(Didja hear about Pokemon Sun and Moon?)
Of course I did. I'm the Universe. I knew it was happening before Nintendo did.
(...Right. Anyways, I'm excited! I'm thinking I might try the Water starter this time, the past couple times I think I've gone for Grass. Sceptile in ORAS... Serperior in BW... and Torterra in DP... yep, all Grass.)
What about all the times you've restarted to play again?
(That doesn't count, it wasn't my first playthrough. Although on that note, maybe I should go for Fire instead... I haven't actively liked the Fire starter since Blaziken.)
As the Universe, I'm going to say... I don't particularly care, I have much more pressing things to worry about than a collection of pixellated dots. Oh, and the author does not own the Legend of Zelda.
(...Harsh...)
The planning as to where the Links would look for Ganondorf was suddenly interrupted by the impact and subsequent explosion of a large, bright-white-yellow sphere of magic in the middle of the group. This was unusual because none of the Links hadmagical projectile capabilities and everyone could see Princess Zelda hadn't done anything.
There was also the fact that the sphere had come from outside their huddle.
"Guys?" Realm said, being facing the direction the magic had come from. "We may want to take a rain check on that plan to go find Ganondorf. I think he already found us."
Mask and Ocarina spun around simultaneously, with near-identical expressions of 'Oh crud' on their faces.
"Zelda, GO!" Ocarina bellowed, and the Princess snapped a Deku Nut on the ground, vanishing in the resulting flash of light. Ganondorf sneered at them.
"Well played, Hero," he said. "But she won't be able to hide from me forever. I shall simply take care of her once I've taken care of you."
"Not likely," Mask snarled, sword drawn and pointed menacingly. "I remember our fight and you didn't win."
Ganondorf ignored this statement entirely. "Prepare yourselves, boys. It's time you saw how a real villain fights!"
The Gerudo King started off the battle by spinning off another of the white-yellow magic orbs and hurling it at the nearest target, who just so happened to be Green. The Link ducked with a yelp, which conveniently had two effects. The first and foremost one was getting him out of the way.
The second one was keeping him out of the way as Mask sprinted into position and whacked the magic back with his sword and all the strength he could muster.
Ganondorf hmmed, then took two casual steps backwards and let the sphere blow past him. "Using old counters already?" he asked, tsking. "My, you've gotten predictable in your... young age."
"You shut up!" Mask snarled.
"I think not," Ganondorf replied, throwing another projectile. This time Blue knocked it back, having seen how it was done from Mask and wasting no time implementing the tactic. Unfortunately, Ganondorf dodged this one just as easily.
"Come now," he chided. "I thought you were better than this... perhaps I've challenged the wrong Heroes?"
"You take that back!" Lore protested, and lunged forward to try and stab. Again, Ganondorf simply stepped out of the way – and Lore, having expected to hit something, went stumbling past and ended up on the ground.
"You're the people who are supposed to defeat me?" Ganondorf asked, shaking his head. "My my... I'm beginning to think Demise overestimates you."
"Get back here!" Lore exclaimed, shooting up from the dirt and lunging forwards again. This time, Ganondorf casually parried and sent the Link running back into the group, where his sword ended up impaling Shadow through the abdomen.
"...Really?" Shadow asked dryly, wrapping a hand around the hilt and pulling the weapon back out again. "What, I didn't get stabbed enough during the Veran/Onox fight?"
"He's being difficult!" Lore explained crankily, shooting a glare at Ganondorf. Said villain yawned and flipped his hand in a 'Come at me' gesture.
"Right, that's it," Gen decided. "We are going to beat you into next week."
Ganondorf raised an eyebrow at this, then stepped backwards and negligently dodged an attempted slash attack.
Unnoticed by the Links, who were trying and failing to hit Ganondorf, the villain was slowly but surely leading them across the Hyrule Field, stepping only when he dodged and occasionally baiting the group into taking another swipe. Every move he made was calculated: if one of the Heroes realized what was going on, the ruse would become that much more difficult.
But then, that was the reason for the fight in the first place. So focused on the battle, they wouldn't have time to pay attention. Pity.
