Reminisce

CHAPTER ONE

"What's going on!" a man demanded. Zelda had a group of gaurds around her, one of them held a firm grip on her forearm, she was dressed in traveler's clothes, a light yellow-green hunter's shirt and long brown cloth pants.

The man who had spoken was about 2 years older than Zelda; he had a well-groomed appearance and seemed trustworthy at first glance.

The guard holding onto Zelda replied in an irritated way, but knew enough to stay in control of the tone of his voice when speaking to his superior officer, "This prisoner is refusing to allow us to search her, sir."

The man eyes Zelda for a moment, "Is that so?"

He walks over to her and eyes the others; they avert their gazes, "Let me handle her."

He gently takes her hand and leads her towards the holding cell down the cobblestone steps; he spoke over his shoulder, "Return to your posts, all of you."

The man led Zelda into a room for holding suspected criminals. As far as Zelda could tell, the place was empty. The man shuts the door, sealing them both inside, "Well, miss, I still have to search you, you know…"

Zelda turned and looked at him with an angry, spiteful expression.

The man held his hands up peacefully, "Look, I'm not going to do anything stupid, okay? You know it's required to make sure you're not carrying anything dangerous."

Zelda replied angrily, "Is a strip search required, too?"

The man raised a brow and glanced at the door, thinking about the gaurds from earlier, "Oh…hmm," he thought, "So that's why." He turned to Zelda, "I'll have a talk with them later, they'll hear from me very soon. I guarantee it."

He stepped towards her, she backs away. The man sighs, "Look, I'm just going to pat you down, ok? Not everyone here acts like those idiots up there, I promise."

The man stops and sighs, "Fine…look, I'll just ask you. Do you have any weapons on you?"

"No." she answered.

"Any other illegal items? Contraband?" he asked.

"No." she quickly answered in an irritated way.

The man puts his head down, "Well…this isn't going anywhere. You could be lying for all I know."

Zelda narrowed her eyes, "You'll just have to live with it."

The man scratches the back of his head in thought, "Alright, fine. I'll just take your word for it. I owe you that much for what you went through earlier." He points to the jail cell behind her, "Just do me a favor and go in there."

Zelda shook her head.

The man sighs, "You're making this harder than it has to be."

Zelda crosses her arms, "I don't belong here."

The man walks up to her, "I guess I'll have to be rough with you, then…"

Zelda backs away and suddenly bolts towards him. She almost makes it past before the man grabs her by the arm and pulls her to him, "Hold it!" he yelled, using his other hand to wrap around her waist and picks her up sideways as she kicked and screamed in an effort to escape. He carried her into the cell and unceremoniously drops her as he runs back out and slams the barred doors shut.

Zelda sits up and stares at him with hatred in her eyes. They were both panting.

The man looked annoyed, "See? You would've ended up in there one way or the other."

Zelda puts her head down, defeated.

The man looked at her curiously, "Tell me one thing."

Zelda looked up. He continued, "What did you do to get put in here?"

"You carried me in here." Zelda said sarcastically. The man shakes his head, "Look, you'd have to do something wrong before we can jail you like this."

"That's none of your business." Zelda replied heatedly.

He responds by sighing and turning away, "Whatever."

As he reached for the door, Zelda shouted to him, "Wait."

He ignored her and begins to open the door. Zelda said quickly, "My name is Zelda!"

The man froze; he looked at her before shutting the door again, "Zelda…As in…Princess Zelda?"

Zelda merely looked at him.

The man laughed, "You're joking. You really shouldn't be doing that. Impersonating royalty can land you in jail, you know."

Zelda sighs.

Realization hits him and he laughs, "Oh…so that's why you're here." He eyes her curiously, "You know, if you're going to pretend to be someone, you really shouldn't impersonate someone as famous and influential as Princess Zelda. Besides, she's back in Hyrule. She can't be in two places at once. If she had gone missing, half the globe would be buzzing with news by now."

Zelda looks at him pleadingly, "Please…let me out."

