OMG! I'm getting so many reviews! It's totally awesome!

Dragon-Charmer16: I'm glad you like it! Once again, you're first and you get the cookie! (gives another cookie) Yeah, that's one of my favorite chapters. If you like that, you'll LOVE when the scene with the Water Spirit…

EvilRobotZombieLoofaOverlord: Yeah, I know what you mean (about the OCs) I figured since Zelda has the most OC fics I've ever seen, why not contribute? Thank you for your review!

EvilRobotZombieLoofaOverlord: Thank you.

Jana+Anthony: It's from a Tales of Symphonia/Zelda crossover thing I wrote a long time ago, but you'll probably never see it because it's in script format and I'm not allowed to post those… XP

Lil-dragon-blue: I'd LOVE a Deviantart account, but I think I'd better just be grateful for what I have for now… Yeah, it's kinda a LinkxHieke situation, but I never more than just hint at it until the very end of the fic. Glad you could find time to read and review! (gives a cookie just 'cause she's my most favorite-est author!)

Yayness! Now… onto the story!

Chapter 4: A Rose by Any Other Name… or Something

Don't ask how, but Link and Hieke managed to get into the Forest Temple. Link looked around at the main room with great curiosity. When he had last left it, he had restored the light to the torches. Of course, that was seven years in the future. For all he knew, they had always been out before that.

They heard a poe laugh evilly and strained to see through the blanket of shadow that engulfed them. Hieke exclaimed as four ghastly monsters appeared, each adorned with a differently colored garb. Link growled. These were definitely the poes he had worked so hard to defeat once before.

"The Guardian Spirit of the Forest lies within. Proceed if you wish to face our wrath," they said in monotonous unison, then they faded into the darkness. Link looked very concerned. The Forest Temple had been difficult enough to navigate in his older body. How he was supposed to succeed as his younger self was beyond him. Hieke, however, appeared as confident as usual.

"We will face it! And we'll win, too!" she shouted, shaking her fist at the area where the poes first appeared. Link rolled his eyes and sighed with a bit of a smile. What an idealist, he thought as he watched Hieke stride ahead bravely. She turned around and huffed. "What are you waiting for, Ganon's revival? Let's get going!" the Hylian girl instructed, turning back around and heading for the door.

Link ran ahead to lead the way. After all, he had been through the Forest Temple before. Hieke snorted slightly when Link silently elected himself leader. She was just as able as any boy, despite his being the legendary Hero of Time. Just because she didn't have an entire fable strapped to her name didn't mean she was any less of a warrior. Hieke grinned to herself. Hopefully Link would get to see firsthand what she was capable.

"We go left here," Link stated matter-of-factly when they reached the next room. He pushed the door open and entered. Hieke didn't follow and instead started laughing. She knew full well what was behind that door. Link ran back out shortly after, pale and out of breath. "Not that door," he muttered, heading for the other doorway in the room. Hieke shook her head, still smiling. Behind that door was a pair of Stalfos eager for a fight.

Link navigated fairly well, only leading them into a few unnecessary conflicts. "So, after we find Rose, where are we headed?" Link asked after a while, just to make conversation. Hieke shrugged. "You know the areas we have to cover. What's closest?" she said casually, turning to her travel companion.

"We can reach both Death Mountain and Zora Domain by means of the Lost Woods," he explained. Hieke nodded. "Why don't we stick to your previous adventure and find the Fire Spirit first?" she suggested. Link voiced his agreement, then the room when abruptly dark. Hieke gasped and took a quick scan of the chamber to check for the poes. Link drew his sword and stood in waiting. If the poes would attack, they wouldn't wait for an invitation. That much he was sure of.

A wicked laugh echoed through the room and a poe with a red robe over its hunched shoulders appeared. A lamp with a crimson flame burned brightly in its hand. Then it vanished into the dark. Link moved to take his shield off his back, then stopped halfway as he remembered his past experiences with a Deku shield and fire. Hieke took off a crescent-shaped pendant that had been hidden in his shirt. She clasped her hands around it and murmured a few words. When she revealed the pendant again, it was glowing and changing form. In mere moments Hieke was holding a Gerudo broadsword firmly in her hands.

