Bonus Chapter: Simple People

Synopsis
The story takes place sometime between 1911 and 1914, before the main events of the series. Ed and Al are walking through a town, trying to find gifts to bring back to Pinako and Winry as they return to Resembool. Ed doesn't want to by Winry a gift, but Al remembers that, since Ed has ruined his automail once again, giving Winry a gift might diverge her anger and avoid she hitting Ed. Al then remembers Winry has recently got her ears pierced and suggests giving her silver earrings.

They arrive at Resembool and, by the time Ed shows the damage in his automail, Winry menaces to hit him. He presents the earrings he bought with Al as a protection. Winry is thrilled by the gift and, the next time they come to visit, they see she has pierced new holes in her ears to put the earings they bought her.

Once again, Ed has ruined his automails and asks Winry to fix them. She starts to get angry at him, to which Ed produces a new pair of rings to diverge her anger.

Edward than asks Winry why she decided to pierce her ears in the first place. Winry answers back that, when "that woman from the Military" (Riza Hawkeye) came to Resembool, she noticed she wore silver earings and that they looked "really nice", so she decided that it might look good on herself.

The next morning, Ed and Al are preparing to leave only to see Winry has once again pierced new holes in her ears. She says she wants to wear all the earings they gave her because "they gave them to her". Edward gets angry and says he won't give her any more earings if she's to keep making new holes and hurting herself, calling her stupid for acting so thoughtlessly.

The scene cuts to the Eastern Headquarters, where Lt. Hawkeye and Lt. Catalina are about to leave the shooting practice area. Rebecca comments that she has noticed Riza started to grow her hair and that it's quite long already. She notes Riza has always kept her hair short while at the Military and wondered at the reason why she decided to let it grow, now, joking with her friend asking if it's because "a man likes it better longer". Riza answers that it's nothing of the sort and that, when she went to Resembool a couple time back, she met "this girl" (Winry Rockbell) who had long hair and that it might not be so bad to let her own hair get longer.

Rebecca states back that that's "a real simple reason" to do something, to which Riza answers back "The reasons to why we do things in life are always simple".

Chapter Notes

 * The line that Riza quotes to Rebecca comes from a line said by Maes Hughes during the Ishval Civil War.
 * The openess of the end of this chapter, after Riza states that line, in emblematic, as a metaphor to the whole sequence of the Ishval Civil War and the reflections the author of FMA wants to bring about human nature, the nature of war and the difficulty people have in dealing with facts that are, in essence, very simple. That thought is more evident at the time Maes Hughes says a similar line, as he states to Roy Mustang that he fights the war "because he wants to live" (as opposed to giving up life and dying).
 * The title "Simple People" is also very significant, meaning not only "simple minded" people, that make decisions based on very simple reasons, but also about people wanting life to be simple, or wanting to take a humble or simple approach to life, in contrast to the heaviness of Military life and war.