Notice: This story is set apart from what originally happened in Majora's Mask. I only own my invited characters, but everything else such as the locations and enemies belong to Nintendo.

Chapter 2: Mystery of the Basement

"I can't see anything!" complained little Eric in his attempt to see something in the surrounding darkness.

"Wait, I think there's an oil lamp here" exclaimed Sara grabbing blindly by the handle a rusted, old lamp that was on an open drawer near where she was. "I saw some Lantern Oil in the kitchen's cupboard, I'll be right back."

"No wait!" cried Eric, "Don't leave me alone in here!"

"Oh, common Eric, there's nothing here" uttered his sister, "But if you want you can come with me."

"N-no" he said with shaky voice, "I will be brave and wait here."

"That's my little bro," said Sara smiling at him, though she wasn't sure Eric could see her smile anyway. "I'll be right back."

Eric nodded as Sara climbed (being careful not to trip over) the wooden staircase that led back to the sitting room, pushing the trapdoor open as she reached the last steps.

Five minutes later, Sara returned to the basement carrying the oil lamp lit in her right hand. The lamp's blaze managed to illuminate just part of the basement; Sara just noticed how big the basement actually was, easily bigger than the kitchen and the sitting room together. Sara could see no sign of Eric, though.

"Eric?" she said with preoccupied voice as she walked in straight line through the basement.

The more she walked by with the lamp in her hand and identified the surrounding objects in the basement, the more scared she became. The previous owner was indeed a freak, or so she thought. Posters of Poes, Gibdos, ReDeads and other scary monsters were scattered all over the brick walls of the basement, with some hand-written notes here and there on the edges of the posters that Sara insinuated the previous owner had written himself. On the cold floor resided powder of different substances that Sara saw upstairs in the cupboard of the kitchen, as well as screws and other mechanical tools placed randomly. Death bugs could be seen too. Sara though that they might have died of intoxication as they were inhaling the powders all the time, or they might be other reason?

"Eric, I'm serious!" Sara exclaimed trying to sound angry, though a shaky voice of fright came out of her mouth. "Come out wherever you are!"

Then she heard the noise of a box dropping to the floor. Sara leapt in fright and immediately raised the lantern to expand her view. The source of the noise seemed to come from a wardrobe located at the far end wall. Sara slowly walked to the wardrobe, her heart beating faster and faster in every step she took. When she was face to face with the door of the wardrobe, she panicked. She was expecting Eric to come out of it in an attempt to scare the hell out of her. Not that he wouldn't succeed, she thought.

"Hey, sis!" called a voice from right beside her. Sara's heart skipped a beat and she jumped frantically, almost dropping the lantern she firmly held in her hand.

"Eric! You scared the crap out of me!" Sara said angrily to her brother who was looking at her with a petrified face, as he didn't though his sister was capable of such language.

"Listen, I'm sorry," she immediately apologized with calmer voice, looking at Eric's reaction, "Is just that you really scared me".

"Yea, I'm sorry too, sis" replied little Eric comprehensively, "I guess I shouldn't have popped out unexpectedly."

Sara merely smiled. "Anyway, you didn't break anything right?"

"What do you mean?" asked Eric having no clue what his sister was talking about.

"That box you dropped," uttered Sara worried, "There was no glass inside, right?"

"I-I didn't dropped any box" said Eric horrified, "I though you were the one who dropped something."

"Oh please Eric, stop trying to freak me out more! I already had enough!"

"I'm t-telling the truth, sis" replied Eric honestly.

"Okay, I believe you" accepted Sara after hearing the honest reply of her brother. "But then who did it?"

"Well, there's the box," said Eric pointing an upside-down box that lay on the floor. Some research papers had escaped from its container, and where now scattered everywhere on the floor. Judging the position of the box and the place where it fell, Sara deduced it once stood on top of the wardrobe.

"What do you think is inside it, sis?" questioned Eric, looking at the wardrobe with curiosity.

"I don't know…" answered Sara insecure, "But I don't think I wanna find out."

"Oh, common, sis!" pleaded Eric, "Don't you even have curiosity to know?"

"Mm… maybe?" uttered Sara, "But I'm not opening it! I had enough scares for today."

"Okay, I will open it," said Eric confidently walking closer to the wardrobe.