And so, Ganondorf led them on a dance. Lean, sway, one foot back. Dip, slide, two steps left. Spin to avoid, and stop – and step, step, step...
Who knew that all those dance lessons used to infiltrate Royal Balls would come in so handy?
"Why-aren't-you-fighting!?" Steam growled. Ganondorf considered this, casually stepped back from an intended stabbing, and shrugged.
"Blood is highly overrated, wouldn't you say?"
"Oh, that's rich!" Mask sputtered. "You tried to kill me! Multiple times!"
Ganondorf brought one of his hands to his chin in mock-thought. "I feel I would remember that..." he said – and abruptly threw himself into a graceful backbend as the Four's swords whistled over his face.
"Future knowledge," Ocarina reminded his younger-but-older self.
"Okay, you will try to kill me! Multiple times!" Mask corrected.
Ganondorf peered at him in between dodges. "Are you sure? Normally when I try to kill someone I'm much more successful that that. Could it possibly have been someone else?"
"NO!" Mask exploded.
Ganondorf frowned. "Well then, clearly I have some work to do, can't have a mistake of that magnitude walking around alive... You understand."
Mask snarled and made to stab the Gerudo, only to miss as his target slid back-and-left in one smooth motion.
"STOP DOING THAT!"
"I believe I'll decline that offer, thank you."
"AAAAAARGH!"
He lunged forwards again, but missed as Ganondorf stepped back again and spun with the momentum, using the brief view of the opposite direction to see how much farther he had to go. Of course, none of the Links noticed this, simply seeing the dodge as just that – a dodge.
And that was exactly how Ganondorf wanted it.
On the other hand, he still had a ways to go before they reached his desired destination, so... better step up the pace.
Ganondorf promptly shot multiple energy projectiles at any Link moving.
The incoming mass of magic spheres caused more than one Link to yelp is surprise and created a lot of hurried dodging and/or retaliation. In particular, Realm, who had to fend off three at once, launched himself into a Spin Attack and silently thanked Dusk for teaching him back when they'd first met. The move had definitely come in handy more than once.
Speck, on the other hand, took his usual way out and whipped out his Jar, shrinking right before impact. He then hitched a ride on Gen's pants, since the fabric was more voluminous than most of the other options.
They were also the closest pants in range, but eh. Details.
But for most of the Links, having a lack of shrinking options, sending the projectiles back was their only real option – but unfortunately, Ganondorf dodged them all. He now had his hands folded behind his back and, every now and then, yawned.
He didn't even bother to cover his mouth. Truly, he was evil.
They were on the edge of the Temple grounds now, and Ganondorf was intent on making sure that the Hero of Time didn't notice. The rest of the Heroes were less of a problem, not being native and thus not knowing how important this place was to them. With this in mind, Ganondorf abruptly switched his focus from keeping everybody off balance to keeping two very specific people off balance.
It worked rather well; caught off guard by the sudden change in targets, the taller one was sent reeling right into the shorter one, knocking both versions of the Hero to the ground. The shorter one, pinned underneath, send the taller one an annoyed glare and began pushing with his one free hand.
"Ocarina, get off," he grunted.
"Sorry-" the taller one wheezed. "Give me... a minute..."
"I don't believe I will," Ganondorf interrupted, suddenly right there and shooting another round of magic spheres down at the two Links. They yelped almost simultaneously, the taller one suddenly finding the strength to move and the shorter one rolling to the side, avoiding the attack by the slimmest possible margin.
"Hey!" the taller one yelled. " Don't go killing me in front of me! Do you have any idea how traumatizing that would be!?"
"Yes," Ganondorf told him bluntly. "That was the point." Really, did none of these Heroes understand what 'Evil' was?
"You JERK!" the Hero yelled, and lunged again.
Ganondorf dodged Ocarina's slice with insulting negligence and, raising an eyebrow, proceeded to avoid every subsequent attack simply by taking one step backwards per stab.
"You may want to take accuracy training," Ganondorf advised in a bored tone. "You've gotten sloppy since the last time I saw you."
"I helped take down a dragon last week, I think my sword skills are fine, thanks!"
"And yet, you still haven't landed one single hit," Ganondorf replied. "And to think, you've apparently managed to beat me sometime in the future. Are you quite sure your other self is not mistaken?"
