Foraging for Knowledge

[Alphonse]

The midday sun filtered through the hole-filled roof of the abandoned school building. Dust had been recently disturbed and made the air murky in the dim light. Shifting through overturned desks and torn pages of once good-condition educational books was the youngest son of Amestris's most famous alchemist. Dusting off an old book he looked over the title. It was for an AP Science class but there were several pages missing. With a slight sigh he tossed the book over his shoulder and began looking once more. After finding the teacher's desk and digging through the broken mess that use to be the drawers he managed to find a relatively good condition instructor copy of basic calculus. A smile crossed the alchemist's face as he flipped through pages to make sure that there were none missing, to his relief all of the pages were intact. He safely tucked the book into his bag and searched more. He had searched most of the school already and had only found three usable books including the one he had just picked up. It wouldn't seem like much to those living in Central but those books were priceless to the only two families living in the once thriving farming town.

Figuring the room was well looked over he headed back out, resting his hand on the twisted door frame as he exited. He started to wonder what high school would have been like, had civil war not closed down all the schools in the area well before the rest of the world went insane. He would have been a sophomore or junior by then depending on how well he studied. He adjusted the strap of his bag before starting down the hallways, avoiding broken desks and trash as he went. But something caught his attention before he could get too far. A quiet cry was emanating from one of the rooms. Recognizing the sound of a cat he sought out the source. He tracked the cat down to find it was pinned under some rubble that had fallen from the ceiling. Cautiously he unburied the cat to find that it was no more then a kitten. Dusting the kitten off the blonde haired teen started out of the room.

[Salem]

Salem let out a content sigh as he basked in the warm glow of the sun. His black coat was splayed beneath him, protecting his white button down shirt from the ill kept school grounds. The black hat that often accompanied it lay on top of his face, obscuring the sun from the man's single good eye. The man had no business in the town of Rizembol. It was simply a detour on his way back to the Shamballa building. Four days of hard riding had left the man's muscles stiff and uncooperative. He had honestly attempted to continue on his way, but after stopping for a moment to have a cigarette he found it impossible to get up and continue. At first he simply sat down for a moment, then sitting turned to leaning, and then eventually full blown lounging. It had been a couple of hours since Salem had gotten comfortable. The only thing marking the progress of time being the sun moving through the sky.

His thoughts drifted as he laid beneath the morning star to the first time he had been in Amestris. He had passed through this town before, years ago, back when he was still Master Sergeant Reid. He remembered ransacking what was left of it for supplies, from what he recalled there was nothing here. Even now, years after the war had supposedly ended the landscape was still sparse. He flicked his hat and looked towards the holey structure that was once a school. He snorted, remembering huddling down in that school with his crew. He turned, ready to drift back to sleep, except a small sound caught his attention. He sat up and sniffed the air.

The scent of a cat was the first thing that grabbed his attention. He inhaled again, deeply, his eye closing as he noticed a second scent. It was a person, a human. Salem arched an eyebrow. Wondering why someone would be wandering the broken down building. "Scavanger?" he asked himself as he forced himself up. He picked up his coat and draped it over his shoulder, fixing his hat with his free hand. He made his way towards the school, neglecting to make an attempt to hide his guns from view. His feet crushed the dead grass and kicked aside gravel as he went towards one of the larger holes. Salem made his way in and walked slowly, careful not to make any sound as he walked. He followed the scent, sniffing quietly at every hallway. He eventually came to the room where the human and the cat were.

He peeked in and saw a blonde haired boy, roughly ten years younger than him, a teenager. A half smile touched Salem's lips. He was probably up to no good. That's what Salem would have been doing if he was the kid. The Enforcer crept forward and then leaned against the door frame, his large body taking up most of it. "Ahem," he cleared his throat, as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a crumpled cigarette cartoon. "Funny, finding a kid a school now." he mused to himself as he pulled out a gnarled cigarette with his lips. He replaced the cartoon and then produced a worn, silver lighter. "Thought kids were supposed to hate school." he flicked the lighter open and lit the tip of the cigarette with practiced ease. It closed with a click as he pushed it into the confines of his pocket, his arm brushing against the grip of his pistol.