"Just… be careful!" panicked Sara.

Eric slowly grabbed the doorknob of the left door of the wardrobe and pulled it open. Something immediately came out of it, something really soft, as it made no sound when it reached the floor. Eric bent over to pick it up from the floor. Sara walked closer to Eric to provide some light so they could see what that thing was.

"A teddy bear?" exclaimed Sara in disbelief.

"This doesn't look like a common teddy bear…" said Eric disapprovingly. The teddy bear was wrapped around with white toilet paper, giving it a mummified look, and wore a pink tiny bow on its head. Eric stared back at the wardrobe "It appears as if someone had someone locked in here."

"… Better leave it there and lets go back upstairs, shall we?" said Sara with firm voice, "This is freaking me out."

Eric threw the teddy bear back inside the wardrobe and closed it immediately. "I'm right behind you, sis."


"Anyway, what you do for fun here?" Owen asked Aden as both of them were climbing back the staircase that led to the eastern side of the canyon, each holding a net full of fish. Aden was a more adept fisher than Owen, as he won their little competition by five points, including the capture of two Octoroks.

Two hours had passed since Owen left the house for fishing. He wondered if they had already finished the cleaning back at 'home'. It still sounded strange to Owen when he called that wicked, old house 'home', but he guessed he would get used to it.

"Well, as you can see, there's nothing in here" laughed Aden, "But there's swimming in the river, fishing, and strolls in the forest."

"Well, at least that's something," laughed Owen back. They reached the end of the staircase and started walking through the clear field. The weather seemed warmer as the sun was starting to rise on the horizon behind the Stone Tower.

"Do you know something about the Stone Tower?" Owen asked Aden suddenly.

Aden stared thoughtfully at Owen and responded "Mmm… only that is very old and there's a keep at the top full of monsters."

"Have you ever… you know, entered inside?" questioned Owen staring back at Aden with the same look.

"Just once…" admitted Aden, "But as soon as I entered, I freaked out and immediately left the building."

"Oh…" exclaimed Aden disappointed.

"But you know, we can sneak inside sometime," suggested Aden, "I guess is not as scary with company" he laughed.

"Yea, that's the spirit," agreed Owen with enthusiasm.

"Well… I guess here we part ways" said Aden. They were standing before the bridge that led to Owen's house.

"Yea… sure you don't wanna come in?" said Owen hoping he would agree.

"N-no, thanks, man" Aden answered, looking at the house in a strange way "I must return, or my family will worry of my absence."

"Okay, then seeya!" said Owen as he waved to Aden who had started walking in the direction of the forest.

"Dad, I'm back!" called Owen as he closed the door behind him.

"Hey! How was the fishing?" said Mr. Anderson as he entered the sitting room coming from the kitchen, the smell of charcoal coming along with him.

"Great! I caught umm…" he counted the small, blue fish crowded in the net, "seven fish."

"Hey, that's good" said Mr. Anderson joyfully, "I already started heating the oven. Hurry, let's go to the kitchen."

Owen followed his father into the kitchen, where a blazing flame was already heating the stone oven above. It took Mr. Anderson a quarter of an hour to cook the fish, and then he called the rest of the family members to come into the kitchen.

"By the way, I met a new friend down at the river, Dad" commented Owen before giving a starving bite to his fish. The Anderson family sat at the dinning table in the kitchen, eating peacefully their fish. Sara and Eric still had petrified looks of what they had experienced down at the basement, and Sara was still thinking about that mysterious girl that appeared at the window.

"You… did?!" exclaimed Mr. Anderson surprised, "I mean… Of course you did! What did I told ya, ah?" said Mr. Anderson in triumph.

His two sons and daughter exchanged looks at his weak attempt of lying and then laughed lowly.

"Anyway, he lives in a house in the forest," Owen continued, ignoring his father's last comment, "He told me we could visit him and his family sometime."

"Oh, of course!" Mr. Anderson exclaimed with enthusiasm, "That would be great, just tell us when."

"Does he have some brothers or sisters?" asked Sara hopefully. Her voice still sounded a bit weak and shaky.

"Yea, he has a younger sister, of about the same age as Eric," Owen answered her. "… Why you sound like that? Are you feeling okay?"

"Are you sick, darling?" asked Mr. Anderson looking at his daughter worried, putting a hand on her forehead to check her temperature.

