Ed and Al had just returned to East City after a long, fruitless mission, and all Ed wanted to do was sleep. One hand holding his crumpled mission report and the other dug deep into his pocket, he stalked through Eastern Command, totally ignoring all the soldiers around him.

"Your report shouldn't take too long. There isn't much to tell," Al said optimistically, obviously trying to lighten his brother's mood. "I can run and get you some dinner while you lie down, and—"

"Young lady!" A woman's loud voice cut across the rest of his sentence, but Ed continued walking, unperturbed. The faster he got to Mustang's office—

"Young lady!" the woman persisted, and Ed briefly paused to wonder why there would be a "young lady" in Eastern Command in the first place. He was the only underage person—

And then he noticed the sniggering sergeants a few feet ahead of him, alternately looking at him and some spot behind him. "Brother…I think she's…"

"With the braid and red coat! If you keep ignoring me—"

Ed glared daggers at the nearly hysterical sergeants before turning around to face this excessively annoying woman. "Do you need something, lady?" he asked rudely, making sure his voice sounded quite masculine.

He was met with a middle-aged woman with graying hair and sharp glasses, who looked both angry and surprised. "Yes, I am male," he growled, when she didn't seem about to say anything. "I'm rather busy at the moment, so—"

She stood up a bit straighter, her mouth forming a thin line. "What class are you in? We told you not to wander off! Where is your chaperone? And the rest of your group? You're going to get in big trouble once we're back; the General only allowed us here on the strict condition that nobody strayed—"

Ed stared at her. Class? Chaperone? What the hell was she going on about? She disregarded his flabbergasted expression, instead going on about "principals" and "suspensions" and all sorts of other things that did not at all relate in Ed's mind.

He cast around the hallway for help, but Al seemed just as lost as he was, and all the other soldiers were far too busy attempting to look professional. They were failing rather spectacularly; their face-splitting grins and badly stifled snickers made them look more like small children in a candy store. Ed leaned to the left slightly, hoping to see anyone—even Hughes or Major Armstrong—who could come and save him, but all he saw was a group of about fifteen kids his age, staring at him curiously.

Oh, hell.

"You all are from a school?" he realized, folding his arms and crumpling his report even more in the process. He paid it no heed as he went on—"What are a bunch of schoolkids doing on a military base? Isn't it 'dangerous' or something?"

"And that is exactly why you needed to stay with your group!" she said, apparently paying no heed to what he said first. "You'll just have to join ours for now, but when we get back to—"

"Lady, I have no idea who you are," Ed said loudly, cutting her off. "I work here. I'm not part of any 'group' or 'class' that needs a tour. We've got places to be, so if you'd just leave us the hell alone—"

Several gasps rose from the students, but Ed was not perturbed; he spun around, stalking his way toward Mustang's office again. Damn teachers…no wonder he had dropped out of school so early.

He only noticed her hand on his right shoulder when he was no longer moving forward. "What?"

"Is that—automail?" she asked, shock flashing across her features as her arm dropped to her side. Ed couldn't decide if that was any better than the anger.

"What of it?" he growled, trying to turn away again. "If you'll excuse us—"

"Why would I believe that you work here?" she asked, glaring hard at him. "And you know I do not tolerate any sort of foul language—"

"I'll say whatever the fuck I want," Ed said loudly. The students behind her were laughing now, but Ed had no clue why.

"Please, ma'am, Brother really does work here. He needs to turn in his report," Al said, gesturing vaguely behind him. "The Colonel won't be happy if he's late…"

The woman stared up at Al for a moment, apparently taken aback by the fact that he was supporting Ed. "Well, if you need to 'turn in your report' so badly, you can lead us to your superior's office, yes? Sergeant Brosh, would that be acceptable?"

The man who had apparently been leading the tour nodded immediately, covering his grin with his hand. "Absolutely, Mrs. Snodgrass."

One glance at the man's face told Ed that he knew exactly who he and Al were. He scowled deeply, spun around, and walked off quickly enough to make them work to keep up. Al sighed loudly as he easily kept up with Ed's strides. "Brother, you're overreacting. If you had just shown her your watch—"

"She'd probably say I stole it or something," Ed grumbled. "Mustang'll shut her up, and then—"

"Hey, what rank are you?" a boy's voice asked from behind him.

