Chapter 15: Deep Dive - Wrath of the Sea Snakes
Scourge of the Ocean Pirates Arc
Disclaimer: I don't own The Legend of Zelda, this is just a Fanfiction.
Featured Music: "Ranked Amongst the World's Best" - The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass OST. Chapter Briefing.
"New Wave Bossa Nova" - The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask OST. Scene 4 (Second Half).
Having rescued the lands of Weybour and neighbouring Snowhead from a horrible eternal winter, the young Hero of Time and his guardian fairy companion move their eyes to Termina's western section; the gigantic seas of Great Bay. As they saunter through the coast their first meeting is with a man of the nearby Zorans, by name of 'Mikau'; the lead guitarist of the all-Zoran band, the Indigo-Go's, Mikau had previously undertaken a single-man endeavour in which he attempted to infiltrate the nearby Gerudo's pirate fortress.
An unfortunate action that sees him on the wrong end of the skilled Aveil's blade.
With a heavy heart in meeting the two heroes, Mikau pleads for an end to his tortured soul and he is granted it; in playing the 'Song of Healing', a powerful melody the mysterious Happy Mask Salesman gifted him with, the fallen Mikau is at last given respite. He ascends to the afterlife now, leaving only the rest of his Zoran powers in the Zora Mask for Link to collect and fight with.
With their entrance to the beautiful beaches of Great Bay, Link and Tatl meet and stumble upon a Gerudo prisoner of her own making; a young woman calling herself by name of 'Flyssa'. In advancing through the otherwise intimidating garrison, the new party of three manage to easily track down and recover the four Zoran eggs the pirates had stolen – with thanks to their reconnaissance skills. It is when locating the final egg however that commander Aveil herself, killer of Mikau and leader of the pirates, shows herself.
She clashes head-first and savagely with the younger Gerudo turncoat Flyssa and, though the battle looked grim, the young fire-haired girl manages to overcome. Surprised not just by Tatl's new attitude, Link can only extol his praise toward the similar-aged swordsmen; an act that manages to see the two growing closer... much to the watching Tatl's chagrin.
Unfortunately for the Zorans however, and for the adventuring heroes, the search is not over; while they have recovered a maximum of four eggs there still remain three. In their eavesdropping through the pirates' fortress the group manage to discover the location of the lingering three; south of the fortress itself and into an area known only as 'Pinnacle Rock'.
Known to the general populace as the 'Sea Snakes' Lair', Pinnacle Rock is a huge expanse of ocean going as far deep as two miles; an intimidating enough notion in its own right that is strengthened only by its notoriety in housing the 'Deep Pythons'. These vile fiends, known informally to the masses of Great Bay as 'Sea Snakes', are giant snake-like beings that have infested the once-pristine underseas of Pinnacle Rock.
It is through these overrun waters that Link, Tatl and Flyssa must now wade through.
Scene 1
DAWN OF THE SECOND DAY
-48 Hours Remain-
"Oh!"
The large man's voice, so deep in its bass, managed to make the nearby Tatl and Flyssa wince. Link however, as always, merely grinned up at him as he placed a single hand to rest upon the green of his well-clothed hip.
"That's my Hookshot that those damned pirates stole!"
The man standing before him, tall and muscled, certainly managed to show it off via his bare open chest. Resting upon his lower section were simple enough shorts befitting the warm weather and, sitting across his buffed-up arms and right leg, were three snake-like blue-shaded tattoos. The large man, previously having introduced himself as 'Piers', cast the youth a knowing and impressed grin as he folded his powerfully-muscled arms together.
"You've been to their fortress...," he posed forward, quipping up a curious eyebrow as he did. "Haven't ya?"
The similarly grinning-faced Link shrugged back at the much larger-framed male, an exaggerated shut-eyed chuckle on his lips.
"What can I say," he batted back in his shrug before soon lowering his small arms in response as he stared on back. "I live for danger."
"Yeah, right..."
The annoyed mutter from the back of the room, seemingly belonging to the ever-floating Tatl, made the listening Piers and Link burst out laughing together as if having been waiting for just such an occasion.
