Chapter 3: My Crew (In Case You Forgot)

…

Link decided to change his gear before disembarking. He switched his boots to a more worn pair with pastel-blue wing patches stitched to the ankles. He removed his naval belt so that he had room for a belt holding a wide-barrel pistol and brass shells marked with one of four colors. He slung another belt lower on his waist, this one carrying a shortsword with a triangular guard that fit with the bronze locket of the sheath to form a diamond, a grip covered in rings of leather, and a steel disk on the pommel. He attached a pouch to the back of the sword belt. For his left wrist, he clamped on a gold bracelet that held a ruby inside which a single letter of the Sorian alphabet had been embedded. Then he stuffed a pair of gemstones and a scraggly, blue feather into his pocket.

The last thing he grabbed was a pointed cap that was sitting on his desk. Before he put it on, he looked over at the bed. "Ready to go?" he asked.

Irleen emerged from the smaller bed hanging over the foot of Link's bed. She let out a yawn before asking, "Go where? What's with the gear?"

"We found the Lost Library."

Irleen suddenly shook side to side, producing a bell-like jingle. "We found it?"

Link grinned at her. "I sure hope so," he said. "It'd be embarrassing to have found a different island on this Sky Line." He gestured toward his head. "Let's go." Irleen fluttered to him and landed in his messy hair. Link then pulled his cap onto his head. It felt a little strange; he had not worn the cap for some time. "Hmm. I think I need a haircut."

"I've been telling you that for five months, Link," Irleen said.

Whump! Link turned to look at the door, and Irleen peered out from under his cap. "What was that?" she asked.

"Let's go see."

When Link stepped back outside, he saw that the port mizzen sail had collapsed to the deck. Two airmen sat against the starboard mizzen-mast, both looking a little exhausted. Link watched as Chief Dubbl looked over some broken pieces of rigging laid out on the deck. She wore a pale-blue button-up shirt with the sleeves torn off and a pair of work trousers sporting a few holes. Her black, braided hair had been hooked back on itself so that it appeared to be a loop behind her head.

"Good mohning, Captain." Link turned to the stairs to his left as Lieutenant Leynne, his second-in-command, stepped down onto the main deck. He had his black hair cropped short, and he wore a leather waistcoat over a blue, long-sleeve shirt and black slacks. "We will be docked at the island in a few minutes; theh's quite a bit moh distance between it and the Sky Line than I'd fihst thought."

Link nodded. Then he indicated the fallen sail. "What happened here?"

"Dubbl?" Leynne called.

Dubbl stood up and crossed her arms. "Ze chainbla—chainplate bloke," she hollered back, her face twisting in annoyance with the failed attempt to pronounce a "p" once again.

Link and Leynne stepped closer to look at the rigging. Leynne gave a sigh and asked, "Is this the one with that spring we replaced befoh we left?"

Dubbl nodded. "I told you. Sbl—… sbl—… Ze zing, not right shabe. Shabe… shape?"

"Theh was nothing wrong with it," Leynne told her as he leaned over to look at the sail.

"Ze zing was too stlong," Dubbl argued.

"The spring was fine," Leynne replied in a calm tone. "I asked you to decrease tension on the line."

"Tension not ploblem!"

"Guys," Link said in a terse voice. He looked between the two of them for a moment. Then he asked, "Dubbl, can you repair it?"

Dubbl looked up at the top of the mast. "I can fix ze chainplate," she said.

"I think ouh cuhrent problem would be finding a new spring device foh the boom," Leynne said, indicating the subject to Link. "The sail didn't retract all the way. The sudden release of the sail must have damaged the intehnal mechanisms."

"How long would it take to fix?" Link asked him.

"Depends on how long it takes foh me to find a wohkshop. I'll have to build the pahts from theih broken components; I don't have the original plans heh."

"Where be zey?" Dubbl asked.

"I left them at the main office, wheh they would be safe in case we needed them."

"Well, it sounds like we need them," Irleen pointed out from under Link's cap.

Link glanced over at the opposite mizzen-mast. Then he told Leynne and Dubbl, "Disassemble the boom so you have the parts you need. Dubbl, have the starboard sail lowered so we're not unbalanced. It'll slow us down, but we'll run on four sails for now."

