The Heist

A/N: Hey guys! I'm sorry I wasn't able to update last month. I really wanted to maintain my record of at least one update each month, but April was a terrible, terrible month for me. I could drench you guys in excuses, but I think that a two-month long wait is enough, and you're just going to skip the Author's Note anyway, haha.

Also, I realized that a lot of my readers may not have Fanfiction accounts. I co-posted this story last month to AO3, so if that's a better platform for you guys, it's now also there. In any case, you can also review as anonymous, and I'll try to get back to you in the author's notes.

Dargon: Thanks again for the lovely review and encouragement over at DA!

Guest: Sorry the update took a while, but here it is!

Banana: It will get better for Lan Fan. Eventually. Not in this chapter though. =/

Fun Fact: Yuna used to take Ling to her work when he was a toddler. Yuna runs a consulting business primarily as a liaison to entrepreneurs from Xing who want to expand their businesses to Amestris.

"You're insane." Goosebumps rose on Lan Fan's skin, her heart skipping a beat as horror dawned on her. Horror for herself and for Ling, because if there was anything this imp incarnate was good at, it was getting what he wanted. "Your own son?"

Chu's grin remained stretched disgustingly across his face. "Well, it didn't stop you from doing the same to Arthur Hwang, did it?"

"Grandpa killed him out of self-preservation," Lan Fan retorted, trying her best to ignore the nagging whisper of guilt and confusion she felt about the young man's murder. It wasn't like he would have given them the same consideration; no, that boy never even flinched when he administered each burn, each slice, and she felt sick just thinking of it! "There's a difference between protecting yourself and killing a person because someone ordered it."

"Ah, moralizing again, are we?" he calmly placed his hands in his pockets, facing her squarely. He looked bored, and Lan Fan boiled with indignation at how he could be so nonchalant while he toyed with people's lives. "It is no different to me. At least, whatever difference there may be is subtle. Arthur was useful in streamlining the creation of the Red Stones, but he was a leech and his mother is an irritating harpy. Ling, on the other hand, has never been anything other than a nuisance, who has grown to be a rather persistent pain in my ass. What, you think I planned for him to inherit my company just because he's my legitimate son? Don't be so naive! I've always known how he felt about my business! God, he'd burn it to the ground! No, there's hardly any difference at all. They're both impediments.

"You could say that I'm just... protecting myself."

Lan Fan winced, hating the way he twisted her words. She was unprepared for this, loathed as she was to admit it. She came here to ask about the Red Stones, probably to threaten him into coughing a bottle or two into her palms so that she could go back to the hospital and take care of things that actually mattered! She didn't come here to weigh Ling's life against her grandfather's, didn't come to ponder the prospect of painting her hands with blood again.

And how many times had she berated Ling for being short-sighted and crazy? He wasn't crazy. She was, and she was too late in realizing it this time.

"So, do we have a deal or not?" He turned around, going behind the desk where she had moments ago been plundering his documents.

"There is no way I would kill on your behalf again." Not Ling. Especially not Ling. She had to warn him.

She snapped open the largest binder on the desk and tried to fire up the edges of the sheets with her lighter. But it was difficult to set it ablaze, so thick was the pile. Chu lounged at her, fist speeding towards her face, and she had to roll over on top of the desk to avoid him. Damn him, she had already built a decently sized fire, and he had to drown it in one of his nasty drinks. Now she had to build up another one.

As she tumbled on the other side, several stray sheets of paper landed on the ground with her. She scrambled to her knees, and tried to spark one on fire with the lighter. Her thumb flicked over the striker wheel, but the flame spluttered to death. She felt Chu's hand grab her ankle, but she lashed out with her other foot, and his hold loosened. She somersaulted across the floor to give herself some distance from him, her hand gripping the lighter tightly and trapping the paper beneath. Hooking her foot around the legs of a small stool, she swung her leg forward, sending it hurling across the space between her and Chu.

During the split second that that bought her, Lan Fan rolled the striker wheel again. Finally, a small flame burst into life, and she lowered it on the scrap piece of paper. The edge began to fold as it blackened, the fire eating away the pulp. She snatched it up from the ground, careful not to let the fire die against the air, and she placed it on the table, among the remaining documents on Chu's desk.

Now all she had to do was to stop Chu from putting it out, to let the fire feed and grow. It would activate the sprinklers, and then that should take care of everything else. For now. She tried to aim for his face with a kick, but he blocked it. She stepped closer to the side of the table where Chu left the bottle of sparkling water, and with a roundhouse kick, she sent it hurtling towards his head. He avoided it neatly, and it crashed into pieces on the floor. It didn't matter; she just had to get him away from the desk. With a flurry of offensives, she tried to strike Chu where she knew he was vulnerable from her earlier attacks: his ribcage, his temple, anywhere she had damaged him before. But he had the advantage of being both taller and bigger than her, stronger even, and his older age didn't take away from his agility.

The smoke detector woke with a screechy beep, as the room began to fill with the tendrils of dark smoke. Lan Fan smiled inwardly. Only a minute more, maybe not even that much.

Fighting Chu, she was beginning to understand the difference it made having to grow up in a place where fighting was necessary for survival. Her life, filled with poverty and scarcity as it was, required other methods to ensure that she and her grandfather could make it each day. Fu had taught her every technique, every school of art that their clan had mastered, but what she lacked was the high-pressured experience. On the other hand, every punch that Chu delivered was streaked with cruel intent, his kicks were lined with single-minded determination, his eyes were clouded with apathy.

She managed to sneak in a jab to his rib cage and he yelled out loud, crumpling slightly against her attack. She kicked him in the chest, pushing him away from the table.

Just then, the sprinklers suddenly activated themselves and water rained down on them. Turning around, Lan Fan found that the fire had grown bigger, now feeding itself on more than half of the crap littering Chu's desk. The mess sizzled against the sudden onslaught of liquid. She was so relieved that the fire system kicked in, that she barely avoided the punch coming in from her left.

She switched her approach, moving to defend herself rather than actively attack him. He was still fast, and the room was getting more and more cluttered as pieces of furniture met their ruin during their fight. The ground was uneven, her stance unbalanced. She took several hits, one against her solar plexus, followed by a strike against her head. She fell to the ground.

Chu laughed a little.

"What do you hope to get out of this, little Lan Fan?" He loomed over her, losing his footing for a moment. "You're not getting a Red Stone anymore. You might not even get out of here. How would you like that, eh?" He spat out blood. "Your grandfather would never see you again. I wonder how he would feel. He's on his deathbed, and yet still made it longer than you did."

Lan Fan squirmed on the ground, trying to get her right hand beneath her. She watched as Chu swayed over her.

"Just keep talking, Chu," she muttered.

"What did you say?" he yelled.

