15 Months Ago...

"Ha ha! You did good!" said a fourteen-year-old Diana.

"I'm surprised I made it to the Top 5 board in only two weeks of coming here!" replied a fourteen-year-old Nathan.

"I like it here! We'll have a head-start in Turf War 101 when school starts soon!"

"Yep!" Nathan and Diana were at Turf War Training Camp, a summer camp designed to give training Inklings a head-start on the art of Turf War, as the name implied. The two were sitting at a table in the camp's main building, a large log cabin-like structure.

They were on the second floor specifically in the cafeteria. The two were resting after a training match, as they themselves requested that they take a break to recover. A counselor had gone up to watch them, but had to leave when she was called down. Everyone else was outside, practicing on Camp Triggerfish, the nearby stage.

"So...what do you think about Turf War?" Diana asked.

"Great!" said Nathan, "It's super fun! I know that once I'm older I'll probably quit, like a lot of Inklings do. But it's so fun that I heard there's a more intense or professional version of it that older people play, but I'm sure."

"Really?"

"Some older Inklings DO still play Turf War. The oldest player in history was 23 when he retired, even though Turf War is a sport made for Inklings ages 14 to 19."

"Huh...I never knew that!

"I know. But you know, I wonder what our future has in store! Maybe one of us will be the next Champion! That would be quite a sight!

"You should try it when you get skilled enough!"

"Hmm...I'll think about it, but now's not the time, I'm only a trainee at the moment!"

"Oh right...Hey, remember that time when we-" Diana was interrupted when he heard a bang from upstairs and smelled something funny. "D-Did you hear that?"

"Yeah...sounded like a...a...I don't know really."

"I think it might-...Ugh! Do you smell that?!"

"...Oh yeah...That smell I might know..." They suddenly heard screaming from outside. They saw some of students were pointing at the building towards the third floor, but Nathan and Diana were unable to see what was going on at first. They looked through the window to see a thick gray cloud rise into the air.

"Is that...smoke?!"

"Diana...I think there might be a-" Suddenly, a fire alarm started blaring loudly. "Fire!" The smoke started traveling through the windows and into the room. Diana was frozen in fear, she had never been in this kind of situation before. "Diana, c'mon!" She snapped out of it and ran towards the door with Nathan.

Areas of the ceiling started to give way, dropping not just debris but flames as well. Fire was around the area within seconds, and while they started small they quickly grew larger. Nathan was scared, but being courageous he barely showed a speck of fear in his face.

Diana, on the other hand, was downright terrified. Her body was consumed by fear completely, and she could do nothing but stand there in horror. Nathan had to grab her arm to get her moving. Fire and smoke quickly consumed the room, lowering their visibility dramatically.

They could hear people screaming outside. Some of the kids were yelling Nathan and Diana's names in between sobs while the other kids were simply crying. Adults were panicking too, some of them trying to keep both the kids and themselves calm. One counselor was screaming into her phone, calling the fire department and hospital.

"I can't believe this is happening..." Nathan thought to himself before yelling, "We gotta find the door!"

"B-But...there's so much smoke I can't see anything!" Diana replied as she covered her mouth in an attempt to prevent the smoke from entering her lungs.

"Uh...don't worry! We'll find it!" Nathan looked around, searching for the doorway downstairs, where the exit was. The emergency exit was blocked by flames, and was thus inaccessible. Finally, he spotted it. "Over there! Hurry!" He ran over to the door with Diana by his side. But just when it seemed they had a chance of escape, the ceiling collapsed in front of it, and flames quickly engulfed it.

"NOOO!" yelled Diana. Suddenly, the floor gave way, getting them to the first floor, but not very safely. Flames began quickly consuming the room as the ceiling collapsed more and more, blocking the front door.

"Oh COME ON!" yelled Nathan as he and Diana looked for another exit. There were three other doors, but one by one they were either consumed in fire or blocked off somehow. Eventually, flames were everywhere, and Diana panicked. She tripped over something and landed right by a flame. She screamed and quickly got up, but her short sleeve shirt caught fire in the flame.

She quickly put it out, lifting her sleeve to make sure it did no skin damage on her arm. A small piece of flaming debris dropped from above, landing on her shoulder. She screamed in pain as a small flame developed on her shoulder, burning her flesh. Nathan intervened and quickly put out the flame, but it was too late to prevent a wound. Nathan looked around frantically, returning to his search for a way out. In all the commotion, Diana and Nathan were seperated in the thick smoke.