As he spoke, Ganondorf dodged a particularly angry stab attempt by leaning to the right and twisting himself halfway. This allowed him to get the briefest glimpse of what was behind him...
Perfect.
Meanwhile, Ocarina was experiencing an intense onslaught of sudden self-doubt. Ganondorf's taunt had broken open his biggest fear: that he wasn't good enough.
Sure, he had Mask around now, and seeing how confident his future self was, how much he'd accomplished, was a huge motivational booster. The problem lay in the fact that Ocarina just couldn't see how he'd gotten so good.
There he was, the Hero of Time, having saved both Hyrule and Termina from certain destruction, and for the life of him Ocarina couldn't figure out how he'd done it. Mask told him he'd figure it out, yeah, but...
But there was always this small voice that wondered, Am I really good enough to become him?
On the far side of the room the group was now in, Shadow narrowed his eyes at Ganondorf while the rest of the Links caught their breath.
"...Something's not right," he muttered.
"What's that now?" Steam gasped.
"I don't want to tear him limb from limb," Shadow elaborated, pointing at the Gerudo King. "He's the one who made me and abandoned me, but for some reason I don't feel like killing him."
He received multiple concerned looks.
"Dude, you feeling alright?" Blue asked.
"Maybe you're sick," Speck suggested. "Does your forehead feel hotter than normal?"
Shadow gave them both his 'You're an Idiot' glare. "I'm going to give you a few seconds to rethink that statement and realize exactly why it's impossible before moving on," he said.
Both Links thought about it for a moment, remembered Shadow wasn't actually biological, and decided to stop talking.
"Thank you," Shadow said. "My point is, I'm not actually sure who we're fighting."
Everyone blinked.
"...Oh boy," Sketch gulped.
"You... you take that back," Ocarina growled.
Ganondorf blinked at him. "What on earth makes you think I'm going to listen to you? You're just a boy in a man's body trying desperately to keep up. What do I have to fear from someone like that?"
"Plenty," Mask snarled, appearing on Ocarina's left. "He kicked your butt, Ganondork. I should know, I was there."
"He wasn't," Ganondorf replied simply, pointing at Ocarina.
"I will be!" Ocarina snapped, lunging again. Like before, Ganondorf made to dodge by stepping backwards – only for his legs to seemingly bump into something and stop his retreat. Ocarina, seeing this, took full advantage of the situation and brought his sword down in an attempt to impale his enemy through the torso.
Unfortunately for him, that's when everything went horribly wrong.
As the sword came down, Ganondorf suddenly smiled. It was not a nice smile. In fact, it was an absolutely terrifying smile because it was the sort of smile that said, 'You've just royally screwed yourself over and I'm going to enjoy every minute of it'.
The next moment, he vanished into thin air.
"Phantom!" Mask yelled in alarm, beginning to twist around to warn everybody else – and suddenly turning white as he recognized his surroundings. Ocarina, on the other hand, was seeing everything in slow motion, because he'd just realized what the Phantom Ganondorf had 'bumped' into.
Specifically, the stone sheath of the Master Sword.
The stone sheath that the Master Sword was currently heading straight for, driven by Ocarina himself.
Mask, halfway through spinning himself back around, noticed this at the exact same time the weapon slid fully into the rock.
"Oh, CRAP."
And before anybody could do anything else, the Temple of Time thrummed and the world turned white.
Ganondorf, who in reality had never actually set foot in Hyrule Field during that entire showdown, cut his connection to his Phantom, steepled his fingers together, and allowed himself a smile.
That couldn't have gone better if he'd done it himself.
Just a few more things to take care of, then. The first, he'd already done; erect a barrier around the Master Sword, to prevent the Hero from simply removing it again and coming straight back. His Phantom had taken care of that when it's corporeal body had dissipated, the energy used to make it real now repurposing to block anything end everything from the pedestal.
Second, though he was not looking forward to it, was to contact Demise and see about getting himself put back seven years. Competent though Ganondorf knew himself to be, he did not trust his past self to grasp the importance of the situation and eliminate all the Heroes with the necessary urgency.
