just create a wall behind us so that he cannot escape," Ed advised.

"Alright," Al responded.

Al used alchemy to block the entry by creating a wall. Watching that, the Ishvalan man got angrier and charged toward Ed. He punched Ed but, Ed blocked that attack with his hand. Then he kicked Ed, and again Ed blocked it. Ed's reaction enraged the Ishvalan man due to which he started raining punches and kicks. Al was worriedly watching his brother in defensive position. Al said with a concerned voice, "Brother, do you need any-"

But before Al could complete his sentence, Ed interrupted while fighting with the Ishvalan, "Don't worry Al, I can handle this." And to complement his answer to his brother, Ed smirked with confidence.

And just after that, Ed punched the man. Even though the man successfully blocked the attack with crossed wrists, the force from Ed's punch pushed the man to some distance. "How can a tiny boy like you punch me so hard?" The man looked at Ed with narrowed eyebrows.

But, the man said something which he shouldn't have said. "You shouldn't have said tiny. Now you have made him angry," Al warned the man.

"You want to know, how I punched you so hard. Let me show you," Ed smiled even though his eyes were radiating anger.

Ed slowly removed his red cloak and threw it to Al. When he was done removing his cloak, the man and even Al were surprised to see Ed's arm. It was an automail, but it was not any typical automail, it was an exoskeleton covering Ed's both arms.

After the incident of promised day, Ed got his limbs back by sacrificing the ability to perform alchemy. He gave up alchemy after that, but his tendency to get into trouble and help others never changed. Now that there was no alchemy to help him, he started relying on the gadgets provided by Winry. He then had two jobs to do every day, one was to be a helper for Winry in her automail shop and being a dummy for her new automail inventions, while the other job was to rebuild his house with his brother, which he burnt a long time ago. In such a young age, he learned how to be satisfied and be happy with whatever he had.

The automail which he was wearing was a new design of Winry which was not meant for physically handicap people. Instead, the model was meant to increase the tendency of a person. It was worn on the hand like an exoskeleton and it increased the strength of a person as well as providing an armored cover for the hands. But, the only problem was that the model which Ed was wearing was in testing phase. Moreover, Winry was unaware that Ed had brought them to Central and was wearing them.

After watching the exoskeleton automail of Ed, the Ishvalan man asked curiously, "What is that?"

"It's an exoskeleton automail of battle grade. It is light and strong at the same time," Ed replied with a smile.

Meanwhile, Al shouted, "I thought you were using it at home…Do Winry knows about it?"

"No," Ed looked at Al and let out a guilty laughter.

"WHAT?" Al looked at Ed with widened eyes.

"Please do not tell her. If she finds out that I have brought her little piece of experiment along with me to Central, she will definitely kill me with her wrench," Ed requested.

"Brotherrr…," Al cried.

Meanwhile, the man moved some steps back. Watching that Ed taunted him by saying, "Why are you moving back? Are you really that afraid?"

"Even I got a secret weapon to fight with you, Edward Elric," The man smirked.

"Great, you know me," Ed mocked.

The man removed his t-shirt and started groaning as his body was transforming into something else. "Interesting, he is a human chimera," Ed said.

And after transformation, the man looked like a were-leopard. "So you are a leopard chimera I guess," Ed commented, but he was not amazed a bit.

"Yes," The man growled.

"For your information, I have fought more dangerous people than you," Ed took a fighting stance.

And then suddenly, Ed saw the man was too close to him and the man was about to attack Ed with his claws. Ed was lucky that he saw the attack in time, and he blocked it with his automail exoskeleton. Because the exoskeleton was metal, Ed saved himself from a brutal attack. "Looks like your speed and strength have increased," Ed said.

The man then attacked Ed with a barrage of attacks, and Ed was continuously defending himself. Gradually, Ed got an opening to attack, but when he tried to punch, the man held his fist with one hand. But, the man was not aware of one more secret weapon that Ed was hiding. Suddenly a blade emerged from the exoskeleton's upper wrist part and grazed the upper skin of that man. The man was startled and jumped back few steps back. "What happened? Didn't you see that coming?" Ed mocked.

Ed extended the blade from his other wrist, which seemed very much like his old fighting style where he used to transmute his automail to create a blade. Watching that Al got excited and the man got nervous. "You are so cool brother," Al clapped excitedly.

"What if I am not an alchemist anymore? I can still kick some ass," Ed smirked.

Suddenly, Ed felt something in his automail. When he looked at it, he found some of the screws had come off. When he tried to move his arms, he found it hard because the exoskeleton was somehow jammed due to which Ed had to exert extra force to move his own hand. Both Al and the man noticed that. "What happened? Didn't you see that coming?" The man mocked.

The man charged toward Ed who was defenseless at the moment. But, before the man could attack Ed with his claws, Al created a small wall in between them using alchemy. Al then produced multiple protrusions from one side of the wall in that alley. The man tried to dodge all the attacks, but when he thought he was safe from Al's assault, he was already trapped inside Al's jail. Al used alchemy to create more protrusions to make sure that the man couldn't move until the military comes there. Ed was happy that his brother captured the human chimera, but he was also disappointed in himself to rely on his brother to save him. "Nice work Al, guess I have to work harder to save my own ass," Ed smiled and then walked toward that man with his stiff hands.

"Now, Mr. Leopard, can you please tell us if you are the one responsible for blasting the old age home?" Ed asked.

"No," The man replied.

"Are you a part of IFF?" Ed inquired.

"Yes," The man answered.

"Does this mean, IFF is not responsible for the blasts?" Ed questioned.

"I am not sure and even if they are responsible for this, I have no clue on why they are doing this," The man replied.

Suddenly someone broke the wall that Al had created at the entry of that alley. Everyone looked toward the man who broke the wall. It was Colonel Alex Louis Armstrong with his signature alchemy gauntlets on and the blue military uniform.