Time Stop: Hello.
Wang: It's me.
Static: It's "us" not "me."
Wang: But the song!
Shadow: So, uh, hey.
Time Stop: After much deliberation –
Wang: And too much caffeine!
Time Stop: – we decided to continue on our whole story thing.
Wang: So this is a continuation of A Second Chance! That's our previous Legend of Zelda fic!
Shadow: So read that one first. Or don't. Whatever.
Static: Shadow…
Shadow: What? It's not like we aren't going to do a recap in the first chapter anyways.
Static: silent
Shadow: What? It's true. Most good stories do that anyway.
Time Stop: Anywho, this is going to be the second of this little series.
Wang: This is gonna be a series? gasps over dramatically
Static: We can talk about that later, Wang.
Wnag: Okay!
Shadow: As usual, we don't own Legend of Zelda.
Chapter 1: Uncertain Future
A half a season had passed, and spring had slowly died into summer. A young boy just around ten fought against a red headed girl his age in the Sacred Meadow. He swung his sword quickly, using his shield to deflect against the twin daggers that jabbed at him in rapid succession. And despite it being mid-morning, neither one of them bothered to even acknowledge the food that Saria laid out for them. The Kokiri watched them sadly as they fought in silence.
It had been like that since Navi left them. Link refused to break camp, and spent many days in the Lost Woods looking for his dear friend. As for Nadai, she too searched for their lost fairy friend. But Navi couldn't be found anywhere. And for a fairy to right out leave it's Kokiri like that was unheard of. Well, Link couldn't exactly be considered a biological Kokiri but it didn't matter; the bond between the two of them was real. Something important must have happened to Navi. That or something dangerous.
She glanced down at the wood in her hands. Using the special fairy wood she had constructed Nadai a flute. But when she met them once again months ago she had her old dagger-flute again. It had taken both Link and Nadai several days to completely tell her what had happened to them. Time travel? Her a sage? Navi gone? They were in love?
Well, the last one she could understand, but only a little. What she did understand was that they had a destiny ahead of them that couldn't be erased. And that they needed to stay hidden from the evil King Gannondorf. Though why he called himself King was beyond her. The Princess was rumored to still be alive, and the people didn't take kindly to his kingship.
But that led her back to her carving. Link had no ocarina, and Saria wanted to remake Nadai's flute. So, she came out to her special spot to watch over her two young friends. She whittled and watched and watched and whittled. And every day they would fight until they were exhausted, then ate, then hunted for Navi in the same spots as before.
When you thought about it, it did make her sad.
A loud shout caused her to look up at the fighters. As usual, it was Link who had lost. While he had trained with the best of the best in order to become strong enough to defeat Gannondorf, Nadai still had more years of training on him. They stared at each other for a while; him lying on his back and her standing over him. Eventually, as if they could talk to each other telepathically, they both reached out a hand to the other.
"That's almost seventy straight wins." Link muttered. He brushed at his tunic to wipe away the dirt as best he could.
"Almost. You could still win." Nadai smirked. "Perhaps in seven years or so."
Link groaned. "I could win if we were adults."
"But we aren't." Nadai's smirk faded. "Not anymore."
Partly to save Link's life, and partly to restore the timeline, Zelda had sent Link, Nadai, and Navi back in time to their childhood. Though, whether or not that was true depended on what Link and Nadai had told her. Saria shook her head. All of this time travel talk got her confused.
Link sat down in front of Saria and began stuffing his face. He kept his eyes downcast, and no sound other than loud chewing could be heard from his mouth. Nadai and Saria exchanged knowing glances. He became like that all too quickly. If he wasn't fighting, his mind would turn to his lost friend and where she could be. Nadai sat down slower than Link, and also ate her share. Saria returned to her whittling. Only the occasional sound of the birds could be heard.
"I'm going to look for Navi." Link got up suddenly.
Saria winced. "Link, I think—"
"I'm going to try under the bridge again, and try to branch out from there."
"— that it might be time to stop."
Link turned to her. "What?"
"Navi is a smart fairy. She wouldn't have left without a good reason."
"I'm her Kokiri." Link stubbornly repeated the same point that he had time and time before. "Why would she leave?"
"We don't know. We have to trust her."
"But what if she is captured by Gannondorf? I have to free her."
"He's busy enough to deal with his new kingdom." Nadai pointed out. "He isn't going to worry about us right now. We're too far beneath him."