And third, appropriate a pictograph once in the past. If any of his theories on the Temple of Time's magic were correct, Ganondorf wanted to preserve the results on physical paper.
This, he thought, would be both fruitful, and hilarious.
The first thing Ocarina noticed was his height, which basically confirmed that everything he'd been afraid of was happening and that he should give up on the rest of his hopes now, because they'd just been dashed against a very hard and pointy wall.
The second thing he noticed was that Mask, who was standing next to him, was now five.
"Wait, what?" Ocarina blurted – taking a moment to grimace at his nine-year-old vocal chords – and stared at his older-but-much-younger-than-he-was-used-to self
"Uhh..." Mask replied intelligently, clearly just as confused. Ocarina was about to respond – until he got interrupted by a two-feet-shorter (and absolutely livid) Shadow.
"WHAT ON DIN'S EARTH DID YOU DO!?" Shadow roared, stalking up and practically spitting in Ocarina's face. "LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT THEM!"
Ocarina and Mask both blinked, then slowly followed Shadow's finger to where the rest of the Links had been standing.
There was now a group of fifteen boys ranging from toddler to ten-year-old stage.
"...Oh," Ocarina said in a small voice.
"I really hope there's a good explanation for this," one of the ten-year-olds said. Mask blinked fiercely.
"Duthk?"
The word came out in a high-pitched, slightly lispy voice, causing Mask to twitch and Shadow to fall over laughing.
"Were you expecting someone else?" Dusk replied dryly, in a voice that was at a much higher range than anyone was used to. He looked down, picked up one of the toddlers, and said, "Huh, Speck was cute as a baby."
"That's Speck!?"
"Well... yeah, I'm pretty sure he was only going on eleven," Dusk said. "Seriously though, somebody explain this to me?"
Instead, Ocarina blurted, "How are you not freaking out?"
Dusk calmly set Speck back down on the floor and looked Ocarina in the eye. "I've had weirder," he stated. "Besides, we've all pretty much established that I'm the level-headed one, and plus, Gen is already freaking out enough for three Links."
Sure enough, a younger version of Gen was rocking himself back and forth on the floor while a significantly brighter-shade-of-ginger Lore scurried through the group of toddlers and tried to guess who was who. He'd already mis-identified Wind and Steam and was in the process of completely mixing and matching the Four and Red, Vio, Green, and Blue. Clearly, he was having the time of his life.
"...Basically, I'm being the adult," Dusk finished resignedly. "Again."
"Okay, yes, this is weird," Ocarina agreed. "But it'll only take a few seconds to fix, I just need to-"
He turned around and stopped dead. "...This could be a problem."
The Master Sword was completely encased in a dark red-black barrier, which sparked angrily when Ocarina tried to put his hand through and gave him a nasty electrical burn in the process. Ocarina yelped and snatched his hand back, shaking it to try and regain the feeling while glaring at the force-field all the while.
"Definitely a problem," he decided. "We can't get back."
Shadow abruptly killed the mood by triumphantly discovering he could just utilize his shapeshifting abilities to get his old/new form back and promptly did so. He then looked down on all the smaller Links and said, "I've always dreamed of this moment..."
"Thut up and take thith theriouthly!" Mask snapped. "Thith ith a mathive problem!"
"A massive problem which is completely hilarious," Shadow replied, barely holding a smirk off his face.
"Seriously though, how long are we stuck like this?" Dusk asked. At his feet, Speck crawled around on the floor before tugging on Dusk's pants. The older Link lifted him off the floor and tucked the Hero of the Minish into his left arm, automatically adjusting his posture to support most of Speck's weight on his left hip. Everyone who was capable of doing so stared at him.
"What?" Dusk asked. "I've been around kids before, you know, I've got an adoptive little brother."
"You're in charge of them," Mask decided instantly, pointing to the multitude of the other toddler Links, all of whom were beginning to crawl around and explore.
"I've only got two hands," Dusk pointed out mildly.
"Right... Shadow, help him," Ocarina decided.
"Why me!?"
"Because you're a free shapeshifter and you can have as many arms as you want to, now pick up a toddler and help."
