Chapter 7

Year 1970s Dimension

The moonless night was bleak and quiet. Below L rest an abandoned factory, more spacious than three football stadiums put together. The factory used to be a nuclear power plant until the government closed it down, claiming that the factory was creating weapons of mass destruction. The factory was shut down soon afterwards, and not a single person had approached it ever since.

Until now. Using his infrared goggles, L spotted numerous heat sources. The abandoned factory was teeming with people, all of them armed with flashlights, radios, and firearms. This was the spot. This was the place where L's target, mob lord Guizaro, had holed up in with his wife and daughter. The mob lord had spent his colossal fortune on body guards, and L was going to have him running for a refund.

L was the best agent The COMPANY had ever seen. It was an organization that worked behind the backs of the world's largest governments. The President of the United States had asked The COMPANY to bring Guizaro to justice. The mob lord had ordered the hits of several prominent political figures and had hundreds of innocent civilians killed in mob shootouts. The COMPANY accepted the President's request and had sent L in to break in, capture, and retrieve Guizaro's sorry hide.

L was currently on the Z-66 Predator, The COMPANY's latest stealth carrier. They were going to perform a drop off, and once L had infiltrated and captured the target, he would rendezvous with the Z-66 Predator at the pick-up point. L quickly checked himself to ensure that he was fully prepared; black mask, black suit, two standard issue V-13 Tactical Wolf Knives, one Kevlar Vest, three feet of carbon fiber wire, a set of night goggles with infrared vision, a standard issue M-10 Pistol, two spare bullet clips for his M-10, a set of handcuffs, and a fast-acting poison pill in case he failed his mission and was captured by the enemy.

"You ready, Agent L?" the pilot asked from the front.

"Whenever and wherever," L replied, turning away from the rear plane door and strapping on his parachute.

"Then I wish you the best of luck. Get that bastard for us."

"Will do, Johnny." L said before jumping out the stealth carrier. He felt the wind tear at his body as he angled his body and plummet towards the earth. Once he reached the designated distance, L pulled the cord on his parachute, letting the chute open up and jerk his rapid descent to a steady fall.

Two of Guizaro's hired bodyguards turned to see L swooping in on them. Before either of the two armed men could sound the alarm, L pulled out his M-10 Pistol attached with a silencer and took them both out with a single bullet each. With the two watchers out of the way, L pulled out his two V-13 knives and cut the straps on his parachute the moment he was close enough to the ground. He hit the concrete surface with a roll, quickly getting to his feet the moment he landed. He saw the backs of three guards, who could turn around and spot him at any moment. They were twenty feet away. L raised both his V-13 knives and hurled them; the two blades embedded themselves into the backs of two of the guards. When the third guard realized he was under attack, L had already closed the distance and wrapped his carbon fiber wire around the man's neck.

The moment the strangled man's limbs stopped twitched, L pulled his wire back up into his sleeve and yanked his two V-13 knives out of the backs of the other two nuisances. He kept his stride, continuing deeper into the factory as if nothing had happened. He paced himself, knowing that he could not tire out before reaching his target. The COMPANY's intel told him that Guizaro was located at the very heart of the factory. The mob lord had locked himself away inside the steel safe house at the heart of the factory along with his wife and daughter and a few of his most trusted body guards.

Just ahead, standing on a walkway twenty feet above the ground, two body guards were keeping a look out with Thompson machine guns in their hands. L sent them both to their ancestors with a bullet to the head each. One of the Thompson users slumped against the walkway's rails while the other hit the hard ground with a nasty thwack. L approached the Thompson holder who had hit the ground. The fallen man had three grenades strapped to his belt.

Perfect. L grabbed one of the grenades, pulled out the clip, and chucked it as far away from his current position as possible. A few seconds later, the grenade exploded, taking out one of the factor's empty tankards in the process. Alarms went up like fireworks on the fourth of July, and every hired help in the immediate vicinity flocked to the explosion to see what had caused it. L took out any stragglers in his path with his V-13 knives or pistol, but the vast majority of his roadblocks had gone over to the false scene of action.