"I said just keep talking!" she yelled back, rolling to her knees and driving her fist into his knee. He fell to the ground like a sack of rice. His reflexes were slowing.

"I've learned a thing or two," she said, getting up, watching as he blinked his eyes, no doubt trying to clear his vision. The liquid from the sprinklers continued to fall. "Working for Auto-Mail, I get an interesting array of clients. You honestly think you're the only one out there with tricks up your sleeve?"

Chu tried to get up, but he lost his balance and fell again. "What did you do, you bitch?" he said, but his words were slurring.

"Halothane solution," Lan Fan said. He was now reclining on the floor, almost unmoving, save for the shifting of his head and his silent mouthing of words. "I have contacts too, you know. I know where to get things like those. As for the sprinklers, I guess I have to thank Ling for the blueprint of the building. The pipes were outlined in yellow."

She risked several steps toward the man quickly losing consciousness. She crouched down near his head, and lowered her voice. "You remember halothane, don't you? Nitrous oxide? Xenon? You thought they were so harmless. I would too if they hadn't knocked me right out. Then you and your son and your team of bad doctors made tiny little tweaks to the Red Stone, and eventually none of them worked on me anymore." Lan Fan snickered ironically. "Maybe you expect my thanks for being conscious right now, while you and the rest of your men soon wouldn't be. But I have no gratitude for you."

Chu's eyes rolled to the back of his head, and he slumped to the floor.

Lan Fan snorted. The halothane solution took effect quickly but it also wore off quickly. She jumped from where she was kneeling, and went straight out of the basement room. The two men she had downed earlier remained lying on the floor, though she didn't know if it was because of the contaminated sprinklers or still an effect of her earlier attack.

Her heart hammered in her chest, her mind ticked the time until the knock-out agent would wear off. She had to be far away then. At least, she needed to be somewhere not easily traceable, and then she needed to get out of Tobha. And while she was very worried about Ling, Chu would be pissed and the first thing he'll do to get to her was find her grandfather. She needed to get to Fu first. Then they needed protection. She had no doubt that Henry Chu would kill them this time for certain, if he managed to catch them. She had conspired against him, put his business and his life at risk; she had done more than so many people who had died from his hands had ever done.

The cool dawn air was a welcome change from the fire-heated basement she was in only moments ago. She ran, seeking refuge in the close buildings nearby, the cozy smell of the suburbs disorienting her for a moment. How could something so normal be within the reach of her fingers, when she herself was losing her grip with her own world? Everything was crumbling.

She searched her backpack for the cellphone that Ling gave her. She had ignored every single one of his calls within the past few hours, and felt terrible for it. But she didn't think that their circumstances would be so dire. Lan Fan pressed the button to turn it on, and waited for it to boot. Ling would hate her. He would so hate her, he wouldn't want to see her face, but she needed to warn him. Tell him that he has to be careful, because his father wanted him dead. He might not believe her, but at least he could take the necessary precautions. Then maybe she could turn herself in to Mustang or Hawkeye or one of the other guys. They can take care of things, right? They were good State Militants, trustworthy; the ones who would do the right thing even if the law said it wasn't. They would take care of Grandpa Fu. It didn't matter what happened to her. She'd gladly go to prison, where at least there would be guards posted outside her door.

Lan Fan couldn't barely catch her breath as she looked for a ride, a bus or cab, anything. Her hand was shaking with anxiety, her eyes darting about the streets, looking for pursuers. Her ears strained to hear a hint of sirens, of a fire-truck sent to deal with the fire alarms she'd set off. She wore a glove, but she was sure, if the investigators were thorough, that they would find a trace of her there. Maybe a loose hair, or the crumbled pieces of her knife handle.

Her phone vibrated slightly in her hand, indicating that it was now fully booted. The signal was low, and when she tried to dial Ling's number, the service provider told her she was still unregistered in the network. Lan Fan swore quietly under her breath, waving the stupid gadget about to see where she could get a good connection.

Lan Fan suddenly felt a sting on the side of her neck. She brought her hand up to feel the spot, and her fingers found a long, skinny needle piercing her skin. She glanced to her side, but it was too late. Her mind clouded, and her body numbed. She fell to the ground, getting only a glimpse of red hair and black clothes, before darkness overcame her.

-o-

"What do you mean that they're all gone?" Ling pressed his hand to his ear, trying to block out the sounds of traffic surrounding him. He felt bloodless and faint, severe disappointment lodging itself in his chest so tightly he could barely breathe.

"I mean that they are not where we planned them to be," Mustang replied, sounding a little piqued, but with the operation deteriorating in its most crucial part, who wouldn't be?

"I was just there," Ling exclaimed. "I went there twice this past night to check that they were there. And they were." He had even looked inside the bag and found the bundled wads of cash crowding the small space. The contract had been in an envelope, stashed in the side pocket of the bag.

"Well, they're not here now," Mustang said glumly.

Ling glanced at the laptop, zooming into the grid system where the trackers were beeping their lives away. But Hawkeye and Mustang and Hunter Manos were exactly where they were supposed to be, where he himself had been twice just that night. They had rented a bachelor apartment in the outskirt of the city, not terribly posh nor large, but well-secured. In the bedroom, they installed a cabinet with a fake bottom, in which they stored the bag of evidence.

"It's hiding in the cabinet, and you have to pull the upper drawers in a stair-formation to activate the latch that pulls the false bottom open," he said, trying to bring to his mind the process of opening the secret compartment. He'd left the apartment in relative satisfaction to head back to the downtown core, worrying only about Lan Fan.

Was this his fault? Again? Overlooking something because he'd been distracted? Naïve?

"Ling, listen to me. We have searched the entire place. It's small, it didn't even take that much time. We've pulled apart the cabinet, even undressed the bed, dismantled the kitchenware and the living room furniture. The things we need are not here."

Ling closed his eyes, and pinched the bridge of his nose. A part of him felt like this was a dream, that the entire night had been nothing but an unraveling nightmare. He tried not to see Lan Fan's absence as an omen, because what did it mean anyway if Lan Fan wasn't here? It wasn't like she –

He caught himself before finishing that thought. This was his operation, and he was its mastermind. He had to take responsibility for the outcome of his actions, not randomly blame people for its failure just because things didn't go according to plan.

He took a deep breath.

"Have you contacted the others?" he asked, and even though he tried his best to suppress it, a nervous tremor shook his voice.

"You were the first one I called after we found out that it wasn't here," Mustang answered. "Hawkeye's calling Ed."

Ling shook his head, trying to clear it of distracting thoughts like why in the world did this have to happen yet again or what in goodness's name had he forgotten or would he always be a failure, always be one step behind his father? Instead, he tried to focus on the problem now and how they were going to solve it.

So.

