Replies:

To Xanfel: Thanks! Glad you joined the party. I hope that you'll review more often from here on in. And that you won't give me the Evil Eye ™ for not commenting so heavily on you review… (quivers in fear)

To kitana5055: Glad you liked last chapter! I've just seen video footage of the game actually being played for half an hour! I won't give away anything but I must comment that the character animation is superbly detailed and smooth! (Combusts with excitement)

To Mecha Scorpion: There's a hell of a long way to go, believe me. But I hope that you might guess what's going to be the main quest by the end of this chapter. If not, then all will be clear in the next chap.

P.S. There'll be no more Gerudo for a long while after next chap. Their continuous presence so far is starting to bug me. This one's a bit longer for lateness.

Disclaimer: I like cheese… What? This is the disclaimer and not the "what type of dairy product do you prefer?" bio question?… Oh well, same thing…

Chapter 10: Another way?

Somewhere, less deep within the Spirit temple…

This feeling that was occupying him was beginning to happen too often. The dull, black pain of unconsciousness; although he could not think about it in this state, he was still able to half-mindedly feel annoyed that he was knocked out again.

When he was like this, he had no control. He had no idea where he was, when he was, or even who he was. All he could do was wait until he would awaken again, that is, if he would at all. Then he would do everything he could do to be under control again, and prevent this from happening again.

The faint feeling of being dragged along cold, hard stone faded in and out until he was still again. More time passed by and then he felt the sharp searing motion of ice cold water being splashed carelessly in his face. With a startled movement, he woke up, memory washed over him, and he remembered.

Link went to get up, but the startled elf was securely tied to a large pillar that seemed to have been placed there recently compared to the rest of the weathered stone room. Looking above him, he saw one of the Gerudos standing in front of him with a recently emptied bucket of water. A continuous screeching noise rang throughout the large room that they were in. Link's assumption of there being hundreds of enemies must have been slightly exaggerated, since there was more like twenty surrounding him at the moment. Link decided to ignore the large mass of enemies staring at him and strained his head as far as he could to the side so that he could look past the woman in front of him.

He saw the witch, conjuring up some sort of ritual. And in front of her, was a huge swirling black gateway of some sort, like a portal but it looked very unstable as its disturbing noise wailed like an ear-splitting scream and its violently swirling dark mist shot sparks of thunder at a rapid pace. Dust and stone was vaporized as the black hole drew in anything nearby, crumbling rock that was in front of the gateway began to rip itself of the platform structure from the daunting force.

Looking around a bit more, he noticed that they were all in the same room where he fought those two elemental witches nearly a year ago. So in that case they were all standing on the large platform in the middle. Link assumed that more recruits were standing below on the stone floor. This part of the Spirit Temple seemed to have been slightly rejuvenated; pillars were scattered in a respectable manner. The Gerudo probably did it in order to preserve the crumbling chamber.

The witch seemed to have finished what she was doing, and turned around to face Link. The Gerudo who was standing between them moved back along the rest of the mind slaves surrounding the two.

"Impressive, isn't it" the witch shouted over the horrible noise as she once again looked around at her servants, Malon now included. "And this control spreads further than you may think…" She glared at Link, expecting him to demand for more information from what she was talking about. He didn't bother though, instead he simply glared back, not really caring how much control the witch had; it would end once he was finished with her, and he was much more interested in how he was going to get out of here.

Showing slight signs of annoyance, the evil sorceress began pacing in front of him (or what seemed like pacing, since she was also levitating at the time) and continued anyway. "My influence may affect anyone I may choose nearby, but it also spreads through them to anyone short of will, anywhere, and they will also bend to eventually do whatever I please."

Link thought about that for a moment, and realized why he was attacked last night, "So you were controlling Ingo too!"

The witch sneered, "to a certain degree, yes, I was. However, it hardly took much to persuade him to murder you. He was already willingly selling us all of the supplies necessary for us to carry out this plan."

Link had mock egoism all over his face, "Then I must be pretty strong willed to resist your control!" he said with a smirk. "Seeing as how I'm right beside you and all…" His self flattering was cut off, "You idiot! It was merely due to your wretched fairy companion that your mind has been made impregnable for the moment!" barked the hag. Link wondered where Navi was, hoping she wasn't caught too, but replied with fake alarm, "Oh! Seems like I hit a nerve." Deciding to ignore him, the witch spun around to speculate at the portal, turning her back on the scheming Hylian.