"Mister Adams, he is most likely one of your classmates. Don't encourage him," the teacher—Snotass?—said impatiently.

"I've never seen him before," another boy piped up. "And he seems like he knows where he's going—"

"I'm a major," Ed said loudly to shut them up, not turning around or slowing down. "And I—"

"Woah," yet another boy said loudly, while the rest of the students started talking excitedly amongst themselves.

"No one so young could be such a high rank," Snotass said dismissively. "It'll be exposed soon enough…"

Ed quit listening, finally flinging open the door to Mustang's office. "Hey, Boss," Havoc said, looking up and grinning. "The Colonel's in—"

"Someone tell these idiots that I work here," he said loudly, glaring around at them all.

There was a pause while Snotass and the students stood awkwardly in the doorway. "Yes, he does, ma'am," Hawkeye finally said, regaining her composure first. "He outranks everyone in this room, in fact. He's the Fullmetal Alchemist."

Snotass seemed to have no reply to that, and the students were whispering excitedly. "Mrs. Snodgrass, this is actually where we were going to go next on our tour," Brosh said, walking into the office and saluting the officers there. "Colonel Mustang agreed to tell you all about the State Alchemist program, so once he is ready—"

"Oh, are they here already?" Ed scowled as Mustang emerged from his inner office, glancing around at the crowded room. "Excellent, a distraction from the paperwork—"

"Sir," Hawkeye said warningly. She and the rest of the staff stood up and saluted, something Ed had never seen them do before.

Putting on a show for the kiddies, I bet.

"So, can I give my report before your little presentation, or do we have to wait?" he asked, flopping into a chair next to Breda's.

Mustang opened his mouth to respond, but a boy piped up from the class—"Don't you have to salute your superior officer?"

All eyes turned to Ed, who had absolutely no intention of doing so. "Come now, Fullmetal," Mustang said, his face barely betraying a hint of a smirk. "The students need to learn what the military is like."

"If I do, can we go home faster?" Mustang shrugged, and Ed huffed loudly, standing up and snapping off a sloppy salute before continuing—"Me and Al'd love to get back to our room, so if the kids could wait five minutes for our report—"

"I've got a better idea," Mustang said, his eyes glinting in a way that Ed did not like at all. "Alphonse can stay here and give your report, and you can help Sergeant Brosh with the tour of Headquarters."

Havoc laughed somewhere off to Ed's left—most likely at Ed's face—but he had no response to that ridiculous suggestion. Mustang had to know that he had no idea what to do with kids his age, right? Talking to them and taking them on a tour—

Mustang ignored his flabbergasted expression, though, and gave some sort of speech that Ed didn't really listen to. Soon enough, he shooed Ed away with the kiddies, much to everyone's chagrin. They walked down the hallway for a while before someone suddenly broke the silence—

"Eeeeed..." He spun around, annoyed, as someone tugged on his sleeve. "Do you really have automail?" a red-haired girl asked. "That's so cool! I heard it's much stronger than normal limbs, is that why you had the surg—"

Ed stiffened, glaring (down!) at her. "I got automail because my arm and leg were ripped off my body," he ground out. The girl flushed but did not look away.

"That's so brave of you, to go through the surgery! Didn't it hurt a lot?"

"Like fucking hell," he said, inching away as she moved toward him. What the hell was up with her? Winry never acted like this—

"You and your brother live alone here? Your parents are gone? That's so tragic! I can't even—"

"Uh—" Ed said loudly as several girls crowded around him with big, excited eyes. "You guys need to listen to Socks! Aren't you getting marks for this or something?"

The girls didn't listen to him, only moving closer, ignoring Brosh completely. They were moving in like a pack of wolves, and Ed was utterly terrified. That look in their eyes—whatever it was—

Lust.

Oh God, it was lust.

His pants, his hair, his face—they were looking at everything. They were eye-raping him.

They were eye-raping him.

Ed let out a very unmanly squeal he would later deny with his life and looked desperately for any means of escape. But there wasn't anything.

Everyone had abandoned him. Everyone, except for the rabid creatures now reaching for his coat. Brosh was busy talking to Major Armstrong (where the hell did he come from), the boys in the class were busy glaring at him (why are they angry—who would want to be mobbed—why aren't they helping me dammit), and even Snotass (who by all right should have been on this faster than Hughes on family photos) was busy looking through the nearby door at the military archives.