The money and the contract were gone. His heart raced just thinking about it. Their evidence that Chu was conspiring with the black markets, the very evidence that would prove once and for all that he was an enemy of the state... was gone.

Calm, he told himself. "What do we need to do?" he asked.

"Well, there are only several options I can think of for the moment," the Colonel replied, sounding – to Ling's grave disappointment – defeated. "We still have to take Hunter Manos to the station. It will be very scandalous to return empty handed."

He heard an audible sigh at the other end of the line. He could imagine that Mustang was rubbing his forehead. Ling's own head felt like a hive for restless bees; they had detailed maps of the city, had memorized the intervals of traffic lights, had even set up a complex communication system, and they had more than five back-ups ready to intervene should anything happen. And yet none of them ever thought of this.

It was Operation Greed 1.0 all over again.

Ling swore.

"Ling, calm down," Mustang's voice came through his earpiece again. "We won't be involving any of the higher ranked officers right now. My team is responsible for this entire mission, so any interrogation would be performed by one of us. We still have time to collect ourselves."

"Right," Hawkeye's voice came through Ling's left earphone. "I think the best course of action right now is for some of you to look for the missing money. I've notified Edward and Winry about the problem. If we don't find it, not only do we have the failed mission to think about, but we now have to scrape four million sens to pay back to the devil."

Ling rubbed his hand over his face, unintentionally spreading cold perspiration across his skin. Hawkeye was right. Who cared about his silly little operation when his own friends were sinking in debt to the most cruel money-lender in the history of mankind?

"Alright," Ling breathed. "Alright. I will help."

He disengaged himself from his connection to Mustang, and tuned in to Edward. He closed his laptop, and began packing up his things.

"Ed?"

"I'm here!" his friend grumbled. "Winry and I are taking a cab out of the city. Funny how we are all bugged and we didn't even bother to put a tracking device on the freaking money itself. Damnit!"

Ling tried not to let Ed's words get to him; his friend was just as frustrated as he was, after all. But he also could not deny that this was a rather large issue they had overlooked. A tracking device. That was all it would have taken to prevent something like this from happening. Unless someone from the inside betrayed –

No, no. Not this thought again. No, he couldn't think it.

"We'll be looking around the perimeter of South City," Edward continued. "You might want to touch base with Al and your sister. Paninya too. We're all on the hunt."

Ling hoisted his pack onto his shoulders, and thought about hailing for another taxi cab to take him to the parking area where he'd left his car, just north of the city's busiest districts. But the roads were impeded by the rush hour traffic as more and more vehicles entered city. No, it would take him far longer to get out of the city via a vehicle, than it would for him to just run. But it wasn't like he could run either. That would also take him longer than he wanted in the first place. He needed to get out now. This place was suffocating.

He searched for a bike rental terminal; those were littered in various places around the city, where people could take a bicycle from a docking station for a small fee, use it for a while, and dock it in a different terminal close to their destination. When he found one, he quickly swiped his credit card on the reader, took one of the bicycles and headed for the parking lot where he left his car.

The money could be anywhere; that was the most terrifying part of this entire dilemma. Auto-Mail had used very little of the four million sens loaned to them; they didn't use any amount that they couldn't possibly pay back within a moment's notice. That bag had over three million sens worth of cash in it. Which meant that if someone discovered it, it would be like winning a lottery for them. That bag of money could have been split up between multiple people; they could be using it at this moment. There might be no money left to trace.

Then the contract is the most important thing to retrieve now. It could still work after all; if they found the contract, they would still be able to prove that Henry Chu had supplied Auto-Mail with money. And perhaps after Chu had been incarcerated, their debt to him wouldn't matter anymore. XYZ Ltd. would be dissolved anyway. Wouldn't it? His friends would be safe then, right?

Ling distractedly rubbed his eyes, aware of how quickly his heart was beating, which had nothing to do with his efforts at biking. He found it difficult to breathe, and there was a profound pressure on his chest spurned by the impending sense of failure. He forced himself to pedal faster, and he began to see the last intersection before the roads would merge into the highway exiting the city. He'd have to find that contract. That could be the only thing that would save them.

-o-

Rosé chewed her lips nervously, watching as the doctors and nurses scrambled to get back to work after the sudden, puzzling, and slightly terrifying commotion that just transpired.

Fu had already been awake by the time she came to visit him. Pale and slow, he hadn't looked that much better than the previous day, but at least the nurses were able to get some food into him. For a moment she wondered if it was worth mentioning that Lan Fan seemed to have disappeared from the operation last night; she was afraid of the old man's reaction. It wasn't the right time to put stress upon him. Yet at the same time, he deserved to know what was happening to his granddaughter.

She had barely begun to open up the topic, getting only as far as mentioning that Ling had called her to ask if she knew about Lan Fan's whereabouts. But his confusion was met by the slamming of the door, and men and women in the colour of shadows came in and took him.

Rosé had yelled as they unhooked him from the machines. She screamed for help, and tried her best to retrieve her patient from their grasps. Fu was barely strong enough to stand, let alone fight back with the efficiency of the warrior he used to be. However, when security came bursting in, followed by wary doctors and staff, Fu began to tell them to go away.

In the end, she could do nothing but watch as the strangers dragged Fu from his room, dispatching security and passers-by alike with quick efficiency, and brought him to a waiting car just outside of the hospital lobby. Fu had warned her that State Militants weren't necessary and that they weren't to be followed. He seemed to have known his captors. At least, he didn't even show signs of resistance. She remembered precisely the clear, piercing look he'd given her, full of meaning and warning.

"Something happened to my granddaughter. I have to know," was all he was able to yell as he succumbed to their administration, and the door of the car slammed shut. She didn't understand what he meant.

Now back in the waiting room of the hospital, stunned and numb, Rosé played with the strings of her bag, wondering what in the world just happened, wondering what she was going to do now. Everything had happened so fast. She didn't even get to tell Fu how worried Ling was last night after Lan Fan had seemingly vanished from his radar. Even when morning had dawned, Rosé herself tried to contact Lan Fan, but to no avail. Would Fu have understood what was going on? Would he be able to explain it to Ling?

Too late. Fu was gone as well.

A commotion bubbled into existence at the entrance of the hospital again. Rosé turned around, scared to see more bad-tempered goons, but there were only enforcers coming through the glass doors, their cars parked at the driveway. One of the hospital's security guards went up to them, probably to explain the earlier fiasco.

Squeezing through the uniform-clad bodies blocking the doorway was Mrs. Yao, hair collected up in a neat, shiny ponytail. She stood out like a cloud in a clear summer's day, her white blazer a stark contrast against the waves of blue fabric that the militants wore. When she spotted Rosé, she headed straight for her.

