Chapter 28: The one where you deal with cars
"Sup, pipsqueak" Impi greeted.
A grin nearly splitting your face in half, you took in the familiar tall figure in front of you. Long, braided white hair, almost glowing red eyes and a smart black business suit and black high heels that could be used to kill if necessary were the classical Impi look. You knew the woman and she always looked professional, even when caked in flour and eggs (she didn't allow Zelda and you to try baking anything for two years after that one incident, though).
But for once hidden behind her cold blooded professionalism you could actually see something like relief in her eyes, especially when she calmly stated: "Good to see you're still in one piece."
"Aww, you do care" you gave back and she gave an amused eyeroll, her eyes flickering briefly to the Links to assert their danger levels. The near invisible slight twitch of her lips showed that her danger assessment came back successfully and with levels she did not like.
Seeing the near invisible tension building in her muscles and the resulting slight tensions of some the Links you quickly decided to interfere: "Alright, nice to see you again, Impi. Those are my new friends, and guys, that's Impi and she's gonna be our ride to a location where you can stay for a while."
Okay, good, at her name a lot of Links lost some of their tension, now curiosity on their faces instead, Legend not under them. That was positive anyway and you understood why the poor veteran did not lose his tension, familiar faces are not always an indication of the person being necessarily the one they were acting as.
Welp, couldn't change that now, or could you?
Well, actually you could.
"Would you stop calling me pipsqueak?" you gave out annoyed, watching as your whine drew a small smirk from Legend, finally the near invisible tension also fleeing him. "Never" gave Impi out calmly. "Otherwise I'd have taken your dearest friend's bribe to only call you Babble."
"Seriously?" you asked, fake offended. Okay, that drew a chuckle, good job.
"Yes" Impi gave blankly before turning on her heels and stalking away. "Come now, I do not want to get a ticket for stashing the car where it is."
Shrugging, you followed.
And after only a slight hesitation the Links did so, too.
Okay, admittingly leading people stemming from a medieval fantasy era around a stacked carnival in order to get to the parking lot was not on the list of your brighter ideas yet.
With one hand you quickly pulled Hyrule into continuing his walking when he had stopped to stare in horrified fascination at the nearby rollercoaster while you reached with your other for Wild who had taken his Sheikah Slate out trying to capture everything within it only to realize horrified that it wouldn't turn on.
"Welcome to the real world, buddy. Technics running on magic ain't working here. I can feel your pain, but you must move on now. Literally" you stated calmly while pushing him back into moving.
Then you quickly reached out to snag Wind at the back of his tunic when he tried to sneak of, probably trying to rob the nearby sweets cart that had stupidly large cookies on display.
Gosh, they were supposed to be heroes right? Not a bunch of overgrown toddlers with how they were behaving!
In that moment you could totally understand Time's pain at having to deal with all of them for who knows long.
At least Warriors and Twilight were behaving, though both country and city boy seemed hopelessly overwhelmed. And Sky seemed just short of freaking out, his breaths coming out short and raspy. Or maybe sky boy had trouble with the polluted air around you on top of being overwhelmed. That'd be a possibility, too. You'd have to talk Zelda into taking him to see a doctor about that, then.
Time seemed to be somewhat calm, as was Legend. Well, the two of them have gone through a lot of sh*tty things and surprises and time travel, so probably this was not even the cherry on top of that cake.
Four's eyes were a light blue almost silver, seemingly vacant, and he was walking as if on auto-pilot. Yep, he was totally freaking out on the inside but because he probably couldn't decide on the freaking out method he was simply letting it all happen. You should make sure to check in on him later, to make sure he was okay.
And so your little procession reached the parking lot, finally. Wild looked absolutely giddy at seeing the cars but many other Links did not join his enthusiasm.
Impi calmly guided you to the car and…of course, Zelda had sent a freaking limousine. A lot of kids had gathered around the sparkly silvery white car to take selfies but once they saw Impi approach with long strides, her eyes promising murder, they quickly scattered.