Link stared at the blade with envy as he compared it to his Kokiri sword. Hieke's weapon was long and wide with a curve at the end like all Gerudo blades. Scarlet patterns ran up the base of the sword like fire, gradually fading about a foot or so in with a ruby crescent situated in the very center of the pattern. There was a bright orange cloth tied about the golden hilt. The whole sword looked as though it was born of fire. Hieke noticed Link staring and directed his attention back to the battle with a few inspirational words:

"What the freak are you doing! We're in the middle of a fight here! Concentrate!"

Link blushed and tightened his grip on his sword with renewed determination. The poe reappeared and started spinning in an increasingly swift circle. It charged at Link and Hieke, flames spewing from it's lantern and setting the decorative carpets alight.

Hieke jumped to the side and Link quickly pulled out his Hylian shield to block the blow. The poe's lantern bounced off the metal shield and it quickly withdrew in surprise. Hieke attacked the ghost from behind with shout of triumph. The poe screeched in pain, then disappeared again. "Darn ghost!" Hieke muttered fiercely, preparing herself to pounce the next time her foe reared its ugly head.

The poe appeared again behind the Hylian girl and was in the immediate vicinity for a close-range attack. Hieke did a quick forward flip, landing gracefully in a crouched position. Link attacked the poe while it was still stunned from seeing Hieke's agile feat. This time when the poe shrieked, it disappeared in a red cloud, leaving only its lantern behind. With nothing holding it up anymore, the lamp fell to the ground and shattered, then disintegrated into the red flame it contained.

Link laughed victoriously. "One down!" he said, making a victory sign. Hieke shook her head. "And three to go, each being more difficult to track down and defeat," she reminded. Link huffed and turned away. So much for optimism…

They carefully made their way through the Forest Temple and trounced two of the remaining three poes. All that was left was the infamous purple poe, the poe that nearly had Link's life the first time he faced it. She was the only poe with the ability to make copies of herself. The secret to revealing her true form was to watch for the copy that spun around one extra time when it appeared. Of course, Link had discovered that when the battle was nearly over.

"We searched this entire temple over!" Hieke groaned as she leaned against the wall. "The last poe isn't here!"

Link shook his head. "There's one room left to look through," he stated grimly. He hoped with all of his heart that the poe wouldn't use the decor of the room to her advantage. The last room to search was the Boss Chamber, the location of the great evil that tainted the Temple seven years in the future. Hopefully Phantom Ganon wasn't around this time. Link shuddered. That battle had been more difficult the conflict with the real Ganon. Or maybe Ganondorf was just a wimp.

Link solemnly led Hieke into the bleak room. They ascended the winding staircase cautiously. The purple poe was bound to appear soon, and they needed to be ready. They stepped into the arena-like area and looked around expectantly. Hieke studied the dozen or so identical pictures on the walls, each depicting a road leading into a darkened forest.

"I guess she isn't here," Link shrugged as he headed back towards the staircase. A barrier of spiked bars shot up to block him. Link stumbled backwards, then remembered what was happening. "Forgot about this," he murmured and took his place beside Hieke. The girl readied her sword and looked around alertly. The purple poe appeared above them with a short, haunting musical interlude, then vanished into one of the paintings.

"Oh, you little wannabe!" Link shouted with contempt. "You'll never be as tough as Phantom Ganon, even if you copy his strategies! Hieke! She can appear in any one of these paintings, so keep your eyes open. If you see her, stab the painting with your sword. If nothing happens, no screams or anything, then you better look out…"

An image of the purple poe suddenly appeared in four of the twelve paintings. Link stared with awestruck eyes. Maybe the purple poe could be as tough as Phantom Ganon if it really believed. He had a random mental image of a little poe dressed in purple sitting in a bigger poe's lap with the bigger poe saying, "You can grow up to be anything you want to be!" He couldn't help but laugh.

"What are you doing!" Hieke said in astonished ferocity. "This is nothing to laugh about! Pay attention! You can laugh at the dancing monkey in your head when the battle is over!"