"Have you heard from Lan Fan?" the older woman asked, forehead creasing in a worried frown.

"Lan Fan? I'm guessing Ling hasn't found her yet," Rosé said. "No, no, I haven't heard from Lan Fan since almost midnight last night."

Mrs. Yao cursed under her breath.

"That's not all, ma'am," Rosé added hesitantly, anxious about how she would be able to deliver the news. "Her grandfather is also gone."

Mrs. Yao's head snapped up to hers, eyes wider than she'd ever seen them before. Her usually bright complexion dulled into a bleached palour.

"I know, I know, I am so sorry, but it happened so quickly! All these guys just came in and took him, and we all tried to stop them, but they were hurting other people, and Fu said that he will go because he thinks they know something about Lan Fan, and then they were just gone!" Rosé breathed. "Just like that. Gone."

Mrs. Yao blinked once, but her face seemed to have frozen in that wide-eyed stare.

Helplessly, Rosé gestured to the militants in the doorway. "That's why they're here," she explained lamely. "Because of all the ruckus earlier."

Slowly, the Xingese woman looked away, blinking rapidly in shock. After a few moments, she regained her composure, and nodded solemnly. "I must tell Ling about this. He's not going to be happy. He's been worrying about Lan Fan the entire night." Then she frowned in concentration. "Do you think it is a coincidence? The operation occurred at dawn. Lan Fan disappeared before, and Fu was kidnapped after. I don't like how this appears. Not at all."

She filched her cellphone from her purse and dialed a number.

Rosé stood there, contemplating what all this disturbance entailed. A slow sinking feeling pooled into her gut, as she remembered how they had struggled – and continue to struggle – with finding the special medicine for Fu. Was that also connected to Ling's plans?

"Ling, can you talk now?" Mrs. Yao spoke. "N-no, I haven't found Lan Fan. Ling... Ling, listen, I have some more news for you." She stopped talking, and listened to whatever her son was telling her on the other side. Slowly, her eyes widened again, not only in puzzlement, but also with something akin to disbelief and fear.

"I don't understand!" the woman exclaimed. "How could those vanish?" More explanation on the other end. "Listen, Ling. This might not be the best time to disclose this to you then, but I'll tell you anyway, because I think you have the right to know. It might even help in your analysis of the situation. I'm at the hospital now with Rosé. Fu is also gone. Yes, gone. Apparently some men and women took him earlier... look, I don't know the entire story. But those are the facts."

She ended the conversation in relative anxiousness, meeting Rosé's eyes with dread. "The operation failed," Mrs. Yao whispered. "Lan Fan and Fu aren't the only ones that disappeared. The money and the contract did too."

-o-

"We'd have to regroup soon," the Colonel replied in a low tone as he drove them out of city, heading for the military headquarters in South Area. "This is a complete, utter mess."

Riza leaned back against her seat, closing her eyes for a moment to calm herself. Everyone was confused and in a state of disarray, but it was also true that nobody really knew how to proceed at the moment. The kids were already scouring the area for the lost assets. The Colonel would have to report that there were no fruits to their labour from this day, apart from a member of Auto-Mail who could be useful in some way. In the worst case scenario, their superiors would not be satisfied with their progress and might re-assign the entire assignment to another team. That could be terrible news for their friends and acquaintances working in Auto-Mail. As for XYZ Ltd., Ling had lost a rare chance to finally dismantle it, which was bad news for the entire country, really.

They had noticed Lan Fan's absence during the operation. It was difficult not to. Everyone was supposed to be tracked by the software, and each person was supposed to be connected to at least two others through their communication transmitters. When she had asked Ling where Lan Fan was, the boy regrettably admitted that she didn't show up. All he knew was that she had gone to check on her grandfather's medicine, and he lost contact with her soon after.

She hadn't given it much thought before. Lan Fan had a marginal role in this latter half of the operation, and they had more than enough back-ups anyway. Riza didn't know what kind of arrangements the girl had made with Ling, but as far as she was concerned, Lan Fan wasn't in possession of any major stakes.

Manos sat surprisingly calmly at the back seat of the car. That didn't bother Riza too much; they would need to be collected at this time of confusion.

"You do realize we have to detain you for a while," she told the young man. "You are, after all, a confirmed member of the underworld."

"I know," Manos said. "When will the interrogation be, do you think?"

"Not long after we get there," Riza said. "You're our only link to the Auto-Mail dealings now. Everyone will be expecting us to milk answers out of you. It'll be tricky, but we'll probably send Breda or Falman to do the questioning, while the rest of us try to pick up the pieces."

"Are we sticking to our story then?" Mustang asked. "Everyone would want to know why he ran to the apartment after he was busted from their hideout. Initially we planned for him to say that he hurried there to try and relocate the goods, thought he lost us when his team diverged, but we caught up to him anyway."

"We don't need to deviate that much from the planned back story," Manos answered. "Maybe this time, we can resort to the truth. I can honestly tell them that I was there to take the money away to a different place, but it wasn't there anymore. And I have no idea where it could be."

The Colonel exchanged glances with Riza, an uncertain glint in his eye, but he shrugged as if he couldn't think of a better alternative. "It's plausible."

Riza nodded. "You gotta play Goldilocks in this scenario. Stories that are too reasonable, that make too much sense, can easily get suspected of fabrication. Likewise, stories that make very little logic would just invoke suspicion and doubt. We have to go for something in between."

"I don't have to change any of the other facts we've determined for my back story," Manos said. "I can still confess that I'm a sub-admin, that I know that Auto-Mail signed a deal with XYZ Ltd. and that's where all the money came from. They might not believe me yet until we find the evidence, but that's a sure start."

Riza turned back to look at the road, rubbing her hands to rid them of their clamminess. Before they reached the station, Riza cuffed Manos's hands, and by the time they arrived at their destination they had schooled their faces into uttermost business-like expressions. They couldn't allow their anxieties about the failed mission to bleed through their facade.

She and Mustang were met with salutes as they entered the precinct. One young man, a newly appointed officer, came up to her and she handed him Hunter Manos. "Take him to one of the cells below. We will interrogate him soon."

The young man nodded, his curly red hair bouncing with the action. He took Manos by the arm and led him away. Riza followed the Colonel to the small office assigned to them here at the South Area precinct; it was a warm little space, despite being only a quarter of the size of the rooms assigned to them in Central or the East. She usually found the room quite cozy despite being a little cluttered, but at this moment, the room seemed filled with a gloomy atmosphere. It was nothing like how she imagined she would return from the operation. Nothing in her line of work was ever stamped with the mark of certainty, but for some reason – perhaps it was Ling's eagerness or her own optimism – she thought they would finally gain an upper hand. Chu, it appeared, was always one step ahead of them.

