Chapter Twenty-Five: Gerudo Mining Complex
Title: Legend of Zelda - The True Force
Chapter: 25
Author: Hikari no Vikki
Genre: Action/Adventure
Disclaimer: Would I be writing this if I owned these franchises? Well, even if I were, I'd be busy making it a reality instead of leaving it here to gather cyber dust on a data sever somewhere. (Because really, what else is it doing?)
Description: A modern Hyrule is in chaos. After reconstruction from the receding sea, the New Hyrule is literally built from the ashes of the Old Kingdom. However, history is destined, or rather, determined to repeat itself.
Author's Notes-
No luck on the job… wish me luck while I continue searching, I guess.
As for progress? We're getting there.
(Been drawing a bunch of junk to get my mind off the job bust. Listening to Harry Potter audiobooks… should have some time before the next one is available for download so now I'm here, writing this.)
Don't really know where we're going to end up, but hey… here we go! :D
It felt like they were in the dark for a very long time. The desert nights were cold, and this left Ashei and the rest of them shivering in the ladder shaft while they climbed deep into the dark. The earth around them smelled of sweat and tasted heavily of tangy metal, bits of grime and dirt worming its way into their teeth and hair.
The metal ladder was even colder under their hands, and eventually they could hardly feel their limbs as most of the heat had left them after a couple minutes.
"Ashei?" Link whispered when he realized that he couldn't feel his feet even though he knew that they'd been wrapped securely within a thick pair of socks and his boots were quite snugly fit around his calves. She grunted in response, trying to lick her lips so that she could coax them into moving and forming proper words.
"Can you see anything?" he asked after he'd taken her grunt for an admission of acknowledgement. She moved her head in what she hoped was the direction further down, and she was surprised to see that she could.
"Actually…" she managed to reply breathlessly, "I can. I see the first docking point just down below. Hold on for just a few more moments."
Somewhere above her, she could hear Anakin groan in irritation.
"Yeah, easy for you to say, you'll be the first to reach it!" And shortly following that: "Anakin, be polite. Though, I must admit you are right; but still that's no excuse for rudeness…" That one was Obi-Wan. And then Anakin again: "Sorry, Master."
Just as Link's resulting chuckles reached her ears, Ashei was also reaching the entrance to the first docking point. It was just large and wide enough that a fully-grown adult of about Link's size could pass through, with a slightly rounded edge at the top of the threshold. Looking behind her across her shoulder, she could also see that there was – thankfully – a mine cart waiting parked on the edge of the tracks, and the dim light of the moon filled the chamber that contained it.
"There's a cart in this one," she called up to them, "I suppose that Link and I will take it." Carefully she bridged the gap and used the well-placed railing on the sides of the door to pull her through. Steadying herself and stretching out her stiff muscles, she looked around, noticing that there were all sorts of electronic maps and charts all along the south wall, since the north one was occupied by the lever that Quill had mentioned would summon a cart if there wasn't one available.
She walked just a bit closer to study them as Link was sliding into the room after her. The largest of the maps seemed to be a complete schematic of the whole layout: with both sides of the canyon's blueprints displayed as a three-dimensional on a two-dimensional space.
By that point Anakin had passed the doorway but she could just see the back of Obi-Wan's head as he was descending.
"Obi-Wan," she called in a hushed whisper, "wait!" He paused, glancing back around. "Yes, Ashei?" She turned back to the digital schematic, combing the image quickly. "There are a total of seven levels on either side of the canyon, but only the far northern sections have levels six and seven. There seems to be some kind of machine in the northern section along with some holding areas on the top level that appear to be classified…"
She muttered something under her breath as she fiddled with the image upon discovering that it could be manipulated by touch. Obi-Wan whispered for Anakin to wait a moment so that he could catch Ashei's next words.
"If you would check those out for me while looking for a way back to the surface on the other side, that would be nice. There seem to be holding cells on the south side too, but they're much smaller and are actually labeled 'Correctional Facilities' or some such. I think, if Mutoh's men are still alive somewhere then that's where they'll be. Link and I will keep an eye out while we look for our own way back to the surface. Got all that?"
