Junior year was a big year for me. I was doing well in school, I was able to drive, and I had a huge group of friends surrounding me. Being sixteen, for me, was pretty awesome.

Misako, however, was living a different story. Her parents had divorced, her grandmother had died, and her mother had fallen back to her old, alcoholic ways. Misako went home with us after school almost everyday, and essentially lived with us during the week. She stayed with us so often, that the guest room was called Misako's room, the walls having been repainted with her favorite shade of dark, royal blue.

I admit, over the year, I had grown another, greater feeling for my best friend. Misako was my very best friend, but sometimes, I found myself getting lost in her twinkling eyes, or noticed my heart speeding up with her cute laugh. It wasn't as though I things to speed up, or anything like that. I was perfectly fine with staying good friends. But the crush I had on her wasn't something I could ignore.

It was a Friday, the day everything happened. I was walking home alone, as I always did on Fridays. Misako was going to her Dad's house as she did every weekend, and Wu was staying after school at the robotics club that he enjoyed so much.

It was a relatively decent walk from the bus stop to the monastery. One had to walk a nature-y, beaten path from the main road to the top of a hill where the monastery was. A nice, relaxing walk to take during the day, and an incredibly scary walk to do at night. I, for one, loved all things nature. Especially animals. I loved all animals, no matter if they had four eyes, six legs, sharp teeth; they all were things I loved. I did not discriminate against animals.

I was walking the path, when an emerald green snake slithered across the trail. Immediately, I dove to the ground, trying to find the snake that had just disappeared into the bushes. The crown around its head had been nothing I had ever seen before, and I wanted to get a closer look at the potentially new species of snake I had just spotted. My head was buried in the bush, when I suddenly heard,

"Hey Quinn."

I jumped in surprise, jerking my head up and smacking it into the bush's branches. Misako, the voice, laughed as she helped me up off the ground.

"What were you doing down there?" She asked me, as I massaged my throbbing head.

"I saw a snake," I said, as if that would clear everything up, "What are YOU doing here? Aren't you supposed to be with your dad?"

Misako's smile immediately vanished, and her eyes left mine to look down at her feet.

"He's on a business trip… Am I allowed to stay the weekend?" She asked quietly, afraid of having to go live with her mom over the weekend.

"Misako." I said, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder. She looked up at me and into my eyes. "I wouldn't ever make you live with her. Of course you can stay over the weekend. Mom and Dad will completely understand."

Her eyes twinkled as a smile returned to her face, and she suddenly embraced me in a quick hug of thanks, before running up the path towards the monastery. I was dumbstruck for a couple of seconds, a healthy flush of red present on my cheeks, before running after her, both of us laughing all along the way as we played our game of race. Misako was almost always the one to win and get to the house first. Wu and I were always too busy pushing and shoving each other to ever beat her.

If I had known what was going to happen, I would have never gone home. I would have ran, as far and as fast as I could, away from the monastery. I couldn't predict the future, however. Misako and I entered the house without a worrying thought in our mind.

"Hey Dad." I called out, to the otherwise empty house. Misako disappeared into her room, probably to do homework in order to free her weekend up a bit. Sadly, even in being a sophomore like Misako, we all got more than enough homework from our teachers. I'm pretty sure we learned more at home than we did at school.

I walked down the hall and into my room, where I threw my backpack on the bed. It would probably stay there, and would only be touched when I moved it to the ground, or when I finally decided to do my homework Sunday night.

I gave my room a look over, just to make sure it was clean enough so my mom wouldn't bug me about it later.

My room was incredibly plain and simple. The floor was made of bamboo mats, and my walls were a tan, light color. This was how all the rooms in the monastery used to look before they were repainted and refurbished. I hadn't changed my room, though. Honestly, I liked the different feel to it. There was a couple posters of my favorite bands on the walls, but other than that, it was pretty plain. I got my own bathroom though, which I really enjoyed.

Before I left to go train on the training course, I decided to check in on my dad.

There was one big rule in the house that no one ever dared to disobey. Nobody in their sane mind would try and walk into Dad's meditation room while he was in there. Wu and I both learned this at a very young age. Mom never told us why, but she did tell us he did very important things in there that could not be interrupted. Neither of us had ever tried to test that. We could tell how serious it was.

I stood outside the door to his meditation room, about to knock on the door, when I heard a voice.

"Come in." My dad said from inside the room. I hadn't even needed to knock.

I opened the door to find my father sitting cross-legged on a bamboo mat, with a pot of burning sticks in front of him.

"Hello Quinn," My dad said, without opening an eye, "How was school?"