He was doomed.

Screw incredible alchemic abilities; screw master martial arts skills; screw brilliant mind that held the entirety of the Truth; Ed was absolutely no match for a pack of hormonal teenage girls.

What is this madness none of the books said anything like this what kind of drugs are they on when am I going to wake up OH GOD SHE'S TOUCHING ME—

He yanked his automail away from a dark-skinned girl violently, staring around at the eight or nine pubescent girls with bug eyes. "Go—go away!" he said, his voice much higher than he would have liked. But that was the least of his worries at the moment—

"Don't touch me! Get away!" he squeaked, backing into a wall. Why hadn't Major Armstrong come over to greet him yet—on every other occasion he wasted no time—what the hell was wrong with the world?

Al! Where was Al? He would know what to do with these rabid monsters—he had always had a way with people—or in any case, he could just scare the shit out of them by acting like some sort of giant—something—

Whatever the hell he did—

He squeaked again when one girl—a curly-haired one—actually got close enough to touch his hair. She was petting his hair. While eye-raping his pants. And his jacket. And his face and his—

Oh Truth just take me now, take another arm or leg or guts or whatever the hell you want, anything's better than this—

"I've never seen such sexy eyes before," a tall girl purred in his ear. "No men have golden eyes anymore…they've sure bought your way into my heart…"

Ed couldn't even begin to wonder what the hell she meant by that before the short girl snuck under another's arm, flinging her arms around him and nearly choking him to death. "Julie Elric…I like the sound of that~"

"Elizabeth Elric is better!" the curly-haired one growled, still running her fingers through Ed's hair.

What it's unbraided, where the hell did that rubber band go and why does this feel like sexual assault—

"Kathryn Elric!" the tall one said, her voice low but no less dangerous.

"Sadie Elric sounds the best by far! I don't know what the hell you bitches are talking about—"

Ed felt a glimmer of hope—just the tiniest, tiniest flare—grow in his chest as the girls became distracted, fighting over whose name sounded best with his.

(Which was all sorts of disturbing…but that was, quite frankly, the least of his worries at the moment.)

But as soon as he tried to inch away, all of the girls snapped back to him. The craziest ones were still in sight, while the rest of them formed a sort of half-circle behind them—

Shit. Where was the smallest one?

The dark-skinned one was directly in front of him, wearing what Ed could only assume was a seductive smile. Or, at least, it was supposed to be. To him, it looked more predatory and—

Shit, Ed. Focusfocusfocus. The curly-haired one was still playing with his hair on one side, and the tall one was on his other side, trying to turn his head toward her and saying things—insane things—into his ear that—Oh God are those pick-up lines?

He'd have to thank Mustang later for telling him what the hell those were. At least he knew a small part of what was—

Who the fuck is singing?

He was brought abruptly back to the task at hand by a weight on his back (what the hell I thought I was against the wall when did they lure me away) that had a death grip around his neck. He realized with horror that it was the midget girl—the one who had fawned over his automail—who seemed to be singing some bizarre song and—

Caressing his chest?

Oh God get it off get it off getitoffgetitoffgetitoff—

But she was already attached like a leech, still belting out the lyrics with gusto—"Oh baby when you talk like that, you make a woman go mad~"

"What the hell?" Ed finally was able to yell, but it was far too late to salvage the situation. The tall one simply put a hand over his mouth, smiling and humming along with the human koala glued to his back—

"So be wise and keep on reading the signs of my body~"

The girls were closing in, singing that ridiculous song Ed had never heard in his life, and he was beginning to think this was how he would die. Not in a shower of glory, not giving up his life for Alphonse, not even with a single loved one by his side. He would die here, alone, in the hallway of Eastern Command. Death by rabid female. How—

"Brother? Are you down there?"

Ed never thought he'd be so happy to hear his little brother's voice. (That was saying quite a lot, as he loved Al more than these girls loved him.)