Obi-Wan nodded. "Yeah, I think so. I'm a little curious about that machine, and something labeled as classified is never good… do be careful, you two."
"You as well," Link replied.
After a few moments, Anakin and Obi-Wan were properly out of sight, having disappeared back into the darkness of the dim, chilly ladder shaft.
Link glanced over at the mine cart, a thin trapezoidal box made of several thin sheets of shiny metal with two seats built in and set upon an iron base welded firmly to two sets of axles on the tracks. Strange swirling symbols glowed on the metal facing the outside, and Ashei guessed that it was some form of the written Gerudo language. She noticed Link giving it a skeptical once over and walked forward, running her hands over the sides.
"Don't worry," she told him, "these are sheets of atomically bonded titanium." She knelt, her fingers trailing the glowing markings in the metal, magic sparking beneath her hands wherever they touched. It reminded her of the way the words on the wall of the Shadow Temple's entrance had responded to her.
"Looks like they've been reinforced with strings of brightsteel, too. It's a kind of precious magical gemstone that makes any other metal its melted or decorated with nearly unbreakable." She stood, nodding as if in approval.
"I don't know what they're doing here," she said quietly after a few more moments, "but they're not fooling around. This is serious business, and from what Mutoh told us, it's been going on for a while." She looked up and over again at Link. "Well, we'd better get going. And I wouldn't worry about the height: the cart looks to be programmed to follow the electrical pulses along the tracks, and I saw that there was plenty of scaffolding holding the tracks in place." She gestured with one hand towards the edge of the moonlit exit.
Finally, Link seemed to stuff his trepidation somewhere as dark and deep as the shaft behind them and climbed into the cart with Ashei. There was no visible method of propulsion, but once the two of them were inside the lights on the cart glowed all at once and it began to move forward on its own, following the electrical currents along the metal tracks towards the other side.
"You know," Link muttered idly as they were approaching the other side of the canyon, "you'd think that after everything I've done, things like heights wouldn't bother me much anymore…"
Ashei scoffed lightly, though Link could tell she was simply amused by her relaxed expression.
"Auru… my father… well, he told me once that being courageous didn't necessarily mean that you were unafraid. It just meant that you were doing what needed to be done… in spite of your fear."
She smiled at him, and the light of the moon caught her eyes for a moment just before they were plunged into half darkness again, turning them into two orbs of sparkling silver. He nodded just as they were passing back into the canyon walls and the cart slowed to a stop at the end of the line.
The two of them climbed out again and Ashei quickly made for the maps on the south side of the wall so that she could study them a bit closer. Link stood next to her on her left, checking another map that displayed the railway paths that were inside the underground complex. Most of the maps glowed a soft electric blue with most of the writing colored white or black depending on the value of the backdrop.
Ashei reached up and tapped a section of the complex that was labeled 'Correctional Facilities', and then tapped at the spot that the map proclaimed to be their current location.
"Computer, please give the quickest route," she said experimentally, not really expecting anything to happen. However, the map responded, and a glowing red path began to draw itself from their location to the other part of the complex she had tapped on.
Blinking in surprise, she also noticed a black button on the far right near the corner that read in bold white letters: 'DISPLAY LIFE SIGNS.' Frowning, she tapped it, and the color changed from black with white letters to cherry red with black letters and now read 'HIDE LIFE SIGNS' instead. Immediately white spots began to pop up all over the map of the complex, and Link glanced over the map with increasing interest.
"Look there," he said, pointing to a cluster of the other white dots strewn throughout the complex. They all seemed to be moving back and forth in a set pattern, like a patrol. "Those must be the Gerudo guards inside the mine complex." Ashei nodded, and pointed to four stationary points set at four separate locations in the 'Correctional Facilities.'
"And those must be Mutoh's men. Looks like they're all still on this same floor, but…" She tapped the 'Correctional Facilities' again and spoke in a clear voice, "Computer, show exit routes."
Several paths, each one a different color, branched out to complete the task the computer had been given. Ashei's brow furrowed slightly in worry. "There are a total of three exits from the facilities that Mutoh's men are being held in, and one of those is the main entrance." Carefully, without tapping the screen, she pointed to the most heavily guarded spot near the area.