Link decided that it was time for him to finish this, since the witch seemed to be nearly finished ranting about her own superiority. He realized that all of his weapons had been taken away from him, that was a bit obvious, but he doubted that they were able to find his Kokiri sword. Since the weapon was made for a small child, it was more the size of a dagger, and Link would always either store it under a pillow at night or have it tucked in his boot when he traveled anywhere.

Shifting his boot slightly, he confirmed that he indeed still had it. His arms were tied so that they were held down, but since he was also sitting down at the time, he could perhaps bring his loose leg over to his hand. Glancing up for a bit, he guessed that the witch was going to tell him what the screeching dark portal was about and then probably kill him or something, so he likely had a few minutes at most. Luckily she had turned her back on him, and the Gerudos surrounding him seemed to be too deep in their trance to notice him.

"Do you know what this is?" The witch was gazing into the huge black mist. Again, Link didn't answer; he was preoccupied with his escape, bending his leg far enough so he could just about reach into his boot at an awkward angle. The witch snorted in aggravation, but went on, "It is a half sealed gateway to the Sacred Realm. Link paused for a moment…

The Sacred Realm! Isn't that where Ganon and Zelda are!

His attention caught, Link responded just after taking out the dagger and hiding it behind himself. "What do you mean? The Sacred Realm was permanently closed by the Sages."

Pleased that Link was finally giving the reaction that she was looking for, the sorceress corrected him. "Not just the sages, foolish boy. The Master Sword played a role in all of this too. The Evil King's banishment may have been caused by the Sages, but the Sword was the tool that locked the seals to the Sacred Realm entirely, preventing not only anyone from getting out, but anyone from breaking in and possibly opening them again."

"In that case…" said Link, "what's this gateway doing here? The Master Sword isn't broken or anything." He barely noticed anymore that he was still cutting his bonds off.

"The sword doesn't just rely on its existence alone…" replied the witch, "In order for it to work, the one with the Triforce of Courage must continually channel his life force to it to keep the Sacred Realm fully closed off from this world."

"That explains nothing! What would stop that from happening if I'm still about?"

The witch's eerie laughter rang around the room along with the screeching noise the portal still emitted. "You don't even know, do you?' she said, "You don't even have the Triforce of Courage anymore! When your selflessness caused you to leave the land of Hyrule, your bond with the Triforce of Courage was shattered along with your promise to continually protect the land. I'd have thought you'd have at least known that. Didn't it seem a bit odd that you could no longer wield the sword destined to be touched only by the bearer of the Triforce of Courage!"

Link couldn't believe it! When he ventured out of Hyrule to find a way to save Zelda, it became a chore of pain and agony every time he unsheathed the Master Sword. Before he left Hyrule for certain, he decided to return it back to its pedestal in the Temple of Time. He also wondered why he wasn't pulled back in time as well, but he guessed that this explained it.

"Then why do you have such a grudge with me if I don't have the Triforce of Courage?" He'd almost finished with those ropes.

"Of course, despite the seals have weakened, the Hero of Time's effect on them have not completely diminished. So that is why we have brought you here to your grave; where the portal shall stabilize and I will reverse its effects, thus allowing our rightful leader to emerge once more." The witch cackled loudly once more and charged her hand full of dark energy. She then turned around to face Link in order to carry out her plan, but there was one slight problem, Link was no longer there.

"What!"

Link was standing on top of a broken pillar that ended up only half the height of the others due to shoddy architecture, "For someone with all-seeing powers, you don't seem notice stuff so easily."

"Get him!" All of the minions in the room rose to attention and leaped off the platform towards Link's location, but due to the fact that they had no ground to support themselves there, Link found it easy enough to keep them at bay. As they were fended off and were forced to fall further down to the floor though, they continued to persist and some even began to climb up the pillar itself to attack their target.

Link's Kokiri Sword was his only weapon, and it wouldn't be long before its short range would fail to keep him alive anymore. As more and more Gerudo warriors began to gang up on him, he found it harder to keep balance and was starting to slip. It seemed that the witches mind control came equipped along with bestowing the victims with stronger abilities and quicker reflexes as Malon herself had sneaked up behind him and grabbed his leg, causing Link to fall off and smack flat on his face into the ground, hard.