L silently slunk from one shadow to another, ghosting his way through the maze of a factory until he reached his destination: the steel safe house his target had barracked himself in. L switched on his infrared: four males, one adult female, one child. Guizaro, his wife, his daughter, and three more of his goons. The door was shut tight, the windows were boarded with wood planks, and the ceiling appeared to have been reinforced with steel bars.

L knew exactly how to get in, take out the three guards, and cuff Guizaro without killing him; all that held him back was his professional curiosity. L had never told Guizaro beforehand that he was coming for him. The COMPANY never alerted targets before taking them in. Yet Guizaro was clearly acting under the impression that he was expecting someone. He destroyed his entire fortune hiring thugs to protect him, he holed himself up in one of the most desolate spots in the United States, and he even brought his wife and daughter along with him.

L had competition. Someone else was after Guizaro, and that person certainly wasn't here to bring Guizaro to justice, that person was here to kill Guizaro's whole family. L didn't know who this mysterious assassin was, but he knew one thing: he needed to get Guizaro and his family to the rendezvous point as fast as possible.

No more time for thinking. L rushed at the steel safe house, quickly analyzing its every nook and corner as he closed in on it. It was impossible to enter via the door; his current equipment would never be able to penetrate neither the door nor its frame. Entering via the ceiling was a no-go as well; the reinforced steel probably wouldn't even buckle to a bazooka. That left the wood-boarded windows. With his perfect accuracy and M-10 Pistol, he slugged four bullets into the wooden boards covering the window; each projectile buried itself into the exact as spot as the first. After that, L grabbed one of his V-13 knives and threw it at the small hole his previous four bullets had created. The steel knife struck the wood right in the bullet hole, letting small lines of cracks spread from the break. Finally, L did a jumping kick, ramming the booted heel of his foot into the end of his protruding knife. The result: the V-13 knife sent a tremor of breaks and cracks across the wooden boards, shattering them to pieces as L flew into the safe house.

L rolled across the splinter-ridden ground, swiped and sheathed his stray V-13 knife, grabbed his pistol and aimed. The three body guards inside with Guizaro were momentarily stunned at L's sudden entrance, all the time he needed to use his last three bullets to put them each down. Even before the three guards hit the ground, L let the empty bullet cartridge slid out from the barrel and reloaded his gun with a full clip. L spun around, pointing his pistol at Guizaro's heart. The fat mob lord was shielding his scrawny wife and small daughter behind him.

"S-S-So you're h-here!" Guizaro said, stuttering so badly that he barely seemed like the cruel mob lord he was famed to be. "P-Please, I b-b-beg of you! Take m-m-m-m-m-my life! J-J-Just s-spare my wife and daughter! Please!"

L lowered his gun. "Believe me when I say this, Guizaro. As much as I want to kill you, The COMPANY wants you to fry in front of the Supreme Court. I have my orders to bring you in alive!"

The terror on Guizaro's face broke instantaneously. In one moment, the mob lord was groveling at L's feet. "Oh my god! You're not him! You're not him! The lord has not abandoned me yet!" Guizaro raised his hands, holding them close together in front of L; a sign of surrender. "Please, take me in! I'll go to court, I'll go to prison! I don't care! JUST GET ME OUT OF HERE!"

L pulled the handcuffs from his belt and fastened them around Guizaro's wrists. "You said before that I wasn't him. Who is him? Who were you expecting?"

"HIM! Him! Him! Him! Him! Him!" Guizaro repeated that single word like an obsessive chant. The man had lost it.

