A/N: Yay! I got a review! Sorry this chapter is even shorter, but again, I wanted to end on a good cliffhanger.

Chapter 2: Oops.

White. There was no other way to describe it. Just…white. Julie floated in the midst of this white nothingness, bobbing up and down as if she were in water. Only she wasn't. It was very strange. A wind blew from behind her, tossing her hair mischievously. She twisted around, trying to find the source of the wind. Her breath caught in her throat. There it was, outlined against the stark white like a banana in a smokehouse: the shimmering blue vortex.

"Maybe…if I go back through that…I can get home!" Thus motivated, she began trying to move toward the vortex. This proved difficult, as the wind blew in from the portal, pushing her away. The closer she got to the vortex, the stronger it got, and the farther from it, the weaker.

"Alright…so this vortex must be sucking air in from the other side. So there must be some kind of vacuum in here. Wait…no, that doesn't make sense. If it was a vacuum, I wouldn't be able to breath. What the hell?" Julie stroked her chin as she floated, deep in thought. Maybe if she snuck up to the vortex from the side, then dove in? She swam through the "air", maneuvering around the wind. She wound up having to come at it from the back, as the wind still whipped around at the sides of the vortex. The backside was odd, because she couldn't even see the vortex at all. Just the white nothingness, and…something that glinted in the distance. But she paid it no mind. She swam forward carefully. How was she supposed to know when she got to it if she couldn't even see it? Suddenly the very air in front of her seemed to wrap around her hand and drag her forward, thrusting her out into the void. When she finally slowed to a stop again, Julie lay- er, hovered panting. What had just happened? She twisted around. The vortex was behind her again.

"Damn. I must have passed right through it and gotten caught by that stupid wind." She untwisted, facing away from the vortex, and crossed her arms. How on earth was she going to get through that thing? Something ahead caught her eye. A thin line of gold not far away, extending both ways as far as she could see. She swam up to it. Close up, it resembled some kind of rope. Hesitantly, she reached out and touched it. A jolt of grinding pain made her jerk her finger back instantly. Wincing, she examined the damage. A burn mark. Odd. She held her hand out right on top of the line. Strange…it didn't feel hot. There wasn't any warmth coming off of it, at least. Wait a minute…she dug around in her purse, which had-miraculously-remained attached to her back, and withdrew a ribbon. She let the end touch the golden rope. It didn't burn, or smolder, or anything, just slipped off to the side. Frowning, she roped the ribbon around the line, then tightened it so that it was forced against it. The ribbon shot forward, taking her with it, until she had the sense to let go. She watched the ribbon trail off into the distance, then swam back over so that she was in line with the vortex. She definitely didn't want to lose track of that, now. Her suspicion had been confirmed. The rope wasn't hot- it was moving. Really fast. That's why it burned her finger. She hovered next to it, staring at it. What was it? What was pulling it? Where did the ends go? And why was it being pulled through this impossible void of white? Little did she know she was about to find out what was at one of the ends. Something rammed into her-hard. She felt something crunch and break against her at the impact, then she gasped in surprise and pain as the rope sizzled by her midsection, burning the side of her stomach. The impact sent her and whatever had hit her spiraling after the rope, though they eventually slowed and came to a stop where as the rope trailed off into the distance. Julie moaned, clutching her burned side. Son of a b--ch that hurt. There were also little shards of some colored metal sticking into her skin, each outlined by a thin line of red.

"Ohh…owie…" she groaned, rubbing her shoulder. Now that the initial burn had subsided, she was feeling stabbing pains from her shoulder. Was it dislocated? She hoped not, but that thing had rammed into her pretty hard. Speaking of which… She twisted around to get a look at the thing that bumped her. Her mouth dropped open, and her eyes grew so wide they were in danger of popping out. Floating there, wearing a similar-though less severe- expression of shock and confusion, was Ganondorf Dragmire.

"HO-LY SHIT!" he blinked, almost as if taken aback at her language.

"WHAT THE F&$# IS GOING ON HERE!" She looked him up and down, just to be sure. Yup, it was him. He was wearing the very same clothing she had been painstakingly trying to sketch just that afternoon, although it was much more bedraggled and ripped up in person than it had been in the game.

"Hey! Miss! You in there!" A voice, so distant she almost didn't hear it, drifted across her ears. She gasped and looked around frantically. That was the jogger's voice! She couldn't even see the vortex anymore, but she assumed that was due to the angle. No longer caring who he was, she pushed herself around the confused King of Evil and swam frantically towards where she hoped the vortex was. She hadn't been swimming long when she spotted it, and sighed in relief at the familiar sight.

"Miss! Can you hear me? Miss!"

"I'm here! I can hear you! I'm here!" she shouted back, cupping her hand around her mouth to increase the volume. Still she swam towards the vortex, until she was so close she could feel the wind fighting against her.

"Thank God…Are you okay?"

"Yeah! Just get me out of here!"

"Alright, we've got a winch from this guy's truck tied around my waist. I'm going in to get you. Is it safe?"

"Yeah! There's just this wind coming out from the vortex that's stopping me from going back! Just make sure that winch is tied real tight!"

"Alright, here I go!" A figure appeared in the midst of the vortex, and shot out at her at an alarming rate. Julie froze, afraid of another collision, but luckily he slowed down enough by the time he reached her that they barely bumped against each other.

"Wow. What a ride! Okay, grab onto me now." She only too happily obliged.

"Ok, guys! Reel us in!"

The winch around his waist tightened, then all at once they were thrust back towards the vortex…towards home…towards freedom. Julie smiled. She was getting out of this hell hole. She almost didn't even notice the hand wrapping around her ankle at the last minute…

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Meanwhile, in the clouds above Hyrule, the hero and the princess were exchanging their final words…

"Link, please give me the ocarina. As a sage, I can return you to your original time with it."

Wordlessly he withdrew the ocarina of time from his bag, handing it to the sage as he tried to meet her eyes. But she would not look at him. She kept her eyes on the ocarina, cupping his hand in hers as she paused. She didn't want him to go…but this had to be done. She had just closed her eyes and raised the ocarina to her lips when she felt it. Her eyes flew open, her hands shuddering with the feeling…the feeling of her magic shattering. Link peered at her with concern.

"Zelda?"

She stared ahead unseeingly as she slowly lowered the ocarina.

"Zelda, what is it?"

"…something's gone wrong."

A/N: See? Told ya it wouldn't be your standard self-insertion fic. So what do you think so far? Review please! Think of the trees! (...what? It rhymes!)