"Call the rest of our team," Mustang told her as he sank in his chair behind the large oak desk in the middle of the room. "Breda can perform Manos's interrogation. I'm sure he knows how to deal with that. Falman needs to start on the reports; he'll have the best recollection of the events and how they deviated from our plans. Tell Havoc to help him with that. As for Fuery, he needs to clear up the communication lines that we used. But before he does that, tell him to contact Winry and Ling, and tell them to meet the two of us at one of my mother's dens. The old parlour at Fius Hill. We need to talk about what happened."

Riza spent the next few minutes busily carrying out her orders. The swiftness with which everyone agreed to tackle their duties or to regroup felt like a relief to her. She knew how they felt, how zealously they wanted to receive answers. By early afternoon, Winry, Edward and Ling gathered themselves in the appointed meeting place. This one was a back room in a massage parlour, and the smell of acetone and coconut oil assaulted Riza's nose when they entered.

Ling was sitting on an upturned crate with the word 'flammable' painted in block letter across one of its sides. The boy looked destroyed; head in his hands, his hair fell through the spaces between his fingers, giving him a despondent aura. Riza had never seen him look so defeated.

Slowly, he looked up at her, then focused his red-rimmed eyes at the Colonel.

"I couldn't find the contract," he said slowly, his voice gravelly. "And Fu disappeared as well, apparently."

Riza felt her own shock at the same moment she registered the Colonel's stricken face, but she forced herself to calm down and wait for an explanation. This was turning into quite the mystery – honestly, a sick old man? What did he have to do with anything?

"No Lan Fan, no Fu, no money and no evidence," the colonel sighed beside her. "Anything else I need to know, Ling?"

The Xingese boy exhaled bitterly, and buried his face in his hands again.

A long silence stretched before Edward kicked the wall in a bout of frustration. "She betrayed us, didn't she? And you're all just afraid to say it out loud."

"Ed," Winry placed a calming hand on his shoulder. "I'm sure we're all wondering that, but there's no proof–"

"Oh, and how else do you explain the total disaster today?"

"Well," Riza interjected softly. "It could be that whoever took the money and the document also took Lan Fan and Fu," she guessed wildly.

"You're saying they were kidnapped?" Ed said. "That punch-wielding, one-armed butt spanker was kidnapped? I don't believe it!"

"We don't know what happened to Lan Fan," Ling said, his voice laced with hardness and impatience. "But my mother said that Rosé witnessed Fu being taken from the hospital."

"By whom?" Mustang asked directly.

"A group of men and women, dressed in dark clothes and who knew self-defense enough to disarm and defeat the hospital's security guards."

"What time?"

"This morning, probably around the same time that we were busy with the operation," Ling answered. "Rosé said that he didn't even resist. He went along because he suspected that they knew something about Lan Fan."

Riza narrowed her eyes, mulling over his words in her head. "And what time did you lose contact with Lan Fan?"

"A little before midnight last night," Ling said. "I haven't spoken to her since she left the house, but she contacted Rosé close to midnight to ask after her grandfather."

"You said she took a cab?" Mustang asked, dragging a creaky wooden chair away from the wall, and setting it down in front of Ling. He sat on it, and planted his palms on his knees. "Do you know the cab number she took?"

Ling shook his head. "She left before I did, and she called the cab herself."

"Well, that puts another hurdle in front of us, but not by much," Mustang muttered. He turned his head and looked at Riza. "Make an inquiry for all cabs active last night that made a trip to..." he trailed off, cocking an eyebrow at Ling's direction. Not missing his cue, Ling gave them the address of the post office.

"Do you know why she needed to go there the night of the operation? Why didn't she wait until it was over?"

"Lan Fan's grandfather is very sick as you know," Ling began to explain. "She receives medication for him in the post office. She made a deposit for the payment some days ago, but the medicine failed to show up. We have been checking every day for the past several days for it. What Lan Fan told me before she left is that she would check on it, and if it's not there, she would come straight to South City."

"We'll find the cab then," Riza suggested. "Even if she switched cabs after she arrived at the post office, we'll question any driver who passed along that building anytime between 10pm yesterday night and 9am this morning." Hopefully that would give them some kind of clue.

"We can also look more into the people who abducted Fu. If they caused a commotion, I'm sure that the incident was already reported." Mustang said. "If we find out more information about them, I'm sure they will give us a clue about what in the world happened today."

"Colonel," Winry spoke up quietly from a corner of the room. She looked shyly at Ling for a moment, but the Eastern boy didn't return her glance. He still looked lethargic and beaten. Winry stepped closer to them, and said, "You might be interested in knowing that the medicine Lan Fan is searching for is called the Red Stone."

Riza's heart skipped a beat upon hearing that name. Fu's disappearance came as an extreme surprise, but this... this wasn't just surprising. This was alarming.

Was every problem they were going to have related to that cursed object? They had lost access to it long ago, and yet the government – and their team in particular – had always felt the reverberating effects of their mistake. In a way, she could just laugh. How ironic that they were more affected by something they had lost, than when they had possessed it.

"The Red Stone," Mustang repeated from where he was seated. He was staring at a middle distance, his face unreadable, but Riza knew that his mind was engaged in deep analysis. With an irritated sigh, he stood up and rubbed his face with his gloved hand, and began a slow trek back and forth between the walls of the room. Then with a sudden spark of frustration, he punched the wall nearest him. Even Edward stopped his murmuring to look with consternation at the Colonel.

"Then Edward might be more right than we all want to admit," Mustang said after a few moments.

"Why?" Ling asked, finally standing up, his frame gaining an assertive stance.

"Because when we revolted against Fuhrer Bradley during the Sanitary Movement, we needed funds for weapons." Slowly, Mustang turned around, his eyes shadowed by his straight bangs. "And we bargained with Henry Chu. An unbelievable amount of sum in exchange for the single prototype of the Red Stone. That was our collateral."

Riza heard Winry's small gasp, and couldn't bring herself to look at the girl. That Stone had been the culmination of her parents' hard work before they passed away.

It was the only thing they had worth bargaining at that time. Fuhrer Bradley's faction of the government owned everything else of value; they possessed the majority of arsenal, people power, and even fiscal assets derived from taxes. But the Red Stone project was a humanitarian initiative, backed by Riza's own grandfather and guised under the Aerugan War Act to help their forces in battle. It wasn't Bradley's, but if the tide of the uprising had turned against them, they all knew he would take the prototype and use it for purposes other than what Grumman intended. Mustang saw a crack of opportunity: they needed power against the president's echelon, and they needed to keep the Red Stone away from the treasonous higher-ups.

Trading with XYZ Ltd. achieved those goals simultaneously. At that time, Chu was the lesser evil.

