Okay, this took a long time for many reasons. One, I was stressing out over a film project for school, two, I had writers block (sorta) and three, I was busy at P.A.R.T.Y- and if you don't know what that is… well… you don't want to. It was horrible, gory, disgusting, way too long and well, there was no pizza. Which sucked. Anyways, I'm rambling…

Zelda not owned by me because my accomplice fell asleep while deciphering the blueprints…

………………

The Birdie Man

Chapter 5

New Friends

"Arill! Go get Ms Marie!" yelled Saria. Arill nodded, and ran down the hill to get the teacher. Saria panicked. She had no idea what to do.

Mido felt his grip loosening. His feet struggled to stay in the small crack in the rock wall, but he knew he couldn't hold on much longer. He cursed. Why did he have to do that? He knew that the cliff was right there, why did he have to go and push him off?

He felt the root cracking under his weight.

Soon, the entire class was at the edge of the cliff, trying to see what had happened.

Link and Kafei found a rope in the boat, and they lowered it down to Mido. He grabbed onto it with tired arms, and they pulled him up. He looked down just as the branch snapped and went tumbling into the waters below.

"Where is Prince Komali?" asked Ms Marie. She looked around at the students, and did a head count. "And where is Tetra?"

Tetra ran down the hill. She wasn't all that confident in her swimming abilities, but somebody had to save him.

She dived into the ice cold water, and swam along the shore until she reached the part where Komali had fallen in. He still hadn't surfaced yet. His photos of Dragon Roost were floating out to sea. She took a deep breath, and looked underwater.

"There she is, Ms Marie!" Arill pointed out.

Komali was unconscious, and his arm was caught in the branches of a tree that must have fallen from the cliff.

"Tetra! Be careful!"

Tetra surfaced, took another deep breath, and went underwater.

The class was silent. Noone was making a sound, except for Mido who was still gasping for breath.

Five seconds passed, ten, twenty…

And then suddenly, Tetra came up with a splash, Komali in her arms. She looked up, waved, and started swimming back to shore.

The class ran down to the docks to see them, leaving Mido sitting there alone. Ivan noticed he wasn't there, looked back, and ran back up beside Mido.

"Mido, sir, do you need any-"

"Leave me alone!" Mido snapped.

"But sir, you're hur-"

"I said leave me alone! I'm fine!" Mido looked away. He wasn't fine, he was almost positive his foot was broken, but he didn't want to talk to anyone.

"Well… okay…" Ivan ran after the others. Mido sighed.

Ms Marie took the red chu jelly, and dripped some into Komali's mouth. After a few seconds, he sat up, coughing. Ms Marie smiled. He was alive.

After Komali caught his breath, he looked around. Barely able to sit up, he could make out blurry images of the class surrounding him.

"Komali!" Arill said, smiling. Komali looked at her.

"…How… What… What happened?" He said.

"Tetra saved you…"

Komali looked at Tetra, who was avoiding eye contact.

"I couldn't just let you drown…" She said, turning away from him.

Komali smiled.

"Thank you…"

Ms Marie loaded all the kids up in the boat, and after carrying Mido down the hill, they left. Everyone had finished their projects anyways…

Komali felt his head spinning. He couldn't sit up, he couldn't move. Everything was blurry… Arill looked over.

"Ms Marie, Ms Marie, I think something's wrong with Komali!"

And everything went black…

He woke up, barely able to move. Everything hurt, his arms, his legs, his head… everything. He looked around. He was lying in bed, in the now familiar room filled with framed pictures. He shook his head, trying to shake off the dizziness.

Komali lifted his arm up to rub his eyes, but he couldn't move it. He looked down… His arm was in a cast.

"Great…" he thought. "Just what I need…"

He sat up, and saw what else had been done to him.

His chest had been wrapped in a bandage… Broken ribs… That explained why he was having trouble breathing…

Komali got up, and walked downstairs, his stomach rumbling. He was so hungry… how long had he been asleep?

Lenzo came out of the back room and saw Komali.

"Prince Komali, you're awake I see…"

"Yeah…" He sat on a chair by the table. "How long have I been asleep?"

"Oh, let's see…" Lenzo looked at the clock. "About… about a day and a half."

"I'm hungry."

"I'll get you something to eat." And with that Lenzo disappeared into the back room once again.

There was a knock on the door. Komali waited a second, and then got up to answer it.

Standing at the door were Arill, Tetra, Kafei, Saria and Link. Link looked bored, as if his sister forced him to come. Tetra wasn't looking at him. Kafei yawned. But Saria and Arill were extremely happy to see him.

"Komali!" Arill said, hugging him. Komali blushed. "You're okay!" Komali nodded, laughing a bit, and pushed her off, his arm hurting. Saria laughed.

"So, Komali, Ms Marie said that you're okay…"

"Yeah… Just this," Komali pointed to his cast. "Hey… wanna come inside?"

"Inside?" Kafei looked up. "But the photo guy doesn't let anyone inside!" Komali laughed.

"He'll understand."

Komali took them upstairs, and sat down on his bed. Link sat down by the wall, and looked at Arill.

"We can't stay long, grandma wants us home before dark…" Arill was busy looking at the pictures on the wall.

"Yeah, I know…"

Saria sat down by Komali.

"Listen, it's my fault that Mido… that he…" Komali looked over to her.

"No, it's not your fault."

"But if I hadn't tried to make Mido jealous, then you wouldn't have almost drowned!" Komali shook his head.

"It's okay, I'm fine."

He looked over to Tetra, who still wouldn't look at him.

"Thank you Tetra…"

Tetra just nodded.

Lenzo walked upstairs, and was surprised when he saw all the kids sitting around in his showroom.

"Friends of yours?" Komali nodded.

"Yeah…"

Komali and the others just sat around talking, until everyone had to go home. Tetra still hadn't said anything to him, Komali got the sense that she had been forced to come. Kafei and Saria left together, and Link was trying to get Arill to leave. Arill looked at Komali.

"Well, there's no school tomorrow… can I come over?"

Komali nodded.

"Sure…"

Arill waved as she was dragged out the door by her brother.

Komali smiled, and closed the door.

Lenzo looked at him.

"So, you do have friends…"

Komali nodded. "Yeah…"

Lenzo smiled as he put a bowl of soup on the table.

After supper, Komali walked back up to his room. He was tired already, and so he put out the lantern and curled up in bed. He held Din's pearl close to him, and drifted asleep.

He had friends.

That was all that mattered now.

………………

FINISHED! FINALLY! God that took a long time! Okay, I'm reeeeeeally sorry this took so long, but every time I tried to write this, I got distracted by people challenging me to Hexic on MSN… I have a high score of about 36 000, so if you want to challenge me, I'll accept!

Please review! Uh… oh, and for all you who requested a romance… can you see it? I'm building onto one… but if you want me to stop, I will…