Barely able to move from the painful landing, Link's attackers were called off as the witch decided to deliver the final blow herself. Link couldn't get out of the way in time as a huge burst of dark energy was shot at him. A few moments passed and he realized that he was still alive. Straining himself to look behind him he saw a large scorch mark very close by, meaning that the attack had missed. Link turned around again to see that the witch was screaming while grabbing her hand in agony. A small dart-like knife had been thrown into her wrist just before she fired the shot.

Before Link could figure out what happened, more Gerudo burst through the entrance behind him, but instead of attacking the injured Hero, they filed in and surrounded him while taking defensive stances towards the rest of their own tribe. They seemed to have followed all of the commotion from the portal in the room. He noticed that one of them was Queen Naburoo, who also had her weapons raised, preparing for a fight.

Link wasn't sure what to do, but two of the new arrivals helped him up and quickly lead him out the way they came in. He had little choice since he felt as though he had broken half of his entire rib cage thanks to that terribly landed fall, plus he could have swore his nose was busted into his skull. Thankfully that didn't seem to be the case since he doubted that he'd be still conscious after something like that.

Before he was dragged too far away, he heard a voice shouting out to kill him. One of the Gerudo helping him said to him with a small grin, "Don't worry, we'll have you out of here in no time…" both of them took out a Deku Nut to presumably transport them to the Gerudo Grounds, but Link finally found his voice and stopped them.

"Wait! Those Gerudo in there, they're under mind control and…"

"Do not worry about that." She replied, "We heard everything before stepping in. They will not be harmed, but the rest of our troops will try to focus on Sheba to stop her control…"

So that's that old lunatic's name. Link thought.

"…We're sorry that we couldn't act sooner, we needed to know as much information as possible before we could act."

"Ah, well don't worry about that." Said Link. He began to pick up his own weight a little more as they traveled through the more familiar tunnel routes of the Temple. "I guess that it was one of you that threw that shuriken at her before I was zapped, huh?"

The two women looked at each other, confused looks on their faces. "Erm, no I don't think so…"

"What? Then who did?" asked Link.

"I don't know," said one of them. "The Gerudo tribe do not even use such weapons." Stated the other.

The two dismissed the thought, keen on sticking to their objective, "Anyway, it doesn't matter. If what that Sorceress said was true, then we must urgently get you out of here."

"No!" Link refused to leave, "I came here to save a friend of mine; I'm not going until I get her out too!"

One of the Gerudo hung her head in slight frustration, but the other one seemed a little more concerned about Link's dilemma, "Were is she?"

Link pointed back to were the sounds of the inevitable fight were coming from, "back there, she's also under, erm, Sheba's control."

Neither of them seemed willing to let him go back, "We were given strict orders by our Queen herself! We can't just let you go back in there!"

"I'm sure Naburoo will understand my situation. And yours too since I don't intend on leaving without a fight."

They looked at each other again, and one of them took out a small vial containing a red potion. "You look weary, take this before you go."

Link took it and gulped the revitalizing liquid down whole. Its effects were almost immediate; although his pain merely ebbed away partially, he felt his strength return full force. He still wondered how in the world it worked!

"Thanks." He turned around and was about to head towards the large sacrificial room, but stopped after taking a few steps.

"Hold on! All my weapons have been taken, were would you store them in this place if you needed to disarmed me?"

One of them grabbed his wrist and pulled him across a side route, "My knowledge of this Temple is limited, but I believe that there's a small armory around this corner. The trio entered a small room were Link saw spears, scimitars and even old and misused torture devices stacked along the floor and walls. In one of the corners, he saw his weaponry had been rather carelessly thrown into a bundle on the floor.

With a disapproving grunt, he began to collect his sprawled out inventory. The two women stood behind him looking a bit apprehensive as Link put away his Kokiri Sword, and somehow managed to equip his sword, Mirror Shield, Hookshot, Fairy Bow, a few arrows that were on the wall since he had none left along with a pair of bombs that were nearby, his Ocarina and the rest of his items such as bottles all on himself, yet he didn't seem that heavily armed from his outer appearance.

