Two

('That's, Er, Not How It Works')

The young man who called himself Davin Sunrider was very good at making people laugh. For most of his life, his wits had been quick, and he could find a way to turn almost any situation into a smart remark. Some of them he did not say aloud, but just kept to himself to laugh at later. Some he did say aloud, so that the other people around him could laugh right then. Sometimes they laughed, and sometimes they didn't; such was the bane of the comedian.

But his best line worked every time. His best line was so hilarious to women that it had worked on every single woman he had ever said it to in his entire life. It never failed to produce wild, uncontrollable laughter, ever.

Davin Sunrider's best line was this:

"Hey, would you like to go out sometime?"

The Gerudo warrior he was speaking to had the undesired but predictable reaction. Leaning on her spear, she continued to laugh until Davin scowled at her and walked away, muttering irritably to himself.

"All you had to say was 'no'," he grumbled, straightening his jerkin.

Davin Sunrider, formerly of The Real World, was currently in the employ of the Dark Lord Ganondorf as the official Court Comedian. Through an odd series of circumstances, he'd found himself in the supposedly fictional land of Hyrule, and so far he'd found no way to leave it and return to his former life.

Up until five minutes ago, he'd thought Hyrule wasn't that bad, and was sort of enjoying his time here in a land so very different from his own. But, some things didn't change no matter what world you were in.

At least the clothes were cool here.

For his time in Hyrule, Davin had chosen clothes as usual in dark colors and loose fit. He wore loose black trousers tucked into mid-calf length leather boots of the same color, a dark blue long-sleeved tunic, and a black jerkin over this, cinched with a black leather belt, on which hung a sword. He did know how to use it, having wasted quite a bit of time in learning how to wield archaic weapons back in The Real World. That time turned out not to have been wasted here, since Ganondorf often surprised him by jumping out from behind corners and attacking him.

Ganondorf thought this was hilarious.

Davin did not.

The former college student made his way through the halls of the castle, drumming his fingers against the hilt of his sword as he walked, and warily watched for hulking shapes snickering as they hid around corners.

When he reached the rooms he had been given, Davin was unsurprised to see Ganondorf inside, playing with his MP3 player. Ganondorf never knocked, just barged right in whenever he felt like it, and if he wanted to hear a joke, Davin had darn well better stop sleeping and tell him one.

Ganondorf had quickly figured out how to work the music player, and had been entertaining himself by listening to Real World music for the last few days. He was most fond of the Hard Rock and Metal albums, though Davin thought this sort of made sense. Ganondorf seemed like a Metal guy.

Davin heard the faint music coming from the earbud-style headphones Ganondorf had on, playing the music much too loud, and recognized the song, as he listened to it often.

The Dark Lord turned at Davin's entrance and grinned broadly, holding up the small music player within one huge hand. "I quite enjoy the songs of these 'Nine Inch Nails' minstrels whose souls you have captured within this device," he said. "Tell me, how did you conjure this magic?"

"Er, that's not really how it works," Davin said, somewhat nervously. He barely knew how the device functioned himself, and if Ganondorf wanted a detailed explanation, he wasn't sure he could give one.

Ganondorf looked down at the MP3 player, frowned at it, and then suddenly smiled, a truly terrible thing to behold.

"I fixed it," he said, and, taking out the headphones, handed the MP3 player to Davin.

Davin looked down at the player as he took it back. "Fixed it how?" he said suspiciously.

Ganondorf had 'fixed' his laptop a few days before by smashing it against a wall when it failed to perform the task he had been expecting. Granted, he had immediately done something with magic and restored it, but it was acting even funnier than usual now. And for Davin's computer, that was saying something.

"The enchantment that bestows it with life," Ganondorf replied. "It had almost exhausted itself, so I altered the spell so that it would refresh itself automatically."

"Huh?" Explanations of magic were just as mystifying to Davin as explanations of electronics were to the Dark Lord.

"This small green bar in the corner here," Ganondorf explained. "It turns slowly to white as the enchantment is exhausted. I have altered your soul-capturing device so that it will draw energy from the world around. Now it will not threaten me with the curse of 'Low Battery' and cease to obey."

Davin's expression at this could best be described as 'more than a little freaked out'.

"I have also done this to your computer device," Ganondorf said. "The wizards in your realm structure their spells poorly."

Davin sighed. "Yeah, they kinda do," he agreed, realizing the futility of explanation.

Ganondorf slapped him on the back hard enough to crack a rib or two, which he occasionally had a few times in the past. "Come, Sunrider, tell me another of your humorous stories."

Davin idly tapped the pommel of his sword as he searched his brain for another joke to tell. He had told quite a lot of them, and while Ganondorf had a few favorites, he always demanded new ones.

Davin's last had not gone over well:

"Hey, what time is it when a Goron sits on your sundial?"

"I've heard that one."

"Right, okay. I suppose you have reason to be a little annoyed. Could you please reattach my arm there? I may need it again."

Now, Davin dove to the depths of his comedic reservoir and reluctantly dredged up a joke his father had told him.

"Okay, I got one. The King of Hyrule was walking through the forest one day, taking another break from running his country to slack off."

Ganondorf snickered at this, the reason why Davin had included that detail.

"He had a fine time, wandering along the forest path, and enjoyed the scenery very much. He watched the cheerful forest animals scampering between the trees, and continued on through the path, putting off getting back to work.

"After an hour or so, the King came upon a giant, a huge but friendly fellow. The King asked if he could ride on the giant's shoulder, and the giant genially agreed. He grabbed the King by the back of his royal robe, picked him up, and deposited him on his huge shoulder.

"The King of Hyrule had a fine time riding on the giant's shoulder, and further put off getting back to work. The giant stomped merrily through the forest, squishing cheerful forest creatures and knocking over trees. The King was a bit concerned about this, but could do nothing to stop the giant."