"It started a month ago," Guizaro's wife answered. The more L looked at her, the more she seemed to resemble a hawk; a keen and scared hawk. "My husband got a threatening letter, claiming that in one month's time, he would come to end my husband's life. At first, we thought nothing of it. My husband receives death threats all the time, so we simply ignored it all together. The next day, one of my husband's…employers…was found dead on our front door, with the number 30 carved on his chest. The very next day, inside my daughter's bedroom was the body of one of her classmates, with the number 29 carved on her corpse. The day after that, I found my best friend's body hanging from my balcony with the number 28 burned into his flesh."

"So it's safe to assume that this has been going on for a while?" L asked, pulling the sputtering Guizaro to his feet.

"Today is day zero." The wife replied, hugging her daughter closely. "You're not the one who wishes to kill my husband?"

"No, although the thought has crossed my mind frequently," L replied, giving Guizaro a hard shake. "If he's really after your lives, then you'd better come with me. Get your stuff and let's go. Now!" The wife and daughter jumped to L's orders. For people running for their lives, they were over packed. Was there really a need to pack your entire wardrobe of clothes into at least twenty different suitcases?

L could only sigh as he watched Guizaro's wife individually count off the number of suitcases she brought in order to make sure she had them all; it was really sad, since she couldn't even could to eight without forgetting what the next number was. He looked out the shattered window he entered through, watching the fire his grenade started slowly die in the distance. He didn't have much time before more of Guizaro's goons came back to check on their boss. He probably had even less time before the psycho targeting Guizaro and his family came for them. He had to be one seriously demented assassin to butcher so many people before going for his actually targets, making them suffer such a sick count down.

Butcher. Demented. Assassin. Targets. Coun down.

Psycho killer.

L had read about it once. In the most secure files of The COMPANY's database. A killer. His origin was unknown. His age was unknown. His height, weight, appearance, everything…everything was a mystery about this killer. There was one thing The COMPANY did know: this unsub loved to kill. This killer had assassinated 3 Presidents, 88 prominent White House figures, 1,843 marines of the U.S., and more than 35,877 innocent civilians of the United States of America over that past fifteen years. That was in the United States alone. This killer liked to travel. His total, worldwide headcount had already long surpassed the millions.

The most wanted killer in the entire world. The world named him Death.

There was absolutely no connection between Death and this case, but the more L thought about it, the more and more a sense of dread nestled itself in his stomach.

"Boss, boss!"

L snapped his head towards a radio strapped to one of the three dead body guards in the room. L swiped it and tossed it to Guizaro. "You tell your men I'm here and I cut off your lips. You'll need your tongue for court." L spoke darkly into Guizaro's ear.

Guizaro gave L a stiff nod of understanding. But when Guizaro raised the radio to speak into it, he never had the time to answer.

"HELP! BOSS, HELP US, HELP! NOOOOOOO!"

"HE'S HERE, HE'S HERE! GAAAAAAAH!"

"NO! I DON'T WANT TO DIE!"

"!"

Silence pursued after the screams of the damned ceased. All the blood in Guizaro's face seemed to have drained to his feet. His wife was equally pale, and his daughter had the most terrified face a five year old could have. For the first time in L's life, he felt afraid. His heart hammered against his chest, the blood pounded in his ears, and his back was spewing nervous sweat.

When a voice came from the radio in Guizaro's hand, L's fear made him reflexively point his pistol at the device. In response, Guizaro yelped, tossing the radio onto the floor.

"Hey, baby! I hope you're having a wonderful night. I know I am."

The voice was eerie yet cheerful, like a hippy Lucifer was speaking to L. He could feel the hairs on his arm stand on end beneath his black camouflage suit. "Who the hell are you?"

"Me? Oh, I'm nobody to worry about! I'm just here to kill everyone in this little playground! But by all means, don't surrender! Struggle! Fight for your lives! Gnash your teeth and fight for that last inch of life I'll be cutting from you!"

L's trigger finger twitched. "You're insane!"

"And I like it that way! The world is so pretty from this point of view! Now, here's how the rest of your life is going to work out! I'm going to kill the old hag. Then I'm going to kill the brat. Then I'm going to kill you. Finally, after that, I'll kill fatty. Okay with you?"