"You know my hips don't lie, and I'm starting to feel it's right~"

"Al! Over—mmph—"

The tall girl's hand was over his mouth again, and several of the girls seemed to be taking the lyrics to this ridiculous song a bit too seriously, but none of that mattered because Al was here. Al was stability, Al was reason, Al was an end to this ridiculous madness—

His desperate yelp may have been cut off, but his little brother would not fail him; sure enough, Al shoved his way past the still-red-faced boys (why are they angry why would they ever want to be in this position) to burst through the crowd of strange—batshit insane—girls suffocating Ed. "Brother!" he cried in alarm, sending the dark-skinned one flying to reach him. "Brother, what's going on? Why are all these—" He pulled the tall and curly-haired ones off his scalp, sending them away only slightly more gently than the others.

"They're—I don't even know—they just mobbed me—" Ed tried desperately to get the parasite of a girl off his back, but all he was met with was a pair of legs on his shoulders.

What the—?

When had she flipped upside-down?

"HE TOUCHED ME, BITCHES! ALL BY HIMSELF!" the girl crowed, apparently hanging by her knees from his shoulders—and still managing to nearly hug him to death.

"Al, get her off," he pleaded, all sense of manliness and older-brotherliness gone. What if he caught something from these crazies? Surely, they had to have some form of rabies—

Al pulled her off with ease, but she seemed totally unperturbed; she continued to yell to all the other girls, who were slowly picking themselves up off the ground (oh God why won't they die they're like zombies), that they needed to "BACK OFF EDWARDKINS" because he was "HERS."

Ed didn't even know this psycho's name.

But as Al threw her aside into the gathering horde, Ed knew there was no time to ponder the impossibilities of the universe. The famous Elric brothers would not be brought down by rabid girls; that was just ridiculous. They had to come up with a plan, dammit!

"Al, do you think you could make a path?"

His little brother turned to the girls (were there that many before, holy shit I think they multiplied), apparently weighing his options. "It'll be risky," he said finally, his voice shaking a bit. "But we really don't have any other choice, do we?"

Ed shook his head, but he knew he had to be strong for the both of them. Zombies can sense fear. "We can make it," he said confidently. "If I get on your shoulders…"

Al was already hunkering down, and Ed quickly climbed up. "Al, if we—if we don't make it out of here," Ed said, suddenly solemn, looking out over the huge group of mindless schoolchildren. All of the tour groups seemed to have joined up. This was it. "If we—we're overcome, I want you to know that I love you. More than anything in the world."

Al was silent for a moment, his grip on Ed's calves tightening. "I love you too, Big Brother."

They paused for a moment, enjoying what were possibly the last moments of their short, sad lives.

Then, with wild war cries, they dived through the horde.

Roy thought the day had gone relatively well so far. The field trips from the local high schools were not as chaotic as he had feared they would be, and Fullmetal had even come back in time for the last day. Hawkeye had suggested that it would be a good experience for him to meet with other children his age, and the rest of the office had agreed wholeheartedly. Ed hadn't been happy about it, but he had gone with that Snodgrass woman's group, and the whole office waited eagerly for his return.

It was not quite what Roy had expected.

Alphonse rammed through the door wildly, barely keeping from decapitating his older brother as he ninja-flipped to the floor. Roy thought he saw a strange blur streak in before Ed transmuted the door away, putting his back to the wall and staring around with wide, terrified eyes.

"Edward, Alphonse, what hap—?" Hawkeye started, standing up in concern and walking toward them. Al growled low in his not-throat, though, and moved to stand in front of Ed.

"I'm not trusting any women with Brother until someone finds a cure for female-zombie-lust," he said warningly, sounding very threatening—and looking the part. Hawkeye backed off, a baffled look on her face, and Roy walked forward carefully. What the hell was female-zombie-lust, and why were they suddenly so terrified of it?

"What happened? It was just a bunch of kids on a field trip…what could've…?"

But then he noticed the dents in Al's armor and the torn loincloth that had not been there fifteen minutes ago. As Ed stepped out cautiously from behind his brother, Roy saw that he was missing a boot, his hair was let down, and his coat was torn.

"Guys…what…?" Havoc asked in alarm, standing up and making to rush toward him.

He never got that far. A short girl with dark red hair popped up from nowhere, dashing toward Ed with her arms outstretched.

"Eddie, wanna hug~?"

Al punted her through a nearby window.

And Edward screamed.