audio;

[armoured]

Good morning, everyone!

[Al has a very young sounding voice, but it's bursting with warmth and enthusiasm. Far too chipper for first thing in the morning, which is when he's sending this out.]

I've found a book, and I was hoping people might be able to help me with what it means. Oh-- and I don't mean that book about cheese, though I don't really understand what that's about either.

[One of the more bizarre things he's received. He clears his throat a little awkwardly and then gets down to business.]

I'm sure everyone remembers going home, or-- to some places that looked like our homes not long ago. Well, on the last day I went back, I found a journal, one of those books that woman was always writing in. I've been trying to decipher what was written in there, but it's not of a language that I understand and it's not in a code that I'm familiar with.

I'd be more than willing to show it to anyone who wanted to help, I'm sure there must be some clues as to how that version of the Ingress worked inside it, and that might help us all to get home a little faster. Anyway, if you're interested, my name is Alphonse Elric and my rooms are on the Moro Deck.

Comments

[forfeits]

That's great.

[ He likes hearing his brother so pleased, so confident, especially after their worry over the false Ingress. It's nice to think they could really have something to work on, now. ]

It has to have clues, or maybe her notes about different worlds, at the very least. Maybe we should try to find words that look like articles and stuff. Like 'the' and 'a' and words like that. We might be able to see if they correspond to our alphabet that way. [ He makes a face. ] But I guess they probably spoke another language, too, huh?

[armoured]

That's a really good idea. I've been writing out all the different characters I can find, seeing how many there are because that might give us a clue to what kind of base language we're dealing with.

[It's taking a long time, though, going through the book and checking these things one at a time.]

I guess a good way to find articles might be to look for words that are capitalised but not the start of a sentence, the word before it is most likely to be an article, right?

[forfeits]

Yeah, the base language is gonna be the important part. I can get some books from the library, maybe. Ask Elizabeth if there is anything on foreign languages out here. But I'm guessing there are tons of them, huh?

[ Ed sighs a little, looking over the notebook. It's both exciting and frustrating to know they have the ability to get more information, but that there are so many steps to acquire it. ]

Yeah, beginnings of sentences. And well, in English at least, the articles are all shorter words. Like 'a' and 'the'. But I guess that's assuming the base language even uses them. Hmm.

[armoured]

We don't need to know the base language immediately to figure out some of it, we can treat it like an alchemical cipher. All we need are a few points of reference and I just know we can figure the rest out from there.

[Besides, this is what they're good at. Obsessing over something difficult for days or weeks until it gets done.

A moment or two passes in silence as they study the book, before Al chuckles quietly.]

It's weird, I've missed this. Having something real to focus on. I know we're trying to get back home, and I've not given up, but it feels kind of-- nebulous. Like we can't do much until the Ingress gets fixed, all we have is worry over the people back home. But with this? Maybe we have the key to finally doing something that can make a difference to achieving that.

[forfeits]

You're right. We can look at it like building arrays, I guess, it's got the same idea. It's made of parts, so once we figure those out we'll get going on it.

[ Ed smiles to his brother, feeling energized about the project. ] It's been a while since we've had stuff to do, huh? It's kind of nice, you're right. I want more answers and it seems like we finally have a way to do that, Al. Or at least get one step closer. We'll find a way to get it fixed, and we'll find a way back home soon. I just know it.

[armoured]

Mm.

[He lays a hand over the page, head tilting to look at Ed.]

Though all of this has made me think about what we're going to do when we get home. I mean-- after we fight Father. After we get our original bodies back.

[Not 'if' but 'after', because he has to believe it will happen one day.]

What do you think we'll do?