One of said toddlers chose that exact moment to burst into tears. Dusk sighed, smiled tolerantly, and handed Speck off to Shadow, saying, "Support his back or he won't feel secure," before scooping up the crier and bouncing him playfully.
"Calm down Steam, everything's fine," Dusk told the child. "We're gonna fix this, promise."
"Freaking out," Steam told him. Dusk nodded.
"That's perfectly understandable, but I need you to calm down, okay? Some of the guys are younger than you right now, and I need everyone as calm as possible. Think you can do that?"
Steam nodded. Dusk gave him another patient smile, but didn't put him down as he surveyed the rest of the child group. "Is anyone else panicking?" he asked.
Multiple small and/or chubby hands went up, Gen's included. Lore just beamed.
"This is so cool!" he enthused. "I've never done this before! I knew coming along with you guys was a good idea, look at all the interesting stuff that happens!"
"Not now, Lore," Dusk said sharply. His half-leader stopped mid-bounce and looked at Dusk attentively.
"As much as I appreciate your craziness and the humor you have, this is not the time," Dusk lectured. "You can go back to being weird after the rest of us are done freaking out, okay?"
Lore sighed. "Yeah... yeah, you've got a point, I'll put on my serious face. What's the plan?"
"Hold Steam," Dusk instructed, handing said Link into Lore's surprised hands. "And don't patronize him, he's still got all the mentality of the Steam you know. The only thing getting in the way is his foot-and-a-half of height and the fact that his tongue isn't used to being talked with."
"Uh... got it," Lore said, sharing a glance with the child in his arms. Steam blinked back like, 'I don't know when he took charge either.'
"Mask, Ocarina, you guys grab Wind and Sketch," Dusk ordered. "Shadow, give Speck back to me once I get back and go handle the Four – and for the Love of Nayru, remember to keep them together, otherwise the discordant effects of being separated will trigger their crying instinct. They're only three physically." He took a deep breath, then said, "I'll handle Gen."
Dusk sat down next to his half-leader and carefully looked him over. Gen had a wide-eyed look of shock-panic-terror on his face and seemed to have stopped blinking entirely. Dusk frowned; Gen was the medic, he didn't know what going into shock looked like.
However, he did know what completely freaking out looked like, and this was pretty darn close.
"Gen," Dusk said. "Can you look at me?"
He received a slight twitch that turned the Hero of Sky's head ever so slightly his way; but other than that, nothing.
"Gen," Dusk repeated. "Look at me."
The new tone got a response, and Gen slowly met Dusk's eyes with his.
"Still me," Dusk said, motioning up and down. "Just younger. If I had a photo, I could show you me when I was ten and you'd see I'm exactly the same. That's all this is."
Gen said nothing.
"We all turned into animals once," Dusk reminded him. "You were a falcon, and remember what you did? You spent the next two months learning how to fly. And you didn't freak out then. So... why now?"
"..." Gen whispered.
"Ah," Dusk nodded, having heard every word Gen had said despite the volume. One of the perks of being part-wolf. "So having the warning makes that much of a difference, huh?"
Gen took a deep breath. "I... I never had to go through a form change before this. The falcon thing... was different, I had fair warning, I had time to get used to the idea, and... and it was our choice. This is... completely unwarranted, I admit it shocked me, but what gets me is that... is that we didn't plan this. This is an accident, but it's a deliberate accident, Ganondorf wanted us this way, and-"
"Deep breath," Dusk interrupted.
"Right... sorry... Geez, I thought I was used to this kind of thing by now."
"There's always something," Dusk shrugged. "I always think I know everything Midna's going to do, and then she goes and does something that throws me off all over again."
"What's she think of this?"
Dusk listened for a moment. "...She still hasn't stopped laughing. Apparently my kid voice is hilarious and sends her over the edge every time I open my mouth."
Gen snorted, then turned contemplative. "I wonder how... I... whoa."
"Pretty much," Dusk agreed. "You're not much better."
"Geez, I haven't been this high-pitched in... years."
"Probably around seven."
"Sounds about right," Gen agreed. "Hey... thanks."
