Chapter Text
Temperance was in the kitchen when she felt it, the indescribable shift in reality that meant another was joining their ranks. The sensation hit her suddenly, the innate connection to the Gate bursting into life, and she was forced to grab the edge of the table to steady herself until she got used to it. The previous times she’d felt it, with Charity and Compassion, she’d had the same reaction, and she didn’t think that she would ever get used to it.
Shakily, she managed to make her way to the door, calling out into the rest of the house. “Chary?”
“Yeah, I felt it too.” Charity came out of her room. “Patience?”
“I’m here, ladies.” Patience joined them in the main corridor, bounding in from the entryway. “Damn, this is a bad one. Or a good one. It’s a strong one, at any rate.” Patience’s brow furrowed. “I think there are two of them pushing it from this side. Come on, let’s get to it. Who’s got the clock?”
“It lives in the study after last time.” The three of them made their way along to Hohenheim’s study. The map of Amestris was already spread out over the table, scarcely recognisable as a map anymore with the amount of scribbles all over it. Hohenheim was poised over it, red ink at the ready, brow furrowed in concentration as he tried to pinpoint the transmutation’s location.
Patience grabbed the alarm clock off the shelf and began to wind it.
The reality shift was getting stronger; Truth was taking its toll and throwing the deceased back out into the world. Patience was right; this was the strongest wave that Tempe had ever felt.
“Feels like a lady,” Charity said. She was staring into the middle distance rather than looking at the map: Chary was always the best at getting identities whilst the rest of them focussed on location.
Pasha rushed into the room. “What’s going on?”
“Someone’s performing a human transmutation,” Hohenheim said. “If we time it right, we’ll be getting another housemate.”
Compassion screwed his face up. “It feels weird. I don’t like it.”
“I know. It’s a horrible feeling, but it’ll be over in a minute, I promise.” Hohenheim grimaced as if he was in pain; the souls always screeched whenever the Gate was opened.
“Lady,” Charity said firmly. “Mid-twenties, young mum, died about six years ago. Tempe, what if it’s the kids who are trying to bring her back?”
Temperance shook her head. She didn’t want to think about it.
There was a clatter as Hohenheim’s pen dropped onto the table and he gasped, leaning heavily on the map.
“Hohenheim?”
“No,” he said softly. “No, it can’t be. He can’t have done it again.”
“Hohenheim?”
He didn’t respond, evidently miles away and evidently disturbed by whatever was going on in his head.
Then, as suddenly as it started, the reality shift stopped. The transmutation was over. Whoever had performed it was back from the Gate and whoever had been pulled back to life was now on borrowed time before it became too late for them to be rescued and they were doomed to a fate worse than the death they’d just left. Patience started the clock counting down the hours that they had left to work with, but Hohenheim didn’t move.
“Hohenheim? Hohenheim, we need to find her,” Charity said. “She’s not got long and it was a bad one.”
“East.” The single word came through gritted teeth. “East. Close to the Ishval border.”
There was another shift, and this one threw Temperance and Compassion off their feet. Patience rushed round to help them up. It was only a couple of seconds, not a full human transmutation, but the Gate had opened again.
“That’s never happened before.” Patience’s brow furrowed. “What’s going on?”
“East,” Hohenheim said again. This time he sounded a little more relaxed. “Resembool.” He grabbed his dropped pen and circled the small village in the eastern sector of Amestris, marking the date and time. “Tempe, Chary, you’re with me for this one.” He paused. “I think you’re right, Chary. I think it was the children.”
Chary swore softly under her breath before grabbing the clock and going to pack everything that they would need for the trip to the new arrival, but Tempe hung back, watching Hohenheim as he packed up the things in his study, maps and the like. Going to a fresh transmutation always took it out of all of them, but she’d never let Hohenheim go on his own, like he’d had to do with Humility, the first of their number.
“What’s going on, Hohenheim? I’ve never seen you affected like that when a new one comes; and what was that aftershock?”
“I’ll tell you later. We’re running out of time. Come on.”
X
Eight hours later found them alighting the midnight mail train in Resembool, misty rain falling all around them and giving what should have been a quaint countryside town a heavy, depressing air. It was almost as if the very atmosphere knew that the ultimate taboo had been committed here.
Temperance was still reeling from everything that Hohenheim had told her on the journey. She had known for a while that Patience was the child of his nemesis, but the general consensus had always been that the Homunculus had never known about Patience’s existence and had left the mother before the pregnancy was known.
According to Hohenheim, the two young boys who had made the trip to the Gate to try and resurrect their mother were also the Homunculus’ children, and the age gap meant that he must have known about at least one of them.
The Xerxian bloodline was flowing again.
The aftershock, Hohenheim had explained, had been one boy willingly going back to Truth to rescue his brother’s soul. Temperance couldn’t bear to think about it and yet she couldn’t drag her thoughts away from it. At least everyone else they had encountered who had tried to perform human transmutation had been an adult. Two children…
“This way.” Hohenheim set off up the bleak-looking hill and Charity and Temperance followed him.
“Tempe? Are you ok?”
Temperance shook her head. “This feels different. This feels like a paradigm shift. I don’t like it.”
