Gray

They ate while they were walking. Even though he'd gotten hungry as a wolf, Gray had refused to eat anything until he'd become a normal Hylian again. For several hours in his normal body after he'd eaten that squirrel last time, he'd still been picking pieces of fur out of his mouth. It was gross.

Soup tasted a lot better anyway.

After walking for a couple hours, they all stopped as they spotted a steep cliff in front of them, blocking the path ahead. The actual bare rock was covered by a skeleton of wood planks with a mesh rope net slung over it. Tangled in the rope was a very broken ladder that didn't look very stable, and only reached about halfway down anyway.

"How do we get up there?" Red asked.

"We climb," Blue answered simply, striding forward and tugging on the net before starting to climb up.

Gray wasn't too thrilled with the notion of climbing that. It might have held Blue just fine, but the ropes looked old and frayed, and he was a lot heavier than an eleven-year-old.

Still, they had to make it up the mountain somehow, and he figured it wasn't too much of a fall if the rope snapped. It wouldn't be fun, but it probably wouldn't break any bones. He hoped.

The things he'd been getting himself into lately…

Steeling himself, Gray gripped the net and started to haul himself up. The ropes creaked under him, but thankfully didn't break. Clumsily, he climbed up until he reached the top. Along the way, he was passed up by Green, Red, and Vio, who clambered up the ropes as if they were a proper ladder. Granted, he had no idea what they had done in past adventures, and probably had more experience, but still, it was a little embarrassing.

Once in reach, the other Links grabbed his arms and helped haul him the rest of the way onto the cliff. A winding path looking exactly like the one they had just climbed up went at a slant uphill in front of them.

"Come on, let's keep going," Green said, leading the way up the path. Before they had even taken five steps, the ground started shaking slightly and a crashing could be heard. Grey peered around, confused, before spotting a rolling object racing towards them at top speeds down the path. A big boulder.

He spun to warn the others and get out of the way, but the moment he screamed, "Rock! Look out!"

Vio screamed, "Goron! Run!" (1)

Gray slowed a little to glance at the purple hero in confusion, and then it hit him.

Flying backwards off of the cliff he'd just scaled, Gray let out a yell of surprise. His back slammed into the ground, knocking the wind out of him, and slid until his head crashed into a rock. He felt a jolt of pain, and then his vision went dark.

Red

Red was glad he had Pegasus boots. With them, he was able to rush straight off of the cliff, and go in a much more controlled fall than Gray did. The older Link crashed roughly onto the ground, flinging up dust and dirt and only stopping when he hit a rock. Ouch. That looked like it hurt. He felt kind of bad for leaving Gray to get run over like that, but there wasn't much he could have done.

He hit the ground and rolled smoothly onto his feet, having had a lot of practice from when he went teleporting around with his fairy partner looking for his friends. He missed her.

"These lands belong to the Goron tribe! No humans allowed! A weak spirit is no match for the Gorons! Do you understand me, humans? Away with you!" Red looked up to see the Goron that had knocked them down plant his hands on his hips and stride away from the cliff, probably to prepare to knock away any more random strangers wanting to come for a visit.

"That wasn't nice," Red said, frowning at where the Goron had been standing. Then he remembered Gray and raced over. He was unconscious, his tunic now all dusty from sliding along the ground.

"Gray!" Red exclaimed. Worried, he dug a bottle of red potion out of his pouch and poured it into his mouth. He didn't wake up, but the potion had probably fixed whatever concussion he'd gotten from the rock.

"We need to get back to Kakariko," Vio said, "We can't do anything else out here, and Gray could probably use a better place to rest…" Everyone agreed.

"…So, are we supposed to just carry him all the way back? The village is like five or six miles away!" Blue said.

"We don't really have a choice," Green answered, trying to lift Gray's shoulders up. He grunted, "He's heavy."

"This is going to take a while," Blue muttered, "Fine. Let's get this over with."

Even with all four of them helping, it took well over half of the day to carry him back. The entire time, Gray stayed out like a light. Well, at least he'd be well-rested.