"Yes, Captain," Leynne replied while Dubbl gave in a business-like snap, "Ay'a, Captain."

Link turned and crossed the deck to the starboard mizzen-mast. "Are you all right?" he asked the Hylian airman sitting on the deck.

"I think so, Captain," the man replied, one hand holding his head. Beneath his thick mop of chestnut-brown hair, Link thought he could see a trickle of blood. He looked at his hand, and then he glanced down to find a dark stain on the shoulder of his regulation blue airman's tunic. "It looks worse than it is, sir."

"I'm sure it is," Link replied. "What happened, Gillam?"

"We were doing one last round on the deck before the rest of the day crew got up," Gillam replied. "Twali here was standing under the boom looking up at it. I tried to ask her what went wrong, and that's when the thing just snapped. I shoved her outta the way, but damn are these lines heavy. I'd've rather taken an anvil to my head."

Link looked to Twali. She appeared a little disheveled with her maroon work shirt halfway tucked into her trousers and a few strands of her bright red hair dangling loose from her ponytail. "Twali, waba hwicikak mah?"

Twali gave her head an exhausted nod. "Ay'a, Kyabtin, ay'a."

"Waba nadmaysohak mah?" Link asked.

"'Olwu 'imayn noxb," Twali answered, pointing to the side of her head.

Link nodded. "Waba yayhwotak 'an talb mah?"

Twali shook her head and said, "Na', Kyabtin."

Link turned back to Gillam. "How about you? Do you need to see the doc?"

Gillam started. "No, no, sir," he quickly said. "I'll-I'll clean it up."

Link narrowed his eyes as he looked Gillam over. It occurred to him that Gillam looked a little haggard with dark circles just on the edge of forming under his baggy eyes. "Now for my next question," he told Gillam. "Do you need a pillow?"

Gillam sighed. "Sorry, sir. Been having a hard time getting to sleep. That's why I was up early."

"Why don't you go have the doc patch you up," Link told him.

Gillam stood up. "Aye aye, sir."

Then Link sighed. "And then take three hours." Gillam, in the middle of helping Twali to her feet, gave Link a confused look. "If you can't get sleep then, take another three. Find another airman to fill in."

Gillam's mouth opened as he gave a silent stammer. "But… but, Captain—"

"Do I have to make it an order?" Link interrupted, attempting to emphasize his position by raising one eyebrow. However, he only earned a confused scowl due to both eyebrows going up. So he continued, "Or do I have to have Airman Layna put you to sleep for the rest of the day?"

Gillam swallowed hard at the prospect of having fifty needles stabbed into his neck, the current rumor as to how Airman Layna usually operated under Link's order. He opened his mouth to argue some more. Link halfway expected it. Gillam, like a few others on his crew, was a career airman, an airman who would prefer the grunt work to even the prospect of command. His thick, muscular frame was a better indication than his attitude. However, even without ever experiencing command, Gillam did understand Link's priorities. So he gave a defeated sigh and attempted to wave over a passing airman. "No, sir," he told Link. "I'll go quietly."

"Good," Link replied with a grin on his face. "Because I'd hate to have to sacrifice an airman just to wake her up." Gillam rolled his eyes as he crossed the deck to stop the airman he had failed to signal. Link looked to Twali and said, "Fizuban taris."

"Ay'a, Kyabtin," Twali replied with a salute. Link gave her a disappointed look because she had used her right hand. She quickly caught herself and switched hands so that Link could dismiss her with the right-handed salute.

"It's too bad you never learned Sorian," Irleen commented as Link started for the forecastle. "I'm a little jealous that you talk to the Gelto in their native language, but not me."

"That's what you have Cale for, isn't it?" Link asked his brow. "Besides, I think I've picked up a few words of it. Eeka? Reeta? Kanee? Ip? Kipaekwaehtoo. That's a long one."

"Your pronunciation is crap," she chided him while he responded to a salute from a deckhand crossing his path. "The only one you got right is 'one'. And you're lucky to remember 'Technoworks' just because I got Cale in the habit of mixing it with the Hylian translation."