Link nodded in mortification and took out two of the poe images, both turning out to be mere copies. Hieke stabbed at one of the other two and it let out a bloodcurdling scream. She smiled at Link victoriously. They carried on like that until Hieke started singing.

"I'm just a Hylian warrior who wears Gerudo clothes! Just how strong I really am, no one ever knows! I slay hordes of enemies, keeping them on their toes! Now here I am fighting against the purple poes!" she sang happily. Suddenly the extra poe images vanished and the real poe started thrashing and convulsing, screaming in agony the whole time. It then exploded in a puff of purple mist. Link looked at Hieke with a joking grin, his hands clasped firmly over his ears.

"Nice one!" he shouted as though he were deaf. Hieke gave him a short scowl, then a faint green light appeared in the center of the arena. In the center of the light was the tiny fairy called Rose.

"Thank you for defeating the poes, but did you have to make that mind-wrenching sound?" she said, patting one of her ears to stop the ringing. Hieke huffed and looked at the ground. Rose giggled. "It got the job done," she reminded.

Link crouched down to get a better look at the fairy. She looked so much like Navi, but had a different outfit and glowed a different color. "Lady Hieke, do you have the Ocarina of Time?" Rose asked in her chiming voice. The Hylian girl gestured to Link, who removed his blue ocarina from his pocket and showed it to the Forest Spirit. Rose nodded and looked at Hieke again.

"Lady Hieke, where is the Moon Pendant?" she asked. Hieke placed a hand on her sword and muttered a few words. The steel began to glow, then it retracted to its original form. She placed the pendant on the ground in front of Rose. The litte fairy studied it for a moment, then instructed Hieke to try to combine the necklace with Link's ocarina.

The Hylian girl held her pendant in one hand the ocarina in the other. She closed her eyes and whispered something. This time Link listened hard and heard what she was saying.

"By the moon and stars, give new form to these items."

It was some kind of incantation. The items in her hands glowed she slowly moved them together until they were one. There was a bright flash that momentarily blinded Link. When the light faded, Hieke was holding a slender flute-like instrument. There was an emblem of a crescent moon with the Triforce inside the indentation at one end. Rose smiled gleefully at the results of Hieke's combination.

"That's it! The Pipe of Ages! Now all you need is the Amulet of Epochs!" she giggled, running her hand along the ivory flute. Link breathed a gentle sigh of amazement at the beautiful instrument his ocarina had been turned into. It was long and thin, made of ivory with swirls of blue running down its length like vines. Then there was the crescent Triforce emblem, etched into the surface and embossed with pure silver. Compared to this, the Ocarina of Time looked like a child's toy.

"Rose, we're looking to find all the Guardian Spirits in hopes that when you combine your powers, you'll be able to show us where the Amulet of Epochs is," Hieke explained, keeping a firm grasp on the gorgeous instrument in her hands. Rose turned away and wandered in the opposite direction. "I don't know," she whispered as she paced. "Maybe… But I'm not sure if our powers alone will be enough. The Amulet is indeed a great source of power; so great, in fact, that it must be very well hidden to keep it from the hands of evil."

Link stared at the fairy with discouragement lingering in the depths of his gaze. "Does that mean that our journey is a lost cause?" he asked, his voice disheartened as though he had already been given the answer that he feared. Rose shook her head and gave the Hylian pair a fragile smile. "If you can learn a certain song and play it on the Pipe of Ages while in the company of all the Guardian Spirits, you may have just enough power to pull of such an achievement," she explained. "Unfortunately, I know neither what the song is nor where you can learn it."

Hieke nodded slowly, he lips pressed together. She stood up with a resolute smile across her lips and gestured for Link to rise as well. "We'll find that song!" she promised. "We'll learn it… for the sake of the world and all who inhabit it!"

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Well, there ya go! The statement that spawned the name of this fic! So? How is it? And just to give all you deadbeats something to talk about in your reviews: I like pie! What's your favorite flavor of pie and why?

Note: That question is just for you guys who have nothing else to say in your review...

Five more reviews and I update! It gets much better next chapter!