"You somethin' else kid!" The laughing Piers claimed in his sociable grin, unfolding his arms as he lowered one to offer an open palm down at him. As expected, the similarly grinning youth slapped his much smaller left hand with his new friend's in a powerful slap together. "Anyone that's even thought about trying to infiltrate 'em has ended up fish food... or worse!"
"Yeah, well...," Link began in reply, lowering his hand to place on his hip as he liked to. "I guess it helps to have one of 'em on your good side, huh?" He grinned, edging both his free thumb and blonde-haired head in the direction of the frowning-faced Flyssa. She watched the pair communicate, gold-tipped eyes swerving between them as she folded her own small and tanned arms, leaning her similarly slim form up against the wall behind her.
Piers couldn't help but widen his tired-stricken eyes, visibly surprised. "You charmed one of 'em...?!" He hissed out, his incredulous tone successfully elucidating his shock. "Well done lad!"
"I guess she just had to have me," the brash young Hero of Time replied back as casually as ever, shrugging a second time in his shut-eyed grin. "What can I say," he repeated, lightly tilting his head once as he spoke in his confident expression. "I guess I'm just irresistible."
The inevitable laugh that came not only from the listening and watching Tatl, but the leaning and similarly grinning Flyssa, did not dissuade him; rather, it made him merely turn his smirk over in their direction before re-facing the front.
"So if you were in the pirates' fortress...,"
Piers' low-toned prodding could only make the listening young Hylian drop his grin in favour of a blinking frown; he could only stare on as the bald-headed man leaned his form forward, almost as if he were about to divulge something sensitive.
"Then you'll have encountered those Gerudo guards...," he whispered down in his own knowing and devious little grin, eliciting a chuckling and rolling-eyed smirk from the listening Link. "Right...?"
Listening in from the sidelines, Flyssa found her eyes rolling up to match the lightly-amused grin her face took. Tatl's normally calm milk-tinged light soon reddened into a visibly-annoyed shade of red.
"I know what you want...," the chuckling Link rolled his own sky-blue eyes in a similar-grinning look, pulling out the pictograph box from his inventory. As the youth very quickly used the device to cycle through numerous photos already existing within it, he eventually located the snapshot he was looking for. Raising it up for the much taller man to take and have a look at, Piers couldn't help but widen his tired-stricken eyes before letting out a suitably shocked gasp of delight.
"Ooooh...! That's it!" He gasped out. "That's the one I've been lookin' for!"
The watching Flyssa, so oddly silent, merely grew her watching grin into a knowing smirk as the huffing Tatl hovered similarly quiet next to her.
"Okay...," Piers began again in response, turning his head to nod toward the large glass of water sitting to the pair's right and left sides respectively. "Here...," he started, narrowing his eyes in concentration as he leaned his large form over the huge glass-like tank. As he reached down into its contents he very quickly pulled out the floating seahorse within, holding it up for the grinning Link to open one of his many empty bottles to. "I found this little fella hidin' around Pinnacle Rock."
"S'where we're headin', ain't it girls?" The smirking-faced Hero of Time commented as he swung his straw-haired head 'round to eye the two women resting behind him.
In response, they merely watched him in what seemed to be contrasting expressions indeed; while the fire-coloured Tatl glared back at him in impatient anger, the folded-armed Flyssa merely quipped her crimson-haired head up in her widening close-mouthed grin.
"I was gonna sell it at the Carnival of Time in Clock Town, but...," Piers began again, a grin adorning his face as he gratefully accepted the much-coveted pictograph he was after, admiring it zealously as he lowered his grin to face the youth one last time. "I think I can let it go for this."
"So you just happened to have one of those pictographs, huh?"
Flyssa's interrogative tone, so filled with her usual bantering grin, could only make the rambunctious Link similarly smirk back in response.
"I mean come on, Flyssa," the former Kokiri shot back, shrugging up his shoulders and his arms as he did as if to ward off her implied accusations. "Can you blame 'em? I'm one tasty dish."
The listening Gerudo snorted in response, but only very lightly, as she held back a giggle, eliciting the following Tatl to sigh out in frustration and annoyance.
"All right I'll admit... that in spite of yourself you've had brief moments where you're not completely stupid," the young girl grinned in his direction as they walked along the beach together. Link couldn't help but to return the facial gesture, pulling the quietly-trotting form of Epona next to him as Tatl hovered on after them all. "I kinda wish I met you years back."