The truth was that it was the prototype's potential that held the most value. The hundred grams of compound itself was not the magical cure it promised to be. At least not yet. The doctors assigned to the project managed to engineer the special cells, but it was untested, the cells untrained. There was work, and a lot of it, yet to be done before the Red Stone could actually heal anything. But Chu bought it regardless, and Riza could still remember the greed and the slyness in the man's eyes as he regarded the material they had presented on his desk.

"Do you think Chu discovered a way to upgrade the prototype into a working cure?" Riza asked.

"No!" Ling blurted from where he was standing. He clutched his head in his hands, angrily digging his fingers into his hair. "No, because Fu is still sick! Lan Fan had been spoon-feeding him that medicine for two years and he's still sick! He's–"

"It doesn't matter!" Mustang shot back. Riza could tell Ling was trying his best to avoid the one conclusion everyone else would have realized by now. "The point is that your bodyguard is buying her stash from Henry Chu, directly or indirectly! And where was she last night? Where is our evidence now? Don't you get it yet?"

Ling let out a bitter laugh. "And what else should we conclude? How far do you want to take this? You know who gave me Lan Fan, right? Edward and Winry gave me Lan Fan! Do you want to say that Ed and Win are also conspiring with my father?" He laughed again, a stark, ugly bark devoid of any humour.

"Lan Fan was quickly becoming a fine figure in the Auto-Mail network," Winry whispered. She met Riza's eyes briefly, and the sharpshooter could see the doubt in those blue pools. "I mean, it's not impossible that Chu could have infiltrated our market with a spy, but... I just don't understand. Lan Fan was honest and fair in her business." Everything that Chu was not.

"To gain our trust, no doubt," Ed suggested, but even he too had lost his feistiness. Now he just seemed partly disturbed and partly resigned, which Riza attributed to him realizing that he was one of the people responsible for bringing Lan Fan into the team.

"But... but it doesn't make sense," Ling said softly. He was now sitting again on his chair, eyes trained on the floor as if the worn wooded patterns would unravel the mystery for him. "Fu really is sick, you know. He's still sick. Are you saying he's part of the ploy? An ill old man? And Lan Fan... if she really was Chu's spy, why would he withhold the medicine for so long?"

Riza's mind whirred with possibilities. There were too many questions, sprouting from the infinite number of variables whose values she did not have at her disposal. She didn't even know Lan Fan well either. The only time they had spent together was when the girl was bleeding her life out in Riza's car, as they headed for the closest, safest hospital Riza could find on that equally woeful night brimming in failure.

"Perhaps he didn't give her the medicine until she gave up relevant information about the operation," Riza said softly. "This is only a speculation of course, but it doesn't rule out the possibility that Lan Fan may be working for him, albeit unwillingly."

There were thousands of scenarios, Riza thought. Lan Fan could have accepted Ling's employment offer without any connection to Chu, and was only later coerced into cooperating with the business man. Or perhaps they were both conspiring right from the beginning. Maybe even since the first operation two years ago. The girl had been there. The operation had failed then as well. It was too ridiculous for a coincidence, and yet Riza couldn't find the relationship between everything, not with so many unknowns still lingering.

"I trusted her," Ling whispered hopelessly. "I knew she was keeping secrets, but... I just thought... it made her fascinating." He swore. "Why didn't I see this? Why wasn't I able to connect the dots? I didn't even pry... I just thought she was..." He swore again, louder this time, before burying his face back in his palms.

"Ling, you did admit that Lan Fan was very reticent about her background," Winry added. "Don't be too hard on yourself. If anything, it should be me who – look, I'm sorry. I'm really sorry." Riza stood helplessly as she watched the blonde girl succumb to wracking sobs. Ed beside her was left to grudgingly pat her on the head.

She looked at the Colonel, and he returned her stare with a clouded gaze that spoke of disappointment. But at least it wasn't a defeated one, which Riza considered a good enough reason to stay away from pessimism. At least, for now.

-o-

Hunter Manos sat in contemplative silence behind the black metal bars of the prison cell. The cell was damp and small, the pale green paint peeling off in sections. He sat languidly on the thin mattress set to the side of the cell, wondering what he would do with two million sens.

He'd get out of this wretched country, that was for sure. He contemplated life in Xing. Hmm, too different. He would suffer from culture shock as soon as he stepped foot on the sandy borders of the Western provinces where the Amestrian train would dump him. He liked the food, yes, and perhaps even the women too. But he would be bored in Xing.

Creta was out of the question, seeing as the plague still raged over there. Aerugo was traumatized by the war. That left Drachma, or leaving the continent altogether.

Or perhaps he shouldn't leave the country just yet. A part of him felt that there was more he could leech out from this blood-run nation. There were risks, that was for certain, but then again he learned long ago that there was nowhere he could go where there weren't any risks.

Two million sens. Hunter could almost taste the money, so fresh was the smell of the crisp bills in his memory. It had been easy to avoid Ling – stupid, giddy Ling – when the Xingese boy made his multiple trips to the apartment. There was an advantage to being connected at all times to any one of their teammates. There was always an advantage to being an insider.

It was just too bad. He didn't have anything against Ling. As a matter of fact, Hunter rather liked everyone he worked with. Edward was a mightily packed entertainment, Winry was very easy on the eyes. So was Lan Fan, though he wasn't quite fond of her asymmetry. No matter. She already attracted Henry Chu's attention, and that practically made her a walking, talking warning sign.

Hunter slouched against the wall, wondering what time it was. It couldn't have been more than a few hours since he had arrived here with Colonel Mustang and Lieutenant Hawkeye. He wondered when Chu would come and see him. The man was exceptionally punctual, as most serious men were, and if he was late for anything, Hunter would sooner assume that it was for dramatic effect.

It wasn't like Hunter considered himself a traitor. No. Traitor would mean that he'd pledged his loyalty in the first place. Hunter wasn't that kind of an individual. His services could be bought, but his loyalty belonged only to himself. He didn't know how the great, busy Chu learned about him. But shortly after returning home from the first part of Greed Operation 2.0, he was welcomed by the man himself and several of his well-dressed urchins.

And he accepted their proposition.

Hunter noticed as a lowly State Militant approached the guard standing observantly in front of his cell. The two of them exchanged a few words, before both exited the chamber. They showed little qualms in leaving him alone, but that was understandable; he was, after all, only a mischievous cheater, not an aggressive thug.

Within the moments that followed, Hunter heard the soft, measured footfalls he'd been waiting for. Henry Chu walked into his view, followed by two mean-looking subordinates, one a woman and the other a man. All three were unsmiling, but when Chu turned to face Hunter, his lips pulled into a small smirk.

Hunter pushed himself away from the bed. "So, it's true what they say," he said. "You do have your ways. Look at you, walking into a precinct without anyone stopping you."

