Backwards🪭↩️

5

Roy and Ed were driven to the lab in a military car with a chauffeur this time so as to not embarrass other soldiers like last time. Plus, it helped that Roy was in his military uniform this time. When they got the doors, the two soldiers who had fussed at them the first time were there and they stood straight as boards when they saw the two of them.

"Welcome back, Colonel Mustang and Fullmetal Alchemist, sirs!" they yelled in unison.

"At ease boys..." Roy said with a lift of his fingers to assure them he was not mad.

The two deflated and Ed smirked at their rigidness. He was glad he was never a military brat and that he just happened to fall into it more than join it.

The two were led down the white hallways again and to the lab where the Fountain of Youth was being made. Dr. Striker met them at the door this time and was grinning ear to ear.

"I'm so excited that you both made it! I have wanted to show you what it can do to humans for the longest time and now that the military has given me a prisoner of war to try it on, I can show you all the many things that can be done with my experiment!"

Roy nodded a little as he walked after the doctor. They came to another door and Dr. Striker stopped there.

"I will have to ask you to please take off your jackets and put on lab coats as well as a gas mask. We're going to use the gas to show you the experiments quicker."

Edward wasn't liking that he had to take off his coat but he obliged as well as the Colonel and they donned on the lab coats and gas masks. Dr. Striker nodded and then opened the door. They were in a room that had a thing glass pane and had a prisoner from Drachma chained to a pole in the middle of the room.

"I'm going to show you the three uses of the serum that I was thinking of. The first is going to be interrogation." He pressed a button. "Interrogation gas!"

Gas filled the chamber and the Drachman spy yelled out in fear until his cries sounded more like a child's cries rather than a man. When the gas lifted, there was a five year old boy in frumpy clothing shivering next to the pole and looking very confused.

"Do you know your name?"

"What have you done to me!?" he yelled in his childlike state.

"What is your name?"

"What's it to you?!"

Dr. Striker looked at the two alchemists.

"You see, changing them into a child will allow for easier interrogation. This is not an exact way to do it but eventually, you will get to them. Watch." He pressed the button again. "Little Drachma child." The man-turned-boy turned around in a circle. "Son, can you tell me your name?"

"Danny... My name is Danny."

"See? With kindness, the childishness comes out in him and he answers any and all questions."

"Interesting." Mustang said.

"There is also the option of making him forget who he is as well and making him live with an Amestrian family and allowing the aging process to be quickened and defeat our enemies that way. Or, we use the torture method."

Gas filled the chamber again and the boy turned back into a man. He was confused and looked around when more smoke filled the chamber. He yelled out but was only about four years younger than usual. He looked around a little and Dr. Striker motioned for them to watch.

"Why are you spying on Amestris?"

"Like I'd tell you!"

"If you don't tell us, we will make you grow younger and younger until you are nothing but a child. We can kill you then, you know?"