"I'm fine, Dad" lied Sara faking neutral voice, "I just got tired from all the cleaning, that's all."

"Why don't you go upstairs and take a nap?" suggested Mr. Anderson still looking worried.

"Fine…" said Sara leaving her fish back on the dish as she stood up and started climbing the stairs to the upper floor, with the other three family members watching her leave.

"Eric, do you know why your sister is like that?" asked Mr. Anderson to his younger son.

"N-no, why should I know something?" said Eric nervously not looking at his father.

Mr. Anderson merely stared at his son with suspicion and then continued eating his fish. Owen, on the other hand, started eating wickedly faster.

"I'm done" said Owen cleaning his face with a napkin and immediately stood up. "I'm going to check on Sara to see if she's okay."

And so Owen climbed the stairs in a rush, leaving his father and brother looking at him with a dumbfounded expression. There Sara was, lying in bed on her back. She wasn't even asleep; she was contemplating the ceiling deep in her thoughts.

"Hey," Owen said walking toward her and sitting on the edge of her bed, "What's bothering you, Sara?"

"What do you mean?" said Sara with an eyebrow raised, "I'm fine."

Owen shook his head disapprovingly and then laughed "You inherited Dad's inability at lying, you know?"

Sara chuckled a bit, and then returned her expression to a serious one. "Fine, here's what happened…" And so Sara told Owen everything, from the mysterious girl showing up at the window to the mummified teddy bear in the wardrobe.

"So, you think someone was kept imprisoned inside the wardrobe?" asked Owen seriously after hearing Sara's tale.

"I don't know…" replied Sara honestly.

"Maybe that lunatic kept his daughter as a prisoner down there, that bastard!" suggested Owen.

"Maybe, but… we shouldn't be bringing conclusions too quickly!" exclaimed Sara, scared of the conclusions they were reaching.

"You are right; first we should investigate" said Owen, "Aden told me that the previous owner was a researcher of supernatural phenomena."

"Well, that explains the pictures" said Sara.

"What pictures?" questioned Owen.

"Some human-sized pictures pasted on the walls down at the basement," explained Sara, "With monsters such as Gibdos and Poes…"

"Well, that sounds like a good place to start researching," said Owen and Sara nodded "Meanwhile, no word to Dad or Eric, okay?"

"Eric already knows about the wardrobe and the teddy bear," stated Sara, "He was with me, remember?"

"What about the girl appearing at the window?"

"No, only I saw her…" answered Sara remembering those creepy pair of blue eyes…

"Well, then no word about it, okay?" said Owen looking at his sister with seriousness.

"Fine…" agreed Sara.

"We need to take a look at the basement, and see it with my own eyes" said Owen.

"Not right now! Or Dad would suspect" uttered Sara immediately.

"Okay, then we will go at midnight," said Owen realizing his sister was right, "When everyone's asleep."

"Sounds good to me" accepted Sara.

"But for now, you rest" he added while standing from the bed and walking to the staircase, "I'll meet you at the sitting room at midnight."

"Fine" agreed Sara as he saw Owen leaving her.


Owen lay impatiently in the sofa in his pajama pants, while holding his stomach in pain. Mr. Anderson cooked some boiled eggs for dinner, brought by the last time they went to Romani Ranch. The owner of the ranch was his oldest cousin, Cremia, living with his other cousin, Romani, who was named after the ranch. Because they were family, Cremia always has gifted his family with products such as milk and beef, and of course, eggs. Something about this last time eggs didn't quite satisfied Owen, though. At first he thought they might have been spoiled, but then he realized that he was the only one having a stomachache, when all the other family members ate the same. Maybe it was just bad luck, he thought.

He peered at the trademark clock brought directly from their old home at Clock Town. A quarter before midnight; Sara would be coming down any minute. With difficulty and laziness he changed his position from a sleeping one to a sitting one. After yawning deeply, he stood up and went looking for his shirt. It wasn't a difficult job, though, because the full moon illuminated quite well the sitting room from the window where the girl that Sara saw appeared.

