Worthwhile mistakes

An: phew….sorry this took so long. I've had so much going on with school and other things; my time for writing was cut down severally. As always enjoy and review!

Annie wished she had been able to follow Link into the mines. But it was not possible for her to, until recently she had been unable to defend herself with any skill; and even if she had been ready to enter the temple, she would not have made it far without iron boots like Links. She realized these things all far too late, as she lay sprawled across her bed; wide awake in the middle of the night. She hadn't been able to sleep for a long time now, each night her dark self crept through her dreams; it felt to her like that was where the dark mass had escaped to, her dreams and her mind. While awake her dark self was but a whisper of a memory, but as she entered sleep her shadow became her nightmare; only allowing her a few hours of sleep each night.

So she lay on her back thinking of what ever happened to cross her mind, while tracing the lines in the ceiling like she had done after king bulbin kidnapped her. Tonight though Annie felt restless, she couldn't just stay in her room like she had been, so she grabbed her weapons and quietly slipped out of the building. There was no particular direction or place she was headed, Annie just wandered where ever her feet happened to take her. The moon was full and the air cool, soothing her mind and relaxing her body. Many times when she had been stressed or troubled Annie would walk through the wilderness around her home, and she hoped a walk through Hyrule would work as well as it had in the past.

Annie did not head towards the cemetery like she had so many times before, but towards Hyrule field. She knew it was dangerous but she needed to be out in the wilderness, not in the small town; at the moment it held far too many bad memories that she needed to get away from, and the possibility of a minor battle could help to distract her from her own thoughts. Even at night the field was full of monsters and various other types of life. Within seconds she had surveyed what she could see of the field and had begun thinking of the best way to navigate through it. And it surprised her how much more aware of her surroundings she was now, compared to when she first entered Hyrule; looking back it was astounding how much of a difference there was between then and now, and what she could accomplish on her own without the help of Link. It felt wonderful to be outside in the wilderness, out of the houses and sharp angles of humanity; and into the gentle curves of nature, but she was still mindful of the various monsters lurking around. Annie had no idea where she was going, or if she wanted to go back to Kakariko so she called Epona; not wanting to be stuck somewhere without a way to escape. Annie had a feeling that tonight she would end up much farther from Kakariko than she had originally planned, and Epona soon appeared so she walked through the night with a hand on the horse's reins and refused to think of anything stressful.

Everything was peaceful in the night; even most of the monsters were lethargic and made no move to attack her. It was moments like this that she wished could last forever; there were no epic battles for her to fight, no immediate problems to deal with, and nothing expected of her at the moment. As Eldin's bridge came into view Annie climbed up into the saddle, trusting the horse more than herself to not fall of the edge; and only loosely guided the horse towards the bridge, allowing Epona to partially choose her own path.

As they crossed the great bridge Annie couldn't help but gape at the shear depth of the canyon and its grandeur. She could barely remember her first real visit here, and to be honest Annie didn't really want to either; she had only vague memories of what it was like and what it felt like to be so high above the ground. It was much like what she imagined the Grand Canyon was like, only you couldn't see the bottom even on the sunniest of days. Annie wondered what kind of creatures lived at the bottom, and if it was like the creatures that lived at the bottom of the ocean. Strange and foreign to everyone who lived in Hyrule, she almost wished it was possible to visit the floor of the canyon so she could find out.

Eventually though Annie returned her focus to where she was currently headed, and she half expected the road to be blocked by some sort of rock slide. But to her surprise it wasn't, so Annie steered Epona towards the opening and let herself relax; she leaned back against the rolled up supplies and the back of the saddle, closed her eyes and let Epona find her own way. Annie focused on what she could feel and hear, there wasn't much to see in the shallow fissure; so she allowed herself the possibility of long needed sleep. It was amazing how much better she felt, and how much of a difference the fresh air made in her mood.

The next sensation she felt was that of weightlessness, immediately followed by severe pain. Annie must have fallen asleep because even with the pain it took her a while to register these things; there were a few noises off to her side, which caused her to panic more than anything else. And when Annie opened her eyes Epona was nowhere to be seen, and she was being fired at from above; she took a 5 second inventory of what she still had with her, and rolled to the side trying to avoid another volley of arrows. As soon as she was out of the way Annie grabbed her bow and tried to nock an arrow as fast she could manage; but she fumbled with the arrow on account of her own nervousness, and it occurred to her that she only had a few arrows left. Not enough to finish all of the bulbins on the ridge.

She fired a couple arrows into the group of enemies, but she wasted no time trying to discern if she had killed any of them; and instead tried to seek shelter from the angry volley aimed at her. If she had killed any, it hadn't made any difference so there was no need to give it another thought. So Annie ran; looking for any place to escape into, and would provide a respite from her attackers. But Annie hadn't the slightest clue as to where she was, or which direction she was now running; there was no way to tell if Epona had turned around and headed back towards Kakariko and her master. As she ran though the amount of arrows being fired never changed, bulbins were lined up on the top of the fissure seemingly the whole way; and she began to panic. There was no way she would realistically be able to dodge that many arrows for an extended amount of time.

She frantically searched for any kind of alcove that would provide decent cover, but there always seemed to be a bulbin directly above them. Her legs were starting to burn, and her lungs felt like they were on fire; but she pushed her self-onwards determined not to die in such a sad way. Annie made herself think of it, and imagine how it would end if she collapsed here and now; she was willing to try anything in order to keep herself moving.

She could see it now; she saw herself dropping into a pile, coughing and gasping for air. While also attempting to pull herself away from the arrows that would undoubtedly be getting close to hitting their mark; and then she saw herself splayed across the dirt, with a myriad of arrows penetrating her body. The image caused Annie to gag, and she pushed the thought aside before she ended up choking on her own vomit. It was then that Annie spotted a small cave off to her right; she meant to jump the small ledge in front of the entrance, but she ended up falling into it instead.

She was tempted to just lie there, but Annie was sure the bulbins would still be able to hit her from this angle. So she pulled herself to her feet and made her way into the cave, as far as she could tell it only had one tunnel; if it was a dead end and the bulbins decided to follow her, she could be worse off than she was originally. So she hurried to find another branch in the cave, or where ever it happened to exit.

Annie was amazed when she came to the end of the cave, and now found herself in a rundown town; and it took her a few moments to realize exactly where she was. She was in the hidden village, but looking back Annie wasn't sure if she was any safer here. It was slightly harder to see in the village due to the rock walls surrounding the whole town, and she crept to the closest thing providing any kind of cover, which was the broken sign identifying the town. Annie sat there for a while, catching her breath and also looking and listening for any of the bulbins that were supposed to be there. After her breathing had quieted enough for her to actually hear, it was strangely quiet; she had expected to hear the yelps and hollers of multiple bulbins, but it was silent; finally. Annie relaxed against the pole, utterly exhausted; it was an idiotic decision but she had no intention of moving for a while. She didn't care if the bulbins came after her, she was in desperate need of sleep and she was going to die happy if it came to that.