Is this what happens to kids who wander into the forest?
That which enters the forest becomes lost. That which takes from the forest, belongs to the forest. It is a law unto itself… but the old Great Deku Tree always had a soft spot for children.
The former King of Hyrule unified the lands after a bitter war and brought peace at last for ten years, but Hyrule has long had a bloody history of greed and hatred, and its legacy is everywhere, even in the great forest. Seventeen years ago, a dying mother fled into the forest with her baby in desperation, but while he was the only one to remain unchanged, he was by no means the first.
It looks like he doesn't like grownups...
You wake up in a nest of leaves. Everything about them is comforting, safe, familiar.
(Once, you woke up in a warm if threadbare bed-)
You sit up and scramble out of your sheltered hollow, leaving the disturbed drift behind you already half-forgotten. It's a sunny spring day and that puts you in as good a mood as you've been lately. The forest has turned dark and dangerous, but it's still your home.
(Once, your home was a little village-)
It's still your shelter.
(You thought they would always keep you safe, but they couldn't-)
You miss the Kokiri. When they're around, you forget the bad times completely. But they haven't left their homes much for a while. The forest is too dangerous. So now it's just you and the others.
(You miss your – but you won't think about that-)
You can hear someone playing a little tune, lively and defiant. So you head that way, looking for company. Hopping between the branches is easy for you. You blend in like a little clump of dying leaves, autumn finery in spring. Down below, one of the mad Scrubs notices you all the same. It spits at you, so you spit back.
There's nothing you have to do here in the forest. It isn't safe any more, exactly, but it's still your home. You don't have to work or even eat; you play with the other children and the Kokiri and you explore and when you're tired you sleep a mostly dreamless sleep.
(There was smoke everywhere, shouting-)
There's one of the others. You change your names every day, you don't need them. You know her by sight, by her features, by the patterns of the cloth of leaves she wears, by the slight variations in colour over her tight-drawn skin, by her height and shape and the music she plays. She's playing her flute, so you play yours, warbling like birds.
She was here before you. You know this because you met her early on. She blew a foul note at you and ran away, but you weren't scared any more, so you chased her. You're friends now, most of the time.
(You had friends before but they didn't run into the forest-
You knew better than to run into the forest-)
With a little dark, dark reddish-brown hair escaping in a tuft from under her hat on one side of her face, she reminds you briefly of the body of the fox you found that one time. You were exploring in a swamp when you came across it. It was much older than you, you could feel its age, but it was almost like you. You hauled it out onto the edge to look at it.
(You had seen animals killed before but never people-)
Its skin was dark and tough and drawn tight like yours. Its fur was just slightly more reddish than its skin but nearly the same colour, in the patches where it still had it. It was a bit flat, but it was mostly in one piece. You kept it for a while, but, out of the swamp, it eventually fell apart. It wasn't alive like you, after all.
(You nearly weren't alive; you ran in a mad panic, you'd have died if you stayed and that the forest would kill you didn't matter, it was the only place you could hide-)
She plays a foul note to get your attention. You look into the bright sparks of her eyes. She's trying just like you are, but everything has been wrong for seven years now. You all thought you were safe from it ever happening again, but you were wrong.
(You were lost, you couldn't find your way. The trees seemed ominous, looming over you. You were so tired. You found a handful of berries, a few mouthfuls of water from a stream. You found a hollow to curl up in and you fell asleep.
You were better when you woke up. It was strange at first, but the forest made you not be afraid. You like your new dark tight-stretched skin, your stick-thin limbs. They say you are different, that you survived, that you don't have to be that child any more, who ran into the forest because-)
You didn't know what happened at first, but gossip spreads through the great forest as fast as anywhere else, for those who know how to listen. There wasn't very much of it, but you cared enough to put it all together, from the impudent Scrubs and the chatter of birds and the scorchmarks you found on a tree above shattered mossy bones. There was a man (a man a man), a tall man (a great big grown-up), he was in the forest (adults don't belong in the forest!) and he went (around the Kokiri who didn't see him though the Kokiri usually see everything) to see the Great Deku Tree (he threw lightning at the Stalfos, lightning!) and then the youngest Kokiri (Link, that's the one) went to see the Great Deku Tree and then the Great Deku Tree was dead.
You don't want to think about it, so you jump to her branch instead. You tag her and bolt and she comes after you calling you a rotten conker-head. You giggle. Maybe that's your name today, Conker-Head. You haven't decided yet when you spot one of the others and you veer towards him so she'll have two of you to chase.
For a while you just play tag together, almost carefree like the forest has always let you be. Then, suddenly, the game breaks up, and you're on your own again. That's okay, you feel like exploring anyway. Except it's almost half patrolling. You have to know what's going on, even though there's not really anything you can do about it. Ever since the Great Deku Tree died, it's been harder not to think about things. The forest still wants you to not think about them and be happy, but it's weak and sick. So even though you don't want to either, sometimes you do anyway.
You've wandered as far as you usually go, these days, and you're perched on the broken end of a branch that fell years ago when you spot something wrong. There's someone there, an adult, a Hylian man wearing green (how dare he?) and walking at once cautiously and almost confidently like he's barely lost at all, like he belongs here too, (how dare he?) and as he turns slightly you see the sword on his back-
(You see the flash of silver on the blade that cuts through the air and through-
you see your- -do not think it- crumple to the ground-)
He reminds you of the past. You hate it.
He shouldn't be here. You hate it.
(People like him killed everything you cared about!)
You spit darts at him, and he leaps out of the way. He's strong and fast and he scares you. You just want him to go away and he seems to get the hint, bolting from the clearing.
You don't know why there was a fairy following him. You don't care. He's gone now. Maybe the forest will claim him. It's sick now, but it can still defend itself. It can still shelter you.
It still shelters you.
Skull Kids' appearances based on bog bodies. (Check 'em out if you've never heard of one!) This whole story just came to me one night while I was busy songwriting, so the next morning I wrote it up.
Ocarina of Time is a wonderful, excellent, horrifying game.