"The western exit is the one we would need to find a way back to the surface, and the eastern exit would be the best for the carpenters to use…" She trailed off again, and slowly tapped the spot where they were currently standing. Once more she asked the computer to display the fastest way back to the surface (other than the way they'd come) and it appeared to be a much faster and safer alternative than the way through the facilities where Mutoh's men were being held. Link glanced in Ashei's direction.
"So… what do you want to do?"
Ashei met his gaze with some measure of exasperation.
"I was hoping you would know. I mean, I get that it's imperative we find the Temple, free the last Sage and slay the Evil King as quickly as possible, but…" she turned back to the map to stare, frustrated, at the 'Correctional Facilities' section of the screen. Sighing deeply she continued, in a much softer voice, "I'd rather not leave them there to die. Because, you know they will… die, I mean, if we leave them there. Monsters are one thing, but people?" Ashei shook her head. "I just… I couldn't do it."
Link glanced up at the map, studying the path to the facility and mentally redrawing the map in his head that showed where each of the carpenters was being held.
"Well then," he replied softly, "let's not." She turned to Link to see him wink at her and a soft smile teased his lips gently upwards.
"What?" she asked, bewildered. Link shrugged. "Let's not let them die. I'd rather not either, to be honest, and while I don't know how hard it would be to sneak past these Gerudo, at least we'd be inside the facilities ourselves if we got caught." Ashei frowned.
"That's one way of thinking about it… anyway, as for going undetected, I'm sure we could charm our arrows or your Longshot so that the tips are blunted and we could knock them out pretty easily. If worst comes to worst, I'm not about to go into captivity quietly, now." Link chuckled. "Yeah, that'd be just like you to resist it right up until you couldn't."
He glanced over the map again, but he frowned when he saw two white dots four levels below theirs.
"Hmm. Looks like Anakin and Obi-Wan couldn't find any other way across except through the fifth level…" Ashei shrugged. "It'll give Obi-Wan a chance to check out whatever that machine is if he really wants to… well, we should go." She tapped the life signs button again and the screen was cleared of them at once.
"Computer, return to default display settings."
And then the screen no longer displayed either the exit routes or the quickest route to their destination. "Come on," she said to Link, and the two of them exited the docking point and entered the Gerudo Mining Complex.
.oOo.
After Obi-Wan and Anakin had finally made it over to the other side, they too had decided to check out the map in the western docking point's cart holding cell. Obi-Wan was checking out routes to the bottom levels and from the bottom levels to the top, while Anakin was observing the smaller lists and holo-charts off to the side.
He finally came to a chart that listed the things the mine collected and for what purpose they were being used, and he found something that struck him as, well… odd.
"Master?" Anakin hissed in a soft whisper. Obi-Wan glanced over to his right, where Anakin was standing.
"Yes, Anakin?"
Anakin frowned, pointing to but not tapping the list he'd spotted on the holo-board. "This compound here… heavy water? I've seen it before, but I don't remember where. And why is its purpose listed as classified? All of the minerals and metals that are being mined have specific purposes listed except this one. Why?"
Obi-Wan's gaze shifted from the map of the complex until it came to rest on the item that had piqued his padawan's interest. His eyes narrowed.
"Hmm. Heavy water is also known as deuterium oxide. Deuterium is a kind of isotope of hydrogen that, instead of having a single electron, has a proton and a neutron, making it 'heavier' than normal hydrogen." Anakin nodded. "And thus the reason why it is called 'heavy' water?"
Obi-Wan hummed in agreement. "Yes, that's why. But heavy water isn't supposed to be a natural resource, though perhaps…"
"Perhaps it is here?" Anakin finished hesitantly. Obi-Wan shrugged.
"That might be the case. I remember hearing about a planet that mined for heavy water once in my youth. They mined it because their options for space travel were very limited at the time, and heavy water was used in certain kinds of reactors to produce a radioactive isotope of hydrogen called tritium. These elements were then thrown into a basic fusion reactor that could power small spacecraft out of the atmosphere and into the vacuum of space."
"So that's where I've seen it before," Anakin mumbled, "fusion reactors…"
Suddenly Obi-Wan turned back to the map, staring intently at the paths the computer had drawn for him and the white dots that represented the signs of any living creature in the complex.