Link grunted in anger, and spun about, taking a few steps. "I just can't wait here for nothing." He said softly. "It'll be too much like giving up."
"No it isn't." Nadai got up and placed a hand on his shoulder. "I know how you feel. Navi—"
"Isn't dead." Link cut her off. "She can't be. I'd know if it was." He shot her a pained look. "I know her far too well for that."
He started out down the stairs.
"Link!" Nadai called out. But he kept on going. She started after him, but a call from Saria stopped her.
"Let him go."
The former Gerudo turned to the Kokiri. "I don't want to leave him alone."
"Time alone is what he needs right now." Sarai smiled sadly. She held out the instrument to Nadai. "Here, now both of you have Fairy Instruments now."
Nadai took the flute and slipped it into her pocket. "I don't understand."
"Understand what?"
"He – Link feels different to me."
"Different?" Saria patted the stump next to her and the girl sat down. "Like bad different?"
"Different different." Clarified Nadai. "The final battle against Gannondorf changed him. Made him…colder? Is that the word?" She nodded. "Yeah, colder."
"Colder?"
"Well, in the Water Temple, I watched Link as he came to terms with the evil inside of him. He fell, not literally mind you, but more spiritually and emotionally. At that point I didn't know if he would become a monster or a man and it frightened me. But bit by bit he came back to the light. He became the man I fell in love with. And, well, he wasn't cold anymore. He could feel again, not like he could've before."
"So he's at that point again?"
"I don't think so. Navi leaving us did something to him, but the look in his eyes changed after the battle against Gannondorf. He seemed decades older. And sadder. And more frightened."
"Frightened?"
"Like he has this terrible secret that he wants to tell someone but he can't." Nadai looked at the stairs where her love had run off to. "And I want to be there for him but right now I can't. And that hurts."
Saria reached out and moved the red hair out of Nadai's eyes, revealing watery blue eyes threatening to flood. "I know it hurts." She whispered. "There are some things we can't heal."
Nadai jerked her arm sleeve over her eyes, wiping away unfallen tears. "But there should. We should be able to heal them." She whispered.
Saria nodded. "If only." She followed Nadai's gaze to the stairs. "Give him some time alone. He needs to think."
Nadai nodded and sat in silence next to her friend.
Time to think was the last thing that Link needed.
He knew that Nadai suspected something. But if he could only tell her just what that something was.
Years ago, Link had fallen to his death. A third form of Gannondorf had surprised him, and knocked him away. In doing so, the man known as Link failed his mission against evil and everything he sacrificed to become a hero became worthless. At the last possible moment he was saved. By sacrificing their lives, Rauru and the other sages brought him to the Sacred Realm and away from death.
It was at that moment that the three Goddesses gave him a choice. Fight Gannondorf as he was, or go back to the beginning and redo the entirety of his quest. The only stipulation was that he couldn't talk to anyone about it, or otherwise the world as he knew it would end. He chose the latter, and he and Navi went back in time to the past.
However, things were now different. He ran into Nadai who tried to kill him. He defeated her somehow and in doing so lost all of his memories. Those memories of his past life were then locked deep away in his mind, and he would come to a blank conclusion whenever he thought about it. And yet there were times when the answer to a problem came in a dream from those memories of his. Other times he would get a resounding headache that wouldn't go away no matter what he did.
That headache eventually turned into a head splitting reopening of his past during the last battle against Gannondorf. In doing so he remembered everything from that time. Which included how different a character he was in his past life versus his current one. Which also led to the realization that Navi's brains about the world around her was because she could tap unhindered into her own past life's memories.
Navi knew. She knew about his past life and didn't tell him. Link gritted his teeth. Promises be damned, he needed to talk to her about that more than ever. She knew of his past life. She knew what kind of monster he had been…had become.
While his mind was full of dark memories of his past and happier ones of his present, it brought about a lot of confusion and fear. Was he the Link from the past, or the Link from the now, or was he in some sort of in between? Could be called a man anymore? Or was he a monster?
Link looked down at his ten year old self. Of course he couldn't exactly be called a man physically, but the point still held true. His mind hadn't mentally grown up like his body had after the seven year time warp. And once his mind finally adjusted to being an adult he was now a kid again. Link looked up at the sky and the clouds lazily going by. He would always consider himself an adult.
