So. In response to the question, "What would it look like if Edward Elric were as crazy as Allen Walker?" I said, well. CLEARLY I MUST WRITE THAT FIC.

Where the loss of ignorance is more valuable than the knowledge gained, and Edward figures out the source of alchemy a lot sooner than before. "Edward has cockroaches under his skin and leeches in his veins. He's vibrating and bursting and his body is too small, too big, doesn't fit quite right. He needs Al to know - needs to tell someone, anyone, but he will cut out his own tongue before he burdens anyone else with this knowledge."

Esdras Al-Ridha is born in 1899, in his mother’s family home. His birth certificate, when it’s written a month later by Dr. Yuriy Rockbell, will declare his name Edward Elric. It will name his mother Trisha, and it will say nothing of her white hair. It will say nothing of the blue desert sky he first opens his eyes under, the way he is passed to relative after relative and is held and blessed by each. (Even before the war, tensions are high, and hatred is brewing. Tirzah holds her newborn son, with eyes as gold as his father’s, and pale-sun hair halfway there, and she decides that if Ishvala wants him hidden, then Tirzah will not brand him where his genes have not.)