The man gave a proud shrug. "I'm just industrious, not a miracle worker. That means I don't have much time so you better start talking."

Hunter looked at a corner of the ceiling where the telltale rim of an inset camera glinted in the poor light.

"Don't worry about that. Just talk," Chu instructed.

"It's still in the apartment we rented," Hunter snickered. "By the intersection of 68th District and Kanes Blvd. I placed it in the air vent in the ceiling. It's funny really. It was your son who gave me the inspiration for it. You know what he said about this operation of his? 'The last place a man looks is under his own two feet.' Cute, isn't it? All I had to do was move the money just a little bit, and their panic did the rest. Now they think–"

"You talk too much," Chu cut him off. Hunter snapped his mouth shut, frowning in distaste. "How much is left?"

"One million, five hundred seventy-five thousand," Hunter said, injecting his voice with a shot of confidence. The truth was that there were three million, five hundred seventy-five thousand left, but why not cut his share in it too? Chu would hardly care how much Auto-Mail really used, so long as he got all his money back in time. It's too bad, really, just too bad that Edward and Winry would have to pay an extra two million that they never used, but by the time they realize the extent of their problem, Hunter would be out of there.

They would never suspect him either. They would suspect Lan Fan. What a pity.

"What do you have for me, Chu?"

"When you go out of here, there will be a cab that will take you to the train station. From there someone will approach you and settle our arrangement." Chu meant the five million sens they agreed upon. Hunter already had plans for those. It was the extra two mil he filched from Auto-Mail that gave him the extra thrill.

It was a great stroke of luck. Seven million for revealing the information that Auto-Mail would use the government's inspection of the black market as an opportunity to undermine XYZ Ltd. But Hunter was no amateur – Chu asked specifically about Auto-Mail, so he was going to give information pertaining only to Auto-Mail.

Hunter already decided that if this man wanted to know the even juicier fact that Mustang's unit was part of the operation all along, well... perhaps he could double their current deal.

The young man rolled up his sleeves, as he prepared to set in motion his next wheel of fortune. He watched with eagerness as Chu pulled out a set of keys from his coat pocket. The Xingese man fumbled with it while looking for the key that would presumably unlock Hunter, but it slipped from his fingers and dropped to the ground between the bars.

"Get that for me?" Chu said briskly, eyeing the distance to the floor with some laziness.

Despite being face to face with one of the most powerful men on the continent, Hunter couldn't suppress a sarcastic eye-roll as he bent down to retrieve the keys from the floor. Almost immediately a sharp, excruciating pain emerged from his upper back, and the sticky wetness of blood soaked the material of his shirt. He tried to move away, but the pain paralyzed him in his spot, turning his muscles into jelly. He tumbled to his side, now fully aware of what Chu had done.

The metallic stench of blood perfumed the air, and he gurgled helplessly as he tried to curse at the smirking man above him.

"You... you..."

"Oh? Lost your wagging tongue now, did you?" Chu said softly, almost fatherly even, as if reprimanding a child after a spanking. "You always did talk too much for my liking."

The ground began to fill with Hunter's blood as it seeped out of the wound on his back, soaking his sleeves, matting his hair.

You made a big mistake, Hunter wanted to say, but when he opened his mouth, only a stream of blood trickled out. His sight was blurring, and for the briefest of moments in between the blinding pain, he felt a strong pang of anger that Chu's face would be the last thing he saw in this world.

No matter. Hunter would die with the other secret untold. He hoped Chu would get a nice back-stabbing surprise, a taste of his own medicine.

The last thing he felt was utter disappointment that he could not use the seven million sens where he would end up in the next life, then he succumbed to the darkness that ate away at his consciousness.

-o-

A strong lurch woke Lan Fan.

Out of balance, she found herself thrown from whatever she was lying on, and she landed ungracefully on a heap on the ground. Her mind whirled, and her stomach felt queasy. She realized she was staring at linoleum flooring, and that she was moving.

Lan Fan blinked. The entire room was moving.

Then she realized she wasn't in a room. She was in a booth. A train booth. She looked up to find an empty seat in front of her, and through the window beside her, she saw browning pasture fields pass by quickly.

Her muscles felt rickety and her memories were hazy. Pushing herself up on all fours, she tried to remember what happened before she got here. She didn't remember boarding a train. She didn't even know where this was going. She had been looking for a bus, but she never got the opportunity to hop on one. And then...

Then someone shot her.

Damn it!

Her hand flew to her neck where she recalled being pierced by something. Her hand came away unstained, no blood. But when she applied pressure against her flesh, it felt a little tender.

Frightened, she turned around to scan the booth, and stopped in shock when she found her grandfather's limp body deposited haphazardly on the seat behind her. There was a small space beside him, probably what she had been occupying before she fell off.

Heart thudding in her chest, she scrambled to her feet while fighting nausea. She knelt in front of her grandfather to inspect him. He was unconscious and pale. A little cold to the touch. How the hell did he get here?

The door to the booth slid open, and Lan Fan looked up to find several State Militants standing guard just outside of their booth. One of them, the one who opened the door, was Xingese based on his facial features, and he gave her an unkind smile as he entered. Slowly, he closed the door shut behind him.

"You're awake," he said. "That's good. I was looking forward to speaking with you."

"Who are you?" Lan Fan demanded. "How did I get here? Why is my grandfather here?"

The man settled on the seat across from them. He was poised and careful, and his calmness made Lan Fan all the more aware of her panic and fear.

"I am Major Xie, and I have some unfortunate news for you, Ms. Zhang." He cleared his throat, "I mean, Ms. Tseng." From an inside pocket on his uniform, he pulled a thin bundle of papers, unfolding them before her. When he offered them to her, she reached for them hesitantly. "You are being deported."

Lan Fan scanned the document, which outlined charges against her and her grandfather for illegal immigration and fraudulent documentation.

"Sixteen years," the man said again. "I am actually quite impressed. And a little proud too. I've always known us Xingese are a persistent, intelligent bunch."

She tried to tune him out. He was most likely one of Chu's goons, she was almost certain of it. Her eyes roamed the page, flipping between the papers, trying to filter all the important information she could glean from the hoard of legal terminology.

"I don't understand. You said we are being deported," she stated. "But it says here that the Amestrian government issues extended internment and labour for severe breaches in immigration laws. Grandpa and I didn't just overstay a summer vacation, like you know. So why are we being sent away instead of imprisoned?"

The man smiled at her. "Why, Lan Fan? You'd rather be thrown in jail? Forced to work in a camp?"

"That's not my point!" she snapped. They weren't following the regulations. And whenever Henry Chu ditched protocol, it usually meant bad news.

"Don't worry too much," he said, waving his hands in front of her as if he was trying to pacify a rabid dog. "You'd still be imprisoned, okay. Just not here. Don't be too upset."