He stopped, then grimaced, then moved on quickly.
Being an adult meant taking care of certain problems. And while said problems were ignored during the weeks before the final battle, they were now heavily present in his mind. But now he and Nadai were both children. Was it even possible for them to do that in their current forms? He grunted as he tripped over an unexpected rock, rolling on his back to come up on his feet.
That was a particular problem that could only be answered with Nadai; if he could only muster up the courage to talk to her about that kind of thing.
Link laughed aloud. "Courage?" He said to himself. "Now that's a joke." He took a step forward. "I hold at least half of the Triforce of Courage, and yet I don't have the will to talk to my love." He stopped moving. "How the hell can I be courageous?"
The ground under him gave away and he fell.
Link reached out to grab at a root or a rope or grass or a rock or something to slow his descent but nothing came to reach. He had searched the Lost Woods over and over again and only now this mysterious hole decided to envelope him?
The walls of the tunnel opened up wider and wider and Link found the slope decreasing bit by bit. One hand gripped the Kokiri Sword and the other the Hylian Shield. He couldn't quite get his footing. So instead of running or stopping his momentum he slid on his back. He kicked down with his feet and grasped at the earthen walls as best he could until he began to slow down. Before he fully stopped he saw light up ahead. He stopped as he reached the mouth of the tunnel.
"Where am I?"
The mysterious hole led him to a forest, one in which giant trees sprouted and the air was as calm and still as nothing else Link had felt. It reminded him of the stale air of the Forest Temple, only cleaner and fresher. And the light in here, it was dimmer than the light he felt in the Lost Woods. He couldn't tell if it was the trees blocking out the sun or something bigger and more terrifying. A shiver ran up his spine but he fought down the fear. He had faced worse.
"What part of the Lost Woods is this?" Link muttered. Taking his sword he etched an arrow pointing straight forward. "I'll go further in I guess." He spoke to himself. "I'll follow my arrows back home before dark."
Link finished the arrow and kept his sword in hand. He gulped and started walking into the mysterious woods.
"He should be back by now." Nadai repeated for the tenth time. "It isn't like him to get lost in these woods."
She had been saying it for hours now, but now as night started to fall Saria had to agree. "He can still warp you know." She reminded gently. "He has his ocarina."
"Then why isn't he back then?" Nadai asked. "This isn't like him." She whispered.
"Give it a little more time."
"I'm going to look for him." Nadai bent down and collected what gear they had. "I won't be back until I found him."
Saria nodded. "Then I'll see you when you come back then." She replied. "Play my song if you need guidance."
Nadai nodded her thanks. She hiked the bag high onto her shoulder and set off at a run. Even at her young age she could out run and outpace most things in Hyrule. If Link had run off or had gotten into trouble she should be able to catch up to them soon. And she ran through the paths that had become so familiar to her the past several months. She stopped almost as soon as she set out. Just outside of the Sacred Meadow and several turns about lay a small hole that shouldn't have been there before.
"Huh?"
She leaned down to the hole and peered inside. It was deep, and it wasn't lit by any torches or by magic. She took out her flute and played a quick scale. The familiar notes flew through her mind and almost caused her to cry. There had been too many things that had happened to Link and herself the last few days of their adult lives. Too many things and not enough time to reflect on it.
Particularly for her was Gannondorf. She didn't like the Gerudo as much as Link did. Perhaps even more. If what Gannondorf had told them was true, then…
No. She had to hope that the man was lying to her. She had to hope that wasn't true. And if it was…
"Nadai? What happened?" Saria's voice called out to her.
Nadai shook her head, bringing her back from the past. While she was no longer a Gerudo, Gerudo's don't dwell on the past; old habits die more easily than she had once thought.
"Um, I found some sort of hole. I don't have any clue where it leads."
"I hole?"
"Yeah. It's in a different part of the woods. And I've been here before, there hasn't been a hole here, at least not until today."
"Interesting." Saria mused. "Do you think Link—"
"Yes." Nadai sighed. "I'm going to go in. I'll play the song again in a bit."
"I'll wait here for you." Saria called.
The spell ended. Nadai put the flute back into her pack. Taking a deep breath to steady her nerves, she jumped in.
Time Stop: Please Review!
Wang: Pssst! That's why Saria was there after seven years, she promised you that she would wait for you!
Static: Really?
Shadow: Oh hell no. Wang's making stuff up again.