"My pleasure," Dusk grinned. "Now, can you come help with the younger ones? I've already got Shadow on the Four, but someone needs to help keep Green and them upright. They're right at the 'unsteady walker' age and Blue throws a tantrum every time he falls down."
"Ouch," Gen said. "Yeah, no problem."
"Great – SHADOW DO NOT HOLD HIM UPSIDE DOWN!"
"HE ASKED FOR IT!" Came the furiously bellowed reply. Dusk took a deep breath, eyes closed.
"I don't care, he's four years old right now. Hold him upright or so help me, I will break your neck if you break his."
"...Fine."
"...Okay yeah, I should go help," Gen said quickly.
"That would be greatly appreciated."
Shadow, although increasingly angry, was the only one who could have more than two hands, and thus ended up saddled with all eight of the Four Sword Links. Realm, who was now seven, was handed Steam, who was five. Mask, who was five, was given the three-year-old Speck, as he was the lightest and probably the one Mask could support the best with his child body. The ten-year-old Gen was put in charge of Sketch, who was six and could mostly handle himself, except for the times when he tripped over something, which was frequent. Lore, who was nine, was given Wind, who was also six – but the ironic thing was that Wind was spending more time controlling Lore than the other way around. It just looked and sounded absolutely hilarious.
Ocarina didn't have a child to look after, but this was fine by him because he had enough to worry about in the first place.
And Dusk, after finally getting everyone organized, was the go-to guy if anybody's toddler instincts took over.
"So now that we've got all this sorted out," he said, "will you two please explain to us what happened and how long it's going to last?"
Mask hoisted Speck farther up his hip with difficulty and exchanged a glance with Ocarina, who sighed and stood up.
"We went back in time," Ocarina said quietly.
"And that causes spontaneous de-aging because...?" Gen prompted.
"The Temple of Time workth differently," Mask started, frowning at his own speech impediment. "It utheth the natural order of thingth, and – thith ith ridiculouth!" he complained, interrupting himself. "Ocarina, you exthplain, I'm annoyed with my own tongue."
"Like Mask said, the Temple of Time doesn't actually operate like a standard 'time machine' would," Ocarina explained. "It moves the fabric of time back and forth without discrimination, meaning that everything – and I do mean everything – that's inside it's influence gets affected."
"But why did it even start up in the first place?" Lore asked, earning nods from the rest of the Links, toddlers included.
"Well... the Master Sword kinda acts as the trigger," Ocarina answered sheepishly. "And I... may or may not... have gotten tricked into using it."
"That explains why I didn't want to kill anything!" Shadow exclaimed, sounding relieved. This earned him several odd looks, which only got more confused as they took in his currently ten arms holding onto the eight toddlers (Some of them (Blue) required more than one).
"What?" he said. "It wasn't actually Ganondorf, it was a trick. Therefore, my 'Kill the Pig' instinct wasn't activated."
"...It's sad that I accept that sentence as normal," Realm sighed, high-pitched like everyone else.
"Back to point?" the six year-old Wind reminded everyone.
"Right, sorry. Uh, to answer the second half of your question, Dusk... a while."
There was a moment of silence before Gen said, "Define 'a while'."
"There'a a barrier around the Master Sword and I can't get through it," Ocarina admitted. "We need the Master Sword to get back, but... I can't. And the barrier can't be dispelled without the power of the seven sages, but right now half of them are my age and none of them will be able to be awakened because Ganondorf hasn't made the world a disaster zone yet. We're... we're stuck here."
The Four simultaneously burst into tears, causing Shadow to nearly drop them in surprise and a good bit of annoyance. Dusk sighed, wordlessly held out his arms, and somehow managed to take all Four of them into his lap where he set about calming them down.
It wasn't like they wanted to cry, but the instincts of the four-year-old body were too strong to resist sometimes. Normally they would be much more composed.
"Okay... I admit that wasn't what I was wanting to hear," Realm started. "But I guess we've been through worse... maybe."
"Do we have any sort of plan at all?" Lore questioned.
At this point, Ocarina tried to exchange another look with Mask, only to find that his older-but-younger self was staring at the ground. After a few seconds he noticed someone was looking at him and met Ocarina's eyes with a resigned expression.
