momo: Hello, everyone! If I'm to give myself some credit, I hope some of you recognize this as what it is.
Effectively, this story is a rewriting and intensive revision of a Naruto/Ocarina of Time crossover I began and then fell out of due both to my own dissatisfaction with how well I was writing it and the onset of applying for university, followed by my harrying first semester.

I'll allow you all to make your own conclusions and enjoy as you please for now, and save all other ramblings for the end of this prologue. I hope, if none else, you'll enjoy what I've written.

Prologue

Kushina watched the red energy fill the sky from her makeshift cot. The air all around was hot and electrified from the concentrated chakras of dying men and monster, thinner here than where the battles were raging the hardest, but still heavy on her skin. The unsettling sense of an energy that should be inside her being now present all around her clogged her concentration.

She could move if she put her mind to it, but her arms refused to respond to any command and she was left only with the option to shift restlessly using her legs and glance at the blanket covering the gaping wound in her gut.

She was stuck here, with Kakashi and and a few scared looking genin and students, watching everything collapse from a distance in the shelter of a half collapsed shed.

After it became apparent that the nerves in her arms were mostly deadened, the baby had been handed to one of the children, who had mercifully taken a seat directly next to her and attempted to lull the wailing infant- her son- to sleep. His face and clothes were muddied and a bold, white scar ran across his face, but his eyes were warm even while full of fear. He had introduced himself to her as Iruka. A wild eyed, wiry girl named Anko was next to him, clutching a spot on her shoulder where an awry fire release had seared through skin.

Kakashi stood in vigil at the window with a hand poised near his weapons pouch, Sharingan eye whirling madly. A young sensor Kushina had never met was with him, and perked up like a dog.

"I can feel Hokage-sama coming nearer again." he announced to everyone, turning bespectacled eyes upon them and straining out a half relieved smile.

Kushina breathed, tried to twitch a finger once more, and sighed. "Good." she said.

"Good, provided he found the books he went for." Iruka remarked anxiously, "They were in his study, weren't they? They could have burned by now, or-"

Anko took her hand away from her oozing shoulder and punched his arm viciously. "Shut up, you academy kid! You're depressing me!"

The tan boy winced but otherwise returned to rocking Naruto, who was growing quieter with the motion. Kushina heard Iruka mutter a half-hearted apology just as a blur of white and gold shot out of the sky and came to a harsh halt in front of them.

Minato stood for a long moment, sweating and bleeding and dripping Kushina didn't know what. He had an armful of leatherbound, yellow paged books as thick as her hand was tall and he looked frantic.

After the moment passed tensely, no one speaking, Minato strode to Kushina's side and tossed the books down on the ground in front of Iruka, who jolted in surprise. The Hokage proceeded to remove his coat and fold it neatly.

"I've found what we need," he said quietly, stonily, "If you're certain this is what you want to do."

They had spoken about this in rushed tones, minutes, or hours or days ago when he was rushing through the forest with her in his arms, looking for some place safe and away from that thing that was supposed to be locked up tight, woven through the coils of her chakra and sleeping. About what they would need, if a transportation jutsu would serve their purpose, about how no, she was not likely to last long.

Even now, Kushina could feel her natural, sunny chakra fleeing from her body like so many scattered birds and a chill gripped her throat. Kakashi had fed her as many soldier pills as he had in his pouch and helped her choke them down with some water. It had delayed the side effects of having her chakra lines torn apart effectively enough, buying them time to do what they needed.

"We already decided." Kushina said.

Iruka, Anko and the chuunin with Kakashi all looked bewildered and confused. As far as they knew, the Hokage had rushed off to get some books. They hadn't any idea what they were for or why he needed them, or why Kushina, who couldn't move her arms to form hand signs, was involved.

"Asakura-kun." Minato intoned, nodding at the black-haired chuunin. The teen stood at attention and adjusted his glasses over his narrow eyes.

"Sir?"

"Please proceed to the front and notify Sandaime-sama to begin. He'll know what you are talking about."

Asakura-kun saluted smartly and leapt away through the night.