L blasted the radio to pieces, emptying his entire magazine into the device.

"I'm so glad you understand."

L nearly jumped out of his skin. The same voice on the radio was now coming from behind him, inside the safe house. L twisted on the spot while simultaneously reloading his pistol. When he turned to face the voice, he fired off four bullets. Whatever had spoken, it dodged the bullets L fired at it, twisting and turning like a giant snake.

"Get out of here!" L ordered Guizaro and his family, shooting one bullet after another at the mysterious figure, which used its supernatural reflexes to dodge each and every bullet. Even before L could use his last two bullets, the figure sent something at L, knocking his pistol clean from his hands. The moment L felt his gun leave the tip of his fingers, his hands flashed for his V-13 knives on his belt.

He was too slow. He was barely able to draw his knives an inch from their sheaths before the figure sent a flurry of blows all across L's body. One second, L was on his feet. The next second, L was on his knees, his head bowed and his vision shaking.

A hand tore off L's black mask and patted his head, ruffling about his hair. "I thought I told you, you naughty boy. You're third to die. Wait right here." The figure whispered, licking the edged of L's ear.

L couldn't move, and he knew why. At first, he thought he had been disabled by a random storm of blows delivered by the unknown subject. Now that the initial shock was passing and pain was flowing through his nerves, L knew none of the attacks he suffered were random. Each blow was delivered to a major part of the human body: joints, nerve points, and pressure points. These blows were inflicted by a man with intimate knowledge of how to destroy the human body.

Move, move, move! L kept this single thought running about his mind, trying to use sheer willpower to operate his immobile body. He could barely move the tips of his fingers. All he could do was rest on his knees with his head hunched over like a stone gargoyle.

Thud! If L had his motor control, he would have jumped. Guizaro's wife had fall the floor, right in front of L's bowed face. No, not all of Guizaro's wife, only her head. Her head was rolling in front of L's eyes. Her look of terror was stiffly engraved on her bodiless head.

No, no, no! L felt his neck muscles fall back under his control, but all he could do was raise his head to see a sight he did not want to see. The moment he looked up, he saw the killer plunge his knife directly into the daughter's head. The kill was too clean, as the killer's knife entered and exit the five-year old girl's head like water. Like a puppet with her strings cut, the girl slumped to the ground, and the killer cackled with a malicious giggle.

Anger pumped through L's veins like a poison. He pulled out his two V-13 knives and lunged at the killer. The killer turned his head and faced L, countering L's two blades with a pair of bloody serrated blades. L jumped back, putting some distance between himself and the assassin.

Calm down, L ordered himself, raising his V-13 knives into a defensive stance. I'm a trained agent of The COMPANY! I don't let anger rule my emotions! Concentrate! Think! Observe! Don't fog the mind, clear it! I'll win, and I'll kill this bastard! L took a single deep breath, tightened the grip on his knives, and glared at his opponent.

His face was covered with a white mask with narrow eye slits and a thin mouth line; it put a sneer on the mask's surface. He also wore a hood, covering the back of his head as well as his hair. He was about five-eleven, maybe six feet tall. He wore a black robe-jacket that touched the ground, along with a black vest, pants, gloves, and boots. His jacket fit his body like a second skin, layering his well muscled body. By the looks of it, this assassin didn't use guns, but had a massive assortment of knives stashed in his robe-jacket: throwing knives, cleavers, slicers, folding knives, and even machetes. There was even something that resembled a claymore strapped on his back. This manic killer dodged all of L's bullets while being weighed down by that much steel?

"Ah! You like my collection?" the assassin asked in a jubilant voice. "I must admit, I'm quite proud of it myself!"

"No firearms?" L demanded, expertly handling his knives in his hands. He had to be prepared for any sudden movements.