"I'm not going to be much help," Mask said, gesturing down with his one free hand. "I'm five. Can't do much when I'm five. Thith one'th gonna have to be on you."
Ocarina suddenly found the situation to be exponentially more intimidating.
"Okay... um... It's Ganondorf's forcefield..." Ocarina said slowly. "So logically... if we beat him, it should disappear."
"Wait wait wait. Back up a second," Gen interrupted. "We need to fight the guy who's responsible for this? Like this? Am I the only one who sees that as a spectacularly bad idea?"
"Have you got a better one?" Ocarina asked him.
Gen paused mid-sentence, thought about it, then let out a heavy sigh. "...No."
"My point exactly. So... uh... I guess we should move out... there's no point hanging around in here since we can't go back."
"Makes sense," Dusk nodded, having calmed the Four down sometime earlier and handing them back to Shadow. "Now, everyone who can walk, find somebody bigger than you and stick to them like glue. Shadow, you handle the Four, but find a better way to hold them around other people, not everyone is used to seeing you with extra hands. I'll take Blue, Ocarina can take Red, Lore holds Speck, Realm can take Vio, and Gen can hold Green. We good?"
"Why do I always end up with the most kids?" Shadow seethed.
"Because you're the only one who can actually keep them together," Gen told him. "And the rest of us have two each, so stop complaining."
"We're being good," Sketch pointed out in the halting sentences of a child still learning how to put words together. From the look on his face, he'd meant to say something a good bit more sophisticated until his six-year-old mouth muscles got in the way.
"Yes you are, and thank you for that," Gen replied, taking Green from one of Shadow's multiple arms in the process.
"Hang on, should we have an alibi?" Lore asked. "I mean, normally we just sorta run around and cause mass amounts of chaos and nobody questions it because we're old enough to handle ourselves. Now we're kinda... not. What's the plan?"
Ocarina glanced around at the group. "Well... we're all about the age for it, so... Alright, we're Kokiri visiting from the Lost Woods. Nobody knows much about Kokiri so the fact that we're all going to be siblings won't get examined too closely, and nobody will wonder – much – about us all being kids because Kokiri aren't supposed to get much older than this anyways."
"We thpeak from exthperienthe," Mask informed everyone.
"Aside from that..." Ocarina shrugged. "Find a house and figure out how to support ourselves and all the toddlers, I guess."
"Castle Town?" Realm asked.
"Castle Town."
"...and we were wondering if we could rent a place to stay for a while," Ocarina concluded to the very, very confused property salesman, and readjusted his grip on Red, who was slowly sliding through his hands.
"I... I'm sorry... what?"
Ocarina sighed, wondering how Dusk did this without losing his temper. "My brothers and I are Kokiri visiting from the Lost Woods," he repeated slowly. "We have a big family and we don't know how long we'll be staying, so we were wondering if we could rent a house for the duration."
"But... Kokiri are a myth."
"Clearly not, I'm standing right in front of you," Ocarina replied somewhat sharply. "Look, can we just... are you willing to rent us a house or not?"
"...You're ten."
"Nine," Ocarina corrected tiredly. "And for the record, I only look nine. Kokiri stop aging when we're still children. My brother over there's actually... a couple hundred years old, I think? We lost track."
He was, in fact, talking about Gen, who, when one calculated the years in between his time and Ocarina's time, actually was a few centuries older. Unfortunately, this only served to make the salesman even more disbelieving.
"You're pulling my leg," he decided after a moment. "Good prank, kid, but I'm not buying it."
"It's not a prank!" Ocarina snapped. "Look, I've got eight little brothers in the toddler range and we need someplace to spend the night! Don't you have anything?"
The salesman by now was smiling, confident he'd figured out the game. "I'm sure your mother is worried about you," he said. "What's her name? I can help you look for her, and then your little brothers can get a nice nap."
"Don't patronize them, it's only physical," Ocarina muttered. "And no, I do not need your help looking for my mother! I'm a Kokiri, I don't have a mother!"
The salesman sighed. "Kid, I have a business to run, and if you won't let me help you then I don't know what to say. You can hang in my building if you want, but please move to the side so you don't block the customers. I've still got a living to make."