"If that is what they're trying to do, I'd like to be certain about it." Obi-Wan said quietly, his eyes flickering to the elevator shaft that was the only way down to the sixth level.
"Looks like we'll have to brave the lift after all."
Anakin nodded. "But what about the guards? Are we going to try to sneak past them, or…?" He trailed off, waiting for his master to answer the rest of his unspoken question. Obi-Wan folded his arms and sighed. "That is the plan, yes. But if we are unable to do that, then we'll have to set our blasters to stun and do it that way." He reached up a hand to massage his temple in the hopes of relieving some of the pressure.
"I'd rather not go about it that way, but if we must, we must."
He stood up straighter, spoke the command to return the display settings to default, and turned around to face the docking point's exit. Jerking his head in that direction, Anakin nodded silently in reply and the two of them headed out of the room and into the maze of dimly lit tunnels, lifts, and Gerudo guards.
.oOo.
It felt like the two of them had spent an eternity padding softly through the shadows, ducking behind crates of stones and minerals and even using the occasional mine cart to escape the gaze of the Gerudo guards. (Obi-Wan was less keen on using the mine carts to hide in, mostly since doing so required bouts of speed and stamina that he just couldn't replicate every other minute like Anakin could. )
But after a few breaks to catch their breaths, one or two close calls, and at least one time where they had to use force to knock out a guard, they had finally made it to the lift they were looking for.
"Are you sure this is the one?" Anakin hissed, jogging as softly as he possibly could as he was coming back from wherever he'd hidden the guard's body.
Obi-Wan nodded firmly, his gaze flicking to a plaque tacked beside the door.
"Level Five, Reactor Lift. I should think so. Mostly because the only direction it goes is, eh… down."
Anakin blinked, noticing the arrow-shaped button underneath a yellow sign with a striped black border that read, 'AUTHORIZED PERSONEL ONLY'.
"Ah. Right. Well, shall we?"
Obi-Wan turned back to the closed lift and pressed the button, and the two of them waited with baited breath as the compartment inside made its way up to them. Anakin was so tense when the doors opened that his hand jerked reflexively towards his lightsaber, but before Obi-Wan had time to stop him, Anakin had managed to do it on his own.
"No life signs," he managed to gasp through an anxious breath when Obi-Wan gave him an odd look, "Couldn't sense any through the Force." Obi-Wan turned back to the elevator, which was empty as Anakin had said it would be, and the two of them shuffled inside. Once the doors had closed and a small electric light flickered to life above them, Obi-Wan pressed the second of the three circular buttons, this one being labeled with the number six.
"You get better at that every day," Obi-Wan remarked as he leaned against one side of the lift. Anakin shrugged. "And it wasn't even my idea. It just… sort of came to me, like when I knew that icicle was going to fall in the Ice Cavern." He paused, frowning. "Why does it feel like that was a long time ago? It's been what… a few days?"
"It's the Force looking out for you, I suppose," Obi-Wan replied quietly.
"As for the other thing… we've done a lot in those few days. With little time in between to stop and think about things, it does feel like what happened four days ago seems more like four weeks, or four years."
Anakin nodded, seeming to accept his master's explanation.
"I wonder how we're supposed to know what to look for," Anakin mused as the lift finally began to slow to a stop. "I mean, it's not like either of us knows what a heavy water reactor looks like…" He glanced over at Obi-Wan.
"Do you?" he asked, as if the thought had just occurred to him. "Know what one looks like?"
Obi-Wan didn't have time to answer him, because just then the doors of the lift opened up to a balcony that ran around the length of what appeared to be a large room about two stories high. Rectangular in shape, a few metal catwalks joined either of the opposite sides of the room together, seemingly held in place with only a few screws and several thick wires attached to the ceiling.
Below them, bathed in the red-orange glow of the soft lights attached to the bottoms of the catwalks, was a giant metal cylinder and a smaller, rectangular chamber about a quarter of the height of the cylinder that was made of a similar material. A large, box-shaped tube connected the two objects and several holes in the side of the large cylinder were emitting dense clouds of smoke and steam.