"Not here?" She turned to the window again, where the horizon was modulated by gently rolling hills, punctuated occasionally by small houses and pasture and sheep. They were in East Area. Lan Fan's eyes darted to the position of the sun. The train was eastbound. "We're going to Xing!" she exclaimed, more than she asked.

But it didn't make sense! Chu already had her! How long had she been out? It was still dawn when she tried to flee from Tobha. It was late afternoon now. He had so many hours to kill her. The halothane would have worn off not long after she left. By the time she'd been brought back, he would have already been awake. It wasn't like him to let go of someone like her, someone who had already demonstrated her ability to endanger not only him, but his entire life's work, multiple times.

"Read the last page," the Xingese Major said. "Mr. Henry Chu intervened on your behalf, pulled a couple of strings here and there."

"Why? He could have just–"

"Killed you?" he finished for her. "He thought about it. Contemplated it very well, may I add. In the end, he just didn't seem... convinced that it was the right retaliation against you. You see, you and his son were nurturing a scheme that would incapacitate him. Not kill him. He'd still be alive, but he would watch as everything he has worked for crashes to the ground in smithereens, everything he loves hopelessly withers away."

Lan Fan snorted. Love? What love? His love for money and sadism, perhaps. Better world for everyone else if he lost those.

"And so, he decided that he will give you the same opportunity to experience what you wanted him to. Sounds more fair, doesn't it?"

Same opportunity?

Then it struck her.

Everything she loved hopelessly wither away. She turned around to look at Fu, slowly reaching for his hand. She didn't have any Red Stones at all. He didn't even have any sort of medical attention anymore. Chu didn't have them sent to prison or camp, because he knew that the officials would not even bother sending Fu with her, that he would be sent to a quarantined infirmary to vegetate the rest of his life away. He knew that she would be shielded from watching her grandfather die, working miles away in the mines or factories. And what he wanted was for her to witness her loss. Every day. Every second.

And they were going to Xing, because she had no friends there, no acquaintances, no connection. No one to visit her, no one for her to warn.

Because now that she knew that Chu was informed of everything, he would prevent her from letting Ling know that his father wasn't a sitting duck any longer. He would gain the one advantage they were counting on him not to have – the knowledge that he was being framed.

But wait...

Her mind flashed back to a moment when she was still in his basement in Tobha, gripping her lighter as he revealed to her that he had discovered her duplicity. There was something about the way he said it, something that nagged at her mind then, though she didn't have the resources to pay more attention to it.

A State Military echelon visited me first... so I got curious. That was what he said. His suspicion was aroused only when Winry and Edward sealed a deal that was less than what Mustang's unit borrowed from Chu. After all, if they really wanted to avoid the military dogs, wouldn't they have invested more, if not as much? Spies alone cost double to triple the moving expenses for site relocations. And there were the bribes to think about too.

It slowly dawned on her that Henry Chu might not yet know that Auto-Mail was in league with the very batch of militants sent to undermine them. How long that would last, she didn't know. Henry Chu was influential, and he did find out about her after all, didn't he? Whoever betrayed her would surely have no qualms revealing that information as well.

And maybe it didn't even matter. It didn't matter that Auto-Mail had allied themselves with one of the best units working for the government, because knowing the kind of man they were dealing with, Lan Fan suspected that Auto-Mail might not even survive the week. He might find Winry and Edward useful if he managed to get the right leverage, but Ling... he made it clear that he had no use for Ling.

In an impulse so quick and charged with anger, she stood up and punched Xie across the jaw. She heard him gasp, but she didn't care. She reached for the door latch and slid the door open.

On the other side, five guns were trained at her.

"Get back!" one of the State Militants yelled. "Get back down. Now!"

Lan Fan raised her hands, and eyed her chances of getting across them. They blocked the hallway, each person strategically placed so that there was no space for her to slither through unless she wanted to be a bullet cushion by the time she was through with them.

Xie groaned from behind her, but stood up and placed an ungentle hand on her shoulder.

"Come now, Lan Fan. Do you really think you're going to get through them with your grandfather slung across your back? There wouldn't be any other ride for miles. Unless you're thinking of cows?" He leaned towards her ear and whispered, "These men know that you are a dangerous illegal immigrant. Your profile has already been added to the Immigration Bureau's watchlist. If you stay in Amestris, you and your grandfather would be fugitives. Imagine living the way you did before. Except this time, there wouldn't be a moment's rest."

"And how would Xing be any different?" she snapped.

"I have orders to keep an eye on you," he explained. "You'd be placed under house arrest. That means accommodations are already provided. Food and utilities as well. You'll be guarded at all times. You will be impoverished but you won't have to worry about how to survive. We'll make sure that you will."

But that her grandfather would not.

Her heart beat loudly in her chest, as if trying to escape the enclosed space that felt too small to account for all the emotions she was feeling. The booth felt small. The train felt small. She hadn't felt this way for two years, not to this extent, and she shuddered against the familiar wave of devastation. Even bound by Chu's puppet strings, she at least had a marginal amount of freedom to search for a way to freedom. But now he'd once again smothered all forms of escape, and she suffocated against what this would imply.

Her grandfather would die, and she couldn't do anything about it.

Her grandfather would die.

"Oh don't look so down!" the officer said, waving his hand. "Gramps is an old man, isn't he? His time was bound to come sooner or later. Why don't you focus your energy into making his last moments as comfortable as practically possible?"

Lan Fan looked at Fu, sleeping on the leather-covered seat. He didn't look comfortable. He didn't look at peace. It had been so long since he had stood up on his own without the crutches of the Red Stone, and even then, he already sacrificed so much for her behalf. The only thing she ever wanted was to ease his burden just a little bit, to make him proud so that even though he had to leave his home and everything he loved behind, she could at least make him believe that it wasn't all a waste. Now, he would eventually go, leaving a life of suffering and disappointment. Suffering and disappointment that she gave him.

AN: And there you go! I had a hard time writing this chapter, not only because I've been terribly busy in real life, but because there's a lot going on. I mean, I like that there's a lot going on. This middle part is my favourite part of this story, because the different threads are coming together, but at the same time, it's difficult to make them all come together smoothly. Anyway, I have two more chapters for the middle part, and then I'll try to wrap things up from Chapters 11 to 15.

I don't know who I feel worse for: Lan Fan or Ling? Hehe. They won't see each other for a while, but when they do, I promise to up the LingFan. In the meantime, they'll be in each other's thoughts. Ling is pretty angry with her right now due to the misunderstanding, but he'll make up for it in later chapters. I promise he will.

I hope you guys are enjoying the ride as much as I am! If you're confused by anything, let me know so that I can edit stuff or clarify it in future chapters.