A.N. I do not own Zelda or any attributes of the franchise.
The young boy awoke with a start, his piercing blue eyes shooting open like arrows from his bow. A small, blue fairy hovered above him, crying tears of joy, and beside him was a Skull kid wearing a strange mask. Upon seeing him, Link jumped at the boy, attempting to strangle him.
"You…killed…my…HORSE!" He screamed angrily, his voice cracking. The young skull kid struggled for air as two years of rage exploded out of Link in a second. Then, he remembered the end of the journey in his head, and dropped the boy, suddenly. The boy in the mask breathlessly croaked
"No! I-I would never do that! This fairy found you passed out in the woods, and found me. We put you on your horse and rode you to clock town-"
"Clock…town?" asked Link, with worry in his eyes, "but-but that was ...in my head…wasn't it?"
The skull kid looked to Navi, then back at Link.
"Yes, and no. Termina is real, but your journeys there were not. Navi told me you liked adventure, so every week I would come here and tell stories of a surreal quest to prevent a moon from falling. I was the antagonist, and you were the hero. You're currently in Anju's house."
"Anju?" Link enquired, thoughtfully, "You…mean the…cucco lady?"
"No," answered the skull kid, "you must have transferred images onto faces. Termina is Hyrule's twin country. Many of its races originated in Hyrule, such as the Zoras and Terminians, but no one here should resemble the people of Hyrule"
It was then that a young woman of around 25 walked into the room. She was tall and graceful, with black hair coming down to her waist. Link's gaze was strangely drawn to her chest. Before he could fantasize, however, he was distracted.
"Good morning there, sleepy head" Anju said sweetly, as she ruffled his unkempt fringe, "It's nice to finally see your eyes after two years of having you in my house."
Link drew a silent gasp.
"I've been here for two…years?" he thought, unable to find the right words to say aloud. He was dropping back into his old state of almost total mutism. He drew a deep breath, and said "All I remember…is having spent a year searching for my-my-my friend Navi." He then added, as an afterthought "where…is my…horse, Epona?"
"In the town stable" Replied Anju, kindly.
"She's missed you terribly" Added Navi in a more sober tone than usual.
"So I'm fifteen." Thought Link as he stroked his elated horse. "No wonder I'm feeling this odd attraction to Anju. The Deku tree once told me about puberty, back when I was ten, and I suppose it's been going ever since my adventures in Hyrule, but I never thought it would get this extreme."
"What 'ya thinking about?" asked Navi, playfully.
"Oh…Nothing" replied Link, sadly. It was a sad thing, his mutism. Link was a thoughtful young man, and had always had so much to say. He'd just never been ever to say it. The most he'd spoken at once was when he warned Zelda not to tell his future self to look for the spiritual stones, and that was oly a few sentences. With Ganondorf thrown off, Link had gathered the stones and kept them hidden away, before going to look for Navi. Well, all but one of the stones.
Four long years passed, and Link went on many adventures. He helped people, and saved lives, and even managed to do the impossible.
You see, he'd found a dying Zora named Fillain on a beach, and, out of respect for his dream, listened to his dying words. He'd buried him right there and then. But something seemed all too familiar. Out of curiosity, he played a haunting, hollow tune on his ocarina. The song of healing. With that, a smiling blue spirit rose from the ground and stored itself in one of Link's bottles. A spirit that he then kept for the next two years he would stay in Termina.
Now, looking over an almost unchanged Hyrule, Link patted the bottle containing his now friend, Fillain. Looking to the East, he saw Kakariko, His old Forest of Kokiri, but much more importantly, the end of a river. An important river. Zora's river. He remembered the days he'd spent there with a friend, (or was she more than just a friend?) fondly. And so, with an ocarina in one hand, a mask in the other, which he'd kept as a souvenir from Hyrule, and the Zora's Sapphire hanging around his neck, he stood there, looking over that familiar old country. He straightened his favourite blue hat and tunic and, as the sun set over the field, he gathered all of his resolve, and said aloud
"It's good to be home."