The arcade stick slipped from aching fingers as the 14-year-old boy's vision tunneled. "No no no! I had the perfect combo!" His protest died as the Street Fighter emulator glitched violently, pixels stretching like taffy across the corrupted screen.
A final thought flashed through his mind - Izuku could've kept One for All if he wasn't such a damn martyr - before darkness swallowed him whole.
Warmth. That was the first sensation. Then pressure - gentle but firm - cradling his impossibly small body.
Blinking against the assault of fluorescent lights, his newborn eyes focused on the exhausted woman holding him.
Black hair clung to her sweat-slick forehead, but her crimson eyes shone with tears of joy.
"Meet your son, Tetsuo," she whispered hoarsely.
A shadow loomed over them - a mountain of a man with dark purple hair pulled into a messy ponytail.
Calloused fingers, surprisingly gentle, brushed the baby's cheek. "He's got your eyes, Akane."
Akane Kirishima. Tetsuo Kirishima. The realization hit like a truck. These are... my parents?
A shrill wail erupted beside him. Craning his neck (since when did he have neck control?), he saw another infant swaddled in blue - this one with wild black hair and an impressive set of lungs.
Eijiro. My twin.
Panic spiked through his tiny body. I died playing Street Fighter and got reborn as Kirishima's brother?!
The absurdity nearly made him laugh, but all that emerged was a pathetic gurgle.
Four Years Later - Preschool Playground
"Tag! You're it, Eijiro!" Eizo's bare feet slapped against sun-warmed sand as he charged at his twin.
At four years old, his body thrummed with restless energy, though his mind remained frustratingly adult.
Eijiro turned just in time to take the slap square on his shoulder -
CRACK
A strange tingling shot through Eizo's arm.
His skin rippled like disturbed water, fracturing into blocky pixels for the briefest moment.
Simultaneously, Eijiro's entire body shimmered as jagged rock-like plates erupted across his skin. The unexpected recoil sent Eijiro tumbling backwards.
Eizo stared at his flickering arm. What the hell was that?! Across from him, Eijiro gaped at his own stony hands.
"Whoa...!" Eijiro's awed whisper cut through the sudden silence.
The entire playground had frozen, teachers and children alike staring at the spectacle.
Principal Tanaka's shrill whistle pierced the air. "Kirishima twins! Office! Now!"
Dr. Yurei Kurozawa's Clinic - 3:42 PM
The sterile white walls of the examination room did little to contain Eijiro's energy. He bounced on the padded table, sending the paper cover crinkling violently.
"Do I get super armor like Dad?!"
Tetsuo's booming laugh filled the small space. "Better, kiddo! That hardness is better than I ever had at your age."
Akane massaged her temples. "And hopefully with better brains than you too."
Eizo remained uncharacteristically quiet, flexing his still-tingling fingers.
The doctor's scanner hummed as it passed over his arm, projecting holographic readouts neither boy could decipher.
"Remarkable," Kurozawa murmured, adjusting his glasses. He tapped the display, zooming in on a cross-section of Eizo's arm.
"Your cells undergo complete digitization when activated. Bone, muscle, nerves - all fusing into a single, ultra-durable structure."
The grainy black-and-white image indeed showed no distinction between tissue types, just uniform pixelated matter.
Eijiro's eyes sparkled as he leaned in. "So Ei's Quirk is cooler than mine?!"
The doctor chuckled. "Yours is beautifully straightforward - pure defensive hardening with offensive potential.
His..." Kurozawa trailed off, tapping new commands into the console. "Well, see for yourself."
The display shifted to show Eizo's quirk activation in slow motion. His skin visibly decomposed into shimmering cubes before reforming.
"It's like watching a video game character render in real time," Kurozawa continued.
"The potential applications are staggering - enhanced strength, rapid recovery, possibly even-"
"Stamina drain," Eizo interrupted, rubbing his still-aching arm. "I couldn't hold it for more than thirty seconds."
The doctor nodded gravely. "Precisely. Your body isn't meant to sustain this form yet. Until you build endurance, overuse could cause system shock."
Eizo clenched his fists. So I've got god mode... with a shitty battery.
Kirishima Household - Evening
The smell of spicy curry and bubbling soda filled the modest dining room.
Tetsuo lifted both boys onto his broad shoulders, making the wooden floorboards creak in protest. "My little warriors! With quirks like these, you'll be unstoppable!"
Eijiro whooped, nearly braining himself on the ceiling fan. "We're gonna be the best heroes ever!"
Eizo smirked despite himself, though his mind raced through calculations. If I can increase activation time by just five seconds per week...
Akane's knowing gaze caught his. "Eat first, train later," she murmured, pressing a steaming bowl into his hands.
Later that night, as moonlight filtered through their shared bedroom, Eijiro's whisper cut through the dark. "Ei... you think I can really be as strong as you?"
Eizo turned to see his twin's usual bravado replaced by rare vulnerability. The sight sent an unexpected pang through his chest.