One of them gathered the nerve to ask him something.

"How do you carry all of those weapons at the same time?"

"Huh? Oh, I suppose that is a bit strange…" replied Link, who was feeling more secure now he had his weapons back. He pointed to the (still slightly damaged) belt that hung on his shoulder. "This was made out of elements from the Kokiri Forest," he said. "Their materials possess magical powers. In this case, when I put an item in one of these pockets on the belt, the item shrinks small enough to fit inside, and vice versa when I take it back out again. I don't quite know how it works though, a friend made it for me a long time ago."

Link remembered his fond memories of playing with Saria as a kid. He loved to collect things like nuts, seeds, sticks that he'd pretend to use as swords and rupees. Saria, who had much more experience than Link of the mysteries of the forest, decided to make the inventory belt for him so that carrying all of that stuff wasn't a problem. Little did either of them know how invaluable it would become in his quest later on.

Looking up at them, the two Gerudos still seemed a bit perplexed, but he interrupted their behavior.

"Hey! Never mind about that, we've got to get back to that fight!"

Once again, Link set off in a hurry back to the battle with the other two following close behind.

When they entered the room it for a second time, Link saw near even numbers of Gerudo fighting each other. It seemed that despite their slightly smaller numbers, the spellbound ones seemed to be faster and more offensive. Link had to stop this before any of these innocent people got killed… well, as innocent as a bunch of thieves could be anyway. Besides, they were his friends.

The two Gerudo that were following him joined into the fight. "Good luck!" called out one as she passed by. Searching for his target, Link found Sheba floating high above the action, too far for any of the warriors on his side to reach.

Except for me. Thought Link as he took out his hookshot and aimed it at a pillar nearby the witch. He pulled the trigger and dragged himself close enough to upset the old hag's balance and make her spin and nearly fall to the ground. Link didn't think it was a good idea to unhook his item off the pillar yet, since he was already at a dangerous height, so he held onto his hookshot and ended up still clinging on to the side of it.

His plan so far seemed to be working, as Sheba had drawn her mainstream attention off the fight and towards him instead. Her enraged fury cause her to fire another burst of dark energy, which gave Link no choice but to let go of the pillar and fall halfway down his distance from the floor before he managed to grab on to the edge of the large platform in the center. He pulled himself up, ran past the crowds of confused Gerudo due to the disturbance in Sheba's mind control, and readied himself for another go.

Reaching the other side of the platform, Link glanced up to confirm that the witch was close enough for him to attempt another attack. She could be seen nearby overhead, trying to regain control of her minions.

Link only had to take a running jump this time to get high enough, but Sheba was more aware this time and moved out of the way as he swiped a sword strike in midair. Very much fed up with Link at this point, the witch flicked a wrist at him, sending the same invisible force directly shooting him back onto the platform amongst the women who had by now stopped fighting.

"ACK!" Link hit the stone stage with his back before tumbling further back towards the edge. Finding his footing in mid-roll, Link ended up just short of the edge, scattering dust as he slid to a stop. This was good, cause the menacingly evil looking dark portal was situated behind him by just a few meters. Falling over the edge at this point would surely mean him being sucked into it as he could already feel its effect pulling him back, and he didn't fancy his chances of surviving if that happened.

"I've had enough of your interfering!" shouted the destructive elder, as she flung both arms forward, causing a huge might of power to crash upon them all. The Gerudo that were unfortunately standing on the landing were all cast aside like rag-dolls as they fell onto the floor below, some smacking into the walls before doing so. Link though was rooted to the spot thanks to a well timed protective spell, which was helpful, since he was practically teetering over the edge at this point.

It seemed that this was what Sheba was looking for, as she already fired another attack at him now that she had a clear shot. This one was simply a potent burst of dark purple energy that looked remarkably similar to the dark portal's matter itself. Link ducked forward and was able to get off the edge in time as the energy hit right at the spot Link was standing in.

The witch looked as though she was turning mad; her eyes were a bright yellow and seemed to be on fire, her robes at this point were dark rags that had turned from an elegant red to a raging black, even her hair was standing on end. Overall, it gave Link the picture that he was in trouble.