"Oh yeah?" He batted back, his grin widening as he raised a curious eyebrow upwards. "Why's that?"
"Just curious...," she bantered over, her eyelids lowering as she pulled her fire-haired head back in a kind of teasing grin of her own. "Who's this 'Saria'?"
Link's hay-coloured eyebrows shot up in both shock and remembrance; it was then that he realised his mistake in speaking to her only a few hours previously. He hadn't even noticed himself using the words when attempting to assist Flyssa in her time of need.
Seems like that's all I do, he thought in a wry grin.
"Mistakes..."
The listening two females could only blink back at him, clueless and curious and all. "What?"
Realising he voiced his very thoughts, the lightly-grinning Link merely shook his head and responded again. "Nothing," he began before soon elaborating. "Saria's a friend of mine; I grew up with her." The young Hylian at last answered, swivelling his cobalt-blue eyes 'round to the similarly beautiful sapphire of the ocean far ahead.
"Oh yeah?" Flyssa prodded, raising another eyebrow this time with a cheeky little smirk on her face. "Girlfriend?"
Suddenly thankful he wasn't drinking anything when she asked, Link soon found himself coughing and sputtering in an unhealthy mixture of embarrassment and awkwardness. When he raised up his free right hand to rest across his open mouth as he recovered, he hesitantly hung his eyes 'round every now and again to find her openly smirking back at him.
"U-Um... n-no...," he answered again, this time in a nervous-toned chuckle. "She's...," the youth began again, as if readying himself to do any other job. However, it was only then that he realised how difficult a job it was; his eyes re-opened in a surprised widen and he began to speak again. "Hrm..." He hummed lowering his newly-narrowed eyes in scrutinisation, even halting his march alongside Epona as if to ponder further.
The ever-curious Tatl and Flyssa, similarly as inquisitive, opted to follow his machinations and turned mid-march to face him in likewise interest.
"I guess she's my mom," he clarified, eyes glaring holes into the beautiful peach beach resting below before, soon re-raising his straw-haired head to gain his grin once more. In a sheepish-like chuckle, he raised up his right hand to rest behind his green-hat head as he briefly shut his eyes. "In a way!" He finished his sentence in a similarly cheery tone.
The similarly smirking-faced Flyssa's grin merely curled up a little as she re-opened her mouth to respond. "Is that so...?"
2
"You know she likes you, y'know."
Tatl's obvious question, muffled as though it may have seemed from inside of his green-shaded hat, made him chuckle as he stroke through the underwater seas in his Zoran form.
"Is that right...?"
"Yes! It is right!"
Over the past couple of days, and especially during this particular part of their adventure, Link had quickly noted a change in Tatl's normally volatile attitude; strangely, she seemed to be very apt to talking back.
Almost as if she were looking for a fight.
She definitely doesn't like Flyssa, he thought silently to himself, amused and all.
"Well...," he began openly, his words oddly having an effect, even underwater; a feature unique to the Zoran people. "I mean, come on Tatl; it's me we're talkin' about," he batted back as he tilted his blue-shaded head in his grin; an attempt at some kind of shrug as his arms and legs were absorbed with swimming through the endless expanse of ocean before them. "Who can blame her?"
"Hmph!"
He couldn't help but curl one side of his lip up half in amusement as he listened to her respond, perhaps inevitably in anger. It was only when he finally began to approach what seemed to be the end of the road and the beginning a new one; the entrance to Pinnacle Rock. Sitting off and away down at the ocean's floor seemed to be a signpost, erected as if to be some kind of marker.
Sea snakes' lair ahead.
Due to the murky water, caution is advised for all who enter.
"What now genius?" Tatl taunted him from the safety of his hat, her soprano taking a kind of superior tone to it. The initially frowning-faced Hero of Time could only upturn his frown back into his eternal smirk, as if being faced with a challenge. Instead of responding to her vocally he went back into his inventory and smiled simply as he pulled out the bottle he used to house the little golden seahorse he had rescued previously. As he hovered the glass jar forward and took out the wooden stopper, the narrow-eyed Tatl's tone took a visible gasp.
How is she able to see that, the grinning Link wondered.
Maybe she can read minds; so scary!
