~ Prologue ~
Someone was screaming.
No, not someone. Someones. Plural. As in more than one person.
The voices melded together, creating a horrific cacophony of sounds that grated against the ears like a symphony of fingernails dragging across a thousand chalkboards.
Interwoven between the screams of pain and horror came the sounds of glass shattering. Explosions sounded from far off in the distance, almost sounding as if the entire Bomb Shop inventory had just caught fire. The explosions were coming closer. The screams were growing louder.
Yet everything was still dark. It wasn't the darkness that came from the night. This was a different kind of darkness.
Nothing was working as it should. Shouldn't he be doing something? Shouldn't he be up moving? That was a thing he should have been able to do, but everything was disjointed. Disconnected, somehow. Something was incredibly wrong, that was for sure, but any clear train of thought past there just fell apart.
The ground rumbled beneath him. Thunder and lightning crackled ominously in the sky.
Someone was there next to him. Sounds were coming at him, but the sounds didn't make any sense. It was all just garbled gibberish. He thought he could detect certain emotions - fear, terror, anger - but beyond that, their words were lost to him.
It was cold. So very, very cold. The limbs that wouldn't move felt as if they were freezing from the inside out. A deep freezing sensation gripped his chest, making it difficult to breathe. The sounds that were being spoken above him grew louder, but the louder they became, the less they seemed to make sense.
Above him, there was a sharp gasp. Someone was laughing now.
Another loud explosion.
Another shrill scream.
And then there was nothing.
Nothing but the gritty sensation of wet sand plastering itself against his face, his lips, and his hair, the gentle lapping of waves, and the somber cry of a gull circling overhead.
A wave crashed over him, soaking him through. The coldness that gripped him thoroughly shattered as soon as the water hit him, but now he was cold in a different kind of way. This cold, at least, felt more natural. His body started shivering violently as his teeth clacked together. He tasted salt on his lips. Salt? But why was the water salty?
The sound of footsteps finally managed to rouse enough energy within him to force his eyes open a crack. Standing in front of him was a barefoot woman in a light blue dress, styled strangely from anything he had ever seen before. Her hair was bright red. One arm was raised up cautiously. She was staring down at him with the widest, wildest looking eyes he had ever seen. The look on her face looked as though she had just stumbled across a dead body.
Maybe she has, was the last thought Link had before passing out face down in the sand.