The man shakes his head, "I'm sorry, that's out of my power." He turns and opens the door. Zelda asks, "Can you at least tell me your name?"

The man pauses for a moment before responding, "It's Nave."

With that, he walks through the strong wooden doors and closes it, locking the iron bolts in place, sealing Zelda off inside by herself.

She sits against the hard black brick wall and hugs her knees, resting her head in her arms to keep warm.

It was dark now. Several hours have passed since the time Nave put Zelda inside the cell. Nave had given the guards a long-winded lecture on what would happen to them if they'd act the same way again. Needless to say, it tired both parties out very quickly.

Nave was inside the local bar, sitting in front of the counter as the bartender sets the drink in front of him. Nave looks up and takes it; taking a little sip to test the beverage, "Not bad." He looked tired. There was no one else at the bar, just the two of them.

The bartender, deciding to make some small-talk, spoke, "Rough day?" he asked. Nave looked at him, "Yeah…some of my 'High-ranking' men were out of line today…couldn't control their urges, I suppose." He scoffs, "Tried to take advantage of some woman." He thought for a moment, "…she's pretty good-looking, though. Not the type you'd think would end up in prison."

The bartender raised a brow, "Oh?" he smiled as he took a cloth from below the counter and began wiping it, "Speaking of pretty ladies, have you heard the rumors?"

Nave looked at the bartender lazily, "What rumors?" the bartender smiled, "About Hyrule. More specifically, the Princess…"

This catches Nave's attention immediately, "Do tell."

"Well…I don't know the details—and this is just a rumor, mind you." He began.

Nave grew impatient, "Just get on with it."

The bartender continued. He stopped cleaning to collect his thoughts before saying, "They say the princess ran away. The details are rough, but they say Hyrule's been trying hard to keep any of this from leaking out. And well…obviously it did. They say she ran off in the middle of the night."

Intrigued, Nave inquired the bartender, "Why would the princess run away like that?"

The man shrugged, "Who knows?"

Nave thought back to the Zelda in the prison. Could they be the same person? He decided to investigate, "I'm going to check on something." He stood up and dropped some rupees on the counter to pay for the drink, "Thanks for the story."

The bartender looked down at Nave's drink. He had barely taken a sip.

Nave walked down the dark streets. It was winter. Luckily, the wind wasn't blowing, or it would've been hell walking back. His breath trailed behind him in the form of mist. As he neared an alley, a cloaked figure steps out, blocking his path. Nave paid no attention to this and walks around the figure.

Suddenly, theres a loud clicking sound. Nave turns and sees a knife flying right for his head. Naturally he ducks to evade the weapon and draws his sword, "What is the meaning of this!" he demanded.

Under the hood, two white eyes glowed suddenly, "Garo…" Nave muttered.

The Garo were a group of spies and assassins from the Kingdom of Ikana. Nave had no idea why they were here or why they were after him, he knew better than to ask.

The Garo lunges forward as two long curved blades snapped out of it's hands. It almost seemed to fly towards him. Instead of doing what was expected, Nave instead waits for the right moment and lunges forward before the Garo could begin it's swipe.

He punches the Garo right in the face. Due to the angle and speed the Garo had flown towards Nave, there was an audible snap as the cloaked ninja's neck snapped.

The thing went limp and skidded behind Nave, crumpling to a stop.

Nave sheaths his sword and walks over cautiously to the crumpled form. He kneels beside the body and throws off the hood.

To his surprise, instead of a face like he had expected he found…

"A BOMB!" his eyes widen as the explosive detonates, shaking the entire neighborhood around him.

As the dust settles, Nave is seen lying on the ground a few yards away. He had enough time to get a quick sprint away. He groaned and turned over to lie on his back, blood seeped out of the wound on the back of his head. He stared at the night sky for a moment. The stars seemed to dance around him. He heard footsteps and turned his head to the side to see a pair of large muddied boots. The image suddenly becomes even fuzzier, "Who…?" he asked faintly before he slipped into unconsciousness.