Sure enough, just as he had pre-planned it, the little gold-shaded seahorse gladly exited the now empty bottle and smiled back at the standing youth.
"Thank you... Link, isn't it?"
"Yeah, that's right," the former Kokiri grinned back in his direction, ever placing his left hand fondly across his hip as he spoke. "And you are...?"
"Caspian!" The little seahorse smiled back to nod, almost as if in some kind of respectful bow. "I'm going to-"
"Need my help," Link answered with a sociable, if rude, chuckle. "I know."
"Y-Yes! This way!"
As the little Caspian swam off to the far-east at one of the many signposts stationed, Link cast his grin up to address the hiding and unusually quiet Tatl.
"You're gonna get to see me work a little more, Tatl," he grinned up in her direction before extending forward both hands and cracking his fingers together in a sickening echo. "Just a little more!"
"Here in the depths of Pinnacle Rock live many dangerous sea snakes..."
Caspian's re-greeting managed to make the fast-approaching Link cast his grin back onto him; even far down undersea the little seahorse's bright aura was strong, pushing through the inside waves with its great gold light.
"A close friend of mine is trapped within the walls of this place...," he explained briefly, eliciting a raised eyebrow from the listening Zoran youth. "I need your strange transformative powers!"
"Say no more...," the smirking Hero of Time impolitely interrupted, lowering his cerulean-shaded head in his closed-eyed beam of confidence. "That chick's as good as saved." He finished this time in a raise of his head, re-open of his blue-orbed eyes and an approving thumbs up.
"Oh! That's-!" Caspian began again in his appreciative smile however, when he soon noted the words with which Link used to respond, the little seahorse found himself blinking curiously and dropping his smile as he did. "H-How did you know...?"
He shrugged in reply, re-shutting his eyes in his eternal toothy smirk. "What can I say," he batted back. "I guess I'm psychic."
"Urgh."
The audibly-annoyed tone that Tatl took, still ever hunkered within the bounds of his green cap, managed to make the listening Caspian chuckle in response.
"W-Well, anyway...," he began again. "I've taken the liberty of marking the route we just took on your map. I hope you don't mind!"
"Nah," he grinned back, tilting his head lightly as he folded his slim arms. "It's kinda a hobby of mine." The youth added, grinning widely as he raised his eyes up to direct his stare toward his hat and therefore his hidden guardian fairy.
I'm enjoying this, he thought.
I wonder if she is.
"I believe in you and your strange powers!" Caspian smiled. "Good luck!"
–
3
"You're not as good as you think you are."
VVVVVVVV...
SCREECH-RUMBLE...
"Oh really?"
As one of the many Deep Pythons that Link had successfully executed along the way called out in agonising pain, Link shot up his grin to face the hidden-away guardian fairy. In a simple dive down, he cast his grin similarly downward on the dim glow of bright-blue further down the chasm; proof of the Zoran egg's life. He reached forward and took one of his many empty bottles before scooping it down to collect the embryo up. As the confident youth turned around to saunter back the way he came, he tossed up the glass jar he carried to expertly catch it undersea.
Which was an achievement in and of itself.
"So you know another Hero of Time, huh?" He pressed her, raised eyebrow and all in his amused tone of voice.
"Well, no, but-"
"Of course you don't!" The young Zoran laughed out as he snatched up the bottle for the last time before swiftly bagging it and taking off to swim for the next and final chasm. "I mean how special would I be if I wasn't the one and only 'Hero of Time'?"
"Oh you're special all right..."
Tatl's annoyed mutter left him in the smirking-faced chuckle he spiced his tenor with as he swum through the powerful waves of Pinnacle Rock's underseas. When the two adventurers at last reached the bottom of the sandy underbelly, they awoke the wrath of the final Deep Python; a long and angry-looking eel-like organism that growled lowly as it pulled its long body out of its chasm to attack with.
As with all the poor-fated sea snakes before it, however, the confident Link merely hung in mid-water and activated Mikau's old electrical barrier of Aegir; a divine-like ability that successfully pushed all intruders and attackers off of his form with a powerful shield of artificial electricity, completely covering his whole body.
VVVVVV...
SQUELCH-SCREECH-RUMBLE...
