Prologue: Family Pride

Roy yawned. It was early in the morning, he always had to get up early for these visits, and his life was made a great deal worse by the fact that he had company on this current visit. He wouldn't have minded if it was Rita, Havoc, hell even Fullmetal would have been better traveling company.

Who had Roy been saddled with? Major Alex Louis Armstrong.

Now, Roy didn't have a big issue with the Strong-Arm Alchemist, he might have even considered him a friend. It was simply that Roy didn't trust him, or at least, not with the current mission.

What was the mission? Check up on Mrs. Bradley and Selim, who if Roy remembered correctly was around seven now, at least his body was.

Others had said that despite his past, Pride or Selim was just an average child now. But Roy still didn't feel comfortable with that. He didn't know how losing your memories worked, but if Selim ever regained his memories, the very world could be in danger.

And who knows how easy it is to regain a lost memory? One snowflake can start an avalanche; one tiny miss action could set Selim off. Roy hoped that Selim died before he could remember, but Roy at the very least understood the problems with killing a child who didn't know anything.

It appeared that in his thoughts Major Armstrong had managed to lead him towards the Führer's old place of residence. He breathed in, he putting on his 'Game Face' if you will, go in, drink some coffee with Mrs Bradley, watch Selim and ask him how things are going, leave and file a report.

It would have been a normal day, but then, Roy had Major Armstrong's assistance.

At least if something goes wrong he'll have some cover.

The two military men stepped into the house, and were greeted by non-other than Selim Bradley himself. He looked surprized at the men in front of him, but then his mouth twisted into a smile and his eye shined, a look of pure innocence, a look that Roy knew would come back to haunt him one day.

"Mr. Mustang! So nice to see you again! Who's your friend?" Selim asked as he looked at Armstrong, smiling at him, for if he were a friend of Roy's, he must have been a nice person. Armstrong didn't disappoint.

"I'm Alex Louis Armstrong. It's nice to finally be meeting you, Selim." Armstrong smiled down at Selim, and he smiled back knowing he was right about his thoughts on Armstrong, he even took a little pride in being right.

"Mother's waiting in the living room come on!" Selim grabbed Roy's hand, and began dragging him through the large house, Armstrong followed behind, amazed at this strange sight.

Something else Roy didn't overly enjoy about visiting Selim, Selim never left his side. Call it hero-worship, call it normal friendship, which was possible. Roy had been over enough times, and he even played with the boy sometimes. Yes, knowing everything that Pride had done had made him a little jumpy at first, but Selim was a perfectly delightful child.

'But if I remember correctly, Pride was a good actor…' Roy thought to himself, it made him nervous at the thought.

Roy decided to try and ease himself, deciding to talk with Selim for a bit.

"So Selim, how've you been?" He asked kindly, it paid to make sure kids were happy. It always paid.

"I've been great! So many visitors, I've made so many friends!" There was a smile in his voice, and Roy felt a strange combination of happiness and pity. Happy because Selim was happy, and pity because all of his visiting 'friends' were from the military.

Roy didn't have time to think about it, as his group was now in the living room. Mrs. Bradley was sitting on a cough in front of a coffee table, and at the top of the coffee table was a single fluffy chair. Also, in front of this chair, on the table, was a cup of coffee.

Roy made his way for the single chair, picking the cup of coffee up and began drinking as if it were his source of life. Selim giggled at the strange habit of Roy, and got on the cough next to his mother. Armstrong, strangely, grabbed a piece of paper from his inner pocket and pencil and sat cross-legged at the coffee table.

Roy didn't ask him what he was doing or why he'd want to rest on the hard floor when there was another space on the cough, but frankly he didn't care. Armstrong must have had a reason.

Minutes ticked by, Roy asked about Selim's schoolwork, which she answered with him doing rather well. Selim asked Roy how his Ishval project was going, and it turned out it was going rather well.

At some point, Selim's eyes turned slightly to Armstrong, and noticed that he was drawing. Selim got up from his seat, and went around the table and sat by Armstrong. He looked at the paper and was fairly surprized, he was drawing a perfect picture of Roy, his mother and himself, just sitting on the cough. By itself, it was rather lacklustre, but the fact that it was so perfect in detail had made Selim marvel at it.

"Cool! How'd you learn to draw like that?" Selim wondered out loud, drawing the attention of Mrs. Bradley and Roy. They looked at Armstrong's picture as well, both a little surprized.

"Hmm?" Armstrong noticed he was being watched, than turned to Selim. "This drawing skill has been passed down the Armstrong line for generations, my boy. I learned from my Father." Selim blinked his eyes repeatedly, he swore he saw a sparkle appear around Armstrong's eye, but that was a silly thought, probably just a trick of the light.

"Are you proud? Of your family, I mean." Selim was confused by the way Armstrong held his head so high, and his thirst for knowledge had to be filled.

"Why of course! Aren't you proud of yours?"

"Am I? Am I proud of my mother? Yes…but I feel like I should be proud of someone else…someone more important than mother." Selim said scratching his head. At his words Roy noticed Mrs Bradley cringed, sadden for good reason.

