"Dad! Can I play with the other kids?!" shouted a boy with light brown hair and bright eyes, full of energy, as he tugged at his father's sleeve.
The man looked down from behind his glasses, watching his son who radiated great energy around him.
"Sure. Just be careful, Ethan."
With a beaming smile, he launched himself toward the playground with the momentum of a rocket taking off. His steps were clumsy, but full of life. Every time his little body moved, it seemed as if the world responded with joy.
The father followed him with his gaze, standing still, his hands clasped behind his back.
"Be careful, son!" he shouted, worried that something might happen to him if he continued to run so recklessly.
"Pure energy... don't you think?" commented a woman who was also watching her own son from another bench, crossing her arms with a resigned smile.
The man barely nodded.
"They're unstoppable creatures," the woman continued, watching as Ethan ran with great excitement and began talking to the other children there.
"Sometimes I think that without my husband, it would be impossible to raise them," the woman said casually, and the man smiled with a certain bitterness.
"It takes a lot of energy to raise one, and my wife wanted three." A small snort of laughter escaped his lips as he finished his sentence.
"That's total torture. You'd hardly have time to be yourselves," the woman advised, almost as if she had a lot of experience on the subject, even though they appeared to be the same age.
"At least it was just an idea..." he said, trying to change the subject slightly.
The woman laughed softly, not noticing the bitter laugh that escaped the man standing a few feet away from her. Ethan's father turned his attention back to his son, who was climbing unsteadily onto the slide platform.
One of the children running behind Ethan stumbled clumsily, accidentally pushing him. The little boy fell with all his weight, his knee hitting the concrete edge that separated the playground from the lawn.
The man's body moved instantly, running to reach Ethan, who was getting up between sobs, tears streaming down his face. His left knee had an ugly scrape that covered most of the area. Small threads of blood began to trickle down, staining his legs.
"Are you okay...?" said the child's father as he approached him. But his eyes widened in surprise at what he was seeing.
As Ethan rubbed his leg and moaned, the wound began to... close.
First, the bleeding slowed immediately. Then the skin began to regenerate at an unnatural speed. The redness disappeared. And in less than a minute, the boy's knee was clean, smooth, covered only by a thin layer of new skin.
The father slowly bent down.
"Ethan... does it hurt?" he asked, his voice mingled with concern and amazement.
The boy shook his head, still with tears in his eyes.
"It's over..."
The father stared at the closed wound for a few seconds, his mind wandering, until an idea crossed his mind.
"Let's go home."
Ethan looked at his father and nodded, taking his hand to start walking away from the park. His excitement for the game had completely faded, and he just wanted to get home and rest, as he felt quite tired.
***
Reiji woke up in the middle of the night, his mind constantly replaying the vivid images from the dream he had just had. His chest rose and fell as if he had run a marathon.
The room was silent, barely lit by the pale moonlight filtering through the curtains. The faint hum of the refrigerator in the kitchen was the only thing breaking the silence. Everything was calm... except his mind.
His hands trembled slightly, hidden under the blanket, while his eyes scanned the room without focusing on anything. His heart pounded in his ears.
The warm heat of the night did little to combat the icy sensation running down his spine.
He didn't understand why, but the scene remained as vivid as if it had happened just seconds ago. He could still feel the burning of the wound on his knee, the texture of the cement, the look in that man's eyes... his father. Not his current father. The other one.
He had felt it. He had become Ethan again.
His breathing remained agitated for several seconds. Something hurt deep in his chest. It wasn't physical. It was that dull ache that comes when you remember something you wish you could forget forever.
He brought a hand to his forehead and noticed he was sweating. Next to him, Himiko slept soundly, curled up like a little cat, her breathing calm. That image restored some stability. He closed his eyes for a moment and tried to calm his mind.
'It wasn't real... or was it...'
He didn't want to be an experiment again.
He didn't want to be looked at with empty eyes, waiting for results.
His breathing finally stabilized, although the trembling in his fingers still hadn't gone away. He turned his face slightly and, seeing that Himiko was still asleep, he swung his feet off the bed and sat there in silence.
'Here... I'm Reiji. I'm not Ethan. I'm not him.'
He repeated that phrase in his mind, like a desperate mantra.
What unsettled him was not just the clarity of the images. It was the absolute certainty that it had happened to him. In another life. In another body. With the same ability.
His regeneration.
Back then, no one called it that. Not a Quirk, not a gift, not a talent. Just an anomaly. A mistake that had to be studied. Analyzed. Exploited.
His jaw tightened.
'I will never be that again'
He looked back at Himiko, her small figure protected by the darkness, her hair tousled on the pillow. She also had something special. Something no one understood. Something that could lead her to be loved or feared.
He wasn't going to let anyone touch her with the same cold hands that had marked him.