She fired another shot at him. Link took a risk and decided to try out his new shield. As the powerful beam hit the reflective surface of his Mirror Shield, Link tried to cast it directly back to his target, but the energy was far too violent to be reflected directly against itself. Link was sent flying back with the force of it all, over the platform's edge, and was inches away from shooting straight into the unstable gateway as the anchor of his hookshot saved him again.

He didn't fall into the side of the platform as the portal's effect was dragging him in so hard. The opening in dimensions and perhaps time itself had surely grown in strength as it sensed a nearby life force that could feed its never ending hunger for matter. Even when he released the trigger to pull himself back in, the hookshot strained with the force and barely moved, before the sound of a metal component inside it gave way to tell Link that it was now broken! His own grip was straining too. The wailing scream from behind was wrecking his ears. The air molecules were being sucked past so quick that his light and vision was almost completely impaired. Link dragged his other arm far enough to grab the hookshot's handle with both hands.

If the hookshot wasn't gonna pull him back out, then he'd have to do it himself. Letting the handle go with one hand, the determined Hero grabbed the chain of the item and started to ever so slowly heave himself along the extended component. The arrow tip of the weapon was beginning to crumble itself loose of the platform edge.

Seeing this opportunity, Sheba charged up another attack to finish Link off, but Some of the Gerudo who were fast on their feet had climbed back up and got in the way. One of them threw their scimitar at the witch, causing her shot to fire way off target and hit a nearby pillar instead. Another support in the room was damaged as the pillar collapsed apart with the attack. More of the bandits began to join in to give Link more time, but he wasn't getting very far. His distance from the black hole was making its effect on him weaker, but it wasn't enough and his grip was loosening all the more anyway.

Malon was standing directly below, hardly having any clue to what was going on, but looking above her, she knew Link's situation wasn't good. All of the people around her seemed to be too busy recuperating or fighting some weird magician high above to help the doomed Hero, so she began climbing up the wall of the platform herself.

Link had almost reached the edge again, but the dragging energy from behind still threatened to swallow him whole if he let go.

Just a little more!

Sheba unleashed the last of her power just to get one more crack at Link, a huge barrier dispelled of any Gerudo that were daring enough to be close by and then she blasted at him once more in blind fury. Again the attack was a bit off but it was close enough in that it blown up the point were Link's Hookshot was fired.

Link, who was mere inches from reaching solid rock again was devoid of any support at all as he seen the tip of the Hookshot fly past his head. Having no ideas left Link was now mercilessly sucked into the portal. He closed his eyes, accepting that he had failed and felt everything stop…

He opened his eyes again, expecting to either see himself in some sort of afterlife, dead or perhaps nothing because he had seized to exist. But looking at his still outstretched arm, he noticed that something had grabbed it. His vision had come back into focus, and he saw that Malon had reached out and stopped him from almost certain death.

Link could see that she was now struggling to hold on too, so now that he had the chance again, the persistent elf quickly put away the damaged Hookshot that was in his right hand, and then pulled himself close enough to grab the ledge with it. He used his lingering strength to haul both Malon and himself closer to the center of the stone stage as the shrieking portal's dragging effect had finally began to ebb away.

Link clambered to his feet in time to spot Sheba fling one last surge of dark power at Malon for saving him. Link jumped in front and deflected it with his Mirror Shield again. This time though, he tried using a different strategy with the counter attack, and instead of foolishly sending it directly back, he aimed his shield at a pillar directly beside the deranged villain. It predictably shattered to pieces along with the section of ceiling that it was supporting, and Sheba disappeared in the falling rubble that toppled on top of her.

There was definitely no time to celebrate as the whole room was starting to collapse along with most of the Spirit Temple as a result. Thankfully, everyone seemed to get the hint from 'huge trembling cave-in' that it was their cue to get the hell outta there. The whole pack of Gerudo began to swiftly file through the exit, while Link picked up Malon and jumped of the stone block just before a large piece of debris crashed onto the spot they were both standing in.

Link and Malon made to the exit along with the last bunch of stragglers. Before leaving, Link took one last glance behind him, seeing that no one seemed to have been left behind, and hoped that that was the last anyone would see of that crazed witch. He made his way after the others as a huge chunk of ruins crashed right at the doorway.

Due to all of the commotion, the Gerudos couldn't possibly concentrate well enough to teleport themselves out of here, so they had to make it out on foot too.