Charity shook her head. “No. Me neither. But we’ve got to do what we can do. We can’t doom the poor thing to an eternity of being buried alive.” She took the clock out of her bag. They had just over four hours left. It should be plenty of time for Hohenheim to do what he needed to do, but it would depend if the body was in an accessible place, if there was anyone else around… It would depend if the children were still there, if they needed help…
The house on the top of the hill looked to be deserted when they got there, the ozone smell of alchemy still hanging heavy in the air despite the transmutation being hours ago now. Charity ran on ahead to scout out the place, confirming that there was no one around, inside or outside. Temperance allowed herself to relax a little. Hopefully that meant that they wouldn’t be interrupted whilst they were working, and more importantly, it hopefully meant that the children had got help. Coming back from the Gate after a human transmutation was a messy business; Temperance had seen the aftermath before and had no desire to do so again, especially not with children.
“Here we are.”
There was a mound of freshly dug earth in the yard at the back of the house; it could only have been the final resting place of the new transmutation. Temperance felt her heart start beating faster. She was still alive under there. Still conscious and unable to fully die even under the earth.
Hohenheim knelt down on the wet ground and Temperance got down beside him, opening her carpet bag as he transmuted the topsoil of the shallow grave away to expose the body beneath. Charity looked away, ostensibly keeping watch for anyone coming but also not wanting to look at the twisted mess that could barely be called human. Temperance didn’t begrudge her it.
Hohenheim placed a hand on the thin chest. “Soul’s still in. It bonded strongly - those boys knew what they were doing.” He gave a long sigh and looked down at the skeletal frame. “This will hurt, I’m afraid,” he said to her, “but leaving you here would be worse.”
Temperance handed him a blanket out of the carpet bag and he spread it over his knees before carefully lifting the body out of the grave and laying it across his lap. He held out a hand for the knife, and Temperance noticed that her hands were shaking as she gave it to him.
He slashed his palm deeply, letting the blood run down into the corpse’s mouth. Temperance sat back on her heels, feeling her boots sinking into the mud. It was just a matter of time.
The body gasped and convulsed in Hohenheim’s arms, but he didn’t move, blood still flowing as the Philosopher’s Stone sparked around the edges of the wound. Gradually, the limbs began to straighten out, flesh realigning and skin regrowing, hair lightening to chestnut brown.
Two small, delicate hands grabbed Hohenheim’s larger one, bringing his palm to her mouth and sucking ravenously. Temperance was reminded of vampires.
“Ok, I think that’s enough.” Hohenheim tugged his hand free and wrapped the woman up in the blanket for modesty, wiping her mouth with the corner. “Welcome back to the land of the living.”
The woman just looked up at him, wide green eyes blinking slowly, and there was the slightest hint of recognition and familiarity in her eyes for just a moment before it died. Something inside Temperance’s gut twisted. None of them remembered their life before they were transmuted and Hohenheim pulled them out of the ground and out of the darkness into this strange second life; they’d only been able to piece together the odd bits and pieces from what Hohenheim had been able to deduce - like Patience’s parentage.
If what they believed was true and this lady had had two children with Hohenheim’s nemesis, it made sense that somewhere in her subconscious, he would look familiar to her.
“Where am I?” she asked. “I don’t… I don’t remember anything.”
“No. I know.” Hohenheim sounded so sad and apologetic. “I’m sorry… That’s just the way it is.”
He helped her sit up and she pulled in the blanket closer around her. Temperance came closer, giving what she hoped was a reassuring smile.
“We’ll keep you safe,” she said.
The woman looked over at the grave as Hohenheim transmuted the earth back to fill in the hole, leaving it roughly the same as it had been before. Any discrepancies in appearance in the morning could be put down to the rain.
“I thought I was going to be in there forever,” she murmured. “I can’t remember anything. It’s just pain. Darkness and pain and suffocation.” She glanced at Hohenheim. “Thank you. I think.”
“There are lights coming on at the next house.” Charity pointed over the crest of the hill to the flickering lamplight just visible in what was presumably one of the windows in the dark shape that could just about be identified as a house. “We should probably make a move.”
Temperance helped the woman onto her feet, but her legs buckled underneath her. Hohenheim caught her, lifting her up into a bridal hold and carrying her down the hill.
“Who are you?” she asked, looking around herself in fear and confusion. “Where did you come from? Why did you rescue me?”
“My name is Hohenheim. This is Temperance, and Charity. We came from Central City, and we rescued you because we didn’t want you to suffer.”
“Hohenheim. Temperance. Charity.” She shook her head, leaning against Hohenheim’s shoulder. “I don’t even know my own name. I guess I must have had one before.”
“Maybe it’ll come back,” Temperance said. She didn’t know why she was giving her false hope; none of the rest of them had regained their memories after all, but there was still a part of her that was certain that somehow, somewhen, she would remember her previous life.
There was another part of her that really didn’t want to remember. Maybe ignorance was bliss after all.
“For now, we’ll call you Diligence,” Charity said.
Diligence nodded and closed her eyes, and Temperance found herself thinking of the two children who had tried to resurrect their mother, wondering if their paths would ever cross again…