fossilised | For Stephanie Brown

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For Stephanie Brown

He still isn't quite sure how they managed to make it home.

All he knows is that one moment he was standing in the snow, listening to his tablet blare out a warning about being in a 'RESTRICTED ZONE', and the next thing-- he's standing at the bottom of the dirt path in Resembool that leads up to Winry's home. He would have thought this another hallucination, a cruel trick of Norfinbury such as they had dealt with in the past, if it weren't for the person standing next to him who definitely doesn't fit the scene.

"S-Steph--?!"

She looks ridiculous in her thick coat and scarf out here in the summer sun, and he can't stop staring at her. This doesn't seem real, it can't be real.

Can it?

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He just can't stop laughing, even though he knows it wasn't that funny and she might start getting annoyed at him if he doesn't. It's just that she is so strong, and so amazing, she reminds him of his brother.

"Yeah, yeah... come on, I'll get you to a shower."

Still sniggering, he gestures for her to follow him up the dirt road and towards a picturesque white house with a sign outside reading ROCKBELL AUTOMAIL.

"I bet Winry will have some clothes you can borrow too, since it's a little bit warm for those here."

"Warm," she agrees giddily, following him up the road. She was sort of hoping that she could shower before introductions, but she would take whatever she could get.

As long as it involved a shower, at some point.

Al was feeling pretty giddy himself, as if he were sinking into a perfect dream. The grass was so green either side of the road, and everything looked just as if he had never been away. Like home.

He pushed open the heavy wooden door and gestured Steph to follow him inside to the traditional looking household. "Granny? Winry? I'm home! Hello--?"

Lucky for Steph's want not to be introduced, nobody replied. Winry was in Rush Valley with her customers and Granny had travelled down there herself to lend a hand in the busy season, leaving the house empty. So Al led Winry through to the bathroom, big porcelain tub with hot and cold taps and an old iron shower overhead.

"I'll be in the room next door when you're done, okay?"

Steph looked around curiously at everything in the house. It was a little weird, entering a house with the owners out, but she's pretty accustomed to feeling out of place by now. She grins like an idiot when she sees the very normal looking (if old-fashioned) shower and tub. There will be hot water. Running, consistent hot water.

She might not ever leave this room again.

"Yeah, sure. I won't take too long. Probably."

Her delight is contagious and he can't help a happy chuckle as he heads out of the room. After all that they've been through over the past few months, Steph deserves the longest and hottest shower she could possibly get. There's no way Al will begrudge her such a little thing.

He retires into the other room and fetches a pot of lubricant to start giving himself a clean too.

When Steph did come out she would find him with his head in his lap, polishing the faceplate carefully.

She spends a long time luxuriating in the warmth, getting her hair really properly clean and taking the time to scrub herself everywhere within her reach. When she finally steps out of the shower, wringing her hair and toweling herself dry, she shudders. But it's not because of the cool (not cold) air on her back. Being clean she feels like a new person, and it's still hard to believe that all of this is real.

She finds and puts on a clean set of clothes before going to see Al. When she does, she has to do a double-take. She's never seen him take his head off before. She considers asking him how he does that if he can't see what he's doing, but decides against it.

"So, what's the plan?"

Even though it was a stupid thing, being able to take his helmet off again seemed to be the final point that cemented this as real for him. He could never do that in Norfinbury, they had altered him somehow so that he was one solid piece, so that he had to eat, so that he had to feel the cold.

Now he felt nothing again, now he had his head on his lap. It was a different kind of ache, a more familiar and natural one.

"I'm not really sure, maybe we should head to Central. That's where Brother and I were when we first got to Norfinbury, there could be some clues there."

"Is that where he would go?" She runs a hand through her wet hair a few times, letting air into the middle layers so it might dry faster.

"It's possible Ed came through whatever and just ended up someplace else in the same world. Or the same place, but later or earlier."

"Yeah, I think so. I know so."

He hesitated. It seemed wrong to have to spoil this pleasant surprise of warmth and safety, but she deserved to know what was going on in Amestris. She already knew some of it, but it was different from living it.

"We were fighting in Central, a lot of our friends were too. I know if he got back here then that's where he'd go, and it's where I have to go too. We owe them our help in this fight, if-- if we're not too late."