"I'm trying," Link said as he stepped onto the forecastle.

His utterance caught the attention of the helmsman and the deck supervisor standing nearby. The red-haired helmsman, with a physical appearance similar to his captain if a little taller, wore a blue duster over an old, off-white shirt and brown work trousers. His hair, having been whipped about by the Sky Line for the past half a day, was a tangled mat. The deck supervisor was a large man sporting thick muscles and a round face bare of hair. Over a grey body suit, he wore a blue airman's tunic and a pair of worn, black slacks.

"Trying what, Captain?" the large man asked.

"Never mind," Link told him. The large man shrugged and returned his attention to the island beyond the ship's bow. "Report."

"On a courssssse…" the helmsman said, pausing to check the compass built into the post between the two wheels that comprised the helm. "Almost due south from the Sky Line. Wind's…" Again, he had to pause as he turned to check a gauge on the instrument panel behind him. "Heading south, too."

"Estimate docking in about twenty minutes, Captain," Link's deck chief added. He lowered the twin-telescope device, known to them as a "duoscope", from his face and turned to directly address Link. "But I already don't like how this looks. There's not a soul in sight."

Link shrugged. "It's early in the morning," he pointed out.

"Even Sorians stir early in the morning," Irleen commented from Link's hat. "Are there lights or anything?"

"Not a sight," the chief replied.

"Do you at least have a dock for us?" Link asked.

"Yeah, but we don't have any dockers in sight, either."

Link crossed his arms and gave the chief a smug grin. "Well, then, Mister Flower, it looks like we'll be repeating our first trip to Forelight Island. So you might wanna go find a rope you can make into a lasso."

Flower gave a defeated grin and shook his head. "As long as we aren't sailing through any more storms…" he remarked as he turned and walked past Link toward the stairs.

"Agreed!" the helmsman said in a loud sigh of relief.

"Big deal, Line," Irleen told the helmsman. "You only had to sail through it once."

"Line," Link said, "one of our booms just broke, so remind me that we need to find a smith's shop or something on the island. Leynne'll need it to fix the boom."

"Is that what that sound was?" Line asked, glancing over his shoulder across the main deck. Then he gave Link a wide-eyed stare. "Waaaaait a min—Why am I going?!"

"Why are you complaining?" Link asked in turn, his hands helping illustrate his confusion. "You've been whining for a month about being stuck on this ship. Now you wanna loiter around here?"

Line gave him a disbelieving look. "Yeah!"

"I want you with me in case we have to split up," Link explained. "If we find any more Sorians, there's always a chance someone will recognize one of us. Besides, I figure it'd be better to get you off the ship before the crew chucks you into the engine." He looked back across the deck as Line slumped against the wheel. "Switch over to the engine," he told Line. "Then get changed and… see if you can find Cale."

Line let out a weak laugh. "Makes me glad this ship only has three closets," he said as Link started walking forward.

Link descended to the beakhead. Then he carefully stepped onto the safety netting around the bowsprit while holding onto a forestay. His eyes searched the surface of the massive island before them. Now that the sun had had time to rise, he could see buildings that grew taller the closer they stood toward the center. Most of the smaller buildings were normal, square-shaped buildings, sometimes with a sloped roof. But the tallest towers in the center barely reached above the surrounding buildings before they turned into pyramids or cones easily three times the base height. The centermost building looked as if it did not even try to keep its walls vertical; its outer structure, wider than the surrounding spires, already tapered inward from the ground and ended in a flat-topped roof with a single pole reaching into the sky. Link then directed his eyes to the docking area the Island Symphony slowly approached. It was a massive, open area covered in large, stone blocks. There were a few small buildings dotting the landscape. Off to starboard, Link watched as the ship passed an outcrop of rock and earth jutting out from this port area, upon which a lighthouse had been built. He looked to port, but he saw no other lighthouses within immediate sight.

Link turned and stepped back onto the beakhead. As he set foot back onto the forecastle, he asked, "What do you think?"

"No one's in sight," Irleen replied. "But that's the least of my concerns."

"There's more?" Link asked in genuine confusion.

"Link. You've seen my home almost a dozen times now. What part of that looked like Sorian architecture?"

