"Turn that video game down, moron!"

Cindi Hatchett squealed in frustration. Her maths final was tomorrow, she'd left revision till the last minute as usual and now she was trying to cram. Stacey Parker always got straight As and she swore by chocolate ice cream, but after three tubs Cindi was feeling fat, trigonometry wasn't making any more sense and the endless formulae and diagrams were starting to swim in and out of focus. To top it off, her brat of a little brother had the TV on top volume to play his stupid bleepy bloopy game.

"I'm not gonna warn you again, you little brat! I'll call Mom!"

"Oh, I'm so scared!" shouted Josh from the living room. "Face it, Sis, you're gonna fail anyway. Ice-cream can't stop you being dumb."

"Go screw, you little jerk!" Her head was pounding. Maybe she needed something to drink. Flopping off her bed, she shoved her feet into fluffy pink slippers and padded to the next room where Josh was sprawled on a beanbag, his eyes glued to the idiot box. She glanced at the screen; it was the one with the dumb little green goblin guy, or whatever it was.

"Turn it down or I'll pull the plug," she warned as she headed over to the open plan kitchen.

"Whatever, you're such a loser," grumbled Josh, reaching for the remote and turning it down two insignificant notches from 'earth-shattering' to 'mind-destroying'.

She poured herself a glass of milk, then looked out of the rainstreaked window as she sipped it. It was a miserable day, a slate-grey sky only broken by a few foul black clouds. A distant rumble of thunder sounded. Still, if it was sunny she'd have been tempted to go hang at the mall, and then she'd never have learnt that some of the hypotenuse was equal to some squares. Hey, maybe the ice cream was working!

"Woah, I've never seen this dungeon before," exclaimed Josh. "But I finished this game, like, twenty times!"

"Wow, Josh, that is so totally interesting," drawled Cindi sarcastically.

"I've been past this screen a thousand times, and its never been there before! Wait... what the? Um, Sis, I think you better see this!"

"Some of us have a life, Josh, I don't have time for your lame-ass game." Despite herself, something in her brother's voice made her look back at the TV. What she saw made her jaw drop.

The little green guy was looking up at them, and words had appeared at the bottom of the screen to show he was speaking. It said:

Is Cindi Hatchett there?

She blinked hard, and swallowed. Thunder rumbled a little closer, and rain beat incessantly against the windows. "Is... is this a joke?"

"No joke, sis. I swear." Josh might be a brat 98% of the time, but she knew when he was being serious.

"Well, it must be a... a bug, or something. Right?"

Josh shrugged. "I never saw a bug that made it say your name. Something weird's going on. Hey, the writing's changing!"

I need your help, Cindi Hatchett. Hyrule will perish without you!

"What the heck is Hyrule?" demanded Cindi.

"That's the kingdom where the game is set." Josh was suddenly excited. "This is totally awesome!"

Cindi snapped at him. "How is this awesome? I don't want to be in your stupid game, Josh. I need to learn stuff." But her large pale-blue eyes stayed steadily on the screen.

Cindi, if you can hear me, I need you to take the controller from Josh.

"OK, this is too weird. I'm turning it off." She stormed over to the console, and despite her brother's protests switched the power off. At that same moment, lighting struck the Hatchett household. The TV went to static and thick purplish smoke billowed out of the SNES, quickly filling the room and sending Josh into a coughing fit.

Then the smoke cleared, and he could breathe again.

But Cindi Hatchett was nowhere to be seen.

To Be Continued