After putting on his shirt, Owen started walking to the sofa again. Something on the floor drew his attention before he reached it, though. An open book lay on the floor before the bookshelf, its white pages glowing under the moonlight. Lured by it, Owen picked it up from the floor, remaining the book open. The page showed a picture of a hooded creature, with sharp, thin swords at both ends of the cape. Its face was hidden under the hood, though a pair of white eyes could be clearly seen. It was a 'Garo Robe', or so it was entitled on top of the page.

"Owen, what are you doing?" whispered Sara with an eyebrow raised, "I haven't see you touch a book since a long time ago." Owen laughed sarcastically.

"You should better look at this," whispered Owen, getting the book closer to Sara.

After reading the title and looking carefully at the picture of the Garo, she looked back at his brother.

"So what…?" she said still having no clue.

"Err, I don't know" replied Owen, feeling rather stupid, "I saw it lying on the floor, open in this page."

"Wait…" said Sara coming up with something, "Where exactly did you pick it up?"

"From there," said Owen, pointing the place where the book once stood, right before the bookshelf.

"That's the book I dropped when I saw that girl!" exclaimed Sara.

"Shhhh, keep your voice down!" whispered Owen angrily.

"Sorry," apologized Sara, "I saw that book fell from the bookshelf, and so I bent to pick it up, but when I was reaching my height again I saw that girl and… just froze."

Owen had no comments and was still looking at her, as if telling her to continue.

"And after five frightening moments Eric talked to me and brought me out of trance, and that's when she disappeared. The next thing I remember is that I was following him down to the basement. Maybe I dropped the book back to the floor when I saw that girl."

Owen meditated Sara's words. "I may sound stupid, but I think this can be a clue."

"You're not…" said Sara, remembering something else, "I think I saw a picture of that thing down at the basement."

Owen's face went bright. "Then what are we waiting for?"


"Watch your step," warned Sara to Owen. Both of them were going downstairs to the basement, Owen carrying the same lamp Sara carried that afternoon. "They seem really breakable."

"Got it" whispered Owen.

When both of them reached the end of the staircase, Owen stopped moving, waiting for Sara to show him around.

"C'mon, you are the one who knows this place," said Owen.

"I have only been here once, don't exaggerate," said Sara staring at him.

"Well, at least you remember were that picture was?" asked Owen hopefully.

"I remember it was on the left wall, if that helps…" whispered Sara.

"Well, let's roll then," said Owen walking at fast pace to the left wall, with Sara trailing behind him.

The first human-sized picture they came across was Poe, looking back at them with a glare. The second one was a Gibdo, the mummified creature looking as creepy as ever.

"I can't imagine how Eric didn't freak out when he was down here," admitted Owen looking at the Gibdo with chills, "Even I find them scary."

"I'm not quite sure if he saw them," said Sara, "I wasn't with him when I saw these pictures."

"I hope he didn't" hoped Owen, "Or he would need serious psychological treatment…"

"Found it!" exclaimed Sara pointing a picture ahead. The Garo was an exact replica of the one they saw in the book, with the same pose and everything.

"Now what?" asked Owen clueless, as he never thought they would find it in first place.

"Read the notes for something important," suggested Sara as she started reading the hand-written notes that were all around the central picture of the Garo.

"'Spies from an enemy nation to investigate Ikana'… 'They reveal themselves only to one of their kind…' read Sara out loud.

"Look for something else," suggested Owen while reading the notes too, "What you are reading is probably on the book."

"Hey! Hear this… 'Some fellows living near Romani Ranch seem to be descendants of the Garo bloodline, though I haven't investigated them enough to be accurate in my suspicions'."

Both of them exchanged shocked expressions.

"Do you think Cremia might know something about it?" suggested Owen with an excited look.

"We should ask her next time we see her" said Sara as Owen nodded.

Suddenly, Sara felt someone putting a hand on her shoulder. She leaped in panic and by instinct jumped onto Owen's shoulders, almost making him drop the lamp. Owen raised the lamp to see who or what it was. He almost wished it was actually a monster, as he saw an angered Mr. Anderson looking at them.

"Can you explain me what the HELL are you doing here at these hours?!"

End of chapter.

Just to clarify things, Sara is 14 years old, Owen 18, Eric 7 and Mr. Anderson in his 40's. Ikana's geography is not exactly the same as the one in the game, but key places are still in the same direction (Stone Tower in the East, Ikana's Castle in the South, the river running from North to South, etc.) Thanks for reading.