The two Jedi exited the lift and approached the railing bolted to the balcony so that they could get a better look at the rest of the room.
"I would guess that this is what a heavy reactor looks like," Obi-Wan muttered quietly. Anakin scanned the floor, which, while absent of guards and scientists, appeared to be littered with large barrels labeled with words like processed heavy water, tritium, and other fusion materials. Tables with lab equipment were placed in a line close to the wall just below them, and one in particular managed to catch his eye.
"Master? Look at that table down there. Those are blueprints, aren't they?"
Obi-Wan's gaze shifted to where Anakin was pointed, and again his eyes narrowed in suspicion. "That they are, Padawan." He looked back towards his right where a black metal staircase led from the sixth level down to the seventh.
"Is it just me, Master," Anakin began again as they descended the stairs, "or does the air in here kind of… tingle? And not in a good way."
Obi-Wan hummed in acknowledgement. "No, it's not just you. I told you, tritium is a radioactive isotope. In small quantities it wouldn't normally affect people, but because these Gerudo are producing it in such larger amounts…" He sighed, wiping a bit of sweat that had begun to pool on his brow. "The radiation is affecting our perceptions of heat and cold, even if only slightly."
Glancing up, he murmured to no one in particular, "Probably why they've got so many fans up there. But there's no one on shift here, so they aren't in operation right now."
He didn't mention it to Anakin, but Obi-Wan could also tell that the air tasted ever so slightly of the kind of processed air that was usually filtered through spacecraft ventilation systems. That… and, for some reason, plastic. Though he couldn't guess at why it would taste like plastic of all things.
By now they were approaching the table that Anakin had pointed out from the sixth floor balcony, and as Obi-Wan was the first to reach it, he began rummaging through the various papers to get a few glimpses at what exactly the Gerudo were doing here.
Meanwhile, Anakin slid around the other side and picked up one of the portable holographic charts, flipping through its settings.
"Well," Obi-Wan muttered dully, "as far as I can see, these are just blueprints for the various machines behind us. Look here, this is the reactor building with instructions on how to repair the gravity pool, and the fuel building and detailed notes on keeping the fuel transfer's radiation levels at the safest capacity…" He let the blueprint he was holding fall back against the table.
"It's all in the common tongue, isn't it?" Anakin added, his eyes flicking over to the notes, hands still clasping the holo-chart. Obi-Wan nodded. "Had to be. This planet has long since had the ability to use and produce fuel for spacecraft, but we had assumed that the entire planet had the capability."
"And now it's becoming clear that wasn't the case," Anakin mused idly.
Obi-Wan straightened and took a step back from the table and its contents, running a hand through his hair. "So it seems. But if these people didn't have access to such materials beforehand–"
"They probably at least knew about them," Anakin interjected. "Wasn't this Ganondorf originally the head of the peacekeeping envoy between the Hylian and Gerudo people?" Slowly, Obi-Wan nodded. "So Ashei tells us…" Anakin nodded sharply in return. "Well it would certainly tick me off if I was part of a culture that didn't have a way to access other planets, but the culture I was as war with did." A short, barking laugh escaped Obi-Wan.
"So you're saying that what may have started out as an actual effort to make peace might have turned into an illusion just to get at the Hylian spacecraft?"
Anakin shrugged, still flipping through the holo-chart. "Maybe. It's entirely possible." But Obi-Wan seemed to disagree. "Surely this Ganondorf knew he could ask that the Hylians share their spaceflight technology?" He stared in Anakin's direction, but not really looking at him.
"That requires some measure of forgiveness, Master. And I have a feeling that these people don't exactly have it in spades. People of oppression an' all that."
Obi-Wan sighed deeply, pressing his right hand against his face.
"So what are you suggesting, Padawan? That they wanted to destroy what the Hylians had and build their own from what was left?" He let the hand that was covering his face fall to his side before meeting Anakin's gaze, instantly freezing when he saw exactly how serious Anakin's expression had become.
"Yes, Master. That's exactly what I'm saying."
And then Obi-Wan's gaze flickered to the holo-chart that Anakin was holding out for him to see. Behind the picture that took up about a quarter of the screen was yet another map of the complex, only none of the areas on this one were labeled classified. He took another look at the image that was displayed.
