Waiting for me at the Temple of Time was none other than Scourge, who it appeared had been thinking of trying to steal the three Spiritual Stones had it not been for my surprise appearance out of nowhere.
"Silver!" he said in surprise, almost falling over himself. "I wish you wouldn't do that!"
"Well someone's got to keep you out of trouble," I shrugged.
"What, you think I was going to take these?"
"You're a thief, those are valuable items. Two and two, Scourge."
"I wasn't really thinking about it. Not seriously, anyway. Did you know the inscription has changed though?"
"Inscription?" I asked, joining him. "I know there was on the altar, but I couldn't read it. What did it say before?"
"I don't remember. Something about these stone and some song, I think."
I glanced over the pictograms, still in the same ornate hand I recalled they'd been before, and still in such a form that they were beyond me. "I don't suppose you read Hylian better than I do?"
Scourge gave me a sidelong glance, then burst out laughing. "The Great Hero of Time, possibly soon to be the saviour of Hyrule, can't even read a few simple words! Oh, Ganondorf's gonna love to hear about this."
"Yes, thank you, now can you read it or not," I asked sourly.
"Of course I can. I knew how to read Hylian long before I met you." That was useful to know. I could commandeer him in the past and have him read the old inscription too. "It reads like this: 'The Ocarina of Time opened the door. The Hero of Time with the Master Sword descended here.'"
"I didn't descend exactly. I just sort of took out the sword and then woke up seven years later. I wonder who changed it?" When I saw there was no trace of the original inscription, I added, "And how, for that matter?"
Scourge hid his interest at this, giving me the impression that only Sheik, Navi and I – and now him too – knew about how I'd skipped seven years. He may not have known it was a two-way thing, and I intended to keep it that way.
"Who knows?" he said aloud. "Now why don't you tell me what you've been up to?"
"Oh, nothing much. Cleared out the Water Temple, awakened the Zora Princess Ruto as the Water Sage, headed to Kakariko, faced off against some dark shadow thing calling itself Bongo-Bongo at the Shadow Temple to awaken the Shadow Sage, then headed off to Gerudo Valley."
"Where you got caught like everyone else?"
"I wouldn't know, I didn't go that far in," I lied. "The bridge was out, and my horse wouldn't jump the gap, so I'm taking a quick break while I think of another way across."
"You didn't think to try to fly across?"
"Well I guess I could have," I answered, berating myself for not thinking of that before I gave him the excuse. "I was feeling lazy though. Now tell me – what have you been up to?"
"What do you think? I've been getting back into my old habits. Or trying to – the people of Kakariko aren't particularly fond of me, apparently. I'm told one of the guards wants to introduce me to his pike, so I thought I'd better steer clear for a bit. If it wasn't for the bridge I'd try to get into the Gerudo thieves."
"Isn't that a shame? I don't have any problems, you know. Maybe you ought to try taking a leaf out of my book."
Scourge snorted, "As if I would. Though speaking of leaves... been a while since I dropped in on the forest. Think I'll go see how they're doing." And without another word, he was gone.
"At last. I thought he'd never leave."
"You're going to leave once you've saved Hyrule, aren't you?" Navi asked.
"Of course not. Not until its time for me to visit Termina, and even then I'll always come back to visit it. Why do you ask?"
"Just curious. And I wanted to know what you planned to do about him."
"Nothing. I've no idea how he got here, and if he wants me to take him anywhere he'll have to persuade me its a good idea. Unless he starts causing trouble too, I'm just going to leave him alone. Except in a moment when we go back in time, because I'm going to get him to read what this used to say for me."
While it might seem strange to hear it, it felt good to be young again. Alright, so the Master Sword, even if I could have kept it without going forward in time, was too big for me and Biggoron's sword was completely out of the question. Much of the things I'd picked up while older were similarly too big for me to use, the bow being a borderline case – I could use it, but only very awkwardly.
But despite those things and the loss of the mental boost I got in the future, it was gained by taking a shortcut – cutting out the seven years between and just arriving there, giving no time to gradually come into those things.
I used the Nocturn of Shadow to quickly make my way to Kakariko, appearing on the warp pad just outside the Shadow Temple only to hop down again. It was fortunate that I'd started in the Temple of Time, since such magic here still affected the Hylian image I always had here.
A search ahead revealed that Scourge was still in the village, if the nearby minds were any indication either picking pockets or getting arrested. It didn't take me long to track him down, where we found it happened to be the latter, held in the air between two guards protesting all the while. His expression when he saw my amused look was absolutely priceless.
"I guess that means he'll be too tied up to lend us a hand then," Navi murmured.
"Oh well. It was more of a curiosity anyway. I'm sure it can wait, and besides I can always ask someone in the castle town to read it for me."
"Won't that..."
"Make them wonder? I'm just a kid in their eyes Navi, and everyone knows we can't read."
"I guess you've got a point there. Anything else we've got to do here?"
"Not really, except find somewhere safe to disappear. I don't think the world is quite ready for people popping into nothingness just yet."