"What's the fun in that?" the assassin laughed, juggling the pair of serrated knives in his hands like a circus act. "Want to know who my first playmate was? My adopted father! Killed him, bang, bang, bang! Three shots to his head! The second was his wife! Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang! Two pieces of lead to her head and three to her stomach! Aw, I was never more proud of myself! From then, I killed their brothers, their sisters, their cousins, their grand-daddies and grand-mommies, everyone who they were related to!"

"You really are insane," L growled.

"I sure am!" the assassin cackled, twitched his body with each chuckle. "Killing is so fun! But shooting was getting boring. It took the fun out of everything, you know what I mean? So I started with knives. I love them, all of them! I like mah big swords and my little ones!" the assassin continued to laugh, making obscene body gestures. "I can feel the life leaving their bodies with every cut I make, I can see the terror in their eyes every time I stab them, and there's NO greater joy than that! You get what I'm saying, pal?"

"Yeah, I get what you're saying. You're a sick freak that loves to kill."

"Yes, yes! You understand me! I'm so happy, man!"

L started to circle the assassin, and the assassin mimicked L's footsteps. "But here's what I don't get. Why are you targeting these people? Why did you kill that girl? She was only five! Were you hired by some rival gang? Did someone pay you to kill this man?" L demanded, jerking his chin at handcuffed Guizaro, who was sobbing at his wife's headless body.

The assassin's mirth instantly disappeared. Even with his mask on, L knew the man was scowling. "No, man, no! Don't you get it? I thought you'd get it! Aw, no one understands me these days! I feel lonely, dude! Man, do you even know who I am? What my name is?"

"Of course I do! You're Death, the most wanted mass murderer in the entire world! A bloody, evil, psychopath killer!"

The assassin sighed. "That's not my name. That's not my name, that's not my name, that's not my name! It's a stupid name you idiots gave me without asking for my permission! Fine, whatever!"

"Why don't you start by answering the first question! Why did you choose to attack these people? Was it for money? How much were you paid? Answer!"

At first, the assassin didn't answer. He twiddled his knives, like he was considering whether or not he should even bother answering. The wait continued to stretch, moving from seconds to minutes. L readjusted his grip on his knives, trying to keep his palms from sweating. He gave Guizaro, who was now staring over his dead daughter, a quick glance to make sure the man was still alive.

A mistake. The instant L's eyes wandered off the assassin, the killer was suddenly only a few inches from L's face. L barely had the time to react, dodging the assassin's knives by a hair's width by sharply twisting his waist. He could see the tip of the assassin's blade pass right by his eyes, slicing off a few of his eyelashes. L quickly retaliated, brining the knife in his left hand up to defend himself while swinging the knife in his right towards the assassin's jugular. No go, the assassin's unnatural speed let him block L's attack with his own knife.

L continued to slash and jab at the assassin, alternating knives and hands, always using one for offense and one for defense. No matter how L attacked, it was like trying to cut air. Even with the assassin right in front of L's face, no matter how hard or precisely he struck, nothing landed.

He couldn't win. Years of training and actual combat told him that he was outmatched. With each failed attacked, a deeper pit of despair swelled at the pit of his stomach. What was he going to do? He couldn't tell if he opponent was serious or not. His M-10 Pistol was empty. His carbon fiber wire was useless in this situation. He couldn't force the assassin to take the poison capsule. What was he going—?

Slice.

L watched a spurt of blood start gushing from his right wrist. When? How? The assassin had just attacked L, slashing open his wrist, but when? How did he do it? L didn't see anything, and L didn't have time to stop and think about it. Instead, he lowered his bleeding right hand and stabbed at the assassin with the knife in his left hand.

Slice.

Again. To L's eyes, the assassin's two knife-wielding hands were outstretched at his side. So why was there a fresh knife wound pierced in L's left hand? Why?

"That's right!" the assassin screamed in rapture. "Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle! Struggle!" With each scream, the assassin slashed open L's body. By the fourteen cut, L was on his back, and the assassin was on top of him, lifting and dropping his knives as he continued his mindless chanting.