[Alphonse]

Before Al got far at all he was confronted by a man with.. several weapons. The first thing that crossed the teen's mind was "raider" as it always did with wanderers. Quickly he tucked the shivering kitten into his jacket and took a careful step back as the man started to speak and light up a cigarette. The kid grimaced at the smell. Pinako smoked around him all the time but that didn't mean he liked the smell. "Not everyone hates school." he replied in a friendly but cautious tone. With a slight smile he asked "So.. what brings you to Rizembol?" Under his jacket the kitten was starting to mew and was getting annoyed at him. He tried to ignore the kitten as he continued "There aren't many people who come through this area." The kitten was growing more restless by the second as Al quickly started to think of how he would get out of the room since the bulky man was standing in the way. Luckily they were on the first floor so he would be able to get out through the window if need be.

But despite what was taught to him by the history of the area he decided to relax a bit and give the man the benefit of the doubt. He didn't seem too bad despite his smoking and large frame. Maybe he was former military and didn't mean any harm even though body language said otherwise. Carefully, not to get scratched, Al patted the cat to try to calm it down. After all, who would want claws of an annoyed cat to dig into their chest?

[Salem]

"I guess that's true." Salem said as he rubbed the back of his head. "I do recall a couple of kids who actually liked going to school. Hell, some days I liked it." he mused allowed. He was more reminding himself of days that had long past, rather than informing the young man. Sometimes it seemed like it hadn't even been him in those days. It was more like he was just a spectator watching someone else's life. He stopped rubbing his head and ran his fingers through his hair, revealing his half masked face. He dropped his hand as he took in a deep breath, the cherry of his cigarette glowing a bright orange. He exhaled upward, watching the smoke billow out through one of the many holes that littered the building.

"I'm just passing through." he said, removing the cylinder from his mouth and tapping off the excess ash. "I was stationed out here during the war a couple years back and decided to stop by and visit the old place." he said as he walked from out of the doorway. He strayed towards a wall and placed his hand on it fondly, as if he were greeting an old friend. "This school protected me and my friends from hell. Felt like it was only right to come by and pay my respects. Sides, partially my fault that it's like this." he released a sigh of regret, removing his hand from the wall. He had said a little more than he had intended to, but he was hoping to put the kid at ease. He saw how he had retreated at the sight of him and only recently noticed that his guns were in full sight.

He shifted his jacket uneasily, covering his side, obscuring the black metal from view. "You should let that cat out of your coat." he said nonchalantly, turning his head back towards the young man. "You don't want to get clawed up in a dirty place like this." Salem lifted up his smoking hand and noticed that a bit of his cigarette had burned away while he had been reminiscing. He flicked away the ash and placed it back between his lips. "What are you doing here anyway? It's a pretty dangerous place. We were worried about it coming down on us about five years ago. I can't imagine that it's any better now."

[Alphonse]

'It must have been nice to go to school' the alchemist thought as the man reminisced about his school years. When the guy moved his hair to reveal the mask it got Al curious as to why he had a mask. Was he a burn victim from some weapon, a house or building fire, he would ask but it seemed to him like it would be a rude thing to do. After all he didn't even know the man. Thus he suppressed the question and watched the man continue his explanation on why he was in Rizembol and finally moved away from the door. Al moved quietly out of the way and begun to inch his way to the door until the man stopped and looked back at him as if the guy wouldn't notice that he had moved. But the guy covered his guns with his coat as if that would keep them from the teen's mind. Al nodded a bit at the guy's story, he wasn't really paying attention at first but the last thing the guy said hit him. The building didn't protect any Amestrisian soldiers in the war which meant he must have been from a neighboring country.

Still the guy didn't seem bad at all. The man even went as far as to warn him about getting scratched by the cat. Al thought for a moment before answering, he didn't want to give anything about his family away so he had to choose what he sad carefully "I'm here looking for reading material. I ran out of things to read and thought that I could find something useable here." With that he finally let the cat down before digging in his bag and pulling out the calculus book to show the guy he wasn't lying.