"Now see here! There is no one in any young boy's life more important than their mother! But, maybe you're also proud of your Father?" Armstrong ended with a question, which visibly made Roy twitch. That, that right there was why Roy was freaking out about Armstrong being around.

"My…Father?" Selim asked out loud, more in a trance than anything else. 'Who was my Father again? The late Führer King Bradley? That's what mother said…' Selim thought to himself, trying to reassure himself.

Then his head started to hurt, and he didn't know why.

'I take pride in my Father, only my Father…not Führer King Bradley…not…W-wrath.' Selim's eyes rolled back into his head, and the boy collapsed to the ground.

Mrs. Bradley freaked out, shouting "Selim! Dear are you okay? what's wrong?" as she went to grab her son. Roy's eyes became dangerously sharp as he glared at Armstrong, who rubbed his head, embarrassed by his mistake.

Selim on the other decided that he didn't want to cause his mother any trouble, and his eyes snapped open and he rolled onto his back and stared at the celling. Roy had to focus, but he was sure he heard Selim mumble,

"Where am I? Where's Father?" Then his eyes became shocked as he seemed to recall something. This truly freighted Roy.

Selim's black eyes had changed into a deep purple. Roy was afraid that Selim wasn't Selim anymore.

Selim got up from the floor, and looked around, slightly surprized at the age his mother appeared to be, the mustache on Roy's face, and the simple presence of Alex Louis Armstrong.

"How many…seven, at the very least." Selim asked himself, then he decided to confirm this. He glared up at Roy, and his mother backed away a bit as she saw the glare that was so strange on her son's face.

"You! Sacrifice! How long has it been since the Promise Day?" Selim demanded, or to be more precise, Pride demanded. Roy was gulped, not out of fear. It was simply if he had to kill Selim, the wrath of Mrs. Bradley is terrifying to think about.

Mrs. Bradley gasped at harshness of her son's words. She knew the truth of what was happening, but it still shocked her. The part of her that told her to be sacred was drowned out by a voice that told her to be a parent.

"Selim! You will not be rude to our guests! Do you understand?" Mrs. Bradley said sternly, making all the males present stare at her. Pride was surprized that she was there, Roy looked at her like she was an idiot for trying to tell Pride what to do, and Armstrong? He was crying about her 'skill to overlook her son's memory, and still be a parent'

Pride looked down, a scowl on his face.

"Yes Mother. Sorry Sacrifice, could you please tell me how long it's been?" Pride tried to appear calm, made all the more difficult when he realised Roy was holding his hand up, ready to snap his fingers and end Pride's one life.

"What are you doing General Mustang?" Mrs. Bradley said fearfully. Roy's glare hardened, Pride dropped his attempt at calm and glared back.

"I'm getting ready to kill a monster, Mrs. Bradley." Roy said coldly, he was ready to do it too. Armstrong stood up and pulled her away before she could get in the line of fire.

"Monster? Hardly. I'm a Homunculus, there is a major difference. Besides, what's the point in killing me just because I remember, when you weren't going to when I didn't? I'm still powerless, more or less." Pride glanced at his fingernails, fairly bored of Mustang now. Roy couldn't believe that Pride could be this…arrogant.

"Well, maybe I want to kill you for forcing me to commit the taboo. It's not my fault, it was yours." Roy glared.

Pride chuckled, as if he were playing a simple mental game. He probably was, "Wouldn't that make you as bad as me? Killing people simply because they wronged…" Pride stopped talking as a fault crossed his mind. He stared up at Roy surprized and confused.

"W…what?" Roy asked, not used to seeing that look on Pride's face, he'd seen it countless times on Selim's but that was another story.

"Can you see?" Pride asked simply, not giving Roy a chance to figure out what this was about or how Pride would react.

"Yes, I can. Why?" Roy didn't know where that answer would take him, but he found out when Pride's eye began to twitch.

"You're telling me that the human transmutation that I forced you to do, that ended up taking most of my Stone's souls and basically ended up with me being powerless and led to my greatest lose, you ended up coming out of perfectly fine?" Pride asked, speaking remarkably calm. Roy now understood what was up, and it unnerved him that he hadn't thought about it. But he quickly regained control of his facial features.

"That would be the case." Then without warning a shadow snapped up and slapped Roy across the face. Roy stared at the shadow, then back to Pride, then back at the shadow.

"That's for getting out of this okay, and this - " The shadow swiped at his feet and Roy fell onto his back, then a shadow snapped him through the his shoulder, making Roy cry out. Roy knew at that moment that he was going to click his fingers and end this, but that thought disappeared when Pride spook,

"Is for killing my little sister." Pride scoffed, and the shadow disappeared. His eye twitched, it was as if he was trying to call his shadow again, but it simply wasn't working.

"Huh. Strange." Pride mumbled. He looked around the room, his mother was shocked at his shadows and the fact that he had attacked a person with them, making him feel kind of bad, but his reasons were justified as far as he was concerned. Roy was staring at him, and Pride thought that Roy was thinking about killing him as he pressed at his wound. Armstrong simply stared, rather shocked.

"Well…pip pip, cheery-o and all that!" Pride ran from the room, afraid of his mother's wrath, Roy's wrath and then Armstrong's wrath…in that order of fear.

All will be explained in time, but for not point out any mistakes. and enjoy.