Disclaimer: I do not own the Legend of Zelda series, in whole or in part. No profit is made from the production of this fan-created work. That would be pretty awesome, though.
It's never revealed how Dampé died between the young and adult Link timelines; this story serves to shed some light on at least one possibility.
Word count: 1870
Rated for language/graphic imagery.
After a long, uneventful night of patrolling Kakariko Village's graveyard as he had done every night for the many past years, Dampé slowly trudged his way towards the small shack just outside the graveyard's perimeter that he called his home. It was a humble existence, seemingly known only to a handful of the entire population. Despite this, he found it suited him just fine, as he didn't much care for the loudness that typically surrounded Hyrule's citizens.
The only two people he'd known to enter the graveyard in recent times were two boys. One rather young child who had taken a shine to Dampé and his work, to the extent of mimicking Dampé's patrol route and lethargic walking pattern. The other boy, somewhat older, would usually come around at night, silently walking around, peeking inside graves. Dampé had warned the boy against moving the graves, and many times chuckling to himself as he saw the boy run from a Poe that he awakened.
On this particular night, Dampé found himself unable to sleep, despite feeling utterly exhausted. There certainly was an ominous tension in the air, but that was no explanation for his lack of slumber. He hadn't let anything else interfere with his sleep, and he saw no reason for that to change any time soon. Closing his eyes, Dampé finally felt blissful slumber coming to him...
A loud explosion promptly jarred Dampé from his sleep.
"Oh you have got to be-" Dampé was cut off from his imminent rant by another explosion, which was quickly followed by many more. A grotesque combination of moans and laughter filled his ears moments after the last explosion. With a groan, Dampé lifted himself from his bed. He knew what had happened. The restless dead roamed the realm of the living. Horrifying that may be, Dampé was in no mood for dealing with any of this.
The door to Dampé's hut flew off its hinges, having been kicked off by its inhabitant. The old gravekeeper walked out, his trusty shovel held in one hand, his prized hookshot in the other. A small group of Redeads and Poes began making their way towards the only living being in the vicinity.
"Interrupt my sleep will you? Just because you freaks feel you've had enough of it, doesn't mean I need to sacrifice my shut-eye for your pleasure!" Taking aim with the hookshot, Dampé fired at a Poe. The large metal tooth at the end of the chain collided with the ghoul's lantern, destroying both it and the Poe instantly. Two more Poes quickly met the same fate.
The Redeads, having moved close enough, released a chorus of bone-chilling shrieks. Dampé put away his hookshot, holding the shovel with both hands as one would a battle ax. The Redead closest to Dampé screeched again as it drew closer.
"Shut the hell up! I heard you fine the first time, damn it!" Dampé swung the shovel, neatly decapitating the undead abomination. The other Redeads screamed at him in turn, only serving to irritate the gravekeeper even more.
"Apparently you didn't hear ME though! I. Said. Shut. Up!" He swung with each individual word, relieving each Redead's body of its head, one at a time.
As he went on his rampage, Dampé failed to notice a lone Redead had managed to sneak up behind him. Latching on to the back of his body, the Redead proceeded to lower it's gaping mouth the the gravekeeper's head, eager to devour his life force.
"And what the hell do you think YOU'RE doing?" Grabbing the Redead by its neck, Dampé flung it to the ground directly in front of him.
"What, couldn't even buy me dinner first? Ha!" Dampé drove the end of the shovel into one of the empty eye sockets staring at him, shattering the creature's skull.
Dampé continued through the graveyard, cutting down any of the undead beings who dared oppose him, as well as those that had attempted to run. None of these freaks would get away with interrupting Dampé's sleep if he had anything to say about it!
Even as the sun rose higher into the sky, the waves of undead did not slow, and neither did Dampé. Hours passed, with the only noticeable change being the bodies of the recently twice-deceased piling up.
As the sun reached it's peak, the onslaught of the undead finally ceased. Dampé continued his patrol, waiting for the undead to appear so that he could remove that rather annoying prefix they carried.
Sitting down against his house, Dampé released a tired groan. Having now been up for the better part of a full day, he definitely felt ready for sleep. Not to mention fighting off those evil forces that would surely have destroyed all of Kakariko's life...
"What the hell... how is this pitiful village still standing? Where is my great unholy army of the damned? Who did this?" Dampé looked up to see a large man in black armor surveying the bloodied graveyard. He couldn't resist a chuckle at the man's confusion. The man quickly whipped his head around, eyes gleaming with hatred.
"You! Do you have any idea who I am, you pathetic fool?" He stormed over to Dampé, and lifted him into the air by the collar of his shirt. Dampé just chuckled again.
"Afraid I don't. Enlighten me." This time the other man laughed, dropping Dampé to land on his back.
"I am Ganondorf, and you will soon know me as your king! Not only of this land of Hyrule, but of the world!" Ganondorf posed menacingly, but Dampé merely stared in amusement.