"Ha!" said Ganondorf. "Just like the real one. Go on."

Davin flicked a nervous glance at the enormous Dark Lord, knowing what he'd probably done to the old King upon conquering the kingdom.

"Ah, anyway," he went on, "the King finally decided he'd had enough, and he wanted down. He yelled at the giant to let him down, but the giant was deaf in that ear, and was having too much fun squishing cheerful forest creatures besides.

"He ignored the King, and continued on his way. Desperate, the King finally spied a peasant he knew named Dennis and called down to him, 'Ho there, Dennis! How do you get down from a giant?'

" 'You great dummy of a King!' Dennis responded, 'You don't get down from giants, you get down from geese!' "

Davin waited nervously for a moment as Ganondorf studied him in inscrutable silence. The Dark Lord suddenly seemed even taller than usual as he slowly crossed his arms over his chest, frowning thoughtfully.

Finally, so suddenly it made Davin flinch, Ganondorf let out a great booming laugh. "Ha! Goose down!" he said between chuckles. "An excellent play on words!" He slapped Davin's shoulder, and Davin stumbled into the wall. "Most clever, Sunrider."

Davin had always thought the punchline of that joke to be an atrocious pun, but if it made Ganondorf laugh...

He was further glad that he'd been transported to the English-speaking Hyrule, where puns like that actually worked. If he had ended up in the Japanese version, he would have been in serious trouble.

Ganondorf walked out of Davin's rooms, and Davin hurried to catch up to him, knowing the Dark Lord wanted him to come along.

"Say, Sunrider," Ganondorf said as they walked along the wide stone halls of the castle. "Perhaps you can help me with something."

"Oh?" Davin asked. Ganondorf gave him a funny look, so he hastily added, "I mean, how can I help you, Dread Lord?"

Ganondorf pondered this. "Dread Lord. I like that. You may continue to call me that in the future."

"Sure thing, dude," Davin replied, realizing only too late the flippancy of his statement. His mind was having a bit of revenge on him for not being allowed to go mad, it seemed.

"It's ah, a term of... comradeship... in my country," Davin said hastily, looking nervously up at Ganondorf.

The Dark Lord nodded solemnly. "Very well, dude," he replied gravely.

Davin nearly had an aneurysm as he tried to keep from laughing.

"I have recently recaptured Princess Zelda," Ganondorf went on. "I have noticed that she seems rather despondent at this, so I thought perhaps you could go cheer her up."

Davin thought about this. He knew one line that was guaranteed to make her laugh. "Um, sure," he said. "What do you want me to do?"

Ganondorf gestured at the spiral staircase leading up to the top of one of the castle's many towers. "Tell her one of your joking stories. And while you are there, please reassure Her Highness that I do not intend to kill her."

"You got it," said Davin.

"Thanks, Sunrider dude," said Ganondorf.

Davin nearly had another aneurysm.

Sitting in her chair next to the window of the tower in which Ganondorf had imprisoned her, Princess Zelda looked down over the capital of her captured kingdom, wondering darkly what plans Ganondorf had for it.

The door opened, and Zelda looked back, expecting the Dark Lord come to taunt her again about her capture, or one of his horrible minions sent to torment her.

The minion, however, was decidedly unminionlike; it was a tall, ordinary-looking human man wearing glasses and dark-colored clothing. He did not have any hint of malevolence about him, which was surprising, considering his employer. In fact, he almost seemed sort of nice, in an odd way.

"Er, want to hear a joke?" the young man said somewhat nervously.

"I would not care for levity now," Zelda replied sadly. "My kingdom is conquered, and my people suffer under a dark tyrant."

"Well," said the young man, dragging over the other chair, "I agree that Ganondorf can be kind of grouchy sometimes, but he's really not that bad if you just try not to make him mad."

"He slaughtered my entire royal guard and killed my father when he invaded," Zelda said bluntly.

"Okay, so he's kind of a jerk," said the young man. "But there's really nothing either one of us can do, now is there?"

Zelda shrugged in acceptance. "No," she agreed sadly, "there isn't. We can only hope in the Hero."

The young man gave her a frank look. "Ganondorf was watching him in his scrying bowl the other day. This Link ain't too bright, Your Highness. I saw that kid eat some purple Chu jelly. Raw." He held up two fingers. "Twice. The only reason he didn't do it three times was 'cause he couldn't catch another one."

Zelda sighed again. The poor boy had seemed a little dim. She looked up at the young man, sensing through the powers of the Triforce of Wisdom that he was trying to think of something uplifting to say.

Finally, he paused for a moment, and the words 'Ah, what the hell? Worth a try,' drifted through his surface thoughts.

"Hey," he said, "do you want to go out sometime?"

Puzzling her, Princess Zelda felt an overwhelmingly powerful urge to laugh at this, and a chuckle escaped her control.

The young man scowled almost reflexively, then smiled half-heartedly. "There you go," he said with forced cheer. "Feel better?"

She did, somewhat. She also felt like laughing at the young man some more, so she did. She laughed loud and long, harder than she'd ever laughed at anything in her whole life. The young man just got redder and redder, and for some reason this sent Zelda into a whole new paroxysm of mirth.

"Thank you," she finally gasped, struggling mightily to stop laughing. "I needed that."

"No problem," the young man mumbled. He got up to leave.

"Wait, what is your name?" she asked him.

"Davin Sunrider," he mumbled, almost too indistinct to hear. "I'm Ganondorf's Court Comedian."

"Thank you for helping me to cheer up, Master Comedian," Zelda said.

Davin sighed heavily. "Just doing my job."

Author's Note: Davin the Dark Side Comedian will return in 'Attack of The Fangirl', coming soon. Thanks for reading!