Reiji slowly lay back down, his body still somewhat stiff. But this time, instead of closing his eyes, he kept them open, fixed on the ceiling. Listening to the silence. Feeling every heartbeat.
He had only been in this new life for a year and a half, but there are wounds that do not heal, even in a lifetime. His mind wandered, going back a few hours, when Himiko stood transfixed, staring at her companion's blood, her gaze filled with regret for something she hadn't even done.
'You won't suffer that... I can't let you...'
***
It was noon, and Reiji was still sleeping peacefully in his room. Nightmares and constant thoughts about the future had kept him awake, and only when the sun rose did he feel calmer, as if it were a sign that his demons could no longer affect him.
Little Himiko, who had slept through the night, was playing alone in the backyard. It was Saturday, so both her parents were home, which was unusual but something both children enjoyed.
While the mother prepared some food in the kitchen, occasionally glancing out the window at her daughter, the father leafed through a magazine on the sofa, completely absorbed in his reading. The house exuded tranquility.
"Oh, a cat!" Himiko exclaimed when she saw the animal peeking over the fence of her yard, her eyes sparkling with fascination at the little pet, admiring its beautiful orange fur.
The cat's sharp eyes were fixed on a much more interesting target: a small sparrow fluttering unsuspectingly near a bush. The bird pecked at the ground, oblivious to the predator lurking nearby.
Himiko didn't quite understand what was happening. She wanted to touch the cat, to stroke its shiny, purring back, but before she could take another step, the animal tensed like a spring...
It was a precise, quick, brutal movement.
The sparrow barely had time to flap its wings once before the weight of the feline crushed it to the ground with a muffled squeak. The animal's claws dug deeply into the bird's skin, preventing it from escaping, and its fangs were ready to devour its prey.
Himiko stood frozen, her mind still processing what was happening. When she finally saw the little animal stop chirping, her mind connected the dots.
"Chu, bad cat!" she exclaimed, running toward the two animals, scaring the cat away, which left exactly where it had come from, leaving behind the body of the poor animal it had just hunted.
The small animal's blood was flowing from its wounds, dripping onto the ground of the small lawn in the playground.
"Are you okay, little bird?" she murmured, approaching the animal and picking it up in her small hands. She held it up to her eyes, staring at the small creature that had already died.
Himiko's breathing became shaky. She held the dead bird in her hands with a mixture of confusion and... something else. The red staining the feathers, the warmth still retained by the body, the contrast between the softness of the plumage and the roughness of the blood... everything seemed strange, attractive, almost hypnotic to her.
"Why... are you asleep?" she whispered.
She didn't fully understand what she was feeling. It was a mixture of sadness and hunger. Without thinking, her trembling fingers slid toward the bird's neck, touching the open wounds. She stained her fingers with the warm blood and then, instinctively, brought them to her lips.
The metallic taste startled her... but it didn't stop her.
She licked her fingers again. Then she did it more decisively. She closed her eyes. Her heart was beating fast.
From the window, her mother, who had just tasted the soup, turned her head automatically to check on Himiko. What she saw made her frown.
She blinked. She leaned forward slightly.
Himiko... was she holding something?
She approached the window.
"Himiko-chan," she called from the other side, but her daughter did not even react to her call. From where she was standing, she could not see what was happening, but her eyes widened when she noticed the girl putting something in her mouth.
Her maternal instincts kicked in immediately. She dropped everything she was doing and ran out to the patio. Her husband, who was in the living room, saw his wife's reaction and jumped up, his heart pounding without knowing why.
The patio door flew open.
"Himiko!"
The mother's voice pierced the air as she reached the patio, stopping Himiko in her tracks.
When the father arrived at the patio, he stood next to his wife, watching what their daughter was doing.
Himiko was crouching, her white dress stained with dirt and splattered with red drops, delicately holding the sparrow's lifeless body. The bird's fresh blood trickled between her fingers, and a crimson line stained the corner of her lips. With complete calm, as if she were eating something sweet, she ran her tongue over the blood, absorbing it with fascination.
The father felt a chill run down his spine. He opened his eyes wide, motionless, as if his brain refused to process the image.
The mother, unable to contain her horror, fell to her knees on the ground with a moan.
"Himiko... What did you do?" he asked himself, unable to react. His daughter, the same girl he had given birth to and raised, was in front of him devouring an animal, her smile disturbing and the enjoyment evident on her face.
As if it were... part of her.
"I didn't want it to die..." she whispered, lowering her gaze once more to the bloodied little bird. "I just wanted to know why it wasn't moving..."
Her father took a step forward. His breathing was heavy. His voice, now much louder, exploded.
"Were you sucking its blood, Himiko?!"
That scream echoed off the walls of the house.
