Son of the Flame Alchemist

Chapter 1: Alchemy

Disclaimer: I do not own Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.

Seven Years Later...

Richard sat in the library of his home, his fingers tracing across the pages of the heavy tome before him. Unusually intelligent for his age, he was able to understand the laws of alchemy with ease. He understood what was required, and what had to be done. A transmutation circle was required to direct the energy to do the alchemist's bidding, influencing the matter and reshaping it. Every alchemist had to abide by this restriction, every alchemist except those few who had committed the taboo of alchemy: human transmutation.

Richard was only a few feet tall, wiry and slim. His arms and legs were long, and his hair was a mess of black, with a few blonde strands here and there. His eyes were a deep brown, like his mother's, and wore a pair of silver rimmed glasses that sat on a sharp nose. 

Not only was a circle required, but so was the piece of matter which was to be influenced. Richard knew that he also had to exchange the matter for something of equal value, and that the material had to be somewhat like the original; he could use lead to create statues, but he could not transmute it into water, or vice versa.

Richard smiled to himself as he began to sketch a transmutation circle on a slip of paper. It resembled the same circle which his father had once used for his flame alchemy: an hourglass with a salamander beneath it, though there were a few differences from the original.

He'd heard the story so many times, the story of how his parents had destroyed the research of his grandfather, Berthold Hawkeye, who had developed flame alchemy, and why they had done it: to keep anyone from ever using it again. And they had failed.

Richard, simply by looking at the transmutation circle, had figured out how it worked, and had modified it to give far more... destructive results. Instead of guiding a heat source to a concentrated area of oxygen through the use of alchemy, Richard's circle transmuted oxygen into hydrogen and guided the spark to it, yielding a far greater explosion.

Closing the tome, Richard took an ignition cloth glove and bottle of red ink from his pocket. On his slate, he sketched a simple imprinting transmutation circle and placed the paper and glove, palm side up, inside it. Unstopping the cork from the ink bottle, Richard poured a few drops onto the slip, the bright white turning a deep scarlet.

Placing his hands at the edges of the chalk circle, Richard began the transmutation. Wicked tendrils of blue energy swirled along the circle, whipping back and forth the air. The patch of red ink disappeared as the transmutation finished, the energy slowly dying away.

Richard picked up the gloved and slipped it onto his hand, and smiled as he turned it over. There dyed into the cloth, was his modified circle, now ready for use.

"I hope this works," he said as he hopped down from the chair, his voice high-pitched.

. . . . . . .

Propped up on on a tree stump was a split log, its edges rough with sharp splinters sticking from its sides. Twenty feet away from it stood Richard, his small figure just barely taller than the combined height of the log and stump.

Slipping the glove onto his hand, Richard took a death breath, and snapped his fingers. He could here the sizzle of heat as the spark flew into the air and energy raced into the circle. He watch as the spark raced to the stump, where what had previously been ordinary oxygen, was now transmuted hydrogen.

The explosion that ensued shook the earth and made the birds fly frantically from the trees. The blast blew back Richard's hair and knocked his glasses to the ground, revealing his forehead. A column of inky black smoke rose from the grass, completely hiding the stump and log. Behind him, he could hear a few house windows cracking. But he didn't care about that. Whooping with enthusiasm, Richard ran about the yard, waving his arms in the air.