Sooo, i was testing one of those heating patches for my monthly stomach ouchies and found myself severely disappointed by it.
It only got like... a little less than lukewarm, but from all the warnings in regards to burnings and the thing catching fire and how you should take it off when it gets too hot i expected a different experience.
It didn't need to channel the fires of hell itself in order to burn my flesh to a charred chrisp (which i am not wholely against, depends on the level of pain i am in), but like ... couldn't that thing be like 5 to 10 degrees warmer?
It's like... the worlds most mediocre pocket warmer, which is a shame since, next to medication, warmth works really well during the pains of the blood wars.
Welp, i guess i have to venture on in my explorations of different combat methods, that will one day help me silence the hords of crimson malice.
cw: blood, a description of a dead body, a mention of cannibalism for a second
I have had a fascination with the forest since early childhood. My parents took me there to pick berries and mushrooms every autumn and those were my happiest moments back then. So, when it was time to go again, right after my eleventh birthday, I was ecstatic.
It was truly a beautiful sight. Red and yellow leaves a blanket on the wet, cold ground, lush tree crowns of gold and bronze shining in the morning sun. I loved the way air smelled then, of dump grass and fresh dirt, of bark and pine.
You need to be covered head to toe in thick clothes to protect you from mite and thorns, so you walk and move slowly. It's not very cold this time of year, but after hours and hours outside your cheeks and nose become pink and itchy. Well, as a child I didn't care about anything other than getting my basket full of the best mushrooms I could find and eating as much berries as possible. Nothing could convince me it was time to head home. Nowadays you can't pay me enough to spend even a minute in the woods.
We were far from the only family there, now and again I saw someone pass by, sometimes even with dogs, which I liked very much as a kid. I remember telling my parents that we should get a dog, too, so it can protect us from wild animals, which only made them chuckle.
I don't really remember how I got lost. After so many years I might have imagined so many details that weren't even there, so many thoughts and feelings that I retroactively assigned to a child who just wandered off into the woods. However, when I think of that time, all that comes to mind is that I felt compelled to see where a path hidden between two wide tree trunks would lead me. I walked and walked until I almost reached a clearing and stopped, frozen in place. Only then I noticed a rhythmic, moist sound of chewing. A sudden gust of wind brought a metallic smell of blood and meat with it. There was something big and moving behind the last row of trees. I held my breath and covered my mouth with my hand. Dad taught me that you should never run or scare a hungry wild animal, so I stayed put, refusing to even take a peek. I could feel my heart pumping blood in my temples, my hands and legs shaking with every escaping gasp as the sound of tearing flesh came again and again. I didn't cry. I was too focused on surviving.
But after a long, long time I couldn't take it anymore. I looked. What was before me did not look like any real animal but every description I gave made adults sure it was an elk. It was massive, with giant deer antlers, its limbs smooth and dark, stretched and bent in unnatural ways. But I can swear that its face didn't look like anything I've seen before. It's neck twisted to reveal a flat, round muzzle with big black eyes staring straight into my soul. I stared back. With every passing second my heart accelerated and I was ready for it to stop for good. But the creature made a few small steps away, as if inviting me to feast together. This was when I saw its prey.
It was a hunter, with his chest torn open, a gun still lying on the ground near him. I gulped and shook my head. The creature looked at me and tilted its head to the side like a curious puppy. I did the same, hoping it would think I was a friend. Somehow, it worked. It continued its feast without me, only pausing sometimes to look at me. Like it was asking if I'm sure I don't want to join.
When my legs started to ache and only the skeleton was left from the poor guy, it left, turning its head one last time to look at me. I fell to the ground and wept for what seemed like hours until I felt like there was nothing to cry with anymore. I got up and went back where I came from, my legs shaking. But when I heard the voices and finally found my way to the main path, my parents weren't scared at all.
“What, you saw something interesting in the bushes?” Mom asked.
I nodded. And dragged myself after them for hours. Red berries made me want to throw up, mushrooms reminded me of skin and flesh, and I was throwing up for days without any reason, which made my parents scared that I ate the wrong mushroom. And even after the doctors said I was fine, they decided this was our last trip to the forest.
There's a lake in front of me and a bottle in my hand. It's cold and windy here at night. The moon looks, impassive, at her own reflection stretched on the rippled surface of the water. I look at the moon. Then turn away — I do not like that it is not yet full. It smells of dirt and burnt plastic. I can hear the leaves whisper nearby.
She sits besides me. We do not talk. I can feel her near me but not the way I feel everything else that's hidden in the dark around us. There's a train far, far away, visible only because the lights are on in every window. There are hundreds of people inside, and none of them know we are here, looking at them, shivering every time the wind is too strong for our thin clothes. Nobody will ever know that the two of us were here. Nobody will ever know what we've seen.
She sighs, and I nod in agreement. She gets up and goes away. I do not follow. The next train will be there only for me to see.
I read before that some people’s criticism of Alphonse’s character in FMA is that he’s too ‘innocent’ and ‘follows Edward’ loyally and has ‘no backbone’, unlike his personality in Brohood where he’s more independant and stubborn and it’s more a 50-50% relationship.
Reminder that the manga and FMA’s moods really are very different, first of all. I really can’t imagine the animation team not knowing that or not planning for it. For me, as early as episode 3, the anime was gonna do its own thing.
Since FMA’s very character driven (unlike the manga that’s very plot-driven and shounen, and by extension Brohood), Alphonse having a ‘younger’ disposition if you will when compared to Edward (whose older brother/man of the family/martyr syndrome are hiked up) makes for good drama in a series that had many seinen elements to it. Al in this version is also the type that stands back and simply observes - he’s a low profile kind of personality. Mangaverse, he is noticeably more outspoken even if not as loud as Edward.
Regardless, Alphonse’s been shown more than once in FMA to be more than capable of handling his own. In CoS’s prototype script and notes, they wanted to add a scene where Izumi told Winry that Alphonse’s genius in alchemy is almost frightening. In the movie itself, they add a scene that parallels the first episode. In that first episode, Edward was 15 then, hungry and thirsty and wishing there was at least some grass to transmute. In the movie, Al transmuted the freaking SAND into a huge well that exploded water. He could pull a benign mini-Voldemort and chop his soul to pieces and make temporary Horcruxes like it was nothing. And he was only 13 then.
He’s also an excellent martial artist, and has overall better emotional control than Edward, in and out of the armor body. I really like that contrast - giving Ed a rough face that hid a lot of vulnerability, and giving Al a soft face that hid a steelness.
One other thing - Al’s body in the manga waited at the Gate. It was connected to his soul still and it even aged. As he aged, he began experiencing blackouts as the armor slowly began to reject his soul. In FMA, his body was in suspended animation, unconnected to anything. It didn’t grow a day for four years. I’m by no means knowledgeable in biology, but if we follow the belief that the normal aging process cannot be achieved through experiences only, and that there will always be an element influenced by hormones produced by the body as it grows, that fact that he wasn’t might attribute to the feeling some people have that he was not quite ‘growing up’ as much as Edward.
I’m sorry. I’m horrible at explaining biologyXD.
Update:
I'd like to add another thing -
Part of Al's character development in FMA is that he will always choose to be with Ed no matter his mistakes or flaws, loving him unconditionally and accepting him completely. Throughout the story Ed holds himself responsible for Al's sad existence. First Al lives for 4 years as a suit of armor, and then he lives for another 2 years with amnesia, and then has to deal with a body 6-7 years younger than it should be. Would he forgive Ed for it?