Reiji, who was still asleep upstairs, stirred suddenly under the sheets. The echo of the scream roused him from a restless sleep, and with his eyes still cloudy, he sat up abruptly.
"What's going on...?"
"Dad... I..." The girl tried to explain, her voice trembling, knowing she was about to be scolded.
The father took two strides forward and, with a strength he didn't usually show, grabbed Himiko by the wrist, forcing her to let go of the dead bird. The lifeless body fell to the lawn with a soft thud, leaving a reddish stain on the damp earth.
"No, you can't do that!" the man roared, beside himself, as if the scene before his eyes could not be part of reality.
Reiji's eyes widened instantly, his mind processing many things at once. His body reacted, starting to run to see for himself what was happening in the yard.
"What did Himiko do? What was that scream...?"
When he crossed the room, the first thing he saw was his mother, standing by the patio door, with one hand over her mouth. The second image hit him even harder. His father, kneeling in front of Himiko, still holding her wrist, with restrained force. And on the floor, the little bird, dead, its feathers stained red.
Himiko's eyes were misty, confused, breathing heavily, with traces of fresh blood still on her lips.
"Let her go!" Reiji shouted from the back.
The father looked up, seeing his other son arrive on the scene. For an eternal second, their eyes met. The adult's eyes trembled inside; his son, barely a year and a half old, had just yelled at him as if he himself were the bad guy.
Reiji's eyes, on the other hand, burned. With rage. With protection. With confusion.
"Don't touch her like that!" he shouted, striding down to the garden and stepping between them.
The man hesitated. His hand slowly released the girl's wrist. The mark of his grip was visible on her fragile body.
Himiko was barely holding back her tears, her whole body trembling with a mixture of fear and sadness.
Reiji crouched down beside her without saying a word. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close to his chest. The little girl did not resist, hugging her younger brother tightly.
"I didn't mean to hurt her..." she murmured, like a whisper against his chest. "She just... tasted sweet."
Silence fell once more. All that could be heard was the distant song of birds and the heavy breathing of everyone present.
***
It was nighttime in the master bedroom. Himiko's parents were sitting on the bed, both still dressed, not having dared to speak for hours. Their children were asleep, yet the vivid scene of their daughter sucking the blood from the little bird remained alive in the minds of both parents. They didn't know how to react after seeing that.
Himiko was devouring a dead animal, and yet she couldn't understand that she was doing something wrong. Clearly something had gone wrong with her, her thoughts constantly wandering and the silence in their room absolute.
The father rubbed his face with his hands, exhausted, his eyes wide open as if he were still watching his daughter repeat that grotesque action.
"It wasn't normal. Neither what she did... nor the way she looked at us afterwards. That face..." He paused, lowering his gaze. "It wasn't guilt, she was just scared because I scolded her..."
She turned slowly toward him, clutching the edge of the bedspread tightly.
"She... won't do it again, will she?" She let out the thoughts that had invaded her mind more than once. She couldn't stop thinking about her daughter's look of total excitement and emotion at what she was doing.
The father clenched his jaw. A nervous tic crossed his eyebrow.
"We have to control that impulse. Whatever it takes. Maybe... seek help. A doctor, a psychologist, whatever it takes."
"What if it doesn't work? What if it's something that's already inside her?"
"Don't say that."
She didn't answer. She lowered her head, defeated, while her husband got out of bed and began to pace around the room, restless with the thoughts flooding his mind.
"She can't leave this house. No one can know. I don't want her to be pointed at. I don't want them to... think she's crazy."
And then, a pause.
"And I didn't like the way Reiji looked at us either. It was just a second... but there was something in his gaze. As if... what his sister was doing was good, that I was the bad guy for intervening."
"Huh?"
Reiji, sitting on the stairs on the second floor, held his breath.
It wasn't the first time he had overheard private conversations without being invited, but few had left him as stiff as this one.
"They're not wrong... this isn't going to stop with scolding, or with a cheap psychologist who tries to disguise the symptom without looking at the root cause."
Memories of his sister's future flooded his mind. He had promised himself he wouldn't let it get to that point, and yet he had been careless and everything had escalated too quickly.
"If they want to 'cure' her with conventional methods, they're just going to push her to the limit. Himiko doesn't understand what she did. The solution isn't to repress it..."
"She was in shock. That's all."
He nodded but said nothing more. Silence reigned once again in the room, as they silently agreed on what he would do with his 'problematic' daughter.
With silent steps, he moved away from the railing and returned to his room. He closed the door carefully, as if each movement were part of a rehearsed choreography.
He sat on the bed, staring at the ceiling, his mind already far away from that home.
'I won't let them destroy her. If no one else understands what it is, then I'll take it upon myself to teach her how to live with it. How to control it.'