"Is that…?" Obi-Wan said slowly. Anakin turned it back around to face him and he frowned slightly. "I think so. But I'd like to have a look at those holding cells on the first floor." He tapped an empty part of the map on the screen and the image disappeared, and when he pressed a button on the bottom of the canister, the holo-chart disappeared as well.
"And now we have a map to lead the way," said Anakin, flashing his Master one of his best boyish grins. "Right," Obi-Wan replied, nodding. "Let's go before anyone discovers we've been here."
So they climbed the stairs and entered a different lift on the western side of the balcony and left the reactor chamber behind them.
.oOo.
"Hey, you! Look over here, inside the cell!"
Ashei paused, freezing instantly when the hissing voice reached her ears. She and Link had somehow made it into the correctional facilities without much incident, however that fact alone was making Ashei very nervous. She was alone in a strange place after all, since she and Link had agreed to split up to look for the carpenters.
The room she had been in the process of leaving was very dark, being lit only by a small florescent installation on the ceiling and a map like the one they had seen at the docking point. Several boxes were stacked at various heights along one wall and others littered the floor, with the other side of the room containing a holding cell with what appeared to be only darkness.
However, being cautiously optimistic, Ashei decided to turn around very slowly and comb the area with her eyes while she continued to question the voice until she could determine whom (or what) exactly she was talking to.
"I see nothing in the cell… mind coming closer to the light?" she prodded gently. And, to her amazement, the owner of the voice complied.
From within the shadows in the holding cell emerged a burly looking young man with wild curly brown hair wearing little except for some shoes, leg wraps, a pair of dusty red pants and a blue vest similar to the jacket that their leader, Mutoh, was always wearing.
"I have no idea where you come from," he whispered as Ashei crept closer, "but you must have a lot of guts to make it past all the guards around here!" She frowned at the young man in slight distaste, much as she tried to hide it.
"Guts, huh? I bet you thought it was something of a gutsy move to try and join the Gerudo, did you? I thought you would've had a bit more brains…"
The carpenter shrugged. "Yeah, I suppose. But, honest – I've seen the error of my ways… too late though, it seems." Ashei shook her head. "Your leader sent us to find you. I can get you out of here." His eyes, both of which she noticed were a rich brown color, gleamed hopefully. "Do you mean it?" Folding her arms across her chest, Ashei nodded. "Of course I do." The carpenter glanced around shiftily before scooting even closer to the bars.
"Then you should know that all of my fellow carpenters are imprisoned somewhere in here. If you can get us out of here, we'll repay the favor somehow! But be careful! There's sure to be Gerudo guards somewhere around here... woo! Watch out!"
Ashei's senses had gone on full blast even before the carpenter had managed to warn her. Immediately she rolled off to one side, hearing a loud yelp and the clang of metal on metal. She reached for her sword, and as she drew it, sparks of light magic scattered across the floor. The Gerudo woman jumped back, hissing something in the Gerudo language.
Without another word, Ashei advanced, and their blades clashed, but the two were of equal strength. She glanced at the boxes; what was in them? Through the power of the Force, she blew the top of the one nearest to the Gerudo. It hit her against her head and during that moment of stunned silence, Ashei moved in so that she could deal as much non-lethal damage as possible while still getting a good look at the contents of the crate.
Ashei dealt the Gerudo woman a long cut to her side, a crippling wound but nothing fatal as she'd intended. Slipping between the Gerudo and the crate, Ashei glimpsed a few of the things in the crate: several metal canisters all labeled 'plasma bolt fuel.'
Fuel for a fighting spacecraft? Ashei whirled around just as the Gerudo was coming back around. That question would have to wait.
However the Gerudo did not immediately attack this time. There seemed to be some manner of recognition, and Ashei was able to make out something that sounded an awful lot like, "A woman?" in a surprised and very heavily accented common tongue just before the Gerudo raised one of her long curved blades in their signature lunge.