As with its other brethren, the poor Deep Python saw itself twisting and turning in almost immediate retreat as it made contact with the hovering Zoran's electrical form; it was something that managed to put a grin of satisfaction on the swimming youth's face. When, at last, the final sea snake found its end, so too did the thorough search for the second seahorse; a fickle little thing, as small as its mate.
As the smiling Link dove back down to ground level, he stepped forward in the intense waves that the underbelly of the ocean provided to them in order to join the drifting pair.
"Thank you, Link, sincerely," the ever-smiling Caspian greeted, glowing his usual golden shaded aura of Aegir next to his nameless mate. "Kespien is grateful too... aren't you dear?"
"Y-Yes...," the second little seahorse smiled, bowing forward in her display of gratitude. "You really saved us both."
Link grinned at her, leaning his form back as he rose up his slim arms to rest behind his head in his usual light-hearted cheer. "Ain't no skin off my nose," he promised merrily. "What can I say! I like to help."
"Well... here...," Caspian responded in a similar pleasant tone of voice. "You didn't have to kill every single one of these things to help us. But you did," he pressed further before, oddly enough, an object began to float out from inside of him. "It's not nearly enough for rescuing us my friend but-"
"A Heart Piece?! Oh hell yeah!" The wide-eyed Link exclaimed, immediately lowering his form and his hands to both take the gift in, as grateful as his two new companions. "Hey, thanks guys!" He grinned in their direction, re-raising his blue-shaded head up from admiring the beautiful Piece of Heart in his hands before swiftly widening his eyes and dropping his smile.
When he looked back up the two seahorses were in some strange kind of dance; a public display of affection so openly caring that hearts of love itself spewed out from their forms.
Link, of course, responded the only way he knew how.
"Gross." He shot out with, his earlier grin and cheer soon lost to him in favour of a disgusted frown and a limp lower of his eyebrows.
Tatl, this time, found herself laughing – presumably at his own expense – within the confines of his hat.
"So how'd you do?" The frowning-faced Flyssa greeted him from the metal land ahead. The ocean splashed noisily as the grinning Link flipped up mid-swim, managing to kick the water fiercely enough that it splashed a couple of drops of water down toward her small form. "Agh!" She exclaimed, raising her similarly slim pair of arms up to defend her long hair's delicate form from the onslaught of water fast-approaching her.
Ever the jokester, the Zoran-disguised Hylian let out a satisfied chuckle as he rolled expertly across the ground; a safe and graceful landing.
"I hate you!" The young Gerudo proclaimed, wringing the long ponytail of her beautiful fire-red hair for any water. "I don't see why I couldn't have just gone to get those Zora-"
"That's exactly it," Link interrupted her impolitely, swinging his taller body 'round to face her before he reached up with his free right hand to pull at the glued mask resting on his face. In response, the rest of his body shrunk as he did until eventually his trusty Hylian form stood back at her. "You couldn't have gone to get those Zora eggs." He finished for her, folding his arms as he belted his useful Zora Mask, leaning the rest of his body to his right as he did so; a kind of humorous stance that took the listening Flyssa to roll her gold-tipped eyes and avert her vision from his.
"I guess...," she finally conceded in her annoyed tone of voice before, soon she regained the infectious smirk that Link managed to pass onto her as she swung her eyes back to rest on his. "You're good for something...," the former pirate continued her sentence slyly, folding her arms at him as she watched him chuckle. "Huh?"
–
4
"Ahhh, good! Welcome, welcome!"
Dr. Mizumi's greeting, ever so sociable if a little awkward, was well received by the grinning Link and his two female companions.
"How are the the Zoran e-?" He began initially in his light smile before he soon widened his eyes in shock at the sight that lay before him; the similarly-surprised form of Flyssa could only exchange her dubious frown with the likewise-faced Link, unsure on how to react. "What in seven hells is she doing here?!" The doctor angrily spoke, poking a bony finger at the blinking Flyssa standing next to the green-clothed youth. "She's one of them!"
"No, I-"
"Quick boy, do something! Silence her or what have you!" Mizumi interrupted her with a hail of irritated words and a matching suspicious narrow of his eyes.
"She's fine, doctor, I promise," the standing Link chuckled as he rose up his two small hands, as if to ward off the anger in the man's voice. "She ain't workin' with 'em no more."