"Stronger," he promised. "But we've got to work for it."
Eijiro's answering grin could've powered cities.
Personal Training Room - 5:15 AM
Eizo's bare feet slapped against cold concrete as he slipped into the family's makeshift gym.
The space smelled of iron and old sweat, equipment crammed haphazardly between support beams.
Moonlight through the high windows painted silver stripes across the punching bag.
Stamina. That's the bottleneck.
He focused, willing the strange energy to gather in his right arm.
With a sensation like carbonation under his skin, his forearm dissolved into shimmering cubes before reforming. The digital watch on the wall ticked mercilessly.
Three... two... one...
The transformation collapsed, leaving him gasping. Eizo glared at his trembling limb. Again.
By the time Eijiro stumbled in at 6:00 AM, rubbing sleep from his eyes, Eizo's shirt clung to his back with sweat.
"Ei... you're already training?!" Eijiro's voice cracked with sleep.
Eizo threw a damp towel at his face. "Heroes don't sleep in."
Eijiro's answering grin outshone the rising sun.
Preschool - 8:30 AM
The twins arrived just as their two best friends commenced their daily argument by the monkey bars.
Mina Ashido's pink skin glowed under the morning sun as she brandished a stick at Hitoshi Shinso.
"-and that's why All Might would beat Endeavor in a food fight!" Hitoshi's deadpan expression didn't waver.
"That's the dumbest thing you've said all week, and yesterday you tried to eat a crayon."
Mina whirled as the Kirishimas approached. "Eiji! Eizo! You're late!" Her golden eyes narrowed playfully. "Again."
Hitoshi merely raised an eyebrow. "Let me guess. Training."
Eijiro didn't disappoint, flexing with enough enthusiasm to nearly tear his dinosaur-print shirt. "Guess what! We got our Quirks yesterday!"
Mina's subsequent squeal startled birds from a nearby tree. "No way! Show me show me show me!"
Eizo crossed his arms. "Mine's... complicated."
Eijiro needed no further prompting. His entire arm crystallized into jagged rocky skin, the morning light catching on uneven facets. "Boom! Unbreakable!"
"Whoa!" Mina poked the stony surface. "It's all... crunchy!"
Hitoshi's lips quirked. "So you're basically a walking brick wall now?"
"The manliest brick wall!" Eijiro declared.
Mina whirled on Eizo, invading his personal space with alarming speed. "Okay your turn! What's yours?!"
Eizo took an instinctive step back. "It's like... my body turns into video game pixels. It gets stronger and tougher but tires me out fast."
Mina leaned in until their noses nearly touched. "Pixels?! Like an arcade game?! That's the coolest thing ever!"
Only then did she seem to realize their proximity. A darker pink bloomed across her cheeks as she scrambled back. "I-I mean, it's okay I guess! Not as cool as my acid!"
Hitoshi smirked. "Sounds broken."
Eizo returned the grin. "I hope so."
Three Months Later - Dagobah Beach
Summer sun beat down on the trash-strewn shoreline where the four children played.
Mina cackled as Eijiro floundered in an acid-melted sandpit, his hardened limbs making swimming motions.
"This is why you don't challenge her to sand battles," Hitoshi observed from his shady perch beneath a rusted refrigerator.
"Not helping!" Eijiro groaned, sending up a spray of glittering sand.
Eizo paused to catch his breath, sweat stinging his eyes.
Three months of brutal training had pushed his pixelation time to nearly a full minute, but the doctor's warnings about overexerting kept him from testing limits.
"Tag!" Mina's sudden shout preceded her tackle by milliseconds. "You're it, Ei!"
Instinct overrode caution. As Mina collided, Eizo's body glitched violently - his form stretching like corrupted data before-
POP!
He re-materialized five feet away, the world tilting nauseatingly. Mina face-planted into his afterimage with an "Oof!"
Silence. Even the crashing waves seemed to pause.
Hitoshi's jaw hung open. Eijiro stopped struggling mid-pit. On the nearby boardwalk, Tetsuo's soda can slipped from suddenly limp fingers.
Eizo grinned through the encroaching darkness. "Hah... you're still it, Mina..."
Then his legs betrayed him.
THUD
Face-first into the sand, consciousness fled as swiftly as it had come.
Distantly, he registered Mina's panicked shouts, Eijiro's bellowing, and - most embarrassingly - the gritty texture of sand between his teeth.
"Relax," Akane's amused voice cut through the chaos. "He's just asleep."
Mina's nervous giggle floated above him. "Look! He's smiling! And... kinda eating sand?"
A calloused hand lifted him effortlessly.
As Tetsuo's shoulder became his pillow, Eizo's last coherent thought was that he'd need to master that teleport before Mina tried tackling him again.
Somewhere behind them, Mina's challenge rang out: "Race you to the water, Eiji!"
The responding battle cry and subsequent splashes faded into dreams of pixelated battles and pink-skinned girls laughing beneath a summer sun.