Impi opened the driver's door and gave you all a cold once over: "Don't get blood on the seats or I'll make you clean them with your toothbrushes."
While that threat would not be as good for the Links seeing as they probably did not possess toothbrushes, you thought they got the gist and the hesitancy they had before probably tripled. Trying to salvage the situation you quickly tried to be your best example and quickly opened the first passenger door to slip inside, Wild luckily following you directly. You didn't question your little piece of luck before turning to the Links: "Don't worry, this is fine, this is just like a carriage."
Oh, that got an action. Shrugging Time moved ever the good grown-up and took to the second passenger compartment, Legend following behind, dragging a slightly protesting Wind behind him who only cared about not having gotten to rob anything.
Which left only five of the heroes standing.
Four finally seemed to have battled out his inner fight and the violet shimmer in his eyes was the only warning you got before he pointed out calmly: "If that's a carriage, where's the horses?"
By the additional tension of the other four, that was the wrong thing to point out. Well damn.
"Get inside smartass and see for yourself" you quipped and thank god, that slight green and blue shimmer had taken that challenge.
Which reduced the problems down to four.
Okay three, now that Sky seemed only barely conscious. He really's gotta see a doctor about his breathing problems. He only gave half hearted mumbled protests as you quickly stepped out and helped Hyrule bring him inside the second compartment, though the poor cave kid probably would freak out later once he realized what he'd done after he'd slipped into doctor mode in his concern for his comrade.
Okay, that left two. Thank whoever cares for Wild as he managed to somehow coax Twilight inside: "Come on, Twi! Where's your sense of adventure?" You could literally see the lupin hero gain a few grey hairs at that statement. Poor guy, but at least it reduced the number of problems to one.
Namely Warriors.
"Come on, don't be a pussy!" Wind dared, having found the fascinating mechanic that was opening and closing the window, through opened window. "Language" came the chide of Time directly after, while the window was closed.
Warriors glared at him almost Legend worthy and you could see the conflict between survival instinct and pride that was battled out within him.
Unluckily in that moment a nearby pretty old car decided to start pretty loudly, causing a lot of the Links to flinch at the unexpectedly loud noise. And then whoever drove the ratty old thing decided they'd have to hurry and thus as soon as they were clear of their parking space decided to speed up and then they were quickly gone.
Wild next to you gave a loud and happy "whoop", his anticipation for action only rising after that glorious display of human invention. Twilight only looked sick and Four's hands twitched probably either for something to grab and hold onto for life or to write theories regarding the possibility of reaching a speed like that with. You did not want to know the reactions in the other compartment but looking back to Warriors you felt the blood drain from face as you saw him staring in unabashed horror to where the rusty little metal box just had been.
Sadly, for once in a Link's life, survival instincts had won.
"Those are goddess damned monsters! No way am I going in there, never!" Well, damn.
That was the moment when luckily or unluckily, you may pick either, Impi's patience snapped. She rolled the window down to glare at the last hero standing. You shuddered knowing too well her glare was something that could even wilt flowers so it was no surprise that even a hero of courage would flinch and cover beneath it.
"Car" she ordered calmly. "Now."
It was a terrifying display of her power and she hadn't even started to count down from three before Warriors folded in and snuck with a lowered head into your compartment. You closed the door and grinned inwardly knowing too well the feeling of having been bested by Impi. It was no shame really, it was a foolery to even try. As a rule of thumb Impi always won.
The limousine started gently and quickly started the music player in hope of distracting the Links in your compartment.
From the radio came the whippy song that was Pink's "Just like Fire" and you grinned and hummed the song happily. While it seemed to loosen the tension somewhat it soon came back tenfold once Impi drove onto the highway.
And Impi totally drove a lot faster than she would usually on purpose. You could practically imagine her self-satisfied smirk while she pressed down on the gas pedal.
You looked at the horrified faces around you and the giddiness of Wild as he was practically glued to the window watching the landscape outside rush by and decided that this was going to be a long drive.