Disclaimer: Midna, and The Legend of Zelda are the intellectual property of Nintendo.
Entwilightened
Chapter 1
Fat droplets of water stampeded against the window in their attempt to break it down. Simultaneously, thunder boomed through the tiny apartment, rattling windows, shifting doors, and causing its sole inhabitant to flinch.
"God damn…" he muttered under his breath, getting up from his position on the floor, "Sounded like that actually hit something."
He crossed the room in two long strides and looked at the rooftop-filled horizon. He was disappointed to find no signs of a lightning strike. It wasn't so much that he wanted a fire or any such catastrophe—he was just anxious for something to do, or something to happen. He was out of school for the next few months, his friends were either busy or out of town and he, not being a very social person, was left without anything to do. He didn't have a job at the moment; the University fees had been less than he had expected, leaving him with surplus loan money that would easily see him through the next month or two.
He rapped his fingertips against the windowpane irritably. In addition to all that, the damn rain was keeping him inside. Normally, he wasn't against a bit of rain—quite the opposite—but this was a real storm. "Pouring buckets" as his friends would say. He looked down onto street, and saw it nearly deserted. What few passerby he saw moved quickly, trying to escape the pervasive cold and wetness. Water coated everything, running in a thin sheet over everything flat, directed by gravity alone. The best thing to do on a day like this was huddle up inside and savor the warm and dry.
He sighed, moved back to his previous position on the floor of the room, and sat back down heavily. He picked up the Wiimote and unpaused the game. He was playing The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. He had beaten it several times, and didn't particularly feel like playing, but it was either that or stare at the walls as far as he was concerned.
He wasn't doing anything in particular in the game…just roaming about the overworld, beating up on whatever random baddies he ran into. The save file he was playing had everything unlocked, so there was nothing left to accomplish, and beating the game for the umpteenth time held no appeal.
Just as he was considering starting a new save file to attempt a three-hearts clear again, thunder boomed again. This time, the widows clattered and vibrated in their panes, and he heard a door elsewhere in the apartment slam shut. The lights and TV flickered once, and with a quiet pwp! sound, went out altogether. He could swear he even felt the floor shaking.
As the thunder faded away, he got to his feet, looked out across the city and let out a long-suffering sigh. With the power to the apartment out, he was facing the prospect of an even bleaker day. As his frustration faded, he became aware of the silent apartment. Normally, it was filled with a variety of sounds that were so commonplace he had forgotten to hear them. Now that they were gone, their absence was jarring.
In fact, he realized he was feeling more than a little unsettled. The hair on the back of his neck stood up, and a chill ran down his spine. Somehow, without understanding how, he knew that there was someone in the apartment with him. He turned around, crept across the room and as silently as he could, grabbed a nearly-forgotten wooden curtain rod out of the corner of the room. Stepping lightly through the doorway, he brandished the curtain rod like a medieval sword.
He scanned the living room for anything out of the ordinary, a difficult task in the powerless room, with the only source of illumination being the watery gray light filtering through the window. The only sounds were his breathing and, when the wind changed direction, the rain crashing against the glass.
The only things he saw in the living room were the usual—the battered old TV on the entertainment center next to the window, the chipped and cigarette-scarred coffee table in front of it, with the entire ensemble completed by a tired-looking, sagging couch.
He resisted the urge to ask if anybody was there on the grounds that in most horror movies, this led to a horrible, grisly death. Not that the thought that a grisly death was even remotely possible was a comforting one, but his imagination tended to run rampant when left to its own devices.
After several tense seconds of staring into the living room, he found nothing out of place, and relaxed slightly. He lowered the curtain rod, and sat down. He rubbed his temples with his left hand, maintaining the grip on the curtain rod with his right.
"Dunno what that was all about…just thunder and lightning. Sturm und drang…" he muttered to himself, trying to get his hammering heart under control. He took a deep breath in an attempt to calm himself. That seemed to help. Maybe he could try another…
He was halfway through his fourth deep breath when he halted abruptly. The hair on the back up his neck stood up once more, and a wave of heat flooded his body for a moment as his fight-or-flight instinct kicked in. He could detect something just on the edge of his hearing…something like a low buzzing hum. But that was normal, right? Electrical appliances made that sound.
When they're powered, yes! He thought furiously. He gripped the curtain rod in both hands and stood up. He swiveled to face…yes…his room. The sound was definitely coming from in there. He approached it slowly, arms tensed to swing the wooden weapon if he detected so much as a hint of a threat. His breath echoed in his ears, and he willed himself to breathe quietly, lest he give away his position. He poked his head around the doorway into his room, hoping that he wasn't in for a nasty surprise.
His hopes went unfulfilled. Swirling violently in the center of the room, hovering several feet in the air was a maelstrom of small, two-dimensional black squares. Whipped about as if in a violent storm, the black squares zoomed through the room, speeding up and slowing down at random. As they flew, they trailed a smoky black residue that clouded the flock of black things.
Something nagged at the back of his mind. I've seen that somewhere before…As his eyes widened with realization, the black cloud pulsed outward once and gave an almighty CRACK! sending him to his rear in surprise. The black cloud collapsed to the floor and coalesced into a humanoid shape.
He climbed to his feet again, and held the curtain rod without much conviction and quickly trotted over to the sprawled figure on the ground. As he got a better look at it, he inhaled sharply. Sprawled and unconscious of the floor of his bedroom something—someone, he corrected himself—impossible. She didn't exist. And yet, here she was, as real as the makeshift weapon in his hand and the carpet under his feet.
Lying crumpled on the floor in front of him was Midna, the Twilight Princess.
Notes: Yes, the story is utterly self-indulgent. No, it will not be a self-insert, because I hate those with all my mindpower. I've chosen to set the story on Earth for a number of reasons, but frankly I doubt you care too much about my story writing philosophy.
Chapter two is written and edited. It'll go up soon. If you've enjoyed the story so far, I'd love to hear from you. If you hated it, I'd still love to hear from you.