"Nathan?! NATHAN?!" Diana yelled. She heard a faint yell but couldn't pinpoint where it was coming from. She looked around, covering her mouth to try and prevent herself from breathing in too much smoke. She was cornered in a corner of the room, next to a large glass window.

Diana was so terrified that her mind drew a blank on what to do. She couldn't see Nathan or anything else, and the flames slowly came closer to her. She held her breath, scared to death. She knew that death was certain, her time was up. She closed her eyes, not wanting to see herself burn alive in the inferno. She would not be able to take the sight.

"DIANA!" yelled a voice. It was Nathan, still alive with his clothes and face were covered in ash. He rushed towards Diana, avoiding the flames as best as he could. He knew there was only one way out that wasn't blocked off, the large window Diana stood near.

Wrapping his arms around Diana, Nathan rammed into the large glass window with his body, taking the full force of the blow, breaking out of the burning building. Glass shards cut both of them, Nathan especially, but Nathan ignored the pain. Coughing, he and Diana quickly ran away.

"Nathan!" Diana said, "You- You're alr-" Suddenly, a huge explosion occurred in the building, blowing out all the windows and knocking the two to the ground.

"Diana!" yelled Nathan, "Are you okay?!"

"No!" Diana screamed, "I have a burn on my shoulder and it hurts really really bad!"

"Uh..." He quickly noticed an ambulance. "HEY! OVER HERE!" He yelled, waving his arms. Firefighters and medics quickly noticed them and rushed to their aid. Nathan got up, noticing blood dripping down his face and arm. He took the full blow of the glass while ramming it, and glass shards had cut him on his face, back, and arms, as well as a few on his legs.

Diana had far less cuts, since Nathan's body had protected her, but still had noticeable ones on her face and torso. Three medics arrived quickly, two of them examined Diana while another tended to Nathan.

"I got an injured child here, a female of what seems to be about fourteen years old! She's got minor cuts and a second-degree burn on her shoulder, possibly even third-degree." said one of them into his radio. "I also get a fourteen-year-old male over here who's covered in cuts."

"Hey kid," said another medic to Nathan, "You alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," said Nathan in between coughs, "But she's not!" Nathan rushed over to Diana, who was clutching her shoulder in pain.

"It's a small area," said another medic, "It's linear, like a wide cut or scrape. But it's deep and she seems to be in massive pain. We need an ambulance bed! Get one over here stat!"

"Is she going to be okay?!" Nathan said.

"It's a deep burn, but she should recover within a month or two. It seems to be second-degree, but might be third. What happened in there?"

"I...I don't know! We heard a bang and then the alarm went off and then BOOM! A whole bunch of fire showed up! A small piece of flaming debris hit her shoulder while she was looking at it. I put the flames out with a towel I spotted...I'm surprised it's not worse!"

"She should recover. What are your names?"

"I'm Nathan, and she's Diana!"

"Thank you. Diana, are you gonna be alright?"

"It hurts really bad! BBut...But I can take it!"

"You can take it?"

"Yeah, I'll pull through!"

"Diana, take it easy!" said Nathan. A medic with an ambulance bed just arrived.

"She's stable," said the medic by Nathan, "But we'll take her to the hospital to care for that wound!"

"Can I go, too?" said Nathan, "I want to make sure she's okay."

"Of course you can, kid. There aren't any rule saying you can't. We'll give ya some bandages for those cuts, too. You can ride with us in the ambulance."

"Fine with me!" Diana was placed on the bed and put in the ambulance. Nathan sat inside next to the bed as it drove away from the building, where the fire was now nearly put out. Nathan was silent, he didn't know what to think about the events. He had saved a life that day. He was only fourteen, yet he had just become a hero.

"Nathan..." Diana said quietly.

"Yeah?" Nathan replied, "You okay?"

"Yeah...I'll pull through despite the pain. I...I owe you my LIFE for saving me back there. I would've broken through myself, but I was so scared and afraid I was gonna die that I never thought about it."

"You owe me nothing, Diana. I was just...following my gut. I heard you scream and...I had to spring into action. I couldn't let that fire take a life."

"..."

"It's okay, you don't have to say anything. What's important is that no one died in the fire."

"Yeah. I wonder what caused it..."

"We'll find out soon, don't you worry."

"...Nathan?"

"Yes?"

"From this day forward, I vow I will be strong! No matter what happens!"

"Now that's what I'm taking about! That's the bold spirit I know!"

"Ha ha! Yep! You're the brave one though, Nathan!"