"For everyone else..." Minato glanced around. "Iruka-kun can continue with Naruto. Kakashi, Anko-san, help me here."

Umino Iruka struggled to comprehend what he witnessed as Minato waved his hands, sending Kakashi and Anko scurrying to the wall. Somewhere in the flurry of activity, Kushina's baby had been deposited in her carefully placed arms and the two were set in the center of the now glowing, foreign looking circular seal.

With a sudden crackle, the air was alight with a yellow energy that could only be chakra, a scream, a roar, and the sound of the Fourth Hokage uttering words none of them had ever heard before.

Then as suddenly as the air was alight, it was still again. Kushina and the baby were absent and the roars of the monster were silent. Everything was still.

(...)(...)(...)

Mido, boss of the Kokiri tribe, trudged barefoot into the meadow where his father resided. His fairy Leaf wobbled tiredly behind him before finally settling in his unruly hair with a sigh.

He had been first woken by the gale force wind that had rent through the village accompanied by a green light, but it was only when the Deku Tree's messenger had come for him that he had known he was not dreaming.

He had been ready to inquire testily what was happening and why he was shaken out of his sleep so rudely when he saw the woman.

Mido had never lef the Lost Woods, but he knew what was beyond them. People who grew old, and had children from their own bodies, and died when their hair turned white. That was the world of Hyrule, on the northern side of the woods, the place they were apart from but still part of.

This woman was not of Hyrule nor of the Woods, but she smelled of magic and death and there was a baby in her arms.

Mido did not like intruders in his home. This was a place of magic only his people could control, where men became monsters and children withered to nothingness when they lost their way. Only a Kokiri or a beast could survive here, and no one else belonged.

That was how he felt inherently, but he was not cruel by nature. Whoever this woman was, and wherever she had come from, she was in need of help.

The Great Deku Tree, his esteemed father, spoke with a booming voice.

"Mido, come close."

Hesitantly, the Kokiri tribesman proceeded until he was squatted gracelessly next to the woman.

"This human is called Kushina. There are things that have forced her to flee from her home with her son. All will be explained in time," The Deku Tree intoned this when Mido nearly interrupted, "But for now she has pleaded with us to grant her a favor."

Mido stared into her face. Her mouth was dripping blood, and her eyes were gray and smoky.

"I...need you to take care of this one." She said, flicking her eyes briefly to the golden haired infant in her arms.

Mido was not wont to refuse her. It was the request of a dying woman, and though the child was, by all means, not meant to be here, he could survive here, if only an oath of assent was given him.

"What is the child's name?" Mido asked it carefully and looked with meaning at his father. It was not his job to give the oath, but it was his duty to see it made.

"He has one. Naruto." Kushina smiled wetly, "But it's useless to him, now."

"He'll have a better one." Mido promised.

The woman, red hair fanned out around her, looked at him gratefully. "The talking tree called you Mido." she murmured, "Thank you, Mido."

As Leaf stirred into a greater state of wakefulness, Mido clasped the woman's hand and spoke words only the gods truly knew. They were flowing like water from his lips and tying a bind to the sleeping baby, weaving magic into his bones that would stop him from withering or dying in the poisonous magic of the woods.

It sung in the air around them and the Great Deku Tree murmured a quiet phrase of witness. All was done, and the Kokiri took the baby from the numb arms of the sleeping woman. She would fade from sleep into something else quicker than he could help her, he knew, but he had done what he could.

All there was to do now, he supposed, was to title him.

"Hello, Link."

End Prologue

momo: To conclude and clarify, the precept of this story is indeed that Uzumaki Naruto is the character of Link, at least for the purpose of this crossover.

I've made Mido more likeable than perhaps I should have, but I did want to give him a more adult character to fit with his role as the Boss of the Kokiri. He is still surly and snippish, of course, but he takes things in stride.

I'm still in bed with mono and feel awful, but I am continuing work and beginning chapter one. Once I've finished enough for two chapters I plan to post the next part.

Reviews are a valuable way to tell me what you liked or hated and what needs work. If I suck, I can only get better when people tell me what needs fixed! Thank you for reading.