Ashei had heard of this move before. It was fast and deadly if you allowed yourself to succumb to it; however the Force was on her side and allowed her to brace her feet and block the attack at just the right moment, more sparks flying between them across the stones. Ashei pressed against the Gerudo blade and the woman jumped back, cursing under her breath before she jumped up into the darkness up above and the alert in the back of Ashei's mind ceased to little more than a faint buzzing.
She turned to look at the carpenter. "I would suggest that we should get around to letting you out now… huh?" Something sparkling and shiny had caught her attention. Kneeling down, she picked it up, only to find herself fingering a small silver key between her thumb and forefinger.
"She must have dropped this… hmm."
Ashei stood up, walked over to the door of the cell and fitted the key in the lock. Taking a quick breath, she turned it to the left and heard the lock click open. She chuckled quietly. "Well, that's convenient."
"Does it matter?" asked the carpenter as he exited his cell. Ashei shrugged, walking over to the map to check which exit the man needed to use. "Probably not," she answered quietly, "but the Gerudo aren't known for their carelessness."
The man nodded slowly. "Well… I'm Ichiro, the carpenter. My friends and I were really interested in joining their all-female group, but they locked us up like this just because we're men!" Ashei glanced back at him, her eyes rolling slightly. "Oh really?" she remarked sarcastically, to which Ichiro responded by holding up his hands defensively.
"Hey, I know that now!" he replied indignantly, but after a while he sighed and finally added, "I really can't thank you enough."
Ashei told the computer to return the display settings to default and pointed out the direction the carpenter should take to get back to the docking points. "Just go down as far as you can and when you get to Storage Room 1B take a left and then another right at the intersection. Got that?"
He nodded. "Yeah, thanks!"
"And tell Mutoh thanks when you see him again!" she called back. "I might also apologize if you can find it in yourself to do so!" She wasn't able to make out his response after that, since he was too far down the corridor.
Meanwhile, Link had just finished freeing yet another carpenter, Jiro.
He'd freed Sabooro first, and while he had been somewhat eccentric for a young man, he'd been… civil. And straight. Link flushed at the thought of the last carpenter, Jiro, calling him a 'cute boy.' If he weren't so embarrassed at the thought of the advance, he might've been at least a little offended at being called a boy. After all, he had accepted his role as an adult now, so being called a boy – particularly a cute one – was slightly degrading.
Not that he'd say that aloud.
But it wasn't much longer after that he heard the sound of footsteps coming down a nearby hall, and he pressed himself up against the wall while his senses combed the darkness for anything recognizable.
"Ashei?" he asked when he sensed a magical signature he recognized.
"Link?" came the reply.
Moments later a form emerged out of the darkness and into the light of the electric torch mounted on the wall in the middle of the 'T' intersection. It was indeed Ashei, though she was slightly disheveled and splinters of wood were stuck in her hair.
"What… happened to you?" he asked, noting her tired expression.
"Gerudo guard ambushed me while I was trying to free one of the carpenters. She ran off though, once she knew I had the advantage… not sure why. It could be because I'm a woman? I don't know…" Link frowned. "I've been ambushed too. Twice. Both times I was trying to free one of the carpenters."
"Looks like you succeeded though," she muttered, looking him over with mildly amused appraisal. "So that means we've freed three of the four carpenters, correct?" Link nodded, and pointed down the hallway he'd been following before he heard her footsteps. "And the last one is down this way."
"I know," she replied. "I don't see why we shouldn't stick together."
"All right, let's go," Link whispered. And the two of them proceeded down the hallway in silence until they reached yet another of the holding cells. The room was the same as the room Ashei had encountered: spacious, dimly lit, boxes stacked against the side… however this room didn't have any boxes scattered across the floor, though the cell was still pitch black except for about six inches past the bars.
"Hello?" Ashei whispered, "Is anyone there?"
Someone groaned from within the darkness of the cell, until eventually movement could be heard. The vague outline of a young man with even more wildly curly hair and irises so dark they were almost black.
"Did you come here to save me?" he asked quietly.
"We did, yes." Link replied in kind. "Mutoh sent us. Or, well… he asked us if we could spare some time looking for you. We're sort of supposed to be doing something else." The carpenter raised a single eyebrow but said nothing. Ashei noticed that this one wore a similar get-up as Ichiro had, only his pants were green.