At long last, as a brilliant orange sunset filled the sky, they finally reached the village. Renado was waiting for them.

"Ah, you made it back in one piece, it seems!" he congratulated before eyeing Gray, "…Ah, mostly. What happened? Is he alright?"'

"A Goron knocked us off of a cliff. He hit his head," Red helpfully supplied, setting him down, "He hasn't woken up yet."

"I see. He must have hit his head rather hard then. I will take him to the inn; there are lots of spare beds there."

The shaman scooped Gray up easily and carried him to the biggest building in the town. They all stopped on the porch. "You four can do whatever you like until bedtime. But, I want you all inside when the sunset is gone! No excuses!" Renado instructed.

"We have a curfew?" Blue asked.

"Yes. You are still young, and you need your rest. You will be inside when the sun is gone. No buts."

Blue clamped his mouth shut, glowering, and stomped off to sit on the stairs. Red didn't get that. To him, it was kind of nice to have an adult looking out after them. He liked Renado. Maybe he could help out and go try to cheer Blue up.

"Okay. Thanks Mister Renado, for taking care of Gray and watching out for us!" Red said, smiling brightly before going to sit next to Blue. Vio and Green followed him as the shaman took Gray inside.

Normally, he would have been excited to go exploring or something, but after carrying Gray all the way back here, Red didn't feel like running around very much. Instead, he just peered around from where he was sitting.

It was windy that night, and clouds of dust blew across the road. Occasionally, a tumbleweed would fly by as well, and Red would watch as they crashed into random objects like signs, houses, or the spirit's spring. It was only when one of those weeds rolled into a cuckoo that he noticed it there. The bird squawked in surprise and darted hastily across the road, leaving a few feathers in its wake.

Quickly calming down, the cuckoo resumed its march about the town. For whatever reason, it liked to just walk across the road and back, clucking once in a while if it got bored or if a tumbleweed got to close.

"Why does the cuckoo keep crossing the road?" Red wondered, watching the bird stride meaningfully across the path for the umpteenth time.

"To get to the other side," Green said, shrugging.

"That's like the lamest joke ever!" Blue raised an eyebrow at Green.

"Technically, that isn't really a joke. It's an anti-joke, which is used to make fun of jokes in general, usually by stating the obvious instead of something witty or different," Vio informed helpfully.

"Who cares? Whatever it is, it's still stupid," Blue grumbled.

"Hey, we should go inside now," Green pointed to the sky, where the sun was nearly gone. Red was happy to comply. He was getting sleepy anyway. Going inside, Renado showed them their beds for the night, in a room across the hall from Talo and Malo, who had both gone to sleep before they'd arrived. Plopping himself down and snuggling under the covers, Red drifted quickly to sleep.

~/_\~

In a storage room beneath Hyrule castle, just after the Links disappeared…

Shadow Link

Shadow was confused. He'd gone to sleep when things had gotten boring on the other Links' end. At the time, they had just been eating sandwiches and generally hanging out with Zelda and each other. He'd felt a little put out by the fact that once again, he'd been ignored and shoved back to being a mere shadow on the wall. He'd known it was the right thing to do, breaking the Dark Mirror, but all the same, he still desperately wished he wasn't stuck as some unnoticed bit of background. Again.

That was what made him confused. Being a creature of the Dark Mirror, that was where he resided when he wasn't following Link around in his shadow. He knew what it was like there. Dark, safe, a big window to watch the Links that he could step through to take over their shadows, a collection of Force Gems that would make Tingle jealous, and a laptop that he'd somehow managed to procure, but he didn't remember exactly how.

But when he woke up and opened his eyes, he knew at once that he was not in the Dark Mirror. For one, he was lying on a cold stone floor. The room was dark, but he could make out piles of wooden crates set haphazardly around the small room. Behind him was the Dark Mirror itself (2), but the glass was shattered and broken from when he'd smashed it to stop Vaati.

How was he outside of the mirror? Not that he was complaining, but he thought he'd never be able to leave again. Maybe Link had decided to finally put the sword back, and somehow it shocked him back into the world of light? He had to find Link. Maybe he'd have some answers.