"Just what the hell are you looking at? You're still nothing more than a pathetic old man, you should be bowing to me!" Ganondorf became visibly annoyed at Dampé's lack of reaction.
"I may be nothing special, but if I'm as low as pathetic, I can't help but wonder what that says of your 'great undead army'!" Disgust filled Ganondorf's face as Dampé laughed.
"You.. no, impossible! I summoned all of the undead from this graveyard, all of them. You could not have destroyed them!" Dampé nodded, and gestured to the graveyard.
"It would seem that everything points to the impossible being true, your majesty." Dampé erupted into laughter, much to Ganondorf's increased annoyance.
"Enough of your impudence! You will not have the privilege of living long enough to bow to me under that title!"
"Oh, is that so? Good, I'd rather not know you by any!" Dampé had made his way over towards the removed door to his house, which was laying just in front of the wooden fence of the graveyard.
A few moments of bitter silence passed, broken by Ganondorf roaring loudly. Holding his hand above his body, Ganondorf brought together a mass of bright energy. The moment the energy stabilized into a ball, he launched it towards Dampé.
"What the-" Dampé turned around quickly, seeing bright ball of malevolent energy barreling towards him. A moment before it contacted his body, Dampé swung his shovel. The energy connected with the metal head of the tool, and was sent ricocheting into the sky.
"Hmph. Let's see you do it again!" Ganondorf charged up another energy attack, this one much more quickly than the first. As he did the first time, Dampé used his shovel to deflect the attack, this time directly back towards its origin. Ganondorf effortlessly backhanded the ball towards Dampé. The game of Dead Man's Volley continued for many passes, much to Ganondorf's annoyance. Bringing his fist down on the ball, Ganondorf forced it to explode harmlessly into the ground.
"Enough! Your returns are far too slow to pose any threat of hitting me. And at the same time, you somehow seem to be able to return mine with equal precision. Perhaps you aren't as pathetic as I earlier assumed. Let us see how you fare against a more potent attack!" Ganondorf held both hands above his head, collecting a much larger ball of dark energy. Bringing his hands together, the energy collapsed, releasing a multitude of smaller energy balls hurtling towards Dampé. Ganondorf smirked as he saw his opponent take up a defensive stance; surely he knew that attempting to return these attacks would guarantee being struck.
Dampé smiled in return to Ganondorf's. Waiting until the energy was within range, Dampé swung his shovel in front of him in a horizontal arc, deflecting the barrage away into the environment. Ganondorf's entire body shook in silent rage.
"That all you got?" Dampé kept his eyes locked with Ganondorf's, even as the latter rushed to be directly in front of him.
"Perish!" Seizing Dampé's shoulders, Ganondorf released a massive amount of dark energy into him. After finishing his assault, Ganondorf dropped Dampé to the ground, a sadistic smirk crossing his face.
"I suggest you make your peace with this world while you can. You certainly won't be a part of it for much longer." Ganondorf left the graveyard, mumbling to himself about needing to make up for lost time.
"Eheheh... most fun I've had in ages...looks like this is the end for me though.." The day's events were finally given a chance to affect Dampé's body. Barely coherent, he slowly crawled on his hands and knees to his hut.
"At least I got my own grave dug already... Here's hoping I can last long enough to pull myself to it. Maybe I can close the headstone as a ghost, those Poes seem to have an easy enough time doing it..." With some difficulty, Dampé pulled himself up to his desk, tearing out the last entry to his journal.
"I can't just leave my hookshot here, but perhaps someone courageous enough will come to retrieve it, if they have need of it. This note... should serve as direction enough." With a cry of pain, Dampé fell to the floor.
"Ah! Seems I've lost the legs... oh well, I don't need them to get to my resting place anyhow..." Using his shovel as a walking stick, Dampé pulled himself across the graveyard, gradually slower as the day progressed. As the sun began to set, Dampé collapsed onto one of the few grass spots in the graveyard that wasn't soaked through with the blood and bodies of the undead he had cut down.
"Oh, thank the goddesses above I've arrived. Now for the last part..." Sinking his shovel's head into the ground, a square shaped mass caved in, revealing a deep hole.
"Heh... even if I can't do it, I'm sure that Guru-Guru fellow will cover this up, even if only to keep the number of unwanted visitors low..." He looked toward the large windmill that his labyrinthine grave exited out to, chuckling once more to himself.
"Ah!" Dampé collapsed forward, his head hanging into the hole. Pushing against the dirt wall, he felt the rest of his body follow, cascading down into his final resting place.
"Goodbye... Hy...rule..." Dampé went silent as the last of his life force was drained by Ganondorf's curse.
Well then. I was working on a silly little thing with Link and Saria, but suddenly my muse decided to change gears, and this thing happened instead. If there's one thing we can conclude from this story, it's that Dampé is a badass. According to me, myself, and my muse, anyway...
I hope to have more stories available soon! Hopefully not all of them with such a dark theme, but I won't promise anything.
Thanks for reading.