The windmill turned out to be perfect for that, as for a change it was deserted. Maybe some observant people would notice that I'd gone in and not come out, but that was just a minor inconvenience.
Sheik's final song, the Requiem of Spirit, took me to the warp pad at the Desert Colossus, which seemed to live up to its name even more than it had before with my younger perspective. Several Leevers, sensing my presence, shot up out of the surrounding sand and tried to head for me, but they wouldn't leave the sand. Floating up above and over them meant that even on the sand they couldn't reach me. Leevers are inconvenient if you can't fly, but otherwise they're nothing to be concerned about.
Inside the Colossus was almost perfectly identical to its future self, tidy and well-kept, even the two inscriptions were in the same condition. This symmetry was broken when I came to the top of the staircase to see a tall Gerudo crouched before the tunnel I'd seen before.
"I think you're a little big to crawl through there," I told her, startling her. "Did you lose something down there?"
"How did you get in here?" she demanded.
"Through the door," I shrugged, playing dumb. "It was only open."
She almost clarified her question, but apparently thought better and instead asked, "Well, what do you want here?"
"I'm just curious. Seemed like a waste to come all this way and not find out what was in here. Never know what you'll find, exploring places like this."
"And just who are you?"
"I'm Silver. Like the block over there, but not really."
"Not one of Ganondorf's minions then," she decided. "I am Nabooru, chief of the Gerudos and second only to Ganondorf himself. Don't get me wrong though – the things he does... if he weren't the only Gerudo man around I'd kill him myself."
"I heard that about you. You have to wait for a century before another one comes along."
"You're well informed. I like you, kid. Maybe when you grow up you should pay us a visit. Now, how about exploring and helping me against Ganondorf?"
There's those coincidences again.
"Sure thing," I agreed amicably. "What do you need found?"
"Somewhere past there is a treasure called the Silver Gauntlets. Its said that those who equip them can easily move heavy objects – like the block you pointed out."
"That's useful. I could use something like that."
"Don't be silly, they wouldn't fit a kid like you. You bring them back to me, and I'll be able to use them to go deeper into the temple. Ganondorf and his minions are using it as a hideout, so with the power of silver-"
"You'll be able to sneak in and mess up their plans?" Navi finished. Nabooru looked curiously from the fairy to me.
"You're a fairy boy, huh? You're a long way from home. I didn't think you could leave your forest."
"Don't know anything about that, I just wanted to see what was out in the world," I replied, keeping up my 'dumb child' act. It was kind of fun actually. I never really had the chance to be a child with everything that had been going on, so I guess in a way I was reclaiming that here.
"Well fairy boy... you get me the Silver Gauntlets, and when you grow up I'll do something very nice for you. Deal?"
Given how I was treated in the future, is it really that hard to guess what her 'very nice' was?
"And I get to explore the place too," I added. "Sounds good to me. Don't know who this Ganondorf is, but he doesn't sound nice, so bothering him sounds good too. I'll do it."
Nabooru moved aside to let me reach the tunnel, watching with some slight envy as I crawled easily through. It was only a short tunnel, so it wasn't long before I emerged on the other side into a corridor, made of bright yellow sandstone like the rest of the place – it was a nice change from the bleak stone and dirt that made up most of the other Temples.
At the end a shallow set of steps led up to a larger flat area with a round, red rug in the middle, on top of that an Armos statue. Four Keese flitted about, two of them on fire, and a bit of metal bent into spikes was tracing the outside of the rug, following the thin line it was stuck in.
The slingshot quickly shot down the keese, while the Armos statue was easily dealt with. Navi woke it up and held it in place, and I hovered bombs near it until it was defeated. This unbarred the doors leading northwest and northeast, though I could just as easily crawl through another tunnel that lead straight north between them.
I checked the tunnel only to find it was temporarily a dead end, requiring a key to open – which I didn't have. Instead I went back and headed northwest into a larger room, this one separated into two halves by a chasm. On the far side a raised grating looked as if it could be triggered to create a bridge, but my attention was quickly distracted by a Stalfos – which here was taller than me, and much more of a threat.
Fortunately though it surprised me I was able to react in time to handle the downward strike it made for me, quickly turning on the spot so it would catch the Hylian shield strapped to my back. It might have been too big to use normally right now, but it was useful the way it was.
As soon as I heard the clang of its blade on the shield I turned back and lashed out, stealing Mido's idea once again to shatter the skeleton, sending many of the bones down into the chasm below.
Now it was out the way I returned my attention to the room. There was a crystal switch just behind the grating I figured I could trigger with the boomerang, and large Green Bubble that kept jumping up out of the intervening gap. Rather than deal with it, I guided the boomerang around to hit the switch, causing the grating to drop – right on top of it. There was a crack of bone on metal, and the Bubble dropped out of sight into the pit.
"That was nasty," Navi chuckled.
"Fun though. As long as I have to look like a child again, I might as well have some fun with it."
"Is that what was behind your strange attitude back there?"
"Of course. You didn't think I'd suddenly turned immature, did you?"
"Could have fooled me. Just be careful, won't you?"
"Naturally," I replied with a smirk, heading through the door on the other side of the room.