When the assassin was done, L was barely alive. He could still feel his body, and he knew it had been torn apart beyond healing. L coughed once, and his head tilted to the side.

Before the last drop of life seeped from L's wounds, he saw the assassin stroll over to Guizaro with his claymore in both his hands. The last words L heard were, "Body zero, my little piggy. Body zero."

O – O – O

He plunged his Master Blade into fatty's chest, letting the ecstasy of the kill roll off His body in a wave of pleasure that made His body twitch. He twisted His Master Blade just for the fun of it before yanking it out of the corpse. He swung His massive claymore in a wide circle, letting the blood ark from its tip.

"Nicely done, Death."

He chuckled, stabbing His Master Blade into the ground and turning around like a pole dancer. Someone He missed? How rare. No matter. Just another piggy to put down.

He faced forward and raised an eyebrow behind His mask. "Whoa man, whoa! I'm so sorry, bro! Did I just kill your twin bro or something?" Standing in front of Him was a man, taller He was, but dressed in retro-black armor. The guy was the spitting image of the man He'd just killed; stout, red hair, muscular, and odd green skin. The only difference was the guy breathing in front of Him was a bad man. The one He just cut to bits and pieces, He was a good man. He could tell.

"Suffice to say, you did me a favor, Death." The armored man in front of Him said. "My name is Ganondorf, the Great King of Evil. The man you killed, the one who looks like me. His name was Ganon L. Dorf. Hard to believe that there is actually a dimension that houses a good me, but I suppose anything is possible. I came here to kill him myself, but it seems you've done the deed for me. It's a pity that I won't be able to harvest his power for myself, since I failed to kill my alternate self by my own hands, but my current power is already sufficient."

"Whoa, man, whoa! Hold up!" He raised his hands, scratching His hooded head. "Dimension? Collect his power? Alternate self? Sounds awesome! Think you can hook me up on whatever you're on?"

The man calling himself Ganondorf laughed. "Certainly. I've been looking for an individual such as yourself. My recent subordinates have proven to be less than adequate. You would prove to be a valuable asset to my growing army!"

He raised his Master Blade, letting it rest on Ganondorf's shoulder, right next to Ganondorf's neck. "Whoa, buddy, whoa! Hold your horses! I don't work for nobody! Never have, never will! Why would I want to be buddy-buddy with you?"

Ganondorf placed a finger at the edge of His Master Blade and pushed it aside like it was a play toy. "Do you wish to become strong?"

He smiled. "You bet, buddy. More muscles on my biceps would make me look hot. I'd be smokin."

"Well I can tell you how. All you have to do is kill a few individuals for me."

He smiled, licking His lips with His scarred tongue. "Sounds too wonderful to be true."

"Oh, but it is true. Just do what I say, and you'll have more power than you could possibly imagine."

He cackled. "I've got a big imagination."

"No doubt. Before I tell you this little secret of mine, answer a question for me. Why did you pick this pitiful mortal to hunt?" Ganondorf stared repulsively at fatty's corpse. "I'm sure Ganon L. Dorf asked you the same question, but I don't remember you answering."

"It's simple man! The guy was loaded!" He replied, laughing all the while.

"You did this for wealth?"

"No, dude! He's rich! That means if I freaked him out enough, he'd buy tons of playmates for me to kill! Get it? Get it?"

Ganondorf smiled. "Interesting. I'm liking you more and more, Death."

"Death ain't my name bub. Get the facts straight before you try to make friends."

"My apologies. What is your name?"

This time, it was His turn to smile. He pulled back his hood and removed His mask. He yawned, stretching His angled jaw and brushing His gold hair from His face. He looked at Ganondorf with His blue eyes, and from Ganondorf's expression, He knew that Ganondorf was startled by His appearance.

"My name is Link."


Chapter 7 of the not-so-frequently-updated-story of Legend of Zelda, Breaking Dimensions. Chapter 8 probably won't be for a while.