Chapter
5
"A
Darkness Within"
Dark.
Everything.
Everywhere.
Pain,
oh... the pain...
A
voice.
My
name?
Who's
there?
So
tired...the pain...
The
voice again.
That
voice!! Can it be?
"Link-kun!!"
Zelda!!
With a
short gasp as if he had just woken up from a nightmare, Link's blue eyes shot
open. Only one thing was seen to his unfocused eyes, the face of a blond-haired
beautiful woman...
"Link-kun,
are you alright?"
"Zelda!"
Instinctively,
Link attempted to sit up to look at his unfamiliar surroundings, but was pushed
back by burning pain with a yelp. Immediately Zelda came to his aid, holding him
up gently with one arm and putting her hand on his wounded shoulder, searching
for answers that weren't there.
"This
wound... I thought it was completely healed, but..." she looked closely at
Link's healed shoulder where the black arrow had hit, just missing the heart.
"Something is causing you pain. It must have penetrated deeper than I
thought."
Link
moved his lips to speak, but she laid one finger upon them before he could
whisper a word.
"Don't,
save your strength." she whispered.
Link
closed his eyes, trying with all of his willpower to ignore the searing pain
tearing through his body. In hopes of dulling the pain slightly, Link occupied
his thoughts by concentrating on his breathing, relaxing his tensed muscles as
Zelda inspected the mysterious wound.
They
were silent for a moment or two, one caring for the other. The pain had only
dulled slightly, if any, and Link could not stop the convulsing ripping through
him. In an attempt to sooth Link, Zelda put all of her willpower to help Link's
body relax -- whatever the arrow had done to his shoulder was traveling to every
corner of his body, taking a painful toll on him.
The
convulsing ceased and a calm enveloped Link. Cold sweat soaked his skin;
worrying Zelda that he might have taken sickness.
Link
opened one eye to look upon the Princess of Hyrule, only then did he notice a
major fact they he had overlooked due to his awful pain
earlier.
This
doesn't make sense, Link
thought to himself. When Zelda looked at him with a puzzled look on her face he
realized he had spoken aloud.
"How am
I here?" he asked. "I'm a..." Link lifted his gauntleted hands, hands with
longer fingers than they should have. He lifted them to his face, feeling his
features.
His
face was bigger, not as round as he had as a child. Yes, as a child, for he was
not a child anymore...
"How am
I here?" he repeated, staring at Zelda, in adult form, for answers.
"I...
I..." she stammered. For once the wise princess of Hyrule was out of
answers.
Despite
his muscles screaming in pain from the motion, Link reached behind him to his
back, finding that the legendary blade, the Master Sword, was not present.
This
did not register in Link's weary mind. The very last thing he could strain his
mind to remember was tearing through Hyrule Field on Epona with a deadly pursuit
behind, then the arrow... the pain...
"Link-kun..."
He
turned toward her, the Zelda he knew even better than the Zelda from his time.
This Zelda fought with him to save Hyrule from the evil that threatened its
freedom and peace. This Zelda became his friend and assisted him so much through
his adventure that, without her help, he would have certainly perished. She did
so without question, without a favor in return.
Link
knew that he would, without so much as a thought for his own welfare, would
protect her with his life.
"I do
not know why you're here. Or how," she added. "you came to be here. But there's
something that you need to know before we talk any
further."
All
Link could do was to look at her. The pain was defeated by a feeling that he
hadn't felt since the last time he had seen her -- after the fateful battle with
the King of Evil, Ganondorf.
It was
for her than he defeated Ganondorf -- it was her love for Hyrule and its people
which gave him the strength to defeat the powerful adversary in a deadly battle
which ended with Ganondorf sealed forever within the clutches of the Sacred
Realm.
Yes,
all Link could do was look at her, her beautiful face and shining blue eyes.
There was one other thing that Link could do, and that was to listen to
her.
"After
you... left to go back to your original time..." she began. "Hyrule entered an
brief age of prosperity. Villages were rebuilt as the Temples were forever
cleansed of the evil that was wrought upon them during the time of Ganondorf's
seven-year rule. It was a time of
peace, but it did not last long." Zelda bit her lip; Link spied tears welling up
in her blue eyes.
"Then
it came. It was slow at first, but it spread with such speed that it was too
hard to keep up with it. It destroyed life, wiping out anything that stood
against it. There was no warning, no hint of its arrival, it just...
came.
"The
Kokiri Forest was first, all the beautiful trees, the green grass, the woodland
animals, and the forever-youthful Kokiri, gone. Then it there was rumors of it
infecting the desert. The desert, of all places!! By the time the army got
there, it was taken too.