"I'm trying to give you business!"
"You're ten!"
"Nine!" Ocarina retorted, then took a deep breath and reigned himself back in. "This is just – gah... Sorry for wasting your time."
He stomped out the door, muttering mutinously under his breath.
"How'd it go?" Lore asked cheerfully, balancing Speck in one arm and holding Wind's hand in the other. Ocarina stalked past him and started pacing.
"This entire town thinks Kokiri are made up," Ocarina fumed. "Nobody believes me! I mean, last time I was here I got a few strange looks, but I didn't think everybody believed we weren't real!"
"Castle Town's a no-go then, huh?" Gen guessed.
"Pretty much... And now I'm out of ideas..."
"What about the actual Kokiri?" Dusk suggested.
Ocarina blinked. "That's... That's actually not a half-bad idea. Saria at the very least will let us stay the night, and as long as we avoid Mido with every fiber of our being we might be able to stay longer."
"Which way then?" Realm asked.
"This way" Ocarina decided. He renewed his grip on Red, started off towards the Castle Town drawbridge-
And abruptly stopped mid-stride.
"Something wrong?" Steam asked, stumbling over his words a little.
Ocarina didn't respond, because he was paying attention to something else. Namely, the small, moving spot of warm on top of his head and underneath his hat which hadn't moved in weeks.
"Link?" A small, chiming voice murmured sleepily through the fabric. "Why's everyone so loud?"
Ocarina froze. Mask, who was in hearing range, also froze. And Dusk, after glancing between the two of them and concluding they wouldn't be moving anytime soon, reached up and helpfully removed Ocarina's hat.
Navi blinked at the sudden rush of light and hastily covered a yawn. "What'd I miss?"
It's been a while since I dropped a good cliffhanger.
Aside from that, who saw this coming?
Yeah, me neither. And I was the one writing it... I mean, I had the basic idea, but the rest just sorta hit me as I went.
Before I forget, I've attempted to make a Favorite Link poll as a response to requests. Basically you vote for your favorite Link, and... that's about it. You can vote three times but DO NOT vote for the same Link for all three of them. That's cheating, and I legitimately want to know who the fan favorite is.
And if you don't know where to find polls, there should be this little hard-to-notice sentence at the top of my profile that says, 'Which Link is your favorite? Vote Now!' Click on that and follow the directions, it shouldn't be too hard…I think.
Until next time,
Changeling
Thanks to LolAngel161, Theotaku3, RizLuvAnime, anibutterfly, thylasupial, CatrinSara, silversliced-rain, Kairiaka, Perseus Champion, dauntingnebula7, coolosus1, apha jd, Gargantuan Yoshi, zotinha456, and Taiski for favoriting/following!
sbr8910: Actually, the Realm I've written has only been through the original LoZ game and hasn't gotten to AoL yet. Once he does, then yes, I'll include the magic spells. ...This'll probably happen in that spinoff/sequel thing I'm planning.
The has-been who never will-be: Glad you liked it! / Hmm... sucked inside a game... well, as much as I love them I would not choose a Legend of Zelda game. I'd die at the first boss monster. So in that light... Sonic, maybe? It'd be fun to run that fast, and as long as it's not '06 I think I could handle the plot fairly well... oh, wait, put Unleashed on the list too. Do not fancy fighting the Dark Gaia thing.
Chariot's Cave: Well, dangit. And here I thought that was a valid guess. Can I get a hint? Like, when was the last chapter you reviewed (other than the one immediately prior)? / No, it doesn't really bother me, although I would like to know who you are (reviewer-wise) eventually. / And that you for the compliments... wasn't expecting that :)
Guest: I wasn't planning on using Koholint, because that would involve getting the Windfish, putting it back to sleep, getting the exact same nightmare to come back, getting all the Links to be at the right place at the right time, somehow getting Lore to get sucked in again even though he already knows how it works and would likely avoid it at all costs, and then somehow getting all the other Links into Lore's dream. It's just... too unlikely.
Zyrex: Would you believe I had both of those planned before I ever got your review? Well, maybe not planned planned, but they were definitely in my head. You're not the first person to request a Realm-in-the-Lost-Woods disaster.