Picking himself up off the floor, Shadow strode to the door, determined to figure out what was going on. He gasped with surprise when he slammed into the heavy piece of wood.

Normally, given any little crack, which this door obviously had, he could simply dissolve into shadow and basically 'walk through' the wall. That didn't happen. Concentrating, he tried again. The only thing he was rewarded with was a sore nose.

Oh, this was not good. Shadow rubbed his nose as he paced anxiously back and forth. Were his powers really gone? What if he never got them back? What was he going to do? Now he really had to find Link.

Biting his lip, he tried opening the door the normal way. Twisting and shaking the doorknob, he quickly discovered that the door was locked, and after a quick search, he confirmed that it was locked on the other side. This was looking like a lovely day.

Peering through the small crack between the door and the wall, he discovered it was locked with one of those big metal chains-and-lock kind of lock. Not something he could break with his sword (which he thankfully still had).

Sighing, he sat on a crate, looking down onto it and reading the label. In big, all-capital bold letters, were the words 'EXPEREMENTAL EXPLOSIVES'.

Explosives. He could work with that. Opening the crate, he discovered that the bombs inside were not of usual make. Probably where the 'experimental' part of the label came from. They looked kind of like mouse heads with pointy ears, anyway. The front half was blue, while the back was a more bronze color. Intrigued, he turned it over. There were little switches on either side of the bottom- probably the way to activate it. No harm in trying, right?

Holding it above his head, he clicked the switches down and tossed the bomb onto the floor by the door. Unexpectedly, the thing made a buzzing noise, and sped up the door, onto the ceiling, and back onto the opposite wall before exploding thunderously. Shadow winced as the wall crumbled under the explosion, bricks flying noisily left and right. He ducked behind a crate as a rock almost hit him in the head, and prayed to the goddesses that no more explosives went off.

When the dust cleared, Shadow came out from behind his box. There was now a large hole in the wall, which led into a hallway. Freedom. Tiptoeing, and wincing whenever his foot scraped a rock, he crept into the hallway and sidled up to the wall, sneaking down it as silently as possible. He did not want to get caught. Everyone in the castle probably still hated him for what he'd done, and without his powers, there was no way to disguise himself. The thought made him incredibly nervous and self-conscious. He had to find Link… who was probably in a much more populated area of the castle.

Steeling himself, Shadow slunk down the hall, pressing his back against the wall as he crept toward the upper levels. Thankfully, from the combination of following Link's shadow around, as well as generally wandering the castle when he'd taken it over, he was proud to say he knew the layout pretty well. The only problem now was getting to places without being seen.

~/_\~

After many close calls, and several hours of looking, he had seen neither hide nor hair of Link in any color tunic. He was doubting that Link had put the sword back after all, because he'd just checked the Four Sword sanctuary. There was no sword in the pedestal… so where had the Links gone? They were nowhere to be found. He was starting to freak out.

Sneaking up to Princess Zelda's room, he took a moment to gather the courage and knock, and then rapped on the door several times. Someone grabbed the doorknob and the door swung open, revealing the princess.

"Shadow Link?" she gasped, her eyes widening, "I thought I'd never see you again!"

"Yeah… about that," Shadow swallowed nervously, "…I have a problem."

(1)- Okay, so really, the Four Swords Links are a bit of a mash up between the manga and FSA, but just mostly manga. More like, the manga version happened, but they met more of the people/creatures in the game than shown. The book does timeskip a lot anyway. We don't know the exact details of everything they met. But for the sake of this, they have met the Gorons.

(2)- The Dark Mirror was moved here so that the good guys could keep a better eye on it. They weren't going to leave it in the middle of some ruins of the Tower of Winds so that some other big baddie could find it, repair it somehow, and use it for their own means. However, the lower levels of the castle don't have a whole lot of guards. There's no prisoners at the moment to take care of, the Four Sword is not there, and the Dark Mirror was supposedly rendered useless, so they saw no reason to up security.