My Dad was a very mysterious man. He always wore an ancient chinese-styled hat, an elegant, ancient silk robe covered in old runes, and always looked at you with a quiet, calculating stare. I didn't know too much about my father, other than he was famous for something big, he had awesome ninja skills, and that I got my grey eyes from him. I didn't have much connection to him. It always seemed to me that he liked Wu better, anyways.

"It was alright. Misako is going to stay with us over the weekend. Her dad is out of town." I explained. He slowly nodded once, indicating he was okay with this.

"Okay, cool. I'll be out on the training course if you need me." I said.

No response. He seemed to have fallen back into some trance, where he could no longer hear me.

"Awesome. Good talk." I muttered, before closing the door behind me as I walked out. As I said, he was a mysterious man. It was hard to connect with him.

I made my way outside for my daily training. Friday was always the day of which I tried to push myself as hard as I could in my training, using moving equipment and obstacle courses to make it harder.

Grabbing my black steel katana, I began to practice. I dodged the swinging axes, sliced the flying arrows, combated the moving training dummies; I used all the strength I had until I was dripping in sweat.

I was dodging arrows again, doing back flips and other cool ninja stuff like that, when I saw Misako out of the corner of my eye.

"Hey." I grunted, as I brought down my sword on the last flying arrow.

"Nice." She said. I grinned, turned the training system off, and flipped my sweat coated hair out of my face.

"You probably don't want to be near me," I joked, sitting down on the porch steps, " I smell disgusting."

Misako laughed and sat down next to me, handing me a glass of water that she had been holding. I thanked her for the glass, as the nice cold water soothed my throat.

"You don't smell that bad. Not as bad as usual." Misako teased.

"Thanks?"

We laughed for a couple of seconds, as I took another gulp of the ice cold water.

"I was wondering… Could you teach me how to do all that?" Misako asked as I wiped my mouth on my sleeve.

"What? Train?" I said.

"Yeah. You know, all that stuff you do with your sword."

I raised an eyebrow at her.

"It's not as easy as it looks, Misako. It takes a lot of hard work and a lot of patience." I warned her. She frowned at me.

"Just because I'm a girl doesn't mean I can't do what you can do." She said, annoyed.

"That's not what I meant," I protested, setting the glass on the steps and standing up again, "I just meant it's a hefty workout."

"I can manage." She promised.

Sword wielding wasn't as easy as it looked. It required perfect hand-eye coordination, as well as patience and determination. However, Misako was a persistent, determined woman, and anything she put her mind to, she could accomplish.

"First, you have to pick out the right sword," I explained, walking her over to our sword rack, which held many of such weapons, "It's usually best to get one made just for you, but for now, you can just practice with a generic one."

I grabbed a lighter sword, and handed it to her. She took it, and followed me back onto the training course.

"Now, in order to be good, you first have to learn the basic stance-" I began.

"Why does your sword look different than mine?" Misako interrupted. I smirked. Misako never was one for directions.

"It's a katana. A different styled sword. More swift, less clunky." I explained. She nodded, and let me continue.

Misako was a quick learner, absorbing the basic stances, in offense and defense. It was enjoyable, watching her learn to do something I loved. I liked teaching her, too.

"Alright, now I think we're ready to-" I began, when she interrupted me once more.

"I want to spar." She demanded. I chuckled in surprise.

"Alrighty then," I said, accepting her challenge, "Let's go get some sparring armor."

Suited up and ready to go, Misako took the first move, aiming a stab at my lower rib cage. I parried it with ease, and then took a sidestep to the right, ready to strike her side.

Suddenly, with an ease I didn't expect, Misako twirled around and brought her sword down on my shoulder pad.

"Nice." I commented, a hint of surprise in my voice. She grinned, and brought her sword in for a stab at my chest. My katana made contact with her weapon, and I instinctively twirled it out of her grip, and hit her with the butt of my sword, causing her to lose balance and fall to the ground.

"Oh crap. I'm sorry!" I apologized, setting y sword on the ground, before offering my hand to help her up.

"It's fine, silly." She laughed as she took my hand and stood up.

I suddenly had a jump in my heart, when her hand didn't let go of mine. She looked down at our connected hands, and looked back up into my eyes. Her sea green eyes melted me, and the butterflies in my stomach did loops and twists.

She smiled.

I was about to take her other hand in mine, in an attempt to be brave, when the doors connected to the outside world opened.

I ripped away from Misako, leaving her confused, as I stared wide-eyed at my younger brother, hoping he hadn't noticed us holding hands.

I was well aware of the major crush Wu had on Misako. I always made sure to lessen any rivalry between us. A love triangle was the last thing Misako (or any of us) needed, especially in the only place where she could find true happiness.

"Hey Wu." I said, waiting for him to squint at me, like he always did when he was angry at me.