They weren't out of trouble just yet, as the entire Desert Coliseum continued to tremble apart. Link caught up with Malon at the back of the group and barely heard Naburoo's voice up ahead of the crowd, "Follow me!"

They all ran as fast as they could along the narrow passageways that vigorously shook more and more as they got closer to the Temple's exit. Link looked to his side and noticed Malon was having difficulty keeping up with all of these well-trained fighters, so he grabbed her hand to help her move faster. As they ventured hastily along certain parts of the structure, Link was grateful that there were no creatures along the way this time to slow them all down.

Eventually, they began to see light dead ahead! Regaining hope, they all sped up to reach the exit. But Link was beginning to realize that they were not heading out of the main exit. His suspicions were confirmed when Malon and himself skidded to a halt on top a huge statue's hand on the outside of the Temple.

Malon gazed wide-eyed in horror when she saw a huge drop right in front of them, leading at least three stories all the way down to a hard stony ground. The Spirit Temple's main entrance was all the way down there, but Naburoo must have thought that it was a better idea to use a quicker route to get out. Link saw that they could use their agile skills to teleport directly to the ground in open space, but what about Malon and himself!

His Hookshot was busted, so that couldn't help them. Just then the hand they were standing on began to crumble apart with the shock waves, giving them no more time. Unable to think of any more solutions, Link picked up Malon and readied himself.

Malon failed to believe what Link was planning to do… surely not…

All she could manage to do was give him a look of disbelief and some encouragement…

"No…" Link returned the gesture with a nervous grin, and jumped.

"…WAAYYYYYY!" Malon was heard screaming all the way down as Link landed heavily on the arm of the statue, slid down to it's elbow and free fell the rest of the way down. He ended up yelling out himself at this point.

"WHAAAAA!"

SMACK!

Link may have had similar falls like that before, but never while supporting the weight of two people before.

"…owww." Link had landed on both feet, his legs felt as though they had been shattered in twenty-one places. But Malon gained enough courage to open her eyes after the incident and noticed the remains of the boulder like statue tumble down above them.

"LOOK OUT!"

Link had to painfully respond by heaving the two of them out of the way. Both Link and Malon ended up sprawled on the desert sand as rock and earth crushed the area behind them.

A few moments later, after things calmed down a bit…

Malon ended up completely unharmed after the ordeal, but Link's condition was a slightly different matter. Naburoo's most skilled healer done all she could do for the moment with her revitalizing magic and potions, but they all insisted that Link where to stay at their headquarters for the night. They were going to have a celebration thanks to the return of the rest of their missing group.

Since both of his legs and other several parts of himself where bandaged and bruised (notably his head, which Malon had confessed about) Link found it a bit too hard to refuse.

Then Link remembered something that struck him with panic.

"WHERE'S NAVI!"

Just as he shouted that out, a muffled noise was heard inside his belt. Inside one of the pockets Link took out a bottle that contained a very annoyed looking fairy. Relieved, but still dreading the lashing that he'd get, Link hurriedly uncorked the bottle, letting Navi furiously shoot out, burning a bright red.

"ARGH! How in the world did you not notice me! One of those damned Gerudo shoved me in here! And you didn't even see me when you picked me up! How could you!"

Had a dull expression, ignoring the fairy…

"So… on to Gerudo Grounds?"

End Chapter

A/N: Right… I'm off now for summer, and now that I've recovered from horrible school repercussions, I'll be updating much faster…

In fact, I'll even swear on the Triforce itself that I'll have the next chapfinished within a week. Now you can be sure that I'll keep to my word… I'm sure Mr. Ravenstar will make sure of that.

That's all I can say! It's way past my bedtime so I'll be off. Sorry for any spelling mistakes. The Title will be changed to The Dark Revenge for now, so expect that in a little while to change.

Read and review! They let me sleep at night with happy thoughts of acknowledgement (big word… heheh…)

Bye! -

(CUT) As some may have noticed, this chap has been modified. When I went to upload the next chap, I noticed that this one's paragraphs were all glued together. And I noticed that I didn't get even one review! I've stuck to my word by finishing the 11th chap, but it won't be uploaded until I get at least one review please, good or bad (I don't mind negative opinions as long as they're somewhat constructive).

Bye again! (till that review anyway)