"Zora's
domain was taken next, and very quickly, since the domain itself is water. Then
Death Mountain, the Gorons died immediately from the change of climate. Kakariko
Village, Hyrule Field, Hyrule Lake, Gerudo Valley, and finally... the castle
itself was taken by the... the..." The tears in her eyes spilled over as the
painful memories played in her mind, but there was no need to end the
sentence...
For
Link knew.
"The
Cold." he finished for her. Zelda looked at him, surprised of his knowledge of
the Cold. To explain, he told her of the dreams he had.
She
regarded them carefully, and thought for a moment. Her eyes stared off,
unfocused on the surroundings around her. It was during those moments of silence
did Link see his surroundings for the first time.
Nothing,
endlessly stretched on forever and ever. There was no source for the light that
shone around them. No ground was visible, and it seemed as if they were inside a
white void, floating through the air, though it was solid enough to be
stone.
Again
Link's mind drifted to the question of how he came to be here, for they had not
yet reached the conclusion to this puzzling mystery.
Zelda
spoke, snapping Link out of his toiling thoughts.
"It
seems that you are connected to two times, the past and future. The past, or
present for you, is your original time. The future is here," she gestured the
area with a wave of he white-gloved hand. "seven years in the future, to be
exact.
"Your
heart is in both times, and with that it is as if you almost live in both times.
But, since the mind cannot be in both places at once, your physical body had to
reside in one time -- the past. But the heart, it can be in many places at once,
stayed within two times, for something kept it that way.
"That
is why I believe you had those dreams concerning the cold -- your heart is as
much here as it is back where you come from." She laid a hand on Link's chest to
hear a muffed heartbeat through his green tunic. "As the Hero of Time, you can
feel disaster strike from both times, and it effects you with
nightmares.
"But
that does not explain how you can here without the Master
Sword."
Forgetting
the pain for the moment, Link sat up on his own using all his strength, and
asked a question which had been burning in his mind since he had come to
consciousness. His eyes locked on hers.
"How
did you come to be here?" he asked intently.
Zelda
looked back at him, gaze unwavering though her heart pounded so loud she feared
that he could hear her. "That is a question I cannot
answer."
"And
neither can I." A familiar rumbled from behind them.
Link
recognized the voice immediately, and a growl escaped from his throat. Ignoring
the burning pain Link whipped his head around to face a formal no, present, enemy.
Ganondorf.
He
stared at Link with the same identical expression: pure hatred, though it was on
a much larger scale than the expression gave by the young
Link.
"How
long have you been here?" Link demanded.
"Not
long, boy," Ganondorf answered with venom in his deep voice. "But long
enough."
He
moved quicker than Link had ever imagined him moving, and soon his hand was
almost at his throat. Zelda had been knocked away, and Link was completely
helpless due to his severe injury to save his own life. He closed his eyes and
waited to hear the sickening crunch of his neck snap...
But it
never came.
Link
opened one eye cautiously, and then the other. Ganondorf was there, with his
hand at his throat. But strangely, Link did not feel Ganondorf's large hand
against the skin of his neck.
Link
allowed himself to breath once more, taking each breath in slowly. The moment of
tension continued as Ganondorf vainly tried to tighten his iron grip and end
Link's life.
Crying
out in frustration, Ganondorf released Link, and he collapsed onto the ground,
causing a new wave of pain to tear through him. Though Ganondorf had not in
anyway cut off his air, Link's breath came in short gasps.
Zelda
rushed to his aid immediately, propping him up against her warm body as he began
to shake violently again.
"I
don't know what's wrong, Link-kun!" she cried. "You should be healed, but
something's wrong!"
"I hope
it kills him, since some unseen force is keeping me from doing the task myself."
Ganondorf snarled a little distance away with his arms
crossed.
Zelda
ignored him and began to remove Link's tunic to reveal the shoulder where the
pain had began and spread through his body from. She gasped as she peeled away
his tunic and saw the damage that was being done to his
body.
"Oh,
Link-kun!"
Link's
shoulder was completely black, and was very cold to the touch. Link couldn't
hear Zelda anymore; the pain had forced his consciousness, cowering, in a corner
inside his mind. His eyes were shut tight and his body had ceased its quivering,
he looked very dead.
Fearing
the worst, Zelda place a hand on his breast, and to her relief found a thumping
heartbeat from deep within. Vainly she called his name, trying to force him back
into reality, but it was of no use --
-- the
poison was deep within him, infecting his soul.
~End of
Chapter 5