She nods, serious again. She's ready to get to work anyway. Even if they're in the middle of a war, or the aftermath of one, there's more she's able to do here with access to real information and history than she could ever do in Norfinbury.

"Nice to have things simple for a change. Well, unless you have weapons hidden around here we may as well head out. We can always find something to use if we need it."

Because this is a real place, that works like the real world! Places that are occupied, houses that are lived in and full of things that living people need! What a time to be alive.

"A weapon...?"

He repeats the words after her as if she's just said something utterly profound. It's not that there are weapons here, it's just that mentioning them has reminded him that he should have his alchemy back. After so long without being able to use it and only being able to explain the basics to others, he should finally be able to perform transmutation again.

It's with eagerness that he claps his hands together and presses them to the floor. There's a flash of blue light and the sing of energy in the air, before a weapon rises up out of the floor to leave a concave patch in the stone. It's a spear, sharp steel and made at a height for Steph to use.

She watches him expectantly, waiting for him to tell her there's a pistol in the bedroom drawer or a metal bat under the bed. What he does instead is first confusing, then amazing.

"Oh. Okay. Well. That works."

She takes the spear and twirls it slowly. Yes, this she can work with. She grins.

"Sweet."

He can't grin right back at her, but there's a definite excitement in his tone of voice and he's practically vibrating with happiness.

"That's proof that we're really here, I can use my alchemy again! I haven't been able to use it even once in Norfinbury."

It should have worked. Alchemy ran on tectonic energy, after all, and anywhere on the Earth should have that sort of energy to harness and use. He had suffered with it blocked before, but only briefly and in the smallest of areas.

Either that or Steph is having a strange but very pleasant dream.

"And you can make pretty much anything, right? I'm surprised your technology isn't more advanced. Putting the stuff together is usually the hard part."

"I can make anything as long as I understand the components of the start and end product. And I can't make anything that takes a greater amount of material than what I can put in, it has to be an equivalent exchange."

So, really, there are a lot of limitations for alchemy. The primary one being that the alchemist has to understand what is being done on an expert level.

[ooc: Sorry for the wait, I was out of town at a wedding.]

"Huh." Well, so much for revolutionizing... anything, really. Too bad Steph's realm of experience is with information gathering and not engineering.

"Ooh! You could totally make a skateboard, that would be sweet."

The excitement has clearly scrambled her priorities.

Al was willing to make her anything she wanted as long as it lay within his abilities and did not compromise his morals, not that he expected she would ask for anything that he deemed unethical, because she deserved at least some small treats after being trapped in a place like Norfinbury for so long.

"Definitely! I can make you one of those."

He flashed her a thumbs up enthusiastically, followed by a beat of awkward silence.

"Uh... what is a skateboard?"

"It's a board with wheels. Pretty much what it sounds like. I'll draw you a picture."

She actually pulls a notebook and pen out of her bag before realizing that this is not the time.

"Uh. Maybe when we get in town, actually. It works better on paved roads."

"You know we have cars, right? And trains! You don't need a board with wheels on it to get around."

Wow, how technologically backwards does she think Amestris is? He might be offended if this wasn't Steph and he literally can't be offended by anything she says. Not when he loves her so much. She's like another member of the family by now.

"It's for fun. Like bikes! But cooler. Way, way cooler." She will convert him to the ways of the skater, just you wait.

"O-Oh... I see."

He feels a bit stupid now. Chuckling, he reaches out to drag Steph into a one-armed hug, still shocked as to where they are.

"Maybe a skateboard should come after we get to Central and find the others, huh?"

She gives him a squeeze back. It'll be strange, getting used to his body having different rules, but Al is always Al.

"I can live with that. Just don't let me forget to teach you how to do a kickflip."

"Why do I have the feeling that this is going to end in a lot of me falling over and you laughing about it?"

He's not saying that he won't try all the same. He might even consider a bit of embarrassing falling worth it to make her smile.

She grins. There is going to be lots of laughing.

"Look on the bright side: you won't break nearly as many bones as most beginners."

"No way, I'm going to wait until I get my body back. It won't be too long now, I'm sure of it, brother and I are so close to finding our answers."

He really hopes that's true, anyway. Especially because getting back here reminds him that all hadn't been going too well, that his blood seal had been failing.

For Stephanie Brown

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