Link, giving a nod to the airman who was now manning the helm in Line's place, froze mid-step. His face drooped into an expression of dawning realization, and he turned back toward the island. Square buildings? Stone blocks covering a large, open area? A lighthouse!? Why had he not noticed it before? Those were all buildings.

Sorians did not build their homes; they grew them. In two years, Link had never seen a Sorian-built home. Every living space, every place made for storage, sleep, or just lounging around, was always grown from the native trees. The library underneath the large tree at the center of Forelight Island had been cleared of space within the trunk without any sort of cutting, sawing, or sanding. Even bookshelves were merely grown out of the walls.

"Captain?" Link spun around in response to Airman Brandon's question. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," Link said. He gave his head a small shake, trying not to rattle Irleen in the process. "Carry on."

"Yessir," Brandon replied, his eyes following Link as he descended to the main deck.

"My Captain?"

Link stopped at the bottom of the stairs and let his head hang for a moment. Then he turned his head to give Airman Dholit a sidelong glare. Dholit, being a few years older than Link, stood an extra head taller than him. Her long, brilliant, red hair had been tied back into a pair of long, slender pigtails while her bangs, having recently been shortened, formed a curtain for her bright, amber eyes. She wore what could loosely be called a "shirt"; it was a small top of red fabric that covered her from her collarbone to just underneath her ample bust with small, square pieces of cloth covering her shoulders. Her trousers (which she had called "harem trousers") were the stretchy material from a tunic waistband sewn into the waist of a pair of trousers that bagged outward the further down they went until they were tightly cuffed around the ankles. She never wore boots; her shoes were some type of either leather or fabric that had been dyed a glittering gold.

"Yes. Dholit." Link's words were slow and terse, meant to indicate to her that any sort of antics were out of the question.

She read his mood. He could tell because the smile on her face turned into a smug look. "Oh, come now, My Captain," she told him. "I should not like to solicit youh attention when we ah on the eve of an impohtant event."

"You said the same thing during my parents' wedding," Link pointed out.

Her grin became wider. "And did I lie?"

"My dad threatened to use my carcass to scrub the Grand Sails' keel if I didn't get you away from him. You barely danced around the truth then."

"Yes, well," she said, putting on a serious tone, "befoah my past antics bah me from fuhthah contact with you, I would like to know what kind of dangah you anticipate."

Link sighed and glanced over his shoulder as the Island Symphony began to turn. "I don't know. We haven't seen anyone on shore yet."

"Should you like to have Layna in youh pahty?"

Link raised an eyebrow and glanced over his shoulder again just as the open area of port came into view. "That's a lot of open ground for her to try to hide in," he pointed out.

"Oh, please," Irleen spoke up. "You two could be locked in an empty room together, and she'd still be able to hide."

"Oooooh," Dholit purred. "What do you foahsee as the result of myself being locked into a room with My Captain?"

"You know, Dholit?" Irleen said. "I've said it plenty before, and I'm gonna say it again. I do not want to know where the hell Link found you."

"Okay, that's enough," Link said with a bored tone. "Dholit, have Layna join the shore party. Feel free to let her know that she doesn't have to stay hidden the whole time."

"I will infohm heh," Dholit said, "but I cannot help the impression that heh hiding all the time is moah of an expression of heh shyness than heh training."

"We've known that for a while," Irleen called to Dholit's back as the latter walked away.

Link turned just in time to see Flower come back onto the deck from the starboard staircase and followed him to the bulwark. They both looked over the edge at the closest area of the port. To their fortune, the very edge of the port was a jagged rock edge with thick, wooden mooring pylons planted into the ground. The stone slabs comprising the majority of the nearby area simply ended and allowed the rock to peer from underneath, as if the slabs had either never been laid down or had fallen over the edge with time.

"The edge looks solid enough, Captain," Flower said as he dropped part of the rope in his arms onto the deck. "Not sure about those pylons, though. I don't know that I'd trust them."

"Well, give one a good tug once you rope it," Link suggested. "We'll have the rest tested after we get ashore."

"Along with a few other things…" Irleen murmured, a statement barely audible to Link as he watched Flower heave a loop over the side.