"Y-Yeah!" The young girl agreed hurriedly, shifting her fire-haired head to mix between the two males. "I mean for Giants' sake I helped him fight them for those eggs."
"Mm...," the wary-toned doctor murmured out, his scowl twitching in half-suspicion as he lowered his hands to join behind his studious form. "Well, all right then," he finally abdicated, nodding his head upward at the huge tank sitting behind him. "How goes the search for Lulu's missing Zora eggs? Did Mikau manage to find them all?"
Link couldn't help but chuckle nervously, lowering his cobalt-blue eyes as he stepped forward to pull out the once-empty bottles resting in his inventory. "Y-Yeah...," he answered in a positive nod. "Mikau asked me to pass these on to y-"
"Ooh! Excellent!" Dr. Mizumi exclaimed out, eyes widened as he even drew his slim arms out from behind him in display of his delighted shock. "Q-Quick! Up there!" He pointed out, nodding again but this time toward the metal ladder at the far end of the tank, seemingly leading toward its top. "We must save the eggs!"
As the grin on Link's face ever carried him forward, he stepped toward the ladder and made the inevitable climb up. Flyssa and Tatl followed but only to stand next to the similarly frowning ocean scientist and to overlook the deep tanker before them.
"Is there a reason we had to save them so quickly?" Flyssa asked curiously, turning her folded-armed frown 'round on the business-expressed scientist. "I mean aren't they basically Zoras?"
"It's precisely because they're extremely young Zorans that we had to rescue them so swiftly, yes," the man answered in his simple frown, turning his eyes 'round on the tanker to watch the grinning Link drop down each egg one-by-one. "You see Zora eggs are so sensitive to the climate in which they are exposed to," he explained briefly, eyeing the pair watching him as he spoke. "In this aquarium however I've set the temperature to be... just so," the wise doctor smirked, re-raising up one of his thin fingers into an 'a-okay' gesture; making a simple circle with his thumb and forefinger, the rest of his fingers raised up. "Normally it takes around one-to-three days for these embryos to hatch and if they were left out in the abnormal temperature that Great Bay's been afflicted with... even for a day... well..."
It was only when he finished his explanation that the smirking-faced Link dropped in what appeared to be the final Zoran egg; an achievement that made him fold his arms in satisfaction.
"Ah, good!" Mizumi similarly grinned out in his positive nod before he rose up one of his hands to wave the youth down. "Just in time! It's going to start!" He called out. "Quick! To the front of the aquarium!"
When the adventuring Link managed to hop down to join his other three companions, the Zoran eggs at last reacted; whether it was to the sensitive temperature in which the tank was set to or some other strange reason was unknown. What was known, however, was the eventual effects of the Zoran eggs having been rescued; as they, very quickly, began to hatch in a strange transformative procedure.
"Could it be...?!" The watching Dr. Mizumi gasped, eyes widened.
"Woah...," Flyssa similarly gasped, her eyebrows similarly rising up in response. "That's incredible..."
"Baby...," Link retorted in his earlier frown before swiftly switching it up into a satisfied smirk as he watched the seven Zoran tadpoles all take successful form together. "You ain't kiddin'."
FWIP...
FWIP...
FWIP...
In three single strokes the group of seven Zoran infants managed to swim all the way up to the front of the aquarium's tank, their sides facing the heroes. As they began to wiggle the rest of their way into some strange kind of formation, Link's similarly cerulean-shaded eyes narrowed in scrutinisation as he watched them silently.
"L-Look at this! W-What does this mean?!" The gasping ocean scientist exclaimed out incredulously, his form shaking in sheer shock at the surprising sight that stood before him. "What in the world could it...?"
It was only when the little Zoran tadpoles, however, arranged themselves in some odd kind of order, that the doctor widened his eyes in seeming realisation.
"Of course!" He called out. "Look at them!"
Flyssa and even the likewise blinking Tatl could only exchange their clueless frowns with the aquarium resting before them. When the frowning Link watched the former eggs organise their bodies to look like musical notes, he found his former grin of confidence and knowledge return to him.
"Yeah," he answered the scholar in a simple slow nod, bold courage fuelling him. "I see it." He finished, reaching back into his inventory for the last gift that his princess had given him.
He reached back for the Ocarina of Time.