"You should be careful," he finally said as they were approaching the bars of the cell. "There are Gerudo nearby. I heard them sometimes in the night…"
Suddenly a panicked expression crossed his face and he yelled, "Look out!"
Ashei had ducked and rolled off to the side again as the buzzing in her head became a full-fledged warning blaring in her temples. It hurt, but enough to put her on the highest of alerts, and Link was much the same, biting his lip as the warning pulsed against his senses.
This time there were two Gerudo women, working together in perfect sync. Ashei caught Link's gaze from across the room and the two of them formed a plan without even having to say a word. They had worked together before using the Force, and they would do it now. Immediately Ashei lunged with the white sword, sparks of light magic running across its length while Link spun the Master Sword in a quick, blinding arc to stun the Gerudo facing him.
Ashei pushed the Gerudo she clashed with against the other, and she backed up, using the Gerudo as a springboard to jump to the other side and join Link to aid in his assault.
Now they were together, however the Gerudo had caught on to this and suddenly one of them whistled and more Gerudo materialized from out of nowhere. Ashei had her back to Link's feeling his warmth and comforting presence through her clothing as Link had his Hylian Shield strapped to his right arm. But no matter how well their connection was, how strong they were as a team… could they take on this many?
She glanced back, managing to catch Link's eye once more.
Could they do this, Ashei wanted to ask. Link nodded. Even if they couldn't, they would sure as hell at least try.
The Gerudo inched closer, holding their blades aloft. Suddenly, they began to charge up their deadly lunge all at once, and Ashei could feel her stomach drop through the four floors below them and bury itself into the earth. They probably could take on this many, but there was no way to avoid this, not with Gerudo preparing to execute them on every side!
Link could feel Ashei's panic through the air around them. It was sort of contagious; he'd never felt so afraid until now, not even when he'd faced Gohma down in the depths of the Great Deku Tree.
But suddenly an idea occurred to him.
'Ashei,' he whispered, grasping her hand and holding it tight, 'fill your sword with light, and then release it upon them when I tell you.'
'What? How?' Her voice in his head was much calmer than he thought.
'Think of it like a spinning slash, but the two of us will perform it, instead of just one of us.'
Suddenly Ashei understood, and Link could feel the moment when she did. The Master Sword, already brimming with light, was throwing sparks at the feet of the wary Gerudo. He grinned. He couldn't die here. In fact, he refused.
'Now!' he commanded.
In one sweeping motion, the two of them locked arms and spun counterclockwise with their swords outstretched. White-hot arcs of light energy fell at the feet of the Gerudo, and they all scrambled back for safety. Some made it, some didn't, though none were fatally wounded.
They stood there, breathing heavily when the dust fell.
All around them, the Gerudo seemed dazed, but at once they recovered and advanced again.
"Wait!" called a voice, sharp and commanding. Immediately the Gerudo paused. Then, they parted ways for yet another Gerudo in different colored clothing. Where most of the Gerudo were clothed in thick fabrics and silks of crimson and violet, this one wore similarly styled clothing of gold and white.
And unlike the others, her face was uncovered.
"Stand down," she told the other Gerudo in the room, "and return to your posts. I will take these two to the Fortress and speak with them there. Oh," she paused, touching the shoulder of one of the retreating Gerudo, "and please see the young carpenter safely back to town. Oh… a word of advice: if I find that any of you have harmed him… I'll feed you to the desert. Now get to it."
She took a deep breath and sighed as her orders were being carried out, and she looked up at Link and Ashei with a weary but relived expression.
"All right…" she began slowly, "why don't we go find your companions? I'm sure they've gotten into just as much trouble as you by now. We should probably make sure that they're not accidentally executed." She grinned at them, and there was a paused of stunned silence before Link managed to cough out a rough, "Um, well… would you mind leading the way?"
"Why certainly," she replied cordially, "It's this way."
And, apparently having no other choice, the two of them followed her as she led the towards the north side of the complex.
Ahh… finally. This looks like a good stopping point. (Honestly, I'm still trying to work out what's going to happen next, so I'm probably going to disappear for a little bit to draw some stuff to listen to my new audiobooks.)
See you then!
- Hikari no Vikki