The Same Coin

To Bind Him Here

It was cold. So cold, and windy. Winry shivered as the fog gradually cleared from her head, leaving her vulnerable. She lifted her head ever so slightly, then sucked in breath of air so cold it hurt to breathe, and she began coughing.

She was staring down at the ground from six stories up, and Winry tried to fling herself away from the ledge. A strong arm around her small waist tightened. She fought the unexpected vertigo to look upward, and she let out a shrill cry of surprise and terror — it was Scar who was holding her.

"Don't move," he warned gruffly, "or I'll drop you."

Her fingers dug into him, desperate for purchase. Far below she could see Kimblee and his men in the street, with Ed and Al alongside them. She didn't know what could've happened for her to end up in this position, but she'd never been more genuinely fearful for her safety. Scar had his scruples about killing her, but that could've easily changed. Thick flakes of snow swirled around them in a violent dervish.

Scar bent, and she dug her nails into him through her gloves, trying to balance herself with her legs as he pressed his free hand against the roof they stood on. It was like lightning erupted through the building. Winry watched as the concrete splintered and cracked, crumbling in chunks — dangerously close to hitting the soldiers below.

"This is all your fault, Kimblee! You were supposed to be watching Winry!" she heard Ed's voice echo up.

Scar stepped away from the edge as it crumbled beneath his feet. He retreated back into the building, descending the stairs effortlessly, as though he wasn't hefting a full grown woman along with him.

"Let me go!" she demanded.

"No. Major Miles — Briggs's part-Ishvalan soldier — has entrusted you to me, to take you to Briggs."

"No! Let me go!"

Scar hauled her down flight after flight, before throwing ajar a set of doors that opened into an underground tunnel. He set her on her feet then, but took a handful of the back of her coat to keep her close. Dr. Marcoh, May, Yoki, and two of the soldiers she recognized as Kimblee's were there waiting for them. When she saw the soldiers, her struggling subsided. Kimblee's soldiers were escorting them to Briggs.

"What's going on here?" she demanded, turning as best she could to look at Scar.

"All you need to know is we are going to Briggs. All of us."

Winry was sullen and silent then as Scar gestured down the tunnel. She saw now that there were tracks, almost like for a train — then she realized that they were in the mines.

"A snowstorm has hit Baschool," Dr. Marcoh explained. "This is the safest and quickest way to Briggs under the circumstances."

She wanted to ask what would happen once they reached the fort — whether Scar would be arrested, what Ed and Al were going to do next since they'd fulfilled their mission to capture Scar (sort of), and more questions that she ultimately quashed. Instead she let Yoki and Dr. Marcoh lead the way.

"So it's true then? You're actually the daughter of the Doctors Rockbell?" Marcoh asked after they'd crossed what Winry could only hope were a couple miles.

"Yes. Did you know my parents, Doctor Marcoh?"

He smile. His face disfigured horribly when he did, but she saw the light in his eye that carried its own brand of becoming.

"Of course I did. There isn't a single doctor who worked in Ishval who didn't know your parents' names. They did their duty without any regard to themselves."