Stand Up and Walk

Now I've Gone and Made You Cry

"I still have too long a life ahead to get rid of these feelings, right? I want to try doing over the things I've left undone. I thought I was running after something carried over from my dreams, yet I'm stumbling into people on this narrow, winding road. It's not like I want to go back to the way things were back then; I'm just searching for the sky I've been losing. Here's hoping you'll understand. Stop making that sad face as though you were a victim. Sins don't end in tears; you have to carry the pain forever. Who am I waiting for in this maze of emotions with no way out in sight? I want to purge myself more simply, as if writing in a blank notebook. What is it I want to escape from? ...Is it reality? It makes me want to scream that we're alive for things to come true. Can you hear me? I can't put up with playing it safe. ...I've got nowhere to go home to! I'm always grateful for kindness; that's why I want to grow stronger (I'm on the way). I even welcome this pain for the things I miss."
—Yui, Again

...

"Rush Valleyyyyyyy!!" Winry shrieks joyfully, gazing wondrously around at everything there is to see. "Automail," she coos. "Automail! Automail!!" She jumps up and down, ecstatic. "I'm so happy!!" She gasps dramatically, pointing at something in a display case in one of the shop's windows. "Look! It's the most recent G.O.D.S. model!!"

"Welcome to the holy land of automail," Al says. "This place is bustling!"

Ed groans. "Remind me again why we let ourselves get dragged out in this heat to look at a bunch of automail?" he complains. "We should've dropped Winry off at the station and kept going straight to Dublith."

"Hey, kid!" a man's voice calls from behind you. "Come back for a sec!" You glance over your shoulder to see who was calling, and then, before you know it, there's a crowd surrounding you. One man is holding your left arm, examining it curiously, while the onlookers murmur to each other. "I've never seen an automail model quite like this before!"

"It really is unusual," another man comments. "Everybody, take a look!"

The crowd swarms around you, bustling you so much that you may as well be in a mosh pit. Quite a few pairs of hands tug on your clothes, which you hastily swat away.

After what feels like an eternity, you finally manage to escape the hungry crowd, dragging yourself free from the clustered mass of gross, sweaty bodies. "Fucking hell," you grumble irately, fixing your shirt and pushing your hair out of your eyes. "This is why I keep away from gearheads!"

You're working on straightening your belt when you hear Ed let out a groan. You look over to see him turning his pockets inside-out. "No, no, no, no, no!" he chants. "It's gone!?"

"...What did you lose?"

"My pocket watch!" he moans, still desperately searching his pockets. "It's the only thing that proves I'm a State Alchemist!!"

"Ah," chimes in a man's voice to your right. "It sounds like you guys had a run-in with Paninya!"

The four of you pause your panicking. "...Paninya?"

"A pickpocket around here who likes to target tourists," the man explains.

Ed rushes over to the man and grab onto his shirtfront. "Where is this 'Paninya' girl? Do you know how I can find her? She took something very important!!"

The man puts his hand to his chin thoughtfully. "Hmm," he muses to the man next to him; "Where is she again?"

The other man repeats the former's gesture. "Ah, I know what might jog my memory..." he says suggestively. You're sure he's about to ask for money, but then he turns around with a wrench in his hand and squeals something about taking a better look at his automail.