"Hey guys." My brother said, smiling at us, having not seen anything. I sighed in relief

"How was robotics?" Misako asked him, as we unlatched our armor, done with her lesson for the day.

"It was fine. Teddy's taking over again." Wu grumbled. Teddy, my best friend since I could remember, loved robotics, and took over a lot in their robotics club. It was an ongoing power struggle they had.

"Ah, well, he'll never change." I said. Wu sighed in defeat.

"I know what will cheer you up," Misako announced, smiling ear to ear, "Some good old fashioned video games."

Wu's face immediately lit up.

"You'll join, right?" Wu asked her.

"Of course." She said, and he grinned even wider.

Before she went with my brother to play video games, however, she turned to look at me, a melting stare that made my knees go weak.

"Thank you for the lesson. Another time, okay?" She said, smiling at me in a way that made my stomach do somersaults once more.

"Y...y...yeah." I stuttered, a blush coming to my cheeks. I watched as Wu's eyes narrowed, picking up on something that he was obviously not okay with.

They both went inside, and I knew I was about to be in big trouble with my younger brother.

Sure enough, in the evening, just as the sun was about to set, Wu opened my bedroom door, without even knocking, disrupting my reading.

"Spar. Now." Wu ordered me,. I could almost see the waves of anger rolling off him.

"Sure." I accepted, ready to face my doom.

We weren't even into our sparring gear yet, when Wu slammed his golden katana down on the ground.

"What the heck, dude." Wu growled, acid dripping in his voice. I opened my mouth, ready to defend myself, when he cut me off.

"Don't try to pretend you don't know what I'm angry about. You know how much I like her!" He yelled at me, "And I saw the way she looked at you! How could you go behind my back like that. I thought we were friends!"

I flinched.

"Wu, I-"

"Oh, don't 'Wu' me! You knew full well what you were doing! Flirting with a younger girl. Disgusting!" He shot at me.

"Please-" I tried again, beginning to get slightly angry.

"Don't try to honey me with your lies-" Wu began.

"Shut up!" I screamed at him, which immediately shut him up, "She didn't look at me any differently! Am I going to blush when a cute girl decides to smile at me? Yes! Does that mean I'm trying to 'steal' her away? No! Loosen up, Wu. Not all the world is out to get you, and I certainly am not!"

Wu seemed taken aback for a couple of seconds. His speech he had probably prepared had not expected me to interrupt.

"There's nothing between Misako and I," I said, trying to calm my brother down, "I think you're just over-thinking things."

Wu bowed his head in shame, his fists still curled in anger.

"I shouldn't have assumed you'd take her away." He apologized.

"It's okay. Let's just spar, okay? Get your mind off this." I said.

He nodded, and picked his golden katana up off the ground. We decided not to wear the sparing armor, and in a couple of minutes, I became his outlet to stress and anger, lessening his tension the longer we fought.

The sun was set when it happened. I saw Wu's sword slice toward me in the last seconds of sunlight, and in reflex, I twisted it out of his hand, up, and over the monastery wall.

"Crap." He muttered. Dad never allowed us to go outside the walls once the sun had set. He said it was to "protect us from the demons of the night', or something stupid like that. But again, we followed out dad's rules. Most of the time.

"You get it." I told Wu.

"No. You're the one that made it go over the wall. You get it." He countered.

"Fine, but next time, it's your turn." I mumbled, rolling my eyes.

I scaled up the monastery wall. Using the door would have been too loud, and would warn our father we were going outside the walls.

I jumped once I got to the top of the wall, my feet barely making a sound as I landed on the outside.

I didn't have to search long, finding Wu's golden katana glittering in the bushes.

I reached down to grab it, and almost got the handle, when I suddenly felt a searing, white hot pain piercing my hand. Quickly withdrawing my hand from the bushes, I saw two, circular bite marks on my hand.

Something bit me.

Out of the bushes slithered the snake I had seen earlier, as I had been coming home from school. It hissed and bared its fangs at me, before dashing away, into the dark.

My head suddenly became light and airy, as if I was to faint. My knees buckled underneath me, and I fell to the ground, not understanding what was going on.

The only thing I understood was the pain. The searing pinch had now turned to fire, and it felt as though my entire hand was on fire. I tried to open my eyes, to actually see if my hand was on fire. But my eyelids felt sealed shut, and they also felt like they were on fire, burning and combusting into painful flames.

The fire in my hand began to spread up my arm, the molten lava flowing up my veins, it;s only goal to take over my body. My eyes screamed in white hot pain. The worst pain I had ever felt in my life.

I screamed a bloodcurdling scream. The fire reached my chest, and everything went black.