A/N: So I've had some trouble getting the plot for this book straightened out and it's still a work in progress but I have some idea of where we're gonna head out now so that's good. I've managed to fight off the block for now so hopefully updates won't be too far apart. For all the old readers who've followed me here from Full Circle Book I, enjoy Book II. To all the new readers, you might wanna go back and read Book I first or this one won't make much sense. That's it for now.

Enjoy~

Disclaimer: I only own my original characters and the plotline. Everything else used here belongs to their respective owners.

Prologue:

Roy Mustang was not a superstitious man. In his mind, anything that could not be explained through science- be it ordinary or alchemic- simply could not exist. And yet, as he hurried through the quickly-darkening streets of Central, he couldn't help but shudder. Not quite in fear, no. He wasn't afraid, only confused. He was sure what he had just experienced was real…but at the same time, logic told him it wasn't possible. And though he might be able to come up with some way to explain it away as some highly advanced form of transmutation, he knew deep down that that wasn't quite it either.

He nodded at a couple of soldiers patrolling the streets as he hurriedly made his way to his apartment, trying not to dwell on the deal he had made with that woman. She had red eyes, like an Ishvalan, yet everything about her had screamed something else entirely. What it was he wasn't quite sure he wanted to acknowledge yet. Maybe he could just dismiss it all as a hallucination and be done with it?

"You want power in your country." The red-eyed woman smirked at him as she leaned back on her settee, uncaring of the amount of skin she exposed along the way, 'The highest rank attainable, do you not?'

"That is not common knowledge." He had to struggle not to outwardly wince at that, though his voice still came out cold and collected. Inside, his heart was racing. How could a stranger know of that? His men would never betray him like that and-

"I know." Her smirk widened.

"Seeing as you are telling me this, I'm sure there is something you want from me."

"On the contrary, Flame Alchemist," she replied, a lazy drawl seeping into her tone as though she could not be bothered to feel threatened by the anger radiating off of him at that moment, "it is you who wants something from me. The question that remains is," here she eyed him appraisingly, looking far older and wiser then her physical age, "are you willing to pay the price?"

Shaking himself out of his disturbing thoughts, Roy decided to dismiss the incident from his mind altogether as he suddenly found himself standing in front of the door to his apartment. He wasn't even aware of his arrival, but from the way the doorknob was warm under his fingers, he had to have been standing there for quite some time. Blinking at the sound of another door opening and closing somewhere nearby, the state alchemist pulled the key from his pocket and inserted it in the lock. Shaking his head once again, he tried not to think of what he had somehow ended up doing.

He was not a superstitious man, so he never did wish on a star. Even as he grew up, he never wished for anything when he blew the candles out on his cake. So then why… had he made that strange wish to that strange not-Ishvalan shop owner? After all… there were no such things as wish-granting witches, were there?

-0-

The world was drowning, suffocating, smothering crimson. So much crimson, so much of it. It washed over her skin, drenching her in its decaying, acrid stench. Dribbling from her body, drizzling down her hair, trickling in rivulets from her face.

But wait… this wasn't her dream.

No.

She should not even be here.

So much blood. So much of it. (Someone else's?)

She did not know. All she knew was that the world was crimson, drowning in that color as chilling laughter echoed around her. It rang with darkness and insanity and pain and fear and hatred and anger and so much more. So much anger. And pain. Insanity.

It shook her to the core, and yet, she did not know where it came from. (Around her?)

No.

It wasn't just around her. It was everywhere. In every pore of her existence. It was in the air and the ground and the crimson-drenched rocks. It was in the blood that bathed that dead

deadnotlivingnotbreathingdeaddeaddeadDEAD!

world just as it was inside her. Consuming her. Destroying her. Drowning, suffocating, smothering! But wait… this wasn't her dream. (Whose, then?)

This pain and anger and hatred and fear and oh, God! What was all of this? How could it even exist? Such darkness. Who was this twisted, broken person whose dream she now invaded? No. Not a dream. (Reality, then?) But this reality…How could it have come to pass?

Slowly she drifted through the sea of crimson, her heart clenching with dread as manic glee encompassed this person she was (inside?) now. (Who was it? She knew this person, didn't she?) The blood parted for her, caressing her lovingly like a mother (she grew up in it, bathed in it every moment of her gloriously bloody existence. No…that wasn't right.)

It sloshed around her bare feet, even as the rivulets streamed down to join the sea of crimson.(She grew up with it but there was a time before this all. A life before this and…maybe for a short while after this too.) She knew what awaited her at the end of her short journey and her heart clenched tighter with dread and fear (of what?) and the manic laughter rose in a crescendo as her destination neared.(the pain had come and consumed her whole and taken away the person she had once been and torn and broken and twisted her into this…this creature that she now was. A creature of the crimson sea that parted only for her)She stopped nearly a foot away, the laughter nearly deafening in her ears. It was everywhere, drowning and maddening as a pale, blood-drenched hand reached out to touch the sparkling silver surface of the mirror, turning to angle it to her face. The dreamer awoke with a gasp at the image reflected back, for she knew who the child of blood was and her heart ached and bled and screamed for she knew there was nothing she could do to save the person she had dreamt herself to be, because she had made a deal with the witch.

And even as she struggled with all her might to hold on to the memory of just this one dream,(because she knew she could stop it from happening if only she could remember. She could change it somehow because it had not yet happened and oh please! Let her remember it!)the blood and the pain and the darkness and the laughter all began to trickle from her grasp like sand slipping through her clenched fingers (and please! Just this once don't make her forget.)

She wanted to beg, oh how she wanted to beg, but it was not to be… and so… she forgot.

A/N: As you can probably already guess, there will be a crossover with FMA ;) ;) and possibly one or two other fandoms. I'd love to hear your thoughts so please don't forget to review and put this story on your alerts.